mrs. warren's daughter a story of the woman's movement by sir harry johnston new york the macmillan company to my jury of matrons: winifred johnston ella hepworth-dixon catherine wells angela mond beatrice sands margaret powys annette henderson florence fellowes mary levy ray rockman-braham florence travers maud parry this book is affectionately dedicated, in the knowledge that--in the main--it has their sympathy and approval. h. h. johnston poling, _march, _ preface the earlier part of vivien warren's life and that of her mother, catherine warren, was told by mr. george bernard shaw in his play, "mrs. warren's profession," published first in . (_plays pleasant and unpleasant_: . _unpleasant_. constable and co., th edition.) i have his permission to continue the story from onwards. to understand my sequel it is not necessary to have read the play which so brilliantly placed the warren problem before us. but as most persons of average good education have found mr. shaw's comedies necessary to their mental furnishing, their understanding of contemporary life, it is probable that all who would be drawn to this book are already acquainted with the story of mrs. warren, and will be interested in learning what happened after that story was laid down by mr. shaw in . i would in addition placate hostile or peevish reviewers by reminding them of the continuity of human histories; of biographies, real--though a little disguised by the sauce of fiction--and unreal--because entitled _life and letters, by his widow_. the best novel or life-story ever written does not commence with its opening page. the real commencement goes back to the stone ages or at any rate to the antecedent circumstances which led up to the crisis or the formation of the characters portrayed. mr. pickwick had a father, a grandfather; a mother in a mob-cap; in the eighteenth century. it is permissible to speculate on their stories and dispositions. neither does a novel or a biography end with the final page of its convenient instalment. when you lay down the book which describes the pathetic failure of lord randolph churchill, you do so with curiosity as to what will become of winston. with a pre-knowledge of the pickwick club, one may usefully employ the imagination in tracing out the possible careers of sam weller's chubby little boys; grown into old men, and themselves, perchance, leaving progeny that may have married into the peerage from the turf, or have entered the war cabinet at the beckoning of mr. lloyd george. i know of descendants of madame de brinvilliers in england who have helped to found the y.w.c.a.; and collateral offshoots from the charlotte corday stock who are sternly opposed to the assassination of statesmen-journalists. so, i have taken on myself the continuation of the story outlined twenty-three years ago by mr. shaw in its late victorian stage. _he_ had a prior claim to do so; just as he might have shown us the life--but not the letters, for she was illiterate--of catherine warren's mother, the frier of fish and letter of lodgings on tower hill in the 'forties and 'fifties of the last century; and of the young lieutenant warren of the tower garrison who lodged and cohabited with her at intervals between and , when he went out to the crimea and there died of frost-bite and neglected wounds. mr. shaw has waived such claims, having, as vivie's grandmother would have said, "other fish to fry." but for this i should not have ventured to take up the tale, as i hold an author while he lives has a prescriptive right to his creations. i shall feel no bitterness in nirvana if, after my death, another continues the story of vivie or of her friends and collateral relations, under circumstances which i shall not live to see. in justice to mr. shaw i should state that the present book is entirely my own, and that though he has not renounced a polite interest in vivie he is in no way responsible for her career and behaviour. he may even be annoyed at both. h. h. johnston. contents chapter preface by the author i vivie and norie ii honoria and her friends iii david vavasour williams iv pontystrad v reading for the bar vi the rossiters vii honoria again viii the british church ix david is called to the bar x the shillito case xi david goes abroad xii vivie returns xiii the suffrage movement xiv militancy xv imprisonment xvi brussels and the war: xvii the germans in brussels: - xviii the bomb in portland place xix bertie adams xx after the armistice l'envoi mrs. warren's daughter chapter i vivie and norie the date when this story begins is a saturday afternoon in june, , about p.m. the scene is the western room of a suite of offices on the fifth floor of a house in chancery lane, the offices of _fraser and warren_, consultant actuaries and accountants. there is a long window facing west, the central part of which is open, affording a passage out on to a parapet. through this window, and still better from the parapet outside, may be seen the picturesque spires and turrets of the law courts, a glimpse here and there of the mellow, red-brick, white-windowed houses of new square, the tree-tops of lincoln's inn fields, and the hint beyond a steepled and chimneyed horizon of the wooded heights of highgate. all this outlook is flooded with the brilliant sunshine of june, scarcely dimmed by the city smoke and fumes. in the room itself there are on each of the tables vases of flowers and a bunch of dark red roses on the top of the many pigeon-holed bureau at which vivien warren is seated. the walls are mainly covered with book-shelves well filled with consultative works on many diverse subjects. there is another series of shelves crowded with neat, green, tin boxes containing the papers of clients. a dark green-and-purple portière partly conceals the entry into a washing place which is further fitted with a gas stove for cooking and cupboards for crockery and provisions. at the opposite end of the room is a door which opens into a small bedroom. the fireplace in the main room is fitted with the best and least smelly kind of gas stove obtainable in . there are two square tables covered with piles of documents neatly tied with green tape and ranged round the central vase of flowers; a heavy, squat earthenware vase not easily knocked over; and there is a second bureau with pigeon-holes and a roll top, similar to the one at which vivien warren is seated. this is for the senior partner, honoria fraser. between the bureaus there is plenty of space for access to the long west window and consequently to the parapet which can be used like a balcony. two small arm-chairs in green leather on either side of the fireplace, two office chairs at the tables and a revolving chair at each bureau complete the furniture of the partners' room of _fraser and warren_ as you would have seen it twenty years ago. the rest of their offices consisted of a landing from which a lift and a staircase descended, a waiting-room for clients, pleasantly furnished, a room in which two female clerks worked, and off this a small room tenanted by an office boy. you may also add in imagination an excellent lavatory for the clerks, two telephones (one in the partners' room), hidden safes, wall-maps; and you must visualize everything as pleasing in colour--green, white, and purple--flooded with light; clean, tidy, and admirably adapted for business in the city. vivien warren, as already mentioned, was, as the curtain goes up, seated at her bureau, reading a letter. the letter was headed "camp hospital, colesberg, cape colony, may , "; and ran thus:-- dearest vivie,-- here i am still, but my leg is mending fast. the enteric was the worse trouble. that is over and done with, though i am the colour of a pig-skin saddle. my leg won't let me frisk just yet, but otherwise i feel as strong as a horse. when i was bowled over three months ago and the enteric got hold of me, on top of the bullet through my thigh, i lost my self-control and asked the people here to cable to you to come and nurse me. it was silly perhaps--the nursing here is quite efficient--and if any one was to have come out on my account it ought to have been the poor old mater, who wanted to very much. but somehow i could only think of _you_. i wanted you more than i'd ever done before. i hoped somehow your heart might be touched and you might come out and nurse me, and then out of pity marry me. won't you do so? owing to my stiff leg i dare say i shall be invalided out of the army and get a small wound pension. and i've a project which will make lots of money--up in rhodesia--a tip i've had from a man in the know. i'm going to take up some land near salisbury. ripping country and climate and all that. it would suit you down to the ground. you could put all that warren business behind you, forget it all, drop the name, start a new career as mrs. frank gardner, and find an eternally devoted husband in the man that signs this letter. i've been out here long enough to be up to all the ropes, and i'd already made a bit of money in rhodesia before the war broke out and i got a commission. at any rate i've enough to start on as a married man, enough to give you a decent outfit and your passage out here and have a honeymoon before we start work on our future home. darling vivie! do think about it. you'd never regret it. i'm a very different frank to the silly ass you knew in the old haslemere days. now here's a five pound note to cover the cost of a full cable to say "yes," and when you'll be ready to start. when i get your answer--somehow i feel it'll _be_ "yes"--i'll send you a draft on a london bank to pay for a suitable trousseau and your passage from london to cape town, and _of course_ i'll come and meet you there, where we can be married. i shan't sleep properly till i get your "yes." your ever loving and always faithful frank. p.s. there's a poor fellow here in the same ward dying--i should say--of necrosis of the jaw--vavasour williams is his name or a part of his name. his father was at cambridge with my old man, and--isn't it rum?--he was a pupil of _praddy's_!! he mucked his school and 'varsity career, thought next he'd like to be an architect or a scene painter. my dad recommended praddy as a master. he worked in the praed studio, but got the chuck over some foolery. then as he couldn't face his poor old governor, he enlisted in the bechuanaland border police, came out to south africa and got let in for this show. the doctors and nurses give him about a month and he doesn't know it. he can't talk much owing to his jaw being tied up--usually he writes me messages, all about going home and being a good boy, turning over a new leaf, and so on. i suppose the last person you ever see nowadays is the revd. sam gardner? you know they howked him out of woodcote? he got "preferment" as he calls it, and a cure of souls at margate. rather rough on the dear old mater--bless her, _always_--she so liked the hindhead country. but if you run up against praddy you might let him know and he might get into touch with vavasour williams's people--twig?--f.g. vivie rose to her feet half-way through this letter and finished it standing by the window. she was tall--say, five feet eight; about twenty-five years of age; with a well-developed, athletic figure, set off by a smart, tailor-made gown of grey cloth. yet although she might be called a handsome woman she would easily have passed for a good-looking young man of twenty, had she been wearing male costume. her brown-gold hair was disposed of with the least ostentation possible and with no fluffiness. her eyebrows were too well furnished for femininity and nearly met when she frowned--a too frequent practice, as was the belligerent look from her steely grey eyes with their beautiful irish setting of long dark lashes. she had a straight nose and firm rounded chin, a rather determined look about the mouth--lower lip too much drawn in as if from perpetual self-repression. but all this severity disappeared when she smiled and showed her faultless teeth. the complexion was clear though a little tanned from deliberate exposure in athletics. altogether a woman that might have been described as "jolly good-looking," if it had not been that whenever any man looked at her something hostile and forbidding came into the countenance, and the eyebrows formed an angry bar of hazel-brown above the dark-lashed eyes. but her "young man" look won for her many a feminine friendship which she impatiently repelled; for sentimentality disgusted her. the door of the partners' room opened and in walked honoria fraser. she was probably three years older than vivie and likewise a well-favoured woman, a little more matronly in appearance, somewhat after the style of a married actress who really loves her husband and has preserved her own looks wonderfully, though no one would take her for less than twenty-eight. at the sight of her, vivie lost her frown and tossed the letter on to the bureau. honoria fraser had been lunching with friends in portland place. _honoria_: "what a swotter you are! i _thought_ i should find you here. i suppose the staff departed punctually at one? i've come back expressly from the michael rossiters to carry you off to them--or rather to kew. they're going to have tea with the thiselton-dyers and then revel in azaleas and roses. i shall go out and charter a hansom and we'll drive down ... it'll be some compensation for your having worked extra hard whilst i've been away.... "i met such a delightful man at the rossiters'!" (slightly flushing) "don't look at me so reproachfully! there _are_ delightful men--a few--in existence. this one has been wounded in south africa and he's so good-looking, though the back of his head is scarred and he'll always walk with a limp.... now then! why do you look so solemn? put on your hat..." _vivie_: "i look solemn because i'm just considering a proposal of marriage--or rather, the fewest words in which i can refuse it. i don't think i want to go to kew at all ... much sooner we had tea together, here, on the roof..." _norie_: "i suppose it's frank gardner again, as i see his handwriting on that envelope. well i'm sorry about kew--i should have enjoyed it..." _vivie_ (bitterly): "i expect it's that 'delightful man' that attracts you." _norie_: "nonsense! i'm vowed to virginity, like you are ... i really don't care if i never see major armstrong again ... though he certainly _is_ rather a darling ... very good-looking ... and, d'you know, he's almost a pro-boer, though the boers ambushed him.... says this war's a beastly mistake.... "well: i'll have tea here instead, if you like, and we can talk business, which we haven't done for a fortnight. i must get out of the way of paying visits in the country. they make one so discontented with the city afterwards. i've had a feeling lately i should like to have been a farmer.... too much of the work of the firm has been thrown on you.... but there's lots and lots i want to talk over. i abandon kew, willingly, and as to major armstrong.... however he can always find my address if he cares to..." _vivie_ (sits down in one of the arm chairs and norie takes the other): "oh don't pity me. i love hard work and work which interests me. and as to working for _you_, you know there's nothing i wouldn't..." _norie_: "oh stow that!... you've been a full-fledged partner for a year and ought to be getting callous or suspicious ... i _did_ take some money out of the petty cash yesterday. i must remember to put it down. i took quite a lot ... for theatre tickets ... and you may be suspecting bertie adams ... we can't call this an adamless eden, can we? i wonder why we keep an office boy and not an office girl? i suppose such things will soon be coming into being. we've women clerks and typewriteresses ... adams, i notice, is growing, and he has the trace of a moustache and is already devoted to you ... dog-like..." _vivie_: "he's still more devoted to cricket, fortunately; and as soon as rose and lilian had gone he was off too.... only, i fancy, he discards regent's park now in favour of hendon or herne hill..." _norie_: "now, about frank gardner..." _vivie_: "yes, that cablegram.... let's frame it and send it off as soon as we can; then get tea ready. talking of tea: i was just thinking before frank's letter came how much good you'd done me--in many other ways than setting me up in business." _norie_: "shut up!..." _vivie_: "how, when we first worked together, i used to think it necessary to imitate men by drinking an occasional whiskey and soda--though i loathe spirits--and smoking a cigar--ugh!--and how you drew me back to tea and a self-respecting womanliness--china tea, of course, and cigarettes. why _should_ we have wanted to be like men?... much better to be the new woman.... "as to frank's cablegram..." (goes to bureau, tries over several drafts of message, consults postal guide as to cable rates _per_ word, and reads aloud) ... "how's this? 'captain frank gardner camp hospital colesberg cape colony. sorry must say no best wishes recovery writing. vivie.' that'll cost just two pounds and out of the balance i shall buy a good parcel of books to send him, and some strawberries and cakes for our tea." (therewith she puts on hat carefully--for she is always very particular, in a young-gentlemanly way, about her appearance--goes out to send off cablegram from chancery lane post-office, buy strawberries and cakes from fleet street shops, and so back to the office by four o'clock. meantime norie is reading through some of the recent correspondence on the file.) _vivie_ (on her return): "pouf! it _was_ hot in fleet street! i'm sorry for poor frankie, because he seems so to have set his heart on marrying me. but i do hope he will take this answer as _final_." _norie_: "i suppose you are not refusing him for the same old reason--that vague suggestion that he might be your half-brother?" _vivie_: "oh _no_! besides i pretty well know for a fact he isn't, he simply couldn't be. i'm absolutely sure my father wasn't sam gardner, any more than george crofts was. i believe it was a young irish seminarist, some student for the priesthood whom my mother met in belgium the year before i was born. if i ever find out more i will tell you. _you_ haven't seen 'soapy sam,' the vicar of woodcote, or that beast, george crofts; but if you _had_, you'd be as sure as i am that neither of them was _my_ father--thank goodness! as to frank--yes--for a short time i _was_ fond of him--till i learnt about my mother's 'profession.' it was rather a silly sort of fondness. he was two years younger than i; i suppose my feeling for him was half motherly ... i neither encouraged him nor did i repel him. i think i was experimenting ... i rather wanted to know what it felt like to be kissed by a man. frank was a nice creature, so far as a man can be. but all those horrid revelations that broke up our summer stay at haslemere four years ago--when i ran away to you--gave me an utter disgust for marriage. and what a life mine would have been if i had married him then; or after he went out to south africa! _ghastly_! want of money would have made us hate one another and frank would have been sure to become patronizing. because i was without a father in the legitimate way he would have thought he was conferring a great honour on me by marrying me, and would probably have expected me to drudge for him while he idled his time away.... oh, when i think what a life i have led here, with you, full of interesting work and bright prospects, free from money anxieties--dearest, dearest norie--i can't thank you enough. no, i'm not going to be sentimental--the new woman is never that. i'm going to get the tea ready; and after we've had tea on the balcony we really must go into business matters. your being away so much the last fortnight, things have accumulated that i did not like to decide for myself..." _norie_ (speaking rather louder as vivie is now busy in the adjoining roomlet, boiling the kettle on the gas stove and preparing the tea): "yes. and i've got _lots_ to talk over with you. all sorts of plans have come into my head. i don't know whether i have been eating anything more than usually brain stimulating--everything has a physical basis--but i have come back from this scattered holiday full of new ideas." presently they are seated on camp-stools sipping tea, eating strawberries and cakes, under the striped sun-blind. _norie_ continues: "do you remember beryl clarges at newnham?" _vivie_: "yes--the pretty girl--short, curly hair, brown eyes, rather full lips, good at mathematics--hockey ... purposely shocked you by her outspokenness--well?" _norie_: "well, she's had a baby ... a month ago ... awful rumpus with her people ... father's dean clarges ... norwich or ely, i forget which ... they've put her in a nursing home in seymour street. mother wears a lace mantilla and cries softly. beryl went wrong, as they call it, with an architect." _vivie_: "pass your cup ... don't take _all_ the strawberries (_norie_: "sorry! absence of mind--i've left you three fat ones") architect? strange! i always thought all architects were like praddy--had no passions except for bricks and mortar and chiselled stone and twirligig iron grilles ... perhaps just a thrill over a nude statue. why, till you told me this i'd as soon have trusted my daughter--if i had one--with an architect as with a colonel of engineers--you know! the kind that believes in the identity of the ten lost tribes with the british and is a true protestant! poor beryl! but how? what? when? why?" _norie_: "i think it began at cambridge--the acquaintance did ... later, it developed into a passion. he had already one wife in sussex somewhere and four children. he took a flat for her in town--a studio--because berry had given up mathematics and was going in for sculpture; and there, whenever he could get away from storrington or some such place and from his city office, he used to visit beryl. this had been going on for three years. but last february she had to break it to her mother that she was six months gone. the other wife knows all about it but refuses to divorce the naughty architect, and at the same time has cut off supplies--what _cowards_ men are and how _little_ women stand by women! and then it's a poor deanery and beryl has five younger brothers that have got to be educated. her sculpture was little more than commissions executed for her architect's building and i expect that resource will now disappear ... i half think i shall bring her in here, when she is well again. she's got a very good head-piece and you know we are expanding our business ... she'd make a good house agent ... she writes sometimes for _country life_..." _vivie_: "ye-es.... but you can't provide for many more of our college-mates. any more gone wrong?" _norie_: "it depends how you qualify 'wrong.' i really don't see that it is 'wronger' for a young woman to yield to 'storgé' and have a baby out of wedlock than for a man to engender that baby. society doesn't damn the man, unless he is a cabinet minister or a cleric; but it does its best to ruin the woman ... unless she's an actress or a singer. if a woman likes to go through all the misery of pregnancy and the pangs of delivery on her own account and without being legally tied up with a man, why can't she? beryl, at any rate, is quite unashamed, and says she shall have as many children as her earnings support ... that it will be great fun choosing their sires--more variety in their types.... is _she_ the new woman, i wonder?" _vivie_: "well the whole thing bores me ... i suppose i am embittered and disgusted. i'm sick of all this sexual nonsense.... yes, after all, i approve of the marriage tie: it takes away the romance of love, and it's that romance which is usually so time-wasting and so dangerous. it conceals often a host of horrors ... but i'm a sort of neuter. all i want in life is hard work ... a cause to fight for.... revenge ... revenge on man. god! how i hate men; how i despise them! we can do anything they can if we train and educate. i have taken to your business because it is one of the crafty paths we can follow to creep into man's fastnesses of the law, the stock-market, the banks and actuarial work..." _norie_: "my dear! you have quite a platform manner already. i predict you will soon be addressing audiences of rebellious women.... but i am more the booker washington of my sex. i want women to work--even at quite humble things--before they insist on equal rights with man. at any rate i want to help them to make an honest livelihood without depending on some one man.... business seems to be good, eh? if the first half of this year is equalled by the second, i should think there would be a profit to be divided of quite a thousand pounds?" _vivie_: "quite. of course we are regular pirates. none of the actuarial or accountancy corporations will admit women, so we can't pass exams and call ourselves chartered actuaries or incorporated accountants. but if women clients choose to consult us there is no law to prevent them, or to make our giving advice illegal. so we advise and estimate and do accounts and calculate probabilities. then although we can't call ourselves solicitors we can--or at any rate we do--give legal advice. we can't figure on the stock exchange, but we can advise clients about their investments and buy and sell stock and real estate (by the bye i want you to give me your opinion on the tithe question, the liability on that kent fruit farm). we are consulted on contracts ... i'm going to start a women authors' branch, and perhaps a tourist agency. some day we will have a women's publishing business, we'll set up a women's printing press, a paper mill.... of course as you know i am working hard on law ... not only to understand men's roguery in every direction, but so that if necessary i can add pleading in the courts to some other woman's solicitor work. that's going to be my first struggle with man: to claim admittance to the bar.... if we can once breach that rampart the vote must inevitably follow. oh _how_ we have been dumb before our shearers! the rottenness of man's law.... the perjury, corruption, waste of time, special pleading that go on in our male courts of _in_justice, the verdicts of male juries!" _norie_: "just so. but can't you find a little time to be social? why be so morose? for instance, why not come and be introduced to michael rossiter? he's a dear--amazingly clever--a kind of prophet--your one confidant, stead, thinks a lot of him." _vivie_: "_dear_ norie--i can't. i swore two years ago i would drop society and run no risk of being found out as 'mrs. warren's daughter.' that beast george crofts revenged himself because i wouldn't marry him by letting it be known here and there that i _was_ the daughter of the 'notorious mrs. warren'; whereupon several of the people i liked--you remember?--dropped me--the burne-joneses, the lacrevys. or if it wasn't crofts some other swine did. but for the fact that it would upset our style as a firm i could change my name: call myself something quite different.... "d'you know, i've sometimes thought i'd cut my hair short and dress in men's clothes, and go out into the world as a man ... my voice is almost a tenor--_such_ a lark! i'd get admitted to the bar. but the nuisance about that would be the references. i'm an outlaw, you see, through no fault of mine.... i couldn't give _you_ as a reference, and i don't know any man who would be generous enough to take the risk of participating in the fraud.... unless it were praed--good old praddy. i'm sure it's been done now and again. they call judge fitzsimmons 'an old woman.' well, d'you know, i believe he _is_ ... a wise old woman." _norie_: "well: bide a wee, till our firm is doing a roaring business: i can pretend then to take in a male partner, p'raps. rose and lilian are very hard-working and we can't afford to lose them yet. if you appeared one morning dressed as a young man they might throw up their jobs and go elsewhere..." _vivie_: "you may be quite sure i won't let _you_ down. moreover i haven't the money for any vagaries yet, though i have an instinct that it is coming. you know those charles davis shares i bought at _s._ _d._? well, they rose to _s._ whilst you were away; so i sold out. we had three hundred, and that, less commissions, made about £ profit; the boldest coup we have had yet. and all because i spotted that new find of emery powder in tripoli, saw it in a consular report.... "i want to be rich and therefore powerful, norie! then people will forget fast enough about my shameful parentage." _norie_: "how _is_ she? do you ever hear from or of her now?" _vivie_: "i haven't heard _from_ her for two years, since i left her letters unanswered. but i hear _of_ her every now and again. no. not through crofts. i suppose you know--if you take any interest in that wretch--that since he married the american quakeress he took his name off the _warren hotels company_ and sold out much of his interest. he is now living in great respectability, breeding race horses. they even say he has given up whiskey. he has got a son and has endowed six cots in a children's hospital. no. i think it must be _mother_ who has notices posted to me, probably through that scoundrel, bax strangeways ... generally in the _london argus_ and the _vie-de-paris_--cracking up the warren hotels in brussels, berlin, buda-pest and roquebrune. _what_ a comedy!... "there's my aunt liz at winchester--mrs. canon burstall--won't know me--i'm too compromising. but i'm sure her money-bags have been filled at one time--perhaps are still--out of the profits on mother's 'hotels.'..." _norie_: "i didn't remember your aunt was married ... or rather i suppose i did, but thought she was a widow, real or _soi-disant_..." _vivie_: "so she is, after four years of happy married life! my 'uncle' canon burstall--oh what a screaming joke the whole thing is!... i doubt if he was aware he had a niece.... don't you remember he was killed in the alps last autumn?..." _norie_: "i remember your going down to see your aunt after you broke off relations with your mother in--in-- ...?" _vivie_: "yes. i wanted to see how the land lay and not judge any one unfairly. besides i--i--didn't like being dependent entirely on you--at that time--for support: and praed was in italy. i knew that aunt liz, like mother, was illegitimate--and guessed she had once made her living in the higher walks of prostitution--she was a stockbroker's mistress at one time--. but she had married and settled down at winchester ... she met her canon--the alpine traveller ... in switzerland. i felt if she took no money from mother's 'houses,' i could perhaps make a home with her, or at any rate have _some_ kith and kin to go to. she had no children.... but--i must have told you all this years ago?--she almost pushed me out of her house for fear i should stay till the canon came in from the afternoon service; denied everything; threatened me as though i was a blackmailer; almost looked as if she could have killed me and buried me in the garden of the canonry.... "i've examined the business of the _warren hotels ltd._ since then, but it's a private company, and all its doings are so cleverly concealed.... aunt liz doesn't figure amongst the shareholders any more than crofts does. that horrid bax holds most of the shares now, and mother the rest.... yet aunt liz must be rich and she certainly didn't get it from the canon, who only left a net personality of under £ , .... i read his will at somerset house.... she has had her portrait in the _queen_ because she gave a large subscription to the underpinning of winchester cathedral and the restoration of wolvesey as a clergy house.... mother must be very rich, i should judge, from certain indications. i expect _she_ will retire from the 'hotels,' some day, wipe out the past, and buy a new present with her money.... she'll have _her_ portrait in the _queen_ some day as a vice-president of the girls' friendly society!... and yet she's such a gambler and a rake that she _may_ get pinched over the white slave traffic.... i was on tenterhooks over that lewissohn case the other day, fearing every moment to see mother's name mixed up with it, or else an allusion to her 'hotels.' but i fancy she has been wise enough--indeed i should guess that aunt liz had long ago warned her to leave england alone as a recruiting ground and to collect her chambermaids, waitresses, musicians, typists from the continent only--austria, alsace, bohemia, belgium, italy, the rhineland, paris, russia, poland. knowing what we british people are, can't you almost predict the _bias_ of aunt liz's mind? how she would solace herself that her dividends were not derived from the prostitution of english girls but only of 'foreigners'?..." _norie_: "you seem to have studied the geography of the business pretty thoroughly!..." _vivie_ (bitterly): "yes. i have talked it over with stead from time to time. i believe he has only spared mother and the warren hotels out of consideration for me ... he wants me to change my surname and give myself a chance..." _norie_: "i see" (pausing). "of course it is rather an idea, as you refuse to disguise yourself by marriage. you'd change your name and then listen with equanimity to fulminations against the warren hotels. but there would be an awkwardness in the firm. we oughtn't to change our title just as we are getting a good clientèle.... i must think ... if only we could pretend you'd been left some property--but that sort of lie is soon found out!--and had to change your name to--to--to. oh well, we could soon think of some name beginning with a w--walters, waddilove--waddilove is a delicious name in cold weather, suggesting cotton-wool or a warm duvet--or wilson--or wilberforce. but i'm afraid the staff--rose mullet and lily steynes and the amorous bertie adams--would think it odd, put two and two together, and guess right. warren, after all, is such a common name. and we've got so used to our three helpers, we could hardly turn them off, and take on new people whom perhaps we couldn't trust.... we must think it over.... "now i must go back to queen anne's mansions and sit a little while with mummy. come and dine with us? there'll only be us three ... no horrid man to fall in love with you.... you needn't put on a low dress ... and we'll go to the dress circle at some play afterwards." _vivie_: "but those papers on my desk? i must have your opinion for or against..." _norie_: "all right. it's half-past five. i'll give them half an hour's study whilst you wash up the tea things and titivate. then we'll take a hansom to quansions: the underground is so grimy." chapter ii honoria and her friends the story of honoria fraser was something like this: partly guesswork, i admit. although i know her well i can only put her past together by deductions based on a few admitted facts, one or two letters and occasional unfinished sentences, interrupted by people coming in. is it not _always_ thus with our friends and acquaintances? i long to know all about them from their birth (including date and place of birth and parentage) onwards; what the father's profession was and why on earth he married the mother (after i saw the daguerreotype portrait), and how they became possessed of so much money, and why she went back to live with _her_ mother between the birth of her second child and the near advent of her third. but in how very few cases do we know their whole story, do we even care to know more than is sufficient for our purpose in issuing or accepting invitations? there are the dombeys--the gorings as they're now called, who live near us. i've seen the tombstone of lucilla smith in goring churchyard, but i don't know _for a fact_ that lord goring was the father of lucilla's son (who was killed in the war). i guess he was, from this and that, from what mrs. legg told me, and what i overheard at the sterns'. if he wasn't, then he has only himself to thank for the wrong assumption: i mean, from his goings-on. then again, the clementses, who live at the grange. i feel instinctively they are _nice_ people, but i haven't the least idea who _she_ was and how _he_ made his money, though from his acreage and his motors i am entitled to assume he has a large income. she seems to know a lot about spain; but i don't feel encouraged to ask her: "was your father in the wine trade? is _that_ why you know xeres so well?" clements himself has in his study an enlarged photograph of a handsome woman with a kind of mourning wreath round the frame--beautifully carved. is it the portrait of a former wife? or of a sister who committed suicide? or was it merely bought in venice for the sake of the carving? perhaps i shall know some day--if it matters. in a moment of expansion during the railway strike, mrs. clements will say: "_that_ was poor walter's first. she died of acute dyspepsia, poor thing, on their marriage tour, and was buried at venice. don't ever allude to it because he feels it so dreadfully." and my curiosity will have been rewarded for its long and patient restraint. clements' little finger on his left hand is mutilated. i have never asked why--a lawn-mowing machine? or a bite from some passionate mistress in a buried past? i note silently that he disapproves of palmistry-- but about honoria fraser, to whom i was introduced by mr. george bernard shaw twenty years ago: she was born in , as _who's who_ will tell you; also that she was the daughter and eldest child of a famous physician (sir meldrum fraser) who wrought some marvellous cures in the 'sixties, 'seventies and 'eighties, chiefly by dieting and psycho-therapy. (he got his knighthood in the first jubilee year for reducing to reasonable proportions the figure of good-hearted, thoroughly kindly, and much loved princess mary of oxford.) he--honoria's father--was married to a beautiful woman, a relation of bessie rayner parkes, with inherited advanced views on the rights and position of woman. lady fraser was, indeed, an early type of suffragist and also wrote some poetry which was far from bad. they had two children: honoria, born, as i say, in ; and john (john stuart mill fraser was his full name--too great a burden to be borne) four years later than honoria, who was devoted to him, idolized him, as did his mother and father. honoria went to bedford college and newnham; john to one of the two most famous of our public schools (i need not be more precise), with cambridge in view afterwards. but in the case of john a tragedy occurred. he had risen to be head of the school; statesmen with little affectation applauded him on speech days. he had been brilliant as a batsman, was a champion swimmer, and _facile princeps_ in the ineptitudes of the classics; and showed a dazzling originality in other studies scarcely within the school curriculum. further he was growing out of boy gawkiness into a handsome youth of an apolline mould, when, on the morning of his eighteenth birthday, he was found dead in his bed, with a bottle of cyanide of potassium on the bed-table to explain why. all else was wrapt in mystery ... at any rate it was a mystery i have no wish to lay bare. the death and the inquest verdict, "suicide while of unsound mind, due to overstudy," broke his father's heart and his mother's: in the metaphorical meaning of course, because the heart is an unemotional pump and it is the brain and the nerve centres that suffer from our emotions. sir meldrum fraser died a year after his son. he left a fortune of eighty thousand pounds. half of this went at once to honoria and the other half to the life-use of lady fraser with a reversion to her daughter. honoria after her father's death left cambridge and moved her mother from harley street to queen anne's mansions so that with her shattered nerves and loss of interest in life she might have no household worries, or at any rate nothing worse than remonstrating with the still-room maids on the twice-boiled water brought in for the making of tea; or with the culinary department over the monotonous character of the savouries or the tepid ice creams which dissolved so rapidly into fruit-juice when they were served after a house-dinner.[ ] honoria herself, mistress of a clear two thousand pounds a year, and more in prospect, carried out plans formed while still at newnham after her brother's death. she, like vivien warren, her three-years-younger friend and college-mate, was a great mathematician--a thing i never could be and a status i am incapable of understanding; consequently one i view at first with the deepest respect. i am quite astonished when i meet a male or female mathematician and find they require food as i do, are less quick at adding up bridge scores, lose rather than win at goodwood, and write down the "down" train instead of the "up" in their memorabilia. but there it is. they have only to apply sines and co-sines, tangents and logarithms to a stock exchange quotation for me to grovel before their superior wisdom and consult them at every turn in life. [footnote : this, of course, was twenty, years ago.--h.h.j.] honoria had resolved to turn her great acquirements in algebra and the higher mathematics to practical purposes. being the ignoramus that i am--in this direction--i cannot say how it was to be done; but both she and vivie had grasped the possibilities which lay before exceptionally well-educated women on the stock exchange, in the provision markets, in the law, in insurance calculations, and generally in steering other and weaker women through the difficulties and pitfalls of our age; when in nine cases out of thirteen (honoria worked out the ratio) women of large or moderate means have only dishonest male proficients to guide them. moreover honoria's purpose was two-fold. she wished to help women in their business affairs, but she also wanted to find careers for women. she, like vivien warren, was a nascent suffragist--perhaps a born suffragist, a reasoned one; because the ferment had been in her mother, and her grandmother was a friend of lydia becker and a cousin of mrs. belloc. john's death had been a horrible numbing shock to honoria, and she felt hardly in her right mind for three months afterwards. then on reflection it left some tarnish on her family, even if the memory of the dear dead boy, the too brilliant boy, softened from the poignancy of utter disappointment into a tender sorrow and an infinite pity and forgiveness. but the tragedy turned her thoughts from marriage to some mission of well-doing. she determined to devote that proportion of her inheritance which would have been john's share to this end: the liberation and redemption of women. she was no "anti-man," like vivie. she liked men, if truth were told, a tiny wee bit more than women. but she wished in the moods that followed her brother's death in to be a mother by adoption, a refuge for the fallen, the bewildered, the unstrung. she helped young men back into the path of respectability and wage-earning as well as young women. she was even, when opportunity offered, a matchmaker. being heiress eventually to £ , a year (a large income in pre-war days) and of attractive appearance, she had no lack of suitors, even though she thought modern dancing inane, and had little skill at ball-games. i have indicated her appearance by some few phrases already; but to enable you to visualize her more definitely i might be more precise. she was a tall woman rather than large built, like the young juno when first wooed by jove. where she departed from the junonian type she turned towards venus rather than minerva; in spite of being a mathematician. you meet with her sisters in physical beauty among the americans of pennsylvania, where, to a stock mainly anglo-saxon, is added a delicious strain of gallic race; or you see her again among the cape dutch women who have had french huguenot great grandparents. it is perhaps rather impertinent continuing this analysis of her charm, seeing that she lives and flourishes more than ever, twenty years after the opening of my story; not very different in outward appearance at , as lady armstrong--for of course, as you guess already, she married major--afterwards sir petworth--armstrong--than she was at twenty-eight, the partner, friend and helper of vivien warren. being in comfortable circumstances, highly educated, handsome, attractive, with a mezzo-soprano voice of rare beauty and great skill as a piano-forte accompanyist, she had not only suitors who took her rejection without bitterness, but hosts of friends. she knew all the nice london people of her day: lady feenix, who in some ways resembled her, diana dombey, who did not _quite_ approve of her, being a little uncertain yet about welcoming the new woman, all the ritchies, married and unmarried, lady brownlow, the duchess of bedford (adeline), the michael fosters, most of the stracheys (she liked the ones i liked), the hubert parrys, the ripons (how she admired lady ripon, as who did not!), mrs. alfred lyttelton, miss lena ashwell, the bernard shaws, the wilfred meynells, the h.g. wellses, the sidney webbs; and--leaving uninstanced a number of other delightful, warm-blooded, pleasant-voiced, natural-mannered people--the rossiters. or at least, michael rossiter. for although you could tolerate for his sake mrs. rossiter, and even find her a source of quiet amusement, you could hardly say you liked her--not in the way you could say it of most of the men and women i have specified. michael rossiter, who comes into this story, ought really if there were a discriminating wide-awake, up-to-date providence--which there is not--to have met honoria when she was twenty. (at nineteen such a woman is still immature; and moreover until she was twenty, honoria had not mastered the binomial theorem.) had he married her at that period he would himself have been about twenty-seven which is quite soon enough for a great man of science to marry and procreate geniuses. but as a matter of fact, when he came down to cambridge in--? --to deliver a course of vacation lectures on embryology, he was already two years married to linda bennet, an heiress, the daughter and niece (her parents died when she was young and she lived with an uncle and aunt) of very rich manufacturers at leeds. so, though his eye, quick to discern beauty, and his brain tentacles ready to detect intelligence combined with a lovely nature, soon singled out honoria fraser, amongst a host of less attractive girl-graduates, he had no more thought of falling in love with her than with a princess of the blood-royal. he might, long since, within a month of his marriage have found out his linda to be a pretty little simpleton with a brain incapable of taking in any more than it had learnt at a scarborough finishing school; but he was too instinctive a gentleman to indulge in any flirtation, any deviation whatever from mental or physical monogamy. for he remembered always that it was his wife's money which had enabled him to pursue his great researches without the heart-breaking delays, limitations and insufficiencies involved in government or royal society grants; and that linda had not only endowed him with all her worldly goods--all but those he had insisted in putting into settlement--but that she had given him all her heart and confidence as well. still, he liked honoria. she was eager to learn much else beyond the hard-grained muses of the square and cube; she was the daughter of a prosperous and boldly experimental physician, whose wife was a champion of women's rights. so he pressed honoria to come with her mother and make the acquaintance of himself and linda in portland place. why was michael rossiter wedded to linda bennet when he was no more than twenty-five, and she just past her coming of age? because fresh from edinburgh and cambridge and with a reputation for unusual intuition in biology and chemistry he had come to be science master at a great college in the north, and thus meeting linda at the philosophical institute of leeds had caused her to fall in love with him whilst he lectured on the cainozoic fauna of yorkshire. he was himself a northumbrian of borderland stock: something of the dane and angle, the pict and briton with a dash of the gypsy folk: a blend which makes the northumbrian people so much more productive of manly beauty, intellectual vivacity, bold originality than the slow-witted, bulky, crafty saxons of yorkshire or the under-sized, rugged-featured britons of lancashire. linda fell in love all in one evening with his fiery eyes, black beard, the northumbrian burr of his pronunciation, and the daring of his utterances, though she could scarcely grasp one of his hypotheses. her uncle and aunt being narrowly pietistic she was bored to death with the old testament, and rossiter's scarcely concealed contempt for the mosaic story of creation captured her intellect; while the physical attraction she felt was that which the tall, handsome, resolute brunet has for the blue-eyed fluffy little blonde. she openly made love to him over the tea and coffee served at the "soirée" which followed the lecture. her slow-witted guardian had no objection to offer; and there were not wanting go-betweens to urge on rossiter with stories of her wealth and the expanding value of her financial interests. he wanted to marry; he was touched by her ill-concealed passion, found her pretty and appealingly childlike. so, after a short wooing, he married her and her five thousand pounds a year, and settled down in park crescent, portland place, so as to be near the zoo and tudell's dissecting rooms, to have the royal botanic gardens within three minutes' walk, and the opportunity of turning a large studio in the rear of his house into a well-equipped chemical and dissecting laboratory. one of his close pursuits at that time was the analysis of the thyroid gland and its functions, its over or under development in british statesmen, dramatic authors and east end immigrants. chapter iii david vavasour williams it is in the spring of . a fine warm evening, but at eight o'clock the dusk is already on the verge of darkness as honoria emerges from the lift at her chancery lane office (near the corner of carey street), puts her latch-key into the door of the partners' room, and finds herself confronting the silhouette of a young man against the western glow of the big window. _norie_ (inwardly rather frightened): "hullo! who are _you_ and what are you doing here?" _vivie_ (mimicking a considerate, cringing burglar): "sorry to startle you, lidy, but i don't mean no 'arm. i'll go quiet. me name's d.v. williams..." _norie_: "you absurd creature! but you shouldn't play such pranks on these respectable premises. you gave me a _horrid_ start, and i realized for the first time that i've got a heart. i really must sit down and pant." _vivie_: "i am sorry, dearest. i had not the slightest notion you would be letting yourself into the office at this hour-- o'clock--and i was just returning from my crammers..." _norie_: "i came for those cranston papers. mother is ill. i may have to sit up with her after violet hunt goes, so i thought i would come here, fetch the bundle of papers and plans, and go through them in the silent watches of the night, _if_ mother sleeps. but do you mean to say you have already started this masquerade?" _vivie_: "i do. you see christabel pankhurst has been turned down as a barrister. they won't let her qualify for the bar, because she's a woman, so they certainly won't let _me_ with my pedigree; just as, merely because we are women, they won't let us become chartered actuaries or incorporated accountants. after we had that long talk last june i got a set of men's clothes together, a regular man's outfit. the suit doesn't fit over well but i am rectifying that by degrees. i went to a general outfitter in cornhill and told a cock-and-bull story--as it was an affair of ready cash they didn't stop to question me about it. i said something about a sea-faring brother, just my height, a trifle stouter in build--lost all his kit at sea--been in hospital--now in convalescent home--how i wanted to save him all the fatigue possible--wouldn't want more than reach-me-downs at present, etc., etc. they rather flummoxed me at first by offering a merchant service uniform, but somehow i got over that, though this serge suit has rather a sea-faring cut. i got so unnecessarily explanatory with the shopman that he began to pay me compliments, said my brother must be a good-looking young chap if he was at all like me. however, i got away with the things in a cab, and told the cab to drive to st. paul's station, and on the way re-directed him here. "last autumn i began practising at night-time after all our familiars had left these premises. purposely i did not tell you because i feared your greater caution and instinctive respectability might discourage me. otherwise, nobody's spotted me, so far. i'd intended breaking it to you any day now, because i've gone too far to draw back, for weal or woe. but either we have been rushed with business, or you've been anxious about lady fraser--how is she?" (norie interpolates "very poorly.") "so truly sorry!--i was generally just about to tell you when rose or lilian--tiresome things!--would begin most assiduously passing in and out with papers. even now i mustn't keep you, with your mother so ill..." _norie_ (looking at her wrist-watch): "violet has very kindly promised to stay with mother till ten.... i can give you an hour, though i must take a few minutes off that for the firm's business as i haven't been here much for three days..." (they talk business for twenty minutes, during which norie says: "it's really _rather_ odd, how those clothes change you! i feel vaguely compromised with a handsome young man bending over me, his cheek almost touching mine!"--and vivie retorts "oh, _don't_ be an ass!") _norie_: "so you really _are_ going to take the plunge?" _vivie_: "i really _am_. as soon as it suits your convenience, vivie warren will retire from your firm and go abroad. you must either replace her by beryl clarges or allow mr. vavasour williams" (honoria interpolates: "_ridiculous_ name! how did you think of it?") "to come and assist in the day-time or after office hours. you can say to the winds that he is vivie's first cousin, remarkably like her in some respects.... rose mullet is engaged to be married and is only--she told me yesterday with many blushes--staying on to oblige us. lilian steynes said the other day that if we were making any changes in the office, much as she liked her work here, her mother having died she thought it was her duty to go and live with her maternal aunt in the country. the aunt thinks she can get her a post as a brewery clerk at aylesbury, and she is longing to breed aylesbury ducks in her spare time.--there is bertie adams, it's true. there's something so staunch about him and he is so useful that he and praed and stead are the three exceptions i make in my general hatred of mankind..." _norie_: "he will be very much cut up at your going--or seeming to go." _vivie_: "just so. i think i shall write him a farewell note, saying it's only for a time: i mean, that i may return later on--dormant partnership--nothing really changed, don't you know? but that as rose and lilian are going, mrs.--what does she call herself, claridge?"--(norie interpolates: "yes, that was her idea: she doesn't want to blazon the name of clarges as the symbol of free love, 'cos of the dear old dean; yet claridge will not be too much of a surrender and is sure to invoke respectability, because of the hotel")--"mrs. claridge, then, is coming in my stead--he's to help her all he can--and my cousin, who is reading for the bar, will also look in when you are very busy. i shall, of course, see about rooms in one of the inns of court--the temple perhaps. i have been stealthily watching fig tree court. i _think_ i can get chambers there--a man is turning out next month--got a colonial appointment--i've put my new name down at the lodge and i shall have to rack my brains for references--you will do for one--or perhaps not--however that i can work out later. of course i won't take the final plunge till i have secured the rooms. meantime i will use my bedroom here but promise you i will be awfully prudent..." _norie_: "i couldn't possibly have beryl 'living in,' with a child hanging about the place; so i think if you _do_ go i shall turn your bedroom into an apartment which beryl and i can use for toilet purposes but where we can range out on book-shelves a whole lot of our books. just now they are most inconveniently stored away in boxes. it's rather tiresome about beryl. i believe she's going to have _another_ child. at any rate she says it may be four months before she can come to work here regularly. i asked her about it the other day, because if mother gets worse i may be hindered about coming to the office, and i didn't want you to get overworked,--so i said to beryl.... that reminds me, she referred to the coming child and added that its father was a policeman. quite a nice creature in his private life. of course she's only kidding. i expect it's the architect all the time. you know how she delighted in shocking us at newnham. i wish she hadn't this kink about her. p'raps i'm getting old-fashioned already--you used to call me 'the girondist.' but if the new woman _is_ to go on the loose and be unmoral like the rabbits, won't the cause suffer from middle-class opposition?" _vivie_: "perhaps. but it may gain instead the sympathies of the lower and the upper classes. why do you bother about beryl? i agree with you in disliking all this sexuality..." _norie_: "does one _ever_ quite know why one likes people? there is _something_ about beryl that gets over me; and she _is_ a worker. you know how she grappled with that norfolk estate business?" _vivie_: "well, it's fortunate she and i have not met since newnham days. you must tip her the story that i am going away for a time--abroad--and that a young--young, because i look a mere boy, dressed up in men's clothes--a young cousin of mine, learned in the law, is going to drop in occasionally and do some of the work..." _norie_: "i'm afraid i'm rather weak-willed. i _ought_ to stop this prank before it has gone too far, just as i ought to discourage beryl's babies. your schemes sound so stagey. off the stage you never take people in with such flimsy stories and weak disguises--you'll tie yourself up into knots and finally get sent to prison.... however.... i can't help being rather tickled by your idea. it's vilely unjust, men closing two-thirds of the respectable careers to women, to bachelor women above all..." (a pause, and the two women look out on a blue london dotted with lemon-coloured, straw-coloured, mauve-tinted lights, with one cold white radiance hanging over the invisible piccadilly circus)--"well, go ahead! follow your star! i can be confident of one thing, you won't do anything mean or disgraceful. deceiving man while his vile laws and restrictions remain in force is no crime. be prudent, so far as compromising our poor little firm here is concerned, because if you bring down my grey hairs with sorrow to the grave we shall lose a valuable source of income. besides: any public scandal just now in which i was mixed up might kill my mother. want any money?" _vivie_: "you generous darling! _never, never_ shall i forget your kindness and your trust in me. you have at any rate saved one soul alive." (honoria deprecates gratitude.) "no, i don't want money--yet. you made me take and bank £ last january over that rio de palmas coup--heaps more than my share. altogether i've got about £ , on deposit at the c. and c. bank, the temple bar branch. i've many gruesome faults, but i _am_ thrifty. i think i can win through to the bar on that. of course, if afterwards briefs don't come in--" _norie_: "well, there'll always be the partnership which will go on unaltered. i shall pretend you are only away for a time and your share shall be regularly paid in to your bank. of course i shall meet mr. vavasour williams now and again and i can tell him things and consult with him. if we think beryl, after she is installed here as head clerk--of course i shan't make her a partner for _years_ and _years_--not at all if she remains flighty--if we think she is unsuspicious, and bertie adams likewise, and the new clerks and the housekeeper and her husband, there is no reason why you should not come here fairly often and put in as much work as you can on our business." _vivie_: "yes. of course i must be careful of one predicament. i have studied the regulations about being admitted to the english bar. they are very quaint and medieval or early georgian. you mayn't be a chartered accountant or actuary--the lord alone knows why! i suppose some lord chancellor was done in the eye in elizabeth's reign by an actuary and laid down that law. equally you mayn't be a clergyman. as to that we needn't distress ourselves. it's rather piteous about the prohibiting accountants, because as women we are not allowed to qualify in _any_ capacity as accountants or actuaries; and work here is only permissible by our not pretending to belong to any recognized body like the institute of actuaries. so that in coming to work for you i must not seem to be in any way doing the business of accountants or actuaries. indeed it might be awkward for my scheme if i was too openly associated with fraser and warren. "i already think of myself as williams--i shall pose of course as a welshman. my appearance _is_ rather welsh, don't you think? it's the irish blood that makes me look keltic--i'm sure my father was an irish student for the priesthood at louvain, and certain scraps of information i got out of mother make me believe that _her_ mother was a pretty welsh girl from cardiff, brought over to london town by some ship's captain and stranded there, on tower hill. "however, i have still the whole scheme to work out and when i'm ready to start on it--which will be very soon--i'll let you know. now, though i'd love to discuss all the other details, i mustn't forget your mother will be wanting you--i wish _i_ had a mother to tend--i wonder" (wistfully) "whether i was too hard on mine? "d'you mind posting these letters as you go out? i shall change back to vivie warren in a dressing gown, give myself a light supper, and then put in two hours studying latin and norman french. good night, dearest!" two months after this conversation vivie decided to pay a call on an old friend of her mother's, lewis maitland praed, if you want his full name, a well-known architect, and one of the few male friends of catherine warren who had not also been her lover. why, he never quite knew himself. when he first met her she was the boon companion, the mistress--more or less, and unattached--of a young barrister, a college friend of praed's. kate warren at that time called herself kitty vavasour; and on the strength of having done a turn or two on the music halls considered herself an actress with a right to a professional name. it was in this guise that the "revd." samuel gardner met her and had that six months' infatuation for her which afterwards caused him so much disquietude; though it preceded the taking of his ordination vows by quite a year, and his marriage to his wife--much too good for him--in . [the revd. sam, you may remember, was the father of the scapegrace frank who nearly captured vivie's young affections and had written from south africa proposing marriage at the opening of this story.] kate vavasour in was an exceedingly pretty girl of nineteen or twenty; showily dressed, and quick with her tongue. she was good-natured and jolly, and though praed himself was the essence of refinement there was something about her reckless mirth and joy in life--the immense relief of having passed from the sordid life of a barmaid to this quasi-ladyhood--that enlisted his sympathies. though she was always somebody else's mistress until she developed her special talent as a manageress of high-class houses of accommodation, "private hotels" on the continent, chiefly frequented by english and american _roués_--praed kept an eye on her career, and occasionally rendered her, with some cynicism, unobtrusive friendly services in disentangling her affairs when complications threatened. he was an art student in those days of the 'seventies, possessed of about four hundred a year, beginning to go through the aesthetic phase, and not decided whether he would emerge a painter of pictures or an architect of grandiose or fantastic buildings. to his studio miss kitty vavasour or miss kate warren would often come and pose for the head and shoulders, or for some draped caryatid wanted for an ambitious porch in an imaginary millionaire's house in kensington palace gardens. when in , vivie had learnt about her mother's "profession," she had flung off violently from all her mother's "friends," except "praddy." she even continued to call him by this nickname, long ago bestowed on him by her mother. at distant intervals she would pay him a visit at his house and studio near hans place; when honoria's advice and assistance did not meet the case of some grave perplexity. so one afternoon in june, , she came to his little dwelling with its large studio, and asked to have a long talk to him, whilst his parlour-maid--he was still a bachelor--denied him to other callers. they had tea together and vivie plunged as quickly as possible into her problem. "you know, praddy dear, i want to be a barrister. but as a female they will never call me to the bar. so i'm going to send vivien warren off for a long absence abroad--the few who think about me will probably conclude that money has carried the day and that i've gone to help my mother in her business--and in her absence mr. vavasour williams will take up the running. david v. williams--don't interrupt me--will study for the bar, eat through his terms--six dinners a year, isn't it?--pass his examinations, and be called to the english bar in about three years from now. didn't you once have a pupil called vavasour williams?" _praed_: "what, david, the welsh boy? yes. his name reminded me of your mother in one of her stages. david vavasour williams. i took him on in--let me see? i think it was in or early . but how did you hear about him?" _vivie_: "never mind, or never mind for the moment. tell me some more about him." _praed_: "well to sum him up briefly he was what school boys and subalterns would call 'a rotter.' not without an almost mordid cleverness; but the welsh strain in him which in the father turned to emotional religion--the father was vicar or rector of pontystrad--came out in the boy in unhealthy fancies. he had almost the talent of aubrey beardsley. but i didn't think he had a good influence over my other pupils, so before i planned that italian journey--on which you refused to accompany me--i advised him to leave my tuition--i wasn't modern enough, i said. i also advised him to make up his mind whether he wanted to be a sane architect--he despised questions of housemaids' closets and sanitation and lifts and hot-water supply--or a scene painter. i think he might have had a great career at drury lane over fairy palaces or millionaire dwellings. but i turned him out of my studio, though i put the fact less brutally before his father--said i should be absent a long while in italy and that i feared the boy was too undisciplined. afterwards i think he went into some south african police force..." _vivie_: "he did, and died last year in a south african hospital. had he--er--er--many relations, i mean did he come of well-known people?" _praed_: "i fancy not. his father was just a dreamy old welsh clergyman always seeing visions and believing himself a descendant of the druids, sam gardner told me; and his mother had either died long ago or had run away from her husband, i forget which. in a way, i'm sorry david's dead. he had a sort of weird talent and wild good looks. by the way, he wasn't altogether unlike _you_." _vivie_: "thank you for the double-edged compliment. however what you say is very interesting. well now, my idea is that david vavasour williams did _not_ die in a military hospital; he recovered and returned, firmly resolved to lead a new life.--is his father living by the bye? did he believe his son was dead?" _praed_: "couldn't tell you, i'm sure. i never took any further interest in him, and until you mentioned it--i don't know on whose authority--i didn't know he was dead. on the whole a good riddance for his people, i should say, especially if he died on the field of honour. but what lunatic idea has entered your mind with regard to this poor waster?" _vivie_: "why my idea, as i say, is that d.v.w. got cured of his necrosis of the jaw--i suppose it is not invariably deadly?--came home with a much improved morale, studied hard, and became a barrister, thinking it morally a superior calling to architecture and scene painting. in short, i shall be from this day forth vavasour williams, law-student! would it be safe, d'you think, in that capacity to go down and see his old father?" _praed_: "_vivie_! i _did_ think you were a sober-minded young woman who would steer clear of--of--crime: for this impersonation would be a punishable offence..." _vivie_: "_crime_? _what_ nonsense! i should consider i was justified in a court of equity if i burnt down or blew up the law courts or one of the inns or broke the windows of the chartered institute of actuaries or the incorporated law society. all these institutions and many others bar the way to honourable and lucrative careers for educated women, and a male parliament gives us no redress, and a male press laughs at us for our feeble attempts to claim common rights with men. instead of proceeding to such violence i am merely resorting to a very harmless guile in getting round the absurd restrictions imposed by the benchers of the inns of court, namely that all who claim a call to the bar should not be _accountants_, _actuaries_, _clergymen_ or _women_. i am going to give up the accountancy business--or rather, the law has never allowed either honoria or me to become chartered accountants, so there is nothing to give up. to avoid any misapprehension she is going to change the title on our note paper and brass plate to 'general inquiry agents.' that will be sufficiently non-committal. well then, as to sex disqualification, a few weeks hence i shall become david vavasour williams, and i presume he was a male? you don't have to pass a medical examination for the bar, do you?" _praed_: "really, vivie, you are _unnecessarily_ coarse..." _vivie_: "i don't care if i am, poor outlaw that i am! every avenue to an honest and ambitious career seems closed to me, either because i am a woman or--in women's careers--the few that there are--because i am kate warren's daughter. _i_ am not to blame for my mother's misdeeds, yet i am being punished for them. that beast of a friend of yours--that filthy swine, george crofts--set it about after i refused to marry him that i was 'mrs. warren's daughter,' and the few nice people i knew from cambridge days dropped me, all except honoria and her mother." _praed_: "well, _i_ haven't dropped you. _i'll_ always stick by you" (observes that vivie is trying to keep back her tears). "vivie--_darling_--what do you want me to do? why not marry me and spend half my income, take the shelter of my name--i'm an a.r.a. now--you needn't do more than keep house for me.... i'm rather a valetudinarian--dare say i shan't trouble you long--we could have a jolly good time before i went off with a heart attack--travel--study--write books together--" _vivie_ (recovering herself): "thanks, dear praddy; you are a brick and i really--in a way--have quite got to love you. except an office boy in chancery lane and w.t. stead, i don't know any other decent man. but i'm not going to marry any one. i'm going to become vavasour williams--the name is rotten, but you must take what you can get. williams is a quiet young man who only desires to be left alone to earn his living respectably at the bar, and see there if he cannot redress the balance in the favour of women. but there is something you _could_ do for me, and it is for that i came to see you to-day--by the bye, we have both let our tea grow cold, but _for goodness' sake_ don't order any more on my account, or else your parlour-maid will be coming in and out and will see that i've been crying and you look flushed. what i wanted to ask was this--it's really very simple--_if mr. vavasour williams, aged twenty-four, late in south africa, once your pupil in architecture_ or scene painting or whatever it was--_gives you as a reference to character, you are to say the best you can of him_. and, by the bye, he will be calling to see you very shortly and you could lend further verisimilitude to your story by renewing acquaintance with him. you will find him very much improved. in every way he will do you credit. and what is more, if you don't repel him, he will come and see you much oftener than his cousin--i'm not ashamed to adopt her as a cousin--vivie warren could have done. because vivie, with her deplorable parentage, had your good name to think of, and visited you very seldom; whereas there could be raised _no_ objection from your parlour-maid if mr. d.v. williams came rather often to chat with you and ask your advice. think it over, dear friend--good-bye." early in july, norie and vivie were standing at the open west window in their partners' room at the office, trying to get a little fresh air. the staff had just gone its several ways to the suburbs, glad to have three hours of daylight before it for cricket and tennis. confident therefore of not being overheard, vivie began: "i've got those rooms in fig tree court. i shall soon be ready to move my things in. i'll leave some of poor vivie warren's effects behind if you don't mind, in case she comes back some day. do you think you can rub along if i take my departure next week? i want to give myself a fortnight's bicycle holiday in wales--as d.v. williams--a kind of honeymoon with fate, before i settle down as a law student. after i come back i can devote much of the summer recess to our affairs, either openly or after office hours. you could then take a holiday, in august. you badly need one. what about beryl?" _norie_: "beryl is well over her accouchement and is confident of being able to start work here on august .... it's a boy this time. i haven't seen it, so i can't say whether it resembles a policeman more than an architect. besides babies up till the age of six months only resemble macrocephalic idiots.... i shall be _wary_ with beryl--haven't committed myself--ourselves to any engagement beyond six months. she's amazingly clever, but i should say quite heartless. two babies in three years, and both illegitimate--the real mrs. architect very much upset, no doubt, mr. architect getting wilder and wilder in his work through trying to maintain two establishments--they say he left out all the sanitation in sir peter robinson's new house and let the builders rush up the walls without damp courses--and it's killing her father, the dean. it's not as though she hid herself away, but she goes out so much! they are talking of turning her out of her club because of the things she says before the waitresses..." _vivie_: "what things?" _norie_: "why, about its being very healthy to have babies when you're between the ages of twenty and thirty; and how with this twilight sleep business she doesn't mind how often; that it's fifty times more interesting than breeding dogs and cats or guinea-pigs; and she's surprised more single women don't take it up. i think she must be détraquée.... i have a faint hope that by taking her in hand and interesting her in our work--which _entre nous deux_--is turning out to be very profitable--i may sober her and regularize her. no doubt in most women will talk as she does to-day, but the advance is too abrupt. it not only robs _her_ parents of all happiness, but it upsets _my_ mother. she now wrings her hands over her own past and fears that by working so strenuously for the emancipation of women she has assisted to breach the dam--can't you imagine the way the old cats of both sexes go on at her?--the dam which held up female virtue, and that society now will be drowned in a flood of free love..." _vivie_: "well! we'll give her a six months' trial here, and see if our mix-up of advice in law, banking, estate management, stock-and-share dealing, divorce, private enquiries, probate, etc., does not prove _much_ more interesting than an illicit connection with a hare-brained architect.... if she proves impossible you'll pack her off and vivie shall return and d.v. williams go abroad.... don't you think there is something that ought to win over providence in that happily chosen name? _d.v._ williams? and my mother once actually called herself 'vavasour.' "well, then, barring accidents and the unforeseen, it's agreed i go on my holiday next saturday, to return never no more--perhaps--?--" _norie_ (with a sigh): "yes!" _vivie_: "how's your mother?" _norie_: "oh, as to her, i'm glad to say '_much_ better.' when i can get away, after the new clerks and beryl are installed and everything is going smoothly, i shall take her to switzerland, to a deliciously quiet spot i know and nobody else knows up the göschenenthal. the continent won't be so hot for travelling if we don't start till the end of august..." _vivie:_ "_then_, dearest ... in case you don't come to the office any more this week, i'll say good-bye--for--for some time..." (they grip hands, they hesitate, then kiss each other on the cheek, a very rare gesture on either's part--and separate with tears in their eyes.) the following monday morning, bertie adams, combining in his adolescent person the functions of office boy, junior clerk, and general factotum, entered the outer office of fraser and warren and found this letter on his desk:-- fraser and warren midland insurance chambers, general inquiry agents - , chancery lane, w.c. july , . dear bertie-- i want to prepare you for something. if you had been an ordinary office boy, i should not have bothered about you or confided to you anything concerning the firm. but you are by now almost a clerk, and from the day i joined miss fraser in this business, you have helped me more than you know--helped me not only in my work, but to understand that there _can_ be good, true, decent-minded, trustworthy ... you won't like it if i say "boys" ... young men. i am going away for a considerable time, i cannot say how long--probably abroad. but miss fraser thinks i can still help in the work of her firm, so i remain a partner. a cousin of mine, mr. d.v. williams, may come in occasionally to help miss fraser. i shall ask him to keep an eye on you. miss rose mullet and miss steynes are likewise leaving the service of the firm. i dare say you know miss mullet is getting married and how miss steynes is going to live at aylesbury. two other ladies are coming in their place, and much of my own work will be undertaken by a mrs. claridge, whom you will shortly see. it is rather sad this change in what has been such a happy association of busy people, nobody treading on any one else's toes; but there it is! "the old order changeth, giving place to the new ... lest one good custom should corrupt the world"--you will read in the tennyson i gave you last christmas. let's hope it won't be when i return: "change and decay in all around i see" ... as the rather dismal hymn has it. sometimes change is a good thing. you serve a noble mistress in miss fraser and i am sure you realize the importance of her work. it may mean so much for women's careers in the next generation. i shan't quite lose touch with you. i dare say miss fraser, even if i am far away, will write to me from time to time and give me news of the office and tell me how you get on. don't be ashamed of being ambitious: keep up your studies. why don't you--but perhaps you do?--join evening classes at the polytechnic?--or at this new london school of economics which is close at hand? make up your mind to be lord chancellor some day ... even if it only carries you as far as the silk gown of a q.c. i suppose i ought now to write "k.c." a few years ago we all thought the state would go to pieces when victoria died. yet you see we are jogging along pretty well under king edward. in the same way, you will soon get so used to the new head clerk, mrs. claridge, that you will wonder what on earth you saw to admire in vivien warren. this letter came like a cricket ball between the eyes to bertie adams. his adored miss warren going away and no clear prospect of her return--her farewell almost like the last words on a death-bed.... he bowed his head over his folded arms on his office desk, and gave way to gruff sobs and the brimming over of tear and nose glands which is the grotesque accompaniment of human sorrow. he forgot for a while that he was a young man of nineteen with an unmistakable moustache and the status of a cricket eleven captain. he was quite the boy again and his feeling for vivien warren, which earlier he had hardly dared to characterize, out of his intense respect for her, became once more just filial affection. his good mother was a washerwoman-widow, in whom honoria fraser had interested herself in her harley street girlhood. bertie was the eldest of six, and his father had been a coal porter who broke his back tumbling down a cellar when a little "on." bertie--he now figured as mr. albert adams in the cricket lists--was a well-grown youth, rather blunt-featured, but with honest hazel eyes, fresh-coloured, shock-haired. vivie had once derided him for trying to woo his frontal hair into a flattened curl with much pomade ... he now only sleeked his curly hair with water. you might even have called him "common." he was of the type that went out to the war from to , and won it, despite the many mistakes of our flurried strategicians: the type that so long as it lasts unspoilt will make england the predominant partner, and great britain the predominant nation; the type out of which are made the bluejacket and petty officer, the police sergeant, the engine driver, the railway guard, solicitor's clerk, merchant service mate, engineer, air-pilot, chauffeur, army non-commissioned officer, head gardener, head game-keeper, farm-bailiff, head printer; the trustworthy manservant, the commissionaire of a city office; and which in other avatars ran the british world on an average annual income of £ before the war. when women of a similar educated lower middle class come into full equality with men in opportunity, they should marry the bertie adamses of their acquaintance and not the stockbrokers, butchers, drapers, bookies, professional cricketers or pugilists. they would then become the mothers of the salvation-generation of the british people which will found and rule utopia. however, bertie adams was quite unconscious of all these possibilities, and thought of himself modestly, rather cheaply. swallowing the fourth or fifth sob, he rose from his crouching over the desk, wiped his face with a wet towel, smoothed his hair, put straight his turn-over collar and smart tie, and went to his work with glowing eyes and cheeks; resolved to show miss warren that she had not thought too highly of him. nevertheless, when miss mullet arrived and giggled over the details of her trousseau and lily steynes discussed the advertisements of aylesbury ducks in the current _exchange and mart_, he was reserved and rather sarcastic with them both. he intimated later that he had long been aware of the coming displacements; but he said not a word of vivie's letter. chapter iv pontystrad on a morning in mid-july, , mr. d.v. williams bicycled to paddington station from new square, lincoln's inn. the brown canvas case fitted to the frame of his male bicycle contained a change of clothes, a suit of paijamas, a safety razor, tooth-brush, hair-brush and comb. he himself was wearing a well-cut dark grey suit--norfolk jacket, knickerbockers and thick stockings. having had his bicycle labelled "swansea," he entered a first-class compartment of the south wales express. though not lavish on his expenditure he was travelling first because he still felt a little uneasy in the presence of men--mostly men of the rougher type. perhaps there was a second class in those days; there may be still. but i have a distinct impression that mr. vavasour williams, law student, travelled "first" on this occasion: for this was how he met a person of whom his friend, honoria fraser, had often spoken--michael rossiter. he did not of course--till after they had passed swindon--know the name of his travelling companion. five minutes before the train left paddington there entered his compartment of the corridor carriage a tall man with a short, curly black beard and nice eyes--eyes like agates in colour. there was a touch of grey about the temples, otherwise the head hair, when he changed from a hard felt hat to a soft travelling cap, showed as dark as the beard and moustache. his frame was strong, muscular and loosely built, and he had clever, nervous hands with fingers somewhat spatulate. his clothes did not much suggest the tourist--they seemed more like a too well-worn town morning suit of dark blue serge; as though he had left home in an absent-minded mood intent on some hurriedly conceived plan. he cast one or two quick glances at david; once, indeed, as they got out into full daylight, away from tunnels and high walls, letting his glance lengthen into a searching look. then he busied himself with a number of scientific periodicals he had brought to read in the train. impelled, he knew not why, to provoke conversation, david asked (quite needlessly), "this _is_ the south wales express, i mean the swansea train, is it not?" blackbeard was struck with the unusualness of the voice--a very pleasant one to come from the lips of a man--and replied: "it is; at least i got in under that impression as i am intending to go to swansea; but in any case the ticket inspector is sure to come along the corridor presently and we'll make sure then. we stop at swindon, i think, so if we've made a mistake we can rectify it there." then after a pause he resumed: "i think you said you were going to swansea? might i ask if you are bound on the same errand as i am? i mean, are you one of boyd dawkins's party to examine the new cave on the gower coast?" _d.v.w._: "oh no--i--i am going inland from swansea to--to have a bicycling tour. i'm going to a place on the river--i don't know how to pronounce it--at least i've forgotten. the river's name is spelt llwchwr." _blackbeard_: "you should change your mind and turn south--come and see these extraordinary caves. are you interested in palæontology?" (david hesitates) "what careless people call 'prehistoric animals' or 'prehistoric man.' they have been ridiculously misled by comic artists in _punch_ who imagine a few thousand years of prehistory would take us back to the cretaceous period; really four or five million years before man came into existence, when this country and most other lands swarmed with preposterous reptiles that had become extinct long before the age of mammals. however, i don't suppose this interests you. i only spoke because i thought you might be one of boyd dawkins's pupils ... or one of mine." _david_: "on the contrary, i am very, very much interested in the subject, but i am afraid it has lain rather outside my line of studies so far--p'raps i will turn south when i have seen something of the part of glamorgan i am going to. i'm really welsh in origin, but i know wales imperfectly because i left it when i was quite young" ("this'll be good practice," vivie's brain voice was saying to herself) ... "i've returned recently from south africa." _blackbeard_: "what were you doing there?" _david_: "i--i--was in the army ... at least in a police force ... i got wounded, had to go into hospital--necrosis of the jaw ... i came home when i got well..." _blackbeard_: _"necrosis of the jaw!_ that was a bad thing. but you seem to have got over it very well. i can't see any scar from where i am..." _david_: "oh no. it was only a _slight_ touch and i dare say i exaggerate ... i've left the army however and now i'm reading law..." blackbeard thinks at this point that he has gone far enough in cross-examination and returns to his periodicals and pamphlets. but there's something he likes--a wistfulness--in the young man's face, and he can't quite detach his mind to the presence of palæolithic man in south wales. at swindon they both get out--there was still lingering the practice of taking lunch there--have a hasty lunch together and more talk, and share a bottle of claret. on returning to their compartment, rossiter offers david a cigar but the young man prefers smoking a cigarette. by this time they have exchanged names. d.v.w. however is reticent about the south african war--says it was all too horrible for words, and should never have taken place and he can't bear to think about it and was knocked out quite early in the day. now all he asks is peace and quiet and the opportunity of studying law in london so that he may become some day a barrister. rossiter says--after more talk, "pity you're going in for the bar--we've too many lawyers already. you should take up science"--and as far as the severn tunnel discourses illuminatingly on biology, mineralogy, astronomy, chemistry as david-vivien had never heard them treated previously. in the severn tunnel the noise of the train silences both professor and listener, who willingly takes up the position of pupil. between newport and neath, david thinks he has never met any one so interesting. it has been his first real induction into the greatest of all books: the book of the earth itself. rossiter on his part feels indefinably attracted by this young expatriated welshman. david does not say much, but what he does contribute to the conversation shows him a quick thinker and a person of trained intelligence. yet somehow the professor of biology in the university of london--and many other things beside--f.r.s., f.z.s., f.l.s., gold medallist of this and that academy and university abroad--does not "see" him as a soldier or a non-commissioned officer in the british army: law-student is a more likely qualification. however as they near swansea, michael rossiter gives mr. d.v. williams his card (d.v.w. regrets he cannot reciprocate but says he has hardly settled down yet to any address) and--though as a rule he is taciturn in trains and cautious about making acquaintances--expresses the hope he will call at , park crescent some afternoon--"my wife and i are generally at home on thursdays"--when all are back in town for the autumn. they separate at swansea station. david spends the night at swansea, employing some of his time there by enquiring at the terminus hotel as to the roads that lead up the valley of the llwchwr, what sort of a place is pontystrad ("the bridge by the meadow"), whether any one knows the clergyman of that parish, mr.... er ... howel vaughan williams. the "boots" or one of the "bootses," it appears, comes from the neighbourhood of pontystrad and knows the reverend gentleman by sight--a nice old gentleman--has heard that he's aged much of late years since his son ran away and disappeared out in africa. his sight was getting bad, boots understood, and he could not see to do all the reading and writing he was once so great at. after a rather wakeful night, during which d.v. williams is more disturbed by his thoughts and schemes than by the continual noises of the trains passing into and out of swansea, he rises early and drafts a telegram:-- revd. howel williams, vicarage, pontystrad, glamorgan. hope return home this evening. all is well. david. then pays his bill and tries to mount his bicycle the wrong way to the great amusement of the boots; then remembers the right way and rides off, with the confidence of one long accustomed to bicycling, through the crowded traffic of swansea in the direction of llwchwr. it was a very hot ride through a very lovely country, now largely spoilt by mining and metallurgy, along a road that was constantly climbing up steeply to descend abruptly. david of course could have travelled by rail to the pontyffynon station and thence have ridden back three miles to pontystrad. but he wished purposely to bicycle the whole way from swansea and take in with the eye the land of his fathers. he was postponing as long as possible the test of meeting his father, the father of the young n'eer-do-weel who had been lying for months in a south african field hospital the year before. he halted for a cup of tea at llandeilotalybont ... wales has many place names like this ... and being there not many miles from pontystrad was able to glean more recent and more circumstantial information about the man he proposed to greet as "father." at half-past six that evening, having perspired and dried, perspired and dried, strained a tendon and acquired a headache, he halted before the gate of the vicarage garden at pontystrad, having been followed thither to his secret annoyance by quite a troop of village boys of whom he had imprudently asked the way. as they talked welsh he could not tell what they were saying, but conjectured that his telegram had arrived and that he was expected. standing under the porch of the house was an old man with a long white beard like a druid in spectacles shading his eyes and expectant... a bicycle might prove an incumbrance in the ensuing interview, so david hastily propped his against a fuchsia hedge and hurried forward to meet the old man, who extended hands to envelop him, not trusting to his eyes. an old, rosy-cheeked woman in a sunbonnet came up behind the old man, shrieked out "master david!" and only waited with twitching fingers for her own onslaught till the father had first embraced his prodigal son. this was done at least three times, accompanied with tears, blessings, prayers, the uplifting of poor filmy eyes to a cloudless heaven--"diolch i dduw!"--ejaculations as to the wonder of it--"rhyfeddol yw yn eiholl ffyrdd"--god's providence--his ways are past finding out! "ni ellir olrain ei ragluniaeth!"--"my own dear boy! fy machgen annwyli!" then the old woman took her turn: "master david! eh, but you're changed, mun!"--then a lot of welsh exclamations, which until the welsh can agree to spell their tongue phonetically i shall not insert--"five years since you left us! eh, and i never thought to see you no more. some said you wass dead, others that you wass taken prisoner by the wild boars. but here you are, and welcome--indeed--" then master david between the embraces was scanned, a little more critically than by the purblind father, but with distinct approval. at last david stood apart in the stone-flagged hall of the vicarage. his abundant hair was rumpled, his face was stained by other people's tears, his collar, tie, dress disordered, and his heart touched. it was a rare experience in his twenty-four years of life--he guessed that should be his age--to find himself really taken on trust, really desired and loved. honoria's friendship was a pure and precious thing, but in its very purity carefully restrained. praddy's kindness, and the office boy's worship had both been gratifying to vivie's self-esteem, but both had to be kept at bay. somehow the love of a father and of an old nurse were of a different category to these other contacts. all these thoughts passed through david's brain in thirty seconds. he shook himself, straightened himself, smiled adequately, and tried to live up to the situation. "dear father! and dear ... nannie! (a bold but successful deduction). how sweet of you both--greeting me like this. i've come home a very different david to the one that left you--what was it? five--six years ago?--to go to mr. praed's studio. i've learnt a lot in the interval. but i'm so sick of the past, i don't want to talk about it more than i can help, and i've been in very queer health since i got ill--and--wounded--in--south africa. my memory has gone for many things--i'm afraid i've forgotten all my welsh, nannie, but it'll soon come back, that is, if i may stay here a bit." (exclamations from father and nurse: "this is your _home_, davy-bach!") "i'm not going to stay too long this time because i've got my living to earn in london.... "did you never hear anything about me from ... south africa ... or the war office--or--your old college chum, mr. gardner?" "i heard--my own dear boy--" said the revd. howel, again taking him in his arms in a renewed spasm of affection. "i heard you were wounded and very ill in the camp hospital at colesberg. it was a nursing sister, i think, who sent me the information. i wrote several times to the war office, my letters were acknowledged, that was all. then sam gardner wrote to me from margate and said his son had been in the same hospital with you. later on i saw in a bristol paper that this hospital--colesberg--had fallen into the hands of the boers and the cape insurgents. then i said to myself 'my poor boy's been taken prisoner' and as time went on, 'my poor boy's dead, or he would have written to me.'" here the revd. howel stopped to wipe his eyes and blow his nose. david touched through his armour of cynicism, said--nannie retiring to prepare the evening meal--"father dear, though i don't want to refer too often to the past, i behaved disgracefully some time ago and the colonies seemed my only chance of setting myself right. i did manage to get away from the boers, but i had not the courage to present myself before you till i had done something to regain your good opinion. i have got now good employment in london and i'm even reading up law. we will talk of that by and bye but i tell you now--from my heart--i am a different david to the one you knew, and you shall never regret taking me back." both father and son were crying now, for emotion especially in wales is catching. but the father laughed through his tears; and incoherently thanked god for the return of the prodigal--a fine upstanding lad--whole and sound. "no taint about _you_, davy, _i'll_ be bound. why your voice alone shows you've been a clean liver. it's music in my ears, and if i could see as well as i can hear i'd wager you're a handsome lad and have lost much of your foolishness. davy, lad" (lowering his voice) "you've no cause to be anxious about jenny. she--she--had a boy, but we got her married to a miner--i made it right with him. she has another child now, but they're being brought up together. we won't refer to it again. she lives twenty miles from here, at gower--and ... and ... there's an end of it.... "now you won't run away back to london till you're obliged? where's your luggage? at pontyffynon?" "no," said david, a little non-plussed at evidences of his dissolute past and this unexpected fatherhood assumed on his account. "i haven't more luggage than what is contained in my bicycle bag. but don't let that concern you. i'll go over to swansea one day or some nearer town and buy what may be necessary, and i'll stay with you all my holidays, tell you all my plans, and even after i go back to london i'll always come down here when i can get away. for the present i'm going simply to enjoy myself for the first time in my life. the last four years we'll look on as a horrid dream. what a paradise you live in." his eye ranged over the two-storeyed, soundly-built stone house facing south, with mountains behind and the western sun throwing shafts of warm yellow green over the lawn and the flower beds; over clumps of elms in the middle, southern distance, that might have been planted by the romans (who loved this part of wales). bees, butterflies and swallows were in the air; the distant lowing of kine, the scent of the roses, the clatter in the kitchen where nannie aided by another female servant was preparing supper, even the barking of a watch dog; aware that something unusual was going on, completed the impression of the blissful countryside. "what a paradise you live in! how _could_ i have left it?" "ay, dear lad; i doubt not it looks strange and new to you since you've been in south africa and london. but it'll soon seem homelike enough. and now you'll like to see your room, and have a wash before supper. tom, the gardener, shall take in your bicycle and give it a rub over. i've still got the old one here in the coach-house which you left behind. tom's new, since you left. he's not so clever with the bees as your old friend evan was, but he's a steadier lad. i fear me evan led you into some of your scrapes. the fault was partly mine. i shouldn't have let you run wild so much, but i was so wrapped up in my studies--well, well!" david was careful to play his part sufficiently to say when shown into his old bedroom, "just the same, father; scarcely a bit altered--but isn't the bed moved--to another place?" "you're right, my boy--ah! your memory can't be as bad as you pretend. yes, we moved it there, bridget and i, because the archdeacon came once to stay and complained of the draught from the window." "the deuce he did!" said david. "well, _i_ shan't complain of anything." his father left him and he then proceeded to lay out the small store of things he had brought in his bicycle bag, giving special prominence to the shaving tackle. he had just finished a summary toilet when there was a tap on the door, and, suppressing an exclamation of impatience--for he dearly wanted time and solitude for collected thought--he admitted bridget. "well, nannie," he said, "come for a gossip?" "yess. i can hardly bear to take my eyes off you, for you've changed, you _have_ changed. and yet, i don't know? you don't look much older than you wass when you went off to london to be an architect. your cheek--" (lifting her hand and stroking it, while david tried hard not to wince) "your cheek's as soft and smooth as it was then, as any young girl's. wherever you've been, the world has not treated you very bad. no one would have dreamt you'd been all the way to south africa to them wild boars. but some men wear wonderful well. i suppose your father giv' you a bit of a shock? he's much older looking; and he wassn't suffering, to speak of, from his sight when you went away. and now he can hardly see to read even with his new spectol. old doctor murgatroyd can't do nothing for him--advises him to go to see some bristol or london eye-doctor. but after you seemed to disappear in africa he had no heart for trying to get his sight back. he'd sit for hours doing nothing but think and talk, all about old welsh times, or bible times. of course he knows hiss services by heart; hiss only job wass with the lessons.... but you see, he'd often only have me and the girl and tom in church. there's a new preacher up at little bethel that's drawn all the village folk to hear him. but your father'll be a different man now--you see, he'll be like a boy again. and if you could stay long enough, you might take him to bristol--or clifton i think it wass--to see if they could do anything about his eyes.... "the past's the past and we aren't going to say no more about it, and now you've turned over a new leaf--somehow i _can't_ feel you're the same person--don't go worrying yourself about that slut jenny. _she's_ all right. after your baby was born at her mother's, she went into service at llanelly and there she met a miner who's at work on the new coal mine in gower. he wasn't a bad sort of chap and when he'd heard her story he said for a matter of twenty pound he'd marry her and take over her baby. so your father paid the twenty pounds, and if she'll only keep straight she'll be none the worse for what's happened. i always said it wass my fault. it wass the year i had to go away to my sister, and your father had to go to st. david's, and after all, if it hadn't 'a-been you, it 'd 'a-been young evan. why there's bin some girls in the village have had two and even three babies before they settled down and got married. now we must dish up supper. i've given you lots and lots of pancakes and the cream and honey you wass always so fond of--you bad boy--" she ventured a kiss on the smooth cheek of her nursling and heavily descended the stairs. david had a very bad night, because to please his old nurse he had eaten too many of her pancakes with cream and honey. in fact, he had at last to tip-toe down through a sleeping house cautiously to let himself out and relieve his feelings by pacing the verandah till the nausea passed off. after that he lay long awake trying to size up the situation. he got his thoughts at last into some such shape as this:-- "it's clear i was a regular young rake before i was sent up to london to be praddy's pupil. apparently i seduced the housemaid or kitchenmaid--my father's establishment seems to consist of nannie who is housekeeper and cook, and a maid who does housework and helps in the kitchen--and this unfortunate girl who fell a prey to my solicitations--or more likely misled me--afterwards gave birth to a child attributed either to my fatherhood or the gardener's. but the matter has been hushed up by a payment of twenty pounds and the girl is now married and respectable and ought to give no further trouble. i suppose that was a climax of naughtiness on my part and the main reason why i was sent away. the two people who matter most have received me without doubt or question, but the one to be wary about is the old nurse, whose very affection makes her inconveniently inquisitive. _mem._ get up and lock my door, or else she may come in with hot water or something in the morning and take me by surprise. "the original david is evidently dead and well out of the way. there can be no harm in my taking his place, at any rate for a few years: it may give the old man new life and genuine happiness, for i shall play my part as a good son, and certainly shall cost him nothing. i'll begin by taking him to an oculist and finding out what is wrong with his eyes.... probably only cataract. it may be possible to effect a cure and he can then finish his book on the history of glamorganshire from earliest times. must remember, by the bye, that the welsh change most of the old _m's_ into _f's_ and that this country is called forganwg, with the _w_ pronounced like _oo_, and the _f_ like _v_. must learn some welsh. what a nuisance. but nothing is worth doing if it isn't done well. if i can keep this deception up this would be a jolly place to come to for occasional holidays, and i simply couldn't have a better reference to respectability, sex and station with the benchers of lincoln's inn than 'my father,' the revd. howel williams, vicar of pontystrad. they'll probably want a second or a third reference. can i rely on praddy? is it possible i might work up my acquaintance with that professor whom i met in the train? i'll see. perhaps i could attend classes of his if he lectures in london." then the plotting david fell asleep at last and woke to hear the loud tapping on his door at eight o'clock, of bridget, rather surprised to find the door locked, but entering (when he had garbed himself in his norfolk jacket and opened the door), with hot water for shaving and a cup of tea. it was a hot july morning, and while he dressed, the southern breeze came in through the open window scented by the roses and the lemon verbena growing against the wall. his father was pacing up and down the hall and the verandah restlessly awaiting him, fearing lest the whole episode of the day before might not have been one of his waking dreams. his failing sight made reading almost a torture and writing more a matter of feeling than visual perception. time therefore hung wearisomely on his hands; bridget was not a good reader, besides being too busy a housekeeper to have time for it. had david really returned to him? would he sometimes read aloud and sometimes write his letters, or even the finish of his history? too good to be true! but there was david coming down the stairs, greeting him with tender affection. "read and write for you, father? of course! but before i go back to london--and unfortunately i _must_ go back early in august--i'm going to take you to see an oculist--bristol or clifton perhaps--and get your sight restored." after breakfast, however, the father decided he must take david round the village, to see and be seen. david was not very anxious to go, but as the revd. howel looked disappointed he gave in. it had to be got over some time or other. so they first visited the church, a building in the form of a cross, with an imposing battlemented tower. here david asked to inspect the registers and found therein (while the old gentleman silently prayed or sat in mute thankfulness in a sunny corner)--the record of his father's marriage to mary vavasour twenty-six years before (mary was twenty-three and the revd. howel forty at the time) and of his own baptism two years afterwards. then issuing from the church, father and son walked through the village, the father pointing out the changes for better or worse that had taken place in four years, and not noticing the vagueness of his son's memories of either persons or features in the landscape. the village, like most welsh villages, was of white-washed cottages, slate-roofed, but it was embowered with that luxuriance of foliage and flowers which makes glamorganshire--out of sight of the coal-mining--seem an earthly paradise. every now and then the revd. howel would nudge his son and say: "that man who spoke was old goronwy, as big a scoundrel now as he was five years ago," or he would introduce david to a villager of whom he thought more favourably. if she were a young woman she generally smirked and looked sideways; if a man he grunted out a welsh greeting or only gave a nod of surly recognition. several professed fluent recognition but some said in welsh "he wasn't a bit like the mr. david _they_ had known." whereupon the revd. howel laughed and said: "wait till you have been out to south africa fighting for your king and country and see if _that_ doesn't change _you_!" the visit to the clifton oculist resulted in a great success. the oculist after two or three days' preparation in a nursing home performed the operation and advised david then to leave his father for a few days (promising if any unfavourable symptoms supervened he would telegraph) so that he might pass the time in sleep as much as possible, and with no mental stimulation. during this interval david transferred himself and his bicycle to swansea, and thence visited the gower caves where he ran up against rossiter once more and spent delightful hours being inducted into palæontology by rossiter and his companions. then back to--by contrast--boresome clifton (except for its zoological gardens). after another week his father was well enough to be escorted home. in another fortnight he might be able to use his eyes, and soon after that would be able to read and write--in moderation. but david could not wait to see his intervention crowned with complete success. he must keep faith with honoria who would be wanting a long holiday in switzerland; and their joint business must not suffer by his absence from london. there were, indeed, times when the peace and comfort and beauty of pontystrad got hold of him and he asked himself: "why not settle down here for the rest of his life, put aside other ambitions, attempt no more than this initial fraud, leave the hateful world wherein women had only three chances to men's seven." then there would arise once more fierce ambition, the resolve to avenge vivien warren for her handicaps, the desire to keep tryst with honoria and to enjoy more of rossiter's society. besides, he ran a constant risk of discovery under the affectionate but puzzled inspection of the old nurse. in her mind, residence amongst the "wild boars," service in an army, travel and adventure generally during an absence of five years, as well as emergence from adolescence into manhood, accounted for much change in physical appearance, but not sufficiently for the extraordinary change in _morale_: the contrast between the vicious, untidy, selfish, insolent boy that had gone off to london with ill-concealed glee in and this grave-mannered, polite, considerate, pleasant-voiced young man who had already managed to find good employment in london before he revealed himself anew to his delighted father. these doubts david read in nannie's mind. but he would not give them time and chance to become more precise and formulated. gradually she would become used to the seeming miracle. in the meantime he would return to london, and if his father's recovery was complete he would not revisit "home" till christmas. as soon as he was able to write, his father would forward him the copy of his birth-certificate, and he would likewise answer in the sense agreed upon any letters of reference or enquiry: would state the apprenticeship to architecture with praed a.r.a., and then the impulse to go out to south africa, the slight wound--david insisted it was slight, a fuss about nothing, because he had enquired about necrosis of the jaw and realized that even if he had recovered it would have left indisputable marks on face and throat. in fact there were so many complications involved in an escape from the boers, only to be justified under the code of honour prevailing in war time, that he would rather his father said little or nothing about south africa but left him to explain all that. a point of view readily grasped by the revd. howel, who to get such a son back would even have not thought too badly of desertion--and the negative letters of the war office said nothing of that. so early in september, after the most varied, anxious, successful six weeks in his life--so far--david vavasour williams returned to fig tree court, inner temple. chapter v reading for the bar it had been a hot, windless day in london, in early september. though summer was in full swing in the country without a hint of autumn, the foliage in the squares and gardens of the inns of court was already seared and a little shrivelled. the privet hedges were almost black green; and the mould in the dismal borders that they screened looked as though it had never known rain or hose water and as if it could no more grow bright-tinted flowers than the asbestos of a gas stove which it resembled in consistency and colour. it was now an evening, ending one of those days which are peculiarly disheartening to a londoner returned from a long stay in the depths of the country--a country which has hills and streams, ferny hollows, groups of birches, knolls surmounted with pines, meadows of lush, emerald-green grass, full-foliaged elms, twisted oaks, orchards hung with reddening apples, red winding lanes between unchecked hedges, blue mountains in the far distance, and the glimpse of a river or of ponds large enough to be called a mere or even a lake. the exhausted london to which david williams had returned a few days previously had lost a few thousands of its west-end and city population--just, in fact, most of its interesting if unlikable folk, its people who mattered, its insolent spoilt darlings whom you liked to recognize in the carlton atrium, in hyde park, in a box at the theatre: yet the frowsy, worthy millions were there all the same. the air of its then smelly streets was used up and had the ammoniac strench of the stable. it was a weary london. the london actors had not returned from cornwall and switzerland. provincial companies enjoyed--a little anxiously owing to uncertain receipts at the box office--a brief license on the boards of famous play-houses. the newspapers had exhausted the stunt of the silly season and were at their flattest and most yawn-provoking. the south african war had reached its dreariest stage.... bertie adams on this close september evening had out-stayed the other employés of _fraser and warren_ in their fifth floor office at no. - chancery lane. he had remained after office hours to do a little work, a little "self-improvement"; and he was just about to close the outer office and leave the key with the housekeeper, when the lift came surging up and out of it stepped a young man in a summer suit and a bowler hat who, to bertie's astonishment, not only dashed straight at the door of the partners' room, but opened its yale lock with a latch-key as though long accustomed to do so. "but, sir!..." exclaimed the junior clerk (his promotion to that rank had tacitly dated from vivie warren's departure). "it's all right," said the stranger. "i'm mr. david williams and i've come to draw up some notes for mrs. claridge. i dare say miss fraser has told you i should work in the office every now and then whilst my cousin--miss warren, you know--is away. you needn't wait, though you can close the outer office before you go; and, by the bye, you might fetch me _who's who_ for the present year." all this was said a little breathlessly. bertie brought the volume, then only half the size of its present bulk, because it lacked our new nobility and gave no heed to your favourite recreation. d.v. williams stood in the yellow light of the west window, reading a letter... "cousin? no! twin brother, perhaps; but had she one?..." mused bertie... and then, that never-to-be-forgotten voice ... "here's 'oo's oo--er--hoo's hoo, i mean.... miss..." he only added the last word as by some sub-conscious instinct. "_mister_ williams," said vivien-david-warren williams, facing him with resolute eyes. "be quite clear about that, adams; _david vavasour williams_, miss warren's cousin." "indeed i will be, miss ... mister ... er ... sir..." said the transfigured bertie (his brain voice saying over and over again in ecstasy ... "_i_ tumble to it! _i_ tumble to it!"). and then again "_indeed_ i will, mr. williams. i'm a bit stupidlike this evenin' ... readin' too much.... may i stay and help you, sir? i'm pretty quick on the typewriter, miss warren may have told you ... sir ... and i ain't--i mean--_i am not_--half bad with me shorthand.... you know--i mean, _she_ would know i'd joined them evenin' classes..." "thank you, adams; but if you have joined the evening classes you oughtn't to interrupt your attendance there. i can _quite_ manage here alone and you need not be afraid: i shall leave everything properly closed. you could give up the key of the outer office as you go out. you may often find me at work here after office hours, but that need not disturb you ... and i need hardly say, after all miss fraser and miss warren have told me about you, i rely on you to be at all times thoroughly discreet and not likely to discuss the work of this firm or my share in it with any one?"... "indeed you may ... mr. williams ... indeed you may.... oh! i'm so happy.... good-night ... sir!" and adams's heart was too full for attendance at a lecture on roman law. he went off instead to the play. he himself belonged now to the world of romance. he knew of things--and wild horses and red-hot tweezers should not tear the knowledge from him, or make him formulate his deductions--he knew of things as amazing, as prodigal of developments as anything in the problem play enacted beyond the pit and the stalls; he was the younger brother of herbert waring and the comrade of jessie joseph: at that moment deceiving the sleuth hounds of stage law by parading in her fiancé's evening dress and going to prison for his sake. beryl claridge had taken up much of vivie warren's work on the st of august in that year, while honoria fraser was touring in switzerland. miss mullet and miss steynes were replaced (steynes staying on a little later to initiate the new-comers) by two young women so commonplace yet such efficient machines that their names are not worth hunting up or inventing. if i have to refer to them i will call them miss a. and miss b. beryl claridge was closely scanned by bertie adams, and frequently compared in his mind with the absent and idealized vivie. he decided that although she was shrewd and clever and very good-looking, he did not like her. she smoked too many cigarettes for . she had her curly hair "bobbed" (though the term was not invented then). she put up her feet too high and too often; so much so that the scandalized bertie saw she wore black knickerbockers and no petticoats under her smart "tailor-made." she snapped your head off, was short, sharp and insolent, joked too much with the spectacled women clerks (who became her willing slaves); then would ask bertie about his best girl and tell him he'd got jolly good teeth, a good biceps and quite a nice beginning of a moustache. but she was a worker: no doubt of that! of course, in the dead season there were not many clients to shock or to win over by her nonchalant manners, only a few women who required advice as to houses, stocks, and shares, law, or private enquiries as to the good faith of husbands or fiancés. such as found their way up in the lift were a little disappointed at seeing beryl in vivie's chair or at not being received by their old friend honoria fraser. but beryl was too good a business woman to put them off with any license of speech or manners. for the rest she spent august and early september in "mugging up" the firm's business. although deep down in her curious little heart, under all her affectation of hardness and insolent disdain of public or family opinion she firmly loved her architect and the children she had borne him, she desired quite as passionately to be self-supporting, to earn a sufficient income of her own, to be dependent on no one. she might have her passing caprices and her loose and flippant mode of talking, but she wasn't going to be a failure, a cadger, a parasite, a "fallen" woman. she fully realized that in england no woman _has_ fallen who is self-supporting, whose income meets her expenses and who pays her way. given those guarantees, all else that she does which is not actually criminal is eventually put down to mere eccentricity. so honoria's offer and honoria's business provided her with a most welcome opening. she realized the opportunities that lay before this woman's office for general inquiries, established in the closing years of the nineteenth century--this business that before woman's enfranchisement nibbled discreetly at the careers and the openings for profit-making hitherto rigidly reserved for man. she wasn't going to let honoria down. honoria, she realized, was in herself equivalent to many thousands of pounds in capital. her reputation was flawless. she was known to and esteemed by a host of women of the upper middle class. her cambridge reputation for learning, her eventual inheritance of eighty thousand pounds were unexpressed reasons for many a woman of good standing preferring to confide her affairs to the judgment of _fraser and warren_, in preference to dealing with male legal advisers, male land agents, men on the stock exchange, men in house property business. so beryl became in most respects a source of strength to honoria fraser, deprived for a time of the overt co-operation of her junior partner. beryl in the first few weeks of her stay evinced small interest in the departure of vivien warren and her reasons for going abroad. she had a scheme of her own in which her architect would take a prominent part, for providing women--authoresses, actresses, or the wives of the newly enriched--with week-end cottages; the desire for which was born with the twentieth century and fostered by the invention of motors and bicycles. cases before the firm for opinions on intricate legal problems beryl was advised to place before the consideration of one of honoria's friends, a law student, mr. d.v. williams, who would shortly be back from his holiday and who had agreed to look in at the office from time to time and go through such papers as were set aside for him to read. beryl had remarked--without any intention behind it--on seeing some of his notes initialled v.w. that it was rum he should have the same initials as that vivie girl whom she remembered at newnham ... who was "so silent and standoffish and easily shocked." but she noticed later that when mr. williams got to work his initials were really three and not two--d.v.w. one thing with the other: her departure from the office at the regular closing hour--five--so that she might see her babies before they were put to bed; williams's habit of coming to work after six; kept them from meeting till the october of . when they did meet after honoria's return from switzerland, beryl scanned the law student critically; decided he was rather nice-looking but very pre-occupied; perhaps engaged to some girl whose parents objected; rather mysterious, _quand même_; she had heard some one say this mr. david williams was a cousin or something of vivie warren ... what if he were in love with vivie and she had gone away because she had some fad or other about not wanting to marry? well! all this could be looked into some other time, if it were worth bothering about at all. or could williams be spoony on honoria? after her money? he was much younger--evidently--but young men adored ripe women, and young girls idolized elderly soldiers. _c'était à voir_ (beryl ever since she had been to paris on a stolen honeymoon with the architect liked saying things to herself in french). towards the end of october, david received at fig tree court a letter from his father in glamorganshire. pontystrad vicarage, _october_ , . my dear son,-- the improvement in my sight continues. i can now read a little every day, by daylight, without pain or fatigue, and write letters. i feel i owe you a long one; but i shall write a portion each day and not try my eyes unduly. i am glad to know you are now settled down in chambers at fig tree court in the temple and have begun your studies for the bar. you could not have taken up a finer profession. what seems to me so wonderful is that you should be able to earn your living at the same time and be no charge on me. i accept your assurances that you need no support; but never forget, my dear son, that if you _do_, i am ready and willing to help. you sowed your wild oats--perhaps we both exaggerated the sins of the wild years--at any rate you have made a noble reparation. what a splendid school the colonies must be! what a difference between the david who left me five years ago for mr. praed's studio and the david who returned to me last summer! i can never be sufficiently thankful to almighty god for the change he has wrought in you! no lip religion, but a change of heart. i presume you explained everything to the colonial office after you got back to london and that you are now free to take up a civil career? the people out there never sent me any further information; but the other day one of my letters to you (written after i had received the sad news) returned to me, with the information that the hospital you were in had been captured by the boers and that you could not be traced. i enclose it. you can now finish up the story yourself and let the authorities know how you got away and returned home. the other day that impudent baggage jenny gorlais came and asked to see me ... she said her husband was out of work and refused to give her enough money to provide for all her children, that he had advised her to apply to _you_ for the maintenance of _your_ son! relying on what you had told me i sent for bridget and we both told her we had made every enquiry and now refused absolutely to believe in her stories of five years ago--that we were sure you were _not_ the father of her eldest child. bridget, for example, believed the postman was its father. jenny burst into tears, and as she did not persist in her claim my heart was moved, and i gave her ten shillings, but told her _pretty plainly_ that if she ever made such a claim again i should go to the police. you should have heard bridget defending you! _such_ a champion. if you want a witness to character for your references you should call _her_! she is loud in your praise. _october_ . there is one thing i want to tell you; and it is easier to write it than say it. your mother did not die when you were three years old--much worse: she left me--ran away with an engineer who was tracing out the branch railway. he seemed a nice young fellow and i had him often up at the vicarage, and _that_ was the way he repaid my hospitality! he wrote to me a year afterwards asking me to divorce her. as though a clergyman of the church of england could do such a thing! i had offered to take her back--not then--it would have been a mockery--but by putting advertisements into the south wales papers. but after her paramour's letter--which i did not answer--i never heard any more about her.... ["damn it all," said david to himself at this juncture of the letter--he was training himself to swear in a moderate, gentlemanly way--"damn it all! whatever i do, it seems i _cannot_ come from altogether respectable stock."...] you grew up therefore without a mother's care, though good bridget did her best. when you were a child i fear i rather neglected you. i was so disappointed and embittered that i sought consolation in the legends of our beloved country and in scriptural exegesis. you were rather a naughty boy at swansea grammar school and somewhat of a scamp at malvern college--well! we won't go over all that again. i quite understand your reticence about the past. once again i think the blame was mine as much as yours. i ought to have interested myself more in your pursuits and games ... what a pity, by the bye, that you seem to have lost your gift of drawing and painting! i do remember how at one time we were drawn together over the old welsh legends and the very clever drawings you made of national heroes and heroines--they seemed to come on you as quite a surprise when i took them out of the old portfolio. but about your mother--for it is necessary you should know all i can tell you in case you have to answer questions as to your parentage. your mother's name was, as you know, mary vavasour. it is a common name in south wales though it seems to be norman french. she came to our pontystrad school as a teacher in . her father was something to do with mining at merthyr. i fell in love with her--she had a sweet face--and married her in . you were born two years afterwards. bridget had been my housekeeper before i was married and i asked her to stay on lest your mother should be inexperienced at first in the domestic arts. they never got on well together and when mary had recovered from her confinement and seemed disposed to take up housekeeping i sent away poor bridget reluctantly and only took her back after your mother's flight. bridget was a second mother to you as you know, though i fear you never showed her much affection till these later days. _october_ . my eyes seem to be improving instead of getting tired with the new delights of reading and writing. i owe all this to you and to the clever oculist at clifton. dr. murgatroyd from pontyffynon looked in here the other day, to ask about your return. he seemed almost to grudge me my restored sight because i had got it from other people's advice. said _he_ could have advised an operation only he never believed my heart would stand it. when i told him they had mixed the anæsthetic with oxygen he became quite angry--and exclaimed against these new-fangled notions. but i must not use up my new found energy writing about him. i want to finish my letter in a business-like fashion so that you may know all that is necessary to be known about yourself and your position. you may have at any moment to answer questions before you get called to the bar, and with your defective memory--i am glad to hear things in the past are becoming clearer to you--i am sure with god's grace you will wholly recover soon from the effects of your wound and your illness--what was i writing? i meant to say that you ought to know the main facts about your family and your position. i was an only son. your grandfather was a prosperous farmer and auctioneer. you have distant cousins, vaughans and williamses, and some others living at shrewsbury named price. i have written to none of them about your return because they never evinced any interest in me or my concerns. your mother's people, her vavasour relations at cardiff--did not seem to me to be very respectable, though her father was a well-educated man for his position. he died--i heard--in a mine accident. i am not poorly off for a welsh clergyman. my mother--a price of ystrwy--wanted me to go into the church and prevailed on your grandfather to send me first to malvern and next to cambridge. it was at cambridge that i met your comrade's father--sam gardner, i mean. he was rather wild in his college days and to tell you the truth, i never cared to keep up with him much--he had such very rowdy friends. my mother died while i was at cambridge and in his later years your grandfather married again--his housekeeper--and rather muddled his affairs, because at one time he was quite well off. after i was ordained he purchased for me the advowson of this living. all that came to me from his estate, however, was a sum of about eleven thousand pounds. this used to bring me in about five hundred pounds a year, and in addition to that was the fluctuating two hundred and fifty pounds income from my benefice. i took about three thousand pounds out of my capital to pay the debts you ran up, to article you to mr. praed; and, i must admit, to get my "tales from taliessin" and "legends of the welsh saints" privately printed at cardiff. i am afraid i wasted much good money on the desire to see my cymraeg studies in print. well: there i am! with about eight or nine thousand pounds to leave. i have not altered my will--leaving it all to you, subject to an annuity of £ a year to your faithful nannie. i was projecting an alteration in case of your death, when you most happily returned. i may live another ten years yet. you have put new life into me. one charge, however, i was going to have laid on you; while you were with me i could not bear to speak of these matters. if at any time after i'm gone you should come across your unhappy mother and find her in distressed circumstances, i bid you provide for her, but how much, i leave entirely to your judgment. meantime, here i am with an income of nearly £ a year. i live very simply, as you see, but i give away a good deal in local charity. the people are getting better wages now; in any case they are usually most ungrateful. i feel i should be happier if i diverted some of this alms-giving to you. you must find this preparatory life very expensive. you must let me send you twenty-five pounds every half-year for pocket money. here is a cheque on the south wales bank for the first instalment. and remember, if you are in _any_ difficulty about your career that a little money can get over do not hesitate to apply to me. your loving father, howel vaughan williams. p.s. i have taken five days to write this but see how steady the handwriting is. it is a pleasure to me to look on my own handwriting again. and i feel i owe it all to you! i also forgot in the body of the letter to tell you one curious thing. you know we are here on the borders of an interesting vein of limestone which runs all round the coal beds. i dare say you remember as a boy of fifteen or so spraining your ankle in griffith's hole? well griffith's hole turns out to be the entrance into a wonderful cave in the limestone. hither came the other day a party of scientific men who think that majestic first chapter of genesis to be a babylonian legend! it appears they discovered or thought they discovered the remains of ancient man in griffith's hole. i invited them to tea at the vicarage and amongst them was a very learned gentleman quite as wise as but less aggressive than the others. he was known as "professor rossiter"; and commenting on the similarity of my name with that of a "very agreeable young gentleman" whom he had recently seen in gower, it turned out that you were an acquaintance of his. he thinks it a great pity that you are reading for the bar and wishes you had taken up science instead. at any rate he hopes you will go and see him in london one day--no. park crescent. portland place. h. v. w. several times in reading this letter the tears stood in david's eyes. so much trust and kindness made him momentarily sorry at the double life he was leading. if it were possible to establish the death of the wastrel he was personating he would perhaps allow his "father" to live on in this new-found happiness; but if the real d.v.w. were alive some effort must be made to help him out of the slough--perhaps to bring him back. he would try to find out through frank gardner. some time before vivie warren had taken her departure, she had left behind in honoria fraser's temporary care a power of attorney duly executed in favour of david vavasour williams; and reciprocally d.v.w. had executed another in favour of vivien warren. both these documents lay securely in the little safe that david had had fitted into the wall of his sitting-room in fig tree court. also david had opened an account in his own name after he got back from wales, at the temple bar branch of the c. &. c. bank. into this he now paid the cheque for twenty-five pounds which his father had sent as pocket money. a few days afterwards, vivie warren reappeared--in spirit--and indited a letter to frank gardner's agents in cape town. she was careful to give no address at the head of the letter and to post it at victoria station. in it she said she was starting on a tour abroad, but asked him to do what he could to trace the boy who had lain so grievously ill in the hospital at colesberg. had he recovered after the boers had taken colesberg? as a rumour had reached her that he had, and had even returned to england. she wanted to know, and if they ever met again would tell him why. meanwhile if he got any news would he address it to _her_, care of honoria fraser, queen anne's mansions, st. james's park; as her own address would be quite uncertain for the present. or it would do quite as well if he wrote to praddy; but _not_ to his father, which might only needlessly agitate the old clergyman down in wales, whom vivie by an unexpected chance had come to know. the first result of this letter a year later was a statement of frank's belief, almost certainty, that his acquaintance of the hospital _had_ died and been buried while the boers held possession of colesberg; and that indeed was the utmost that was ever learnt about the end of the ill-fated son of howel vaughan williams and mary his wife, who were wedded in sunshine and with fair prospects of happiness in the early summer of . the new-born david vavasour williams having by november settled all these details, having arranged to pay the very modest rent of fifty-five pounds for his three rooms at fig tree court, and twenty-five pounds a year to the housekeeper who was to "do" for him and another gentleman on the same floor--a gentleman who was most anxious to be chummy with the new tenant of the opposite chambers but whose advances were firmly though civilly kept at bay--having likewise passed his preliminary examination (since he could not avow that inside his clothes he was a third wrangler), having satisfied his two "godfathers" of the bar that he was a fit person to recommend to the benchers; having arranged to read with a barrister in chambers, and settled all other preliminaries of importance: decided that he would pay an afternoon call on the rossiters in portland place and see how the land lay there. already a strange exhilaration was spreading over david's mind. life was not twice but ten times more interesting than it had appeared to the prejudiced eyes of vivien warren. it was as though she--he--had passed through some magic door, gone through the looking-glass and was contemplating the same world as the one vivie had known for--shall we say fifteen?--years, but a world which viewed from a different standpoint was quite changed in proportions, in colour, in the conjunction of events. it was a world in which everything was made smooth and easy before the semblance of manhood. what a joy to be rid of skirts and petticoats! to be able to run after and leap on to an omnibus, to wear the same hat day after day just stuck on top of her curly head. not, perhaps, to change her clothes, between her uprising and her retirement to bed, unless she were going out to dine. no simpering. no need to ask favours. no compliments. it is true she felt awkward in the presence of women, not quite the same, even with honoria. but with men. what a difference! she felt she had never really known men before. at first the frank speech, the expletives, the smoking-room stories made her a little uncomfortable and occasionally called forth an irrepressible blush. but this was not to her disadvantage. it made her seem younger, and created a good impression on her tutors and acquaintances. "a nice modest boy, fresh from the country--pity to lead him astray--won't preserve his innocence long--" was the vaguely defined impression, contact with her--him, i mean--made on most decent male minds. many a lad comes up from the country to commence his career in london who knew far less than the unfortunate vivie had been compelled to know of the shady side of life; who is compelled to lead a somewhat retired life by straitness of means; whose determination towards probity and regularity of life is respected by the men of law among whom he finds himself. but david having decided--he did not quite know why--to pursue his acquaintance with professor rossiter; having written to ask if he might do so (as a matter of fact he frequently saw rossiter walking across the gardens of new square to go to the museum of the royal college of surgeons: he recollected him immediately but rossiter did not reciprocate, being absent-minded); and having received a card from "linda rossiter" to say they would be at home throughout the winter on thursdays, between and : went on one of those thursdays and made definite progress with the great friendship of his life. chapter vi the rossiters the rossiters' house in park crescent was at the northern end of portland place, and its high-walled garden--the stables that were afterwards to become a garage--and michael rossiter's long, glass-roofed studio-laboratory--abutted on one of those quiet, deadly-respectable streets at the back that are called after devon or dorset place names. the house is now a good deal altered and differently numbered, a portion of it having been destroyed in one of the air-raids, when the marylebone road was strewn with its broken glass for twenty yards. but in the winter of - and onwards till it was a noted centre of social intercourse between society and science. the rossiters were well enough off--he made quite two thousand a year out of his professorial work and his books, and her income which was £ , when she first married had risen to £ , after they had been married ten years; through the increase in value of leeds town property. mrs. rossiter had had two children, but were both dead, her facile tears were dried, she satisfied her maternal instinct by the keeping of three pug dogs which her husband secretly detested. she also had a scarlet-and-blue macaw and two cockatoos and a persian cat; but these last her husband liked or tolerated for their colour or their biological interest; only, as in the case of the dogs, he objected (though seldom angrily, out of consideration for his wife's feelings) to their being so messily and inopportunely fed. linda rossiter was liable to lose her pets as she had lost her two children by alternating days of forgetfulness with weeks of lavish over-attention. but as she readily gave way to tears on the least remonstrance, michael in the course of eleven years of married life remonstrated as little as possible. a clever, tactful parlour-maid and two good housemaids, a manservant who was devoted to the "professor" and a taxidermist who assisted him in his experiments did the rest in keeping the big house tolerably tidy and presentable. rossiter himself was too intent on the stars, the gases of decomposition, the hidden processes of life, miscegenation in star-fish, microbic diseases in man, beasts, birds and bees, the glands of the throat, the suprarenal capsules and the chemical origin of life to care much for æsthetics, for furniture and house decoration. he was the third son of an impoverished northumbrian squire who on his part cared only for the more barbarous field-sports, and when he could take his mind off them believed that at some time and place unspecified almighty god had dictated the english bible word for word, had established the english church and had scrupulously prescribed the functions and limitations of woman. his wife--michael rossiter's tenderly-loved mother--had died from a neglected prolapsus of the womb, and the old rambling house in northumberland situated in superb scenery, had in its furniture grown more and more hideous to the eye as early and mid-victorian fashions and ideals receded and modern taste shook itself free from what was tawdry, fluffy, stuffy, floppy, messy, cheaply imitative, fringed and tasselled and secretive. michael himself from sheer detestation of the surroundings under which he had grown to manhood favoured the uncovered, the naked wood or stone or slate, the bare floor, the wooden settee or cane-bottomed chair, the massive side-board, the bare mantelpiece and distempered wall. on the whole, their house in portland place satisfied tolerably well the advanced taste in domestic scenery of . but your eye was caught at once by the additions made by mrs. rossiter. linda conceived it was her womanly mission to lighten the severity of michael's choice in furniture and decorations. she introduced rickety and expensive screens that were easily knocked over; photographs in frames which toppled at a breath; covers on every flat surface that could be covered--occasional tables, tops of grand pianos. if she did not put frills round piano legs, she placed tasselled poufs about the drawing-room that every short-sighted visitor fell over, and used large bows of slightly discoloured ribbon to mask unneeded brackets. in the reception rooms food-bestrewn parrot stands were left where they ought never to be seen; and there were gilt-wired parrot cages; baskets for the pugs lined with soiled shawls; absurd ornaments, china cats with exaggerated necks, alabaster figures of stereotyped female beauty and flowerpot stands of ornate bamboo. she loved portières, and she would fain have mitigated the bareness of the panelled or distempered walls; only that here her husband was firm. she unconsciously mocked the few well-chosen, well-placed pictures on the walls (which she itched to cover with a "flock" paper) by placing in the same room on bamboo easels that matched the be-ribboned flower-stands pastel, crayon, or _gouache_ studies of the worst possible taste. michael's library alone was free from her improvements, though it was sometimes littered with her work-bags or her work. she had long ago developed the dreadful mistake that it "helped" michael at his work if she brought hers (perfectly futile as a rule) there too. "i just sit silently in his room, my dear, and stitch or knit something for poor people in marrybone--i'm told you mayn't say mary-le-bone. i feel it _helps_ michael to know i'm there, but of course i don't interrupt him at his _work_." as a matter of fact she did, confoundedly. but fortunately she soon grew sleepy or restless. she would yawn, as she believed "prettily," but certainly noisily; or she would wonder "how time was going," and of course her twenty-guinea watch never went, or if it was going was seldom within one hour of the actual time. or she would sneeze six times in succession--little cat-like sneezes that were infinitely disturbing to a brain on the point of grasping the solution of a problem. throughout the winter months she had a little cough. oh no, you needn't think i'm preparing the way for decease through phthisis--it was one of those "kiffy" coughs due in the main to acidity--too many sweet things in her diet, too little exercise. she _thought_ she coughed with the greatest discretion but to the jarred nerves of her husband a few hearty bellows or an asthmatic wheeze would have been preferable to the fidgety, marmoset-like sounds that came from under a lace handkerchief. sometimes he would raise his eyes to speak sharply; but at the sight of the mild gaze that met his, the perfect belief that she was a soothing presence in this room of hard thinking and close writing--this superb room with its unrivalled library that he owed to the use of her wealth, his angry look would soften and he would return smile for smile. linda though a trifle fretful on occasion, especially with servants, a little petulant and huffy with a sense of her own dignity and importance as a rich woman, was completely happy in her marriage. she had never regretted it for one hour, never swerved from the conviction that she and michael were a perfect match--he, tall, stalwart, black-haired and strong; she "petite"--she loved the french adjective ever since it had been applied to her at scarborough by a sycophantic governess--petite--she would repeat, blonde, plump, or better still "potelée" (the governess had later suggested, when she came to tea and hoped to be asked to stay) _potelée_, blue-eyed and pink-cheeked. dresden china and all the stale similes applied to a type of little woman of whom the modern world has grown intolerant. it was therefore into this _milieu_ that david found himself introduced one thursday at the end of november, . he had walked the short distance from great portland street station. it was a fine day with a red sunset, and a lemon-coloured, thin moon-crescent above the sunset. the trees and bushes of park crescent were a background of dull blue haze. the surface of the broad roads was dry and polished, so his neat, patent-leather boots would still be fit for drawing-room carpets. a footman in a very plain livery--here michael was firm--opened the massive door. david passed between some statuary of too frank a style for linda's modest taste and was taken over by a butler of severe aspect who announced him into the great drawing-room as mr. david williams. he recognized rossiter at once, standing up with a tea-cup and saucer, and presumed that a fluffy, much be-furbelowed little lady at the main tea-table was mrs. rossiter, since she wore no hat. there was besides a rather alarming concourse of men and women of the world as he kept his eyes firmly fixed on mrs. rossiter for his immediate goal. rossiter met him half-way, shook hands cordially and introduced him to his wife who bowed with one of her "sweet" looks. for the moment david did not interest her. she was much more interested in trying to give an impression of profundity to lady feenix who was commenting on the professor's discoveries of the strange properties of the thyroid gland. a few introductions were effected--lady towcester, lady flower, miss knipper-totes, lady dombey, mr. lacrevy, professor ray lankester, mr. and mrs. gosse--and naturally for the most part david only half caught their names while they, without masking their indifference, closed their ears to his ("some student or other from his classes, i suppose--rather nicely dressed, rather too good-looking for a young man"); and rossiter, who had been interrupted first by mrs. rossiter asking him to observe that lady dombey had nothing on her plate, and secondly by david's entrance, resumed his discourse. goodness knew that he didn't _want_ to discourse on these occasions, but society expected it of him. there were quite twenty--twenty-two--people present and most of them--all the women--wanted to go away and say four hours afterwards: "we were (i was) at the rossiters this afternoon, and the professor was fascinating" ("great," "profoundly interesting," "shocking, my dear," "scandalous," "disturbing," "illuminating," "more-than-usually- enthralling-only-she-_would_-keep-interrupting-why-_is_-she-such-a-fool?") according to the idiosyncrasy of the diner-out. "he talked to us about the thyroid gland--i don't believe poor bob's got one, between ourselves--and how if you enlarged it or reduced it you'd adjust people's characters to suit the needs of society; and all about chimpanzi's blood--i believe he _vivisects_ half through the night in that studio behind the house--being the same as ours; and then ray lankester and chalmers mitchell argued about the cæca--cæcums, you know--something to do with appendicitis--of the mammalia, and altogether we had a high old time--i _always_ learn something on their thursdays." well: rossiter resumed his description of an experiment he was making--quite an everyday one, of course, for there were at least three men present to whom he wasn't going to give away clues prematurely. an experiment on the motor biallaxis of dormice. [mrs. rossiter had six months previously bought a dormouse in a cage at a bazaar, and after idolizing it for a week had forgotten all about it. her husband had rescued it half starved; his assistant had fed it up in the laboratory, and they had tried a few experiments on it with painless drugs with astonishing results.] the recital really was interesting and entirely outside the priggishness of science, but it was marred in consecutiveness and simplicity by mrs. rossiter's interruptions. "michael dear, lady dombey's cup!" or: "mike, could you cut that cake and hand it round?" or, if she didn't interrupt her husband she started stories and side-issues of her own in a voice that was quite distinctly heard, about a new stitch in crochet she had seen in the _queen_, or her inspection of the east marrybone soup kitchen. however when all had taken as much tea and cakes and _marrons glacés_ as they cared for--david was so shy that he had only one cup of tea and one piece of tea-cake--the large group broke up into five smaller ones. the few gradually converged, and dropping all nonsense discussed biology like good 'uns, david listening eager-eyed and enthralled at the marvels just beginning to peep out of the dissecting and vivisecting rooms and chemical laboratories in the opening years of the twentieth century. then one by one they all departed; but as david was going too rossiter detained him by a kindly pressure on the arm--a contact which sent a half-pleasant, half-disagreeable thrill through his nerves. "don't hurry away unless you really _are_ pressed for time. i want to show you some of my specimens and the place where i work." david followed him--after taking his leave of mrs. rossiter who accepted his polite sentences--a little stammered--with a slightly pompous acquiescence--followed him to the library and then through a curtained door down some steps into a great studio-laboratory, provided (behind screens) with washing places, and full of mysteries, with cupboards and shelves and further rooms beyond and a smell of chloride of lime combined with alcoholic preservatives and undefined chemicals. after a tour round this domain in which david was only slightly interested--for lack of the right education and imagination--so far he--or--she had only the mind of a mathematician--rossiter led him back into the library, drew out chairs, indicated cigarettes--even whiskey and soda if he wanted it--david declined--and then began to say what was at the back of his mind:-- "we met first in the train, the south wales express, you remember? i fancy you told me then that you had been in south africa, in this bungled war, and had been either wounded or ill in some way. in fact you went so far as to say you had had 'necrosis of the jaw,' a thing i politely doubted because whatever it was it has left no perceptible scar. of course it's damned impertinent of me to cross-examine you at all, or to ask _why_ you went to and why you left south africa. but i don't mind confessing you inspire me with a good deal of interest. "now the other day--as you know--i made the acquaintance of your father in wales--at pontystrad. i told him i had shown a young fellow some of those gower caves and how his name was--like your father's, 'williams.' of course we soon came to an understanding. then your father spoke of you in _high_ praise. what a delightful nature was yours, how considerate and kind you were--don't blush, though i admit it becomes you--well you can pretty well guess how he went on. but what interested me particularly was his next admission: how different you were as a lad--rather more than the ordinary wild oats--eh? and how completely an absence in south africa had changed you. you must forgive my cheek in dissecting your character like this. my excuse is that you yourself had rather vaguely referred to some wound or blood poisoning or operation, on the jaw or the throat. not to beat about the bush any more, the idea came into my mind that _if_ in some way the knife or the enemy's bullet had interfered with your thyroid gland--twig what i mean? i mean, that if your old man has not been exaggerating and that the difference between the naughty boy whom he sent up to london in--what was it? ?--and the perfectly behaved, good sort of chap that you are _now_ is no more than what usually happens when young men lose their cubbishness, _why_--_why_--do you take me?--i ask myself whether the change had come about through some interference with the thyroid gland. do you understand? and i thought, seeing how intensely interesting this research has become, you might have told me more about it. just what _did_ happen to you; where you were wounded, who attended to you, what operation was performed on the throat--only the rum thing is there seems to be no scar--well: now _you_ help me out, that is unless you feel more inclined to say, 'what the _hell_ does it matter to _you_?'"... david by this time has grown scarlet with embarrassment and confusion. but he endeavoured to meet the situation. "my character _has_ changed during the last five years, and especially so since i came back from south africa. but i am quite sure it was not due to any operation, on the throat or anywhere else. i really don't know _why_ i told you that silly falsehood in the train--about necrosis of the jaw. the fact is that when i was in hospital--at--colesberg, a friend of mine in the same ward used--to chaff me--and say i was going to have necrosis. i had got knocked over one day--by--the--wind of a shell and thought i was done for, but it really was next to nothing. p'raps i had a dose of fever on top. at any rate they kept me in hospital, and one morning the doctors disappeared and the boers marched in and when i got well enough i managed to escape and get away to--er--cape town and so returned--with some money--my friend frank gardner lent me." (at this stage the sick-at-heart vivie was saying to herself, "_what_ an account i'm laying up for frank to honour when he comes back--if he _does_ come back.") "i don't know _why_ i tell you all this, except that i ought never to have misled you at the start. but _if_ you are a kind and good man"--david's voice broke here--"you will forget all about it and not upset my father, i can _assure_ you i haven't done _anything_ really wrong. i haven't deserted--some day--perhaps--i can tell you all about it. but at present all that south african episode is just a horrid dream--i was more sinned against than sinning" (tears were rather in the voice at this stage). "i want to forget all about it--and settle down and vex my father no more. i want to read for the bar--a soldier's life is the very _opposite_ to what i should choose if i were a free agent. but you will trust me, won't you? you will believe me when i say i've done _nothing_ wrong, nothing that you, if you knew all the facts, would call wrong...?" speech here trailed off into emotion. despite the severest self-restraint the bosom rose and fell. a few tears trickled down the smooth cheeks--it was an ingratiating boy on the verge of manhood that rossiter saw before him. he hastened to say: "my _dear_ chap! don't say another word, unless you like to blackguard me for my impertinence in putting these questions. i _quite_ understand. we'll consider the whole thing erased from our memories. go on studying for the bar with all your might, if you must take up so barren a profession and won't become my pupil in biology--great openings, i can tell you, coming now in that direction." (a pause.) "but if it's of any interest to you, just come here as often as you like in your spare time--either to tea with mrs. rossiter or to see me at work on my experiments. i've taken a great liking to you, if you'll allow me to say so. i think there's good stuff in you. a young man reading for the bar in london is none the worse for a few friends. he must often feel pretty lonely on a sunday, for example. and he may also--now i'm going to be impertinent and paternal again--he may also pick up undesirable acquaintances, male--and female. don't you get feeling lonely, with your home far away in wales. consider yourself free of this place at any rate, and my wife and i can introduce you to some other people you might like to know. i might introduce you to mark stansfield the q.c. do you know any one in london, by the bye?" "oh yes," said david, smiling with all but one tear dried on a still coloured cheek. "i know honoria fraser--i know mr. praed the architect--" "the a.r.a.? of course; you or your father said you had been his pupil. h'm. praed. yes, i visualize him. rather a dilettante--whimsical--i didn't like what i heard of him at one time. however it's no affair of mine. and honoria fraser! she's simply one of the best women i know. it's curious she wasn't here--at least i didn't see her--this afternoon. she's a friend of my wife's. i knew her when she was at newnham. she had a great friend--what was it? violet? no, vera? vivien--yes that was it, _vivien_ warren. of course! why that business she started for women in the city somewhere is called _fraser and warren_. she was always wanting to bring this vivien warren here. said she had such a pretty colouring. i own i rather like to see a pretty woman. but she didn't come" (pulls at his pipe and thrusts another cigarette on david). "went abroad. seemed rather morose. some one who came with honoria said she had a bad mother, and honoria very rightly shut him up. by the bye, _where_ and _how_ did you come to meet honoria first?" (david was on the point of saying--he was so unstrung--"why we were at newnham together." then resolved to tell another whopper--indeed i am told there is a fascination in certain circumstances about lying--and replied): "vivien warren was my cousin. she was a vavasour on her mother's side--from south wales--and my mother was a vavasour too--" and as the disguised vivie said this, some inkling came into her mind that there _was_ a real relationship between catharine warren _née_ vavasour and the mary vavasour who was david's mother. a spasm of joy flashed through her at the possibility of her story being in some slight degree true. "i see," said rossiter, satisfied, and feeling now that the interview had lasted long enough and that there would be just time to glance at his assistant's afternoon work before he dressed for dinner.... "well, old chap. good-bye for the present. come often and see us and look upon me--i must be fifteen years older than you are--what, _twenty-four_? impossible! you don't look a day older than twenty--in fact, if you hadn't told me you'd been in south africa--however as i was saying, look on me as _in loco parentis_ while you _are_ in london. i'll show you the way out into the hall. shall they call you a cab? no? you're quite right. it's a splendid night for january. where do you live? here, write it down in my address book.... ' fig tree court, temple'--what a jolly address! are there fig trees in the temple ... still? p'raps descended from cuttings or layers the poor templars brought from the holy land." david returned to fig tree court and his studies of criminology. but his body and mind thrilled with the experiences of the afternoon; and the musty records in works of repellent binding and close, unsympathetic print of nineteenth century forgery, poisoning, assaults-on-the-person, and cruelty-to-children cases for once failed to hold his close attention. he sat all through the evening after a supper of bread and cheese and ginger beer in his snug, small room, furnished principally with well-filled book-shelves. the room had a glowing fire and a green-shaded reading lamp. he sat staring beyond his law books at visions, waking dreams that came and went. the dangers of exposure that opened before him were in these dreams, but there were other mind-pictures that filled his life with a glow of colour. how different from the drab horizons that encircled poor vivie warren less than a year ago! poor vivie, whom even fitzjohn's avenue at hampstead had rejected, who had long since been dropped--no doubt on account of rumours concerning her mother--by the few acquaintances she had made at cambridge, who had parents living in south kensington, bayswater, and bloomsbury. here was portland place receiving her in her guise as david williams with open arms. men and women looked at her kindly, interestedly, and she could look back at them without that protective frown. at night she could walk about the town, go to the theatre, stroll along the embankment and attract no man's offensive attentions. she could enter where she liked for a meal, a cup of tea, frequent the museum of the royal college of surgeons when she would without waiting for a "ladies" day; stop to look at a street fight, cause no sour looks if she entered a smoking compartment on the train, mingle with the man-world unquestioned, unhindered, unnoticed, exciting at most a pleasant off-hand camaraderie due to her youth and good looks. should she go on with the bold adventure? a thousand times yes! david should break no law in vivie's code of honour, do real wrong to no one; but vivie should see the life best worth living in london from a man's standpoint. david however must be armed at every point and have his course clearly marked out before his contemplation. he must steep himself in the geography of south africa--why not get rossiter to propose him as a fellow of the royal geographical society? that _would_ be a lark because they wouldn't admit women as members: they had refused honoria fraser. david must read up--somewhere--the history of the south african war as far as it went. he had better find out something about the bechuanaland police force; how as a member of such a force he could have drifted as far south as the vicinity of colesberg; how thereabouts he could have got sick enough--he certainly would say nothing more about a wound--to have been put into hospital. he must find out how he could have escaped from the boers and come back to england without getting into difficulties with the military or the colonial office or whoever had any kind of control over the members of the bechuanaland border police.... but the whole south african episode had better be dropped. rossiter, after his appeal, would set himself to forget and ignore it. it must be damped down in the poor old father's mind as of relative unimportance--after all, his father was a recluse who did not have many visitors ... by the bye, he must remember to write on the morrow and explain why he could not come down for christmas or the new year ... would promise a good long visit in the easter holidays instead--must remember that resolution to learn up some welsh. what a nuisance it was that you couldn't buy anywhere in london or in south wales any book about modern conversation in welsh. the sort of welsh you learnt in the old-fashioned books, which were all that could be got, was biblical language--some one had told david that if you went into smithfield market in the early morning you might meet the welsh farmers and stock-drivers who had come up from wales during the night and who held forth in the cymric tongue over their beasts. but probably their language was such as would shock nannie.... supposing frank gardner did come to england? in that case it might be safer to confide in frank. he was harum-scarum, but he was chivalrous and he pitied vivie. besides he was a prime appreciator of a lark. should she even tell rossiter? no, of _course_ not. that was just one of the advantages of being "david." as "david" she could form a sincere and inspiring friendship with rossiter which would be utterly beyond her reach as "vivie." how pale beside the comradeship of honoria now appeared the hand-grips, the hearty male free-masonry of a man like rossiter. how ungrateful however even to make such an admission to herself.... at present the only people who knew of her prank and guessed or knew her purpose were honoria and bertie adams. honoria! what a noble woman, what a true friend. somehow, now she was david, she saw honoria in a different light. poor norie! she too had her wistful leanings, her sorrows and disappointments. what a good thing it would be if her mother decided to die--of course she would, could, never say any such thing to norie--to die and set free honoria to marry major petworth armstrong! she felt norie still hankered after him, but perhaps kept him at bay partly because of her mother's molluscous clingings--no! she wouldn't even sneer at lady fraser. lady fraser had been one of the early champions of woman's rights. very likely it was a dread of vivie's sneers and disappointment that had mainly kept back norie from accepting major armstrong's advances. well, when next they met she--vivie--or better still david--would set that right. chapter vii honoria again , fig tree court, temple. _march_ , . dear honoria,-- i am going down to spend easter with my people in south wales. before i leave i should so very much like a long talk with you where we can talk freely and undisturbed. that is impossible at the office for a hundred reasons, especially now that beryl claridge has taken to working early in her new-found zeal, while bertie adams deems it his duty to stay late. i am--really, truly--grieved to hear that your mother is so ill again. i would not ask to meet her--even if she was well enough to receive people--because she does not know me and when one is as ill as she is, the introduction to a stranger is a horrid jar. but if you _could_ fit in say an hour's detachment from her side--is it "bed-side" or is she able to get up?--and could receive me in your own sitting-room, why then we could have that full and free talk i should like on your affairs and on mine and on the joint affairs of _fraser and warren_. yours sincerely, d. v. w. dear david,-- come by all means. the wish for a talk is fully reciprocated on my side. mother generally tries to sleep in the afternoon between three and six, and a nurse is then with her. yours sincerely, h. f. "mr. david williams wishes to see you, miss," said a waiter, meeting honoria on a thursday afternoon, as she was emerging into their tiny hall from her mother's room. "show him up, please.... ah _there_ you are, _david_. we must both talk rather low as mother is easily waked. come into my study; fortunately it is at the other end of the flat." * * * * * they reach the study, and honoria closes the door softly but firmly behind them. "we never do kiss as a rule, having long ago given up such a messy form of greeting; but certainly we wouldn't under these circumstances lest we could be seen from the opposite windows and thought to be 'engaged'; but though i may seem a little frigid in greeting you, it is only because of the clothes you are wearing'--you understand, don't you--?" "quite, dearest. we cannot be too careful. besides we long ago agreed to be modern and sanitary in our manners." "won't you smoke?" "well, perhaps it would be more restful," said david, "more manly; but as a matter of fact of late i have been rather 'off' smoking. it is very wasteful, and as far as i am concerned it never produced much effect--either way--on the nerves. still, it gives one a nice manly flavour. i always liked the smell of a smoking-room.... and your mother: how is she?" "very bad, i fear. the doctor tells me she can't last much longer, and hypocritical as the phrase sounds i couldn't wish her to, unless these pains can be mitigated, and this dreadful distress in breathing.... i wonder if some day _i_ shall be like that, and if behind my back a daughter will be saying she couldn't wish me to live much longer, unless, etc. i shall miss her _frightfully_, if she does die.... armstrong has been more than kind. he has got a woman's heart for tenderness. he thinks every day of some fresh palliative until the doctors quite dislike him. fortunately his kindness gives mother a fleeting gleam of pleasure. she wants me to marry him--i don't know, i'm sure.... whilst she's so bad i don't feel i could take any interest in love-making--and i suppose we _should_ make love in a perfunctory way--we're all of us so bound by conventions. we try to feel dismal at funerals, when often the weather is radiant and the ride down to brookwood most exhilarating. and love-making is supposed to go with marriage ... heigh-ho! what should you say if i _did_ marry--major armstrong...? did you ever hear of such a ridiculous name as petworth? i should have to call him 'pet' and every one would think i had gone sentimental in middle age. how _can_ parents be so unthinking about christian names? he can't see the thing as i do; it is almost the only subject on which he is 'huffy.' _you_ are the other, about which more anon. he says the petworth property meant _everything_ to the armstrongs, to _his_ branch of the armstrongs. but for that, they might have been any other kind of armstrong--it always kept him straight at school and in the army, he says, to remember he was an armstrong of petworth. they have held that poor little property (_i_ call it) alongside the egmonts and the leconfields for three hundred years, though they've been miserably poor. his second name is james--petworth james armstrong. but he loathes being called 'jimmy.' "of course, dear, i've no illusions. i'm not bad to look at--indeed i sometimes quite admire my figure when i see myself after my bath in the cheval glass--but i'm pretty well sure that one of the factors in pet's admiration for me was my income. mother, it seems, has a little of her own, from one of her aunts, and if the poor darling is taken--though it is simply horrid considering that _if_--only that she has talked so freely to army--i think i like 'army' far better than 'pet'--well i mean she's been trying to tell him ever since he first came to call that when she is gone i shall have, all told, in my own right, five thousand a year. so i took the first opportunity of letting _him_ know that two thousand a year of that would be held in reserve for the work of the firm and for the woman's cause generally.... look here, i won't babble on much longer.... i know you're dying to make _me_ confidences.... we'll ring for tea to be sent in here, and whilst the waiter is coming and going--don't they take _such_ a time about it, when they're _de trop_?--we'll talk of ordinary things that can be shouted from the _house tops_. "i haven't been to the office for three days. does everything seem to be going on all right?" _david_: "quite all right. bertie adams tries dumbly to express in his eyes his determination to see the firm and me through all our troubles and adventures. i wish i could convey a discreet hint to him not to be so _blatantly_ discreet. if there were a sherlock holmes about the place he would spot at once that adams and i shared a secret.... but about beryl--" (enter waiter....) _honoria_ (to waiter): "oh--er--tea for two please. remember it must be china and the still-room maids _must_ see that the water has been fresh-boiled. and buttered toast--or if you've got muffins...? you have? well, then muffins; and of course jam and cake. and--would you mind--you always try, i know--bringing the things in very quietly--here--? because lady fraser is so easily waked..." (the swiss waiter goes out, firmly convinced that honoria's anxiety for her lady mother is really due to the desire that the mother should not interrupt a flirtation and a clandestine tea.) _honoria_: "well, about beryl?" _david_: "beryl, i should say, is going to become a great woman of business. but for that, and--i think--a curious streak of fidelity to her vacillating architect ('how happy could i be with either,' don't you know, _he_ seems to feel--just now they say he is living steadily at storrington with his wife no. , who is ill, poor thing) ... but for that and this, i think beryl would enjoy a flirtation with me. she can't quite make me out, and my unwavering severity of manner. her cross-questioning sometimes is maddening--or it might become so, but that with both of us--you and me--retiring so much into the background she has to lead such a strenuous life and see one after the other the more important clients. of course--here's the tea..." (brief interval during which the waiter does much unnecessary laying out of the tea until honoria says: "don't let me keep you. i know you are busy at this time. i will ring if we want anything.") david continues: "of course i come in for my share of the work after six. on one point beryl is firm; she doesn't mind coming at nine or at eight or at half-past seven in the morning, but she _must_ be back in chelsea by half-past five to see her babies, wash them and put them to bed. she has a tiny little house, she tells me, near trafalgar square, and fortunately she's got an excellent and devoted nurse, one of those rare treasures that questions nothing and is only interested in the business in hand. she and a cook-general make up the establishment. before mrs. architect no. became ill, mr. architect used to visit her there pretty regularly, and is assumed to be mr. claridge.... well: to finish up about beryl: i think you--we--can trust her. she may be odd in her notions of morality, but in finance or business she's as honest--as--a man." "my dear vivie--i mean david--what a strange thing for _you_ to say! i suppose it is part of your make-up--goes with the clothes and that turn-over collar, and the little safety pin through the tie--?" _david_: "no, i said it deliberately. men are mostly hateful things, but i think in business they're more dependable than women--think more about telling a lie or letting any one down. the point for you to seize on is this--if you haven't noticed it already: that beryl has become an uncommonly good business woman. and what's more, my dear, you've improved _her_ just as you improved _me_" (honoria deprecates this with a gesture, as she sits looking into the fire). "beryl's talk is getting ever so much less reckless. and she takes jolly good care not to scandalize a client. she finds adams--she tells me--so severe at the least jest or personality that she only talks to him now on business matters, and finds him a great stand-by; and the other day she told miss a.--as you call the senior clerk--she ought to be ashamed of herself, bringing in a copy of the _vie parisienne_. the way she settled mrs. gordon's affairs--you remember, no. you catalogued the case--was masterly; and mrs. g. has insisted on paying per cent. commission on the recovered property. and it was beryl who found out that leakage in the 'variegated tea rooms' statement of accounts. i hadn't spotted it. no. i think we needn't be anxious about beryl, especially whilst i am in wales and you are giving yourself up--as you ought to do--to your mother. but it's coming to _this_, honoria--" (enter waiter. david says "oh, damn," half audibly. waiter is confirmed in his suspicions, but as he likes honoria immensely resolves to say nothing about them in the steward's room. she is such a kind young lady. he explains he has come to take the tea things away, and honoria replies "capital idea! now, david, you'll be able to have the whole table for your accounts!").... "it's coming to _this_, honoria," says david, clearing his throat, "that you will soon be wanting not to be bothered any more with the affairs of _fraser and warren_, and after i really get into the law business i too shall require to detach myself. let us therefore be thankful that beryl is shaping so well. i rather think this summer you will have to get more office accommodation and give her some more responsible women to help her.... _now_ finish what you were saying about major armstrong." _honoria_: "of _course_ i shall marry him some day. i suppose i felt that the day after i first met him. but it amuses me to be under no illusion. i am sure this is what happened two years ago--or whenever it was he came back wounded from your favourite haunt, south africa. michael rossiter--who likes 'army' enormously--i think they were at school or college together--said to linda, his wife: 'here's armstrong. one of the best. wants to marry. wife must have a little money, otherwise he'll have to go on letting petworth manor. and here's honoria fraser, one of the finest women i've ever met. getting a little long in the tooth--or will be soon. let's bring 'em together and make a match of it.' "so we are each convoked for a luncheon, with a projected adjournment to kew--which _you_ spoilt--and there it is. but joking apart, 'army' is a dear and i am sure by now he wants me even more than my money--and i certainly want him. i'm rising thirty and i long for children and don't want 'em to come to me too late in life." _david_: "you said he didn't like _me_..." _honoria_: "oh that was half nonsense. when we all met last sunday at the rossiters he became very jealous and suspicious. asked who was that whipper-snapper--i said you neither whipped nor snapped, especially if kindly treated. he said then who was that madonna young man--a phrase it appears he'd picked up from lord cromer, who used to apply it to every new arrival from the foreign office--armstrong was once his military secretary. i was surprised to hear he thought you womanish--i spoke of your fencing, riding,--was just going to add 'hockey,' and 'croquet': then remembered they might be thought feminine pastimes, so referred to your swimming. military men always respect a good swimmer; i fancy because many of them funk the water.... i was just going on to explain that you were a cousin of a great friend of mine and helped me in my business, when a commissionaire came from quansions in a hansom to say that mother was feeling very bad again. 'army' and i went back in the hansom, but i was crying a little and being a gentleman he did not press his suit..." enter lady fraser's nurse on tiptoe. says in a very hushed voice "major armstrong has called, miss fraser. he came to ask about lady fraser. i said if anything she was a bit better and had had a good sleep. he then asked if he might see you." _honoria_: "certainly. would you mind showing him in here? it will save my ringing for the waiter." enter major armstrong. at the sight of david he flushes and looks fierce. _honoria_: "so glad you've come, dear major. i hear mother has had a good nap. i must go to her presently. you know david vavasour williams?--davy! you really _must_ leave out your second name! it gets so fatiguing having to say it every time i introduce you." armstrong bows stiffly and david, standing with one well-shaped foot in a neat boot on the curb of the fireplace, looks up and returns the bow. _honoria_: "this won't do. you are two of my dearest friends, and yet you hardly greet one another. i always determined from the age of fifteen onwards i would never pass my life as men and women in a novel do--letting misunderstandings creep on and on where fifty words might settle them. _army!_ you've often asked me to marry you--or at least so i've understood your broken sentences. i never refused you in so many words. now i say distinctly 'yes'--if you'll have me. only, you know quite well i can't actually marry you whilst mother lies so ill..." major armstrong, very red in the face, in a mixture of exultation, sympathy and annoyance that the affairs of his heart are being discussed before a whipper-snapper stranger--says: "_honoria!_ do you _mean_ it? oh..." _honoria_: "of course i mean it! and if i drew back you could now have a breach-of-promise-of-marriage action, with david as an important witness. d.v.w.--who by the bye is a cousin of my _greatest friend_--my friend for life, whether you like her--as you ought to do--or not--vivie warren.... david is reading for the bar; and besides being your witness to what i have just said, might--if you deferred your action long enough--be your counsel.... now look here," (with a catch in the voice) "you two dear things. my nerves are all to bits.... i haven't slept properly for nights and nights. david, dear, if you _must_ talk any more business before you go down to wales, you must come and see me to-morrow.... darling mother! i can't _bear_ the thought you may not live to see my happiness." (david discreetly withdraws without a formal good-bye, and as he goes out and the firelight flickers up, sees armstrong take honoria in his arms.) chapter viii the british church david had read hard all through hilary term with mr. stansfield of the inner temple; he had passed examinations brilliantly; he had solved knotty problems in the legal line for _fraser and warren_, and as already related he had begun to go out into society. indeed, starting from the rossiters' thursdays and praed's studio suppers, he was being taken up by persons of influence who were pleased to find him witty, possessed of a charming voice, of quiet but unassailable manners. opinions differed as to his good looks. some women proclaimed him as adorable, rather sphynx-like, you know, but quite fascinating with his well-marked eye-brows, his dark and curly lashes, the rich warm tints of his complexion, the unfathomable grey eyes and short upper lip with the down of adolescence upon it. other women without assigning any reason admitted he did not produce any effect on their sensibility--they disliked law students, they said, even if they were of a literary turn; they also disliked curates and shopwalkers and sidesmen ... and sunday-school teachers. give them _manly_ men; avowed soldiers and sailors, riders to hounds, sportsmen, big game hunters, game-keepers, chauffeurs--the chauffeur was becoming a new factor in society, bernard shaw's "superman"--prize-fighters, meat-salesmen--then you knew where you were. similarly men were divided in their judgment of him. some liked him very much, they couldn't quite say why. others spoke of him contemptuously, like major armstrong had done. this was due partly to certain women being inclined to run after him--and therefore to jealousy on behalf of the professional lady-killer of the military species--and partly to a vague feeling that he was enigmatic--sphynx-like, as some women said. he was too silent sometimes, especially if the conversation amongst men tended towards racy stories; he was sarcastic and nimble-witted when he did speak. and he was not easily bullied. if he encountered an insolent person, he gave full effect to his five feet eight inches, the look from his grey eyes was unwavering as though he tacitly accepted the challenge, there was an invisible rapier hanging from his left hip, a poise of the body which expressed dauntless courage. honoria's stories of his skill in fencing, riding, swimming, ball-games, helped him here. they were perfectly true or sufficiently true--_mutatis mutandis_--and when put to the test stood the test. david indeed found it well during this first season in town to hire a hack and ride a little in the park--it only added one way and another about fifty pounds to his outlay and impressed certain of the benchers who were beginning to turn an eye on him. one elderly judge--also a park rider--developed an almost inconvenient interest in him; asked him to dinner, introduced him to his daughters, and wanted to know a deal too much as to his position and prospects. on the whole, it was a distinct relief from a public position, from this increasing number of town acquaintances, this broader and broader track strewn with cunning pitfalls, to lock up his rooms and go off to wales for the easter holidays. easter was late that year--or it has to be for the purpose of my story--and david was fortunate in the weather and the temperature. if west glamorganshire had looked richly, grandiosely beautiful in full summer, it had an exquisite, if quite different charm in early spring, in april. the great trees were spangled with emerald leaf-buds; the cherries, tame and wild, the black-thorn, the plums and pears in orchards and on old, old, grey walls, were in full blossom of virgin white. the apple trees in course of time showed pink buds. the gardens were full of wall-flowers--the inhabited country smelt of wall-flowers--purple flags, narcissi, hyacinths. the woodland was exquisitely strewn with primroses. in the glades rose innumerable spears of purple half-opened bluebells; the eye ranged over an anemone-dotted sward in this direction; over clusters of smalt-blue dog violets in another. ladies'-smocks and cowslips made every meadow delicious; and the banks of the lowland streams were gorgeously gilded with king-cups. the mountains on fine days were blue and purple in the far distance; pale green and grey in the foreground. under the april showers and sun-shafts they became tragic, enchanted, horrific, paradisiac. even the mining towns were bearable--in the spring sunshine. if man had left no effort untried to pile hideosity on hideosity, flat ugliness on nauseous squalor, he had not been able to affect the arch of the heavens in its lucid blue, all smokes and vapours driven away by the spring winds; he had not been able to neutralize the vast views visible from the miners' sordid, one-storeyed dwellings, the panorama of hill and plain, of glistening water, towering peaks, and larch forests of emerald green amid the blue-scotch pines and the black-green yews. david in previous letters, looking into his father's budget, had shown him he could afford to keep a pony and a pony cart. this therefore was waiting for him at the little station with the gardener to drive. but in a week, david, already a good horseman, had learnt to drive under the gardener's teaching, and then was able to take his delighted father out for whole-day trips to revel in the beauties of the scenery. they would have with them a wicker basket containing an ample lunch prepared by the generous hands of bridget. they would stop at some spot on a mountain pass; tether the pony, sit on a plaid shawl thrown over a boulder, and feast their eyes on green mountain-shoulders reared against the pale blue sky; or gaze across ravines not unworthy of switzerland. or they would put up pony and cart at some village inn, explore old battlemented churches and churchyards with seventeenth and eighteenth century headstones, so far more tasteful and seemly than the hideous death memorials of the nineteenth century. and ever and again the old father, looking more and more like a druid, would recite that charming spring song, the th psalm; or fragments of welsh poetry sounding very good in welsh--as no doubt greek poetry does in properly pronounced greek, but being singularly bald and vague in its references to earth, sea, sky and flora when translated into plain english. david expressed some such opinions which rather scandalized his father who had grown up in the conventional school of unbounded, unreasoning reverence for the hebrew, greek and keltic classics. from that they passed to the great problems, the undeterminable problems of the universe; the awful littleness of men--mere lice, perhaps, on the scurfy body of a shrinking, dying planet of a fifth-rate sun, one of a billion other suns. the revd. howel like most of the christian clergy of all times of course never looked at the midnight sky or gave any thought to the terrors and mysteries of astronomy, a science so modern, in fact, that it only came into real existence two or three hundred years ago; and is even now only taken seriously by about ten thousand people in europe and america. where, in this measureless universe--which indeed might only be one of several universes--was god to be found? a god that had been upset by the dietary of a small desert tribe, who fussed over burnt sacrifices and the fat of rams at one time; at another objected to censuses; at another and a later date wanted a human sacrifice to placate his wrath; or who had washed out the world's fauna and flora in a flood which had left no geological evidence to attest its having taken place. "did you ever think about the dinosaurs, father?" said david at the end of some such tirade--an outburst of free-thinking which in earlier years might have upset that father to wrath and angry protest, but which now for some reason only left him dazed and absent-minded. (it was the colonies that had done it, he thought, and the studio talk of that dilettante architect. by and bye, david would distinguish himself at the bar, marry and settle down, and resume the orthodox outlook of the english--or as he liked to call it--the british church.) "the dinosaurs, my boy? no. what were they?" _david_: "the real dragons, the dragons of the prime, that swarmed over england and wales and scotland, and europe, asia, and north america--and i dare say africa too. one of the most stupendous facts of what you call 'creation,' though perhaps only one amongst many skin diseases that have afflicted the planet--well the dinosaurs went on developing and evolving and perfecting--so rossiter says--for three million years or so--then they were scrap-heaped. what a waste of creative energy!..." _father_: "ah it's rossiter who puts all these ideas into your head, is it?" _david_ (flushing); "oh dear no! i used to think about them at (is about to say 'newnham,' but substitutes 'malvern')--at malvern--" _father_ (drily): "i'm glad to hear you thought about something--serious--at any rate--then, in the midst of your scrapes and truancies--but go on, dear boy. it's a delight to me to hear you speak. it reminds me--i mean your voice does--of your poor mother. you know i loved her very tenderly, david, and though it is all past and done with i believe i should forgive her _now_, if she only came back to me. i'm sometimes _so_ lonely, boy. i wish you'd marry and settle down here--there's lots of room for you--some nice girl--and give me grandchildren before i die. but i suppose i must be patient and wait first for your call to the bar. what a dreary long time it all takes! why can't they, with one so clever, shorten the term of probation? or why wait for that to marry? i could give you an allowance. as soon as you were called you could then follow the south wales circuit--well, go on about your dinosaurs. i seem to remember professor owen invented them--but _he_ never wavered in his faith and was the great opponent of that rash man, darwin. oh, _i_ remember now the old controversies--what a stalwart was the bishop of winchester! they couldn't bear him at their scientific meetings--there was one at bath, if i recollect right, and he put them all to the right-about. what about your dinosaurs? i'm not denying their existence; it's only the estimates of time that are so ridiculous. god made them and destroyed them in the great flood, of which their fossil remains are the evidence--" david however would desist from pursuing such futile arguments; feel surprised, indeed, at his own outbreaks, except that he hated insincerity. however new and disturbing to his father were these flashes of the new learning, in his outward conduct he was orthodox and extremely well-behaved. the spiritual exercises of the revd. howel had become jejune, and limited very much by his failing sight. the recovery after the operation had come too late in life to bring about any expansion of public or private devotions. family prayers were reduced to the recital from memory of an exhortation, a confession, and an absolution, followed by the lord's prayer and a benediction. services in the church were limited to morning and evening prayers, with communion on the first sunday in the month, and a sermon following morning prayer. there was no one to play the organ if the schoolmistress failed to turn up--as she often did. david however scrupulously turned the normal congregation of five--bridget, the maid of the time-being, the gardener-groom, the sexton, and a baker-church-warden--into six by his unvarying attendance. in the course of half his stay the rumour of his being present and of his good looks and great spiritual improvement attracted quite a considerable congregation, chiefly of young women and a few sheepish youths; so that his father was at one and the same time exhilarated and embarrassed. was this to be a church revival? if so, he readily pardoned david his theories on the dinosaurs and his doubts as to the unvarying evidence of divine wisdom in the story of creation. if any other consideration than a deep affection for this dear old man and repentance for his unwise ebullitions of free thought had guided david in the matter it was an utter detestation of the services and the influence of the calvinist chapel in the village, the little bethel, presided over by pastor prytherch, a fanatical blacksmith, who alternated spells of secret drunkenness and episodes of animalism by orgies of self-abasement, during which he--in half-confessing his own lapses--attributed freely and unrebukedly the same vices to the male half of his overflowing congregation. these out-pourings--"pechadur truenus wyf i! arglwydd madden i mi!"--extempore prayers, psalms chanted with a swaying of the body, hymns sung uproariously, scripture read with an accompaniment of groans, hysteric laughter, and interjections of assent, and a rambling discourse--lasting fully an hour, were in the welsh language; and david on his three or four visits--and it can be imagined what a sensation _they_ caused! the vicar's son--himself perhaps about to confess his sins!--understood very little of the subject matter, save from the extravagant gestures of the participants. but he soon made up his mind that religion for religion, that expressed by the english--"well, father, you are right--the 'british'"--church in wales was many hundred times superior in reasonableness and stability to the negroid ebullitions of the calvinists. as a matter of fact they were scarcely more followers of the reformer calvin than they were of ignatius loyola; it was just a symptomatic outbreak of some prehistoric iberian, silurian form of worship, something deeply planted in the soil of wales, something far older than druidism, something contemporary with the beliefs of neolithic days. eighteen years ago, much of wales was as enslaved by whiskey as are still keltic scotland, keltiberian ireland, lancashire, london and wicked little kent. it was only saved from going under completely by decennial religious revivals, which for three months or so were followed by total abstinence and a fierce-eyed continence. just about this time--during david's extended spring holiday in wales (he had brought many law books down with him to read)--there had begun one of the newspaper-made-famous revivals. it was led by a young prophet--a football half-back or whatever they are called, though i, who prefer thoroughness, would, if i played football, offer up the whole of my back to bear the brunt--who saw visions of teutonically-conceived angels with wings, who heard "voices," was in constant communication with the redeemer of mankind and on familiar terms with god, had a lovely tenor voice and moved emotional men and hysterical, love-sick women to tears, even to bellowings by his prayers and songs. he had for some weeks been confined in publicity to half-contemptuous paragraphs in the south wales press. then the _daily chronicle_ took him up. their well-known, emotional-article writer, mr. sigsbee, saw "copy" in him, and--to do him justice (for there i agreed with him)--a chance to pierce the armour of the hand-in-glove-with-government distillers, so went down to wales to write him up. for three weeks he became more interesting than a cabinet minister. indeed cabinet ministers or those who aspired to become such at the next turn of the wheel truckled to him. some were afraid he might become a small messiah and lead wales into open revolt; others that he might smash the whiskey trade and impair the revenue. mr. lloyd george going to address a pro-boer meeting at aberystwith (was it?) encountered him at a railway junction, attended by a court of ex-footballers and reformed roysterers, and said in the hearing of a reporter "i must fight with the sword of the flesh; but you fight with the sword of the spirit"--whatever that may have meant--and i do not pretend to complete accuracy of remembrance--i only know i felt very angry with the whole movement at the time, because it delayed indefinitely the _daily chronicle's_ review of my new book. well this evan--in all such movements an evan is inevitable--evan gwyllim jones--with the black eyes, abundant black hair, beautiful features (he was a handsome lad) and glorious voice, addressed meetings in the open air and in every available building of four walls. thousands withdrew their names from foot-ballery, nigh on two millions must have taken the pledge--and not merely an anti-whiskey pledge but a fierce renunciation of the most diluted alcohol as well; and approximately two hundred and fifty thousand confessed their sins of unchastity and swore to be reborn galahads for the rest of their lives. it was a spiritual spring-cleaning, as drastic and as overdone as are the domestic upheavals known by that name. but it did a vast deal of good, all the same, to south wales; and though it was a seventh wave, the tide of temperance, thrift, cleanliness, bodily and spiritual, has risen to a higher level of average in the beautiful romantic principality ever since. evan gwyllim jones, however, overdid it. he had to retire from the world to a home--some said even to a mental hospital. six months afterwards he emerged, cured of his "voices," much plumper, and--perhaps--poor soul--shorn of some of his illusions and ideals; but he married a grocer's widow of cardiff, and the _daily chronicle_ mentioned him no more. the infection of his meetings however penetrated to the agricultural district in which pontystrad was situated. five villages went completely off their heads. the blacksmith-pastor had to be put under temporary restraint. quite decent-looking, unsuspected folk confessed to far worse sins than they had ever committed. there arose an aristocracy of outcasts. three inns where little worse than bad beer was sold were gutted, respectable farmers' wives drank eau-de-cologne instead of spirits, several over-due marriages took place, there were a number of premature births, and the membership of the football clubs was disastrously reduced. such excitement was generated that little work was done, and the illegitimate birth rate of west glamorganshire--always high--for the opening months of became even higher. david was enlisted by the employers of labour, the farmers, chemical works, mining and smelting-works managers, squires, and postmasters to restore order. he preached against the revivalists. not with any lack of sympathy, any apology for the real ills which they denounced. he spoke with emphasis against the loosening of morality, recommended early marriage, and above all _education_; denounced the consumption of alcohol so strenuously and convincedly that then and there as he spoke he resolved himself henceforth to abstain from anything stronger than lager beer or the lighter french and german wines. but he threw cold water resolutely on the fantastical nonsense that accompanied these emotional outbursts of so-called religion; invited his hearers to study--at any rate elementarily--astronomy and biology; did not run down football but advised a moderate interest only being taken in such futile sports; recommended volunteering and an acquaintance with rifles as far preferable, seeing that we always stood in danger of a european war or of a drastic revival of insolent conservatism. then he made his appeal to the women. he spoke of the dangers of this hysteria; the need there was for level-headed house-keeping women in our councils; how they should first qualify for and then demand the suffrage, having already attained the civic vote. (here some of the employers of labour disapproved, plucked at his arm or hem of his reefer jacket, and one squire lumbered off the platform.) but he held on, warming with a theme that hitherto had hardly interested him. his speeches were above the heads of his peasant audiences; but they were a more sensitive harp to play on than the average anglo-saxon audience. many women wept, only decorously, as he outlined their influence in a reformed village, a purified principality. the men applauded frantically because, despite some prudent reserves, there seemed to be a promise of revolt in his suggestions. david felt the electric thrill of the orator in harmony with his audience; who for that reason will strive for further triumphs, more resounding perorations. he introduced scraps of welsh--all his auto-intoxicated brain could remember (how physically true was that taunt of dizzy's--"inebriated with the exuberance of his own verbosity!"). and the delighted audience shouted back "you're the man we want! into parliament you shall go, davy-bach" and much else. so david restored the five villages to sobriety in life and faith, yet left them with a new enthusiasm kindled. before he departed on his return to london and the grind of his profession, he had effected another change. because he had spoken as he had spoken and touched the hearts of emotional people, they came trickling back to his father's church, to the "british" church, as david now called it. little bethel was empty, and the pastor-blacksmith not yet out of the asylum at swansea. the revd. howel williams trod on air. his sermons became terribly long and involved, but that was no drawback in the minds of his welsh auditory; though it made his son swear inwardly and reconciled him to the approaching return to fig tree court. the old druid felt inspired to convince the hundred people present that the church they had returned to _was_ the church of their fathers, not only back to roman times, when glamorganshire was basking in an italian civilization, but further still. he showed how the druids were rather to be described as ante-christian than anti--with an _i_; and played ponderously on this quip. in druidism, he observed--i am sure i cannot think why, but it was his hobby--you had a remarkable foreshadowing of christianity; the idea of the human sacrifice, the atonement, the communion of saints, the mystic vine, which he clumsily identified with the mistletoe, and what not else. he read portions of his privately-published _tales of taliessin_. in short such happiness radiated from his pink-cheeked face and recovered eyes that david regretted in no wise his own lapses into conventional, stereotyped religion. the church of britain might be stiff and stomachered, as the offspring of elizabeth, but it was stately, it was respectable--as outwardly was the great virgin queen--and it was easy to live with. only he counselled his father to do two things: never to preach for more than half-an-hour--even if it meant keeping a small american clock going inside the pulpit-ledge; and to obtain a curate, so that the new enthusiasm might not cool and his father verging on seventy, might not overstrain himself. he pointed out that by letting off most of the glebe land and pretermitting david's "pocket-money" he might secure a young and energetic welsh-speaking curate, the remainder of whose living-wage would--he felt sure--be found out of the diocesan funds of st. david's bishopric. the revd. howel let him have his way (this was after david had returned to fig tree court) and by the following june a stalwart young curate was lodged in the village and took over the bulk of the progressive church work from the fumbling hands of the dear old vicar. he was a thoroughly good sort, this curate, troubled by no possible doubts whatever, a fervent tee-totaller, a half-back or whole back--i forget which--at football, a good boxer, and an unwearied organizer. little bethel was sold and eventually turned into a seed-merchant's repository and drying-room. the curate in course of time married the squire's daughter and i dare say long afterwards succeeded the revd. howel vaughan williams when the latter died--but that date is still far ahead of my story. at any rate--isn't it _droll_ how these things come about?--david's action in this matter, undertaken he hardly knew why--did much to fetter mr. lloyd george's subsequent attempts to disestablish the british church in wales. what did bridget think of all this, of the spiritual evolution of her nursling, of his identity with the vicious, shifty, idle youth whose uncanny gift of design seemed to have been completely lost after his stay in south africa? david vavasour williams had left home to the relief of his father and the whole village, if even to the half-pitying regret of his old nurse, in . he had spent a year or more in mr. praed's studio studying to be an architect or a scene painter. then somehow or other he did not get on with mr. praed and he enlisted impulsively in a south african police force (in the army, it seemed to bridget). he had somehow become involved in a war with a south african people, called by bridget "the wild boars"; he is wounded or ill in hospital; is little heard of, almost presumed dead. throughout all these five years he scarcely ever writes to his forgiving father; maintains latterly a sulky silence. then, suddenly in the summer of , returns; preceded only by a telegram but apparently vouched for by this mr. praed; and announces himself as having forgotten his welsh and most of the events of his youth, but having acquired a changed heart, and an anxiety to make up for past ill-behaviour by a present good conduct which seems almost miraculous. well: miracles were easily believed in by bridget. perhaps his father's prayers had been answered. providence sometimes meted out an overwhelming boon to really good people. david was certainly a vavasour, if there was nothing williamsy about his looks.... his mother, in mrs. bridget evanwy's private opinion, had been a hussy.... was david his father's son? hadn't she once caught mrs. howel williams kissing a young stranger behind a holly bush and wasn't that why bridget had really been sent away? she had returned to take charge of the pretty, motherless little boy when she herself was a widow disappointed of children, and the child was only three. would she ever turn against her nursling now, above all, when he was showing himself such a son to his old father? not she. he might be who and what he would. he was giving another ten years of renewed life to the dear old druid and the continuance of a comfortable home to his old nannie. they talked a great deal up at little bethel of a "change of heart." perhaps such things really took place, though bridget evanwy from a shrewd appraisement of the welsh nature doubted it. she would like to, but couldn't quite believe that an angel from heaven had taken possession of david's body and come here to play a divine part; because david sometimes talked so strangely--seemed not only to doubt the existence of a heavenly host, but even of something beyond, so awful in bridget's mind that she hardly liked to define it in words, though in her own welsh tongue it was so earthily styled "the big man." however, at all costs, she would stand by david ... and without quite knowing why, she decided that on all future visits she herself would "do out" his room, would attend to him exclusively. the "girl" was a chatterer, albeit she looked upon mr. david with eyes of awe and a most respectful admiration, while david on his part scarcely bestowed on her a glance. chapter ix david is called to the bar was the year of king edward's break-down in health but of his ultimate coronation; it was the year in which mr. arthur balfour became premier; it was the year in which motors became really well-known, familiar objects in the london streets, and hansoms (i think) had to adopt taximeter clocks on the eve of their displacement by taxi-cabs. it was likewise the year in which the south african war was finally wound up and the star of joseph chamberlain paled to its setting, and mrs. pankhurst and her daughter christabel founded the women's social and political union at manchester. in , the fiscal controversy absorbed much of public attention, the war office was once more reformed, women's skirts still swept the pavement and encumbered the ball-room, a peeress wrote to the _times_ to complain of modern manners, surrey beat something-or-other at the oval, and modern cricket was voted dull. in , the russo-japanese war was concluded, and _fraser and warren_ received a year's notice from the midland insurance co. that they must vacate their premises on the fifth floor of nos. - chancery lane. the business of _f. and w._ had grown so considerable that, as the affairs of the midland insurance co. had slackened, it became intolerable to hear the lift going up and down to the fifth floor all through the day. the housekeeper also thought it odd that a well-dressed young gentleman should steal in and up, day after day, after office hours to work apparently alone in _fraser and warren's_ partners' room. _fraser and warren_ over the hand of its junior partner, mrs. claridge, accepted the notice. their business had quite overgrown these inconveniently situated offices and a move to the west end was projected. mrs. claridge's scheme for week-end cottages had been enormously successful and had put much money not only into the coffers of _fraser and warren_ but into the banking account of that clever architect, francis brimley storrington. [i find i made an absurd mistake earlier in this book in charging the too amorous architect with a home at "storrington." his home really was in a midland garden city which he had designed, but his name--a not uncommon one--was storrington.] in the autumn of , poor lady fraser died. in january, , honoria married the impatient colonel armstrong. in january, , she had her first baby--a boy. at the close of beryl claridge made proposals to honoria fraser relative to a change in the constitution of _fraser and warren_. honoria was to have an interest still as a sleeping partner in the concern and some voice in its management and policy. but she was to take no active share of the office work and "warren" was to pass out of it altogether. beryl pointed out it was rather a farce when the middle partner--she herself had been made the junior partner a year before--was perpetually and mysteriously absent, year after year, engaged seemingly on work of her own abroad. her architect semi-husband moreover, who if not in the firm was doing an increasing share of its business, wanted to know _more_ about vivien warren. "was she or was she not the daughter of the 'notorious' mrs. warren; because if so..." he took of course a highly virtuous line. like so many other people he compounded for the sins he was inclined to by being severe towards the misdoings of others. _his_ case--he would say to beryl when they were together at chelsea--was _sui generis_, quite exceptional, they were really in a way perfectly good people--_tout savoir c'est tout pardonner, etc._; whereas the _things_ that were _said_ about mrs. warren!... and though vivien was nothing nearer sin than being her daughter, still if it were known or known more widely that _she_ was the warren in _fraser and warren_, why the wives of the wealthier clergy, for example, and a number of quakeresses would withdraw their affairs from the firm's management. whereas if only his little berry could become the boss, _he_ knew where to get "big money" to put behind the firm's dealings. the idea was all right; an association for the special management on thoroughly honest lines of women's affairs. they'd better get rid of that hulking young clerk, bertie adams, and staff the entire concern with capable women. he himself would always remain in the background, giving them ideas from time to time, and if any were taken up merely being paid his fees and commissions. david vavasour williams, privately consulted by norie, put forward no objection. he disliked beryl and was increasingly shy of his rather clandestine work on the fifth floor of the midland insurance chambers; besides, if and when he were called to the bar, he would have to cease all connection with _fraser and warren_. the consent of vivie was obtained through the power of attorney she had left behind. a new deed of partnership was drawn up. honoria insisted that vivien warren must be bought out for three thousand pounds, which amount was put temporarily to the banking account of david vavasour williams; she herself received another three thousand and a small percentage of the future profits and a share in the direction of affairs of the women's co-operative association (_fraser and claridge_) so long as she left a capital of five thousand pounds at their disposal. so in david with three thousand pounds purchased an annuity of £ a year for vivien warren. that investment would save vivie from becoming at any time penniless and dependent, and consequently would subserve the same purpose for her cousin and agent, david v. williams. going to the c. and c. bank, temple bar branch, to take stock of vivie's affairs, he found a thousand pounds had been paid in to her current account. ascertaining the name of the payee to be l.m. praed, he hurried off at the first opportunity to praed's studio. praed was entertaining a large party of young men and women to tea and the exhibition of some wild futurist drawings and a few rather striking designs for stage scenery and book covers. david had perforce to keep his questions bottled up and take part in the rather vapid conversation that was going on between young men with _glabre_ faces and high-pitched voices and women with rather wild eyes. [it struck david about this time that women were getting a little out of hand, strained, over-inclined to laugh mirthless laughter, greedy for sensuality, sensation, sincerity, sweetmeats. something. even if they satisfied some fleeting passion or jealousy by marrying, they soon wanted to be de-married, separated, divorced, to don male costume, to go on the amateur stage and act salome parts on sunday afternoons that most ladies of the real stage had refused; while the men that went about with them in these troops from restaurant to restaurant, studio to studio, music hall to café chantant, brighton to monte carlo, sandown to goodwood, were shifty, too well-dressed, too near neutrality in sex, without defined professions, known by nicknames only, spend-thrifts, spongers, bankrupts, and collectors of needless bric-à-brac.] however this mob at last quitted praddy's premises and he and david were left alone. praed yawned, and almost intentionally knocked over an easel with a semi-obscene drawing on it of a sphynx with swelling breasts embracing a lean young man against his will. _david_: "praddy! why do you tolerate such people and why prostitute your studio to such unwholesome art?" _praed_: "my dear david! this is _indeed_ satan rebuking sin. why there are three designs here--one i've just knocked over--beastly, wasn't it?--that _you _ left with me when you went off at a tangent to south africa.... really, we ought to have _some_ continuity you know.... "but i agree with you.... i'm sick of the whole business of this nouvel art and l'art nouveau, about aubrey beardsley and the disgusting 'nineties generally--but what _will_ you? if miss vivie warren had condescended to accept me as a husband she might have brought a wholesome atmosphere into my life and swept away all this ... inspired me perhaps with some final ambition for the little that remains of my stock of energy.... heigh-ho! well: what is the quarrel now? the life i lead, the people who come here?" _david_: "no. i hardly came about that; though dear old praddy, i wish i had time to look after you ... perhaps later.... no: what i came to ask was: what _did_ you mean the other day by paying in a thousand pounds to vivie warren's account at her bank? she's not in want of money so far as i know, and you can't be so very rich, even though you design three millionaire's houses a year. who gave you the money to pay in to my--to vivie's account?" _praed_: "well, when vivie herself comes to ask me, p'raps i'll tell; but i can't see how it concerns _you_. why not stop and dine--à l'imprévu, but i dare say my housekeeper can rake something together or it may not be too late to send out for a paté. we can then talk of other things. when are you going to get your call?" _david_: "sorry, dear old chap, but i can't stay to dinner. i'm not going anywhere else but i've got some papers i _must_ study before i go to bed. but i'll stop another half-hour at any rate. don't ring for lights or turn up the electric lamps. i would sooner sit in the dark studio and put my question. who has given me that thousand pounds?" _praed_: "that's _my_ business: _i_ haven't! i shan't give or lend vivie a penny till she consents to marry me. as to the rest, take it and be thankful. you're not certain to get any more and i happen to know it had what you would call a 'clean origin.'" _david_: "you mean it didn't come from those 'hotels'?" _praed_: "well, at any rate not directly. don't be a romantic ass, a tiresome fool, and give me any trouble about it. a certain person i imagine must have heard that _fraser and warren_ had been wound up and couldn't bear the thought of your being hard up in consequence ... doesn't know you got a share of the purchase-money..." * * * * * david decided at any rate for the present to accept the addition to his capital--you can perhaps push principle _too_ far; or, once you plunge into affairs, you cease to be quite so high-souled. at any rate nothing in david's middle-class mind was so horrible as penury and the impotence that comes with it. how many months or years would lie ahead of him before fees could be gained and a professional income be earned? besides he wanted to take bertie adams into his service as a clerk. a barrister must have a clerk, and david in his peculiar circumstances could only engage one acquainted more or less with his secret. so bertie adams fulfilled the ambition he had cherished for three years--he felt all along it was coming true. and when david was called to the bar--which he was with all the stately ceremonial of a call night at the inner temple in the easter term of , more elbow room was acquired at fig tree court, and bertie adams was installed there as clerk to mr. david vavasour williams, who had residential chambers on the third floor, and a fair-sized office and small private room on the second floor. bertie's mother had "washed" for both honoria and vivie in their respective dwellings for years, and for david after he came to live at fig tree court. a substantial douceur to the "housekeeper" had facilitated this, for in the part of the temple where lies fig tree court the residents do not call their ministrants "laundresses," but "housekeepers." curiously enough the accounts were always tendered to the absent vivie warren, but mrs. adams noted no discrepancy in their being paid by her son or in an unmarried lady living in the temple under the name of david williams. installed as clerk and advised by his employer to court one of the fair daughters of the housekeeper (mrs. laidly) with a view to marriage and settling down in premises hard-by, bertie adams (who like david had spent his time well between and and was now an accomplished and serviceable barrister's clerk) soon set to work to chum up with other clerks in this clerical hive and get for his master small briefs, small chances for defending undefended cases in which hapless women were concerned. but before we deal with the career of david at the bar, which of course did not properly commence--even as a brilliant junior--till the early months of , let us glance at the way in which he had passed the intervening space of time between his return from wales in may, , and the spending of his long vacation of as an esquire by the common law of england called to the bar, and entitled to wear a becoming grey wig and gown. he had begun in by studying latin, norman french--so greatly drawn on in law terms--and english history. in the summer of , by one of those subterfuges winked at then, he had obtained two rooms, sublet to him by a member of the inn, in fig tree court, inner temple. in the autumn of that year, having made sure of his parentage and his finance, he had approached the necessary authorities with a view to his being admitted a member of the inner temple, which meant filling up a form of declaration that he, david vavasour williams, of pontystrad, glamorgan, a british subject, aged twenty-four, son of the revd. howel vaughan williams, clerk in holy orders, of pontystrad in the county of glamorgan, was desirous of being admitted a student of the honourable society of the inner temple for the purpose of being called to the bar or of practising under the bar; and that he would not either directly or indirectly apply for or take out any certificate to practise directly or indirectly as a pleader, conveyancer or draftsman in equity without the special permission of the masters of the bench of the said honourable society of the inner temple. further, david declared with less assurance but perhaps within the four corners of the bare truth that he had not acted directly or indirectly in the capacity of a solicitor, attorney-at-law, writer to the signet or in about thirteen other specified legal positions; that he was not a chartered, incorporated or professional accountant ("a good job we changed the device of the firm," he thought), a land agent, a surveyor, patent agent, consulting engineer, or even as a clerk to any such officer. which made him rather shivery about what he _had_ been doing for _fraser and warren_, but there was little risk that any one would find out--and finally he declared that he was not in trade or an undischarged bankrupt. the next and most difficult step was to obtain two separate certificates from two separate barristers each of five years' standing, to the effect that he was what he stated himself to be. this required much thinking out, and was one of the reasons why he did not go down as promised and spend his christmas and new year with his father. instead he wrote to pontystrad explaining how important it was he should get admitted as a student in time to commence work in hilary term. did his father know any such luminary of the law or any two such luminaries? his father regretted that he only knew of one such barrister of over five years' standing: the distinguished son of an old cambridge chum. to him he wrote, venturing to recall himself, the more eagerly since this son of an old friend was himself a welshman and already distinguished by his having entered parliament, served with the welsh party, written a book on welsh history, and married a lady of considerable wealth. next david applied to rossiter with the result--as we have seen--that he got an introduction to mr. stansfield. so he obtained from mr. price and mr. stansfield the two certificates to the effect that "david vavasour williams has been introduced to me by letter of introduction from the revd. howel williams" (or "professor michael rossiter, f.r.s.") "and has been seen by me; and that i, mark stansfield, barrister-at-law, king's counsel" (or "john price, barrister-at-law, member of parliament") "believe the said david vavasour williams to be a gentleman of respectability and a proper person to be admitted a student of the honourable society of the inner temple with a view to being called to the bar." copies of the letters of introduction accompanied the two certificates. these of course were not obtained without several visits to the unsuspicious guarantors; or at least one to mr. price in paper buildings, for whom it was enough that david claimed to be welsh and showed a very keen interest in the welsh tongue and its indo-german affinities, and three or four to mr. mark stansfield, k.c., one of the nicest, kindliest and most learned persons david had ever met, whom he grieved deeply at deceiving. stansfield had a high opinion of rossiter. the fact that he recommended david was quite sufficient to secure his "guarantee." but apart from that, he felt himself greatly drawn towards this rather shy, grave, nice-looking young fellow with the steady eyes and the keen intelligence. he had him to dine and to lunch; drew him out--as far as david thought it prudent to go--and was surprised david had never been to a university ("only to malvern--and then i studied with an architect in london--who? mr. praed, a.r.a.--but then i travelled for a bit, and after that i felt more than ever i wanted to go in for the bar"--said david, with a charming smile which lit up his young face ordinarily so staid). stansfield consented that david should come and read with him, and in many ways facilitated his progress so materially and so kindly that more than once the compunctious young welshman thought of discarding the impersonation; and might have done so had not this most estimable stansfield died of pneumonia in the last year of david's studenthood. of course the preliminary examination was easily and quickly passed. david translated his bit of caesar's commentaries, answered brilliantly the questions about alfred the great, the anglo-norman kings, the constitutions of clarendon, magna charta and mortmain, henry the eighth and the reformation, the civil war and protectorate of cromwell, the bill of rights and the holy alliance. he paid his fees and his "caution" money; he ate the requisite six dinners--or more, as he found them excellent and convenient--in each term, attended all the lectures that interested him, and passed the subsidiary examinations on them with fair or even high credit; and finally got through his "call-to-the-bar" examination with tolerable success; at any rate he passed. a friend of the deceased stansfield--whose death was always one of the scars in vivie's memory--introduced him to one of the masters of the bench who signed his "call" papers. he once more made a declaration to the effect that he was not a person in holy orders, that he was not a solicitor, attorney-at-law, writer to the signet, etc., etc., a chartered, incorporated or professional accountant; and again that if called to the bar, he would never become a member of the abhorred professions over and over again enumerated; and was duly warned that without special permission of the masters of the bench of the inner temple he might not practise "under the bar"--whatever that may mean (i dare say it is some low-down procedure, only allowed in times of scarcity). then after having his name "screened" for twelve days in all the halls of the four inns, and going in fear and trembling that some one might turn up and object, he finally received his call to the bar on april (if april in that year was on a sunday, then on the following monday) and was "called" at the term dinner where he took wine with the masters. he remembered seeing present at the great table on the dais, besides the usual red-faced generals and whiskered admirals, simpering statesmen, and his dearly loved friend, michael rossiter--representing science,--a more sinister face. this was the well-known philanthropist and race-horse breeder, sir george crofts, bart., m.p. for a norfolk borough. their eyes met, curiously interlocked for a moment. sir george wondered to himself where the dooce he had seen that, type of face before, those grey eyes with the dark lashes. "gad! he reminds me of kitty warren! well, i'll be damned" (he was eventually) "i wonder whether the old gal had a son as well as that spitfire vivie?!" michael whispered a word or two to one of the masters, and david was presently summoned to attend the benchers and their distinguished guests in the inner chamber to which they withdrew for wine and dessert. rossiter made room for him, and he had to drink a glass of port with the benchers. every one was very gracious. rossiter said: "i was a sort of godfather to him, don't you know. david! you must do me credit and make haste to take silk and become a judge." crofts moved from where he sat next to a bishop. ("damn it all! i like bein' respectable, but why _will_ they always put me next a bishop or an archdeacon? it spoils all my best stories.") he came over--dragging his chair--to rossiter and said "i say! will you introduce me to our young friend here?" he was duly introduced. "h'm, williams? _that_ doesn't tell me much. but somehow your face reminds me awfully of--of--some one i used to know. j'ever have a sister?" "no," said david. crofts, he noticed, had aged very much in the intervening eight years. he must now be no more than-- ? but he had become very stout and obviously suffered from blood pressure without knowing it. he moved away a little, and david heard him talking to a master about lady crofts, who had come up to london for the season and how they were both very anxious about his boy--"yes, he had two children, a boy and a girl, bless 'em--the boy had been ill with measles and wasn't makin' quite the quick recovery they expected. what an anxiety children were, weren't they? though we wouldn't be without 'em, would we?" the bencher assented out of civility, though as a matter of fact he was an old bachelor and detested children or anything younger than twenty-one. david after his call was presented with a bill to pay of £ . _s._ his father hearing of this, insisted on sending him a cheque for £ out of his savings, adding he should be deeply hurt if it was not accepted and no more said about it. how soon was david coming down to see south wales once more gloriously clothed with spring? [much of this review of the years between and , many of these sweet remembrances are being taken from vivie's brain as she lies on a hard bed in , musing over the past days when, despite occasional frights and anxieties, she was transcendently happy. oh "sorrow's crown of sorrow, the remembering happier days!" she recalled the articles she used to write from the common room or library of the inn; how well they were received and paid for by the editors of daily and weekly journals; what a lark they were, when for instance she would raise a debate in the _saturday review_: "should women be admitted to the bar?" or an appeal in the _daily news_ to do away with the disabilities of women. how poor stansfield, before he died, said he had never met any young fellow with a tenderer heart for women, and advised him to marry whilst he still had youth and fire. she remembered david's social success at the great houses in the west end. how he might have gone out into society and shone more, much more, only he had to consider prudence and expense; the curious women who fell in love with him, and whom he had gently, tactfully to keep at arm's length. she remembered the eager discussions in the temple debating society, or at the "moots" of gray's inn, her successes there as an orator and a close reasoner; how boy students formed ardent friendships for her and prophesied her future success in parliament, would have her promise to take them into the cabinet which david was to form when an electorate swept him into power and sent the antiquated old rotters of that day into the limbo of deserved occlusion. she saw and heard once more the amused delight of honoria armstrong over her success, and the latent jealousy of the uxorious colonel armstrong if she came too often to see honoria in sloane street: and she remembered--oh god! _how_ she remembered--the close association in those three priceless years with her "godfather" michael rossiter; rossiter who shaped her mind--it would never take a different turn--who was patient with her stupidity and petulance; an elder brother, a robust yet tactful chaffer; a banisher of too much sensibility, a constant encouragement to effort and success. rossiter, she knew, with her woman's instinct, was innocently in love with her, but believed all the time he was satisfying his craving for a son to train, a disciple who might succeed him: for he still believed that david when he had been called to the bar and had flirted awhile with themis, would yet turn his great and growing abilities to the service of science. and mrs. rossiter in those times: vivie smiled at the thought of her undefined jealousy. she was anxious to be civil to a young man of whom michael thought so highly. she sympathized with his regret that they had no children, but why could he not take up with one of her cousin bennet's boys from manchester, or sophy's son from northallerton, or one of his own brother's or sister's children? how on earth did he become acquainted with this young man from south wales? but she was determined not to be separated in any way from her husband, and so she sat with them as often and as long as she could in the library. the studio-laboratory she could not stand with its horrid smell of chemicals; she also dreaded vaguely that vivisection went on there--michael of course had a license, though he was far too tender-hearted to torture sentient creatures. still he did odd things with frogs and rats and goats and monkeys; and her dread was that she might one day burst in on one of these sacrifices to science and see a transformed michael, blood-stained, wielding a knife and dangerous if interrupted in his pursuit of a discovery. but as the long talks and conferences of the two friends--really not so far separated in age as one of them thought--generally took place in the library, she assisted at a large proportion of them. rossiter would not have had it otherwise, though to david she was at times excessively irksome. her husband had long viewed her as a lay figure on these occasions. he rarely replied to her flat remarks, her inconsequent platitudes, her yawns and quite transparent signals that it was time for the visitor to go. sometimes david took her hints and left: he had no business to make himself a bore to any one. sometimes however michael at last roused to consciousness of the fretful little presence would say "what? sweety? _you_ still up. trot off to bed, my poppet, or you'll lose the roses in your cheeks." the roses in mrs. rossiter's cheeks at that time were beginning to be a trifle eczematous and of a fixed quality. nevertheless, though she tossed her head a little as she took up her "work" and swished out of the great heavy door--which david opened--she was pleased to think that michael cared for her complexion and was solicitous about her rest. and vivie's eyes swam a little as she thought about the death of mark stansfield, and the genuine tears that flowed down the cheeks of his pupils when they learnt one raw february morning from the housekeeper of his chambers that he had died at daybreak. "a better man never lived" they agreed. and they were right. and she smiled again as she thought of some amongst those pupils, the young dogs of those days, the lovers of actresses of the minor order--ballet girls, it might have been; of the larks that went on sometimes within and without the staid precincts of the temple. harmless larks they were; but such as she had to withdraw from discreetly. she played lawn tennis with them, she fenced surprisingly well; but she had refused to join the "devil's own"--the inns of court volunteers, for prudent reasons; and though it had leaked out that she was a good swimmer--that tiresome impulsive honoria had spread it abroad--she resolutely declined to give proofs of her prowess in swimming baths. her associates were not so young as the undergraduates she had met in newnham days: they were an average ten years older. their language at times made david blush, but they had more discretion and reserve than the university student, and they respected his desire to withdraw himself into himself occasionally, and to abstain from their noisier amusements without questioning his camaraderie. at this point in her smiling reminiscences, the wardress clanged open the door and slammed down a mug of cocoa and a slab of brown bread; and rapped out some orders in such a martinet utterance that they were difficult to understand. (don't be alarmed! she isn't about to be executed for having deceived the benchers of the inner temple in ; she is only in prison for a suffragist offence).] i can't wind up this chapter somehow without more or less finishing the story of beryl claridge. she has been a source of anxiety to my wife--who has read these chapters one by one as they left my typewriter. "was it wise to bring her in?" "well, but my dear, she was rather a common type of the new woman in the early nineteen hundreds." "yes--but--" of course the latent anxiety was that she might end up respectably. and so she did. in , the first mrs. storrington died at ware (ware was where the architect husband had his legitimate home). she had long been ill, increasingly ill of some terrible form of anæmia which had followed the birth of her fourth child. she slowly faded away, poor thing; and about the time david was returning from a triumphant christmas and new year at pontystrad--the curate and his young wife had made a most delightful partie carrée and david had kissed the very slightly protesting bridget under the native mistletoe--mrs. storrington breathed her last, while her faithless yet long forgiven francis knelt by her bedside in agonies of unavailing grief. well: she died and was buried, and her four children, ranging from nine to sixteen, sobbed very much and mourned for darling mummie without the slightest suspicion ("'twas better so," she had always thought) that dad had poisoned her wells of happiness ever since he took up with that minx at cambridge in the very year in which long-legged claribel was born. a few months after the poor lady was consigned (under a really lovely cenotaph designed by her husband) to ware churchyard--no, it was to ware cemetery; dad introduced them all to a very sprightly and good-looking widow, mrs. claridge, who had also been bereaved years ago and left with two perfect ducks of children, four and five years old, to whom claribel took instinctively (the elder ones sniffed a little, disliking "kids"). then about christmas time, , dad told them that mrs. claridge was going to make him happy by coming to tend his motherless children; was going to be his wife. francis, the eldest, stomped about the garden at ware and swore he would go back to rugby during the holidays; elspeth, the gaunt girl of fourteen and agnes, a dreamy and endearing child, cried themselves to sleep in each other's arms. claribel, however, quite approved. and whether they liked it or not, in january, , the marriage took place--at the registrar's--and beryl came to live for a short time at ware, bringing ducksome margery and adorable podge. in less than a month beryl had won over all her step-children, except francis, who held out till easter, but was reduced to allegiance by the hampers she sent to him at rugby--; in three months they had all moved to a much sweller house on the chelsea embankment. father--beryl voted "dad" a little lower-middle class--father had somehow become connected with some great business establishment of which mother was the head. together they were making pots of money. francis would go to sandhurst, elspeth to a finishing school in paris (her ambition), and the others would spend the fine months of the year rollicking with margery and podge on the sussex coast. in , also, they became aware that their new mother was not alone in the world. a stately lady whose eyes seemed once to have done a deal of weeping (they were destined alas! to do much more, for three of her gallant, handsome sons were killed in the war, and _that_ finally killed the poor old dean of thetford), who wore a graceful spanish mantilla of black lace when in draughty places, came to see them after they had moved to garden corner on the chelsea embankment. she turned out to be the mother of mrs. beryl and was quite inclined to be their grandmother as well as margery's and podge's. but her husband the dean was--it appeared--too great an invalid to come up to town. the second mrs. storrington, who was a woman of boundless energy, could work all day with secretaries, and could dance all night, gave brilliant parties in the season at her large chelsea house. but she never invited to them mr. david vavasour williams, that rising young barrister who had become so famous as a pleader of the causes of friendless women. chapter x the shillito case in the autumn of , increase among women of the idea of full citizenship made rapid strides. there was a feeling in the air that balfour must soon resign or go to the country, that a liberal ministry would succeed to power, and that being liberal it could scarcely, in reason or with any logic, refuse to enlarge the franchise to the advantage of the female half of the community. these idealizers of the liberal party, which had really definitely ceased to be liberal in , had a rude awakening. annie kenney and christabel pankhurst dared to act as if they were men, and asked sir edward grey at his manchester meeting in october, , if a liberal administration would give votes to women, should it be placed in power at the next election. answer they had none, from the platform; but the male audience rose in their hundreds, struck these audacious hussies in the face, scratched and slapped them (this was the rôle of the boys), and hustled them out into the street, bleeding and dishevelled. here for attempting to explain the causes of their expulsion they were arrested by the police, and the following morning were sent to prison, having declined to pay the fines illegally imposed on them. this incident made a great impression on the newspaper-reading public, because at that time the press boycott on the woman suffrage movement had not set in. it gave david much to think about, and he found honoria fraser and several of his men and women friends had joined the woman suffrage movement and were determined that the new liberal government should not shirk the issue; an issue on which many members of parliament had been returned as acquiescent in the principle. on that account they had received the whole-hearted support of many, women owing allegiance to the liberal party. at first of course the new government was too busy in allotting the loaves and fishes of office and in handing out the peerages, baronetcies, knighthoods, governorships, private secretaryships, and promotions among the civil servants which had--not to put too fine a point on it--been purchased by large and small contributions to the party chest. [such a procedure seems to be inseparable from our present party system. in this respect the conservatives are no better than the liberals; and it is always possible that in a different way the labour party when it comes into power will be similarly inclined to reward those who have furnished the sinews of war. the house of commons in the last act which revised the conditions of elections of members of parliament was careful to leave open many avenues along which money might attain to the heart of things.] but at length all such matters were settled, and the cabinet was free to face the steady demand of the women leaders of the suffrage movement; a demand that at any rate _some_ measure of enfranchisement should be granted to the women of the british isles without delay. we all know how this demand was received by the leading men of the liberal party and by the more prominent liberals among their supporters in the house; with evasions, silences, sneers, angry refusals, hasty promises given to-day (when ministers were frightened) and broken to-morrow; with a whole series of discreditable tongue-in-the-cheek tricks of parliamentary procedure; till at last the onlooker must have wondered at and felt grateful for our british phlegm; surprised that so little actual harm was done (except to the bodies of the suffragists), that no home secretary or police inspector or magistrate, no flippant talker-out of would-be-serious franchise bills was assassinated, trounced, tarred and feathered, kidnapped, nose-tweaked, or even mud-bespattered. (i am reproducing here the growing comprehension of the problem as it shaped in vivie's mind, under the hat and waistcoat of david williams.) honoria, faithful to her old resolve, continued to devote the greater part of the two thousand a year she had set aside for the woman's cause to financing the new suffrage movement; and incidentally she brought grist to david's mill by recommending him as counsel to many women in distress, arrested suffragists. in , and he made himself increasingly famous by his pleadings in court on behalf of women who with dauntless courage and at the cost of much bodily pain and even at the risk of death had forcibly called attention to this grave defect in the british polity, the withholding of the ordinary rights of tax-paying citizens from adult women. where the suffragist was poor he asked no fee, or a small fee was paid by some suffragist association. but he gained much renown over his advocacy; he became quite a well-known personality outside as well as inside the law courts and police-stations by . his pleadings were sometimes so moving, so passionate that--_teste_ mrs. pankhurst--"burly policemen in court had tears trickling down their faces" as he described the courage, the flawless private lives, the selfless devotion to a noble cause of these women agitating for the rights of their sex--rich and poor, old and young. juries flinched from the verdict which some bitter-faced judge enjoined; magistrates swerved from executing the secret orders of the home office; policemen--again--for they are most of them decent fellows--resigned their positions in the force, sooner than carry out the draconian policy of the home secretary. but of course concurrently he lost many a friend and friendship in the inns of court. there were even growls that he should be disbarred--after this espousal of the suffrage cause had been made manifest for three years. he might have been, but that he had other compeers, below and above his abilities and position; advocates like lord robert brinsley, the famous son of the marquis of wiltshire. if williams was to be disbarred, why they would have to take the same course with a brinsley who also defended women law-breakers, fighting for their constitutional rights. and of course such a procedure as _that_ was unthinkable. yet where a brinsley sailed unhampered, undangered over these troubled waters, poor david often came near to crashing on the rocks. "to hear the fellow talk," said one angry k.c. in the library at the inner temple, "you'd think he was a woman himself!" "egad" said his brother k.c.--yes, he really _did_ say "egad," the oath still lingers in the inns of court--"egad, he looks like one. no hair on his face and i'll lay he doesn't shave." there were of course other briefs he held, for payment or for love of justice; young women who had killed their babies (as to these he was far from sentimental; he only defended where the woman had any claim to sympathy or mitigation of the unreal death sentence); breach of promise actions where the woman had been grossly wronged; affiliation cases in high life--or the nearest to high life that makes a claim on the man for his fatherhood. he was a deadly prosecutor in cases where women had been robbed by their male trustees, or injured in any other way wherein, in those days, the woman was at a disadvantage and the marriage laws were unjust. one way and another, with the zealous aid and business-like care of his interests by his clerk, albert adams, david must have earned between and the autumn of , an average three hundred a year. as he paid adams £ a year and allowed him certain perquisites, and lived within his own fixed income (from his annuity and investments) of £ a year, this meant a profit of about £ . this was raised at a leap to £ , by the fees and the special gift he received for defending lady shillito. the "shillito case," an indictment for murder, was tried at the winter assize of the north-eastern circuit, january or february, . i dare say you have forgotten all about it now: lady shillito changed her name, married again (eventually), and was lost in the crowd--she may even, eleven years afterwards, be reading this novel at the riper age of forty and be startled out of her well-fed apathy by the revival of acute memories. there have been not a few similar cases before and since of comparatively young, beautiful women murdering their elderly, objectionable husbands in a clever cattish way, and of course getting off through lack of evidence or with a short term of imprisonment. (they were always treated in prison far more tenderly than were suffragettes, and the average wardress adored them and obtained for them many little alleviations of their lot before the home secretary gave way and released them.) nowadays the war and the pressing necessities of life, the coal famine, the milk famine, the railway strikes have robbed such cases of all or nearly all their interest. i could quite believe that women in similar circumstances continue to murder their elderly husbands, and the doctors and coroners and relations on "his" side tacitly agree not to raise a fuss in the presence of much graver subjects of apprehension. i can also understand why these beautiful-women-elderly-husband cases scarcely starred our island story prior to the 'fifties of the last century. it was only when chemical analysis had approached its present standard of perfection that the presence of the more subtle poisons could be detected in the stomach and intestines, and that the young and beautiful wife could be charged with and found guilty of the deed by the damning evidence of an analytical chemist. it was rossiter who secured for david the conduct of lady shillito's defence. arbella[ ] shillito was his second cousin, a rossiter by birth, and would fain have married michael herself, only that he was not at that time thinking of marriage, and when his thoughts turned that way--the very day after, as it were--he met linda bennet and her thousands a year. but he retained a half humorous liking for this handsome young woman. [footnote : an old northumbrian variant of arabella.] arbella, disappointed over michael--though she was a mere slip of a girl at the time--next decided that she must marry money. when she was twenty-one she met grimthorpe shillito, an immensely rich man of newcastle-on-tyne, whose foundries poured out big guns and many other things made of iron and steel combined with acids and brains. grimthorpe was a curious-looking person, even at forty; in appearance a mixture of julius caesar, several unpleasant-featured doges of venice, and voltaire in middle age. his looks were not entirely his fault and doubtless acquired for him, in his moral character, a worse definition than he deserved. he had travelled much in his pursuit of metallurgy and chemistry; at forty he saw rising before him the prospect of a peerage, due either for his extraordinary discoveries and inventions in our use of steel, or easily purchasable out of his immense wealth. what is the good of a peerage if it ends with your life? he was not without his vanities, though one of the most cynical men of his cynical period. he arrived therefore at the decision that he would marry some young and buxom creature of decent birth and fit in appearance to be a peeress, and decided on arbella rossiter. after a gulp or two and several _moues_ behind his back, she accepted him. a brilliant marriage ceremony followed, conducted by a bishop and an archdeacon. and then arbella was carried off to live in a bluebeard's castle he possessed on the northumbrian coast. in the three years following her marriage she gave him two boys, with which he was content, especially as his own health began to fail a little just then. at the end of four years of marriage with this cynical, italianate tyrant, arbella got very sick of him and thought more and more tenderly of a certain subaltern in the cavalry whom she had once declined to marry on £ a year. this subaltern had returned from the south african war, a colonel and still extremely good-looking. they had met again at a garden party and fallen once more deeply in love. if only her tiresome old borgia would die--was the thought that came too often into the mind of arbella, now entering the "thirties" of life, and with the least possible misgiving of her colonel's constancy if she became presently "_un peu trop mûre_." she noticed at this time that grimthorpe shillito went on several occasions to london to consult a specialist. he complained of indigestion, was rather thin, and balder than ever, and difficult to please in his food and appetite. this was her opportunity. she would have said, had she been convicted, that he had driven her to it by his cruelties: that's as may be.--she consulted the family doctor who attended to the household of bluebeard's castle; suggested that sir grimthorpe (they had just knighted him) might be the better for a strychnine tonic; she had read somewhere that strychnine did wonders for middle-aged men who had led rather a rackety life in their early manhood. the family doctor who disliked her and suspected her, as you or i wouldn't have done, but doctors think of everything, feigned to agree; and supplied her with little phials of _aqua distillata_ flavoured with quinine. he himself was puzzled over sir grimthorpe's condition but was a little offended at not being personally consulted. the fact was that sir g. had a very poor opinion of his abilities in diagnosis and being naturally secretive and generally cussed, preferred consulting a london specialist. he wasn't then sir grimthorpe, the specialist wasn't very certain that it _was_ cancer on the liver, and amid his multitude of consulters did not, unless aroused, remember very clearly the case of a mr. shillito from somewhere up in the north. but shillito pondered gravely over the specialist's carefully guarded phrases about "growths, possibly malign, but at the same time--difficult to be sure quite so soon--perhaps harmless, might of course be merely severe suppressed jaundice." when the pains began--he hated the idea of operations, and knew that any operation on the liver only at best staved off the dread, inevitable end for a year or a few months--when the pains began, he had grown utterly tired of life; so he compounded a subtle poison--he was a great chemist and had--only his wife knew not of this--a cabinet which contained a variety of mineral, vegetable, and acid poisons; and kept the draught in a secret locker in his bedroom. meantime arbella, who after all was human, was tortured at the sight of his tortures. she felt she must end it, or her nerves would give way. she trebled, she quintupled the dose of _aqua distillata_ embittered with quinine. one night when the night nurse was sleeping ("resting her eyes," she called it) the wretched man stole from his bed to the night nursery and kissed both his boys. he then swiftly took the phial from its hiding place and drank the contents and died in one ghastly minute. when the night nurse awoke he was crisped in a horrible _rigor_. on the night table was the phial with the remains of the draught. she had noticed in the last day or two lady shillito fussing a good deal about the sick man, pressing on him doses of a colourless medicine. _what if she had stolen in while the nurse was asleep and placed a finally fatal draught by the bedside?_ from that she proceeded to argue (when she had leisure to think it out) that she _hadn't_ been to sleep, had merely been resting her eyes. and she was now sure that whilst she had closed those orbs she had heard--as indeed she had, only it was sir grimthorpe himself--some one stealing into the room. she communicated her suspicions to the doctor. the latter knew his patient had not died of anything he had prescribed, but concluded that lady shillito, wishing to be through with the business, had prepared a fulminating dose obtained elsewhere; and insisted on autopsy with a colleague, to whom he more than hinted his suspicions. together they found the strychnine they were looking for--not very much, but the proportion that was combined by shillito with less traceable drugs to make the death process more rapid--and quite overlooked the signs of cancer in the liver. the outcome was that lady shillito at the inquest found herself "in a very unpleasant position" and was placed under arrest, and later charged with the murder of her husband. believing herself guilty she summoned all her resolution to her aid, admitted nothing, appealed to michael rossiter and others for advice. thus david was drawn into the business. [but this doesn't sound very credible, you will say. "if the husband felt he could not face the agony of death by cancer, why didn't he leave a note saying so, and every one would have understood and been quite 'nice' about it?" i really can't say. perhaps he wished to leave trouble for her behind him; perhaps he divined the reason why she thought a day nurse unnecessary, and insisted on giving him his day medicines with her own fair hands. perhaps he hoped for an open verdict. perhaps he wasn't quite right in his mind. i have told you the story as i remember it and my memory is not perfect. personally i've always been a bit sorry for grimthorpe. it is quite possible that all those hints as to his "queerness" were invented by his wife to excuse herself. i only know that science benefited greatly from his researches, and that he bequeathed some priceless collections to both branches of the british museum. some one once told me he had a heart somewhere and had loved intensely a sister much younger than himself and had only begun to be "queer" and secretive and bald after her premature death. i think also that in the last year of his life he was greatly embittered at not getting the expected peerage; after the trouble and disagreeableness he had gone through to obtain heirs for this distinction this poor little attempt at immortality which it is in the power of a prime minister to bestow.] the grand jury returned a true bill against lady shillito. david had been studying the case from the morrow of the inquest, that is as soon as rossiter had learnt of the coming trouble. the latter though he regarded cousin arbella as a rather amusing minx, an interesting type in modern psychology (though really her type is as old as--say--the hallstadt period) had no wish to see her convicted of murder. furthermore he was getting so increasingly interested in this clever david williams that he would have liked to make his fortune by helping him to a sensational success as a pleader, to one of those cases which if successfully conducted mark out a path to the bench. so he insisted that david williams be briefed for the defence, and well fee'ed, in order that he might be able to devote all his time to the investigation of the mystery. david had an uphill task. he went down to the north in november, , conferred with lady shillito's solicitors, and at great length with the curiously calm, ironly-resolved lady shillito herself. the evidence was too much against her for him to prevent her being committed for trial and lodged in reasonably comfortable quarters in newcastle jail, or for the grand jury to find no true bill of indictment. but between these stages in the process and the actual trial for murder in february, , david worked hard and accumulated conclusive evidence (with rossiter's help) to prove his client's innocence of the deed of which she believed herself guilty. to punish her as she deserved he allowed her to think herself guilty till his defence of her began. the prospect of a death on the gallows did not perturb lady shillito in the least. she was perfectly certain that if found guilty her beauty and station in life would avail to have the death penalty commuted to a term of imprisonment which she would spend in the infirmary. still, that would ruin her life pretty conclusively. she would issue from prison a broken woman, whom in spite of her wealth--if she retained any--no impossibly-faithful colonel would marry at the age of forty-five or fifty. so she followed the opening hours of the trial with a dry mouth. with the help of rossiter and of many and minute researches david got on the track of the consultation in harley street, the warning given of the possible cancer. he found in sir grimthorpe's laboratory sufficient strychnine to kill an army. he was privately informed by the family doctor (who didn't want to press matters to a tragedy) that although he fully believed arbella capable of the deed, she certainly had--so far as the doctor's prescriptions were concerned--obtained nothing from him which could have killed her husband, even if she had centupled the dose. lady shillito appeared in the dock dressed as much as possible like mary, queen of scots on her trial; and was attended by a hospital nurse with restoratives and carminatives. the jury retired for a quarter of an hour only, and returned a verdict of _not guilty_. the court was rent with applause, and the judge commented very severely on such a breach of decorum, apparently unknown to him in previous annals of our courts of justice. lady shillito fainted and the nurse fussed, and the judge in his private room sent for mr. williams and complimented him handsomely on his magnificent conduct of the case. "of course she _meant_ to poison him; but i quite agree with the jury, she didn't. he saved her the trouble. now i suppose she'll marry again. well! i pity her next husband. come and have lunch with me." and in the course of the meal, his ludship spoke warmly to mr. williams of the bright prospects that lay before him if he would drop those foolish suffragette cases. david returned to london with rossiter and remained silent all the way. his companion believed him to be very tired, and refrained from provoking conversation, but surrounded him with a quiet, fatherly care. arrived at king's cross rossiter said: "don't go on to your chambers. my motor's here. it can take your luggage on with mine to portland place. you can have a wash and a rest and a talk when you're rested; and after we've dined and talked the motor shall come round and take you back to fig tree court." mrs. rossiter was there to greet them, and whilst david went to wash and rest and prepare himself for dinner, she chirrupped over her big husband, and asked endless and sometimes pointless questions about the trial and the verdict. "did michael believe she really _had_ done it? she, for one, could believe anything about a woman who obviously dyed her hair and improved her eyebrows. (of course michael said he didn't, or the questions, as to why, how, when might have gone on for hours). was mr. williams's defence of arbella so very wonderful as the evening papers said? why could he not have gone straight home and rested _there_? it would have been so much nicer to have had mike all to herself on his return, and not have this tiresome, melancholy young man spending the evening with them ... really _some_ people had _no_ tact ... could _not_ see they were _de trop_. why didn't mr. williams marry some nice girl and make a home for himself? not well enough off? rubbish! she had known plenty young couples marry and live very happily on two hundred and fifty a year, and mr. williams must surely be earning that? and if he must always be dining out and spending the evening with other people, why did he not make himself more 'general?' not _always_ be absorbed in her husband. of course she understood that while arbella's fate hung in the balance they had to study the case together and have long confabulations over poisons in the lab'rat'ry...!" (this last detestable word was a great worry to mrs. rossiter. sometimes she succeeded in suppressing as many vowels as possible; at others she felt impelled to give them fuller values and call it "labóratorry.") and so on, for an hour or so till dinner was announced. david sat silent all through this meal, under mrs. rossiter's mixture of mirthless badinage: "we shall have you now proposing to lady shillito after saving her life! i expect her husband won't have altered his will as she didn't poison him, and she must have had quite thirty thousand pounds settled on her.... they do say however she's a great _flirt_..." indiscreet questions: "how much will you make out of this case? you don't know? i thought barristers had all that marked on their briefs? and didn't she give you 'refreshers,' as they call them, from time to time? what was it like seeing her in prison? was she handcuffed? or chained? what did she wear when she was tried?" and inconsequent remarks: "i remember my mamma--she died when i was only fourteen--used to dream she was being tried for murder. it distressed her very much because, as she said, she couldn't have hurt a fly. what do _you_ dream about, mr. williams? some pretty young lady, i'll be bound. i dream about such _funny_ things, but i nearly always forget what they were just as i am going to tell michael. but i did remember one dream just before michael went down to newcastle to join you ... was it about mermaids? no. it was about _you_--wasn't that funny? and you seemed to be dressed as a mermaid--no, i suppose it must have been a mer_man_--and you were trying to follow michael up the rocks by walking on your tail; and it seemed to hurt you awfully. of course i know what it all came from. michael had wanted me to read hans andersen's fairy stories--don't you think they're pretty? i do; but sometimes they are about rather silly things, skewers and lucifer matches ... and i had spent the afternoon at the zoo. michael's a fellow, of course, and i use his ticket and always feel quite at home there ... and at the zoo that day i had seen one of the sea-lions trying to walk on his tail.... oh, _how_ i laughed! but what made me associate the sea-lion with you and mermaids, i cannot say, but then as poor papa used to say, 'dreams are funny things'..." david's replies were hardly audible, and to his hostess's pressing entreaties that he would try this dish or not pass that, he did not answer at all. he felt, indeed, as though the muscles of his throat would not let him swallow and if he opened his mouth wide enough to utter a consecutive speech he would burst out crying. a great desire--almost unknown to vivie hitherto--seized him to get away to some lonely spot and cry and cry, give full vent to some unprecedented fit of hysteria. he could not look at rossiter though he knew that michael's eyes were resting on his face, because if he attempted to reply to the earnest gaze by a reassuring smile, the lips would tremble and the tears would fall. at last when the dessert was reached and the servants--_do_ they never feel telepathically at such moments that some one person seated at the table, crumbling bread, wishes them miles away and loathes their quiet ministrations?--the servants had withdrawn for a brief respite till they reappeared with coffee, david rose to his feet and stammered out something about not being well--would they order the motor and let him go? and as he spoke, and tried to speak in a level, "society" voice, his aching eyes saw the electric lamps, the glinting silver, mrs. rossiter's pink, foolish face and crisp little flaxen curls, rossiter's bearded countenance with its honest, concerned look all waltzing round and round in a dizzying whirl. he made the usual vain clutches at unreal supports, and fainted into rossiter's arms. the latter carried him with little effort into the cool library and laid him down on a couch. mrs. rossiter followed, full of exclamations, vain questions, and suggestions of inapplicable or unsuitable remedies. rossiter paid little heed to her, and proceeded to remove david's collar and tie and open his shirt front in order to place a hand over the heart. suddenly he looked up and round on his wife, and said with a peremptoriness which admitted of no questioning: "go and see that one of the spare bedrooms is got ready, a fire lit, and so on. get this done _quickly_, and meantime leave him to me. i have got restoratives here close at hand." mrs. rossiter awed into silence summoned the housemaid and parlour-maid and hindered them as much as possible in the task of getting a room ready. meantime the sub-conscious david sighed a great deal and presently wept a great deal in convulsive sobs, and then opened his eyes and saw the tourbillon of whirling elements settling down into rossiter's grave, handsome face--yes, but a gravity somehow interpenetrated by love, a love not ashamed to show itself--bending over him with great concern. the secret had been guessed, was known; and as they held each other with their eyes as though the world were well lost in this discovery, their lips met in one kiss, and for a minute vivie's arms were round michael's neck, for just one unforgettable moment, a moment she felt she would cheerfully have died to have lived through. they were soon unlaced, for sharp little high-heeled footsteps on the tiled passage and the clinketing of trinkets announced the return of mrs. rossiter. vivie became david once more, but left behind her the glad tears of relief that were coursing down david's cheeks. mrs. rossiter thought this was a very odd way for a barrister to celebrate his winning a great case at the criminal courts, and turned away in delicacy from the spectacle of a dishevelled and obviously lachrymose young man with one arm dangling and the other thrown negligently over the back of the leather couch. "mr. williams's room is ready, michael," she said primly. "all right, dear; thank you. i will help williams up to bed and have his luggage sent up. he will be quite well to-morrow if he can get to sleep. you needn't bother any more, dearie. go into the drawing-room and i will join you there presently." rossiter gave the rather shuddery, shivery, teeth-clacking david an arm till he saw him into the bedroom and resting on the bedroom sofa. then he drew up a chair and said in low but distinct tones:-- "look here. i know you want to make me an explanation. well! it can wait. a little more of this strain and you'll be having brain fever. sleep if you can, and eat all the breakfast linda sends you up in the morning. get up at eleven to-morrow and if you are fit then to drive out in my motor, return to your chambers. when you have calmed down to a normal pulse, write to me all you want to say. no one shall read it but me ... i'll burn it afterwards or send it back to you under seal. but at the present time, it may be easier for both of us if our communications are only written and not spoken. we have both been tried rather high; and both of us are human, however high-principled. if you write, register the letter.... good-night..." this that follows is probably what vivie wrote to michael. he burnt the long letter when he had finished reading it though he made excerpts in a pocket-book. but i can more or less correctly surmise how she would put her case; how she typed it herself in the solitude of two evenings; how, indeed, her nervous break-down was made the reason for fending off all clients and denying herself to all callers. "i am not david vavasour williams. i am vivien warren, the daughter of a woman who runs a series of disreputable private hotels on the continent. i had no avowed father, nor had my mother, who likewise was illegitimate. she was probably the daughter of a lieutenant warren who was killed in the crimea, and _her_ mother's name was vavasour. my grandmother was probably--i can only deal with probabilities and possibilities in this undocumented past--a welsh woman of cardiff, and i should not be surprised if i were a sort of cousin of the man i am personating. "he was the ne'er-do-weel, only son of a welsh vicar, a pupil of praed's, who went out to south africa and died or was killed in the war. "you have met my adopted father. he fully believes i am the bad son, the prodigal son, returned and reformed. he has grown to love me so much that it really seems to have put new life into him. i have helped him to get his affairs straight, and i think i may say he has gained by this substitution of one son for another, even though the new son is a daughter! i have taken none of his money, other than small sums he has thrust on me. i have some money of my own, earned in honoria's firm, for i was the 'warren' of her 'fraser and warren.' she has known my secret all along, hasn't quite approved, but was overborne by me in my resolve to show what a woman--in disguise, it may be--could do at the bar. "michael! i started out twelve years ago--and the dreadful thing is i am now _thirty-four_ in true truth! to conquer man, and a man has conquered me! i wanted to show that woman could compete with man in all careers, and especially in the law. so she can--have i not shown it by what i have done? but it is a drawn battle. i have realized that if some men are bad--rotten--others, like you--are supremely good. i love you as i never thought i could love any one. i cannot trust myself to write down how much i love you: it would read shamefully and be too much a surrender of my first principle of self-respect. "i am going to throw up the whole d.v.w. business. it has put us in a false relation which was exasperating me and puzzling you. moreover the disguise was wearing very thin. only those two loyal souls, honoria fraser and albert adams, were cognizant of the secret, but it was being guessed at and almost guessed right, in certain quarters. professional jealousy was on my track. i never fainted before in my life--so far as i can remember--but i might have done so elsewhere than in your dear house, after the strain of such an effort as i made to save that worthless woman--she was your cousin, which is why i fought for her so hard--how often is not justice deflected by love! i might, somewhere else, when over-strained have had a fit of hysterics; and my disguise would have been penetrated by eyes less merciful than yours. then would have come exposure and its consequences--damaging to you (_i_ should not have mattered), to my poor old 'father' down in wales--whom i sincerely love--to praddy, to honoria.... "let me be thankful to get off so easily! _somme toute_, i have had a glorious time, have seen the world from the man's point of view--and i can assure you that from his point of view it is a jolly place to live in--_he_ can walk up and down the strand and receive no insult. "well now, to relieve your anxieties, i will tell you, that after a brief visit to south wales to recuperate from the exertions of that trial, mr. david williams the famous young barrister at the criminal bar will go abroad to investigate the white slave traffic. miss vivien warren privately believes--and hopes--that the horrors of this traffic in british womanhood are greatly exaggerated. the lot in life of many of these young women is so bad in their native land that they cannot make it worse by going abroad, no matter in what avowed career. but mr. david williams takes rather a higher line and is resolved in any case to get at the truth. miss warren, nathless, has her misgivings anent her old mamma, and would like to know what that old lady is doing at the present time, and whether she is past reform. miss warren even has her moments of doubt as to the flawless perfection of her own life: whether the path of duty in did not rather lie in the direction of a serious attempt to be a daughter to her wayward mother and reclaim her then, instead of going off at a tangent as the mannish type of new woman, to whom applicable mathematics are everything and human affections very little. i suppose the truth, the commonplace truth is, that rather late in life, vivien warren has fallen in love in the old-fashioned way--how nature mocks at us!--and now sees things somewhat differently. at any rate, david and vivie, fused into one personality, are going abroad for a protracted period ... going out of your life, my dearest, for it is better so. linda has every right to you and science is a jealous mistress. moreover poor, outcast vivie has her own bitter pride. she is resolved to show that a woman _can_ cultivate strength of character and an unflinching sobriety of conduct, even when born of such doubtful stock as mine, even when devoid of all religious faith. i know you love me, i glory in the knowledge, but i know that you likewise are more strongly bound by principles of right conduct because like myself you have no sham theology.... "michael! _why_ are we tortured like this? why mayn't we love where we please? is this discipline necessary to the improvement of the race? i only know that if we sinned against these human laws and conventions, your great career in science--and again, why in science? lightness in love does not seem to affect the career of orchestral conductors, actors, singers, play-wrights and house painters--why weren't you one of these, and not a high priest of the only real religion? i only know also that if i fell, so many people would have the satisfaction of saying: 'there! _what_ did i say? what's bred in the bone comes out in the flesh. _that's_ how the woman's movement's goin' to end, you take my word for it! they'll get a man somewhere, somehow, and then they'll clear out of it.' "i think i said before--i meant to say, at any rate, so as to ease your mind: i'm all right as regards financial matters. i have a life annuity and some useful savings. i shall give bertie adams a year's salary; and if you feel, dear friend, you _must_ put forth your hand to help me, help _him_ instead to get another position. he has a wife and a young family, and for his class is just about as good a chap as i have ever met--this is 'david' speaking! if you can do nothing you may be sure vivie will, even if she has to borrow unclean money from her wicked old mother to keep bertie adams from financial anxiety and his pretty young wife and the child they are so proud of.... "i must finish this gigantic letter somewhere, though i'm not going to stop writing to you. i couldn't--i should lose all hold on life if i did. for the purpose of correspondence and finishing up things, i shall be 'david williams' for some time longer. you know his address in wales? pontystrad vicarage, pontyffynon, glamorgan, if you've forgotten it. he'll be there till april, and then begin his foreign tour and write to you at intervals from the continent. as to vivie, i think she won't return to life and activity till the autumn and _then_ she'll make things hum. she'll throw all the energy of frustrated love into the woman's cause, and get 'em the vote somehow...!" early in the genesis of the book. i appointed a jury of matrons to judge each chapter before it went to the press, and to decide whether it was suited to the restrictions of the circulating library, and whether it would cause real distress or perturbation to three persons whom we chose as representative readers of decent fiction: admiral broadbent, lady percy mountjoye, and old mrs. bridges (mrs. bridges was said to have had a heart attack after reading the gay-dombeys--i did not wish her to have another). this jury of broad-minded women of the world decided that rossiter's reply to vivie's very long epistle should not see the light. he himself would probably--had he known we were discussing his affairs--have been thankful for this decision; because twelve hours after he had written it he was heartily ashamed of his momentary lapse from high principles, ashamed that the woman in the case should have shown herself truer metal. he resolved, so far as our poor human resolves are worth anything, to remain inflexibly true to his devoted linda and to his career in biological science. he knew too well that if he were caught in adultery it would be all over with the great theories he was working to establish. the royal society would condemn them. besides, so fine a resolve as vivie's, to live on the heights must be respected. at the same time, it is certain that for the next three months he muddled his experiments, confused his arguments, lost his temper with a colleague on the council of the zoological society, kicked the pugs--even caused the most unbearable two of them to be poisoned by his assistant--and lied in attributing their deaths to other causes. he promised the weeping linda a pom instead; he said "hell!" when the macaw interrupted them with raucous screams. he let pass all sorts of misprints in his article on the ductless glands for the _encyclopaedia scotica_, he was always losing the thread of his discourse in his lectures at the london institution and university college; and he spent too much of his valuable time writing hugely long letters on all sorts of subjects to david williams. david--or vivie--replied much more laconically. in the first place he--she--had had her say in the one big outpouring from which i have quoted so freely; in the second she did not wish to stoke up these fires lest they should become volcanic and break up a happy home and a great career. she wrote once saying: "if ever you were in trouble of any kind; if linda should die before me, for example, i would come back to you from the ends of the earth and even if i were legitimately married to the prince of monaco; come back and serve you as a drudge, as a butt for your wit, as a sick nurse. but meantime, michael, you must play the game." and so after this three months' frenzy was past, he did. it was not always easy. linda's devotion was touching. she perceived--though she hardly liked admitting it--that her husband missed the society of "that" mr. williams, in whom she, for one, never could see anything particularly striking, and who was now travelling abroad on a quest it would be indelicate to particularize, and one that in _her_ opinion should have been taken up by a far older man, the father of a grown-up family. she strove to replace williams as an intelligent companion in the library and even in the laboratory. she gave up works of charity and espionage in marylebone and many of her trips into society, to sit more often with the dear professor, and was a little distressed by his groans which seemed to be quite unprovoked by her remarks or her actions. however as the months went by, rossiter buckled down more to his work, and mrs. rossiter noticed that he engaged a new assistant at £ a year to take charge of his enormous correspondence. mr. bertie adams seemed a nice young man, though also afflicted at times with something that gave melancholy to his gaze. but he had a good little wife who came to make a home for him in marylebone. mrs. rossiter being a kindly woman went to call on her and was entirely taken up with their one child whom she frequently asked to tea and found much more interesting than the new pom. "but it's got such a funny name, michael; i mean funny for their station in life. it's a girl and they call it 'vivvy,' which is short for vivien. i told mrs. adams she must have been reading tennyson's _idylls of the king_; but she said 'no, she wasn't much of a reader: adams was, and it was some lady's name in a story that had stuck in his head, and that as her mother's name was susan and his was jane, she hadn't minded.'" chapter xi david goes abroad david williams had an enthusiastic greeting when he went home to pontystrad for the easter of . it was an early easter that year, whether you like it or not; it suits my story better so, because then david can turn up in brussels at the end of april, and yet have attended to a host of necessary things before his departure on a long absence. he first of all devoted himself to making the old vicar happy for a few weeks in a rather blustery, showery march-april. his father was full of wonderment and exultation over the honourable publicity his barrister son had attained. "you'll be a judge, davy; at any rate a k.c., before i'm dead! but marry, boy, _marry_. _that's_ what you must do now. marry and give me grandchildren." the burly curate privately thought david a bit morbid in his passionate devotion to the woman's cause, and this white slave traffic all rot. he had worked sufficiently in the bad towns of the south welsh coast and had had an initiation into the lower-living parts of birmingham and london to be skeptical about the existence of these poor, deluded virgins, lured from their humble respectable homes and thrust by shakespearean procuresses, bawds, and bullies into an impure life. if they went to these places abroad it was probably with the hope of greater gains, better food, and stricter medical attention. however, he kept most of these thoughts to himself and his wife, the squire's daughter; who as she somehow thought david _ought_ to have married _her_, was a little bit sentimental about him and considered he was a galahad. old nannie remained as usual wistfully puzzled, half fearing the explanation of the enigma if it ever came. returned to london and fig tree court--which he was soon vacating--david obtained through his and her bankers a passport for himself and another for miss vivien warren, thirty-four, british subject, and so forth, travelling on the continent, a lady of independent means. he re-arranged all david's and vivie's money matters, stored such of vivie's property and his own as was indispensable at honoria armstrong's house in kensington, and left a box containing a complete man's outfit in charge of bertie adams; bade farewell as "david williams" and "uncle david" to honoria and her two babies, and to the still unkindly-looking colonel armstrong (who very much resented the "uncle" business, which was perhaps why honoria out of a wholesome _taquinage_ kept it up); and called in for a farewell chat with dear old praddy--beginning to look a bit shaky and rather too much bossed by his parlour-maid. honoria had said as he departed "do try to run up against vivie somewhere abroad and tell her i shan't be happy till she returns and takes up her abode among us once more. 'army' is _longing_ to know her." ('army' didn't look it.) "now pettums! wave handikins to uncle david. he's goin' broadies. 'army' dear, would you ask them to whistle for a taxi? i know david doesn't want to walk all the way back to the temple in those lovely button boots." praed told him all he wanted to know about the localities of the warren private hotels; most of all, that at which vivie's mother resided in the rue royale, brussels. so at this establishment a well but plainly dressed english lady, scarcely looking her age (thirty-four) turned up one morning, and sent in a card to the lady-proprietress, mme. varennes. this card was closely scanned by a heavy-featured flemish girl who took it upstairs to an _appartement_ on the first floor. she read: _miss vivien warren_ and vaguely noted the resemblance of the two names varennes and warren, and the fact that the establishment in which she earned a lucrative wage was one of the "warren" hotels. with very short delay, vivie was invited to ascend in a lift to the first floor and was shown in to a gorgeously furnished bedroom which, through an open door, gave a glimpse of an attractive boudoir or sitting-room beyond, and beyond that again the plane trees of a great boulevard breaking into delicate green leaf. a woman of painted middle age in a _descente de lit_ that in its opulence matched the hangings and furniture of the room, had been reclining on a sofa, drinking chocolate and reading a newspaper. she rose shakily to her feet, when the door closed behind vivie, tottered forward to meet her, and exclaimed rather theatrically "my _daughter_ ... come back to me ... after all these years!" (a few tears ran down the rouged cheeks). "steady on, mother," said vivie, propping her up, and feeling oh! so clean and pure and fresh and wholesome by contrast with this worn-out woman of pleasure. "lie down again on your sofa, go on with your _petit déjeuner_--which is surely rather late? there were signs and appetizing smells of the larger meal being imminent as i passed through the hotel. now just lie down until you want to dress--if you like, i'll help you dress" (swallowing hard to choke down a little shudder of repulsion). "i'm not in any hurry. i've come to brussels to go into matters thoroughly. for the present, i am staying at the hotel grimaud." mrs. warren was convulsively sobbing and ruining the complexion she had just made up, before she changed out of her _descente de lit_: "why not stop here, dearie? don't laugh! there's _lots_ that do and never suspect for one minute it ain't like any other hotel; though from all i see and hear, _all_ hotels are pretty much the same now-a-days, whether they're called by my name or not. of course a man might find out pretty quick, but not a woman who wasn't in the business herself. why we actually _encourage_ decent women to come here when we ain't pressed for room. they give the place a better tone, don't you know. there's two clergyman's sisters come here most autumns and stop and stop and don't notice anything. they come in here and chat with me, and once they said they liked foreign gentlemen better than their own fellow-countrymen: 'their manners are so _affable_.' why it was partly through people like that, that i got to hear every now and then what _you_ was up to. oh, i wasn't taken in long by that david williams business. praddy didn't give you away--to speak of, when i sent you that thousand pounds--lord, i was glad you kept it! but what fixed me was your portrait in the _daily mirror_ a couple of years ago as 'the brilliant young advocate, mr. david vavasour williams.' somehow the 'vavasour' seemed to fit in all right, though what you wanted with my--ahem--maiden name, with what was pore mother's _reel_ name, before she lived with your grandfather--well as i say, i soon saw through the whole bag o' tricks--but _what_ a lark! beat anythink _i_ ever did. what have you done with your duds? gone back to bein' vivie once more?--" _vivie_: "i'll tell you all about it in good time. but i would rather not stay here all the same. i've found a quiet hotel near the station. i will come and see you if you can make it easy for me; but what i should very much prefer, if you can only get away from this horrid place, is that you should come and see _me_. why shouldn't you give yourself a fortnight's holiday and go off with me to louvain ... or to spa ... or some other quiet place where we can talk over everything to our heart's content?" _mrs. warren_: "not a bad idea. do me a lot of good. i was feeling awfully down, vivie, when you came. i wasn't altogether taken aback at your coming, dearie, 'cos praddy had given me a kind of a hint you might turn up. but somehow, though everything goes well in business--we seldom had so busy a time as during this last humanitarian congress of the powers--all the diplomats came here--mostly the old ones, the old and respectable--oh we _all_ like respectability--yet i never 'ad such low spirits. my gals used to come in here and find me cryin' as often as not.... 'comment, madame,' they used to say, 'pourquoi pleurez vous? tout va si bien! _quelle_ clientele, et pas chiche'--i suppose you understand french? however about this trip to the country, look on it as _settled_. i'll pack up now and away we go in the afternoon. and not to any of your measly hotels or village inns. why i've got me _own_ country place and me _own_ auto. villa de beau-séjour, a mile or so beyond the lovely beech woods of tervueren. ain't so far from louvain, so's i can send you on there one day--ah! there's some one you'd like to see in louvain, if i mistake not! you always was one for findin' out things, and maybe i'll tell you more, now you've come back to me, than what i'd a done with you standing up so stiff and proud and me unfit to take up the hem of your skirt.... how i do ramble. suppose it's old age comin' on" (shudders). "about this villa de beau-séjour ... it was once a farm house, and even now it's the farm where i get me eggs and milk and butter an' the fruit and vegetables for this hotel. _he_ gave it to me--you know whom i mean by '_he_'? ... don't do to talk too loud in a place like this.... they say he's pretty bad just now, not likely to live much longer. i was his mistress once, years ago--at least i was more a confidante than anything else. _how_ he used to laugh at my stories! 'que tu es une drôlesse,' he used to say. i never used to mince matters and we were none the worse for that. bless you, he wasn't as bad as they painted him, 'long of all this fuss about the blacks. as i say, he gave me the villa de beau-séjour, and used to say if i behaved myself he might some day make me 'baronne de beau-séjour.' how'd you have liked that, eh? sort of morganatic queen? i lay i'd have put some good management into the runnin' of those places. aïe! how they used to swindle 'im, and he believing himself always such a sharp man of business! when that vaughan hussy..." _vivie_: "very well. we'll go to villa beau-séjour. but don't give me too many of your reminiscences or i may leave you after all and go back to england. whilst i'm with you, you must give up rouge and patchouli and the kind of conversation that goes with them. i'm out here trying to do my duty and duty is always unpleasant. i don't want to be a kill-joy, but don't give me more of that side of your character than you can help. it--it makes me sick, mother..." [mrs. warren--or madame varennes--whimpers a little, but soon cheers up, rings the bell for her maid preparatory to dressing and being the business woman over her preparations for departure. she notes the address of vivie's hotel and promises to call for her there in the _auto_ at three o'clock. vivie leaves her, descends the richly carpeted stairs--the lift is worked by an odiously pretty, little, plump soubrette dressed as a page boy--and goes out into the street. several lounging men stare hard at her, but decide she is too english, too plainly dressed, and a little too old to neddle with. this last consideration is apparent to vivie's intelligence and she muses on it with a wistful little smile, half humour, half regret. she will at her leisure write a whole description of the scene to michael.] those who come after us will never realize how delightful was foreign travel before the war, before that war which installed damnable dora in power in all the countries of europe, especially france, belgium, switzerland, italy, and holland. they will not conceive it possible that the getting of a passport (as a mere means of rapidly establishing one's identity at bank or post-office) was a simple transaction done through a banker or a tourist agency, the enclosing of stamps and the payment of a shilling or two; that there was no question of _visas_ entailing endless humiliation and back-breaking delays, waiting about in ante-rooms and empty apartments of squalid, desolating ugliness situate always in the most odious parts of a town. but the foreign offices of europe were agreed on one topic, and this was that having got their feet back on the necks of the people, their serfs of the glebe should not, save under circumstances hateful, fatiguing, unhealthy and humiliating, travel through the lands that once were beautiful and bountiful and are so no longer. so: vivie, never having consciously been abroad before (though she was later to learn she had actually been born in brussels), began to experience all the delights of travel in a foreign land. she woke up the next morning to the country pleasures of villa beau-séjour, a preposterous chateau-villa it might be, but attached to a charming flemish farm; with cows and pigs, geese and ducks, plump poultry and white pigeons, with clumps of poplars and copses of hawthorns and wild cherry trees which joined the little domain on to the splendid forest of tervueren. there were the friendly, super-intelligent big dogs, like bastard st. bernards or mastiffs in breed, that drew the little carts which carried the produce of the farm to the markets or to brussels. there were cheery flemish farm servants and buxom dairy or poultry women, their wives; none of them particularly aware that there was anything discreditable about madame varennes. they may have vaguely remembered she had once lived under high protection, but that, if anything, added to her prestige in their eyes. she was an english lady who for purposes of business and may be of _la haute politique_ chose to live in belgium. she was a kind mistress and a generous _patronne_. vivie as her daughter was assured of their respect, and by her polite behaviour won their liking as well. "you know, viv, old girl," said mrs. warren one day, "if you played your cards all right, this pretty place might be yours after i'd gone. why don't yer pick up a decent husband somewhere and drop all this foolishness about the suffragettes? he needn't know too much about me, d'yer see? and if you looked at things sensible-like, you'd come in for a pot of money some day; and whilst i lived i'd make you a good allowance--" "it's no use, dear mother"--involuntarily she said "dear": her heart was hungry for affection, wales was rapidly passing out of her sphere, david's business must soon be wound up in that quarter and where else had she to go? "so long as you keep on with those hotels i can't touch a penny. i oughtn't to have kept that thousand, only praddy assured me it was 'clean' money." _mrs. w._: "so it was. i won it at monte. i don't often gamble now, i hate losing money. but we'd had a splendid season at roquebrune and i sat down one day at the tables, a bit reckless-like. seemed as if i couldn't lose. when i got up and left i had won thirty thousand francs. so i says to myself: 'this shall go to my little girl: i'll send it through praddy and he'll pay it into her bank. then i shan't feel anxious about her.'" "mother! what a strange creature you are! such a mixture of good and bad--for i suppose it _is_ bad, i feel somehow it _is_ bad, trafficking in women's bodies, as they put it sensationally. towards me you have always been compact of kindness; you took every precaution to have me brought up well, out of knowledge of any impurity; and well and modernly educated. you left me quite free to marry whom i liked ... but ... but ... you stuck to this horrible career..." "well, vivie. i did. but did you make any great effort to turn me from it? besides, _is_ it horrible? i won't promise much for berlin and buda-pest or even vienna, because i haven't been in those directions for ever so long, and the germans are reg'lar getting out of hand, they are, working up for something. i dessay if you looked in at the warren hotels in those places you might find lots to say against 'em. but you couldn't say the places i supervise here and at roquebrune are so bad? _i_ won't stop your looking into 'em. the girls are treated right down well. looked after if they fall sick and given every encouragement to marry well. i even call those two places--i've giv' up me paris house this ten years--i even call them my 'marriage markets.' ah! an' i've given in my time not a few _dots_ to decent girls that had found a good husband _dans la clientèle_. why they're no more than what you might call hotels a bit larkier than what other hotels are. i've never in all my twenty years of brussels management had a row with the police.... and as to all this rot about the white slave traffic that you seem so excited about ... well i'm not saying there's nothin' in it.... antwerp, hamburg, rotterdam--you'd hear some funny stories there ... but only if you went as david williams in your man's kit--my! what a wheeze that's bin!... and from all they tell me, that place in south america--buenos aires, is a reg'lar hell. but ... god bless my soul ... there's nothin' to fuss about here. our young ladies would take on like anything if you forced them to go away from my care. it's gettin' near the time when we close our roquebrune establishment for the summer, an' the girls'll all be goin' back to their homes in the mountains and fattenin' up on new milk; still if you go there before the middle of may you'll see things pretty much as they are in the season; and what's more you'll see plenty of perfectly respectable people stoppin' there. of course the prices are high. but look at the luxury! what that wicked bax used to call 'all the home comforts.' he liked 'is joke. i hear he's settlin' down at home with his old dutch. she's bin awful good to him, i must say. _i_ couldn't stand 'im long. i don't often lose me temper but i did with him, after he got licked by paul dombey, and i threw an inkpot at his head and ain't seen him for a matter of thirteen or fourteen year. he sold out all his shares in the warren hotels when he came a cropper." "well, mother, i'll have a look round. i'm truly glad you're quit of the german and austrian horrors, though you must bear the blame for having organized them in the first place. i will presently put on david williams's clothes and see what i _can_ see of them. but if you want me to be a daughter to you, you'll take the first and the readiest opportunity of removing your name from these--_ach_!--these legacies of the nineteenth century. you'll wind up the warren hotels' company, and as to the two houses you've got here and at roquebrune, you'll turn them now into decent places where no indecency is tolerated." _mrs. warren_: "i'll think it over and i don't say as i won't give in to you. i'm tired of a rackety life and i'm proud of you and ... and ... (cries) ... ashamed of meself ... ashamed whenever i look at you. though i've never bin what i call _bad_. i've helped many a lame dog over a stile.... that's partly how you came into existence--almost the only time i've ever been in love--many years ago--why, girl, you must be--getting on for thirty-five--let me see ... (muses). yes, it was in the winter of ' - . i'd bin at ostende with a young barrister from london ... him i told you about once, who used to write plays, and we came on to brussels because he had some business with the belgian government. he left me pretty much to myself just then, though quite open-handed, don't you know.... one day i was walking through one of the poorer streets where the people was very flemish, and i stood looking up at an old doorway--dunno' why--s'pose i thought it picturesque--reminded me of praddy's drawin's. and an old woman comes up and says in french, 'madame est anglaise?' in those days i couldn't hardly speak a word o' french, but i said 'oui.' then she wants me to come upstairs but i thought it was some trap. however as far as i could make out there was a young irishman there, she said, lying very sick of a fever and seemingly had no friends. "well: i took down the address and the next day i came there with the concierge of the hotel where we were staying, and under his protection we went upstairs. my! it was a beastly place--and your poor father--for he _was_ your father--was tossing about and raving, with burning cheeks and huge eyes, just like yours. well! i had plenty of money just then, so with the help of that concierge we found a decent lodging--they wasn't so partic'lar then about infection or they didn't think typhoid infectious--i took him there in an ambulance, engaged a nurse, and in a fortnight he was recovering. he turned out to be a seminarist--i think they called it--from ireland who was going to be trained for the priesthood at louvain--lots of irish used to come there in those days. and somehow a fit of naughtiness had overcome him--he was only twenty--and he thought he'd like to see a bit of the world. so he'd sloped from his college and had a bit of a spree at brussels and ostende. then he was took with this fever-- "his name was fergus o'conor and he always said he was descended from the real old irish kings, and he was some kind of a fenian. i mean he used to go on something terrible against the english, and say he would never rest till they were drove out of ireland. when he got well again he was that handsome--well i've never seen any one like him, unless it's you. i expect when you dress up as david williams you're the image of what he was when i fell in love with him. "and i did. and when me barrister friend--mr. fitzsimmons--teased me about it, and wanted me--he having finished his business--to return with him to london i refused. bein' a bit free with me speech in those days i dessay i said 'go to hell.' but he only laughed and left me fifty pounds. "well, i lived with this young student for a matter of six months. a lovely time we had, till he began gettin' melancholy--matter of no money partly. he tried bein' a journalist. "then the church got him back. there came about a reg'lar change in him, and just at the time when _you_ was comin' along. he woke up one night in a cold sweat and said he was eternally damned. 'nonsense,' i says, 'it's them crayfish; you ought never to eat that bisque soup...' "but he meant it. he went back to louvain--where i'm goin' to take you in a day or two--and i suppose they made him do all sorts of penances before they gave him absolution. but he stuck to it. in due time he became a priest and entered one of them religious houses. they think a lot of him at louvain. i've seen him once or twice but i can't bear to meet his eyes--they're somethin' like yours--make me feel a reg'lar jezebel. and as to you? well, when he left me i hadn't got much money left; so, before i begged a passage back to england, i called in at the very hotel where you found me the other day, and where me an' my barrister friend had been stayin'. i'd got to know the proprietress a little--real kind-'earted woman she was. she said to me 'see here. you stop with me and help me in the bureau and have your baby. i'll look after you. and when you can get about again, stop on and help me in my business. i reckon you're the type of woman i've bin looking out for this long while.' and that's how the first of the warren hotels was started and that's where you were born ... in october, eighteen--seventy--five--" (vivie gave a little shudder, but her mother's thoughts were so intent on the past that she did not perceive it.) _mrs. warren_: "dj'ever see yer aunt liz?" vivie told her of the grim experiences already touched on in chapter i. _mrs. warren_: "well she dropped _me_--_com_pletely--from the time she married that canon. and i respected her. she was comfortably off, her past was dead and done with. d'yer think _i_ wanted to bother 'er? not i. it depends so much on the way you was born and brought up. if liz had been the child of a respectable married couple that could give her a good start in life, 'probability is she'd have run straight from the first. dunno about me. i was always a bit larky. and yet d'you know, i think if yer father hadn't been a sort of young god, with his head in the skies, and no reg'lar income, if he'd a married me and been kind to me ... i should have been an honest woman all the rest of me life.... "what do _you_ feel about morality? you don't seem to have much faith in religion, yet you've always taken a high line--and somehow i'm glad you have--about things that never seemed to me to matter much. we're given these passions and desires--and my! don't it hurt, falling in love!--and then the clergy, though they're awful humbugs, tells us we must deny our cravings..." _vivie_: "in the main the clergy are right in what they preach though they give the wrong reasons. we must try to regulate our passions or they will master us, stifle what is really good in us. my solution of this problem which i am so sick of discussing.... but let's finish with it while we are about it--my solution is that the state and the community should do their utmost to encourage, subsidize, reward early marriages; and at the same time facilitate in a reasonable degree divorce. apply both these remedies and you would go far to wipe out prostitution, which i think perfectly horrible--i--i should like to penalize it. perhaps it is the irish ascetic in my constitution. a good many early marriages might be failures. well then, at the end of ten years these should be dissolvable, with proper provision made for the children. i think many a couple if they knew that after a time and without scandal their partnership could be dissolved wouldn't, when the time came, want it. while on the other hand if you made the tie not everlastingly binding, young people--especially if they hadn't to trouble about means--would get married without hesitation or delay. i should not only encourage that, but i should give every woman a heavy bonus for bringing a living child into the world.... now let's talk of something else. when are you going to take me to louvain?" * * * * * they went to louvain a few days later and vivie's newly awakened senses for the beautiful in art revelled in the glorious architecture, so much of which was afterwards wrecked in the war. walking beneath the planes in a narrow street between monastic buildings, they descried a gaunt, stately figure of a father superior of some great order. "there!" said mrs. warren; "that's him, that's your father." they quickened their pace and were presently alongside him. he flashed his great, grey eagle eyes for a contemptuous second on the face of mrs. warren, who was all of a tremble and could not meet the gaze. vivie, he scarcely glanced at as he strode towards a doorway which engulfed him, though the eyes she had inherited would have met his unflinchingly. * * * * * david williams duly visited antwerp, rotterdam, hamburg, berlin, vienna, and buda-pest. much of what he saw disgusted, even revolted, him, but he found few of his fellow-countrywomen held captive and crying to be delivered from a life of infamy. on his return to england in the autumn of , he published the results of his observations; but they had very little effect on continental public opinion. however mrs. warren in due course turned her two establishments into hotels that gradually acquired a well-founded character of propriety and were in time included amongst those recommended to quiet, studious people by first class tourist agencies. their names were changed respectively from hotel leopold ii to hotel edouard-sept, from the homestead, roquebrune, to hotel du royaume-uni. mrs. warren or mme. varennes retired completely from the management, but arranged to retain for her own use the magnificently furnished _appartement_ on the first floor of the hotel edouard-sept at brussels, where vivie had seen her in the late spring of . she still continued to receive a certain income from these two admirably managed hostelries. constrained by vivie she bestowed large donations on charitable and educational institutions affecting the welfare of women and established a fund of ten thousand pounds for the promotion of woman suffrage in great britain, which fund was to be at vivie's disposal. but even with these sacrifices to _bienséance_ she remained a lady of considerable fortune. she resisted however all invitations to make her home in england. "no, dear; i've got used to foreign ways. i hate my own people; they're such damned hypocrites; and the cooking don't suit my taste, accustomed to the best." but she gave up brandy except as a very occasional _chasse_ after the postprandial coffee. she no longer dyed her hair and used very little rouge and no scent but lavender. her hair turned a warm white colour, and dressed à la pompadour made her look what she probably was at heart--quite a decent sort. chapter xii vivie returns honoria armstrong, faithful in friendship and purpose as few people are (though she abated never a whit her love for her dear, fierce, blue-eyed, bristly-moustached, battle-scarred, bullying husband) prepared for vivie's return in the autumn of by securing for her occupancy a nice little one-storeyed house in a kensington back street; one of those houses--i doubt not, now tenanted by millionaires who don't want a large household, just a roof over their heads--that remain over from the early nineteenth century, when kensington was emerging from a country village into villadom. the broad, quiet road, named after our late dear queen, has nothing but these detached or semi-detached little _cottages ornés_, one-storeyed villas with a studio behind, or two-storeyed components of "terraces," for about a quarter of a mile; and just before the war, building speculators were wont to pace its pavements with a hungry gaze directed to left and right buying up in imagination all this wasted space, pulling down these pretty stucco nests, and building in their place castles of flats, high into the air. i don't suppose this district will escape much longer the destruction of its graceful flowering trees and vivid gardens, its air of an opulent village; it will match with the rest of kensingtonia in huge, handsome buildings and be much sought after by the people who devote their lives--till they commit suicide--to illicit love and the victory balls at the albert hall. but in --would that we were all back in !--it was as nice a part of london as a busy, energetic, sober-living spinster, in the movement, yet liking home retirement and lilac-scented privacy--could desire to inhabit, at the absurd rental of fifty pounds a year, with comparatively low rates, and the need for only one hard-working, self-respecting suffragette maid, with the monthly assistance of a charwoman of advanced views. there vivie took up her abode in november of the year indicated. honoria lived not far away, next door but one to the parrys in kensington square. she--vivie--was aware that colonel armstrong did not altogether like her, couldn't "place" her, felt she wasn't "one of us," and therefore despite honoria's many invitations to run in and out and not to mind dear old "army" who was _always_ like that at first, just as their chow was--she exercised considerable discretion about her frequentation of the armstrong household, though she generally attended honoria's suffrage meetings, held whenever the colonel was called away to aldershot or hythe. honoria by this time--the close of --was the mother of four lovely, healthy, happy children. she would give birth to a fifth the following june ( ), and then perhaps she would stop. she often said about this time--touching wood as she did so--"could any woman be happier?" she was so happy that she believed in god, went sometimes to st. mary abbott's or st. paul's, knightsbridge--the music was so jolly--and gave largely to cheerful charities as well as to the suffrage cause. she would in the approach to christmas, , look round and survey her happiness: could any one have a more satisfactory husband? of course he was a man and had silly mannish prejudices, but then without them he would not be so lovable. her children--two boys and two girls--could you find greater darlings if you spent a week among the well-bred childern playing round the round pond? such _natural_ children with really original remarks and untrained ideas; not artificial peter pans who wistfully didn't want to grow up; not slavish little mimics of the children's stories in vogue, pretending to play at red indians--when every one knew that red indians nowadays dressed like all the other citizens of the united states and canada and sat in congress and cultivated political "pulls" or sold patent medicines; or who said "good hunting" and other mowgli shibboleths to mystified relations from the mid-nineteenth century country towns; nor children who teased the cat or interfered with the cook or stole jam or did anything else that was obsolete; or decried sullivan's music in favour of debussy's or of scarlatini's th century _tiraliras_; or wore spectacles and had to have their front teeth in gold clamps. just clear-eyed, good-tempered, good-looking, roguish and spontaneously natural and reasonably self-willed children, who adored their parents and did not openly mock at the elishas that called on them. then there were honoria's friends. i gave a sort of list of them in chapter ii--which i am told has caused considerable offence, not by what was put _in_ but to those who were left out. but they needn't mind: if the protesters were nice people according to my standard, you may be sure honoria knew them. but of all her friends none was dearer and closer--save her husband--than vivie warren--pal of pals, brave comrade of the unflinching eyes. and somehow vivie (since she fell in love with michael rossiter) was ten times dearer than she had been before: she was more understanding; she had a brighter eye, a much greater sense of humour; she was tenderer; she liked children as she never had done in bygone years, and was soon adopted by the four children in kensington square as "aunt vivie" (they also--the two elder ones--had a vague remembrance of an uncle david who had brought them toys and sweetmeats in a dim past). aunt vivie and mummie used to get up the most amusing suffrage meetings in the long, narrow garden behind the house; or they combined forces with lady maud parry, and spoke in lilting contralto or mezzo-soprano (with the compliant tenor or baritone of here and there a captive man) across the two gardens. or somehow they commandeered the square garden on the pretext of a vast garden party, at which every one talked and laughed at once over their suffrage views. yes: honoria was happy then, as indeed she had been during most of her life, except when her brother died and her mother died. what did she lack for happiness? nothing that this world can give in the opening twentieth century ... not even a very good pianola or a motor. i feel somehow it was almost unfair (in my rage at the inequality of treatment meted out by the powers beyond). shall not general sir petworth armstrong die in the great débacle of the world-wide war? i shall see, later. and yet i feel that this nucleus of pure happiness housed in kensington square--or at petworth manor--was to the little world that revolved round the armstrongs like a good radiator in a cold house. it warmed many a chilly nature into fructification; it healed many a scar, it brightened many a humble life, like that of bertie adams's hard-working, washerwoman mother, or the game-keeper's crippled child at petworth or the newest, suburbanest little employé of _fraser and claridge's_ huge establishment in the brompton road. it pulled straight the wayward life of some young subaltern, about to come a cropper, but who after a talk or two with that jolly mrs. armstrong took quite a different course and made a decent marriage. it conjoined with many of the social activities for good of one who might have been her twin sister--suzanne feenix--only that suzanne was twenty years older and perhaps an inch or two shorter. dear woman! my remembrance flashes a kiss to your astral cheek--which in reality i should never have dared to salute, so great was my awe of colonel armstrong's muscles--as, at any reasonable time before or after the birth of your last child in june, , you stand in the hall of your sunny, eighteenth century house, with the gold and green glint of the kensington garden behind you: saying with your glad eyes and bonny mouth "come to our suffrage party? _such_ a lark! we've got mrs. pankhurst here and the police daren't raid us; they're so afraid of 'army.' of course he's away, but he knows _perfectly well_ what i'm doing. he's _quite_ given in. now michael, you show sir harry and lady johnston to the front seats..." (i looked round for the rather gloomy presence of michael rossiter, but it was his little golden-haired god-son she meant.) you shall have your general back safe from the wars, with a wound that gives only honour, a reasonable number of well-earned decorations, and a reputation for rather better strategy than aldershot generally produces; and he shall live out his wholesome life alongside yours, still dispensing happiness, even under a labour government: till, as burton used to wind up his arabian nights love stories, "there came to them the destroyer of delight and the sunderer of societies." honoria acted towards the suffrage movement somewhat as in older-fashioned days of second empire laxity well-to-do people evaded military service under conscription by paying a substitute to take their place in the fighting line. on account of her husband, and the children she had just had or was going to have, she did not throw herself into the physical struggle; but she still continued out of her brother's ear-marked money to subsidize the cause. rather regretfully, she looked on from a motor, a balcony, a front window or the safe plinth of some huge statue, whilst her comrades, with less to risk physically and socially, matched their strength of will, their trained muscles, their agility, astuteness and feminine charm (seldom without some effect) against the brute force and imperturbability of the police. the struggle waxed hot and fierce in the early months of . vivie held herself somewhat in the background also, not wishing to strike publicly and effectively until she was sure for what principle she endangered her life and liberty. nevertheless she became a resource of rising importance to the suffrage cause. she was known to have had a clever barrister cousin who for some reasons best known to himself had of late kept in the background--ill-health, said some; an unfortunate love affair, said another. but his pamphlet on the white slave traffic on the continent showed that he was still at work. vivie was thought to be fully equal in her knowledge of the law to her cousin, though not allowed to qualify for the bar. case after case was referred to her with the hope that if she could not solve it, she might submit it to her cousin's judgment. in this way, excellent legal advice was forthcoming which drove the home office officials from one quandary to another. but vivie in the spring of , looking back on nearly twelve months of womanly life (save for david's summer of continental travel) decided that she didn't like being a woman, so far as woman was dressed in and for three or four hundred years previously. as "david" this had been more or less her costume: an undershirt (two, in very cold weather), a pair of pants coming down to the ankle, and well-fitting woollen socks on the feet. a shirt, sometimes in day-time all of one piece with its turn-over collar; at worst with a separate collar and a tie passed through it. braces that really braced and held up the nether garment of trousers; a waistcoat buttoning fairly high up (no pneumonia blouse)--two waistcoats if she liked, or a dandy slip buttoned innocently inside the single vest to suggest the white lie of a second inner vest. over the waistcoat a coat or jacket. on the head a hat which fitted the head in thirty seconds (allowing for david's shock of hair). lace-up or button boots, with perhaps at most six buttons; gloves with one button; spats--if david wanted to be very dressy--with three buttons. on top of all this a warm, easily-fitting overcoat or a mackintosh. if you were really dressing to kill (as a man) it might take half an hour; if merely to go about your business and not be specially remarked for foppishness, twenty minutes. to divest yourself of all this and get into paijamas and so to bed: ten minutes. but when vivie returned to herself and went about the world of - , and merely wished to pass as an inconspicuous, modest woman she had to spend _hours_ in dressing and undressing, and this is what she had to wear and waste so much of her time in adjusting and removing:-- next the skin, merino combinations, unwieldy garments requiring a contortionist's education to put on without entangling your front and hind limbs. the "combies" were specially buttoned with an infinitude of small, scarcely visible buttons, which always wanted sewing on and replacing, and were peevish about remaining in the button hole. often, too, the "combies" (i really can't keep writing the full name) had to be tied here and there with little white ribbons which preferred getting into a knot (no wonder the average woman has a temper!). when the "combies" went to the wash, all these ribbonlets had to be taken out, specially washed, specially ironed, and ingeniously threaded back into position. next to the combinations, proceeding outwards, came the corset, a most serious affair. this exceedingly expensive instrument of torture was compounded chiefly of silk (which easily frayed) and whale-bone. many good women of the middle class have gone to their graves for three hundred years believing that almighty god had specially created toothless whales of the family _balænidæ_ solely for the purpose of providing women with the only possible ingredient for a corset; and for three hundred years, brave seamen of the dutch, british and basque nations had gone to a watery grave to procure for women this indispensable aid to correct clothing. but these filaments of horny palatal processes are unamiable. though sheathed in silk or cotton, they, after the violent movements of a suffragette or a charwoman, break through the restraining sheath and run into the body under the fifth rib, or press forward on to the thigh. which is why you often see a woman's face in an omnibus express severe pain and her lips utter the exclamation "aïe, aïe." then this confounded corset had to be laced with pink ribbons at the back and in front and both lacings demanded unusual suppleness of arms and sense of touch in finger-tips; and when the corset went to the wash the ribbons had to be drawn out, washed, ironed, and threaded again. from the front of the corset hung two elastic suspenders as yet awaiting their prey. but first must be drawn on the silk or stockinette knickerbockers which in the woman replaced the piteously laughable drawers of the victorian period. then the suspenders clutched the rims of the stockings with an arrangement of nickel and rubber which no _man_ would have tolerated for its inefficiency but would have thrown back in the face of the shopman and have been charged with assault. in times of stress, at public meetings the suspenders would release the stockings from their hold, and the latter roll about the ankles of the embarrassed pleader for woman's rights ("who would be free, themselves must strike the blow," and first of all throttle the modiste, thought vivie). then there was the camisole that concealed the corset and had to be "pinned" in with safety pins. the knickerbockers might not seek the aid of braces; but they must be kept up by an elastic band. over the camisole, in , came a blouse, pernickety and shiftless about its waist fastening; and finally a hobble skirt, chiefly kept up by safety pins, and so cut below as to hamper free movement of the limbs as much as possible. day-boots often had as many as twenty-one buttons--and, mind you, not _sham_, buttons, as i used to think, out of swagger; but every button demanded entrance into a practicable button hole. or the boots themselves were mere shoes with many buttoned spats drawn over them. all the boots had high heels and the woman walked so as to put a severe strain on her arched instep in order that she might bring on by degrees "flat foot" for surgical treatment. who shall describe the hats of ?--and before and since--in all but the very poorest women? they were enormous; and so were the hat-boxes; and they could only be held on to the head by running hatpins through wisps of hair. i will not portray the evening dresses that it sometimes takes a kindly husband an hour to fasten, with "press-buttons" and hooks and eyes; and poor vivie had no husband and depended on her suffragette maid because at all costs she mustn't look dowdy or the woman's cause might suffer at mrs. pethick lawrence's receptions. as to night gear: of course vivie being a free agent slept in david's paijamas. she had long ago cut the gordian knots of her be-ribboned, girdled night gowns in favour of the indian garment. but can you wonder after this true recital of the simplest forms of a decent woman's costume in - and even now (a recital drawn from a paper on _woman's dress_ delivered by david on one of the last occasions in which he appeared at the debating society of the inner temple--and checked by my jury of matrons)--can you wonder that vivie took very hardly to giving up a man's life in the clothes of david williams? how she vowed to herself--fruitlessly, because now she is one of the best-dressed women in town (in a quiet way)--that she would one day enfranchise women in their costume as in their citizenship? this will never be done until the modistes of paris, in some great popular uprising, are strangled and burnt on the place de la concorde. at the (january) election, michael rossiter had been returned as m.p. for one of the midland universities. his science had certainly suffered from his suppressed love for vivie, a passion which secretly tortured him, yet for which he dared ask no respite. he thought it was about time that _real_ men of science entered parliament to check the utter mismanagement of public affairs which had been going on since . he proposed to himself to make a succession of brilliant speeches (he really was an admirable and fluent lecturer) on anthropology, chemistry--chemistry ought to appeal, even to city men because it made such a lot of money--ethnology, hygiene, geography, economic botany, regional zoology, germ diseases, agriculture, etc., etc.; _and_ the absolute necessity of giving woman the same electoral privileges as man. he was always well inclined that way, but after he realized that david was vivie he became almost an embittered suffragist. the speaker took care that he had little scope for his anthropology, economic botany, chemistry, hygiene, etc., on votes of supply: but he got in some nasty blows in the woman's cause, and in fact was so strangely rancorous that ministers looked at him evilly and arranged that he was not placed on the committee of the conciliation bill; that amusing farce with which the liberal ministry sought in to stave off the suffrage dilemma. rossiter and vivie seldom met except at public receptions. every now and again he came to suffrage meetings when she was going to speak; and how well she spoke then! how real it all seemed to her! how handsome she looked (even at ) and how near she was to tears and a breakdown; while his eyes burned; and when he got home poor little linda was in despair over her poor distraught michael, who could find no happiness or contentment in ten thousand a year, great fame as the chief inventor of the ductless glands, and the man who had issued a taxonomic classification of the _bovidae_ which even satisfied _me_. what a cruel force is love! or is the cruelty in human disciplinary laws? here were two persons eminently suited to be mates, calculated while still in the prime of life to procreate offspring that would be a credit to the nation, who asked for nothing more in life than to lie in each other's arms--after which no doubt they would have arisen and performed the most wonderful feats in inductive science or in embroidery or mathematics. and they were inwardly raging, losing their appetites, sleeping very badly yet eschewing drugs, pursuing will-of-the-wisps in politics, wasting the best years of their lives ... from a sense of duty, that sense of duty which has made the nordic white man the dominant race on the earth. "we suffer individually but we gain collectively," rossiter said to himself. in may, , king edward died, and all these gladiators, male and female, willingly declared a truce in the suffrage battle, to obtain a much needed rest in the weary conflict. as soon as political activities were resumed, the conciliation bill by the energies of the liberal whips was talked out (wasn't it?). at any rate it came to nothing for that session. vivie took this as a decision. she openly declared that the vote never would be given by the house of commons or house of lords until it was wrung from the legislature by a complete dislocation of public affairs, the nearest approach to a revolution women could bring about without rifles and cannon. meantime she refused to be duped by ministers or by amiable go-betweens. she resolved instead, perhaps for the last time, to resume the clothes and status of david williams, go down to wales, and stay with her father who was dying by slow degrees. the letters which the curate had written from time to time to d.v. williams, esq., care of michael rossiter, esq., f.r.s., and usually forwarded on by bertie adams, had told david how much the revd. howel williams had failed since the cold spring of , and how in the colder spring of he had once or twice narrowly survived influenza. in july, , he was dying of heart failure. nevertheless the return of david, his well-beloved, brought to him a flicker of renewed life, a little pink in the cheeks, and some garrulity. he could hardly bear his darling son out of his sight, except for the narrowest margin of necessary sleep; and often david slept sitting up in an arm-chair in the vicar's bedroom. the revd. howel said nothing more about grandchildren; often--with a finer sense--spoke to him not as though he were a son, but as a beloved daughter. at last he died in his sleep one night, holding david's hand, looking so ineffably happy that the impostor inwardly gloried in his imposture as in one of the best deeds of his chequered life. * * * * * the will, of course, had not been changed, and david inherited all his "father's" property. out of it he settled £ on the miner's--or rather jenny's--son who probably _was_ the offspring of the real david williams's boyish amour. he provided a handsome annuity for poor, shaken, old nannie; and the rest of the money after paying all expenses he laid out on the endowment of a village hall for games and study, social meetings and political discussions, together with provision for an annual stipend of a hundred pounds for the vicar or curate of the parish who should run this hall: which was to be a lasting memorial to the reverend howel vaughan williams, so learned in the lore of wales. having settled all these matters to his satisfaction, and certainly to that of the revd. cadwalladr jones (who succeeded as vicar of pontystrad by a wise nudging and monetary pressure on the part of the late vicar's son), david returned to london at the close of , took off his clothes and shed his personality. it was bruited that he had gone abroad to nurse a health that was seriously impaired through his incredible exertions over the shillito case. he left his cousin vivie free to espouse the suffrage cause, even unto the extremest militancy. chapter xiii the suffrage movement the conciliation bill which was intended to give the parliamentary vote to a little over one million women had passed its second reading on july , , by a majority of votes; in spite of the bitter opposition of the premier, the chancellor of the exchequer, the home secretary, the president of the board of trade, and the secretary for the colonies. the premier's arguments against it were, firstly, that "women were women"--this of course was a deplorable fact--and that "the balance of power might fall into their hands without the physical force necessary to impose their decisions, etc., etc."; and finally "that in force lay the ultimate appeal" (rather a dangerous incitement to the sincere militants). the chancellor of the exchequer took up a more subtle attitude than the undisguised, grumpy hostility of his leader. his arguments at the time reminded me of an episode in east africa thirty years ago. a certain independent chief tolerated the presence on his territory of a plucky band of missionary pioneers. he did not care about christianity but he liked the trade goods the missionaries brought to purchase food and pay for labour in the erection of a station. these trade goods they kept in a storehouse made of wattle and daub. but this temporary building was not proof against cunning attempts at burglary on the part of the natives. the missionaries at length went to the chief (who was clothed shamelessly in the stolen calicoes) and sought redress. "all right," said the potentate, who kept a fretful realm in awe, "_but_ you have no proof it _is_ my people who break in and steal. you just catch one in the act, and _then_ you'll see what i'll do." so the oxford and cambridge athletic missionaries sat up night after night under some camouflage and at last their patience was rewarded by the capture of a naked, oily-skinned negro who emerged from a tunnel he had dug under the store-foundations. then they bore him off to the yao chieftain. "_now_ we know where we are," said the chief. "you've proved your complaint. we'll have him burnt to death, after lunch, in the market place. i presume you've brought a lunch-basket?" "oh no!" said the horrified propagandists: "we don't want such a penalty as _that_..." "very good" said the chief, "then we'll behead him..." "no! no!" "crucify him?"--"no! no!"--"peg him down over a driver ants' nest?" "no! no!" "then, if you don't want _any_ rational punishment, he shall go free." and free he went. in the same way the chancellor of the exchequer of those days was so hard to please over suffrage measures that none brought forward was democratic enough, far-reaching and overwhelming enough to secure his adhesion. he was therefore forced to torpedo the conciliation bill, to snatch away the half-loaf that was better than no bread at all. he spoke and voted against these tentative measures of feminine enfranchisement, with tongue in cheek, no doubt, and hand linked in that of lulu grandcourt whose opposition to any vote being given to woman and whole attitude towards the sex was so bitter that he had to be reminded by lord aloysius brinsley (who like his brother robert was a convinced suffragist) that after all he, lulu grandcourt, had deigned to be born of a woman, had even--maybe--been spanked by one. the speaker had hinted on the occasion of the second reading of the concilition bill and at a later raising of the same question that there might arise all sorts of obstacles to wreck the woman's franchise measure in committee; obstacles that apparently need not be taken into account as dangerous to any measure affecting male interests. therefore many of the m.p.'s timorously voted for the second reading of the conciliation bill in order to stand well with their constituencies, yet looked to the premier to trip it up by some adroit use of parliamentary jiu-jitsu. they were not disappointed in their ideal politician. the bill after it had passed its second reading by a large majority was referred to a committee of the whole house, which seemingly is fatal to any measure that seeks to become law. so the stale summer of wore itself away in recriminations, hopings against probability that the newer types of liberal statesmen were honest men, keepers of promises, not merely--as vivie said in one of the many speeches that got her into trouble--"bridge-players, first and foremost, golf-players when they couldn't play bridge, or speculators on the stock exchange, champagne drinkers; and prone to eat at their lucullus banquets, public and private, till they sometimes fainted with indigestion." my! but she was bitter in her hyde park speeches and at her albert hall meetings against this band of mock-liberals who had seized the impulse of the country towards reform which had grown up under the chamberlain era to instal themselves in power with the financial backing of great americo-german-jewish internationalists, who in those early years of the twentieth century were ready to stake their dollars on the free trade british empire if they might guide its policy. [very likely if they had obtained the complete guidance they sought for they might have staved off this ruinous war by telling germany bluntly she must keep her hands off france and belgium; they might also have seen to it that the war office _was_ reformed and the british army ready to fulfil lord haldane's promises; for there is no doubt they had ability even if they despised the instruments they worked with.] but as i say, vivie was a bitter and most effective speaker. she inflamed to action many a warm-hearted person like myself, like rossiter (who got into trouble--though it was hushed up--in - for slapping the face of a secretary of state who spoke slightingly of the women suffragists and their motives). yet i seem to be stranded now, with a few others, in my pre-war enthusiasm over the woman's cause, or, later, my horror at the german treatment of belgium. where are the snows of yester-year; where is the animosity which in the years between the burking of the conciliation bill and the spring of grew up between the disinterested reformers who wanted woman enfranchised and the liberal ministers who fought so doggedly, so unscrupulously, against such a rational completion of representative government? the other day i glanced at a newspaper and saw that sir michael and lady rossiter had been dining at the ritz with the grandcourts, princess belasco, sir abel batterby, the great police surgeon, knighted for his skill and discretion in forcible feeding, and the george bounderbys (g.b. was the venomous private secretary of a former chancellor of the exchequer and put him up to most of his anti-suffrage dodges); and meeting vivien rossiter soon afterwards i said, "how _could_ you?" "how could i what?" "dine with the people you once hated." "oh i don't know, it's all past and done with; we've got the vote and somehow after those years in brussels i seem to have no hates and few loves left"--however this is anticipating. i only insert this protest because i may seem to be expressing a bitterness the protagonists have ceased to feel, a triumph at the victory of their cause which produces in them merely a yawn. where is mrs. pankhurst? somehow one thought she would never rest till she was in the cabinet. and christabel? and annie kenney? married perchance to some permanent under secretary of state and viewing "direct action" with growing disapproval. and the pethick lawrences? some one told me the other day that they'd almost forgotten what it felt like to be forcibly fed. but in november, , we all--we that were whole-hearted reformers, true liberals, not wolves in sheep's clothing, took very much to heart what happened on the th of that month, when the prime minister of the time announced that the conference between the house of lords and the house of commons on the veto question having broken down he had advised his majesty to dissolve parliament. this meant that the conciliation bill was _finally_ done for; while the declaration of the prime minister as to the future programme of the liberal party, if it was returned to power, excluded any mention of a woman's enfranchisement bill. on black friday, november th, vivie was present at the meeting in caxton hall when mrs. pankhurst explained the position to the suffragist women assembled there. her blood was fired by the recital of their wrongs and she was prominent among the four hundred and fifty volunteers who came forward to accompany mrs. pankhurst, dr. garret anderson and susan knipper-totes (the two last, infirm old ladies) when they proposed to march to the houses of parliament to exercise their right of presenting a petition. the women proceeded to parliament square in small groups so as to keep within the letter of the law. some like vivie carried banners with pitiful devices--"where there's a bill there's a way," "women's will beats asquith's skill," and so on.... she wished she had given more direct attention to these mottoes, but much of this procedure had been got up on impulse and little preparation made. it was near to four o'clock on a fine november afternoon when the four hundred and fifty women began their movement towards parliament square. a red sun was sinking behind the house of lords, the blue of the misty buildings and street openings was enhanced by the lemon yellow lights of the newly-lit lamps. the avenues converging on the houses of parliament were choked with people, and vehicles had to be diverted from the streets. the men in the watching crowd covered the pavements and island "refuges," leaving the roadways to the little groups of struggling women, and the large force--a thousand or more--of opposing police. it was said at the time that the government of the day, realizing by their action or inaction in the house of commons they had provoked this movement of mrs. pankhurst's, had prepared the policy with which to meet it. as on the eve of a general election it might be awkward if they made many arrests of women--perchance liberal women--on their way to the house to present a petition or escort a deputation, the police should be instructed instead to repel the suffragists by force, to give them a taste of that "frightfulness" which became afterwards so familiar a weapon in the prussian armoury. some said also that the government looked to the crowd which was allowed to form unchecked on the pavements, the crowd of rough men and boys--costers from lambeth, longshore men from the barges on the unembanked westminster riverside, errand boys, soldiers, sailors, clerks returning home, warehousemen, the tag-rag and bob-tail generally of london when a row is brewing--looked to this crowd to catch fire from the brutality of the police (uniformed and in plain clothes) and really give the women clamouring for the vote "what for"; teach them a lesson as to what the roused male can do when the female passes the limits of domestic license. a few deaths might result (and did), and many injuries, but the treatment they received would make such an impression on mrs. pankhurst's followers that they would at last realize the futility of measuring their puny force against the muscle of man. force, as the premier had just said, must be the decisive factor. but unfortunately for these calculations the large male crowd took quite a different line. the day had gone by when men and boys were wont to cry to some expounding suffragette: "go home and mind yer biby." dimly these toilers and moilers, these loafers and wasters now understood that women of a courage rarely matched in man were fighting for the cause of all ill-governed, mal-administered, swindled, exploited people of either sex. the mass of men, _in_ the mass, is chivalrous. it admires pluck, patience, and persistency. so the crowd instead of aiding the police to knock sense into the women began to take sides with the buffeted, brutalized and bleeding suffragettes. fortunately before the real fighting began, and no doubt as a stroke of policy on the part of some police inspector, mrs. pankhurst convoying the two frail old ladies--dr. garret anderson and susan knipper-totes--champions of the vote when woman suffrage was outside practical politics--had reached the steps of the strangers' entrance to the house of commons. from this point of 'vantage a few of the older leaders of the deputation were able to witness the four or five hours' struggle in and around parliament square, the abbey, parliament street, great george street which made black friday one of the note-worthy days in british history--though, _more nostro_, it will be long before it is inserted in school books. here, while something like panic signalized the legislative chamber and cabinet ministers scurried in and out like flurried rabbits and finally took refuge in their private rooms--here was fought out the decisive battle between physical and moral force over the suffrage question. the women were so _exaltées_ that they were ready to face death for their cause. the police were so exasperated that they saw red and some went mad with sex mania. it was a horrible spectacle in detail. men with foam on their moustaches were gripping women by the breasts, tearing open their clothing, and proceeding to rabid indecencies. or, if not sex-mad, they twisted their arms, turned back their thumbs to dislocation, rained blows with fists on pale faces, covering them with blood. they tore out golden hair or thin grey locks with equal disregard. mounted police were summoned to overawe the crowd, which by this time whether suffragist and female, or neutral, non-committal and male, was giving the police on foot a very nasty time. the four hundred and fifty women of the original impulse had increased to several thousand. dusk had long since deepened into a night lit up with arc lamps and the golden radiance of great gas-lamp clusters. flares were lighted to enable the police to see better what they were doing and who were their assailants. but the women showed complete indifference to the horses; and the horses with that exquisite forbearance that the horse can show to the distraught human, did their utmost not to trample on small feet and outspread hands. here and there humanity asserted itself. one policeman--helmetless, his fair, blond face scratched and bleeding--had in berserkr rage felled a young woman in the semi-darkness. he bore his senseless victim into the shelter of some nook or cloister and turned on her his bull's eye lantern. she was a beautiful creature, in private life a waitress at a tea shop. her hat was gone and her hair streamed over her drooping face and slender shoulders. the policeman overcome with remorse exclaimed--mentioning the home secretary's name "---- be damned; this ain't the job for a decent man." the suffragette revived under his care. he escorted her home, resigned from the police force, married her and i believe has lived happily ever afterwards, if he was not killed in the war. vivie had struggled for about two hours to reach the precincts of the house, with or without her banner. probably without, because she had freely used its staff as a weapon of defence, and her former skill in fencing stood her in good stead. but at last she was gripped by two constables, one of them an oldish man and the other a plain-clothes policeman, whom several spectators had singled out for his pleasure in needless brutalities. these men proceeded to give her "punishment," and involuntarily she shrieked with mingled agony of pain and outraged sex-revolt. a man who had paused irresolutely on the kerb of a street refuge came to her aid. he dealt the grey-haired constable a blow that sent him reeling and then seized the plain-clothes man by his coat collar. a struggle ensued which ended in the intervener being flung with such violence on the kerb stone that he was temporarily stunned. presently he found himself being dragged along with his heels dangling, while vivie, described in language which my jury of matrons will not allow me to repeat, was being propelled alongside him, her clothes nearly torn off her, to some police station where they were placed under arrest. as soon as they had recovered breath and complete consciousness, had wiped the blood from cut heads, noses, and lips, they looked hard at each other. "thank you _so_ much," said vivie, "it _was_ good of you." "that's enough," said her defender, "it wanted the voice to make me sure; but somehow i thought all along it _was_ vivie. don't you know me? frank gardner!" while waiting for the formalities to be concluded and their transference to cells in which they were to pass the night, frank told vivie briefly that he had returned from rhodesia a prosperous man on a brief holiday leaving his wife and children to await his return. hearing there was likely to be an unusual row that evening over the suffrage question he had sauntered down from the strand to see what was going on and had been haunted by the conviction that he would meet vivie in the middle of the conflict. but when he rushed to her defence his action was instinctive, the impulse of any red-blooded man to defend a woman that was being brutally maltreated. the next morning they were haled before the magistrate. michael rossiter was in court as a spectator, feverishly anxious to pay vivie's fine or to find bail, or in all and every way to come to her relief. he seemed rather mystified at the sight of frank gardner arraigned with her. but presently the prosecuting counsel for the chief commissioner of police arrived and told the astonished magistrate it was the wish of the home secretary that the prisoners in the dock should all be discharged, vivie and frank gardner among them. at any rate no evidence would be tendered by the prosecution. so they were released, as also was each fresh batch of prisoners brought in after them. vivie went in a cab to her house in the victoria road; frank back to his hotel. both had promised to foregather at rossiter's house in portland place at lunch. hitherto vivie had refrained from entering no. park crescent. she had not seen it or mrs. rossiter since david's attack of faintness and hysteria in february, , nearly two years ago. why she went now she scarcely knew, logically. it was unwise to renew relations too closely with rossiter, who showed his solicitude for her far too plainly in his face. the introduction to linda rossiter in her female form would be embarrassing and would doubtless set that good lady questioning and speculating. yet she felt she must see rossiter--writing was always dangerous and inadequate--and reason with him; beg him not to spoil his own chances in life for her, not lose his head in politics and personal animosities on her behalf, as he seemed likely to do. already people were speaking of him as a parallel to ----, and ----, and ---- (you can fill the blanks for yourself with the names of great men of science who have become ineffective, quarrelsome, isolated members of parliament); saying it was a great loss to science and no gain to the legislature. as to frank gardner, she was equally eager for a long explanatory talk with him. except that her life had inured her to surprises and unexpected meetings, it was sufficiently amazing that frank and she, who had not seen each other or touched hands for thirteen years, should meet thus in a dangerous scuffle in a dense struggling crowd outside the houses of parliament. she must so arrange matters after lunch that frank should not prevent her hour's talk with rossiter, yet should have the long explanation he himself deserved. an idea. she would telephone to praddy and invite herself and frank to tea at his studio after she had left the rossiters. mrs. rossiter was used to unexpected guests at lunch. people on terms of familiarity dropped in, or the professor detained some colleague or pupil and made him sit down to the meal which was always prepared and seated for four. therefore she was not particularly taken aback when her husband appeared at five minutes to one in the little drawing-room and after requesting that the macaw and the cockatoo might be removed for the nonce to a back room--as they made sustained conversation impossible, announced that he expected momently--ah! there was the bell--two persons whose acquaintance he was sure linda would like to make. one was captain frank gardner, who owned a big ranch in rhodesia, and--er--the other--oh no! no relation--was miss warren.... "what, one of the warrens of huddersfield? well, i never! and where did you pick her up? strange she shouldn't have written to me she was coming up to town! i could--" "no, this is a miss vivien warren--" "vivien? how curious, why that is the name of the adams's little girl--" "a miss vivien warren," went on rossiter patiently--"a well-known suffragist who--" "oh michael! _not_ a suffragette!" wailed mrs. rossiter, imagining vitriol was about to be thrown over the surviving pug and damage done generally to the furniture--but at this moment the butler announced: "captain frank gardner and miss warren." gardner was well enough, a lean soldierly-looking man, brown with the african sun, with pleasant twinkling blue eyes, a thick moustache and curly hair, just a little thin on the top. his face was rather scarred with african adventure and did not show much special trace of his last night's tussle with the police. there was a cut at the back of his head where he had fallen on the kerb stone but that was neatly plastered, and you do not turn your back much on a hostess, at any rate on first introduction. but vivie had obviously been in the wars. she had--frankly--a black eye, a cut and swollen lip, and her ordinarily well-shaped nose was a trifle swollen and reddened. but her eyes likewise were twinkling, though the bruised one was bloodshot. "i'm sorry, mrs. rossiter, to be introduced to you like this. i don't know _what_ you will think of me. it's the first time i've been in a really bad row.... we were trying to get to the house of commons, but the police interfered and gave us the full privileges of a man as regards their fists. captain gardner here--who is an old friend of mine--intervened, or i'm afraid i shouldn't have got off as cheaply as i did. and your husband kindly came to the police court to testify to our good character, and then invited us to lunch." _mrs. rossiter_: "why how your voice reminds me of some one who used to come here a good deal at one time--a mr. david williams. i suppose he isn't any relation?" _vivie_ (while frank gardner looks a little astonished): "oh--my cousin. i knew you knew him. he has often talked to me about you. i'll tell you about david by and bye, frank." at this interchange of christian names mrs. rossiter thinks she understands the situation: they are engaged, have been since last night's rescue. but what _extraordinary_ people the dear professor _does_ pick up! have _they_ got ductless glands, she wonders? rossiter who has been fidgeting through this dialogue considers that lunch is ready, so they proceed to the small dining-room, "the breakfast-room." mrs. rossiter was always very proud of having a _small_ drawing-room (otherwise, "me boudwor") and a _small_ dining-room. it prepared the way for greater magnificence at big parties and also enabled one to be cosier with a few friends. at luncheon: _mrs. rossiter_ to _frank gardner_, archly: "i suppose you've come home to be married?" _frank_: "oh no! i'm not a bigamist, i've got a wife already and four children, and jolly glad i shall be to get back to 'em. i can't stand much of the english climate, after getting so used to south african sunshine. no. i came on a business trip to england, leaving my old dear out at the farm near salisbury, with the kids--we've got a nice english governess who helps her to look after 'em. a year or two hence i hope to bring 'em over to see the old country and we may have to put the eldest to school: children run wild so in south africa. as to miss warren, she's an old friend of mine and a very dear one. i hadn't seen her for--for--thirteen years, when the sound of her voice--she's got one of those voices you never forget--the sound of her voice came up out of that beastly crowd of gladiators yesterday, and i found her being hammered by two policemen. i pretty well laid one out, though i hadn't used my fists for a matter of ten years. then i got knocked over myself, i passed a night in a police cell feeling pretty sick and positively maddened at not being able to ask any questions. then at last morning came, i had a wash and brush up--the police after all aren't bad chaps, and most of 'em seemed jolly well ashamed of last night's doin's--then i met vivie in court and your husband too. he took me on trust and i'm awfully grateful to him. i've got a dear old mater down in kent--margate, don't you know--my dad's still alive, vivie!--and she'd have been awfully cut up at hearing her son had been spending the night in a police cell and was goin' to be fined for rioting, only fortunately the home secretary said we weren't to be punished.... but professor rossiter's coming on the scene was a grand thing. besides being an m.p., i needn't tell _you_, mrs. rossiter, he has a world-wide reputation. oh, we read your books, sir, out in south africa, _i_ can tell you--well--er--and here we are--and i'm monopolizing the conversation." vivie sat opposite her old lover, and near to the man who loved her now with such ill-concealed passion that his hand trembled for her very proximity. she felt strangely elated, strangely gay, at times inclined to laugh as she caught sight of her bruised and puffy face in an opposite mirror, yet happy in the knowledge that notwithstanding the thirteen years of separation, her repeated rejection of his early love, her battered appearance, frank still felt tenderly towards her, still remembered the timbre of her voice. her mouth was too sore and swollen to make eating very pleasant. she trifled with her food but she felt young and full of gay adventure. mrs. rossiter a little overwhelmed with all the information gardner had poured out, a little irritated also at the dancing light in vivie's eyes, turned her questionings on her. _mrs. rossiter_: "i suppose you are the miss warren who speaks so much. i often see your name in the papers, especially in _votes for women_ that the professor takes in. isn't it funny that a man should care so much about women getting the vote? i'm sure _i_ don't want it. i'm _quite_ content to exercise _my_ influence through _him_, especially now he's in parliament. but then i have my home to look after, and i'm _much_ too busy to go out and about and mix myself up in politics. i'm quite content to leave all that to the menfolk." _vivie_: "quite so. in your position no doubt i should do the same; but you see i haven't any menfolk. there is my mother, but she prefers to live abroad, and as she is comfortably off she can employ servants to look after her." (this hint of wealth a little reassured mrs. rossiter, who believed most suffragettes to be adventuresses.) "so, as i have no ties i prefer to give myself up to the service of women in general. when they have the vote and other privileges of men, then of course i can attend to my private interests and pursuits--mathematical calculations, insurance risks--" _mrs. rossiter_: "it is _extraordinary_ how like your voice is to your cousin's. if i shut my eyes i could think he was back again. not," (she added hastily) "that he has not, no doubt, _plenty_ to do abroad. do you ever see him now? why does he not marry and settle down? one never hears of him now as a barrister. but then he used to _feel_ his cases too much. the last time he was here he fainted and had to stay here all night. "and yet he had won his case and got his--what do you say? client? off--i dare say you remember it? she was my husband's cousin though we hardly liked to say so at the time: it is so unpleasant having a murder in the family. fortunately she was let off; i mean, the jury said 'not guilty,' though personally i--however that is neither here nor there, and since then she's married colonel kesteven--won't you have some pheasant? no? i remember your cousin used to have a very poor appetite, especially when one of his cases was on. _how_ he used--excuse my saying so--how he used to tire poor michael--mr. rossiter! talk, talk, talk! in the evenings, and i knew the professor had his lectures to prepare, but hints were thrown away on mr. david." rossiter broke in: "now what would you like to do in the afternoon, miss warren? and gardner? you, by the bye, have the first claim on our hospitality. you have just arrived from africa and the only thing we have done for you, so far, is to drag you into a disgraceful row." _frank_: "well, _i_ should like a glimpse of the zoo. i'm quite willing to pay my shilling and give no more trouble, but if vivie is going there too we could all walk up together. after that i'm going to revisit an old acquaintance of mine and vivie's, praed the architect--lives somewhere in chelsea if i remember right--" _vivie_: "in hans place. i don't particularly want to go to the zoo. i look so odd i might over-excite the monkeys. i think i should like to try a restful visit to the royal botanic. i'm so fond of their collection of weird succulent plants--things that look like stones and suddenly produce superb flowers." _mrs. rossiter_: "we belong to the botanic as well as to the zoo. _i_ could take you there after lunch." _rossiter_: "you forget, dearie, you've got to open that bazaar in marylebone town hall--" _linda_: "oh, have i? to be sure. but it's lady goring that does the opening, i'm _much_ too nervous. still i promised to come. would miss warren care to come with me?" _vivie_: "i should have liked to awfully: i love bazaars; but just at this moment i'm thinking more of those succulent plants ... and my battered face." _rossiter_: "i'll make up your minds for you. we'll _all_ drive to the zoo in linda's motor. gardner shall look at the animals and then find his way to hans place. i'll escort miss warren to the botanic, and then come on and pick you up, linda, at the town hall." that statement seemed to satisfy every one, so after coffee and a glance round the laboratory and the last experiments, they proceeded to the zoo, with at least an hour's daylight at their disposal. rossiter and vivie were at last alone within the charmed circle of the botanic gardens. they made their way slowly to the great palm house and thence up twisty iron steps to a nook like a tree refuge in new guinea, among palm boles and extravagant aroid growths. "now michael," said vivie--despite her bruised face she looked very elegant in her grey costume, grey hat, and grey suède gloves, and he had to exercise great self-restraint, remember that he was known by sight to most of the gardeners and to the ubiquitous secretary, in order to refrain from crushing her to his side: "now michael: i want a serious talk to you, a talk which will last for another eighteen months--which is about the time that has elapsed since we had our last--you're _not_ keeping the pact we made." "what was that?" "why you promised me that your--your--love--no! i won't misuse that word--your friendship for me should not spoil your life, your career, or make linda unhappy. yet it is doing all three. you've lived in a continual agitation since you got into parliament, and now you'll be involved in more electioneering in order to be returned once more. meantime your science has come to a dead stop. and it's so far more important for us than getting the vote. all this franchise agitation is on a much lower plane. it amuses and interests me. it keeps me from thinking too much about you. besides, i am naturally rather combative; i secretly enjoy these rough-and-tumbles with constituted authority. i also really _do_ think it is a _beastly_ shame, this preference shown for man, in most of the careers and in the franchise. but don't you worry _yourself_ unduly about it. if i really thought that you cared so much about me that it was turning you away from _our_ religion, scientific research, i'd go over to brussels to my mother and stay there. i really would; and i really will if you don't stop following me about from meeting to meeting and going mad over the suffrage question in the house. is it true that you struck a cabinet minister the other day? mr. ----?" _rossiter_: "yes, it's true, and he asked for it. if i am unreasonable what are _they_? ----, ----, _and_ ----? why have they such a bitter feeling against your sex? have they had no mothers, no sweethearts, no sisters, no wives? if i'd never met you i should still have been a suffragist. i think i _was_ one, as a boy, watching what my mother suffered from my father, and how he collared all her money--i suppose it was before the married woman's property act--and grudged her any for her dress, her little comforts, her books, or even for proper medical advice. and to hear these liberal cabinet ministers--_liberal_, mind you--talk about women, often with the filthy phrases of the street--well: he got a smack on the jaw and decided to treat the incident as a trifling one ... his private secretary patched it up somehow, but i expressed no regret.... "well, darling, i'll try to do as you wish. i'll try to shut you out of my thoughts and return to my experiments, when i'm not on platforms or in the house. i think i shall get in again--it's a mere matter of money, and thanks to linda that isn't wanting. i'm not going to withdraw from politics, you bet, however disenchanted i may be. it's because the decent, honest, educated men withdraw that legislation and administration are left to the case-hardened rogues ... and the uneducated ... and the cranks. but don't make things _too_ hard for me. keep out of prison ... keep off hunger strikes--if you're going to be man-handled by the police--ah! _why_ wasn't _i_ there, instead of in the house? gardner had all the luck.... i was glad to hear he was married." _vivie_: "oh you needn't be jealous of poor frank. and he'll soon be back in south africa. you needn't be jealous of _any_ one. i'm all yours--in spirit--for all time. now we must be going: it's getting dusk and we should be irretrievably ruined if we were locked up in this dilapidated old palm house. besides, i'm to meet frank at praddy's studio in order to tell him the history of the last thirteen years." as they walked away: "you know, michael, i'm still hoping we may be friends without being lovers. i wonder whether linda would get to like me?" at praed's studio. lewis maitland praed is looking older. he must be now--november, --about fifty-eight or fifty-nine. but he has still a certain elegance, the look of a lesser leighton about him. frank has been there already for half an hour, and the tea-table has been, so to speak, deflowered. vivie accepts a cup, a muffin, and a marron glacé. then says, "now, dear praddy, summon your mistress, _dons l'honnête sens du mot_, and have this tea-table cleared so that we can have a hugely long and uninterrupted talk. i have got to give frank a summary of all that i've done in the past thirteen years. meanwhile frank, as your record, i feel convinced, is so blameless and normal that it could be told before any parlour-maid, you start off whilst she is taking away the tea, fiddling with the stove, and prolonging to the uttermost her services to a master who has become her slave." the parlour-maid enters, and casts more than one searching glance at vivie's bruised features, but performs her duties in a workmanlike manner. _frank_: "my story? oh well, it's a happy one on the whole--very happy. soon as the war was over, i got busy in rhodesia and pitched on a perfect site for a stock and fruit farm. the b.s.a. co. was good to me because i'd known cecil rhodes and dr. jim; and by nineteen four i was going well, they'd made me a magistrate, and some of my mining shares had turned out trumps. then westlock came out as governor general, and lady enid had brought out with her a jolly nice girl as governess to her children. she was the daughter of a parson in hertfordshire near the brinsley estates. well, i won't say--bein' the soul of truth--that i fell in love with her--straight away--because i don't think i ever fell deep in love--straight away--with any girl but you, vivie. but i did feel, as it was hopeless askin' you to marry me, here was the wife i wanted. she was good enough to accept me and the westlocks were awfully kind and made everything easy. lady enid's a perfect brick--and, by the bye, she's a great suffragist too. well: we were married at pretoria in , and now we've got four children; a sturdy young frank, a golupshous vivie--oh, i told muriel everything, she's the sort of woman you can--and the other two are called bertha after my mother and charlotte after mrs. bernard shaw. i sent you, vivie--a newspaper with the announcement of my marriage--dj'ever get it?" _vivie_: "never. but i was undergoing a sea-change of my own, just then, which i will tell you all about presently." _frank_: "well then. i came back to england on a hurried visit. you remember, praddy? but you were away in italy and i couldn't find vivie anywhere. i called round at where your office was--fraser and warren--where we parted in --and there was no more fraser and warren. nobody knew anything about what had become of you. p'raps i might have found out, but i got a bit huffy, thought you might have written me a line about my marriage. i did write to miss fraser, but the letter was returned from the dead letter office," (_vivie_: "she married colonel armstrong.") "well, there it is! by some devilish lucky chance i had no sooner got to london from southhampton, day before yesterday, than some one told me all about the expected row between the suffragettes and the police. thought i'd go and see for myself what this meant. no idea before how far the thing had gone, or what brutes the police could be. had a sort of notion, don't know why, that dear old viv would be in it, up to the neck. got mixed up in the crowd and helped a woman or two out of it. lady feenix--they said it was--picked up some and took 'em into her motor. and then i heard a cry which could only be in vivie's voice--dear old viv--(leans forward with shining eyes to press her hand) and ... there we are. how're the bruises?" _vivie_: "oh, they ache rather, but it is such _joy_ to have such friends as you and praddy and michael rossiter, that i don't mind _what_ i go through..." _frank_: "but i say, viv, about this rossiter man. he seems awfully gone on you...?" _vivie_ (flushing in the firelight): "does he? it's only friendship. i really don't see them often but he came to my assistance once at a critical time. and now that praddy's all-powerful parlour-maid's definitely left us, i will tell you _my_ story." so she does, between five and half-past six, almost without interruption from the spell-bound frank--who says it licks any novel he ever read, and she ought to turn it into a novel--with a happy ending--or from praed who is at times a little somnolent. then at half-past six, the practical frank says: "look here, you chaps, i could go on listening till midnight, but what's the matter with a bit of dinner? i dare say praddy's parlour-maid might turn sour if we asked her at a moment's notice to find dinner for three. why not come out and dine with me at the hans crescent hotel? close by. i'll get a quiet table and we can finish our talk there. to-morrow i must go down to margate to see the dear old mater, and it may be a week before i'm up again." they adjourn to the hostelry mentioned. over coffee and cigarettes, vivie makes this appeal to frank: "now frank, you know all my story. tell me first, what really became of the real david williams, the young man you met in the hospital and wrote to me about?" _frank_: "'pon my life i don't know. i never heard one word about him after i got clear of the hospital myself. you know it fell into boer hands during that rising in cape colony. i expect the 'real' david williams, as you call him, died from neglected wounds or typhoid--or recovered and took to drink, or went up country and got knocked on the head by the natives for interfering with their women--good riddance of bad rubbish, i expect. what do you want me to do? i'll swear to anything in reason." _vivie_: "i want you to do this. run down one day before you go back to africa, to south wales, to pontystrad--it's not far from swansea--and call at the vicarage on the pretext that you've come to enquire about david vavasour williams whom you once knew in south africa. it'll give verisimilitude to my stories. they'll probably say they haven't seen him for ever so long, but that you can hear of him through professor rossiter. i dare say it's a silly idea of mine, but what i fear sometimes--is that if the fact comes out that _i_ was david williams, some vaughan or price or other williams may call the old man's will in question and get it put into chancery, get the money taken away from poor old bridget evanwy and the village hall which i've endowed. that's all. if it wasn't that i've disposed of my supposed father's money in the way i think he would have liked best, i shouldn't care a hang if they found out the trick i'd played on the benchers. d'you see?" _frank_: "i see." the next day vivie wisely spent in bed, healing her wounds and resting her limbs which after the mental excitement was over ached horribly. honoria came round and listened, applauded, pitied, laughed and concurred. but she was well enough on the following tuesday after black friday to attend another meeting of the w.s.p.u. at caxton hall, to hear one more ambiguous, tricky, many-ways-to-be-interpreted promise of the then prime minister. mrs. pankhurst pointing out the vagueness of these assurances announced her intention then and there of going round to downing street to ask for a more definite wording. vivie and many others followed this dauntless lady. their visit was unexpected, the police force was small and the suffragettes had two of the cabinet ministers at their mercy. they contented themselves by shaking, hustling, frightening but not otherwise injuring their victims before the latter were rescued and put into taxi-cabs. chapter xiv militancy the lilacs, victoria road, s.w. _december_ , . dear michael,-- i'm so glad you got returned all right by your university. i feared very much your championship of the woman's cause might have told against you. but these newer universities are more liberal-minded. i am keeping my promise to tell you of any important move i am making. so this is to inform you, _in very strict confidence_, of my latest dodge. for the effective organization of my particular branch of the w.s.p.u. activities, i must have an office. "the lilacs" is far too small, and besides i shrink from having my little home raided or too much visited even by confederates. i learned the other day that the old fraser and warren offices on the top floor of - chancery lane were vacant. the midland insurance co. that occupied nearly all the building has cleared out and the block is to be given over to a multitude of small undertakings. well: i secured our old rooms! simply splendid, with the two safes that honoria, untold ages ago, fitted into the walls, and hid so cleverly that if there is no treachery it would be hard for the police to find them and raid them. the midland insurance co. did not behave well to fraser and warren, so beryl storrington, when she was clearing out said nothing about the safes, which were not noticed by the company. honoria kept the keys and now hands them over to me. the w.s.p.u. has taken--also under an alias--other offices on the same side of the way, at no. , top storey. we find we can, by using the fire escape, pass over the intervening roofs and reach the parapet outside the "partners' room" at the - building. i shall once again make use of the little room next the partners' office as a bedroom or rather, "tiring" room, where i can if necessary effect changes of costume. i have taken the new offices in the name of mr. michaelis[ ] for a special reason; and with some modifications of david's costume i have appeared in person to assume possession of them. i generally enter no. dressed as vivie warren. all this may sound very silly to you, like playing at conspiracy. but these precautions seem to be necessary. the government is beginning to take suffragism seriously, and a whole department at new scotland yard has been organized to cope with our activities. [footnote : michaelis, i believe, was a greek merchant dealing with sponges, emery powder, coral, and other products of the mediterranean shores whose acquaintance vivie had originally made when interested in the shares of that levantine house, charles davis and co. of ionian birth he had become a naturalized british subject, but having grown wealthy had decided to transfer himself to athens and enter political life. he had consented amusedly to vivie's adoption of his name for her new tenancy and had given her an old passport, which you could do in the days that knew not dora--she resembling him somewhat in appearance. he was aware of her suffragist activities and guessed she might want it occasionally for eluding the police on trips abroad.--h.h.j.] one reason i have in writing this letter--a letter i hope you will burn after you have read and noted its contents--is to ask you to lend me for a while the services of bertie adams as clerk. of course i shall insist on paying his salary whilst i employ him, and indemnifying him for anything he may suffer in my service--that of the w.s.p.u. i am fairly well off for money now. besides the funds the w.s.p.u. places at my disposal, i have the interest on mother's ten thousand pounds, and she would give me more if i asked for it. she has quite taken to the idea of spending her ill-gotten gains on the enfranchisement of women! (i am going over to see her for a week or so, when it is not quite so cold.) what business am i going specially to undertake in mr. michaelis's office on the top storey of - ? i will tell you. scotland yard is getting busy about us, the suffragists, trying to find out all it can that is detrimental to our personal characters, our upbringing, our progeniture, our businesses and our relations; whether we had a forger in the family, whether i am the daughter of the "notorious" mrs. warren, whether mrs. canon burstall is really my aunt and whether she couldn't be brought to use her private influence on me to keep me quiet, in case it came out that kate warren was her sister, and that she led kate into that way of life wherein she earned her shameful livelihood. i have had one or two covert hints from aunt liz promising to open up relations _if_ only i'll behave myself! scotland yard has already had the sorry triumph of causing one or two of our most prominent workers to retire from the ranks because they were not properly married or had been married after the eldest child was born; or had once "been in trouble," over some peccadillo, or had had a son or a sister who though now upright and prosperous had once been in the clutches of the law. now my idea is to turn the tables on all this. i myself am impeccable in a real court of equity. my avatar as david williams was by way of being a superb adventure. i only retired from the harmless imposture lest i might compromise you, and you are so far gone in politics now that the revelation--if it came about--that you were deceived by me and by my "father"--would do you no harm. for a number of reasons i know pretty well that the benchers would not make themselves ridiculous by having the story of my successful entry into their citadel told in open court. i have in fact, through a devious channel, received the assurance that if i do not resume this character (of d.v.w.) nothing more will be said. what, then, have i to fear? my mother _s'est bien rangée_. she leads a life of the most respectable. if they challenge her, she can counter with some of the most piquant scandals of the last thirty years. my own careful study of criminology and the assiduous searchings of albert adams in the same direction; my mother's anecdotes of the lives of statesmen, police-magistrates, prosecuting counsel, judges, press-editors--many of whom have enjoyed her hospitality abroad--have given me numerous hints in what direction to pursue my researches. consequently the office of mr. michaelis will be the criminal investigation department of the w.s.p.u. i feel instinctively i am touching pitch and that you will disapprove ... but if we are to fight with clean hands, _que messieurs les assassins commencent_! if scotland yards drops slander and infamous suggestions as a weapon we will let our poisoned arrows rust in the armoury. how _beastly_ all this is! _why_ do they drive us to these extremes? i know already enough to blast the characters of several among our public men. yet i know in so doing i should wreck the life-happiness of faithful wives, believing sisters or daughters, or bright-faced children. perhaps i won't, when it comes to the pinch. but somehow, i think, if they guess i have this knowledge in my possession, they will leave david williams and kate warren alone. sometimes, d'you know, i wake up in the middle of the night at the lilacs or in my reconstituted bedroom at - , and wish i were quit of all this suffrage business, all this vain struggle against predominant man--and away with you on a pacific island. then i realize that we should have large cockroaches and innumerable sand fleas in our new home, that we should have broken linda's heart, have set back the suffrage cause as much as parnell's adultery postponed home rule; and above all that i am already thirty-five and shall soon be thirty-six and that it wouldn't be very long before you in comfort-loving middle age sighed for the well-ordered life of no. , park crescent, portland place! on the whole, i think the most rational line i can take is to continue resolutely this struggle for the vote. with the vote must come the opening of parliament to women. i'm not too old to aspire to be some day secretary of state for home affairs. because the general post office has already become interested in my correspondence, and because this is really a "pivotal" letter i am not trusting it to the post but am calling with it at no. and handing it personally to your butler. i look to you to destroy it when you have read its contents--if you go to that length. yours, vivie. rossiter read this letter an hour or so after it had been delivered, frowned a good deal, made notes in one of his memorandum books; then tore the sheets of typewriting into four and placed them on the fire. having satisfied himself that the flames had caught them, he went up with a sullen face to dress for dinner: linda was giving a new year's eve dinner to friends and relations and he had to play the part of host with assumed heartiness. in the perversity of fate, one piece of the typewritten letter escaped the burning except along the edge. a puff of air from the chimney or the opened door, as linda entered the room, lifted it off the cinders and deposited it on the hearth. linda had dressed early for the party, had felt a little hurt at the locked door of michael's dressing-room, and had come with some vague intention into his study, to see perhaps if the fire was burning brightly: because to avoid unnecessary journies upstairs they would receive their guests to-night in the study and thence pass to the dining-room. but the fire had gone sulky, as fires do sometimes even with well-behaved chimneys and first-class coal. she noted the charred portion of paper lying untidily on the hearth, with typewriting on its upper surface. picking it up she read inside the scorched margin: ria kept the keys and now them over to me. w.s.p.u. has taken--also under an alias--other of same side of the way, at no. , top storey. we using the fire-escape, pass over the intervening r reach the parapet outside the "partners' room" at the ding. i shall once again make use of the little room tners' office as a bedroom or rather "tiring" room, w if necessary effect changes of costume. i have tak ces in the name of mr. michaelis for a special reas ome modifications of david's costume i have appeared in p ssume possession of them. i generally enter no. dressed a warren. all this may sound very silly to you, like pla "warren!" that name stood out clear. did it mean the suffragette, vivien warren, who had sometimes been here, and in whose adventures her husband seemed so unbecomingly interested? one of the great ladies who were anti-suffragists and had already decoyed mrs. rossiter within their drawing-rooms had referred with great disapproval to miss warren as the daughter of a most notorious woman whom their husbands wouldn't hear mentioned because of her shocking past. and david, david of course must be that tiresome david williams, supposed to be a cousin of vivien warren, but really seeming in these allusions to be a disguise in which this bold female deceived people. and "mr. michaelis?" could that be her own michael? the shameless baggage! she choked at the thought. was it a conspiracy into which they were luring her husband, already rather compromised as a man of science by his enthusiasm for the suffrage cause? people used to speak of michael almost with awe, he was so clever, he made such wonderful discoveries. now, since he had become a politician he had many enemies, and several ladies of high title referred to him contemptuously even in her hearing and cut _her_ without compunction, though she had ten thousand a year. she felt all the same a profound conviction that michael was the most honourable of men. yet why all this mystery? the w.s.p.u.? those letters stood for some more than usually malignant suffrage society. she had seen the letters often in "votes for women."... her musings here were stayed by the sound of her husband's steps in the passage. hastily she thrust the half sheet of charred paper into her corsage and brushed off the fragments of the burnt edges from her laces; then turned and affected to be tidying the writing table as michael came in. _rossiter_: "linda! surely not putting my papers in order--or rather disorder? i thought you were far too intimate with my likes and dislikes to do that!... why, what's the matter?" _linda_: "oh nothing. i was only seeing if they had made up your fire. i--i--haven't touched anything." (rossiter looked anxiously at the grate, but was relieved to see nothing but burnt, shrivelled squares of paper. he poked the fire fiercely and at any rate demolished the remains of vivie's letter.) _rossiter_: "yes: it isn't very cheerful. they must brighten it while we are at dinner; though as we shall go to the drawing-room afterwards we shan't need a huge fire here. there! it looks better after that poke. i threw some papers on it to start a flame just before i went up to dress.... why dearie! what cold hands and what flushed cheeks!"... _linda_: "oh michael! you'll always love me, won't you? i--i know i'm not clever, not half clever enough for you. but i _do_ try to help you all i can. i--i--" (sobs.) _rossiter_ (really distressed): "_of course_ i love you! what silly notion have you got into your head?" (he asks himself anxiously "surely all that letter was burnt before she came in?") "come! pull yourself together. be worthy of that dress. it is such a beauty." _linda_: "i thought you'd like it. i remembered your saying that blue always became me." (dabs at her eyes with a small lace handkerchief.) loud double knocks begin to sound. dinner guests are soon announced. linda and michael receive them heartily. rossiter--as many a public man does and has to do--shoves his vain regrets, remorse, anxiety, weary longing for the unattainable--somewhere to the back of his brain, where these feelings will not revive till he lies awake at three in the morning; and prepares to entertain half-a-dozen hearty men and buxom women who are easily impressed by a little spoon-fed science. linda is soon distracted from the scrap of paper in her bosom and gives all her attention to her cousins and grown-up school friends from bradford and northallerton who are delighted to see the new year in amid the gaieties of london. but before she rings for her maid and undresses that night, she locks the burnt fragment in a secret drawer of her desk. the ministry which was returned to power in december, , had to plan during the first half of to keep the suffragists becalmed with promises and prevent their making any public protest which might mar the coronation festivities. so various conciliation bills were allowed to be read to the house of commons and to reach second readings at which they were passed with huge majorities. then they came to nothingness by being referred to a committee of the whole house. still a hope of some solution was dangled before the oft-deluded women, who could hardly believe that british ministers of state would be such breakers of promises and tellers of falsehoods. in november, , there being no reason for further dissembling, the government made the announcement that it was contemplating a manhood suffrage bill, which would override altogether the petty question as to whether a proportion of women should or should not enjoy the franchise. this new electoral measure was to be designed for men only, but--the government opined--it might be susceptible of amendment so as to admit women likewise. [probably the government had satisfied itself beforehand that, acting on some unwritten code of parliamentary procedure, the speaker would rule out such an amendment as unconstitutional. at any rate, this is what he did in .] the wrath of the oft-deluded women flamed out with immediate resentment when the purport of this trick was discerned. led by mrs. pethick lawrence a band of more than a thousand women and men (and some of the presumed men were, like vivie, women in men's clothes, as it enabled them to move about with more agility and also to escape identification) entered whitehall and parliament street armed with hammers and stones. they broke all the windows they could in the fronts of the government offices and at the residences of ministers of state. vivie found herself shadowed everywhere by bertie adams though she had given him no orders to join the crowd, indeed had begged him to mind his own business and go home. "this _is_ my business," he had said curtly, and for once masterfully, and she gave way. though vivie for her own reasons carried no hammer or stone and as one of the principal organizers of the militant movement had been requested by the inner council of the w.s.p.u. to keep out of prison as long as possible, she could not help cheering on the boldest and bravest in the mild violence of their protest. to the angry police she seemed merely an impertinent young man, hardly worth arresting when they could barely master the two hundred and twenty-three arch offenders with glass-breaking weapons in their hands. so a constable contented himself with marching on her feet with all his weight and thrusting his elbows violently into her breast. she well-nigh fainted with the pain; in fact would have fallen in the crowd but for the interposition of adams who carried her out of it to the corner of parliament street, where he pounced on one of the many taxis that crawled about the outskirts of the shouting, swaying crowd, sure of a fare from either police or escaping suffragists. feeling certain that some policeman had not left the disguised vivie entirely unobserved--indeed bertie had half thought he caught the words above the din: "that's david williams, that is," he told the taxi man to drive along the embankment to the temple. by the time they had reached the nearest access on that side of fountain court, vivie was sufficiently recovered from her semi-swoon to get out, and leaning heavily on bertie's arm, limp slowly through the intricacies of the temple and out into fleet street by sergeant's inn. then with fresh efforts and further halts they made their way to , chancery lane. some one was sitting up here with one electric light on, ready for any development connected with w.s.p.u. work that night. to her--fortunately it was a woman--bertie handed over his stricken chief, and then made his way home to his little house in marylebone and a questioning and not too satisfied wife. the suffragette in charge of the top storey at knew something, fortunately, of first aid, was deft of hands and full of sympathy. vivie's--or mr. michaelis's--lace-up boots were carefully removed and the poor crushed and bleeding toes washed with warm water. the collar was taken off and the shirt unbuttoned revealing a terrible bruise on the sternum where the policeman's elbow had struck her--better however there, though it had nearly broken the breastbone, than on either side, as such a blow might have given rise to cancer. as it was, vivie when she coughed spat blood. a cup of hot bovril and an hour's rest on a long chair and she was ready, supremely anxious indeed, to try the last adventure: an excursion across the roofs and up and down fire-escapes on to the parapet of her own especial dwelling, the old offices of fraser and warren at no. - . the great window of the partners' room opened to her manipulations--it had been carefully left unbolted before her departure for caxton hall; and aided cautiously and cleverly by her suffragette helper, vivie at last found herself--or mr. michaelis did--in the snug little bedroom that knew her chiefly in her male form. here she was destined to lie up for several weeks till the feet and the chest were healed and sound again. hither by the normal entrance came a woman suffragette surgeon to heal, and vivie's woman clerk to act as secretary; whilst adams typed away in the outer office on mr. michaelis's business or went on long and mysterious errands. hither also came the little maid from the lilacs, bringing needed changes of clothes, letters, and messages from honoria. a stout young man with a fresh colour went up in the lift at no. to the flat or office of "algernon mainwaring," and then skipped along the winding way between the chimney stacks and up and down short iron ladders till he too reached the parapet, entered through the opened casement, and revealed himself as a great w.s.p.u. leader, costumed like vivie as a male, but in reality a buxom young woman only waiting for the vote to be won to espouse her young man--shop steward--and begin a large family of children. from this leader, vivie received humbly the strictest injunctions to engage in no more disabling work for the present, to keep out of police clutches and the risk of going to prison or of attracting too much police attention at - chancery lane. "you are our brain-centre at present. our offices for show and for raiding by the police have been at clifford's inn and are now in lincoln's inn. but the really precious information we possess is ... well, you know where it is: walls may have ears ... your time for public testimony hasn't come yet ... we'll let you know fast enough when it has and _you_ won't flinch, _i'm_ quite sure..." as a matter of fact, though vivie's intelligence and inventiveness, her knowledge of criminal law, of lawyers and of city business, her wide education, her command of french (improved by the frequent trips to brussels--where indeed she deposited securely in her mother's keeping some of the funds and the more remarkable documents of the suffrage cause) and her possession of monetary supplies were not to be despised: as a figure-head, she was of doubtful value. there was always that mother in the background. if vivie was in court for a suffrage offence of a grave character the prosecuting counsel would be sure to rake up the "notorious mrs. warren" and drag in the white slave traffic, to bewilder a jury and throw discredit on the militant side of the suffrage cause. of course if the true story of vivie were fully known, she would rise triumphant from such a recital.... still ... throw plenty of mud and some of it will stick.... and what _was_ her full, true story? even in the pure passion of the fight for liberty among these young and middle-aged women, the tongue of scandal occasionally wagged in moments of lassitude, discouragement, undeception. at such times some weaker sister with a vulgar mind, or a mind with vulgar streaks in it, might hint at the great interest taken in vivie by a distinguished man of science who had become an m.p. and a raging suffragist. or indecorum would be hinted in the relations between this enigmatic woman, so prone seemingly to don male costume, and the burly clerk who attended her so faithfully and had brought her home on the night of mrs. pethick lawrence's spirited raid. so much so, that vivie with a sigh, as soon as she attained convalescence was fain to send for bertie and tell him with unanswerable decision that he must return to his work with rossiter and thither she would send from time to time special instructions if he could help her business in any way. this was done in january, . vivie's feet were now healed and the woman surgeon was satisfied that she could walk on them without displacing the reset bones. the slight fracture in the breastbone had repaired itself by one of nature's magic processes. so one day our battered heroine doffed the invalid garments of michaelis and donned those of any well-dressed woman of , including a thick veil. thus attired she passed from the parapet to the fire-escape (recalling the agony these gymnastics had caused her the previous november), and from the fire-escape to the roof of no. (continuous with the roof of ), and past the chimney stacks, into the top storey of , and so on down to the street, where a taxi was waiting to convey her to the lilacs. (the w.s.p.u., by the bye, to bluff scotland yard had added to the name of "algernon mainwaring, th floor," the qualification of "hygienic corset-maker," as an explanation--possibly--of why so many women found their way to the top storey of no. .) arrived at the lilacs, vivie took up for a brief spell the life of an ordinary young woman of the well-to-do middle class, seriously interested in the suffrage question but non-militant. she attended several of honoria's or mrs. fawcett's suffrage parties or public meetings and occasionally spoke and spoke well. she also went over to brussels twice in to keep in touch with her mother. mrs. warren had had one or two slight warnings that a life of pleasure saps the strongest constitution.[ ] she lived now mainly at her farm, the villa beau-séjour, and only occasionally occupied her _appartement_ in the rue royale. she must have been about fifty-nine in the spring of , and was beginning to "soigner son salut," that is to say to take stock of her past life, apologize for it to herself and see how she could atone reasonably for what she had done wrong. a decade or two earlier she would have turned to religion, inevitably to that most attractive and logical form, the religion expounded by the holy roman catholic and apostolic church. she would have confessed her past, slightly or very considerably _gazée_, to some indulgent confessor, have been pardoned, and have presented a handsome sum to an ecclesiastical charity or work of piety. but she had survived into a skeptical age and she had conceived an immense respect for her clever daughter. vivie should be her spiritual director; and vivie's idea put before her at their reconciliation three years previously had seemed the most practical way of making amends to woman for having made money in the past out of the economic and physiological weakness of women. she had fined herself ten thousand pounds then; and out of her remaining capital of fifty or sixty thousand (all willed with what else she possessed to her daughter) she would pay over more if vivie demanded it as further reparation. still, she found the frequentation of churches soothing and gave much and often to the mildly beseeching little sisters of the poor when they made their rounds in town or suburbs. [footnote : or so the observers say who haven't had a life of pleasure.] "what do you think about religion, viv old girl?" she said one day in the eastertide of , when vivie was spending a delicious fortnight at villa beau-séjour. "personally," said vivie, "i hate all religions, so far as i have had time to study them. they bind up with undisputed ethics more or less preposterous theories concerning life and death, the properties of matter, man, god, the universe, the laws of nature, the food we should eat, the relations of the sexes, the quality of the weekly day of rest. gradually they push indisputable ethics on one side and are ready to apply torture, death, or social ostracism to the support of these preposterous theories and explanations of god and man. such theories"--went on vivie, though her mother's attention had wandered to some escaped poultry that were scratching disastrously in seed beds--"such theories and explanations, mark you--_do_ listen, mother, since you asked the question..." "i'm listenin', dearie, but you talk like a book and i don't know what some of your words mean--what's ethics?" "well 'ethics' means er--er--'morality'; it comes from a greek word meaning 'character.'..." _mrs. warren_: "you talk like a book--" _vivie_: "i do sometimes, when i remember something i've read. but now i've lost my thread.... what i meant to finish up with was something like this 'such theories and explanations were formulated several hundred, or more than two thousand years ago, in times when man's knowledge of himself, of his surroundings, of the earth and the universe was almost non-existent, yet they are preserved to our times as sacred revelations, though they are not superior to the fancies and fetish rites of a savage.' there! all that answer is quoted from professor rossiter's little book (_home university library_, "the growth of the human mind")." _mrs. warren_: "rossiter! is that the man you're sweet on?" _vivie_: "don't put it so coarsely. there is a great friendship between us. we belong to a later generation than you. a man and a woman can be friends now without becoming lovers." _mrs. warren_: "go _on_! don't humbug me. men and women's the same as when i was young. i'm sorry, all the same, dear girl. there are you, growin' middle-aged and not married to some good-'earted chap as 'd give you three-four children i could pet in me old age. wodjer want to go fallin' in love with some chap as 'as got a wife already? _i_ know your principles. there's iron in yer blood, same as there is in that proud priest, your father. i know you'd break your 'eart sooner 'n have a good time with the professor. my! it seems to me love's as bad as religion for bringin' about sorrer!" _vivie_: "if you mean that it is answerable for the same intense happiness and even more intense _un_happiness, i suppose you're right. i'm _miserable_, mother, and it's some relief to me to say so. if i could become honourably the wife of michael rossiter i'm afraid i should let suffrage have the go-by. but as i can't, why this struggle for the vote is the only thing that keeps me going. i shall fight for it for another ten years, and by that time certain physiological changes may have taken place in me, and my feelings towards rossiter will have calmed down." (here mrs. warren proceeded to call out rather disharmoniously in flemish to the poultry woman, and asked why the something-or-other she let the houdans spoil the seed beds.) _mrs. warren_ resuming: "well it's clear you're your father's daughter. 'e'd 'ave gone on--_did_ go on--in just such a way. 'im and me were jolly well suited to one another. i'd got to reg'lar love 'im. i'd 'a bin a true wife to him, and 'ave worked my fingers to the bone for 'im, and you bet i'd 'ave made a livin' somehow. and he'd have written some jolly good books and 'ave made lots of money. but no! this beastly religion comes in with its scare of hell fire and back 'e goes to the priests and 'is prayers and 'is penances. the last ten years or so 'e's bin filled up with pride. 'is passions 'ave died down and 'e thinks 'imself an awful swell as the head of his order. and they do say as 'e's got 'is fingers in several pies and is a reg'lar old conspirator, working up the irish to do something against england. yer know since i've made my peace with you.... _ain't_ it a rum go, by the bye? ten or twenty years ago it'd 'a bin 'my peace with god.' i dunno nothin' about god--can't see 'im at the end of a telescope, anyways. but i _can_ see you, vivie, and there's no one livin' i respect more" (speaks with real feeling).... "well, as i was sayin', since i'd set myself right with you and wound up the business of the hotels i ain't so easy cowed by 'is looks as i used to be. so every now and then it amuses me to run over in my auto to louvain and stroll about there and watch 'im as 'e comes out for 'is promenade, pretendin' to be readin' a breviary or some holy book. i know it riles 'im.... "well, but for high principles, 'e and i might 'a bin as 'appy as 'appy and 'ad a large family. and there was nothin' to stop 'im a-marryin' me, if that was all he wanted to feel comfortable about it. but jus' see. he's had a life that seems to me downright sterile, and i--well, i ain't been _really_ happy till we made it up three years ago" (leans over, and kisses vivie a little timorously). "now there's you, burning yourself out 'cos your high principles won't let you go for once in a way on the spree with this rossiter--s'posin' 'e's game, of course.... you've too much pride to throw yourself at his head. but if he loves you as bad as you loves 'im, why don't you ask him" (instinctively the old ministress of love speaks here) "ask 'im to take you over to paris for a trip? i'll lay 'e 'as to go over now'n again to the sorbonne or one of them scientific institutes. _she'd_ never come to 'ear of it. an' after one or two such honeymoons you'd soon get tired of 'im, specially now you're gettin' on a bit in years, and may be you'd settle down quietly after that. or if you ain't reg'lar set on _'im_, why not giv' up this suffrage business and live a bit with me here? there's plenty of upstanding, decent, belgian men in good positions as'd like to have an english wife. _they_ wouldn't look too shy at my money..." _vivie_: "get thee behind me, satan! mother, you oughtn't to make such propositions. don't you understand, we must all have a religion somewhere. some principle to which we sacrifice ourselves. rossiter would be horrified if he could hear you. his mistress is science, besides which he is really devoted to his wife and would do nothing that could hurt her. you don't know england, it's clear. supposing for one moment i could consent--and i couldn't--we should be found out to a certainty, and then michael's career would be ruined. "my religion, though i sometimes weary of it and sneer at it, is women's rights: women must have precisely the same rights as men, no disqualification whatever based merely on their being women. did you read those disgusting letters in the _times_ by the surgeon, the midwifery man, sir wrigsby blane? declaring that the demand for the vote was based on immorality, and pretending that once a month, till they were fifty, and for several years _after_ they were fifty, women were not responsible for their actions, because of what he vaguely called 'physiological processes.' what poisonous rubbish! you know as well as i do that in most cases it makes little or no difference; and if it does, what about men? aren't _they_ at certain times not their normal selves? when they're full up with wine or beer or whiskey, when they're courting, when they're pursuing some illicit love, when after fifty they get a little odd in their ways through this, that and the other internal trouble or change of function? what's true of the one sex is equally true of the other. most men and women between twenty and sixty jolly well know what they want, and generally they want something reasonable. we don't legislate for the freaks, the unbalanced, the abnormal; or if we do restrict the vote in those cases, let's restrict it for males as well as females--but don't you see at the same time what a text i should furnish to this malign creature if i ran away to paris with michael, and made the slightest false step ... even though it had no bearing on the main argument?..." at this juncture vivie, whose obsession leads her more and more to address every one as a public meeting--is interrupted by the smiling _bonne à tout faire_ who announces that _le déjeuner de madame est servi_, and the two women gathering up books and shawls go in to the gay little _saile-à-manger_ of the villa beau-séjour. on vivie's return to london, after her easter holiday, she threw herself with added zest into the suffrage struggle. the fortnight of good feeding, of quiet nights and lazy days under her mother's roof had done her much good. she was not quite so thin, the dark circles under her grey eyes had vanished, and she found not only in herself but even in the most middle-aged of her associates a delightful spirit of tomboyishness in their swelling revolt against the liberal leaders. it was specially during the remainder of that vivie noted the enormous good which the suffrage movement had done and was doing to british women. it was producing a splendid camaraderie between high and low. heroines like lady constance lytton mingled as sister with equally heroic charwomen, factory girls, typewriteresses, waitresses and hospital nurses. women doctors of science, music, and medicine came down into the streets and did the bravest actions to present their rights before a public that now began to take them seriously. debutantes, no longer quivering with fright at entering the royal presence, modestly but audibly called their sovereign's attention to the injustice of mr. asquith's attitude towards women, while princesses of the blood royal had difficulty in not applauding. many a tame cat had left the fire-side and the skirts of an inane old mother (who had plenty of people to look after her selfish wants) and emerged, dazed at first, into a world that was unknown to her. such had thrown away their crochet hooks, their tatting-shuttles and fashion articles, their church almanacs, and girl's own library books, and read and talked of social, sexual, and industrial problems that have got to be faced and solved. colour came into their cheeks, assurance into their faded manners, sense and sensibility into their talk; and whatever happened afterwards they were never crammed back again into the prison of victorian spinsterhood. they learnt rough cooking, skilled confectionery, typewriting, bicycling, jiu-jitsu perhaps. "the maidens came, they talked, they sang, they read; till she not fair began to gather light, and she that was became her former beauty treble" sang in prophecy, sixty years before, the greatest of poets and the poet-prophet of woman's emancipation. many a woman has directly owed the lengthened, happier, usefuller life that became hers from - - onwards to the suffrage movement for the liberation of women. the crises of moreover were not so acute as bitterly to envenom the struggle in the way that happened during the two following years. there was always some hope that the ministry might permit the passing of an amendment to the franchise bill which would in some degree affirm the principle of female suffrage. it is true that a certain liveliness was maintained by the suffragettes. the w.s.p.u. dared not relax in its militancy lest ministers should think the struggle waning and woman already tiring of her claims. the vaunted manhood suffrage bill had been introduced by an anti-woman-suffrage quaker minister and its second reading been proposed by an equally anti-feminist secretary of state--this was in june-july, ; and no member of the cabinet had risen to say a word in favour of the women's claims. still, something might be done in committee, in the autumn session--if there were one--or in the following year. there was a simmering in the suffragist ranks rather than any alarming explosion. in march, before vivie went to brussels, mrs. pankhurst had carried out a window-smashing raid on bond street and regent street and the clubs of piccadilly, during which among the two hundred and nineteen arrests there were brought to light as "revolutionaries" two elderly women surgeons of great distinction and one female doctor of music. in revenge the police had raided the w.s.p.u. offices at clifford's inn, an event long foreseen and provided against in the neighbouring chancery lane. the irish nationalist party had shown its marked hostility to the enfranchisement of women in any irish parliament and so a few impulsive irish women had thrown things at nationalist m.p.'s without hurting them. mr. lansbury had spoken the plain truth to the prime minister in the house of commons and had been denied access to that chamber where truth is so seldom welcome. in july the slumbering movement towards resisting the payment of taxes by vote-less women woke up into real activity, and there were many ludicrous and pathetic scenes organized often by vivie and bertie adams at which household effects were sold and bought in by friends to satisfy the claims of a tax-collector. in the autumn vivie and others of the w.s.p.u. organized great pilgrimages--the marches of the brown women--from scotland, wales, devon and norfolk to london, to some goal in downing street or whitehall, some door-step which already had every inch of its space covered by policemen's boots. these were among the pleasantest of the manifestations and excited great good humour in the populace of town and country. they were extended picnics of ten days or a fortnight. the steady tramp of sixteen to twenty miles a day did the women good; the food _en route_ was abundant and eaten with tremendous appetite. the pilgrims on arrival in london were a justification in physical fitness of woman's claim to equal privileges with man. vivie after her easter holiday took an increasingly active part in these manifestations of usually good-humoured insurrection. as vivien warren she was not much known to the authorities or to the populace but she soon became so owing to her striking appearance, telling voice and gift of oratory. all the arts she had learnt as david williams she displayed now in pleading the woman's cause at the albert hall, at manchester, in edinburgh and glasgow. countess feenix took her up, invited her to dinner parties where she found herself placed next to statesmen in office, who at first morose and nervous--expecting every moment a personal assault--gradually thawed when they found her a good conversationalist, a clever woman of the world, becomingly dressed. after all, she had been a third wrangler at cambridge, almost a guarantee that her subsequent life could not be irregular, according to a man's standard in england of what an unmarried woman's life should be. she deprecated the violence of the militants in this phase. but she was protean. much of her work, the lawless part of it, was organized in the shape and dress of mr. michaelis. some of her letters to the press were signed edgar mckenna, albert birrell, andrew asquith, edgmont harcourt, felicia ward, millicent curzon, judith pease, edith spenser-churchhill, marianne chamberlain, or emily burns; and affected to be pleas for the granting of the suffrage emanating from the revolting sons or daughters, aunts, sisters or wives of great statesmen, prominent for their opposition to the women's cause. the w.s.p.u. had plenty of funds and it did not cost much getting visiting cards engraved with such names and supplied with the home address of the great personage whom it was intended to annoy. one such card as an evidence of good faith would be attached to the plausibly-worded letter. the _times_ was seldom taken in, but great success often attended these audacious deceptions, especially in the important organs of the provincial press. editors and sub-editors seldom took the trouble and the time to hunt through _who's who_, or a peerage to identify the writer of the letter claiming the vote for women. no real combination of names was given, thus forgery was avoided; but the public and the unsuspecting editor were left with the impression that the premier's, colonial secretary's, home secretary's, board of trade president's, or prominent anti-suffragist woman's son, daughter, brother, sister, wife or mother-in-law did not at all agree with the anti-feminist opinions of its father, mother, brother or husband. if the politician were foolish enough to answer and protest, he was generally at a disadvantage; the public thought it a good joke and no one (in the provinces) believed his disclaimers. vivie generally heckled ministers on the stump and parliamentary candidates dressed as a woman of the lower middle class. it would have been unwise to do so in man's guise, in case there should be a rough-and-tumble afterwards and her sex be discovered. although in order to avoid premature arrest she did not herself take part in those most ingenious--and from the view of endurance, heroic--stow-aways of women interrupters in the roofs, attics, inaccessible organ lofts or music galleries of public halls, she organized many of these surprises beforehand. it was vivie to whom the brilliant idea came of once baffling the police in the rearrest of either mrs. pankhurst or annie kenney. knowing when the police would come to the building where one or other of these ladies was to make her sensational re-appearance, she had previously secreted there forty other women who were dressed and veiled precisely similarly to the fugitive from justice. thus, when the force of constables claimed admittance, forty-one women, virtually indistinguishable one from the other, ran out into the street, and the bewildered minions of the law were left lifting their helmets to scratch puzzled heads and admitting "the wimmen were a bit too much for us, this time, they were." in her bedroom at - she kept an equipment of theatrical disguises; very natural-looking moustaches which could be easily applied and which remained firmly adhering save under the application of the right solvent; pairs of tinted spectacles; wigs of credible appearance; different styles of suiting, different types of women's dress. she sometimes sat in trains as a handsome, impressive matron of fifty-five, with a pompadour confection and a tortoiseshell _face-à-main_, conversing with ministers of state or permanent officials on their way to their country seats, and saying "_horrid_ creatures!" if any one referred to the activities of the suffragettes. thus disguised she elicited considerable information sometimes, though she might really be on her way to organize the break-up of the statesman's public meeting, the enquiry into discreditable circumstances which might compel his withdrawal from public life, or merely the burning down of his shooting box. this life had its risks and perils, but it agreed with her health. it was exciting and took her mind off rossiter. rossiter for his part experienced a slackening in the tension of his mind during the same year . he was touched by his wife's faint suspicion of his alienated affection and by her dogged determination to be sufficient to him as a companion and a helper; and a little ashamed at his middle-aged--he was forty-seven--infatuation for a woman who was herself well on in the thirties. there were times when a rift came in the cloud of his passion for vivie, when he looked out dispassionately on the prospect of the rest of his life--he could hope at most for twenty more years of mental and bodily activity and energy. was this all too brief period to be filled up with a senile renewal of sexual longing! he felt ashamed of the thoughts that had occupied so much of his mind since he had laid david williams on the couch of his library, to find it was vivie warren whose arms were round his neck. he was not sorry this love for a woman he could not possess had sent him into parliament. he was beginning to enjoy himself there. he had found himself, had lost that craven fear of the speaker that paralyzes most new members. he knew when to speak and when to be silent; and when he spoke unsuspected gifts of biting sarcasm, clever characterization, convincing scorn of the uneducated minister type came to his aid. his tongue played round his victims, unequipped as they were with his vast experience of reality, vaguely discursive, on the surface as are most lawyers, at a loss for similes and tropes as are most men of business, or dull of wits as are most of the fine flowers of the public schools, stultified with the classics and scripture history. he knew that unless there was some radical change of government he could not be a minister; but he cared little for that. he was rich--thanks to his wife--he was recovering his influence and his european and american reputation as a great discoverer, a deep thinker. he enjoyed pulverizing the ministry over their suffrage insincerities and displaying his contempt of the politician elected only for his money influence in borough, county, or in the subscription lists of the chief whip. though his pulses still beat a little quicker when he held vivie's hand in his at some reception of lady feenix's or a dinner party at the gorings--vivie as the child of a "fallen" woman had a prescriptive right of entrance to diana's circle--he had not the slightest intention of running away with her, of nipping his career in two, just as he might be scaling the last heights to the citadel of fame: either as a politician of the new type, the type of high education, or as one of the giants of inductive science. besides in , if i mistake not, dr. smith-woodward and mr. charles dawson made that discovery of the remains of an ape-like man in the gravels of mid-sussex; and the hounds of anthropology went off on a new scent at full cry, rossiter foremost in the pack. mrs. rossiter in the same year allowed herself more and more to be tempted into anti-suffrage discussions at the houses of peers or of strong-minded, influential ladies who were on the easiest terms with peers and potentates. she still resented the line her husband had taken in politics and believed it to be chiefly due to an inexplicable interest in vivien warren who she began to feel was the same person as "david williams." if she could only master the "anti" arguments--they sounded so convincing from the lips of miss violet markham or mrs. humphry ward or some suave king's counsel with the remnants of mutton-chop whiskers--if she could wean michael away from that disturbing nonsense--he could assign "militancy" as the justification of his change of mind...! all that was asked by authority, so far as she could interpret hints from great ladies, was neutrality, the return of professor rossiter to the paths of pure science in which area no one disputed his eminence. _then_ he might receive that knighthood that was long overdue; better still his next lot of discoveries in anatomy might bring him the peerage he richly deserved and which her wealth would support. he could then rest on his oars, cease his more or less nasty investigations; they could take a place in the country and move from this much too large house which lay almost outside the limits of society's london to a really well-appointed flat in westminster and have a thoroughly enjoyable old age. honoria in these times did not see so much of vivie as before. her warrior husband spent a good deal of at home as he had a hounslow command. he had come to realize--some spiteful person had told him--who vivie's mother had been, and told honoria in accents of finality that the "aunt vivie" nonsense must be dropped and vivie must not come to the house. at the most, if she _must_ meet her friend of college days--oh, he was quite willing to believe in her personal propriety, though there were odd stories in circulation about her dressing as a man and doing some very rum things for the w.s.p.u.--still if she _must_ see her, it would have to be in public places or at her friends, at lady feenix's, if she liked. no. he wasn't attacking the cause of suffrage. women could have the vote and welcome so far as he was concerned: they couldn't be greater fools than the men, and they were probably less corrupt. he himself never remembered voting in his life, so honoria was no worse off than her husband. but he drew the line in his children's friends at the daughter of a.... here honoria to avoid hearing something she could not forgive put her plump hand over his bristly mouth. he kissed it and somehow she couldn't take the high tone she had at first intended. she simply said "she would see about it" and met the difficulty by giving up her suffrage parties for a bit and attending lady maud's instead; where you met not only poor vivie, but--had she been in london and guaranteed reformed and _rangée_--you might have met vivie's mother; as well as the duchess of dulborough--american, and intensely suffrage--the charwoman from little francis street, the bookseller's wife, the "mother of the maids" from derry and toms; and that very clever chemist who had mended juliet duff's nose when she fell on the ice at princes'--they would both be there. honoria said nothing to vivie and vivie said nothing to honoria about the inhibition, but together with her irrational jealousy of _eoanthropos dawsoni_ and irritation at the growing contentedness with things as they were on the part of rossiter, it made her a trifle more reckless in her militancy. and praddy? how did he fare in these times? praed felt himself increasingly out of the picture. he was not far gone in the sixties, sixty-one, perhaps at most. but out of the movement. in his prime the people of his set--the cultivated upper middle class, with a few recruits from the peerage--cared only about art in some shape or form--recondite music, the themes of which were never obvious enough to be hummed, the androgyne poetry of the 'nineties, morbidities from the yellow book, and scarlet sins that you disclaimed for yourself, to avoid unpleasantness with the criminal investigation department, but freely attributed to people who were not in the room; the drawings of aubrey beardsley and successors in audacity and ugly indecency who left beardsley a mere disciple of raphael tuck; also architecture which ignored the housemaid's sink, the box-room and the fire-escape. the people who still came to his studio because he had the reputation of being a wit and the husband of his parlour-maid (whom to her indignation they called queen cophetua) cared not a straw about art in any shape or form. the women wanted the vote--few of them knew why--the men wanted to be aviators, motorists beating the record in speed on french trial trips, or apaches in their relations with the female sex or prize-fighters--jimmy wilde had displaced oscar, to the advantage of humanity, even praddy agreed. to praed however vivie took the bitterness, the disillusions which came over her at intervals: "i feel, praddy, i'm getting older and i seem to be at a loose end. d'you know i'm on the verge of thirty-seven--and i have no definite career? i'm rather tired of being a well-meaning adventuress." "then why," praddy would reply, "don't you go and live with your mother?" "ugh! i couldn't stand for long that life in belgium or elsewhere abroad. they seem miles behind us, with all our faults. mother only seems to think now of good things to eat and a course of the waters at spa in september to neutralize the over-eating of the other eleven months. there is no political career for women on the continent." "then why not marry and have children? that is a career in itself. look at honoria, how happy she is." "yes--but there is only one man i could love, and he's married already." "pooh! nonsense. there are as many good fish in the sea as ever came out of it. if you won't do as beryl did--by the bye isn't she a swell in these days! and _strict_ with her daughters! she won't let 'em come here, i'm told, because of some silly story some one set abroad about me! and that humbug, francis brimley storrington--by the bye he's an a.r.a. now and scarcely has enough talent to design a dog kennel, yet they've given him the job of the new stables at buckingham palace. well if you won't share some one else's husband, pick out a good man for yourself. there must be plenty going--some retired prize-fighter. they seem all the rage just now, and are supposed to be awfully gentlemanly out of the ring." "don't be perverse. you know exactly how i feel. i'm wasting the prime of my life. i see no clear course marked out before me. sometimes i think i would like to explore central africa or get up a woman's expedition to the south pole. life has seemed so flat since i gave up being david williams. then i lived in a perpetual thrill, always on my guard. i tire every now and then of my monkey tricks, and the praise of all these women leaves me cold. i wish i were as simple minded as most of them are. to them the vote seems the beginning of the millennium. they seem to forget that after we've _got_ the vote we shall have another fight to be admitted as members to the house. you may be sure the men will stand out another fifty years over _that_ surrender. i alternate in my moods between the reckless fury of an anarchist and the lassitude of lord rosebery. to think that i was once so elated and conceited about being a third wrangler...!" with the closing months of , however, there was a greater tenseness, a sharpening of the struggle which once more roused vivie to keen interest. when she returned from an autumn visit to villa beau-séjour she found there had been a split between the "peths" and the "panks." the girondist section of the women suffragists had separated from those who could see no practical policy to win the vote but a regime of terrorism--mild terrorism, it is true--somewhat that of the curate in _the private secretary_ who at last told his persecutors he should _really have to give them a good hard knock_. the peths drew back before the pankish programme (mild as this would seem, to us of bolshevik days and of irish insurrection). _votes for women_ returned to the control of the pethick lawrences, and the pankhurst party to which vivie belonged were to start a new press organ, _the suffragette_. the panks, it seemed, had a more acute fore-knowledge than the peths. the latter had felt they were forcing an open door; that the liberal ministry would eventually squeeze a measure of female suffrage into the long-discussed franchise bill; and that too much militancy was disgusting the general public with the woman's cause. the former declared all along that women were going to be done in the eye, because all the militancy hitherto had got very little in man's way, had only excited smiles, and shoulder-shrugs. ministers of the crown in had compared the hoydenish booby-traps and bloodless skirmishes of the suffragettes with the grim fighting, the murders, burnings, mob-rule of the 's, when men were agitating for reform; or the mutilation of cattle, the assassinations, dynamite outrages, gun-powder plots, bombs and boycotting of the long drawn-out irish agitation for home rule. an agitation which was now resulting in the placing on the statute book of a home rule bill, while another equally deadly agitation--in promise--was being worked up by sir edward carson, the duke of this and the marquis of that, and a very rising politician, mr. f.e. smith, to defeat the operation of home rule for ireland. in short, if one might believe the second-rate ministers who were not repudiated by their superiors in rank, the vote for women could only be wrung from the reluctance of the tyrant man, _if_ the women made life unbearable for the male section of the community. it was a dangerous suggestion to make, or would have proved so, had these sneering politicians been provoking men to claim their constitutional rights: bloodshed would almost certainly have followed. but the leaders of the militant women ordered (and were obeyed) that no attacks on life should be part of the woman's militant programme. property might be destroyed, especially such as did not impoverish the poor; but there were to be no railway accidents, no sinking of ships, no violent deeds dangerous to life. at the height and greatest bitterness of militancy no statesman's life was in danger. the only recklessness about life was in the militant women. they risked and sometimes lost their lives in carrying out their protests. they invented the hunger strike (the prospect of which as an inevitable episode ahead of her, filled vivie with tremulous dread) to balk the executive of its idea of turning the prisons of england into bastilles for locking up these clamant women who had become better lawyers than the men who tried them. but think what the hunger strike and its concomitant, forcible feeding, meant in the way of pain and danger to the life of the victim. the government were afraid (unless you were an utterly unknown man or woman of the lower classes) of letting you die in prison; so to force them to release you, you had first to refuse for four days all food--the heroic added all drink. then to prevent your death--and being human you, the prisoner, must have hoped they were keeping a good look-out on your growing weakness--the prison doctor must intervene with his forcible feeding. this was a form of torture the inquisition would have been sorry to have overlooked, and one no doubt that the bolsheviks have practised with great glee. the patient was strapped to a chair or couch or had his--usually her--limbs held down by warders (wardresses) and nurses. a steel or a wooden gag was then inserted, often with such roughness as to chip or break the teeth, and through the forced-open mouth a tube was pushed down the throat, sometimes far enough to hurt the stomach. this produced an apoplectic condition of choking and nausea, and as the stomach filled up with liquid food the retching nearly killed the patient. the windpipe became involved. food entered the lungs--the tongue was cut and bruised (think what a mere pimple on the tongue means to some of us: it keeps _me_ awake half the night)--the lips were torn. worse still--requiring really a pathological essay to which i am not equal--was feeding by slender pipes through the nose. the far simpler and painless process _per rectum_ was debarred because it might have constituted an indecent assault. was ever ministry in a greater dilemma? it was too old-fashioned, too antiquely educated to realize the spirit of its age, the pass at which we had arrived of conceding to women the same rights as to men. women were ready to die for these rights (not to kill others in order to attain them). yet for fear of wounding the national sentimentality they must not be allowed to die; they must not be saved from suicide by any action savouring of indecency; so they must be tortured as prisoners hardly were in the worst days of the inquisition or at the worst-conducted public school of the victorian era. but vivie's gradually rising wrath was to be brought by degrees to boiling-point through the spring of , and to explode at last over an incident more tragic than any one of the five or six hundred cases of forcible feeding. early in , the speaker intimated that any insertion of a woman suffrage amendment into the manhood franchise bill would be inconsistent with some unwritten code of parliamentary procedure of which apparently he was the sole guardian and interpreter. ministers who had probably prepared this _coup_ months before went about expressing hypocritical laments at the eccentricities of our constitution; and the franchise act was abandoned. a little later, frightened at the renewal of arson in town and country, at interferences with their week-end golf courses, at the destruction of mails in the letter-boxes, and the slashing of old masters at the national gallery (purchased at about five times their intrinsic value by a minister who would not have spent one penny of national money to encourage native art), the cabinet let it be known that a way would be found presently to give woman suffrage a clear run. a private member would be allowed to bring in a bill for conferring the franchise on women, and the opinion of the house would be sought on its merits independently of party issues. the government whips would be withdrawn and members of the government be left free to vote as they pleased. it was a fair deduction, however, from what was said at that time and later, that the strongest possible pressure--arguments _ad hominem_ and in a sense _ad pecuniam_--was brought to bear on liberals and on irish nationalists to vote against the bill. had the second reading been carried, the government would have resigned and a home rule bill for ireland have been once more postponed. the rejection of mr. dickinson's measure by a majority of forty-seven convinced the militants that pharaoh had once more hardened his heart; and the hopelessness of the woman's cause at that juncture inspired one woman with a resolution to give her life as a protest in the manner most calculated to impress the male mind of the british public. chapter xv imprisonment prior to the derby day of , vivie had heard of emily wilding davison as a northumbrian woman, distantly related to the rossiters and also to the lady shillito she had once defended. she came from morpeth in northumberland and had had a very distinguished university career at oxford and in london, of which latter university she was a b.a. the theme of the electoral enfranchisement of women had gradually possessed her mind to the exclusion of all other subjects; she became in fact a fanatic in the cause and a predestined martyr to it. in she had received her first sentence of imprisonment for making a constitutional protest, and to escape forcible feeding had barricaded her cell. the visiting committee had driven her from this position by directing the warders to turn a hose pipe on her and knock her senseless with a douche of cold water; for which irregularity they were afterwards fined and mulcted in costs. two years later, for another suffragist offence (setting fire to a pillar box after giving warning of her intention) she went to prison for six months. here the tortures of forcible feeding so overcame her reason--it was alleged--that she flung herself from an upper gallery, believing she would be smashed on the pavement below and that her death under such circumstances might call attention to the agony of forcible feeding and the reckless disregard of consequences which now inspired educated women who were resolved to obtain the enfranchisement of their sex. but an iron wire grating eight feet below broke her fall and only cut her face and hands. the accident or attempted suicide, however, procured the shortening of her sentence. vivie and she often met in the early months of , and on the first day of june she confided to a few of the w.s.p.u. her intention of making at epsom a public protest against public indifference to the cause of the woman's franchise. this protest was to be made in the most striking manner possible at the supreme moment of the derby race on the th of june. probably no one to whom she mentioned the matter thought she contemplated offering up her own life; at most they must have imagined some speech from the grand stand, some address to royalty thrown into the royal pavilion, some waving of a suffrage flag or early-morning placarding of the bookies' stands. vivie however had been turning her thoughts to horse-racing as a field of activity. she was amused and interested at the effect that had been produced in ministerial circles by her interference with the game of golf. if now something was done by the militants seriously to impede the greatest of the sports, the national form of gambling, the protected form of swindling, the main interest in life of the working-class, of half the peerage, all the beerage, the chief lure of the newspapers between october and july, and the preoccupation of princes, she might awaken the male mind in a very effectual way to the need for settling the suffrage question. so she determined also to see the running of the derby, as a preliminary to deciding on a plan of campaign. she had become hardened to pushing and scrouging, so that the struggle to get a seat in one of the fifty or sixty race trains leaving waterloo or victoria left her comparatively calm. she was dressed as a young man and had no clothing impediments, and as a young man she was better able to travel down with racing rascality. in that guise she did not attract too much attention. rough play may have been in the mind of the card-playing, spirit-drinking scoundrels that occupied the other seats in the compartment, but vivie in her man's dress created a certain amount of suspicion and caution. "look's like a 'tec,'" one man whispered to another. so the card-playing was not thrust on her as a round-about form of plunder, and the stories told were more those derived from the spicy columns of the sporting papers, in words of double meaning, than the outspoken, stable obscenity characteristic of the race-course rabble. vivie arriving early managed to secure a fairly good seat on the grand stand, to which she could have recourse when the crowd on the race course became too repulsive or too dangerous. she wished as much as possible to see all aspects of the premier race meeting. indeed, meeting a friend of lady feenix's, a good-natured young peer who halted irresolute between four worlds--the philosophic, the political, the philanthropic, and the sporting, she introduced herself as "david williams"--hoping no bencher was within hearing--said "dare say you remember me? lady feenix's? been much abroad lately--really feel quite strange on an english race course," and persuaded him to take her round before the great people of the day were all assembled. she was shown the royal pavilion being got ready for the king and queen, the weighing room of the jockeys, the paddock and temporary stables of the horses that were to race that day. here was a celebrated actress in a magnificent lace dress and a superb hat, walking up and down on the sun-burnt, trodden turf, in a devil of a temper. her horse--for with her lovers' money she kept a racing stable--had been scratched for the race--i really can't tell you why, not having been able to study all the _minutiæ_ of racing. [talking of that, _how_ annoying it is--or was--when one cared about things of great moment, to take up an evening newspaper's last edition and read in large type "official scratchings," with a silly algebraic formula underneath about horses being withdrawn from some race, when you thought it was a bear fight in the cabinet.] vivie gathered from her guide that to-day would be rather a special derby, because it did not often happen that a king-emperor was there to see a horse from his own racing stables running in the classic race. then, thanking the pleasant soldier-peer for his information, vivie (david williams) left him to his duties as equerry and member of the jockey-club and entered the dense crowd on either side of the race course. it reminded her just slightly of frith's derby day. there were the gypsies, the jugglers, the acrobats, the costers with their provision barrows; the grooms and stable hands; the beggars and obvious pick-pockets; the low-down harlots--the high-up ones were already entering the seats of the grand stand or sitting on the four-in-hand coaches or in the open landaulettes and silent knights. but evidently the professional betting men were a new growth since the mid-nineteenth century. they were just beginning to assemble, wiping their mouths from the oozings of the last potation; some, the aristocrats of their calling, like sporting peers in dress and appearance; others like knock-about actors on the music-hall stage. the generality were remarkably similar to ordinary city men or to the hansom-cab drivers of twenty years ago. in the very front of the crowd on the grand stand side, leaning with her elbows on the wooden rail, she descried emily davison. vivie edged and sidled through the crowd and touched her on the shoulder. emily looked up with a start, surprised at seeing the friendly face of a young man, till she recognized vivie by her voice. "dear emily," said vivie, "you look so tired. aren't you over-trying your strength? i don't know what you have in hand, but why not postpone your action till you are quite strong again?" "i shall never be stronger than i am to-day and it can't be postponed, cost me what it will," was the reply, while the sad eyes looked away across the course. "well," said vivie, "i wanted you to know that i was close by, prepared to back you up if need be. and there are others of our union about the place. that young man over there talking to the policeman is really a---- k---- though she is supposed to be in prison. mrs. tuke is somewhere about, mrs. despard is on the grand stand, and blanche smith is selling _the suffragette_." "thank you," said miss davison, turning round for an instant, and pressing vivie's hand, "good-bye. i hope what i am going to do will be effectual." vivie did not like to prolong the talk in case it should attract attention. individual action was encouraged under the w.s.p.u., and when a member wished to do something on her own, her comrades did not fuss with advice. so vivie returned to the grand stand. presently there was the stir occasioned by the arrival of the royal personages. vivie noted with a little dismay that while she was wearing a homburg hat all the men near her wore the black and glistening topper which has become--or had, for the tyranny of custom has lifted a little since the war--the conventional head-gear in which to approach both god and the king. there was a great raising of these glistening hats, there were grave bows or smiling acknowledgments from the pavilion. then every one sat down and the second event was run. still emily wilding davison made no sign. vivie could just descry her, still in the front of the crowd, still gazing out over the course, pressed by the crowd against the broad white rail. * * * * * the race of the day had begun. the row of snickering, plunging, rearing, and curvetting horses had dissolved, as in a kaleidoscope, into a bunch, and a pear-shaped formation with two or three horses streaming ahead as the stem of the pear. then the stem became separated from the pear-shaped mass by its superior speed, and again this vertical line of horses formed up once more horizontally, leaving the mass still farther behind. then the horses seen from the grand stand disappeared--and after a minute reappeared--three, four, five--and the bunch of them, swerving round tattenham corner and thundering down the incline towards the winning post.... the king's horse seemed to be leading, another few seconds would have brought it or one of its rivals past the winning post, when ... a slender figure, a woman, darted with equal swiftness from the barrier to the middle of the course, leapt to the neck of the king's horse, and in an instant, the horse was down, kneeling on a crumpled woman, and the jockey was flying through the air to descend on hands and knees practically unhurt. the other horses rushed by, miraculously avoiding the prostrate figures. some horse passed the winning post, a head in front of some other, but no one seemed to care. the race was fouled. vivie noted thirty seconds--approximately--of amazed, horrified silence. then a roar of mingled anger, horror, enquiry went up from the crowd of many thousands. "it's the suffragettes" shouted some one. and up to then vivie had not thought of connecting this unprecedented act with the purposed protest of emily wilding davison. she sprang to her feet, and shouting to all who might have tried to stop her "i'm a friend of the lady. i am a doctor"--she didn't care what lie she told--she was soon authoritatively pushing through the ring of police constables who like warrior ants had surrounded the victims of the protest--the shivering, trembling horse, now on its legs, the pitifully crushed, unconscious woman--her hat hanging to the tresses of her hair by a dislodged hat-pin, her thin face stained with blood from surface punctures. the jockey was being carried from the course, still unconscious, but not badly hurt. a great surgeon happening to be at epsom race course on a friend's drag, had hurried to offer his services. he was examining the unconscious woman and striving very gently to straighten and disentangle her crooked body. presently there was a respectful stir in the privileged ring, and vivie was conscious by the raising of hats that the king stood amongst them looking down on the woman who had offered up her life before his eyes to enforce the woman's appeal. he put his enquiries and offered his suggestions in a low voice, but vivie withdrew, less with the fear that her right to be there and her connection with the tragedy might be questioned, as from some instinctive modesty. the occasion was too momentous for the presence of a supernumerary. emily wilding davison should have her audience of her sovereign without spectators. returning with a blanched face to the seething crowd, and presently to the grand stand, vivie's mood altered from awe to anger. the "bookies" were beside themselves with fury. she noted the more frequent of the nouns and adjectives they applied to the dying woman for having spoilt the derby of , but although she went to the trouble, in framing her indictment of the turf, of writing down these phrases, my jury of matrons opposes itself to their appearance here, though i am all for realism and completeness of statement. after conversing briefly and in a lowered voice with such suffragettes as gathered round her, so that this one could carry the news to town and that one his to communicate with miss davison's relations, vivie--recklessly calling herself to any police questioner, "david williams" and eliciting "yes, sir, i have seen you once or twice in the courts," reached once more the grand stand with its knots of shocked, puzzled, indignant, cynical, consternated men and women. most of them spoke in low tones; but one--a blond jew of middle age--was raving in uncontrolled anger, careless of what he said or of who heard him. he was short of stature with protruding bloodshot eyes, an undulating nose, slightly prognathous muzzle and full lips, and a harsh red moustache which enhanced the prognathism. his silk hat tilted back showed a great bald forehead, in which angry, bluish veins stood out like swollen earth worms. "those suffragettes!" he was shouting or rather shrieking in a nasal whine, "if i had _my_ way, i'd lay 'em out along the course and have 'em ---- by ----. the ----'s!" the shocked auditory around him drew away. vivie gathered he was mr. ---- well, perhaps i had better not give his name,[ ] even in a disguised form. he had had a chequered career in south america--mexico oil, peruvian rubber, buenos aires railways, and a corner in argentine beef--but had become exceedingly rich, a fortune perhaps of twenty millions. he had given five times more than any other aspirant in benefactions to charities and to the party chest of the dominant party, but the authorities dared not reward him with a baronetcy because of the stories of his early life which had to be fought out in libel cases with baxendale strangeways and others. but he had won through these libel cases, and now devoted his vast wealth to improving our breed of horses by racing at newmarket, epsom, doncaster, gatwick, sandown and brighton. racing had, in fact, become to him what auction bridge was to the society gamblers of those days, only instead of losing and winning tens and hundreds of pounds, his fluctuations in gains and losses were in thousands, generally with a summing up on the right side of the annual account. but whether on the turf, at the billiard table, or in the stock market he was or had become a bad loser. he lost his temper at the same time. on this occasion miss davison's suicide or martyrdom would leave him perhaps on the wrong side in making up his day's book to the extent of fifteen hundred pounds. viewed in the right proportion it would be equivalent to our--you and me--having given a florin to a newspaper boy as the train was moving, instead of a penny. but no doubt her unfortunate impulse had spoiled the day for him in other ways, upset schemes that were bound up with the winning of the king's horse. yet his outburst and the shocking language he applied to the suffrage movement made history: for they fixed on him vivie's attention when she was looking out for some one or something on whom to avenge the loss of a comrade. [footnote : he died in . my jury of matrons has excised his phrases.] she forthwith set out for london and wrote up the dossier of mr. ----. in the secret list of buildings which were to be destroyed by fire or bombs, with as little risk as possible to human or animal life, she noted down the racing stables, trainers' houses and palaces of mr. ---- at newmarket, epsom, the devil's dyke, and the neighbourhood of doncaster. rossiter and vivie met for the first time for a year at emily davison's funeral. rossiter had been profoundly moved at her self-sacrifice; she was moreover a northumbrian and a distant kinswoman. perhaps, also, he felt that he had of late been a little lukewarm over the suffrage agitation. his motor-brougham, containing with himself the very unwilling mrs. rossiter, followed in the procession of six thousand persons which escorted the coffin across london from victoria station to king's cross. a halt was made outside a church in bloomsbury where a funeral service was read. mrs. rossiter thought the whole thing profoundly improper. in the first place the young woman had committed suicide, which of itself was a crime and disentitled you to christian burial; in the second she had died in a way greatly to inconvenience persons in the highest society; in the third she had always understood that racing was a perfectly proper pastime for gentlemen; and in the fourth this incident, touching michael through his relationship with the deceased, would bring him again in contact with that vivie warren--_there_ she was and there was _he_, in close converse--and make a knighthood from a nearly relenting government well-nigh impossible. rossiter, after the service, had begged vivie to come back to tea with them in park crescent and give mrs. rossiter and himself a full account of what took place at epsom. vivie had declined. she had not even spoken to the angry little woman, who had refused to attend the service and had sat fuming all through the half hour in her electric brougham, wishing she had the courage and determination to order the chauffeur to turn round and run her home, leaving the professor to follow in a taxi. but perhaps if she did that, he would go off somewhere with that warren woman. michael presently re-entered the carriage and in silence they returned to portland place. the next day his wife meeting one of her anti-suffrage friends said: "er--supposing--er--you had got to know something about these dreadful militant women, something which might help the police, yet didn't want to get _too_ much mixed up with it yourself, and _certainly_ not bring your husband into it--the professor _thoroughly_ disapproves of militancy, even though he may have foolish ideas about the vote--er--what would you do?" "well, what is it?" "it's part of a letter." "well, i should just send it to the criminal investigation department, new scotland yard, and tell them under what circumstances it came into your possession. you needn't even give your name or address. they'll soon know whether it's any use or not." so mrs. rossiter took from her desk that scrap of partly burnt paper with the typewritten words on it which she had picked out of the grate two and a half years before, and posted it to the criminal investigation department, with the intimation that this fragment had come into the possession of the sender some time ago, and seemed to refer to a militant suffragist who called herself "vivie warren" or "david williams," and perhaps it might be of some assistance to the authorities in tracking down these dangerous women who now stuck at nothing. she posted the letter with her own hands in the north west district. park crescent, portland place, she always reflected, was still in the _western_ district, though it lay perilously near the north west border line, beyond which lady jeune had once written, no one in society thought of living. this was a dictum that at one time had occasioned mrs. rossiter considerable perturbation. it was alarming to think that by crossing the marylebone road or migrating to cambridge terrace you had passed out of society. it took the police a deuce of a time--two months--to make use effectively of the information contained in mrs. rossiter's scrap of burnt paper; though the statement of their anonymous correspondent that vivie warren and david williams were probably the same person helped to locate mr. michaelis's office. it was soon ascertained that miss vivien warren, well known as a sort of society speaker on suffrage, lived at the lilacs in victoria road, kensington. but when a plain-clothes policeman called at victoria road he was only told by the suffragette caretaker (whose mother now usually lived with her to console her for her mistress's frequent absences) that miss warren was away just then, had recently been much away from home, probably abroad where her mother lived. (here the enquirer registered a mental note: miss warren has a mother living abroad: could it be _the_ mrs. warren?). polite and respectful calls on lady feenix, lady maud parry, and mrs. armstrong--vivie's known associates--elicted no information, till on leaving the last-named lady's house in kensington square the detective heard colonel armstrong come in from the garden and call out "ho-no-ria." "'--ria," he said to himself, "'-ria kept the keys, and now--' honoria. what was her name before she married colonel armstrong?--why--" he soon found out--"fraser." "wasn't there once a firm, _fraser and warren_, which set up to be some new dodge for establishing women in a city career?--accountancy? stockbroking? where did _fraser and warren_ have their office? fifth floor of midland insurance office in chancery lane. what was that building now called? no. - ." done. these two sentences run over a period of--what did i say? two months?--in their deductions and guesses and consultation of out-of-date telephone directories. but on one day in september, , two plain-clothes policemen made their way up to the fifth floor of - chancery lane and found the outer door of mr. michaelis's office locked and a notice board on it saying "absent till monday." not deterred by this, they forced open the door--to the thrilling interest of a spectacled typewriteress, who had no business on that landing at all, but she usually made assignations there with the lift man. and on the writing table in the outer office they found a note addressed to miss annie kenney, which said inside: "dear annie. if you should chance to look in between your many imprisonments and find me out, you will know i am away on the firm's business, livening up the racing establishments of the right honble sir ---- ----, bart. bart. no one knows anything about this at no. ." (this note was purely unnecessary--a bit of swagger perhaps, lest miss kenney should think vivie never did anything dangerous, but only planned dangerous escapades for others. like the long letter of vivie to michael rossiter, written on the last day of december, , which he had imperfectly destroyed, it was a reminder of that all-too-true saying: "litera scripta manet.") if the outer door of michaelis's office was locked how could miss kenney be expected to call and find this note awaiting her? why, _here_ came in the "no. " of the scrap of paper. there was an over-the-roofs communication between the block of - and house no. . the policemen in fact found that the large casement of the partners' room was only pulled to, so that it was easily opened from the outside. from the parapet they passed to the fire-escapes and through the labyrinth of chimney stacks to a similar window leading into the top storey of , the office of mr. algernon mainwaring, hygienic corset-maker. this office at the time of their unexpected entry was fairly full of suffragettes planning all sorts of direful things. so the plain-clothes policemen had a rare haul that day and certainly had mrs. rossiter to thank for rising to be inspectors and receiving some modest order of later days. it was about the worst blow the w.s.p.u. had; before the outbreak of war turned suddenly the revolting women into the stanchest patriots and the right hands of muddling ministers. for in addition to many a rich find in no. and a dozen captives caught red-handed in making mock of the authorities, the plain-clothes policemen made themselves thoroughly at home in mr. michaelis's quarters till the following monday. and when in the fore-noon of that day, mr. michaelis entered his rooms, puzzled and perturbed at finding the outer door ajar, he was promptly arrested on a multiform charge of arson ... and on being conveyed to a police station and searched he was found to be miss vivien warren. at intervals in the summer and early autumn of the male section of the public had been horrified and scandalized at the destruction going on in racing establishments, particularly those of sir george crofts and of a well-known south american millionaire, whose distinguished services to british commerce and immense donations to hospitals and homes would probably be rewarded by a grateful government. if these outrages were not stopped, horse-racing and race-horse breeding must come to a stand-still; and we leave our readers to realize what _that_ would mean! there would be no horses for the plough or the gig, or the artillery gun-carriage; no--er--fox-hunting, and without fox-hunting and steeple-chasing and point-to-point races you could have no cavalry and without cavalry you could have no army. if we neglected blood stock we would deal the farmer a deadly blow, we should--er-- you know the sort of argument? reduced to its essentials it is simply this:--that a few rich people are fond of gambling and fond of the excitement that is concentrated in the few minutes of the horse race. some others, not so rich, believe that by combining horse-racing with a certain amount of cunning and bold cheating they can make a great deal of money. a few speculators have invested funds in spaces of open turf, and turn these spaces into race courses. having no alternative, no safer method of gambling offered them, and being as fond of gambling as other peoples of the world, the men of the labouring classes and a few of their women, the publicans and their frequenters, army officers, farmers, and women of uncertain virtue stake their money on horses they have never seen, who may not even exist, and thus keep the industry going. and the chevaliers of this "industry," the go-betweens, the parasites of this sport, are the twelve thousand professional book-makers and racing touts. somehow the turf has during the last hundred years, together with its allies the distillers and brewers, the licensed victuallers and the press that is supported by these agencies, acquired such a hold over the government departments, the labour party, the conservative party, and liberal politicians who are descended from county families, that it has more interest with those who govern us than the church, the nonconformist conscience, the county palatine of lancaster or any other body of corporate opinion. so that when in september, , representatives of the turf (and no doubt of the trade unions) went to the home secretary in reference to the burning and bombing of racing stables, trainers' houses, grand stands and the residences of racing potentates, and said "look here! this has got to stop," the home secretary and the cabinet knew they were up against no ordinary crisis. at the same time sir edward carson, the marquis of londonderry, the duke of abercorn, mr. f.e. smith and nearly a third of the colonels in the british army of ulster descent were actively organizing armed resistance to any measure of home rule; while keltiberian ireland was setting up the irish volunteers to start a home rule insurrection. you can therefore imagine for yourselves the mental irritability of members of the liberal cabinet in the autumn of the sinister year . i have been told that there were days at the house of commons during the autumn session of that year when the leading ministers would just shut themselves up in their private rooms and scream on end for a quarter of an hour.... of course an exaggeration, a sorry jest. in retrospect one feels almost sorry for them: the great war must have come almost as a relief. not one of them was what you would call a bad man. some of them suffered over forcible feeding and the cat and mouse act as acutely as does the loving father or mother who says to the recently spanked child, "you _know_, dear, it hurts _me_ almost as much as it hurts _you_." if one met them out at dinner parties, or in an express train which they could not stop by pulling the communication cord, and sympathized with their dilemma, they would ask plaintively _what_ they could do. they could not yield to violence and anarchy; yet they could not let women die in prison. of course the answer was this, but it was one they waved aside: "dissolve parliament and go to the country on the one question of votes for women. if the country returns a great majority favourable to that concession, you must bring in a bill for eliminating the sex distinction in the suffrage. if on the other hand, the country votes against the reform, then you must leave it to the women to make a male electorate change its mind. and meantime if men and women, to enforce some principle, rioted and were sent to prison for it, and then started to abstain from food and drink, why they must please themselves and die if they wanted to." but this was just what the liberal ministry of those days would not do; at all costs they must stick to office, emoluments, patronage, the bestowal of honours, and the control of foreign policy. they clung to power, in fact, at all costs; even inconsistency with the bedrock principle of liberalism: no taxation without representation. it was decided in the innermost arcana of the home office that an example should be made of vivie. they had evidently in her got hold of something far more dangerous than a pankhurst or a pethick lawrence, a constance lytton or an emily davison. the very probable story--though the benchers were loth to take it up--that she had actually in man's garb passed for the bar and pleaded successfully before juries, appalled some of the lawyer-ministers by its revolutionary audacity. they might not be able to punish her on that count or on several others of the misdemeanours imputed to her; but they had got her, for sure, on arson; and on the arson not of suburban churches, which occurred sometimes at peckham or in the suburbs of birmingham and made people laugh a little in the trains coming up to town and say there were far too many churches, seemed to them; _but_ the burning down of racing establishments. _that_ was bolshevism, indeed, they would have said, had they been able to project their minds five years ahead. being only in they called vivie by the enfeebled term of anarchist, the word applied by _punch_ to mr. john burns in for wishing to address the public in trafalgar square. so it was arranged that vivie's trial should take place in october at the old bailey and that a judge should try her who was quite certain he had never stayed at a warren hotel; who would be careful to keep great names out of court; and restrain counsel from dragging anything in to the simple and provable charge of arson which might give miss warren a chance to say something those beastly newspapers would get hold of. i am not going to give you the full story of vivie's trial. i have got so much else to say about her, before i can leave her in a quiet backwater of middle age, that this must be a story which has gaps to be filled up by the reader's imagination. you can, besides, read for yourself elsewhere--for this is a thinly veiled chronicle of real events--how she was charged, and how the magistrate refused bail though it was offered in large amounts by rossiter and praed, the latter with mrs. warren's purse behind him. how she was first lodged in brixton prison and at length appeared in the dock at the old bailey before a court that might have been set for a cinematograph. there was a judge with a full-bottomed wig, a scarlet and ermine vesture, there was a jury of prosperous shopkeepers, retired half pay officers, a hotelkeeper or two, a journalist, an architect, and a builder. a very celebrated king's counsel prosecuted--the cabinet thus said to the racing world "we've done _all_ we can"--and vivie defended herself with the aid of a clever solicitor whom bertie adams had found for her. from the very moment of her arrest, bertie adams had refused--even though they took away his salary--to think of anything but vivie's trial and how she might issue from it triumphant. he must have lost a stone in weight. he was ready to give evidence himself, though he was really quite unconcerned with the offences for which vivie was on trial; prepared to swear to anything; to swear he arranged the conflagrations; that miss warren had really been in london when witness had seen her purchasing explosives at newmarket (both stories were equally untrue). bertie adams only asked to be allowed to perjure himself to the tune of five years' penal servitude if that would set vivie free. yet at a word or a look from her he became manageable. the attorney general of course began something like this. "i am very anxious to impress on you," he said, addressing the jury, "that from the moment we begin to deal with the facts of this case, all questions of whether a woman is entitled to the parliamentary franchise, whether she should have the same right of franchise as a man are matters which in no sense are involved in the trial of this issue. all you have to decide is whether the prisoner in the dock committed or procured and assisted others to commit the very serious acts of arson of which she is accused..." nevertheless he or the hounds he kept in leash, the lesser counsel, sought subtly to prejudice the jury's mind against vivie by dragging in her parentage and the eccentricities of her own career. as thus:-- _counsel for the prosecution_: "we have in you the mainspring of this rebellious movement..." _vivie_: "have you?" _counsel_: "are you not the daughter of the notorious mrs. warren?" _vivie_: "my mother's name certainly is warren. for what is she notorious?" _counsel_: "well--er--for being associated abroad with--er--a certain type of hotel synonymous with a disorderly house--" _vivie_: "indeed? have you tried them? my mother has managed the hotels of an english company abroad till she retired altogether from the management some years ago. it was a company in which sir george crofts--" _judge_, interposing: "we need not go into that--i think the counsel for the prosecution is not entitled to ask such questions." _counsel_: "i submit, me lud, that it is germane to my case that the prisoner's upbringing might have--" _vivie_: "i am quite willing to give you all the information i possess as to my upbringing. my mother who has resided mainly at brussels for many years preferred that i should be educated in england. i was placed at well-known boarding schools till i was old enough to enter newnham. i passed as a third wrangler at cambridge and then joined the firm of fraser and warren. as you seem so interested in my relations, i might inform you that i have not many. my mother's sister, mrs. burstall, the widow of canon burstall, resides at winchester; my grandfather, lieutenant warren, was killed in the crimea--or more likely died of neglected wounds owing to the shamefully misconducted, man-conducted army medical service of those days. my mother in early days was better known as miss kate vavasour. she was the intimate friend of a celebrated barrister who--" _judge_, intervening: "we have had enough of this discursive evidence which really does not bear on the case at all. i must ask the prosecuting counsel to keep to the point and not waste the time of the court." _prosecuting counsel_ (who has meantime received three or four energetic notes from his leader, begging him to remember his instructions and not to be an ass): "very good m'lud." (to vivie) "do you know mr. david vavasour williams, a barrister?" _vivie_: "i have heard of him." _counsel_: "have you spoken of him as your cousin?" _vivie_: "i may have done. he is closely related to me." _counsel_: "i put it to you that _you_ are david williams, or at any rate that you have posed as being that person." _judge_, interposing with a weary air: "_who_ is david williams?" _counsel_: "well--er--a member of the bar--well known in the criminal courts--shillito case--" _judge_: "really? i had not heard of him. proceed." _counsel_ (to vivie): "you heard my questions?" _vivie_: "i have never posed as being other than what i am, a woman much interested in claiming the parliamentary franchise for women; and i do not see what these questions have to do with my indictment, which is a charge of arson. you introduce all manner of irrelevant matter--" _counsel_: "you decline to answer my questions?" (vivie turns her head away.) _judge_, to counsel: "i do not quite see the bearing of your enquiries." _counsel_: "why, me lud, it is common talk that prisoner is the well-known barrister, david vavasour williams; that in this disguise and as a pretended man she passed the necessary examinations and was called to the bar, and--" _judge_: "but what bearing has this on the present charge, which is one of arson?" _counsel_: "i was endeavouring by my examination to show that the prisoner has often and successfully passed as a man, and that the evidence of witnesses who affirmed that they only saw _a young man_ at or near the scene of these incendiary fires, that a young man, supposed to have set the stables alight, once dashed in and rescued two horses which had been overlooked, might well have been the prisoner who is alleged to have committed most of these crimes in man's apparel--" _judge_: "i see." (to vivie) "are you david vavasour williams?" _vivie_: "obviously not, my lord. my name is vivien warren and my sex is feminine." _judge_, to counsel: "well, proceed with your examination--" (but here the leader of the prosecution takes up the rôle and brushes his junior on one side). vivie of course was convicted. the case was plain from the start, as to her guilt in having organized and carried out the destruction of several great racing establishments or buildings connected with racing. there had been no loss of life, but great damage to property--perhaps two or three hundred thousand pounds, and a serious interruption in the racing fixtures of the late summer and early autumn. the jury took note that on one occasion the prisoner in the guise of a young man had personally carried out the rescue of two endangered horses; and added a faintly-worded recommendation to mercy, seeing that the incentive to the crimes was political passion. but the judge put this on one side. in passing sentence he said: "it is my duty, vivien warren, to inflict what in my opinion is a suitable and adequate sentence for the crime of which you have been most properly convicted. i must point out to you that whatever may have been your motives, your deeds have been truly wicked because they have exposed hard-working people who had done you no wrong to the danger of being burnt, maimed or killed, or at the least to the loss of employment. you have destroyed property of great value belonging to persons in no way concerned with the granting or withholding of the rights you claim for women. in addition, you have for some time past been luring other people--young men and young women--to the committal of crime as your assistants or associates. i cannot regard your case as having any political justification or standing, or as being susceptible of any mitigation by the recommendation of the jury. the least sentence i can pass upon you is a sentence of three years' penal servitude." vivie took the blow without flinching and merely bowed to the judge. there was the usual "sensation in court." women's voices were heard saying "shame!" "shame!" "three cheers for vivie warren," and a slightly ironical "three cheers for david whatyoumay-callem williams." the judge uttered the usual unavailing threats of prison for those who profaned the majesty of the court; honoria, rossiter, praed (in tears), bertie adams, looking white and ill, all the noted suffragists who were out of prison for the time being and could obtain admittance to the court, crowded round vivie before the wardresses led her away from the dock, assuring her they would move heaven and earth, first to get the sentence mitigated, and secondly to have her removed to the first division. but on both points the government proved adamant. an interview between rossiter and the home secretary nearly ended in a personal assault. all the officials concerned refused to see honoria, who almost had a serious quarrel with her husband, the latter averring that vivien warren had only got what she asked for. vivien was therefore taken to holloway to serve her sentence as a common felon. "didn't she hunger-strike to force the authorities to accord her better prison treatment?" she did. but she was very soon, and with extra business-like brutality, forcibly fed; and that and the previous starvation made her so ill that she spent weeks in hospital. here it was very plainly hinted to her that between hunger-striking and forcible feeding she might very soon die; and that in her case the government were prepared to stand the racket. moreover she heard by some intended channel about this time that scores of imprisoned suffragists were hunger-striking to secure her better treatment and were endangering if not their lives at any rate their future health and validity. so she conveyed them an earnest message--and was granted facilities to do so--imploring them to do nothing more on her account; adding that she was resolved to go through with her imprisonment; it might teach her valuable lessons. the governor of the prison fortunately was a humane and reasonable man--unlike some of the home office or scotland yard officials. he read the newspapers and reviews of the day and was aware who vivie warren was. he probably made no unfair difference in her case from any other, but so far as he could mould and bend the prison discipline and rules it was his practice not to use a razor for stone-chipping or a cold-chisel for shaving. he therefore put vivie to tasks co-ordinated with her ability and the deftness of her hands--such as book-binding. she had of course to wear prison dress--a thing of no importance in her eyes--and her cell was like all the cells in that and other british prisons previous to the newest reforms--dark, rather damp, cruelly cold in winter, and disagreeable in smell; badly ventilated and oppressively ugly. but it was at any rate clean. she had not the cockroaches, bugs, fleas and lice that the earliest suffragists of had to complain of. five years of outspoken protests on the part of educated, delicate-minded women had wrought great reforms in our prisons--the need for which till then was not apparent to the perceptions of visiting magistrates. the food was better, the wardresses were less harsh, the chaplains a little more endurable, though still the worst feature in the prison personnel, with their unreasoning bibliolatry, their contemptuous patronage, their lack of christian pity--christ had never spoken to _them_, vivie often thought--their snobbishness. the chaplain of her imprisonment became quite chummy when he learnt that she had been a third wrangler at cambridge, knew lady feenix, and had lived in kensington prior to committing the offences for which she was imprisoned. however this helped to alleviate her dreary seclusion from the world as he occasionally dropped fragments of news as to what was going on outside, and he got her books through the prison library that were not evangelical pap. one day when she had been in prison two months she had a great surprise--a visit from her mother. strictly speaking this was only to last fifteen minutes, but the wardress who had conceived a liking for her intimated that she wouldn't look too closely at her watch. honoria came too--with mrs. warren--but after kissing her friend and leaving some beautiful flowers (which the wardress took away at once with pretended sternness and brought back in a vase after the visitors had left) honoria with glistening eyes and a smile that was all tremulous sweetness, intimated that mrs. warren had so much to say that she, honoria, was not going to stay more than that _one_ minute. mrs. warren had indeed so much to impart in the precious half hour that it was one long gabbled monologue. "when i heard you'd got into trouble, my darling, i _was_ put about. some'ow i'd never thought of your being pinched and acshally sent to prison. it was in the belgian papers, and a german friend of mine--oh! quite proper i assure you! he's a secretary of their legation at brussels and ages ago he used to be one of my clients when the hotel had a different name. well, he was full of it. 'madam,' 'e said, 'your english women are splendid. they're going to bring about a revolt, you'll see, and that, an' your ulster movement 'll give you a lot of trouble next year.' "well: i wrote at once to praddy, givin' him an order on my london agents, 'case he should want cash for your defence. i offered to come over meself, but he replied that for the present i'd better keep away. soon as i heard you was sent to prison i come over and went straight to praddy. my! he _was_ good. he made me put up with him, knowin' i wanted to live quiet and keep away from the old set. 'there's my parlour-maid,' 'e says, 'sort of housekeeper to me--good sort too, but wants a bit of yumourin.' you'll fix it up with her,' he says. and i jolly soon did. i give her to begin with a good tip, an' i said: 'look 'ere, my gal--she's forty-five i should think--every one's in trouble _some_ time or other in their lives, and _i'm_ in trouble now, if you like. and the day's come,' i said, 'when all women ought to stick by one another.' 'pears she's always had the highest opinion of you; very different, you was, from _some_ of 'er master's friends. i says 'right-o; then _now_ we know where we are.' "praddy soon got into touch with the authorities, but for some reason they wouldn't pass on a letter or let me come and see you, till to-day. but here i am, and here i'm goin' to stay--with praddy--till they lets you out. i'm told that if you be'ave yourself they'll let me send you a passel of food, once a week. think of that! my! won't i find some goodies, and paté de foie gras. i'll come here once a month, as often as they'll let me, till i gets you out. 'n after that, we'll leave this 'orrid, 'yprocritical old country and live 'appily at my villa, or travel a bit. fortunately i've plenty of money. bein' over here i've bin rearranging my investments a bit. fact is, i 'ad a bit of a scare this autumn. they say in belgium, war is comin'. talkin' to this same german--he's always pumpin' me about the suffragettes so i occasionally put a question or so to 'im, 'e knowing 'what's, what' in the money market--'e says to me just before i come over, 'what's your english proverb, madame varennes, about 'avin' all your eggs in one basket? is all your money in english and belgian securities?' i says 'chiefly belgian and german and austrian, and some i've giv' to me daughter to do as she likes with.' 'well' 'e says, 'friend speakin' to friend, you've giv' me several good tips this autumn,' he says. 'now i'll give you one in return. sell out your austrian investments--there's goin' to be a big war in the balkans next year and as like as not _we_ shall be here in belgium. sell out most of yer belgian stock and put all your money into german funds. they'll be safe there, come what may.' i thanked 'im; but i haven't quite done what he suggested. i'm takin' all my money out of austrian things and all but ten thousand out of belgian funds. i'm leavin' my german stock as it was, but i'm puttin' forty thousand pounds--i've got sixty thousand altogether--all yours some day--into canadian pacifics and royal mail--people 'll always want steamships--and new zealand five per cents. i don't like the look of things in old england nor yet on the continent. now me time's up. keep up your heart, old girl; it'll soon be over, specially if you don't play the fool and rile the prison people or start that silly hunger strike and ruin your digestion. g--good-bye; and g-god b-bless you, my darlin'" added mrs. warren relapsing into tears and the conventional prayer, of common humanity, which always hopes there _may_ be a pitiful deity, somewhere in cosmos. going out into the corridor, she attempted to press a sovereign into the wardress's hard palm. the latter indignantly repudiated the gift and said if mrs. warren tried on such a thing again, her visits would be stopped. but her indignation was very brief. she was carrying honoria's flowers at the time, and as she put them on the slab in vivie's cell, she remarked that say what you liked, there was nothing to come up to a mother, give her a mother rather than a man any day. on other occasions bertie adams came with mrs. warren; even professor rossiter, who also went to see vivie's mother at praed's, and conceived a whimsical liking for the unrepentant, outspoken old lady. vivie's health gradually recovered from the effects of the forcible feeding; the prison fare, supplemented by the weekly parcels, suited her digestion; the peace of the prison life and the regular work at interesting trades soothed her nerves. she enjoyed the respite from the worries of her complicated toilettes, the perplexity of what to wear and how to wear it; in short, she was finding a spell of prison life quite bearable, except for the cold and the attentions of the chaplain. she gathered from the fortnightly letter which her industry and good conduct allowed her to receive, and to answer, that unwearied efforts were being made by her friends outside to shorten her sentence. mrs. warren through bertie adams had found out the cases where jockeys and stable lads had lost their effects in the fires or explosions which had followed vivie's visits to their employers' premises, and had made good their losses. as to their employers, they had all been heavily insured, and recovered the value of their buildings; and as to the insurance companies _they_ had all been so enriched by mr. lloyd george's legislation that the one-or-two hundred thousand pounds they had lost, through vivie's revenge for the seemingly-fruitless death of emily wilding davison, was a bagatelle not worth bothering about. but all attempts to get the home office to reconsider miss warren's case or to shorten her imprisonment (except by the abridgment that could be earned in the prison itself) were unavailing. so long as the cabinet held vivie under lock and key, the suffrage movement--they foolishly believed--was hamstrung. so the months went by, and vivie almost lost count of time and almost became content to wait. till war was declared on august th, . a few days afterwards followed the amnesty to suffragist prisoners. from this the home office strove at first to exclude vivien warren on the plea that her crime was an ordinary crime and admitted of no political justification; but at this the wrath of rossiter and the indignation of the w.s.p.u. became so alarming that the agitated secretary of state--not at all sure how we were going to come out of the war--gave way, and an order was signed for vivie's release on the th of august; on the understanding that she would immediately proceed abroad; an understanding to which she would not subscribe but which in her slowly-formed hatred of the british government she resolved to carry out. mrs. warren, assured by praed and rossiter that vivie's release was a mere matter of a few days, had left for brussels on the th of august. if--as was then hoped--the french and belgian armies would suffice to keep the germans at bay on the frontier of belgium, she would prefer to resume her life there in the villa de beau-séjour. if however belgium was going to be invaded it was better she should secure her property as far as possible, transfer her funds, and make her way somehow to a safe part of france. vivie would join her as soon as she could leave the prison. chapter xvi brussels and the war: the lilacs in victoria road had been disposed of--through honoria--as soon as possible, after the sentence of three years' imprisonment had been pronounced on vivie; and the faithful suffragette maid had passed into honoria's employ at petworth, a fact that was not fully understood by colonel armstrong until he had become general armstrong and perfectly indifferent to the suffrage agitation which had by that time attained its end. so when vivie had come out of prison and had promised to write to all the wardresses and to meet them some day on non-professional ground; had found rossiter waiting for her in his motor and honoria in hers; had thanked them both for their never-to-be-forgotten kindness, and had insisted on walking away in her rather creased and rumpled clothes of the previous year with bertie adams; she sought the hospitality of praddy at hans place. the parlour-maid received her sumptuously, and praddy's eyes watered with senile tears. but vivie would have no melancholy. "oh praddy! if you only knew. it's worth going to prison to know the joy of coming out of it! i'm so happy at thinking this is my last day in england for ever so long. when the war is over, i think i shall settle in switzerland with mother--or perhaps all three of us--you with us, i mean--in italy. we'll only come back here when the women have got the vote. now to-night you shall take me to the theatre--or rather i'll take _you_. i've thought it all out beforehand, and bertie adams has secured the seats. it's _the chocolate soldier_ at the adelphi, the only war piece they had ready; there are two stalls for us and bertie and his wife are going to the dress circle. my cook's ticket is taken for brussels and i leave to-morrow by the ostende route." "to-morrow" was the th of august, and dora was not yet in being to interpose every possible obstacle in the way of the civilian traveller. down to the battle of the marne in september, , very little difficulty was made about crossing the channel, especially off the main dover-calais route. so in the radiant noon of that august day vivie looked her last on the brown-white promontories, cliffs and grey castle of dover, scarcely troubling about any anticipations one way or the other, and certainly having no prevision she would not recross the channel for four years and four months, and not see dover again for five or six years. british war vessels were off the port and inside it. but there was not much excitement or crowding on the ostende steamer or any of those sensational precautions against being torpedoed or mined, which soon afterwards oppressed the spirits of cross-channel passengers. vessels arriving from belgium were full of passengers of the superior refugee class, american and british tourists, or wealthy people who though they preferred living abroad had begun to think that the continent just now was not very healthy and england the securest refuge for those who wished to be comfortable. vivie being a good sailor and economical by nature, never thought of securing a cabin for the four or five hours' sea-journey. she sat on the upper deck with her scanty luggage round her. a nice-looking young man who had a cabin the door of which he locked, was walking up and down on the level deck and scrutinizing her discreetly. and when at last they worked their way backwards into ostende--the harbour was full of vessels, chiefly mine-dredgers and torpedo boats--she noticed the obsequiousness of the steamer people and how he left the ship before any one else. she followed soon afterwards, having little encumbrances in the way of luggage; but she observed that he just showed a glimpse of some paper and was allowed to walk straight through the douane with unexamined luggage, and so, on to the brussels train. but she herself had little difficulty. she put her hand luggage--she had no other--into a first-class compartment, and having an hour and a half to wait walked out to look at ostende. summer tourists were still there; the casino was full of people, the shops were doing an active trade; the restaurants were crowded with english, americans, belgians taking tea, chocolate, or liqueurs at little tables and creating a babel of talk. newspapers were being sold everywhere by ragamuffin boys who shouted their head-lines in french, flemish, and quite understandable english. a fort or two at liége had fallen, but it was of no consequence. general léman could hold out indefinitely, and the mere fact that german soldiers had entered the town of liége counted for nothing. belgium had virtually won the war by holding up the immense german army. france was overrunning alsace, russia was invading east prussia and also sending uncountable thousands of soldiers, via archangel, to england, whence they were being despatched to calais for the relief of belgium. "it looks," thought vivie, after glancing at the _indépendance belge_, "as though belgium were going to be extremely interesting during the next few weeks; i may be privileged to witness--from a safe distance--another waterloo." then she returned to the train which in her absence had been so crowded with soldiers and civilian passengers that she had great difficulty in finding her place and seating herself. the young man whom she had seen pacing the deck of the steamer approached her and said: "there is more room in my compartment; in fact i have selfishly got one all to myself. won't you share it?" she thanked him and moved in there with her suit case and rugs. when the train had started and she had parried one or two polite enquiries as to place and ventilation, she said: "i think i ought to tell you who i am, in case you would not like to be seen speaking to me--i imagine you are in diplomacy, as i noticed you went through with a red passport.--i am vivien warren, just out of prison, and an outlaw, more or less." "'the outlaws of to-day are the in-laws of to-morrow,' as the english barrister said when he married the boer general's daughter. i have thought i recognized you. i have heard you speak at lady maud's and also at lady feenix's suffrage parties. my name is hawk. i suppose you've been in prison for some suffrage offence? so has my aunt, for the matter of that." _vivie_: "yes, but in her case they only sentenced her to the first division; whereas _i_ have been doing nine months' hard." _hawk_: "what was your crime?" _vivie_: "i admit nothing, it is always wisest. but i was accused of burning down mr. ----'s racing stables--and other things..." _hawk_: "_that_ beast. well, i suppose it was very wrong. can't quite make up my mind about militancy, one way or the other. but here we are up against the biggest war in history, and such peccadilloes as yours sink into insignificance. by the bye, my aunt was amnestied and so i suppose were you?" _vivie_: "yes, but not so handsomely. i was requested to go away from england for a time, so here i am, about to join my mother in brussels--or in a little country place near brussels." _hawk_: "well, i've been secretary of legation there. i'm just going back to--to--well i'm just going back." at bruges they were told that the train would not leave for ghent and brussels for another two hours--some mobilization delay; so hawk proposed they should go and see the memlings and then have some dinner. "don't you think they're perfectly wonderful?"--_àpropos_ of the pictures in the hospital of st. jean. _vivie_: "it depends on what you mean by 'wonderful.' if you admire the fidelity of the reproduction in colour and texture of the flemish costumes of the fifteenth century, i agree with you. it is also interesting to see the revelations of their domestic architecture and furniture of that time, and the types of domestic dog, cow and horse. but if you admire them as being true pictures of life in palestine in the time of christ, or in the rhineland of the fifth century, then i think they--like most old masters--are perfectly rotten. and have you ever remarked another thing about all paintings prior to the seventeenth century: how _plain_, how _ugly_ all the people are? you never see a single good-looking man or woman. do let's go and have that dinner you spoke of. i've got a prison appetite." at ghent another delay and a few uneasy rumours. the court was said to be removing from brussels and establishing itself at antwerp. the train at last drew into the main station at brussels half an hour after midnight. vivie's mother was nowhere to be seen. she had evidently gone back to the villa beau-séjour while she could. it was too late for any tram in the direction of tervueren. there were no taxis owing to the drivers being called up. leaving most of her luggage at the cloak-room--it took her about three-quarters of an hour even to approach the receiving counter--vivie walked across to the _palace hotel_ and asked the night porter to get her a room. but every room was occupied, they said--americans, british, wealthy war refugees from southern belgium, military officers of the allies. the only concession made to her--for the porter could hold out little hope of any neighbouring hotel having an empty room--was to allow her to sit and sleep in one of the comfortable basket chairs in the long atrium. at six o'clock a compassionate waiter who knew the name of mrs. warren gave her daughter some coffee and milk and a _brioche_. at seven she managed to get her luggage taken to one of the trams at the corner of the boulevard du jardin botanique. the train service to tervueren was suspended--and at the porte de namur she would be transferred to the no. tram which would take her out to tervueren. even at an early hour brussels seemed crowded and as the tram passed along the handsome boulevards the shops were being opened and tourists were on their way to waterloo in brakes. every one seemed to think in mid-august, , that germany was destined to receive her _coup-de-grâce_ on the field of waterloo. it would be so appropriate. and no one--at any rate of those who spoke their thoughts aloud--seemed to consider that brussels was menaced. leaving her luggage at the tram terminus, vivie sped on foot through forest roads, where the dew still glistened, to the villa beau-séjour. mrs. warren was not yet dressed, but was rapturous in her greeting. her chauffeur had been called up, so the auto could not go out, but a farm cart would be sent for the luggage. "i believe, mother, i'm going to enjoy myself enormously," said vivie as she sat in the verandah in the morning sunshine, making a delicious _petit déjeuner_ out of fresh rolls, the butter of the farm, a few slices of sausage, and a big cup of frothing chocolate topped with whipped cream. the scene that spread before her was idyllic, from a bucolic point of view. the beech woods of tervueren shut out any horizon of town activity; black and white cows were being driven out to pasture, a flock of geese with necks raised vertically waggled sedately along their own chosen path, a little disturbed and querulous over the arrival of a stranger; turkey hens and their half-grown poults and a swelling, strutting turkey cock, a peacock that had already lost nearly all his tail and therefore declined combat with the turkey and was, moreover, an isolated bachelor; guinea-fowls scratching and running about alternately; and plump cocks and hens of mixed breed covered most of the ground in the adjacent farm yard and the turf of an apple orchard, where the fruit was already reddening under the august sun. pigeons circled against the sky with the distinct musical notes struck out by their wings, or cooed and cooed round the dove cots. the dairy women of the farm laughed and sang and called out to one another in flemish and wallon rough chaff about their men-folk who were called to the colours. there was nothing suggestive here of any coming tragedy. this was the morning of the th of august. for three more days vivie lived deliriously, isolated from the world. she took new books to the shade of the forest, and a rug on which she could repose, and read there with avidity, read also all the newspapers her mother had brought over from england, tried to master the events which had so rapidly and irresistibly plunged europe into war. were the germans to blame, she asked herself? of course they were, technically, in invading belgium and in forcing this war on france. but were they not being surrounded by a hostile alliance? was not this hostility on the part of servia towards austria stimulated by russia in order to forestal the central powers by a russian occupation of constantinople? why should the russian empire be allowed to stretch for nine millions of square miles over half asia, much of persia, and now claim to control the balkan peninsula and asia minor? if england might claim a large section of persia as her sphere of influence, and egypt likewise and a fourth part of africa, much of arabia, and cyprus in the mediterranean, why might not germany and austria expect to have their little spheres of influence in the balkans, in asia minor, in mesopotamia? we had helped france to morocco and italy to tripoli; why should we bother about servia? it might be unkind, but then were we not unkind towards her father's country, ireland? were we very tender towards national independence in egypt, in persia? yet this brutal invasion of france, this unprovoked attack on liège were ugly things. france had shown no disposition to egg servia on against austria, and sir edward grey in the last days of june--she now learnt for the first time, for she had seen no newspapers in prison, where it is part of the dehumanizing policy of the home office to prevent their entry, or the dissemination of any information about current events--sir edward grey had clearly shown great britain did not approve of servian intrigues in bosnia. well: let the best man win. germany was just as likely to give the vote to her women as was britain. the germans were first in music and in science. she for her part didn't wish to become a german subject, but once the war was over she would willingly naturalize herself belgian or swiss. and the war must soon be over. europe as a whole could not allow this devastation of resources. america would intervene. already the germans realized their gigantic blunder in starting the attack. their men were said to be--she read--much less brave than people had expected. the mighty german armies had been held up for ten days by a puny belgian force and the forts of liège and namur. there would presently be an armistice and germany would have to make peace with perhaps the cession to france of metz as a _solatium_, while germany was given a little bit more of africa, and austria got nothing.... meantime the villa beau-séjour seemed after holloway prison a paradise upon earth. why quarrel with her fate? why not drop politics and take up philosophy? she felt herself capable of writing a universal history which would be far truer if more cynical than any previous attempt to show civilized man the route he had followed and the martyrdom he had undergone. on the th of august she took the tram into brussels. it seemed however as if it would never get there, and when she reached the porte de namur she was too impatient to wait for the connection. she could not find any gendarme, but at a superior-looking flower-shop she obtained the address of the british legation. she asked at the lodge for mr. hawk; but there was only a belgian coachman in charge, and he told her the minister and his staff had followed the court to antwerp. mr. hawk had only left that morning. "what a nuisance," said vivie to herself. "i might have found out from him whether there is any truth in the rumours that are flying about tervueren." these rumours were to the effect that the germans had captured all the forts of liège and their brave defender, general léman; that they were in namur and were advancing on louvain. "i wonder what we had better do?" pondered vivie. in her bewilderment she took the bold step of calling at the hotel de ville, gave her name and nationality, and asked the advice of the municipal employé who saw her as to what course she and her mother had better pursue: leave tervueren and seek a lodging in brussels; or retreat as far as ghent or bruges or even holland? the clerk reassured her. the germans had certainly occupied the south-east of belgium, but dared not push as far to the west and north as brussels. they risked otherwise being nipped between the belgian army of antwerp and the british force marching on mons.... he directed her attention to the last _communiqué_ of the ministry of war: "la situation n'a jamais été meilleure. bruxelles, à l'abri d'un coup de main, est défendue par vingt mille gardes civiques armés d'un excellent fusil," etc. vivie returned therefore a trifle reassured. at the same time she and her mother spent some hours in packing up and posting valuable securities to london, via ostende, in packing for deposit in the strong rooms of a brussels bank mrs. warren's jewellery and plate. the tram service from tervueren had ceased to run. so they induced a neighbour to drive them into brussels in a chaise: a slow and wearisome journey under a broiling sun. arrived in brussels they found the town in consternation. placarded on the walls was a notice signed by the burgomaster--the celebrated adolphe max--informing the bruxellois that in spite of the resistances of the belgian army it was to be feared the enemy might soon be in occupation of brussels. in such an event he adjured the citizens to avoid all panic, to give no legitimate cause of offence to the germans, to renounce any idea of resorting to arms! the germans on their part were bound by the laws of war to respect private property, the lives of non-combatants, the honour of women, and the exercise of religion. vivie and her mother found the banks closed and likewise the railway station. they now had but one thought: to get back as quickly as possible to villa beau-séjour, and fortunately for their dry-mouthed impatience their farmer friend was of the same mind. along the tervueren road they met numbers of peasant refugees in carts and on foot, driving cattle, geese or pigs towards the capital; urging on the tugging dogs with small carts and barrows loaded with personal effects, trade-goods, farm produce, or crying children. all of them had a distraught, haggard appearance and were constantly looking behind them. from the east, indeed, came the distant sounds of explosions and intermittent rifle firing. mrs. warren was blanched with fear, her cheeks a dull peach colour. she questioned the people in french and flemish, but they only answered vaguely in raucous voices: "les allemands!" "de duitscher." one old woman, however, had flung herself down by the roadside, while her patient dog lay between the shafts of the little cart till she should be pleased to go on. she was more communicative and told mrs. warren a tale too horrible to be believed, about husband, son, son-in-law all killed, daughter violated and killed too, cottage in flames, livestock driven off. recovering from her exhaustion she rose and shook herself. "i've no business to be here. i should be with _them_. i was just packing this cart for the market when it happened. why did i go away? oh for shame! i'll go back--to _them_..." and forthwith she turned the dog round and trudged the same way they were going. at last they came opposite the courtyard of the villa and saw the lawn and gravel sweep full of helmeted soldiers in green-grey uniform, their bodies hung with equipment--bags, great-coats, rolled-up blankets, trench spades, cartridge bandoliers. vivie jumped down quickly, said to her mother in a low firm voice: "leave everything to me. say as little as possible." then to the farmer: "nous vous remercions infiniment. vous aurez mille choses à faire chez vous, je n'en doute. nous réglerons notre compte tout-à l'heure.... pour le moment, adieu." she clutched the handbags of valuables, slung them somehow on her left arm, while with her other she piloted the nearly swooning mrs. warren into the court. they were at once stopped by a non-commissioned officer who asked them in abrupt, scarcely understandable german what they wanted. vivie guessing his meaning said in english--she scarcely knew any german: "this is our house. we have been absent in brussels. we want to see the officer in command." the soldier knew no english, but likewise guessed at their meaning. he ordered them to wait where they were. presently he came out of the villa and said the herr oberst would see them. vivie led her mother into the gay little hall--how pleasant and cool it had looked in the early morning! it was now full of surly-looking soldiers. without hesitating she took a chair from one soldier and placed her mother in it. "you rest there a moment, dearest, while i go in and see the officer in command." the corporal she had first spoken with beckoned her into the pretty sitting-room at the back where they had had their early breakfast that morning. here she saw seated at a table consulting plans of brussels and other papers a tall, handsome man of early middle age, who might indeed have passed for a young man, had he not looked very tired and care-worn and exhibited a bald patch at the back of his head, rendered the more apparent because the brown-gold curls round it were dank with perspiration. he rose to his feet, clicked his heels together and saluted. "an english young lady, i am told, rather ... a ... surprise ... on ... the ... outskirts ... of brussels..." (his english was excellent, if rather staccato and spaced.) "it ... is ... not ... usual ... for ... englishwomen ... to ... be owners ... of chateaux ... in belgium. but i ... hear ... it ... is ... your mother ... who is the owner ... from long time, and you are her daughter newly arrived from england? nicht wahr? sie verstehen nicht deutsch, gnädiges fraulein?" "no," said vivie, "i don't speak much german, and fortunately you speak such perfect english that it is not necessary." "i have stayed some time in england," was the reply; "i was once military attaché in london. both your voice and your face seem--what should one say? familiar to me. are you of london?" "yes, i suppose i may say i am a londoner, though i believe i was born in brussels. but i don't want to beat about the bush: there is so much to be said and explained, and all this time i am very anxious about my mother. she is in the hall outside--feels a little faint i think with shock--might she--might i?"-- "but my dear miss--?" "miss warren--" "my dear miss warren, of course. we are enemies--pour le moment--but we germans are not monsters. ("what about those peasants' stories?" said vivie to herself.) your lady mother must come in here and take that fauteuil. then we can talk better at our ease." vivie got up and brought her mother in. "now you shall tell me everything--is it not so? better to be quite frank. À la guerre comme à la guerre. first, you are english?" "yes. my mother is mrs. warren, i am her daughter, vivien warren. my mother has lived many years in belgium, though also in other places, in germany, austria and france. of late, however, she has lived entirely here. this place belongs to her." "and you?" "i? i have just been released from prison in london, holloway prison..." "my dear young lady! you are surely joking--what do you say? you pull my leg? but no; i see! you have been suffragette. aha! _i_ understand you are _the_ miss warren, the miss warren who make the english government afraid, nicht wahr? you set fire to houses of parliament..." _vivie_ (interrupting): "no, no! only to some racing stables..." _oberst_: "i understand. but you are rebel?" _vivie_: "i hate the present british government--the most hypocritical, the most..." _oberst_: "but we are in agreement, you and i! this is splendid. but now we must be praktisch. we are at war, though we hope here for a peaceful occupation of belgium. you will see how the flämisch--ah, you say the fleming?--the flemish part of belgium will receive us with such pleasure. it is only with the wälsch, the wallon part we disagree.... but there is so much for me to do--we must talk of all these things some other time. let us begin our business. i must first introduce myself. i am oberst gottlieb von giesselin of the saxon army. (he rose, clicked heels, bowed, and sat down.) i see you have three heavy bags you look at often. what is it?" _vivie_ (taking courage): "it is my mother's jewellery and some plate. she fears--" _von g._: "i understand! we have a dr-r-eadful reputation, we poor germans! the french stuff you up with lies. but we are better than you think. you shall take them in two--three days to brussels when things are quiet, and put them in some bank. here i fear i must stay. i must intrude myself on your hospitality. but better for you perhaps if i stay here at present. i will put a few of my men in your--your--buildings. most of them shall go with their officers to tervueren for billet." (turning to mrs. warren.) "madam, you must cheer up. i foresee your daughter and i will be great friends. let us now look through the rooms and see what disposition we can make. i think i will have to take this room for my writing, for my work. i see you have telephone here. _gut_!" leaving mrs. warren still seated, but a little less stertorous in breathing, a little reassured, vivie and oberst von giesselin then went over the villa, apportioning the rooms. the colonel and his orderly would be lodged in two of the bedrooms. vivie and her mother would share mrs. warren's large bedroom and retain the salon for their exclusive occupation. they would use the dining-room in common with their guest. vivie looking out of the windows occasionally, as they passed from room to room, saw the remainder of the soldiery strolling off to be lodged at their nearest neighbour's, the farmer who had driven them in to brussels that morning. there were perhaps thirty, accompanying a young lieutenant. how would he find room for them, poor man? they were more fortunate in being asked only to lodge six or seven in addition to the colonel's orderly and soldier-clerk. before sunset, the villa beau-séjour was clear of soldiers, except the few that had gone to the barn and the outhouses. the morning room had been fitted up with a typewriter at which the military clerk sat tapping. the colonel's personal luggage had been placed in his bedroom. a soldier was even sweeping up all traces of the invasion of armed men and making everything tidy. it all seemed like a horrid dream that was going to end up happily after all. presently vivie would wake up completely and there would even be no oberst, no orderly; only the peaceful life of the farm that was going on yesterday. here a sound of angry voices interrupted her musings. the cows returning by themselves from the pasture were being intercepted by soldiers who were trying to secure them. vivie in her indignation ran out and ordered the soldiers off, in english. to her surprise they obeyed silently, but as they sauntered away to their quarters she was saddened at seeing them carrying the bodies of most of the turkeys and fowls and even the corpse of the poor tailless peacock. they had waited for sundown to rob the hen-roosts. very much disillusioned she ran to the morning room and burst in on the colonel's dictation to his clerk. "excuse me, but if you don't keep your soldiers in better order you will have very little to eat whilst you are here. they are killing and carrying off all our poultry." the colonel flushed a little at the peremptory way in which she spoke, but without replying went out and shouted a lot of orders in german. his orderly summoned soldiers from the barn and together they drove the cows into the cow-sheds. all the flemish servants having disappeared in a panic, the germans had to milk the cows that evening; and vivie, assisted by the orderly, cooked the evening meal in the kitchen. he was, like his colonel, a saxon, a pleasant-featured, domesticated man, who explained civilly in the thuringian dialect--though to vivie there could be no discrimination between varieties of high german--that the sachsen folk were "eines gütes leute" and that all would go smoothly in time. nevertheless the next morning when she could take stock she found nearly all the poultry except the pigeons had disappeared; and most of the apples, ripe and unripe, had vanished from the orchard trees. the female servants of the farm, however, came back; and finding no violence was offered took up their work again. two days afterwards, von giesselin sent vivie into brussels in his motor, with his orderly to escort her, so that she might deposit her valuables at a bank. she found brussels, suburbs and city alike, swarming with grey-uniformed soldiers, most of whom looked tired and despondent. those who were on the march, thinking vivie must be the wife of some german officer of high rank, struck up a dismal chant from dry throats with a refrain of "gloria, viktoria, hoch! deutschland, hoch!" at the bank the belgian officials received her with deference. apart from being the daughter of the well-to-do mrs. warren, she was english, and seemed to impose respect even on the germans. they took over her valuables, made out a receipt, and cashed a fairly large cheque in ready money. vivie then ventured to ask the bank clerk who had seen to her business if he had any news. looking cautiously round, he said the rumours going through the town were that the queen of holland, enraged that her prince consort should have facilitated the crossing of limburg by german armies, had shot him dead with a revolver; that the crown prince of germany, despairing of a successful end of the war, had committed suicide at his father's feet; that the american consul general in brussels--to whom, by the bye, vivie ought to report herself and her mother, in order to come under his protection--had notified general sixt von arnim, commanding the army in brussels, that, _unless he vacated the belgian capital immediately_, england would bombard hamburg and the united states would declare war on the kaiser. alluring stories like these flitted through despairing brussels during the first two months of german occupation, though vivie, in her solitude at tervueren, seldom heard them. after her business at the bank she walked about the town. no one took any notice of her or annoyed her in any way. the restaurants seemed crowded with belgians as well as germans, and the belgians did not seem to have lost their appetites. the palace hotel had become a german officers' club. on all the public buildings the german imperial flag hung alongside the belgian. only a few of the trams were running. yet you could still buy, without much difficulty at the kiosques, belgian and even french and british newspapers. from these she gathered that the german forces were in imminent peril between the belgian antwerp army on the north and the british army advancing from the south; and that in the plains of alsace the french had given the first public exhibition of the new "turpin" explosive. the results had been _foudroyant_ ... and simple. complete regiments of german soldiers had been destroyed in _one minute_. it seemed curious, she thought, that with such an arm as this the french command did not at once come irresistibly to the rescue of brussels.... however, it was four o'clock, and there was her friend the enemy's automobile drawn up outside the bank, awaiting her. she got in, and the soldier chauffeur whirled her away to the villa beau-séjour, beyond tervueren. on her return she found her mother prostrate with bad news. their nearest neighbour, farmer oudekens who had driven them into brussels the preceding day had been executed in his own orchard only an hour ago. it seemed that the lieutenant in charge of the soldiers billeted there had disappeared in the night, leaving his uniform and watch and chain behind him. the farmer's story was that in the night the lieutenant had appeared in his room with a revolver and had threatened to shoot him unless he produced a suit of civilian clothes. thus coerced he had given him his eldest son's sunday clothes left behind when the said son went off to join the belgian army. the lieutenant, grateful for the assistance, had given him as a present his watch and chain. on the other hand the german non-commissioned officers insisted their lieutenant had been made away with in the night. the farmer's allegation that he had deserted (as in fact he had) only enhanced his crime. the finding of the court after a very summary trial was "guilty," and despite the frantic appeals of the wife, reinforced later on by mrs. warren, the farmer had been taken out and shot. the evening meal consequently was one of strained relations. colonel von giesselin came to supper punctually and was very spruce in appearance. but he was gravely polite and uncommunicative. and after dessert the two ladies asked permission to retire. they lay long awake afterwards, debating in whispers what terror might be in store for them. mrs. warren cried a good deal and lamented futilely her indolent languor of a few days previously. _why_ had she not, while there was yet time, cleared out of brussels, gone to holland, and thence regained england with vivie, and from england the south of france? vivie, more stoical, pointed out it was no use crying over lost opportunities. here they were, and they must sharpen their wits to get away at the first opportunity. perhaps the american consul might help them? the next morning, however, their guest, who had insensibly turned host, told vivie the tram service to brussels, like the train service, was suspended indefinitely, and that he feared they must resign themselves to staying where they were. under his protection they had nothing to fear. he was sorry the soldiers had helped themselves so freely to the livestock; but everything had now settled down. henceforth they would be sure of something to eat, as he himself had got to be fed. and all he asked of them was their agreeable society. two months went by of this strange life. two months, in which vivie only saw german newspapers--which she read with the aid of von giesselin. their contents filled her with despair. they made very little of the marne rebuff, much of the capture of antwerp and ostende, and the occupation of all belgium (as they put it). vivie noted that the german emperor's heart had bled for the punishment inflicted on louvain. (she wondered how that strange personality, her father, had fared in the destruction of monastic buildings.) but she had then no true idea of what had taken place, and the far-reaching harm this crime had done to the german reputation. she noted that the german press expressed disappointment that the cause of germany, the crusade against albion, had received no support from the irish nationalists, or from the "revolting" women, the suffragettes, who had been so cruelly maltreated by the administration of asquith and sir grey. this point was discussed by the colonel, but vivie found herself speaking as a patriot. how _could_ the germans expect british women to turn against their own country in its hour of danger? "then you would not," said von giesselin, "consent to write some letters to your friends, if i said i could have them sent safely to their destination?--only letters," he added hastily, seeing her nostrils quiver and a look come into her eyes--"to ask your suffrage friends to bring pressure to bear on their government to bring this d-r-r-eadful war to a just peace. that is all we ask." but vivie said "with all her own private grudge against the present ministry she felt _au fond_ she was _british_; she must range herself in time of war with her own people." mrs. warren went much farther. she was not very voluble nowadays. the german occupation of her villa had given her a mental and physical shock from which she never recovered. she often sat quite silent and rather huddled at meal times and looked the old woman now. in such a conversation as this she roused herself and her voice took an aggressive tone. "my daughter write to her friends to ask them to obstruct the government at such a time as this? _never!_ i'd disown her if she did, i'd repudiate her! she may have had her own turn-up with 'em. i was quite with her there. but that, so to speak, was only a domestic quarrel. we're british all through, and don't you forget it--sir--(she added deprecatingly): british _all through_ and we're goin' to beat germany yet, _you'll_ see. the british navy never _has_ been licked nor won't be, this time." colonel von giesselin did not insist. he seemed depressed himself at times, and far from elated at the victories announced in his own newspapers. he would in the dreary autumn evenings show them the photographs of his wife--a sweet-looking woman--and his two solid-looking, handsome children, and talk with rapture of his home life. why, indeed, was there this war! his heart like his emperor's bled for these unhappy belgians. but it was all due to the macchiavellian policy of "sir grey and asquiss." if germany had not felt herself surrounded and barred from all future expansion of trade and influence she would not have felt forced to attack france and invade belgium. why, see! all the time they were talking, barbarous russia, egged on by england, was ravaging east prussia! then, in other moods, he would lament the war and the policy of prussia. how he had loved england in the days when he was military attaché there. he had once wanted to marry an englishwoman, a miss fraser, a so handsome daughter of a court physician. "why, that must have been honoria, my former partner," said vivie, finding an intense joy in this link of memory. and she told much of her history to the sentimental colonel, who was conceiving for her a sincere friendship and camaraderie. they opened up other veins of memory, talked of lady feenix, of the musical parties at the parrys, of emily daymond's playing, of this, that and the other hostess, of such-and-such an actress or singer. the colonel of course was often absent all day on military duties. he advised vivie strongly on such occasions not to go far from mrs. warren's little domain. "i am obliged to remind you, dear young lady, that you and your mother are my prisoners in a sense. many bad things are going on--things we cannot help in war--outside this quiet place..." in november, however, there was a change of scene, which in many ways came to vivie and her mother with a sense of great relief. colonel von giesselin told them one morning he had been appointed secretary to the german governor of brussels, and must reside in the town not far from the rue de la loi. he proposed that the ladies should move into brussels likewise; in fact he delicately insisted on it. their pleasant relations could thus continue--perhaps--who knows?--to the end of this war, "to that peace which will make us friends once more?" it would in any case be most unsafe if, without his protection, they continued to reside at this secluded farm, on the edge of the great woods. in fact it could not be thought of, and another officer was coming here in his place with a considerable suite. eventually compensation would be paid to mrs. warren for any damage done to her property. the two women readily agreed. in the curtailment of their movements and the absence of normal means of communication their life at villa beau-séjour was belying its name. their supply of money was coming to an end; attempts must be made to regularize that position by drawing on mrs. warren's german investments and the capital she still had in belgian stock--if that were negotiable at all. where should they go? mrs. warren still had some lien on the hotel Édouard-sept (the name, out of deference to the germans, had been changed to hotel impérial). with the influence of the government secretary behind her she might turn out some of its occupants and regain the use of the old "appartement." this would accommodate vivie too. and there was no reason why their friend should not place his own lodging and office at the same hotel, which was situated conveniently on the rue royale not far from the governor's residence in the rue de la loi. so this plan was carried out. and in december, , mrs. warren had some brief flicker of happiness once more, and even vivie felt the nightmare had lifted a little. it was life again. residence at the villa beau-séjour had almost seemed an entombment of the living. here, in the heart of brussels, at any rate, you got some news every day, even if much of it was false. the food supply was more certain, there were , people all about you. true, the streets were very badly lit at night and fuel was scarce and dear. but you were in contact with people. in january, vivie tried to get into touch with the american legation, not only to send news of their condition to england but to ascertain whether permission might not be obtained for them to leave belgium for holland. but this last plea was said by the american representative to be unsustainable. for various reasons, the german government would not permit it, and he was afraid neither vivie nor her mother would get enough backing from the british authorities to strengthen the american demand. she must stop on in brussels till the war came to an end. "but how are we to live?" asked vivie, with a catch in her throat. "our supply of belgian money is coming to an end. my mother has considerable funds invested in england. these she can't touch. she has other sums in german securities, but soon after the war they stopped sending her the interest on the plea that she was an 'enemy.' as to the money we have in belgium, the bank in brussels can tell me nothing. what are we to do?" the rather cold-mannered american diplomatist--it was one of the secretaries of legation and he knew all about mrs. warren's past, and regarded vivie as an outlaw--said he would try to communicate with her friends in england and see if through the american relief organization, funds could be transmitted for their maintenance. she gave him the addresses of rossiter, praed, and her mother's london bankers. vivie now tried to settle down to a life of usefulness. to increase their resources she gave lessons in english to belgians and even to german officers. she offered herself to various groups of belgian ladies who had taken up such charities as the germans permitted. she also asked to be taken on as a red cross helper. but in all these directions she had many snubs to meet and little encouragement. scandal had been busy with her name--the unhappy reputation of her mother, the peculiar circumstances under which she had left england, the two or three months shut up at tervueren with colonel von giesselin, and the very protection he now accorded her and her mother at the hotel impérial. she felt herself looked upon almost as a pariah, except among the poor of brussels in the quartier des marolles. here she was only regarded as a kind englishwoman, unwearied in her efforts to alleviate suffering, mental and bodily. and meantime, silence, a wall of silence as regarded england--england which she was beginning to look upon as the paradise from which she had been chased. not a word had come through from rossiter, from honoria, bertie adams, or any of her suffrage friends. i can supply briefly what she did not know. rossiter at the very outbreak of war had offered his services as one deeply versed in anatomy and in physiology to the army medical service, and especially to a great person at the war office; but had been told quite cavalierly that they had no need of him. as he persisted, he had been asked--in the hope that it might get rid of him--to go over to the united states in company with a writer of comic stories, a retired actor and a music-hall singer, and lecture on the causes of the war in the hope of bringing america in. this he had declined to do, and being rich and happening to know personally general armstrong (honoria's husband) he had been allowed to accompany him to the vicinity of the front and there put his theories of grafting flesh and bone to the test; with the ultimate results that his work became of enormous beneficial importance and he was given rank in the r.a.m.c. honoria, racked with anxiety about her dear "army," and very sad as to vivie's disappearance, slaved at war work as much as her children's demands on her permitted; or even put her children on one side to help the sick and wounded. vivie's suffrage friends forgot she had ever existed and turned their attention to propaganda, to recruiting for the voluntary army which our ministers still hoped might suffice to win the war, to the making of munitions, or aeroplane parts, to land work and to any other work which might help their country in its need. and bertie adams? when he realized that his beloved and revered miss warren was shut off from escape in belgium, could not be heard of, could not be got at and rescued, he went nearly off his nut.... he reviewed during a succession of sleepless nights what course he might best pursue. his age was about thirty-two. he might of course enlist in the army. but though very patriotic, his allegiance lay first at the feet of vivie warren. if he entered the army, he might be sent anywhere but to the belgian frontier; and even if he got near belgium he could not dart off to rescue vivie without becoming a deserter. so he came speedily to the conclusion that the most promising career he could adopt, having regard to his position in life and lack of resources, was to volunteer for foreign service under the y.m.c.a., and express the strongest possible wish to be employed as near belgium as was practicable. so that by the end of september, , bertie was serving out cocoa and biscuits, writing paper and cigarettes, hot coffee and sausages and cups of bovril to exhausted or resting soldiers in the huts of the y.m.c.a., near ypres. alternating with these services, he was, like other y.m.c.a. men in the same district and at the same time, acting as stretcher bearer to bring in the wounded, as amateur chaplain with the dying, as amateur surgeon with the wounded, as secretary to some distraught officer in high command whose clerks had all been killed; and in any other capacity if called upon. but always with the stedfast hope and purpose that he might somehow reach and rescue vivie warren. chapter xvii the germans in brussels: - in the early spring of , vivie, anxious not to see her mother in utter penury, and despairing of any effective assistance from the americans (very much prejudiced against her for the reasons already mentioned), took her mother's german and belgian securities of a face value amounting to about £ , and sold them at her belgian bank for a hundred thousand francs (£ , ) in belgian or german bank notes. she consulted no one, except her mother. who was there to consult? she did not like to confide too much to colonel von giesselin, a little too prone in any case to "protect" them. but as she argued with mrs. warren, what else were they to do in their cruel situation? if the allies were eventually victorious, mrs. warren could return to england. there at least she had in safe investments £ , , ample for the remainder of their lives. if germany lost the war, the german securities nominally worth two hundred thousand marks might become simply waste paper; even now they were only computed by the bank at a purchase value of about one fifth what they had stood at before the war. if germany were victorious or agreed to a compromise peace, her mother's shares in belgian companies might be unsaleable. better to secure now a lump sum of four thousand pounds in bank notes that would be legal currency, at any rate as long as the german occupation lasted. and as one never knew what might happen, it was safer still to have all this money (equivalent to a hundred thousand francs), in their own keeping. they could live even in war time, on such a sum as this for four, perhaps five years, as they would be very economical and vivie would try to earn all she could by teaching. it was useless to hope they would be able to return to villa beau-séjour so long as the german occupation lasted, or during that time receive a penny in compensation for the sequestration of the property. the notes for the hundred thousand francs therefore were carefully concealed in mrs. warren's bedroom at the hotel impérial and vivie for a few months afterwards felt slightly easier in her mind as to the immediate future; for, as a further resource, there were also the jewels and plate at the bank. they dared hope for nothing from villa beau-séjour. von giesselin, after more entreaty than vivie cared to make, had allowed them with a special pass and his orderly as escort to go in a military motor to the villa in the month of april in order that they might bring away the rest of their clothes and personal effects of an easily transportable nature. but the visit was a heart-breaking disappointment. their reception was surly; the place was little else than a barrack of disorderly soldiers and insolent officers. any search for clothes or books was a mockery. nothing was to be found in the chests of drawers that belonged to them; only stale food and unnameable horrors or military equipment articles. the garden was trampled out of recognition. there had been a beautiful vine in the greenhouse. it was still there, but the first foliage of spring hung withered and russet coloured. the soldiers, grinning when vivie noticed this, pointed to the base of the far spreading branches. it had been sawn through, and much of the glass of the greenhouse deliberately smashed. on their way back, mrs. warren, who was constantly in tears, descried waiting by the side of the road the widow of their farmer-neighbour, madame oudekens. she asked the orderly that they might stop and greet her. she approached. mrs. warren got out of the car so that she might more privately talk to her in flemish. since her husband's execution, the woman said, she had had to become the mistress of the sergeant-major who resided with her as the only means, seemingly, of saving her one remaining young son from exile in germany and her daughters from unbearably brutal treatment; though she added, "as to their virtue, _that_ has long since vanished; all i ask is that they be not half-killed whenever the soldiers get drunk. oh madame! if you could only say a word to that colonel with whom you are living?" mrs. warren dared not translate this last sentence to vivie, for fear her daughter forced her at all costs to leave the hotel impérial. where, if she did, were they to go? the winter of had witnessed an appalling degree of frightfulness in eastern belgium, the wallon or french-speaking part of the country more especially. the germans seemed to bear a special grudge against this region, regarding it as doggedly opposed to absorption into a greater germany; whereas they hoped the flemish half of the country would receive them as fellow teutons and even as deliverers from their former french oppressors. thousands of old men and youths, of women and children in the provinces south of the meuse had been shot in cold blood; village after village had been burnt. scenes of nearly equal horror had taken place between brussels and antwerp, especially around malines. von bissing's arrival as governor general was soon signalized by those dreaded red placards on the walls of brussels, announcing the verdicts of courts-martial, the condemnation to death of men and women who had contravened some military regulation. yet in spite of this, life went on in brussels once more--by von bissing's stern command--as though the country were not under the heel of the invader. the theatres opened their doors; the cinemas had continuous performances; there was grand opera; there were exhibitions of toys, or pictures, and charitable bazaars. ten days after the fall of antwerp _char-à-bancs_ packed with belgians drove out of brussels to visit the scenes of the battles and those shattered forts, so fatuously deemed impregnable, so feeble in their resistance to german artillery. vivie, even had she wished to do so, could not have joined the sight-seers. as the subjects of an enemy power she and her mother had had early in january to register themselves at the kommandantur and were there warned that without a special passport they might not pass beyond the limits of brussels and its suburbs. except in the matter of the farewell visit to the farm at tervueren, vivie was reluctant to ask for any such favour from von giesselin, though she was curious to see the condition of louvain and to ascertain whether her father still inhabited the monastic house of his order--she had an idea that he was away in germany in connection with his schemes for raising the irish against the british government. von giesselin however was becoming sentimentally inclined towards her and she saw no more of him than was necessary to maintain polite relations. frau von giesselin, for various reasons of health or children, could not join him at brussels as so many german wives had done with other of the high functionaries (to the great embitterment of brussels society); and there were times when von giesselin's protestations of his loneliness alarmed her. the king of saxony had paid a visit to brussels in the late autumn of and had invited this colonel of his army to a fastuous banquet given at the palace hotel. the king--whom the still defiant brussels press, especially that unkillable _la libre belgique_, reminded ironically of his domestic infelicity, by enquiring whether he had brought signor toselli to conduct his orchestra--was gratified that a subject of his should be performing the important duties of secretary to the brussels government, and his notice of von giesselin gave the latter considerable prestige, for a time; an influence which he certainly exercised as far as he was able in softening the edicts and the intolerable desire to annoy and exasperate on the part of the prussian governors of province and kingdom. he even interceded at times for unfortunate british or french subjects, stranded in brussels, and sometimes asked vivie about fellow-countrymen who sought this intervention. this caused her complicated annoyances. seeing there was some hope in interesting her in their cases, these english governesses, tutors, clerks, tailors' assistants and cutters, music-hall singers, grooms appealed to vivie to support their petitions. they paid her or her mother a kind of base court, on the tacit assumption that she--vivie--had placed colonel von giesselin under special obligations. if in rare instances, out of sheer pity, she took up a case and von giesselin granted the petition or had it done in a higher quarter, his action was clearly a personal favour to her; and the very petitioners went away, with the ingratitude common in such cases, and spread the news of vivie's privileged position at the hotel impérial. it was not surprising therefore that in the small circles of influential british or american people in brussels she was viewed with suspicion or contempt. she supported this odious position at the hotel impérial as long as possible, in the hope that colonel von giesselin when he had realized the impossibility of using herself or her mother in any kind of intrigue against the british government would do what the american consul general professed himself unable or unwilling to do: obtain for them passports to proceed to holland. von giesselin, from december, , took up among other duties that of press censor and officer in charge of publicity. after the occupation of brussels and the fall of antwerp, the "patriotic" belgian press had withdrawn itself to france and england or had stopped publication. its newspapers had been invited to continue their functions as organs of news-distribution and public opinion, but of course under the german censorate and martial law. as one editor said to a polite german official: "if i were to continue the publication of my paper under such conditions, my staff and i would all be shot in a week." but the large towns of belgium could not be left without a press. public opinion must be guided, and might very well be guided in a direction favourable to german policy. the german government had already introduced the german hour into belgian time, the german coinage, the german police system, and german music; but it had no intention, seemingly, of forcing the german speech on the old dominions of the house of burgundy. on the contrary, in their tenure of belgium or of north-east france, the germans seemed desirous of showing how well they wrote the french language, how ready they were under a german regime to give it a new literature. whether or not they enlisted a few recreants, or made use of alsatians or lorrainers to help them, it is never-the-less remarkable how free as a rule their written and printed french was from mistakes or german idioms; though their spoken french always remained alsatian. it suffered from that extraordinary misplacement and exchange in the upper and lower consonants which has distinguished the german people--that nation of great philologists--since the death of the roman empire. german officers still said "barton, die fous brie," instead of "pardon, je vous prie" (if they were polite), but they were quite able to contribute _articles de fond_ to a pretended national belgian press. besides there was a sufficiency of belgian "sans-patries" ready to come to their assistance: belgian nationals of german-jewish or dutch-jewish descent, who in the present generation had become catholic christians as it ranged them with the best people. they were worthy and wealthy belgian citizens, but presumably would not have deeply regretted a change in the political destinies of belgium, provided international finance was not adversely affected. there were also a few belgian socialists--a few, but enough--who took posts under the german provisional government, on the plea that until you could be purely socialistic it did not matter under what flag you drew your salary. von giesselin was most benevolently intentioned, in reality a kind-hearted man, a sentimentalist. not quite prepared to go to the stake himself in place of any other victim of prussian cruelty, but ready to make some effort to soften hardships and reduce sentences. (there were others like him--saxon, thuringian, hanoverian, württembergisch--or the german occupation of belgium might have ended in a vast sicilian vespers, a boiling-over of a maddened people reckless at last of whether they died or not, so long as they slew their oppressors.) he hoped through the pieces played at the theatres and through his censored, subsidized press to bring the belgians round to a reasonable frame of mind, to a toleration of existence under the german empire. but his efforts brought down on him the unsparing ridicule of the parisian-minded bruxellois. they were prompt to detect his attempts to modify the text of french operettas so that these, while delighting the lovers of light music, need not at the same time excite a military spirit or convey the least allusion of an impertinent or contemptuous kind towards the central powers. thus the couplets "dans le service de l'autriche le militaire n'est pas riche" were changed to "dans le service de la suisse le militaire n'est pas riche." these passionate lines of a political exile: "a l'étranger un pacte impie vendait mon sang, liait ma foi, mais à present, o ma patrie je pourrai done mourir pour toi!" were rendered harmless as "a l'étranger, en réverie chaque jour je pleurais sur toi mais à present, o ma patrie je penserai sans cesse à toi!" the pleasure he took in recasting this doggerel--calling in vivie to help him as presumably a good scholar in french--got on her nerves, and she was hard put to it to keep her temper. sometimes he proposed that she should take a hand, even become a salaried subordinate; compose articles for his subsidized paper, "_l'ami de l'ordre_" (nicknamed "l'ami de l'ordure" by the belgians), "_la belgique_," "_le bruxellois_," "_vers la paix_." he would allow her a very free hand, so long as she did not attack the germans or their allies or put in any false news about military or naval successes of the foes of central europe. she might, for instance, dilate on the cruel manner in which the woman suffragists had been persecuted in england; give a description of forcible feeding or of police ferocity on black friday. vivie declined any such propositions. "i have told you already, and often," she said, "i am deeply grateful for all you have done for my mother and me. we might have been in a far more uncomfortable position but for your kindness. but i cannot in any way associate myself with the german policy here. i cannot pretend for a moment to condone what you do in this country. if i were a belgian woman i should probably have been shot long ago for assassinating some prussian official--i can hardly see von bissing pass in his automobile, as it is, without wishing i had a bomb. but there it is. it is no business of mine. as i can't get away, as you won't let us go out of the country--switzerland, holland--and as i don't want to go mad by brooding, find something for me to do that will occupy my thoughts: and yet not implicate me with the germans. can't i go and help every day in your hospitals? if you'll continue your kindness to mother--and believe me"--she broke off--"i _do_ appreciate what you have done for us. i shall _never_ forget i have met _one true german gentleman_--if you'll continue to be as kind as before, you will simply give instructions that mother is in no way disturbed or annoyed. there are germans staying here who are odious beyond belief. if they meet my mother outside her room they ask her insulting questions--whether she can give them the addresses of--of--light women ... you know the sort of thing. i have always been outspoken with you. all i ask is that mother shall be allowed to stay in her own room while i am out, and have her meals served there. but the hotel people are beginning to make a fuss about the trouble, the lack of waiters. a word from you--and then if my mind was at ease about her i could go out and do some good with the poor people. they are getting very restive in the marolles quarter--the shocking bad bread, the lack of fuel--most of all i should like to help in the hospitals. my own countrywomen will not have me in theirs. they suspect me of being a spy in german pay. besides, your von bissing has ordered now that all belgian, british, and french wounded shall be taken to the german red cross. well: if you want to be kind, give me an introduction there. surely it would be bare humanity on your part to let an englishwoman be with some of those poor lads who are sorely wounded, dying perhaps"--she broke down--"the other day i followed two of the motor ambulances along the boulevard d'anspach. blood dripped from them as they passed, and i could hear some english boy trying to sing 'tipperary--'" "my _tear_ miss warren--i will try to do all that you want--you will not do _anything i_ want, but never mind. i will show you that germans can be generous. i will speak about your mother. i am sorry that there are bad-mannered germans in the hotel. there are some--what-you-call 'bounders'--among us, as there are with you. it is to be regretted. as to our red cross hospitals, i know of a person who can make things easy for you. i will write a letter to my cousin--like me she is a saxon and comes from leipzig--minna von stachelberg. she is but a few months widow, widow of a saxon officer, graf von stachelberg who was killed at namur. oh! it was very sad; they were but six months married. afterwards she came here to work in our red cross--i think now she is in charge of a ward..." so vivie found a few months' reprieve from acute sorrow and bitter humiliation. gräfin von stachelberg was as kind in her way as her cousin the colonel, but much less sentimental. in fact she was of that type of new german woman, taken all too little into account by our press at the time of the war. there were many like her of the upper middle class, the professorial class, the lesser nobility to be found not only in leipzig but in berlin, hamburg, frankfort, halle, bonn, münchen, hannover, bremen, jena, stuttgart, cologne--nice to look at, extremely modern in education and good manners, tasteful in dress, speaking english marvellously well, highly accomplished in music or with some other art, advocates of the enfranchisement of women. the war came just too soon. had heaven struck down that epilept emperor and a few of his ministers, had time been given for the new german woman to assert herself in politics, there would have been no invasion of belgium, no maltreatment of servia. germany would have ranged herself with the western powers and western culture. minna von stachelberg read her cousin's note and received the worn and anxious-looking vivie like a sister ... like a comrade, she said, in the war for the vote ... "which we will resume, my dear, as soon as this dreadful man's war is over, only we won't fight with the same weapons." but though kind, she was not gushing and she soon told vivie that in nursing she was a novice and had much to learn. she introduced her to the german and belgian surgeons, and then put her to a series of entirely menial tasks from which she was to work her way up by degrees. but if any english soldier were there and wanted sympathy, she should be called in to his ward ... from that interview vivie returned almost happy. in the hot summer months she would sometimes be allowed to accompany red cross surgeons and nurses to the station, when convoys of wounded were expected, if there was likelihood that british soldiers would be amongst them. these would cheer up at the sound of her pleasant voice speaking their tongue. yet she would witness on such occasions incongruous incidents of german brutality. once there came out of the train an english and a french soldier, great friends evidently. they were only slightly wounded and the english soldier stretched his limbs cautiously to relieve himself of cramp. at that moment a german soldier on leave came up and spat in his face. the frenchman felled the german with a resounding box on the ear. alarums! excursions! a german officer rushed up to enquire while the frenchman was struggling with two colossal german military policemen and the englishman was striving to free him. vivie explained to the officer what had occurred. he bowed and saluted: seized the soldier-spitter by the collar and kicked him so frightfully that vivie had to implore him to cease. moreover the red placards of von bissing were of increasing frequency. as a rule vivie only heard what other people said of them, and that wasn't very much, for german spies were everywhere, inviting you to follow them to the dreaded kommandantur in the rue de la loi--a scene of as much in the way of horror and mental anguish as the conciergerie of paris in the days of the red terror. but some cheek-blanching rumour she had heard on a certain monday in october caused her to look next day on her way home at a fresh red placard which had been posted up in a public place. the daylight had almost faded, but there was a gas lamp which made the notice legible. it ran: condamnations par jugement du octobre, , le tribunal de campagne a prononcé les condamnations suivantes pour trahison commise pendant l'état de guerre (pour avoir fait passer des recrues à l'ennemi): ° philippe baucq, architecte à bruxelles; ° louise thuliez, professeur à lille; ° edith cavell, directrice d'un institut médical à bruxelles; ° louis severin, pharmacien à bruxelles; ° comtesse jeanne de belleville, à montignies. À la peine de mort * * * * * vivie then went on to read with eyes that could hardly take in the words a list of other names of men and women condemned to long terms of hard labour for the same offence--assisting young belgians to leave the belgium that was under german occupation. and further, the information that of the five condemned to death, _philip bauck_ and _edith cavell_ had already been _executed_. * * * * * the monsters! oh that von bissing. how gladly she would die if she might first have the pleasure of killing him! that pompous old man of seventy-one with the blotched face, who had issued orders that wherever he passed in his magnificent motor he was to be saluted with eastern servility, who boasted of his "tender heart," so that he issued placards about this time punishing severely all who split the tongues of finches to make them sing better. edith cavell--she did not pause to consider the fate of patriotic belgian women--but edith cavell, directress of a nursing home in brussels, known far and wide for her goodness of heart. she had held aloof from vivie, but was that to be wondered at when there was so much to make her suspect--living, seemingly, under the protection of a german official? but the very german nurses and doctors at the red cross hospital had spoken of her having given free treatment in her home to germans who needed immediate operations, and for whom there was no room in the military hospitals--and for such a trivial offence as _that_--and to kill her before there could be any appeal for reconsideration or clemency. oh _what_ a nation! she would tend their sick and wounded no more. she hurried on up the ascent of the boulevard of the botanic garden on her way to the rue royale. she burst into von giesselin's office. he was not there. a clerk looking at her rather closely said that the herr oberst was packing, was going away. vivie scarcely took in the meaning of his german phrases. she waited there, her eyes ablaze, feeling she must tell her former friend and protector what she thought of his people before she renounced any further relations with him. presently he entered, his usually rather florid face pale with intense sorrow or worry, his manner preoccupied. she burst out: "_have_ you seen the red placard they have just put up?" "what about?" he said wearily. "the assassination by your government of edith cavell, a crime for which england--yes, and america--will _never_ forgive you.... from this moment i--" "but have you not heard what has happened to _me_? i am _dismissed_ from my post as secretary, i am ordered to rejoin my regiment in lorraine--it is very sad about your miss cavell. i knew nothing of it till this morning when i received my own dismissal--and _oh_ my dear miss, i fear we shall never meet again." "why are they sending you away?" asked vivie drily, compelled to interest herself in his affairs since they so closely affected her own and her mother's. "because of this," said von giesselin, nearly in tears, pulling from a small portfolio a press cutting. "do you remember a fortnight ago i told you some one, some belgian had written a beautiful poem and sent it to me for one of our newspapers? i showed it to you at the time and you said--you said 'it was well enough, but it did not seem to have much point.'" vivie did remember having glanced very perfunctorily at some effusion in typewriting which had seemed unobjectionable piffle. she hadn't cared two straws whether he accepted it or not, only did not want to be too markedly indifferent. now she took it up and still read it through uncomprehendingly, her thoughts absent with the fate of miss cavell. "well! what is all the fuss about? i still see nothing in it. it is just simply the ordinary sentimental flip-flap that a french versifier can turn out by the yard." "it is _far_ worse than that! it is a horrible--what the french call 'acrostiche,' a deadly insult to our people. and i never saw it, the editor never saw it, and you, even, never guessed its real meaning![ ] the original, as you say, was in typewriting, and at the bottom was the name and address of a very well-known homme de lettres: and the words: 'offert à la rédaction de l'ami de l'ordre.' he say now, _never never_ did he send it. it was a forgery. when we came to understand what it meant all the blame fall on me. i am sent back to the army--i shall be killed before verdun, so good-bye dear miss--we have been good friends. oh this war: this d-r-r-eadful war--it has spoilt everything. now we can never be friends with england again." [footnote : i have obtained a copy and give it here as it had an almost historical importance in the events of the german occupation. but the reader must interpret its meaning for himself. la guerre ma soeur, vous souvient-il qu'aux jours de notre enfance, en lisant les hauts fails de l'histoire de france, remplis d'admiration pour nos frères gaulois, des généraux fameux nous vantions les exploits? en nos âmes d'enfants, les seuls noms des victoires prenaient un sens mystique evocateur de gloires; on ne rêvait qu'assauts et combats; a nos yeux un général vainqueur etait l'égal des dieux. rien ne semblait ternir l'éclat de ces conquétes. les batailles prenaient des allures de fêtes et nous ne songions pas qu'aux hurrahs triomphants se mêlaient les sanglots des mères, des enfants. ah! nous la connaissons, hélas, l'horrible guerre: le fléau qui punit les crimes de la terre, le mot qui fait trembler les mères à genoux et qui seme le deuil et la mort parmi nous! mais ou sqnt les lauriers que réserve l'histoire a celui qui demain forcera la victoire? nul ne les cueillira: les lauriers sont flétris seul un cypres s'élève aux torubes de nos fils.] he gave way to much emotion. vivie, though still dazed with the reverberating horror of edith cavell's execution, tried to regain her mind balance and thank him for the kindness he had shown them. but it was now necessary to see her mother who might also be undergoing a shock. as she walked up to their bedroom she reflected that the departure of von giesselin would have to be followed by their own exile to some other lodging. they would share in his disgrace. the next morning in fact the belgian manager of the hotel with many regrets gave them a month's warning. the hotel would be required for some undefined need of the german government and he had been told no one could be lodged there who was not furnished with a permit from the kommandantur. for three weeks vivie sought in vain for rooms. every suitable place was either full or else for reasons not given they were refused. she was reduced to eating humble pie, to writing once more to gräfin von stachelberg and imparting the dilemma in which they were placed. did this kind lady know where a lodging could be obtained? she herself could put up with any discomfort, but her mother was ill. if she could help them, vivie would humbly beg her pardon for her angry letter of three weeks ago and resume her hospital work. minna von stachelberg made haste to reply that there were some things better not discussed in writing: if vivie could come and see her at six one evening, when she had a slight remission from work-- vivie went. out of hearing, gräfin von stachelberg--who, however, to facilitate intercourse, begged vivie to call her "minna,"--"we may all be dead, my dear, before long of blood-poisoning, bombs from your aeroplanes, a rising against us in the marolles quarter--" said very plainly what she thought of edith cavell's execution. "it makes me think of talleyrand--was it not?--who said 'it is a blunder; worse than a crime' ... these terrible old generals, they know nothing of the world outside germany." as to her cousin, gottlieb von giesselin--"really dear, if in this time of horrors one _dare_ laugh at anything, i feel--oh it is too funny, but also, too 'schokking,' as we suppose all english women say. yet of course i am sad about him, because he is a good, kind man, and i know his wife will be very very unhappy when she hears--and it means he will die, for certain. he must risk his life to--to--regain his position, and he will be shot before verdun in one of those dreadful assaults." then she told vivie where she might find rooms, where at any rate she could use her name as a reference. also: "stay away at present and look after your mother. when she is quite comfortably settled, come back and work with me--here--it is at any rate the only way in which you can see and help your countrymen." one day in november when their notice at the hotel was nearly expired, vivie proposed an expedition to her mother. they would walk slowly--because mrs. warren now got easily out of breath--up to the jardin bontanique; vivie would leave her there in the palm house. it was warm; it was little frequented; there were seats and the belgians in charge knew mrs. warren of old time. vivie would then go on along the inner boulevards by tram and look at some rooms recommended by minna von stachelberg in the quartier st. gilles. mrs. warren did as she was told. vivie left her seated in one of the long series of glass houses overlooking brussels from a terrace, wherein are assembled many glories of the tropics: palms, dracaenas, yuccas, aloes, tree-ferns, cycads, screw-pines, and bananas: promising to be back in an hour's time. somehow as she sat there it seemed to mrs. warren it was going for her to be the last hour of fully conscious life--fully conscious and yet a curious mingling in it of the past and present. she had sat here in the middle of the 'seventies with vivie's father, the young irish seminarist, her lover for six months. he had a vague interest in botany, and during his convalescence after his typhoid fever, when she was still his nurse, not yet his mistress, she used to bring him here to rest and to enjoy the aspect of these ferns and palms. what a strange variety of men she had known. some she had loved, more or less; some she had exploited frankly. some--like george crofts and baxendale strangeways--she had feared, though in her manner she had tried to conceal her dread of their violence. well! she had taken a lot of money off the rich, but she had never plundered the poor. her greatest conquest--and that when she was a woman of forty--was the monarch of this very country which now lay crushed under the kaiser's heel. for a few months he had taken a whimsical liking to her handsome face, well-preserved figure, and amusing cockney talk. but he had employed her rather as the mistress of his menus plaisirs, as his recruiting agent. he had rewarded her handsomely. now it was all in the dust: her beautiful villa beau-séjour a befouled barrack for german soldiers. she herself a homeless woman, repudiated by the respectable british and americans more or less interned in this unhappy city. not much more than a year ago she had been one of the most respected persons in brussels, with a large income derived from safe investments. now all she had for certain was something over three thousand pounds in bank notes that might turn out next month to be worthless paper. and was she certain even of them? had vivie before they left the hotel remembered to put some, at least, of this precious sum on her person? suppose, whilst they were out, looking for a fresh dwelling place, the hotel servants or the police raided her bedroom and found the little hoard of notes? this imagined danger made her want to cry. they were so friendless now, she in particular felt so completely deserted. had she deserved this punishment by fate? was there after all a god who minded much about the sex foolishnesses and punished you for irregularities--for having lovers in your youth, for selling your virtue and inducing other women to sell theirs? was she going to die soon and was there a hereafter?' she burst out crying in an abandonment of grief. an elderly gardener who had been snipping and sweeping in the next house came up and vaguely recognized her as a well-known bruxelloise, a good-natured lady, a foreigner who, strange to say, spoke flemish. "ach," he said, looking out where he thought lay the source of her tears, at the dim view of beautiful brussels through the steamy glass, "onze arme, oude brüssel." mrs. warren wept unrestrainedly. "madame is ill?" he enquired. mrs. warren nodded--she felt indeed very ill and giddy. he left her and returned shortly with a small glass of schnapps. "if madame is faint--?" she sipped the cordial and presently felt better. then they talked of old times. madame had kept the hotel leopold ii in the rue royale? ah, _now_ he placed her. a _superb_ establishment, always well-spoken of. her self-respect returned a little. "yes," she said, "never a complaint! i looked after those girls like a mother, indeed i did. many a one married well from there." the gardener corroborated her statement, and added that her _clientèle_ had been of the most chic. he had a private florist's business of his own and he had been privileged often to send bouquets to the pensionnaires of madame. but madame was not alone surely in these sad times. had he not seen her come here with a handsome english lady who was said to have been--to have been--fortunately--_au mieux_ with one of the german officials? "_that_ was my daughter," mrs. warren informed him with pride.... "she is a lady who has taken a high degree at an english university. she has been an important person in the english feminist movement. when this dreadful war is over, i and my daughter will--" at this juncture vivie entered. "_mother_, i hope you haven't missed me, haven't been unwell?" she said, looking rather questioningly at the little glass of schnapps, only half of which had been drunk. "well yes, dear, i have. _terrible_ low spirits and all swimmy-like. thought i was going to faint. but this man here has been so kind "--her tears flowed afresh--"we've bin talking of old times; he used to know me before--" _vivie_: "quite so. but i think, dear, we had better be going back. i want to talk to you about the new rooms i've seen. are you equal to walking? if not perhaps this kind man would try to get us a cab...?" but mrs. warren said it was no distance, only round the corner, and she could well walk. when they got back she would go and lie down. vivie, reading her mother's thoughts, pressed a five-franc note into the gardener's not reluctant palm, and they regained the rue royale. but just as they were passing through the revolving door of the hotel impérial, a german who had been installed as manager came up with two soldiers and said explosively: "heraus! foutez-nous le camp! aout you go! don't show your face here again!" "but," said vivie, "our notice doesn't expire till the end of this week...!" "das macht nichts. the rooms are wanted and i won't have you on the premises. off you go, or these soldiers shall take you both round to the kommandantur." "but our luggage? _surely_ you will let me go up to our room and pack it--and take it away? we..." "your luggage has been packed and is in the corridor. if you send round for it, it shall be delivered to your messenger. but you are not to stop on the premises another minute. you understand?" he almost shrieked. "but--" for answer, the soldiers took them by the shoulders and whirled them through the revolving door on to the pavement, where a crowd began to collect, as it does in peace or war if you cough twice or sneeze three times in brussels. "englische hure! englische küpplerin," shouted the soldiers as they retreated and locked the revolving door. mrs. warren turned purple and swayed. vivie caught her round the waist with her strong arm.... thus was mrs. warren ejected from the once homely inn which she had converted by her energy, management and capital into the second most magnificent hostelry of brussels; thus was vivie expelled from the place of her birth.... hearing the shouting and seeing the crowd a belgian gendarme came up. to him vivie said, "si vous êtes chrétien et pas allemand--" "prenez garde, madame," he said warningly--"vous m'aiderez à porter ma mère à quelqu' endroit ou elle peut se remettre..." he assisted her to carry the inert old woman across the street and a short distance along the opposite pavement. here, there was a pleasant, modest-looking tea-shop with the name of walcker over the front, and embedded in the plate glass were the words "tea rooms." these of course dated from long before the war, when the best chinese tea was only four francs the demi-kilo and the fashion for afternoon tea had become established in brussels. vivie and her mother had often entered walcker's shop in happier days for a cup of tea and delicious forms of home-made pastry. besides the cakes, which in pre-war times were of an excellence rarely equalled, they had been drawn to the pleasant-looking serving woman. she was so english in appearance, though she only spoke french and flemish. behind the shop was a cosy little room where the more intimate clients were served with tea; a room with a look-out into a little square of garden. thither mrs. warren was carried or supported. she regained consciousness slightly as she was placed on a chair, opened her eyes, and said "thank you, my dears." then her head fell over to one side and she was dead--seemingly.... the _agent de police_ went away to fetch a doctor and to disperse the crowd of _ketjes_[ ] and loafers which had transferred itself from the hotel to the tea-shop. the shop woman, who was one of those angels of kindness that turn up unexpectedly in the paths of unhappy people, called in a stout serving wench from the kitchen, and the three of them carried mrs. warren out of the inner tea-room into the back premises and a spare bedroom. here she was laid on the bed, partially undressed and all available and likely restoratives applied. [footnote : street urchins of brussels. how they harassed the germans and maddened them by mimicking their military manoeuvres!] the doctor when he came pronounced her dead, thought it was probably an effusion of blood on the brain but couldn't be certain till he had made an autopsy. "what _am_ i to do?" said vivie thinking aloud.... "why, stay here till all the formalities are over and you can find rooms elsewhere," said mme. trouessart, the owner-servant of the tea-shop. "i have another spare room. for the moment my locataires are gone. i know you both very well by sight, you were clients of ours in the happy days before the war. madame votre mère was, i think, the gérante of the hotel Édouard-sept when i first came to manage here. since then, you have often drunk my tea. je me nomme 'trouessart' c'est le nom de mon mari qui est ... qui est--vous pouvez diviner où il est, où est à present tout belge loyal qui peut servir. le nom walcker? c'était le nom de nom père, et de plus est, c'était un nom anglais transformé un peu en flamand. mon arrière-grand-père etait soldat anglais. il se battait à waterloo. for me, i spik no english--or ver' leetle." she went on to explain, whilst the doctors occupied themselves with their gruesome task, and vivie was being persuaded to take some nourishment, that her great grandfather had been a soldier servant who had married a belgian woman and settled down on the site of this very shop a hundred years ago. he and his wife had even then made a specialty of tea for english tourists. she, his great grand-daughter, had after her marriage to monsieur trouessart carried on the business under the old name--walker, made to look flemish as walcker. vivie when left alone suddenly thought of the money question. she remembered then that before going out to look for rooms she had transferred half the notes from their hiding-place to an inner pocket. they were still there. but what about her luggage and her mother's, and the remainder of the money? in her distress she wrote to gräfin von stachelberg. minna came over from her hospital at half past six in the evening. by that time the doctor had given the necessary certificate of the cause of death, and an undertaker had come on the scene to make his preparations. minna went over to the hotel impérial with vivie. appearing in her red cross uniform, she was admitted, announced herself as the gräfin von stachelberg, and demanded to know what justification the manager could offer for his extraordinary brutality towards these english ladies, the result of which had been the death of the elder lady. the manager replied that inasmuch as the all highest himself was to arrive that very evening to take up his abode at the hotel impérial, the hotel premises had been requisitioned, etc., etc. he still refused absolutely to allow vivie to proceed to her room and look for her money. she might perhaps be allowed to do so when the emperor was gone. as to her luggage he would have it sent over to the tea-shop. (the money, it might be noted, she never recovered. there were many things also missing from her mother's trunks and no satisfaction was ever obtained.) so there was vivie, one dismal, rainy november evening in ; homeless, her mother lying dead in a room of this tea-shop, and in her own pocket only a matter of thirty thousand francs to provide for her till the war was over. a thousand pounds in fluctuating value was all that was left of a nominal twenty thousand of the year before. but the financial aspect of the case for the time being did not concern her. the death of her mother had been a stunning shock, and when she crossed over to the hotel--what irony, by the bye, to think she had been born there thirty-nine years ago, in the old inn that had preceded the twice rebuilt hotel!--when she crossed the street with minna, it had been with blazing, tearless eyes and the desire to take the hotel manager and his minions by the coat collar, fling _them_ into the street, and assert her right to go up to her room. but now her violence was spent and she was a broken, weeping woman as she sat all night by the bedside of her dead mother, holding the cold hand, imprinting kisses on the dead face which was now that of a saintly person with nothing of the reprobate in its lineaments. * * * * * the burial for various reasons had to take place in the cemetery of st. josse-ten-noode, near the shuddery national shooting range where edith cavell and numerous belgian patriots had recently been executed. minna von stachelberg left her hospital, with some one else in charge, and insisted on accompanying vivie to the interment. this might have been purely "laïc"; not on account of any harsh dislike to the religious ceremony on vivie's part; only due to the fact that she knew no priest or pastor. but there appeared at the grave-side to make a very suitable and touching discourse and to utter one or two heartfelt prayers, a belgian baptist minister, a relation of mme. trouessart. waterloo left many curious things behind it. not only a tea-shop or two; but a nonconformist nucleus, that intermarried, as sergeant walker or walcker had done, with belgian women and left descendants who in the third generation--and by inherent vigour, thrift, matrimony and conversion--had built up quite a numerous congregation, which even grew large enough and rich enough to maintain a mission of its own in congoland. kind mme. trouessart (née walcker), distressed and unusually moved at the sad circumstances of mrs. warren's death, had called in her uncle the baptist pastor (who also in some unexplained way seemed to hold a brief for the salvation army). he prayed silently by the death-bed which, under the circumstances, was more tactful than open intercession. he helped greatly over all the formalities of the funeral, and he took upon himself the arrangement of the ceremony, so that everything was done decorously, and certainly to the satisfaction of the belgians, who attended. such people would be large-minded in religion--you might be protestant, if you were not catholic, or you might be jewish; but a funeral without some outward sign of faith and hope would have puzzled and distressed them. to vivie's great surprise, there was a considerable attendance at the ceremony. she had expected no more than the company of minna--an unprofessing but real christian, if ever there were one, and the equally christian if equally hedonist mme. trouessart. but there came in addition quite a number of shopkeepers from the rue royale, the rues de schaerbeek, du marais, de lione, and de l'association, with whom mrs. warren had dealt in years gone by. "c'etait une dame _très_ convenable," said one purveyor, and the others agreed. "elle me paya écus sonnants," said another, "et toujours sans marchander." there was even present a more distinguished acquaintance of the past: a long-retired commissaire de police of the quartier in which mrs. warren's hotel was situated. he appeared in the tightly-buttoned frock-coat of civil life, with a minute disc of some civic decoration in his button hole, and an incredibly tall chimney-pot hat. he came to render his _respectueux hommages_ to the maîtresse-femme who had conducted her business within the four corners of the law, "sans avoir maille à partir avec la police des moeurs." mrs. warren at least died with the reputation of one who promptly paid her bills; and the whole _assistance_, as it walked slowly back to brussels, recalled many a deed of kindness and jovial charity on the part of the dead englishwoman. * * * * * vivie, on sizing up her affairs, got monsieur walcker, the baptist pasteur, to convey a letter to the american consulate general. walcker was used to such missions as these, of which the german government was more or less cognizant. the germans, among their many contradictory features, had a great respect for religion, a great tolerance as to its forms. they not only appreciated the difference between jews and christians, catholics and lutherans, but between the church of england and the various free churches of britain and america. the many people whom they sentenced to death must all have their appropriate religious consolation before facing the firing party. catholics, lutherans and calvinists were all provided for; there was a church of england chaplain for the avowed anglicans; but what was to be done for the free churches and nonconformist sects of the anglo-saxons? they were not represented by any captive pastor; so in default this much respected monsieur walcker, the belgian baptist, was called in to minister to the nonconformist mind in its last agony. he therefore held a quasi-official position and was often entrusted with missions which would have been dealt with punitorily on the part of any one else. consequently he was able to deliver vivie's communication to the american consul-general with some probability of its being sent on. it contained no further appeal to american intervention than this: that the consul-general would try to convey to england the news of her mother's death to such-and-such solicitors, and to lewis maitland praed a.r.a. in hans place. she went to the brussels bank a fortnight after her mother's death whilst still availing herself of the hospitality of madame trouessart: to withdraw the jewellery and plate which she had deposited there on her mother's account. but there she found herself confronted with the red tape of the latin which is more formidable, even, than that of the land of dora at the present day. these deposited articles were held on the order of mrs. warren; they could not be given up till her will was proved and letters of administration had been granted. so _that_ small resource in funds was withheld, at any rate till some time after peace had been declared. however she had a thousand pounds (in notes) between her and penury, and the friendship of minna von stachelberg. she would resume her evening lessons in english--madame trouessart had found her several pupils--and she would lodge--as they kindly invited her to do--with the baptist pastor and his wife in the rue haute. and she would help minna at the hospital, and hope to be rewarded with the opportunity of bringing comfort and consolation to the wounded british prisoners. thus, with no unbearable misery, she passed the year . there were short commons in the way of food, and the cold was sometimes cruel. but madame walcker was a wonderful cook and could make soup from a sausage skewer, and heaped _édredons_ on vivie's bed. vivie sighed a little over the blue placards which announced endless german victories by land and sea; and she gasped over the dreadful red placards with their lists of victims sentenced to death by the military courts. she ground her teeth over the announcement of gabrielle petit's condemnation, and behind the shut door of minna's small sitting-room--and she only shut the door not to compromise minna--she raved over the judicial murder of this belgian heroine, who was shot, as was edith cavell, for nothing more than assisting young belgians to escape from german-occupied belgium. she witnessed the air-raids of the allies, when only comforting papers were dropped on brussels city, but bombs on the german aerodromes outside; and she also saw the germans turn their guns from the aeroplanes--which soared high out of their reach or skimmed below range--on to thickly-inhabited streets of the poorer quarters, to teach them to cheer the air-craft of the allies! she beheld--or she was told of--many acts of rapine, considered cruelty and unreasoning ferocity on the part of german officials or soldiers; yet saw or heard of acts and episodes of unlooked-for kindness, forbearance and sympathy from the same hated people. von giesselin, after all, was a not uncommon type; and as to minna von stachelberg, she was a saint of the new religion, the service of man. chapter xviii the bomb in portland place mrs. rossiter said to herself in that she had scarcely known a happy day, or even hour, since the war began. in the first place michael had again shown violence of temper with ministers of state over the release from prison of "that" miss warren--"a convict doing a sentence of hard labour." and then, when he had got her released, and gone himself with their beautiful new motor--whatever _could_ the chauffeur have thought?--to meet her at the prison gates, _there_ he was, afterwards, worrying himself over the war: not content as she was, as most of her friends were, as the newspapers were, to leave it all to lord kitchener and mr. asquith, sir edward grey, and even mr. lloyd george--though the latter had made some rather foolish and exaggerated speeches about alcohol. michael, if he went on like this, would _never_ get his knighthood! then when michael had at last, thanks to general armstrong, found his right place and was accomplishing marvels--the papers said--as a "mender of the maimed"--here was she left alone in portland place with hardly any one to speak to, and all her acquaintances--she now realized they were scarcely her friends--too much occupied with war work to spend an afternoon in discussing nothing very important over a sumptuous tea, still served by a butler and footman. presently, too, the butler left to join the professor in france and the footman enlisted, and the tea had to be served by a _distraite_ parlour-maid, with her eye on a munitions factory--so that she might be "in it"--and her heart in the keeping of the footman, who, since he had gone into khaki, was irresistible. mrs. rossiter of course said, in , that she would take up war work. she subscribed most handsomely to the soldiers' and sailors' families' association, to the red cross, to the prince of wales's fund (one of the unsolved war-time mysteries ... what's become of it?), to the cigarette fund, the christmas plum pudding fund, the blue cross, the purple cross, the green cross funds; to the outstandingly good work at st. dunstan's and at petersham--(i am glad she gave a hundred pounds each to _them_); and to the french, belgian, russian, italian, serbian, portuguese and japanese flag days and to our own day; besides enriching a number of semi-fraudulent war charities which had alluring titles. but if, from paying handsomely to all these praise-worthy endeavours to mitigate the horrors of war, she proceeded to render personal service, she became the despair of the paid organizers and business-like workers. she couldn't add and she couldn't subtract or divide with any certainty of a correct result; she couldn't spell the more difficult words or remember the right letters to put after distinguished persons' names when she addressed envelopes in her large, childish handwriting; she couldn't be trusted to make enquiries or to detect fraudulent appeals. she lost receipts and never grasped the importance of vouchers; she forgot to fill up counterfoils, or if reminded filled them up "from memory" so that they didn't tally; she signed her name, if there was any choice of blank spaces, in quite the wrong place. so, invariably, tactful secretaries or assistant secretaries were told off to explain to her--ever so nicely--that "she was no business woman" (this, to the daughter of wholesale manufacturers, sounded rather flattering), and that though she was invaluable as a "name," as a patroness, or one of eighteen vice presidents, she was of no use whatever as a worker. she had no country house to place at the disposal of the government as a convalescent home. michael after a few experiments forbade her offering any hospitality at no. park crescent to invalid officers. such as were entrusted to her in the spring of soon found that she was--as they phrased it--"a pompous little, middle-class fool," wielding no authority. they larked in the laboratory with red cross nurses, broke specimens, and did very unkind and noisy things ... besides smoking in both the large _and_ the small dining-rooms. so, after the summer of , she lived very much alone, except that she had the adams children from marylebone to spend the day with her occasionally. poor mrs. adams, though a valiant worker, was very downcast and unhappy. she confided to mrs. rossiter that although she dearly loved her bert--"and a better husband i defy you to find"--he never seemed all hers. "always so wrapped up in that miss warren or 'er cousin the barrister." and no sooner had war broken out than off he was to france, as a kind of missionary, she believed--the young men's christian something or other; "though before the war he didn't seem particular stuck on religion, and it was all she could do to get him sometimes to church on a sunday morning. oh yes: she got 'er money all right; and she couldn't say too much of mr. and mrs. rossiter's kindness. there was bert, not doin' a stroke of work for the professor, and yet his pay going on all the same. indeed she was putting money by, because bert was kep' out there, and all found." however his two pretty children were some consolation to mrs. rossiter, whom they considered as a very grand lady and one that was lavishly kind. mrs. rossiter tried sometimes in having working parties in her house or in the studio; and if she could attract workers gave them such elaborate lunches and plethoric teas that very little work was done, especially as she herself loved a long, aimless gossip about the royal family or whether lord kitchener had ever _really_ been in love. or she tried, since she was a poor worker herself--her only jersey and muffler were really finished by her maid--reading aloud to the knitters or stitchers, preferably from the works of miss charlotte yonge or some similar novelist of a later date. but that was found to be too disturbing to their sense of the ludicrous. for she read very stiltedly, with a strange exotic accent for the love passages or the death scenes. as lady victoria freebooter said, she would have been _priceless_ at a music-hall matinée which was raising funds for war charities, if only she could have been induced to read passages from miss yonge in _that_ voice for a quarter of an hour. even the queen would have had to laugh. but as that could not be brought off, it was decided that working parties at her house led to too much giddiness from suppressed giggles or torpor from too much food. so she relapsed once more into loneliness. unfortunately air-raids were now becoming events of occasional fright and anxiety in london, and this deterred cousin sophie from darlington, cousin matty from leeds, joseph's wife from northallerton or old, married schoolfellows from other northern or midland towns coming to partake of her fastuous hospitality. also, they all seemed to be busy, either over their absent husbands' business, or their sons', or because they were plunged in war work themselves. "and really, in these times, i couldn't stand linda for more than five minutes," one of them said. as to the air-raids, she was not greatly alarmed at them. of course it was very uncomfortable having london so dark at night, but then she only went out in the afternoon, and never in the evening. and the germans seemed to be content and discriminating enough not to bomb what she called "the resi_den_tial" parts of london. the nearest to portland place of their attentions was hampstead or bloomsbury. "we are protected, my dear, by the open spaces of regent's park. they wouldn't like to waste their bombs on poor me!" however her maid didn't altogether like the off chance of the germans or our air-craft guns making a mistake and trespassing on the residential parts of london, so she persuaded her mistress to spend part of the winter of - at bournemouth. here she was not happy and far lonelier even than in london. she did not like to send all that way for the adams children, she had a parlour suite all to herself at the hotel, and was timid about making acquaintances outside, since everybody now-a-days wanted you to subscribe to something, and it was so disagreeable having to say "no." she was not a great walker so she could not enjoy the talbot woods; the sea made her feel sad, remembering that michael was the other side and the submarines increasingly active: in short, air-raids or no air-raids, she returned home in march, and her maid, who had been with her ten years, gave her warning. but then she had an inspiration! she engaged mrs. albert adams to take her place, and although the parlour-maid at this took offence and cut the painter of domestic service, went off to the munitions till sergeant frederick summers should get leave to come home and marry her; and they were obliged to engage another parlour-maid in her place at double the wages: mrs. rossiter had done a very wise thing. "bert" had been home for three weeks in the preceding february, and the recently bereaved mrs. adams had united her tears with mrs. rossiter's on the misery of the war which separated attached husbands and wives. it now alleviated the sorrows of both that they should be together as mistress and maid. the cook--a most important factor--had always liked bertie and adored his "sweet, pretty little children." "if you'll let 'em sleep in the spare room on the fourth floor, next their mother, and play in the day-time in the servants' 'all, they'll be no manner of difficulty _nor_ bother to me and the maids. we shall love to 'ave 'em, the darlin's. and they'll serve to cheer you up a bit ma'am till the professor comes back." mrs. adams was a very capable person who hated dust and grime. the big house wanted some such intervention, as since the butler's departure it had become rather slovenly, save in the portions occupied by mrs. rossiter. charwomen were got in, and spring cleanings on a gigantic scale took place, so that when rossiter did return he thought it had never looked so nice, or his linda been so cheery and companionable. but before this happy confirmation of her wisdom in engaging nance adams as maid and factotum, mrs. rossiter had several waves of doubt and distress to breast. there was the suffrage question. once converted by mrs. humphry ward, miss violet markham, sir almroth wright--whose _prénom_ she could not pronounce--the late lord cromer, and the impressive lord curzon, to the perils of the woman's vote, mrs. rossiter was hard to move from her uncompromising opposition to the enfranchisement of her sex. some adroit champion of the wrong had employed the argument that _once_ women got the vote, _the divorce laws would be greatly enlarged_. this would be part of the scheme of the wild women to get themselves all married; that and _the legalisation of polygamy_ which would follow the vote _as surely as the night the day_. linda had an undefined terror that her michael might take advantage of such licentiousness to depose her, like the empress josephine was put aside in favour of a child-producing rival; or if polygamy came into force, that miss warren might lawfully share the professor's affections. she was therefore greatly perturbed in the course of at the sudden throwing up of the sponge by the anti-suffragists. however, there it was. the long struggle drew to a victorious close. example as well as precept pointed to what women could do and were worth; sound arguments followed the inconveniences of militancy, and the men were convinced. or rather, the men in the mass and the fighting, working men had for some time been convinced, but the great statesmen who had so obstinately opposed the measures were now weakening at the knees before the results of their own mismanagement in the conduct of the war. a further perplexity and anxiety for mrs. rossiter arose over the german spy mania. she had been to one of lady towcester's afternoon parties "to keep up our spirits." lady towcester collected for at least six different charities and funds, and mrs. rossiter was a generous subscriber to all six. touching the wood of the central tea-table, she had remarked to lady victoria and lady helen freebooter how fortunate they (who lived within the prescribed area defined by lady jeune) had been in so far escaping air-raids. "but don't you know why?" said lady victoria. mrs. rossiter didn't. "because in manchester square, in cavendish--grosvenor--hanover squares, in portland place--a few doors off your own house--in harley street and wigmore street: there are special friends of the kaiser living. they _may_ call themselves by english names, they may even be ex-cabinet-ministers; but they are working for the kaiser, all the same. and _he_ wouldn't be such a fool as to have them bombed, would he?" "especially as it is well known that there _is a wireless installation_ on a house in portland place which communicates with a similar installation in the harz mountains," added lady helen. this was a half-reassuring, half-terrifying statement. it was comfortable to know that you lived under the kaiser's wing--mrs. rossiter hoped the aim of the aeronauts was accurate, and their knowledge of london topography good. at the same time it was alarming to feel that you might be involved in that final blow up of the villains which must bring such scoundreldom to a close. but if lady vera and lady helen knew all this for a fact, why not tell the police? "what would be the good? they'd deny everything and we should only be sued for libel." however to form some conception of how english home life was undermined with plots, she was advised to go and see mr. dennis eadie in _the man that stayed at home_. she did, taking mrs. adams with her to the dress circle for a matinée. both were very much impressed, and on their return expected the fireplaces to open all of a piece and reveal german spies with masked faces and pistols, standing in the chimney. at last these and other nightmares were dispelled by the arrival of rossiter on leave of absence in the autumn of . he had the rank of colonel in the r.a.m.c., and wore the khaki uniform--mrs. rossiter proudly thought--of a general. he had shaved off his beard and trimmed his moustache and looked particularly soldierly. the butler who came with him though not precisely a soldier but a sort of n.c.o. in a medical corps, also looked quite martial, and had so much to say for himself that mrs. rossiter felt he could never become a butler again. but he did all the same, and a most efficient one though a little breezy in manner. linda now entered on an aftermath of matrimonial happiness. rossiter was to take quite a long leave so that he could pursue the most important researches in curative surgery--bone grafting and the like; not only in his own laboratory but at the college of surgeons and the zoological gardens prosectorium. with only occasional week-ends at home he had been away from london since september, ; had known great hardships, the life of the trenches and the bomb-proof shelter, stewed tea and bad tinned milk, rum and water, bully beef, plum and apple jam, good bread, it is true, but shocking margarine for butter. he had slept for weeks together on an old sofa more or less dressed, kept warm by his great-coat and two army blankets of woven porcupine quills (seemingly) the ends of which tickled his nose and scratched his face. he had been very cold and sweatingly hot, furiously hungry with no meal to satisfy his healthy appetite, madly thirsty and no long drink attainable; unable to sleep for three nights at a time owing to the noise of the bombardment; surfeited with horrible smells; sickened with butchery; shocked at his own failures to retrieve life, yet encouraged by an isolated victory, here and there, over death and disablement. so the never-before-appreciated comfort of his park crescent home filled him with intense gratitude to linda. had he known, he owed some of his acknowledgment to mrs. adams; who had worked both hard and tactfully in her undefined position of lady's-maid-housekeeper-companion. but naturally he didn't know, though he praised his wife warmly for her charity of soul in taking pity on the poor little woman and her two children. he could only give the slightest news about bertie, but said he was a sort of jack-of-all-trades for the y.m.c.a. as to vivie--"that miss warren"--he answered his wife's questions neither with the glowering taciturnity nor suspicious loquacity of former times. "miss warren? vivie? i fancy she's still at brussels, but there is no chance of finding out. there is a story that her mother is dead. p'raps now they'll let her come away. she must be jolly well sick of brussels by now. when i last heard of adams he was still hoping to get into touch with her. i hope he won't take any risks. she's a clever woman and i dare say can take care of herself. i hope we shall all meet again when the war is over." he seemed very pleased to hear of the new conciliation bill, the general agreement all round on the suffrage question and the enlargement of the electorate. he had always told linda it was bound to come. "and after it has come, dearie, you mark my words: things will go on pretty much as before." but his real, intense, absorbing interest lay in the new experiments he was about to make in bone grafting and cartilage replacing, and the functions of the pituitary body and the interstitial glands. to carry these out adequately the zoological society had accumulated troops of monkeys and baboons. at a certain depôt in camden town dogs were kept for his purposes. and the vaults and upper floors of the royal college of surgeons were at rossiter's disposal, with professor keith to co-operate. never had his house in portland place--to be accurate the park crescent end thereof--seemed so conveniently situated, or its studio-laboratory so well designed. "air-raids? pooh! just about one chance in a million we should be struck. besides: can't think of that, when so much is at stake. that's a fine phrase, 'menders of the maimed.' just what we want to be! no more artificial limbs if we can help you to grow your own new legs and arms--perhaps. at any rate, mend up those that are a hopeless mash. grand work! only bright thing in the war. now dear, are you ready with that lymph?" and she was. never had linda been so happy. she overcame her disgust at the sight of blood, at monkeys, dogs, and humans under anæsthetics, at yellow fat, gleaming sinew, and blood-stained bone. she was careful as a washer-up. the services of mrs. adams were enlisted, and she was more deft even than her mistress; and the butler, who was by this time a regular hospital dresser, greatly admired her pretty arms when they were bared to the elbow, and her flushed cheeks when she took a humble part in some tantalizing adjustment. "i'm some use to you after all," linda would say when they retired from the studio for a rest and she made the tea. "some _use_? i should think so!" said rossiter (whether truly or not). and he reproached himself that twenty years ago he had not trained and developed her to help him in his work, to be a real companion in his studies. he was really fond of her through the winter of . and so jovial and lover-like, so boyish in his fun, so like the typical tommy home from the trenches. when he was overjoyed at the success of some uncovered and peeped-at experiment, he would sing, "when _i_ get me civvies on again, an' it's home sweet home once more"; and ask for the ideal cottage "with rowses round the door--and a nice warm bottle in me nice warm bed, an' a nice soft pillow for me nice soft 'ead..." mrs. rossiter began to think there was a good side to the war, after all. it made some men more conscious of their home comforts and less exigent for intellectuality in their home companions. they went out very little into society. rossiter held that war-time parties were scandalous. he poohpoohed the idea that immodest dancing with frisky matrons or abandoned spinsters was necessary to restore the shell-shocked nerves of temporary captains, locally-ranked majors, or the recently-joined subaltern. he was far too busy for twaddly tea-fights and carping at hard-worked generals who were doing their best and a good best too. he and linda did dine occasionally with honoria, but the latter felt she could not let herself go about vivie in the presence of mrs. rossiter and seemed a little cold in manner. ordinarily, after working hard all day while the daylight lasted they much preferred an evening of complete solitude. rossiter's new robustness of taste included love of a gramophone. money being no consideration with them, they acquired a tip-top one with superlative records; not so much the baaing, bellowing and shrieking of fashionable singers, but orchestral performances, heart-melting duets between violin and piano (_what_ human voice ever came up to a good violin or violoncello?), racy comic songs, inspiriting two steps, xylophone symphonies, and dreamy, sensuous waltzes. this gramophone linda learnt to work; and while michael read voraciously the works of hunter, hugh owen thomas, stromeyer, duchenne, goodsir, wolff, and redfern on bones, muscles, ligaments, tendons, cartilage, periosteum and osteogenesis--or, more often, keith's compact and lucid analysis of their experiments and conclusions--linda let loose in the scented air of a log fire these varied melodies which attuned the mind to extraordinary perceptibility. the little adamses were allowed to steal in and listen, on condition they never uttered a word to break the spell of colonel rossiter's thoughts. i think also rossiter felt his wife had been unjustly snubbed by the great ladies and the off-hand, harum-scarum young war-workers; so he flatly declined to have any of them messing around his studio or initiated into his research work. it was intimated that the rossiter thursday afternoons of long ago would not be resumed until after the peace. linda therefore derived much consolation and satisfaction for past injuries to her pride when lady vera--or victoria--freebooter called one day just before christmas and said "oh--er--mother's let our house till february and thinks we'd better--i mean the marrybone guild of war-workers--meet at _your_ house instead"; and she, linda, had the opportunity of replying: "oh, i'm sorry, _but_ it's quite impossible. the professor--i mean, colonel rossiter--and i are so _very_ busy ... we are seeing _no_ one just now. indeed we've enlisted all the servants to help the colonel in his work, so i can't even offer you a cup of tea.... i must _rush_ back at once.... you'll excuse me?" "that rossiter woman is quite off her head with grandeur," said lady vera to lady helen. "i expect uncle algy has let out that her husband is in the new year's honours." and so he was. but uncle algy, though he might have babbled to his nieces, had not written a word to the rossiters. so they just enjoyed christmas--too much, they thought, more than any christmas before--in the simple satisfaction of being colonel and mrs. rossiter, all in all to each other, but rendered additionally happy by making those about them happy. the little adamses staggered under their presents and had a christmas tree to which they were allowed to ask their two grannies--mrs. laidly from fig tree court and mrs. adams from the kilburn laundry--and numerous little friends from marylebone, who had been washed and curled and crimped and adjured not to disgrace their parents, _or_ father--in the trenches--would be told "as sure as i stand here." (the little adamses were also warned that if they _ever_ again were heard calling mrs. rossiter "gran'ma," they'd--but the threat was too awful to be uttered, especially as their mother at this time was always on the verge of tears, either at getting no news of bert or at the unforgettable kindness of bert's employer.) mrs. rossiter, quite unaware that she was soon to be a dame, gave christmas entertainments at st. dunstan's, at the marylebone workhouse, and to all the wounded soldiers in the parish. and on december , , michael received a note from the prime minister to say that his majesty, in recognition of his exceptional services in curative surgery at the front, had been pleased to bestow on him a knight commandership of the bath. "so that, linda, you can call yourself lady rossiter, and you will have to get some new cards printed for both of us." linda didn't feel quite that ecstasy over her title that she had expected in her day-dreams. she was getting a little frightened at her happiness. generations of puritan forefathers and mothers had left some influence of calvinism on her mentality. she was brought up to believe in a jealous god, whose providence when you felt too happy on earth just landed you in some unexpected disaster to fit you for the kingdom of heaven--a kingdom which all healthy human beings shrink from entering with the terror of the unknown and a certain homeliness of disposition which is humbly content with this cosy planet and a corporeal existence. however it was very nice to leave cards of calling on lady towcester--even though she was out of town on account of air-raids--and on others, inscribed: "lady rossiter, colonel sir michael rossiter, sir michael and lady rossiter;" and to see printed foolscap envelopes for michael arrive from the war office and lie on the hall table, addressed: colonel sir michael rossiter k.c.b. etc., etc., etc., etc. and later on, in january or february, for some very good reason, sir michael and lady rossiter were received in audience by the king and queen at buckingham palace. the king had already watched sir michael at work in his laboratory just behind the french front; so they two, as linda timidly glanced at them, had no lack of subjects for conversation. but the queen! linda had thought she could _never_ have talked to a queen without swooning, and indeed had arrived primed with much sal volatile. yet there, as in some realistic dream, she was led on to talk about her war charities and sir michael's experiments without trembling, and found herself able to listen with intelligence to the queen's practical suggestions about war work and the application of relief funds in crowded districts. "_we actually compared notes!_" said a flushed and triumphant linda to her michael, as they drove away through the blue twilight of st. james's park. and so far from being puffed up by this, people said they had always thought lady rossiter was kind, but they really before had never imagined there was so much in her. she was even allowed to preside as vice president, in the absence of lady towcester; and got through it quite creditably--kind hearts being more than coronets--and made a little speech to which cook and nance adams called out "hear, _hear_!" and roused quite a hearty response. of course it was an awful wrench when michael had to return to france. but he would be back in the autumn, and meantime she must remember she was a soldier's wife. so the summer was got through with cheerfulness, especially as she was now treated with much more regard in the different committees whereof she was vice president. on these committees she met honoria armstrong, and the longing to renew the old friendship and talk about michael's superlative qualities to one who had long known them, took her over to kensington square, impulsively. honoria perceived the need instinctively. the coldness engendered by linda's silly anti-suffragism disappeared. they both talked by the hour together of their respective husbands and their outstanding virtues and charming weaknesses. the armstrong children took to calling her aunt linda--michael and petworth, after all, were brothers-in-arms and friends from youth. lady rossiter was delighted, and lavished presents on them, till honoria reminded her it was war-time and extravagance in all things was reprehensible, even in british-made toys. they discussed the vote, soon to be theirs, and how it should be exercised. from that--by some instinct--honoria passed on to a talk about vivien warren ... a selective talk. she said nothing about david williams, but enlarged on vivie's absolute "straightness," especially towards other women; her business capacities, her restoration of her mother to the ranks of the respectable; till at last it seemed as though the burning down of racing stables was a meritorious act ... "ridding england of an evil that good might come." and there was poor vivie, locked up in brussels, if indeed she were still living. linda felt shocked at her own treachery to the woman's cause in having betrayed that poor, well-meaning miss warren to the police. never could she confess this to lady armstrong (sir petworth had just been knighted for a great success in battle), tell her about the fragment of letter she had forwarded anonymously to scotland yard. perhaps she might some day tell michael, when he returned. in any case she would say at the next opportunity that as soon as miss warren reappeared in england, he might ask her to the house as often as he liked--even to stay with them if she were in want of a home. she said as much to michael when he came back in september, , to make some further investigations into bone grafting. he seemed genuinely pleased at her broad-mindedness, and said it would indeed be delightful when the war was over--and it _surely_ must be over soon--now mr. lloyd george and clemenceau and president wilson had taken it in hand--it would indeed be delightful to form a circle of close friends who had all been interested in the woman's movement. as to vivie ... if she were not dead ... he should advise her to go in for parliament. he had had no news of her since ever so long; what was worse, he had now very great misgivings about bertie adams. during the autumn of he had disappeared in the direction of la bassée. there were stories of his having joined some american relief expedition at lille--a most dangerous thing to do; insensate, if it were not a mad attempt to get through to brussels in disguise to rescue miss warren. no one in the y.m.c.a. believed for a moment that he had done anything dishonourable. most likely he had been killed--as so many y.m.c.a. people were just then, assisting to bring in the wounded or going up to the trenches with supplies. mrs. adams had better be prepared, cautiously, for a bereavement. rossiter himself was very sad about it. he had missed bertie's services much these last three years. he had never known a better worker--turn his hand to anything--such a good indexer, for example. linda wondered whether _she_ could do any indexing? three years ago michael would have replied: "_you?_ nonsense, my dear. you'd only make a muddle of it. much better stick to your housekeeping" (which as a matter of fact was done in those days by cook, butler and parlour-maid). but now he said, thoughtfully: "well--i don't know--perhaps you might. there's no reason you shouldn't try." and linda began trying. but she also worked regularly in the laboratory now, calling it at his suggestion the lab, and stumbling no more over the word. she wore a neat overall with tight sleeves and her hair plainly dressed under a little white, pleated cap. she never now caught anything with her sleeve and switched it off the table; she never let anything drop, and was a most judicious duster and wiper-up. rossiter in this autumn of was extremely interested in certain crucial experiments he was making with spiculum in sponge-cells; with scleroblasts, "mason-cells," osteoblasts, and "consciousness" in bone-cells. most of the glass jars in which these experiments were going on (those of the sponges in sea-water) required daylight for their progress. there was no place for their storage more suitable than that portion of his studio-laboratory which was above ground; and the situation of his house in regard to air attacks, bombs, shrapnel seemed to him far more favourable than the upper rooms at the college of surgeons. that great building was often endangered because of its proximity to the strand and fleet street; and the strand and fleet street, being regarded by the germans as arteries of empire, were frequently attacked by german air-craft. but in rossiter's studio there was an under-ground annex as continuation of the house cellars; and the household was instructed that if, in rossiter's absence, official warnings of an air-raid were given, certain jars were to be lifted carefully off the shelves and brought either into the library or taken down below in case, through shrapnel or through the vibration of neighbouring explosions, the glass of the studio roof was broken. one day in october, , the german air fleet made a determined attack on london. it was intended this time to belie the stories of the heart of the western district being exempted from punishment because lady so-and-so lived there and had lent her house in east anglia to the empress and her children in , or because sir somebody-else was really an arch spy of the germans and had to go on residing in london. so the aeroplanes this time began distributing their explosives very carefully over the residential area between regent's park and pall mall, the tottenham court road and selfridge's. lady rossiter in her overall was disturbed at her indexing by the clamour of an approaching daylight raid; by the maroons, the clanging of bells, the hooters, the gunfire; and finally by the not very distant sounds of exploding bombs. she called and rang for the servants, and then rushed from the library into the studio to commence removing the more important of the jars to a place of greater safety. she had seized two of them, one under each arm, and was making for the library door, when there came the most awful crash she had ever heard, and resounding bangs which seemed to echo indefinitely in her ears.... rossiter was working in the prosectorium at the zoo when the daylight air-raid began. it seemed to be coming across the middle of london; so, hastily doffing his overall, he left the gardens and walked rapidly towards portland place. he had hardly got past the fountain presented by sir jamsetjee jeejeebhoy in wasted benevolence, than he heard the deafening report of the bomb which had wrecked his studio, reduced it to a tangle of iron girders and stanchions, strewn its floor with brick rubble and thick dust, and left his wife a human wreck, lying unconscious with a broken spine, surrounded by splinters of glass, broken jars, porcelain trays, and nasty-looking fragments of sponge and vertebrate anatomy. with an almost paralyzing premonition of disaster he ran as quickly as possible towards park crescent. the marylebone road was strewn with glass, and a policeman--every one else had taken shelter--was ringing and knocking at his front door to ascertain the damage and possible loss of life. michael let both of them in with his latch-key. in the hall the butler was lying prone, stunned by a small statue which had been flung at him by the capricious violence of the explosion. all the mirrors were shivered and most of the pictures were down. at the entrance to the library cook was standing, all of a tremble. the two little adamses rushed up to him: "oh sir michael! mummie is dead and gran'ma is awfully hurted." but mummie--mrs. adams--was not dead; neither was the expensive parlour-maid. both had fainted or been stunned by the explosion on their way to help their mistress. both lay inanimate on the library floor. the library glass door was shivered to dangerous jagged splinters, but the iron framework--"curse it"--remained a tangled, maddening obstacle to his further progress. he could see through the splinters of thick glass something that looked like linda, lying on her back--and--something that looked like blood. the policeman who followed him was strong and adroit. together they detached the glass splinters and wrenched open the framework, with space enough, at any rate, to pass through without the rending of clothes into the studio. linda rossiter was regaining consciousness for just a few more minutes of sentient life. she was aware there had been a dreadful accident to some one; perhaps to herself. but she fully believed she had first of all saved the precious jars. no doubt they had put her to bed, and as there was something warm (her blood, poor thing) round her body, they must have packed her with hot water bottles. some idea of michael's no doubt. how _kind_ he was! she would soon get right, with him to look after her. she opened her eyes to meet his, as he bent over her, and said with the ghost of an arch smile: "i--have been--of some use--to you, haven't--i? ... (then the voice faltered and trailed away) ... i ... saved--your--specimens--" chapter xix bertie adams one day, early in april, , vivie was standing in a corridor of the hôpital de st. pierre talking to minna von stachelberg. she had just come from the railway station, where in common with the few british and americans who remained in brussels she had been to take a respectful and grateful farewell of the american minister and his wife, who were leaving belgium for holland, prior to the american declaration of war. american diplomacy had done little for her or her mother, but it had been the shield, the salvation, the only hope of belgium. moreover, the break-off of diplomatic relations initiated the certain hope of a happier future. american intervention in the war _must_ lead to peace and freedom. germany _must_ now be beaten and belgium set free. so she had contributed her mite to the fund which purchased spring flowers--hothouse-grown, for this april was a villainous prolongation of winter--with which to strew the approach to the station and fill the reserve compartment of the train. as vivie was nearing the end of her description--and minna was hoping it _was_ the end, as she wanted to get back to her patients--two german policemen marched up to vivie, clicked their heels, saluted, and said in german, "mademoiselle varennes, nicht wahr? be good enough to accompany us to the kommandantur." at this dread summons, vivie turned pale, and minna dismayed began to ask questions. the polizei answered that they had none to give.... might she accompany her friend? she might not. then followed a ride in a military motor, with the two silent policemen. they arrived outside the kommandantur.... more clanking, clicking, and gruff conversation in german. she got out, in response to a tight pressure on her arm, a grip in fact, and accompanied her grim guide through halls and corridors, and at last entered a severely furnished office, a kind of magistrate's court, and was confronted with--bertie adams! a whiskered, bearded, moustached, shabbily dressed (in a quasi-military uniform) bertie adams: lean, and hollow-eyed, but with the love-light in his eyes. he turned on her such a look of dog-like fealty, of happy recognition that although, by instinct and for his safety, she was about to deny all knowledge of him, she could not force her eyes or tongue to tell the lie. "oh miss, oh my dear miss warren! _how_ i have hungered and thirsted for a sight of you all these months and years! to see you once more is worth all and more i've gone through to get here. they may shoot me now, if they've got the heart--not that i've done anything to deserve it--i've simply had one object in view: to come here and help you." he looked around as if instinctively to claim the sympathy of the policemen. to say he met with none would be to make them out more inhuman than they were. but as all this speech was in english they understood but little of what he had said. they guessed he loved the woman to whom he spake, but he may have been pleading with her not to give him away, to palliate his acts of espionage. vivie replied: "_dear_ bertie! you can't be gladder to see me than i am you. i greet you with all my heart. but you must be aware that in coming here like this you--" her words stuck in her throat--she knew not what to say lest she might incriminate him farther-- a police officer broke in on her embarrassment and said in german: "es ist genug--you recognize him, madame? he was arrested this morning at the hotel impérial, enquiring for you. meantime, you also are under arrest. please follow that officer." "may i communicate with my friends?" said vivie, with a dry tongue in a dry mouth. "who are your friends?" "gräfin von stachelberg, at the hôpital de st. pierre; le pasteur walcker, rue haute, --" "i will let them know that you are arrested on a charge of high treason--in league with an english spy," he hissed. then vivie was pushed out of the room and bertie was seized by two policemen-- they did not meet again for three days. it was a saturday, and a police agent came into the improvised cell where vivie was confined--who had never taken off her clothes since her arrest and had passed three days of such mental distress as she had never known, unable to sleep on the bug-infested pallet, unable to eat a morsel of the filthy food--and invited her to follow him. "by the grace of the military governor of the prison of saint-gilles"--he said this in french as she understood german imperfectly--"you are permitted to proceed there to take farewell of your english friend, the prisoner a-dams, who has been condemned to death." bertie had been tried by court-martial in the senate, on the friday. he followed all the proceedings in a dazed condition. everything was carried on in german, but the parts that most concerned him were grotesquely translated by a ferocious-looking interpreter, who likewise turned bertie's stupid, involved, self-condemnatory answers into german--no doubt very incorrectly. bertie however protested, over and over again, that miss warren knew _nothing_ of his projects, and that his only object in posing as an american and travelling with false passports was to rescue miss warren from brussels and enable her to pass into holland, "or get out of the country _some_ 'ow." as to the emperor, and taking his life--"why lor' bless you, _i_ don't want to take _any one's_ life. i 'ate war, more than ever after all i've seen of it. upon my honour, gentlemen, all i want is miss warren." here one member of the court made a facetious remark in german to a colleague who sniggered, while, with his insolent light blue eyes, he surveyed bertie's honest, earnest face, thin and hollowed with privations and fatigue.... he was perfunctorily defended by a languid belgian barrister, tired of the invidious rôle of mechanical pleading for the lives of prisoners, especially where, as in this case, they were foredoomed, and eloquence was waste of breath, and even got you disliked by the impatient ogres, thirsty for the blood of an english man or woman.... "du reste," he said to a colleague, "agissait-il d'un belge, mon cher, tu sais que l'on se sentirait forcé à risquer le déplaisir de ces ogres: tandis que, pour un pauvre bougre d'anglais...? et qu'ont-ils fait pour nous, les anglais? nous avons tâché de leur boucher le trou à liège--et--il--nous--ont--abandonné. enfin--allons boire un coup--" verdict: as translated by the ferocious interpreter:-- "ze court faind you geeltee. you are condemned to dess, and you will be shot on monday." in the prison of saint-gilles--as i believe elsewhere in belgium--though there might be a military governor in control who was a german, the general direction remained in the hands of the belgian staff which was there when the german occupation began. these belgian directors and their subordinates were as kind and humane to the prisoners under their charge as the germans were the reverse. everything was done at saint-gilles to alleviate the mental agony of the condemned-to-death. the german courts tried to prolong and enhance the agony as much as possible, by sentencing the prisoners three days, six days, a week before the time of execution (though for fear of a reprieve this sentence was not immediately published) and letting them know that they had just so many days or hours to live: consequently most of them wasted away in prison with mind-agony, inability to sleep or eat; and even opiates or soporifics administered surreptitiously by the belgian prison doctors were but slight alleviations. bertie when first placed in his cell at saint-gilles asked for pen, ink, and paper. they were supplied to him. he was allowed to keep on the electric light all night, and he distracted his mind--with some dreadful intervals of horror at his fate--by trying to set forth on paper for vivie to read an explanation and an account of his adventures. he intended to wind up with an appeal for his wife and children. vivie never quite knew how bertie had managed to cross the war zone from france into belgium, and reach brussels without being arrested. when they met in prison they had so little time to discuss such details, in face of the one awful fact that he was there, and was in all probability going to die in two days. but from this incomplete, tear-stained scribble that he left behind and from the answers he gave to her few questions, she gathered that the story of his quest was something like this:-- he had planned an attempt to reach her in brussels or wherever she might be, from the autumn of onwards. the most practicable way of doing so seemed to be to pass as an american engaged in belgian relief work, in the distribution of food. direct attempts to be enrolled for such work proved fruitless, only caused suspicion; so he lay low. in course of time he made the acquaintance of one of those american agents of mr. hoover--a tousle-haired, hatless, happy-go-lucky, lawless individual, who made mock of laws, rules, precedents, and regulations. he concealed under a dry, taciturn, unemotional manner an intense hatred of the germans. but he was either himself of enormous wealth or he had access to unlimited national funds. he spent money like water to carry out his relief work and was lavishly generous to german soldiers or civilians if thereby he might save time and set aside impediments. he took a strong liking to bertie, though he showed it little outwardly. the latter probably in his naïveté and directness unveiled his full purpose to this gum-chewing, grey-eyed american. when the news of mrs. warren's death had reached bertie through a circuitous course--praed-honoria-rossiter--he had modified his scheme and at the same time had become still more ardent about carrying it into execution. in fact he felt that mrs. warren's death was opportune, as with her still living and impossible to include in a flight, vivie would probably have refused to come away. therefore in the summer of , he asked his american friend to obtain two american passports, one for himself and one for "his wife, mrs. violet adams." mr. praed had sent him a credit for five hundred pounds in case he could get it conveyed to vivie. bertie turned the credit into american bank notes. this money would help him to reach brussels and once there, if vivie would consent to pass as his wife, he might convey her out of belgium into holland, as two americans working under the relief committee. it had been excessively difficult and dangerous crossing the war zone and getting into occupied belgium. there was some hint in his talk of an alsatian spy who helped him at this stage, one of those "sanspatries" who spied impartially for both sides and sold any one they could sell (fortunately after the armistice most of these judases were caught and shot). the spy had probably at first blackmailed him when he was in belgium--which is why of the five hundred pounds in dollar notes there only remained about a third in his possession when he reached brussels--and then denounced him to the authorities, for a reward. but his main misfortune lay in the long delay before he reached brussels. during that time, the entire american diplomatic and consular staff was leaving belgium; and the emperor was arriving more or less secretly in brussels (it was said in the hope that a personal talk with brand whitlock might stave off the american declaration of war). bertie on his arrival dared not to go to the american legation for fear of being found out and disavowed. so he had asked his way in very "english" french, and wearing the semi-military uniform of an american relief officer--to the hotel "edward-sett," where he supposed vivie would be or could be heard of. when he reached the hotel impérial and asked for "miss warren," he had been at once arrested. indeed probably his steps had been followed all the way from the railway station to the door of the hotel by a plain-clothes german policeman. the germans were convinced just then that many englishmen and some american cranks were out to assassinate the kaiser. they took bertie's appearance at the door of the hotel impérial as a proof of his intention. they considered him to have been caught red-handed, especially as he had a revolver concealed on his person and was obviously travelling with false passports. "ah, bertie," said vivie, when they first met in his cell at saint-gilles prison. "if _only_ i had not led you into this! i am mad with myself..." "are you, miss? but 'oo could 'a foreseen this war would come along! we thought all we 'ad to fight was the police and the 'ome office to get the vote. and _then_, you'd 'a bin able to come out into the open and practise as a barrister--and me, again, as your clerk. it was our damned government that made you go abroad and get locked up 'ere. and once i realized you couldn't get away, thinks i to meself, _i'll_ find a way..." it was here that vivie began questioning him as to how he had reached brussels from the war zone; and as, towards the end of his story--some of which he said she would find he had written down in case they wouldn't let him see her--the reference to the emperor came in, she sprang up and tried the door of the cell. it was fastened without, but a face covered the small, square opening through which prisoners were watched; and a rough voice asked her what she wanted. it was the german police agent or spy, who, perched on a stool outside, next this small window, was there to listen to all they said. as they naturally spoke in english and the rough creature only knew "god-dam," and a few unrepeatable words, he was not much the wiser for his vigil. "i want--i _must_ see the director," said vivie. presently the director came. "oh, sir," said vivie, "give me paper and an envelope, i _implore_ you. there is pen and ink here and i will write a letter to the emperor, a petition. i will tell him briefly the true story of this poor young man; and _then_, if you will only forward it he may grant a reprieve." the director said he would do his best. after all, you never knew; and the kaiser, though he said he hated them always, had a greater regard for the english than for any other nation. as he glanced from vivie and her face of agonized appeal to the steadfast gaze which bertie fixed on her, as on some fairy godmother, his own eyes filled with tears--as indeed they did many, many times over the tragic scenes of the german terror. another request. could vivie see or communicate with gräfin von stachelberg?--with pasteur walcker? here the police agent intervened--"nothing of the kind! you're not going to hold a salon here. far too many concessions already. much more fuss and trouble, and i shall take you back to the kommandantur and report. write your letter to the all highest, who may deign to receive it. as to pastor walcker, he shall come to-morrow, sunday, to prepare the englishman for his death, on monday--" vivie wrote her letter--probably in very incoherent language. it was handed to the german police agent. he smiled sardonically as he took it in his horny hand with its dirty broken nails. the governor general disliked these appeals to the all highest. indeed, in most cases executions that were intended to take place were only announced at the same time as the condemnation, to obviate the worry of these appeals. besides, he knew the emperor had left that morning for charleville, after having bestowed several decorations on the police officials who told him they had just frustrated an english plot for his assassination. vivie and bertie were at length alone, for the police agent was bored, couldn't understand their talk, and gave himself an afternoon off. in this prison of saint-gilles, the cells were in many ways superior to those of english prisons. they were well lit through a long window, not so high up but that by standing on a chair you could look out on the prison garden. through this window the rays of the sun could penetrate into and light up the cell. there was no unpleasant smell--one of the horrors of holloway. the floor was a polished parquet. the bed was comfortable. there was a table, even a book-shelf. the toilet arrangements were in no way repulsive or obvious. vivie insisted on bertie lying down on the bed; she would sit on the chair by his side. he must be so exhausted.... "and what about _you_, miss? i'll lay you ain't slept these last three nights. _what_ a mess i've made of the 'ole thing!" "bertie! _why_ did you do this? _why_ did you risk your life to come here; _oh why, oh why_?" wailed vivie. "because i loved you, because i've always loved you, better'n any one else on earth--since i was a boy of fourteen and you spoke so kind to me and encouraged me to get on and improve myself; and giv' me books, and encouraged me about me cricket. i suppose i'm going to die, so i ain't got any shame about tellin' you all this. though if i thought i was goin' to live, i'd cut my tongue out sooner'n offend you--oh,"--he gave a kind of groan--"when the news come about mrs. warren bein' dead an' you p'raps without money and at the mercy of these germans ... well!--all i wonder at is i didn't steal an airyplane, and come in that. i tell you i had to exercise great self-control to stay week after week fiddling with the food distribution and pretendin' to be an american.... "well! there it is! we must all die sooner or later. it's a wonder i ain't dead already. i've bin in some tight places since i come out for the y.m.c.a.... "and talkin' about the y.m.c.a., miss, i do _beg_ of you, if you get out of this--an' i'm sure you will--they'll never kill _you_," said bertie adoringly, looking up at the grave, beautiful face that bent over him--"i do _beg_ of you to make matters right with the y.m.c.a. i ain't taken away one penny of their money--i served 'em faithfully up to the last day before i saw my chance of hooking it across the lines--they must think me dead--and so must poor nance, my wife. for i haven't dared to write to any one since i've bin in belgium. but i did send her a line 'fore i started, sayin', 'don't be surprised if you get no letter from me for some time. i'll turn up all right, you bet your boots--' "that may 'ave kept 'er 'opin'. an' soon you'll be able to let 'er know. who can say? _i_ dunno! but peace, you'd think, must come soon--seems like our poor old world is comin' to an end, don't it? _what_ times we've 'ad--if you don't mind me puttin' it like that! i remember when i had to be awful careful always to say 'sir' to you, and 'mr. david' or 'mr. williams'"--and a roguish look, a gleam of merriment came into bertie's eyes, and he laughed a laugh that was half sob. "if you was to write your life, no one 'ud believe it, miss. it licks any novel i ever read--and i've read a tidy few, looking after the y.m.c.a. libraries.... "my! but you was wonderful as a pleader in the courts! i used sometimes to reg'lar cry when i heard you takin' up the case of some poor girl as 'ad bin deserted by 'er feller, and killed 'er baby. 'tricks of the trade,' says some other barrister's clerk, sneerin' because you wasn't 'is boss. an' then i'd punch 'is 'ead.... an' i don't reckon myself a soft-'earted feller as a rule.... reklect that shillito case--?" "_don't_, bertie! _don't_ say such things in praise of me. i'm not _worth_ such love. i'm just an arrogant, vain, quarrelsome woman.... look how many people i've deceived, what little good i've really done in the world--" "rub--bish! you done good wherever you went ... to my pore mother--wonder, by the bye, what _she_ thinks and 'ow _she's_ gettin' on? sons are awful ungrateful and forgettin'. what with you--and nance--and the little 'uns, i ain't scarcely give a thought to poor mother. but you'll let her know, won't you, miss?... "think 'ow good you was to your old father down in wales, 'im as you called your father--an' 'oo's to say 'e wasn't? you never know.... miss warren! what a pity it is you never married. there's lots was sweet on you, i'll bet. yet i remember i used to 'ate the idea of your doin' so, and was glad you dressed up as a man, an' took 'em all in.... i may tell you all, miss, now i'm goin' to die, day after to-morrow. my poor nance! she see there was some one that always occupied my mind, and she used to get jealous-like, at times. but never did i let on it was you. why i wouldn't even 'av said it to myself--i respected you more than--than--" and bertie, at a loss for a parallel, ceased speaking for a time, and gulped down the sobs that were mastering him. then, after this pause--"i haven't a word to say against nance. no one could 'a bin a better wife. i know, miss, if you get away from here you'll look after her and my kids? i ain't bin much of a father to 'em lately. p'raps this is a punishment for neglecting my home duties--as they used to say to you when you was suffragin'." he gave a bitter laugh--"two such _nice_ kids.... i ain't seen 'em since last february twelve-month ... more'n a year ago ... i got a bit of leave then.... there's little vivie--the one we called after you.... she's growin' up so pretty ... and bert! 'e'll be a bigger and a better man than me, some day. 'e's started in life with better chances. i 'ope 'e'll be a cricketer. there's no game comes up to cricket, in my opinion..." at this juncture, the belgian directeur of the jail opened the door and asked vivie to follow him, telling bertie she would return in the afternoon. at the same time, a warder escorting two good conduct prisoners who did the food distribution proceeded to place quite an appetizing meal in bertie's cell. "dear miss," said the directeur in french, "you are so wise, i know, you will do what i wish...?" (vivie bowed.) "i shall not send you back to the kommandantur. i will take that on myself. but i must regard you while here as my prisoner"--he smiled sadly--"come with me. i will give you a nice cell where you shall eat and sleep, and--yes--and my wife shall come and see you..." in the evening of that day, vivie was led back to bertie's cell. there she found kind pasteur walcker. in some way he had heard of bertie's condemnation--perhaps seen it posted up on a red placard--and in his quiet assumption that whatever he did was right, had not waited for an official summons but had presented himself at the prison of saint-gilles and asked to see the directeur. he constituted himself bertie's spiritual director from that time onwards.... he spoke very little english but he was there more to sympathize than to preach-- "ce n'est pas, chère mamselle que je suis venu le troubler sur les questions de réligion. j'ai voulu le rassurer--et vous aussi--que j'ai déjà mis en train tous les precédés possibles, et que je connais, pour obtenir sa grace.... but," he went on, "i have spoken to the prison doctor and begged him meantime to give the poor young man an injection or a dose of something to make him sleep a little while..." then he withdrew. the daylight turned pink and faded to grey whilst vivie sat by the bed holding the left hand of the sleeping man. exhausted with emotion, she dropped off to sleep herself, slid off the chair on to the parquet, laid her head on the angle of his pillow and slept likewise.... the electric light suddenly shone out from a globe in the angle of the wall which served two cells. she awoke; bertie awoke. he was still happy in some opiate dream and his eyes in his haggard face looked at her with a sleepy, happy affection. loth to awaken him to reality she kissed him on the cheek and withdrew from the cell--for the directeur, out of delicacy, had withdrawn and left the door ajar. she rejoined him in the corridor and he led her to her own quarters for the night; where, worn out with sorrow and fatigue, she undressed and slept dreamlessly. but the hour of the awakening on that wintry sunday morning! it was snowing intermittently and the sky, seen from the high window, was lead-coloured. owing to the scarcity of fuel, the cell was unwarmed. she dressed hurriedly, feeling still untidy and dishevelled when she had finished. her breakfast, and with it a little packet of white powder from the prison doctor, to be taken with the breakfast. she swallowed it. if it were poison sent by the german government, what matter? but it was in reality some drug which took the edge off sorrow. bertie had evidently been given a similar dose. they spent the morning and the afternoon of that sunday together, almost happily. with intervals of dreamy silence, they talked of old times. neither would have been surprised had the cell walls dissolved as in a transformation scene and they had been able to step out into the fountain court of the temple or into the cheerful traffic of chancery lane. when however she returned to his cell after her evening meal, his mood had changed; the effect of the drug had passed. he had moods of despair and wild crying. no response had come, no answer to vivie's appeal, no result from monsieur walcker's activities. bertie reproached himself for cowardice ... then the doctor came in. "an injection in the arm? so! he will sleep now till morning. espérons toujours! et vous, ma pauvre mademoiselle. vous êtes excédée. permettez que je vous fasse la meme piqure?" but she thanked him and said she wanted all her wits about her, though she promised "se maîtriser"--to keep calm. what a night! her ears had a sense of hearing that was preternaturally acute. the most distant step in the corridors was audible. was it a reprieve? one such sound multiplied itself into the footsteps of two men walking, coming ever nearer--nearer--nearer till they stopped outside her cell door. with a clank it was opened. she sprang up. fortunately she had not undressed. "you've brought a reprieve?" she gasped. but the directeur and monsieur walcker only stood with downcast faces. "it will soon be morning," the directeur said. "there is no hope of a reprieve. he is to be executed at seven at the tir national. all we have secured for you is permission to accompany him to the end. but if you think _that_ too painful, too great a strain, i would suggest that you--" "nothing could overstrain me," said vivie, "or rather i don't care if anything kills me. i will go with him and stay with him, till the very last moment, stay with him till he is buried if you permit!" she made some hasty toilette, more because she wanted to look a fit companion for him, and not a wretched derelict. they summoned her, proffering a cup of acorn coffee, which she waved aside. the bitter cold air of the snowy april morning braced her. she entered the shuttered, armoured prison taxi in which bertie and a soldier were placed already. bertie had his arms tied, but not too painfully. he was shivering with the cold, but as he said, "_not_ afraid, miss. it'll come out allright, some'ow. that mr. walcker, 'e done me a lot of good. at any rate i'll show how an englishman can die. 'sides 'e says reprieves sometimes comes at the last moment. they takes a pleasure in tantalizin' you. and the doctor put somethin' in me cup of coffee, sort of keeps me spirits up." but for vivie, that drive was an unforgettable agony. they went through suburbs where the roads had been unrepaired or torn up by shrapnel. the snow lay in places so thickly that it nearly stopped the motor. still, it came to an end at last. the door on one side was wrenched open; she was pulled out rather unceremoniously; then, the pinioned bertie, who was handed over to a guard; and the soldier escort after him, who took his place promptly by his side. vivie had just time to note the ugly red-brick exterior of the main building of the tir national. it reminded her vaguely of some hastily-constructed exhibition at earl's court or olympia. then she was pushed inside a swinging door, into a freezing corridor; where the prison directeur and monsieur walcker were standing--irresolute, weeping.... "where is bertie?" she asked. "he is being prepared for the shooting party," they answered. "it will soon be over ... dear dear lady ... try to be calm--" "i will be as calm as you like," she said, "i will behave with the utmost correctitude or whatever you call it, if you--if they--the soldiers--the officer--will let me see him--as you promised--up to the last, the very last. but by god--if there _is_ a god--if you or they prevent me, i'll--" inexplicably, sheer mind-force prevailed, without the need for formulating the threat the poor grief-maddened woman might have uttered--she moved unresisted to a swing door which opened on to a kind of verandah. here was drawn up the firing party, and in front of them, fifteen feet away on snow-sodden, trampled grass, stood bertie. he caught sight of vivie passing in, behind the firing party, and standing beyond them at the verandah rail. he straightened himself; ducked his head aside from the handkerchief with which they were going to bandage his eyes, and shouted "take away your blasted handkerchief! _i_ ain't afraid o' the guns. if you'll let me look at her, i'll stand as quiet as quiet." the officer in command of the firing party shrugged his shoulders. the soldier escort desisted from his attempts to blindfold the englishman and stood aside, out of range. bertie fixed his glowing eyes on the woman he had loved from his youth up, the rifles rang out with a reverberating bellow, and he fell out of her sight, screened by the soldiers, a crumpled body over which they threw a sheet. what happened then to vivie? i suppose you expect the time-worn trick of the weary novelist, anxious to put his pen down and go to his tea: "then she seemed swallowed up in a cloud of blackness and knew no more"--till it was convenient to the narrator to begin a fresh chapter. but with me it must be the relentless truth and nothing but the truth, in all its aspects. vivie was deafened, nearly stunned by the frightful noise of the volley in a confined space. next, she was being unceremoniously pushed out of the verandah, into the corridor, and so out into the snow-covered space in front of the brick building; whilst the officer was examining the dead body of the fallen man, ready to give the _coup-de-grâce_, if he were not dead. but he was. vivie was next conscious that she had the most dreadful, blinding headache she had ever known, and with it felt an irresistible nausea. the prison directeur was taking her hand and saying: "mademoiselle: it is my duty to inform you that you are no longer under arrest. you are free to return to your lodging." minna von stachelberg had come from somewhere and was taking her right arm, to lead her brussels-ward; and pasteur walcker was ranging himself alongside to be her escort. unable to reply to any of them, she strode forward by herself to where under the snow lay an ill-kept grass plot, and there was violently sick. the anæsthetics and soporifics of the last two days were having their usual aftermath. after that came on a shuddering faintness and a rigor of shivers, under which her teeth clacked. some doctor came forward with a little brandy. she put the glass to her lips, then pushed it aside, took pasteur walcker's proffered arm, and walked towards the tram terminus. then they were in the tram, going towards the heart of brussels. how commonplace! fat frowsy market women got in--or got out--with their baskets; clerks entered with portfolios--don't they call them "serviettes"?--under their arms; german policemen, belgian gendarmes, german soldiers, a priest with his breviary came and went as though this monday morning were like any other. vivie walked quite firmly and staidly from the tram halt to the walckers' house in the rue haute. there she was met by madame walcker, who at a sign from her husband took her upstairs, silently undressed her and put her to bed with a hot water bottle and a cup of some hot drink which tasted a little of coffee. after that vivie passed three days of great sickness and nausea, a furred tongue, and positively no appetite. finally she arose a week after the execution and looked at herself in the mirror. she was terribly haggard, she looked at least fifty-five--"they must have taken me for his mother or his aunt; never for his sweetheart," she commented bitterly to herself. and her brown-gold hair was now distinctly a cinder grey. the next day she went back to work at the hospital. to minna, she said: "i can _never, never, never_ forget your kindness and sympathy. 'sister' seems an insufficient name to call you by. whatever happens, unless you cast me off, we shall be friends.... i dare say i even owe my life to you, if it is worth anything. but it is. i want to live--now--i want to live to be revenged. i want to live to help bertie's"--her voice still shook over the name--"bertie's wife and children. i expect but for you i should have been tried already in the senate for complicity with ... bertie ... and found guilty and shot..." _minna_: "i won't go so far as to say you are right. but i certainly _was_ alarmed about you, when you were arrested. of course i knew nothing--_nothing_--about that poor young man till just before his execution when pastor walcker came to me. even then i could do nothing, and i understood so badly what had happened. but about you: i said to myself, if i do not do _something_, you can perhaps be sentenced to imprisonment ... and i _did_ bestir myself, you can bet!" (minna liked to show she knew a slangy phrase or two.) "so i telegraphed to the emperor, i besieged von bissing at the ministère des sciences et des arts; wrote to him, telegraphed to him, telephoned to him, sat in his anterooms, neglected my hospital work entirely from friday to monday-- "i expect as a matter of fact they found nothing in that poor young's man's papers to implicate you. they just wanted--the brutes--to give you a good fright ... and i dare say ... such is the military mind--even wished you to see him shot. "by the bye, i suppose you have heard that von bissing is very ill? dying, perhaps--" _vivie_: "i _hope_ so. i am _so_ glad. i hope it's a painful illness and that he'll die and find there really _is_ a hell, and an uncommonly hot one!" it must not be supposed from the frequent quotations from countess von stachelberg's condemnations of german cruelties that she was an unpatriotic woman, repudiating, apostatizing from her own country. on the contrary: she held--mistakenly or not--that germany had been the victim of secret diplomacy, had been encircled by a ring fence of enemies, refused the economic guarantees she required, and the colonial expansion she desired. minna disliked the slavs, did not believe in them, save as musicians, singers, painters, dancers, and actors. she believed germany had a great civilizing, culture-spreading mission in south-east europe; and that the germs of this war lay in the policy of chamberlain, the protectionism of the united states, the revengeful spirit and colonial selfishness of france. but she shuddered over the german cruelties in belgium and france. the horrors of war were a revelation to her and she was henceforth a pacifist before all things. "_your_ old statesmen and _our_ old or middle-aged generals, my dear, are alike to blame. but you and i know where the _real_ mischief lies. we are mis-ruled by an all-man government. _i_, certainly, don't want the other extreme, an all-woman government. what we want, and must have, is a man-and-woman--a married--government. _then_ we shall settle our differences without going to war." vivie agreed with her, cordially. she--vivie--i really ought to begin calling her "vivien": she is forty-one by now--in resuming her duties at the hôpital de st. pierre found no repugnance in tending wounded german soldiers--the officers she did shrink from--she realized that the soldiers were but the slaves of the officer class, of kaiserdom. her reward for this degree of christianity was to have a batch of wounded english boys or men to look after. she saw again bertie adams in many of them, especially in the sergeants and corporals. they, in turn, thought her a very handsome, stately lady, but rather maudlin at times. "so easy to set 'er off a-cryin' as though 'er 'eart would break, poor thing.... and i says 'why ma'am, the pain's _nuthin_', nuthin' to what it use ter be.' 'spec' she lost some son in the war. wonder 'ow she came to be 'ere? ain't the germans afraid of 'er!"... they were. the mental agony she had been through had etherialized her face, added to its look of age and gravity, but imparted likewise a sort of "awfulness." she exhaled an aura of righteous authority. she had been through the furnace, and foolishness and petulance had been burnt out of her ... though, thank goodness, she retained some sense of humour. she had probably never been so handsome from the painter's point of view, though one could not imagine a young man falling in love with her now. her personality was first definitely noted by the bruxellois the day that von bissing's funeral cortège passed through the streets of brussels on its way to germany. vivien warren was sufficiently restored to health then to stand on the steps of some monument and cry "vive la belgique! À bas les tyrans!" the policemen and the spies looked another way and affected deafness. they had orders not to arrest her unless she actually resorted to firearms or other lethal weapons. it was said that her appeal for bertie adams did reach the emperor, two days too late; that he pished and pshawed over von bissing's cruel precipitancy. "englishmen," he muttered to his entourage, "don't assassinate. the irish do. but _how_ i'm going to make peace with england, _i_ don't know...!" (his hell on earth must have been that few people admired the english character more than he did, and yet, unprovoked, he had blundered into war with england.) however, though it was too late to save "this lunatic adams," he gave orders that vivie was to be let alone. he even, through gräfin von stachelberg, transmitted to her his regrets that she and her mother had been treated so cavalierly at the hotel impérial. it was not through any orders of his. so: vivie became quite a power in brussels during that last anxious year and a half of waiting, between may, , and november, . german soldiers, still limping from their wounds, saluted her in the street, remembering her kindness in hospital, and the letters she unweariedly wrote at their dictation to their wives and families--for she had become quite a scholar in german. the scanty remains of the british colony and the great ladies among the patriotic belgians now realized how false were the stories that had circulated about her in the first year of the war; and extended to her their friendship. and the spanish minister who had taken the place of the american as protector of british subjects, invited her to all the fêtes he gave for belgian charities and red cross funds. through his legation she endeavoured to send information to the y.m.c.a. and to bertie's widow that albert adams of the y.m.c.a. "had died in brussels from the consequences of the war." i dare say in the autumn of , if vivien warren had applied through the spanish minister for a passport to leave belgium for some neutral country, it would have been accorded to her: the german authorities would have been thankful to see her no more. she reminded them of one of the cruellest acts of their administration. but she preferred to stay for the historical revenge of seeing the germans driven out of belgium, and belgian independence restored. and she could not go lest bertie's grave should be forgotten. in common with edith cavell, gabrielle petit, philippe bauck, and the other forty or fifty victims of von bissing's "terror," he had been buried in the grassy slopes of the amphitheatre of the rifle range, near where he had been executed. every sunday, wet or fine, vivien went there with fresh flowers. she had marked the actual grave with a small wooden cross bearing his name, till the time should come when she could have his remains transferred to english soil. one day, as she was leaving the hospital in the autumn of , a shabby man pushed into her hand a soiled, way-worn copy of the _times_, a fortnight old. "three francs," he whispered. she paid him. it was no uncommon thing for her or one of her english or belgian acquaintances to buy the _times_ or some other english daily at a price ranging from one franc to ten, and then pass it round the friendly circle of subscribers who apportioned the cost. on this occasion she opened her _times_ in the tram, going home, and glanced at its columns. in any one but "mees varennes" in these days of , , this would have been a punishable offence; but in her case no spy or policeman noted the infringement of regulations about the enemy press. on one of the pages she read the account of a bad air-raid on portland place, and a reference--with a short obituary notice elsewhere--to the death of one of the victims of the german bombs. this was "linda, lady rossiter, the dearly loved wife of sir michael rossiter, whose discoveries in the way of bone grafting and other forms of curative surgery had been among the outstanding achievements in etc., etc." "dear me!" said vivien to herself, as the tram coursed on beyond her usual stopping place and the conductor obstinately looked the other way, "i'm glad she lived to be _lady_ rossiter. it must have given her such pleasure. poor thing! and to think the knowledge that he's a widower hardly stirs my pulses one extra beat. and how i _loved_ that man, seven years, six years, five years ago! hullo! where am i? miles from the rue haute! conducteur! arrêtez, s'il vous plaît." chapter xx after the armistice the bruxellois felt very disheartened in the closing months of . the russian revolution had brought about the collapse of russia as an enemy of germany; and the germans were enabled to transport most of their troops on the russian frontier to the west and to the italian frontier. italy had lost half venetia and enormous quantities of guns in the breach of her defences at caporetto. it seemed indeed at any moment, when the ice and snow of that dreadful winter of - melted, as though italy would share the fate of rumania. though the british army had had a grand success with their tanks, they had, ere ended, lost nearly all the ground gained round cambrai. besides, the submarine menace was imperilling the british food supplies and connections with america. as to the united states: was their intervention going to be more than money loans and supplies of material? would they really supply the fighting men, the one thing at this crisis necessary to defeat germany? belgium had been divided administratively into two distinct portions, north and south of the meuse. north of the meuse she was to be a dutch-speaking country either part of germany eventually, or given to holland to compensate her for her very benevolent neutrality towards germany during the war. a handful of flemish adventurers appeared at brussels to form the council of flanders, and sickened the bruxellois by their lavish praise of the german administration and servile concurrence with all german measures. the events of the spring of accentuated the despair in the belgian capital. when the germans broke through the defences of the new lines which ran through picardy and champagne, reached the vicinity of amiens, retook soissons, and recrossed the marne, it seemed as though belgian independence had been lost; the utmost she could hope for would be the self-government of a german province. but vivie was not among the pessimists. she discerned a smouldering discontent among the german soldiers, even when germany seemed near to a sweeping victory over france and britain. the brutality of the soldiers, their deliberate, nasty dirtiness during the first two years of the war seemed due rather to their officers' orders than to an anti-human disposition of their own. many of the soldiers in belgium, in brussels, turned round--so to speak--and conceived a horror of what they had done, of what they had been told to do. men who on the instigation of their officers--and these last, especially the prussians, seemed fiends incarnate--had offered violence to young belgian women, ended by offering to marry them, even showed themselves kind husbands, only too willing to become domesticated, groaning at having to leave their temporary homes and return to the terrible fighting on the yser or in france. there were, for example, the soldiers stationed at the villa beau-séjour and at the oudekens' farm. vivie had a growing desire to find out what had happened to her mother's property. one day, late in february, , when there was a premature breath and feeling of spring in the air, she called on her friend--as he had become--the directeur of the prison of saint-gilles, and asked him--since she herself could not deign to ask any favour or concession of the german authorities--to obtain for her a permit to proceed to tervueren, the railway service between brussels and that place having been reopened. she walked over--with what reminiscences the roads and paths were filled--to the villa, and showing her pass was received, not uncivilly, by the sergeant-major in charge. fortunately the officers had all gone, voting it very dull, with brussels so near and yet so far. after their departure the sergeant-major and his reduced guard of men had begun to make the place more homelike. the usual german thrift had shown itself. they had reassembled the remains of mrs. warren's herd of cows. these had calves and were giving milk. there were once more the beginnings of a poultry yard. the rooms had been cleaned at any rate of their unspeakable filth, though the dilapidations and the ruined furniture made tears of vexation stand in vivie's eyes. however she kept her temper and told the sergeant that it was _her_ property now; that she intended to reclaim it at the end of the war, and that if he saw to it that the place was handed back to her with no further damage, she would take care that he was duly rewarded; and as an instalment she gave him a good tip. he replied with a laugh and a shrug "that may well come about." ("das könnte wohl geschehen.") he had already heard of the engländerin whom the kommandantur was afraid to touch, and opened his heart to her; even offering to prepare her a little meal in her own _salle à manger_. with what strange sensations she sat down to it. the sergeant as he brought in the _oeufs au plat_ said the soldiers were already sick of the war. most wanted to go back to germany, but a few were so much in love with belgium that they hoped they might be allowed to settle down there; especially those who spoke platt-deutsch, to whom flemish came so easy. from villa beau-séjour, vivien warren passed on to the oudekens' farm, wondering what she would see--some fresh horror? but on the contrary, mme. oudekens looked years younger; indeed when vivien first stood outside the house door, she had heard really hearty laughter coming from the orchard where the farmer's widow was pinning up clothes to dry. yet it was here that the woman's husband had been shot and buried, as the result of a field-court's sentence. but when she answered vivien's questions, after plying her with innumerable enquiries, she admitted with a blush that heinrich, the german sergeant, with whom she had first cohabited by constraint, had recently married her at the mairie, though the curé had refused to perform the religious service. heinrich was now invariably kind and worked hard on the farm. he hoped by diligently supplying the officers' messes in brussels with poultry and vegetables that he and his assistants--two corporals--might be overlooked and not sent back into the fighting ranks. as to her daughters, after a few months of promiscuity--a terrible time that mme. oudekens wanted to forget--they had been assigned to the two corporals as their exclusive property. they were both of them about to become mothers, and if no one interfered, as soon as this accursed war was over their men would marry them. "but," said vivie, "suppose your husband and these corporals are married already, in germany?" "qu'est-ce-que ça fait?" said mme. oudekens. "c'est si loin." by making these little concessions she had already saved her youngest son from deportation to germany. the enormous demands for food in brussels, which in had a floating population of over a million and where the germans were turning large dogs into pemmican, had tripled the value of all productive farms so near the capital as those round tervueren, especially now the railway service was reopened. many of the peasants were making huge fortunes in complicity with some german soldier-partner. in brussels itself, soldiers often sided with the people against the odious "polizei," the intolerable german spies and police agents. conflicts would sometimes occur in the trams and the streets when the german police endeavoured to arrest citizens for reading the _times_ or _la libre belgique_, or for saying disrespectful things about the emperor. the tremendous rush of the german offensive onward to the marne, somme, and ypres salient in march-june, , was received by the shifting garrison of brussels with little enthusiasm. would it not tend to prolong the war? the german advance into france was spectacular, but it was paid for by an appalling death-roll. the hospitals at brussels were filled to overflowing with wounded and dying men. the austrians who were brought from the italian front to replenish the depleted battalions, quarrelled openly with the prussians, and in some cases had to be surrounded in a barrack square and shot down. the first real check to the german army in its second march on paris--that which followed its crossing of the marne near dormans--was prophetically greeted by the bruxellois as the turning of the tide. the emperor had gone thither from the hotel impérial in order to witness and follow the culminating march on paris. but foch now struck with his reserves, and the head of the tortoise was nipped off. the driving back of the germans over the marne coincided with the belgian national fête of july . not since had this fête been openly observed. but on this day in , the german police made no protest when a huge crowd celebrated the fête day in every church and every street. vivien herself, smiling and laughing as she had not done since bertie's death, attended the service in sainte-gudule and joined in singing _la brabançonne_ in place of _te deum, laudamus_. in the streets and houses of brussels every piano, every gramophone was enrolled to play the _marseillaise_, _vers l'avenir_, and _la brabançonne_, the belgian national anthem (uninspiring words and dreary tune). from this date onwards--july --the german _débacle_ proceeded, with scarcely one day's intermission, with never a german regain of lost ground. when the americans had retaken st. mihiel on september , then did belgians boldly predict that their king would be back in brussels by christmas. but their prophecies were outstripped by events. already, in the beginning of october, the accredited german press in belgium was adjuring the belgians not to be impatient, but to let them evacuate belgium quietly. at the end of october, minna von stachelberg told vivien that she and the other units of the german red cross had received instructions to leave and hand over their charges to the belgian doctors and nurses. the two women took an affectionate farewell of each other, vowing they would meet again--somewhere--when the war was over. british wounded now began to cease coming into brussels, so vivie was free to attend to her own affairs. enormous quantities of german plunder were streaming out of belgium by train, by motor, in military lorries, in carts and waggons. nearly all this belonged to the officers, and the already-rebellious soldiers broke out in protestations. "why should they who had done all the fighting have none of the loot?" so they won over the belgian engine-drivers--delighted to see this quarrel between the hyenas--and held up the trains in the suburban stations north of brussels. there were pitched battles which ended always in the soldiers' victory. the soldiers then would hold auctions and markets of the plunder captured in the trains and lorries. they were in a hurry to get a little money to take back with them to germany. vivie, who had laid her plans now as to what to do after the german evacuation of brussels, attended these auctions. she was nearly always civilly treated, because so many german soldiers had known her as a friend in hospital and told other soldiers. at one such sale she bought a serviceable motor-car for francs; at another drums of petrol. she had provided herself with funds by going to her mother's bank and reopening the question of the deposited jewels and plate. now that the victory of the allies seemed certain, the bank manager was more inclined to make things easy for her. he had the jewels and plate valued--roughly--at £ , ; and although he would not surrender them till the will could be proved and she could show letters of administration, he consented on behalf of the bank to make her a loan of , francs. on november th, a german soldier who followed vivien about with humble fidelity since she had cured him of a bad whitlow--and also because, as he said, it was a joy to speak english once more--for he had been a waiter at the savoy hotel--came to her in the boulevard d'anspach and said "the red flag, lady, he fly from kommandantur. with us i think it is kaput." this was what vivien had been waiting for. asking the man to follow her, she first stopped outside a shop of military equipment, and after a brief inspection of its goods entered and purchased a short, not too flexible riding-whip, with a heavy handle. then as the trams were densely crowded, she walked at a rapid pace--glancing round ever and again to see that her german soldier was following--up the boulevard du jardin botanique and along the rue royale until she came to the hotel impérial. here she halted for a minute to have the soldier close behind her; then gave the revolving door a turn and found herself and him in the marble hall once built for mrs. warren's florid taste. "call the manager," she said--trying not to pant--to two belgian servants who came up, a porter and a lift man. the manager--he who had ejected her and her mother in --was fortunately a little while in appearing. he was really packing up with energy so as to depart with all the plunder he could transport before the way of escape was closed. this little delay enabled vivien to get her breath and resume an impressive calm. "well: what you want?" the manager said insolently, recollecting her. "this first," she said, seizing him suddenly by his coat collar. "i want--to--give--you--the--soundest--thrashing you have ever had..." and before he could offer any effective resistance she had lashed him well with the riding _cravache_ about the shoulders, hands, back and face. he wrenched himself free and crouched ready for a counter attack. but the belgian servants intervened and tripped him up; and the german soldier--the ex-waiter from the savoy--said that madame was by nature so kind that there must be some good reason for this chastisement. "there is," she replied, now she had got her breath and was inwardly feeling ashamed at her resort to such violent methods. "three years ago, this creature turned my mother and myself out of this hotel with such violence that my mother died of it a few minutes afterwards. he stole our money and much of our property. i have inherited from my mother, to whom this hotel once belonged, a right over certain rooms which she used to occupy. i resume that right from to-day. i shall go to them now. as to this wretch, throw him out on to the pavement. he can afterwards send for his luggage, and what really is his he shall have." her orders were executed. she then sent a message to mme. walcker and to the kind tea-shop woman, mme. trouessart, close by, explaining what she had done and why. "i shall take control of this hotel in the name of the belgian company that owns it, a company in which, through my mother, i possess shares. i shall stay here till responsible persons take it over and i shall resume possession of the _appartement_ that belonged to my mother." meantime, would madame trouessart engage a few stout wenches to eke out the scanty hotel staff, most of which being german had already commenced its flight back to the fatherland with all the plunder it could carry off. the soldier-ex-hotel-waiter was provisionally engaged to remain, as long as the belgian government allowed him, and three stalwart british soldiers, until the day before prisoners-of-war, were enlisted in her service and armed with revolvers to repel any ordinary act of brigandage. by the end of november she had the hotel Édouard-sept--with the old name restored--running smoothly and ready for the new guests--british, french officers and civilians who would follow the king of the belgians on his return to his capital. the re-established belgian authorities soon put her into possession of the villa beau-séjour. the german sergeant-major here had kept faith with her, and in return for handing over everything intact, including the herd of cows, received a _douceur_ which amply rewarded him for this belated honesty before he, too, set his face towards germany with the rest of the evacuating army. the motor-car she had bought enabled her to fetch supplies of food from farm to hotel and to perform many little services to belgians who were returning to their old homes. madame trouessart, not as yet having any stock of tea with which to reopen her tea-shop to the first incoming of curious tourists, agreed to live with miss warren at the hotel and act as her deputy, if affairs took her away from brussels. it was at the hotel Édouard-sept, the place where she had been born, that rossiter met her when he arrived in brussels after the armistice. she felt a little tremulous when his card was sent up to her, and kept him waiting quite five minutes while she saw that her hair was tidy and estimated before the glass the extent to which it had gone grey. she had let it grow of late years--the days of david williams and mr. michaelis seemed very remote--and spent some time and consideration in arranging it. her costume was workmanlike and that of an hotel manageress in the morning; yet distinctly set off her figure and suited her character of an able-bodied, intellectual woman. * * * * * "vivie!" "michael!" "my _dear_! you're handsomer than ever!" "michael! your khaki uniform becomes you; and i'm _so_ glad you've got rid of that beard. _now_ we can see your well-shaped chin. but still: we mustn't stand here, paying one another compliments, though this meeting is _too_ wonderful: i never thought i should see you again. let's come to realities. i suppose the real heart-felt question at the back of your mind is: _can_ i let you have a room? i can, but not a bath-room suite; they're all taken..." _michael_: "nonsense! i'm going to be put up at the palace hotel. jenkins--you remember the butler of old time?--jenkins, and my batman, a refined brigand, a polished robber, have already been there and commandeered something.... "no. i came here, firstly to find out if you were living; secondly to ask you to marry me" ... (a pause) ... "and thirdly to find out what happened to bertie adams. a message came through the spanish legation here, a year and a half ago, to the effect that he had died at brussels from the consequences of the war. however, unless you can tell me at once this is all a mistake, we can go into his affairs later. my first question is--oh! bother all this cackle.... _will_ you marry me?" _vivie_: "dear, brave bertie, whom i shall everlastingly mourn, was shot here in brussels by the abominable germans, as a spy, on april th, . he was of course no more a spy than you are or i am. the poor devoted fool--i rage still, because i shall never be worth such folly, such selfless devotion--got into belgium with false passports--american: in the hope of rescuing me. he came and enquired here--my last address in his remembrance--and came by sheer bad luck just as the kaiser was about to arrive. they jumped to the conclusion that--" _rossiter_: "_awfully, cruelly_ sad. but you can give me the details of it later on. you must have a long, long story of your own to tell which ought to be of poignant interest. but ... will you marry me? i suppose you know dear linda died--was killed by a bomb in a german air-raid last year--october, . i really felt _heart-broken_ about it, but i know now i am only doing what she would have wished. she came at last to talk about you _quite_ differently, _quite_ understanding--" _vivie_: "that's what all widowers say. they always declare the dead wife begged them to marry again, and even designated her successor. poor linda! yes, i read an account of it in a copy of the _times_; but i couldn't of course communicate with you to say how _truly, truly_ sorry i was. i am glad to know she spoke nicely of me. did she really? or have you only made it up?" _michael_: "_of course_ i haven't. she really did. do you know, she and i quite altered after the war began? she lost all her old silliness and inefficiency--or at any rate only retained enough of the old childishness to make her endearing. and i really grew to love her. i quite forgot you. yes: i admit it.... "but somehow, after she was dead the old feeling for you came back ... and without any disloyalty to linda. i felt in a way--i know it is an absurd thing for a man of science to say, for we have still no proof--i felt somehow as though she lived still. that's why i don't want to get rid of the park crescent house. her presence seems to linger there. but i also knew--instinctively--that she would like us to come together.... she..." _waiter_ (knocking at door and slightly opening it): "madame! le général tompkins veut vous voir. il ajoute qu'il n'est pas habitué à attendre. il y a aussi m'sieur Émile vandervelde, qui arrive instamment et qui n'a pas d'installation..." _rossiter_: "damn! let me go and settle with 'em. tompkins! i never heard such cheek--" _vivien_: "not at all. you forget i am manageress." (to waiter) "entrez done! dîtes au général que je serai à sa disposition dans trois minutes; et montrez-lui ce que nous avons en fait de chambres. tous les appartements avec bain sont pris. casez m'sieur vandervelde quelque part. du reste, je descendrai."... (waiter goes out) ... "michael! it is impossible to have a sentimental conversation here, and at this hour--eleven o'clock on a busy morning. if you want an answer to your second question, now you've seen me, meet me outside the palm house of the jardin botanique, at p.m. i'll get off somehow for an hour just then. don't forget! it's close by here--along the rue royale. be absolutely punctual, or else i shall think that having _seen_ me, seen how changed i am, you have altered your mind. i shall _quite_ understand; only i _may_ come back at five minutes past three and accept general tompkins. acquaintances ripen quickly in brussels." * * * * * in the palm house--or rather one of its many compartments; . p.m., on a beautiful afternoon in early december. the sun is sinking over outspread brussels in a pink and yellow haze radiating from the good-humoured-looking, orange orb. there are no other visitors to the palm house, at any rate not to this compartment, except the superintending gardener--the same that cheered the last hours of mrs. warren. he recognizes vivien and salutes her gravely. seeing that she is accompanied by a gentleman in khaki he discreetly withdraws out of hearing and tidies up a tree fern. vivien and michael seat themselves on two green iron chairs under the fronds and in front of grey stems. _vivie_: "this is a favourite place of mine for assignations. i can't think why it is so little appreciated by young brussels. these palm houses are much more beautiful than anything at kew; they are in the heart of brussels, over which, as you see, you have a wonderful view. it was much more frequented when the germans were here. with all their brutality they did not injure this unequalled collection of tropical plants. they made the palm house an allowance of coal and coke in winter while we poor human beings went without. i used often to come in here on a winter's day to get warm and to forget my sorrows.... "look at that superb raphia--_what_ fronds! and that phoenix spinosa--and that aralia--" _rossiter_: "bother the aralia. i haven't come here for a botany lesson. besides, it isn't an aralia; it's a gomphocarpus.... vivie! _will_ you marry me?" _vivie_: "my dear michael: i was forty-three last october." _michael_: "i was _fifty-three_ last november, the day the armistice was signed. but i feel more like thirty-three. life in camp has quite rejuvenated me..." _vivie_ (continuing): ... "and my hair is cinder grey--an unfortunate transition colour. and if the gardener were not looking i should say: 'feel my elbows ... dreadfully bony! and my face has become..." she turns her face towards him. he sees tears trembling on the lower lashes of her grey eyes, but something has come into the features, some irradiation of love--is it the light of the sunset?--which imparts a tender youthfulness to the curvature of cheek, lips and chin. her face, indeed, might be of any age: it held the undying beauty of a goddess, in whom knowledge has sweetened to tenderness and divinity has dissolved in a need for compassion; and the youthful assurance of a happy woman whose wish at last is won.... for a minute she looks at him without finishing her sentence. then she sits up straighter and says explicitly: "yes, i will." * * * * * the gardener managed an occasional peep at them, sitting hand in hand. he wished the idyll to last as long as the clear daylight, but the hour for closing was four o'clock--"il n'y avait pas à nier." either they were husband and wife, reunited, after years of war-severance; or they were mature lovers, and probably of the most respectable. in either case, the necessary hint that ecstasies must transfer themselves at sunset from the glass houses of the jardin botanique to the outer air was best conveyed on this occasion by a discreet gift of flowers. accordingly he went on to where exotic lilies were blooming, picked a few blossoms, returned, came with soft padding steps up to vivie, offered them with a bow and "mes félicitations _sincères_, madame." vivie laughed and took the lilies; rossiter of course gave him a ten-franc note. and they sauntered slowly back to the hotel. l'envoi i am reproached by such art critics as deign to notice my pictures with "finishing my foregrounds over much,"--filling them with superabundant detail, making the primroses more important than the snow-peaks. and by my publishers with forgetting the price of paper and the cost of printing. my jury of matrons thinks i don't know where to leave off and that i might very well close this book on the answer that mrs. warren's daughter gave to sir michael rossiter's proposal of marriage in the palm house at brussels. "the reader," they say, "can very well fill in the rest of the story for himself or herself. it is hardly likely that vivie will cry off at the last moment, or michael reconsider the plunge into a second marriage. why therefore waste print and paper and our eyesight in describing the marriage ceremony, the inevitable visit to honoria, and what vivie did with the property she inherited from her mother?" no doubt they are all right. yet i am distrustful of my readers' judgment and imagination. i feel both want guiding, and i doubt their knowledge of the world and goodness of heart being equal to mine, except in rare cases. so i throw out these indications to influence the sequels they may plan to this story. i think that michael and vivie were married at the british legation in brussels between christmas and the new year of - ; before that legation was erected into an embassy; and that the marriage officer was kind, genial mr. hawk when he returned to brussels from the hague and proceeded to get the legation into working order. i am sure mr. hawk entered into the spirit of the thing and gave an informal breakfast afterwards in the rue de spa to which mons. and mme. walcker, mons. and mme. trouessart, and the directeur of the prison of saint-gilles and his wife were invited. i think the head gardener of the jardin botanique who had charge of the tropical houses cribbed from the collections some of the most magnificent blooms, and presented them to vivie on the morning of her marriage; and that afterwards she laid the bouquet on her mother's newly finished tomb in the cemetery of st. josse-ten-noode, where, the weather being singularly mild for the time of year, the flowers lasted fresh and blooming for several days. i am sure she and michael then crossed the road and passed on to the building of the tir national; entered it and stood for a moment in the verandah from which vivie had seen bertie adams executed; and passed on over the tussocky grass to the graves of bertie adams and edith cavell, where they did silent homage to the dead. i believe a few days afterwards they visited the senate where the victims of von bissing's "terror" had been tried, browbeaten, insulted, mocked. and the functionary who showed them over this superb national palace is certain to have included in his exposition the once splendid carpets which the german officers prior to their evacuation of the senate--all but the legislative chamber of which was used as a barracks for rough soldiery--had sprayed and barred, streaked and splodged with printing ink. he would also have pointed out the three-hundred-year-old tapestries they had ripped from the walls and the historical portraits they had slashed, and would again have emphasized the fact that in all these senseless devastations the officers were far worse than the men. also i am certain that michael and vivie made a pilgrimage to the prison of saint-gilles, and stood silently in the cell where bertie adams and vivie had spent those terrible days of suspense and despair between april and april , ; and that when they entered that other compartment of the prison where edith cavell had passed her last days before her execution, they listened with sympathetic reverence to the recital by the directeur of verses from "l'hymne d'Édith cavell"--as it is now called--no other than the sad old poem of human sorrow, _abide with me_; and that they appreciated to the full the warmth of belgian feeling which has turned the cell of edith cavell into a chapelle ardente in perpetuity. i think they returned to england in january, , so that michael might get back quickly to his work of mending the maimed, now transferred to english hospitals; and so that vivie--always a practical woman--should prove her mother's will, secure her heritage and have it in hand as a fund from which to promote all the happiness she could. i doubt whether she will give much of it to "causes" rather than cases and to politics in preference to persons. i think she was awfully disgusted when she was back in the england of to-day not to find mrs. fawcett prime ministress and first lady of the treasury, annie kenney at the board of trade and christabel pankhurst running the ministry of health. it was disheartening after the long struggle for the woman's vote and the equality of the sexes in opportunity to find the same old men-muddlers in charge of all public affairs and departments of state, and the only woman on the benches of the house of commons a millionaire peeress never before identified with the struggle for the woman's cause. however i think her disenchantment did not diminish the rapture at finding herself once more in the intimacy of honoria armstrong. sir petworth, when he ran over on leave from the army of occupation, thought her enormously improved, though he had the tact not to say so. he frankly made the _amende honorable_ for his suspicions and churlishness of the past, and himself--i think--insisted on his frank and friendly children calling her "aunt vivie." i am equally sure that vivie was not long in london before she appeared at dear old praddy's studio, beautifully gowned and looking years younger than forty-three; and i shouldn't wonder but that her presence once more in his circle will give his frame a fillip so that he may cheat death over a few more annual outbreaks of influenza. i am convinced that he has left all his money, after providing a handsome annuity for the parlour-maid, to vivie, knowing that in her hands, far more--and far more quickly than in those that direct princely and public charities--will his funds reach the students and the poverty-stricken artists whom he wants to benefit. i think that after spending the first five months of in london, getting no. park crescent tidy again and fully repaired (because michael wished to pursue more thoroughly than ever his biological researches), vivie and michael went off to spend their real honeymoon in the occupied territory of the rhineland, in that never-to-be forgotten june, memorable for its splendid sunshine and the beauty of its flowers and foliage. i think they did this expressly (under the guise of a visit to general armstrong), so that vivie and minna von stachelberg--now minna schultz--might foregather at bonn. minna had married again, an officer of no family but of means and of fine physique whom she had nursed in brussels. his left arm had been shattered, but the skill of the belgian surgeons and her devoted nursing had saved it from being amputated. she had wished however to have him examined by some great exponent of curative surgery at bonn university, and the conjunction of the celebrated sir michael rossiter--who in his discussions of anatomy with the bonn professors forgot there had ever been a war between britain and germany--was most opportune. i think however that sir michael said this was all humbug on minna's part, and that all she wanted--her husband, major schultz, looking the picture of health--was to meet once more her well-beloved vivie. at any rate i am sure they met in the rhineland in a propitious month when you could be out of doors all day and all night; and that minna said some time or other how happy she was in her second marriage, and that however heartily she disliked militarism and condemned war, soldiers made the nicest husbands. i think before she and vivie parted to go their several ways, they determined to work for the building up of an anglo-german reconciliation, and for the advocacy in both countries of a man-and-woman government. i think, nevertheless, that vivie being a sound business woman and possessing a strong sense of justice on the lines of an eye for an eye, will claim at least five thousand pounds from the german government for the devastations and thefts at the villa beau-séjour; and that having got it and having disposed of her mother's jewellery and plate for £ , , she will present the villa beau-séjour property and an endowment of £ , to the town of brussels, as an educational orphanage for the children of belgian soldiers who have died in the war, where they may receive a practical education in agriculture and poultry farming. i fancy she gave a thousand pounds to pasteur walcker's congo mission; and transferred to mme. trouessart all her shares in and rights over the hotel Édouard-sept. i also picture to myself the rossiters having a motor tour of pure pleasure and delight of the eyes in south wales in september, . i imagine their going to pontystrad and surprising the vicar and vicaress and puzzling them by purposely-diffuse stories of vivie's cousin the late david vavasour williams, intended to convey the idea, without telling unnecessary fibs, that david died abroad during the war, but that vivie in his memory and that of his dear old father intends to continue a strong personal interest in the village hall and its educational aims. i also picture vivie going alone to mrs. evanwy's rose-entwined cottage. the old lady is now rather shaky and does not walk far from her little garden with its box bower and garden seat. i can foreshadow vivie dispelling some of the mystery about david williams and being embraced by the old nannie with warm affection and the hearty assurances that she had guessed the secret from the very first but had been so drawn to the false david williams and so sure of his honest purposes that nothing would have induced her to undeceive the old vicar. i can even imagine the old lady ere--years hence--paralysis strikes her down--telling vivie so much gossip about the welsh vavasours that vivie becomes positively certain her mother came from that stock and that she really was first cousin to the boy she personated for the laudable purpose of showing how well a woman could practise at the bar. i like to think also that by the present year of grace-- --the rossiters will have become convinced that no. park crescent, even with the zoo and the royal botanic gardens close by and the ornamental garden of regent's park in between, does not satisfy all their needs and ambitions: that they will have resolved even before this year began--to supplement it by a home in the country for week-ends, for summer visits, and finally for rest in their old age. that for this purpose they will acquire some ideal grange or priory, or ample farmstead near petworth and the armstrongs' home, over against the south downs, and near the river rother; that it shall be in no mere suburb of petworth but in a stately little village with its own character and history going back to roman times and a church with a saxon body and a norman chancel. and that in the ideal churchyard of this enviable church with ancient yews and th century tomb-stones, and old, old benches in the sunshine for the grandfathers and loafers of the village to sit on and smoke of a sabbath morning, a place shall be found for the bones of bertie adams; reverently brought over from the grassy amphitheatre of the tir national to repose in this churchyard of west sussex which looks out over one of the finest cricket pitches in the county. if, then, there is any lien between the mouldering fragments of our bodies and the inexplicable personality which has been generated in the living brain, the former office boy of _fraser and warren_ will know that he is always present in the memory of vivien rossiter, that she has placed the few physical fragments still representing him in such a setting as would have delighted his honest, simple nature in his lifetime. he would also know that his children are now hers and her husband's; that his nance very rightly married the excellent butler, jenkins, with whom he had discussed many a cricket score; and that love, after all, is stronger than death. the end none proofreading team [illustration: elizabeth cady stanton] eighty years and more reminiscences - elizabeth cady stanton "social science affirms that woman's place in society marks the level of civilization." i dedicate this volume to susan b. anthony, my steadfast friend for half a century. contents. chapter i. childhood ii. school days iii. girlhood iv. life at peterboro v. our wedding journey vi. homeward bound vii. motherhood viii. boston and chelsea ix. the first woman's rights convention x. susan b. anthony xi. susan b. anthony (_continued_) xii. my first speech before a legislature xiii. reforms and mobs xiv. views on marriage and divorce xv. women as patriots xvi. pioneer life in kansas--our newspaper "the revolution" xvii. lyceums and lecturers xviii. westward ho! xix. the spirit of ' xx. writing "the history of woman suffrage" xxi. in the south of france xxii. reforms and reformers in great britain xxiii. woman and theology xxiv. england and france revisited xxv. the international council of women xxvi. my last visit to england xxvii. sixtieth anniversary of the class of --the woman's bible xxviii. my eightieth birthday index of names list of portraits. the author, _frontispiece_ margaret livingston cady judge daniel cady henry brewster stanton the author and daughter the author and son susan b. anthony elizabeth smith miller children and grandchildren the author, mrs. blatch, and nora the author, mrs. lawrence, and robert livingston stanton eighty years and more. chapter i. childhood. the psychical growth of a child is not influenced by days and years, but by the impressions passing events make on its mind. what may prove a sudden awakening to one, giving an impulse in a certain direction that may last for years, may make no impression on another. people wonder why the children of the same family differ so widely, though they have had the same domestic discipline, the same school and church teaching, and have grown up under the same influences and with the same environments. as well wonder why lilies and lilacs in the same latitude are not all alike in color and equally fragrant. children differ as widely as these in the primal elements of their physical and psychical life. who can estimate the power of antenatal influences, or the child's surroundings in its earliest years, the effect of some passing word or sight on one, that makes no impression on another? the unhappiness of one child under a certain home discipline is not inconsistent with the content of another under this same discipline. one, yearning for broader freedom, is in a chronic condition of rebellion; the other, more easily satisfied, quietly accepts the situation. everything is seen from a different standpoint; everything takes its color from the mind of the beholder. i am moved to recall what i can of my early days, what i thought and felt, that grown people may have a better understanding of children and do more for their happiness and development. i see so much tyranny exercised over children, even by well-disposed parents, and in so many varied forms,--a tyranny to which these parents are themselves insensible,--that i desire to paint my joys and sorrows in as vivid colors as possible, in the hope that i may do something to defend the weak from the strong. people never dream of all that is going on in the little heads of the young, for few adults are given to introspection, and those who are incapable of recalling their own feelings under restraint and disappointment can have no appreciation of the sufferings of children who can neither describe nor analyze what they feel. in defending themselves against injustice they are as helpless as dumb animals. what is insignificant to their elders is often to them a source of great joy or sorrow. with several generations of vigorous, enterprising ancestors behind me, i commenced the struggle of life under favorable circumstances on the th day of november, , the same year that my father, daniel cady, a distinguished lawyer and judge in the state of new york, was elected to congress. perhaps the excitement of a political campaign, in which my mother took the deepest interest, may have had an influence on my prenatal life and given me the strong desire that i have always felt to participate in the rights and duties of government. my father was a man of firm character and unimpeachable integrity, and yet sensitive and modest to a painful degree. there were but two places in which he felt at ease--in the courthouse and at his own fireside. though gentle and tender, he had such a dignified repose and reserve of manner that, as children, we regarded him with fear rather than affection. my mother, margaret livingston, a tall, queenly looking woman, was courageous, self-reliant, and at her ease under all circumstances and in all places. she was the daughter of colonel james livingston, who took an active part in the war of the revolution. colonel livingston was stationed at west point when arnold made the attempt to betray that stronghold into the hands of the enemy. in the absence of general washington and his superior officer, he took the responsibility of firing into the _vulture_, a suspicious looking british vessel that lay at anchor near the opposite bank of the hudson river. it was a fatal shot for andré, the british spy, with whom arnold was then consummating his treason. hit between wind and water, the vessel spread her sails and hastened down the river, leaving andré, with his papers, to be captured while arnold made his escape through the lines, before his treason was suspected. on general washington's return to west point, he sent for my grandfather and reprimanded him for acting in so important a matter without orders, thereby making himself liable to court-martial; but, after fully impressing the young officer with the danger of such self-sufficiency on ordinary occasions, he admitted that a most fortunate shot had been sent into the _vulture_, "for," he said, "we are in no condition just now to defend ourselves against the british forces in new york, and the capture of this spy has saved us." my mother had the military idea of government, but her children, like their grandfather, were disposed to assume the responsibility of their own actions; thus the ancestral traits in mother and children modified, in a measure, the dangerous tendencies in each. our parents were as kind, indulgent, and considerate as the puritan ideas of those days permitted, but fear, rather than love, of god and parents alike, predominated. add to this our timidity in our intercourse with servants and teachers, our dread of the ever present devil, and the reader will see that, under such conditions, nothing but strong self-will and a good share of hope and mirthfulness could have saved an ordinary child from becoming a mere nullity. the first event engraved on my memory was the birth of a sister when i was four years old. it was a cold morning in january when the brawny scotch nurse carried me to see the little stranger, whose advent was a matter of intense interest to me for many weeks after. the large, pleasant room with the white curtains and bright wood fire on the hearth, where panada, catnip, and all kinds of little messes which we were allowed to taste were kept warm, was the center of attraction for the older children. i heard so many friends remark, "what a pity it is she's a girl!" that i felt a kind of compassion for the little baby. true, our family consisted of five girls and only one boy, but i did not understand at that time that girls were considered an inferior order of beings. to form some idea of my surroundings at this time, imagine a two-story white frame house with a hall through the middle, rooms on either side, and a large back building with grounds on the side and rear, which joined the garden of our good presbyterian minister, the rev. simon hosack, of whom i shall have more to say in another chapter. our favorite resorts in the house were the garret and cellar. in the former were barrels of hickory nuts, and, on a long shelf, large cakes of maple sugar and all kinds of dried herbs and sweet flag; spinning wheels, a number of small white cotton bags filled with bundles, marked in ink, "silk," "cotton," "flannel," "calico," etc., as well as ancient masculine and feminine costumes. here we would crack the nuts, nibble the sharp edges of the maple sugar, chew some favorite herb, play ball with the bags, whirl the old spinning wheels, dress up in our ancestors' clothes, and take a bird's-eye view of the surrounding country from an enticing scuttle hole. this was forbidden ground; but, nevertheless, we often went there on the sly, which only made the little escapades more enjoyable. the cellar of our house was filled, in winter, with barrels of apples, vegetables, salt meats, cider, butter, pounding barrels, washtubs, etc., offering admirable nooks for playing hide and seek. two tallow candles threw a faint light over the scene on certain occasions. this cellar was on a level with a large kitchen where we played blind man's buff and other games when the day's work was done. these two rooms are the center of many of the merriest memories of my childhood days. i can recall three colored men, abraham, peter, and jacob, who acted as menservants in our youth. in turn they would sometimes play on the banjo for us to dance, taking real enjoyment in our games. they are all at rest now with "old uncle ned in the place where the good niggers go." our nurses, lockey danford, polly bell, mary dunn, and cornelia nickeloy--peace to their ashes--were the only shadows on the gayety of these winter evenings; for their chief delight was to hurry us off to bed, that they might receive their beaux or make short calls in the neighborhood. my memory of them is mingled with no sentiment of gratitude or affection. in expressing their opinion of us in after years, they said we were a very troublesome, obstinate, disobedient set of children. i have no doubt we were in constant rebellion against their petty tyranny. abraham, peter, and jacob viewed us in a different light, and i have the most pleasant recollections of their kind services. in the winter, outside the house, we had the snow with which to build statues and make forts, and huge piles of wood covered with ice, which we called the alps, so difficult were they of ascent and descent. there we would climb up and down by the hour, if not interrupted, which, however, was generally the case. it always seemed to me that, in the height of our enthusiasm, we were invariably summoned to some disagreeable duty, which would appear to show that thus early i keenly enjoyed outdoor life. theodore tilton has thus described the place where i was born: "birthplace is secondary parentage, and transmits character. johnstown was more famous half a century ago than since; for then, though small, it was a marked intellectual center; and now, though large, it is an unmarked manufacturing town. before the birth of elizabeth cady it was the vice-ducal seat of sir william johnson, the famous english negotiator with the indians. during her girlhood it was an arena for the intellectual wrestlings of kent, tompkins, spencer, elisha williams, and abraham van vechten, who, as lawyers, were among the chiefest of their time. it is now devoted mainly to the fabrication of steel springs and buckskin gloves. so, like wordsworth's early star, it has faded into the light of common day. but johnstown retains one of its ancient splendors--a glory still fresh as at the foundation of the world. standing on its hills, one looks off upon a country of enameled meadow lands, that melt away southward toward the mohawk, and northward to the base of those grand mountains which are 'god's monument over the grave of john brown.'" harold frederic's novel, "in the valley," contains many descriptions of this region that are true to nature, as i remember the mohawk valley, for i first knew it not so many years after the scenes which he lays there. before i was old enough to take in the glory of this scenery and its classic associations, johnstown was to me a gloomy-looking town. the middle of the streets was paved with large cobblestones, over which the farmer's wagons rattled from morning till night, while the sidewalks were paved with very small cobblestones, over which we carefully picked our way, so that free and graceful walking was out of the question. the streets were lined with solemn poplar trees, from which small yellow worms were continually dangling down. next to the prince of darkness, i feared these worms. they were harmless, but the sight of one made me tremble. so many people shared in this feeling that the poplars were all cut down and elms planted in their stead. the johnstown academy and churches were large square buildings, painted white, surrounded by these same sombre poplars, each edifice having a doleful bell which seemed to be ever tolling for school, funerals, church, or prayer meetings. next to the worms, those clanging bells filled me with the utmost dread; they seemed like so many warnings of an eternal future. visions of the inferno were strongly impressed on my childish imagination. it was thought, in those days, that firm faith in hell and the devil was the greatest help to virtue. it certainly made me very unhappy whenever my mind dwelt on such teachings, and i have always had my doubts of the virtue that is based on the fear of punishment. perhaps i may be pardoned a word devoted to my appearance in those days. i have been told that i was a plump little girl, with very fair skin, rosy cheeks, good features, dark-brown hair, and laughing blue eyes. a student in my father's office, the late henry bayard of delaware (an uncle of our recent ambassador to the court of st. james's, thomas f. bayard), told me one day, after conning my features carefully, that i had one defect which he could remedy. "your eyebrows should be darker and heavier," said he, "and if you will let me shave them once or twice, you will be much improved." i consented, and, slight as my eyebrows were, they seemed to have had some expression, for the loss of them had a most singular effect on my appearance. everybody, including even the operator, laughed at my odd-looking face, and i was in the depths of humiliation during the period while my eyebrows were growing out again. it is scarcely necessary for me to add that i never allowed the young man to repeat the experiment, although strongly urged to do so. i cannot recall how or when i conquered the alphabet, words in three letters, the multiplication table, the points of the compass, the chicken pox, whooping cough, measles, and scarlet fever. all these unhappy incidents of childhood left but little impression on my mind. i have, however, most pleasant memories of the good spinster, maria yost, who patiently taught three generations of children the rudiments of the english language, and introduced us to the pictures in "murray's spelling-book," where old father time, with his scythe, and the farmer stoning the boys in his apple trees, gave rise in my mind to many serious reflections. miss yost was plump and rosy, with fair hair, and had a merry twinkle in her blue eyes, and she took us by very easy stages through the old-fashioned school-books. the interesting readers children now have were unknown sixty years ago. we did not reach the temple of knowledge by the flowery paths of ease in which our descendants now walk. i still have a perfect vision of myself and sisters, as we stood up in the classes, with our toes at the cracks in the floor, all dressed alike in bright red flannel, black alpaca aprons, and, around the neck, a starched ruffle that, through a lack of skill on the part of either the laundress or the nurse who sewed them in, proved a constant source of discomfort to us. i have since seen full-grown men, under slighter provocation than we endured, jerk off a collar, tear it in two, and throw it to the winds, chased by the most soul-harrowing expletives. but we were sternly rebuked for complaining, and if we ventured to introduce our little fingers between the delicate skin and the irritating linen, our hands were slapped and the ruffle readjusted a degree closer. our sunday dresses were relieved with a black sprig and white aprons. we had red cloaks, red hoods, red mittens, and red stockings. for one's self to be all in red six months of the year was bad enough, but to have this costume multiplied by three was indeed monotonous. i had such an aversion to that color that i used to rebel regularly at the beginning of each season when new dresses were purchased, until we finally passed into an exquisite shade of blue. no words could do justice to my dislike of those red dresses. my grandfather's detestation of the british redcoats must have descended to me. my childhood's antipathy to wearing red enabled me later to comprehend the feelings of a little niece, who hated everything pea green, because she had once heard the saying, "neat but not gaudy, as the devil said when he painted his tail pea green." so when a friend brought her a cravat of that color she threw it on the floor and burst into tears, saying, "i could not wear that, for it is the color of the devil's tail." i sympathized with the child and had it changed for the hue she liked. although we cannot always understand the ground for children's preferences, it is often well to heed them. i am told that i was pensively looking out of the nursery window one day, when mary dunn, the scotch nurse, who was something of a philosopher, and a stern presbyterian, said: "child, what are you thinking about; are you planning some new form of mischief?" "no, mary," i replied, "i was wondering why it was that everything we like to do is a sin, and that everything we dislike is commanded by god or someone on earth. i am so tired of that everlasting no! no! no! at school, at home, everywhere it is _no_! even at church all the commandments begin 'thou shalt not.' i suppose god will say 'no' to all we like in the next world, just as you do here." mary was dreadfully shocked at my dissatisfaction with the things of time and prospective eternity, and exhorted me to cultivate the virtues of obedience and humility. i well remember the despair i felt in those years, as i took in the whole situation, over the constant cribbing and crippling of a child's life. i suppose i found fit language in which to express my thoughts, for mary dunn told me, years after, how our discussion roused my sister margaret, who was an attentive listener. i must have set forth our wrongs in clear, unmistakable terms; for margaret exclaimed one day, "i tell you what to do. hereafter let us act as we choose, without asking." "then," said i, "we shall be punished." "suppose we are," said she, "we shall have had our fun at any rate, and that is better than to mind the everlasting 'no' and not have any fun at all." her logic seemed unanswerable, so together we gradually acted on her suggestions. having less imagination than i, she took a common-sense view of life and suffered nothing from anticipation of troubles, while my sorrows were intensified fourfold by innumerable apprehensions of possible exigencies. our nursery, a large room over a back building, had three barred windows reaching nearly to the floor. two of these opened on a gently slanting roof over a veranda. in our night robes, on warm summer evenings we could, by dint of skillful twisting and compressing, get out between the bars, and there, snugly braced against the house, we would sit and enjoy the moon and stars and what sounds might reach us from the streets, while the nurse, gossiping at the back door, imagined we were safely asleep. i have a confused memory of being often under punishment for what, in those days, were called "tantrums." i suppose they were really justifiable acts of rebellion against the tyranny of those in authority. i have often listened since, with real satisfaction, to what some of our friends had to say of the high-handed manner in which sister margaret and i defied all the transient orders and strict rules laid down for our guidance. if we had observed them we might as well have been embalmed as mummies, for all the pleasure and freedom we should have had in our childhood. as very little was then done for the amusement of children, happy were those who _conscientiously_ took the liberty of amusing themselves. one charming feature of our village was a stream of water, called the cayadutta, which ran through the north end, in which it was our delight to walk on the broad slate stones when the water was low, in order to pick up pretty pebbles. these joys were also forbidden, though indulged in as opportunity afforded, especially as sister margaret's philosophy was found to work successfully and we had finally risen above our infantile fear of punishment. much of my freedom at this time was due to this sister, who afterward became the wife of colonel duncan mcmartin of iowa. i can see her now, hat in hand, her long curls flying in the wind, her nose slightly retroussé, her large dark eyes flashing with glee, and her small straight mouth so expressive of determination. though two years my junior, she was larger and stronger than i and more fearless and self-reliant. she was always ready to start when any pleasure offered, and, if i hesitated, she would give me a jerk and say, emphatically: "oh, come along!" and away we went. about this time we entered the johnstown academy, where we made the acquaintance of the daughters of the hotel keeper and the county sheriff. they were a few years my senior, but, as i was ahead of them in all my studies, the difference of age was somewhat equalized and we became fast friends. this acquaintance opened to us two new sources of enjoyment--the freedom of the hotel during "court week" (a great event in village life) and the exploration of the county jail. our scotch nurse had told us so many thrilling tales of castles, prisons, and dungeons in the old world that, to see the great keys and iron doors, the handcuffs and chains, and the prisoners in their cells seemed like a veritable visit to mary's native land. we made frequent visits to the jail and became deeply concerned about the fate of the prisoners, who were greatly pleased with our expressions of sympathy and our gifts of cake and candy. in time we became interested in the trials and sentences of prisoners, and would go to the courthouse and listen to the proceedings. sometimes we would slip into the hotel where the judges and lawyers dined, and help our little friend wait on table. the rushing of servants to and fro, the calling of guests, the scolding of servants in the kitchen, the banging of doors, the general hubbub, the noise and clatter, were all idealized by me into one of those royal festivals mary so often described. to be allowed to carry plates of bread and butter, pie and cheese i counted a high privilege. but more especially i enjoyed listening to the conversations in regard to the probable fate of our friends the prisoners in the jail. on one occasion i projected a few remarks into a conversation between two lawyers, when one of them turned abruptly to me and said, "child, you'd better attend to your business; bring me a glass of water." i replied indignantly, "i am not a servant; i am here for fun." in all these escapades we were followed by peter, black as coal and six feet in height. it seems to me now that his chief business was to discover our whereabouts, get us home to dinner, and take us back to school. fortunately he was overflowing with curiosity and not averse to lingering a while where anything of interest was to be seen or heard, and, as we were deemed perfectly safe under his care, no questions were asked when we got to the house, if we had been with him. he had a long head and, through his diplomacy, we escaped much disagreeable surveillance. peter was very fond of attending court. all the lawyers knew him, and wherever peter went, the three little girls in his charge went, too. thus, with constant visits to the jail, courthouse, and my father's office, i gleaned some idea of the danger of violating the law. the great events of the year were the christmas holidays, the fourth of july, and "general training," as the review of the county militia was then called. the winter gala days are associated, in my memory, with hanging up stockings and with turkeys, mince pies, sweet cider, and sleighrides by moonlight. my earliest recollections of those happy days, when schools were closed, books laid aside, and unusual liberties allowed, center in that large cellar kitchen to which i have already referred. there we spent many winter evenings in uninterrupted enjoyment. a large fireplace with huge logs shed warmth and cheerfulness around. in one corner sat peter sawing his violin, while our youthful neighbors danced with us and played blindman's buff almost every evening during the vacation. the most interesting character in this game was a black boy called jacob (peter's lieutenant), who made things lively for us by always keeping one eye open--a wise precaution to guard himself from danger, and to keep us on the jump. hickory nuts, sweet cider, and _olie-koeks_ (a dutch name for a fried cake with raisins inside) were our refreshments when there came a lull in the fun. as st. nicholas was supposed to come down the chimney, our stockings were pinned on a broomstick, laid across two chairs in front of the fireplace. we retired on christmas eve with the most pleasing anticipations of what would be in our stockings next morning. the thermometer in that latitude was often twenty degrees below zero, yet, bright and early, we would run downstairs in our bare feet over the cold floors to carry stockings, broom, etc., to the nursery. the gorgeous presents that st. nicholas now distributes show that he, too, has been growing up with the country. the boys and girls of will laugh when they hear of the contents of our stockings in . there was a little paper of candy, one of raisins, another, of nuts, a red apple, an _olie-koek_, and a bright silver quarter of a dollar in the toe. if a child had been guilty of any erratic performances during the year, which was often my case, a long stick would protrude from the stocking; if particularly good, an illustrated catechism or the new testament would appear, showing that the st. nicholas of that time held decided views on discipline and ethics. during the day we would take a drive over the snow-clad hills and valleys in a long red lumber sleigh. all the children it could hold made the forests echo with their songs and laughter. the sleigh bells and peter's fine tenor voice added to the chorus seemed to chant, as we passed, "merry christmas" to the farmers' children and to all we met on the highway. returning home, we were allowed, as a great christmas treat, to watch all peter's preparations for dinner. attired in a white apron and turban, holding in his hand a tin candlestick the size of a dinner plate, containing a tallow candle, with stately step he marched into the spacious cellar, with jacob and three little girls dressed in red flannel at his heels. as the farmers paid the interest on their mortgages in barrels of pork, headcheese, poultry, eggs, and cider, the cellars were well crowded for the winter, making the master of an establishment quite indifferent to all questions of finance. we heard nothing in those days of greenbacks, silver coinage, or a gold basis. laden with vegetables, butter, eggs, and a magnificent turkey, peter and his followers returned to the kitchen. there, seated on a big ironing table, we watched the dressing and roasting of the bird in a tin oven in front of the fire. jacob peeled the vegetables, we all sang, and peter told us marvelous stories. for tea he made flapjacks, baked in a pan with a long handle, which he turned by throwing the cake up and skillfully catching it descending. peter was a devout episcopalian and took great pleasure in helping the young people decorate the church. he would take us with him and show us how to make evergreen wreaths. like mary's lamb, where'er he went we were sure to go. his love for us was unbounded and fully returned. he was the only being, visible or invisible, of whom we had no fear. we would go to divine service with peter, christmas morning and sit with him by the door, in what was called "the negro pew." he was the only colored member of the church and, after all the other communicants had taken the sacrament, he went alone to the altar. dressed in a new suit of blue with gilt buttons, he looked like a prince, as, with head erect, he walked up the aisle, the grandest specimen of manhood in the whole congregation; and yet so strong was prejudice against color in that no one would kneel beside him. on leaving us, on one of these occasions, peter told us all to sit still until he returned; but, no sooner had he started, than the youngest of us slowly followed after him and seated herself close beside him. as he came back, holding the child by the hand, what a lesson it must have been to that prejudiced congregation! the first time we entered the church together the sexton opened a white man's pew for us, telling peter to leave the judge's children there. "oh," he said, "they will not stay there without me." but, as he could not enter, we instinctively followed him to the negro pew. our next great fête was on the anniversary of the birthday of our republic. the festivities were numerous and protracted, beginning then, as now, at midnight with bonfires and cannon; while the day was ushered in with the ringing of bells, tremendous cannonading, and a continuous popping of fire-crackers and torpedoes. then a procession of soldiers and citizens marched through the town, an oration was delivered, the declaration of independence read, and a great dinner given in the open air under the trees in the grounds of the old courthouse. each toast was announced with the booming of cannon. on these occasions peter was in his element, and showed us whatever he considered worth seeing; but i cannot say that i enjoyed very much either "general training" or the fourth of july, for, in addition to my fear of cannon and torpedoes, my sympathies were deeply touched by the sadness of our cook, whose drunken father always cut antics in the streets on gala days, the central figure in all the sports of the boys, much to the mortification of his worthy daughter. she wept bitterly over her father's public exhibition of himself, and told me in what a condition he would come home to his family at night. i would gladly have stayed in with her all day, but the fear of being called a coward compelled me to go through those trying ordeals. as my nerves were all on the surface, no words can describe what i suffered with those explosions, great and small, and my fears lest king george and his minions should reappear among us. i thought that, if he had done all the dreadful things stated in the declaration of ' , he might come again, burn our houses, and drive us all into the street. sir william johnson's mansion of solid masonry, gloomy and threatening, still stood in our neighborhood. i had seen the marks of the indian's tomahawk on the balustrades and heard of the bloody deeds there enacted. for all the calamities of the nation i believed king george responsible. at home and at school we were educated to hate the english. when we remember that, every fourth of july, the declaration was read with emphasis, and the orator of the day rounded all his glowing periods with denunciations of the mother country, we need not wonder at the national hatred of everything english. our patriotism in those early days was measured by our dislike of great britain. in september occurred the great event, the review of the county militia, popularly called "training day." then everybody went to the race course to see the troops and buy what the farmers had brought in their wagons. there was a peculiar kind of gingerbread and molasses candy to which we were treated on those occasions, associated in my mind to this day with military reviews and standing armies. other pleasures were, roaming in the forests and sailing on the mill pond. one day, when there were no boys at hand and several girls were impatiently waiting for a sail on a raft, my sister and i volunteered to man the expedition. we always acted on the assumption that what we had seen done, we could do. accordingly we all jumped on the raft, loosened it from its moorings, and away we went with the current. navigation on that mill pond was performed with long poles, but, unfortunately, we could not lift the poles, and we soon saw we were drifting toward the dam. but we had the presence of mind to sit down and hold fast to the raft. fortunately, we went over right side up and gracefully glided down the stream, until rescued by the ever watchful peter. i did not hear the last of that voyage for a long time. i was called the captain of the expedition, and one of the boys wrote a composition, which he read in school, describing the adventure and emphasizing the ignorance of the laws of navigation shown by the officers in command. i shed tears many times over that performance. chapter ii. school days. when i was eleven years old, two events occurred which changed considerably the current of my life. my only brother, who had just graduated from union college, came home to die. a young man of great talent and promise, he was the pride of my father's heart. we early felt that this son filled a larger place in our father's affections and future plans than the five daughters together. well do i remember how tenderly he watched my brother in his last illness, the sighs and tears he gave vent to as he slowly walked up and down the hall, and, when the last sad moment came, and we were all assembled to say farewell in the silent chamber of death, how broken were his utterances as he knelt and prayed for comfort and support. i still recall, too, going into the large darkened parlor to see my brother, and finding the casket, mirrors, and pictures all draped in white, and my father seated by his side, pale and immovable. as he took no notice of me, after standing a long while, i climbed upon his knee, when he mechanically put his arm about me and, with my head resting against his beating heart, we both sat in silence, he thinking of the wreck of all his hopes in the loss of a dear son, and i wondering what could be said or done to fill the void in his breast. at length he heaved a deep sigh and said: "oh, my daughter, i wish you were a boy!" throwing my arms about his neck, i replied: "i will try to be all my brother was." [illustration: margaret livingston cady.] [illustration: judge daniel cady.] then and there i resolved that i would not give so much time as heretofore to play, but would study and strive to be at the head of all my classes and thus delight my father's heart. all that day and far into the night i pondered the problem of boyhood. i thought that the chief thing to be done in order to equal boys was to be learned and courageous. so i decided to study greek and learn to manage a horse. having formed this conclusion i fell asleep. my resolutions, unlike many such made at night, did not vanish with the coming light. i arose early and hastened to put them into execution. they were resolutions never to be forgotten--destined to mold my character anew. as soon as i was dressed i hastened to our good pastor, rev. simon hosack, who was always early at work in his garden. "doctor," said i, "which do you like best, boys or girls?" "why, girls, to be sure; i would not give you for all the boys in christendom." "my father," i replied, "prefers boys; he wishes i was one, and i intend to be as near like one as possible. i am going to ride on horseback and study greek. will you give me a greek lesson now, doctor? i want to begin at once." "yes, child," said he, throwing down his hoe, "come into my library and we will begin without delay." he entered fully into the feeling of suffering and sorrow which took possession of me when i discovered that a girl weighed less in the scale of being than a boy, and he praised my determination to prove the contrary. the old grammar which he had studied in the university of glasgow was soon in my hands, and the greek article was learned before breakfast. then came the sad pageantry of death, the weeping of friends, the dark rooms, the ghostly stillness, the exhortation to the living to prepare for death, the solemn prayer, the mournful chant, the funeral cortège, the solemn, tolling bell, the burial. how i suffered during those sad days! what strange undefined fears of the unknown took possession of me! for months afterward, at the twilight hour, i went with my father to the new-made grave. near it stood two tall poplar trees, against one of which i leaned, while my father threw himself on the grave, with outstretched arms, as if to embrace his child. at last the frosts and storms of november came and threw a chilling barrier between the living and the dead, and we went there no more. during all this time i kept up my lessons at the parsonage and made rapid progress. i surprised even my teacher, who thought me capable of doing anything. i learned to drive, and to leap a fence and ditch on horseback. i taxed every power, hoping some day to hear my father say: "well, a girl is as good as a boy, after all." but he never said it. when the doctor came over to spend the evening with us, i would whisper in his ear: "tell my father how fast i get on," and he would tell him, and was lavish in his praises. but my father only paced the room, sighed, and showed that he wished i were a boy; and i, not knowing why he felt thus, would hide my tears of vexation on the doctor's shoulder. soon after this i began to study latin, greek, and mathematics with a class of boys in the academy, many of whom were much older than i. for three years one boy kept his place at the head of the class, and i always stood next. two prizes were offered in greek. i strove for one and took the second. how well i remember my joy in receiving that prize. there was no sentiment of ambition, rivalry, or triumph over my companions, nor feeling of satisfaction in receiving this honor in the presence of those assembled on the day of the exhibition. one thought alone filled my mind. "now," said i, "my father will be satisfied with me." so, as soon as we were dismissed, i ran down the hill, rushed breathless into his office, laid the new greek testament, which was my prize, on his table and exclaimed: "there, i got it!" he took up the book, asked me some questions about the class, the teachers, the spectators, and, evidently pleased, handed it back to me. then, while i stood looking and waiting for him to say something which would show that he recognized the equality of the daughter with the son, he kissed me on the forehead and exclaimed, with a sigh, "ah, you should have been a boy!" my joy was turned to sadness. i ran to my good doctor. he chased my bitter tears away, and soothed me with unbounded praises and visions of future success. he was then confined to the house with his last illness. he asked me that day if i would like to have, when he was gone, the old lexicon, testament, and grammar that we had so often thumbed together. "yes, but i would rather have you stay," i replied, "for what can i do when you are gone?" "oh," said he tenderly, "i shall not be gone; my spirit will still be with you, watching you in all life's struggles." noble, generous friend! he had but little on earth to bequeath to anyone, but when the last scene in his life was ended, and his will was opened, sure enough there was a clause saying: "my greek lexicon, testament, and grammar, and four volumes of scott's commentaries, i will to elizabeth cady." i never look at these books without a feeling of thankfulness that in childhood i was blessed with such a friend and teacher. i can truly say, after an experience of seventy years, that all the cares and anxieties, the trials and disappointments of my whole life, are light, when balanced with my sufferings in childhood and youth from the theological dogmas which i sincerely believed, and the gloom connected with everything associated with the name of religion, the church, the parsonage, the graveyard, and the solemn, tolling bell. everything connected with death was then rendered inexpressibly dolorous. the body, covered with a black pall, was borne on the shoulders of men; the mourners were in crape and walked with bowed heads, while the neighbors who had tears to shed, did so copiously and summoned up their saddest facial expressions. at the grave came the sober warnings to the living and sometimes frightful prophesies as to the state of the dead. all this pageantry of woe and visions of the unknown land beyond the tomb, often haunted my midnight dreams and shadowed the sunshine of my days. the parsonage, with its bare walls and floors, its shriveled mistress and her blind sister, more like ghostly shadows than human flesh and blood; the two black servants, racked with rheumatism and odoriferous with a pungent oil they used in the vain hope of making their weary limbs more supple; the aged parson buried in his library in the midst of musty books and papers--all this only added to the gloom of my surroundings. the church, which was bare, with no furnace to warm us, no organ to gladden our hearts, no choir to lead our songs of praise in harmony, was sadly lacking in all attractions for the youthful mind. the preacher, shut up in an octagonal box high above our heads, gave us sermons over an hour long, and the chorister, in a similar box below him, intoned line after line of david's psalms, while, like a flock of sheep at the heels of their shepherd, the congregation, without regard to time or tune, straggled after their leader. years later, the introduction of stoves, a violoncello, wesley's hymns, and a choir split the church in twain. these old scotch presbyterians were opposed to all innovations that would afford their people paths of flowery ease on the road to heaven. so, when the thermometer was twenty degrees below zero on the johnstown hills, four hundred feet above the mohawk valley, we trudged along through the snow, foot-stoves in hand, to the cold hospitalities of the "lord's house," there to be chilled to the very core by listening to sermons on "predestination," "justification by faith," and "eternal damnation." to be restless, or to fall asleep under such solemn circumstances was a sure evidence of total depravity, and of the machinations of the devil striving to turn one's heart from god and his ordinances. as i was guilty of these shortcomings and many more, i early believed myself a veritable child of the evil one, and suffered endless fears lest he should come some night and claim me as his own. to me he was a personal, ever-present reality, crouching in a dark corner of the nursery. ah! how many times i have stolen out of bed, and sat shivering on the stairs, where the hall lamp and the sound of voices from the parlor would, in a measure, mitigate my terror. thanks to a vigorous constitution and overflowing animal spirits, i was able to endure for years the strain of these depressing influences, until my reasoning powers and common sense triumphed at last over my imagination. the memory of my own suffering has prevented me from ever shadowing one young soul with any of the superstitions of the christian religion. but there have been many changes, even in my native town, since those dark days. our old church was turned into a mitten factory, and the pleasant hum of machinery and the glad faces of men and women have chased the evil spirits to their hiding places. one finds at johnstown now, beautiful churches, ornamented cemeteries, and cheerful men and women, quite emancipated from the nonsense and terrors of the old theologies. an important event in our family circle was the marriage of my oldest sister, tryphena, to edward bayard of wilmington, delaware. he was a graduate of union college, a classmate of my brother, and frequently visited at my father's house. at the end of his college course, he came with his brother henry to study law in johnstown. a quiet, retired little village was thought to be a good place in which to sequester young men bent on completing their education, as they were there safe from the temptations and distracting influences of large cities. in addition to this consideration, my father's reputation made his office a desirable resort for students, who, furthermore, not only improved their opportunities by reading blackstone, kent, and story, but also by making love to the judge's daughters. we thus had the advantage of many pleasant acquaintances from the leading families in the country, and, in this way, it was that four of the sisters eventually selected most worthy husbands. though only twenty-one years of age when married, edward bayard was a tall, fully developed man, remarkably fine looking, with cultivated literary taste and a profound knowledge of human nature. warm and affectionate, generous to a fault in giving and serving, he was soon a great favorite in the family, and gradually filled the void made in all our hearts by the loss of the brother and son. my father was so fully occupied with the duties of his profession, which often called him from home, and my mother so weary with the cares of a large family, having had ten children, though only five survived at this time, that they were quite willing to shift their burdens to younger shoulders. our eldest sister and her husband, therefore, soon became our counselors and advisers. they selected our clothing, books, schools, acquaintances, and directed our reading and amusements. thus the reins of domestic government, little by little, passed into their hands, and the family arrangements were in a manner greatly improved in favor of greater liberty for the children. the advent of edward and henry bayard was an inestimable blessing to us. with them came an era of picnics, birthday parties, and endless amusements; the buying of pictures, fairy books, musical instruments and ponies, and frequent excursions with parties on horseback. fresh from college, they made our lessons in latin, greek, and mathematics so easy that we studied with real pleasure and had more leisure for play. henry bayard's chief pleasures were walking, riding, and playing all manner of games, from jack-straws to chess, with the three younger sisters, and we have often said that the three years he passed in johnstown were the most delightful of our girlhood. immediately after the death of my brother, a journey was planned to visit our grandmother cady, who lived in canaan, columbia county, about twenty miles from albany. my two younger sisters and myself had never been outside of our own county before, and the very thought of a journey roused our enthusiasm to the highest pitch. on a bright day in september we started, packed in two carriages. we were wild with delight as we drove down the mohawk valley, with its beautiful river and its many bridges and ferryboats. when we reached schenectady, the first city we had ever seen, we stopped to dine at the old given's hotel, where we broke loose from all the moorings of propriety on beholding the paper on the dining-room wall, illustrating in brilliant colors the great events in sacred history. there were the patriarchs, with flowing beards and in gorgeous attire; abraham, offering up isaac; joseph, with his coat of many colors, thrown into a pit by his brethren; noah's ark on an ocean of waters; pharaoh and his host in the red sea; rebecca at the well, and moses in the bulrushes. all these distinguished personages were familiar to us, and to see them here for the first time in living colors, made silence and eating impossible. we dashed around the room, calling to each other: "oh, kate, look here!" "oh, madge, look there!" "see little moses!" "see the angels on jacob's ladder!" our exclamations could not be kept within bounds. the guests were amused beyond description, while my mother and elder sisters were equally mortified; but mr. bayard, who appreciated our childish surprise and delight, smiled and said: "i'll take them around and show them the pictures, and then they will be able to dine," which we finally did. on our way to albany we were forced to listen to no end of dissertations on manners, and severe criticisms on our behavior at the hotel, but we were too happy and astonished with all we saw to take a subjective view of ourselves. even peter in his new livery, who had not seen much more than we had, while looking out of the corners of his eyes, maintained a quiet dignity and conjured us "not to act as if we had just come out of the woods and had never seen anything before." however, there are conditions in the child soul in which repression is impossible, when the mind takes in nothing but its own enjoyment, and when even the sense of hearing is lost in that of sight. the whole party awoke to that fact at last. children are not actors. we never had experienced anything like this journey, and how could we help being surprised and delighted? when we drove into albany, the first large city we had ever visited, we exclaimed, "why, it's general training, here!" we had acquired our ideas of crowds from our country militia reviews. fortunately, there was no pictorial wall paper in the old city hotel. but the decree had gone forth that, on the remainder of the journey, our meals would be served in a private room, with peter to wait on us. this seemed like going back to the nursery days and was very humiliating. but eating, even there, was difficult, as we could hear the band from the old museum, and, as our windows opened on the street, the continual panorama of people and carriages passing by was quite as enticing as the bible scenes in schenectady. in the evening we walked around to see the city lighted, to look into the shop windows, and to visit the museum. the next morning we started for canaan, our enthusiasm still unabated, though strong hopes were expressed that we would be toned down with the fatigues of the first day's journey. the large farm with its cattle, sheep, hens, ducks, turkeys, and geese; its creamery, looms, and spinning wheel; its fruits and vegetables; the drives among the grand old hills; the blessed old grandmother, and the many aunts, uncles, and cousins to kiss, all this kept us still in a whirlpool of excitement. our joy bubbled over of itself; it was beyond our control. after spending a delightful week at canaan, we departed, with an addition to our party, much to peter's disgust, of a bright, coal-black boy of fifteen summers. peter kept grumbling that he had children enough to look after already, but, as the boy was handsome and intelligent, could read, write, play on the jewsharp and banjo, sing, dance, and stand on his head, we were charmed with this new-found treasure, who proved later to be a great family blessing. we were less vivacious on the return trip. whether this was due to peter's untiring efforts to keep us within bounds, or whether the novelty of the journey was in a measure gone, it is difficult to determine, but we evidently were not so buoyant and were duly complimented on our good behavior. when we reached home and told our village companions what we had seen in our extensive travels (just seventy miles from home) they were filled with wonder, and we became heroines in their estimation. after this we took frequent journeys to saratoga, the northern lakes, utica, and peterboro, but were never again so entirely swept from our feet as with the biblical illustrations in the dining room of the old given's hotel. as my father's office joined the house, i spent there much of my time, when out of school, listening to the clients stating their cases, talking with the students, and reading the laws in regard to woman. in our scotch neighborhood many men still retained the old feudal ideas of women and property. fathers, at their death, would will the bulk of their property to the eldest son, with the proviso that the mother was to have a home with him. hence it was not unusual for the mother, who had brought all the property into the family, to be made an unhappy dependent on the bounty of an uncongenial daughter-in-law and a dissipated son. the tears and complaints of the women who came to my father for legal advice touched my heart and early drew my attention to the injustice and cruelty of the laws. as the practice of the law was my father's business, i could not exactly understand why he could not alleviate the sufferings of these women. so, in order to enlighten me, he would take down his books and show me the inexorable statutes. the students, observing my interest, would amuse themselves by reading to me all the worst laws they could find, over which i would laugh and cry by turns. one christmas morning i went into the office to show them, among other of my presents, a new coral necklace and bracelets. they all admired the jewelry and then began to tease me with hypothetical cases of future ownership. "now," said henry bayard, "if in due time you should be my wife, those ornaments would be mine; i could take them and lock them up, and you could never wear them except with my permission. i could even exchange them for a box of cigars, and you could watch them evaporate in smoke." with this constant bantering from students and the sad complaints of the women, my mind was sorely perplexed. so when, from time to time, my attention was called to these odious laws, i would mark them with a pencil, and becoming more and more convinced of the necessity of taking some active measures against these unjust provisions, i resolved to seize the first opportunity, when alone in the office, to cut every one of them out of the books; supposing my father and his library were the beginning and the end of the law. however, this mutilation of his volumes was never accomplished, for dear old flora campbell, to whom i confided my plan for the amelioration of the wrongs of my unhappy sex, warned my father of what i proposed to do. without letting me know that he had discovered my secret, he explained to me one evening how laws were made, the large number of lawyers and libraries there were all over the state, and that if his library should burn up it would make no difference in woman's condition. "when you are grown up, and able to prepare a speech," said he, "you must go down to albany and talk to the legislators; tell them all you have seen in this office--the sufferings of these scotchwomen, robbed of their inheritance and left dependent on their unworthy sons, and, if you can persuade them to pass new laws, the old ones will be a dead letter." thus was the future object of my life foreshadowed and my duty plainly outlined by him who was most opposed to my public career when, in due time, i entered upon it. until i was sixteen years old, i was a faithful student in the johnstown academy with a class of boys. though i was the only girl in the higher classes of mathematics and the languages, yet, in our plays, all the girls and boys mingled freely together. in running races, sliding downhill, and snowballing, we made no distinction of sex. true, the boys would carry the school books and pull the sleighs up hill for their favorite girls, but equality was the general basis of our school relations. i dare say the boys did not make their snowballs quite so hard when pelting the girls, nor wash their faces with the same vehemence as they did each other's, but there was no public evidence of partiality. however, if any boy was too rough or took advantage of a girl smaller than himself, he was promptly thrashed by his fellows. there was an unwritten law and public sentiment in that little academy world that enabled us to study and play together with the greatest freedom and harmony. from the academy the boys of my class went to union college at schenectady. when those with whom i had studied and contended for prizes for five years came to bid me good-by, and i learned of the barrier that prevented me from following in their footsteps--"no girls admitted here"--my vexation and mortification knew no bounds. i remember, now, how proud and handsome the boys looked in their new clothes, as they jumped into the old stage coach and drove off, and how lonely i felt when they were gone and i had nothing to do, for the plans for my future were yet undetermined. again i felt more keenly than ever the humiliation of the distinctions made on the ground of sex. my time was now occupied with riding on horseback, studying the game of chess, and continually squabbling with the law students over the rights of women. something was always coming up in the experiences of everyday life, or in the books we were reading, to give us fresh topics for argument. they would read passages from the british classics quite as aggravating as the laws. they delighted in extracts from shakespeare, especially from "the taming of the shrew," an admirable satire in itself on the old common law of england. i hated petruchio as if he were a real man. young bayard would recite with unction the famous reply of milton's ideal woman to adam: "god thy law, thou mine." the bible, too, was brought into requisition. in fact it seemed to me that every book taught the "divinely ordained" headship of man; but my mind never yielded to this popular heresy. chapter iii. girlhood. mrs. willard's seminary at troy was the fashionable school in my girlhood, and in the winter of , with upward of a hundred other girls, i found myself an active participant in all the joys and sorrows of that institution. when in family council it was decided to send me to that intellectual mecca, i did not receive the announcement with unmixed satisfaction, as i had fixed my mind on union college. the thought of a school without boys, who had been to me such a stimulus both in study and play, seemed to my imagination dreary and profitless. the one remarkable feature of my journey to troy was the railroad from schenectady to albany, the first ever laid in this country. the manner of ascending a high hill going out of the city would now strike engineers as stupid to the last degree. the passenger cars were pulled up by a train, loaded with stones, descending the hill. the more rational way of tunneling through the hill or going around it had not yet dawned on our dutch ancestors. at every step of my journey to troy i felt that i was treading on my pride, and thus in a hopeless frame of mind i began my boarding-school career. i had already studied everything that was taught there except french, music, and dancing, so i devoted myself to these accomplishments. as i had a good voice i enjoyed singing, with a guitar accompaniment, and, having a good ear for time, i appreciated the harmony in music and motion and took great delight in dancing. the large house, the society of so many girls, the walks about the city, the novelty of everything made the new life more enjoyable than i had anticipated. to be sure i missed the boys, with whom i had grown up, played with for years, and later measured my intellectual powers with, but, as they became a novelty, there was new zest in occasionally seeing them. after i had been there a short time, i heard a call one day: "heads out!" i ran with the rest and exclaimed, "what is it?" expecting to see a giraffe or some other wonder from barnum's museum. "why, don't you see those boys?" said one. "oh," i replied, "is that all? i have seen boys all my life." when visiting family friends in the city, we were in the way of making the acquaintance of their sons, and as all social relations were strictly forbidden, there was a new interest in seeing them. as they were not allowed to call upon us or write notes, unless they were brothers or cousins, we had, in time, a large number of kinsmen. there was an intense interest to me now in writing notes, receiving calls, and joining the young men in the streets for a walk, such as i had never known when in constant association with them at school and in our daily amusements. shut up with girls, most of them older than myself, i heard many subjects discussed of which i had never thought before, and in a manner it were better i had never heard. the healthful restraint always existing between boys and girls in conversation is apt to be relaxed with either sex alone. in all my intimate association with boys up to that period, i cannot recall one word or act for criticism, but i cannot say the same of the girls during the three years i passed at the seminary in troy. my own experience proves to me that it is a grave mistake to send boys and girls to separate institutions of learning, especially at the most impressible age. the stimulus of sex promotes alike a healthy condition of the intellectual and the moral faculties and gives to both a development they never can acquire alone. mrs. willard, having spent several months in europe, did not return until i had been at the seminary some time. i well remember her arrival, and the joy with which she was greeted by the teachers and pupils who had known her before. she was a splendid-looking woman, then in her prime, and fully realized my idea of a queen. i doubt whether any royal personage in the old world could have received her worshipers with more grace and dignity than did this far-famed daughter of the republic. she was one of the remarkable women of that period, and did a great educational work for her sex. she gave free scholarships to a large number of promising girls, fitting them for teachers, with a proviso that, when the opportunity arose, they should, in turn, educate others. i shall never forget one incident that occasioned me much unhappiness. i had written a very amusing composition, describing my room. a friend came in to see me just as i had finished it, and, as she asked me to read it to her, i did so. she enjoyed it very much and proposed an exchange. she said the rooms were all so nearly alike that, with a little alteration, she could use it. being very susceptible to flattery, her praise of my production won a ready assent; but when i read her platitudes i was sorry i had changed, and still more so in the _denouement_. those selected to prepare compositions read them before the whole school. my friend's was received with great laughter and applause. the one i read not only fell flat, but nearly prostrated me also. as soon as i had finished, one of the young ladies left the room and, returning in a few moments with her composition book, laid it before the teacher who presided that day, showing her the same composition i had just read. i was called up at once to explain, but was so amazed and confounded that i could not speak, and i looked the personification of guilt. i saw at a glance the contemptible position i occupied and felt as if the last day had come, that i stood before the judgment seat and had heard the awful sentence pronounced, "depart ye wicked into everlasting punishment." how i escaped from that scene to my own room i do not know. i was too wretched for tears. i sat alone for a long time when a gentle tap announced my betrayer. she put her arms around me affectionately and kissed me again and again. "oh!" she said, "you are a hero. you went through that trying ordeal like a soldier. i was so afraid, when you were pressed with questions, that the whole truth would come out and i be forced to stand in your place. i am not so brave as you; i could not endure it. now that you are through it and know how bitter a trial it is, promise that you will save me from the same experience. you are so good and noble i know you will not betray me." in this supreme moment of misery and disgrace, her loving words and warm embrace were like balm to my bruised soul and i readily promised all she asked. the girl had penetrated the weak point in my character. i loved flattery. through that means she got my composition in the first place, pledged me to silence in the second place, and so confused my moral perceptions that i really thought it praiseworthy to shelter her from what i had suffered. however, without betrayal on my part, the trick came to light through the very means she took to make concealment sure. after compositions were read they were handed over to a certain teacher for criticism. miss ---- had copied mine, and returned to me the original. i had not copied hers, so the two were in the same handwriting--one with my name outside and one with miss ----'s. as i stood well in school, both for scholarship and behavior, my sudden fall from grace occasioned no end of discussion. so, as soon as the teacher discovered the two compositions in miss ----'s writing, she came to me to inquire how i got one of miss ----'s compositions. she said, "where is yours that you wrote for that day?" taking it from my portfolio, i replied, "here it is." she then asked, "did you copy it from her book?" i replied, "no; i wrote it myself." "then why did you not read your own?" "we agreed to change," said i. "did you know that miss ---- had copied that from the book of another young lady?" "no, not until i was accused of doing it myself before the whole school." "why did you not defend yourself on the spot?" "i could not speak, neither did i know what to say." "why have you allowed yourself to remain in such a false position for a whole week?" "i do not know." "suppose i had not found this out, did you intend to keep silent?" "yes," i replied. "did miss ---- ask you to do so?" "yes." i had been a great favorite with this teacher, but she was so disgusted with my stupidity, as she called my timidity, that she said: "really, my child, you have not acted in this matter as if you had ordinary common sense." so little do grown people, in familiar surroundings, appreciate the confusion of a child's faculties, under new and trying experiences. when poor miss ----'s turn came to stand up before the whole school and take the burden on her own shoulders she had so cunningly laid on mine, i readily shed the tears for her i could not summon for myself. this was my first sad lesson in human duplicity. this episode, unfortunately, destroyed in a measure my confidence in my companions and made me suspicious even of those who came to me with appreciative words. up to this time i had accepted all things as they seemed on the surface. now i began to wonder what lay behind the visible conditions about me. perhaps the experience was beneficial, as it is quite necessary for a young girl, thrown wholly on herself for the first time among strangers, to learn caution in all she says and does. the atmosphere of home life, where all disguises and pretensions are thrown off, is quite different from a large school of girls, with the petty jealousies and antagonisms that arise in daily competition in their dress, studies, accomplishments, and amusements. the next happening in troy that seriously influenced my character was the advent of the rev. charles g. finney, a pulpit orator, who, as a terrifier of human souls, proved himself the equal of savonarola. he held a protracted meeting in the rev. dr. beaman's church, which many of my schoolmates attended. the result of six weeks of untiring effort on the part of mr. finney and his confreres was one of those intense revival seasons that swept over the city and through the seminary like an epidemic, attacking in its worst form the most susceptible. owing to my gloomy calvinistic training in the old scotch presbyterian church, and my vivid imagination, i was one of the first victims. we attended all the public services, beside the daily prayer and experience meetings held in the seminary. our studies, for the time, held a subordinate place to the more important duty of saving our souls. to state the idea of conversion and salvation as then understood, one can readily see from our present standpoint that nothing could be more puzzling and harrowing to the young mind. the revival fairly started, the most excitable were soon on the anxious seat. there we learned the total depravity of human nature and the sinner's awful danger of everlasting punishment. this was enlarged upon until the most innocent girl believed herself a monster of iniquity and felt certain of eternal damnation. then god's hatred of sin was emphasized and his irreconcilable position toward the sinner so justified that one felt like a miserable, helpless, forsaken worm of the dust in trying to approach him, even in prayer. having brought you into a condition of profound humility, the only cardinal virtue for one under conviction, in the depths of your despair you were told that it required no herculean effort on your part to be transformed into an angel, to be reconciled to god, to escape endless perdition. the way to salvation was short and simple. we had naught to do but to repent and believe and give our hearts to jesus, who was ever ready to receive them. how to do all this was the puzzling question. talking with dr. finney one day, i said: "i cannot understand what i am to do. if you should tell me to go to the top of the church steeple and jump off, i would readily do it, if thereby i could save my soul; but i do not know how to go to jesus." "repent and believe," said he, "that is all you have to do to be happy here and hereafter." "i am very sorry," i replied, "for all the evil i have done, and i believe all you tell me, and the more sincerely i believe, the more unhappy i am." with the natural reaction from despair to hope many of us imagined ourselves converted, prayed and gave our experiences in the meetings, and at times rejoiced in the thought that we were christians--chosen children of god--rather than sinners and outcasts. but dr. finney's terrible anathemas on the depravity and deceitfulness of the human heart soon shortened our newborn hopes. his appearance in the pulpit on these memorable occasions is indelibly impressed on my mind. i can see him now, his great eyes rolling around the congregation and his arms flying about in the air like those of a windmill. one evening he described hell and the devil and the long procession of sinners being swept down the rapids, about to make the awful plunge into the burning depths of liquid fire below, and the rejoicing hosts in the inferno coming up to meet them with the shouts of the devils echoing through the vaulted arches. he suddenly halted, and, pointing his index finger at the supposed procession, he exclaimed: "there, do you not see them!" i was wrought up to such a pitch that i actually jumped up and gazed in the direction to which he pointed, while the picture glowed before my eyes and remained with me for months afterward. i cannot forbear saying that, although high respect is due to the intellectual, moral, and spiritual gifts of the venerable ex-president of oberlin college, such preaching worked incalculable harm to the very souls he sought to save. fear of the judgment seized my soul. visions of the lost haunted my dreams. mental anguish prostrated my health. dethronement of my reason was apprehended by friends. but he was sincere, so peace to his ashes! returning home, i often at night roused my father from his slumbers to pray for me, lest i should be cast into the bottomless pit before morning. to change the current of my thoughts, a trip was planned to niagara, and it was decided that the subject of religion was to be tabooed altogether. accordingly our party, consisting of my sister, her husband, my father and myself, started in our private carriage, and for six weeks i heard nothing on the subject. about this time gall and spurzheim published their works on phrenology, followed by combe's "constitution of man," his "moral philosophy," and many other liberal works, all so rational and opposed to the old theologies that they produced a profound impression on my brother-in-law's mind. as we had these books with us, reading and discussing by the way, we all became deeply interested in the new ideas. thus, after many months of weary wandering in the intellectual labyrinth of "the fall of man," "original sin," "total depravity," "god's wrath," "satan's triumph," "the crucifixion," "the atonement," and "salvation by faith," i found my way out of the darkness into the clear sunlight of truth. my religious superstitions gave place to rational ideas based on scientific facts, and in proportion, as i looked at everything from a new standpoint, i grew more and more happy, day by day. thus, with a delightful journey in the month of june, an entire change in my course of reading and the current of my thoughts, my mind was restored to its normal condition. i view it as one of the greatest crimes to shadow the minds of the young with these gloomy superstitions; and with fears of the unknown and the unknowable to poison all their joy in life. after the restraints of childhood at home and in school, what a period of irrepressible joy and freedom comes to us in girlhood with the first taste of liberty. then is our individuality in a measure recognized and our feelings and opinions consulted; then we decide where and when we will come and go, what we will eat, drink, wear, and do. to suit one's own fancy in clothes, to buy what one likes, and wear what one chooses is a great privilege to most young people. to go out at pleasure, to walk, to ride, to drive, with no one to say us nay or question our right to liberty, this is indeed like a birth into a new world of happiness and freedom. this is the period, too, when the emotions rule us, and we idealize everything in life; when love and hope make the present an ecstasy and the future bright with anticipation. then comes that dream of bliss that for weeks and months throws a halo of glory round the most ordinary characters in every-day life, holding the strongest and most common-sense young men and women in a thraldom from which few mortals escape. the period when love, in soft silver tones, whispers his first words of adoration, painting our graces and virtues day by day in living colors in poetry and prose, stealthily punctuated ever and anon with a kiss or fond embrace. what dignity it adds to a young girl's estimate of herself when some strong man makes her feel that in her hands rest his future peace and happiness! though these seasons of intoxication may come once to all, yet they are seldom repeated. how often in after life we long for one more such rapturous dream of bliss, one more season of supreme human love and passion! after leaving school, until my marriage, i had the most pleasant years of my girlhood. with frequent visits to a large circle of friends and relatives in various towns and cities, the monotony of home life was sufficiently broken to make our simple country pleasures always delightful and enjoyable. an entirely new life now opened to me. the old bondage of fear of the visible and the invisible was broken and, no longer subject to absolute authority, i rejoiced in the dawn of a new day of freedom in thought and action. my brother-in-law, edward bayard, ten years my senior, was an inestimable blessing to me at this time, especially as my mind was just then opening to the consideration of all the varied problems of life. to me and my sisters he was a companion in all our amusements, a teacher in the higher departments of knowledge, and a counselor in all our youthful trials and disappointments. he was of a metaphysical turn of mind, and in the pursuit of truth was in no way trammeled by popular superstitions. he took nothing for granted and, like socrates, went about asking questions. nothing pleased him more than to get a bevy of bright young girls about him and teach them how to think clearly and reason logically. one great advantage of the years my sisters and myself spent at the troy seminary was the large number of pleasant acquaintances we made there, many of which ripened into lifelong friendships. from time to time many of our classmates visited us, and all alike enjoyed the intellectual fencing in which my brother-in-law drilled them. he discoursed with us on law, philosophy, political economy, history, and poetry, and together we read novels without number. the long winter evenings thus passed pleasantly, mr. bayard alternately talking and reading aloud scott, bulwer, james, cooper, and dickens, whose works were just then coming out in numbers from week to week, always leaving us in suspense at the most critical point of the story. our readings were varied with recitations, music, dancing, and games. as we all enjoyed brisk exercise, even with the thermometer below zero, we took long walks and sleighrides during the day, and thus the winter months glided quickly by, while the glorious summer on those blue hills was a period of unmixed enjoyment. at this season we arose at five in the morning for a long ride on horseback through the beautiful mohawk valley and over the surrounding hills. every road and lane in that region was as familiar to us and our ponies, as were the trees to the squirrels we frightened as we cantered by their favorite resorts. part of the time margaret christie, a young girl of scotch descent, was a member of our family circle. she taught us french, music, and dancing. our days were too short for all we had to do, for our time was not wholly given to pleasure. we were required to keep our rooms in order, mend and make our clothes, and do our own ironing. the latter was one of my mother's politic requirements, to make our laundry lists as short as possible. ironing on hot days in summer was a sore trial to all of us; but miss christie, being of an inventive turn of mind, soon taught us a short way out of it. she folded and smoothed her undergarments with her hands and then sat on them for a specified time. we all followed her example and thus utilized the hours devoted to our french lessons and, while reading "corinne" and "télémaque," in this primitive style we ironed our clothes. but for dresses, collars and cuffs, and pocket handkerchiefs, we were compelled to wield the hot iron, hence with these articles we used all due economy, and my mother's object was thus accomplished. as i had become sufficiently philosophical to talk over my religious experiences calmly with my classmates who had been with me through the finney revival meetings, we all came to the same conclusion--that we had passed through no remarkable change and that we had not been born again, as they say, for we found our tastes and enjoyments the same as ever. my brother-in-law explained to us the nature of the delusion we had all experienced, the physical conditions, the mental processes, the church machinery by which such excitements are worked up, and the impositions to which credulous minds are necessarily subjected. as we had all been through that period of depression and humiliation, and had been oppressed at times with the feeling that all our professions were arrant hypocrisy and that our last state was worse than our first, he helped us to understand these workings of the human mind and reconciled us to the more rational condition in which we now found ourselves. he never grew weary of expounding principles to us and dissipating the fogs and mists that gather over young minds educated in an atmosphere of superstition. we had a constant source of amusement and vexation in the students in my father's office. a succession of them was always coming fresh from college and full of conceit. aching to try their powers of debate on graduates from the troy seminary, they politely questioned all our theories and assertions. however, with my brother-in-law's training in analysis and logic, we were a match for any of them. nothing pleased me better than a long argument with them on woman's equality, which i tried to prove by a diligent study of the books they read and the games they played. i confess that i did not study so much for a love of the truth or my own development, in these days, as to make those young men recognize my equality. i soon noticed that, after losing a few games of chess, my opponent talked less of masculine superiority. sister madge would occasionally rush to the defense with an emphatic "fudge for these laws, all made by men! i'll never obey one of them. and as to the students with their impertinent talk of superiority, all they need is such a shaking up as i gave the most disagreeable one yesterday. i invited him to take a ride on horseback. he accepted promptly, and said he would be most happy to go. accordingly i told peter to saddle the toughest-mouthed, hardest-trotting carriage horse in the stable. mounted on my swift pony, i took a ten-mile canter as fast as i could go, with that superior being at my heels calling, as he found breath, for me to stop, which i did at last and left him in the hands of peter, half dead at his hotel, where he will be laid out, with all his marvelous masculine virtues, for a week at least. now do not waste your arguments on these prigs from union college. take each, in turn, the ten-miles' circuit on 'old boney' and they'll have no breath left to prate of woman's inferiority. you might argue with them all day, and you could not make them feel so small as i made that popinjay feel in one hour. i knew 'old boney' would keep up with me, if he died for it, and that my escort could neither stop nor dismount, except by throwing himself from the saddle." "oh, madge!" i exclaimed; "what will you say when he meets you again?" "if he complains, i will say 'the next time you ride see that you have a curb bit before starting.' surely, a man ought to know what is necessary to manage a horse, and not expect a woman to tell him." our lives were still further varied and intensified by the usual number of flirtations, so called, more or less lasting or evanescent, from all of which i emerged, as from my religious experiences, in a more rational frame of mind. we had been too much in the society of boys and young gentlemen, and knew too well their real character, to idealize the sex in general. in addition to our own observations, we had the advantage of our brother-in-law's wisdom. wishing to save us as long as possible from all matrimonial entanglements, he was continually unveiling those with whom he associated, and so critically portraying their intellectual and moral condition that it was quite impossible, in our most worshipful moods, to make gods of any of the sons of adam. however, in spite of all our own experiences and of all the warning words of wisdom from those who had seen life in its many phases, we entered the charmed circle at last, all but one marrying into the legal profession, with its odious statute laws and infamous decisions. and this, after reading blackstone, kent, and story, and thoroughly understanding the status of the wife under the old common law of england, which was in force at that time in most of the states of the union. chapter iv. life at peterboro. the year, with us, was never considered complete without a visit to peterboro, n.y., the home of gerrit smith. though he was a reformer and was very radical in many of his ideas, yet, being a man of broad sympathies, culture, wealth, and position, he drew around him many friends of the most conservative opinions. he was a man of fine presence, rare physical beauty, most affable and courteous in manner, and his hospitalities were generous to an extreme, and dispensed to all classes of society. every year representatives from the oneida tribe of indians visited him. his father had early purchased of them large tracts of land, and there was a tradition among them that, as an equivalent for the good bargains of the father, they had a right to the son's hospitality, with annual gifts of clothing and provisions. the slaves, too, had heard of gerrit smith, the abolitionist, and of peterboro as one of the safe points _en route_ for canada. his mansion was, in fact, one of the stations on the "underground railroad" for slaves escaping from bondage. hence they, too, felt that they had a right to a place under his protecting roof. on such occasions the barn and the kitchen floor were utilized as chambers for the black man from the southern plantation and the red man from his home in the forest. the spacious home was always enlivened with choice society from every part of the country. there one would meet members of the families of the old dutch aristocracy, the van rensselaers, the van vechtens, the schuylers, the livingstons, the bleeckers, the brinkerhoffs, the ten eycks, the millers, the seymours, the cochranes, the biddles, the barclays, the wendells, and many others. as the lady of the house, ann carroll fitzhugh, was the daughter of a wealthy slaveholder of maryland, many agreeable southerners were often among the guests. our immediate family relatives were well represented by general john cochrane and his sisters, general baird and his wife from west point, the fitzhughs from oswego and geneseo, the backuses and tallmans from rochester, and the swifts from geneva. here one was sure to meet scholars, philosophers, philanthropists, judges, bishops, clergymen, and statesmen. judge alfred conkling, the father of roscoe conkling, was, in his late years, frequently seen at peterboro. tall and stately, after all life's troubled scenes, financial losses and domestic sorrows, he used to say there was no spot on earth that seemed so like his idea of paradise. the proud, reserved judge was unaccustomed to manifestations of affection and tender interest in his behalf, and when gerrit, taking him by both hands would, in his softest tones say, "good-morning," and inquire how he had slept and what he would like to do that day, and nancy would greet him with equal warmth and pin a little bunch of roses in his buttonhole, i have seen the tears in his eyes. their warm sympathies and sweet simplicity of manner melted the sternest natures and made the most reserved amiable. there never was such an atmosphere of love and peace, of freedom and good cheer, in any other home i visited. and this was the universal testimony of those who were guests at peterboro. to go anywhere else, after a visit there, was like coming down from the divine heights into the valley of humiliation. how changed from the early days when, as strict presbyterians, they believed in all the doctrines of calvin! then, an indefinite gloom pervaded their home. their consciences were diseased. they attached such undue importance to forms that they went through three kinds of baptism. at one time nancy would read nothing but the bible, sing nothing but hymns, and play only sacred music. she felt guilty if she talked on any subject except religion. she was, in all respects, a fitting mate for her attractive husband. exquisitely refined in feeling and manner, beautiful in face and form, earnest and sincere, she sympathized with him in all his ideas of religion and reform. together they passed through every stage of theological experience, from the uncertain ground of superstition and speculation to the solid foundation of science and reason. the position of the church in the anti-slavery conflict, opening as it did all questions of ecclesiastical authority, bible interpretation, and church discipline, awakened them to new thought and broader views on religious subjects, and eventually emancipated them entirely from the old dogmas and formalities of their faith, and lifted them into the cheerful atmosphere in which they passed the remainder of their lives. their only daughter, elizabeth, added greatly to the attractions of the home circle, as she drew many young people round her. beside her personal charm she was the heiress of a vast estate and had many admirers. the favored one was charles dudley miller of utica, nephew of mrs. blandina bleecker dudley, founder of the albany observatory. at the close of his college life mr. miller had not only mastered the languages, mathematics, rhetoric, and logic, but had learned the secret windings of the human heart. he understood the art of pleasing. these were the times when the anti-slavery question was up for hot discussion. in all the neighboring towns conventions were held in which james g. birney, a southern gentleman who had emancipated his slaves, charles stuart of scotland, and george thompson of england, garrison, phillips, may, beriah greene, foster, abby kelly, lucretia mott, douglass, and others took part. here, too, john brown, sanborn, morton, and frederick douglass met to talk over that fatal movement on harper's ferry. on the question of temperance, also, the people were in a ferment. dr. cheever's pamphlet, "deacon giles' distillery," was scattered far and wide, and, as he was sued for libel, the question was discussed in the courts as well as at every fireside. then came the father matthew and washingtonian movements, and the position of the church on these questions intensified and embittered the conflict. this brought the cheevers, the pierponts, the delevans, the nortons, and their charming wives to peterboro. it was with such company and varied discussions on every possible phase of political, religious, and social life that i spent weeks every year. gerrit smith was cool and calm in debate, and, as he was armed at all points on these subjects, he could afford to be patient and fair with an opponent, whether on the platform or at the fireside. these rousing arguments at peterboro made social life seem tame and profitless elsewhere, and the youngest of us felt that the conclusions reached in this school of philosophy were not to be questioned. the sisters of general cochrane, in disputes with their dutch cousins in schenectady and albany, would end all controversy by saying, "this question was fully discussed at peterboro, and settled." the youngsters frequently put the lessons of freedom and individual rights they heard so much of into practice, and relieved their brains from the constant strain of argument on first principles, by the wildest hilarity in dancing, all kinds of games, and practical jokes carried beyond all bounds of propriety. these romps generally took place at mr. miller's. he used to say facetiously, that they talked a good deal about liberty over the way, but he kept the goddess under his roof. one memorable occasion in which our enthusiasm was kept at white heat for two hours i must try to describe, though words cannot do it justice, as it was pre-eminently a spectacular performance. the imagination even cannot do justice to the limp, woe-begone appearance of the actors in the closing scene. these romps were conducted on a purely democratic basis, without regard to color, sex, or previous condition of servitude. it was rather a cold day in the month of march, when "cousin charley," as we called mr. miller, was superintending some men who were laying a plank walk in the rear of his premises. some half dozen of us were invited to an early tea at good deacon huntington's. immediately after dinner, miss fitzhugh and miss van schaack decided to take a nap, that they might appear as brilliant as possible during the evening. that they might not be late, as they invariably were, cousin lizzie and i decided to rouse them in good season with a generous sprinkling of cold water. in vain they struggled to keep the blankets around them; with equal force we pulled them away, and, whenever a stray finger or toe appeared, we brought fresh batteries to bear, until they saw that passive resistance must give place to active hostility. we were armed with two watering pots. they armed themselves with two large-sized syringes used for showering potato bugs. with these weapons they gave us chase downstairs. we ran into a closet and held the door shut. they quietly waited our forthcoming. as soon as we opened the door to peep out, miss fitzhugh, who was large and strong, pulled it wide open and showered us with a vengeance. then they fled into a large pantry where stood several pans of milk. at this stage cousin charley, hearing the rumpus, came to our assistance. he locked them in the pantry and returned to his work, whereupon they opened the window and showered him with milk, while he, in turn, pelted them with wet clothes, soaking in tubs near by. as they were thinly clad, wet to the skin, and the cold march wind blew round them (we were all in fatigue costume in starting) they implored us to let them out, which we did, and, in return for our kindness, they gave us a broadside of milk in our faces. cousin lizzie and i fled to the dark closet, where they locked us in. after long, weary waiting they came to offer us terms of capitulation. lizzie agreed to fill their guns with milk, and give them our watering pots full of water, and i agreed to call cousin charley under my window until they emptied the contents of guns and pots on his head. my room was on the first floor, and miss fitzhugh's immediately overhead. on these terms we accepted our freedom. accordingly, i gently raised the window and called charley confidentially within whispering distance, when down came a shower of water. as he stepped back to look up and see whence it came, and who made the attack, a stream of milk hit him on the forehead, his heels struck a plank, and he fell backward, to all appearance knocked down with a stream of milk. his humiliation was received with shouts of derisive laughter, and even the carpenters at work laid down their hammers and joined in the chorus; but his revenge was swift and capped the climax. cold and wet as we all were, and completely tired out, we commenced to disrobe and get ready for the tea party. unfortunately i had forgotten to lock my door, and in walked cousin charley with a quart bottle of liquid blacking, which he prepared to empty on my devoted head. i begged so eloquently and trembled so at the idea of being dyed black, that he said he would let me off on one condition, and that was to get him, by some means, into miss fitzhugh's room. so i ran screaming up the stairs, as if hotly pursued by the enemy, and begged her to let me in. she cautiously opened the door, but when she saw charley behind me she tried to force it shut. however, he was too quick for her. he had one leg and arm in; but, at that stage of her toilet, to let him in was impossible, and there they stood, equally strong, firmly braced, she on one side of the door and he on the other. but the blacking he was determined she should have; so, gauging her probable position, with one desperate effort he squeezed in a little farther and, raising the bottle, he poured the contents on her head. the blacking went streaming down over her face, white robe, and person, and left her looking more like a bronze fury than one of eve's most charming daughters. a yard or more of the carpet was ruined, the wallpaper and bedclothes spattered, and the poor victim was unfit to be seen for a week at least. charley had a good excuse for his extreme measures, for, as we all by turn played our tricks on him, it was necessary to keep us in some fear of punishment. this was but one of the many outrageous pranks we perpetrated on each other. to see us a few hours later, all absorbed in an anti-slavery or temperance convention, or dressed in our best, in high discourse with the philosophers, one would never think we could have been guilty of such consummate follies. it was, however, but the natural reaction from the general serious trend of our thoughts. it was in peterboro, too, that i first met one who was then considered the most eloquent and impassioned orator on the anti-slavery platform, henry b. stanton. he had come over from utica with alvin stewart's beautiful daughter, to whom report said he was engaged; but, as she soon after married luther r. marsh, there was a mistake somewhere. however, the rumor had its advantages. regarding him as not in the matrimonial market, we were all much more free and easy in our manners with him than we would otherwise have been. a series of anti-slavery conventions was being held in madison county, and there i had the pleasure of hearing him for the first time. as i had a passion for oratory, i was deeply impressed with his power. he was not so smooth and eloquent as phillips, but he could make his audience both laugh and cry; the latter, phillips himself said he never could do. mr. stanton was then in his prime, a fine-looking, affable young man, with remarkable conversational talent, and was ten years my senior, with the advantage that number of years necessarily gives. two carriage-loads of ladies and gentlemen drove off every morning, sometimes ten miles, to one of these conventions, returning late at night. i shall never forget those charming drives over the hills in madison county, the bright autumnal days, and the bewitching moonlight nights. the enthusiasm of the people in these great meetings, the thrilling oratory, and lucid arguments of the speakers, all conspired to make these days memorable as among the most charming in my life. it seemed to me that i never had so much happiness crowded into one short month. i had become interested in the anti-slavery and temperance questions, and was deeply impressed with the appeals and arguments. i felt a new inspiration in life and was enthused with new ideas of individual rights and the basic principles of government, for the anti-slavery platform was the best school the american people ever had on which to learn republican principles and ethics. these conventions and the discussions at my cousin's fireside i count among the great blessings of my life. one morning, as we came out from breakfast, mr. stanton joined me on the piazza, where i was walking up and down enjoying the balmy air and the beauty of the foliage. "as we have no conventions," said he, "on hand, what do you say to a ride on horseback this morning?" i readily accepted the suggestion, ordered the horses, put on my habit, and away we went. the roads were fine and we took a long ride. as we were returning home we stopped often to admire the scenery and, perchance, each other. when walking slowly through a beautiful grove, he laid his hand on the horn of the saddle and, to my surprise, made one of those charming revelations of human feeling which brave knights have always found eloquent words to utter, and to which fair ladies have always listened with mingled emotions of pleasure and astonishment. one outcome of those glorious days of october, , was a marriage, in johnstown, the th day of may, , and a voyage to the old world. six weeks of that charming autumn, ending in the indian summer with its peculiarly hazy atmosphere, i lingered in peterboro. it seems in retrospect like a beautiful dream. a succession of guests was constantly coming and going, and i still remember the daily drives over those grand old hills crowned with trees now gorgeous in rich colors, the more charming because we knew the time was short before the cold winds of november would change all. the early setting sun warned us that the shortening days must soon end our twilight drives, and the moonlight nights were too chilly to linger long in the rustic arbors or shady nooks outside. with the peculiar charm of this season of the year there is always a touch of sadness in nature, and it seemed doubly so to me, as my engagement was not one of unmixed joy and satisfaction. among all conservative families there was a strong aversion to abolitionists and the whole anti-slavery movement. alone with cousin gerrit in his library he warned me, in deep, solemn tones, while strongly eulogizing my lover, that my father would never consent to my marriage with an abolitionist. he felt in duty bound, as my engagement had occurred under his roof, to free himself from all responsibility by giving me a long dissertation on love, friendship, marriage, and all the pitfalls for the unwary, who, without due consideration, formed matrimonial relations. the general principles laid down in this interview did not strike my youthful mind so forcibly as the suggestion that it was better to announce my engagement by letter than to wait until i returned home, as thus i might draw the hottest fire while still in safe harbor, where cousin gerrit could help me defend the weak points in my position. so i lingered at peterboro to prolong the dream of happiness and postpone the conflict i feared to meet. but the judge understood the advantage of our position as well as we did, and wasted no ammunition on us. being even more indignant at my cousin than at me, he quietly waited until i returned home, when i passed through the ordeal of another interview, with another dissertation on domestic relations from a financial standpoint. these were two of the most bewildering interviews i ever had. they succeeded in making me feel that the step i proposed to take was the most momentous and far-reaching in its consequences of any in this mortal life. heretofore my apprehensions had all been of death and eternity; now life itself was filled with fears and anxiety as to the possibilities of the future. thus these two noble men, who would have done anything for my happiness, actually overweighted my conscience and turned the sweetest dream of my life into a tragedy. how little strong men, with their logic, sophistry, and hypothetical examples, appreciate the violence they inflict on the tender sensibilities of a woman's heart, in trying to subjugate her to their will! the love of protecting too often degenerates into downright tyranny. fortunately all these sombre pictures of a possible future were thrown into the background by the tender missives every post brought me, in which the brilliant word-painting of one of the most eloquent pens of this generation made the future for us both, as bright and beautiful as spring with her verdure and blossoms of promise. however, many things were always transpiring at peterboro to turn one's thoughts and rouse new interest in humanity at large. one day, as a bevy of us girls were singing and chattering in the parlor, cousin gerrit entered and, in mysterious tones, said: "i have a most important secret to tell you, which you must keep to yourselves religiously for twenty-four hours." we readily pledged ourselves in the most solemn manner, individually and collectively. "now," said he, "follow me to the third story." this we did, wondering what the secret could be. at last, opening a door, he ushered us into a large room, in the center of which sat a beautiful quadroon girl, about eighteen years of age. addressing her, he said: "harriet, i have brought all my young cousins to see you. i want you to make good abolitionists of them by telling them the history of your life--what you have seen and suffered in slavery." turning to us he said: "harriet has just escaped from her master, who is visiting in syracuse, and is on her way to canada. she will start this evening and you may never have another opportunity of seeing a slave girl face to face, so ask her all you care to know of the system of slavery." for two hours we listened to the sad story of her childhood and youth, separated from all her family and sold for her beauty in a new orleans market when but fourteen years of age. the details of her story i need not repeat. the fate of such girls is too well known to need rehearsal. we all wept together as she talked, and, when cousin gerrit returned to summon us away, we needed no further education to make us earnest abolitionists. dressed as a quakeress, harriet started at twilight with one of mr. smith's faithful clerks in a carriage for oswego, there to cross the lake to canada. the next day her master and the marshals from syracuse were on her track in peterboro, and traced her to mr. smith's premises. he was quite gracious in receiving them, and, while assuring them that there was no slave there, he said that they were at liberty to make a thorough search of the house and grounds. he invited them to stay and dine and kept them talking as long as possible, as every hour helped harriet to get beyond their reach; for, although she had eighteen hours the start of them, yet we feared some accident might have delayed her. the master was evidently a gentleman, for, on mr. smith's assurance that harriet was not there, he made no search, feeling that they could not do so without appearing to doubt his word. he was evidently surprised to find an abolitionist so courteous and affable, and it was interesting to hear them in conversation, at dinner, calmly discussing the problem of slavery, while public sentiment was at white heat on the question. they shook hands warmly at parting and expressed an equal interest in the final adjustment of that national difficulty. in due time the clerk returned with the good news that harriet was safe with friends in a good situation in canada. mr. smith then published an open letter to the master in the new york _tribune_, saying "that he would no doubt rejoice to know that his slave harriet, in whose fate he felt so deep an interest, was now a free woman, safe under the shadow of the british throne. i had the honor of entertaining her under my roof, sending her in my carriage to lake ontario, just eighteen hours before your arrival: hence my willingness to have you search my premises." like the varied combinations of the kaleidoscope, the scenes in our social life at peterboro were continually changing from grave to gay. some years later we had a most hilarious occasion at the marriage of mary cochrane, sister of general john cochrane, to chapman biddle, of philadelphia. the festivities, which were kept up for three days, involved most elaborate preparations for breakfasts, dinners, etc., there being no delmonico's in that remote part of the country. it was decided in family council that we had sufficient culinary talent under the roof to prepare the entire _menu_ of substantials and delicacies, from soup and salmon to cakes and creams. so, gifted ladies and gentlemen were impressed into the service. the fitzhughs all had a natural talent for cooking, and chief among them was isabella, wife of a naval officer,--lieutenant swift of geneva,--who had made a profound study of all the authorities from archestratus, a poet in syracuse, the most famous cook among the greeks, down to our own miss leslie. accordingly she was elected manager of the occasion, and to each one was assigned the specialty in which she claimed to excel. those who had no specialty were assistants to those who had. in this humble office--"assistant at large"--i labored throughout. cooking is a high art. a wise egyptian said, long ago: "the degree of taste and skill manifested by a nation in the preparation of food may be regarded as to a very considerable extent proportioned to its culture and refinement." in early times men, only, were deemed capable of handling fire, whether at the altar or the hearthstone. we read in the scriptures that abraham prepared cakes of fine meal and a calf tender and good, which, with butter and milk, he set before the three angels in the plains of mamre. we are told, too, of the chief butler and chief baker as officers in the household of king pharaoh. i would like to call the attention of my readers to the dignity of this profession, which some young women affect to despise. the fact that angels eat, shows that we may be called upon in the next sphere to cook even for cherubim and seraphim. how important, then, to cultivate one's gifts in that direction! with such facts before us, we stirred and pounded, whipped and ground, coaxed the delicate meats from crabs and lobsters and the succulent peas from the pods, and grated corn and cocoanut with the same cheerfulness and devotion that we played mendelssohn's "songs without words" on the piano, the spanish fandango on our guitars, or danced the minuet, polka, lancers, or virginia reel. during the day of the wedding, every stage coach was crowded with guests from the north, south, east, and west, and, as the twilight deepened, carriages began to roll in with neighbors and friends living at short distances, until the house and grounds were full. a son of bishop coxe, who married the tall and stately sister of roscoe conkling, performed the ceremony. the beautiful young bride was given away by her uncle gerrit. the congratulations, the feast, and all went off with fitting decorum in the usual way. the best proof of the excellence of our viands was that they were all speedily swept from mortal view, and every housewife wanted a recipe for something. as the grand dinner was to come off the next day, our thoughts now turned in that direction. the responsibility rested heavily on the heads of the chief actors, and they reported troubled dreams and unduly early rising. dear belle swift was up in season and her white soup stood serenely in a tin pan, on an upper shelf, before the town clock struck seven. if it had not taken that position so early, it might have been incorporated with higher forms of life than that into which it eventually fell. another artist was also on the wing early, and in pursuit of a tin pan in which to hide her precious compound, she unwittingly seized this one, and the rich white soup rolled down her raven locks like the oil on aaron's beard, and enveloped her in a veil of filmy whiteness. i heard the splash and the exclamation of surprise and entered the butler's pantry just in time to see the heiress of the smith estate standing like a statue, tin pan in hand, soup in her curls, her eyebrows and eyelashes,--collar, cuffs, and morning dress saturated,--and belle, at a little distance, looking at her and the soup on the floor with surprise and disgust depicted on every feature. the tableau was inexpressibly comical, and i could not help laughing outright; whereupon belle turned on me, and, with indignant tones, said, "if you had been up since four o'clock making that soup you would not stand there like a laughing monkey, without the least feeling of pity!" poor lizzie was very sorry, and would have shed tears, but they could not penetrate that film of soup. i tried to apologize, but could only laugh the more when i saw belle crying and lizzie standing as if hoping that the soup might be scraped off her and gathered from the floor and made to do duty on the occasion. after breakfast, ladies and gentlemen, alike in white aprons, crowded into the dining room and kitchen, each to perform the allotted task. george biddle of philadelphia and john b. miller of utica, in holiday spirits, were irrepressible--everywhere at the same moment, helping or hindering as the case might be. dear belle, having only partially recovered from the white-soup catastrophe, called mr. biddle to hold the ice-cream freezer while she poured in the luscious compound she had just prepared. he held it up without resting it on anything, while belle slowly poured in the cream. as the freezer had no indentations round the top or rim to brace the thumbs and fingers, when it grew suddenly heavier his hands slipped and down went the whole thing, spattering poor belle and spoiling a beautiful pair of gaiters in which, as she had very pretty feet, she took a laudable pride. in another corner sat wealthea backus, grating some cocoanut. while struggling in that operation, john miller, feeling hilarious, was annoying her in divers ways; at length she drew the grater across his nose, gently, as she intended, but alas! she took the skin off, and john's beauty, for the remainder of the festivities, was marred with a black patch on that prominent feature. one can readily imagine the fun that must have transpired where so many amateur cooks were at work round one table, with all manner of culinary tools and ingredients. as assistant-at-large i was summoned to the cellar, where mrs. cornelia barclay of new york was evolving from a pan of flour and water that miracle in the pie department called puff paste. this, it seems, can only be accomplished where the thermometer is below forty, and near a refrigerator where the compound can be kept cold until ready to be popped into the oven. no jokes or nonsense here. with queenly dignity the flour and water were gently compressed. here one hand must not know what the other doeth. bits of butter must be so deftly introduced that even the rolling pin may be unconscious of its work. as the artist gave the last touch to an exquisite lemon pie, with a mingled expression of pride and satisfaction on her classic features, she ordered me to bear it to the oven. in the transit i met madam belle. "don't let that fall," she said sneeringly. fortunately i did not, and returned in triumph to transport another. i was then summoned to a consultation with the committee on toasts, consisting of james cochrane, john miller, and myself. mr. miller had one for each guest already written, all of which we accepted and pronounced very good. strange to say, a most excellent dinner emerged from all this uproar and confusion. the table, with its silver, china, flowers, and rich viands, the guests in satins, velvets, jewels, soft laces, and bright cravats, together reflecting all the colors of the prism, looked as beautiful as the rainbow after a thunderstorm. twenty years ago i made my last sad visit to that spot so rich with pleasant memories of bygone days. a few relatives and family friends gathered there to pay the last tokens of respect to our noble cousin. it was on one of the coldest days of gray december that we laid him in the frozen earth, to be seen no more. he died from a stroke of apoplexy in new york city, at the home of his niece, mrs. ellen cochrane walter, whose mother was mr. smith's only sister. the journey from new york to peterboro was cold and dreary, and climbing the hills from canastota in an open sleigh, nine hundred feet above the valley, with the thermometer below zero, before sunrise, made all nature look as sombre as the sad errand on which we came. outside the mansion everything in its wintry garb was cold and still, and all within was silent as the grave. the central figure, the light and joy of that home, had vanished forever. he who had welcomed us on that threshold for half a century would welcome us no more. we did what we could to dissipate the gloom that settled on us all. we did not intensify our grief by darkening the house and covering ourselves with black crape, but wore our accustomed dresses of chastened colors and opened all the blinds that the glad sunshine might stream in. we hung the apartment where the casket stood with wreaths of evergreens, and overhead we wove his favorite mottoes in living letters, "equal rights for all!" "rescue cuba now!" the religious services were short and simple; the unitarian clergyman from syracuse made a few remarks, the children from the orphan asylum, in which he was deeply interested, sang an appropriate hymn, and around the grave stood representatives of the biddles, the dixwells, the sedgwicks, the barclays, and stantons, and three generations of his immediate family. with a few appropriate words from general john cochrane we left our beloved kinsman alone in his last resting place. two months later, on his birthday, his wife, ann carroll fitzhugh, passed away and was laid by his side. theirs was a remarkably happy union of over half a century, and they were soon reunited in the life eternal. chapter v. our wedding journey. my engagement was a season of doubt and conflict--doubt as to the wisdom of changing a girlhood of freedom and enjoyment for i knew not what, and conflict because the step i proposed was in opposition to the wishes of all my family. whereas, heretofore, friends were continually suggesting suitable matches for me and painting the marriage relation in the most dazzling colors, now that state was represented as beset with dangers and disappointments, and men, of all god's creatures as the most depraved and unreliable. hard pressed, i broke my engagement, after months of anxiety and bewilderment; suddenly i decided to renew it, as mr. stanton was going to europe as a delegate to the world's anti-slavery convention, and we did not wish the ocean to roll between us. thursday, may , , i determined to take the fateful step, without the slightest preparation for a wedding or a voyage; but mr. stanton, coming up the north river, was detained on "marcy's overslaugh," a bar in the river where boats were frequently stranded for hours. this delay compelled us to be married on friday, which is commonly supposed to be a most unlucky day. but as we lived together, without more than the usual matrimonial friction, for nearly a half a century, had seven children, all but one of whom are still living, and have been well sheltered, clothed, and fed, enjoying sound minds in sound bodies, no one need be afraid of going through the marriage ceremony on friday for fear of bad luck. the scotch clergyman who married us, being somewhat superstitious, begged us to postpone it until saturday; but, as we were to sail early in the coming week, that was impossible. that point settled, the next difficulty was to persuade him to leave out the word "obey" in the marriage ceremony. as i obstinately refused to obey one with whom i supposed i was entering into an equal relation, that point, too, was conceded. a few friends were invited to be present and, in a simple white evening dress, i was married. but the good priest avenged himself for the points he conceded, by keeping us on the rack with a long prayer and dissertation on the sacred institution for one mortal hour. the rev. hugh maire was a little stout fellow, vehement in manner and speech, who danced about the floor, as he laid down the law, in the most original and comical manner. as mr. stanton had never seen him before, the hour to him was one of constant struggle to maintain his equilibrium. i had sat under his ministrations for several years, and was accustomed to his rhetoric, accent, and gestures, and thus was able to go through the ordeal in a calmer state of mind. sister madge, who had stood by me bravely through all my doubts and anxieties, went with us to new york and saw us on board the vessel. my sister harriet and her husband, daniel c. eaton, a merchant in new york city, were also there. he and i had had for years a standing game of "tag" at all our partings, and he had vowed to send me "tagged" to europe. i was equally determined that he should not. accordingly, i had a desperate chase after him all over the vessel, but in vain. he had the last "tag" and escaped. as i was compelled, under the circumstances, to conduct the pursuit with some degree of decorum, and he had the advantage of height, long limbs, and freedom from skirts, i really stood no chance whatever. however, as the chase kept us all laughing, it helped to soften the bitterness of parting. [illustration: h.b. stanton] [illustration: mrs. stanton and daughter, .] fairly at sea, i closed another chapter of my life, and my thoughts turned to what lay in the near future. james g. birney, the anti-slavery nominee for the presidency of the united states, joined us in new york, and was a fellow-passenger on the montreal for england. he and my husband were delegates to the world's anti-slavery convention, and both interested themselves in my anti-slavery education. they gave me books to read, and, as we paced the deck day by day, the question was the chief theme of our conversation. mr. birney was a polished gentleman of the old school, and was excessively proper and punctilious in manner and conversation. i soon perceived that he thought i needed considerable toning down before reaching england. i was quick to see and understand that his criticisms of others in a general way and the drift of his discourses on manners and conversation had a nearer application than he intended i should discover, though he hoped i would profit by them. i was always grateful to anyone who took an interest in my improvement, so i laughingly told him, one day, that he need not make his criticisms any longer in that roundabout way, but might take me squarely in hand and polish me up as speedily as possible. sitting in the saloon at night after a game of chess, in which, perchance, i had been the victor, i felt complacent and would sometimes say: "well, what have i said or done to-day open to criticism?" so, in the most gracious manner, he replied on one occasion: "you went to the masthead in a chair, which i think very unladylike. i heard you call your husband 'henry' in the presence of strangers, which is not permissible in polite society. you should always say 'mr. stanton.' you have taken three moves back in this game." "bless me!" i replied, "what a catalogue in one day! i fear my mentor will despair of my ultimate perfection." "i should have more hope," he replied, "if you seemed to feel my rebukes more deeply, but you evidently think them of too little consequence to be much disturbed by them." as he found even more fault with my husband, we condoled with each other and decided that our friend was rather hypercritical and that we were as nearly perfect as mortals need be for the wear and tear of ordinary life. being both endowed with a good degree of self-esteem, neither the praise nor the blame of mankind was overpowering to either of us. as the voyage lasted eighteen days--for we were on a sailing vessel--we had time to make some improvement, or, at least, to consider all friendly suggestions. at this time mr. birney was very much in love with miss fitzhugh of geneseo, to whom he was afterward married. he suffered at times great depression of spirits, but i could always rouse him to a sunny mood by introducing her name. that was a theme of which he never grew weary, and, while praising her, a halo of glory was to him visible around my head and i was faultless for the time being. there was nothing in our fellow-passengers to break the monotony of the voyage. they were all stolid, middle-class english people, returning from various parts of the world to visit their native land. when out of their hearing, mr. birney used to ridicule them without mercy; so, one day, by way of making a point, i said with great solemnity, "is it good breeding to make fun of the foibles of our fellow-men, who have not had our advantages of culture and education?" he felt the rebuke and blushed, and never again returned to that subject. i am sorry to say i was glad to find him once in fault. though some amusement, in whatever extraordinary way i could obtain it, was necessary to my existence, yet, as it was deemed important that i should thoroughly understand the status of the anti-slavery movement in my own country, i spent most of my time reading and talking on that question. being the wife of a delegate to the world's convention, we all felt it important that i should be able to answer whatever questions i might be asked in england on all phases of the slavery question. the captain, a jolly fellow, was always ready to second me in my explorations into every nook and cranny of the vessel. he imagined that my reading was distasteful and enforced by the older gentlemen, so he was continually planning some diversion, and often invited me to sit with him and listen to his experiences of a sailor's life. but all things must end in this mortal life, and our voyage was near its termination, when we were becalmed on the southern coast of england and could not make more than one knot an hour. when within sight of the distant shore, a pilot boat came along and offered to take anyone ashore in six hours. i was so delighted at the thought of reaching land that, after much persuasion, mr. stanton and mr. birney consented to go. accordingly we were lowered into the boat in an armchair, with a luncheon consisting of a cold chicken, a loaf of bread, and a bottle of wine, with just enough wind to carry our light craft toward our destination. but, instead of six hours, we were all day trying to reach the land, and, as the twilight deepened and the last breeze died away, the pilot said: "we are now two miles from shore, but the only way you can reach there to-night is by a rowboat." as we had no provisions left and nowhere to sleep, we were glad to avail ourselves of the rowboat. it was a bright moonlight night, the air balmy, the waters smooth, and, with two stout oarsmen, we glided swiftly along. as mr. birney made the last descent and seated himself, doubtful as to our reaching shore, turning to me he said: "the woman tempted me and i did leave the good ship." however, we did reach the shore at midnight and landed at torquay, one of the loveliest spots in that country, and our journey to exeter the next day lay through the most beautiful scenery in england. as we had no luggage with us, our detention by customs officers was brief, and we were soon conducted to a comfortable little hotel, which we found in the morning was a bower of roses. i had never imagined anything so beautiful as the drive up to exeter on the top of a coach, with four stout horses, trotting at the rate of ten miles an hour. it was the first day of june, and the country was in all its glory. the foliage was of the softest green, the trees were covered with blossoms, and the shrubs with flowers. the roads were perfect; the large, fine-looking coachman, with his white gloves and reins, his rosy face and lofty bearing and the postman in red, blowing his horn as we passed through every village, made the drive seem like a journey in fairyland. we had heard that england was like a garden of flowers, but we were wholly unprepared for such wealth of beauty. in exeter we had our first view of one of the great cathedrals in the old world, and we were all deeply impressed with its grandeur. it was just at the twilight hour, when the last rays of the setting sun, streaming through the stained glass windows, deepened the shadows and threw a mysterious amber light over all. as the choir was practicing, the whole effect was heightened by the deep tones of the organ reverberating through the arched roof, and the sound of human voices as if vainly trying to fill the vast space above. the novelty and solemnity of the surroundings roused all our religious emotions and thrilled every nerve in our being. as if moved by the same impulse to linger there a while, we all sat down, silently waiting for something to break the spell that bound us. can one wonder at the power of the catholic religion for centuries, with such accessories to stimulate the imagination to a blind worship of the unknown? sitting in the hotel that evening and wanting something to read, we asked the waiter for the daily papers. as there was no public table or drawing room for guests, but each party had its own apartment, we needed a little change from the society of each other. having been, as it were, shut from the outside world for eighteen days, we had some curiosity to see whether our planet was still revolving from west to east. at the mention of papers in the plural number, the attendant gave us a look of surprise, and said he would get "it." he returned saying that the gentleman in no. had "it," but he would be through in fifteen minutes. accordingly, at the end of that time, he brought the newspaper, and, after we had had it the same length of time, he came to take it to another party. at our lodging house in london, a paper was left for half an hour each morning, and then it was taken to the next house, thus serving several families of readers. the next day brought us to london. when i first entered our lodging house in queen street, i thought it the gloomiest abode i had ever seen. the arrival of a delegation of ladies, the next day, from boston and philadelphia, changed the atmosphere of the establishment, and filled me with delightful anticipations of some new and charming acquaintances, which i fully realized in meeting emily winslow, abby southwick, elizabeth neal, mary grew, abby kimber, sarah pugh, and lucretia mott. there had been a split in the american anti-slavery ranks, and delegates came from both branches, and, as they were equally represented at our lodgings, i became familiar with the whole controversy. the potent element which caused the division was the woman question, and as the garrisonian branch maintained the right of women to speak and vote in the conventions, all my sympathies were with the garrisonians, though mr. stanton and mr. birney belonged to the other branch, called political abolitionists. to me there was no question so important as the emancipation of women from the dogmas of the past, political, religious, and social. it struck me as very remarkable that abolitionists, who felt so keenly the wrongs of the slave, should be so oblivious to the equal wrongs of their own mothers, wives, and sisters, when, according to the common law, both classes occupied a similar legal status. our chief object in visiting england at this time was to attend the world's anti-slavery convention, to meet june , , in freemasons' hall, london. delegates from all the anti-slavery societies of civilized nations were invited, yet, when they arrived, those representing associations of women were rejected. though women were members of the national anti-slavery society, accustomed to speak and vote in all its conventions, and to take an equally active part with men in the whole anti-slavery struggle, and were there as delegates from associations of men and women, as well as those distinctively of their own sex, yet all alike were rejected because they were women. women, according to english prejudices at that time, were excluded by scriptural texts from sharing equal dignity and authority with men in all reform associations; hence it was to english minds pre-eminently unfitting that women should be admitted as equal members to a world's convention. the question was hotly debated through an entire day. my husband made a very eloquent speech in favor of admitting the women delegates. when we consider that lady byron, anna jameson, mary howitt, mrs. hugo reid, elizabeth fry, amelia opie, ann green phillips, lucretia mott, and many remarkable women, speakers and leaders in the society of friends, were all compelled to listen in silence to the masculine platitudes on woman's sphere, one may form some idea of the indignation of unprejudiced friends, and especially that of such women as lydia maria child, maria chapman, deborah weston, angelina and sarah grimké, and abby kelly, who were impatiently waiting and watching on this side, in painful suspense, to hear how their delegates were received. judging from my own feelings, the women on both sides of the atlantic must have been humiliated and chagrined, except as these feelings were outweighed by contempt for the shallow reasoning of their opponents and their comical pose and gestures in some of the intensely earnest flights of their imagination. the clerical portion of the convention was most violent in its opposition. the clergymen seemed to have god and his angels especially in their care and keeping, and were in agony lest the women should do or say something to shock the heavenly hosts. their all-sustaining conceit gave them abundant assurance that their movements must necessarily be all-pleasing to the celestials whose ears were open to the proceedings of the world's convention. deborah, huldah, vashti, and esther might have questioned the propriety of calling it a world's convention, when only half of humanity was represented there; but what were their opinions worth compared with those of the rev. a. harvey, the rev. c. stout, or the rev. j. burnet, who, bible in hand, argued woman's subjection, divinely decreed when eve was created. one of our champions in the convention, george bradburn, a tall thick-set man with a voice like thunder, standing head and shoulders above the clerical representatives, swept all their arguments aside by declaring with tremendous emphasis that, if they could prove to him that the bible taught the entire subjection of one-half of the race to the other, he should consider that the best thing he could do for humanity would be to bring together every bible in the universe and make a grand bonfire of them. it was really pitiful to hear narrow-minded bigots, pretending to be teachers and leaders of men, so cruelly remanding their own mothers, with the rest of womankind, to absolute subjection to the ordinary masculine type of humanity. i always regretted that the women themselves had not taken part in the debate before the convention was fully organized and the question of delegates settled. it seemed to me then, and does now, that all delegates with credentials from recognized societies should have had a voice in the organization of the convention, though subject to exclusion afterward. however, the women sat in a low curtained seat like a church choir, and modestly listened to the french, british, and american solons for twelve of the longest days in june, as did, also, our grand garrison and rogers in the gallery. they scorned a convention that ignored the rights of the very women who had fought, side by side, with them in the anti-slavery conflict. "after battling so many long years," said garrison, "for the liberties of african slaves, i can take no part in a convention that strikes down the most sacred rights of all women." after coming three thousand miles to speak on the subject nearest his heart, he nobly shared the enforced silence of the rejected delegates. it was a great act of self-sacrifice that should never be forgotten by women. thomas clarkson was chosen president of the convention and made a few remarks in opening, but he soon retired, as his age and many infirmities made all public occasions too burdensome, and joseph sturge, a quaker, was made chairman. sitting next to mrs. mott, i said: "as there is a quaker in the chair now, what could he do if the spirit should move you to speak?" "ah," she replied, evidently not believing such a contingency possible, "where the spirit of the lord is, there is liberty." she had not much faith in the sincerity of abolitionists who, while eloquently defending the natural rights of slaves, denied freedom of speech to one-half the people of their own race. such was the consistency of an assemblage of philanthropists! they would have been horrified at the idea of burning the flesh of the distinguished women present with red-hot irons, but the crucifixion of their pride and self-respect, the humiliation of the spirit, seemed to them a most trifling matter. the action of this convention was the topic of discussion, in public and private, for a long time, and stung many women into new thought and action and gave rise to the movement for women's political equality both in england and the united states. as the convention adjourned, the remark was heard on all sides, "it is about time some demand was made for new liberties for women." as mrs. mott and i walked home, arm in arm, commenting on the incidents of the day, we resolved to hold a convention as soon as we returned home, and form a society to advocate the rights of women. at the lodging house on queen street, where a large number of delegates had apartments, the discussions were heated at every meal, and at times so bitter that, at last, mr. birney packed his valise and sought more peaceful quarters. having strongly opposed the admission of women as delegates to the convention it was rather embarrassing to meet them, during the intervals between the various sessions, at the table and in the drawing room. these were the first women i had ever met who believed in the equality of the sexes and who did not believe in the popular orthodox religion. the acquaintance of lucretia mott, who was a broad, liberal thinker on politics, religion, and all questions of reform, opened to me a new world of thought. as we walked about to see the sights of london, i embraced every opportunity to talk with her. it was intensely gratifying to hear all that, through years of doubt, i had dimly thought, so freely discussed by other women, some of them no older than myself--women, too, of rare intelligence, cultivation, and refinement. after six weeks' sojourn under the same roof with lucretia mott, whose conversation was uniformly on a high plane, i felt that i knew her too well to sympathize with the orthodox friends, who denounced her as a dangerous woman because she doubted certain dogmas they fully believed. as mr. birney and my husband were invited to speak all over england, scotland, and ireland, and we were uniformly entertained by orthodox friends, i had abundant opportunity to know the general feeling among them toward lucretia mott. even elizabeth fry seemed quite unwilling to breathe the same atmosphere with her. during the six weeks that many of us remained in london after the convention we were invited to a succession of public and private breakfasts, dinners, and teas, and on these occasions it was amusing to watch mrs. fry's sedulous efforts to keep mrs. mott at a distance. if mrs. mott was on the lawn, mrs. fry would go into the house; if mrs. mott was in the house, mrs. fry would stay out on the lawn. one evening, when we were all crowded into two parlors, and there was no escape, the word went round that mrs. fry felt moved to pray with the american delegates, whereupon a profound silence reigned. after a few moments mrs. fry's voice was heard deploring the schism among the american friends; that sol many had been led astray by false doctrines; urging the spirit of all good to show them the error of their way, and gather them once more into the fold of the great shepherd of our faith. the prayer was directed so pointedly at the followers of elias hicks, and at lucretia mott in particular, that i whispered to lucretia, at the close, that she should now pray for mrs. fry, that her eyes might be opened to her bigotry and uncharitableness, and be led by the spirit into higher light. "oh, no!" she replied, "a prayer of this character, under the circumstances, is an unfair advantage to take of a stranger, but i would not resent it in the house of her friends." in these gatherings we met the leading quaker families and many other philanthropists of different denominations interested in the anti-slavery movement. on all these occasions our noble garrison spoke most effectively, and thus our english friends had an opportunity of enjoying his eloquence, the lack of which had been so grave a loss in the convention. we devoted a month sedulously to sightseeing in london, and, in the line of the traveler's duty, we explored st. paul's cathedral, the british museum, the tower, various prisons, hospitals, galleries of art, windsor castle, and st. james's palace, the zoological gardens, the schools and colleges, the chief theaters and churches, westminster abbey, the houses of parliament, and the courts. we heard the most famous preachers, actors, and statesmen. in fact, we went to the top and bottom of everything, from the dome of st. paul to the tunnel under the thames, just then in the process of excavation. we drove through the parks, sailed up and down the thames, and then visited every shire but four in england, in all of which we had large meetings, mr. birney and mr. stanton being the chief speakers. as we were generally invited to stay with friends, it gave us a good opportunity to see the leading families, such as the ashursts, the alexanders, the priestmans, the braithwaites, and buxtons, the gurneys, the peases, the wighams of edinburgh, and the webbs of dublin. we spent a few days with john joseph gurney at his beautiful home in norwich. he had just returned from america, having made a tour through the south. when asked how he liked america, he said, "i like everything but your pie crust and your slavery." before leaving london, the whole american delegation, about forty in number, were invited to dine with samuel gurney. he and his brother, john joseph gurney, were, at that time, the leading bankers in london. someone facetiously remarked that the jews were the leading bankers in london until the quakers crowded them out. one of the most striking women i met in england at this time was miss elizabeth pease. i never saw a more strongly marked face. meeting her, forty years after, on the platform of a great meeting in the town hall at glasgow, i knew her at once. she is now mrs. nichol of edinburgh, and, though on the shady side of eighty, is still active in all the reforms of the day. it surprised us very much at first, when driving into the grounds of some of these beautiful quaker homes, to have the great bell rung at the lodge, and to see the number of liveried servants on the porch and in the halls, and then to meet the host in plain garb, and to be welcomed in plain language, "how does thee do, henry?" "how does thee do elizabeth?" this sounded peculiarly sweet to me--a stranger in a strange land. the wealthy english quakers we visited at that time, taking them all in all, were the most charming people i had ever seen. they were refined and intelligent on all subjects, and though rather conservative on some points, were not aggressive in pressing their opinions on others. their hospitality was charming and generous, their homes the beau ideal of comfort and order, the cuisine faultless, while peace reigned over all. the quiet, gentle manner and the soft tones in speaking, and the mysterious quiet in these well-ordered homes were like the atmosphere one finds in a modern convent, where the ordinary duties of the day seem to be accomplished by some magical influence. before leaving london we spent a delightful day in june at the home of samuel gurney, surrounded by a fine park with six hundred deer roaming about--always a beautiful feature in the english landscape. as the duchess of sutherland and lord morpeth had expressed a wish to mrs. fry to meet some of the leading american abolitionists, it was arranged that they should call at her brother's residence on this occasion. soon after we arrived, the duchess, with her brother and mrs. fry, in her state carriage with six horses and outriders, drove up to the door. mr. gurney was evidently embarrassed at the prospect of a lord and a duchess under his roof. leaning on the arm of mrs. fry, the duchess was formally introduced to us individually. mrs. mott conversed with the distinguished guests with the same fluency and composure as with her own countrywomen. however anxious the english people were as to what they should say and do, the americans were all quite at their ease. as lord morpeth had some interesting letters from the island of jamaica to read to us, we formed a circle on the lawn to listen. england had just paid one hundred millions of dollars to emancipate the slaves, and we were all interested in hearing the result of the experiment. the distinguished guest in turn had many questions to ask in regard to american slavery. we found none of that prejudice against color in england which is so inveterate among the american people; at my first dinner in england i found myself beside a gentleman from jamaica, as black as the ace of spades. after the departure of the duchess, dinner was announced. it was a sumptuous meal, most tastefully served. there were half a dozen wineglasses at every plate, but abolitionists, in those days, were all converts to temperance, and, as the bottles went around there was a general headshaking, and the right hand extended over the glasses. our english friends were amazed that none of us drank wine. mr. gurney said he had never before seen such a sight as forty ladies and gentlemen sitting down to dinner and none of them tasting wine. in talking with him on that point, he said: "i suppose your nursing mothers drink beer?" i laughed, and said, "oh, no! we should be afraid of befogging the brains of our children." "no danger of that," said he; "we are all bright enough, and yet a cask of beer is rolled into the cellar for the mother with each newborn child." colonel miller from vermont, one of our american delegation, was in the greek war with lord byron. as lady byron had expressed a wish to see him, that her daughter might know something of her father's last days, an interview was arranged, and the colonel kindly invited me to accompany him. his account of their acquaintance and the many noble traits of character lord byron manifested, his generous impulses and acts of self-sacrifice, seemed particularly gratifying to the daughter. it was a sad interview, arranged chiefly for the daughter's satisfaction, though lady byron listened with a painful interest. as the colonel was a warm admirer of the great poet, he no doubt represented him in the best possible light, and his narration of his last days was deeply interesting. lady byron had a quiet, reserved manner, a sad face, and a low, plaintive voice, like one who had known deep sorrow. i had seen her frequently in the convention and at social teas, and had been personally presented to her before this occasion. altogether i thought her a sweet, attractive-looking woman. we had a pleasant interview with lord brougham also. the philadelphia anti-slavery society sent him an elaborately carved inkstand, made from the wood of pennsylvania hall, which was destroyed by a pro-slavery mob. mr. birney made a most graceful speech in presenting the memento, and lord brougham was equally happy in receiving it. one of the most notable characters we met at this time was daniel o'connell. he made his first appearance in the london convention a few days after the women were rejected. he paid a beautiful tribute to woman and said that, if he had been present when the question was under discussion, he should have spoken and voted for their admission. he was a tall, well-developed, magnificent-looking man, and probably one of the most effective speakers ireland ever produced. i saw him at a great india meeting in exeter hall, where some of the best orators from france, america, and england were present. there were six natives from india on the platform who, not understanding anything that was said, naturally remained listless throughout the proceedings. but the moment o'connell began to speak they were all attention, bending forward and closely watching every movement. one could almost tell what he said from the play of his expressive features, his wonderful gestures, and the pose of his whole body. when he finished, the natives joined in the general applause. he had all wendell phillips' power of sarcasm and denunciation, and added to that the most tender pathos. he could make his audience laugh or cry at pleasure. it was a rare sight to see him dressed in "repeal cloth" in one of his repeal meetings. we were in dublin in the midst of that excitement, when the hopes of new liberties for that oppressed people all centered on o'connell. the enthusiasm of the people for the repeal of the union was then at white-heat. dining one day with the "great liberator," as he was called, i asked him if he hoped to carry that measure. "no," he said, "but it is always good policy to claim the uttermost and then you will be sure to get something." could he have looked forward fifty years and have seen the present condition of his unhappy country, he would have known that english greed and selfishness could defeat any policy, however wise and far-seeing. the successive steps by which irish commerce was ruined and religious feuds between her people continually fanned into life, and the nation subjugated, form the darkest page in the history of england. but the people are awakening at last to their duty, and, for the first time, organizing english public sentiment in favor of "home rule." i attended several large, enthusiastic meetings when last in england, in which the most radical utterances of irish patriots were received with prolonged cheers. i trust the day is not far off when the beautiful emerald isle will unfurl her banner before the nations of the earth, enthroned as the queen republic of those northern seas! we visited wordsworth's home at grasmere, among the beautiful lakes, but he was not there. however, we saw his surroundings--the landscape that inspired some of his poetic dreams, and the dense rows of hollyhocks of every shade and color, leading from his porch to the gate. the gardener told us this was his favorite flower. though it had no special beauty in itself, taken alone, yet the wonderful combination of royal colors was indeed striking and beautiful. we saw harriet martineau at her country home as well as at her house in town. as we were obliged to converse with her through an ear trumpet, we left her to do most of the talking. she gave us many amusing experiences of her travels in america, and her comments on the london convention were rich and racy. she was not an attractive woman in either manner or appearance, though considered great and good by all who knew her. we spent a few days with thomas clarkson, in ipswich. he lived in a very old house with long rambling corridors, surrounded by a moat, which we crossed' by means of a drawbridge. he had just written an article against the colonization scheme, which his wife read aloud to us. he was so absorbed in the subject that he forgot the article was written by himself, and kept up a running applause with "hear!" "hear!" the english mode of expressing approbation. he told us of the severe struggles he and wilberforce had gone through in rousing the public sentiment of england to the demand for emancipation in jamaica. but their trials were mild, compared with what garrison and his coadjutors had suffered in america. having read of all these people, it was difficult to realize, as i visited them in their own homes from day to day, that they were the same persons i had so long worshiped from afar! chapter vi. homeward bound. after taking a view of the wonders and surroundings of london we spent a month in paris. fifty years ago there was a greater difference in the general appearance of things between france and england than now. that countries only a few hours' journey apart should differ so widely was to us a great surprise. how changed the sights and sounds! here was the old diligence, lumbering along with its various compartments and its indefinite number of horses, harnessed with rope and leather, sometimes two, sometimes three abreast, and sometimes one in advance, with an outrider belaboring the poor beasts without cessation, and the driver yelling and cracking his whip. the uproar, confusion, and squabbles at every stopping place are overwhelming; the upper classes, men and women alike, rushing into each other's arms, embrace and kiss, while drivers and hostlers on the slightest provocation hurl at each other all the denunciatory adjectives in the language, and with such vehemence that you expect every moment to see a deadly conflict. but to-day, as fifty years ago, they never arrive at that point. theirs was and is purely an encounter of words, which they keep up, as they drive off in opposite directions, just as far as they can hear and see each other, with threats of vengeance to come. such an encounter between two englishmen would mean the death of one or the other. all this was in marked contrast with john bull and his island. there the people were as silent as if they had been born deaf and dumb. the english stagecoach was compact, clean, and polished from top to bottom, the horses and harness glossy and in order, the well-dressed, dignified coachman, who seldom spoke a loud word or used his whip, kept his seat at the various stages, while hostlers watered or changed the steeds; the postman blew his bugle blast to have the mail in readiness, and the reserved passengers made no remarks on what was passing; for, in those days, englishmen were afraid to speak to each other for fear of recognizing one not of their class, while to strangers and foreigners they would not speak except in case of dire necessity. the frenchman was ready enough to talk, but, unfortunately, we were separated by different languages. thus the englishman would not talk, the frenchman could not, and the intelligent, loquacious american driver, who discourses on politics, religion, national institutions, and social gossip was unknown on that side of the atlantic. what the curious american traveler could find out himself from observation and pertinacious seeking he was welcome to, but the briton would waste no breath to enlighten yankees as to the points of interest or customs of his country. our party consisted of miss pugh, abby kimber, mr. stanton, and myself. i had many amusing experiences in making my wants known when alone, having forgotten most of my french. for instance, traveling night and day in the diligence to paris, as the stops were short, one was sometimes in need of something to eat. one night as my companions were all asleep, i went out to get a piece of cake or a cracker, or whatever of that sort i could obtain, but, owing to my clumsy use of the language, i was misunderstood. just as the diligence was about to start, and the shout for us to get aboard was heard, the waiter came running with a piping hot plate of sweetbreads nicely broiled. i had waited and wondered why it took so long to get a simple piece of cake or biscuit, and lo! a piece of hot meat was offered me. i could not take the frizzling thing in my hand nor eat it without bread, knife, or fork, so i hurried off to the coach, the man pursuing me to the very door. i was vexed and disappointed, while the rest of the party were convulsed with laughter at the parting salute and my attempt to make my way alone. it was some time before i heard the last of the "sweetbreads." when we reached paris we secured a courier who could speak english, to show us the sights of that wonderful city. every morning early he was at the door, rain or shine, to carry out our plans, which, with the aid of our guidebook, we had made the evening before. in this way, going steadily, day after day, we visited all points of interest for miles round and sailed up and down the seine. the palace of the tuileries, with its many associations with a long line of more or less unhappy kings and queens, was then in its glory, and its extensive and beautiful grounds were always gay with crowds of happy people. these gardens were a great resort for nurses and children and were furnished with all manner of novel appliances for their amusement, including beautiful little carriages drawn by four goats with girls or boys driving, boats sailing in the air, seemingly propelled by oars, and hobby horses flying round on whirligigs with boys vainly trying to catch each other. no people have ever taken the trouble to invent so many amusements for children as have the french. the people enjoyed being always in the open air, night and day. the parks are crowded with amusement seekers, some reading and playing games, some sewing, knitting, playing on musical instruments, dancing, sitting around tables in bevies eating, drinking, and gayly chatting. and yet, when they drive in carriages or go to their homes at night, they will shut themselves in as tight as oysters in their shells. they have a theory that night air is very injurious,--in the house,--although they will sit outside until midnight. i found this same superstition prevalent in france fifty years later. we visited the hôtel des invalides just as they were preparing the sarcophagus for the reception of the remains of napoleon. we witnessed the wild excitement of that enthusiastic people, and listened with deep interest to the old soldiers' praises of their great general. the ladies of our party chatted freely with them. they all had interesting anecdotes to relate of their chief. they said he seldom slept over four hours, was an abstemious eater, and rarely changed a servant, as he hated a strange face about him. he was very fond of a game of chess, and snuffed continuously; talked but little, was a light sleeper,--the stirring of a mouse would awaken him,--and always on the watch-tower. they said that, in his great campaigns, he seemed to be omnipresent. a sentinel asleep at his post would sometimes waken to find napoleon on duty in his place. the ship that brought back napoleon's remains was the _belle poule_ (the beautiful hen!), which landed at cherbourg, november , . the body was conveyed to the church of the invalides, which adjoins the tomb. the prince de joinville brought the body from saint helena, and louis philippe received it. at that time each soldier had a little patch of land to decorate as he pleased, in which many scenes from their great battles were illustrated. one represented napoleon crossing the alps. there were the cannon, the soldiers, napoleon on horseback, all toiling up the steep ascent, perfect in miniature. in another was napoleon, flag in hand, leading the charge across the bridge of lodi. in still another was napoleon in egypt, before the pyramids, seated, impassive, on his horse, gazing at the sphinx, as if about to utter his immortal words to his soldiers: "here, forty centuries look down upon us." these object lessons of the past are all gone now and the land used for more prosaic purposes. i little thought, as i witnessed that great event in france in , that fifty-seven years later i should witness a similar pageant in the american republic, when our nation paid its last tributes to general grant. there are many points of similarity in these great events. as men they were alike aggressive and self-reliant. in napoleon's will he expressed the wish that his last resting place might be in the land and among the people he loved so well. his desire is fulfilled. he rests in the chief city of the french republic, whose shores are washed by the waters of the seine. general grant expressed the wish that he might be interred in our metropolis and added: "wherever i am buried, i desire that there shall be room for my wife by my side." his wishes, too, are fulfilled. he rests in the chief city of the american republic, whose shores are washed by the waters of the hudson, and in his magnificent mausoleum there is room for his wife by his side. several members of the society of friends from boston and philadelphia, who had attended the world's anti-slavery convention in london, joined our party for a trip on the continent. though opposed to war, they all took a deep interest in the national excitement and in the pageants that heralded the expected arrival of the hero from saint helena. as they all wore military coats of the time of george fox, the soldiers, supposing they belonged to the army of some country, gave them the military salute wherever we went, much to their annoyance and our amusement. in going the rounds, miss pugh amused us by reading aloud the description of what we were admiring and the historical events connected with that particular building or locality. we urged her to spend the time taking in all she could see and to read up afterward; but no, a history of france and galignani's guide she carried everywhere, and, while the rest of us looked until we were fully satisfied, she took a bird's-eye view and read the description. dear little woman! she was a fine scholar, a good historian, was well informed on all subjects and countries, proved an invaluable traveling companion, and could tell more of what we saw than all the rest of us together. on several occasions we chanced to meet louis philippe dashing by in an open barouche. we felt great satisfaction in remembering that at one time he was an exile in our country, where he earned his living by teaching school. what an honor for yankee children to have been taught, by a french king, the rudiments of his language. having been accustomed to the puritan sunday of restraint and solemnity, i found that day in paris gay and charming. the first time i entered into some of the festivities, i really expected to be struck by lightning. the libraries, art galleries, concert halls, and theaters were all open to the people. bands of music were playing in the parks, where whole families, with their luncheons, spent the day--husbands, wives, and children, on an excursion together. the boats on the seine and all public conveyances were crowded. those who had but this one day for pleasure seemed determined to make the most of it. a wonderful contrast with that gloomy day in london, where all places of amusement were closed and nothing open to the people but the churches and drinking saloons. the streets and houses in which voltaire, la fayette, mme. de staël, mme. roland, charlotte corday, and other famous men and women lived and died, were pointed out to us. we little thought, then, of all the terrible scenes to be enacted in paris, nor that france would emerge from the dangers that beset her on every side into a sister republic. it has been a wonderful achievement, with kings and popes all plotting against her experiment, that she has succeeded in putting kingcraft under her feet and proclaimed liberty, equality, fraternity for her people. after a few weeks in france, we returned to london, traveling through england, ireland, and scotland for several months. we visited the scenes that shakespeare, burns, and dickens had made classic. we spent a few days at huntingdon, the home of oliver cromwell, and visited the estate where he passed his early married life. while there, one of his great admirers read aloud to us a splendid article in one of the reviews, written by carlyle, giving "the protector," as his friend said, his true place in history. it was long the fashion of england's historians to represent cromwell as a fanatic and hypocrite, but his character was vindicated by later writers. "never," says macaulay, "was a ruler so conspicuously born for sovereignty. the cup which has intoxicated almost all others sobered him." we saw the picturesque ruins of kenilworth castle, the birthplace of shakespeare, the homes of byron and mary chaworth, wandered through newstead abbey, saw the monument to the faithful dog, and the large dining room where byron and his boon companions used to shoot at a mark. it was a desolate region. we stopped a day or two at ayr and drove out to the birthplace of burns. the old house that had sheltered him was still there, but its walls now echoed to other voices, and the fields where he had toiled were plowed by other hands. we saw the stream and banks where he and mary sat together, the old stone church where the witches held their midnight revels, the two dogs, and the bridge of ayr. with burns, as with sappho, it was love that awoke his heart to song. a bonny lass who worked with him in the harvest field inspired his first attempts at rhyme. life, with burns, was one long, hard struggle. with his natural love for the beautiful, the terrible depression of spirits he suffered from his dreary surroundings was inevitable. the interest great men took in him, when they awoke to his genius, came too late for his safety and encouragement. in a glass of whisky he found, at last, the rest and cheer he never knew when sober. poverty and ignorance are the parents of intemperance, and that vice will never be suppressed until the burdens of life are equally shared by all. we saw melrose by moonlight, spent several hours at abbotsford, and lingered in the little sanctum sanctorum where scott wrote his immortal works. it was so small that he could reach the bookshelves on every side. we went through the prisons, castles, and narrow streets of edinburgh, where the houses are seven and eight stories high, each story projecting a few feet until, at the uppermost, opposite neighbors could easily shake hands and chat together. all the intervals from active sight-seeing we spent in reading the lives of historical personages in poetry and prose, until our sympathies flowed out to the real and ideal characters. lady jane grey, anne boleyn, mary queen of scots, ellen douglas, jeanie and effie deans, highland mary, rebecca the jewess, di vernon, and rob roy all alike seemed real men and women, whose shades or descendants we hoped to meet on their native heath. here among the scotch lakes and mountains mr. stanton and i were traveling alone for the first time since our marriage, and as we both enjoyed walking, we made many excursions on foot to points that could not be reached in any other way. we spent some time among the grampian hills, so familiar to every schoolboy, walking, and riding about on donkeys. we sailed up and down loch katrine and loch lomond. my husband was writing letters for some new york newspapers on the entire trip, and aimed to get exact knowledge of all we saw; thus i had the advantage of the information he gathered. on these long tramps i wore a short dress, reaching just below the knee, of dark-blue cloth, a military cap of the same material that shaded my eyes, and a pair of long boots, made on the masculine pattern then generally worn--the most easy style for walking, as the pressure is equal on the whole foot and the ankle has free play. thus equipped, and early trained by my good brother-in-law to long walks, i found no difficulty in keeping pace with my husband. being self-reliant and venturesome in our explorations, we occasionally found ourselves involved in grave difficulties by refusing to take a guide. for instance, we decided to go to the top of ben nevis alone. it looked to us a straightforward piece of business to walk up a mountain side on a bee line, and so, in the face of repeated warnings by our host, we started. we knew nothing of zigzag paths to avoid the rocks, the springs, and swamps; in fact we supposed all mountains smooth and dry, like our native hills that we were accustomed to climb. the landlord shook his head and smiled when we told him we should return at noon to dinner, and we smiled, too, thinking he placed a low estimate on our capacity for walking. but we had not gone far when we discovered the difficulties ahead. some places were so steep that i had to hold on to my companion's coat tails, while he held on to rocks and twigs, or braced himself with a heavy cane. by the time we were halfway up we were in a dripping perspiration, our feet were soaking wet, and we were really too tired to proceed. but, after starting with such supreme confidence in ourselves, we were ashamed to confess our fatigue to each other, and much more to return and verify all the prognostications of the host and his guides. so we determined to push on and do what we had proposed. with the prospect of a magnificent view and an hour's delicious rest on the top, we started with renewed courage. a steady climb of six hours brought us to the goal of promise; our ascent was accomplished. but alas! it was impossible to stop there--the cold wind chilled us to the bone in a minute. so we took one glance at the world below and hurried down the south side to get the mountain between us and the cold northeaster. when your teeth are chattering with the cold, and the wind threatening to make havoc with your raiment, you are not in a favorable condition to appreciate grand scenery. like the king of france with twice ten thousand men, we marched up the hill and then, marched down again. we found descending still more difficult, as we were in constant fear of slipping, losing our hold, and rolling to the bottom. we were tired, hungry, and disappointed, and the fear of not reaching the valley before nightfall pressed heavily upon us. neither confessed to the other the fatigue and apprehension each felt, but, with fresh endeavor and words of encouragement, we cautiously went on. we accidentally struck a trail that led us winding down comfortably some distance, but we lost it, and went clambering down as well as we could in our usual way. to add to our misery, a dense scotch mist soon enveloped us, so that we could see but a short distance ahead, and not knowing the point from which we started, we feared we might be going far out of our way. the coming twilight, too, made the prospect still darker. fortunately our host, having less faith in us than we had in ourselves, sent a guide to reconnoiter, and, just at the moment when we began to realize our danger of spending the night on the mountain, and to admit it to each other, the welcome guide hailed us in his broad accent. his shepherd dog led the way into the beaten path. as i could hardly stand i took the guide's arm, and when we reached the bottom two donkeys were in readiness to take us to the hotel. we did not recover from the fatigue of that expedition in several days, and we made no more experiments of exploring strange places without guides. we learned, too, that mountains are not so hospitable as they seem nor so gently undulating as they appear in the distance, and that guides serve other purposes besides extorting money from travelers. if, under their guidance, we had gone up and down easily, we should always have thought we might as well have gone alone. so our experience gave us a good lesson in humility. we had been twelve hours on foot with nothing to eat, when at last we reached the hotel. we were in no mood for boasting of the success of our excursion, and our answers were short to inquiries as to how we had passed the day. being tired of traveling and contending about woman's sphere with the rev. john scoble, an englishman, who escorted mr. birney and mr. stanton on their tour through the country, i decided to spend a month in dublin; while the gentlemen held meetings in cork, belfast, waterford, limerick, and other chief towns, finishing the series with a large, enthusiastic gathering in dublin, at which o'connell made one of his most withering speeches on american slavery; the inconsistency of such an "institution" with the principles of a republican government giving full play to his powers of sarcasm. on one occasion, when introduced to a slaveholder, he put his hands behind his back, refusing to recognize a man who bought and sold his fellow-beings. the rev. john scoble was one of the most conceited men i ever met. his narrow ideas in regard to woman, and the superiority of the royal and noble classes in his own country, were to me so exasperating that i grew more and more bellicose every day we traveled in company. he was terribly seasick crossing the channel, to my intense satisfaction. as he always boasted of his distinguished countrymen, i suggested, in the midst of one of his most agonizing spasms, that he ought to find consolation in the fact that lord nelson was always seasick on the slightest provocation. the poverty in ireland was a continual trial to our sensibilities; beggars haunted our footsteps everywhere, in the street and on the highways, crouching on the steps of the front door and on the curbstones, and surrounding our carriage wherever and whenever we stopped to shop or make a visit. the bony hands and sunken eyes and sincere gratitude expressed for every penny proved their suffering real. as my means were limited and i could not pass one by, i got a pound changed into pennies, and put them in a green bag, which i took in the carriage wherever i went. it was but a drop in the ocean, but it was all i could do to relieve that unfathomed misery. the poverty i saw everywhere in the old world, and especially in ireland, was a puzzling problem to my mind, but i rejected the idea that it was a necessary link in human experience--that it always had been and always must be. as we drove, day by day, in that magnificent phoenix park, of fifteen hundred acres, one of the largest parks, i believe, in the world, i would often put the question to myself, what right have the few to make a pleasure ground of these acres, while the many have nowhere to lay their heads, crouching under stiles and bridges, clothed in rags, and feeding on sea-weed with no hope, in the slowly passing years, of any change for the better? the despair stamped on every brow told the sad story of their wrongs. those accustomed to such everyday experiences brush beggars aside as they would so many flies, but those to whom such sights are new cannot so easily quiet their own consciences. everyone in the full enjoyment of all the blessings of life, in his normal condition, feels some individual responsibility for the poverty of others. when the sympathies are not blunted by any false philosophy, one feels reproached by one's own abundance. i once heard a young girl, about to take her summer outing, when asked by her grandmother if she had all the dresses she needed, reply, "oh, yes! i was oppressed with a constant sense of guilt, when packing, to see how much i had, while so many girls have nothing decent to wear." more than half a century has rolled by since i stood on irish soil, and shed tears of pity for the wretchedness i saw, and no change for the better has as yet come to that unhappy people--yet this was the land of burke, grattan, shiel, and emmett; the land into which christianity was introduced in the fifth century, st. patrick being the chief apostle of the new faith. in the sixth century ireland sent forth missionaries from her monasteries to convert great britain and the nations of northern europe. from the eighth to the twelfth century irish scholars held an enviable reputation. in fact, ireland was the center of learning at one time. the arts, too, were cultivated by her people; and the round towers, still pointed out to travelers, are believed to be the remains of the architecture of the tenth century. the ruin of ireland must be traced to other causes than the character of the people or the catholic religion. historians give us facts showing english oppressions sufficient to destroy any nation. the short, dark days of november intensified, in my eyes, the gloomy prospects of that people, and made the change to the _sirius_ of the cunard line, the first regular atlantic steamship to cross the ocean, most enjoyable. once on the boundless ocean, one sees no beggars, no signs of human misery, no crumbling ruins of vast cathedral walls, no records of the downfall of mighty nations, no trace, even, of the mortal agony of the innumerable host buried beneath her bosom. byron truly says: "time writes no wrinkle on thine azure brow-- such as creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now." when we embarked on the _sirius_, we had grave doubts as to our safety and the probability of our reaching the other side, as we did not feel that ocean steamers had yet been fairly tried. but, after a passage of eighteen days, eleven hours, and fifteen minutes, we reached boston, having spent six hours at halifax. we little thought that the steamer _sirius_ of fifty years ago would ever develop into the magnificent floating palaces of to-day--three times as large and three times as swift. in spite of the steamer, however, we had a cold, rough, dreary voyage, and i have no pleasant memories connected with it. our fellow-passengers were all in their staterooms most of the time. our good friend mr. birney had sailed two weeks before us, and as mr. stanton was confined to his berth, i was thrown on my own resources. i found my chief amusement in reading novels and playing chess with a british officer on his way to canada. when it was possible i walked on deck with the captain, or sat in some sheltered corner, watching the waves. we arrived in new york, by rail, the day before christmas. everything looked bright and gay in our streets. it seemed to me that the sky was clearer, the air more refreshing, and the sunlight more brilliant than in any other land! chapter vii. motherhood. we found my sister harriet in a new home in clinton place (eighth street), new york city, then considered so far up town that mr. eaton's friends were continually asking him why he went so far away from the social center, though in a few months they followed him. here we passed a week. i especially enjoyed seeing my little niece and nephew, the only grandchildren in the family. the girl was the most beautiful child i ever saw, and the boy the most intelligent and amusing. he was very fond of hearing me recite the poem by oliver wendell holmes entitled "the height of the ridiculous," which i did many times, but he always wanted to see the lines that almost killed the man with laughing. he went around to a number of the bookstores one day and inquired for them. i told him afterward they were never published; that when mr. holmes saw the effect on his servant he suppressed them, lest they should produce the same effect on the typesetters, editors, and the readers of the boston newspapers. my explanation never satisfied him. i told him he might write to mr. holmes, and ask the privilege of reading the original manuscript, if it still was or ever had been in existence. as one of my grand-nephews was troubled in exactly the same way, i decided to appeal myself to dr. holmes for the enlightenment of this second generation. so i wrote him the following letter, which he kindly answered, telling us that his "wretched man" was a myth like the heroes in "mother goose's melodies": "dear dr. holmes: "i have a little nephew to whom i often recite 'the height of the ridiculous,' and he invariably asks for the lines that produced the fatal effect on your servant. he visited most of the bookstores in new york city to find them, and nothing but your own word, i am sure, will ever convince him that the 'wretched man' is but a figment of your imagination. i tried to satisfy him by saying you did not dare to publish the lines lest they should produce a similar effect on the typesetters, editors, and the readers of the boston journals. "however, he wishes me to ask you whether you kept a copy of the original manuscript, or could reproduce the lines with equal power. if not too much trouble, please send me a few lines on this point, and greatly oblige, "yours sincerely, "elizabeth cady stanton." "my dear mrs. stanton: "i wish you would explain to your little nephew that the story of the poor fellow who almost died laughing was a kind of a dream of mine, and not a real thing that happened, any more than that an old woman 'lived in a shoe and had so many children she didn't know what to do,' or that jack climbed the bean stalk and found the giant who lived at the top of it. you can explain to him what is meant by imagination, and thus turn my youthful rhymes into a text for a discourse worthy of the concord school of philosophy. i have not my poems by me here, but i remember that 'the height of the ridiculous' ended with this verse: "ten days and nights, with sleepless eye, i watched that wretched man, and since, i never dare to write as funny as i can." "but tell your nephew he mustn't cry about it any more than because geese go barefoot and bald eagles have no nightcaps. the verses are in all the editions of my poems. "believe me, dear mrs. stanton, "very truly and respectfully yours, "oliver wendell holmes." after spending the holidays in new york city, we started for johnstown in a "stage sleigh, conveying the united states mail," drawn by spanking teams of four horses, up the hudson river valley. we were three days going to albany, stopping over night at various points; a journey now performed in three hours. the weather was clear and cold, the sleighing fine, the scenery grand, and our traveling companions most entertaining, so the trip was very enjoyable. from albany to schenectady we went in the railway cars; then another sleighride of thirty miles brought us to johnstown. my native hills, buried under two feet of snow, tinted with the last rays of the setting sun, were a beautiful and familiar sight. though i had been absent but ten months, it seemed like years, and i was surprised to find how few changes had occurred since i left. my father and mother, sisters madge and kate, the old house and furniture, the neighbors, all looked precisely the same as when i left them. i had seen so much and been so constantly on the wing that i wondered that all things here should have stood still. i expected to hear of many births, marriages, deaths, and social upheavals, but the village news was remarkably meager. this hunger for home news on returning is common, i suppose, to all travelers. our trunks unpacked, wardrobes arranged in closets and drawers, the excitement of seeing friends over, we spent some time in making plans for the future. my husband, after some consultation with my father, decided to enter his office and commence the study of the law. as this arrangement kept me under the parental roof, i had two added years of pleasure, walking, driving, and riding on horseback with my sisters. madge and kate were dearer to me than ever, as i saw the inevitable separation awaiting us in the near future. in due time they were married and commenced housekeeping--madge in her husband's house near by, and kate in buffalo. all my sisters were peculiarly fortunate in their marriages; their husbands being men of fine presence, liberal education, high moral character, and marked ability. these were pleasant and profitable years. i devoted them to reading law, history, and political economy, with occasional interruptions to take part in some temperance or anti-slavery excitement. eliza murray and i had classes of colored children in the sunday school. on one occasion, when there was to be a festival, speaking in the church, a procession through the streets, and other public performances for the sunday-school celebration, some narrow-minded bigots objected to the colored children taking part. they approached miss murray and me with most persuasive tones on the wisdom of not allowing them to march in the procession to the church. we said, "oh, no! it won't do to disappoint the children. they are all dressed, with their badges on, and looking forward with great pleasure to the festivities of the day. besides, we would not cater to any of these contemptible prejudices against color." we were all assembled in the courthouse preparatory to forming in the line of march. some were determined to drive the colored children home, but miss murray and i, like two defiant hens, kept our little brood close behind us, determined to conquer or perish in the struggle. at last milder counsels prevailed, and it was agreed that they might march in the rear. we made no objection and fell into line, but, when we reached the church door, it was promptly closed as the last white child went in. we tried two other doors, but all were guarded. we shed tears of vexation and pity for the poor children, and, when they asked us the reason why they could not go in, we were embarrassed and mortified with the explanation we were forced to give. however, i invited them to my father's house, where miss murray and i gave them refreshments and entertained them for the rest of the day. the puzzling questions of theology and poverty that had occupied so much of my thoughts, now gave place to the practical one, "what to do with a baby." though motherhood is the most important of all the professions,--requiring more knowledge than any other department in human affairs,--yet there is not sufficient attention given to the preparation for this office. if we buy a plant of a horticulturist we ask him many questions as to its needs, whether it thrives best in sunshine or in shade, whether it needs much or little water, what degrees of heat or cold; but when we hold in our arms for the first time, a being of infinite possibilities, in whose wisdom may rest the destiny of a nation, we take it for granted that the laws governing its life, health, and happiness are intuitively understood, that there is nothing new to be learned in regard to it. yet here is a science to which philosophers have, as yet, given but little attention. an important fact has only been discovered and acted upon within the last ten years, that children come into the world tired, and not hungry, exhausted with the perilous journey. instead of being thoroughly bathed and dressed, and kept on the rack while the nurse makes a prolonged toilet and feeds it some nostrum supposed to have much needed medicinal influence, the child's face, eyes, and mouth should be hastily washed with warm water, and the rest of its body thoroughly oiled, and then it should be slipped into a soft pillow case, wrapped in a blanket, and laid to sleep. ordinarily, in the proper conditions, with its face uncovered in a cool, pure atmosphere, it will sleep twelve hours. then it should be bathed, fed, and clothed in a high-necked, long-sleeved silk shirt and a blanket, all of which could be done in five minutes. as babies lie still most of the time the first six weeks, they need no dressing. i think the nurse was a full hour bathing and dressing my firstborn, who protested with a melancholy wail every blessed minute. ignorant myself of the initiative steps on the threshold of time, i supposed this proceeding was approved by the best authorities. however, i had been thinking, reading, observing, and had as little faith in the popular theories in regard to babies as on any other subject. i saw them, on all sides, ill half the time, pale and peevish, dying early, having no joy in life. i heard parents complaining of weary days and sleepless nights, while each child, in turn, ran the gauntlet of red gum, jaundice, whooping cough, chicken-pox, mumps, measles, scarlet fever, and fits. they all seemed to think these inflictions were a part of the eternal plan--that providence had a kind of pandora's box, from which he scattered these venerable diseases most liberally among those whom he especially loved. having gone through the ordeal of bearing a child, i was determined, if possible, to keep him, so i read everything i could find on the subject. but the literature on this subject was as confusing and unsatisfactory as the longer and shorter catechisms and the thirty-nine articles of our faith. i had recently visited our dear friends, theodore and angelina grimke-weld, and they warned me against books on this subject. they had been so misled by one author, who assured them that the stomach of a child could only hold one tablespoonful, that they nearly starved their firstborn to death. though the child dwindled, day by day, and, at the end of a month, looked like a little old man, yet they still stood by the distinguished author. fortunately, they both went off, one day, and left the child with sister "sarah," who thought she would make an experiment and see what a child's stomach could hold, as she had grave doubts about the tablespoonful theory. to her surprise the baby took a pint bottle full of milk, and had the sweetest sleep thereon he had known in his earthly career. after that he was permitted to take what he wanted, and "the author" was informed of his libel on the infantile stomach. so here, again, i was entirely afloat, launched on the seas of doubt without chart or compass. the life and well-being of the race seemed to hang on the slender thread of such traditions as were handed down by-ignorant mothers and nurses. one powerful ray of light illuminated the darkness; it was the work of andrew combe on "infancy." he had, evidently watched some of the manifestations of man in the first stages of his development, and could tell, at least, as much of babies as naturalists could of beetles and bees. he did give young mothers some hints of what to do, the whys and wherefores of certain lines of procedure during antenatal life, as well as the proper care thereafter. i read several chapters to the nurse. although, out of her ten children, she had buried five, she still had too much confidence in her own wisdom and experience to pay much attention to any new idea that might be suggested to her. among other things, combe said that a child's bath should be regulated by the thermometer, in order to be always of the same temperature. she ridiculed the idea, and said her elbow was better than any thermometer, and, when i insisted on its use, she would invariably, with a smile of derision, put her elbow in first, to show how exactly it tallied with the thermometer. when i insisted that the child should not be bandaged, she rebelled outright, and said she would not take the responsibility of nursing a child without a bandage. i said, "pray, sit down, dear nurse, and let us reason together. do not think i am setting up my judgment against yours, with all your experience. i am simply trying to act on the opinions of a distinguished physician, who says there should be no pressure on a child anywhere; that the limbs and body should be free; that it is cruel to bandage an infant from hip to armpit, as is usually done in america; or both body and legs, as is done in europe; or strap them to boards, as is done by savages on both continents. can you give me one good reason, nurse, why a child should be bandaged?" "yes," she said emphatically, "i can give you a dozen." "i only asked for one," i replied. "well," said she, after much hesitation, "the bones of a newborn infant are soft, like cartilage, and, unless you pin them up snugly, there is danger of their falling apart." "it seems to me," i replied, "you have given the strongest reason why they should be carefully guarded against the slightest pressure. it is very remarkable that kittens and puppies should be so well put together that they need no artificial bracing, and the human family be left wholly to the mercy of a bandage. suppose a child was born where you could not get a bandage, what then? now i think this child will remain intact without a bandage, and, if i am willing to take the risk, why should you complain?" "because," said she, "if the child should die, it would injure my name as a nurse. i therefore wash my hands of all these new-fangled notions." so she bandaged the child every morning, and i as regularly took it off. it has been fully proved since to be as useless an appendage as the vermiform. she had several cups with various concoctions of herbs standing on the chimney-corner, ready for insomnia, colic, indigestion, etc., etc., all of which were spirited away when she was at her dinner. in vain i told her we were homeopathists, and afraid of everything in the animal, vegetable, or mineral kingdoms lower than the two-hundredth dilution. i tried to explain the hahnemann system of therapeutics, the philosophy of the principle _similia similibus curantur_, but she had no capacity for first principles, and did not understand my discourse. i told her that, if she would wash the baby's mouth with pure cold water morning and night and give it a teaspoonful to drink occasionally during the day, there would be no danger of red gum; that if she would keep the blinds open and let in the air and sunshine, keep the temperature of the room at sixty-five degrees, leave the child's head uncovered so that it could breathe freely, stop rocking and trotting it and singing such melancholy hymns as "hark, from the tombs a doleful sound!" the baby and i would both be able to weather the cape without a bandage. i told her i should nurse the child once in two hours, and that she must not feed it any of her nostrums in the meantime; that a child's stomach, being made on the same general plan as our own, needed intervals of rest as well as ours. she said it would be racked with colic if the stomach was empty any length of time, and that it would surely have rickets if it were kept too still. i told her if the child had no anodynes, nature would regulate its sleep and motions. she said she could not stay in a room with the thermometer at sixty-five degrees, so i told her to sit in the next room and regulate the heat to suit herself; that i would ring a bell when her services were needed. the reader will wonder, no doubt, that i kept such a cantankerous servant. i could get no other. dear "mother monroe," as wise as she was good, and as tender as she was strong, who had nursed two generations of mothers in our village, was engaged at that time, and i was compelled to take an exotic. i had often watched "mother monroe" with admiration, as she turned and twisted my sister's baby. it lay as peacefully in her hands as if they were lined with eider down. she bathed and dressed it by easy stages, turning the child over and over like a pancake. but she was so full of the magnetism of human love, giving the child, all the time, the most consoling assurance that the operation was to be a short one, that the whole proceeding was quite entertaining to the observer and seemingly agreeable to the child, though it had a rather surprised look as it took a bird's-eye view, in quick succession, of the ceiling and the floor. still my nurse had her good points. she was very pleasant when she had her own way. she was neat and tidy, and ready to serve me at any time, night or day. she did not wear false teeth that rattled when she talked, nor boots that squeaked when she walked. she did not snuff nor chew cloves, nor speak except when spoken to. our discussions, on various points, went on at intervals, until i succeeded in planting some ideas in her mind, and when she left me, at the end of six weeks, she confessed that she had learned some valuable lessons. as the baby had slept quietly most of the time, had no crying spells, nor colic, and i looked well, she naturally came to the conclusion that pure air, sunshine, proper dressing, and regular feeding were more necessary for babies than herb teas and soothing syrups. besides the obstinacy of the nurse, i had the ignorance of physicians to contend with. when the child was four days old we discovered that the collar bone was bent. the physician, wishing to get a pressure on the shoulder, braced the bandage round the wrist. "leave that," he said, "ten days, and then it will be all right." soon after he left i noticed that the child's hand was blue, showing that the circulation was impeded. "that will never do," said i; "nurse, take it off." "no, indeed," she answered, "i shall never interfere with the doctor." so i took it off myself, and sent for another doctor, who was said to know more of surgery. he expressed great surprise that the first physician called should have put on so severe a bandage. "that," said he, "would do for a grown man, but ten days of it on a child would make him a cripple." however, he did nearly the same thing, only fastening it round the hand instead of the wrist. i soon saw that the ends of the fingers were all purple, and that to leave that on ten days would be as dangerous as the first. so i took that off. "what a woman!" exclaimed the nurse. "what do you propose to do?" "think out something better, myself; so brace me up with some pillows and give the baby to me." she looked at me aghast and said, "you'd better trust the doctors, or your child will be a helpless cripple." "yes," i replied, "he would be, if we had left either of those bandages on, but i have an idea of something better." "now," said i, talking partly to myself and partly to her, "what we want is a little pressure on that bone; that is what both those men aimed at. how can we get it without involving the arm, is the question?" "i am sure i don't know," said she, rubbing her hands and taking two or three brisk turns round the room. "well, bring me three strips of linen, four double." i then folded one, wet in arnica and water, and laid it on the collar bone, put two other bands, like a pair of suspenders, over the shoulders, crossing them both in front and behind, pinning the ends to the diaper, which gave the needed pressure without impeding the circulation anywhere. as i finished she gave me a look of budding confidence, and seemed satisfied that all was well. several times, night and day, we wet the compress and readjusted the bands, until all appearances of inflammation had subsided. at the end of ten days the two sons of aesculapius appeared and made their examination and said all was right, whereupon i told them how badly their bandages worked and what i had done myself. they smiled at each other, and one said: "well, after all, a mother's instinct is better than a man's reason." "thank you, gentlemen, there was no instinct about it. i did some hard thinking before i saw how i could get a pressure on the shoulder without impeding the circulation, as you did." thus, in the supreme moment of a young mother's life, when i needed tender care and support, i felt the whole responsibility of my child's supervision; but though uncertain at every step of my own knowledge, i learned another lesson in self-reliance. i trusted neither men nor books absolutely after this, either in regard to the heavens above or the earth beneath, but continued to use my "mother's instinct," if "reason" is too dignified a term to apply to woman's thoughts. my advice to every mother is, above all other arts and sciences, study first what relates to babyhood, as there is no department of human action in which there is such lamentable ignorance. at the end of six weeks my nurse departed, and i had a good woman in her place who obeyed my orders, and now a new difficulty arose from an unexpected quarter. my father and husband took it into their heads that the child slept too much. if not awake when they wished to look at him or to show him to their friends, they would pull him out of his crib on all occasions. when i found neither of them was amenable to reason on this point, i locked the door, and no amount of eloquent pleading ever gained them admittance during the time i considered sacred to the baby's slumbers. at six months having, as yet, had none of the diseases supposed to be inevitable, the boy weighed thirty pounds. then the stately peter came again into requisition, and in his strong arms the child spent many of his waking hours. peter, with a long, elephantine gait, slowly wandered over the town, lingering especially in the busy marts of trade. peter's curiosity had strengthened with years, and, wherever a crowd gathered round a monkey and hand organ, a vender's wagon, an auction stand, or the post office at mail time, there stood peter, black as coal, with "the beautiful boy in white," the most conspicuous figure in the crowd. as i told peter never to let children kiss the baby, for fear of some disease, he kept him well aloft, allowing no affectionate manifestations except toward himself. my reading, at this time, centered on hygiene. i came to the conclusion, after much thought and observation, that children never cried unless they were uncomfortable. a professor at union college, who used to combat many of my theories, said he gave one of his children a sound spanking at six weeks, and it never disturbed him a night afterward. another solomon told me that a very weak preparation of opium would keep a child always quiet and take it through the dangerous period of teething without a ripple on the surface of domestic life. as children cannot tell what ails them, and suffer from many things of which parents are ignorant, the crying of the child should arouse them to an intelligent examination. to spank it for crying is to silence the watchman on the tower through fear, to give soothing syrup is to drug the watchman while the evils go on. parents may thereby insure eight hours' sleep at the time, but at the risk of greater trouble in the future with sick and dying children. tom moore tells us "the heart from love to one, grows bountiful to all." i know the care of one child made me thoughtful of all. i never hear a child cry, now, that i do not feel that i am bound to find out the reason. in my extensive travels on lecturing tours, in after years, i had many varied experiences with babies. one day, in the cars, a child was crying near me, while the parents were alternately shaking and slapping it. first one would take it with an emphatic jerk, and then the other. at last i heard the father say in a spiteful tone, "if you don't stop i'll throw you out of the window." one naturally hesitates about interfering between parents and children, so i generally restrain myself as long as i can endure the torture of witnessing such outrages, but at length i turned and said: "let me take your child and see if i can find out what ails it." "nothing ails it," said the father, "but bad temper." the child readily came to me. i felt all around to see if its clothes pinched anywhere, or if there were any pins pricking. i took off its hat and cloak to see if there were any strings cutting its neck or choking it. then i glanced at the feet, and lo! there was the trouble. the boots were at least one size too small. i took them off, and the stockings, too, and found the feet as cold as ice and the prints of the stockings clearly traced on the tender flesh. we all know the agony of tight boots. i rubbed the feet and held them in my hands until they were warm, when the poor little thing fell asleep. i said to the parents, "you are young people, i see, and this is probably your first child." they said, "yes." "you don't intend to be cruel, i know, but if you had thrown those boots out of the window, when you threatened to throw the child, it would have been wiser. this poor child has suffered ever since it was dressed this morning." i showed them the marks on the feet, and called their attention to the fact that the child fell asleep as soon as its pain was relieved. the mother said she knew the boots were tight, as it was with difficulty she could get them on, but the old ones were too shabby for the journey and they had no time to change the others. "well," said the husband, "if i had known those boots were tight, i would have thrown them out of the window." "now," said i, "let me give you one rule: when your child cries, remember it is telling you, as well as it can, that something hurts it, either outside or in, and do not rest until you find what it is. neither spanking, shaking, or scolding can relieve pain." i have seen women enter the cars with their babies' faces completely covered with a blanket shawl. i have often thought i would like to cover their faces for an hour and see how they would bear it. in such circumstances, in order to get the blanket open, i have asked to see the baby, and generally found it as red as a beet. ignorant nurses and mothers have discovered that children sleep longer with their heads covered. they don't know why, nor the injurious effect of breathing over and over the same air that has been thrown off the lungs polluted with carbonic acid gas. this stupefies the child and prolongs the unhealthy slumber. one hot day, in the month of may, i entered a crowded car at cedar rapids, ia., and took the only empty seat beside a gentleman who seemed very nervous about a crying child. i was scarcely seated when he said: "mother, do you know anything about babies?" "oh, yes!" i said, smiling, "that is a department of knowledge on which i especially pride myself." "well," said he, "there is a child that has cried most of the time for the last twenty-four hours. what do you think ails it?" making a random supposition, i replied, "it probably needs a bath." he promptly rejoined, "if you will give it one, i will provide the necessary means." i said, "i will first see if the child will come to me and if the mother is willing." i found the mother only too glad to have a few minutes' rest, and the child too tired to care who took it. she gave me a suit of clean clothes throughout, the gentleman spread his blanket shawl on the seat, securing the opposite one for me and the bathing appliances. then he produced a towel, sponge, and an india-rubber bowl full of water, and i gave the child a generous drink and a thorough ablution. it stretched and seemed to enjoy every step of the proceeding, and, while i was brushing its golden curls as gently as i could, it fell asleep; so i covered it with the towel and blanket shawl, not willing to disturb it for dressing. the poor mother, too, was sound asleep, and the gentleman very happy. he had children of his own and, like me, felt great pity for the poor, helpless little victim of ignorance and folly. i engaged one of the ladies to dress it when it awoke, as i was soon to leave the train. it slept the two hours i remained--how much longer i never heard. a young man, who had witnessed the proceeding, got off at the same station and accosted me, saying: "i should be very thankful if you would come and see my baby. it is only one month old and cries all the time, and my wife, who is only sixteen years old, is worn out with it and neither of us know what to do, so we all cry together, and the doctor says he does not see what ails it." so i went on my mission of mercy and found the child bandaged as tight as a drum. when i took out the pins and unrolled it, it fairly popped like the cork out of a champagne bottle. i rubbed its breast and its back and soon soothed it to sleep. i remained a long time, telling them how to take care of the child and the mother, too. i told them everything i could think of in regard to clothes, diet, and pure air. i asked the mother why she bandaged her child as she did. she said her nurse told her that there was danger of hernia unless the abdomen was well bandaged. i told her that the only object of a bandage was to protect the navel, for a few days, until it was healed, and for that purpose all that was necessary was a piece of linen four inches square, well oiled, folded four times double, with a hole in the center, laid over it. i remembered, next day, that i forgot to tell them to give the child water, and so i telegraphed them, "give the baby water six times a day." i heard of that baby afterward. it lived and flourished, and the parents knew how to administer to the wants of the next one. the father was a telegraph operator and had many friends--knights of the key--throughout iowa. for many years afterward, in leisure moments, these knights would "call up" this parent and say, over the wire, "give the baby water six times a day." thus did they "repeat the story, and spread the truth from pole to pole." chapter viii. boston and chelsea. in the autumn of my husband was admitted to the bar and commenced the practice of law in boston with mr. bowles, brother-in-law of the late general john a. dix. this gave me the opportunity to make many pleasant acquaintances among the lawyers in boston, and to meet, intimately, many of the noble men and women among reformers, whom i had long worshiped at a distance. here, for the first time, i met lydia maria child, abby kelly, paulina wright, elizabeth peabody, maria chapman and her beautiful sisters, the misses weston, oliver and marianna johnson, joseph and thankful southwick and their three bright daughters. the home of the southwicks was always a harbor of rest for the weary, where the anti-slavery hosts were wont to congregate, and where one was always sure to meet someone worth knowing. their hospitality was generous to an extreme, and so boundless that they were, at last, fairly eaten out of house and home. here, too, for the first time, i met theodore parker, john pierpont, john g. whittier, emerson, alcott, lowell, hawthorne, mr. and mrs. samuel e. sewall, sidney howard gay, pillsbury, foster, frederick douglass, and last though not least, those noble men, charles hovey and francis jackson, the only men who ever left any money to the cause of woman suffrage. i also met miss jackson, afterward mrs. eddy, who left half her fortune, fifty thousand dollars, for the same purpose. i was a frequent visitor at the home of william lloyd garrison. though he had a prolonged battle to fight in the rough outside world, his home was always a haven of rest. mrs. garrison was a sweet-tempered, conscientious woman, who tried, under all circumstances, to do what was right. she had sound judgment and rare common sense, was tall and fine-looking, with luxuriant brown hair, large tender blue eyes, delicate features, and affable manners. they had an exceptionally fine family of five sons and one daughter. fanny, now the wife of henry villard, the financier, was the favorite and pet. all the children, in their maturer years, have fulfilled the promises of their childhood. though always in straitened circumstances, the garrisons were very hospitable. it was next to impossible for mr. garrison to meet a friend without inviting him to his house, especially at the close of a convention. i was one of twelve at one of his impromptu tea parties. we all took it for granted that his wife knew we were coming, and that her preparations were already made. surrounded by half a dozen children, she was performing the last act in the opera of lullaby, wholly unconscious of the invasion downstairs. but mr. garrison was equal to every emergency, and, after placing his guests at their ease in the parlor, he hastened to the nursery, took off his coat, and rocked the baby until his wife had disposed of the remaining children. then they had a consultation about the tea, and when, basket in hand, the good man sallied forth for the desired viands, mrs. garrison, having made a hasty toilet, came down to welcome her guests. she was as genial and self-possessed as if all things had been prepared. she made no apologies for what was lacking in the general appearance of the house nor in the variety of the _menu_--it was sufficient for her to know that mr. garrison was happy in feeling free to invite his friends. the impromptu meal was excellent, and we had a most enjoyable evening. i have no doubt that mrs. garrison had more real pleasure than if she had been busy all day making preparations and had been tired out when her guests arrived. the anti-slavery conventions and fairs, held every year during the holidays, brought many charming people from other states, and made boston a social center for the coadjutors of garrison and phillips. these conventions surpassed any meetings i had ever attended; the speeches were eloquent and the debates earnest and forcible. garrison and phillips were in their prime, and slavery was a question of national interest. the hall in which the fairs were held, under the auspices of mrs. chapman and her cohorts, was most artistically decorated. there one could purchase whatever the fancy could desire, for english friends, stimulated by the appeals of harriet martineau and elizabeth pease, used to send boxes of beautiful things, gathered from all parts of the eastern continent. there, too, one could get a most _recherché_ luncheon in the society of the literati of boston; for, however indifferent many were to slavery _per se_, they enjoyed these fairs, and all classes flocked there till far into the night. it was a kind of ladies' exchange for the holiday week, where each one was sure to meet her friends. the fair and the annual convention, coming in succession, intensified the interest in both. i never grew weary of the conventions, though i attended all the sessions, lasting, sometimes, until eleven o'clock at night. the fiery eloquence of the abolitionists, the amusing episodes that occurred when some crank was suppressed and borne out on the shoulders of his brethren, gave sufficient variety to the proceedings to keep the interest up to high-water mark. there was one old man dressed in white, carrying a scythe, who imagined himself the personification of "time," though called "father lampson." occasionally he would bubble over with some prophetic vision, and, as he could not be silenced, he was carried out. he usually made himself as limp as possible, which added to the difficulty of his exit and the amusement of the audience. a ripple of merriment would unsettle, for a moment, even the dignity of the platform when abigail folsom, another crank, would shout from the gallery, "stop not, my brother, on the order of your going, but go." the abolitionists were making the experiment, at this time, of a free platform, allowing everyone to speak as moved by the spirit, but they soon found that would not do, as those evidently moved by the spirit of mischief were quite as apt to air their vagaries as those moved by the spirit of truth. however, the garrisonian platform always maintained a certain degree of freedom outside its regular programme, and, although this involved extra duty in suppressing cranks, yet the meeting gained enthusiasm by some good spontaneous speaking on the floor as well as on the platform. a number of immense mass meetings were held in faneuil hall, a large, dreary place, with its bare walls and innumerable dingy windows. the only attempt at an ornament was the american eagle, with its wings spread and claws firmly set, in the middle of the gallery. the gilt was worn off its beak, giving it the appearance, as edmund quincy said, of having a bad cold in the head. this old hall was sacred to so many memories connected with the early days of the revolution that it was a kind of mecca for the lovers of liberty visiting boston. the anti-slavery meetings held there were often disturbed by mobs that would hold the most gifted orator at bay hour after hour, and would listen only to the songs of the hutchinson family. although these songs were a condensed extract of the whole anti-slavery constitution and by-laws, yet the mob was as peaceful under these paeans to liberty as a child under the influence of an anodyne. what a welcome and beautiful vision that was when the four brothers, in blue broadcloth and white collars, turned down _à la_ byron, and little sister abby in silk, soft lace, and blue ribbon, appeared on the platform to sing their quaint ballads of freedom! fresh from the hills of new hampshire, they looked so sturdy, so vigorous, so pure, so true that they seemed fitting representatives of all the cardinal virtues, and even a howling mob could not resist their influence. perhaps, after one of their ballads, the mob would listen five minutes to wendell phillips or garrison until he gave them some home thrusts, when all was uproar again. the northern merchants who made their fortunes out of southern cotton, the politicians who wanted votes, and the ministers who wanted to keep peace in the churches, were all as much opposed to the anti-slavery agitation as were the slaveholders themselves. these were the classes the mob represented, though seemingly composed of gamblers, liquor dealers, and demagogues. for years the anti-slavery struggle at the north was carried on against statecraft, priestcraft, the cupidity of the moneyed classes, and the ignorance of the masses, but, in spite of all these forces of evil, it triumphed at last. i was in boston at the time that lane and wright, some metaphysical englishmen, and our own alcott held their famous philosophical conversations, in which elizabeth peabody took part. i went to them regularly. i was ambitious to absorb all the wisdom i could, but, really, i could not give an intelligent report of the points under discussion at any sitting. oliver johnson asked me, one day, if i enjoyed them. i thought, from a twinkle in his eye, that he thought i did not, so i told him i was ashamed to confess that i did not know what they were talking about. he said, "neither do i,--very few of their hearers do,--so you need not be surprised that they are incomprehensible to you, nor think less of your own capacity." i was indebted to mr. johnson for several of the greatest pleasures i enjoyed in boston. he escorted me to an entire course of theodore parker's lectures, given in marlborough chapel. this was soon after the great preacher had given his famous sermon on "the permanent and transient in religion," when he was ostracised, even by the unitarians, for his radical utterances, and not permitted to preach in any of their pulpits. his lectures were deemed still more heterodox than that sermon. he shocked the orthodox churches of that day--more, even, than ingersoll has in our times. the lectures, however, were so soul-satisfying to me that i was surprised at the bitter criticisms i heard expressed. though they were two hours long, i never grew weary, and, when the course ended, i said to mr. johnson: "i wish i could hear them over again." "well, you can," said he, "mr. parker is to repeat them in cambridgeport, beginning next week." accordingly we went there and heard them again with equal satisfaction. during the winter in boston i attended all the lectures, churches, theaters, concerts, and temperance, peace, and prison-reform conventions within my reach. i had never lived in such an enthusiastically literary and reform latitude before, and my mental powers were kept at the highest tension. we went to chelsea, for the summer, and boarded with the baptist minister, the rev. john wesley olmstead, afterward editor of _the watchman and reflector_. he had married my cousin, mary livingston, one of the most lovely, unselfish characters i ever knew. there i had the opportunity of meeting several of the leading baptist ministers in new england, and, as i was thoroughly imbued with parker's ideas, we had many heated discussions on theology. there, too, i met orestes bronson, a remarkably well-read man, who had gone through every phase of religious experience from blank atheism to the bosom of the catholic church, where i believe he found repose at the end of his days. he was so arbitrary and dogmatic that most people did not like him; but i appreciated his acquaintance, as he was a liberal thinker and had a world of information which he readily imparted to those of a teachable spirit. as i was then in a hungering, thirsting condition for truth on every subject, the friendship of such a man was, to me, an inestimable blessing. reading theodore parker's lectures, years afterward, i was surprised to find how little there was in them to shock anybody--the majority of thinking people having grown up to them. while living in chelsea two years, i used to walk (there being no public conveyances running on sunday) from the ferry to marlborough chapel to hear mr. parker preach. it was a long walk, over two miles, and i was so tired, on reaching the chapel, that i made it a point to sleep through all the preliminary service, so as to be fresh for the sermon, as the friend next whom i sat always wakened me in time. one sunday, when my friend was absent, it being a very warm day and i unusually fatigued, i slept until the sexton informed me that he was about to close the doors! in an unwary moment i imparted this fact to my baptist friends. they made all manner of fun ever afterward of the soothing nature of mr. parker's theology, and my long walk, every sunday, to repose in the shadow of a heterodox altar. still, the loss of the sermon was the only vexatious part of it, and i had the benefit of the walk and the refreshing slumber, to the music of mr. parker's melodious voice and the deep-toned organ. mrs. oliver johnson and i spent two days at the brook farm community when in the height of its prosperity. there i met the ripleys,--who were, i believe, the backbone of the experiment,--william henry channing, bronson alcott, charles a. dana, frederick cabot, william chase, mrs. horace greeley, who was spending a few days there, and many others, whose names i cannot recall. here was a charming family of intelligent men and women, doing their own farm and house work, with lectures, readings, music, dancing, and games when desired; realizing, in a measure, edward bellamy's beautiful vision of the equal conditions of the human family in the year . the story of the beginning and end of this experiment of community life has been told so often that i will simply say that its failure was a grave disappointment to those most deeply interested in its success. mr. channing told me, years after, when he was pastor of the unitarian church in rochester, as we were wandering through mount hope one day, that, when the roxbury community was dissolved and he was obliged to return to the old life of competition, he would gladly have been laid under the sod, as the isolated home seemed so solitary, silent, and selfish that the whole atmosphere was oppressive. in my father moved to albany, to establish my brothers-in-law, mr. wilkeson and mr. mcmartin, in the legal profession. that made albany the family rallying point for a few years. this enabled me to spend several winters at the capital and to take an active part in the discussion of the married woman's property bill, then pending in the legislature. william h. seward, governor of the state from to , recommended the bill, and his wife, a woman of rare intelligence, advocated it in society. together we had the opportunity of talking with many members, both of the senate and the assembly, in social circles, as well as in their committee rooms. bills were pending from until , when the measure finally passed. my second son was born in albany, in march, , under more favorable auspices than the first, as i knew, then, what to do with a baby. returning to chelsea we commenced housekeeping, which afforded me another chapter of experience. a new house, newly furnished, with beautiful views of boston bay, was all i could desire. mr. stanton announced to me, in starting, that his business would occupy all his time, and that i must take entire charge of the housekeeping. so, with two good servants and two babies under my sole supervision, my time was pleasantly occupied. when first installed as mistress over an establishment, one has that same feeling of pride and satisfaction that a young minister must have in taking charge of his first congregation. it is a proud moment in a woman's life to reign supreme within four walls, to be the one to whom all questions of domestic pleasure and economy are referred, and to hold in her hand that little family book in which the daily expenses, the outgoings and incomings, are duly registered. i studied up everything pertaining to housekeeping, and enjoyed it all. even washing day--that day so many people dread--had its charms for me. the clean clothes on the lines and on the grass looked so white, and smelled so sweet, that it was to me a pretty sight to contemplate. i inspired my laundress with an ambition to have her clothes look white and to get them out earlier than our neighbors, and to have them ironed and put away sooner. as mr. stanton did not come home to dinner, we made a picnic of our noon meal on mondays, and all thoughts and energies were turned to speed the washing. no unnecessary sweeping or dusting, no visiting nor entertaining angels unawares on that day--it was held sacred to soap suds, blue-bags, and clotheslines. the children, only, had no deviation in the regularity of their lives. they had their drives and walks, their naps and rations, in quantity and time, as usual. i had all the most approved cook books, and spent half my time preserving, pickling, and experimenting in new dishes. i felt the same ambition to excel in all departments of the culinary art that i did at school in the different branches of learning. my love of order and cleanliness was carried throughout, from parlor to kitchen, from the front door to the back. i gave a man an extra shilling to pile the logs of firewood with their smooth ends outward, though i did not have them scoured white, as did our dutch grandmothers. i tried, too, to give an artistic touch to everything--the dress of my children and servants included. my dining table was round, always covered with a clean cloth of a pretty pattern and a centerpiece of flowers in their season, pretty dishes, clean silver, and set with neatness and care. i put my soul into everything, and hence enjoyed it. i never could understand how housekeepers could rest with rubbish all round their back doors; eggshells, broken dishes, tin cans, and old shoes scattered round their premises; servants ragged and dirty, with their hair in papers, and with the kitchen and dining room full of flies. i have known even artists to be indifferent to their personal appearance and their surroundings. surely a mother and child, tastefully dressed, and a pretty home for a framework, is, as a picture, even more attractive than a domestic scene hung on the wall. the love of the beautiful can be illustrated as well in life as on canvas. there is such a struggle among women to become artists that i really wish some of their gifts could be illustrated in clean, orderly, beautiful homes. our house was pleasantly situated on the chelsea hills, commanding a fine view of boston, the harbor, and surrounding country. there, on the upper piazza, i spent some of the happiest days of my life, enjoying, in turn, the beautiful outlook, my children, and my books. here, under the very shadow of bunker hill monument, my third son was born. shortly after this gerrit smith and his wife came to spend a few days with us, so this boy, much against my will, was named after my cousin. i did not believe in old family names unless they were peculiarly euphonious. i had a list of beautiful names for sons and daughters, from which to designate each newcomer; but, as yet, not one on my list had been used. however, i put my foot down, at no. , and named him theodore, and, thus far, he has proved himself a veritable "gift of god," doing his uttermost, in every way possible, to fight the battle of freedom for woman. during the visit of my cousin i thought i would venture on a small, select dinner party, consisting of the rev. john pierpont and his wife, charles sumner, john g. whittier, and joshua leavitt. i had a new cook, rose, whose viands, thus far, had proved delicious, so i had no anxiety on that score. but, unfortunately, on this occasion i had given her a bottle of wine for the pudding sauce and whipped cream, of which she imbibed too freely, and hence there were some glaring blunders in the _menu_ that were exceedingly mortifying. as mr. smith and my husband were both good talkers, i told them they must cover all defects with their brilliant conversation, which they promised to do. rose had all the points of a good servant, phrenologically and physiologically. she had a large head, with great bumps of caution and order, her eyes were large and soft and far apart. in selecting her, scientifically, i had told my husband, in triumph, several times what a treasure i had found. shortly after dinner, one evening when i was out, she held the baby while the nurse was eating her supper, and carelessly burned his foot against the stove. then mr. stanton suggested that, in selecting the next cook, i would better not trust to science, but inquire of the family where she lived as to her practical virtues. poor rose! she wept over her lapses when sober, and made fair promises for the future, but i did not dare to trust her, so we parted. the one drawback to the joys of housekeeping was then, as it is now, the lack of faithful, competent servants. the hope of co-operative housekeeping, in the near future, gives us some promise of a more harmonious domestic life. one of the books in my library i value most highly is the first volume of whittier's poems, published in , "dedicated to henry b. stanton, as a token of the author's personal friendship, and of his respect for the unreserved devotion of exalted talents to the cause of humanity and freedom." soon after our marriage we spent a few days with our gifted quaker poet, on his farm in massachusetts. i shall never forget those happy days in june; the long walks and drives, and talks under the old trees of anti-slavery experiences, and whittier's mirth and indignation as we described different scenes in the world's anti-slavery convention in london. he laughed immoderately at the tom campbell episode. poor fellow! he had taken too much wine that day, and when whittier's verses, addressed to the convention, were read, he criticised them severely, and wound up by saying that the soul of a poet was not in him. mr. stanton sprang to his feet and recited some of whittier's stirring stanzas on freedom, which electrified the audience, and, turning to campbell, he said: "what do you say to that?" "ah! that's real poetry," he replied. "and john greenleaf whittier is its author," said mr. stanton. i enjoyed, too, the morning and evening service, when the revered mother read the scriptures and we all bowed our heads in silent worship. there was, at times, an atmosphere of solemnity pervading everything, that was oppressive in the midst of so much that appealed to my higher nature. there was a shade of sadness in even the smile of the mother and sister, and a rigid plainness in the house and its surroundings, a depressed look in whittier himself that the songs of the birds, the sunshine, and the bracing new england air seemed powerless to chase away, caused, as i afterward heard, by pecuniary embarrassment, and fears in regard to the delicate health of the sister. she, too, had rare poetical talent, and in her whittier found not only a helpful companion in the practical affairs of life, but one who sympathized with him in the highest flights of which his muse was capable. their worst fears were realized in the death of the sister not long after. in his last volume several of her poems were published, which are quite worthy the place the brother's appreciation has given them. whittier's love and reverence for his mother and sister, so marked in every word and look, were charming features of his home life. all his poems to our sex breathe the same tender, worshipful sentiments. soon after this visit at amesbury, our noble friend spent a few days with us in chelsea, near boston. one evening, after we had been talking a long time of the unhappy dissensions among anti-slavery friends, by way of dissipating the shadows i opened the piano, and proposed that we should sing some cheerful songs. "oh, no!" exclaimed mr. stanton, "do not touch a note; you will put every nerve of whittier's body on edge." it seemed, to me, so natural for a poet to love music that i was surprised to know that it was a torture to him. from our upper piazza we had a fine view of boston harbor. sitting there late one moonlight night, admiring the outlines of bunker hill monument and the weird effect of the sails and masts of the vessels lying in the harbor, we naturally passed from the romance of our surroundings to those of our lives. i have often noticed that the most reserved people are apt to grow confidential at such an hour. it was under such circumstances that the good poet opened to me a deeply interesting page of his life, a sad romance of love and disappointment, that may not yet be told, as some who were interested in the events are still among the living. whittier's poems were not only one of the most important factors in the anti-slavery war and victory, but they have been equally potent in emancipating the minds of his generation from the gloomy superstitions of the puritanical religion. oliver wendell holmes, in his eulogy of whittier, says that his influence on the religious thought of the american people has been far greater than that of the occupant of any pulpit. as my husband's health was delicate, and the new england winters proved too severe for him, we left boston, with many regrets, and sought a more genial climate in central new york. chapter ix. the first woman's rights convention. in the spring of we moved to seneca falls. here we spent sixteen years of our married life, and here our other children--two sons and two daughters--were born. just as we were ready to leave boston, mr. and mrs. eaton and their two children arrived from europe, and we decided to go together to johnstown, mr. eaton being obliged to hurry to new york on business, and mr. stanton to remain still in boston a few months. at the last moment my nurse decided she could not leave her friends and go so far away. accordingly my sister and i started, by rail, with five children and seventeen trunks, for albany, where we rested over night and part of the next day. we had a very fatiguing journey, looking after so many trunks and children, for my sister's children persisted in standing on the platform at every opportunity, and the younger ones would follow their example. this kept us constantly on the watch. we were thankful when safely landed once more in the old homestead in johnstown, where we arrived at midnight. as our beloved parents had received no warning of our coming, the whole household was aroused to dispose of us. but now in safe harbor, 'mid familiar scenes and pleasant memories, our slumbers were indeed refreshing. how rapidly one throws off all care and anxiety under the parental roof, and how at sea one feels, no matter what the age may be, when the loved ones are gone forever and the home of childhood is but a dream of the past. after a few days of rest i started, alone, for my new home, quite happy with the responsibility of repairing a house and putting all things in order. i was already acquainted with many of the people and the surroundings in seneca falls, as my sister, mrs. bayard, had lived there several years, and i had frequently made her long visits. we had quite a magnetic circle of reformers, too, in central new york. at rochester were william henry channing, frederick douglass, the anthonys, posts, hallowells, stebbins,--some grand old quaker families at farmington,--the sedgwicks, mays, mills, and matilda joslyn gage at syracuse; gerrit smith at peterboro, and beriah green at whitesboro. the house we were to occupy had been closed for some years and needed many repairs, and the grounds, comprising five acres, were overgrown with weeds. my father gave me a check and said, with a smile, "you believe in woman's capacity to do and dare; now go ahead and put your place in order." after a minute survey of the premises and due consultation with one or two sons of adam, i set the carpenters, painters, paper-hangers, and gardeners at work, built a new kitchen and woodhouse, and in one month took possession. having left my children with my mother, there were no impediments to a full display of my executive ability. in the purchase of brick, timber, paint, etc., and in making bargains with workmen, i was in frequent consultation with judge sackett and mr. bascom. the latter was a member of the constitutional convention, then in session in albany, and as he used to walk down whenever he was at home, to see how my work progressed, we had long talks, sitting on boxes in the midst of tools and shavings, on the status of women. i urged him to propose an amendment to article ii, section , of the state constitution, striking out the word "male," which limits the suffrage to men. but, while he fully agreed with all i had to say on the political equality of women, he had not the courage to make himself the laughing-stock of the convention. whenever i cornered him on this point, manlike he turned the conversation to the painters and carpenters. however, these conversations had the effect of bringing him into the first woman's convention, where he did us good service. in seneca falls my life was comparatively solitary, and the change from boston was somewhat depressing. there, all my immediate friends were reformers, i had near neighbors, a new home with all the modern conveniences, and well-trained servants. here our residence was on the outskirts of the town, roads very often muddy and no sidewalks most of the way, mr. stanton was frequently from home, i had poor servants, and an increasing number of children. to keep a house and grounds in good order, purchase every article for daily use, keep the wardrobes of half a dozen human beings in proper trim, take the children to dentists, shoemakers, and different schools, or find teachers at home, altogether made sufficient work to keep one brain busy, as well as all the hands i could impress into the service. then, too, the novelty of housekeeping had passed away, and much that was once attractive in domestic life was now irksome. i had so many cares that the company i needed for intellectual stimulus was a trial rather than a pleasure. there was quite an irish settlement at a short distance, and continual complaints were coming to me that my boys threw stones at their pigs, cows, and the roofs of their houses. this involved constant diplomatic relations in the settlement of various difficulties, in which i was so successful that, at length, they constituted me a kind of umpire in all their own quarrels. if a drunken husband was pounding his wife, the children would run for me. hastening to the scene of action, i would take patrick by the collar, and, much to his surprise and shame, make him sit down and promise to behave himself. i never had one of them offer the least resistance, and in time they all came to regard me as one having authority. i strengthened my influence by cultivating good feeling. i lent the men papers to read, and invited their children into our grounds; giving them fruit, of which we had abundance, and my children's old clothes, books, and toys. i was their physician, also--with my box of homeopathic medicines i took charge of the men, women, and children in sickness. thus the most amicable relations were established, and, in any emergency, these poor neighbors were good friends and always ready to serve me. but i found police duty rather irksome, especially when called out dark nights to prevent drunken fathers from disturbing their sleeping children, or to minister to poor mothers in the pangs of maternity. alas! alas! who can measure the mountains of sorrow and suffering endured in unwelcome motherhood in the abodes of ignorance, poverty, and vice, where terror-stricken women and children are the victims of strong men frenzied with passion and intoxicating drink? up to this time life had glided by with comparative ease, but now the real struggle was upon me. my duties were too numerous and varied, and none sufficiently exhilarating or intellectual to bring into play my higher faculties. i suffered with mental hunger, which, like an empty stomach, is very depressing. i had books, but no stimulating companionship. to add to my general dissatisfaction at the change from boston, i found that seneca falls was a malarial region, and in due time all the children were attacked with chills and fever which, under homeopathic treatment in those days, lasted three months. the servants were afflicted in the same way. cleanliness, order, the love of the beautiful and artistic, all faded away in the struggle to accomplish what was absolutely necessary from hour to hour. now i understood, as i never had before, how women could sit down and rest in the midst of general disorder. housekeeping, under such conditions, was impossible, so i packed our clothes, locked up the house, and went to that harbor of safety, home, as i did ever after in stress of weather. i now fully understood the practical difficulties most women had to contend with in the isolated household, and the impossibility of woman's best development if in contact, the chief part of her life, with servants and children. fourier's phalansterie community life and co-operative households had a new significance for me. emerson says, "a healthy discontent is the first step to progress." the general discontent i felt with woman's portion as wife, mother, housekeeper, physician, and spiritual guide, the chaotic conditions into which everything fell without her constant supervision, and the wearied, anxious look of the majority of women impressed me with a strong feeling that some active measures should be taken to remedy the wrongs of society in general, and of women in particular. my experience at the world's anti-slavery convention, all i had read of the legal status of women, and the oppression i saw everywhere, together swept across my soul, intensified now by many personal experiences. it seemed as if all the elements had conspired to impel me to some onward step. i could not see what to do or where to begin--my only thought was a public meeting for protest and discussion. in this tempest-tossed condition of mind i received an invitation to spend the day with lucretia mott, at richard hunt's, in waterloo. there i met several members of different families of friends, earnest, thoughtful women. i poured out, that day, the torrent of my long-accumulating discontent, with such vehemence and indignation that i stirred myself, as well as the rest of the party, to do and dare anything. my discontent, according to emerson, must have been healthy, for it moved us all to prompt action, and we decided, then and there, to call a "woman's rights convention." we wrote the call that evening and published it in the _seneca county courier_ the next day, the th of july, , giving only five days' notice, as the convention was to be held on the th and th. the call was inserted without signatures,--in fact it was a mere announcement of a meeting,--but the chief movers and managers were lucretia mott, mary ann mcclintock, jane hunt, martha c. wright, and myself. the convention, which was held two days in the methodist church, was in every way a grand success. the house was crowded at every session, the speaking good, and a religious earnestness dignified all the proceedings. these were the hasty initiative steps of "the most momentous reform that had yet been launched on the world--the first organized protest against the injustice which had brooded for ages over the character and destiny of one-half the race." no words could express our astonishment on finding, a few days afterward, that what seemed to us so timely, so rational, and so sacred, should be a subject for sarcasm and ridicule to the entire press of the nation. with our declaration of rights and resolutions for a text, it seemed as if every man who could wield a pen prepared a homily on "woman's sphere." all the journals from maine to texas seemed to strive with each other to see which could make our movement appear the most ridiculous. the anti-slavery papers stood by us manfully and so did frederick douglass, both in the convention and in his paper, _the north star_, but so pronounced was the popular voice against us, in the parlor, press, and pulpit, that most of the ladies who had attended the convention and signed the declaration, one by one, withdrew their names and influence and joined our persecutors. our friends gave us the cold shoulder and felt themselves disgraced by the whole proceeding. if i had had the slightest premonition of all that was to follow that convention, i fear i should not have had the courage to risk it, and i must confess that it was with fear and trembling that i consented to attend another, one month afterward, in rochester. fortunately, the first one seemed to have drawn all the fire, and of the second but little was said. but we had set the ball in motion, and now, in quick succession, conventions were held in ohio, indiana, massachusetts, pennsylvania, and in the city of new york, and have been kept up nearly every year since. the most noteworthy of the early conventions were those held in massachusetts, in which such men as garrison, phillips, channing, parker, and emerson took part. it was one of these that first attracted the attention of mrs. john stuart mill, and drew from her pen that able article on "the enfranchisement of woman," in the _westminster review_ of october, . the same year of the convention, the married woman's property bill, which had given rise to some discussion on woman's rights in new york, had passed the legislature. this encouraged action on the part of women, as the reflection naturally arose that, if the men who make the laws were ready for some onward step, surely the women themselves should express some interest in the legislation. ernestine l. rose, paulina wright (davis), and i had spoken before committees of the legislature years before, demanding equal property rights for women. we had circulated petitions for the married woman's property bill for many years, and so also had the leaders of the dutch aristocracy, who desired to see their life-long accumulations descend to their daughters and grandchildren rather than pass into the hands of dissipated, thriftless sons-in-law. judge hertell, judge fine, and mr. geddes of syracuse prepared and championed the several bills, at different times, before the legislature. hence the demands made in the convention were not entirely new to the reading and thinking public of new york--the first state to take any action on the question. as new york was the first state to put the word "male" in her constitution in , it was fitting that she should be first in more liberal legislation. the effect of the convention on my own mind was most salutary. the discussions had cleared my ideas as to the primal steps to be taken for woman's enfranchisement, and the opportunity of expressing myself fully and freely on a subject i felt so deeply about was a great relief. i think all women who attended the convention felt better for the statement of their wrongs, believing that the first step had been taken to right them. soon after this i was invited to speak at several points in the neighborhood. one night, in the quaker meeting house at farmington, i invited, as usual, discussion and questions when i had finished. we all waited in silence for a long time; at length a middle-aged man, with a broad-brimmed hat, arose and responded in a sing-song tone: "all i have to say is, if a hen can crow, let her crow," emphasizing "crow" with an upward inflection on several notes of the gamut. the meeting adjourned with mingled feelings of surprise and merriment. i confess that i felt somewhat chagrined in having what i considered my unanswerable arguments so summarily disposed of, and the serious impression i had made on the audience so speedily dissipated. the good man intended no disrespect, as he told me afterward. he simply put the whole argument in a nutshell: "let a woman do whatever she can." with these new duties and interests, and a broader outlook on human life, my petty domestic annoyances gradually took a subordinate place. now i began to write articles for the press, letters to conventions held in other states, and private letters to friends, to arouse them to thought on this question. the pastor of the presbyterian church, mr. bogue, preached several sermons on woman's sphere, criticising the action of the conventions in seneca falls and rochester. elizabeth mcclintock and i took notes and answered him in the county papers. gradually we extended our labors and attacked our opponents in the new york _tribune_, whose columns were open to us in the early days, mr. greeley being, at that time, one of our most faithful champions. in answering all the attacks, we were compelled to study canon and civil law, constitutions, bibles, science, philosophy, and history, sacred and profane. now my mind, as well as my hands, was fully occupied, and instead of mourning, as i had done, over what i had lost in leaving boston, i tried in every way to make the most of life in seneca falls. seeing that elaborate refreshments prevented many social gatherings, i often gave an evening entertainment without any. i told the young people, whenever they wanted a little dance or a merry time, to make our house their rallying point, and i would light up and give them a glass of water and some cake. in that way we had many pleasant informal gatherings. then, in imitation of margaret fuller's conversationals, we started one which lasted several years. we selected a subject each week on which we all read and thought; each, in turn, preparing an essay ten minutes in length. these were held, at different homes, saturday of each week. on coming together we chose a presiding officer for the evening, who called the meeting to order, and introduced the essayist. that finished, he asked each member, in turn, what he or she had read or thought on the subject, and if any had criticisms to make on the essay. everyone was expected to contribute something. much information was thus gained, and many spicy discussions followed. all the ladies, as well as the gentlemen, presided in turn, and so became familiar with parliamentary rules. the evening ended with music, dancing, and a general chat. in this way we read and thought over a wide range of subjects and brought together the best minds in the community. many young men and women who did not belong to what was considered the first circle,--for in every little country village there is always a small clique that constitutes the aristocracy,--had the advantages of a social life otherwise denied them. i think that all who took part in this conversation club would testify to its many good influences. i had three quite intimate young friends in the village who spent much of their spare time with me, and who added much to my happiness: frances hoskins, who was principal of the girls' department in the academy, with whom i discussed politics and religion; mary bascom, a good talker on the topics of the day, and mary crowninshield, who played well on the piano. as i was very fond of music, mary's coming was always hailed with delight. her mother, too, was a dear friend of mine, a woman of rare intelligence, refinement, and conversational talent. she was a schuyler, and belonged to the dutch aristocracy in albany. she died suddenly, after a short illness. i was with her in the last hours and held her hand until the gradually fading spark of life went out. her son is captain a.s. crowninshield of our navy. my nearest neighbors were a very agreeable, intelligent family of sons and daughters. but i always felt that the men of that household were given to domineering. as the mother was very amiable and self-sacrificing, the daughters found it difficult to rebel. one summer, after general house-cleaning, when fresh paint and paper had made even the kitchen look too dainty for the summer invasion of flies, the queens of the household decided to move the sombre cook-stove into a spacious woodhouse, where it maintained its dignity one week, in the absence of the head of the home. the mother and daughters were delighted with the change, and wondered why they had not made it before during the summer months. but their pleasure was shortlived. father and sons rose early the first morning after his return and moved the stove back to its old place. when the wife and daughters came down to get their breakfast (for they did all their own work) they were filled with grief and disappointment. the breakfast was eaten in silence, the women humbled with a sense of their helplessness, and the men gratified with a sense of their power. these men would probably all have said "home is woman's sphere," though they took the liberty of regulating everything in her sphere. [illustration: mrs. stanton and son, .] [illustration: susan b. anthony -feb. , --] chapter x. susan b. anthony. the reports of the conventions held in seneca falls and rochester, n.y., in , attracted the attention of one destined to take a most important part in the new movement--susan b. anthony, who, for her courage and executive ability, was facetiously called by william henry channing, the napoleon of our struggle. at this time she was teaching in the academy at canajoharie, a little village in the beautiful valley of the mohawk. "the woman's declaration of independence" issued from those conventions startled and amused her, and she laughed heartily at the novelty and presumption of the demand. but, on returning home to spend her vacation, she was surprised to find that her sober quaker parents and sister, having attended the rochester meetings, regarded them as very profitable and interesting, and the demands made as proper and reasonable. she was already interested in the anti-slavery and temperance reforms, was an active member of an organization called "the daughters of temperance," and had spoken a few times in their public meetings. but the new gospel of "woman's rights," found a ready response in her mind, and, from that time, her best efforts have been given to the enfranchisement of women. as, from this time, my friend is closely connected with my narrative and will frequently appear therein, a sketch of her seems appropriate. lord bacon has well said: "he that hath wife and children hath given hostages to fortune; for they are impediments to great enterprises either of virtue or mischief. certainly the best works, and of greatest merit for the public, have proceeded from the unmarried or childless men; which, both in affection and means, have married and endowed the public." this bit of baconian philosophy, as alike applicable to women, was the subject, not long since, of a conversation with a remarkably gifted englishwoman. she was absorbed in many public interests and had conscientiously resolved never to marry, lest the cares necessarily involved in matrimony should make inroads upon her time and thought, to the detriment of the public good. "unless," said she, "some women dedicate themselves to the public service, society is robbed of needed guardians for the special wants of the weak and unfortunate. there should be, in the secular world, certain orders corresponding in a measure to the grand sisterhoods of the catholic church, to the members of which, as freely as to men, all offices, civic and ecclesiastical, should be open." that this ideal will be realized may be inferred from the fact that exceptional women have, in all ages, been leaders in great projects of charity and reform, and that now many stand waiting only the sanction of their century, ready for wide altruistic labors. the world has ever had its vestal virgins, its holy women, mothers of ideas rather than of men; its marys, as well as its marthas, who, rather than be busy housewives, preferred to sit at the feet of divine wisdom, and ponder the mysteries of the unknown. all hail to maria mitchell, harriet hosmer, charlotte cushman, alice and phoebe gary, louisa alcott, dr. elizabeth blackwell, frances willard, and clara barton! all honor to the noble women who have devoted earnest lives to the intellectual and moral needs of mankind! susan b. anthony was of sturdy new england stock, and it was at the foot of old greylock, south adams, mass., that she gave forth her first rebellious cry. there the baby steps were taken, and at the village school the first stitches were learned, and the a b c duly mastered. when five winters had passed over susan's head, there came a time of great domestic commotion, and, in her small way, the child seized the idea that permanence is not the rule of life. the family moved to battenville, n.y., where mr. anthony became one of the wealthiest men in washington county. susan can still recall the stately coldness of the great house--how large the bare rooms, with their yellow-painted floors, seemed, in contrast with her own diminutiveness, and the outlook of the schoolroom where for so many years, with her brothers and sisters, she pursued her studies under private tutors. mr. anthony was a stern hicksite quaker. in susan's early life he objected on principle to all forms of frivolous amusement, such as music, dancing, or novel reading, while games and even pictures were regarded as meaningless luxuries. such puritanical convictions might have easily degenerated into mere cant; but underlying all was a broad and firm basis of wholesome respect for individual freedom and a brave adherence to truth. he was a man of good business capacity, and a thorough manager of his wide and lucrative interests. he saw that compensation and not chance ruled in the commercial world, and he believed in the same just, though often severe, law in the sphere of morals. such a man was not apt to walk humbly in the path mapped out by his religious sect. he early offended by choosing a baptist for a wife. for this first offense he was "disowned," and, according to quaker usage, could only be received into fellowship again by declaring himself "sorry" for his crime in full meeting. he was full of devout thankfulness for the good woman by his side, and destined to be thankful to the very end for this companion, so calm, so just, so far-seeing. he rose in meeting, and said he was "sorry" that the rules of the society were such that, in marrying the woman he loved, he had committed offense! he admitted that he was "sorry" for something, so was taken back into the body of the faithful! but his faith had begun to weaken in many minor points of discipline. his coat soon became a cause of offense and called forth another reproof from those buttoned up in conforming garments. the petty forms of quakerism began to lose their weight with him altogether, and he was finally disowned for allowing the village youth to be taught dancing in an upper room of his dwelling. he was applied to for this favor on the ground that young men were under great temptation to drink if the lessons were given in the hotel; and, being a rigid temperance man, he readily consented, though his principles, in regard to dancing, would not allow his own sons and daughters to join in the amusement. but the society could accept no such discrimination in what it deemed sin, nor such compromise with worldly frivolity, and so mr. anthony was seen no more in meeting. but, in later years, in rochester he was an attentive listener to rev. william henry channing. the effect of all this on susan is the question of interest. no doubt she early weighed the comparative moral effects of coats cut with capes and those cut without, of purely quaker conjugal love and that deteriorated with baptist affection. susan had an earnest soul and a conscience tending to morbidity; but a strong, well-balanced body and simple family life soothed her too active moral nature and gave the world, instead of a religious fanatic, a sincere, concentrated worker. every household art was taught her by her mother, and so great was her ability that the duty demanding especial care was always given into her hands. but ever, amid school and household tasks, her day-dream was that, in time, she might be a "high-seat" quaker. each sunday, up to the time of the third disobedience, mr. anthony went to the quaker meeting house, some thirteen miles from home, his wife and children usually accompanying him, though, as non-members, they were rigidly excluded from all business discussions. exclusion was very pleasant in the bright days of summer; but, on one occasion in december, decidedly unpleasant for the seven-year-old susan. when the blinds were drawn, at the close of the religious meeting, and non-members retired, susan sat still. soon she saw a thin old lady with blue goggles come down from the "high seat." approaching her, the quakeress said softly, "thee is not a member--thee must go out." "no; my mother told me not to go out in the cold," was the child's firm response. "yes, but thee must go out--thee is not a member." "but my father is a member." "thee is not a member," and susan felt as if the spirit was moving her and soon found herself in outer coldness. fingers and toes becoming numb, and a bright fire in a cottage over the way beckoning warmly to her, the exile from the chapel resolved to seek secular shelter. but alas! she was confronted by a huge dog, and just escaped with whole skin though capeless jacket. we may be sure there was much talk, that night, at the home fireside, and the good baptist wife declared that no child of hers should attend meeting again till made a member. thereafter, by request of her father, susan became a member of the quaker church. later, definite convictions took root in miss anthony's heart. hers is, indeed, a sincerely religious nature. to be a simple, earnest quaker was the aspiration of her girlhood; but she shrank from adopting the formal language and plain dress. dark hours of conflict were spent over all this, and she interpreted her disinclination as evidence of unworthiness. poor little susan! as we look back with the knowledge of our later life, we translate the heart-burnings as unconscious protests against labeling your free soul, against testing your reasoning conviction of to-morrow by any shibboleth of to-day's belief. we hail this child-intuition as a prophecy of the uncompromising truthfulness of the mature woman. susan anthony was taught simply that she must enter into the holy of holies of her own self, meet herself, and be true to the revelation. she first found words to express her convictions in listening to rev. william henry channing, whose teaching had a lasting spiritual influence upon her. to-day miss anthony is an agnostic. as to the nature of the godhead and of the life beyond her horizon she does not profess to know anything. every energy of her soul is centered upon the needs of this world. to her, work is worship. she has not stood aside, shivering in the cold shadows of uncertainty, but has moved on with the whirling world, has done the good given her to do, and thus, in darkest hours, has been sustained by an unfaltering faith in the final perfection of all things. her belief is not orthodox, but it is religious. in ancient greece she would have been a stoic; in the era of the reformation, a calvinist; in king charles' time, a puritan; but in this nineteenth century, by the very laws of her being, she is a reformer. for the arduous work that awaited miss anthony her years of young womanhood had given preparation. her father, though a man of wealth, made it a matter of conscience to train his girls, as well as his boys, to self-support. accordingly susan chose the profession of teacher, and made her first essay during a summer vacation in a school her father had established for the children of his employés. her success was so marked, not only in imparting knowledge, but also as a disciplinarian, that she followed this career steadily for fifteen years, with the exception of some months given in philadelphia to her own training. of the many school rebellions which she overcame, one rises before me, prominent in its ludicrous aspect. this was in the district school at center falls, in the year . bad reports were current there of male teachers driven out by a certain strapping lad. rumor next told of a quaker maiden coming to teach--a quaker maiden of peace principles. the anticipated day and susan arrived. she looked very meek to the barbarian of fifteen, so he soon began his antics. he was called to the platform, told to lay aside his jacket, and, thereupon, with much astonishment received from the mild quaker maiden, with a birch rod applied calmly but with precision, an exposition of the _argumentum ad hominem_ based on the _a posteriori_ method of reasoning. thus susan departed from her principles, but not from the school. but, before long, conflicts in the outside world disturbed our young teacher. the multiplication table and spelling book no longer enchained her thoughts; larger questions began to fill her mind. about the year susan b. anthony hid her ferule away. temperance, anti-slavery, woman suffrage,--three pregnant questions,--presented themselves, demanding her consideration. higher, ever higher, rose their appeals, until she resolved to dedicate her energy and thought to the burning needs of the hour. owing to early experience of the disabilities of her sex, the first demand for equal rights for women found echo in susan's heart. and, though she was in the beginning startled to hear that women had actually met in convention, and by speeches and resolutions had declared themselves man's peer in political rights, and had urged radical changes in state constitutions and the whole system of american jurisprudence; yet the most casual review convinced her that these claims were but the logical outgrowth of the fundamental theories of our republic. at this stage of her development i met my future friend and coadjutor for the first time. how well i remember the day! george thompson and william lloyd garrison having announced an anti-slavery meeting in seneca falls, miss anthony came to attend it. these gentlemen were my guests. walking home, after the adjournment, we met mrs. bloomer and miss anthony on the corner of the street, waiting to greet us. there she stood, with her good, earnest face and genial smile, dressed in gray delaine, hat and all the same color, relieved with pale blue ribbons, the perfection of neatness and sobriety. i liked her thoroughly, and why i did not at once invite her home with me to dinner, i do not know. she accuses me of that neglect, and has never forgiven me, as she wished to see and hear all she could of our noble friends. i suppose my mind was full of what i had heard, or my coming dinner, or the probable behavior of three mischievous boys who had been busily exploring the premises while i was at the meeting. that i had abundant cause for anxiety in regard to the philosophical experiments these young savages might try the reader will admit, when informed of some of their performances. henry imagined himself possessed of rare powers of invention (an ancestral weakness for generations), and so made a life preserver of corks, and tested its virtues on his brother, who was about eighteen months old. accompanied by a troop of expectant boys, the baby was drawn in his carriage to the banks of the seneca, stripped, the string of corks tied under his arms, and set afloat in the river, the philosopher and his satellites, in a rowboat, watching the experiment. the baby, accustomed to a morning bath in a large tub, splashed about joyfully, keeping his head above water. he was as blue as indigo and as cold as a frog when rescued by his anxious mother. the next day the same victimized infant was seen, by a passing friend, seated on the chimney, on the highest peak of the house. without alarming anyone, the friend hurried up to the housetop and rescued the child. another time the three elder brothers entered into a conspiracy, and locked up the fourth, theodore, in the smoke-house. fortunately, he sounded the alarm loud and clear, and was set free in safety, whereupon the three were imprisoned in a garret with two barred windows. they summarily kicked out the bars, and, sliding down on the lightning rod, betook themselves to the barn for liberty. the youngest boy, gerrit, then only five years old, skinned his hands in the descent. this is a fair sample of the quiet happiness i enjoyed in the first years of motherhood. it was 'mid such exhilarating scenes that miss anthony and i wrote addresses for temperance, anti-slavery, educational, and woman's rights conventions. here we forged resolutions, protests, appeals, petitions, agricultural reports, and constitutional arguments; for we made it a matter of conscience to accept every invitation to speak on every question, in order to maintain woman's right to do so. to this end we took turns on the domestic watchtowers, directing amusements, settling disputes, protecting the weak against the strong, and trying to secure equal rights to all in the home as well as the nation. i can recall many a stern encounter between my friend and the young experimenter. it is pleasant to remember that he never seriously injured any of his victims, and only once came near fatally shooting himself with a pistol. the ball went through his hand; happily a brass button prevented it from penetrating his heart. it is often said, by those who know miss anthony best, that she has been my good angel, always pushing and goading me to work, and that but for her pertinacity i should never have accomplished the little i have. on the other hand it has been said that i forged the thunderbolts and she fired them. perhaps all this is, in a measure, true. with the cares of a large family i might, in time, like too many women, have become wholly absorbed in a narrow family selfishness, had not my friend been continually exploring new fields for missionary labors. her description of a body of men on any platform, complacently deciding questions in which woman had an equal interest, without an equal voice, readily roused me to a determination to throw a firebrand into the midst of their assembly. thus, whenever i saw that stately quaker girl coming across my lawn, i knew that some happy convocation of the sons of adam was to be set by the ears, by one of our appeals or resolutions. the little portmanteau, stuffed with facts, was opened, and there we had what the rev. john smith and hon. richard roe had said: false interpretations of bible texts, the statistics of women robbed of their property, shut out of some college, half paid for their work, the reports of some disgraceful trial; injustice enough to turn any woman's thoughts from stockings and puddings. then we would get out our pens and write articles for papers, or a petition to the legislature; indite letters to the faithful, here and there; stir up the women in ohio, pennsylvania, or massachusetts; call on _the lily, the una, the liberator, the standard_ to remember our wrongs as well as those of the slave. we never met without issuing a pronunciamento on some question. in thought and sympathy we were one, and in the division of labor we exactly complemented each other. in writing we did better work than either could alone. while she is slow and analytical in composition, i am rapid and synthetic. i am the better writer, she the better critic. she supplied the facts and statistics, i the philosophy and rhetoric, and, together, we have made arguments that have stood unshaken through the storms of long years; arguments that no one has answered. our speeches may be considered the united product of our two brains. so entirely one are we that, in all our associations, ever side by side on the same platform, not one feeling of envy or jealousy has ever shadowed our lives. we have indulged freely in criticism of each other when alone, and hotly contended whenever we have differed, but in our friendship of years there has never been the break of one hour. to the world we always seem to agree and uniformly reflect each other. like husband and wife, each has the feeling that we must have no differences in public. thus united, at an early day we began to survey the state and nation, the future field of our labors. we read, with critical eyes, the proceedings of congress and legislatures, of general assemblies and synods, of conferences and conventions, and discovered that, in all alike, the existence of woman was entirely ignored. night after night, by an old-fashioned fireplace, we plotted and planned the coming agitation; how, when, and where each entering wedge could be driven, by which women might be recognized and their rights secured. speedily the state was aflame with disturbances in temperance and teachers' conventions, and the press heralded the news far and near that women delegates had suddenly appeared, demanding admission in men's conventions; that their rights had been hotly contested session after session, by liberal men on the one side, the clergy and learned professors on the other; an overwhelming majority rejecting the women with terrible anathemas and denunciations. such battles were fought over and over in the chief cities of many of the northern states, until the bigotry of men in all the reforms and professions was thoroughly exposed. every right achieved, to enter a college, to study a profession, to labor in some new industry, or to advocate a reform measure was contended for inch by inch. many of those enjoying all these blessings now complacently say, "if these pioneers in reform had only pressed their measures more judiciously, in a more ladylike manner, in more choice language, with a more deferential attitude, the gentlemen could not have behaved so rudely." i give, in these pages, enough of the characteristics of these women, of the sentiments they expressed, of their education, ancestry, and position to show that no power could have met the prejudice and bigotry of that period more successfully than they did who so bravely and persistently fought and conquered them. miss anthony first carried her flag of rebellion into the state conventions of teachers, and there fought, almost single-handed, the battle for equality. at the close of the first decade she had compelled conservatism to yield its ground so far as to permit women to participate in all debates, deliver essays, vote, and hold honored positions as officers. she labored as sincerely in the temperance movement, until convinced that woman's moral power amounted to little as a civil agent, until backed by ballot and coined into state law. she still never loses an occasion to defend co-education and prohibition, and solves every difficulty with the refrain, "woman suffrage," as persistent as the "never more" of poe's raven. chapter xi. susan b. anthony--_continued_. it was in that anti-slavery, through the eloquent lips of such men as george thompson, phillips, and garrison, first proclaimed to miss anthony its pressing financial necessities. to their inspired words she gave answer, four years afterward, by becoming a regularly employed agent in the anti-slavery society. for her espoused cause she has always made boldest demands. in the abolition meetings she used to tell each class why it should support the movement financially; invariably calling upon democrats to give liberally, as the success of the cause would enable them to cease bowing the knee to the slave power. there is scarce a town, however small, from new york to san francisco, that has not heard her ringing voice. who can number the speeches she has made on lyceum platforms, in churches, schoolhouses, halls, barns, and in the open air, with a lumber wagon or a cart for her rostrum? who can describe the varied audiences and social circles she has cheered and interested? now we see her on the far-off prairies, entertaining, with sterling common sense, large gatherings of men, women, and children, seated on rough boards in some unfinished building; again, holding public debates in some town with half-fledged editors and clergymen; next, sailing up the columbia river and, in hot haste to meet some appointment, jolting over the rough mountains of oregon and washington; and then, before legislative assemblies, constitutional conventions, and congressional committees, discussing with senators and judges the letter and spirit of constitutional law. miss anthony's style of speaking is rapid and vehement. in debate she is ready and keen, and she is always equal to an emergency. many times in traveling with her through the west, especially on our first trip to kansas and california, we were suddenly called upon to speak to the women assembled at the stations. filled with consternation, i usually appealed to her to go first; and, without a moment's hesitation, she could always fill five minutes with some appropriate words and inspire me with thoughts and courage to follow. the climax of these occasions was reached in an institution for the deaf and dumb in michigan. i had just said to my friend, "there is one comfort in visiting this place; we shall not be asked to speak," when the superintendent, approaching us, said, "ladies, the pupils are assembled in the chapel, ready to hear you. i promised to invite you to speak to them as soon as i heard you were in town." the possibility of addressing such an audience was as novel to miss anthony as to me; yet she promptly walked down the aisle to the platform, as if to perform an ordinary duty, while i, half distracted with anxiety, wondering by what process i was to be placed in communication with the deaf and dumb, reluctantly followed. but the manner was simple enough, when illustrated. the superintendent, standing by our side, repeated, in the sign language, what was said as fast as uttered; and by laughter, tears, and applause, the pupils showed that they fully appreciated the pathos, humor, and argument. one night, crossing the mississippi at mcgregor, iowa, we were icebound in the middle of the river. the boat was crowded with people, hungry, tired, and cross with the delay. some gentlemen, with whom we had been talking on the cars, started the cry, "speech on woman suffrage!" accordingly, in the middle of the mississippi river, at midnight, we presented our claims to political representation, and debated the question of universal suffrage until we landed. our voyagers were quite thankful that we had shortened the many hours, and we equally so at having made several converts and held a convention on the very bosom of the great "mother of waters." only once in all these wanderings was miss anthony taken by surprise, and that was on being asked to speak to the inmates of an insane asylum. "bless me!" said she, "it is as much as i can do to talk to the sane! what could i say to an audience of lunatics?" her companion, virginia l. minor of st. louis, replied: "this is a golden moment for you, the first opportunity you have ever had, according to the constitutions, to talk to your 'peers,' for is not the right of suffrage denied to 'idiots, criminals, lunatics, and women'?" much curiosity has been expressed as to the love-life of miss anthony; but, if she has enjoyed or suffered any of the usual triumphs or disappointments of her sex, she has not yet vouchsafed this information to her biographers. while few women have had more sincere and lasting friendships, or a more extensive correspondence with a large circle of noble men, yet i doubt if one of them can boast of having received from her any exceptional attention. she has often playfully said, when questioned on this point, that she could not consent that the man she loved, described in the constitution as a white male, native born, american citizen, possessed of the right of self-government, eligible to the office of president of the great republic, should unite his destinies in marriage with a political slave and pariah. "no, no; when i am crowned with all the rights, privileges, and immunities of a citizen, i may give some consideration to this social institution; but until then i must concentrate all my energies on the enfranchisement of my own sex." miss anthony's love-life, like her religion, has manifested itself in steadfast, earnest labors for men in general. she has been a watchful and affectionate daughter, sister, friend, and those who have felt the pulsations of her great heart know how warmly it beats for all. as the custom has long been observed, among married women, of celebrating the anniversaries of their wedding-day, quite properly the initiative has been taken, in late years, of doing honor to the great events in the lives of single women. being united in closest bonds to her profession, dr. harriet k. hunt of boston celebrated her twenty-fifth year of faithful services as a physician by giving to her friends and patrons a large reception, which she called her silver wedding. from a feeling of the sacredness of her life work, the admirers of susan b. anthony have been moved to mark, by reception and convention, her rapid-flowing years and the passing decades of the suffrage movement. to the most brilliant occasion of this kind, the invitation cards were as follows: the ladies of the woman's bureau invite you to a reception on tuesday evening, february th, to celebrate the fiftieth birthday of susan b. anthony, when her friends will have an opportunity to show their appreciation of her long services in behalf of woman's emancipation. no. east d st., new york, february , . elizabeth b. phelps, anna b. darling, charlotte beebe wilbour. in response to the invitation, the parlors of the bureau were crowded with friends to congratulate miss anthony on the happy event, many bringing valuable gifts as an expression of their gratitude. among other presents were a handsome gold watch and checks to the amount of a thousand dollars. the guests were entertained with music, recitations, the reading of many piquant letters of regret from distinguished people, and witty rhymes written for the occasion by the cary sisters. miss anthony received her guests with her usual straightforward simplicity, and in a few earnest words expressed her thanks for the presents and praises showered upon her. the comments of the leading journals, next day, were highly complimentary, and as genial as amusing. all dwelt on the fact that, at last, a woman had arisen brave enough to assert her right to grow old and openly declare that half a century had rolled over her head. of carefully prepared written speeches miss anthony has made few; but these, by the high praise they called forth, prove that she can--in spite of her own declaration to the contrary--put her sterling thoughts on paper concisely and effectively. after her exhaustive plea, in , for a sixteenth amendment before the judiciary committee of the senate, senator edmunds accosted her, as she was leaving the capitol, and said he neglected to tell her, in the committee room, that she had made an argument, no matter what his personal feelings were as to the conclusions reached, which was unanswerable--an argument, unlike the usual platform oratory given at hearings, suited to a committee of men trained to the law. it was in that miss anthony gave her much criticised lecture on "social purity" in boston. as to the result she felt very anxious; for the intelligence of new england composed her audience, and it did not still her heart-beats to see, sitting just in front of the platform, her revered friend, william lloyd garrison. but surely every fear vanished when she felt the grand old abolitionist's hand warmly pressing hers, and heard him say that to listen to no one else would he have had courage to leave his sick room, and that he felt fully repaid by her grand speech, which neither in matter nor manner would he have changed in the smallest particular. but into miss anthony's private correspondence one must look for examples of her most effective writing. verb or substantive is often wanting, but you can always catch the thought, and will ever find it clear and suggestive. it is a strikingly strange dialect, but one that touches, at times, the deepest chords of pathos and humor, and, when stirred by some great event, is highly eloquent. from being the most ridiculed and mercilessly persecuted woman, miss anthony has become the most honored and respected in the nation. witness the praises of press and people, and the enthusiastic ovations she received on her departure for europe in . never were warmer expressions of regret for an absence, nor more sincere prayers for a speedy return, accorded to any american on leaving his native shores. this slow awaking to the character of her services shows the abiding sense of justice in the human soul. having spent the winter of - in washington, trying to press to a vote the bill for a sixteenth amendment before congress, and the autumn in a vigorous campaign through nebraska, where a constitutional amendment to enfranchise women had been submitted to the people, she felt the imperative need of an entire change in the current of her thoughts. accordingly, after one of the most successful conventions ever held at the national capital, and a most flattering ovation in the spacious parlors of the riggs house, and a large reception in philadelphia, she sailed for europe. fortunate in being perfectly well during the entire voyage, our traveler received perpetual enjoyment in watching the ever varying sea and sky. to the captain's merry challenge to find anything so grand as the ocean, she replied, "yes, these mighty forces in nature do indeed fill me with awe; but this vessel, with deep-buried fires, powerful machinery, spacious decks, and tapering masts, walking the waves like a thing of life, and all the work of man, impresses one still more deeply. lo! in man's divine creative power is fulfilled the prophecy, 'ye shall be as gods!'" in all her journeyings through germany, italy, and france, miss anthony was never the mere sight-seer, but always the humanitarian and reformer in traveler's guise. few of the great masterpieces of art gave her real enjoyment. the keen appreciation of the beauties of sculpture, painting, and architecture, which one would have expected to find in so deep a religious nature, was wanting, warped, no doubt, by her early quaker training. that her travels gave her more pain than pleasure was, perhaps, not so much that she had no appreciation of aesthetic beauty, but that she quickly grasped the infinitude of human misery; not because her soul did not feel the heights to which art had risen, but that it vibrated in every fiber to the depths to which mankind had fallen. wandering through a gorgeous palace one day, she exclaimed, "what do you find to admire here? if it were a school of five hundred children being educated into the right of self-government i could admire it, too; but standing for one man's pleasure, i say no!" in the quarters of one of the devotees, at the old monastery of the certosa, at florence, there lies, on a small table, an open book, in which visitors register. on the occasion of miss anthony's visit the pen and ink proved so unpromising that her entire party declined this opportunity to make themselves famous, but she made the rebellious pen inscribe, "perfect equality for women, civil, political, religious. susan b. anthony, u.s.a." friends, who visited the monastery next day, reported that lines had been drawn through this heretical sentiment. during her visit at the home of mr. and mrs. sargent, in berlin, miss anthony quite innocently posted her letters in the official envelopes of our suffrage association, which bore the usual mottoes, "no just government can be formed without the consent of the governed," etc. in a few days an official brought back a large package, saying, "such sentiments are not allowed to pass through the post office." probably nothing saved her from arrest as a socialist, under the tyrannical police regulations, but the fact that she was the guest of the minister plenipotentiary of the united states. my son theodore wrote of miss anthony's visit in paris: "i had never before seen her in the role of tourist. she seemed interested only in historical monuments, and in the men and questions of the hour. the galleries of the louvre had little attraction for her, but she gazed with deep pleasure at napoleon's tomb, notre dame, and the ruins of the tuileries. she was always ready to listen to discussions on the political problems before the french people, the prospects of the republic, the divorce agitation, and the education of women. 'i had rather see jules ferry than all the pictures of the louvre, luxembourg, and salon,' she remarked at table. a day or two later she saw ferry at laboulaye's funeral. the three things which made the deepest impression on miss anthony, during her stay at paris, were probably the interment of laboulaye (the friend of the united states and of the woman movement); the touching anniversary demonstration of the communists, at the cemetery of père la chaise, on the very spot where the last defenders of the commune of were ruthlessly shot and buried in a common grave; and a woman's rights meeting, held in a little hall in the rue de rivoli, at which the brave, far-seeing mlle. hubertine auchet was the leading spirit." while on the continent miss anthony experienced the unfortunate sensation of being deaf and dumb; to speak and not to be understood, to hear and not to comprehend, were to her bitter realities. we can imagine to what desperation she was brought when her quaker prudishness could hail an emphatic oath in english from a french official with the exclamation, "well, it sounds good to hear someone even swear in old anglo-saxon!" after two months of enforced silence, she was buoyant in reaching the british islands once more, where she could enjoy public speaking and general conversation. here she was the recipient of many generous social attentions, and, on may , a large public meeting of representative people, presided over by jacob bright, was called, in our honor, by the national association of great britain. she spoke on the educational and political status of women in america, i of their religious and social position. before closing my friend's biography i shall trace two golden threads in this closely woven life of incident. one of the greatest services rendered by miss anthony to the suffrage cause was in casting a vote in the presidential election of , in order to test the rights of women under the fourteenth amendment. for this offense the brave woman was arrested, on thanksgiving day, the national holiday handed down to us by pilgrim fathers escaped from england's persecutions. she asked for a writ of habeas corpus. the writ being flatly refused, in january, , her counsel gave bonds. the daring defendant finding, when too late, that this not only kept her out of jail, but her case out of the supreme court of the united states, regretfully determined to fight on, and gain the uttermost by a decision in the united states circuit court. her trial was set down for the rochester term in may. quickly she canvassed the whole county, laying before every probable juror the strength of her case. when the time for the trial arrived, the district attorney, fearing the result, if the decision were left to a jury drawn from miss anthony's enlightened county, transferred the trial to the ontario county term, in june, . it was now necessary to instruct the citizens of another county. in this task miss anthony received valuable assistance from matilda joslyn gage; and, to meet all this new expense, financial aid was generously given, unsolicited, by thomas wentworth higginson, gerrit smith, and other sympathizers. but in vain was every effort; in vain the appeal of miss anthony to her jurors; in vain the moral influence of the leading representatives of the bar of central new york filling the courtroom, for judge hunt, without precedent to sustain him, declaring it a case of law and not of fact, refused to give the case to the jury, reserving to himself final decision. was it not an historic scene which was enacted there in that little courthouse in canandaigua? all the inconsistencies were embodied in that judge, punctilious in manner, scrupulous in attire, conscientious in trivialities, and obtuse on great principles, fitly described by charles o'conor--"a very ladylike judge." behold him sitting there, balancing all the niceties of law and equity in his old world scales, and at last saying, "the prisoner will stand up." whereupon the accused arose. "the sentence of the court is that you pay a fine of one hundred dollars and the costs of the prosecution." then the unruly defendant answers: "may it please your honor, i shall never pay a dollar of your unjust penalty," and more to the same effect, all of which she has lived up to. the "ladylike" judge had gained some insight into the determination of the prisoner; so, not wishing to incarcerate her to all eternity, he added gently: "madam, the court will not order you committed until the fine is paid." it was on the th of june that the verdict was given. on that very day, a little less than a century before, the brave militia was driven back at bunker hill--back, back, almost wiped out; yet truth was in their ranks, and justice, too. but how ended that rebellion of weak colonists? the cause of american womanhood, embodied for the moment in the liberty of a single individual, received a rebuff on june , ; but, just as surely as our revolutionary heroes were in the end victorious, so will the inalienable rights of our heroines of the nineteenth century receive final vindication. in his speech of , before the phi beta kappa society at harvard, wendell phillips said--what as a rule is true--that "a reformer, to be conscientious, must be free from bread-winning." i will open miss anthony's accounts and show that this reformer, being, perhaps, the exception which proves the rule, has been consistently and conscientiously in debt. turning over her year-books the pages give a fair record up to . here began the first herculean labor. the woman's loyal league, sadly in need of funds, was not an incorporated association, so its secretary assumed the debts. accounts here became quite lamentable, the deficit reaching five thousand dollars. it must be paid, and, in fact, will be paid. anxious, weary hours were spent in crowding the cooper institute, from week to week, with paying audiences, to listen to such men as phillips, curtis, and douglass, who contributed their services, and lifted the secretary out of debt. at last, after many difficulties, her cash-book of was honorably pigeon-holed. in we can read account of herculean labor the second. twenty thousand tracts are needed to convert the voters of kansas to woman suffrage. traveling expenses to kansas, and the tracts, make the debtor column overreach the creditor some two thousand dollars. there is recognition on these pages of more than one thousand dollars obtained by soliciting advertisements, but no note is made of the weary, burning july days spent in the streets of new york to procure this money, nor of the ready application of the savings made by petty economies from her salary from the hovey committee. it would have been fortunate for my brave friend, if cash-books , , and had never come down from their shelves; for they sing and sing, in notes of debts, till all unite in one vast chorus of far more than ten thousand dollars. these were the days of the _revolution_, the newspaper, not the war, though it was warfare for the debt-ridden manager. several thousand dollars she paid with money earned by lecturing, and with money given her for personal use. one thanksgiving was, in truth, a time for returning thanks; for she received, canceled, from her cousin, anson lapham, her note for four thousand dollars. after the funeral of paulina wright davis, the bereaved widower pressed into miss anthony's hand canceled notes for five hundred dollars, bearing on the back the words, "in memory of my beloved wife." one other note was canceled in recognition of her perfect forgetfulness of self-interest and ready sacrifice to the needs of others. when laboring, in , to fill every engagement, in order to meet her debts, her mother's sudden illness called her home. without one selfish regret, the anxious daughter hastened to rochester. when recovery was certain, and miss anthony was about to return to her fatiguing labors, her mother gave her, at parting, her note for a thousand dollars, on which was written, in trembling lines, "in just consideration of the tender sacrifice made to nurse me in severe illness." at last all the _revolution_ debt was paid, except that due to her generous sister, mary anthony, who used often humorously to assure her she was a fit subject for the bankrupt act. there is something humorously pathetic in the death of the _revolution_--that firstborn of miss anthony. mrs. laura curtis bullard generously assumed the care of the troublesome child, and, in order to make the adoption legal, gave the usual consideration--one dollar. the very night of the transfer miss anthony went to rochester with the dollar in her pocket, and the little change left after purchasing her ticket. she arrived safely with her debts, but nothing more--her pocket had been picked! oh, thief, could you but know what value of faithful work you purloined! from the close of the year miss anthony's accounts showed favorable signs as to the credit column. indeed, at the end of five years there was a solid balance of several thousand dollars earned on lecturing tours. but alas! the accounts grow dim again--in fact the credit column fades away. "the history of woman suffrage" ruthlessly swallowed up every vestige of miss anthony's bank account. but, in , by the will of mrs. eddy, daughter of francis jackson of boston, miss anthony received twenty-four thousand dollars for the woman's suffrage movement, which lifted her out of debt once more. in vain will you search these telltale books for evidence of personal extravagance; for, although miss anthony thinks it true economy to buy the best, her tastes are simple. is there not something very touching in the fact that she never bought a book or picture for her own enjoyment? the meager personal balance-sheets show four lapses from discipline,--lapses that she even now regards as ruthless extravagance,--viz.: the purchase of two inexpensive brooches, a much needed watch, and a pair of cuffs to match a point-lace collar presented by a friend. those interested in miss anthony's personal appearance long ago ceased to trust her with the purchase-money for any ornament; for, however firm her resolution to comply with their wish, the check invariably found its way to the credit column of those little cash-books as "money received for the cause." now, reader, you have been admitted to a private view of miss anthony's financial records, and you can appreciate her devotion to an idea. do you not agree with me that a "bread-winner" can be a conscientious reformer? in finishing this sketch of the most intimate friend i have had for the past forty-five years,--with whom i have spent weeks and months under the same roof,--i can truly say that she is the most upright, courageous, self-sacrificing, magnanimous human being i have ever known. i have seen her beset on every side with the most petty annoyances, ridiculed and misrepresented, slandered and persecuted; i have known women refuse to take her extended hand; women to whom she presented copies of "the history of woman suffrage," return it unnoticed; others to keep it without one word of acknowledgment; others to write most insulting letters in answer to hers of affectionate conciliation. and yet, under all the cross-fires incident to a reform, never has her hope flagged, her self-respect wavered, or a feeling of resentment shadowed her mind. oftentimes, when i have been sorely discouraged, thinking that the prolonged struggle was a waste of force which in other directions might be rich in achievement, with her sublime faith in humanity, she would breathe into my soul renewed inspiration, saying, "pity rather than blame those who persecute us." so closely interwoven have been our lives, our purposes, and experiences that, separated, we have a feeling of incompleteness--united, such strength of self-assertion that no ordinary obstacles, difficulties, or dangers ever appear to us insurmountable. reviewing the life of susan b. anthony, i ever liken her to the doric column in grecian architecture, so simply, so grandly she stands, free from every extraneous ornament, supporting her one vast idea--the enfranchisement of woman. as our estimate of ourselves and our friendship may differ somewhat from that taken from an objective point of view, i will give an extract from what our common friend theodore tilton wrote of us in : "miss susan b. anthony, a well-known, indefatigable, and lifelong advocate of temperance, anti-slavery, and woman's rights, has been, since , mrs. stanton's intimate associate in reformatory labors. these celebrated women are of about equal age, but of the most opposite characteristics, and illustrate the theory of counterparts in affection by entertaining for each other a friendship of extraordinary strength. "mrs. stanton is a fine writer, but a poor executant; miss anthony is a thorough manager, but a poor writer. both have large brains and great hearts; neither has any selfish ambition for celebrity; but each vies with the other in a noble enthusiasm for the cause to which they are devoting their lives. "nevertheless, to describe them critically, i ought to say that, opposites though they be, each does not so much supplement the other's deficiencies as augment the other's eccentricities. thus they often stimulate each other's aggressiveness, and, at the same time, diminish each other's discretion. "but, whatever may be the imprudent utterances of the one or the impolitic methods of the other, the animating motives of both are evermore as white as the light. the good that they do is by design; the harm by accident. these two women, sitting together in their parlors, have, for the last thirty years, been diligent forgers of all manner of projectiles, from fireworks to thunderbolts, and have hurled them with unexpected explosion into the midst of all manner of educational, reformatory, religious, and political assemblies; sometimes to the pleasant surprise and half welcome of the members, more often to the bewilderment and prostration of numerous victims; and, in a few signal instances, to the gnashing of angry men's teeth. i know of no two more pertinacious incendiaries in the whole country. nor will they, themselves deny the charge. in fact this noise-making twain are the two sticks of a drum, keeping up what daniel webster called 'the rub-a-dub of agitation.'" chapter xii. my first speech before a legislature. women had been willing so long to hold a subordinate position, both in private and public affairs, that a gradually growing feeling of rebellion among them quite exasperated the men, and their manifestations of hostility in public meetings were often as ridiculous as humiliating. true, those gentlemen were all quite willing that women should join their societies and churches to do the drudgery; to work up the enthusiasm in fairs and revivals, conventions and flag presentations; to pay a dollar apiece into their treasury for the honor of being members of their various organizations; to beg money for the church; to circulate petitions from door to door; to visit saloons; to pray with or defy rumsellers; to teach school at half price, and sit round the outskirts of a hall, in teachers' state conventions, like so many wallflowers; but they would not allow them to sit on the platform, address the assembly, or vote for men and measures. those who had learned the first lessons of human rights from the lips of henry b. stanton, samuel j. may, and gerrit smith would not accept any such position. when women abandoned the temperance reform, all interest in the question gradually died out in the state, and practically nothing was done in new york for nearly twenty years. gerrit smith made one or two attempts toward an "anti-dramshop" party, but, as women could not vote, they felt no interest in the measure, and failure was the result. i soon convinced miss anthony that the ballot was the key to the situation; that when we had a voice in the laws we should be welcome to any platform. in turning the intense earnestness and religious enthusiasm of this great-souled woman into this channel, i soon felt the power of my convert in goading me forever forward to more untiring work. soon fastened, heart to heart, with hooks of steel in a friendship that years of confidence and affection have steadily strengthened, we have labored faithfully together. from the year conventions were held in various states, and their respective legislatures were continually besieged; new york was thoroughly canvassed by miss anthony and others. appeals, calls for meetings, and petitions were circulated without number. in i prepared my first speech for the new york legislature. that was a great event in my life. i felt so nervous over it, lest it should not be worthy the occasion, that miss anthony suggested that i should slip up to rochester and submit it to the rev. william henry channing, who was preaching there at that time. i did so, and his opinion was so favorable as to the merits of my speech that i felt quite reassured. my father felt equally nervous when he saw, by the albany _evening journal_, that i was to speak at the capitol, and asked me to read my speech to him also. accordingly, i stopped at johnstown on my way to albany, and, late one evening, when he was alone in his office, i entered and took my seat on the opposite side of his table. on no occasion, before or since, was i ever more embarrassed--an audience of one, and that the one of all others whose approbation i most desired, whose disapproval i most feared. i knew he condemned the whole movement, and was deeply grieved at the active part i had taken. hence i was fully aware that i was about to address a wholly unsympathetic audience. however, i began, with a dogged determination to give all the power i could to my manuscript, and not to be discouraged or turned from my purpose by any tender appeals or adverse criticisms. i described the widow in the first hours of her grief, subject to the intrusions of the coarse minions of the law, taking inventory of the household goods, of the old armchair in which her loved one had breathed his last, of the old clock in the corner that told the hour he passed away. i threw all the pathos i could into my voice and language at this point, and, to my intense satisfaction, i saw tears filling my father's eyes. i cannot express the exultation i felt, thinking that now he would see, with my eyes, the injustice women suffered under the laws he understood so well. feeling that i had touched his heart i went on with renewed confidence, and, when i had finished, i saw he was thoroughly magnetized. with beating heart i waited for him to break the silence. he was evidently deeply pondering over all he had heard, and did not speak for a long time. i believed i had opened to him a new world of thought. he had listened long to the complaints of women, but from the lips of his own daughter they had come with a deeper pathos and power. at last, turning abruptly, he said: "surely you have had a happy, comfortable life, with all your wants and needs supplied; and yet that speech fills me with self-reproach; for one might naturally ask, how can a young woman, tenderly brought up, who has had no bitter personal experience, feel so keenly the wrongs of her sex? where did you learn this lesson?" "i learned it here," i replied, "in your office, when a child, listening to the complaints women made to you. they who have sympathy and imagination to make the sorrows of others their own can readily learn all the hard lessons of life from the experience of others." "well, well!" he said, "you have made your points clear and strong; but i think i can find you even more cruel laws than those you have quoted." he suggested some improvements in my speech, looked up other laws, and it was one o'clock in the morning before we kissed each other good-night. how he felt on the question after that i do not know, as he never said anything in favor of or against it. he gladly gave me any help i needed, from time to time, in looking up the laws, and was very desirous that whatever i gave to the public should be carefully prepared. miss anthony printed twenty thousand copies of this address, laid it on the desk of every member of the legislature, both in the assembly and senate, and, in her travels that winter, she circulated it throughout the state. i am happy to say i never felt so anxious about the fate of a speech since. the first woman's convention in albany was held at this time, and we had a kind of protracted meeting for two weeks after. there were several hearings before both branches of the legislature, and a succession of meetings in association hall, in which phillips, channing, ernestine l. rose, antoinette l. brown, and susan b. anthony took part. being at the capital of the state, discussion was aroused at every fireside, while the comments of the press were numerous and varied. every little country paper had something witty or silly to say about the uprising of the "strong-minded." those editors whose heads were about the size of an apple were the most opposed to the uprising of women, illustrating what sidney smith said long ago: "there always was, and there always will be a class of men so small that, if women were educated, there would be nobody left below them." poor human nature loves to have something to look down upon! here is a specimen of the way such editors talked at that time. the _albany register_, in an article on "woman's rights in the legislature," dated march , , says: "while the feminine propagandists of women's rights confined themselves to the exhibition of short petticoats and long-legged boots, and to the holding of conventions and speech-making in concert rooms, the people were disposed to be amused by them, as they are by the wit of the clown in the circus, or the performances of punch and judy on fair days, or the minstrelsy of gentlemen with blackened faces, on banjos, the tambourine, and bones. but the joke is becoming stale. people are getting cloyed with these performances, and are looking for some healthier and more intellectual amusement. the ludicrous is wearing away, and disgust is taking the place of pleasurable sensations, arising from the novelty of this new phase of hypocrisy and infidel fanaticism. "people are beginning to inquire how far public sentiment should sanction or tolerate these unsexed women, who would step out from the true sphere of the mother, the wife, and the daughter, and taking upon themselves the duties and the business of men, stalk into the public gaze, and, by engaging in the politics, the rough controversies and trafficking of the world, upheave existing institutions, and overrun all the social relations of life. "it is a melancholy reflection that, among our american women, who have been educated to better things, there should be found any who are willing to follow the lead of such foreign propagandists as the ringleted, gloved exotic, ernestine l. rose. we can understand how such a man as the rev. mr. may, or the sleek-headed dr. channing, may be deluded by her into becoming one of her disciples. they are not the first instances of infatuation that may overtake weak-minded men, if they are honest in their devotion to her and her doctrines; nor would they be the first examples of a low ambition that seeks notoriety as a substitute for true fame, if they are dishonest. such men there are always, and, honest or dishonest, their true position is that of being tied to the apron strings of some strong-minded woman, and to be exhibited as rare specimens of human wickedness or human weakness and folly. but that one educated american should become her disciple and follow her insane teachings is a marvel." when we see the abuse and ridicule to which the best of men were subjected for standing on our platform in the early days, we need not wonder that so few have been brave enough to advocate our cause in later years, either in conventions or in the halls of legislation. after twelve added years of agitation, following the passage of the property bill, new york conceded other civil rights to married women. pending the discussion of these various bills, susan b. anthony circulated petitions, both for the civil and political rights of women, throughout the state, traveling in stage coaches, open wagons, and sleighs in all seasons, and on foot, from door to door through towns and cities, doing her uttermost to rouse women to some sense of their natural rights as human beings, and to their civil and political rights as citizens of a republic. and while expending her time, strength, and money to secure these blessings for the women of the state, they would gruffly tell her that they had all the rights they wanted, or rudely shut the door in her face; leaving her to stand outside, petition in hand, treating her with as much contempt as if she was asking alms for herself. none but those who did that work in the early days, for the slaves and the women, can ever know the hardships and humiliations that were endured. but it was done because it was only through petitions--a power seemingly so inefficient--that disfranchised classes could be heard in the state and national councils; hence their importance. the frivolous objections some women made to our appeals were as exasperating as they were ridiculous. to reply to them politely, at all times, required a divine patience. on one occasion, after addressing the legislature, some of the ladies, in congratulating me, inquired, in a deprecating tone, "what do you do with your children?" "ladies," i said, "it takes me no longer to speak, than you to listen; what have you done with your children the two hours you have been sitting here? but, to answer your question, i never leave my children to go to saratoga, washington, newport, or europe, or even to come here. they are, at this moment, with a faithful nurse at the delevan house, and, having accomplished my mission, we shall all return home together." when my children reached the magic number of seven, my good angel, susan b. anthony, would sometimes take one or two of them to her own quiet home, just out of rochester, where, on a well-cultivated little farm, one could enjoy uninterrupted rest and the choicest fruits of the season. that was always a safe harbor for my friend, as her family sympathized fully in the reforms to which she gave her life. i have many pleasant memories of my own flying visits to that hospitable quaker home and the broad catholic spirit of daniel and lucy anthony. whatever opposition and ridicule their daughter endured elsewhere, she enjoyed the steadfast sympathy and confidence of her own home circle. her faithful sister mary, a most successful teacher in the public schools of rochester for a quarter of a century, and a good financier, who with her patrimony and salary had laid by a competence, took on her shoulders double duty at home in cheering the declining years of her parents, that susan might do the public work in the reforms in which they were equally interested. now, with life's earnest work nearly accomplished, the sisters are living happily together; illustrating another of the many charming homes of single women, so rapidly multiplying of late. miss anthony, who was a frequent guest at my home, sometimes stood guard when i was absent. the children of our household say that among their earliest recollections is the tableau of "mother and susan," seated by a large table covered with books and papers, always writing and talking about the constitution, interrupted with occasional visits from others of the faithful. hither came elizabeth oakes smith, paulina wright davis, frances dana gage, dr. harriet hunt, rev. antoinette brown, lucy stone, and abby kelly, until all these names were as familiar as household words to the children. martha c. wright of auburn was a frequent visitor at the center of the rebellion, as my sequestered cottage on locust hill was facetiously called. she brought to these councils of war not only her own wisdom, but that of the wife and sister of william h. seward, and sometimes encouraging suggestions from the great statesman himself, from whose writings we often gleaned grand and radical sentiments. lucretia mott, too, being an occasional guest of her sister, martha c. wright, added the dignity of her presence at many of these important consultations. she was uniformly in favor of toning down our fiery pronunciamentos. for miss anthony and myself, the english language had no words strong enough to express the indignation we felt at the prolonged injustice to women. we found, however, that, after expressing ourselves in the most vehement manner and thus in a measure giving our feelings an outlet, we were reconciled to issue the documents in milder terms. if the men of the state could have known the stern rebukes, the denunciations, the wit, the irony, the sarcasm that were garnered there, and then judiciously pigeonholed and milder and more persuasive appeals substituted, they would have been truly thankful that they fared no worse. senator seward frequently left washington to visit in our neighborhood, at the house of judge g.v. sackett, a man of wealth and political influence. one of the senator's standing anecdotes, at dinner, to illustrate the purifying influence of women at the polls, which he always told with great zest for my especial benefit, was in regard to the manner in which his wife's sister exercised the right of suffrage. he said: "mrs. worden having the supervision of a farm near auburn, was obliged to hire two or three men for its cultivation. it was her custom, having examined them as to their capacity to perform the required labor, their knowledge of tools, horses, cattle, and horticulture, to inquire as to their politics. she informed them that, being a widow and having no one to represent her, she must have republicans to do her voting and to represent her political opinions, and it always so happened that the men who offered their services belonged to the republican party. i remarked to her, one day, 'are you sure your men vote as they promise?' 'yes,' she replied, 'i trust nothing to their discretion. i take them in my carriage within sight of the polls and put them in charge of some republican who can be trusted. i see that they have the right tickets and then i feel sure that i am faithfully represented, and i know i am right in so doing. i have neither husband, father, nor son; i am responsible for my own taxes; am amenable to all the laws of the state; must pay the penalty of my own crimes if i commit any; hence i have the right, according to the principles of our government, to representation, and so long as i am not permitted to vote in person, i have a right to do so by proxy; hence i hire men to vote my principles.'" these two sisters, mrs. worden and mrs. seward, daughters of judge miller, an influential man, were women of culture and remarkable natural intelligence, and interested in all progressive ideas. they had rare common sense and independence of character, great simplicity of manner, and were wholly indifferent to the little arts of the toilet. i was often told by fashionable women that they objected to the woman's rights movement because of the publicity of a convention, the immodesty of speaking from a platform, and the trial of seeing one's name in the papers. several ladies made such remarks to me one day, as a bevy of us were sitting together in one of the fashionable hotels in newport. we were holding a convention there at that time, and some of them had been present at one of the sessions. "really," said i, "ladies, you surprise me; our conventions are not as public as the ballroom where i saw you all dancing last night. as to modesty, it may be a question, in many minds, whether it is less modest to speak words of soberness and truth, plainly dressed on a platform, than gorgeously arrayed, with bare arms and shoulders, to waltz in the arms of strange gentlemen. and as to the press, i noticed you all reading, in this morning's papers, with evident satisfaction, the personal compliments and full descriptions of your dresses at the last ball. i presume that any one of you would have felt slighted if your name had not been mentioned in the general description. when my name is mentioned, it is in connection with some great reform movement. thus we all suffer or enjoy the same publicity--we are alike ridiculed. wise men pity and ridicule you, and fools pity and ridicule me--you as the victims of folly and fashion, me as the representative of many of the disagreeable 'isms' of the age, as they choose to style liberal opinions. it is amusing, in analyzing prejudices, to see on what slender foundation they rest." and the ladies around me were so completely cornered that no one attempted an answer. i remember being at a party at secretary seward's home, at auburn, one evening, when mr. burlingame, special ambassador from china to the united states, with a chinese delegation, were among the guests. as soon as the dancing commenced, and young ladies and gentlemen, locked in each other's arms, began to whirl in the giddy waltz, these chinese gentlemen were so shocked that they covered their faces with their fans, occasionally peeping out each side and expressing their surprise to each other. they thought us the most immodest women on the face of the earth. modesty and taste are questions of latitude and education; the more people know,--the more their ideas are expanded by travel, experience, and observation,--the less easily they are shocked. the narrowness and bigotry of women are the result of their circumscribed sphere of thought and action. a few years after judge hurlbert had published his work on "human rights," in which he advocated woman's right to the suffrage, and i had addressed the legislature, we met at a dinner party in albany. senator and mrs. seward were there. the senator was very merry on that occasion and made judge hurlbert and myself the target for all his ridicule on the woman's rights question, in which the most of the company joined, so that we stood quite alone. sure that we had the right on our side and the arguments clearly defined in our minds, and both being cool and self-possessed, and in wit and sarcasm quite equal to any of them, we fought the senator, inch by inch, until he had a very narrow platform to stand on. mrs. seward maintained an unbroken silence, while those ladies who did open their lips were with the opposition, supposing, no doubt, that senator seward represented his wife's opinions. when we ladies withdrew from the table my embarrassment may be easily imagined. separated from the judge, i would now be an hour with a bevy of ladies who evidently felt repugnance to all my most cherished opinions. it was the first time i had met mrs. seward, and i did not then know the broad, liberal tendencies of her mind. what a tide of disagreeable thoughts rushed through me in that short passage from the dining room to the parlor. how gladly i would have glided out the front door! but that was impossible, so i made up my mind to stroll round as if self-absorbed, and look at the books and paintings until the judge appeared; as i took it for granted that, after all i had said at the table on the political, religious, and social equality of women, not a lady would have anything to say to me. imagine, then, my surprise when, the moment the parlor door was closed upon us, mrs. seward, approaching me most affectionately, said: "let me thank you for the brave words you uttered at the dinner table, and for your speech before the legislature, that thrilled my soul as i read it over and over." i was filled with joy and astonishment. recovering myself, i said, "is it possible, mrs. seward, that you agree with me? then why, when i was so hard pressed by foes on every side, did you not come to the defense? i supposed that all you ladies were hostile to every one of my ideas on this question." "no, no!" said she; "i am with you thoroughly, but i am a born coward; there is nothing i dread more than mr. seward's ridicule. i would rather walk up to the cannon's mouth than encounter it." "i, too, am with you," "and i," said two or three others, who had been silent at the table. i never had a more serious, heartfelt conversation than with these ladies. mrs. seward's spontaneity and earnestness had moved them all deeply, and when the senator appeared the first words he said were: "before we part i must confess that i was fairly vanquished by you and the judge, on my own principles" (for we had quoted some of his most radical utterances). "you have the argument, but custom and prejudice are against you, and they are stronger than truth and logic." chapter xiii. reforms and mobs. there was one bright woman among the many in our seneca falls literary circle to whom i would give more than a passing notice--mrs. amelia bloomer, who represented three novel phases of woman's life. she was assistant postmistress; an editor of a reform paper advocating temperance and woman's rights; and an advocate of the new costume which bore her name! in her husband was appointed postmaster, and she became his deputy, was duly sworn in, and, during the administration of taylor and fillmore, served in that capacity. when she assumed her duties the improvement in the appearance and conduct of the office was generally acknowledged. a neat little room adjoining the public office became a kind of ladies' exchange, where those coming from different parts of the town could meet to talk over the news of the day and read the papers and magazines that came to mrs. bloomer as editor of the _lily_. those who enjoyed the brief reign of a woman in the post office can readily testify to the void felt by the ladies of the village when mrs. bloomer's term expired and a man once more reigned in her stead. however, she still edited the _lily_, and her office remained a fashionable center for several years. although she wore the bloomer dress, its originator was elizabeth smith miller, the only daughter of gerrit smith. in the winter of mrs. miller came to visit me in seneca falls, dressed somewhat in the turkish style--short skirt, full trousers of fine black broadcloth; a spanish cloak, of the same material, reaching to the knee; beaver hat and feathers and dark furs; altogether a most becoming costume and exceedingly convenient for walking in all kinds of weather. to see my cousin, with a lamp in one hand and a baby in the other, walk upstairs with ease and grace, while, with flowing robes, i pulled myself up with difficulty, lamp and baby out of the question, readily convinced me that there was sore need of reform in woman's dress, and i promptly donned a similar attire. what incredible freedom i enjoyed for two years! like a captive set free from his ball and chain, i was always ready for a brisk walk through sleet and snow and rain, to climb a mountain, jump over a fence, work in the garden, and, in fact, for any necessary locomotion. bloomer is now a recognized word in the english language. mrs. bloomer, having the _lily_ in which to discuss the merits of the new dress, the press generally took up the question, and much valuable information was elicited on the physiological results of woman's fashionable attire; the crippling effect of tight waists and long skirts, the heavy weight on the hips, and high heels, all combined to throw the spine out of plumb and lay the foundation for all manner of nervous diseases. but, while all agreed that some change was absolutely necessary for the health of women, the press stoutly ridiculed those who were ready to make the experiment. a few sensible women, in different parts of the country, adopted the costume, and farmers' wives especially proved its convenience. it was also worn by skaters, gymnasts, tourists, and in sanitariums. but, while the few realized its advantages, the many laughed it to scorn, and heaped such ridicule on its wearers that they soon found that the physical freedom enjoyed did not compensate for the persistent persecution and petty annoyances suffered at every turn. to be rudely gazed at in public and private, to be the conscious subjects of criticism, and to be followed by crowds of boys in the streets, were all, to the very last degree, exasperating. a favorite doggerel that our tormentors chanted, when we appeared in public places, ran thus: "heigh! ho! in rain and snow, the bloomer now is all the go. twenty tailors take the stitches, twenty women wear the breeches. heigh! ho! in rain or snow, the bloomer now is all the go." the singers were generally invisible behind some fence or attic window. those who wore the dress can recall countless amusing and annoying experiences. the patience of most of us was exhausted in about two years; but our leader, mrs. miller, bravely adhered to the costume for nearly seven years, under the most trying circumstances. while her father was in congress, she wore it at many fashionable dinners and receptions in washington. she was bravely sustained, however, by her husband, colonel miller, who never flinched in escorting his wife and her coadjutors, however inartistic their costumes might be. to tall, gaunt women with large feet and to those who were short and stout, it was equally trying. mrs. miller was also encouraged by the intense feeling of her father on the question of woman's dress. to him the whole revolution in woman's position turned on her dress. the long skirt was the symbol of her degradation. the names of those who wore the bloomer costume, besides those already mentioned, were paulina wright davis, lucy stone, susan b. anthony, sarah and angelina grimke, mrs. william burleigh, celia burleigh, charlotte beebe wilbour, helen jarvis, lydia jenkins, amelia willard, dr. harriet n. austin, and many patients in sanitariums, whose names i cannot recall. looking back to this experiment, i am not surprised at the hostility of men in general to the dress, as it made it very uncomfortable for them to go anywhere with those who wore it. people would stare, many men and women make rude remarks, boys followed in crowds, with jeers and laughter, so that gentlemen in attendance would feel it their duty to show fight, unless they had sufficient self-control to pursue the even tenor of their way, as the ladies themselves did, without taking the slightest notice of the commotion they created. but colonel miller went through the ordeal with coolness and dogged determination, to the vexation of his acquaintances, who thought one of his duties as a husband was to prescribe his wife's costume. though we did not realize the success we hoped for by making the dress popular, yet the effort was not lost. we were well aware that the dress was not artistic, and though we made many changes, our own good taste was never satisfied until we threw aside the loose trousers and adopted buttoned leggins. after giving up the experiment, we found that the costume in which diana the huntress is represented, and that worn on the stage by ellen tree in the play of "ion," would have been more artistic and convenient. but we, who had made the experiment, were too happy to move about unnoticed and unknown, to risk, again, the happiness of ourselves and our friends by any further experiments. i have never wondered since that the chinese women allow their daughters' feet to be encased in iron shoes, nor that the hindoo widows walk calmly to the funeral pyre; for great are the penalties of those who dare resist the behests of the tyrant custom. nevertheless the agitation has been kept up, in a mild form, both in england and america. lady harberton, in , was at the head of an organized movement in london to introduce the bifurcated skirt; mrs. jenness miller, in this country, is making an entire revolution in every garment that belongs to a woman's toilet; and common-sense shoemakers have vouchsafed to us, at last, a low, square heel to our boots and a broad sole in which the five toes can spread themselves at pleasure. evidently a new day of physical freedom is at last dawning for the most cribbed and crippled of eve's unhappy daughters. it was while living in seneca falls, and at one of the most despairing periods of my young life, that one of the best gifts of the gods came to me in the form of a good, faithful housekeeper. she was indeed a treasure, a friend and comforter, a second mother to my children, and understood all life's duties and gladly bore its burdens. she could fill any department in domestic life, and for thirty years was the joy of our household. but for this noble, self-sacrificing woman, much of my public work would have been quite impossible. if by word or deed i have made the journey of life easier for any struggling soul, i must in justice share the meed of praise accorded me with my little quaker friend amelia willard. there are two classes of housekeepers--one that will get what they want, if in the range of human possibilities, and then accept the inevitable inconveniences with cheerfulness and heroism; the other, from a kind of chronic inertia and a fear of taking responsibility, accept everything as they find it, though with gentle, continuous complainings. the latter are called amiable women. such a woman was our congressman's wife in , and, as i was the reservoir of all her sorrows, great and small, i became very weary of her amiable non-resistance. among other domestic trials, she had a kitchen stove that smoked and leaked, which could neither bake nor broil,--a worthless thing,--and too small for any purpose. consequently half their viands were spoiled in the cooking, and the cooks left in disgust, one after another. in telling me, one day, of these kitchen misadventures, she actually shed tears, which so roused my sympathies that, with surprise, i exclaimed: "why do you not buy a new stove?" to my unassisted common sense that seemed the most practical thing to do. "why," she replied, "i have never purchased a darning needle, to put the case strongly, without consulting mr. s., and he does not think a new stove necessary." "what, pray," said i, "does he know about stoves, sitting in his easy-chair in washington? if he had a dull old knife with broken blades, he would soon get a new one with which to sharpen his pens and pencils, and, if he attempted to cook a meal--granting he knew how--on your old stove, he would set it out of doors the next hour. now my advice to you is to buy a new one this very day!" "bless me!" she said, "that would make him furious; he would blow me sky-high." "well," i replied, "suppose he did go into a regular tantrum and use all the most startling expletives in the vocabulary for fifteen minutes! what is that compared with a good stove days in the year? just put all he could say on one side, and all the advantages you would enjoy on the other, and you must readily see that his wrath would kick the beam." as my logic was irresistible, she said, "well, if you will go with me, and help select a stove, i think i will take the responsibility." accordingly we went to the hardware store and selected the most approved, largest-sized stove, with all the best cooking utensils, best russian pipe, etc. "now," said she, "i am in equal need of a good stove in my sitting room, and i would like the pipes of both stoves to lead into dumb stoves above, and thus heat two or three rooms upstairs for my children to play in, as they have no place except the sitting room, where they must be always with me; but i suppose it is not best to do too much at one time." "on the contrary," i replied, "as your husband is wealthy, you had better get all you really need now. mr. s. will probably be no more surprised with two stoves than with one, and, as you expect a hot scene over the matter, the more you get out of it the better." so the stoves and pipes were ordered, holes cut through the ceiling, and all were in working order next day. the cook was delighted over her splendid stove and shining tins, copper-bottomed tea kettle and boiler, and warm sleeping room upstairs; the children were delighted with their large playrooms, and madam jubilant with her added comforts and that newborn feeling of independence one has in assuming responsibility. she was expecting mr. s. home in the holidays, and occasionally weakened at the prospect of what she feared might be a disagreeable encounter. at such times she came to consult with me, as to what she would say and do when the crisis arrived. having studied the _genus homo_ alike on the divine heights of exaltation and in the valleys of humiliation, i was able to make some valuable suggestions. "now," said i, "when your husband explodes, as you think he will, neither say nor do anything; sit and gaze out of the window with that far-away, sad look women know so well how to affect. if you can summon tears at pleasure, a few would not be amiss; a gentle shower, not enough to make the nose and eyes red or to detract from your beauty. men cannot resist beauty and tears. never mar their effect with anything bordering on sobs and hysteria; such violent manifestations being neither refined nor artistic. a scene in which one person does the talking must be limited in time. no ordinary man can keep at white heat fifteen minutes; if his victim says nothing, he will soon exhaust himself. remember every time you speak in the way of defense, you give him a new text on which to branch out again. if silence is ever golden, it is when a husband is in a tantrum." in due time mr. s. arrived, laden with christmas presents, and charlotte came over to tell me that she had passed through the ordeal. i will give the scene in her own words as nearly as possible. "my husband came yesterday, just before dinner, and, as i expected him, i had all things in order. he seemed very happy to see me and the children, and we had a gay time looking at our presents and chatting about washington and all that had happened since we parted. it made me sad, in the midst of our happiness, to think how soon the current of his feelings would change, and i wished in my soul that i had not bought the stoves. but, at last, dinner was announced, and i knew that the hour had come. he ran upstairs to give a few touches to his toilet, when lo! the shining stoves and pipes caught his eyes. he explored the upper apartments and came down the back stairs, glanced at the kitchen stove, then into the dining room, and stood confounded, for a moment, before the nickel-plated 'morning glory.' then he exclaimed, 'heavens and earth! charlotte, what have you been doing?' i remembered what you told me and said nothing, but looked steadily out of the window. i summoned no tears, however, for i felt more like laughing than crying; he looked so ridiculous flying round spasmodically, like popcorn on a hot griddle, and talking as if making a stump speech on the corruptions of the democrats. the first time he paused to take breath i said, in my softest tones: 'william, dinner is waiting; i fear the soup will be cold.' fortunately he was hungry, and that great central organ of life and happiness asserted its claims on his attention, and he took his seat at the table. i broke what might have been an awkward silence, chatting with the older children about their school lessons. fortunately they were late, and did not know what had happened, so they talked to their father and gradually restored his equilibrium. we had a very good dinner, and i have not heard a word about the stoves since. i suppose we shall have another scene when the bill is presented." a few years later, horace greeley came to seneca falls to lecture on temperance. as he stayed with us, we invited mr. s., among others, to dinner. the chief topic at the table was the idiosyncrasies of women. mr. greeley told many amusing things about his wife, of her erratic movements and sudden decisions to do and dare what seemed most impracticable. perhaps, on rising some morning, she would say: "i think i'll go to europe by the next steamer, horace. will you get tickets to-day for me, the nurse, and children?" "well," said mr. s., "she must be something like our hostess. every time her husband goes away she cuts a door or window. they have only ten doors to lock every night, now." "yes," i said, "and your own wife, too, mrs. s., has the credit of some high-handed measures when you are in washington." then i told the whole story, amid peals of laughter, just as related above. the dinner table scene fairly convulsed the congressman. the thought that he had made such a fool of himself in the eyes of charlotte that she could not even summon a tear in her defense, particularly pleased him. when sufficiently recovered to speak, he said: "well, i never could understand how it was that charlotte suddenly emerged from her thraldom and manifested such rare executive ability. now i see to whom i am indebted for the most comfortable part of my married life. i am a thousand times obliged to you; you did just right and so did she, and she has been a happier woman ever since. she now gets what she needs, and frets no more, to me, about ten thousand little things. how can a man know what implements are necessary for the work he never does? of all agencies for upsetting the equanimity of family life, none can surpass an old, broken-down kitchen stove!" in the winter of , just after the election of lincoln, the abolitionists decided to hold a series of conventions in the chief cities of the north. all their available speakers were pledged for active service. the republican party, having absorbed the political abolitionists within its ranks by its declared hostility to the extension of slavery, had come into power with overwhelming majorities. hence the garrisonian abolitionists, opposed to all compromises, felt that this was the opportune moment to rouse the people to the necessity of holding that party to its declared principles, and pushing it, if possible, a step or two forward. i was invited to accompany miss anthony and beriah green to a few points in central new york. but we soon found, by the concerted action of republicans all over the country, that anti-slavery conventions would not be tolerated. thus republicans and democrats made common cause against the abolitionists. the john brown raid, the year before, had intimidated northern politicians as much as southern slaveholders, and the general feeling was that the discussion of the question at the north should be altogether suppressed. from buffalo to albany our experience was the same, varied only by the fertile resources of the actors and their surroundings. thirty years of education had somewhat changed the character of northern mobs. they no longer dragged men through the streets with ropes around their necks, nor broke up women's prayer meetings; they no longer threw eggs and brickbats at the apostles of reform, nor dipped them in barrels of tar and feathers, they simply crowded the halls, and, with laughing, groaning, clapping, and cheering, effectually interrupted the proceedings. such was our experience during the two days we attempted to hold a convention in st. james' hall, buffalo. as we paid for the hall, the mob enjoyed themselves, at our expense, in more ways than one. every session, at the appointed time, we took our places on the platform, making, at various intervals of silence, renewed efforts to speak. not succeeding, we sat and conversed with each other and the many friends who crowded the platform and anterooms. thus, among ourselves, we had a pleasant reception and a discussion of many phases of the question that brought us together. the mob not only vouchsafed to us the privilege of talking to our friends without interruption, but delegations of their own came behind the scenes, from time to time, to discuss with us the right of free speech and the constitutionality of slavery. these buffalo rowdies were headed by ex-justice hinson, aided by younger members of the fillmore and seymour families, and the chief of police and fifty subordinates, who were admitted to the hall free, for the express purpose of protecting our right of free speech, but who, in defiance of the mayor's orders, made not the slightest effort in our defense. at lockport there was a feeble attempt in the same direction. at albion neither hall, church, nor schoolhouse could be obtained, so we held small meetings in the dining room of the hotel. at rochester, corinthian hall was packed long before the hour advertised. this was a delicately appreciative, jocose mob. at this point aaron powell joined us. as he had just risen from a bed of sickness, looking pale and emaciated, he slowly mounted the platform. the mob at once took in his look of exhaustion, and, as he seated himself, they gave an audible simultaneous sigh, as if to say, what a relief it is to be seated! so completely did the tender manifestation reflect mr. powell's apparent condition that the whole audience burst into a roar of laughter. here, too, all attempts to speak were futile. at port byron a generous sprinkling of cayenne pepper on the stove soon cut short all constitutional arguments and paeans to liberty. and so it was all the way to albany. the whole state was aflame with the mob spirit, and from boston and various points in other states the same news reached us. as the legislature was in session, and we were advertised in albany, a radical member sarcastically moved "that as mrs. stanton and miss anthony were about to move on albany, the militia be ordered out for the protection of the city." happily, albany could then boast of a democratic mayor, a man of courage and conscience, who said the right of free speech should never be trodden under foot where he had the right to prevent it. and grandly did that one determined man maintain order in his jurisdiction. through all the sessions of the convention mayor thatcher sat on the platform, his police stationed in different parts of the hall and outside the building, to disperse the crowd as fast as it collected. if a man or boy hissed or made the slightest interruption, he was immediately ejected. and not only did the mayor preserve order in the meetings, but, with a company of armed police, he escorted us, every time, to and from the delevan house. the last night gerrit smith addressed the mob from the steps of the hotel, after which they gave him three cheers and dispersed in good order. when proposing for the mayor a vote of thanks, at the close of the convention, mr. smith expressed his fears that it had been a severe ordeal for him to listen to these prolonged anti-slavery discussions. he smiled, and said: "i have really been deeply interested and instructed. i rather congratulate myself that a convention of this character has, at last, come in the line of my business; otherwise i should have probably remained in ignorance of many important facts and opinions i now understand and appreciate." while all this was going on publicly, an equally trying experience was progressing, day by day, behind the scenes. miss anthony had been instrumental in helping a much abused mother, with her child, to escape from a husband who had immured her in an insane asylum. the wife belonged to one of the first families of new york, her brother being a united states senator, and the husband, also, a man of position; a large circle of friends and acquaintances was interested in the result. though she was incarcerated in an insane asylum for eighteen months, yet members of her own family again and again testified that she was not insane. miss anthony, knowing that she was not, and believing fully that the unhappy mother was the victim of a conspiracy, would not reveal her hiding place. knowing the confidence miss anthony felt in the wisdom of mr. garrison and mr. phillips, they were implored to use their influence with her to give up the fugitives. letters and telegrams, persuasions, arguments, and warnings from mr. garrison, mr. phillips, and the senator on the one side, and from lydia mott, mrs. elizabeth f. ellet, and abby hopper gibbons, on the other, poured in upon her, day after day; but miss anthony remained immovable, although she knew that she was defying and violating the law and might be arrested any moment on the platform. we had known so many aggravated cases of this kind that, in daily counsel, we resolved that this woman should not be recaptured if it were possible to prevent it. to us it looked as imperative a duty to shield a sane mother, who had been torn from a family of little children and doomed to the companionship of lunatics, and to aid her in fleeing to a place of safety, as to help a fugitive from slavery to canada. in both cases an unjust law was violated; in both cases the supposed owners of the victims were defied; hence, in point of law and morals, the act was the same in both cases. the result proved the wisdom of miss anthony's decision, as all with whom mrs. p. came in contact for years afterward, expressed the opinion that she was, and always had been, perfectly sane. could the dark secrets of insane asylums be brought to light we should be shocked to know the great number of rebellious wives, sisters, and daughters who are thus sacrificed to false customs and barbarous laws made by men for women. chapter xiv. views on marriage and divorce. the widespread discussion we are having, just now, on the subject of marriage and divorce, reminds me of an equally exciting one in . a very liberal bill, introduced into the indiana legislature by robert dale owen, and which passed by a large majority, roused much public thought on the question, and made that state free soil for unhappy wives and husbands. a similar bill was introduced into the legislature of new york by mr. ramsey, which was defeated by four votes, owing, mainly, to the intense opposition of horace greeley. he and mr. owen had a prolonged discussion, in the new york _tribune_, in which mr. owen got decidedly the better of the argument. there had been several aggravated cases of cruelty to wives among the dutch aristocracy, so that strong influences in favor of the bill had been brought to bear on the legislature, but the _tribune_ thundered every morning in its editorial column its loudest peals, which reverberated through the state. so bitter was the opposition to divorce, for any cause, that but few dared to take part in the discussion. i was the only woman, for many years, who wrote and spoke on the question. articles on divorce, by a number of women, recently published in the _north american review_, are a sign of progress, showing that women dare speak out now more freely on the relations that most deeply concern them. my feelings had been stirred to their depths very early in life by the sufferings of a dear friend of mine, at whose wedding i was one of the bridesmaids. in listening to the facts in her case, my mind was fully made up as to the wisdom of a liberal divorce law. we read milton's essays on divorce, together, and were thoroughly convinced as to the right and duty not only of separation, but of absolute divorce. while the new york bill was pending, i was requested, by lewis benedict, one of the committee who had the bill in charge, to address the legislature. i gladly accepted, feeling that here was an opportunity not only to support my friend in the step she had taken, but to make the path clear for other unhappy wives who might desire to follow her example. i had no thought of the persecution i was drawing down on myself for thus attacking so venerable an institution. i was always courageous in saying what i saw to be true, for the simple reason that i never dreamed of opposition. what seemed to me to be right i thought must be equally plain to all other rational beings. hence i had no dread of denunciation. i was only surprised when i encountered it, and no number of experiences have, as yet, taught me to fear public opinion. what i said on divorce thirty-seven years ago seems quite in line with what many say now. the trouble was not in what i said, but that i said it too soon, and before the people were ready to hear it. it may be, however, that i helped them to get ready; who knows? as we were holding a woman suffrage convention in albany, at the time appointed for the hearing, ernestine l. rose and lucretia mott briefly added their views on the question. although mrs. mott had urged mrs. rose and myself to be as moderate as possible in our demands, she quite unconsciously made the most radical utterance of all, in saying that marriage was a question beyond the realm of legislation, that must be left to the parties themselves. we rallied lucretia on her radicalism, and some of the journals criticised us severely; but the following letter shows that she had no thought of receding from her position: "roadside, near philadelphia, " th mo., th, ' . "my dear lydia mott: "i have wished, ever since parting with thee and our other dear friends in albany, to send thee a line, and have only waited in the hope of contributing a little 'substantial aid' toward your neat and valuable 'depository.' the twenty dollars inclosed is from our female anti-slavery society. "i see the annual meeting, in new york, is not to be held this spring. sister martha is here, and was expecting to attend both anniversaries. but we now think the woman's rights meeting had better not be attempted, and she has written elizabeth c. stanton to this effect. "i was well satisfied with being at the albany meeting. i have since met with the following, from a speech of lord brougham's, which pleased me, as being as radical as mine in your stately hall of representatives: "'before women can have any justice by the laws of england, there must be a total reconstruction of the whole marriage system; for any attempt to amend it would prove useless. the great charter, in establishing the supremacy of law over prerogative, provides only for justice between man and man; for woman nothing is left but common law, accumulations and modifications of original gothic and roman heathenism, which no amount of filtration through ecclesiastical courts could change into christian laws. they are declared unworthy a christian people by great jurists; still they remain unchanged.' "so elizabeth stanton will see that i have authority for going to the root of the evil. "thine, "lucretia mott." those of us who met in albany talked the matter over in regard to a free discussion of the divorce question at the coming convention in new york. it was the opinion of those present that, as the laws on marriage and divorce were very unequal for man and woman, this was a legitimate subject for discussion on our platform; accordingly i presented a series of resolutions, at the annual convention, in new york city, to which i spoke for over an hour. i was followed by antoinette l, brown, who also presented a series of resolutions in opposition to mine. she was, in turn, answered by ernestine l. rose. wendell phillips then arose, and, in an impressive manner pronounced the whole discussion irrelevant to our platform, and moved that neither the speeches nor resolutions go on the records of the convention. as i greatly admired wendell phillips, and appreciated his good opinion, i was surprised and humiliated to find myself under the ban of his disapprobation. my face was scarlet, and i trembled with mingled feelings of doubt and fear--doubt as to the wisdom of my position and fear lest the convention should repudiate the whole discussion. my emotion was so apparent that rev. samuel longfellow, a brother of the poet, who sat beside me, whispered in my ear, "nevertheless you are right, and the convention will sustain you." mr. phillips said that as marriage concerned man and woman alike, and the laws bore equally on them, women had no special ground for complaint, although, in my speech, i had quoted many laws to show the reverse. mr. garrison and rev. antoinette l. brown were alike opposed to mr. phillips' motion, and claimed that marriage and divorce were legitimate subjects for discussion on our platform. miss anthony closed the debate. she said: "i hope mr. phillips will withdraw his motion that these resolutions shall not appear on the records of the convention. i am very sure that it would be contrary to all parliamentary usage to say that, when the speeches which enforced and advocated the resolutions are reported and published in the proceedings, the resolutions shall not be placed there. and as to the point that this question does not belong to this platform--from that i totally dissent. marriage has ever been a one-sided matter, resting most unequally upon the sexes. by it man gains all; woman loses all; tyrant law and lust reign supreme with him; meek submission and ready obedience alone befit her. woman has never been consulted; her wish has never been taken into consideration as regards the terms of the marriage compact. by law, public sentiment, and religion,--from the time of moses down to the present day,--woman has never been thought of other than as a piece of property, to be disposed of at the will and pleasure of man. and at this very hour, by our statute books, by our (so-called) enlightened christian civilization, she has no voice whatever in saying what shall be the basis of the relation. she must accept marriage as man proffers it, or not at all. "and then, again, on mr. phillips' own ground, the discussion is perfectly in order, since nearly all the wrongs of which we complain grow out of the inequality of the marriage laws, that rob the wife of the right to herself and her children; that make her the slave of the man she marries. i hope, therefore, the resolutions will be allowed to go out to the public; that there may be a fair report of the ideas which have actually been presented here; that they may not be left to the mercy of the secular press, i trust the convention will not vote to forbid the publication of those resolutions with the proceedings." rev. william hoisington (the blind preacher) followed miss anthony, and said: "publish all that you have done here, and let the public know it." the question was then put, on the motion of mr. phillips, and it was lost. as mr. greeley, in commenting on the convention, took the same ground with mr. phillips, that the laws on marriage and divorce were equal for man and woman, i answered them in the following letter to the new york _tribune_. "_to the editor of the new york tribune_: "sir: at our recent national woman's rights convention many were surprised to hear wendell phillips object to the question of marriage and divorce as irrelevant to our platform. he said: 'we had no right to discuss here any laws or customs but those where inequality existed for the sexes; that the laws on marriage and divorce rested equally on man and woman; that he suffers, as much as she possibly could, the wrongs and abuses of an ill-assorted marriage.' "now it must strike every careful thinker that an immense difference rests in the fact that man has made the laws cunningly and selfishly for his own purpose. from coke down to kent, who can cite one clause of the marriage contract where woman has the advantage? when man suffers from false legislation he has his remedy in his own hands. shall woman be denied the right of protest against laws in which she had no voice; laws which outrage the holiest affections of her nature; laws which transcend the limits of human legislation, in a convention called for the express purpose of considering her wrongs? he might as well object to a protest against the injustice of hanging a woman, because capital punishment bears equally on man and woman. "the contract of marriage is by no means equal. the law permits the girl to marry at twelve years of age, while it requires several years more of experience on the part of the boy. in entering this compact, the man gives up nothing that he before possessed, he is a man still; while the legal existence of the woman is suspended during marriage, and, henceforth, she is known but in and through the husband. she is nameless, purseless, childless--though a woman, an heiress, and a mother. "blackstone says: 'the husband and wife are one, and that one is the husband.' chancellor kent, in his 'commentaries' says: 'the legal effects of marriage are generally deducible from the principle of the common law, by which the husband and wife are regarded as one person, and her legal existence and authority lost or suspended during the continuance of the matrimonial union.' "the wife is regarded by all legal authorities as a _feme covert_, placed wholly _sub potestate viri_. her moral responsibility, even, is merged in her husband. the law takes it for granted that the wife lives in fear of her husband; that his command is her highest law; hence a wife is not punishable for the theft committed in the presence of her husband. an unmarried woman can make contracts, sue and be sued, enjoy the rights of property, to her inheritance--to her wages--to her person--to her children; but, in marriage, she is robbed by law of all and every natural and civil right. kent further says: 'the disability of the wife to contract, so as to bind herself, arises not from want of discretion, but because she has entered into an indissoluble connection by which she is placed under the power and protection of her husband.' she is possessed of certain rights until she is married; then all are suspended, to revive, again, the moment the breath goes out of the husband's body. (see 'cowen's treatise,' vol. , p. .) "if the contract be equal, whence come the terms 'marital power,' 'marital rights,' 'obedience and restraint,' 'dominion and control,' 'power and protection,' etc., etc.? many cases are stated, showing the exercise of a most questionable power over the wife, sustained by the courts. (see 'bishop on divorce,' p. .) "the laws on divorce are quite as unequal as those on marriage; yea, far more so. the advantages seem to be all on one side and the penalties on the other. in case of divorce, if the husband be not the guilty party, the wife goes out of the partnership penniless. (kent, vol. , p. ; 'bishop on divorce,' p. .) "in new york, and some other states, the wife of the guilty husband can now sue for a divorce in her own name, and the costs come out of the husband's estate; but, in the majority of the states, she is still compelled to sue in the name of another, as she has no means for paying costs, even though she may have brought her thousands into the partnership. 'the allowance to the innocent wife of _ad interim_ alimony and money to sustain the suit, is not regarded as a strict right in her, but of sound discretion in the court.' ('bishop on divorce,' p. .) "'many jurists,' says kent, 'are of opinion that the adultery of the husband ought not to be noticed or made subject to the same animadversions as that of the wife, because it is not evidence of such entire depravity nor equally injurious in its effects upon the morals, good order, and happiness of the domestic life. montesquieu, pothier, and dr. taylor all insist that the cases of husband and wife ought to be distinguished, and that the violation of the marriage vow, on the part of the wife, is the most mischievous, and the prosecution ought to be confined to the offense on her part. ("esprit des lois," tom. , ; "traité du contrat de mariage," no. ; "elements of civil law," p. ).' "say you, 'these are but the opinions of men'? on what else, i ask, are the hundreds of women depending, who, this hour, demand in our courts a release from burdensome contracts? are not these delicate matters left wholly to the discretion of courts? are not young women from the first families dragged into our courts,--into assemblies of men exclusively,--the judges all men, the jurors all men? no true woman there to shield them, by her presence, from gross and impertinent questionings, to pity their misfortunes, or to protest against their wrongs? "the administration of justice depends far more on the opinions of eminent jurists than on law alone, for law is powerless when at variance with public sentiment. "do not the above citations clearly prove inequality? are not the very letter and spirit of the marriage contract based on the idea of the supremacy of man as the keeper of woman's virtue--her sole protector and support? out of marriage, woman asks nothing, at this hour, but the elective franchise. it is only in marriage that she must demand her right to person, children, property, wages, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. how can we discuss all the laws and conditions of marriage, without perceiving its essential essence, end, and aim? now, whether the institution of marriage be human or divine, whether regarded as indissoluble by ecclesiastical courts or dissoluble by civil courts, woman, finding herself equally degraded in each and every phase of it, always the victim of the institution, it is her right and her duty to sift the relation and the compact through and through, until she finds out the true cause of her false position. how can we go before the legislatures of our respective states and demand new laws, or no laws, on divorce, until we have some idea of what the true relation is? "we decide the whole question of slavery by settling the sacred rights of the individual. we assert that man cannot hold property in man, and reject the whole code of laws that conflicts with the self-evident truth of the assertion. "again, i ask, is it possible to discuss all the laws of a relation, and not touch the relation itself? "yours respectfully, "elizabeth cady stanton." the discussion on the question of marriage and divorce occupied one entire session of the convention, and called down on us severe criticisms from the metropolitan and state press. so alarming were the comments on what had been said that i began to feel that i had inadvertently taken out the underpinning from the social system. enemies were unsparing in their denunciations, and friends ridiculed the whole proceeding. i was constantly called on for a definition of marriage and asked to describe home life as it would be when men changed their wives every christmas. letters and newspapers poured in upon me, asking all manner of absurd questions, until i often wept with vexation. so many things, that i had neither thought nor said, were attributed to me that, at times, i really doubted my own identity. however, in the progress of events the excitement died away, the earth seemed to turn on its axis as usual, women were given in marriage, children were born, fires burned as brightly as ever at the domestic altars, and family life, to all appearances, was as stable as usual. public attention was again roused to this subject by the mcfarland-richardson trial, in which the former shot the latter, being jealous of his attentions to his wife. mcfarland was a brutal, improvident husband, who had completely alienated his wife's affections, while mr. richardson, who had long been a cherished acquaintance of the family, befriended the wife in the darkest days of her misery. she was a very refined, attractive woman, and a large circle of warm friends stood by her through the fierce ordeal of her husband's trial. though mcfarland did not deny that he killed richardson, yet he was acquitted on the plea of insanity, and was, at the same time, made the legal guardian of his child, a boy, then, twelve years of age, and walked out of the court with him, hand in hand. what a travesty on justice and common sense that, while a man is declared too insane to be held responsible for taking the life of another, he might still be capable of directing the life and education of a child! and what an insult to that intelligent mother, who had devoted twelve years of her life to his care, while his worthless father had not provided for them the necessaries of life! she married mr. richardson on his deathbed. the ceremony was performed by henry ward beecher and rev. o.b. frothingham, while such men as horace greeley and joshua leavitt witnessed the solemn service. though no shadow had ever dimmed mrs. richardson's fair fame, yet she was rudely treated in the court and robbed of her child, though by far the most fitting parent to be intrusted with his care. as the indignation among women was general and at white heat with regard to her treatment, miss anthony suggested to me, one day, that it would be a golden opportunity to give women a lesson on their helplessness under the law--wholly in the power of man as to their domestic relations, as well as to their civil and political rights. accordingly we decided to hold some meetings, for women alone, to protest against the decision of this trial, the general conduct of the case, the tone of the press, and the laws that made it possible to rob a mother of her child. many ladies readily enlisted in the movement. i was invited to make the speech on the occasion, and miss anthony arranged for two great meetings, one in apollo hall, new york city, and one in the academy of music, in brooklyn. the result was all that we could desire. miss anthony, with wonderful executive ability, made all the arrangements, taking on her own shoulders the whole financial responsibility. my latest thought on this question i gave in _the arena_ of april, , from which i quote the following: "there is a demand just now for an amendment to the united states constitution that shall make the laws of marriage and divorce the same in all the states of the union. as the suggestion comes uniformly from those who consider the present divorce laws too liberal, we may infer that the proposed national law is to place the whole question on a narrower basis, rendering null and void the laws that have been passed in a broader spirit, according to the needs and experiences, in certain sections, of the sovereign people. and here let us bear in mind that the widest possible law would not make divorce obligatory on anyone, while a restricted law, on the contrary, would compel many, marrying, perhaps, under more liberal laws, to remain in uncongenial relations. "as we are still in the experimental stage on this question, we are not qualified to make a perfect law that would work satisfactorily over so vast an area as our boundaries now embrace. i see no evidence in what has been published on this question, of late, by statesmen, ecclesiastics, lawyers, and judges, that any of them have thought sufficiently on the subject to prepare a well-digested code, or a comprehensive amendment to the national constitution. some view it as a civil contract, though not governed by the laws of other contracts; some view it as a religious ordinance--a sacrament; some think it a relation to be regulated by the state, others by the church, and still others think it should be left wholly to the individual. with this wide divergence of opinion among our leading minds, it is quite evident that we are not prepared for a national law. "moreover, as woman is the most important factor in the marriage relation, her enfranchisement is the primal step in deciding the basis of family life. before public opinion on this question crystallizes into an amendment to the national constitution, the wife and mother must have a voice in the governing power and must be heard, on this great problem, in the halls of legislation. "there are many advantages in leaving all these questions, as now, to the states. local self-government more readily permits of experiments on mooted questions, which are the outcome of the needs and convictions of the community. the smaller the area over which legislation extends, the more pliable are the laws. by leaving the states free to experiment in their local affairs, we can judge of the working of different laws under varying circumstances, and thus learn their comparative merits. the progress education has achieved in america is due to the fact that we have left our system of public instruction in the hands of local authorities. how different would be the solution of the great educational question of manual labor in the schools, if the matter had to be settled at washington! "the whole nation might find itself pledged to a scheme that a few years would prove wholly impracticable. not only is the town meeting, as emerson says, 'the cradle of american liberties,' but it is the nursery of yankee experiment and wisdom. england, with its clumsy national code of education, making one inflexible standard of scholarship for the bright children of the manufacturing districts and the dull brains of the agricultural counties, should teach us a lesson as to the wisdom of keeping apart state and national government. "before we can decide the just grounds for divorce, we must get a clear idea of what constitutes marriage. in a true relation the chief object is the loving companionship of man and woman, their capacity for mutual help and happiness and for the development of all that is noblest in each other. the second object is the building up a home and family, a place of rest, peace, security, in which child-life can bud and blossom like flowers in the sunshine. "the first step toward making the ideal the real, is to educate our sons and daughters into the most exalted ideas of the sacredness of married life and the responsibilities of parenthood. i would have them give, at least, as much thought to the creation of an immortal being as the artist gives to his landscape or statue. watch him in his hours of solitude, communing with great nature for days and weeks in all her changing moods, and when at last his dream of beauty is realized and takes a clearly defined form, behold how patiently he works through long months and years on sky and lake, on tree and flower; and when complete, it represents to him more love and life, more hope and ambition, than the living child at his side, to whose conception and antenatal development not one soulful thought was ever given. to this impressible period of human life, few parents give any thought; yet here we must begin to cultivate virtues that can alone redeem the world. "the contradictory views in which woman is represented are as pitiful as varied. while the magnificat to the virgin is chanted in all our cathedrals round the globe on each returning sabbath day, and her motherhood extolled by her worshipers, maternity for the rest of womankind is referred to as a weakness, a disability, a curse, an evidence of woman's divinely ordained subjection. yet surely the real woman should have some points of resemblance in character and position with the ideal one, whom poets, novelists, and artists portray. "it is folly to talk of the sacredness of marriage and maternity, while the wife is practically regarded as an inferior, a subject, a slave. having decided that companionship and conscientious parenthood are the only true grounds for marriage, if the relation brings out the worst characteristics of each party, or if the home atmosphere is unwholesome for children, is not the very _raison d'être_ of the union wanting, and the marriage practically annulled? it cannot be called a holy relation,--no, not a desirable one,--when love and mutual respect are wanting. and let us bear in mind one other important fact: the lack of sympathy and content in the parents indicates radical physical unsuitability, which results in badly organized offspring. if, then, the real object of marriage is defeated, it is for the interest of the state, as well as the individual concerned, to see that all such pernicious unions be legally dissolved. inasmuch, then, as incompatibility of temper defeats the two great objects of marriage, it should be the primal cause for divorce. "the true standpoint from which to view this question is individual sovereignty, individual happiness. it is often said that the interests of society are paramount, and first to be considered. this was the roman idea, the pagan idea, that the individual was made for the state. the central idea of barbarism has ever been the family, the tribe, the nation--never the individual. but the great doctrine of christianity is the right of individual conscience and judgment. the reason it took such a hold on the hearts of the people was because it taught that the individual was primary; the state, the church, society, the family, secondary. however, a comprehensive view of any question of human interest, shows that the highest good and happiness of the individual and society lie in the same direction. "the question of divorce, like marriage, should be settled, as to its most sacred relations, by the parties themselves; neither the state nor the church having any right to intermeddle therein. as to property and children, it must be viewed and regulated as a civil contract. then the union should be dissolved with at least as much deliberation and publicity as it was formed. there might be some ceremony and witnesses to add to the dignity and solemnity of the occasion. like the quaker marriage, which the parties conduct themselves, so, in this case, without any statement of their disagreements, the parties might simply declare that, after living together for several years, they found themselves unsuited to each other, and incapable of making a happy home. "if divorce were made respectable, and recognized by society as a duty, as well as a right, reasonable men and women could arrange all the preliminaries, often, even, the division of property and guardianship of children, quite as satisfactorily as it could be done in the courts. where the mother is capable of training the children, a sensible father would leave them to her care rather than place them in the hands of a stranger. "but, where divorce is not respectable, men who have no paternal feeling will often hold the child, not so much for its good or his own affection, as to punish the wife for disgracing him. the love of children is not strong in most men, and they feel but little responsibility in regard to them. see how readily they turn off young sons to shift for themselves, and, unless the law compelled them to support their illegitimate children, they would never give them a second thought. but on the mother-soul rest forever the care and responsibility of human life. her love for the child born out of wedlock is often intensified by the infinite pity she feels through its disgrace. even among the lower animals we find the female ever brooding over the young and helpless. "limiting the causes of divorce to physical defects or delinquencies; making the proceedings public; prying into all the personal affairs of unhappy men and women; regarding the step as quasi criminal; punishing the guilty party in the suit; all this will not strengthen frail human nature, will not insure happy homes, will not banish scandals and purge society of prostitution. "no, no; the enemy of marriage, of the state, of society is not liberal divorce laws, but the unhealthy atmosphere that exists in the home itself. a legislative act cannot make a unit of a divided family." chapter xv. women as patriots. on april , , the president of the united states called out seventy-five thousand militia, and summoned congress to meet july , when four hundred thousand men were called for, and four hundred millions of dollars were voted to suppress the rebellion. these startling events roused the entire people, and turned the current of their thoughts in new directions. while the nation's life hung in the balance, and the dread artillery of war drowned, alike, the voices of commerce, politics, religion, and reform, all hearts were filled with anxious forebodings, all hands were busy in solemn preparations for the awful tragedies to come. at this eventful hour the patriotism of woman shone forth as fervently and spontaneously as did that of man; and her self-sacrifice and devotion were displayed in as many varied fields of action. while he buckled on his knapsack and marched forth to conquer the enemy, she planned the campaigns which brought the nation victory; fought in the ranks, when she could do so without detection; inspired the sanitary commission; gathered needed supplies for the grand army; provided nurses for the hospitals; comforted the sick; smoothed the pillows of the dying; inscribed the last messages of lave to those far away; and marked the resting places where the brave men fell. the labor women accomplished, the hardships they endured, the time and strength they sacrificed in the war that summoned three million men to arms, can never be fully appreciated. indeed, we may safely say that there is scarcely a loyal woman in the north who did not do something in aid of the cause; who did not contribute time, labor, and money to the comfort of our soldiers and the success of our arms. the story of the war will never be fully written if the achievements of women are left untold. they do not figure in the official reports; they are not gazetted for gallant deeds; the names of thousands are unknown beyond the neighborhood where they lived, or the hospitals where they loved to labor; yet there is no feature in our war more creditable to us as a nation, none from its positive newness so well worthy of record. while the mass of women never philosophize on the principles that underlie national existence, there were those in our late war who understood the political significance of the struggle; the "irrepressible conflict" between freedom and slavery, between national and state rights. they saw that to provide lint, bandages, and supplies for the army, while the war was not conducted on a wise policy, was to labor in vain; and while many organizations, active, vigilant, and self-sacrificing, were multiplied to look after the material wants of the army, these few formed themselves into a national loyal league, to teach sound principles of government and to impress on the nation's conscience that freedom for the slaves was the only way to victory. accustomed, as most women had been to works of charity and to the relief of outward suffering, it was difficult to rouse their enthusiasm for an idea, to persuade them to labor for a principle. they clamored for practical work, something for their hands to do; for fairs and sewing societies to raise money for soldier's families, for tableaux, readings, theatricals--anything but conventions to discuss principles and to circulate petitions for emancipation. they could not see that the best service they could render the army was to suppress the rebellion, and that the most effective way to accomplish that was to transform the slaves into soldiers. this woman's loyal league voiced the solemn lessons of the war: liberty to all; national protection for every citizen under our flag; universal suffrage, and universal amnesty. after consultation with horace greeley, william lloyd garrison, governor andrews, and robert dale owen, miss anthony and i decided to call a meeting of women in cooper institute and form a woman's loyal league, to advocate the immediate emancipation and enfranchisement of the southern slaves, as the most speedy way of ending the war, so we issued, in tract form, and extensively circulated the following call: "in this crisis of our country's destiny, it is the duty of every citizen to consider the peculiar blessings of a republican form of government, and decide what sacrifices of wealth and life are demanded for its defense and preservation. the policy of the war, our whole future life, depend on a clearly defined idea of the end proposed and the immense advantages to be secured to ourselves and all mankind by its accomplishment. no mere party or sectional cry, no technicalities of constitutional or military law, no mottoes of craft or policy are big enough to touch the great heart of a nation in the midst of revolution. a grand idea--such as freedom or justice--is needful to kindle and sustain the fires of a high enthusiasm. "at this hour, the best word and work of every man and woman are imperatively demanded. to man, by common consent, are assigned the forum, camp, and field. what is woman's legitimate work and how she may best accomplish it, is worthy our earnest counsel one with another. we have heard many complaints of the lack of enthusiasm, among northern women; but when a mother lays her son on the altar of her country, she asks an object equal to the sacrifice. in nursing the sick and wounded, knitting socks, scraping lint, and making jellies the bravest and best may weary if the thoughts mount not in faith to something beyond and above it all. work is worship only when a noble purpose fills the soul. woman is equally interested and responsible with man in the final settlement of this problem of self-government; therefore let none stand idle spectators now. when every hour is big with destiny, and each delay but complicates our difficulties, it is high time for the daughters of the revolution, in solemn council, to unseal the last will and testaments of the fathers, lay hold of their birthright of freedom, and keep it a sacred trust for all coming generations. "to this end we ask the loyal women of the nation to meet in the church of the puritans (dr. cheever's), new york, on thursday, the th of may next. "let the women of every state be largely represented in person or by letter. "on behalf of the woman's central committee, "elizabeth cady stanton, "susan b. anthony." among other resolutions adopted at the meeting were the following: "_resolved_, there never can be a true peace in this republic until the civil and political rights of all citizens of african descent and all women are practically established. "_resolved_, that the women of the revolution were not wanting in heroism and self-sacrifice, and we, their daughters, are ready, in this war, to pledge our time, our means, our talents, and our lives, if need be, to secure the final and complete consecration of america to freedom." it was agreed that the practical work to be done to secure freedom for the slaves was to circulate petitions through all the northern states. for months these petitions were circulated diligently everywhere, as the signatures show--some signed on fence posts, plows, the anvil, the shoemaker's bench--by women of fashion and those in the industries, alike in the parlor and the kitchen; by statesmen, professors in colleges, editors, bishops; by sailors, and soldiers, and the hard-handed children of toil, building railroads and bridges, and digging canals, and in mines in the bowels of the earth. petitions, signed by three hundred thousand persons, can now be seen in the national archives in the capitol at washington. three of my sons spent weeks in our office in cooper institute, rolling up the petitions from each state separately, and inscribing on the outside the number of names of men and women contained therein. we sent appeals to the president the house of representatives, and the senate, from time to time, urging emancipation and the passage of the proposed thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth amendments to the national constitution. during these eventful months we received many letters from senator sumner, saying, "send on the petitions as fast as received; they give me opportunities for speech." robert dale owen, chairman of the freedman's commission, was most enthusiastic in the work of the loyal league, and came to our rooms frequently to suggest new modes of agitation and to give us an inkling of what was going on behind the scenes in washington. those who had been specially engaged in the woman suffrage movement suspended their conventions during the war, and gave their time and thought wholly to the vital issues of the hour. seeing the political significance of the war, they urged the emancipation of the slaves as the sure, quick way of cutting the gordian knot of the rebellion. to this end they organized a national league, and rolled up a mammoth petition, urging congress so to amend the constitution as to prohibit the existence of slavery in the united states. from their headquarters in cooper institute, new york city, they sent out the appeals to the president, congress, and the people at large; tracts and forms of petition, franked by members of congress, were scattered like snowflakes from maine to texas. meetings were held every week, in which the policy of the government was freely discussed, and approved or condemned. that this league did a timely educational work is manifested by the letters received from generals, statesmen, editors, and from women in most of the northern states, fully indorsing its action and principles. the clearness to thinking women of the cause of the war; the true policy in waging it; their steadfastness in maintaining the principles of freedom, are worthy of consideration. with this league abolitionists and republicans heartily co-operated. a course of lectures was delivered for its benefit in cooper institute, by such men as horace greeley, george william curtis, william d. kelly, wendell phillips, e.p. whipple, frederick douglass, theodore d. weld, rev. dr. tyng, and dr. bellows. many letters are on its files from charles sumner, approving its measures, and expressing great satisfaction at the large number of emancipation petitions being rolled into congress. the republican press, too, was highly complimentary. the new york tribune said: "the women of the loyal league have shown great practical wisdom in restricting their efforts to one subject, the most important which any society can aim at in this hour, and great courage in undertaking to do what never has been done in the world before, to obtain one million of names to a petition." the leading journals vied with each other in praising the patience and prudence, the executive ability, the loyalty, and the patriotism of the women of the league, and yet these were the same women who, when demanding civil and political rights, privileges, and immunities for themselves, had been uniformly denounced as "unwise," "imprudent," "fanatical," and "impracticable." during the six years they held their own claims in abeyance to those of the slaves of the south, and labored to inspire the people with enthusiasm for the great measures of the republican party, they were highly honored as "wise, loyal, and clear-sighted." but when the slaves were emancipated, and these women asked that they should be recognized in the reconstruction as citizens of the republic, equal before the law, all these transcendent virtues vanished like dew before the morning sun. and thus it ever is: so long as woman labors to second man's endeavors and exalt his sex above her own, her virtues pass unquestioned; but when she dares to demand rights and privileges for herself, her motives, manners, dress, personal appearance, and character are subjects for ridicule and detraction. liberty, victorious over slavery on the battlefield, had now more powerful enemies to encounter at washington. the slaves set free, the master conquered, the south desolate; the two races standing face to face, sharing alike the sad results of war, turned with appealing looks to the general government, as if to say, "how stand we now?" "what next?" questions our statesmen, beset with dangers, with fears for the nation's life, of party divisions, of personal defeat, were wholly unprepared to answer. the reconstruction of the south involved the reconsideration of the fundamental principles of our government and the natural rights of man. the nation's heart was thrilled with prolonged debates in congress and state legislatures, in the pulpits and public journals, and at every fireside on these vital questions, which took final shape in the three historic amendments to the constitution. the first point, his emancipation, settled, the political status of the negro was next in order; and to this end various propositions were submitted to congress. but to demand his enfranchisement on the broad principle of natural rights was hedged about with difficulties, as the logical result of such action must be the enfranchisement of all ostracized classes; not only the white women of the entire country, but the slave women of the south. though our senators and representatives had an honest aversion to any proscriptive legislation against loyal women, in view of their varied and self-sacrificing work during the war, yet the only way they could open the constitutional door just wide enough to let the black man pass in was to introduce the word "male" into the national constitution. after the generous devotion of such women as anna carroll and anna dickinson in sustaining the policy of the republicans, both in peace and war, they felt it would come with a bad grace from that party to place new barriers in woman's path to freedom. but how could the amendment be written without the word "male," was the question. robert dale owen being at washington, and behind the scenes at the time, sent copies of the various bills to the officers of the loyal league, in new york, and related to us some of the amusing discussions. one of the committee proposed "persons" instead of "males." "that will never do," said another, "it would enfranchise wenches." "suffrage for black men will be all the strain the republican party can stand," said another. charles sumner said, years afterward, that he wrote over nineteen pages of foolscap to get rid of the word "male" and yet keep "negro suffrage" as a party measure intact; but it could not be done. miss anthony and i were the first to see the full significance of the word "male" in the fourteenth amendment, and we at once sounded the alarm, and sent out petitions for a constitutional amendment to "prohibit the states from disfranchising any of their citizens on the ground of sex." miss anthony, who had spent the year in kansas, started for new york the moment she saw the proposition before congress to put the word "male" into the national constitution, and made haste to rouse the women in the east to the fact that the time had come to begin vigorous work again for woman's enfranchisement. leaving rochester, october , she called on martha wright at auburn; phebe jones and lydia mott at albany; mmes. rose, gibbons, davis, at new york city; lucy stone and antoinette brown blackwell in new jersey; stephen and abby foster at worcester; mmes. severance, dall, nowell, dr. harriet k. hunt, dr. m.e. zackesewska, and messrs. phillips and garrison in boston, urging them to join in sending protests to washington against the pending legislation. mr. phillips at once consented to devote five hundred dollars from the "jackson fund" to commence the work. miss anthony and i spent all our christmas holidays in writing letters and addressing appeals and petitions to every part of the country, and, before the close of the session of - , petitions with ten thousand signatures were poured into congress. one of my letters was as follows: "_to the editor of the standard_: "sir: mr. broomall of pennsylvania, mr. schenck of ohio, mr. jenckes of rhode island, and mr. stevens of pennsylvania, have each a resolution before congress to amend the constitution. "article first, section second, reads thus: 'representatives and direct taxes shall be apportioned among the several states which may be included within this union, according to their respective numbers.' "mr. broomall proposes to amend by saying, 'male electors'; mr. schenck,'male citizens'; mr. jenckes, 'male citizens'; mr. stevens, 'male voters,' as, in process of time, women may be made 'legal voters' in the several states, and would then meet that requirement of the constitution. but those urged by the other gentlemen, neither time, effort, nor state constitutions could enable us to meet, unless, by a liberal interpretation of the amendment, a coat of mail to be worn at the polls might be judged all-sufficient. mr. jenckes and mr. schenck, in their bills, have the grace not to say a word about taxes, remembering, perhaps, that 'taxation without representation is tyranny.' but mr. broomall, though unwilling that we should share in the honors of government, would fain secure us a place in its burdens; for, while he apportions representatives to "male electors" only, he admits "all the inhabitants" into the rights, privileges, and immunities of taxation. magnanimous m.c.! "i would call the attention of the women of the nation to the fact that, under the federal constitution, as it now exists, there is not one word that limits the right of suffrage to any privileged class. this attempt to turn the wheels of civilization backward, on the part of republicans claiming to be the liberal party, should rouse every woman in the nation to a prompt exercise of the only right she has in the government, the right of petition. to this end a committee in new york have sent out thousands of petitions, which should be circulated in every district and sent to its representative at washington as soon as possible. "elizabeth cady stanton. "new york, january , ." chapter xvi. pioneer life in kansas--our newspaper, "the revolution." in the proposition to extend the suffrage to women and to colored men was submitted to the people of the state of kansas, and, among other eastern speakers, i was invited to make a campaign through the state. as the fall elections were pending, there was great excitement everywhere. suffrage for colored men was a republican measure, which the press and politicians of that party advocated with enthusiasm. as woman suffrage was not a party question, we hoped that all parties would favor the measure; that we might, at last, have one green spot on earth where women could enjoy full liberty as citizens of the united states. accordingly, in july, miss anthony and i started, with high hopes of a most successful trip, and, after an uneventful journey of one thousand five hundred miles, we reached the sacred soil where john brown and his sons had helped to fight the battles that made kansas a free state. lucy stone, mr. blackwell, and olympia brown had preceded us and opened the campaign with large meetings in all the chief cities. miss anthony and i did the same. then it was decided that, as we were to go to the very borders of the state, where there were no railroads, we must take carriages, and economize our forces by taking different routes. i was escorted by ex-governor charles robinson. we had a low, easy carriage, drawn by two mules, in which we stored about a bushel of tracts, two valises, a pail for watering the mules, a basket of apples, crackers, and other such refreshments as we could purchase on the way. some things were suspended underneath the carriage, some packed on behind, and some under the seat and at our feet. it required great skill to compress the necessary baggage into the allotted space. as we went to the very verge of civilization, wherever two dozen voters could be assembled, we had a taste of pioneer life. we spoke in log cabins, in depots, unfinished schoolhouses, churches, hotels, barns, and in the open air. i spoke in a large mill one night. a solitary tallow candle shone over my head like a halo of glory; a few lanterns around the outskirts of the audience made the darkness perceptible; but all i could see of my audience was the whites of their eyes in the dim distance. people came from twenty miles around to these meetings, held either in the morning, afternoon, or evening, as was most convenient. as the regular state election was to take place in the coming november, the interest increased from week to week, until the excitement of the people knew no bounds. there were speakers for and against every proposition before the people. this involved frequent debates on all the general principles of government, and thus a great educational work was accomplished, which is one of the advantages of our frequent elections. the friends of woman suffrage were doomed to disappointment. those in the east, on whom they relied for influence through the liberal newspapers, were silent, and we learned, afterward, that they used what influence they had to keep the abolitionists and republicans of the state silent, as they feared the discussion of the woman question would jeopardize the enfranchisement of the black man. however, we worked untiringly and hopefully, not seeing through the game of the politicians until nearly the end of the canvass, when we saw that our only chance was in getting the democratic vote. accordingly, george francis train, then a most effective and popular speaker, was invited into the state to see what could be done to win the democracy. he soon turned the tide, strengthened the weak-kneed republicans and abolitionists, and secured a large democratic vote. for three months we labored diligently, day after day, enduring all manner of discomforts in traveling, eating, and sleeping. as there were no roads or guide-posts, we often lost our way. in going through cañons and fording streams it was often so dark that the governor was obliged to walk ahead to find the way, taking off his coat so that i could see his white shirt and slowly drive after him. though seemingly calm and cool, i had a great dread of these night adventures, as i was in constant fear of being upset on some hill and rolled into the water. the governor often complimented me on my courage, when i was fully aware of being tempest-tossed with anxiety. i am naturally very timid, but, being silent under strong emotions of either pleasure or pain, i am credited with being courageous in the hour of danger. for days, sometimes, we could find nothing at a public table that we could eat. then passing through a little settlement we could buy dried herring, crackers, gum arabic, and slippery elm; the latter, we were told, was very nutritious. we frequently sat down to a table with bacon floating in grease, coffee without milk, sweetened with sorghum, and bread or hot biscuit, green with soda, while vegetables and fruit were seldom seen. our nights were miserable, owing to the general opinion among pioneers that a certain species of insect must necessarily perambulate the beds in a young civilization. one night, after traveling over prairies all day, eating nothing but what our larder provided, we saw a light in a cottage in the distance which seemed to beckon to us. arriving, we asked the usual question,--if we could get a night's lodging,--to which the response was inevitably a hearty, hospitable "yes." one survey of the premises showed me what to look for in the way of midnight companionship, so i said to the governor, "i will resign in your favor the comforts provided for me to-night, and sleep in the carriage, as you do so often." i persisted against all the earnest persuasions of our host, and in due time i was ensconced for the night, and all about the house was silent. i had just fallen into a gentle slumber, when a chorus of pronounced grunts and a spasmodic shaking of the carriage revealed to me the fact that i was surrounded by those long-nosed black pigs, so celebrated for their courage and pertinacity. they had discovered that the iron steps of the carriage made most satisfactory scratching posts, and each one was struggling for his turn. this scratching suggested fleas. alas! thought i, before morning i shall be devoured. i was mortally tired and sleepy, but i reached for the whip and plied it lazily from side to side; but i soon found nothing but a constant and most vigorous application of the whip could hold them at bay one moment. i had heard that this type of pig was very combative when thwarted in its desires, and they seemed in such sore need of relief that i thought there was danger of their jumping into the carriage and attacking me. this thought was more terrifying than that of the fleas, so i decided to go to sleep and let them alone to scratch at their pleasure. i had a sad night of it, and never tried the carriage again, though i had many equally miserable experiences within four walls. after one of these border meetings we stopped another night with a family of two bachelor brothers and two spinster sisters. the home consisted of one large room, not yet lathed and plastered. the furniture included a cooking stove, two double beds in remote corners, a table, a bureau, a washstand, and six wooden chairs. as it was late, there was no fire in the stove and no suggestion of supper, so the governor and i ate apples and chewed slippery elm before retiring to dream of comfortable beds and well-spread tables in the near future. the brothers resigned their bed to me just as it was. i had noticed that there was no ceremonious changing of bed linen under such circumstances, so i had learned to nip all fastidious notions of individual cleanliness in the bud, and to accept the inevitable. when the time arrived for retiring, the governor and the brothers went out to make astronomical observations or smoke, as the case might be, while the sisters and i made our evening toilet, and disposed ourselves in the allotted corners. that done, the stalwart sons of adam made their beds with skins and blankets on the floor. when all was still and darkness reigned, i reviewed the situation with a heavy heart, seeing that i was bound to remain a prisoner in the corner all night, come what might. i had just congratulated myself on my power of adaptability to circumstances, when i suddenly started with an emphatic "what is that?" a voice from the corner asked, "is your bed comfortable?" "oh, yes," i replied, "but i thought i felt a mouse run over my head." "well," said the voice from the corner, "i should not wonder. i have heard such squeaking from that corner during the past week that i told sister there must be a mouse nest in that bed." a confession she probably would not have made unless half asleep. this announcement was greeted with suppressed laughter from the floor. but it was no laughing matter to me. alas! what a prospect--to have mice running over one all night. but there was no escape. the sisters did not offer to make any explorations, and, in my fatigue costume, i could not light a candle and make any on my own account. the house did not afford an armchair in which i could sit up. i could not lie on the floor, and the other bed was occupied. fortunately, i was very tired and soon fell asleep. what the mice did the remainder of the night i never knew, so deep were my slumbers. but, as my features were intact, and my facial expression as benign as usual next morning, i inferred that their gambols had been most innocently and decorously conducted. these are samples of many similar experiences which we encountered during the three months of those eventful travels. heretofore my idea had been that pioneer life was a period of romantic freedom. when the long, white-covered wagons, bound for the far west, passed by, i thought of the novelty of a six-months' journey through the bright spring and summer days in a house on wheels, meals under shady trees and beside babbling brooks, sleeping in the open air, and finding a home, at last, where land was cheap, the soil rich and deep, and where the grains, vegetables, fruit, and flowers grew bountifully with but little toil. but a few months of pioneer life permanently darkened my rosy ideal of the white-covered wagon, the charming picnics by the way, and the paradise at last. i found many of these adventurers in unfinished houses and racked with malaria; in one case i saw a family of eight, all ill with chills and fever. the house was half a mile from the spring water on which they depended and from which those best able, from day to day, carried the needed elixir to others suffering with the usual thirst. their narrations of all the trials of the long journey were indeed heartrending. in one case a family of twelve left their comfortable farm in illinois, much against the earnest protests of the mother; she having ten children, the youngest a baby then in her arms. all their earthly possessions were stored in three wagons, and the farm which the mother owned was sold before they commenced their long and perilous journey. there was no reason for going except that the husband had the western fever. they were doing well in illinois, on a large farm within two miles of a village, but he had visions of a bonanza near the setting sun. accordingly they started. at the end of one month the baby died. a piece of wood from the cradle was all they had to mark its lonely resting place. with sad hearts they went on, and, in a few weeks, with grief for her child, her old home, her kindred and friends, the mother also died. she, too, was left alone on the far-off prairies, and the sad pageant moved on. another child soon shared the same fate, and then a span of horses died, and one wagon, with all the things they could most easily spare, was abandoned. arrived at their destination none of the golden dreams was realized. the expensive journey, the struggles in starting under new circumstances, and the loss of the mother's thrift and management, made the father so discouraged and reckless that much of his property was wasted, and his earthly career was soon ended. through the heroic energy and good management of the eldest daughter, the little patrimony, in time, was doubled, and the children well brought up and educated in the rudiments of learning, so that all became respectable members of society. her advice to all young people is, if you are comfortably established in the east, stay there. there is no royal road to wealth and ease, even in the western states! in spite of the discomforts we suffered in the kansas campaign, i was glad of the experience. it gave me added self-respect to know that i could endure such hardships and fatigue with a great degree of cheerfulness. the governor and i often laughed heartily, as we patiently chewed our gum arabic and slippery elm, to think on what a gentle stimulus we were accomplishing such wonderful feats as orators and travelers. it was fortunate our intense enthusiasm for the subject gave us all the necessary inspiration, as the supplies we gathered by the way were by no means sufficiently invigorating for prolonged propagandism. i enjoyed these daily drives over the vast prairies, listening to the governor's descriptions of the early days when the "bushwhackers and jayhawkers" made their raids on the inhabitants of the young free state. the courage and endurance of the women, surrounded by dangers and discomforts, surpassed all description. i count it a great privilege to have made the acquaintance of so many noble women and men who had passed through such scenes and conquered such difficulties. they seemed to live in an atmosphere altogether beyond their surroundings. many educated families from new england, disappointed in not finding the much talked of bonanzas, were living in log cabins, in solitary places, miles from any neighbors. but i found emerson, parker, holmes, hawthorne, whittier, and lowell on their bookshelves to gladden their leisure hours. miss anthony and i often comforted ourselves mid adverse winds with memories of the short time we spent under mother bickerdyke's hospitable roof at salina. there we had clean, comfortable beds, delicious viands, and everything was exquisitely neat. she entertained us with her reminiscences of the war. with great self-denial she had served her country in camp and hospital, and was with sherman's army in that wonderful march to the sea, and here we found her on the outpost of civilization, determined to start what kansas most needed--a good hotel. but alas! it was too good for that latitude and proved a financial failure. it was, to us, an oasis in the desert, where we would gladly have lingered if the opposition would have come to us for conversion. but, as we had to carry the gospel of woman's equality into the highways and hedges, we left dear mother bickerdyke with profound regret. the seed sown in kansas in is now bearing its legitimate fruits. there was not a county in the state where meetings were not held or tracts scattered with a generous hand. if the friends of our cause in the east had been true and had done for woman what they did for the colored man, i believe both propositions would have been carried; but with a narrow policy, playing off one against the other, both were defeated. a policy of injustice always bears its own legitimate fruit in failure. however, women learned one important lesson--namely, that it is impossible for the best of men to understand women's feelings or the humiliation of their position. when they asked us to be silent on our question during the war, and labor for the emancipation of the slave, we did so, and gave five years to his emancipation and enfranchisement. to this proposition my friend, susan b. anthony, never consented, but was compelled to yield because no one stood with her. i was convinced, at the time, that it was the true policy. i am now equally sure that it was a blunder, and, ever since, i have taken my beloved susan's judgment against the world. i have always found that, when we see eye to eye, we are sure to be right, and when we pull together we are strong. after we discuss any point together and fully agree, our faith in our united judgment is immovable and no amount of ridicule and opposition has the slightest influence, come from what quarter it may. together we withstood the republicans and abolitionists, when, a second time, they made us the most solemn promises of earnest labor for our enfranchisement, when the slaves were safe beyond a peradventure. they never redeemed their promise made during the war, hence, when they urged us to silence in the kansas campaign, we would not for a moment entertain the proposition. the women generally awoke to their duty to themselves. they had been deceived once and could not be again. if the leaders in the republican and abolition camps could deceive us, whom could we trust? again we were urged to be silent on our rights, when the proposition to take the word "white" out of the new york constitution was submitted to a vote of the people of the state, or, rather, to one-half the people, as women had no voice in the matter. again we said "no, no, gentlemen! if the 'white' comes out of the constitution, let the 'male' come out also. women have stood with the negro, thus far, on equal ground as ostracized classes, outside the political paradise; and now, when the door is open, it is but fair that we both should enter and enjoy all the fruits of citizenship. heretofore ranked with idiots, lunatics, and criminals in the constitution, the negro has been the only respectable compeer we had; so pray do not separate us now for another twenty years, ere the constitutional door will again be opened." we were persistently urged to give all our efforts to get the word "white" out, and thus secure the enfranchisement of the colored man, as that, they said, would prepare the way for us to follow. several editors threatened that, unless we did so, their papers should henceforth do their best to defeat every measure we proposed. but we were deaf alike to persuasions and threats, thinking it wiser to labor for women, constituting, as they did, half the people of the state, rather than for a small number of colored men; who, viewing all things from the same standpoint as white men, would be an added power against us. the question settled in kansas, we returned, with george francis train, to new york. he offered to pay all the expenses of the journey and meetings in all the chief cities on the way, and see that we were fully and well reported in their respective journals. after prolonged consultation miss anthony and i thought best to accept the offer and we did so. most of our friends thought it a grave blunder, but the result proved otherwise. mr. train was then in his prime--a large, fine-looking man, a gentleman in dress and manner, neither smoking, chewing, drinking, nor gormandizing. he was an effective speaker and actor, as one of his speeches, which he illustrated, imitating the poor wife at the washtub and the drunken husband reeling in, fully showed. he gave his audience charcoal sketches of everyday life rather than argument. he always pleased popular audiences, and even the most fastidious were amused with his caricatures. as the newspapers gave several columns to our meetings at every point through all the states, the agitation was widespread and of great value. to be sure our friends, on all sides, fell off, and those especially who wished us to be silent on the question of woman's rights, declared "the cause too sacred to be advocated by such a charlatan as george francis train." we thought otherwise, as the accession of mr. train increased the agitation twofold. if these fastidious ladies and gentlemen had come out to kansas and occupied the ground and provided "the sinews of war," there would have been no field for mr. train's labors, and we should have accepted their services. but, as the ground was unoccupied, he had, at least, the right of a reform "squatter" to cultivate the cardinal virtues and reap a moral harvest wherever he could. reaching new york, mr. train made it possible for us to establish a newspaper, which gave another impetus to our movement. the _revolution_, published by susan b. anthony and edited by parker pillsbury and myself, lived two years and a half and was then consolidated with the new york _christian enquirer_, edited by the rev. henry bellows, d.d. i regard the brief period in which i edited the _revolution_ as one of the happiest of my life, and i may add the most useful. in looking over the editorials i find but one that i sincerely regret, and that was a retort on mr. garrison, written under great provocation, but not by me, which circumstances, at the time, forbade me to disown. considering the pressure brought to bear on miss anthony and myself, i feel now that our patience and forbearance with our enemies in their malignant attacks on our good, name, which we never answered, were indeed marvelous. we said at all times and on all other subjects just what we thought, and advertised nothing that we did not believe in. no advertisements of quack remedies appeared in our columns. one of our clerks once published a bread powder advertisement, which i did not see until the paper appeared; so, in the next number, i said, editorially, what i thought of it. i was alone in the office, one day, when a man blustered in. "who," said he, "runs this concern?" "you will find the names of the editors and publishers," i replied, "on the editorial page." "are you one of them?" "i am," i replied. "well, do you know that i agreed to pay twenty dollars to have that bread powder advertised for one month, and then you condemn it editorially?" "i have nothing to do with the advertising; miss anthony pays me to say what i think." "have you any more thoughts to publish on that bread powder?" "oh, yes," i replied, "i have not exhausted the subject yet." "then," said he, "i will have the advertisement taken out. what is there to pay for the one insertion?" "oh, nothing," i replied, "as the editorial probably did you more injury than the advertisement did you good." on leaving, with prophetic vision, he said, "i prophesy a short life for this paper; the business world is based on quackery, and you cannot live without it." with melancholy certainty, i replied, "i fear you are right." chapter xvii. lyceums and lecturers. the lyceum bureau was, at one time, a great feature in american life. the three leading bureaus were in boston, new york, and chicago. the managers, map in hand, would lay out trips, more or less extensive according to the capacity or will of the speakers, and then, with a dozen or more victims in hand, make arrangements with the committees in various towns and cities to set them all in motion. as the managers of the bureaus had ten per cent. of what the speakers made, it was to their interest to keep the time well filled. hence the engagements were made without the slightest reference to the comfort of the travelers. with our immense distances, it was often necessary to travel night and day, sometimes changing cars at midnight, and perhaps arriving at the destination half an hour or less before going on the platform, and starting again on the journey immediately upon leaving it. the route was always carefully written out, giving the time the trains started from and arrived at various points; but as cross trains often failed to connect, one traveled, guidebook in hand, in a constant fever of anxiety. as, in the early days, the fees were from one to two hundred dollars a night, the speakers themselves were desirous of accomplishing as much as possible. in i gave my name, for the first time, to the new york bureau, and on november began the long, weary pilgrimages, from maine to texas, that lasted twelve years; speaking steadily for eight months--from october to june--every season. that was the heyday of the lecturing period, when a long list of bright men and women were constantly on the wing. anna dickinson, olive logan, kate field,--later, mrs. livermore and mrs. howe, alcott, phillips, douglass, tilton, curtis, beecher, and, several years later, general kilpatrick, with henry vincent, bradlaugh, and matthew arnold from england; these and many others were stars of the lecture platform. some of us occasionally managed to spend sunday together, at a good hotel in some city, to rest and feast and talk over our joys and sorrows, the long journeys, the hard fare in the country hotels, the rainy nights when committees felt blue and tried to cut down our fees; the being compelled by inconsiderate people to talk on the train; the overheated, badly ventilated cars; the halls, sometimes too warm, sometimes too cold; babies crying in our audiences; the rain pattering on the roof overhead or leaking on the platform--these were common experiences. in the west, women with babies uniformly occupied the front seats so that the little ones, not understanding what you said, might be amused with your gestures and changing facial expression. all these things, so trying, at the time, to concentrated and enthusiastic speaking, afterward served as subjects of amusing conversation. we unanimously complained of the tea and coffee. mrs. livermore had the wisdom to carry a spirit lamp with her own tea and coffee, and thus supplied herself with the needed stimulants for her oratorical efforts. the hardships of these lyceum trips can never be appreciated except by those who have endured them. with accidents to cars and bridges, with floods and snow blockades, the pitfalls in one of these campaigns were without number. [illustration: elizabeth smith miller.] [illustration] on one occasion, when engaged to speak at maquoketa, iowa, i arrived at lyons about noon, to find the road was blocked with snow, and no chance of the cars running for days. "well," said i to the landlord, "i must be at maquoketa at eight o'clock to-night; have you a sleigh, a span of fleet horses, and a skillful driver? if so, i will go across the country." "oh, yes, madam!" he replied, "i have all you ask; but you could not stand a six-hours' drive in this piercing wind." having lived in a region of snow, with the thermometer down to twenty degrees below zero, i had no fears of winds and drifts, so i said, "get the sleigh ready and i will try it." accordingly i telegraphed the committee that i would be there, and started. i was well bundled up in a fur cloak and hood, a hot oak plank at my feet, and a thick veil over my head and face. as the landlord gave the finishing touch, by throwing a large buffalo robe over all and tying the two tails together at the back of my head and thus effectually preventing me putting my hand to my nose, he said, "there, if you can only sit perfectly still, you will come out all right at maquoketa; that is, if you get there, which i very much doubt." it was a long, hard drive against the wind and through drifts, but i scarcely moved a finger, and, as the clock struck eight, we drove into the town. the hall was warm, and the church bell having announced my arrival, a large audience was assembled. as i learned that all the roads in northern iowa were blocked, i made the entire circuit, from point to point, in a sleigh, traveling forty and fifty miles a day. at the sherman house, in chicago, three weeks later, i met mr. bradlaugh and general kilpatrick, who were advertised on the same route ahead of me. "well," said i, "where have you gentlemen been?" "waiting here for the roads to be opened. we have lost three weeks' engagements," they replied. as the general was lecturing on his experiences in sherman's march to the sea, i chaffed him on not being able, in an emergency, to march across the state of iowa. they were much astonished and somewhat ashamed, when i told them of my long, solitary drives over the prairies from day to day. it was the testimony of all the bureaus that the women could endure more fatigue and were more conscientious than the men in filling their appointments. the pleasant feature of these trips was the great educational work accomplished for the people through their listening to lectures on all the vital questions of the hour. wherever any of us chanced to be on sunday, we preached in some church; and wherever i had a spare afternoon, i talked to women alone, on marriage, maternity, and the laws of life and health. we made many most charming acquaintances, too, scattered all over our western world, and saw how comfortable and happy sensible people could be, living in most straitened circumstances, with none of the luxuries of life. if most housekeepers could get rid of one-half their clothes and furniture and put their bric-a-brac in the town museum, life would be simplified and they would begin to know what leisure means. when i see so many of our american women struggling to be artists, who cannot make a good loaf of bread nor a palatable cup of coffee, i think of what theodore parker said when art was a craze in boston. "the fine arts do not interest me so much as the coarse arts which feed, clothe, house, and comfort a people. i would rather be a great man like franklin than a michael angelo--nay, if i had a son, i should rather see him a mechanic, like the late george stephenson, in england, than a great painter like rubens, who only copied beauty." one day i found at the office of the _revolution_ an invitation to meet mrs. moulton in the academy of music, where she was to try her voice for the coming concert for the benefit of the woman's medical college. and what a voice for power, pathos, pliability! i never heard the like. seated beside her mother, mrs. w.h. greenough, i enjoyed alike the mother's anxious pride and the daughter's triumph. i felt, as i listened, the truth of what vieuxtemps said the first time he heard her, "that is the traditional voice for which the ages have waited and longed." when, on one occasion, mrs. moulton sang a song of mozart's to auber's accompaniment, someone present asked, "what could be added to make this more complete?" auber looked up to heaven, and, with a sweet smile, said, "nothing but that mozart should have been here to listen." looking and listening, "here," thought i, "is another jewel in the crown of womanhood, to radiate and glorify the lives of all." i have such an intense pride of sex that the triumphs of woman in art, literature, oratory, science, or song rouse my enthusiasm as nothing else can. hungering, that day, for gifted women, i called on alice and phebe cary and mary clemmer ames, and together we gave the proud white male such a serving up as did our souls good and could not hurt him, intrenched, as he is, behind creeds, codes, customs, and constitutions, with vizor and breastplate of self-complacency and conceit. in criticising jessie boucherett's essay on "superfluous women," in which she advises men in england to emigrate in order to leave room and occupation for women, the _tribune_ said: "the idea of a home without a man in it!" in visiting the carys one always felt that there was a home--a very charming one, too--without a man in it. once when harriet beecher stowe was at dr. taylor's, i had the opportunity to make her acquaintance. in her sanctum, surrounded by books and papers, she was just finishing her second paper on the byron family, and her sister catherine was preparing papers on her educational work, preparatory to a coming meeting of the ladies of the school board. the women of the beecher family, though most of them wives and mothers, all had a definite life-work outside the family circle, and other objects of intense interest beside husbands, babies, cook stoves, and social conversations. catherine said she was opposed to woman suffrage, and if she thought there was the least danger of our getting it, she would write and talk against it vehemently. but, as the nation was safe against such a calamity, she was willing to let the talk go on, because the agitation helped her work. "it is rather paradoxical," i said to her, "that the pressing of a false principle can help a true one; but when you get the women all thoroughly educated, they will step off to the polls and vote in spite of you." one night on the train from new york to williamsport, pennsylvania, i found abundant time to think over the personal peculiarities of the many noble women who adorn this nineteenth century, and, as i recalled them, one by one, in america, england, france, and germany, and all that they are doing and saying, i wandered that any man could be so blind as not to see that woman has already taken her place as the peer of man. while the lords of creation have been debating her sphere and drawing their chalk marks here and there, woman has quietly stepped outside the barren fields where she was compelled to graze for centuries, and is now in green pastures and beside still waters, a power in the world of thought. these pleasant cogitations were cut short by my learning that i had taken the wrong train, and must change at harrisburg at two o'clock in the morning. how soon the reflection that i must leave my comfortable berth at such an unchristian hour changed the whole hue of glorious womanhood and every other earthly blessing! however, i lived through the trial and arrived at williamsport as the day dawned. i had a good audience at the opera house that evening, and was introduced to many agreeable people, who declared themselves converted to woman suffrage by my ministrations. among the many new jewels in my crown, i added, that night, judge bently. in november, , i passed one night in philadelphia, with miss anthony, at anna dickinson's home--a neat, three-story brick house in locust street. this haven of rest, where the world-famous little woman came, ever and anon, to recruit her overtaxed energies, was very tastefully furnished, adorned with engravings, books, and statuary. her mother, sister, and brother made up the household--a pleasing, cultivated trio. the brother was a handsome youth of good judgment, and given to sage remarks; the sister, witty, intuitive, and incisive in speech; the mother, dressed in rich quaker costume, and though nearly seventy, still possessed of great personal beauty. she was intelligent, dignified, refined, and, in manner and appearance, reminded one of angelina grimké as she looked in her younger days. everything about the house and its appointments indicated that it was the abode of genius and cultivation, and, although anna was absent, the hospitalities were gracefully dispensed by her family. napoleon and shakespeare seemed to be anna's patron saints, looking down, on all sides, from the wall. the mother amused us with the sore trials her little orator had inflicted on the members of the household by her vagaries in the world of fame. on the way to kennett square, a young gentleman pointed out to us the home of benjamin west, who distinguished himself, to the disgust of broadbrims generally, as a landscape painter. in commencing his career, it is said he made use of the tail of a cat in lieu of a brush. of course benjamin's first attempts were on the sly, and he could not ask paterfamilias for money to buy a brush without encountering the good man's scorn. whether, in the hour of his need and fresh enthusiasm, poor puss was led to the sacrificial altar, or whether he found her reposing by the roadside, having paid the debt of nature, our informant could not say; enough that, in time, he owned a brush and immortalized himself by his skill in its use. such erratic ones as whittier, west, and anna dickinson go to prove that even the prim, proper, perfect quakers are subject to like infirmities with the rest of the human family. i had long heard of the "progressive friends" in the region round longwood; had read the many bulls they issued from their "yearly meetings" on every question, on war, capital punishment, temperance, slavery, woman's rights; had learned that they were turning the cold shoulder on the dress, habits, and opinions of their fathers; listening to the ministrations of such worldlings as william lloyd garrison, theodore tilton, and oliver johnson, in a new meeting house, all painted and varnished, with cushions, easy seats, carpets, stoves, a musical instrument--shade of george fox, forgive--and three brackets with vases on the "high seat," and, more than all that, men and women were indiscriminately seated throughout the house. all this miss anthony and i beheld with our own eyes, and, in company with sarah pugh and chandler darlington, did sit together in the high seat and talk in the congregation of the people. there, too, we met hannah darlington and dinah mendenhall,--names long known in every good work,--and, for the space of one day, did enjoy the blissful serenity of that earthly paradise. the women of kennett square were celebrated not only for their model housekeeping but also for their rare cultivation on all subjects of general interest. in november i again started on one of my western trips, but, alas! on the very day the trains were changed, and so i could not make connections to meet my engagements at saginaw and marshall, and just saved myself at toledo by going directly from the cars before the audience, with the dust of twenty-four hours' travel on my garments. not being able to reach saginaw, i went straight to ann arbor, and spent three days most pleasantly in visiting old friends, making new ones, and surveying the town, with its grand university. i was invited to thanksgiving dinner at the home of mr. seaman, a highly cultivated democratic editor, author of "progress of nations." a choice number of guests gathered round his hospitable board on that occasion, over which his wife presided with dignity and grace. woman suffrage was the target for the combined wit and satire of the company, and, after four hours of uninterrupted sharpshooting, pyrotechnics, and laughter, we dispersed to our several abodes, fairly exhausted with the excess of enjoyment. one gentleman had the moral hardihood to assert that men had more endurance than women, whereupon a lady remarked that she would like to see the thirteen hundred young men in the university laced up in steel-ribbed corsets, with hoops, heavy skirts, trains, high heels, panniers, chignons, and dozens of hairpins sticking in their scalps, cooped up in the house year after year, with no exhilarating exercise, no hopes, aims, nor ambitions in life, and know if they could stand it as well as the girls. "nothing," said she, "but the fact that women, like cats, have nine lives, enables them to survive the present _régime_ to which custom dooms the sex." while in ann arbor i gave my lecture on "our girls" in the new methodist church--a large building, well lighted, and filled with a brilliant audience. the students, in large numbers, were there, and strengthened the threads of my discourse with frequent and generous applause; especially when i urged on the regents of the university the duty of opening its doors to the daughters of the state. there were several splendid girls in michigan, at that time, preparing themselves for admission to the law department. as judge cooley, one of the professors, was a very liberal man, as well as a sound lawyer, and strongly in favor of opening the college to girls, i had no doubt the women of michigan would soon distinguish themselves at the bar. some said the chief difficulty in the way of the girls of that day being admitted to the university was the want of room. that could have been easily obviated by telling the young men from abroad to betake themselves to the colleges in their respective states, that michigan might educate her daughters. as the women owned a good share of the property of the state, and had been heavily taxed to build and endow that institution, it was but fair that they should share in its advantages. the michigan university, with its extensive grounds, commodious buildings, medical and law schools, professors' residences, and the finest laboratory in the country, was an institution of which the state was justly proud, and, as the tuition was free, it was worth the trouble of a long, hard siege by the girls of michigan to gain admittance there. i advised them to organize their forces at once, get their minute guns, battering rams, monitors, projectiles, bombshells, cannon, torpedoes, and crackers ready, and keep up a brisk cannonading until the grave and reverend seigniors opened the door, and shouted, "hold, enough!" the ladies of ann arbor had a fine library of their own, where their clubs met once a week. they had just formed a suffrage association. my visit ended with a pleasant reception, at which i was introduced to the chaplain, several professors, and many ladies and gentlemen ready to accept the situation. judge cooley gave me a glowing account of the laws of michigan--how easy it was for wives to get possession of all the property, and then sunder the marriage tie and leave the poor husband to the charity of the cold world, with their helpless children about him. i heard of a rich lady, there, who made a will, giving her husband a handsome annuity as long as he remained her widower. it was evident that the poor "white male," sooner or later, was doomed to try for himself the virtue of the laws he had made for women. i hope, for the sake of the race, he will not bear oppression with the stupid fortitude we have for six thousand years. at flint i was entertained by mr. and mrs. jenny. mr. jenny was a democratic editor who believed in progress, and in making smooth paths for women in this great wilderness of life. his wife was a remarkable woman. she inaugurated the ladies' libraries in michigan. in flint they had a fine brick building and nearly two thousand volumes of choice books, owned by the association, and money always in the treasury. here, too, i had a fine audience and gave my lecture entitled "open the door." at coldwater, in spite of its name, i found a warm, appreciative audience. the president of the lyceum was a sensible young man who, after graduating at ann arbor, decided, instead of starving at the law, to work with his hands and brains at the same time. when all men go to their legitimate business of creating wealth, developing the resources of the country, and leave its mere exchange to the weaker sex, we shall not have so many superfluous women in the world with nothing to do. it is evident the time has come to hunt man into his appropriate sphere. coming from chicago, i met governor fairchild and senator williams of wisconsin. it was delightful to find them thoroughly grounded in the faith of woman suffrage. they had been devout readers of the _revolution_ ever since miss anthony induced them to subscribe, the winter before, at madison. of course a new glow of intelligence irradiated their fine faces (for they were remarkably handsome men) and there was a new point to all their words. senator williams, like myself, was on a lecturing tour. "man" was his theme, for which i was devoutly thankful; for, if there are any of god's creatures that need lecturing, it is this one that is forever advising us. i thought of all men, from father gregory down to horace bushnell, who had wearied their brains to describe woman's sphere, and how signally they had failed. throughout my lyceum journeys i was of great use to the traveling public, in keeping the ventilators in the cars open, and the dampers in fiery stoves shut up, especially in sleeping cars at night. how many times a day i thought what the sainted horace mann tried to impress on his stupid countrymen, that, inasmuch as the air is forty miles deep around the globe, it is a useless piece of economy to breathe any number of cubic feet over more than seven times! the babies, too, need to be thankful that i was in a position to witness their wrongs. many, through my intercessions, received their first drink of water, and were emancipated from woolen hoods, veils, tight strings under their chins, and endless swaddling bands. it is a startling assertion, but true, that i have met few women who know how to take care of a baby. and this fact led me, on one trip, to lecture to my fair countrywomen on "marriage and maternity," hoping to aid in the inauguration of a new era of happy, healthy babies. after twenty-four hours in the express i found myself in a pleasant room in the international hotel at la crosse, looking out on the great mother of waters, on whose cold bosom the ice and the steamers were struggling for mastery. beyond stretched the snow-clad bluffs, sternly looking down on the mississippi, as if to say, "'thus far shalt thou come and no farther'--though sluggish, you are aggressive, ever pushing where you should not; but all attempts in this direction are alike vain; since creation's dawn, we have defied you, and here we stand, to-day, calm, majestic, immovable. coquette as you will in other latitudes, with flowery banks and youthful piers in the busy marts of trade, and undermine them, one and all, with your deceitful wooings, but bow in reverence as you gaze on us. we have no eyes for your beauty; no ears for your endless song; our heads are in the clouds, our hearts commune with gods; you have no part in the eternal problems of the ages that fill our thoughts, yours the humble duty to wash our feet, and then pass on, remembering to keep in your appropriate sphere, within the barks that wise geographers have seen fit to mark." as i listened to these complacent hills and watched the poor mississippi weeping as she swept along, to lose her sorrows in ocean's depths, i thought how like the attitude of man to woman. let these proud hills remember that they, too, slumbered for centuries in deep valleys down, down, when, perchance, the sparkling mississippi rolled above their heads, and but for some generous outburst, some upheaval of old mother earth, wishing that her rock-ribbed sons, as well as graceful daughters, might enjoy the light, the sunshine and the shower--but for this soul of love in matter as well as mind--these bluffs and the sons of adam, too, might not boast the altitude they glory in to-day. those who have ears to hear discern low, rumbling noises that foretell convulsions in our social world that may, perchance, in the next upheaval, bring woman to the surface; up, up, from gloomy ocean depths, dark caverns, and damper valleys. the struggling daughters of earth are soon to walk in the sunlight of a higher civilization. escorted by mr. woodward, a member of the bar, i devoted a day to the lions of la crosse. first we explored the courthouse, a large, new brick building, from whose dome we had a grand view of the surrounding country. the courtroom where justice is administered was large, clean, airy--the bench carpeted and adorned with a large, green, stuffed chair, in which i sat down, and, in imagination, summoned up advocates, jurors, prisoners, and people, and wondered how i should feel pronouncing sentence of death on a fellow-being, or, like portia, wisely checkmating the shylocks of our times. here i met judge hugh cameron, formerly of johnstown. he invited us into his sanctum, where we had a pleasant chat about our native hills, scotch affiliations, the bench and bar of new york, and the wisconsin laws for women. the judge, having maintained a happy bachelor state, looked placidly on the aggressive movements of the sex, as his domestic felicity would be no way affected, whether woman was voted up or down. we next surveyed the pomeroy building, which contained a large, tastefully finished hall and printing establishment, where the la crosse _democrat_ was formerly published. as i saw the perfection, order, and good taste, in all arrangements throughout, and listened to mr. huron's description of the life and leading characteristics of its chief, it seemed impossible to reconcile the tone of the _democrat_ with the moral status of its editor. i never saw a more complete business establishment, and the editorial sanctum looked as if it might be the abiding place of the muses. mirrors, pictures, statuary, books, music, rare curiosities, and fine specimens of birds and minerals were everywhere. over the editor's table was a beautiful painting of his youthful daughter, whose flaxen hair, blue eyes, and angelic face should have inspired a father to nobler, purer, utterances than he was wont, at that time, to give to the world. but pomeroy's good deeds will live long after his profane words are forgotten. throughout the establishment cards, set up in conspicuous places, said, "smoking here is positively forbidden." drinking, too, was forbidden to all his employés. the moment a man was discovered using intoxicating drinks, he was dismissed. in the upper story of the building was a large, pleasant room, handsomely carpeted and furnished, where the employés, in their leisure hours, could talk, write, read, or amuse themselves in any rational way. mr. pomeroy was humane and generous with his employés, honorable in his business relations, and boundless in his charities to the poor. his charity, business honor, and public spirit were highly spoken of by those who knew him best. that a journal does not always reflect the editor is as much the fault of society as of the man. so long as the public will pay for gross personalities, obscenity, and slang, decent journals will be outbidden in the market. the fact that the la crosse _democrat_ found a ready sale in all parts of the country showed that mr. pomeroy fairly reflected the popular taste. while multitudes turned up the whites of their eyes and denounced him in public, they bought his paper and read it in private. i left la crosse in a steamer, just as the rising sun lighted the hilltops and gilded the mississippi. it was a lovely morning, and, in company with a young girl of sixteen, who had traveled alone from some remote part of canada, bound for a northern village in wisconsin, i promenaded the deck most of the way to winona, a pleased listener to the incidents of my young companion's experiences. she said that, when crossing lake huron, she was the only woman on board, but the men were so kind and civil that she soon forgot she was alone. i found many girls, traveling long distances, who had never been five miles from home before, with a self-reliance that was remarkable. they all spoke in the most flattering manner of the civility of our american men in looking after their baggage and advising them as to the best routes. as you approach st. paul, at fort snelling, where the mississippi and minnesota join forces, the country grows bold and beautiful. the town itself, then boasting about thirty thousand inhabitants, is finely situated, with substantial stone residences. it was in one of these charming homes i found a harbor of rest during my stay in the city. mrs. stuart, whose hospitalities i enjoyed, was a woman of rare common sense and sound health. her husband, dr. jacob h. stuart, was one of the very first surgeons to volunteer in the late war. in the panic at bull run, instead of running, as everybody else did, he stayed with the wounded, and was taken prisoner while taking a bullet from the head of a rebel. when exchanged, beauregard gave him his sword for his devotion to the dying and wounded. i had the pleasure of seeing several of the leading gentlemen and ladies of st. paul at the orphans' fair, where we all adjourned, after my lecture, to discuss woman's rights, over a bounteous supper. here i met william l. banning, the originator of the lake superior and mississippi railroad. he besieged congress and capitalists for a dozen years to build this road, but was laughed at and put off with sneers and contempt, until, at last, jay cooke became so weary of his continual coming that he said: "i will build the road to get rid of you." whittier seems to have had a prophetic vision of the peopling of this region. when speaking of the yankee, he says: "he's whittling by st. mary's falls, upon his loaded wain; he's measuring o'er the pictured rocks, with eager eyes of gain. "i hear the mattock in the mine, the ax-stroke in the dell, the clamor from the indian lodge, the jesuits' chapel bell! "i hear the tread of pioneers of nations yet to be; the first low wash of waves, where soon shall roll a human sea." the opening of these new outlets and mines of wealth was wholly due to the forecast and perseverance of mr. banning. the first engine that went over a part of the road had been christened at st. paul, with becoming ceremonies; the officiating priestess being a beautiful maiden. a cask of water from the pacific was sent by mr. banning's brother from california, and a small keg was brought from lake superior for the occasion. a glass was placed in the hands of miss ella b. banning, daughter of the president, who then christened the engine, saying: "with the waters of the pacific ocean in my right hand, and the waters of lake superior in my left, invoking the genius of progress to bring together, with iron band, two great commercial systems of the globe, i dedicate this engine to the use of the lake superior and mississippi railroad, and name it william l. banning." from st. paul to dubuque, as the boats had ceased running, a circuitous route and a night of discomfort were inevitable. leaving the main road to chicago at clinton junction, i had the pleasure of waiting at a small country inn until midnight for a freight train. this was indeed dreary, but, having mrs. child's sketches of mmes. de staël and roland at hand, i read of napoleon's persecutions of the one and robespierre's of the other, until, by comparison, my condition was tolerable, and the little meagerly furnished room, with its dull fire and dim lamp, seemed a paradise compared with years of exile from one's native land or the prison cell and guillotine. how small our ordinary, petty trials seem in contrast with the mountains of sorrow that have been piled up on the great souls of the past! absorbed in communion with them twelve o'clock soon came, and with it the train. a burly son of adam escorted me to the passenger car filled with german immigrants, with tin cups, babies, bags, and bundles innumerable. the ventilators were all closed, the stoves hot, and the air was like that of the black hole of calcutta. so, after depositing my cloak and bag in an empty seat, i quietly propped both doors open with a stick of wood, shut up the stoves, and opened all the ventilators with the poker. but the celestial breeze, so grateful to me, had the most unhappy effect on the slumbering exiles. paterfamilias swore outright; the companion of his earthly pilgrimage said, "we must be going north," and, as the heavy veil of carbonic acid gas was lifted from infant faces, and the pure oxygen filled their lungs and roused them to new life, they set up one simultaneous shout of joy and gratitude, which their parents mistook for agony. altogether there was a general stir. as i had quietly slipped into my seat and laid my head down to sleep, i remained unobserved--the innocent cause of the general purification and vexation. we reached freeport at three o'clock in the morning. as the depot for dubuque was nearly half a mile on the other side of the town, i said to a solitary old man who stood shivering there to receive us, "how can i get to the other station?" "walk, madam." "but i do not know the way." "there is no one to go with you." "how is my trunk going?" said i. "i have a donkey and cart to take that." "then," said i, "you, the donkey, the trunk, and i will go together." so i stepped into the cart, sat down on the trunk, and the old man laughed heartily as we jogged along through the mud of that solitary town in the pale morning starlight. just as the day was dawning, dubuque, with its rough hills and bold scenery, loomed up. soon, under the roof of myron beach, one of the distinguished lawyers of the west, with a good breakfast and sound nap, my night's sorrows were forgotten. i was sorry to find that mrs. beach, though a native of new york, and born on the very spot where the first woman's rights convention was held in this country, was not sound on the question of woman suffrage. she seemed to have an idea that voting and housekeeping could not be compounded; but i suggested that, if the nation could only enjoy a little of the admirable system with which she and other women administered their domestic affairs, uncle sam's interests would be better secured. this is just what the nation needs to-day, and women must wake up to the consideration that they, too, have duties as well as rights in the state. a splendid audience greeted me in the opera house, and i gave "our girls," bringing many male sinners to repentance, and stirring up some lethargic _femmes coverts_ to a state of rebellion against the existing order of things. from dubuque i went to dixon, a large town, where i met a number of pleasant people, but i have one cause of complaint against the telegraph operator, whose negligence to send a dispatch to mt. vernon, written and paid for, came near causing me a solitary night on the prairie, unsheltered and unknown. hearing that the express train went out sunday afternoon, i decided to go, so as to have all day at mt. vernon before speaking; but on getting my trunk checked, the baggageman said the train did not stop there. "well," said i, "check the trunk to the nearest point at which it does stop," resolving that i would persuade the conductor to stop one minute, anyway. accordingly, when the conductor came round, i presented my case as persuasively and eloquently as possible, telling him that i had telegraphed friends to meet me, etc., etc. he kindly consented to do so and had my trunk re-checked. on arriving, as there was no light, no sound, and the depot was half a mile from the town, the conductor urged me to go to cedar rapids and come back the next morning, as it was sunday night and the depot might not be opened, and i might be compelled to stay there on the platform all night in the cold. but, as i had telegraphed, i told him i thought someone would be there, and i would take the risk. so off went the train, leaving me solitary and alone. i could see the lights in the distant town and the dark outlines of two great mills near by, which suggested dams and races. i heard, too, the distant barking of dogs, and i thought there might be wolves, too; but no human sound. the platform was high and i could see no way down, and i should not have dared to go down if i had. so i walked all round the house, knocked at every door and window, called "john!" "james!" "patrick!" but no response. dressed in all their best, they had, no doubt, gone to visit sally, and i knew they would stay late. the night wind was cold. what could i do? the prospect of spending the night there filled me with dismay. at last i thought i would try my vocal powers; so i hallooed as loud as i could, in every note of the gamut, until i was hoarse. at last i heard a distant sound, a loud halloo, which i returned, and so we kept it up until the voice grew near, and, when i heard a man's heavy footsteps close at hand, i was relieved. he proved to be the telegraph operator, who had been a brave soldier in the late war. he said that no message had come from dixon. he escorted me to the hotel, where some members of the lyceum committee came in and had a hearty laugh at my adventure, especially that, in my distress, i should have called on james and john and patrick, instead of jane, ann, and bridget. they seemed to argue that that was an admission, on my part, of man's superiority, but i suggested that, as my sex had not yet been exalted to the dignity of presiding in depots and baggage rooms, there would have been no propriety in calling jane and ann. mt. vernon was distinguished for a very flourishing methodist college, open to boys and girls alike. the president and his wife were liberal and progressive people. i dined with them in their home near the college, and met some young ladies from massachusetts, who were teachers in the institution. all who gathered round the social board on that occasion were of one mind on the woman question. even the venerable mother of the president seemed to light up with the discussion of the theme. i gave "our girls" in the methodist church, and took the opportunity to compliment them for taking the word "obey" out of their marriage ceremony. i heard the most encouraging reports of the experiment of educating the sexes together. it was the rule in all the methodist institutions in iowa, and i found that the young gentlemen fully approved of it. at mt. vernon i also met mr. wright, former secretary of state, who gave me several interesting facts in regard to the women of iowa. the state could boast one woman who was an able lawyer, mrs. mansfield. mrs. berry and mrs. stebbins were notaries public. miss addington was superintendent of schools in mitchell county. she was nominated by a convention in opposition to a mr. brown. when the vote was taken, lo! there was a tie. mr. brown offered to yield through courtesy, but she declined; so they drew lots and miss addington was the victor. she once made an abstract of titles of all the lands in the county where she lived, and had received an appointment to office from the governor of the state, who requested the paper to be made out "l." instead of laura addington. he said it was enough for iowa to appoint women to such offices, without having it known the world over. i was sorry to tell the governor's secrets,--which i did everywhere,--but the cause of womanhood made it necessary. chapter xviii. westward ho! in the month of june, , miss anthony and i went to california, holding suffrage meetings in many of the chief cities from new york to san francisco, where we arrived about the middle of july, in time to experience the dry, dusty season. we tarried, on the way, one week in salt lake city. it was at the time of the godby secession, when several hundred mormons abjured that portion of the faith of their fathers which authorized polygamy. a decision had just been rendered by the united states supreme court declaring the first wife and her children the only legal heirs. whether this decision hastened the secession i do not know; however, it gave us the advantage of hearing all the arguments for and against the system. those who were opposed to it said it made slaves of men. to support four wives and twenty children was a severe strain on any husband. the women who believed in polygamy had much to say in its favor, especially in regard to the sacredness of motherhood during the period of pregnancy and lactation; a lesson of respect for that period being religiously taught all mormons. we were very thankful for the privilege granted us of speaking to the women alone in the smaller tabernacle. our meeting opened at two o'clock and lasted until seven, giving us five hours of uninterrupted conversation. judge mckeon had informed me of the recent decisions and the legal aspects of the questions, which he urged me to present to them fully and frankly, as no one had had such an opportunity before to speak to mormon women alone. so i made the most of my privilege. i gave a brief history of the marriage institution in all times and countries, of the matriarchate, when the mother was the head of the family and owned the property and children; of the patriarchate, when man reigned supreme and woman was enslaved; of polyandry, polygamy, monogamy, and prostitution. we had a full and free discussion of every phase of the question, and we all agreed that we were still far from having reached the ideal position for woman in marriage, however satisfied man might be with his various experiments. though the mormon women, like all others, stoutly defend their own religion, yet they are no more satisfied than any other sect. all women are dissatisfied with their position as inferiors, and their dissatisfaction increases in exact ratio with their intelligence and development. after this convocation the doors of the tabernacle were closed to our ministrations, as we thought they would be, but we had crowded an immense amount of science, philosophy, history, and general reflections into the five hours of such free talk as those women had never heard before. as the seceders had just built a new hall, we held meetings there every day, discussing all the vital issues of the hour; the mormon men and women taking an active part. we attended the fourth of july celebration, and saw the immense tabernacle filled to its utmost capacity. the various states of the union were represented by young girls, gayly dressed, carrying beautiful flags and banners. when that immense multitude joined in our national songs, and the deep-toned organ filled the vast dome the music was very impressive, and the spirit of patriotism manifested throughout was deep and sincere. as i stood among these simple people, so earnest in making their experiment in religion and social life, and remembered all the persecutions they had suffered and all they had accomplished in that desolate, far-off region, where they had, indeed, made "the wilderness blossom like the rose," i appreciated, as never before, the danger of intermeddling with the religious ideas of any people. their faith finds abundant authority in the bible, in the example of god's chosen people. when learned ecclesiastics teach the people that they can safely take that book as the guide of their lives, they must expect them to follow the letter and the specific teachings that lie on the surface. the ordinary mind does not generalize nor see that the same principles of conduct will not do for all periods and latitudes. when women understand that governments and religions are human inventions; that bibles, prayerbooks, catechisms, and encyclical letters are all emanations from the brain of man, they will no longer be oppressed by the injunctions that come to them with the divine authority of "thus saith the lord." that thoroughly democratic gathering in the tabernacle impressed me more than any other fourth of july celebration i ever attended. as most of the mormon families keep no servants, mothers must take their children wherever they go--to churches, theatres, concerts, and military reviews--everywhere and anywhere. hence the low, pensive wail of the individual baby, combining in large numbers, becomes a deep monotone, like the waves of the sea, a sort of violoncello accompaniment to all their holiday performances. it was rather trying to me at first to have my glowing periods punctuated with a rhythmic wail from all sides of the hall; but as soon as i saw that it did not distract my hearers, i simply raised my voice, and, with a little added vehemence, fairly rivaled the babies. commenting on this trial, to one of the theatrical performers, he replied: "it is bad enough for you, but alas! imagine me in a tender death scene, when the most profound stillness is indispensable, having my last gasp, my farewell message to loved ones, accentuated with the joyful crowings or impatient complainings of fifty babies." i noticed in the tabernacle that the miseries of the infantile host were in a measure mitigated by constant draughts of cold water, borne around in buckets by four old men. the question of the most profound interest to us at that time, in the mormon experiment, was the exercise of the suffrage by women. emeline b. wells, wife of the mayor of the city, writing to a washington convention, in , said of the many complications growing out of various bills before congress to rob women of this right: "women have voted in utah fourteen years, but, because of the little word 'male' that still stands upon the statutes, no woman is eligible to any office of emolument or trust. in three successive legislatures, bills have been passed, providing that the word 'male' be erased; but, each time, the governor of the territory, who has absolute veto power, has refused his signature. yet women attend primary meetings in the various precincts and are chosen as delegates. they are also members of county and territorial central committees, and are thus gaining practical political experience, and preparing themselves for positions of trust. "in a convention was held to frame a constitution to be submitted to the people and presented to the congress of the united states. women were delegates to this convention, and took part in all its deliberations, and were appointed to act on committees with equal privileges. it is the first instance on record, i think, where women have been members and taken an active part in a constitutional convention. "much has been said and written, and justly, too, of suffrage for women in wyoming; but, in my humble opinion, had utah stood on the same ground as wyoming, and women been eligible to office, as they are in that territory, they would, ere this, have been elected to the legislative assembly of utah. "it is currently reported that mormon women vote as they are told by their husbands. i most emphatically deny the assertion. all mormon women vote who are privileged to register. every girl born here, as soon as she is twenty-one years old, registers, and considers it as much a duty as to say her prayers. our women vote with the same freedom that characterizes any class of people in the most conscientious acts of their lives." these various questions were happily solved in , when utah became a state. its constitution gives women the right to vote on all questions, and makes them eligible to any office. the journey over the rocky mountains was more interesting and wonderful than i had imagined. a heavy shower the morning we reached the alkali plains made the trip through that region, where travelers suffer so much, quite endurable. although we reached california in its hot, dry season, we found the atmosphere in san francisco delightful, fanned with the gentle breezes of the pacific, cooled with the waters of its magnificent harbor. the golden gate does indeed open to the eye of the traveler one of the most beautiful harbors in the world. friends had engaged for us a suite of apartments at the grand hotel, then just opened. our rooms were constantly decked with fresh flowers, which our "suffrage children," as they called themselves, brought us from day to day. so many brought tokens of their good will--in fact, all our visitors came with offerings of fruits and flowers--that not only our apartments, but the public tables were crowded with rare and beautiful specimens of all varieties. we spoke every night, to crowded houses, on all phases of the woman question, and had a succession of visitors during the day. in fact, for one week, we had a perfect ovation. as senator stanford and his wife were at the same hotel, we had many pleasant interviews with them. while in san francisco we had many delightful sails in the harbor and drives to the seashore and for miles along the beach. we spent several hours at the little ocean house, watching the gambols of the celebrated seals. these, like the big trees, were named after distinguished statesmen. one very black fellow was named charles sumner, in honor of his love of the black race; another, with a little squint in his eye, was called ben butler; a stout, rotund specimen that seemed to take life philosophically, was named senator davis of illinois; a very belligerent one, who appeared determined to crowd his confrères into the sea, was called secretary stanton. grant and lincoln, on a higher ledge of the rocks, were complacently observing the gambols of the rest. california was on the eve of an important election, and john a. bingham of ohio and senator cole were stumping the state for the republican party. at several points we had the use of their great tents for our audiences, and of such of their able arguments as applied to woman. as mr. bingham's great speech was on the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth amendments, every principle he laid down literally enfranchised the women of the nation. i met the ohio statesman one morning at breakfast, after hearing him the night before. i told him his logic must compel him to advocate woman suffrage. with a most cynical smile he said "he was not the puppet of logic, but the slave of practical politics." we met most of our suffrage coadjutors in different parts of california. i spent a few days with mrs. elizabeth b. schenck, one of the earliest pioneers in the suffrage movement. she was a cultivated, noble woman, and her little cottage was a gem of beauty and comfort, surrounded with beautiful gardens and a hedge of fish-geraniums over ten feet high, covered with scarlet flowers. it seemed altogether more like a fairy bower than a human habitation. the windmills all over california, for pumping water, make a very pretty feature in the landscape, as well as an important one, as people are obliged to irrigate their gardens during the dry season. in august the hills are as brown as ours in december. here, too, i first met senator sargent's family, and visited them in sacramento city, where we had a suffrage meeting in the evening and one for women alone next day. at a similar meeting in san francisco six hundred women were present in platt's hall. we discussed marriage, maternity, and social life in general. supposing none but women were present, as all were dressed in feminine costume, the audience were quite free in their questions, and i equally so in my answers. to our astonishment, the next morning, a verbatim report of all that was said appeared in one of the leading papers, with most respectful comments. as i always wrote and read carefully what i had to say on such delicate subjects, the language was well chosen and the presentation of facts and philosophy quite unobjectionable; hence, the information being as important for men as for women, i did not regret the publication. during the day a committee of three gentlemen called to know if i would give a lecture to men alone. as i had no lecture prepared, i declined, with the promise to do so the next time i visited california. the idea was novel, but i think women could do much good in that way. my readers may be sure that such enterprising travelers as miss anthony and myself visited all the wonders, saw the geysers, big trees, the yosemite valley, and the immense mountain ranges, piled one above another, until they seemed to make a giant pathway from earth to heaven. we drove down the mountain sides with fox, the celebrated whip; sixteen people in an open carriage drawn by six horses, down, down, down, as fast as we could go. i expected to be dashed to pieces, but we safely descended in one hour, heights we had taken three to climb. fox held a steady rein, and seemed as calm as if we were trotting on a level, though any accident, such as a hot axle, a stumbling horse, or a break in the harness would have sent us down the mountain side, two thousand feet, to inevitable destruction. he had many amusing anecdotes to tell of horace greeley's trip to the geysers. the distinguished journalist was wholly unprepared for the race down the mountains and begged fox to hold up. sitting in front he made several efforts to seize the lines. but fox assured him that was the only possible way they could descend in safety, as the horses could guide the stage, but they could not hold it. at stockton we met a party of friends just returning from the yosemite, who gave us much valuable information for the journey. among other things, i was advised to write to mr. hutchins, the chief authority there, to have a good, strong horse in readiness to take me down the steep and narrow path into the valley. we took the same driver and carriage which our friends had found trustworthy, and started early in the morning. the dust and heat made the day's journey very wearisome, but the prospect of seeing the wonderful valley made all hardships of little consequence. quite a large party were waiting to mount their donkeys and mules when we arrived. one of the attendants, a man about as thin as a stair rod, asked me if i was the lady who had ordered a strong horse; i being the stoutest of the party, he readily arrived at that conclusion, so my steed was promptly produced. but i knew enough of horses and riding to see at a glance that he was a failure, with his low withers and high haunches, for descending steep mountains. in addition to his forward pitch, his back was immensely broad. miss anthony and i decided to ride astride and had suits made for that purpose; but alas! my steed was so broad that i could not reach the stirrups, and the moment we began to descend, i felt as if i were going over his head. so i fell behind, and, when the party had all gone forward, i dismounted, though my slender guide assured me there was no danger, he "had been up and down a thousand times." but, as i had never been at all, his repeated experiences did not inspire me with courage. i decided to walk. that, the guide said, was impossible. "well," said i, by way of compromise, "i will walk as far as i can, and when i reach the impossible, i will try that ill-constructed beast. i cannot see what you men were thinking of when you selected such an animal for this journey." and so we went slowly down, arguing the point whether it were better to ride or walk; to trust one's own legs, or, by chance, be precipitated thousands of feet down the mountain side. it was a hot august day; the sun, in the zenith, shining with full power. my blood was at boiling heat with exercise and vexation. alternately sliding and walking, catching hold of rocks and twigs, drinking at every rivulet, covered with dust, dripping with perspiration, skirts, gloves, and shoes in tatters, for four long hours i struggled down to the end, when i laid myself out on the grass, and fell asleep, perfectly exhausted, having sent the guide to tell mr. hutchins that i had reached the valley, and, as i could neither ride nor walk, to send a wheelbarrow, or four men with a blanket to transport me to the hotel. that very day the mariposa company had brought the first carriage into the valley, which, in due time, was sent to my relief. miss anthony, who, with a nice little mexican pony and narrow saddle, had made her descent with grace and dignity, welcomed me on the steps of the hotel, and laughed immoderately at my helpless plight. as hour after hour had passed, she said, there had been a general wonderment as to what had become of me; "but did you ever see such magnificent scenery?" "alas!" i replied, "i have been in no mood for scenery. i have been constantly watching my hands and feet lest i should come to grief." the next day i was too stiff and sore to move a finger. however, in due time i awoke to the glory and grandeur of that wonderful valley, of which no descriptions nor paintings can give the least idea. with sunset cox, the leading democratic statesman, and his wife, we had many pleasant excursions through the valley, and chats, during the evening, on the piazza. there was a constant succession of people going and coming, even in that far-off region, and all had their adventures to relate. but none quite equaled my experiences. we spent a day in the calaveras grove, rested beneath the "big trees," and rode on horseback through the fallen trunk of one of them. some vandals sawed off one of the most magnificent specimens twenty feet above the ground, and, on this the owners of the hotel built a little octagonal chapel. the polished wood, with bark for a border, made a very pretty floor. here they often had sunday services, as it held about one hundred people. here, too, we discussed the suffrage question, amid these majestic trees that had battled with the winds two thousand years, and had probably never before listened to such rebellion as we preached to the daughters of earth that day. here, again, we found our distinguished statesmen immortalized, each with his namesake among these stately trees. we asked our guide if there were any not yet appropriated, might we name them after women. as he readily consented, we wrote on cards the names of a dozen leading women, and tacked them on their respective trees. whether lucretia mott, lucy stone, phoebe couzins, and anna dickinson still retain their identity, and answer when called by the goddess sylvia in that majestic grove, i know not. twenty-five years have rolled by since then, and a new generation of visitors and guides may have left no trace of our work behind them. but we whispered our hopes and aspirations to the trees, to be wafted to the powers above, and we left them indelibly pictured on the walls of the little chapel, and for more mortal eyes we scattered leaflets wherever we went, and made all our pleasure trips so many propaganda for woman's enfranchisement. returning from california i made the journey straight through from san francisco to new york. though a long trip to make without a break, yet i enjoyed every moment, as i found most charming companions in bishop janes and his daughter. the bishop being very liberal in his ideas, we discussed the various theologies, and all phases of the woman question. i shall never forget those pleasant conversations as we sat outside on the platform, day after day, and in the soft moonlight late at night. we took up the thread of our debate each morning where we had dropped it the night before. the bishop told me about the resolution to take the word "obey" from the marriage ceremony which he introduced, two years before, into the methodist general conference and carried with but little opposition. all praise to the methodist church! when our girls are educated into a proper self-respect and laudable pride of sex, they will scout all these old barbarisms of the past that point in any way to the subject condition of women in either the state, the church, or the home. until the other sects follow her example, i hope our girls will insist on having their conjugal knots all tied by methodist bishops. the episcopal marriage service not only still clings to the word "obey," but it has a most humiliating ceremony in giving the bride away. i was never more struck with its odious and ludicrous features than on once seeing a tall, queenly-looking woman, magnificently arrayed, married by one of the tiniest priests that ever donned a surplice and gown, given away by the smallest guardian that ever watched a woman's fortunes, to the feeblest, bluest-looking little groom that ever placed a wedding ring on bridal finger. seeing these lilliputians around her, i thought, when the little priest said, "who gives this woman to this man," that she would take the responsibility and say, "i do," but no! there she stood, calm, serene, as if it were no affair of hers, while the little guardian, placing her hand in that of the little groom, said, "i do." thus was this stately woman bandied about by these three puny men, all of whom she might have gathered up in her arms and borne off to their respective places of abode. but women are gradually waking up to the degradation of these ceremonies. not long since, at a wedding in high life, a beautiful girl of eighteen was struck dumb at the word "obey." three times the priest pronounced it with emphasis and holy unction, each time slower, louder, than before. though the magnificent parlors were crowded, a breathless silence reigned. father, mother, and groom were in agony. the bride, with downcast eyes, stood speechless. at length the priest slowly closed his book and said, "the ceremony is at an end." one imploring word from the groom, and a faint "obey" was heard in the solemn stillness. the priest unclasped his book and the knot was tied. the congratulations, feast, and all, went on as though there had been no break in the proceedings, but the lesson was remembered, and many a rebel made by that short pause. i think all these reverend gentlemen who insist on the word "obey" in the marriage service should be removed for a clear violation of the thirteenth amendment to the federal constitution, which says there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude within the united states. as i gave these experiences to bishop janes he laughed heartily, and asked me to repeat them to each newcomer. our little debating society was the center of attraction. one gentleman asked me if our woman suffrage conventions were as entertaining. i told him yes; that there were no meetings in washington so interesting and so well attended as ours. as i had some woman-suffrage literature in my valise, i distributed leaflets to all earnest souls who plied me with questions. like all other things, it requires great discretion in sowing leaflets, lest you expose yourself to a rebuff. i never offer one to a man with a small head and high heels on his boots, with his chin in the air, because i know, in the nature of things, that he will be jealous of superior women; nor to a woman whose mouth has the "prunes and prisms" expression, for i know she will say, "i have all the rights i want." going up to london one day, a few years later, i noticed a saintly sister, belonging to the salvation army, timidly offering some leaflets to several persons on board; all coolly declined to receive them. having had much experience in the joys and sorrows of propagandism, i put out my hand and asked her to give them to me. i thanked her and read them before reaching london. it did me no harm and her much good in thinking that she might have planted a new idea in my mind. whatever is given to us freely, i think, in common politeness, we should accept graciously. while i was enjoying once more the comforts of home, on the blue hills of jersey, miss anthony was lighting the fires of liberty on the mountain tops of oregon and washington territory. all through the months of october, november, and december, , she was jolting about in stages, over rough roads, speaking in every hamlet where a schoolhouse was to be found, and scattering our breezy leaflets to the four winds of heaven. from to miss anthony and i made several trips through iowa, missouri, illinois, and nebraska, holding meetings at most of the chief towns; i speaking in the afternoons to women alone on "marriage and maternity." as miss anthony had other pressing engagements in kansas and nebraska, i went alone to texas, speaking in dallas, sherman, and houston, where i was delayed two weeks by floods and thus prevented from going to austin, galveston, and some points in louisiana, where i was advertised to lecture. in fact i lost all my appointments for a month. however, there was a fine hotel in houston and many pleasant people, among whom i made some valuable acquaintances. beside several public meetings, i had parlor talks and scattered leaflets, so that my time was not lost. as the floods had upset my plans for the winter, i went straight from houston to new york over the iron mountain railroad. i anticipated a rather solitary trip; but, fortunately, i met general baird, whom i knew, and some other army officers, who had been down on the mexican border to settle some troubles in the "free zone." we amused ourselves on the long journey with whist and woman suffrage discussions. we noticed a dyspeptic-looking clergyman, evidently of a bilious temperament, eying us very steadily and disapprovingly the first day, and in a quiet way we warned each other that, in due time, he would give us a sermon on the sin of card playing. sitting alone, early next morning, he seated himself by my side, and asked me if i would allow him to express his opinion on card playing. i said "oh, yes! i fully believe in free speech." "well," said he, "i never touch cards. i think they are an invention of the devil to lead unwary souls from all serious thought of the stern duties of life and the realities of eternity! i was sorry to see you, with your white hair, probably near the end of your earthly career, playing cards and talking with those reckless army officers, who delight in killing their fellow-beings. no! i do not believe in war or card playing; such things do not prepare the soul for heaven." "well," said i, "you are quite right, with your views, to abjure the society of army officers and all games of cards. you, no doubt, enjoy your own thoughts and the book you are reading, more than you would the conversation of those gentlemen and a game of whist. we must regulate our conduct by our own highest ideal. while i deplore the necessity of war, yet i know in our army many of the noblest types of manhood, whose acquaintance i prize most highly. i enjoy all games, too, from chess down to dominoes. there is so much that is sad and stern in life that we need sometimes to lay down its burdens and indulge in innocent amusements. thus, you see, what is wise from my standpoint is unwise from yours. i am sorry that you repudiate all amusements, as they contribute to the health of body and soul. you are sorry that i do not think as you do and regulate my life accordingly. you are sure that you are right. i am equally sure that i am. hence there is nothing to be done in either case but to let each other alone, and wait for the slow process of evolution to give to each of us a higher standard." just then one of the officers asked me if i was ready for a game of whist, and i excused myself from further discussion. i met many of those dolorous saints in my travels, who spent so much thought on eternity and saving their souls that they lost all the joys of time, as well as those sweet virtues of courtesy and charity that might best fit them for good works on earth and happiness in heaven. in the spring i went to nebraska, and miss anthony and i again made a western tour, sometimes together and sometimes by different routes. a constitutional convention was in session in lincoln, and it was proposed to submit an amendment to strike the word "male" from the constitution. nebraska became a state in march, , and took "equality before the law" as her motto. her territorial legislature had discussed, many times, proposed liberal legislation for women, and her state legislature had twice considered propositions for woman's enfranchisement. i had a valise with me containing hon. benjamin f. butler's minority reports as a member of the judiciary committee of the united states house of representatives, in favor of woman's right to vote under the fourteenth amendment. as we were crossing the platte river, in transferring the baggage to the boat, my valise fell into the river. my heart stood still at the thought of such a fate for all those able arguments. after the great general had been in hot water all his life, it was grievous to think of any of his lucubrations perishing in cold water at last. fortunately they were rescued. on reaching lincoln i was escorted to the home of the governor, where i spread the documents in the sunshine, and they were soon ready to be distributed among the members of the constitutional convention. after i had addressed the convention, some of the members called on me to discuss the points of my speech. all the gentlemen were serious and respectful with one exception. a man with an unusually small head, diminutive form, and crooked legs tried, at my expense, to be witty and facetious. during a brief pause in the conversation he brought his chair directly before me and said, in a mocking tone, "don't you think that the best thing a woman can do is to perform well her part in the role of wife and mother? my wife has presented me with eight beautiful children; is not this a better life-work than that of exercising the right of suffrage?" i had had my eye on this man during the whole interview, and saw that the other members were annoyed at his behavior. i decided, when the opportune moment arrived, to give him an answer not soon to be forgotten; so i promptly replied to his question, as i slowly viewed him from head to foot, "i have met few men, in my life, worth repeating eight times." the members burst into a roar of laughter, and one of them, clapping him on the shoulder, said: "there, sonny, you have read and spelled; you better go." this scene was heralded in all the nebraska papers, and, wherever the little man went, he was asked why mrs. stanton thought he was not worth repeating eight times. during my stay in lincoln there was a celebration of the opening of some railroad. an immense crowd from miles about assembled on this occasion. the collation was spread and speeches were made in the open air. the men congratulated each other on the wonderful progress the state had made since it became an organized territory in . there was not the slightest reference, at first, to the women. one speaker said: "this state was settled by three brothers, john, james, and joseph, and from them have sprung the great concourse of people that greet us here to-day." i turned, and asked the governor if all these people had sprung, minerva-like, from the brains of john, james, and joseph. he urged me to put that question to the speaker; so, in one of his eloquent pauses, i propounded the query, which was greeted with loud and prolonged cheers, to the evident satisfaction of the women present. the next speaker took good care to give the due meed of praise to ann, jane, and mary, and to every mention of the mothers of nebraska the crowd heartily responded. in toasting "the women of nebraska," at the collation, i said: "here's to the mothers, who came hither by long, tedious journeys, closely packed with restless children in emigrant wagons, cooking the meals by day, and nursing the babies by night, while the men slept. leaving comfortable homes in the east, they endured all the hardships of pioneer life, suffered, with the men, the attacks of the dakota indians and the constant apprehension of savage raids, of prairie fires, and the devastating locusts. man's trials, his fears, his losses, all fell on woman with double force; yet history is silent concerning the part woman performed in the frontier life of the early settlers. men make no mention of her heroism and divine patience; they take no thought of the mental or physical agonies women endure in the perils of maternity, ofttimes without nurse or physician in the supreme hour of their need, going, as every mother does, to the very gates of death in giving life to an immortal being!" traveling all over these western states in the early days, seeing the privations women suffered, and listening to the tales of sorrow at the fireside, i wondered that men could ever forget the debt of gratitude they owed to their mothers, or fail to commemorate their part in the growth of a great people. yet the men of nebraska have twice defeated the woman suffrage amendment. in michigan was the point of interest to all those who had taken part in the woman-suffrage movement. the legislature, by a very large majority, submitted to a vote of the electors an amendment of the constitution, in favor of striking out the word "male" and thus securing civil and political rights to the women of the state. it was a very active campaign. crowded meetings were held in all the chief towns and cities. professor moses coit tyler, and a large number of ministers preached, every sunday, on the subject of woman's position. the methodist conference passed a resolution in favor of the amendment by a unanimous vote. i was in the state during the intense heat of may and june, speaking every evening to large audiences; in the afternoon to women alone, and preaching every sunday in some pulpit. the methodists, universalists, unitarians, and quakers all threw open their churches to the apostles of the new gospel of equality for women. we spoke in jails, prisons, asylums, depots, and the open air. wherever there were ears to hear, we lifted up our voices, and, on the wings of the wind, the glad tidings were carried to the remote corners of the state, and the votes of forty thousand men, on election day, in favor of the amendment were so many testimonials to the value of the educational work accomplished. i made many valuable acquaintances, on that trip, with whom i have maintained lifelong friendships. one pleasant day i passed in the home of governor bagley and his wife, with a group of pretty children. i found the governor deeply interested in prison reform. he had been instrumental in passing a law giving prisoners lights in their cells and pleasant reading matter until nine o'clock. his ideas of what prisons should be, as unfolded that day, have since been fully realized in the grand experiment now being successfully tried at elmira, new york. i visited the state prison at jackson, and addressed seven hundred men and boys, ranging from seventy down to seventeen years of age. seated on the dais with the chaplain, i saw them file in to dinner, and, while they were eating, i had an opportunity to study the sad, despairing faces before me. i shall never forget the hopeless expression of one young man, who had just been sentenced for twenty years, nor how ashamed i felt that one of my own sex, trifling with two lovers, had fanned the jealousy of one against the other, until the tragedy ended in the death of one and the almost lifelong imprisonment of the other. if girls should be truthful and transparent in any relations in life, surely it is in those of love, involving the strongest passions of which human nature is capable. as the chaplain told me the sad story, and i noticed the prisoner's refined face and well-shaped head, i felt that the young man was not under the right influences to learn the lesson he needed. fear, coercion, punishment, are the masculine remedies for moral weakness, but statistics show their failure for centuries. why not change the system and try the education of the moral and intellectual faculties, cheerful surroundings, inspiring influences? everything in our present system tends to lower the physical vitality, the self-respect, the moral tone, and to harden instead of reforming the criminal. my heart was so heavy i did not know what to say to such an assembly of the miserable. i asked the chaplain what i should say. "just what you please," he replied. thinking they had probably heard enough of their sins, their souls, and the plan of salvation, i thought i would give them the news of the day. so i told them about the woman suffrage amendment, what i was doing in the state, my amusing encounters with opponents, their arguments, my answers. i told them of the great changes that would be effected in prison life when the mothers of the nation had a voice in the buildings and discipline. i told them what governor bagley said, and of the good time coming when prisons would no longer be places of punishment but schools of reformation. to show them what women would do to realize this beautiful dream, i told them of elizabeth fry and dorothea l. dix, of mrs. farnham's experiment at sing sing, and louise michel's in new caledonia, and, in closing, i said: "now i want all of you who are in favor of the amendment to hold up your right hands." they gave a unanimous vote, and laughed heartily when i said, "i do wish you could all go to the polls in november and that we could lock our opponents up here until after the election." i felt satisfied that they had had one happy hour, and that i had said nothing to hurt the feelings of the most unfortunate. as they filed off to their respective workshops my faith and hope for brighter days went with them. then i went all through the prison. everything looked clean and comfortable on the surface, but i met a few days after a man, just set free, who had been there five years for forgery. he told me the true inwardness of the system; of the wretched, dreary life they suffered, and the brutality of the keepers. he said the prison was infested with mice and vermin, and that, during the five years he was there, he had never lain down one night to undisturbed slumber. the sufferings endured in summer for want of air, he said, were indescribable. in this prison the cells were in the center of the building, the corridors running all around by the windows, so the prisoners had no outlook and no direct contact with the air. hence, if a careless keeper forgot to open the windows after a storm, the poor prisoners panted for air in their cells, like fish out of water. my informant worked in the mattress department, over the room where prisoners were punished. he said he could hear the lash and the screams of the victims from morning till night. "hard as the work is all day," said he, "it is a blessed relief to get out of our cells to march across the yard and get one glimpse of the heavens above, and one breath of pure air, and to be in contact with other human souls in the workshops, for, although we could never speak to each other, yet there was a hidden current of sympathy conveyed by look that made us one in our misery." though the press of the state was largely in our favor, yet there were some editors who, having no arguments, exercised the little wit they did possess in low ridicule. it was in this campaign that an editor in a kalamazoo journal said: "that ancient daughter of methuselah, susan b. anthony, passed through our city yesterday, on her way to the plainwell meeting, with a bonnet on her head looking as if it had recently descended from noah's ark." miss anthony often referred to this description of herself, and said, "had i represented twenty thousand voters in michigan, that political editor would not have known nor cared whether i was the oldest or the youngest daughter of methuselah, or whether my bonnet came from the ark or from worth's." chapter xix. the spirit of ' . the year was one of intense excitement and laborious activity throughout the country. the anticipation of the centennial birthday of the republic, to be celebrated in philadelphia, stirred the patriotism of the people to the highest point of enthusiasm. as each state was to be represented in the great exhibition, local pride added another element to the public interest. then, too, everyone who could possibly afford the journey was making busy preparations to spend the fourth of july, the natal day of the republic, mid the scenes where the declaration of independence was issued in , the government inaugurated, and the first national councils were held. those interested in women's political rights decided to make the fourth a woman's day, and to celebrate the occasion, in their various localities, by delivering orations and reading their own declaration of rights, with dinners and picnics in the town halls or groves, as most convenient. but many from every state in the union made their arrangements to spend the historic period in philadelphia. owing, also, to the large number of foreigners who came over to join in the festivities, that city was crammed to its utmost capacity. with the crowd and excessive heat, comfort was everywhere sacrificed to curiosity. the enthusiasm throughout the country had given a fresh impulse to the lyceum bureaus. like the ferryboats in new york harbor, running hither and thither, crossing each other's tracks, the whole list of lecturers were on the wing, flying to every town and city from san francisco to new york. as soon as a new railroad ran through a village of five hundred inhabitants that could boast a schoolhouse, a church, or a hotel, and one enterprising man or woman, a course of lectures was at once inaugurated as a part of the winter's entertainments. on one occasion i was invited, by mistake, to a little town to lecture the same evening when the christy minstrels were to perform. it was arranged, as the town had only one hall, that i should speak from seven to eight o'clock and the minstrels should have the remainder of the time. one may readily see that, with the minstrels in anticipation, a lecture on any serious question would occupy but a small place in the hearts of the people in a town where they seldom had entertainments of any kind. all the time i was speaking there was a running to and fro behind the scenes, where the minstrels were transforming themselves with paints and curly wigs into africans, and laughing at each other's jests. as it was a warm evening, and the windows were open, the hilarity of the boys in the street added to the general din. under such circumstances it was difficult to preserve my equilibrium. i felt like laughing at my own comical predicament, and i decided to make my address a medley of anecdotes and stories, like a string of beads, held together by a fine thread of argument and illustration. the moment the hand of the clock pointed at eight o'clock the band struck up, thus announcing that the happy hour for the minstrels had come. those of my audience who wished to stay were offered seats at half price; those who did not, slipped out, and the crowd rushed in, soon packing the house to its utmost capacity. i stayed, and enjoyed the performance of the minstrels more than i had my own. as the lyceum season lasted from october to june, i was late in reaching philadelphia. miss anthony and mrs. gage had already been through the agony of finding appropriate headquarters for the national suffrage association. i found them pleasantly situated on the lower floor of no. chestnut street, with the work for the coming month clearly mapped out. as it was the year for nominating candidates for the presidency of the united states, the republicans and democrats were about to hold their great' conventions. hence letters were to be written to them recommending a woman suffrage plank in their platforms, and asking seats for women in the conventions, with the privilege of being heard in their own behalf. on these letters our united wisdom was concentrated, and twenty thousand copies of each were published. then it was thought pre-eminently proper that a woman's declaration of rights should be issued. days and nights were spent over that document. after many twists from our analytical tweezers, with a critical consideration of every word and sentence, it was at last, by a consensus of the competent, pronounced very good. thousands were ordered to be printed, and were folded, put in envelopes, stamped, directed, and scattered. miss anthony, mrs. gage, and i worked sixteen hours, day and night, pressing everyone who came in, into the service, and late at night carrying immense bundles to be mailed. with meetings, receptions, and a succession of visitors, all of whom we plied with woman suffrage literature, we felt we had accomplished a great educational work. among the most enjoyable experiences at our headquarters were the frequent visits of our beloved lucretia mott, who used to come from her country home bringing us eggs, cold chickens, and fine oolong tea. as she had presented us with a little black teapot that, like mercury's mysterious pitcher of milk, filled itself for every coming guest, we often improvised luncheons with a few friends. at parting, lucretia always made a contribution to our depleted treasury. here we had many prolonged discussions as to the part we should take, on the fourth of july, in the public celebration. we thought it would be fitting for us to read our declaration of rights immediately after that of the fathers was read, as an impeachment of them and their male descendants for their injustice and oppression. ours contained as many counts, and quite as important, as those against king george in . accordingly, we applied to the authorities to allow us seats on the platform and a place in the programme of the public celebration, which was to be held in the historic old independence hall. as general hawley was in charge of the arrangements for the day, i wrote him as follows: " chestnut street, july , . "general hawley. "_honored sir_: as president of the national woman's suffrage association, i am authorized to ask you for tickets to the platform, at independence hall, for the celebration on the fourth of july. we should like to have seats for at least one representative woman from each state. we also ask your permission to read our declaration of rights immediately after the reading of the declaration of independence of the fathers is finished. although these are small favors to ask as representatives of one-half of the nation, yet we shall be under great obligations to you if granted. "respectfully yours, "elizabeth cady stanton." to this i received the following reply: "u.s.c.c. headquarters, july . "mrs. elizabeth cady stanton. "_dear madam_: i send you, with pleasure, half a dozen cards of invitation. as the platform is already crowded, it is impossible to reserve the number of seats you desire. i regret to say it is also impossible for us to make any change in the programme at this late hour. we are crowded for time to carry out what is already proposed. "yours very respectfully, "joseph r. hawley, "president, u.s.c.c." with this rebuff, mrs. mott and i decided that we would not accept the offered seats, but would be ready to open our own convention called for that day, at the first unitarian church, where the rev. william h. furness had preached for fifty years. but some of our younger coadjutors decided that they would occupy the seats and present our declaration of rights. they said truly, women will be taxed to pay the expenses of this celebration, and we have as good a right to that platform and to the ears of the people as the men have, and we will be heard. that historic fourth of july dawned at last, one of the most oppressive days of that heated season. susan b. anthony, matilda joslyn gage, sara andrews spencer, lillie devereux blake, and phoebe w. couzins made their way through the crowds under the broiling sun of independence square, carrying the woman's declaration of rights. this declaration had been handsomely engrossed by one of their number, and signed by the oldest and most prominent advocates of woman's enfranchisement. their tickets of admission proved an "open sesame" through the military barriers, and, a few moments before the opening of the ceremonies, these women found themselves within the precincts from which most of their sex were excluded. the declaration of was read by richard henry lee of virginia, about whose family clusters so much historic fame. the moment he finished reading was determined upon as the appropriate time for the presentation of the woman's declaration. not quite sure how their approach might be met, not quite certain if, at this final moment, they would be permitted to reach the presiding officer, those ladies arose and made their way down the aisle. the bustle of preparation for the brazilian hymn covered their advance. the foreign guests and the military and civil officers who filled the space directly in front of the speaker's stand, courteously made way, while miss anthony, in fitting words, presented the declaration to the presiding officer. senator ferry's face paled as, bowing low, with no word he received the declaration, which thus became part of the day's proceedings. the ladies turned, scattering printed copies as they deliberately walked down the platform. on every side eager hands were outstretched, men stood on seats and asked for them, while general hawley, thus defied and beaten in his audacious denial to women of the right to present their declaration, shouted, "order, order!" passing out, these ladies made their way to a platform, erected for the musicians, in front of independence hall. here, under the shadow of washington's statue, back of them the old bell that proclaimed "liberty to all the land and all the inhabitants thereof," they took their places, and, to a listening, applauding crowd, miss anthony read the woman's declaration. during the reading of the declaration, mrs. gage stood beside miss anthony and held an umbrella over her head, to shelter her friend from the intense heat of the noonday sun. and thus in the same hour, on opposite sides of old independence hall, did the men and women express their opinions on the great principles proclaimed on the natal day of the republic. the declaration was handsomely framed, and now hangs in the vice president's room in the capitol at washington. these heroic ladies then hurried from independence hall to the church, already crowded with an expectant audience, to whom they gave a full report of the morning's proceedings. the hutchinsons of worldwide fame were present in their happiest vein, interspersing the speeches with appropriate songs and felicitous remarks. for five long hours on that hot midsummer day a crowded audience, many standing, listened with profound interest and reluctantly dispersed at last, all agreeing that it was one of the most impressive and enthusiastic meetings they had ever attended. all through our civil war the slaves on the southern plantations had an abiding faith that the terrible conflict would result in freedom for their race. just so through all the busy preparations of the centennial, the women of the nation felt sure that the great national celebration could not pass without the concession of some new liberties to them. hence they pressed their claims at every point, at the fourth of july celebration in the exposition buildings, and in the republican and democratic nominating conventions; hoping to get a plank in the platforms of both the great political parties. the woman's pavilion upon the centennial grounds was an afterthought, as theologians claim woman herself to have been. the women of the country, after having contributed nearly one hundred thousand dollars to the centennial stock, found there had been no provision made for the separate exhibition of their work. the centennial board, of which mrs. gillespie was president, then decided to raise funds for the erection of a separate building, to be known as the woman's pavilion. it covered an acre of ground, and was erected at an expense of thirty thousand dollars--a small sum in comparison with the money which had been raised by women and expended on the other buildings, not to speak of the state and national appropriations, which the taxes levied on them had largely helped to swell. the pavilion was no true exhibit of woman's art. few women are, as yet, owners of the business which their industry largely makes remunerative. cotton factories, in which thousands of women work, are owned by men. the shoe business, in some branches of which women are doing more than half the work, is under the ownership of men. rich embroideries from india, rugs of downy softness from turkey, the muslin of decca, anciently known as "the woven wind," the pottery and majolica ware of p. pipsen's widow, the cartridges and envelopes of uncle sam, waltham watches, whose finest mechanical work is done by women, and ten thousand other industries found no place in the pavilion. said united states commissioner meeker of colorado, "woman's work comprises three-fourths of the exposition; it is scattered through every building; take it away, and there would be no exposition." but this pavilion rendered one good service to woman in showing her capabilities as an engineer. the boiler, which furnished the force for running its work, was under the charge of a young canadian girl, miss allison, who, from childhood, had loved machinery, spending much time in the large saw and grist mills of her father, run by engines of two and three hundred horse-power, which she sometimes managed for amusement. when her name was proposed for running the pavilion machinery, it caused much opposition. it was said that the committee would, some day, find the pavilion blown to atoms; that the woman engineer would spend her time reading novels instead of watching the steam gauge; that the idea was impracticable and should not be thought of. but miss allison soon proved her capabilities and the falseness of these prophecies by taking her place in the engine room and managing its workings with perfect ease. six power looms, on which women wove carpets, webbing, silks, etc., were run by this engine. at a later period the printing of _the new century for woman_, a paper published by the centennial commission in the woman's building, was done by its means. miss allison declared the work to be more cleanly, more pleasant, and infinitely less fatiguing than cooking over a kitchen stove. "since i have been compelled to earn my own living," she said, "i have never been engaged in work i like so well. teaching school is much harder, and one is not paid so well." she expressed her confidence in her ability to manage the engines of an ocean steamer, and said that there were thousands of small engines in use in various parts of the country, and no reason existed why women should not be employed to manage them,--following the profession of engineer as a regular business,--an engine requiring far less attention than is given by a nursemaid or a mother to a child. but to have made the woman's pavilion grandly historic, upon its walls should have been hung the yearly protest of harriet k. hunt against taxation without representation; the legal papers served upon the smith sisters when, for their refusal to pay taxes while unrepresented, their alderney cows were seized and sold; the papers issued by the city of worcester for the forced sale of the house and lands of abby kelly foster, the veteran abolitionist, because she refused to pay taxes, giving the same reason our ancestors gave when they resisted taxation; a model of bunker hill monument, its foundation laid by lafayette in , but which remained unfinished nearly twenty years, until the famous german danseuse, fanny ellsler, gave the proceeds of a public performance for that purpose. with these should have been exhibited framed copies of all the laws bearing unjustly upon women--those which rob her of her name, her earnings, her property, her children, her person; also the legal papers in the case of susan b. anthony, who was tried and fined for claiming her right to vote under the fourteenth amendment, and the decision of mr. justice miller in the case of myra bradwell, denying national protection for woman's civil rights; and the later decision of chief justice waite of the united states supreme court against virginia l. minor, denying women national protection for their political rights; decisions in favor of state rights which imperil the liberties not only of all women, but of every white man in the nation. woman's most fitting contributions to the centennial exposition would have been these protests, laws, and decisions, which show her political slavery. but all this was left for rooms outside of the centennial grounds, upon chestnut street, where the national woman's suffrage association hoisted its flag, made its protests, and wrote the declaration of rights of the women of the united states. to many thoughtful people it seemed captious and unreasonable for women to complain of injustice in this free land, amidst such universal rejoicings. when the majority of women are seemingly happy, it is natural to suppose that the discontent of the minority is the result of their unfortunate individual idiosyncrasies, and not of adverse influences in established conditions. but the history of the world shows that the vast majority, in every generation, passively accept the conditions into which they are born, while those who demanded larger liberties are ever a small, ostracized minority, whose claims are ridiculed and ignored. from our standpoint we would honor any chinese woman who claimed the right to her feet and powers of locomotion; the hindoo widows who refused to ascend the funeral pyre of their husbands; the turkish women who threw off their masks and veils and left the harem; the mormon women who abjured their faith and demanded monogamic relations. why not equally honor the intelligent minority of american women who protest against the artificial disabilities by which their freedom is limited and their development arrested? that only a few, under any circumstances, protest against the injustice of long-established laws and customs, does not disprove the fact of the oppressions, while the satisfaction of the many, if real, only proves their apathy and deeper degradation. that a majority of the women of the united states accept, without protest, the disabilities which grow out of their disfranchisement is simply an evidence of their ignorance and cowardice, while the minority who demand a higher political status clearly prove their superior intelligence and wisdom. at the close of the forty-seventh congress we made two new demands: first, for a special committee to consider all questions in regard to the civil and political rights of women. we naturally asked the question, as congress has a special committee on the rights of indians, why not on those of women? are not women, as a factor in civilization, of more importance than indians? secondly, we asked for a room, in the capitol, where our committee could meet, undisturbed, whenever they saw fit. though these points were debated a long time, our demands were acceded to at last. we now have our special committee, and our room, with "woman suffrage" in gilt letters, over the door. in our struggle to achieve this, while our champion, the senior senator from massachusetts, stood up bravely in the discussion, the opposition not only ridiculed the special demand, but all attempts to secure the civil and political rights of women. as an example of the arguments of the opposition, i give what the senator from missouri said. it is a fair specimen of all that was produced on that side of the debate. mr. vest's poetical flights are most inspiring: "the senate now has forty-one committees, with a small army of messengers and clerks, one-half of whom, without exaggeration, are literally without employment. i shall not pretend to specify the committees of this body which have not one single bill, resolution, or proposition of any sort pending before them, and have not had for months. but, mr. president, out of all committees without business, and habitually without business, in this body, there is one that, beyond any question, could take jurisdiction of this matter and do it ample justice. i refer to that most respectable and antique institution, the committee on revolutionary claims. for thirty years it has been without business. for thirty long years the placid surface of that parliamentary sea has been without one single ripple. if the senator from massachusetts desires a tribunal for a calm, judicial equilibrium and examination--a tribunal far from the 'madding crowd's ignoble strife'--a tribunal eminently respectable, dignified and unique; why not send this question to the committee on revolutionary claims? it is eminently proper that this subject should go to that committee because, if there is any revolutionary claim in this country, it is that of woman suffrage. (laughter.) it revolutionizes society; it revolutionizes religion; it revolutionizes the constitution and laws; and it revolutionizes the opinions of those so old-fashioned among us as to believe that the legitimate and proper sphere of woman is the family circle, as wife and mother, and not as politician and voter--those of us who are proud to believe that "woman's noblest station is retreat: her fairest virtues fly from public sight; domestic worth--that shuns too strong a light. "before that committee on revolutionary claims why could not this most revolutionary of all claims receive immediate and ample attention? more than that, as i said before, if there is any tribunal that could give undivided time and dignified attention, is it not this committee? if there is one peaceful haven of rest, never disturbed by any profane bill or resolution of any sort, it is the committee on revolutionary claims. it is, in parliamentary life, described by that ecstatic verse in watts' hymn-- "there shall i bathe my wearied soul in seas of endless rest. and not one wave of trouble roll across my peaceful breast. "by all natural laws, stagnation breeds disease and death, and what could stir up this most venerable and respectable institution more than an application of the strong-minded, with short hair and shorter skirts, invading its dignified realm and elucidating all the excellences of female suffrage. moreover, if these ladies could ever succeed in the providence of god in obtaining a report from that committee, it would end this question forever; for the public at large and myself included, in view of that miracle of female blandishment and female influence, would surrender at once, and female suffrage would become constitutional and lawful. sir, i insist upon it that, in deference to this committee, in deference to the fact that it needs this sort of regimen and medicine, this whole subject should be so referred." this gives a very fair idea of the character of the arguments produced by our opponents, from the inauguration of the movement. but, as there are no arguments in a republican government in favor of an aristocracy of sex, ridicule was really the only available weapon. after declaring "that no just government can be formed without the consent of the governed," "that taxation without representation is tyranny," it is difficult to see on what basis one-half the people are disfranchised. chapter xx. writing "the history of woman suffrage." the four years following the centennial were busy, happy ones, of varied interests and employments, public and private. sons and daughters graduating from college, bringing troops of young friends to visit us; the usual matrimonial entanglements, with all their promises of celestial bliss intertwined with earthly doubts and fears; weddings, voyages to europe, business ventures--in this whirl of plans and projects our heads, hearts, and hands were fully occupied. seven boys and girls dancing round the fireside, buoyant with all life's joys opening before them, are enough to keep the most apathetic parents on the watch-towers by day and anxious even in dreamland by night. my spare time, if it can be said that i ever had any, was given during these days to social festivities. the inevitable dinners, teas, picnics, and dances with country neighbors, all came round in quick succession. we lived, at this time, at tenafly, new jersey, not far from the publisher of the _sun_, isaac w. england, who also had seven boys and girls as full of frolic as our own. mrs. england and i entered into all their games with equal zest. the youngest thought half the fun was to see our enthusiasm in "blindman's buff," "fox and geese," and "bean bags." it thrills me with delight, even now, to see these games! mr. england was the soul of hospitality. he was never more happy than when his house was crowded with guests, and his larder with all the delicacies of the season. though he and mr. stanton were both connected with that dignified journal, the new york _sun_, yet they often joined in the general hilarity. i laugh, as i write, at the memory of all the frolics we had on the blue hills of jersey. in addition to the domestic cares which a large family involved, mrs. gage, miss anthony, and i were already busy collecting material for "the history of woman suffrage." this required no end of correspondence. then my lecturing trips were still a part of the annual programme. washington conventions, too, with calls, appeals, resolutions, speeches and hearings before the committees of congress and state legislatures, all these came round in the year's proceedings as regularly as pumpkin pies for thanksgiving, plum pudding for christmas, and patriotism for washington's birthday. those who speak for glory or philanthropy are always in demand for college commencements and fourth of july orations, hence much of miss anthony's eloquence, as well as my own, was utilized in this way. on october , , i had an impromptu dinner party. elizabeth boynton harbert, may wright thompson (now sewall), phoebe w. couzins, and arethusa forbes, returning from a boston convention, all by chance met under my roof. we had a very merry time talking over the incidents of the convention, boston proprieties, and the general situation. as i gave them many early reminiscences, they asked if i had kept a diary. "no," i said, "not a pen scratch of the past have i except what might be gathered from many family letters." they urged me to begin a diary at once; so i promised i would on my coming birthday. my great grief that day was that we were putting in a new range, and had made no preparations for dinner. this completely upset the presiding genius of my culinary department, as she could not give us the bounteous feast she knew was expected on such occasions. i, as usual, when there was any lack in the viands, tried to be as brilliant as possible in conversation; discussing nirvana, karma, reincarnation, and thus turning attention from the evanescent things of earth to the joys of a life to come,--not an easy feat to perform with strong-minded women,--but, in parting, they seemed happy and refreshed, and all promised to come again. but we shall never meet there again, as the old, familiar oaks and the majestic chestnut trees have passed into other hands. strange lovers now whisper their vows of faith and trust under the tree where a most charming wedding ceremony--that of my daughter margaret--was solemnized one bright october day. all nature seemed to do her utmost to heighten the beauty of the occasion. the verdure was brilliant with autumnal tints, the hazy noonday sun lent a peculiar softness to every shadow--even the birds and insects were hushed to silence. as the wedding march rose soft and clear, two stately ushers led the way; then a group of vassar classmates, gayly decked in silks of different colors, followed by the bride and groom. an immense saint bernard dog, on his own account brought up the rear, keeping time with measured tread. he took his seat in full view, watching, alternately, the officiating clergyman, the bride and groom, and guests, as if to say: "what does all this mean?" no one behaved with more propriety and no one looked more radiant than he, with a ray of sunlight on his beautiful coat of long hair, his bright brass collar, and his wonderful head. bruno did not live to see the old home broken up, but sleeps peacefully there, under the chestnut trees, and fills a large place in many of our pleasant memories. on november , , i was sixty-five years old, and, pursuant to my promise, i then began my diary. it was a bright, sunny day, but the frost king was at work; all my grand old trees, that stood like sentinels, to mark the boundary of my domain, were stripped of their foliage, and their brilliant colors had faded into a uniform brown; but the evergreens and the tall, prim cedars held their own, and, when covered with snow, their exquisite beauty brought tears to my eyes. one need never be lonely mid beautiful trees. my thoughts were with my absent children--harriot in france, theodore in germany, margaret with her husband and brother gerrit, halfway across the continent, and bob still in college. i spent the day writing letters and walking up and down the piazza, and enjoyed, from my windows, a glorious sunset. alone, on birthdays or holidays, one is very apt to indulge in sad retrospections. the thought of how much more i might have done for the perfect development of my children than i had accomplished, depressed me. i thought of all the blunders in my own life and in their education. little has been said of the responsibilities of parental life; accordingly little or nothing has been done. i had such visions of parental duties that day that i came to the conclusion that parents never could pay the debt they owe their children for bringing them into this world of suffering, unless they can insure them sound minds in sound bodies, and enough of the good things of this life to enable them to live without a continual struggle for the necessaries of existence. i have no sympathy with the old idea that children owe parents a debt of gratitude for the simple fact of existence, generally conferred without thought and merely for their own pleasure. how seldom we hear of any high or holy preparation for the office of parenthood! here, in the most momentous act of life, all is left to chance. men and women, intelligent and prudent in all other directions, seem to exercise no forethought here, but hand down their individual and family idiosyncrasies in the most reckless mariner. on november the new york _tribune_ announced the death of lucretia mott, eighty-eight years old. having known her in the flush of life, when all her faculties were at their zenith, and in the repose of age, when her powers began to wane, her withdrawal from among us seemed as beautiful and natural as the changing foliage, from summer to autumn, of some grand old oak i have watched and loved. the arrival of miss anthony and mrs. gage, on november , banished all family matters from my mind. what planning, now, for volumes, chapters, footnotes, margins, appendices, paper, and type; of engravings, title, preface, and introduction! i had never thought that the publication of a book required the consideration of such endless details. we stood appalled before the mass of material, growing higher and higher with every mail, and the thought of all the reading involved made us feel as if our lifework lay before us. six weeks of steady labor all day, and often until midnight, made no visible decrease in the pile of documents. however, before the end of the month we had our arrangements all made with publishers and engravers, and six chapters in print. when we began to correct proof we felt as if something was accomplished. thus we worked through the winter and far into the spring, with no change except the washington convention and an occasional evening meeting in new york city. we had frequent visits from friends whom we were glad to see. hither came edward m. davis, sarah pugh, adeline thompson, frederick cabot of boston, dr. william f. channing, and sweet little clara spence, who recited for us some of the most beautiful selections in her repertoire. in addition we had numberless letters from friends and foes, some praising and some condemning our proposed undertaking, and, though much alone, we were kept in touch with the outside world. but so conflicting was the tone of the letters that, if we had not taken a very fair gauge of ourselves and our advisers, we should have abandoned our project and buried all the valuable material collected, to sleep in pine boxes forever. at this time i received a very amusing letter from the rev. robert collyer, on "literary righteousness," quizzing me for using one of his anecdotes in my sketch of lucretia mott, without giving him credit. i laughed him to scorn, that he should have thought it was my duty to have done so. i told him plainly that he belonged to a class of "white male citizens," who had robbed me of all civil and political rights; of property, children, and personal freedom; and now it ill became him to call me to account for using one of his little anecdotes that, ten to one, he had cribbed from some woman. i told him that i considered his whole class as fair game for literary pilfering. that women had been taxed to build colleges to educate men, and if we could pick up a literary crumb that had fallen from their feasts, we surely had a right to it. moreover, i told him that man's duty in the world was to work, to dig and delve for jewels, real and ideal, and lay them at woman's feet, for her to use as she might see fit; that he should feel highly complimented, instead of complaining, that he had written something i thought worth using. he answered like the nobleman he is; susceptible of taking in a new idea. he admitted that, in view of the shortcomings of his entire sex, he had not one word to say in the way of accusation, but lay prostrate at my feet in sackcloth and ashes, wondering that he had not taken my view of the case in starting. only twice in my life have i been accused of quoting without giving due credit. the other case was that of matilda joslyn gage. i had, on two or three occasions, used a motto of hers in autograph books, just as i had sentiments from longfellow, lowell, shakespeare, moses, or paul. in long lyceum trips innumerable autograph books met one at every turn, in the cars, depots, on the platform, at the hotel and in the omnibus. "a sentiment, please," cry half a dozen voices. one writes hastily different sentiments for each. in this way i unfortunately used a pet sentiment of matilda's. so, here and now, i say to my autograph admirers, from new york to san francisco, whenever you see "there is a word sweeter than mother, home, or heaven--that word is liberty," remember it belongs to matilda joslyn gage. i hope, now, that robert and matilda will say, in their posthumous works, that i made the _amende honorable_, as i always strive to do when friends feel they have not been fairly treated. in may, , the first volume of our history appeared; it was an octavo, containing pages, with good paper, good print, handsome engravings, and nicely bound. i welcomed it with the same feeling of love and tenderness as i did my firstborn. i took the same pleasure in hearing it praised and felt the same mortification in hearing it criticised. the most hearty welcome it received was from rev. william henry channing. he wrote us that it was as interesting and fascinating as a novel. he gave it a most flattering notice in one of the london papers. john w. forney, too, wrote a good review and sent a friendly letter. mayo w. hazeltine, one of the ablest critics in this country, in the new york _sun_, also gave it a very careful and complimentary review. in fact, we received far more praise and less blame than we anticipated. we began the second volume in june. in reading over the material concerning woman's work in the war, i felt how little our labors are appreciated. who can sum up all the ills the women of a nation suffer from war? they have all of the misery and none of the glory; nothing to mitigate their weary waiting and watching for the loved ones who will return no more. in the spring of , to vary the monotony of the work on the history, we decided to hold a series of conventions through the new england states. we began during the anniversary week in boston, and had several crowded, enthusiastic meetings in tremont temple. in addition to our suffrage meetings, i spoke before the free religious, moral education, and heredity associations. all our speakers stayed at the parker house, and we had a very pleasant time visiting together in our leisure hours. we were received by governor long, at the state house. he made a short speech, in favor of woman suffrage, in reply to mrs. hooker. we also called on the mayor, at the city hall, and went through jordan & marsh's great mercantile establishment, where the clerks are chiefly young girls, who are well fed and housed, and have pleasant rooms, with a good library, where they sit and read in the evening. we went through the sherborn reformatory prison for women, managed entirely by women. we found it clean and comfortable, more like a pleasant home than a place of punishment. mrs. robinson, miss anthony, and i were invited to dine with the bird club. no woman, other than i, had ever had that honor before. i dined with them in , escorted by "warrington" of the springfield _republican_ and edwin morton. there i met frank sanborn for the first time. frank bird held about the same place in political life in massachusetts, that thurlow weed did in the state of new york for forty years. in the evening we had a crowded reception at the home of mrs. fenno tudor, who occupied a fine old residence facing the common, where we met a large gathering of boston reformers. on decoration day, may , we went to providence, where i was the guest of dr. william f. channing. we had a very successful convention there. senator anthony and ex-governor sprague were in the audience and expressed great pleasure, afterward, in all they had heard. i preached in rev. frederick hinckley's church the previous sunday afternoon. from providence i hurried home, to meet my son theodore and his bride, who had just landed from france. we decorated our house and grounds with chinese lanterns and national flags for their reception. as we had not time to send to new york for bunting, our flags--french and american--were all made of bright red and blue cambric. the effect was fine when they arrived; but, unfortunately, there came up a heavy thunderstorm in the night and so drenched our beautiful flags that they became colorless rags. my little maid announced to me early in the morning that "the french and americans had had a great battle during the night and that the piazza was covered with blood." this was startling news to one just awakening from a sound sleep. "why, emma!" i said, "what do you mean?" "why," she replied, "the rain has washed all the color out of our flags, and the piazza is covered with red and blue streams of water." as the morning sun appeared in all its glory, chasing the dark clouds away, our decorations did indeed look pale and limp, and were promptly removed. i was happily surprised with my tall, stately daughter, marguerite berry. a fine-looking girl of twenty, straight, strong, and sound, modest and pleasing. she can walk miles, sketches from nature with great skill and rapidity, and speaks three languages. i had always said to my sons: "when you marry, choose a woman with a spine and sound teeth; remember the teeth show the condition of the bones in the rest of the body." so, when theodore introduced his wife to me, he said, "you see i have followed your advice; her spine is as straight as it should be, and every tooth in her head as sound as ivory." this reminds me of a young man who used to put my stoves up for the winter. he told me one day that he thought of getting married. "well," i said, "above all things get a wife with a spine and sound teeth." stove pipe in hand he turned to me with a look of surprise, and said: "do they ever come without spines?" in july, , sitting under the trees, miss anthony and i read and discussed wendell phillips' magnificent speech before the phi beta kappa society at harvard college. this society had often talked of inviting him, but was afraid of his radical utterances. at last, hoping that years might have modified his opinions and somewhat softened his speech, an invitation was given. the élite of boston, the presidents and college professors from far and near, were there. a great audience of the wise, the learned, the distinguished in state and church assembled. such a conservative audience, it was supposed, would surely hold this radical in check. alas! they were all doomed, for once, to hear the naked truth, on every vital question of the day. thinking this might be his only opportunity to rouse some liberal thought in conservative minds, he struck the keynote of every reform; defended labor strikes, the nihilists of russia, prohibition, woman suffrage, and demanded reformation in our prisons, courts of justice, and halls of legislation. on the woman question, he said: "social science affirms that woman's place in society marks the level of civilization. from its twilight in greece, through the italian worship of the virgin, the dreams of chivalry, the justice of the civil law, and the equality of french society, we trace her gradual recognition, while our common law, as lord brougham confessed, was, with relation to women, the opprobrium of the age of christianity. for forty years earnest men and women, working noiselessly, have washed away the opprobrium, the statute books of thirty states have been remodeled, and woman stands, to-day, almost face to face with her last claim--the ballot. it has been a weary and thankless, though successful struggle. but if there be any refuge from that ghastly curse, the vice of great cities, before which social science stands palsied and dumb, it is in this more equal recognition of women. "if, in this critical battle for universal suffrage, our fathers' noblest legacy to us and the greatest trust god leaves in our hands, there be any weapon, which, once taken from the armory, will make victory certain, it will be as it has been in art, literature, and society, summoning woman into the political arena. the literary class, until within half a dozen years, has taken no note of this great uprising; only to fling every obstacle in its way. "the first glimpse we get of saxon blood in history is that line of tacitus in his 'germany,' which reads, 'in all grave matters they consult their women.' years hence, when robust saxon sense has flung away jewish superstition and eastern prejudice, and put under its foot fastidious scholarship and squeamish fashion, some second tacitus from the valley of the mississippi will answer to him of the seven hills: 'in all grave questions, we consult our women.' "if the alps, piled in cold and silence, be the emblem of despotism, we joyfully take the ever restless ocean for ours, only pure because never still. to be as good as our fathers, we must be better. they silenced their fears and subdued their prejudices, inaugurating free speech and equality with no precedent on the file. let us rise to their level, crush appetite, and prohibit temptation if it rots great cities; intrench labor in sufficient bulwarks against that wealth which, without the tenfold strength of modern incorporations, wrecked the grecian and roman states; and, with a sterner effort still, summon woman into civil life, as re-enforcement to our laboring ranks, in the effort to make our civilization a success. sit not like the figure on our silver coin, looking ever backward. "'new occasions teach new duties, time makes ancient good uncouth, they must upward still and onward, who would keep abreast of truth. lo! before us gleam her watch fires-- we ourselves must pilgrims be, launch our _mayflower_, and steer boldly through the desperate winter sea, nor attempt the future's portal with the past's blood-rusted key.'" that harvard speech in the face of fashion, bigotry, and conservatism--so liberal, so eloquent, so brave--is a model for every young man, who, like the orator, would devote his talents to the best interests of the race, rather than to his personal ambition for mere worldly success. toward the end of october, miss anthony returned, after a rest of two months, and we commenced work again on the second volume of the history. november being election day, the republican carriage, decorated with flags and evergreens, came to the door for voters. as i owned the house and paid the taxes, and as none of the white males was home, i suggested that i might go down and do the voting, whereupon the gentlemen who represented the republican committee urged me, most cordially, to do so. accompanied by my faithful friend, miss anthony, we stepped into the carriage and went to the poll, held in the hotel where i usually went to pay taxes. when we entered the room it was crowded with men. i was introduced to the inspectors by charles everett, one of our leading citizens, who said: "mrs. stanton is here, gentlemen, for the purpose of voting. as she is a taxpayer, of sound mind, and of legal age, i see no reason why she should not exercise this right of citizenship." the inspectors were thunderstruck. i think they were afraid that i was about to capture the ballot box. one placed his arms round it, with one hand close over the aperture where the ballots were slipped in, and said, with mingled surprise and pity, "oh, no, madam! men only are allowed to vote." i then explained to him that, in accordance with the constitution of new jersey, women had voted in new jersey down to , when they were forbidden the further exercise of the right by an arbitrary act of the legislature, and, by a recent amendment to the national constitution, congress had declared that "all persons born or naturalized in the united states, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the united states and of the state wherein they reside" and are entitled to vote. i told them that i wished to cast my vote, as a citizen of the united states, for the candidates for united states offices. two of the inspectors sat down and pulled their hats over their eyes, whether from shame or ignorance i do not know. the other held on to the box, and said "i know nothing about the constitutions, state or national. i never read either; but i do know that in new jersey, women have not voted in my day, and i cannot accept your ballot." so i laid my ballot in his hand, saying that i had the same right to vote that any man present had, and on him must rest the responsibility of denying me my rights of citizenship. all through the winter miss anthony and i worked diligently on the history. my daughter harriot came from europe in february, determined that i should return with her, as she had not finished her studies. to expedite my task on the history she seized the laboring oar, prepared the last chapter and corrected the proof as opportunity offered. as the children were scattered to the four points of the compass and my husband spent the winter in the city, we decided to lease our house and all take a holiday. we spent a month in new york city, busy on the history to the last hour, with occasional intervals of receiving and visiting friends. as i dreaded the voyage, the days flew by too fast for my pleasure. chapter xxi. in the south of france. having worked diligently through nearly two years on the second volume of "the history of woman suffrage," i looked forward with pleasure to a rest, in the old world, beyond the reach and sound of my beloved susan and the woman suffrage movement. on may , , i sailed with my daughter harriot on the _château léoville_ for bordeaux. the many friends who came to see us off brought fruits and flowers, boxes of candied ginger to ward off seasickness, letters of introduction, and light literature for the voyage. we had all the daily and weekly papers, secular and religious, the new monthly magazines, and several novels. we thought we would do an immense amount of reading, but we did very little. eating, sleeping, walking on deck, and watching the ever-changing ocean are about all that most people care to do. the sail down the harbor that bright, warm evening was beautiful, and, we lingered on deck in the moonlight until a late hour. i slept but little, that night, as two cats kept running in and out of my stateroom, and my berth was so narrow that i could only lie in one position--as straight as if already in my coffin. under such circumstances i spent the night, thinking over everything that was painful in my whole life, and imagining all the different calamities that might befall my family in my absence. it was a night of severe introspection and intense dissatisfaction. i was glad when the morning dawned and i could go on deck. during the day my couch was widened one foot, and, at night, the cats relegated to other quarters. we had a smooth, pleasant, uneventful voyage, until the last night, when, on nearing the french coast, the weather became dark and stormy. the next morning our good steamer pushed slowly and carefully up the broad, muddy gironde and landed us on the bustling quays of bordeaux, where my son theodore stood waiting to receive us. as we turned to say farewell to our sturdy ship--gazing up at its black iron sides besprinkled with salty foam--a feeling of deep thankfulness took possession of us, for she had been faithful to her trust, and had borne us safely from the new world to the old, over thousands of miles of treacherous sea. we spent a day in driving about bordeaux, enjoying the mere fact of restoration to _terra firma_ after twelve days' imprisonment on the ocean. maritime cities are much the same all the world over. the forests of masts, the heavily laden drays, the lounging sailors, the rough 'longshoremen, and the dirty quays, are no more characteristic of bordeaux than new york, london, and liverpool. but bordeaux was interesting as the birthplace of montesquieu and as the capital of ancient guienne and gascony. but i must not forget to mention an accident that happened on landing at bordeaux. we had innumerable pieces of baggage, a baby carriage, rocking chair, a box of "the history of woman suffrage" for foreign libraries, besides the usual number of trunks and satchels, and one hamper, in which were many things we were undecided whether to take or leave. into this, a loaded pistol had been carelessly thrown. the hamper being handled with an emphatic jerk by some jovial french sailor, the pistol exploded, shooting the bearer through the shoulder. he fell bleeding on the quay. the dynamite scare being just at its height, the general consternation was indescribable. every frenchman, with vehement gestures, was chattering to his utmost capacity, but keeping at a respectful distance from the hamper. no one knew what had caused the trouble; but theodore was bound to make an investigation. he proceeded to untie the ropes and examine the contents, and there he found the pistol, from which, pointing upward, he fired two other bullets. "alas!" said hattie, "i put that pistol there, never dreaming it was loaded." the wounded man was taken to the hospital. his injuries were very slight, but the incident cost us two thousand francs and no end of annoyance. i was thankful that by some chance the pistol had not gone off in the hold of the vessel and set the ship on fire, and possibly sacrificed three hundred lives through one girl's carelessness. verily we cannot be too careful in the use of firearms. bordeaux is a queer old town, with its innumerable soldiers and priests perambulating in all directions. the priests, in long black gowns and large black hats, have a solemn aspect; but the soldiers, walking lazily along, or guarding buildings that seem in no danger from any living thing, are useless and ridiculous. the heavy carts and harness move the unaccustomed observer to constant pity for the horses. besides everything that is necessary for locomotion, they have an endless number of ornaments, rising two or three feet above the horses' heads--horns, bells, feathers, and tassels. one of their carts would weigh as much as three of ours, and all their carriages are equally heavy. it was a bright, cool day on which we took the train for toulouse, and we enjoyed the delightful run through the very heart of old gascony and languedoc. it was evident that we were in the south, where the sun is strong, for, although summer had scarcely begun, the country already wore a brown hue. but the narrow strips of growing grain, the acres of grape vines, looking like young currant bushes, and the fig trees scattered here and there, looked odd to the eye of a native of new york. we passed many historical spots during that afternoon journey up the valley of the garonne. at portets are the ruins of the château of langoiran, built before america was discovered, and, a few miles farther on, we came to the region of the famous wines of sauterne and château-yquem. saint macaire is a very ancient gallo-roman town, where they show one churches, walls, and houses built fifteen centuries ago. one of the largest towns has a history typical of this part of france, where wars of religion and conquest were once the order of the day. it was taken and retaken by the goths, huns, burgundians, and saracens, nobody knows how many times, and belonged, successively, to the kings of france, to the dukes of aquitaine, to the kings of england, and to the counts of toulouse. i sometimes wonder whether the inhabitants of our american towns, whose growth and development have been free and untrammeled as that of a favorite child, appreciate the blessings that have been theirs. how true the lines of goethe: "america, thou art much happier than our old continent; thou hast no castles in ruins, no fortresses; no useless remembrances, no vain enemies will interrupt the inward workings of thy life!" we passed through moissac, with its celebrated organ, a gift of mazarin; through castle sarrazin, founded by the saracens in the eighth century; through montauban, that stronghold of the early protestants, which suffered martyrdom for its religious faith; through grisolles, built on a roman highway, and, at last, in the dusk of the evening, we reached "the capital of the south," that city of learning--curious, interesting old toulouse. laura curtis bullard, in her sketch of me in "our famous women," says: "in , mrs. stanton went to france, on a visit to her son theodore, and spent three months at the convent of la sagesse, in the city of toulouse." this is quite true; but i have sometimes tried to guess what her readers thought i was doing for three months in a convent. weary of the trials and tribulations of this world, had i gone there to prepare in solitude for the next? had i taken the veil in my old age? or, like high-church anglicans and roman catholics, had i made this my retreat? not at all. my daughter wished to study french advantageously, my son lived in the mountains hard by, and the garden of la sagesse, with its big trees, clean gravel paths, and cool shade, was the most delightful spot. in this religious retreat i met, from time to time, some of the most radical and liberal-minded residents of the south. toulouse is one of the most important university centers of france, and bears with credit the proud title of "the learned city." with two distinguished members of the faculty, the late dr. nicholas joly and professor moliner of the law school, i often had most interesting discussions on all the great questions of the hour. that three heretics--i should say, six, for my daughter, son, and his wife often joined the circle--could thus sit in perfect security, and debate, in the most unorthodox fashion, in these holy precincts, all the reforms, social, political, and religious, which the united states and france need in order to be in harmony with the spirit of the age, was a striking proof of the progress the world has made in freedom of speech. the time was when such acts would have cost us our lives, even if we had been caught expressing our heresies in the seclusion of our own homes. but here, under the oaks of a catholic convent, with the gray-robed sisters all around us, we could point out the fallacies of romanism itself, without fear or trembling. glorious nineteenth century, what conquests are thine! i shall say nothing of the picturesque streets of antique toulouse; nothing of the priests, who swarm like children in an english town; nothing of the beautifully carved stone façades of the ancient mansions, once inhabited by the nobility of languedoc, but now given up to trade and commerce; nothing of the lofty brick cathedrals, whose exteriors remind one of london and whose interiors transfer you to "the gorgeous east"; nothing of the capitol, with its gallery rich in busts of the celebrated sons of the south; nothing of the museum, the public garden, and the broad river winding through all. i must leave all these interesting features of toulouse and hasten up into the black mountains, a few miles away, where i saw the country life of modern languedoc. at jacournassy, the country seat of mme. berry, whose daughter my son theodore married, i spent a month full of surprises. how everything differed from america, and even from the plain below! the peasants, many of them at least, can neither speak french nor understand it. their language is a patois, resembling both spanish and italian, and they cling to it with astonishing pertinacity. their agricultural implements are not less quaint than their speech. the plow is a long beam with a most primitive share in the middle, a cow at one end, and a boy at the other. the grain is cut with a sickle and threshed with a flail on the barn floor, as in scripture times. manure is scattered over the fields with the hands. there was a certain pleasure in studying these old-time ways. i caught glimpses of the anti-revolutionary epoch, when the king ruled the state and the nobles held the lands. here again i saw, as never before, what vast strides the world has made within one century. but, indoors, one returns to modern times. the table, beds, rooms of the château were much the same as those of toulouse and new york city. the cooking is not like ours, however, unless delmonico's skill be supposed to have extended to all the homes in manhattan island, which is, unfortunately, not the case. what an admirable product of french genius is the art of cooking! of incalculable value have been the culinary teachings of vatel and his followers. one of the sources of amusement, during my sojourn at jacournassy, was of a literary nature. my son theodore was then busy collecting the materials for his book entitled "the woman question in europe," and every post brought in manuscripts and letters from all parts of the continent, written in almost every tongue known to babel. so just what i came abroad to avoid, i found on the very threshold where i came to rest. we had good linguists at the château, and every document finally came forth in english dress, which, however, often needed much altering and polishing. this was my part of the work. so, away off in the heart of france, high up in the black mountains, surrounded with french-speaking relatives and patois-speaking peasants, i found myself once more putting bad english into the best i could command, just as i had so often done in america, when editor of _the revolution_, or when arranging manuscript for "the history of woman suffrage." but it was labor in the cause of my sex; it was aiding in the creation of "the woman question in europe," and so my pen did not grow slack nor my hand weary. the scenery in the black mountains is very grand, and reminds one of the lofty ranges of mountains around the yosemite valley in california. in the distance are the snow-capped pyrenees, producing a solemn beauty, a profound solitude. we used to go every evening where we could see the sun set and watch the changing shadows in the broad valley below. another great pleasure here was watching the gradual development of my first grandchild, elizabeth cady stanton, born at paris, on the d of may, . she was a fine child; though only three months old her head was covered with dark hair, and her large blue eyes looked out with intense earnestness from beneath her well-shaped brow. one night i had a terrible fright. i was the only person sleeping on the ground floor of the château, and my room was at the extreme end of the building, with the staircase on the other side. i had frequently been cautioned not to leave my windows open, as someone might get in. but, as i always slept with an open window, winter and summer, i thought i would take the risk rather than endure a feeling of suffocation night after night. the blinds were solid, and to close them was to exclude all the air, so i left them open about a foot, braced by an iron hook. a favorite resort for a pet donkey was under my window, where he had uniformly slept in profound silence. but one glorious moonlight night, probably to arouse me to enjoy with him the exquisite beauty of our surroundings, he put his nose through this aperture and gave one of the most prolonged, resounding brays i ever heard. startled from a deep sleep, i was so frightened that at first i could not move. my next impulse was to rush out and arouse the family, but, seeing a dark head in the window, i thought i would slam down the heavy sash and check the intruder before starting. but just as i approached the window, another agonizing bray announced the innocent character of my midnight visitor. stretching out of the window to frighten him away, a gentleman in the room above me, for the same purpose, dashed down a pail of water, which the donkey and i shared equally. he ran off at a double-quick pace, while i made a hasty retreat. on august , i returned to toulouse and our quiet convent. the sisters gave me a most affectionate welcome and i had many pleasant chats, sitting in the gardens, with the priests and professors. several times my daughter and i attended high mass in the cathedral, built in the eleventh century. being entirely new to us it was a most entertaining spectacular performance. with our american ideas of religious devotion, it seemed to us that the people, as well as the building, belonged to the dark ages. about fifty priests, in mantles, gowns, and capes, some black, some yellow,--with tinseled fringes and ornamentation,--with all manner of gestures, genuflections, salutations, kneelings, and burning of incense; with prayers, admonitions, and sacraments, filled the altar with constant motion. a tall man, dressed in red, wheeled in a large basket filled with bread, which the priests, with cups of wine, passed up and down among those kneeling at the altar. at least half a dozen times the places at the altar were filled--chiefly with women. we counted the men,--only seven,--and those were old and tremulous, with one foot in the grave. the whole performance was hollow and mechanical. people walked in, crossed themselves at the door with holy water, and, while kneeling and saying their prayers, looked about examining the dress of each newcomer, their lips moving throughout, satisfied in reeling off the allotted number of prayers in a given time. the one redeeming feature in the whole performance was the grand music. the deep-toned organ, whose sounds reverberated through the lofty arches, was very impressive. the convent consisted of three large buildings, each three stories high, and a residence for the priests; also a chapel, where women, at their devotions, might be seen at various hours from four o'clock in the morning until evening. inclosed within a high stone wall were beautiful gardens with fountains and shrines, where images of departed saints, in alcoves lighted with tapers were worshiped on certain days of the year. such were our environments, and our minds naturally often dwelt on the nature and power of the religion that had built up and maintained for centuries these peaceful resorts, where cultivated, scholarly men, and women of fine sensibilities, could find rest from the struggles of the outside world. the sisters, who managed this large establishment, seemed happy in the midst of their severe and multifarious duties. of the undercurrent of their lives i could not judge, but on the surface all seemed smooth and satisfactory. they evidently took great pleasure in the society of each other. every evening, from six to eight, they all sat in the gardens in a circle together, sewing, knitting, and chatting, with occasional merry bursts of laughter. their existence is not, by many degrees, as monotonous as that of most women in isolated households--especially of the farmer's wife in her solitary home, miles away from a village and a post office. they taught a school of fifty orphan girls, who lived in the convent, and for whom they frequently had entertainments. they also had a few boarders of the old aristocracy of france, who hate the republic and still cling to their belief in popes and kings. for the purpose of perfecting herself in the language, my daughter embraced every opportunity to talk with all she met, and thus learned the secrets of their inner life. as sister rose spoke english, i gleaned from her what knowledge i could as to their views of time and eternity. i found their faith had not made much progress through the terrible upheavals of the french revolution. although the jesuits have been driven out of france, and the pictures of saints, the virgin mary, and christ, have been banished from the walls of their schools and colleges, the sincere catholics are more devoted to their religion because of these very persecutions. theodore, his wife, and baby, and mr. blatch, a young englishman, came to visit us. the sisters and school children manifested great delight in the baby, and the former equal pleasure in mr. blatch's marked attention to my daughter, as babies and courtships were unusual tableaux in a convent. as my daughter was studying for a university degree in mathematics, i went with her to the lycée, a dreary apartment in a gloomy old building with bare walls, bare floors, dilapidated desks and benches, and an old rusty stove. yet mid such surroundings, the professor always appeared in full dress, making a stately bow to his class. i had heard so much of the universities of france that i had pictured to myself grand buildings, like those of our universities; but, instead, i found that the lectures were given in isolated rooms, here, there, and anywhere--uniformly dreary inside and outside. the first day we called on professor depesyrons. after making all our arrangements for books and lectures, he suddenly turned to my daughter, and, pointing to the flounces on her dress, her jaunty hat, and some flowers in a buttonhole, he smiled, and said: "all this, and yet you love mathematics?" as we entered the court, on our way to the lycée and inquired for the professor's lecture room, the students in little groups watched us closely. the one who escorted us asked several questions, and discovered, by our accent, that we were foreigners, a sufficient excuse for the novelty of our proceeding. the professor received us most graciously, and ordered the janitor to bring us chairs, table, paper, and pencils. then we chatted pleasantly until the hour arrived for his lecture. as i had but little interest in the subject, and as the problems were pronounced in a foreign tongue, i took my afternoon nap. there was no danger of affronting the professor by such indifference to his eloquence, as he faced the blackboard, filling it with signs and figures as rapidly as possible; then expunging them to refill again and again, without a break in his explanations; talking as fast as his hand moved. harriot struggled several days to follow him, but found it impossible, so we gave up the chase after cubes and squares, and she devoted herself wholly to the study of the language. these were days, for me, of perfect rest and peace. everything moved as if by magic, no hurry and bustle, never a cross or impatient word spoken. as only one or two of the sisters spoke english, i could read under the trees uninterruptedly for hours. emerson, ruskin, and carlyle were my chosen companions. we made several pleasant acquaintances among some irish families who were trying to live on their reduced incomes in toulouse. one of these gave us a farewell ball. as several companies of the french army were stationed there, we met a large number of officers at the ball. i had always supposed the french were graceful dancers. i was a quiet "looker on in vienna," so i had an opportunity of comparing the skill of the different nationalities. all admitted that none glided about so easily and gracefully as the americans. they seemed to move without the least effort, while the english, the french, and the germans labored in their dancing, bobbing up and down, jumping and jerking, out of breath and red in the face in five minutes. one great pleasure we had in toulouse was the music of the military band in the public gardens, where, for half a cent, we could have a chair and enjoy pure air and sweet music for two hours. we gave a farewell dinner at the tivollier hotel to some of our friends. with speeches and toasts we had a merry time. professor joly was the life of the occasion. he had been a teacher in france for forty years and had just retired on a pension. i presented to him "the history of woman suffrage," and he wrote a most complimentary review of it in one of the leading french journals. every holiday must have its end. other duties called me to england. so, after a hasty good-by to jacournassy and la sagesse, to the black mountains and toulouse, to languedoc and the south, we took train one day in october, just as the first leaves began to fall, and, in fourteen hours, were at paris. i had not seen the beautiful french capital since . my sojourn within its enchanting walls was short,--too short,--and i woke one morning to find myself, after an absence of forty-two years, again on the shores of england, and before my eyes were fairly open, grim old london welcomed me back. but the many happy hours spent in "merry england" during the winter of - have not effaced from my memory the four months in languedoc. chapter xxii. reforms and reformers in great britain. reaching london in the fogs and mists of november, , the first person i met, after a separation of many years, was our revered and beloved friend william henry channing. the tall, graceful form was somewhat bent; the sweet, thoughtful face somewhat sadder; the crimes and miseries of the world seemed heavy on his heart. with his refined, nervous organization, the gloomy moral and physical atmosphere of london was the last place on earth where that beautiful life should have ended. i found him in earnest conversation with my daughter and the young englishman she was soon to marry, advising them not only as to the importance of the step they were about to take, but as to the minor points to be observed in the ceremony. at the appointed time a few friends gathered in portland street chapel, and as we approached the altar our friend appeared in surplice and gown, his pale, spiritual face more tender and beautiful than ever. this was the last marriage service he ever performed, and it was as pathetic as original. his whole appearance was so in harmony with the exquisite sentiments he uttered, that we who listened felt as if, for the time being, we had entered with him into the holy of holies. some time after, miss anthony and i called on him to return our thanks for the very complimentary review he had written of "the history of woman suffrage." he thanked us in turn for the many pleasant memories we had revived in those pages, "but," said he, "they have filled me with indignation, too, at the repeated insults offered to women so earnestly engaged in honest endeavors for the uplifting of mankind. i blushed for my sex more than once in reading these volumes." we lingered long, talking over the events connected with our great struggle for freedom. he dwelt with tenderness on our disappointments, and entered more fully into the humiliations suffered by women, than any man we ever met. his views were as appreciative of the humiliation of woman, through the degradation of sex, as those expressed by john stuart mill in his wonderful work on "the subjection of women." he was intensely interested in frances power cobbe's efforts to suppress vivisection, and the last time i saw him he was presiding at a parlor meeting where dr. elizabeth blackwell gave an admirable address on the cause and cure of the social evil. mr. channing spoke beautifully in closing, paying a warm and merited compliment to dr. blackwell's clear and concise review of all the difficulties involved in the question. reading so much of english reformers in our journals, of the brights, mclarens, the taylors; of lydia becker, josephine butler, and octavia hill, and of their great demonstrations with lords and members of parliament in the chair,--we had longed to compare the actors in those scenes with our speakers on this side of the water. at last we met them one and all in great public meetings and parlor reunions, at dinners and receptions. we listened to their public men in parliament, the courts, and the pulpit; to the women in their various assemblies; and came to the conclusion that americans surpass them in oratory and the conduct of their meetings. a hesitating, apologetic manner seems to be the national custom for an exordium on all questions. even their ablest men who have visited this country, such as kingsley, stanley, arnold, tyndall, and coleridge, have all been criticised by the american public for their elocutionary defects. they have no speakers to compare with wendell phillips, george william curtis, or anna dickinson, although john bright is without peer among his countrymen, as is mrs. besant among the women. the women, as a general rule, are more fluent than the men. i reached england in time to attend the great demonstration in glasgow, to celebrate the extension of the municipal franchise to the women of scotland. it was a remarkable occasion. st. andrew's immense hall was packed with women; a few men were admitted to the gallery at half a crown apiece. over five thousand people were present. when a scotch audience is thoroughly roused, nothing can equal the enthusiasm. the arrival of the speakers on the platform was announced with the wildest applause; the entire audience rising, waving their handkerchiefs, and clapping their hands, and every compliment paid the people of scotland was received with similar outbursts. mrs. mclaren, a sister of john bright, presided, and made the opening speech. i had the honor, on this occasion, of addressing an audience for the first time in the old world. many others spoke briefly. there were too many speakers; no one had time to warm up to the point of eloquence. our system of conventions, of two or three days' duration, with long speeches discussing pointed and radical resolutions, is quite unknown in england. their meetings consist of one session of a few hours, into which they crowd all the speakers they can summon. they have a few tame, printed resolutions, on which there can be no possible difference of opinion, with the names of those who are to speak appended. each of these is read and a few short speeches are made, that may or may not have the slightest reference to the resolutions, which are then passed. the last is usually one of thanks to some lord or member of the house of commons, who may have condescended to preside at the meeting or do something for the measure in parliament. the queen is referred to tenderly in most of the speeches, although she has never done anything to merit the approbation of the advocates of suffrage for women. from glasgow quite a large party of the brights and mclarens went to edinburgh, where the hon. duncan mclaren gave us a warm welcome to newington house, under the very shadow of the salisbury crags. these and the pentland hills are remarkable features in the landscape as you approach this beautiful city with its mountains and castles. we passed a few charming days driving about, visiting old friends, and discussing the status of woman on both sides of the atlantic. here we met elizabeth pease nichol and jane and eliza wigham, whom i had not seen since we sat together in the world's anti-slavery convention, in london, in . yet i knew mrs. nichol at once; her strongly marked face was not readily forgotten. i went with the family on sunday to the friends' meeting, where a most unusual manifestation for that decorous sect occurred. i had been told that, if i felt inclined, it would be considered quite proper for me to make some remarks, and just as i was revolving an opening sentence to a few thoughts i desired to present, a man arose in a remote part of the house and began, in a low voice, to give his testimony as to the truth that was in him. all eyes were turned toward him, when suddenly a friend leaned over the back of the seat, seized his coat tails and jerked him down in a most emphatic manner. the poor man buried his face in his hands, and maintained a profound silence. i learned afterward that he was a bore, and the friend in the rear thought it wise to nip him in the bud. this scene put to flight all intentions of speaking on my part lest i, too, might get outside the prescribed limits and be suppressed by force. i dined, that day, with mrs. nichol, at huntly lodge, where she has entertained in turn many of our american reformers. her walls have echoed to the voices of garrison, rogers, samuel j. may, parker pillsbury, henry c. wright, douglass, remond, and hosts of english philanthropists. though over eighty years of age, she was still awake to all questions of the hour, and generous in her hospitalities as of yore. mrs. margaret lucas, whose whole soul was in the temperance movement, escorted me from edinburgh to manchester, to be present at another great demonstration in the town hall, the finest building in that district. it had just been completed, and, with its ante-room, dining hall, and various apartments for social entertainments, was by far the most perfect hall i had seen in england. there i was entertained by mrs. matilda roby, who, with her husband, gave me a most hospitable reception. she invited several friends to luncheon one day, among others miss lydia becker, editor of the _suffrage journal_ in that city, and the rev. mr. steinthal, who had visited this country and spoken on our platform. the chief topic at the table was john stuart mill, his life, character, writings, and his position with reference to the political rights of women. in the evening we went to see ristori in '"queen elizabeth." having seen her, many years before, in america, i was surprised to find her still so vigorous. and thus, week after week, suffrage meetings, receptions, dinners, luncheons, and theaters pleasantly alternated. the following sunday we heard in london a grand sermon from moncure d. conway, and had a pleasant interview with him and mrs. conway at the close of the session. later we spent a few days at their artistic home, filled with books, pictures, and mementos from loving friends. a billiard room, with well-worn cues, balls, and table--quite a novel adjunct to a parsonage--may, in a measure, account for his vigorous sermons. a garden reception to mr. and mrs. howells gave us an opportunity to see the american novelist surrounded by his english friends. soon after this mr. conway asked me to fill his pulpit. i retired saturday night, very nervous over my sermon for the next day, and the feeling steadily increased until i reached the platform; but once there my fears were all dissipated, and i never enjoyed speaking more than on that occasion, for i had been so long oppressed with the degradation of woman under canon law and church discipline, that i had a sense of relief in pouring out my indignation. my theme was, "what has christianity done for woman?" and by the facts of history i showed clearly that to no form of religion was woman indebted for one impulse of freedom, as all alike have taught her inferiority and subjection. no lofty virtues can emanate from such a condition. whatever heights of dignity and purity women have individually attained can in no way be attributed to the dogmas of their religion. with my son theodore, always deeply interested in my friends and public work, i called, during my stay in london, on mrs. grey, miss jessie boucherett, and dr. hoggan, who had written essays for "the woman question in europe"; on our american minister (mr. lowell), mr. and mrs. george w. smalley, and many other notable men and women. by appointment we had an hour with the hon. john bright, at his residence on piccadilly. as his photograph, with his fame, had reached america, his fine face and head, as well as his political opinions, were quite familiar to us. he received us with great cordiality, and manifested a clear knowledge and deep interest in regard to all american affairs. free trade and woman suffrage formed the basis of our conversation; the literature of our respective countries and our great men and women were the lighter topics of the occasion. he was not sound in regard to the political rights of women, but it is not given to any one man to be equally clear on all questions. he voted for john stuart mill's amendment to the household suffrage bill in , but he said, "that was a personal favor to a friend, without any strong convictions as to the merits of what i considered a purely sentimental measure." we attended the meeting called to rejoice over the passage of the married women's property bill, which gave to the women of england, in , what we had enjoyed in many states in this country since . mrs. jacob bright, mrs. scatcherd, mrs. elmy, and several members of parliament made short speeches of congratulation to those who had been instrumental in carrying the measure. it was generally conceded that to the tact and persistence of mrs. jacob bright, more than to any other person, belonged the credit of that achievement. jacob bright was at the time a member of parliament, and fully in sympathy with the bill; and, while mrs. bright exerted all her social influence to make it popular with the members, her husband, thoroughly versed in parliamentary tactics, availed himself of every technicality to push the bill through the house of commons. mrs. bright's chief object in securing this bill, aside from establishing the right that every human being has to his own property, was to place married women on an even plane with widows and spinsters, thereby making them qualified voters. the next day we went out to barn elms to visit mr. and mrs. charles mclaren. he was a member of parliament, a quaker by birth and education, and had sustained, to his uttermost ability, the suffrage movement. his charming wife, the daughter of mrs. pochin, is worthy of the noble mother who was among the earliest leaders on that question--speaking and writing with ability, on all phases of the subject. barn elms is a grand old estate, a few miles out of london. it was the dairy farm of queen elizabeth, and was presented by her to sir francis walsingham. since then it has been inhabited by many persons of note. it has existed as an estate since the time of the early saxon kings, and the record of the sale of barn elms in the time of king athelstane is still extant. what with its well-kept lawns, fine old trees, glimpses here and there of the thames winding round its borders, and its wealth of old associations, it is, indeed, a charming spot. our memory of those days will not go back to saxon kings, but remain with the liberal host and hostess, the beautiful children, and the many charming acquaintances we met at that fireside. i doubt whether any of the ancient lords and ladies who dispensed their hospitalities under that roof did in any way surpass the present occupants. mrs. mclaren, interested in all the reforms of the day, is radical in her ideas, a brilliant talker, and, for one so young, remarkably well informed on all political questions. it was at barn elms i met, for the first time, mrs. fannie hertz, to whom i was indebted for many pleasant acquaintances afterward. she is said to know more distinguished literary people than any other woman in london. i saw her, too, several times in her home; meeting, at her sunday-afternoon receptions, many persons i was desirous to know. on one occasion i found george jacob holyoake there, surrounded by several young ladies, all stoutly defending the nihilists in russia, and their right to plot their way to freedom. they counted a dynasty of czars as nothing in the balance with the liberties of a whole people. as i joined the circle, mr. holyoake called my attention to the fact that he was the only one in favor of peaceful measures. "now," said he, "i have often heard it said on your platform that the feminine element in politics would bring about perpetual peace in government, and here all these ladies are advocating: the worst forms of violence in the name of liberty." "ah!" said i, "lay on their shoulders the responsibility of governing, and they would soon become as mild and conservative as you seem to be." he then gave us his views on co-operation, the only remedy for many existing evils, which he thought would be the next step toward a higher civilization. there, too, i met some positivists, who, though liberal on religious questions, were very narrow as to the sphere of woman. the difference in sex, which is the very reason why men and women should be associated in all forms of activity, is to them the strongest reason why they should be separated. mrs. hertz belongs to the harrison school of positivists. i went with her to one of mrs. orr's receptions, where we met robert browning, a fine-looking man of seventy years, with white hair and mustache. he was frank, easy, playful, and brilliant in conversation. mrs. orr seemed to be taking a very pessimistic view of our present sphere of action, which mr. browning, with poetic coloring, was trying to paint more hopefully. the next day i dined with margaret bright lucas, in company with john p. thomasson, member of parliament, and his wife, and, afterward, we went to the house of commons and had the good fortune to hear gladstone, parnell, and sir charles dilke. seeing bradlaugh seated outside of the charmed circle, i sent my card to him, and, in the corridor, we had a few moments' conversation. i asked him if he thought he would eventually get his seat. he replied, "most assuredly i will. i shall open the next campaign with such an agitation as will rouse our politicians to some consideration of the changes gradually coming over the face of things in this country." the place assigned ladies in the house of commons is really a disgrace to a country ruled by a queen. this dark perch is the highest gallery, immediately over the speaker's desk and government seats, behind a fine wire netting, so that it is quite impossible to see or hear anything. the sixteen persons who can crowd into the front row, by standing with their noses partly through the open network, can have the satisfaction of seeing the cranial arch of their rulers and hearing an occasional paean to liberty, or an irish growl at the lack of it. i was told that this network was to prevent the members on the floor from being disturbed by the beauty of the women. on hearing this i remarked that i was devoutly thankful that our american men were not so easily disturbed, and that the beauty of our women was not of so dangerous a type. i could but contrast our spacious galleries in that magnificent capitol at washington, as well as in our grand state capitols, where hundreds of women can sit at their ease and see and hear their rulers, with these dark, dingy buildings. my son, who had a seat on the floor just opposite the ladies' gallery, said he could compare our appearance to nothing but birds in a cage. he could not distinguish an outline of anybody. all he could see was the moving of feathers and furs or some bright ribbon or flower. in the libraries, the courts, and the house of lords, i found many suggestive subjects of thought. it was interesting to find, on the frescoed walls, many historical scenes in which women had taken a prominent part. among others there was jane lane assisting charles ii. to escape, and alice lisle concealing the fugitives after the battle of sedgemoor. six wives of henry viii. stood forth, a solemn pageant when one recalled their sad fate. alas! whether for good or ill, women must ever fill a large space in the tragedies of the world. i passed a few pleasant hours in the house where macaulay spent his last years. the once spacious library and the large bow-window, looking out on a beautiful lawn, where he sat, from day to day, writing his glowing periods, possessed a peculiar charm for me, as the surroundings of genius always do. i thought, as i stood there, how often he had unconsciously gazed on each object in searching for words rich enough to gild his ideas. the house was owned and occupied by mr. and mrs. stephen winckworth. it was at one of their sociable sunday teas that many pleasant memories of the great historian were revived. one of the most remarkable and genial women i met was miss frances power cobbe. she called one afternoon, and sipped with me the five o'clock tea, a uniform practice in england. she was of medium height, stout, rosy, and vigorous-looking, with a large, well-shaped head, a strong, happy face, and gifted with rare powers of conversation. i felt very strongly attracted to her. she was frank and cordial, and pronounced in all her views. she gave us an account of her efforts to rescue unhappy cats and dogs from the hands of the vivisectionists. we saw her, too, in her home, and in her office in victoria street. the perfect order in which her books and papers were arranged, and the exquisite neatness of the apartments, were refreshing to behold. my daughter, having decided opinions of her own, was soon at loggerheads with miss cobbe on the question of vivisection. after we had examined several german and french books, with illustrations showing the horrible cruelty inflicted on cats and dogs, she enlarged on the hypocrisy and wickedness of these scientists, and, turning to my daughter, said: "would you shake hands with one of these vivisectionists? yes," said harriot, "i should be proud to shake hands with virchow, the great german scientist, for his kindness to a young american girl. she applied to several professors to be admitted to their classes, but all refused except virchow; he readily assented, and requested his students to treat her with becoming courtesy. 'if any of you behave otherwise,' said he, 'i shall feel myself personally insulted.' she entered his classes and pursued her studies, unmolested and with great success. now, would you, miss cobbe, refuse to shake hands with any of your statesmen, scientists, clergymen, lawyers, or physicians who treat women with constant indignities and insult?" "oh, no!" said miss cobbe. "then," said harriot, "you estimate the physical suffering of cats and dogs as of more consequence than the humiliation of human beings. the man who tortures a cat for a scientific purpose is not as low in the scale of beings, in my judgment, as one who sacrifices his own daughter to some cruel custom." as we were, just then, reading froude's "life of carlyle," we drove by the house where carlyle had lived, and paused a moment at the door where poor jennie went in and out so often with a heavy heart. the book gives a painful record of a great soul struggling with poverty and disappointment; the hope of success, as an author, so long deferred and never realized. his foolish pride of independence and headship, and his utter indifference to his domestic duties and the comfort of his wife made the picture still darker. poor jennie! fitted to shine in any circle, yet doomed, all her married life, to domestic drudgery, instead of associations with the great man for whose literary companionship she had sacrificed everything. at one of miss biggs' receptions miss anthony and i met mr. stansfeld, m.p., who had labored faithfully for the repeal of the contagious diseases act, and had in a measure been successful. we had the honor of an interview with lord shaftesbury, at one of his crowded "at homes," and found him a little uncertain as to the wisdom of allowing married women to vote, for fear of disturbing the peace of the family. i have often wondered if men see, in this objection, what a fatal admission they make as to their love of domination. miss anthony was present at the great liberal conference, at leeds, on october , , to which mrs. helen bright clark, miss jane cobden, mrs. tanner, mrs. scatcherd, and several other ladies were duly elected delegates from their respective liberal leagues. mrs. clark and miss cobden, daughters of the great corn-law reformers, spoke eloquently in favor of the resolution to extend parliamentary suffrage to women, which was presented by walter mclaren of bradford. as mrs. clark made her impassioned appeal for the recognition of woman's political equality in the next bill for extension of suffrage, that immense gathering of sixteen hundred delegates was hushed into profound silence. for a daughter to speak thus in that great representative convention, in opposition to her loved and honored father, the acknowledged leader of that party, was an act of heroism and fidelity to her own highest convictions almost without a parallel in english history, and the effect on the audience was as thrilling as it was surprising. the resolution was passed by a large majority. at the reception given to john bright that evening, as mrs. clark approached the dais on which her noble father stood shaking the hands of passing friends, she remarked to her husband, "i wonder if father has heard of my speech this morning, and if he will forgive me for thus publicly differing with him?" the query was soon answered. as he caught the first glimpse of his daughter he stepped down, and, pressing her hand affectionately, kissed her on either cheek. the next evening the great quaker statesman was heard by the admiring thousands who could crowd into victoria hall, while thousands, equally desirous to hear, failed to get tickets of admission. it was a magnificent sight, and altogether a most impressive gathering of the people. miss anthony, with her friends, sat in the gallery opposite the great platform, where they had a fine view of the whole audience. when john bright, escorted by sir wilfrid lawson, took his seat, the immense crowd rose, waving hats and handkerchiefs, and, with the wildest enthusiasm, gave cheer after cheer in honor of the great leader. sir wilfrid lawson, in his introductory remarks, facetiously alluded to the resolution adopted by the conference as somewhat in advance of the ideas of the speaker of the evening. the house broke into roars of laughter, while the father of liberalism, perfectly convulsed, joined in the general merriment. but when at length his time to speak had come, and mr. bright went over the many steps of progress that had been taken by the liberal party, he cunningly dodged the question of the emancipation of the women of england. he skipped round the agitation of , and john stuart mill's amendment presented at that time in the house of commons; the extension of the municipal suffrage in ; the participation of women in the establishment of national schools under the law of , both as voters and members of school boards; the married women's property bill of ; the large and increasing vote for the extension of parliamentary suffrage in the house of commons, and the adoption of the resolution by that great conference the day before. all these successive steps toward woman's emancipation he carefully remembered to forget. while in london miss anthony and i attended several enthusiastic reform meetings. we heard bradlaugh address his constituency on that memorable day at trafalgar square, at the opening of parliament, when violence was anticipated and the parliament houses were surrounded by immense crowds, with the military and police in large numbers, to maintain order. we heard michael davitt and miss helen taylor at a great meeting in exeter hall; the former on home rule for ireland, and the latter on the nationalization of land. the facts and figures given in these two lectures, as to the abject poverty of the people and the cruel system by which every inch of land had been grabbed by their oppressors, were indeed appalling. a few days before sailing we made our last visit to ernestine l. rose, and found our noble coadjutor, though in delicate health, pleasantly situated in the heart of london, as deeply interested as ever in the struggles of the hour. a great discomfort, in all english homes, is the inadequate system of heating. a moderate fire in the grate is the only mode of heating, and they seem quite oblivious to the danger of throwing a door open into a cold hall at one's back, while the servants pass in and out with the various courses at dinner. as we americans were sorely tried, under such circumstances, it was decided, in the home of my son-in-law, mr. blatch, to have a hall-stove, which, after a prolonged search, was found in london and duly installed as a presiding deity to defy the dampness that pervades all those ivy-covered habitations, as well as the neuralgia that wrings their possessors. what a blessing it proved, more than any one thing making the old english house seem like an american home! the delightful summer heat we, in america, enjoy in the coldest seasons, is quite unknown to our saxon cousins. although many came to see our stove in full working order, yet we could not persuade them to adopt the american system of heating the whole house at an even temperature. they cling to the customs of their fathers with an obstinacy that is incomprehensible to us, who are always ready to try experiments. americans complain bitterly of the same freezing experiences in france and germany, and, in turn, foreigners all criticise our overheated houses and places of amusement. while attending a meeting in birmingham i stayed with a relative of joseph sturge, whose home i had visited forty years before. the meeting was called to discuss the degradation of women under the contagious diseases act. led by josephine butler, the women of england were deeply stirred on the question of its repeal and have since secured it. i heard mrs. butler speak in many of her society meetings as well as on other occasions. her style was not unlike that one hears in methodist camp meetings from the best cultivated of that sect; her power lies in her deeply religious enthusiasm. in london we met emily faithful, who had just returned from a lecturing tour in the united states, and were much amused with her experiences. having taken prolonged trips over the whole country, from maine to texas, for many successive years, miss anthony and i could easily add the superlative to all her narrations. it was a pleasant surprise to meet the large number of americans usually at the receptions of mrs. peter taylor. graceful and beautiful, in full dress, standing beside her husband, who evidently idolized her, mrs. taylor appeared quite as refined in her drawing room as if she had never been exposed to the public gaze while presiding over a suffrage convention. mrs. taylor is called the mother of the suffrage movement. the reform has not been carried on in all respects to her taste, nor on what she considers the basis of high principle. neither she nor mrs. jacob bright has ever been satisfied with the bill asking the rights of suffrage for "widows and spinsters" only. to have asked this right "for all women duly qualified," as but few married women are qualified through possessing property in their own right, would have been substantially the same, without making any invidious distinctions. mrs. taylor and mrs. bright felt that, as married women were the greatest sufferers under the law, they should be the first rather than the last to be enfranchised. the others, led by miss becker, claimed that it was good policy to make the demand for "spinsters and widows," and thus exclude the "family unit" and "man's headship" from the discussion; and yet these were the very points on which the objections were invariably based. they claimed that, if "spinsters and widows" were enfranchised, they would be an added power to secure to married women their rights. but the history of the past gives us no such assurance. it is not certain that women would be more just than men, and a small privileged class of aristocrats have long governed their fellow-countrymen. the fact that the spinsters in the movement advocated such a bill, shows that they were not to be trusted in extending it. john stuart mill, too, was always opposed to the exclusion of married women in the demand for suffrage. my sense of justice was severely tried by all i heard of the persecutions of mrs. besant and mr. bradlaugh for their publications on the right and duty of parents to limit population. who can contemplate the sad condition of multitudes of young children in the old world whose fate is to be brought up in ignorance and vice--a swarming, seething mass which nobody owns--without seeing the need of free discussion of the philosophical principles that underlie these tangled social problems? the trials of foote and ramsey, too, for blasphemy, seemed unworthy a great nation in the nineteenth century. think of well-educated men of good moral standing thrown into prison in solitary confinement, for speaking lightly of the hebrew idea of jehovah and the new testament account of the birth of jesus! our protestant clergy never hesitate to make the dogmas and superstitions of the catholic church seem as absurd as possible, and why should not those who imagine they have outgrown protestant superstitions make them equally ridiculous? whatever is true can stand investigation and ridicule. in the last of april, when the wildflowers were in their glory, mrs. mellen and her lovely daughter, daisy, came down to our home at basingstoke to enjoy its beauty. as mrs. mellen had known charles kingsley and entertained him at her residence in colorado, she felt a desire to see his former home. accordingly, one bright morning, mr. blatch drove us to eversley, through strathfieldsaye, the park of the duke of wellington. this magnificent place was given to him by the english government after the battle of waterloo. a lofty statue of the duke, that can be seen for miles around, stands at one entrance. a drive of a few miles further brought us to the parish church of canon kingsley, where he preached many years, and where all that is mortal of him now lies buried. we wandered through the old church, among the moss-covered tombstones, and into the once happy home, now silent and deserted--his loved ones being scattered in different quarters of the globe. standing near the last resting place of the author of "hypatia," his warning words for women, in a letter to john stuart mill, seemed like a voice from heaven saying, with new inspiration and power, "this will never be a good world for women until the last remnant of the canon law is civilized off the face of the earth." we heard mr. fawcett speak to his hackney constituents at one of his campaign meetings. in the course of his remarks he mentioned with evident favor, as one of the coming measures, the disestablishment of the church, and was greeted with loud applause. soon after he spoke of woman suffrage as another question demanding consideration, but this was received with laughter and jeers, although the platform was crowded with advocates of the measure, among whom were the wife of the speaker and her sister, dr. garrett anderson. the audience were evidently in favor of releasing themselves from being taxed to support the church, forgetting that women were taxed not only to support a church but also a state in the management of neither of which they had a voice. mr. fawcett was not an orator, but a simple, straightforward speaker. he made one gesture, striking his right clenched fist into the palm of his left hand at the close of all his strongest assertions, and, although more liberal than his party, he was a great favorite with his constituents. one pleasant trip i made in england was to bristol, to visit the misses priestman and mrs. tanner, sisters-in-law of john bright. i had stayed at their father's house forty years before, so we felt like old friends. i found them all liberal women, and we enjoyed a few days together, talking over our mutual struggles, and admiring the beautiful scenery for which that part of the country is celebrated. the women of england were just then organizing political clubs, and i was invited to speak before many of them. there is an earnestness of purpose among english women that is very encouraging under the prolonged disappointments reformers inevitably suffer. and the order of english homes, too, among the wealthy classes, is very enjoyable. all go on from year to year with the same servants, the same surroundings, no changes, no moving, no building even; in delightful contrast with our periodical upheavals, always uncertain where we shall go next, or how long our main dependents will stand by us. from bristol i went to greenbank to visit mrs. helen bright clark. one evening her parlors were crowded and i was asked to give an account of the suffrage movement in america. some clergymen questioned me in regard to the bible position of woman, whereupon i gave quite an exposition of its general principles in favor of liberty and equality. as two distinct lines of argument can be woven out of those pages on any subject, on this occasion i selected all the most favorable texts for justice to woman, and closed by stating the limits of its authority. mrs. clark, though thoroughly in sympathy with the views i had expressed, feared lest my very liberal utterances might have shocked some of the strictest of the laymen and clergy. "well," said i, "if we who do see the absurdities of the old superstitions never unveil them to others, how is the world to make any progress in the theologies? i am in the sunset of life, and i feel it to be my special mission to tell people what they are not prepared to hear, instead of echoing worn-out opinions." the result showed the wisdom of my speaking out of my own soul. to the surprise of mrs. clark, the primitive methodist clergyman called on sunday morning to invite me to occupy his pulpit in the afternoon and present the same line of thought i had the previous evening. i accepted his invitation. he led the services, and i took my text from genesis i. , , showing that man and woman were a simultaneous creation, endowed, in the beginning, with equal power. returning to london, i accepted an invitation to take tea one afternoon with mrs. jacob bright, who, in earnest conversation, had helped us each to a cup of tea, and was turning to help us to something more, when over went table and all--tea, bread and butter, cake, strawberries and cream, silver, china, in one conglomerate mass. silence reigned. no one started; no one said "oh!" mrs. bright went on with what she was saying as if nothing unusual had occurred, rang the bell, and, when the servant appeared, pointing to the débris, she said, "charles, remove this." i was filled with admiration at her coolness, and devoutly thankful that we americans maintained an equally dignified silence. at a grand reception, given in our honor by the national central committee, in princess' hall, jacob bright, m.p., presided and made an admirable opening speech, followed by his sister, mrs. mclaren, with a highly complimentary address of welcome. by particular request miss anthony explained the industrial, legal, and political status of american women, while i set forth their educational, social, and religious condition. john p. thomasson, m.p., made the closing address, expressing his satisfaction with our addresses and the progress made in both countries. mrs. thomasson, daughter of mrs. lucas, gave several parties, receptions, and dinners,--some for ladies only,--where an abundant opportunity was offered for a critical analysis of the idiosyncrasies of the superior sex, especially in their dealings with women. the patience of even such heroic souls as lydia becker and caroline biggs was almost exhausted with the tergiversations of members of the house of commons. alas for the many fair promises broken, the hopes deferred, the votes fully relied on and counted, all missing in the hour of action! one crack of mr. gladstone's whip put a hundred liberal members to flight--members whom these noble women had spent years in educating. i never visited the house of commons that i did not see miss becker and miss biggs trying to elucidate the fundamental principles of just government to some of the legislators. verily their divine faith and patience merited more worthy action on the part of their alleged representatives! miss henrietta müller gave a farewell reception to miss anthony and me on the eve of our departure for america, when we had the opportunity of meeting once more most of the pleasant acquaintances we had made in london. although it was announced for the afternoon, we did, in fact, receive all day, as many could not come at the hour appointed. dr. elizabeth blackwell took breakfast with us; mrs. fawcett, mrs. saville, and miss lord were with us at luncheon; harriet hosmer and olive logan soon after; mrs. peter taylor later, and from three to six o'clock the parlors were crowded. returning from london i passed my birthday, november , , in basingstoke. it was a sad day for us all, knowing that it was the last day with my loved ones before my departure for america. when i imprinted the farewell kiss on the soft cheek of my little granddaughter nora in the cradle, she in the dawn and i in the sunset of life, i realized how widely the broad ocean would separate us. miss anthony, met me at alderly edge, where we spent a few days with mr. and mrs. jacob bright. there we found their noble sisters, mrs. mclaren and mrs. lucas, young walter mclaren and his lovely bride, eva müller, whom we had heard several times on the suffrage platform. we rallied her on the step she had lately taken, notwithstanding her sister's able paper on the blessedness of a single life. while there, we visited dean stanley's birthplace, but on his death the light and joy went out. the old church whose walls had once echoed to his voice, and the house where he had spent so many useful years, seemed sad and deserted. but the day was bright and warm, the scenery beautiful, cows and sheep were still grazing in the meadows, and the grass was as green as in june. this is england's chief charm,--it is forever green,--perhaps in compensation for the many cloudy days. as our good friends mrs. mclaren and mrs. lucas had determined to see us safely on board the servia, they escorted us to liverpool, where we met mrs. margaret parker and mrs. scatcherd. another reception was given us at the residence of dr. ewing whittle. several short speeches were made, and all present cheered the parting guests with words of hope and encouragement for the good cause. here the wisdom of forming an international association was first considered. the proposition met with such favor from those present that a committee was appointed to correspond with the friends in different nations. miss anthony and i were placed on the committee, and while this project has not yet been fully carried out, the idea of the intellectual co-operation of women to secure equal rights and opportunities for their sex was the basis of the international council of women, which was held under the auspices of the national woman suffrage association in washington, d. c, in march, . on the atlantic for ten days we had many opportunities to review all we had seen and heard. sitting on deck, hour after hour, how often i queried with myself as to the significance of the boon for which we were so earnestly struggling. in asking for a voice in the government under which we live, have we been pursuing a shadow for fifty years? in seeking political power, are we abdicating that social throne where they tell us our influence is unbounded? no, no! the right of suffrage is no shadow, but a substantial entity that the citizen can seize and hold for his own protection and his country's welfare. a direct power over one's own person and property, an individual opinion to be counted, on all questions of public interest, are better than indirect influence, be that ever so far reaching. though influence, like the pure white light, is all-pervading, yet it is ofttimes obscured with passing clouds and nights of darkness. like the sun's rays, it may be healthy, genial, inspiring, though sometimes too direct for comfort, too oblique for warmth, too scattered for any purpose. but as the prism divides the rays, revealing the brilliant colors of the light, so does individual sovereignty reveal the beauty of representative government, and as the burning-glass shows the power of concentrating the rays, so does the combined power of the multitude reveal the beauty of united effort to carry a grand measure. chapter xxiii. woman and theology. returning from europe in the autumn of , after visiting a large circle of relatives and friends, i spent six weeks with my cousin, elizabeth smith miller, at her home at geneva, on seneca lake. through miss frances lord, a woman of rare culture and research, my daughter and i had become interested in the school of theosophy, and read "isis unveiled," by madame blavatsky, sinnett's works on the "occult world," and "the perfect way," by anna kingsford. full of these ideas, i soon interested my cousins in the subject, and we resolved to explore, as far as possible, some of these eastern mysteries, of which we had heard so much. we looked in all directions to find some pilot to start us on the right course. we heard that gerald massey was in new york city, lecturing on "the devil," "ghosts," and "evil spirits" generally, so we invited him to visit us and give a course of lectures in geneva. but, unfortunately, he was ill, and could not open new fields of thought to us at that time, though we were very desirous to get a glimpse into the unknown world, and hold converse with the immortals. as i soon left geneva with my daughter, mrs. stanton lawrence, our occult studies were, for a time, abandoned. my daughter and i often talked of writing a story, she describing the characters and their environments and i attending to the philosophy and soliloquies. as i had no special duties in prospect, we decided that this was the time to make our experiment. accordingly we hastened to the family homestead at johnstown, new york, where we could be entirely alone. friends on all sides wondered what had brought us there in the depth of the winter. but we kept our secret, and set ourselves to work with diligence, and after three months our story was finished to our entire satisfaction. we felt sure that everyone who read it would be deeply interested and that we should readily find a publisher. we thought of "our romance" the first thing in the morning and talked of it the last thing at night. but alas! friendly critics who read our story pointed out its defects, and in due time we reached their conclusions, and the unpublished manuscript now rests in a pigeonhole of my desk. we had not many days to mourn our disappointment, as madge was summoned to her western home, and miss anthony arrived armed and equipped with bushels of documents for vol. iii. of "the history of woman suffrage." the summer and autumn of miss anthony and i passed at johnstown, working diligently on the history, indulging only in an occasional drive, a stroll round the town in the evening, or a ride in the open street cars. mrs. devereux blake was holding a series of conventions, at this time, through the state of new york, and we urged her to expend some of her missionary efforts in my native town, which she did with good results. as the school election was near at hand miss anthony and i had several preliminary meetings to arouse the women to their duty as voters, and to the necessity of nominating some woman for trustee. when the day for the election arrived the large upper room of the academy was filled with ladies and gentlemen. some timid souls who should have been there stayed at home, fearing there would be a row, but everything was conducted with decency and in order. the chairman, mr. rosa, welcomed the ladies to their new duties in a very complimentary manner. donald mcmartin stated the law as to what persons were eligible to vote in school elections. mrs. horace smith filled the office of teller on the occasion with promptness and dignity, and mrs. elizabeth wallace yost was elected trustee by a majority of seven. it is strange that intelligent women, who are supposed to feel some interest in the question of education, should be so indifferent to the power they possess to make our schools all that they should be. this was the year of the presidential campaign. the republicans and democrats had each held their nominating conventions, and all classes participated in the general excitement. there being great dissatisfaction in the republican ranks, we issued a manifesto: "stand by the republican party," not that we loved blaine more, but cleveland less. the latter was elected, therefore it was evident that our efforts did not have much influence in turning the tide of national politics, though the republican papers gave a broad circulation to our appeal. dowden's description of the poet shelley's efforts in scattering one of his suppressed pamphlets, reminded me of ours. he purchased bushels of empty bottles, in which he placed his pamphlets; having corked them up tight, he threw the bottles into the sea at various fashionable watering places, hoping they would wash ashore. walking the streets of london in the evening he would slip his pamphlets into the hoods of old ladies' cloaks, throw them in shop doors, and leave them in cabs and omnibuses. we scattered ours in the cars, inclosed them in every letter we wrote or newspaper we sent through the country. the night before election mr. stanton and professor horace smith spoke in the johnstown courthouse, and took rather pessimistic views of the future of the republic should james g. blaine be defeated. cleveland was elected, and we still live as a nation, and are able to digest the thousands of foreign immigrants daily landing at our shores. the night of the election a large party of us sat up until two o'clock to hear the news. mr. stanton had long been one of the editorial writers on the new york sun, and they sent him telegrams from that office until a late hour. however, the election was so close that we were kept in suspense several days, before it was definitely decided. miss anthony left in december, , for washington, and i went to work on an article for the north american review, entitled, "what has christianity done for women?" i took the ground that woman was not indebted to any form of religion for the liberty she now enjoys, but that, on the contrary, the religious element in her nature had always been perverted for her complete subjection. bishop spaulding, in the same issue of the review, took the opposite ground, but i did not feel that he answered my points. in january, , my niece mrs. baldwin and i went to washington to attend the annual convention of the national woman suffrage association. it was held in the unitarian church on the th, st, and d days of that month, and went off with great success, as did the usual reception given by mrs. spofford at the riggs house. this dear friend, one of our most ardent coadjutors, always made the annual convention a time for many social enjoyments. the main feature in this convention was the attempt to pass the following resolutions: "whereas, the dogmas incorporated in religious creeds derived from judaism, teaching that woman was an after-thought in the creation, her sex a misfortune, marriage a condition of subordination, and maternity a curse, are contrary to the law of god (as revealed in nature), and to the precepts of christ, and, "whereas, these dogmas are an insidious poison, sapping the vitality of our civilization, blighting woman, and, through her, paralyzing humanity; therefore be it "_resolved_, that we call on the christian ministry, as leaders of thought, to teach and enforce the fundamental idea of creation, that man was made in the image of god, male and female, and given equal rights over the earth, but none over each other. and, furthermore, we ask their recognition of the scriptural declaration that, in the christian religion, there is neither male nor female, bond nor free, but all are one in christ jesus." as chairman of the committee i presented a series of resolutions, impeaching the christian theology--as well as all other forms of religion, for their degrading teachings in regard to woman--which the majority of the committee thought too strong and pointed, and, after much deliberation, they substituted the above, handing over to the jews what i had laid at the door of the christians. they thought they had so sugar-coated my ideas that the resolutions would pass without discussion. but some jews in the convention promptly repudiated this impression of their faith and precipitated the very discussion i desired, but which our more politic friends would fain have avoided. from the time of the decade meeting in rochester, in , matilda joslyn gage, edward m. davis, and i had sedulously labored to rouse women to a realization of their degraded position in the church, and presented resolutions at every annual convention for that purpose. but they were either suppressed or so amended as to be meaningless. the resolutions of the annual convention of , tame as they are, got into print and roused the ire of the clergy, and upon the following sunday, dr. patton of howard university preached a sermon on "woman and skepticism," in which he unequivocally took the ground that freedom for woman led to skepticism and immorality. he illustrated his position by pointing to hypatia, mary wollstonecraft, frances wright, george eliot, harriet martineau, mme. roland, frances power cobbe, and victoria woodhull. he made a grave mistake in the last names mentioned, as mrs. woodhull was a devout believer in the christian religion, and surely anyone conversant with miss cobbe's writings would never accuse her of skepticism. his sermon was received with intense indignation, even by the women of his own congregation. when he found what a whirlwind he had started, he tried to shift his position and explain away much that he had said. we asked him to let us have the sermon for publication, that we might not do him injustice. but as he contradicted himself flatly in trying to restate his discourse, and refused to let us see his sermon, those who heard him were disgusted with his sophistry and tergiversation. however, our labors in this direction are having an effect. women are now making their attacks on the church all along the line. they are demanding their right to be ordained as ministers, elders, deacons, and to be received as delegates in all the ecclesiastical convocations. at last they ask of the church just what they have asked of the state for the last half century--perfect equality--and the clergy, as a body, are quite as hostile to their demands as the statesmen. on my way back to johnstown i spent ten days at troy, where i preached in the unitarian church on sunday evening. during this visit we had two hearings in the capitol at albany--one in the senate chamber and one in the assembly, before the committee on grievances. on both occasions mrs. mary seymour howell, mrs. devereux blake, mrs. caroline gilkey rogers, and i addressed the committee. being open to the public, the chamber was crowded. it was nearly forty years since i had made my first appeal in the old capitol at albany. my reflections were sad and discouraging, as i sat there and listened to the speakers and remembered how long we had made our appeals at that bar, from year to year, in vain. the members of the committee presented the same calm aspect as their predecessors, as if to say, "be patient, dear sisters, eternity is before us; this is simply a question of time. what may not come in your day, future generations will surely possess." it is always pleasant to know that our descendants are to enjoy life, liberty, and happiness; but, when one is gasping for one breath of freedom, this reflection is not satisfying. returning to my native hills, i found the lenten season had fairly set in, which i always dreaded on account of the solemn, tolling bell, the episcopal church being just opposite our residence. on sunday we had the bells of six churches all going at the same time. it is strange how long customs continue after the original object has ceased to exist. at an early day, when the country was sparsely settled and the people lived at great distances, bells were useful to call them together when there was to be a church service. but now, when the churches are always open on sunday, and every congregation knows the hour of services and all have clocks, bells are not only useless, but they are a terrible nuisance to invalids and nervous people. if i am ever so fortunate as to be elected a member of a town council, my first efforts will be toward the suppression of bells. to encourage one of my sex in the trying profession of book agent, i purchased, about this time, dr. lord's "beacon lights of history," and read the last volume devoted to women, pagan and christian, saints and sinners. it is very amusing to see the author's intellectual wriggling and twisting to show that no one can be good or happy without believing in the christian religion. in describing great women who are not christians, he attributes all their follies and miseries to that fact. in describing pagan women, possessed of great virtues, he attributes all their virtues to nature's gifts, which enable them to rise superior to superstitions. after dwelling on the dreary existence of those not of christian faith, he forthwith pictures his st. teresa going through twenty years of doubts and fears about the salvation of her soul. the happiest people i have known have been those who gave themselves no concern about their own souls, but did their uttermost to mitigate the miseries of others. in may, , we left johnstown and took possession of our house at tenafly, new jersey. it seemed very pleasant, after wandering in the old world and the new, to be in my own home once more, surrounded by the grand trees i so dearly loved; to see the gorgeous sunsets, the twinkling fireflies; to hear the whippoorwills call their familiar note, while the june bugs and the mosquitoes buzz outside the nets through which they cannot enter. many people complain of the mosquito in new jersey, when he can so easily be shut out of the family circle by nets over all the doors and windows. i had a long piazza, encased in netting, where paterfamilias, with his pipe, could muse and gaze at the stars unmolested. june brought miss anthony and a box of fresh documents for another season of work on vol. iii. of our history. we had a flying visit from miss eddy of providence, daughter of mrs. eddy who gave fifty thousand dollars to the woman suffrage movement, and a granddaughter of francis jackson of boston, who also left a generous bequest to our reform. we found miss eddy a charming young woman with artistic tastes. she showed us several pen sketches she had made of some of our reformers, that were admirable likenesses. mr. stanton's "random recollections" were published at this time and were well received. a dinner was given him, on his eightieth birthday (june , ), by the press club of new york city, with speeches and toasts by his lifelong friends. as no ladies were invited i can only judge from the reports in the daily papers, and what i could glean from the honored guest himself, that it was a very interesting occasion. sitting in the summerhouse, one day, i witnessed a most amusing scene. two of the boys, in search of employment, broke up a hornets' nest. bruno, our large saint bernard dog, seeing them jumping about, thought he would join in the fun. the boys tried to drive him away, knowing that the hornets would get in his long hair, but bruno's curiosity outran his caution and he plunged into the midst of the swarm and was soon completely covered. the buzzing and stinging soon sent the poor dog howling on the run. he rushed as usual, in his distress, to amelia in the kitchen, where she and the girls were making preserves and ironing. when they saw the hornets, they dropped irons, spoons, jars, everything, and rushed out of doors screaming. i appreciated the danger in time to get safely into the house before bruno came to me for aid and comfort. at last they played the hose on him until he found some relief; the maidens, armed with towels, thrashed right and left, and the boys, with evergreen branches, fought bravely. i had often heard of "stirring up a hornets' nest," but i had never before seen a practical demonstration of its danger. for days after, if bruno heard anything buzz, he would rush for the house at the top of his speed. but in spite of these occasional lively episodes, vol. iii. went steadily on. my suffrage sons and daughters through all the northern and western states decided to celebrate, on the th of november, , my seventieth birthday, by holding meetings or sending me gifts and congratulations. this honor was suggested by mrs. elizabeth boynton harbert in _the new era_, a paper she was editing at that time. the suggestion met with a ready response. i was invited to deliver an essay on "the pleasures of age," before the suffrage association in new york city. it took me a week to think them up, but with the inspiration of longfellow's "morituri salutamus," i was almost converted to the idea that "we old folks" had the best of it. the day was ushered in with telegrams, letters, and express packages, which continued to arrive during the week. from england, france, and germany came cablegrams, presents, and letters of congratulation, and from all quarters came books, pictures, silver, bronzes, california blankets, and baskets of fruits and flowers. the eulogies in prose and verse were so hearty and numerous that the ridicule and criticism of forty years were buried so deep that i shall remember them no more. there is no class who enjoy the praise of their fellow-men like those who have had only blame most of their lives. the evening of the th we had a delightful reunion at the home of dr. clemence lozier, where i gave my essay, after which mrs. lozier, mrs. blake, miss anthony, "jenny june," and some of the younger converts to our platform, all made short speeches of praise and congratulation, which were followed by music, recitations, and refreshments. all during the autumn miss anthony and i looked forward to the spring, when we hoped to have completed the third and last volume of our history, and thus end the labors of ten years. we had neither time nor eyesight to read aught but the imperative documents for the history. i was hungering for some other mental pabulum. in january, , i was invited to dine with laura curtis bullard, to meet mme. durand (henri gréville), the novelist. she seemed a politic rather than an earnest woman of principle. as it was often very inconvenient for me to entertain distinguished visitors, who desired to meet me in my country home during the winter, mrs. bullard generously offered always to invite them to her home. she and her good mother have done their part in the reform movements in new york by their generous hospitalities. reading the debates in congress, at that time, on a proposed appropriation for a monument to general grant, i was glad to see that senator plumb of kansas was brave enough to express his opinion against it. i fully agree with him. so long as multitudes of our people who are doing the work of the world live in garrets and cellars, in ignorance, poverty, and vice, it is the duty of congress to apply the surplus in the national treasury to objects which will feed, clothe, shelter, and educate these wards of the state. if we must keep on continually building monuments to great men, they should be handsome blocks of comfortable homes for the poor, such as peabody built in london. senator hoar of massachusetts favored the grant monument, partly to cultivate the artistic tastes of our people. we might as well cultivate our tastes on useful dwellings as on useless monuments. surely sanitary homes and schoolhouses for the living would be more appropriate monuments to wise statesmen than the purest parian shafts among the sepulchers of the dead. the strikes and mobs and settled discontent of the masses warn us that, although we forget and neglect their interests and our duties, we do it at the peril of all. english statesmen are at their wits' end to-day with their tangled social and industrial problems, threatening the throne of a long line of kings. the impending danger cannot be averted by any surface measures; there must be a radical change in the relations of capital and labor. in april rumors of a domestic invasion, wafted on every atlantic breeze, warned us that our children were coming from england and france--a party of six. fortunately, the last line of the history was written, so miss anthony, with vol. iii. and bushels of manuscripts, fled to the peaceful home of her sister mary at rochester. the expected party sailed from liverpool the th of may, on the _america_ after being out three days the piston rod broke and they were obliged to return. my son-in-law, w.h. blatch, was so seasick and disgusted that he remained in england, and took a fresh start two months later, and had a swift passage without any accidents. the rest were transferred to the _germanic_, and reached new york the th of june. different divisions of the party were arriving until midnight. five people and twenty pieces of baggage! the confusion of such an invasion quite upset the even tenor of our days, and it took some time for people and trunks to find their respective niches. however crowded elsewhere, there was plenty of room in our hearts, and we were unspeakably happy to have our flock all around us once more. i had long heard so many conflicting opinions about the bible--some saying it taught woman's emancipation and some her subjection--that, during this visit of my children, the thought came to me that it would be well to collect every biblical reference to women in one small compact volume, and see on which side the balance of influence really was. to this end i proposed to organize a committee of competent women, with some latin, greek, and hebrew scholars in england and the united states, for a thorough revision of the old and new testaments, and to ascertain what the status of woman really was under the jewish and christian religion. as the church has thus far interpreted the bible as teaching woman's subjection, and none of the revisions by learned ecclesiastics have thrown any new light on the question, it seemed to me pre-eminently proper and timely for women themselves to review the book. as they are now studying theology in many institutions of learning, asking to be ordained as preachers, elders, deacons, and to be admitted, as delegates, to synods and general assemblies, and are refused on bible grounds, it seemed to me high time for women to consider those scriptural arguments and authorities. a happy coincidence enabled me at last to begin this work. while my daughter, mrs. stanton blatch, was with me, our friend miss frances lord, on our earnest invitation, came to america to visit us. she landed in new york the th of august, . as it was sunday she could not telegraph, hence there was no one to meet her, and, as we all sat chatting on the front piazza, suddenly, to our surprise and delight, she drove up. after a few days' rest and general talk of passing events, i laid the subject so near my heart before her and my daughter. they responded promptly and heartily, and we immediately set to work. i wrote to every woman who i thought might join such a committee, and miss lord ran through the bible in a few days, marking each chapter that in any way referred to women. we found that the work would not be so great as we imagined, as all the facts and teachings in regard to women occupied less than one-tenth of the whole scriptures. we purchased some cheap bibles, cut out the texts, pasted them at the head of the page, and, underneath, wrote our commentaries as clearly and concisely as possible. we did not intend to have sermons or essays, but brief comments, to keep "the woman's bible" as small as possible. miss lord and i worked several weeks together, and mrs. blatch and i, during the winter of , wrote all our commentaries on the pentateuch. but we could not succeed in forming the committee, nor, after writing innumerable letters, make the women understand what we wanted to do. i still have the commentaries of the few who responded, and the letters of those who declined--a most varied and amusing bundle of manuscripts in themselves. some said the bible had no special authority with them; that, like the american constitution, it could be interpreted to mean anything--slavery, when we protected that "institution," and freedom, when it existed no longer. others said that woman's sphere was clearly marked out in the scriptures, and all attempt at emancipation was flying in the face of providence. others said they considered all the revisions made by men thus far, had been so many acts of sacrilege, and they did hope women would not add their influence, to weaken the faith of the people in the divine origin of the holy book, for, if men and women could change it in one particular, they could in all. on the whole the correspondence was discouraging. later miss lord became deeply interested in psychical researches, and i could get no more work out of her. and as soon as we had finished the pentateuch, mrs. blatch declared she would go no farther; that it was the driest history she had ever read, and most derogatory to women. my beloved coadjutor, susan b. anthony, said that she thought it a work of supererogation; that when our political equality was recognized and we became full-fledged american citizens, the church would make haste to bring her bibles and prayer books, creeds and discipline up to the same high-water mark of liberty. helen gardener said: "i consider this a most important proposal, and if you and i can ever stay on the same side of the atlantic long enough, we will join hands and do the work. in fact, i have begun already with paul's epistles, and am fascinated with the work. the untenable and unscientific positions he takes in regard to women are very amusing. although the first chapter of genesis teaches the simultaneous creation of man and woman, paul bases woman's subjection on the priority of man, and because woman was of the man. as the historical fact is that, as far back as history dates, the man has been of the woman, should he therefore be forever in bondage to her? logically, according to paul, he should." i consulted several friends, such as dr. william f. channing, mr. and mrs. moncure d. conway, gertrude garrison, frederick cabot, and edward m. davis, as to the advisability of the work, and they all agreed that such a volume, showing woman's position under the jewish and christian religions, would be valuable, but none of them had time to assist in the project. though, owing to all these discouragements, i discontinued my work, i never gave up the hope of renewing it some time, when other of my coadjutors should awake to its importance and offer their services. on october , , with my daughter, nurse, and grandchild, i again sailed for england. going out of the harbor in the clear early morning, we had a fine view of bartholdi's statue of liberty enlightening the world. we had a warm, gentle rain and a smooth sea most of the way, and, as we had a stateroom on deck, we could have the portholes open, and thus get all the air we desired. with novels and letters, chess and whist the time passed pleasantly, and, on the ninth day, we landed in liverpool. chapter xxiv. england and france revisited. on arriving at basingstoke we found awaiting us cordial letters of welcome from miss biggs, miss priestman, mrs. peter taylor, mrs. priscilla mclaren, miss müller, mrs. jacob bright, and mme. de barrau. during the winter mrs. margaret bright lucas, drs. kate and julia mitchell, mrs. charles mclaren, mrs. saville, and miss balgarnie each spent a day or two with us. the full-dress costume of the ladies was a great surprise to my little granddaughter nora. she had never seen bare shoulders in a drawing room, and at the first glance she could not believe her eyes. she slowly made the circuit of the room, coming nearer and nearer until she touched the lady's neck to see whether or not it was covered with some peculiar shade of dress, but finding the bare skin she said: "why, you are not dressed, are you? i see your skin!" the scene suggested to me the amusing description in holmes' "elsie venner," of the efforts of a young lady, seated between two old gentlemen, to show off her white shoulders. the vicar would not look, but steadily prayed that he might not be led into temptation; but the physician, with greater moral hardihood, deliberately surveyed the offered charms, with spectacles on his nose. in december hattie and i finished dowden's "life of shelley," which we had been reading together. here we find a sensitive, refined nature, full of noble purposes, thrown out when too young to meet all life's emergencies, with no loving mentor to guard him from blunders or to help to retrieve the consequences of his false positions. had he been surrounded with a few true friends, who could appreciate what was great in him and pity what was weak, his life would have been different. his father was hard, exacting, and unreasonable; hence he had no influence. his mother had neither the wisdom to influence him, nor the courage to rebuke her husband; and alas! poor woman, she was in such thraldom herself to conventionalisms, that she could not understand a youth who set them all at defiance. [illustration: three generations.] [illustration: my eightieth birthday.] we also read cotton morrison's "service of man," which i hope will be a new inspiration to fresh labors by all for the elevation of humanity, and carnegie's "triumphant democracy," showing the power our country is destined to wield and the vastness of our domain. this book must give every american citizen a feeling of deeper responsibility than ever before to act well his part. we read, too, harriet martineau's translation of the works of auguste comte, and found the part on woman most unsatisfactory. he criticises aristotle's belief that slavery is a necessary element of social life, yet seems to think the subjection of woman in modern civilization a matter of no importance. all through that winter hattie and i occupied our time studying the bible and reading the commentaries of clark, scott, and wordsworth (bishop of lincoln). we found nothing grand in the history of the jews nor in the morals inculcated in the pentateuch. surely the writers had a very low idea of the nature of their god. they make him not only anthropomorphic, but of the very lowest type, jealous and revengeful, loving violence rather than mercy. i know no other books that so fully teach the subjection and degradation of woman. miriam, the eldest sister of moses and aaron, a genius, a prophetess, with the family aptitude for diplomacy and government, is continually set aside because of her sex--permitted to lead the women in singing and dancing, nothing more. no woman could offer sacrifices nor eat the holy meats because, according to the jews, she was too unclean and unholy. but what is the use, say some, of attaching any importance to the customs and teachings of a barbarous people? none whatever. but when our bishops, archbishops, and ordained clergymen stand up in their pulpits and read selections from the pentateuch with reverential voice, they make the women of their congregation believe that there really is some divine authority for their subjection. in the thirty-first chapter of numbers, in speaking of the spoils taken from the midianites, the live stock is thus summarized: "five thousand sheep, threescore and twelve thousand beeves, threescore and one thousand asses, and thirty-two thousand women and women-children," which moses said the warriors might keep for themselves. what a pity a stead had not been there, to protect the child-women of the midianites and rebuke the lord's chosen people as they deserved! in placing the women after the sheep, the beeves, and the asses, we have a fair idea of their comparative importance in the scale of being, among the jewish warriors. no wonder the right reverend bishops and clergy of the methodist church, who believe in the divine origin and authority of the pentateuch, exclude women from their great convocations in the american republic in the nineteenth century. in view of the fact that our children are taught to reverence the book as of divine origin, i think we have a right to ask that, in the next revision, all such passages be expurgated, and to that end learned, competent women must have an equal place on the revising committee. mrs. margaret bright lucas came, in february, to spend a few days with us. she was greatly shocked with many texts in the old testament, to which we called her attention, and said: "here is an insidious influence against the elevation of women, which but few of us have ever taken into consideration." she had just returned from a flying visit to america; having made two voyages across the atlantic and traveled three thousand miles across the continent in two months, and this at the age of sixty-eight years. she was enthusiastic in her praises of the women she met in the united states. as her name was already on the committee to prepare "the woman's bible," we had her hearty approval of the undertaking. in october hattie went to london, to attend a meeting to form a woman's liberal federation. mrs. gladstone presided. the speeches made were simply absurd, asking women to organize themselves to help the liberal party, which had steadily denied to them the political rights they had demanded for twenty years. professor stuart capped the climax of insult when he urged as "one great advantage in getting women to canvass for the liberal party was that they would give their services free." the liberals saw what enthusiasm the primrose dames had roused for the tory party, really carrying the election, and they determined to utilize a similar force in their ranks. but the whole movement was an insult to women. the one absorbing interest, then, was the queen's jubilee. ladies formed societies to collect funds to place at the disposal of the queen. every little village was divided into districts, and different ladies took the rounds, begging pennies at every door of servants and the laboring masses, and pounds of the wealthy people. one of them paid us a visit. she asked the maid who opened the door to see the rest of the servants, and she begged a penny of each of them. she then asked to see the mistress. my daughter descended; but, instead of a pound, she gave her a lecture on the queen's avarice. when the fund was started the people supposed the queen was to return it all to the people in liberal endowments of charitable institutions, but her majesty proposed to build a monument to prince albert, although he already had one in london. "the queen," said my daughter, "should celebrate her jubilee by giving good gifts to her subjects, and not by filching from the poor their pennies. to give half her worldly possessions to her impoverished people, to give home rule to ireland, or to make her public schools free, would be deeds worthy her jubilee; but to take another cent from those who are hopelessly poor is a sin against suffering humanity." the young woman realized the situation and said: "i shall go no farther. i wish i could return every penny i have taken from the needy." the most fitting monuments this nation can build are schoolhouses and homes for those who do the work of the world. it is no answer to say that they are accustomed to rags and hunger. in this world of plenty every human being has a right to food, clothes, decent shelter, and the rudiments of education. "something is rotten in the state of denmark" when one-tenth of the human family, booted and spurred, ride the masses to destruction. i detest the words "royalty" and "nobility," and all the ideas and institutions based on their recognition. in april the great meeting in hyde park occurred--a meeting of protest against the irish coercion bill. it was encouraging to see that there is a democratic as well as an aristocratic england. the london journals gave very different accounts of the meeting. the tories said it was a mob of inconsequential cranks. reason teaches us, however, that you cannot get up a large, enthusiastic meeting unless there is some question pending that touches the heart of the people. those who say that ireland has no grievances are ignorant alike of human nature and the facts of history. on april i went to paris, my daughter escorting me to dover, and my son meeting me at calais. it was a bright, pleasant day, and i sat on deck and enjoyed the trip, though many of my fellow passengers were pale and limp. whirling to paris in an easy car, through the beautiful wheatfields and vineyards, i thought of the old lumbering diligence, in which we went up to paris at a snail's pace forty years before. i remained in paris until october, and never enjoyed six months more thoroughly. one of my chief pleasures was making the acquaintance of my fourth son, theodore. i had seen but little of him since he was sixteen years old, as he then spent five years at cornell university, and as many more in germany and france. he had already published two works, "the life of thiers," and "the woman question in europe." to have a son interested in the question to which i have devoted my life, is a source of intense satisfaction. to say that i have realized in him all i could desire, is the highest praise a fond mother can give. my first experience in an apartment, living on an even plane, no running up and down stairs, was as pleasant as it was surprising. i had no idea of the comfort and convenience of this method of keeping house. our apartment in paris consisted of drawing room, dining room, library, a good-sized hall, in which stood a large american stove, five bedrooms, bathroom, and kitchen, and a balcony fifty-two feet long and four feet wide. the first few days it made me dizzy to look down from this balcony to the street below. i was afraid the whole structure would give way, it appeared so light and airy, hanging midway between earth and heaven. but my confidence in its steadfastness and integrity grew day by day, and it became my favorite resort, commanding, as it did, a magnificent view of the whole city and distant surroundings. there were so many americans in town, and french reformers to be seen, that i gave wednesday afternoon receptions during my whole visit. to one of our "at homes" came mlle. maria deraismes, the only female free mason in france, and the best woman orator in the country; her sister, mme. féresse-deraismes, who takes part in all woman movements; m. léon richer, then actively advocating the civil and political rights of women through the columns of his vigorous journal; mme. griess traut, who makes a specialty of peace work; mme. isabelle bogelot, who afterward attended the washington council of , and who is a leader in charity work; the late mme. emilie de morsier, who afterward was the soul of the international congress of , at paris; mme. pauline kergomard, the first woman to be made a member of the superior council of public instruction in france, and mme. henri gréville, the novelist. among the american guests at our various wednesday receptions were mr. and mrs. john bigelow, mr. and mrs. james g. blaine, mr. daniel c. french, the concord sculptor; mrs. j.c. ayer, mr. l. white busbey, one of the editors of the chicago _inter-ocean_; rev. dr. henry m. field, charles gifford dyer, the painter and father of the gifted young violinist, miss hella dyer; the late rev. mr. moffett, then united states consul at athens, mrs. governor bagley and daughter of michigan; grace greenwood and her talented daughter, who charmed everyone with her melodious voice, and miss bryant, daughter of the poet. one visitor who interested us most was the norwegian novelist and republican, bjornstjorne bjornson. we had several pleasant interviews with frederick douglass and his wife, some exciting games of chess with theodore tilton, in the pleasant apartments of the late w.j.a. fuller, esq., and his daughter, miss kate fuller. at this time i also met our brilliant countrywoman, louise chandler moulton. seeing so many familiar faces, i could easily imagine myself in new york rather than in paris. i attended several receptions and dined with mrs. charlotte beebe wilbour, greatly enjoying her clever descriptions of a winter on the nile in her own dahabeeyeh. i heard père hyacinthe preach, and met his american wife on several occasions. i took long drives every day through the parks and pleasant parts of the city. with garden concerts, operas, theaters, and the hippodrome i found abundant amusement. i never grew weary of the latter performance--the wonderful intelligence displayed there by animals, being a fresh surprise to me every time i went. i attended a reception at the elysée palace, escorted by m. joseph fabre, then a deputy and now a senator. m. fabre is the author of a play and several volumes devoted to joan of arc. he presented me to the president and to mme. jules grévy. i was also introduced to m. jules ferry, then prime minister, who said, among other things: "i am sorry to confess it, but it is only too true, our french women are far behind their sisters in america." the beautiful, large garden was thrown open that evening,--it was in july,--and the fine band of the republican guard gave a delightful concert under the big trees. i also met m. grévy's son-in-law, m. daniel wilson. he was then a deputy and one of the most powerful politicians in france. a few months later he caused his father's political downfall. i have a vivid recollection of him because he could speak english, his father having been a british subject. i visited the picture galleries once more, after a lapse of nearly fifty years, and was struck by the fact that, in that interval, several women had been admitted to places of honor. this was especially noticeable in the luxembourg sculpture gallery, where two women, mme. bertaux and the late claude vignon, wife of m. rouvier, were both represented by good work--the first and only women sculptors admitted to that gallery. at a breakfast party which we gave, i made the acquaintance of general cluseret, who figured in our civil war, afterward became war minister of the paris commune, and is now member of the chamber of deputies. he learned english when in america, and had not entirely forgotten it. he told anecdotes of lincoln, stanton, sumner, fremont, garibaldi, the count of paris, and many other famous men whom he once knew, and proved to be a very interesting conversationalist. old bookstands were always attractive centers of interest to theodore, and, among other treasure-troves, he brought home one day a boy of fourteen years, whose office it had been to watch the books. he was a bright, cheery little fellow of mixed french and german descent, who could speak english, french, and german. he was just what we had desired, to run errands and tend the door. as he was delighted with the idea of coming to us, we went to see his parents. we were pleased with their appearance and surroundings. we learned that they were members of the lutheran church, that the boy was one of the shining lights in sunday school, and the only point in our agreement on which they were strenuous was that he should go regularly to sunday school and have time to learn his lessons. so "immanuel" commenced a new life with us, and as we had unbounded confidence in the boy's integrity, we excused his shortcomings, and, for a time, believed all he said. but before long we found out that the moment we left the house he was in the drawing room, investigating every drawer, playing on the piano, or sleeping on the sofa. though he was told never to touch the hall stove, he would go and open all the draughts and make it red-hot. then we adopted the plan of locking up every part of the apartment but the kitchen. he amused himself burning holes through the pantry shelves, when the cook was out, and boring holes, with a gimlet, through a handsomely carved bread board. one day, in making up a spare bed for a friend, under the mattress were found innumerable letters he was supposed to have mailed at different times. when we reprimanded him for his pranks he would look at us steadily, but sorrowfully, and, immediately afterward, we would hear him dancing down the corridor singing, "safe in the arms of jesus." if he had given heed to one-half we said to him, he would have been safer in our hands than in those of his imaginary protector. he turned out a thief, an unmitigated liar, a dancing dervish, and, through all our experiences of six weeks with him, his chief reading was his bible and sunday-school books. the experience, however, was not lost on theodore--he has never suggested a boy since, and a faithful daughter of eve reigns in his stead. during the summer i was in the hands of two artists, miss anna klumpke, who painted my portrait, and paul bartlett, who molded my head in clay. to shorten the operation, sometimes i sat for both at the same time. although neither was fully satisfied with the results of their labors, we had many pleasant hours together, discussing their art, their early trials, and artists in general. each had good places in the _salon_, and honorable mention that year. it is sad to see so many american girls and boys, who have no genius for painting or sculpture, spending their days in garrets, in solitude and poverty, with the vain hope of earning distinction. women of all classes are awaking to the necessity of self-support, but few are willing to do the ordinary useful work for which they are fitted. in the _salon_ that year six thousand pictures were offered, and only two thousand accepted, and many of these were "skyed." it was lovely on our balcony at night to watch the little boats, with their lights, sailing up and down the seine, especially the day of the great annual fête,--the th of july,--when the whole city was magnificently illuminated. we drove about the city on several occasions at midnight, to see the life--men, women, and children enjoying the cool breezes, and the restaurants all crowded with people. sunday in paris is charming--it is the day for the masses of the people. all the galleries of art, the libraries, concert halls, and gardens are open to them. all are dressed in their best, out driving, walking, and having picnics in the various parks and gardens; husbands, wives, and children laughing and talking happily together. the seats in the streets and parks are all filled with the laboring masses. the benches all over paris--along the curbstones in every street and highway--show the care given to the comfort of the people. you will see mothers and nurses with their babies and children resting on these benches, laboring men eating their lunches and sleeping there at noon, the organ grinders and monkeys, too, taking their comfort. in france you see men and women everywhere together; in england the men generally stagger about alone, caring more for their pipes and beer than their mothers, wives, and sisters. social life, among the poor especially, is far more natural and harmonious in france than in england, because women mix more freely in business and amusements. coming directly from paris to london, one is forcibly struck with the gloom of the latter city, especially at night. paris with its electric lights is brilliant everywhere, while london, with its meager gas jets here and there struggling with the darkness, is as gloomy and desolate as dore's pictures of dante's inferno. on sunday, when the shops are closed, the silence and solitude of the streets, the general smoky blackness of the buildings and the atmosphere give one a melancholy impression of the great center of civilization. now that it has been discovered that smoke can be utilized and the atmosphere cleared, it is astonishing that the authorities do not avail themselves of the discovery, and thus bring light and joy and sunshine into that city, and then clean the soot of centuries from their blackened buildings. on my return to england i spent a day with miss emily lord, at her kindergarten establishment. she had just returned from sweden, where she spent six weeks in the carpenter's shop, studying the swedish slöjd system, in which children of twelve years old learn to use tools, making spoons, forks, and other implements. miss lord showed us some of her work, quite creditable for her first attempts. she said the children in the higher grades of her school enjoyed the carpenter work immensely and became very deft in the use of tools. on november , , we reached basingstoke once more, and found all things in order. my diary tells of several books i read during the winter and what the authors say of women; one the "religio medici," by sir thomas browne, m.d., in which the author discourses on many high themes, god, creation, heaven, hell, and vouchsafes one sentence on woman. of her he says: "i was never married but once and commend their resolution who never marry twice, not that i disallow of second, nor in all cases of polygamy, which, considering the unequal number of the sexes, may also be necessary. the whole world was made for man, but the twelfth part of man for woman. man is the whole world--the breath of god; woman the rib and crooked piece of man. i speak not in prejudice nor am averse from that sweet sex, but naturally amorous of all that is beautiful. i can look all day at a handsome picture, though it be but a horse." turning to john paul friedrich richter, i found in his chapter on woman many equally ridiculous statements mixed up with much fulsome admiration. after reading some volumes of richter, i took up heinrich heine, the german poet and writer. he said: "oh, the women! we must forgive them much, for they love much and many. their hate is, properly, only love turned inside out. sometimes they attribute some delinquency to us, because they think they can, in this way, gratify another man. when they write they have always one eye on the paper and the other eye on some man. this is true of all authoresses except the countess hahn hahn, who has only one eye." john ruskin's biography he gives us a glimpse of his timidity in regard to the sex, when a young man. he was very fond of the society of girls, but never knew how to approach them. he said he "was perfectly happy in serving them, would gladly make a bridge of himself for them to walk over, a beam to fasten a swing to for them--anything but to talk to them." such are some of the choice specimens of masculine wit i collected during my winter's reading! at a reception given to me by drs. julia and kate mitchell, sisters practicing medicine in london, i met stepniak, the russian nihilist, a man of grand presence and fine conversational powers. he was about to go to america, apprehensive lest our government should make an extradition treaty with russia to return political offenders, as he knew that proposal had been made. a few weeks later he did visit the united states, and had a hearing before a committee of the senate. he pointed out the character of the nihilist movement, declaring nihilists to be the real reformers, the true lovers of liberty, sacrificing themselves for the best interests of the people, and yet, as political prisoners, they are treated worse than the lowest class of criminals in the prisons and mines of siberia. i had a very unpleasant interview, during this visit to london, with miss lydia becker, miss caroline biggs, and miss blackburn, at the metropole, about choosing delegates to the international council of women soon to be held in washington. as there had been some irreconcilable dissensions in the suffrage association, and they could not agree as to whom their delegate should be, they decided to send none at all. i wrote at once to mrs. priscilla bright mclaren, pointing out what a shame it would be if england, above all countries, should not be represented in the first international council ever called by a suffrage association. she replied promptly that must not be, and immediately moved in the matter, and through her efforts three delegates were soon authorized to go, representing different constituencies--mrs. alice cliff scatcherd, mrs. ormiston chant, and mrs. ashton dilke. toward the last of february, , we went again to london to make a few farewell visits to dear friends. we spent a few days with mrs. mona caird, who was then reading karl pearson's lectures on "woman," and expounding her views on marriage, which she afterward gave to the westminster review, and stirred the press to white heat both in england and america. "is marriage a failure?" furnished the heading for our quack advertisements for a long time after. mrs. caird was a very graceful, pleasing woman, and so gentle in manner and appearance that no one would deem her capable of hurling such thunderbolts at the long-suffering saxon people. we devoted one day to prince krapotkine, who lives at harrow, in the suburbs of london. a friend of his, mr. lieneff, escorted us there. we found the prince, his wife, and child in very humble quarters; uncarpeted floors, books and papers on pine shelves, wooden chairs, and the bare necessaries of life--nothing more. they indulge in no luxuries, but devote all they can spare to the publication of liberal opinions to be scattered in russia, and to help nihilists in escaping from the dominions of the czar. the prince and princess took turns in holding and amusing the baby--then only one year old; fortunately it slept most of the time, so that the conversation flowed on for some hours. krapotkine told us of his sad prison experiences, both in france and russia. he said the series of articles by george kennan in the _century_ were not too highly colored, that the sufferings of men and women in siberia and the russian prisons could not be overdrawn. one of the refinements of cruelty they practice on prisoners is never to allow them to hear the human voice. a soldier always accompanies the warder who distributes the food, to see that no word is spoken. in vain the poor prisoner asks questions, no answer is ever made, no tidings from the outside world ever given. one may well ask what devil in human form has prescribed such prison life and discipline! i wonder if we could find a man in all russia who would defend the system, yet someone is responsible for its terrible cruelties! we returned to basingstoke, passed the few remaining days in looking over papers and packing for the voyage, and, on march , , mrs. blatch went with me to southampton. on the train i met my companions for the voyage, mrs. gustafsen, mrs. ashton dilke, and baroness gripenberg, from finland, a very charming woman, to whom i felt a strong attraction. the other delegates sailed from liverpool. we had a rough voyage and most of the passengers were very sick. mrs. dilke and i were well, however, and on deck every day, always ready to play whist and chess with a few gentlemen who were equally fortunate. i was much impressed with mrs. dilke's kindness and generosity in serving others. there was a lady on board with two children, whose nurse at the last minute refused to go with her. the mother was sick most of the way, and mrs. dilke did all in her power to relieve her, by amusing the little boy, telling him stories, walking with him on deck, and watching him throughout the day, no easy task to perform for an entire stranger. the poor little mother with a baby in her arms must have appreciated such kindly attention. when the pilot met us off sandy hook, he brought news of the terrible blizzard new york had just experienced, by which all communication with the world at large was practically suspended. the captain brought him down into the saloon to tell us all about it. the news was so startling that at first we thought the pilot was joking, but when he produced the metropolitan journals to verify his statements, we listened to the reading and what he had to say with profound astonishment. the second week in march, , will be memorable in the history of storms in the vicinity of new york. the snow was ten feet deep in some places, and the side streets impassable either for carriages or sleighs. i hoped the city would be looking its best, for the first impression on my foreign friends, but it never looked worse, with huge piles of snow everywhere covered with black dust. i started for washington at three o'clock, the day after our arrival, reached there at ten o'clock, and found my beloved friends, miss anthony and mrs. spofford, with open arms and warm hearts to receive me. as the vessel was delayed two days, our friends naturally thought we, too, had encountered a blizzard, but we had felt nothing of it; on the contrary the last days were the most pleasant of the voyage. chapter xxv. the international council of women. pursuant to the idea of the feasibility and need of an international council of women, mentioned in a preceding chapter, it was decided to celebrate the fourth decade of the woman suffrage movement in the united states by calling together such a council. at its nineteenth annual convention, held in january, , the national woman suffrage association resolved to assume the entire responsibility of holding a council, and to extend an invitation, for that purpose, to all associations of women in the trades, professions, and reforms, as well as those advocating political rights. early in june, , a call was issued for such a council to convene under the auspices of the national woman suffrage association at washington, d. c, on march , . the grand assemblage of women, coming from all the countries of the civilized globe, proved that the call for such a council was opportune, while the order and dignity of the proceedings proved the women worthy the occasion. no one doubts now the wisdom of that initiative step nor the added power women have gained over popular thought through the international council. as the proceedings of the contention were fully and graphically reported in the _woman's tribune_ at that time, and as its reports were afterward published in book form, revised and corrected by miss anthony, miss foster, and myself, i will merely say that our most sanguine expectations as to its success were more than realized. the large theater was crowded for an entire week, and hosts of able women spoke, as if specially inspired, on all the vital questions of the hour. although the council was called and conducted by the suffrage association, yet various other societies were represented. miss anthony was the financier of the occasion and raised twelve thousand dollars for the purpose, which enabled her to pay all the expenses of the delegates in washington, and for printing the report in book form. as soon as i reached washington, miss anthony ordered me to remain conscientiously in my own apartment and to prepare a speech for delivery before the committees of the senate and house, and another, as president, for the opening of the council. however, as mrs. spofford placed her carriage at our service, i was permitted to drive an hour or two every day about that magnificent city. one of the best speeches at the council was made by helen h. gardener. it was a criticism of dr. hammond's position in regard to the inferior size and quality of woman's brain. as the doctor had never had the opportunity of examining the brains of the most distinguished women, and, probably, those only of paupers and criminals, she felt he had no data on which to base his conclusions. moreover, she had the written opinion of several leading physicians, that it was quite impossible to distinguish the male from the female brain. the hearing at the capitol, after the meeting of the council, was very interesting, as all the foreign delegates were invited to speak each in the language of her own country; to address their alleged representatives in the halls of legislation was a privilege they had never enjoyed at home. it is very remarkable that english women have never made the demand for a hearing in the house of commons, nor even for a decent place to sit, where they can hear the debates and see the fine proportions of the representatives. the delegates had several brilliant receptions at the riggs house, and at the houses of senator stanford of california and senator palmer of michigan. miss anthony and i spent two months in washington, that winter. one of the great pleasures of our annual conventions was the reunion of our friends at the riggs house, where we enjoyed the boundless hospitality of mr. and mrs. spofford. the month of june i spent in new york city, where i attended several of colonel robert g. ingersoll's receptions and saw the great orator and iconoclast at his own fireside, surrounded by his admirers, and heard his beautiful daughters sing, which gave all who listened great pleasure, as they have remarkably fine voices. one has since married, and is now pouring out her richest melodies in the opera of lullaby in her own nursery. in the fall of , as ohio was about to hold a constitutional convention, at the request of the suffrage association i wrote an appeal to the women of the state to demand their right to vote for delegates to such convention. mrs. southworth had five thousand copies of my appeal published and distributed at the exposition in columbus. if ten righteous men could save sodom, all the brilliant women i met in cleveland should have saved ohio from masculine domination. the winter of - i was to spend with my daughter in omaha. i reached there in time to witness the celebration of the completion of the first bridge between that city and council bluffs. there was a grand procession in which all the industries of both towns were represented, and which occupied six hours in passing. we had a desirable position for reviewing the pageant, and very pleasant company to interpret the mottoes, symbols, and banners. the bridge practically brings the towns together, as electric street cars now run from one to the other in ten minutes. here, for the first time, i saw the cable cars running up hill and down without any visible means of locomotion. as the company ran an open car all winter, i took my daily ride of nine miles in it for fifteen cents. my son daniel, who escorted me, always sat inside the car, while i remained on an outside seat. he was greatly amused with the remarks he heard about that "queer old lady that always rode outside in all kinds of wintry weather." one day someone remarked loud enough for all to hear: "it is evident that woman does not know enough to come in when it rains." "bless me!" said the conductor, who knew me, "that woman knows as much as the queen of england; too much to come in here by a hot stove." how little we understand the comparative position of those whom we often criticise. there i sat enjoying the bracing air, the pure fresh breezes, indifferent to the fate of an old cloak and hood that had crossed the atlantic and been saturated with salt water many times, pitying the women inside breathing air laden with microbes that dozens of people had been throwing off from time to time, sacrificing themselves to their stylish bonnets, cloaks, and dresses, suffering with the heat of the red-hot stove; and yet they, in turn, pitying me. my seventy-third birthday i spent with my son gerrit smith stanton, on his farm near portsmouth, iowa. as we had not met in several years, it took us a long time, in the network of life, to pick up all the stitches that had dropped since we parted. i amused myself darning stockings and drawing plans for an addition to his house. but in the spring my son and his wife came to the conclusion that they had had enough of the solitude of farm life and turned their faces eastward. soon after my return to omaha, the editor of the _woman's tribune_, mrs. clara b. colby, called and lunched with us one day. she announced the coming state convention, at which i was expected "to make the best speech of my life." she had all the arrangements to make, and invited me to drive round with her, in order that she might talk by the way. she engaged the opera house, made arrangements at the paxton house for a reception, called on all her faithful coadjutors to arouse enthusiasm in the work, and climbed up to the sanctums of the editors,--democratic and republican alike,--asking them to advertise the convention and to say a kind word for our oppressed class in our struggle for emancipation. they all promised favorable notices and comments, and they kept their promises. mrs. colby, being president of the nebraska suffrage association, opened the meeting with an able speech, and presided throughout with tact and dignity. i came very near meeting with an unfortunate experience at this convention. the lady who escorted me in her carriage to the opera house carried the manuscript of my speech, which i did not miss until it was nearly time to speak, when i told a lady who sat by my side that our friend had forgotten to give me my manuscript. she went at once to her and asked for it. she remembered taking it, but what she had done with it she did not know. it was suggested that she might have dropped it in alighting from the carriage. and lo! they found it lying in the gutter. as the ground was frozen hard it was not even soiled. when i learned of my narrow escape, i trembled, for i had not prepared any train of thought for extemporaneous use. i should have been obliged to talk when my turn came, and if inspired by the audience or the good angels, might have done well, or might have failed utterly. the moral of this episode is, hold on to your manuscript. owing to the illness of my son-in-law, frank e. lawrence, he and my daughter went to california to see if the balmy air of san diego would restore his health, and so we gave up housekeeping in omaha, and, on april , , in company with my eldest son i returned east and spent the summer at hempstead, long island, with my son gerrit and his wife. we found hempstead a quiet, old dutch town, undisturbed by progressive ideas. here i made the acquaintance of chauncey c. parsons and wife, formerly of boston, who were liberal in their ideas on most questions. mrs. parsons and i attended one of the seidl club meetings at coney island, where seidl was then giving some popular concerts. the club was composed of two hundred women, to whom i spoke for an hour in the dining room of the hotel. with the magnificent ocean views, the grand concerts, and the beautiful women, i passed two very charming days by the seaside. my son henry had given me a phaeton, low and easy as a cradle, and i enjoyed many drives about long island. we went to bryant's home on the north side, several times, and in imagination i saw the old poet in the various shady nooks, inditing his lines of love and praise of nature in all her varying moods. walking among the many colored, rustling leaves in the dark days of november, i could easily enter into his thought as he penned these lines: "the melancholy days are come, the saddest of the year, of wailing winds, and naked woods, and meadows brown and sear. heaped in the hollows of the grove, the autumn leaves lie dead; they rustle to the eddying gust, and to the rabbit's tread." in september, , my daughter, mrs. stanton lawrence, came east to attend a school of physical culture, and my other daughter, mrs. stanton blatch, came from england to enjoy one of our bracing winters. unfortunately we had rain instead of snow, and fogs instead of frost. however, we had a pleasant reunion at hempstead. after a few days in and about new york visiting friends, we went to geneva and spent several weeks in the home of my cousin, the daughter of gerrit smith. she and i have been most faithful, devoted friends all our lives, and regular correspondents for more than fifty years. in the family circle we are ofttimes referred to as "julius" and "johnson." these euphonious names originated in this way: when the christy minstrels first appeared, we went one evening to hear them. on returning home we amused our seniors with, as they said, a capital rehearsal. the wit and philosopher of the occasion were called, respectively, julius and johnson; so we took their parts and reproduced all the bright, humorous remarks they made. the next morning as we appeared at the breakfast table, cousin gerrit smith, in his deep, rich voice said: "good-morning, julius and johnson," and he kept it up the few days we were in albany together. one after another our relatives adopted the pseudonyms, and mrs. miller has been "julius" and i "johnson" ever since. from geneva we went to buffalo, but, as i had a bad cold and a general feeling of depression, i decided to go to the dansville sanatorium and see what doctors james and kate jackson could do for me. i was there six weeks and tried all the rubbings, pinchings, steamings; the swedish movements of the arms, hands, legs, feet; dieting, massage, electricity, and, though i succeeded in throwing off only five pounds of flesh, yet i felt like a new being. it is a charming place to be in--the home is pleasantly situated and the scenery very fine. the physicians are all genial, and a cheerful atmosphere pervades the whole establishment. as christmas was at hand, the women were all half crazy about presents, and while good doctors james and kate were doing all in their power to cure the nervous affections of their patients, they would thwart the treatment by sitting in the parlor with the thermometer at seventy-two degrees, embroidering all kinds of fancy patterns,--some on muslin, some on satin, and some with colored worsteds on canvas,--inhaling the poisonous dyes, straining the optic nerves, counting threads and stitches, hour after hour, until utterly exhausted. i spoke to one poor victim of the fallacy of christmas presents, and of her injuring her health in such useless employment. "what can i do?" she replied, "i must make presents and cannot afford to buy them." "do you think," said i, "any of your friends would enjoy a present you made at the risk of your health? i do not think there is any 'must' in the matter. i never feel that i must give presents, and never want any, especially from those who make some sacrifice to give them." this whole custom of presents at christmas, new year's, and at weddings has come to be a bore, a piece of hypocrisy leading to no end of unhappiness. i do not know a more pitiful sight than to see a woman tatting, knitting, embroidering--working cats on the toe of some slipper, or tulips on an apron. the amount of nervous force that is expended in this way is enough to make angels weep. the necessary stitches to be taken in every household are quite enough without adding fancy work. from dansville my daughters and i went on to washington to celebrate the seventieth birthday of miss anthony, who has always been to them as a second mother. mrs. blatch made a speech at the celebration, and mrs. lawrence gave a recitation. first came a grand supper at the riggs house. the dining room was beautifully decorated; in fact, mr. and mrs. spofford spared no pains to make the occasion one long to be remembered. may wright sewall was the mistress of ceremonies. she read the toasts and called on the different speakers. phoebe couzins, rev. anna shaw, isabella beecher hooker, matilda joslyn gage, clara b. colby, senator blair of new hampshire, and many others responded. i am ashamed to say that we kept up the festivities till after two o'clock. miss anthony, dressed in dark velvet and point lace, spoke at the close with great pathos. those of us who were there will not soon forget february , . after speaking before committees of the senate and house, i gave the opening address at the annual convention. mrs. stanton blatch spoke a few minutes on the suffrage movement in england, after which we hurried off to new york, and went on board the _aller_, one of the north german lloyd steamers, bound for southampton. at the ship we found captain milinowski and his wife and two of my sons waiting our arrival. as we had eighteen pieces of baggage it took mrs. blatch some time to review them. my phaeton, which we decided to take, filled six boxes. an easy carriage for two persons is not common in england. the dogcarts prevail, the most uncomfortable vehicles one can possibly use. why some of our americans drive in those uncomfortable carts is a question. i think it is because they are "so english." the only reason the english use them is because they are cheap. the tax on two wheels is one-half what it is on four, and in england all carriages are taxed. before we americans adopt fashions because they are english, we had better find out the _raison d'être_ for their existence. we had a very pleasant, smooth voyage, unusually so for blustering february and march. as i dislike close staterooms, i remained in the ladies' saloon night and day, sleeping on a sofa. after a passage of eleven days we landed at southampton, march , . it was a beautiful moonlight night and we had a pleasant ride on the little tug to the wharf. we reached basingstoke at eleven o'clock, found the family well and all things in order. chapter xxvi. my last visit to england. as soon as we got our carriage put together hattie and i drove out every day, as the roads in england are in fine condition all the year round. we had lovely weather during the spring, but the summer was wet and cold. with reading, writing, going up to london, and receiving visitors, the months flew by without our accomplishing half the work we proposed. as my daughter was a member of the albemarle club, we invited several friends to dine with us there at different times. there we had a long talk with mr. stead, the editor of the _pall mall gazette_, on his position in regard to russian affairs, "the deceased wife's sister bill," and the divorce laws of england. mr. stead is a fluent talker as well as a good writer. he is the leader of the social purity movement in england. the wisdom of his course toward sir charles dilke and mr. parnell was questioned by many; but there is a touch of the religious fanatic in mr. stead, as in many of his followers. there were several problems in social ethics that deeply stirred the english people in the year of our lord . one was charles stewart parnell's platonic friendship with mrs. o'shea, and the other was the lord chancellor's decision in the case of mrs. jackson. the pulpit, the press, and the people vied with each other in trying to dethrone mr. parnell as the great irish leader, but the united forces did not succeed in destroying his self-respect, nor in hounding him out of the british parliament, though, after a brave and protracted resistance on his part, they did succeed in hounding him into the grave. it was pitiful to see the irish themselves, misled by a hypocritical popular sentiment in england, turn against their great leader, the only one they had had for half a century who was able to keep the irish question uppermost in the house of commons year after year. the course of events since his death has proved the truth of what he told them, to wit: that there was no sincerity in the interest english politicians manifested in the question of home rule, and that the debates on that point would cease as soon as it was no longer forced on their consideration. and now when they have succeeded in killing their leader, they begin to realize their loss. the question evolved through the ferment of social opinions was concisely stated, thus: "can a man be a great leader, a statesman, a general, an admiral, a learned chief justice, a trusted lawyer, or skillful physician, if he has ever broken the seventh commandment?" i expressed my opinion in the _westminster review_, at the time, in the affirmative. mrs. jacob bright, mrs. ellen battelle dietrick of boston, kate field, in her _washington_, agreed with me. many other women spoke out promptly in the negative, and with a bitterness against those who took the opposite view that was lamentable. the jackson case was a profitable study, as it brought out other questions of social ethics, as well as points of law which were ably settled by the lord chancellor. it seems that immediately after mr. and mrs. jackson were married, the groom was compelled to go to australia. after two years he returned and claimed his bride, but in the interval she felt a growing aversion and determined not to live with him. as she would not even see him, with the assistance of friends he kidnaped her one day as she was coming out of church, and carried her to his home, where he kept her under surveillance until her friends, with a writ of _habeas corpus_, compelled him to bring her into court. the popular idea "based on the common law of england," was, that the husband had this absolute right. the lower court, in harmony with this idea, maintained the husband's right, and remanded her to his keeping, but the friends appealed to the higher court and the lord chancellor reversed the decision. with regard to the right so frequently claimed, giving husbands the power to seize, imprison, and chastise their wives, he said: "i am of the opinion that no such right exists in law. i am of the opinion that no such right ever did exist in law. i say that no english subject has the right to imprison another english subject, whether his wife or not." through this decision the wife walked out of the court a free woman. the passage of the married women's property bill in england in was the first blow at the old idea of coverture, giving to wives their rights of property, the full benefit of which they are yet to realize when clearer-minded men administer the laws. the decision of the lord chancellor, rendered march , , declaratory of the personal rights of married women, is a still more important blow by just so much as the rights of person are more sacred than the rights of property. one hundred years ago, lord chief justice mansfield gave his famous decision in the somerset case, "that no slave could breathe on british soil," and the slave walked out of court a free man. the decision of the lord chancellor, in the jackson case, is far more important, more momentous in its consequences, as it affects not only one race but one-half of the entire human family. from every point of view this is the greatest legal decision of the century. like the great chief justice of the last century, the lord chancellor, with a clearer vision than those about him, rises into a purer atmosphere of thought, and vindicates the eternal principles of justice and the dignity of british law, by declaring all statutes that make wives the bond slaves of their husbands, obsolete. how long will it be in our republic before some man will arise, great enough to so interpret our national constitution as to declare that women, as citizens of the united states, cannot be governed by laws in the making of which they have no part? it is not constitutional amendments nor statute laws we need, but judges on the bench of our supreme court, who, in deciding great questions of human rights, shall be governed by the broad principles of justice rather than precedent. one interesting feature in the trial of the jackson case, was that both lady coleridge and the wife of the lord chancellor were seated on the bench, and evidently much pleased with the decision. it is difficult to account for the fact that, while women of the highest classes in england take the deepest interest in politics and court decisions, american women of wealth and position are wholly indifferent to all public matters. while english women take an active part in elections, holding meetings and canvassing their districts, here, even the wives of judges, governors, and senators speak with bated breath of political movements, and seem to feel that a knowledge of laws and constitutions would hopelessly unsex them. toward the last of april, with my little granddaughter and her nurse, i went down to bournemouth, one of the most charming watering places in england. we had rooms in the cliff house with windows opening on the balcony, where we had a grand view of the bay and could hear the waves dashing on the shore. while nora, with her spade and pail, played all day in the sands, digging trenches and filling them with water, i sat on the balcony reading "diana of the crossways," and bjornson's last novel, "in god's way," both deeply interesting. as all the characters in the latter come to a sad end, i could not see the significance of the title. if they walked in god's way their career should have been successful. i took my first airing along the beach in an invalid chair. these bath chairs are a great feature in all the watering places of england. they are drawn by a man or a donkey. the first day i took a man, an old sailor, who talked incessantly of his adventures, stopping to rest every five minutes, dissipating all my pleasant reveries, and making an unendurable bore of himself. the next day i told the proprietor to get me a man who would not talk all the time. the man he supplied jogged along in absolute silence; he would not even answer my questions. supposing he had his orders to keep profound silence, after one or two attempts i said nothing. when i returned home, the proprietor asked me how i liked this man. "ah!" i said, "he was indeed silent and would not even answer a question nor go anywhere i told him; still i liked him better than the talkative man." he laughed heartily and said: "this man is deaf and dumb. i thought i would make sure that you should not be bored." i joined in the laugh and said: "well, to-morrow get me a man who can hear but cannot speak, if you can find one constructed on that plan." bournemouth is noteworthy now as the burial place of mary wolstonecraft and the shelleys. i went to see the monument that had been recently reared to their memory. on one side is the following inscription: "william godwin, author of 'political justice,' born march rd, , died april th, . mary wolstonecraft godwin, author of the 'vindication of the rights of women,' born april th, , died september th, ." these remains were brought here, in , from the churchyard of st. pancras, london. on the other side are the following inscriptions: "mary wolstonecraft godwin, daughter of william godwin and widow of the late percy bysshe shelley, born august th, , died february st, . percy florence shelley, son of percy shelley and mary wolstonecraft, third baronet, born november th, , died december th, . "in christ's church, six miles from bournemouth, is a bas-relief in memory of the great poet. he is represented, dripping with seaweed, in the arms of the angel of death. as i sat on my balcony hour after hour, reading and thinking of the shelleys, watching the changing hues of the clouds and the beautiful bay, and listening to the sad monotone of the waves, these sweet lines of whittier's came to my mind: "its waves are kneeling on the strand, as kneels the human knee,-- their white locks bowing to the sand, the priesthood of the sea! "the blue sky is the temple's arch, its transept earth and air, the music of its starry march the chorus of a prayer." american letters, during this sojourn abroad, told of many losses, one after another, from our family circle; nine passed away within two years. the last was my sister mrs. bayard, who died in may, . she was the oldest of our family, and had always been a second mother to her younger sisters, and her house our second home. the last of june my son theodore's wife and daughter came over from france to spend a month with us. lisette and nora, about the same size, played and quarreled most amusingly together. they spent their mornings in the kindergarten school, and the afternoons with their pony, but rainy days i was impressed into their service to dress dolls and tell stories. i had the satisfaction to hear them say that their dolls were never so prettily dressed before, and that my stories were better than any in the books. as i composed the wonderful yarns as i went along, i used to get very tired, and sometimes, when i heard the little feet coming, i would hide, but they would hunt until they found me. when my youngest son was ten years old and could read for himself, i graduated in story telling, having practiced in that line twenty-one years. i vowed that i would expend no more breath in that direction, but the eager face of a child asking for stories is too much for me, and my vow has been often broken. all the time i was in england nora claimed the twilight hour, and, in france, lisette was equally pertinacious. when victor hugo grew tired telling his grandchildren stories, he would wind up with the story of an old gentleman who, after a few interesting experiences, took up his evening paper and began to read aloud. the children would listen a few moments and then, one by one, slip out of the room. longfellow's old gentleman, after many exciting scenes in his career, usually stretched himself on the lounge and feigned sleep. but grandmothers are not allowed to shelter themselves with such devices; they are required to spin on until the bedtime really arrives. on july , one of the hottest days of the season, mrs. jacob bright and daughter, herbert burroughs, and mrs. parkhurst came down from london, and we sat out of doors, taking our luncheon under the trees and discussing theosophy. later in the month hattie and i went to yorkshire to visit mr. and mrs. scatcherd at morley hall, and there spent several days. we had a prolonged discussion on personal rights. one side was against all governmental interference, such as compulsory education and the protection of children against cruel parents; the other side in favor of state interference that protected the individual in the enjoyment of life, liberty, and happiness. i took the latter position. many parents are not fit to have the control of children, hence the state should see that they are sheltered, fed, clothed, and educated. it is far better for the state to make good citizens of its children in the beginning, than, in the end, to be compelled to care for them as criminals. while in the north of england we spent a few days at howard castle, the summer residence of lord and lady carlisle and their ten children. so large a family in high life is unusual. as i had known lord and lady amberley in america, when they visited this country in , i enjoyed meeting other members of their family. lady carlisle is in favor of woman suffrage and frequently speaks in public. she is a woman of great force of character, and of very generous impulses. she is trying to do her duty in sharing the good things of life with the needy. the poor for miles round often have picnics in her park, and large numbers of children from manufacturing towns spend weeks with her cottage tenants at her expense. lord carlisle is an artist and a student. as he has a poetical temperament and is aesthetic in all his tastes, lady carlisle is the business manager of the estate. she is a practical woman with immense executive ability. the castle with its spacious dining hall and drawing rooms, with its chapel, library, galleries of paintings and statuary, its fine outlook, extensive gardens and lawns was well worth seeing. we enjoyed our visit very much and discussed every imaginable subject. when we returned to basingstoke we had a visit from mrs. cobb, the wife of a member of parliament, and sister-in-law of karl pearson, whose lectures on woman i had enjoyed so much. it was through reading his work, "the ethic of free thought," that the matriarchate made such a deep impression on my mind and moved me to write a tract on the subject. people who have neither read nor thought on this point, question the facts as stated by bachofen, morgan, and wilkeson; but their truth, i think, cannot be questioned. they seem so natural in the chain of reasoning and the progress of human development. mrs. cobb did a very good thing a few days before visiting us. at a great meeting called to promote mr. cobb's election, john morley spoke. he did not even say "ladies and gentlemen" in starting, nor make the slightest reference to the existence of such beings as women. when he had finished, mrs. cobb arose mid great cheering and criticised his speech, making some quotations from his former speeches of a very liberal nature. the audience laughed and cheered, fully enjoying the rebuke. the next day in his speech he remembered his countrywomen, and on rising said, "ladies and gentlemen." during august, , i was busy getting ready for my voyage, as i was to sail on the _ems_ on august . although i had crossed the ocean six times in the prior ten years i dreaded the voyage more than words can describe. the last days were filled with sadness, in parting with those so dear to me in foreign countries--especially those curly-headed little girls, so bright, so pretty, so winning in all their ways. hattie and theodore went with me from southampton in the little tug to the great ship _ems_. it was very hard for us to say the last farewell, but we all tried to be as brave as possible. we had a rough voyage, but i was not seasick one moment. i was up and dressed early in the morning, and on deck whenever the weather permitted. i made many pleasant acquaintances with whom i played chess and whist; wrote letters to all my foreign friends, ready to mail on landing; read the "egotist," by george meredith, and ibsen's plays as translated by my friend frances lord. i had my own private stewardess, a nice german woman who could speak english. she gave me most of my meals on deck or in the ladies' saloon, and at night she would open the porthole two or three times and air our stateroom; that made the nights endurable. the last evening before landing we got up an entertainment with songs, recitations, readings, and speeches. i was invited to preside and introduce the various performers. we reached sandy hook the evening of the th day of august and lay there all night, and the next morning we sailed up our beautiful harbor, brilliant with the rays of the rising sun. being fortunate in having children in both hemispheres, here, too, i found a son and daughter waiting to welcome me to my native land. our chief business for many weeks was searching for an inviting apartment where my daughter, mrs. stanton lawrence, my youngest son, bob, and i could set up our family altar and sing our new psalm of life together. after much weary searching we found an apartment. having always lived in a large house in the country, the quarters seemed rather contracted at first, but i soon realized the immense saving in labor and expense in having no more room than is absolutely necessary, and all on one floor. to be transported from the street to your apartment in an elevator in half a minute, to have all your food and fuel sent to your kitchen by an elevator in the rear, to have your rooms all warmed with no effort of your own, seemed like a realization of some fairy dream. with an extensive outlook of the heavens above, of the park and the boulevard beneath, i had a feeling of freedom, and with a short flight of stairs to the roof (an easy escape in case of fire), of safety, too. no sooner was i fully established in my eyrie, than i was summoned to rochester, by my friend miss anthony, to fill an appointment she had made for me with miss adelaide johnson, the artist from washington, who was to idealize miss anthony and myself in marble for the world's fair. i found my friend demurely seated in her mother's rocking-chair hemming table linen and towels for her new home, anon bargaining with butchers, bakers, and grocers, making cakes and puddings, talking with enthusiasm of palatable dishes and the beauties of various articles of furniture that different friends had presented her. all there was to remind one of the "napoleon of the suffrage movement" was a large escritoire covered with documents in the usual state of confusion--miss anthony never could keep her papers in order. in search of any particular document she roots out every drawer and pigeon hole, although her mother's little spinning wheel stands right beside her desk, a constant reminder of all the domestic virtues of the good housewife, with whom "order" is of the utmost importance and "heaven's first law." the house was exquisitely clean and orderly, the food appetizing, the conversation pleasant and profitable, and the atmosphere genial. a room in an adjoining house was assigned to miss johnson and myself, where a strong pedestal and huge mass of clay greeted us. and there, for nearly a month, i watched the transformation of that clay into human proportions and expressions, until it gradually emerged with the familiar facial outlines ever so dear to one's self. sitting there four or five hours every day i used to get very sleepy, so my artist arranged for a series of little naps. when she saw the crisis coming she would say: "i will work now for a time on the ear, the nose, or the hair, as you must be wide awake when i am trying to catch the expression." i rewarded her for her patience and indulgence by summoning up, when awake, the most intelligent and radiant expression that i could command. as miss johnson is a charming, cultured woman, with liberal ideas and brilliant in conversation, she readily drew out all that was best in me. before i left rochester, miss anthony and her sister mary gave a reception to me at their house. as some of the professors and trustees of the rochester university were there, the question of co-education was freely discussed, and the authorities urged to open the doors of the university to the daughters of the people. it was rather aggravating to contemplate those fine buildings and grounds, while every girl in that city must go abroad for higher education. the wife of president hill of the university had just presented him with twins, a girl and a boy, and he facetiously remarked, "that if the creator could risk placing sexes in such near relations, he thought they might with safety walk on the same campus and pursue the same curriculum together." miss anthony and i went to geneva the next day to visit mrs. miller and to meet, by appointment, mrs. eliza osborne, the niece of lucretia mott, and eldest daughter of martha c. wright. we anticipated a merry meeting, but miss anthony and i were so tired that we no doubt appeared stupid. in a letter to mrs. miller afterward, mrs. osborne inquired why i was "so solemn." as i pride myself on being impervious to fatigue or disease, i could not own up to any disability, so i turned the tables on her in the following letter: "new york, west st street, november , . "dear eliza: "in a recent letter to mrs. miller, speaking of the time when we last met, you say, 'why was mrs. stanton so solemn?' to which i reply: ever since an old german emperor issued an edict, ordering all the women under that flag to knit when walking on the highway, when selling apples in the market place, when sitting in the parks, because 'to keep women out of mischief their hands must be busy,' ever since i read that, i have felt 'solemn' whenever i have seen any daughters of our grand republic knitting, tatting, embroidering, or occupied with any of the ten thousand digital absurdities that fill so large a place in the lives of eve's daughters. "looking forward to the scintillations of wit, the philosophical researches, the historical traditions, the scientific discoveries, the astronomical explorations, the mysteries of theosophy, palmistry, mental science, the revelations of the unknown world where angels and devils do congregate, looking forward to discussions of all these grand themes, in meeting the eldest daughter of david and martha wright, the niece of lucretia mott, the sister-in-law of william lloyd garrison, a queenly-looking woman five feet eight in height, and well proportioned, with glorious black eyes, rivaling even de staël's in power and pathos, one can readily imagine the disappointment i experienced when such a woman pulled a cotton wash rag from her pocket and forthwith began to knit with bowed head. fixing her eyes and concentrating her thoughts on a rag one foot square; it was impossible for conversation to rise above the wash-rag level! it was enough to make the most aged optimist 'solemn' to see such a wreck of glorious womanhood. "and, still worse, she not only knit steadily, hour after hour, but she bestowed the sweetest words of encouragement on a young girl from the pacific coast, who was embroidering rosebuds on another rag, the very girl i had endeavored to rescue from the maelstrom of embroidery, by showing her the unspeakable folly of giving her optic nerves to such base uses, when they were designed by the creator to explore the planetary world, with chart and compass to guide mighty ships across the sea, to lead the sons of adam with divinest love from earth to heaven. think of the great beseeching optic nerves and muscles by which we express our admiration of all that is good and glorious in earth and heaven, being concentrated on a cotton wash rag! who can wonder that i was 'solemn' that day! i made my agonized protest on the spot, but it fell unheeded, and with satisfied sneer eliza knit on, and the young californian continued making the rosebuds. i gazed into space, and, when alone, wept for my degenerate countrywoman. i not only was 'solemn' that day, but i am profoundly 'solemn' whenever i think of that queenly woman and that cotton wash rag. (one can buy a whole dozen of these useful appliances, with red borders and fringed, for twenty-five cents.) oh, eliza, i beseech you, knit no more! "affectionately yours, "elizabeth cady stanton." to this mrs. osborne sent the following reply: "dear mrs. stanton: "in your skit against your sisterhood who knit, or useful make their fingers, i wonder if--deny it not-- the habit of lucretia mott within your memory lingers! "in retrospective vision bright, can you recall dear martha wright without her work or knitting? the needles flying in her hands, on washing rags or baby's bands, or other work as fitting? "i cannot think they thought the less, or ceased the company to bless with conversation's riches, because they thus improved their time, and never deemed it was a crime to fill the hours with stitches. "they even used to preach and plan to spread the fashion, so that man might have this satisfaction; instead of idling as men do, with nervous meddling fingers too, why not mate talk with action? "but as a daughter and a niece, i pride myself on every piece of handiwork created; while reveling in social chat, or listening to gossip flat, my gain is unabated. "that german emperor you scorn, seems to my mind a monarch born, worthy to lead a column; i'll warrant he could talk and work, and, neither being used to shirk, was rarely very solemn. "i could say more upon this head, but must, before i go to bed. your idle precepts mocking, get out my needle and my yarn and, caring not a single darn. just finish up this stocking." chapter xxvii. sixtieth anniversary of the class of --the woman's bible. i returned from geneva to new york city in time to celebrate my seventy-sixth birthday with my children. i had traveled about constantly for the last twenty years in france, england, and my own country, and had so many friends and correspondents, and pressing invitations to speak in clubs and conventions, that now i decided to turn over a new leaf and rest in an easy-chair. but so complete a change in one's life could not be easily accomplished. in spite of my resolution to abide in seclusion, my daughter and i were induced to join the botta club, which was to meet once a month, alternately, at the residences of mrs. moncure d. conway and mrs. abby sage richardson. though composed of ladies and gentlemen it proved dull and unprofitable. as the subject for discussion was not announced until each meeting, no one was prepared with any well-digested train of thought. it was also decided to avoid all questions about which there might be grave differences of opinion. this negative position reminded me of a book on etiquette which i read in my young days, in which gentlemen were warned, "in the presence of ladies discuss neither politics, religion, nor social duties, but confine yourself to art, poetry, and abstract questions which women cannot understand. the less they know of a subject the more respectfully they will listen." this club was named in honor of mrs. botta, formerly miss anne lynch, whose drawing room for many years was the social center of the literati of new york. on january , , we held the annual suffrage convention in washington, and, as usual, had a hearing before the congressional committee. my speech on the "solitude of self" was well received and was published in the congressional record. the _woman's tribune_ struck off many hundreds of copies and it was extensively circulated. notwithstanding my determination to rest, i spoke to many clubs, wrote articles for papers and magazines, and two important leaflets, one on "street cleaning," another on "opening the chicago exposition on sunday." as sunday was the only day the masses could visit that magnificent scene, with its great lake, extensive park, artificial canals, and beautiful buildings, i strongly advocated its being open on that day. one hundred thousand religious bigots petitioned congress to make no appropriation for this magnificent exposition, unless the managers pledged themselves to close the gates on sunday, and hide this vision of beauty from the common people. fortunately, this time a sense of justice outweighed religious bigotry. i sent my leaflets to every member of congress and of the state legislatures, and to the managers of the exposition, and made it a topic of conversation at every opportunity. the park and parts of the exposition were kept open on sunday, but some of the machinery was stopped as a concession to narrow christian sects. in june, , at the earnest solicitation of mrs. russell sage, i attended the dedication of the gurley memorial building, presented to the emma willard seminary, at troy, new york, and made the following address: "mrs. president, members of the alumnae: "it is just sixty years since the class of ' , to which i belonged, celebrated a commencement in this same room. this was the great event of the season to many families throughout this state. parents came from all quarters; the _élite_ of troy and albany assembled here. principals from other schools, distinguished legislators, and clergymen all came to hear girls scan latin verse, solve problems in euclid, and read their own compositions in a promiscuous assemblage. a long line of teachers anxiously waited the calling of their classes, and over all, our queenly madame willard presided with royal grace and dignity. two hundred girls in gala attire, white dresses, bright sashes, and coral ornaments, with their curly hair, rosy cheeks, and sparkling eyes, flitted to and fro, some rejoicing that they had passed through their ordeal, some still on the tiptoe of expectation, some laughing, some in tears--altogether a most beautiful and interesting picture. "conservatives then, as now, thought the result of the higher education of girls would be to destroy their delicacy and refinement. but as the graduates of the troy seminary were never distinguished in after life for the lack of these feminine virtues, the most timid, even, gradually accepted the situation and trusted their daughters with mrs. willard. but that noble woman endured for a long period the same ridicule and persecution that women now do who take an onward step in the march of progress. "i see around me none of the familiar faces that greeted my coming or said farewell in parting. i do not know that one of my classmates still lives. friendship with those i knew and loved best lasted but a few years, then our ways in life parted. i should not know where to find one now, and if i did, probably our ideas would differ on every subject, as i have wandered in latitudes beyond the prescribed sphere of women. i suppose it is much the same with many of you--the familiar faces are all gone, gone to the land of shadows, and i hope of sunshine too, where we in turn will soon follow. "and yet, though we who are left are strangers to one another, we have the same memories of the past, of the same type of mischievous girls and staid teachers, though with different names. the same long, bare halls and stairs, the recitation rooms with the same old blackboards and lumps of chalk taken for generation after generation, i suppose, from the same pit; the dining room, with its pillars inconveniently near some of the tables, with its thick, white crockery and black-handled knives, and viands that never suited us, because, forsooth, we had boxes of delicacies from home, or we had been out to the baker's or confectioner's and bought pies and cocoanut cakes, candy and chewing gum, all forbidden, but that added to the relish. there, too, were the music rooms, with their old, second-hand pianos, some with rattling keys and tinny sound, on which we were supposed to play our scales and exercises for an hour, though we often slyly indulged in the 'russian march,' 'napoleon crossing the rhine,' or our national airs, when, as slyly, mr. powell, our music teacher, a bumptious englishman, would softly open the door and say in a stern voice, 'please practice the lesson i just gave you!' "our chief delight was to break the rules, but we did not like to be caught at it. as we were forbidden to talk with our neighbors in study hours, i frequently climbed on top of my bureau to talk through a pipe hole with a daughter of judge howell of canandaigua. we often met afterward, laughed and talked over the old days, and kept our friendship bright until the day of her death. once while rooming with harriet hudson, a sister of mrs. john willard, i was moved to a very erratic performance. miss theresa lee had rung the bell for retiring, and had taken her rounds, as usual, to see that the lights were out and all was still, when i peeped out of my door, and seeing the bell at the head of the stairs nearby, i gave it one kick and away it went rolling and ringing to the bottom. the halls were instantly filled with teachers and scholars, all in white robes, asking what was the matter. harriet and i ran around questioning the rest, and what a frolic we had, helter-skelter, up and down stairs, in each other's rooms, pulling the beds to pieces, changing girls' clothes from one room to another, etc., etc. the hall lamps, dimly burning, gave us just light enough for all manner of depredations without our being recognized, hence the unbounded latitude we all felt for mischief. in our whole seminary course--and i was there nearly three years--we never had such a frolic as that night. it took all the teachers to restore order and quiet us down again for the night. no suspicion of any irregularities were ever attached to harriet and myself. our standing for scholarship was good, hence we were supposed to reflect all the moralities. "though strangers, we have a bond of union in all these memories, of our bright companions, our good teachers, who took us through the pitfalls of logic, rhetoric, philosophy, and the sciences, and of the noble woman who founded the institution, and whose unselfish devotion in the cause of education we are here to celebrate. the name of emma willard is dear to all of us; to know her was to love and venerate her. she was not only good and gifted, but she was a beautiful woman. she had a finely developed figure, well-shaped head, classic features, most genial manners, and a profound self-respect (a rare quality in woman), that gave her a dignity truly royal in every position. traveling in the old world she was noticed everywhere as a distinguished personage. and all these gifts she dedicated to the earnest purpose of her life, the higher education of women. "in opening this seminary she could not find young women capable of teaching the higher branches, hence her first necessity was to train herself. amos b. eaton, who was the principal of the rensselaer polytechnic school for boys here in troy, told me mrs. willard studied with him every branch he was capable of teaching, and trained a corps of teachers and regular scholars at the same time. she took lessons of the professor every evening when he had leisure, and studied half the night the branches she was to teach the next day, thus keeping ahead of her classes. her intense earnestness and mental grasp, the readiness with which she turned from one subject to another, and her retentive memory of every rule and fact he gave her, was a constant surprise to the professor. "all her vacation she devoted to training teachers. she was the first to suggest the normal-school system. remembering her deep interest in the education of women, we can honor her in no more worthy manner than to carry on her special lifework. as we look around at all the educated women assembled here to-day and try to estimate what each has done in her own sphere of action, the schools founded, the teachers sent forth, the inspiration given to girls in general, through the long chain of influences started by our alma mater, we can form some light estimate of the momentous and far-reaching consequences of emma willard's life. we have not her difficulties to overcome, her trials to endure, but the imperative duty is laid on each of us to finish the work she so successfully began. schools and colleges of a high order are now everywhere open to women, public sentiment welcomes them to whatever career they may desire, and our work is to help worthy girls struggling for a higher education, by founding scholarships in desirable institutions in every state in the union. the most fitting tribute we can pay to emma willard is to aid in the production of a generation of thoroughly educated women. "there are two kinds of scholarships, equally desirable; a permanent one, where the interest of a fund from year to year will support a succession of students, and a temporary one, to help some worthy individual as she may require. someone has suggested that this association should help young girls in their primary education. but as our public schools possess all the advantages for a thorough education in the rudiments of learning and are free to all, our scholarships should be bestowed on those whose ability and earnestness in the primary department have been proved, and whose capacity for a higher education is fully shown. "this is the best work women of wealth can do, and i hope in the future they will endow scholarships for their own sex instead of giving millions of dollars to institutions for boys, as they have done in the past. after all the bequests women have made to harvard see how niggardly that institution, in its 'annex,' treats their daughters. i once asked a wealthy lady to give a few thousands of dollars to start a medical college and hospital for women in new york. she said before making bequests she always consulted her minister and her bible. he told her there was nothing said in the bible about colleges for women. i said, 'tell him he is mistaken. if he will turn to 'chron. xxxiv. , he will find that when josiah, the king, sent the wise men to consult huldah, the prophetess, about the book of laws discovered in the temple, they found huldah in the college in jerusalem, thoroughly well informed on questions of state, while shallum, her husband, was keeper of the robes. i suppose his business was to sew on the royal buttons.' but in spite of this scriptural authority, the rich lady gave thirty thousand dollars to princeton and never one cent for the education of her own sex. "of all the voices to which these walls have echoed for over half a century, how few remain to tell the story of the early days, and when we part, how few of us will ever meet again; but i know we shall carry with us some new inspiration for the work that still remains for us to do. though many of us are old in years, we may still be young in heart. women trained to concentrate all their thoughts on family life are apt to think--when their children are grown up, their loved ones gone, their servants trained to keep the domestic machinery in motion--that their work in life is done, that no one needs now their thought and care, quite forgetting that the hey-day of woman's life is on the shady side of fifty, when the vital forces heretofore expended in other ways are garnered in the brain, when their thoughts and sentiments flow out in broader channels, when philanthropy takes the place of family selfishness, and when from the depths of poverty and suffering the wail of humanity grows as pathetic to their ears as once was the cry of their own children. "or, perhaps, the pressing cares of family life ended, the woman may awake to some slumbering genius in herself for art, science, or literature, with which to gild the sunset of her life. longfellow's beautiful poem, 'morituri salutamus,' written for a similar occasion to this, is full of hope and promise for all of us. he says: "'something remains for us to do or dare; even the oldest tree some fruit may bear. cato learned greek at eighty; sophocles wrote his grand oedipus, and simonides bore off the prize of verse from his compeers, when each had numbered more than four-score years. and theophrastus, at three-score and ten, had but begun his characters of men; chaucer, at woodstock with the nightingales, at sixty wrote the canterbury tales; goethe at weimar, toiling to the last, completed faust when eighty years were past. these are indeed exceptions; but they show how far the gulf-stream of our youth may flow into the arctic regions of our lives, where little else than life itself survives. for age is opportunity no less than youth itself, though in another dress, and as the evening twilight fades away the sky is filled with stars, invisible by day.'" on december , , we celebrated, for the first time, "foremothers' day." men had celebrated "forefathers' day" for many years, but as women were never invited to join in their festivities, mrs. devereux blake introduced the custom of women having a dinner in celebration of that day. mrs. isabella beecher hooker spent two days with me, and together we attended the feast and made speeches. this custom is now annually observed, and gentlemen sit in the gallery just as ladies had done on similar occasions. my son theodore arrived from france in april, , to attend the chicago exposition, and spent most of the summer with me at glen cove, long island, where my son gerrit and his wife were domiciled. here we read captain charles king's stories of life at military posts, sanborn's "biography of bronson alcott," and lecky's "history of rationalism." here i visited charles a. dana, the nestor of journalism, and his charming family. he lived on a beautiful island near glen cove. his refined, artistic taste, shown in his city residence in paintings, statuary, and rare bric-a-brac, collected in his frequent travels in the old world, displayed itself in his island home in the arrangement of an endless variety of trees, shrubs, and flowers, through which you caught glimpses of the sound and distant shores. one seldom meets so gifted a man as the late editor of the _sun_. he was a scholar, speaking several languages; an able writer and orator, and a most genial companion in the social circle. his wife and daughter are cultivated women. the name of this daughter, zoe dana underhill, often appears in our popular magazines as the author of short stories, remarkable for their vivid descriptions. i met mr. dana for the first time at the brook farm community in , in that brilliant circle of boston transcendentalists, who hoped in a few years to transform our selfish, competitive civilization into a paradise where all the altruistic virtues might make co-operation possible. but alas! the material at hand was not sufficiently plastic for that higher ideal. in due time the community dissolved and the members returned to their ancestral spheres. margaret fuller, who was a frequent visitor there, betook herself to matrimony in sunny italy, william henry channing to the church, bronson alcott to the education of the young, frank cabot to the world of work, mr. and mrs. ripley to literature, and charles a. dana to the press. mr. dana was very fortunate in his family relations. his wife, miss eunice macdaniel, and her relatives sympathized with him in all his most liberal opinions. during the summer at glen cove i had the pleasure of several long conversations with miss frances l. macdaniel and her brother osborne, whose wife is the sister of mr. dana, and who is now assisting miss prestona mann in trying an experiment, similar to the one at brook farm, in the adirondacks. miss anthony spent a week with us in glen cove. she came to stir me up to write papers for every congress at the exposition, which i did, and she read them in the different congresses, adding her own strong words at the close. mrs. russell sage also came and spent a day with us to urge me to write a paper to be read at chicago at the emma willard reunion, which i did. a few days afterward theodore and i returned her visit. we enjoyed a few hours' conversation with mr sage, who had made a very generous gift of a building to the emma willard seminary at troy. this school was one of the first established ( ) for girls in our state, and received an appropriation from the new york legislature on the recommendation of the governor, de witt clinton. mr. sage gave us a description that night of the time his office was blown up with dynamite thrown by a crank, and of his narrow escape. we found the great financier and his wife in an unpretending cottage with a fine outlook on the sea. though possessed of great wealth they set a good example of simplicity and economy, which many extravagant people would do well to follow. having visited the world's exposition at chicago and attended a course of lectures at chautauqua, my daughter, mrs. stanton lawrence, returned to the city, and as soon as our apartment was in order i joined her. she had recently been appointed director of physical training at the teachers' college in new york city. i attended several of her exhibitions and lectures, which were very interesting. she is doing her best to develop, with proper exercises and sanitary dress, a new type of womanhood. my time passed pleasantly these days with a drive in the park and an hour in the land of nod, also in reading henry george's "progress and poverty," william morris on industrial questions, stevenson's novels, the "heavenly twins," and "marcella," and at twilight, when i could not see to read and write, in playing and singing the old tunes and songs i loved in my youth. in the evening we played draughts and chess. i am fond of all games, also of music and novels, hence the days fly swiftly by; i am never lonely, life is ever very sweet to me and full of interest. the winter of - was full of excitement, as the citizens of new york were to hold a constitutional convention. dr. mary putnam jacobi endeavored to rouse a new class of men and women to action in favor of an amendment granting to women the right to vote. appeals were sent throughout the state, gatherings were held in parlors, and enthusiastic meetings in cooper institute and at the savoy hotel. my daughter, mrs. stanton blatch, who was visiting this country, took an active part in the canvass, and made an eloquent speech in cooper institute. strange to say, some of the leading ladies formed a strong party against the proposed amendment and their own enfranchisement. they were called the "antis." this opposing organization adopted the same plan for the campaign as those in favor of the amendment. they issued appeals, circulated petitions, and had hearings before the convention. mrs. russell sage, mrs. henry m. sanders, mrs. edward lauterbach, mrs. runkle, and some liberal clergymen did their uttermost to secure the insertion of the amendment in the proposed new constitution, but the committee on suffrage of the constitutional convention refused even to submit the proposed amendment to a vote of the people, though half a million of our most intelligent and respectable citizens had signed the petition requesting them to do so. joseph h. choate and elihu root did their uttermost to defeat the amendment, and succeeded. i spent the summer of with my son gerrit, in his home at thomaston, long island. balzac's novels, and the "life of thomas paine" by moncure d. conway, with the monthly magazines and daily papers, were my mental pabulum. my daughter, mrs. stanton lawrence, returned from england in september, , having had a pleasant visit with her sister in basingstoke. in december miss anthony came, and we wrote the woman suffrage article for the new edition of johnson's cyclopedia. on march , , lady somerset and miss frances willard, on the eve of their departure for england, called to see me. we discussed my project of a "woman's bible." they consented to join a revising committee, but before the committee was organized they withdrew their names, fearing the work would be too radical. i especially desired to have the opinions of women from all sects, but those belonging to the orthodox churches declined to join the committee or express their views. perhaps they feared their faith might be disturbed by the strong light of investigation. some half dozen members of the revising committee began with me to write "comments on the pentateuch." the chief thought revolving in my mind during the years of and had been "the woman's bible." in talking with friends i began to feel that i might realize my long-cherished plan. accordingly, i began to read the commentators on the bible and was surprised to see how little they had to say about the greatest factor in civilization, the mother of the race, and that little by no means complimentary. the more i read, the more keenly i felt the importance of convincing women that the hebrew mythology had no special claim to a higher origin than that of the greeks, being far less attractive in style and less refined in sentiment. its objectionable features would long ago have been apparent had they not been glossed over with a faith in their divine inspiration. for several months i devoted all my time to biblical criticism and ecclesiastical history, and found no explanation for the degraded status of women under all religions, and in all the so-called "holy books." when part i. of "the woman's bible" was finally published in november, , it created a great sensation. some of the new york city papers gave a page to its review, with pictures of the commentators, of its critics, and even of the book itself. the clergy denounced it as the work of satan, though it really was the work of ellen battelle dietrick, lillie devereux blake, rev. phebe a. hanaford, clara bewick colby, ursula n. gestefeld, louisa southworth, frances ellen burr, and myself. extracts from it, and criticisms of the commentators, were printed in the newspapers throughout america, great britain, and europe. a third edition was found necessary, and finally an edition was published in england. the revising committee was enlarged, and it now consists of over thirty of the leading women of america and europe.[a] the month of august, , we spent in peterboro, on the grand hills of madison county, nine hundred feet above the valley. gerrit smith's fine old mansion still stands, surrounded with magnificent trees, where i had played in childhood, chasing squirrels over lawn and gardens and wading in a modest stream that still creeps slowly round the grounds. i recalled as i sat on the piazza how one time, when frederick douglass came to spend a few days at peterboro, some southern visitors wrote a note to mr. smith asking if mr. douglass was to sit in the parlor and at the dining table; if so, during his visit they would remain in their own apartments. mr. smith replied that his visitors were always treated by his family as equals, and such would be the case with mr. douglass, who was considered one of the ablest men reared under "the southern institution." so these ladies had their meals in their own apartments, where they stayed most of the time, and, as mr. douglass prolonged his visit, they no doubt wished in their hearts that they had never taken that silly position. the rest of us walked about with him, arm in arm, played games, and sang songs together, he playing the accompaniment on the guitar. i suppose if our prejudiced countrywomen had been introduced to dumas in a french salon, they would at once have donned their bonnets and ran away. sitting alone under the trees i recalled the different generations that had passed away, all known to me. here i had met the grandfather, peter sken smith, partner of john jacob astor. in their bargains with the indians they acquired immense tracts of land in the northern part of the state of new york, which were the nucleus of their large fortunes. i have often heard cousin gerrit complain of the time he lost managing the estate. his son greene was an enthusiast in the natural sciences and took but little interest in property matters. later, his grandson, gerrit smith miller, assumed the burden of managing the estate and, in addition, devoted himself to agriculture. he imported a fine breed of holstein cattle, which have taken the first prize at several fairs. his son, bearing the same name, is devoted to the natural sciences, like his uncle greene; whose fine collection of birds was presented by his widow to harvard college. the only daughter of gerrit smith, elizabeth smith miller, is a remarkable woman, possessing many of the traits of her noble father. she has rare executive ability, as shown in the dispatch of her extensive correspondence and in the perfect order of her house and grounds. she has done much in the way of education, especially for the colored race, in helping to establish schools and in distributing literature. she subscribes for many of the best books, periodicals, and papers for friends not able to purchase for themselves. we cannot estimate the good she has done in this way. every mail brings her letters from all classes, from charitable institutions, prisons, southern plantations, army posts, and the far-off prairies. to all these pleas for help she gives a listening ear. her charities are varied and boundless, and her hospitalities to the poor as well as the rich, courteous and generous. the refinement and artistic taste of the southern mother and the heroic virtues of the father are happily blended in their daughter. in her beautiful home on seneca lake, one is always sure to meet some of the most charming representatives of the progressive thought of our times. representatives of all these generations now rest in the cemetery at peterboro, and as in review they passed before me they seemed to say, "why linger you here alone so long?" my son theodore arrived from paris in september, , and rendered most important service during the preparations for my birthday celebration, in answering letters, talking with reporters, and making valuable suggestions to the managers as to many details in the arrangements, and encouraging me to go through the ordeal with my usual heroism. i never felt so nervous in my life, and so unfitted for the part i was in duty bound to perform. from much speaking through many years my voice was hoarse, from a severe fall i was quite lame, and as standing, and distinct speaking are important to graceful oratory, i felt like the king's daughter in shakespeare's play of "titus andronicus," when rude men who had cut her hands off and her tongue out, told her to call for water and wash her hands. however, i lived through the ordeal, as the reader will see in the next chapter. after my birthday celebration, the next occasion of deep interest to me was the chicago convention of , the platform there adopted, and the nomination and brilliant campaign of william j. bryan. i had long been revolving in my mind questions relating to the tariff and finance, and in the demands of liberal democrats, populists, socialists, and the laboring men and women, i heard the clarion notes of the coming revolution. during the winter of - i was busy writing alternately on this autobiography and "the woman's bible," and articles for magazines and journals on every possible subject from venezuela and cuba to the bicycle. on the latter subject many timid souls were greatly distressed. should women ride? what should they wear? what are "god's intentions" concerning them? should they ride on sunday? these questions were asked with all seriousness. we had a symposium on these points in one of the daily papers. to me the answer to all these questions was simple--if woman could ride, it was evidently "god's intention" that she be permitted to do so. as to what she should wear, she must decide what is best adapted to her comfort and convenience. those who prefer a spin of a few hours on a good road in the open air to a close church and a dull sermon, surely have the right to choose, whether with trees and flowers and singing birds to worship in "that temple not made with hands, eternal in the heavens," or within four walls to sleep during the intonation of that melancholy service that relegates us all, without distinction of sex or color, to the ranks of "miserable sinners." let each one do what seemeth right in her own eyes, provided she does not encroach on the rights of others. in may, , i again went to geneva and found the bicycle craze had reached there, with all its most pronounced symptoms; old and young, professors, clergymen, and ladies of fashion were all spinning merrily around on business errands, social calls, and excursions to distant towns. driving down the avenue one day, we counted eighty bicycles before reaching the post-office. the ancient bandbox, so detested by our sires and sons, has given place to this new machine which our daughters take with them wheresoever they go, boxing and unboxing and readjusting for each journey. it has been a great blessing to our girls in compelling them to cultivate their self-reliance and their mechanical ingenuity, as they are often compelled to mend the wheel in case of accident. among the visitors at geneva were mr. douglass and his daughter from the island of cuba. they gave us very sad accounts of the desolate state of the island and the impoverished condition of the people. i had long felt that the united states should interfere in some way to end that cruel warfare, for spain has proved that she is incompetent to restore order and peace. footnotes: [footnote a: part ii. of "the woman's bible," which completes the work, will be issued in january, .] chapter xxviii. my eightieth birthday. without my knowledge or consent, my lifelong friend, susan b. anthony, who always seems to appreciate homage tendered to me more highly than even to herself, made arrangements for the celebration of my eightieth birthday, on the th day of november, . she preferred that this celebration should be conducted by the national council of women, composed of a large number of organizations representing every department of woman's labor, though, as the enfranchisement of woman had been my special life work, it would have been more appropriate if the celebration had been under the auspices of the national woman's suffrage association. mrs. mary lowe dickinson, president of the national council of women, assumed the financial responsibility and the extensive correspondence involved, and with rare tact, perseverance, and executive ability made the celebration a complete success. in describing this occasion i cannot do better than to reproduce, in part, mrs. dickinson's account, published in _the arena_: "in the month of june, , the national council of women issued the following invitation: "'believing that the progress made by women in the last half century may be promoted by a more general notice of their achievements, we propose to hold, in new york city, a convention for this purpose. as an appropriate time for such a celebration, the eightieth birthday of elizabeth cady stanton has been chosen. her half century of pioneer work for the rights of women makes her name an inspiration for such an occasion and her life a fitting object for the homage of all women. "'this national council is composed of twenty organizations; these and all other societies interested are invited to co-operate in grateful recognition of the debt the present generation owes to the pioneers of the past. from their interest in the enfranchisement of women, the influence of mrs. stanton and her coadjutor, miss anthony, has permeated all departments of progress and made them a common center round which all interested in woman's higher development may gather.' "to this invitation came responses, from the old world and the new, expressing sympathy with the proposed celebration, which was intended to emphasize a great principle by showing the loftiness of character that had resulted from its embodiment in a unique personality. the world naturally thinks of the personality before it thinks of the principle. it has, at least, so much unconscious courtesy left as to honor a noble woman, even when failing to rightly apprehend a noble cause. to afford this feeling its proper expression, to render more tangible all vague sympathy, to crystallize the growing sentiment in favor of human freedom, to give youth the opportunity to reverence the glory of age, to give hearts their utterances in word and song was perhaps the most popular purpose of the reunion. in other words, it gave an opportunity for those who revered mrs. stanton as a queen among women to show their reverence, and to recognize the work her life had wrought, and to see in it an epitome of the progress of a century. "the celebration was also an illustration of the distinctive idea of the national council of women, which aims to give recognition to all human effort without demanding uniformity of opinion as a basis of co-operation. it claims to act upon a unity of service, notwithstanding differences of creed and methods. the things that separate, shrank back into the shadows where they belong, and all hearts brave enough to think, and tender enough to feel, found it easy to unite in homage to a life which had known a half century of struggle to lift humanity from bondage and womanhood from shame. "this reunion was the first general recognition of the debt the present owes to the past. it was the first effort to show the extent to which later development has been inspired and made possible by the freedom to think and work claimed in that earlier time by women like lucretia mott, lucy stone, mrs. stanton, and many others whose names stand as synonyms of noble service for the race. to those who looked at the reunion from this point of view it could not fail of inspiration. "for the followers in lines of philanthropic work to look in the faces and hear the voices of women like clara barton and mary livermore; for the multitude enlisted in the crowded ranks of literature to feel in the living presence, what literature owes to women like julia ward howe; for the white ribbon army to turn from its one great leader of to-day whose light, spreading to the horizon, does not obscure or dim the glory of the crusade leaders of the past; for art lovers and art students to call to mind sculptors like harriet hosmer and anna whitney, and remember the days when art was a sealed book to women; for the followers of the truly divine art of healing to honor the blackwell sisters and the memory of mme. clemence lozier; for the mercy of surgery to reveal itself in the face of dr. cushier, who has proved for us that heart of pity and hand of skill need never be divorced; for women lifting their eyes to meet the face of phebe a. hanaford and anna shaw and other women who to-day in the pulpit, as well as out of it, may use a woman's right to minister to needy souls; for the ofttime sufferers from unrighteous law to welcome women lawyers; for the throng of working women to read backward through the story of four hundred industries to their beginning in the 'four,' and remember that each new door had opened because some women toiled and strove; for all these the exercises were a part of a great thanksgiving paean, each phase of progress striking its own chord, and finding each its echo in the hearts that held it dear. "to the student of history, or to him who can read the signs of the times, there was such a profound significance in this occasion as makes one shrink from dwelling too much upon the external details. yet as a pageant only it was a most inspiring sight, and one truly worthy of a queen. indeed as we run the mind back over the pages of history, what queen came to a more triumphant throne in the hearts of a grateful people? what woman ever before sat silver-crowned, canopied with flowers, surrounded not by servile followers but by men and women who brought to her court the grandest service they had wrought, their best thought crystallized in speech and song. greater than any triumphal procession that ever marked a royal passage through a kingdom was it to know that in a score or more of cities, in many a village church on that same night festive fires were lighted, and the throng kept holiday, bringing for tribute not gold and gems but noblest aspirations, truest gratitude, and highest ideals for the nation and the race. "the great meeting was but one link in a chain; yet with its thousands of welcoming faces, with its eloquence of words, with its offering of sweetest song from the children of a race that once was bound but now is free, with its pictured glimpses of the old time and the new flashing out upon the night, with the home voices offering welcome and gratitude and love, with numberless greetings, from the great, true, brave souls of many lands, it was indeed a wonderful tribute, worthy of the great warm heart of a nation that offered it, and worthy of the woman so revered. "it seemed fitting that mme. antoinette sterling, who, twenty years ago, took her wonderful voice away to england, where it won for her a unique place in the hearts of the nation, should, on returning to her country, give her first service to the womanhood of her native land. 'i am coming a week earlier,' so she had written, 'that my first work in my own beloved america may be done for women. i am coming as a woman and not as an artist, and because i so glory in that which the women of my country have achieved.' so when she sang out of her heart, 'o rest in the lord; wait patiently for him!' no marvel that it seemed to lift all listening hearts to a recognition of the divine secret and source of power for all work. "one charming feature of the entertainment was a series of pictures called 'then and now,' each illustrating the change in woman's condition during the last fifty years. and after this, upon the dimness there shone out, one after another, the names of noble women like mary lyon, maria mitchell, emma willard, and many others who have passed away. upon the shadows and the silence broke mme. sterling's voice in tennyson's 'crossing the bar.' and when this was over, as with one voice, the whole audience sang softly 'auld lang syne.' "and last but not least should be mentioned the greetings that poured in a shower of telegrams and letters from every section of the country, and many from over the sea. these expressions, not only of personal congratulation for mrs. stanton, but utterances of gladness for the progress in woman's life and thought, for the conditions, already so much better than in the past, and for the hope for the future, would make of themselves a most interesting and wonderful chapter. among them may be mentioned letters from lord and lady aberdeen, from lady henry somerset and frances e. willard, from canon wilberforce, and many others, including an address from thirty members of the family of john bright, headed by his brother, the right honorable jacob bright; a beautifully engrossed address, on parchment, from the national woman suffrage society of scotland, an address from the london women's franchise league, and a cablegram from the bristol women's liberal association; a letter from the women's rights society of finland, signed by its president, baroness gripenberg of helsingfors; telegrams from the california suffrage pioneers; and others from the chicago woman's club, from the toledo and ohio woman's suffrage society, from the son of the rev. dr. william ellery channing, and a telegram and letter from citizens and societies of seneca falls, new york, accompanied with flowers and many handsome pieces of silver from the different societies. there were also letters from hon. oscar s. strauss, ex-minister to turkey, miss ellen terry, and scores of others. an address was received from the women's association of utah, accompanied by a beautiful onyx and silver ballot box; and from the shaker women of mount lebanon came an ode; a solid silver loving cup from the new york city suffrage league, presented on the platform with a few appropriate words by its president, mrs. devereux blake. "hundreds of organizations and societies, both in this country and abroad, wished to have their names placed on record as in sympathy with the movement. many organizations were present in a body, and one was reminded, by the variety and beauty of the decorations of their boxes, of the venetian carnival, as the occupants gazed down from amid the silken banners and the flowers, upon the throng below. the whole occasion was indeed a unique festival, unique in its presentation, as well as in its purpose, plan, character, and spirit. no woman present could fail to be impressed with what we owe to the women of the past, and especially to this one woman who was the honored guest of the occasion. and no young woman could desire to forget the picture of this aged form as, leaning upon her staff, mrs. stanton spoke to the great audience of over six thousand, as she had spoken hundreds of times before in legislative halls, and whenever her word could influence the popular sentiment in favor of justice for all mankind." my birthday celebration, with all the testimonials of love and friendship i received, was an occasion of such serious thought and deep feeling as i had never before experienced. having been accustomed for half a century to blame rather than praise, i was surprised with such a manifestation of approval; i could endure any amount of severe criticism with complacency, but such an outpouring of homage and affection stirred me profoundly. to calm myself during that week of excitement, i thought many times of michelet's wise motto, "let the weal and woe of humanity be everything to you, their praise and blame of no effect; be not puffed up with the one nor cast down with the other." naturally at such a time i reviewed my life, its march and battle on the highways of experience, and counted its defeats and victories. i remembered when a few women called the first convention to discuss their disabilities, that our conservative friends said: "you have made a great mistake, you will be laughed at from maine to texas and beyond the sea; god has set the bounds of woman's sphere and she should be satisfied with her position." their prophecy was more than realized; we were unsparingly ridiculed by the press and pulpit both in england and america. but now many conventions are held each year in both countries to discuss the same ideas; social customs have changed; laws have been modified; municipal suffrage has been granted to women in england and some of her colonies; school suffrage has been granted to women in half of our states, municipal suffrage in kansas, and full suffrage in four states of the union. thus the principle scouted in was accepted in england in , and since then, year by year, it has slowly progressed in america until the fourth star shone out on our flag in , and idaho enfranchised her women! that first convention, considered a "grave mistake" in , is now referred to as "a grand step in progress." my next mistake was when, as president of the new york state woman's temperance association, i demanded the passage of a statute allowing wives an absolute divorce for the brutality and intemperance of their husbands. i addressed the legislature of new york a few years later when a similar bill was pending, and also large audiences in several of our chief cities, and for this i was severely denounced. to-day fugitives from such unholy ties can secure freedom in many of the western states, and enlightened public sentiment sustains mothers in refusing to hand down an appetite fraught with so many evil consequences. this, also called a "mistake" in , was regarded as a "step in progress" a few years later. again, i urged my coadjutors by speeches, letters, and resolutions, as a means of widespread agitation, to make the same demands of the church that we had already made of the state. they objected, saying, "that is too revolutionary, an attack on the church would injure the suffrage movement." but i steadily made the demand, as opportunity offered, that women be ordained to preach the gospel and to fill the offices as elders, deacons, and trustees. a few years later some of these suggestions were accepted. some churches did ordain women as pastors over congregations of their own, others elected women deaconesses, and a few churches allowed women, as delegates, to sit in their conferences. thus this demand was in a measure honored and another "step in progress" taken. in i tried to organize a committee to consider the status of women in the bible, and the claim that the hebrew writings were the result of divine inspiration. it was thought very presumptuous for women not learned in languages and ecclesiastical history to undertake such work. but as we merely proposed to comment on what was said of women in plain english, and found these texts composed only one-tenth of the old and new testaments, it did not seem to me a difficult or dangerous undertaking. however, when part i. of "the woman's bible" was published, again there was a general disapproval by press and pulpit, and even by women themselves, expressed in resolutions in suffrage and temperance conventions. like other "mistakes," this too, in due time, will be regarded as "a step in progress." such experiences have given me confidence in my judgment, and patience with the opposition of my coadjutors, with whom on so many points i disagree. it requires no courage now to demand the right of suffrage, temperance legislation, liberal divorce laws, or for women to fill church offices--these battles have been fought and won and the principle governing these demands conceded. but it still requires courage to question the divine inspiration of the hebrew writings as to the position of woman. why should the myths, fables, and allegories of the hebrews be held more sacred than those of the assyrians and egyptians, from whose literature most of them were derived? seeing that the religious superstitions of women perpetuate their bondage more than all other adverse influences, i feel impelled to reiterate my demands for justice, liberty, and equality in the church as well as in the state. the birthday celebration was to me more than a beautiful pageant; more than a personal tribute. it was the dawn of a new day for the mothers of the race! the harmonious co-operation of so many different organizations, with divers interests and opinions, in one grand jubilee was, indeed, a heavenly vision of peace and hope; a prophecy that with the exaltation of womanhood would come new life, light, and liberty to all mankind. index of names. * * * * * aberdeen, _lord_ and _lady_, addington, laura, albert, _prince_, alcott, a. bronson, alcott, louisa m., allison, miss, amberly, _lord_ and _lady_, ames, mary clemmer, anderson, dr. garrett, andré, _major_ john, andrews, _governor_ john a., anthony, daniel, anthony, _senator_ henry b., anthony, lucy, anthony, mary, anthony, susan b., arnold, _general_ benedict, arnold, matthew, astor, john jacob, auchet, hubertine, austin, _dr_. harriet n., ayer, mrs. j.c., backus, wealthea, bagley, _governor_, bagley, mrs., baird, _general_, baldwin, elizabeth mcmartin, balgarnie, miss, banning, ella b., banning, william l., barclay, cornelia, barrau, caroline de, bartlett, paul, barton, clara, bascom, mr., bascora, mary, bayard, _dr_. edward, bayard, henry, bayard, thomas f., bayard, tryphena cady, beach, myron, beaman, _rev. dr_., becker, lydia, beecher, catharine, beecher, _rev_. henry ward, bellamy, edward, bellows, rev. henry, benedict, lewis, bently, _judge_, berry, mme., berry, marguerite, berry, mrs., bertaux, mme. léon, besant, annie, bickerdyke, _mother_, biddle, chapman, biddle, george, biggs, caroline, bigelow, john, bigelow, mrs. john, bingham, john a., bird, frank w., birney, james gr., bjornson, bjornstjorne, blackburn, miss, blackwell, antoinette brown, blackwell, _dr_. elizabeth, blackwell, h.b., blaine, _senator_ james g., blaine, mrs. james g., blair, _senator_ henry w., blake, lillie devereux, blatch, harriot stanton, blatch, nora stanton, blatch, william h., blavatsky, mme., bloomer, amelia, bogelot, isabella, bogue, _rev. dr_., bonaparte, napoleon, botta, anne lynch, boucherett, jessie, bowles, samuel, bradburn, george, bradlaugh, _hon_. charles, m, p., bradwell, myra, bright, _hon_. jacob, m.p., bright, mrs. jacob, bright, _hon_. john, m.p., broomall, john m., brougham, henry, lord, brown, antoinette l., brown, john, brown, olympia, brown, mr., browne, sir thomas, m.d., browning, robert, brownson, orestes a., bryan, william j.. bryant, miss, bryant, william cullen, bullard, laura curtis, burlingame, anson, burleigh, celia, burleigh, mrs. william, burnet, rev. j., burr, frances ellen, burroughs, herbert, busbey, l. white, bushnell, horace, butler, general benjamin f., butler, josephine, byron, lady, byron, lord, cabot, frederick, cady, judge daniel, cady, eleazer, cady, margaret livingston, caird, mona, cameron, judge hugh, carlisle, lora and lady, carlyle, thomas, carnegie, andrew, carroll, anna, cary, alice, cary, phoebe, channing, rev. dr. william ellery, channing, dr. william f., channing, rev. william henry, chant, ormiston, chapman, maria, chase, william, cheever, rev. george b., child, lydia maria, choate, joseph h., christie, margaret, clark, helen bright, clarkson, thomas, cleveland, grover, clinton, governor de witt c, cluseret, general, cobb, mr. and mrs., cobbe, frances power, cobden, jane, cochrane, james, cochrane, _general_ john, cochrane, mary, colby, clara b., cole, senator cornelius, coleridge, lady, collyer, rev. robert, combe, andrew, comte, auguste, conkling, judge alfred, conkling, roscoe, conway, rev. moncure d., conway, mrs. moncure d., cooley, judge thomas m., couzins, phoebe w., croly, jennie c, crowninshield, captain a.s., crowninshield, mary, cox, s.s., coxe, bishop, curtis, george william, cushier, dr., cushman, charlotte, dana, charles a., dana, eunice macdaniel, darling, anna b., darlington, chandler, darlington, hannah, davis, edward m., davis. paulina wright, davitt, michael. depesyrons, professor, deraismes, mme. féresse, deraismes, maria, dickinson, anna e., dickinson, mary lowe, dietrick, ellen battelle, dilke, mrs. ashton, dilke, sir charles, dix, dorothy, l., dix, general john a., douglass, frederick, douglass, mr., dowden, professor, dudley, blandina bleecker, dumas, alexandre, durand, mme. m.e., dyer, charles gifford, dyer, hella, eaton, professor amos b., eaton, daniel c, eaton, harriet cady, eddy, miss, eddy, mrs. jackson, s edmunds, senator george f., eliot, george, euet, elizabeth f., ellsler, fanny, elmy, mrs., emerson, ralph waldo, england, isaac w., england, mrs. isaac w., everett, charles, fabre, senator joseph, fairchild, governor lucius, faithful, emily, farnham, mrs.. fawcett, henry, m.p., fawcett, milicent j., ferry, jules, ferry, senator thomas w., field, rev. dr. henry m., field, kate, fine, judge, finney, rev. charles g., fitzhugh, ann carroll, fitzhugh, miss, folsom, abigail, forbes, arethusa, forney, john w., foster, abby kelly, foster, rachel, foster, stephen, frederic, harold, fremont, _general_ john c, french, daniel c, frothingham, _rev_. o.b., fronde, james anthony, fry, elizabeth, fuller, kate, fuller, margaret, fuller, w.j.a., furness, _rev_. william h., gage, frances dana, gage, matilda joslyn, gardener, helen h., garibaldi, _general_ g., garrison, gertrude, garrison, william lloyd, garrison, mrs. w.l., gay, sidney howard, geddes, mr., george, henry, gestefeld, ursula n., gibbons, abby hopper, gillespie, mrs., gladstone, _right hon_., william e., gladstone, mrs. w.e., godwin, mary wollstonecraft, godwin, william, grant, _general_, ulysses s., greeley, horace, greeley, mrs. horace, greene, beriah, greenough, mrs. w.h., greenwood, grace, gréville, henri, grévy, _president_ jules, grévy, mme. jules, grew, mary, grey, maria g., grimké, angelina, grimké, sarah, gripenberg, _baroness_ alexandra, gurney, john joseph, gurney, samuel, gustafsen, mrs., hammond, _dr_. william a., hanaford, _rev_. phebe a., harbert, elizabeth boynton, harberton, _lady_, harvey, _rev_. a., hawley, _general_ joseph r., hawthorne, nathaniel, hazeltine, mayo w., heine, heinrich, hertell, _judge_ hertz, fannie, hicks, elias, higginson, thomas wentworth, hill, octavia, hill, _president_, hinckley, _rev_. frederick a., hoar, _senator_ george f., hoggan, _dr_. frances e., hoisington, rev. william, holmes, oliver wendell, hooker, isabella beecher, holyoake, george jacob, hosack, _rev_. simon, hoskins, frances, hosmer, harriet, hovey, charles, howe, julia ward, howell, _judge_, howell, mary seymour, howells, william d., howells, mrs. william d., howitt, mary, hudson, harriet, hugo, victor, hunt, jane, hunt, _dr_. harriet k., hunt, _judge_ ward, hunt, richard, hurlbert, _judge_, huron, mr., hutchinson, _family_, hutchins, mr., hyacinthe, _père_, ingersoll, robert g., jackson, francis, jackson, _dr_. james, jackson, _dr_. kate, jackson, mr. and mrs., jackson, mrs., jacobi, _dr_. mary putnam, jameson, anna, janes, _bishop_, jarvis, helen, jenckes, thomas a., jenkins, lydia, jenney, mr. and mrs., johnson, adelaide, johnson, mariana, johnson, oliver, johnson, _sir_ william, joly, _professor_ nicholas, jones, phoebe, june, jennie, kelley, william d., kelley, abby, kennan, george, kent, _chancellor_, kergomard, pauline, kilpatrick, _general_, kimber, abby, king, _captain_ charles, kingsford, anna, kingsley, _canon_ charles, klumpke, anna, krapotkine, _prince_, laboulaye, edouard r.l., lafayette, _marquis_ de, lampson, _father_, lapham, anson, lauterbach, mrs. edward, lawrence, frank e., lawrence, margaret stanton, lawson, _sir_ wilfrid, leavitt, joshua, lecky, w.e.h., lee, richard henry, lee, theresa, lieneff, mr., lincoln, abraham, livermore, mary a., livingston, colonel james, livingston, margaret, livingston, mary, logan, olive, long, governor john d., longfellow, henry w., longfellow, rev. samuel, lord, dr., lord, emily, lord, frances, louis philippe, lowell, james russell, lozier, dr. clemence s., lucas, margaret bright, lyon, mary, mcclintock, elizabeth, mcclintock, mary ann, mckeon, judge, mclaren, charles, mclaren, mrs. charles, mclaren, hon. duncan, m.p., mclaren, priscilla bright, mclaren, walter, mcmartin, donald, mcmartin, duncan, mcmartin, margaret cady, macdaniel, eunice, macdaniel, frances l., macdaniel, osborne, macaulay, thomas babbington, maire, rev. hugh, mann, horace, mann, prestona, mansfield, lord chief justice, mansfield, mrs. a.a., marsh, luther r., martineau, harriet, massey, gerald, may, rev. samuel j., mellen, mrs. william, mendenhall, dinah, meredith, george, michel, louise, michelet, jules, milinowski, captain arthur, mill, john stuart, mill, mrs. john stuart, miller, charles dudley, miller, colonel, miller, elizabeth smith, miller, gerrit smith, miller, jenness, miller, john b., miller, judge, miller, justice samuel f., minor, virginia l., mitchell, dr. julia, mitchell, dr. kate, mitchell, professor maria, moffett, rev. dr., moliner, professor, morley, john, morpeth, lord, morris, william, morrison, cotton, morsier, emilie de, morton, edwin, mott, lucretia, mott, lydia, moulton, louise chandler, moulton, mrs., müller, eva, müller, henrietta, murray, eliza, in, napoleon, neal, elizabeth, nichol, elizabeth pease, o'connell, daniel, go, o'conor, charles, olmstead, rev. john w., olmstead, mary livingston, opie, amelia, orr, mrs., osborne, eliza w., o'shea, mrs. kitty, owen, robert dale, palmer, senator john m., parker, margaret, parker, theodore, parkhurst, mrs., parnell, charles stewart, parsons, chauncey c, parsons, mrs. chauncey c, patton, rev. dr., peabody, elizabeth, pearson, karl, pease, elizabeth, phelps, elizabeth b., phillips, ann green, phillips, wendell, pierpont, john, pillsbury, parker, plumb, senator preston b., pochin, mrs., pomeroy, "brick," powell, aaron, powell, professor, priestman, annie, priestman, mary, pugh, sarah, quincy, edmund, ramsey, mr., reid, mrs. hugo, remond, charles, richer, léon, richter, jean paul friedrich, ripley, george, ripley, mrs. george, richardson, abby sage, ristori, marchionesse adelaide, robinson, governor charles, roby, matilda, rogers, caroline gilkey, rogers, nathaniel p., roland, mme., rosa, mr., rose, ernestine l., root, elihu, rouvier, m., runkle, mrs., ruskin, john, sackett, fudge gerrit v., sage, russell, sage, mrs. russell, sanborn, frank, sanders, mrs. henry m., sargent, senator aaron a., sargent, mrs. aaron a., saville, mrs., scatcherd, alice cliff, scatcherd, mr., schenck, elizabeth b., schenck, robert c, scoble, rev. john, seaman, mr., seidl, professor, sewall, may wright, sewall, samuel e., sewall, mrs. samuel e., seward, governor william h., seward, mrs. william h., shaftesbury, lord, shaw, rev. anna, shelley, percy bysshe, shelley, percy florence, smalley, george w., smith, ann carroll fitzhugh, smith, elizabeth oakes, smith, gerrit, smith, greene, smith, professor horace, smith, mrs. horace, smith, peter sken, smith, sidney, smith, sisters, somerset, lady henry, southwick, abby, southwick, joseph, southwick. thankful, southworth, louisa, spaulding, bishop, spence, clara, spencer, john c, spencer, sarah andrews, spofford, jane snow, spofford, mr., sprague, governor william, staël, mme. de, stanford, senator leland, stanley, dean, stansfeld, mr., m.p., stanton, hon. daniel cady, stanton, edwin m., stanton, elizabeth cady, granddaughter of author, stanton, _hon_. gerrit smith, stanton, harriot eaton, stanton, henry, stanton, _hon_. henry brewster, stanton, margaret livingston, stanton, marguerite berry, stanton, robert livingston, stanton, theodore, stead, william t., stebbins, catharine f., stebbins, giles, stebbins, mrs., steinthal, _rev_. mr., stepniak, sterling, antoinette, stevens, thaddeus, stevenson, robert louis, stewart, alvin, stone, lucy, stout, _rev_. c., stowe, harriet beecher, straus, oscar s., stuart, charles, stuart, _dr_. jacob h., stuart, mrs. jacob h., stuart, _professor_, sturge, joseph, sumner, charles, sutherland, _duchess_ of, swift, isabella, swift, _lieutenant_, tanner, mrs., taylor, helen, taylor, mrs. peter a., terry, ellen, thacher, _mayor_, thomson, adeline, thomasson, _hon_. john p., _m. p_., thomasson, mrs. john p., thompkins, _governor_ daniel d., thompson, george, thompson, may wright, tilton, theodore, train, george francis, traut, mme. griess, tree, ellen, tudor, mrs. fenno, tyler, _professor_, moses coit, tyng, _dr_. stephen, underhill, zoe dana, van vechten, abraham, vest, _senator_ george g., victoria, _queen_, vignon, claude, villard, fanny garrison, villard, henry, vincent, henry, virchow, _professor_, waite, _chief justice_ morrison r., walter, ellen cochrane, walsingham, _sir_ francis, "warrington," washington, _general_ george, weed, thurlow, weld, angelina grimke, weld, theodore d., wellington, _duke_ of, wells, emeline b., west, benjamin, weston, deborah, whipple, e.p., whitney, anna, whittier, john g., whittle, _dr._ ewing, wigham, eliza, wigham, jane, wilberforce, canon, wilberforce, william, wilbour, charlotte beebe, wilkeson, catherine cady, wilkeson, samuel, willard, amelia, willard, emma, willard, frances e., willard, mrs. john, williams, _senator_ c.g., williams, elisha, wilson, daniel, winckworth, mr. and mrs. stephen, winslow, emily, woodhull, victoria, wollstonecraft, mary, woodward, mr., worden, mrs., wright, david, wright, frances, wright, henry c., wright, martha c., wright, mr., wright, paulina, yost, elizabeth w., yost, maria, zackesewska, _dr._ m.e., [_portions of chapters x. and xi. of this book are taken by permission from an article written by mrs. stanton for "our famous women," published by a.d. worthington & co._] [illustration: "and i wonder if there is a woman in the land that can blame serepta for wantin' her rights."] samantha on the woman question by marietta holley "josiah allen's wife" author of "samantha at saratoga," "my opinions" and "betsey bobbet's," etc. contents i. "she wanted her rights" ii. "they can't blame her" iii. "polly's eyes growed tender" iv. "strivin' with the emissary" v. "he wuz dretful polite" vi. "concerning moth-millers and minny fish" vii. "no hamperin' hitchin' straps" viii. "old mom nater listenin'" ix. the women's parade x. "the creation searchin' society" illustrations "and i wonder if there's a woman in the land that can blame serepta for wantin' her rights" (p. ). frontispiece "i wanted to visit the capitol of our country.... so we laid out to go" "he'd entered political life where the bible wuzn't popular; he'd never read further than gulliver's epistle to the liliputians" "sez josiah, 'does that thing know enough to vote?'" i "she wanted her rights" lorinda cagwin invited josiah and me to a reunion of the allen family at her home nigh washington, d.c., the birthplace of the first allen we knowed anything about, and josiah said: "bein' one of the best lookin' and influential allens on earth now, it would be expected on him to attend to it." and i fell in with the idee, partly to be done as i would be done by if it wuz the relation on my side, and partly because by goin' i could hit two birds with one stun, as the poet sez. indeed, i could hit four on 'em. my own cousin, diantha trimble, lived in a city nigh lorinda's and i had promised to visit her if i wuz ever nigh her, and help bear her burdens for a spell, of which burden more anon and bom-by. diantha wuz one bird, the reunion another, and the third bird i had in my mind's eye wuz the big outdoor meeting of the suffragists that wuz to be held in the city where diantha lived, only a little ways from lorinda's. and the fourth bird and the biggest one i wuz aimin' to hit from this tower of ourn wuz washington, d.c. i wanted to visit the capitol of our country, the center of our great civilization that stands like the sun in the solar system, sendin' out beams of power and wisdom and law and order, and justice and injustice, and money and oratory, and talk and talk, and wind and everything, to the uttermost points of our vast possessions, and from them clear to the ends of the earth. i wanted to see it, i wanted to like a dog. so we laid out to go. [illustration: "i wanted to visit the capitol of our country.... so we laid out to go."] lorinda lived on the old allen place, and i always sot store by her, and her girl, polly, wuz, as thomas j. said, a peach. she had spent one of her college vacations with us, and a sweeter, prettier, brighter girl i don't want to see. her name is pauline, but everybody calls her polly. the cagwins are rich, and polly had every advantage money could give, and old mom nater gin her a lot of advantages money couldn't buy, beauty and intellect, a big generous heart and charm. and you know the cagwins couldn't bought that at no price. charm in a girl is like the perfume in a rose, and can't be bought or sold. and you can't handle or describe either on 'em exactly. but what a influence they have; how they lay holt of your heart and fancy. royal gray, the young man who wuz payin' attention to her, stopped once for a day or two in jonesville with polly and her ma on their way to the cagwins' camp in the adirondacks. and we all liked him so well that we agreed in givin' him this extraordinary praise, we said he wuz worthy of polly, we knowed of course that wuz the highest enconium possible for us to give. good lookin', smart as a whip, and deep, you could see that by lookin' into his eyes, half laughin' and half serious eyes and kinder sad lookin' too under the fun, as eyes must be in this world of ourn if they look back fur, or ahead much of any. a queer world this is, and kinder sad and mysterious, behind all the good and glory on't. he wuz jest out of harvard school and as full of life and sperits as a colt let loose in a clover field. he went out in the hay field, he and polly, and rode home on top of a load of hay jest as nateral and easy and bare-headed as if he wuz workin' for wages, and he the only son of a millionaire--we all took to him. well, when the news got out that i wuz goin' to visit washington, d.c., all the neighbors wanted to send errents by me. betsy bobbet slimpsey wanted a dozen patent office books for scrap books for her poetry. uncle nate gowdey wanted me to go to the agricultural buro and git him a paper of lettuce seed. and solomon sypher wanted me to git him a new kind of string beans and some cowcumber seeds. uncle jarvis bentley, who wuz goin' to paint his house, wanted me to ask the president what kind of paint he used on the white house. he thought it ort to be a extra kind to stand the sharp glare that wuz beatin' down on it constant, and to ask him if he didn't think the paint would last longer and the glare be mollified some if they used pure white and clear ile in it, and left off whitewash and karseen. ardelia rumsey, who is goin' to be married, wanted me, if i see any new kinds of bedquilt patterns at the white house or the senator's housen, to git patterns for 'em. she said she wuz sick of sun flowers and blazin' stars. she thought mebby they'd have sunthin' new, spread eagle style. she said her feller wuz goin' to be connected with the govermunt and she thought it would be appropriate. and i asked her how. and she said he wuz goin' to git a patent on a new kind of jack knife. i told her that if she wanted a govermunt quilt and wanted it appropriate she ort to have a crazy quilt. and she said she had jest finished a crazy quilt with seven thousand pieces of silk in it, and each piece trimmed with seven hundred stitches of feather stitchin'--she'd counted 'em. and then i remembered seein' it. there wuz a petition fer wimmen's rights and i remember ardelia couldn't sign it for lack of time. she wanted to, but she hadn't got the quilt more than half done. it took the biggest heft of two years to do it. and so less important things had to be put aside. and ardelia's mother wanted to sign it, but she couldn't owin' to a bed-spread she wuz makin'. she wuz quiltin' in noah's ark and all the animals on a turkey red quilt. i remember she wuz quiltin' the camel that day and couldn't be disturbed, so we didn't git the names. it took the old lady three years, and when it wuz done it wuz a sight to behold, though i wouldn't want to sleep under so many animals. but folks went from fur and near to see it, and i enjoyed lookin' at it that day. zebulin coon wanted me to carry a new hen coop of hisen to git patented. and i thought to myself i wonder if they will ask me to carry a cow. and sure enough elnathan purdy wanted me to dicker for a calf from mount vernon, swop one of his yearlin's for it. but the errents serepta pester sent wuz fur more hefty and momentous than all the rest put together, calves, hen coop, cow and all. and when she told 'em over to me, and i meditated on her reasons for sendin' 'em and her need of havin' 'em done, i felt that i would do the errents for her if a breath wuz left in my body. she come for a all day's visit; and though she is a vegetable widow and humbly, i wuz middlin' glad to see her. but thinkses i as i carried her things into my bedroom, "she'll want to send some errent by me"; and i wondered what it would be. and so it didn't surprise me when she asked me if i would lobby a little for her in washington. i spozed it wuz some new kind of tattin' or fancy work. i told her i shouldn't have much time but would try to git her some if i could. and she said she wanted me to lobby myself. and then i thought mebby it wuz a new kind of dance and told her, "i wuz too old to lobby, i hadn't lobbied a step since i wuz married." and then she explained she wanted me to canvas some of the senators. and i hung back and asked her in a cautious tone, "how many she wanted canvassed, and how much canvas it would take?" i had a good many things to buy for my tower, and though i wanted to obleege serepta, i didn't feel like runnin' into any great expense for canvas. and then she broke off from that subject, and said she wanted her rights and wanted the whiskey ring broke up. and she talked a sight about her children, and how bad she felt to be parted from 'em, and how she used to worship her husband and how her hull life wuz ruined and the whiskey ring had done it, that and wimmen's helpless condition under the law and she cried and wep' and i did. and right while i wuz cryin' onto that gingham apron, she made me promise to carry them two errents of hern to the president and git 'em done for her if i possibly could. she wanted the whiskey ring destroyed and her rights, and she wanted 'em both inside of two weeks. i told her i didn't believe she could git 'em done inside that length of time, but i would tell the president about it, and i thought more'n likely as not he would want to do right by her. "and," sez i, "if he sets out to, he can haul them babies of yourn out of that ring pretty sudden." and then to git her mind offen her sufferin's, i asked how her sister azuba wuz gittin' along? i hadn't heard from her for years. she married phileman clapsaddle, and serepty spoke out as bitter as a bitter walnut, and sez she: "she's in the poor-house." "why, serepta pester!" sez i, "what do you mean?" "i mean what i say, my sister, azuba clapsaddle, is in the poor-house." "why, where is their property gone?" sez i. "they wuz well off. azuba had five thousand dollars of her own when she married him." "i know it," sez she, "and i can tell you, josiah alien's wife, where their property has gone, it has gone down phileman clapsaddle's throat. look down that man's throat and you will see acres of land, a good house and barn, twenty sheep and forty head of cattle." "why-ee!" sez i. "yes, and you'll see four mules, a span of horses, two buggies, a double sleigh, and three buffalo robes. he's drinked 'em all up, and two horse rakes, a cultivator, and a thrashin' machine." "why-ee!" sez i agin. "and where are the children?" "the boys have inherited their father's habits and drink as bad as he duz and the oldest girl has gone to the bad." "oh dear! oh dear me!" sez i, and we both sot silent for a spell. and then thinkin' i must say sunthin' and wantin' to strike a safe subject and a good lookin' one, i sez: "where is your aunt cassandra's girl? that pretty girl i see to your house once?" "that girl is in the lunatick asylum." "serepta pester," sez i, "be you tellin' the truth?" "yes, i be, the livin' truth. she went to new york to buy millinery goods for her mother's store. it wuz quite cool when she left home and she hadn't took off her winter clothes, and it come on brilin' hot in the city, and in goin' about from store to store the heat and hard work overcome her and she fell down in a sort of faintin' fit and wuz called drunk and dragged off to a police court by a man who wuz a animal in human shape. and he misused her in such a way that she never got over the horror of what befell her when she come to to find herself at the mercy of a brute in a man's shape. she went into a melancholy madness and wuz sent to the asylum." i sithed a long and mournful sithe and sot silent agin for quite a spell. but thinkin' i must be sociable i sez: "your aunt cassandra is well, i spoze?" "she is moulderin' in jail," sez she. "in jail? cassandra in jail!" "yes, in jail." and serepta's tone wuz now like worm-wood and gall. "you know she owns a big property in tenement houses and other buildings where she lives. of course her taxes wuz awful high, and she didn't expect to have any voice in tellin' how that money, a part of her own property that she earned herself in a store, should be used. but she had been taxed high for new sidewalks in front of some of her buildin's. and then another man come into power in that ward, and he naterally wanted to make some money out of her, so he ordered her to build new sidewalks. and she wouldn't tear up a good sidewalk to please him or anybody else, so she wuz put to jail for refusin' to comply with the law." thinkses i, i don't believe the law would have been so hard on her if she hadn't been so humbly. the pesters are a humbly lot. but i didn't think it out loud, and didn't ophold the law for feelin' so. i sez in pityin' tones, for i wuz truly sorry for cassandra keeler: "how did it end?" "it hain't ended," sez she, "it only took place a month ago and she has got her grit up and won't pay; and no knowin' how it will end; she lays there amoulderin'." i don't believe cassanda wuz mouldy, but that is serepta's way of talkin', very flowery. "well," sez i, "do you think the weather is goin' to moderate?" i truly felt that i dassent speak to her about any human bein' under the sun, not knowin' what turn she would give to the talk, bein' so embittered. but i felt that the weather wuz safe, and cotton stockin's, and hens, and factory cloth, and i kep' her down on them for more'n two hours. but good land! i can't blame her for bein' embittered agin men and the laws they've made, for it seems as if i never see a human creeter so afflicted as serepta pester has been all her life. why, her sufferin's date back before she wuz born, and that's goin' pretty fur back. her father and mother had some difficulty and he wuz took down with billerous colick, voylent four weeks before serepta wuz born. and some think it wuz the hardness between 'em and some think it wuz the gripin' of the colick when he made his will, anyway he willed serepta away, boy or girl whichever it wuz, to his brother up on the canada line. so when serepta wuz born (and born a girl ontirely onbeknown to her) she wuz took right away from her mother and gin to this brother. her mother couldn't help herself, he had the law on his side. but it killed her. she drooped away and died before the baby wuz a year old. she wuz a affectionate, tenderhearted woman and her husband wuz overbearin' and stern always. but it wuz this last move of hisen that killed her, for it is pretty tough on a mother to have her baby, a part of her own life, took right out of her own arms and gin to a stranger. for this uncle of hern wuz a entire stranger to serepta, and almost like a stranger to her father, for he hadn't seen him since he wuz a boy, but knew he hadn't any children and spozed that he wuz rich and respectable. but the truth wuz he had been runnin' down every way, had lost his property and his character, wuz dissipated and mean. but the will wuz made and the law stood. men are ashamed now to think that the law wuz ever in voge, but it wuz, and is now in some of the states, and the poor young mother couldn't help herself. it has always been the boast of our american law that it takes care of wimmen. it took care of her. it held her in its strong protectin' grasp so tight that the only way she could slip out of it wuz to drop into the grave, which she did in a few months. then it leggo. but it kep' holt of serepta, it bound her tight to her uncle while he run through with what property she had, while he sunk lower and lower until at last he needed the very necessaries of life and then he bound her out to work to a woman who kep' a drinkin' den and the lowest hant of vice. twice serepta run away, bein' virtuous but humbly, but them strong protectin' arms of the law that had held her mother so tight reached out and dragged her back agin. upheld by them her uncle could compel her to give her service wherever he wanted her to work, and he wuz owin' this woman and she wanted serepta's work, so she had to submit. but the third time she made a effort so voyalent that she got away. a good woman, who bein' nothin' but a woman couldn't do anything towards onclinchin' them powerful arms that wuz protectin' her, helped her to slip through 'em. and serepta come to jonesville to live with a sister of that good woman; changed her name so's it wouldn't be so easy to find her; grew up to be a nice industrious girl. and when the woman she wuz took by died she left serepta quite a handsome property. and finally she married lank burpee, and did considerable well it wuz spozed. her property, put with what little he had, made 'em a comfortable home and they had two pretty children, a boy and a girl. but when the little girl wuz a baby he took to drinkin', neglected his bizness, got mixed up with a whiskey ring, whipped serepta--not so very hard. he went accordin' to law, and the law of the united states don't approve of a man's whippin' his wife enough to endanger her life, it sez it don't. he made every move of hisen lawful and felt that serepta hadn't ort to complain and feel hurt. but a good whippin' will make anybody feel hurt, law or no law. and then he parted with her and got her property and her two little children. why, it seemed as if everything under the sun and moon, that could happen to a woman, had happened to serepta, painful things and gauldin'. jest before lank parted with her, she fell on a broken sidewalk: some think he tripped her up, but it never wuz proved. but anyway serepta fell and broke her hip hone; and her husband sued the corporation and got ten thousand dollars for it. of course the law give the money to him and she never got a cent of it. but she wouldn't have made any fuss over that, knowin' that the law of the united states wuz such. but what made it so awful mortifyin' to her wuz, that while she wuz layin' there achin' in splints, he took that very money and used it to court up another woman with. gin her presents, jewelry, bunnets, head-dresses, artificial flowers out of serepta's own hip money. and i don't know as anything could be much more gauldin' to a woman than that--while she lay there groanin' in splints, to have her husband take the money for her own broken bones and dress up another woman like a doll with it. but the law gin it to him, and he wuz only availin' himself of the glorious liberty of our free republic, and doin' as he wuz a mind to. and it wuz spozed that that very hip money wuz what made the match. for before she wuz fairly out of splints he got a divorce from her and married agin. and by the help of serepta's hip money and the whiskey ring he got her two little children away from her. ii "they can't blame her" and i wonder if there is a woman in the land that can blame serepta for gittin' mad and wantin' her rights and wantin' the whiskey ring broke up, when they think how she's been fooled round with by men; willed away, and whipped, and parted with, and stole from. why, they can't blame her for feelin' fairly savage about 'em, as she duz. for as she sez to me once, when we wuz talkin' it over, how everything had happened to her. "yes," sez she, with a axent like bone-set and vinegar, "and what few things hain't happened to me has happened to my folks." and sure enough i couldn't dispute her. trouble and wrongs and sufferin's seemed to be epidemic in the race of pester wimmen. why, one of her aunts on her father's side, huldah pester, married for her first husband, eliphelet perkins. he wuz a minister, rode on a circuit, and he took huldah on it too, and she rode round with him on it a good deal of the time. but she never loved to, she wuz a woman that loved to be still, and kinder settled down at home. but she loved eliphelet so well that she would do anything to please him, so she rode round with him on that circuit till she wuz perfectly fagged out. he wuz a dretful good man to her, but he wuz kinder poor and they had hard times to git along. but what property they had wuzn't taxed, so that helped some, and huldah would make one dollar go a good ways. no, their property wuzn't taxed till eliphelet died. then the supervisor taxed it the very minute the breath left his body; run his horse, so it wuz said, so's to be sure to git it onto the tax list, and comply with the law. you see eliphelet's salary stopped when his breath did. and i spoze the law thought, seein' she wuz havin' trouble, she might jest as well have a little more; so it taxed all the property it never had taxed a cent for before. but she had this to console her that the law didn't forgit her in her widowhood. no; the law is quite thoughtful of wimmen by spells. it sez it protects wimmen. and i spoze that in some mysterious way, too deep for wimmen to understand, it wuz protectin' her now. well, she suffered along and finally married agin. i wondered why she did. but she wuz such a quiet, home-lovin' woman that it wuz spozed she wanted to settle down and be kinder still and sot. but of all the bad luck she had. she married on short acquaintance, and he proved to be a perfect wanderer. he couldn't keep still, it wuz spozed to be a mark. he moved huldah thirteen times in two years, and at last he took her into a cart, a sort of covered wagon, and traveled right through the western states with her. he wanted to see the country and loved to live in the wagon, it wuz his make. and, of course, the law give him control of her body, and she had to go where he moved it, or else part with him. and i spoze the law thought it wuz guardin' and nourishin' her when it wuz joltin' her over them prairies and mountains and abysses. but it jest kep' her shook up the hull of the time. it wuz the regular pester luck. and then another of her aunts, drusilly pester, married a industrious, hard-workin' man, one that never drinked, wuz sound on the doctrines, and give good measure to his customers, he wuz a groceryman. and a master hand for wantin' to foller the laws of his country as tight as laws could be follered. and so knowin' that the law approved of moderate correction for wimmen, and that "a man might whip his wife, but not enough to endanger her life"; he bein' such a master hand for wantin' to do everything faithful and do his very best for his customers, it wuz spozed he wanted to do the best for the law, and so when he got to whippin' drusilly, he would whip her too severe, he would be too faithful to it. you see what made him whip her at all wuz she wuz cross to him. they had nine little children, she thought two or three children would be about all one woman could bring up well by hand, when that hand wuz so stiff and sore with hard work. but he had read some scareful talk from high quarters about race suicide. some men do git real wrought up about it and want everybody to have all the children they can, jest as fast as they can, though wimmen don't all feel so. aunt hetty sidman said, "if men had to born 'em and nuss 'em themselves, she didn't spoze they would be so enthusiastick about it after they had had a few, 'specially if they done their own housework themselves," and aunt hetty said that some of the men who wuz exhortin' wimmen to have big families, had better spend some of their strength and wind in tryin' to make this world a safer place for children to be born into. she said they'd be better off in nonentity than here in this world with saloons on every corner, and war-dogs howlin' at 'em. i don't know exactly what she meant by nonentity, but guess she meant the world we all stay in, before we are born into this one. aunt hetty has lost five boys, two by battle and three by licensed saloons, that makes her talk real bitter, but to resoom. i told josiah that men needn't worry about race suicide, for you might as well try to stop a hen from makin' a nest, as to stop wimmen from wantin' a baby to love and hold on her heart. but sez i, "folks ort to be moderate and mejum in babies as well as in everything else." but drusilly's husband wanted twelve boys he said, to be law-abidin' citizens as their pa wuz, and a protection to the govermunt, and to be ready to man the new warships, if a war broke out. but her babies wuz real pretty and cunning, and she wuz so weak-minded she couldn't enjoy the thought that if our male statesmen got to scrappin' with some other nation's male law-makers and made another war, of havin' her grown-up babies face the cannons. i spoze it wuz when she wuz so awful tired she felt so. you see she had to do every mite of her housework, and milk cows, and make butter and cheese, and cook and wash and scour, and take all the care of the children day and night in sickness and health, and make their clothes and keep 'em clean. and when there wuz so many of 'em and she enjoyin' real poor health, i spoze she sometimes thought more of her own achin' back than she did of the good of the govermunt--and she would git kinder discouraged sometimes and be cross to him. and knowin' his own motives wuz so high and loyal, he felt that he ort to whip her, so he did. and what shows that drusilly wuzn't so bad after all and did have her good streaks and a deep reverence for the law is, that she stood his whippin's first-rate, and never whipped him. now she wuz fur bigger than he wuz, weighed eighty pounds the most, and might have whipped him if the law had been such. but they wuz both law-abidin' and wanted to keep every preamble, so she stood it to be whipped, and never once whipped him in all the seventeen years they lived together. she died when her twelfth child wuz born. there wuz jest ten months difference between that and the one next older. and they said she often spoke out in her last sickness, and said, "thank fortune, i've always kep' the law!" and they said the same thought wuz a great comfort to him in his last moments. he died about a year after she did, leavin' his second wife with twins and a good property. then there wuz abagail pester. she married a sort of a high-headed man, though one that paid his debts, wuz truthful, good lookin', and played well on the fiddle. why, it seemed as if he had almost every qualification for makin' a woman happy, only he had this one little eccentricity, he would lock up abagail's clothes every time he got mad at her. of course the law give her clothes to him, and knowin' that it wuz the law in the state where they lived, she wouldn't have complained only when they had company. but it wuz mortifyin', nobody could dispute it, to have company come and have nothin' to put on. several times she had to withdraw into the woodhouse, and stay most all day there shiverin', and under the suller stairs and round in clothes presses. but he boasted in prayer meetin's and on boxes before grocery stores that he wuz a law-abidin' citizen, and he wuz. eben flanders wouldn't lie for anybody. but i'll bet abagail flanders beat our old revolutionary four-mothers in thinkin' out new laws, when she lay round under stairs and behind barrels in her night-gown. when a man hides his wife's stockin's and petticoats it is governin' without the consent of the governed. if you don't believe it you'd ort to peeked round them barrels and seen abagail's eyes, they had hull reams of by-laws in 'em and preambles, and declarations of independence, so i've been told. but it beat everything i ever hearn on, the lawful sufferin's of them wimmen. for there wuzn't nothin' illegal about one single trouble of theirn. they suffered accordin' to law, every one on 'em. but it wuz tuff for 'em, very tuff. and their bein' so dretful humbly wuz another drawback to 'em, though that too wuz perfectly lawful, as everybody knows. and serepta looked as bad agin as she would otherwise on account of her teeth. it wuz after lank had begun to git after this other woman, and wuz indifferent to his wife's looks that serepta had a new set of teeth on her upper jaw. and they sot out and made her look so bad it fairly made her ache to look at herself in the glass. and they hurt her gooms too, and she carried 'em back to the dentist and wanted him to make her another set, but he acted mean and wouldn't take 'em back, and sued lank for the pay. and they had a law-suit. and the law bein' such that a woman can't testify in court, in any matter that is of mutual interest to husband and wife, and lank wantin' to act mean, said that they wuz good sound teeth. and there serepta sot right in front of 'em with her gooms achin' and her face all swelled out, and lookin' like furiation, and couldn't say a word. but she had to give in to the law. and ruther than go toothless she wears 'em to this day, and i believe it is the raspin' of them teeth aginst her gooms and her discouraged, mad feelin's every time she looks in the glass that helps embitter her towards men, and the laws men have made, so's a woman can't have control of her own teeth and her own bones. serepta went home about p.m., i promisin' sacred to do her errents for her. and i gin a deep, happy sithe after i shot the door behind her, and i sez to josiah i do hope that's the very last errent we will have to carry to washington, d.c., for the jonesvillians. "yes," says he, "an' i guess i will get a fresh pail of water and hang on the tea kettle for you." "and," i says, "it's pretty early for supper, but i'll start it, for i do feel kinder gone to the stomach. sympathy is real exhaustin'. sometimes i think it tires me more'n hard work. and heaven knows i sympathized with serepta. i felt for her full as much as if she was one of the relations on _his_ side." but if you'll believe it, i had hardly got the words out of my mouth and josiah had jest laid holt of the water pail, when in comes philander dagget, the president of the jonesville creation searchin' society and, of course, he had a job for us to do on our tower. this society was started by the leadin' men of jonesville, for the purpose of searchin' out and criticizin' the affairs of the world, an' so far as possible advisin' and correctin' the meanderin's an' wrong-doin's of the universe. this society, which we call the c.s.s. for short, has been ruther quiet for years. but sence woman's suffrage has got to be such a prominent question, they bein' so bitterly opposed to it, have reorganized and meet every once in a while, to sneer at the suffragettes and poke fun at 'em and show in every way they can their hitter antipathy to the cause. philander told me if i see anything new and strikin' in the way of society badges and regalia, to let him know about it, for he said the c.s.s. was goin' to take a decided stand and show their colors. they wuz goin' to help protect his women endangered sect, an' he wanted sunthin' showy and suggestive. i thought of a number of badges and mottoes that i felt would be suitable for this society, but dassent tell 'em to him, for his idees and mine on this subject are as fur apart as the two poles. he talked awful bitter to me once about it, and i sez to him: "philander, the world is full of good men, and there are also bad men in the world, and, sez i, did you ever in your born days see a bad man that wuzn't opposed to woman's suffrage? all the men who trade in, and profit by, the weakness and sin of men and women, they every one of 'em, to a man, fight agin it. and would they do this if they didn't think that their vile trades would suffer if women had the right to vote? it is the great-hearted, generous, noble man who wants women to become a real citizen with himself--which she is not now--she is only a citizen just enough to be taxed equally with man, or more exhorbitantly, and be punished and executed by the law she has no hand in makin'." philander sed, "i have always found it don't pay to talk with women on matters they don't understand." an' he got up and started for the door, an' josiah sed, "no, it don't pay, not a cent; i've always said so." but i told philander i'd let him know if i see anything appropriate to the c.s.s. holdin' back with a almost herculaneum effort the mottoes and badges that run through my mind as bein' appropriate to their society; knowin' it would make him so mad if i told him of 'em--he never would neighbor with us again. and in three days' time we sot sail. we got to the depo about an hour too early, but i wuz glad we wuz on time, for it would have worked josiah up dretfully ef we hadn't been, for he had spent most of the latter part of the night in gittin' up and walkin' out to the clock seein' if it wuz train time. jest before we started, who should come runnin' down to the depo but sam nugent wantin' to send a errent by me to washington. he wunk me out to one side of the waitin' room, and ast "if i'd try to git him a license to steal horses." it kinder runs in the blood of the nugents to love to steal, and he owned up it did, but he said he wanted the profit of it. but i told him i wouldn't do any sech thing, an' i looked at him in such a witherin' way that i should most probable withered him, only he is blind in one side, and i wuz on the blind side, but he argued with me, and said that it wuz no worse than to give licenses for other kinds of meanness. he said they give licenses now to steal--steal folkses senses away, and then they could steal everything else, and murder and tear round into every kind of wickedness. but he didn't ask that. he wanted things done fair and square: he jest wanted to steal horses. he wuz goin' west, and he thought he could do a good bizness, and lay up somethin'. if he had a license he shouldn't be afraid of bein' shet up or shot. but i refused the job with scorn; and jest as i wuz refusin', the cars snorted, and i wuz glad they did. they seemed to express in that wild snort something of the indignation i felt. the idee! iii "polly's eyes crowed tender" lorinda wuz dretful glad to see us and so wuz her husband and polly. but the reunion had to be put off on account of a spell her husband wuz havin'. lorinda said she could not face such a big company as she'd invited while hiram wuz havin' a spell, and i agreed with her. sez i, "never, never, would i have invited company whilst josiah wuz sufferin' with one of his cricks." men hain't patient under pain, and outsiders hain't no bizness to hear things they say and tell on 'em. so polly had to write to the relations puttin' off the reunion for one week. but lorinda kep' on cookin' fruit cake and such that would keep, she had plenty of help, but loved to do her company cookin' herself. and seein' the reunion wuz postponed and lorinda had time on her hands, i proposed she should go with me to the big out-door meetin' of the suffragists, which wuz held in a nigh-by city. "good land!" sez she, "nothin' would tempt me to patronize anything so brazen and onwomanly as a out-door meetin' of wimmen, and so onhealthy and immodest." i see she looked reproachfully at polly as she said it. polly wuz arrangin' some posies in a vase, and looked as sweet as the posies did, but considerable firm too, and i see from lorinda's looks that polly wuz one who had to leave father and mother for principle's sake. but i sez, "you're cookin' this minute, lorinda, for a out-door meetin'" (she wuz makin' angel cake). "and why is this meetin' any more onwomanly or immodest than the camp-meetin' where you wuz converted, and baptized the next sunday in the creek?" "oh, them wuz religious meetin's," sez she. "well," sez i, "mebby these wimmen think their meetin' is religious. you know the bible sez, 'faith and works should go together,' and some of the leaders of this movement have showed by their works as religious a sperit and wielded aginst injustice to young workin' wimmen as powerful a weepon as that axe of the 'postles the bible tells about. and you said you went every day to the hudson-fulton doin's and hearn every out-door lecture; you writ me that there wuz probable a million wimmen attendin' them out-door meetin's, and that wuz curosity and pleasure huntin' that took them, and this is a meetin' of justice and right." "oh, shaw!" sez lorinda agin, with her eye on polly. "wimmen have all the rights they want or need." lorinda's husband bein' rich and lettin' her have her way she is real foot loose, and don't feel the need of any more rights for herself, but i told her then and there some of the wrongs and sufferin's of serepta pester, and bein' good-hearted (but obstinate and bigoted) she gin in that the errents wuz hefty, and that serepta wuz to be pitied, but she insisted that wimmen's votin' wouldn't help matters. but euphrasia pottle, a poor relation from troy, spoke up. "after my husband died one of my girls went into a factory and gits about half what the men git for the same work, and my oldest girl who teaches in the public school don't git half as much for the same work as men do, and her school rooms are dark, stuffy, onhealthy, and crowded so the children are half-choked for air, and the light so poor they're havin' their eyesight spilte for life, and new school books not needed at all, are demanded constantly, so some-one can make money." "yes," sez i, "do you spoze, lorinda, if intelligent mothers helped control such things they would let their children be made sick and blind and the money that should be used for food for poor hungry children be squandered on _on_-necessary books they are too faint with hunger to study." "but wimmen's votin' wouldn't help in such things," sez lorinda, as she stirred her angel cake vigorously. but euphrasia sez, "my niece, ellen, teaches in a state where wimmen vote and she gits the same wages men git for the same work, and her school rooms are bright and pleasant and sanitary, and the pupils, of course, are well and happy. and if you don't think wimmen can help in such public matters just go to seattle and see how quick a bad man wuz yanked out of his public office and a good man put in his place, mostly by wimmen's efforts and votes." "yes," sez i, "it is a proved fact that wimmen's votes do help in these matters. and do you think, lorinda, that if educated, motherly, thoughtful wimmen helped make the laws so many little children would be allowed to toil in factories and mines, their tender shoulders bearin' the burden of constant labor that wears out the iron muscles of men?" polly's eyes growed tender and wistful, and her little white hands lingered over her posies, and i knowed the hard lot of the poor, the wrongs of wimmen and children, the woes of humanity, wuz pressin' down on her generous young heart. and i could see in her sweet face the brave determination to do and to dare, to try to help ondo the wrongs, and try to lift the burdens from weak and achin' shoulders. but lorinda kep' on with the same old moth-eaten argument so broke down and feeble it ort to be allowed to die in peace. "woman's suffrage would make women neglect their homes and housework and let their children run loose into ruin." i knowed she said it partly on polly's account, but i sez in surprise, "why, lorinda, it must be you hain't read up on the subject or you would know wherever wimmen has voted they have looked out first of all for the children's welfare. they have raised the age of consent, have closed saloons and other places of licensed evil, and in every way it has been their first care to help 'em to safer and more moral surroundin's, for who has the interest of children more at heart than the mothers who bore them, children who are the light of their eyes and the hope of the future." lorinda admitted that the state of the children in the homes of the poor and ignorant wuz pitiful. "but," sez she, "the bible sez 'ye shall always have the poor with you,' and i spoze we always shall, with all their sufferin's and wants. but," sez she, "in well-to-do homes the children are safe and well off, and don't need any help from woman legislation." "why, lorinda," sez i, "did you ever think on't how such mothers may watch over and be the end of the law to their children with the father's full consent during infancy when they're wrastlin' with teethin', whoopin'-cough, mumps, etc., can be queen of the nursery, dispensor of pure air, sunshine, sanitary, and safe surroundin's in every way, and then in a few years see 'em go from her into dark, overcrowded, unsanitary, carelessly guarded places, to spend the precious hours when they are the most receptive to influence and pass man-made pitfalls on their way to and fro, must stand helpless until in too many cases the innocent healthy child that went from her care returns to her half-blind, a physical and moral wreck. the mother who went down to death's door for 'em, and had most to do in mouldin' their destiny during infancy should have at least equal rights with the father in controllin' their surroundin's during their entire youth, and to do this she must have equal legal power or her best efforts are wasted. that this is just and right is as plain to me as the nose on my face and folks will see it bom-bye and wonder they didn't before. "and wimmen who suffer most by the lack on't, will be most interested in openin' schools to teach the fine art of domestic service, teachin' young girls how to keep healthy comfortable homes and fit themselves to be capable wives and mothers. i don't say or expect that wimmen's votin' will make black white, or wash all the stains from the legislative body at once, but i say that jest the effort to git wimmen's suffrage has opened hundreds of bolted doors and full suffrage will open hundreds more. and i'm goin' to that woman's suffrage meetin' if i walk afoot." but here josiah spoke up, i thought he wuz asleep, he wuz layin' on the lounge with a paper over his face. but truly the word, "woman's suffrage," rousts him up as quick as a mouse duz a drowsy cat, so, sez he, "i can't let you go, samantha, into any such dangerous and onwomanly affair." "let?" sez i in a dry voice; "that's a queer word from one old pardner to another." "i'm responsible for your safety, samantha, and if anybody goes to that dangerous and onseemly meetin' i will. mebby polly would like to go with me." as stated, polly is as pretty as a pink posy, and no matter how old a man is, nor how interestin' and noble his pardner is, he needs girl blinders, yes, he needs 'em from the cradle to the grave. but few, indeed, are the female pardners who can git him to wear 'em. he added, "you know i represent you legally, samantha; what i do is jest the same as though you did it." sez i, "mebby that is law, but whether it is gospel is another question. but if you represent me, josiah, you will have to carry out my plans; i writ to diantha smith trimble that if i went to the city i'd take care of aunt susan a night or two, and rest her a spell; you know diantha is a widder and too poor to hire a nurse. but seein' you represent me you can set up with her ma a night or two; she's bed-rid and you'll have to lift her round some, and give her her medicine and take care of diantha's twins, and let her git a good sleep." "well, as it were--samantha--you know--men hain't expected to represent wimmen in everything, it is mostly votin' and tendin' big meetin's and such." "oh, i see," sez i; "men represent wimmen when they want to, and when they don't wimmen have got to represent themselves." "well, yes, samantha, sunthin' like that." he didn't say anything more about representin' me, and polly said she wuz goin' to ride in the parade with some other college girls. lorinda's linement looked dark and forbiddin' as polly stated in her gentle, but firm way this ultimatum. lorinda hated the idee of polly's jinin' in what she called onwomanly and immodest doin's, but i looked beamin'ly at her and gloried in her principles. after she went out lorinda said to me in a complainin' way, "i should think that a girl that had every comfort and luxury would be contented and thankful, and be willin' to stay to home and act like a lady." sez i, "nothin' could keep polly from actin' like a lady, and mebby it is because she is so well off herself that makes her sorry for other young girls that have nothin' but poverty and privation." "oh, nonsense!" sez lorinda. but i knowed jest how it wuz. polly bein' surrounded by all the good things money could give, and bein' so tender-hearted her heart ached for other young girls, who had to spend the springtime of their lives in the hard work of earnin' bread for themselves and dear ones, and she longed to help 'em to livin' wages, so they could exist without the wages of sin, and too many on 'em had to choose between them black wages and starvation. she wanted to help 'em to better surroundin's and she knowed the best weepon she could put into their hands to fight the wolves of want and temptation, wuz the ballot. polly hain't a mite like her ma, she favors the smiths more, her grand-ma on her pa's side wuz a smith and a woman of brains and principle. durin' my conversation with lorinda, i inquired about royal gray, for as stated, he wuz a great favorite of ourn, and i found out (and i could see it gaulded her) that when polly united with the suffragists he shied off some, and went to payin' attention to another girl. whether it wuz to make polly jealous and bring her round to his way of thinkin', i didn't know, but mistrusted, for i could have took my oath that he loved polly deeply and truly. to be sure he hadn't confided in me, but there is a language of the eyes, when the soul speaks through 'em, and as i'd seen him look at polly my own soul had hearn and understood that silent language and translated it, that polly wuz the light of his eyes, and the one woman in the world for him. and i couldn't think his heart had changed so sudden. but knowin' as i did the elastic nature of manly affection, i felt dubersome. this other girl, maud vincent, always said to her men friends, it wuz onwomanly to try to vote. she wuz one of the girls who always gloried in bein' a runnin' vine when there wuz any masculine trees round to lean on and twine about. one who always jined in with all the idees they promulgated, from neckties to the tariff, who declared cigar smoke wuz so agreeable and welcome; it did really make her deathly sick, but she would choke herself cheerfully and willin'ly if by so chokin' she could gain manly favor and admiration. she said she didn't believe in helpin' poor girls, they wuz well enough off as it wuz, she wuz sure they didn't feel hunger and cold as rich girls did, their skin wuz thicker and their stomachs different and stronger, and constant labor didn't harm them, and working girls didn't need recreation as rich girls did, and woman's suffrage wouldn't help them any; in her opinion it would harm them, and anyway the poor wuz on-grateful. she had the usual arguments on the tip of her tongue, for old miss vincent, the aunt she lived with, wuz a ardent she aunty and very prominent in the public meetin's the she auntys have to try to compel the suffragists not to have public meetin's. they talk a good deal in public how onwomanly and immodest it is for wimmen to talk in public. and she wuz one of the foremost ones in tryin' to git up a school to teach wimmen civics, to prove that they mustn't ever have anything to do with civics. yes, old miss vincent wuz a real active, ardent she aunty, and maud genevieve takes after her. royal gray, his handsome attractive personality, and his millions, had long been the goal of maud's ambition. and how ardently did she hail the coolness growing between him and polly, the little rift in the lute, and how zealously did she labor to make it larger. polly and royal had had many an argument on the subject, that is, he would begin by makin' fun of the suffragists and their militant doin's, which if he'd thought on't wuz sunthin' like what his old revolutionary forbears went through for the same reasons, bein' taxed without representation, and bein' burdened and punished by the law they had no voice in making, only the suffragettes are not nearly so severe with their opposers, they haven't drawed any blood yet. why, them old patriots we revere so, would consider their efforts for freedom exceedingly gentle and tame compared to their own bloody battles. and royal would make light of the efforts of college girls to help workin' girls, and the encouragement and aid they'd gin 'em when they wuz strikin' for less death-dealin' hours of labor, and livin' wages, and so forth. i don't see how such a really noble young man as royal ever come to argy that way, but spoze it wuz the dead hand of some rough onreasonable old ancestor reachin' up out of the shadows of the past and pushin' him on in the wrong direction. so when he begun to ridicule what polly's heart wuz sot on, when she felt that he wuz fightin' agin right and justice, before they knowed it both pairs of bright eyes would git to flashin' out angry sparks, and hash words would be said on both sides. that old long-buried tory ancestor of hisen eggin' him on, so i spoze, and polly's generous sperit rebellin' aginst the injustice and selfishness, and mebby some warlike ancestor of hern pushin' her on to say hash things. 'tennyrate he had grown less attentive to her, and wuz bestowin' his time and attentions elsewhere. and when she told him she wuz goin' to ride in the automobile parade of the suffragists, but really ridin' she felt towards truth and justice to half the citizens of the u.s., he wuz mad as a wet hen, a male wet hen, and wuz bound she shouldn't go. some men, and mebby it is love that makes 'em feel so (they say it is), and mebby it is selfishness (though they won't own up to it), but they want the women they love to belong to them alone, want to rule absolutely over their hearts, their souls, their bodies, and all their thoughts and aims, desires, and fancies. they don't really say they want 'em to wear veils, and be shet in behind lattice-windowed harems, but i believe they would enjoy it. they want to be foot loose and heart loose themselves, but always after ulysses is tired of world wandering, he wants to come back and open the barred doors of home with his own private latch-key, and find penelope knitting stockings for him with her veil on, waitin' for him. that sperit is i spoze inherited from the days when our ancestor, the cave man, would knock down the woman he fancied, with a club, and carry her off into his cave and keep her there shet up. but little by little men are forgettin' their ancestral traits, and men and wimmen are gradually comin' out of their dark caverns into the sunshine (for women too have inherited queer traits and disagreeable ones, but that is another story). well, as i said, royal wuz mad and told polly that he guessed that the day of the parade he would take maud vincent out in the country in his motor, to gather may-flowers. polly told him she hoped they would have a good time, and then, after he had gone, drivin' his car lickety-split, harem skarum, owin' to his madness i spoze, polly went upstairs and cried, for i hearn her, her room wuz next to ourn. and i deeply respected her for her principles, for he had asked her first to go may-flowering with him the day of the suffrage meeting. but she refused, havin' in her mind, i spoze, the girls that couldn't hunt flowers, but had to handle weeds and thistles with bare hands (metaforically) and wanted to help them and all workin' wimmen to happier and more prosperous lives. iv "strivin' with the emissary" but i am hitchin' the horse behind the wagon and to resoom backwards. the reunion wuz put off a week and the suffrage meetin' wuz two days away, so i told lorinda i didn't believe i would have a better time to carry serepta pester's errents to washington, d.c. josiah said he guessed he would stay and help wait on hiram cagwin, and i approved on't, for lorinda wuz gittin' wore out. and then josiah made so light of them errents i felt that he would be a drawback instead of a help, for how could i keep a calm and noble frame of mind befittin' them lofty errents, and how could i carry 'em stiddy with a pardner by my side pokin' fun at 'em, and at me for carryin' 'em, jarrin' my sperit with his scorfin' and onbelievin' talk? and as i sot off alone in the trolley i thought of how they must have felt in old times a-carryin' the urim and thumim. and though i hadn't no idee what them wuz, yet i always felt that the carriers of 'em must have felt solemn and high-strung. yes, my feelin's wuz such as i felt of the heft and importance of them errents not alone to serepta pester, but to the hull race of wimmen that it kep' my mental head rained up so high that i couldn't half see and enjoy the sight of the most beautiful city in the world, and still i spoze its grandeur and glory sort o' filtered down through my conscientiousness, as cloth grows white under the sun's rays onbeknown to it. anon i left the trolley and walked some ways afoot. it wuz a lovely day, the sun shone down in golden splendor upon the splendor beneath it. broad, beautiful clean streets, little fresh green parks, everywhere you could turn about, and big ones full of flowers and fountains, and trees and statutes. and anon or oftener i passed noble big stun buildings, where everything is made for the nation's good and profit. money and fish and wisdom and all sorts of patented things and garden seeds and tariffs and resolutions and treaties and laws of every shape and size, good ones and queer ones and reputations and rates and rebates, etc., etc. but it would devour too much time to even name over all that is made and onmade there, even if i knowed by name the innumerable things that are flowin' constant out of that great reservoir of the nation, with its vast crowd of law-makers settin' on the lid, regulatin' its flow and spreadin' it abroad over the country, thick and thin. but on i went past the capitol, the handsomest buildin' on the globe, standin' in its own eden of beauty. by the public library as long as from our house to grout hozleton's, and i guess longer, and every foot on't more beautifler ornamented than tongue can tell. but i didn't dally tryin' to pace off the size on't, though it wuz enormous, for the thought of what i wuz carryin' bore me on almost regardless of my matchless surroundin's and the twinges of rumatiz. and anon i arrived at the white house, where my hopes and the hopes of my sect and serepta pester wuz sot. i will pass over my efforts to git into the presence, merely sayin' that they were arjous and extreme, and i wouldn't probably have got in at all had not the presence appeared with a hat on jest goin' out for a walk, and see me as i wuz strivin' with the emissary for entrance. i spoze my noble mean, made more noble fur by the magnitude of what i wuz carryin', impressed him, for suffice it to say inside of five minutes the presence wuz back in his augience room, and i wuz layin' out them errents of serepta's in front of him. he wuz very hefty, a good-lookin' smilin' man, a politer demeanored gentlemanly appearner man i don't want to see. but his linement which had looked so pleasant and cheerful growed gloomy and deprested as i spread them errents before him and sez in conclusion: "serepta pester sent these errents to you, she wanted intemperance done away with, the whiskey ring broke up and destroyed, she wanted you to have nothin' stronger than root beer when you had company to dinner, she offerin' to send you some burdock and dandeline roots and some emptins to start it with, and she wanted her rights, and wanted 'em all by week after next without fail." he sithed hard, and i never see a linement fall furder than hisen fell, and kep' a-fallin'. i pitied him, i see it wuz a hard stent for him to do it in the time she had sot, and he so fleshy too. but knowin' how much wuz at the stake, and how the fate of serepta and wimmen wuz tremblin' in the balances, i spread them errents out before him. and bein' truthful and above board, i told him that serepta wuz middlin' disagreeable and very humbly, but she needed her rights jest as much as though she wuz a wax-doll. and i went on and told him how she and her relations had suffered from want of rights, and how dretfully she had suffered from the ring till i declare talkin' about them little children of hern, and her agony, i got about as fierce actin' as serepta herself, and entirely onbeknown to myself i talked powerful on intemperance and rings, and such. when i got down agin onto my feet i see he had a still more worried and anxious look on his good-natured face, and he sez: "the laws of the united states are such that i can't do them errands, i can't interfere." "then," sez i, "why don't you make the united states do right?" he said sunthin' about the might of the majority, and the powerful corporations and rings, and that sot me off agin. and i talked very powerful and allegored about allowin' a ring to be put round the united states and let a lot of whiskey dealers and corporations lead her round, a pitiful sight for men and angels. sez i, "how duz it look before the nations to see columbia led round half-tipsy by a ring?" he seemed to think it looked bad, i knew by his looks. sez i, "intemperance is bad for serepta and bad for the nation." he murmured sunthin' about the revenue the liquor trade brought the govermunt. but i sez, "every penny is money right out of the people's pockets; every dollar the people pay into the liquor traffic that gives a few cents into the treasury, is costin' the people ten times that dollar in the loss intemperance entails, loss of labor, by the inability of drunken men to do anything but wobble and stagger, loss of wealth by the enormous losses of property and taxation, of alms-houses, mad-houses, jails, police forces, paupers' coffins, and the diggin' of thousands and thousands of graves that are filled yearly by them that reel into 'em." sez i, "wouldn't it be better for the people to pay that dollar in the first place into the treasury than to let it filter through the dram-seller's hands, a few cents of it fallin' into the national purse at last, putrid and heavy with all these losses and curses and crimes and shames and despairs and agonies?" he seemed to think it would, i see by the looks of his linement he did. every honorable man feels so in his heart, and yet they let the liquor ring control 'em and lead 'em round. "it is queer, queer as a dog." sez i, "the intellectual and moral power of the united states are rolled up and thrust into that whiskey ring and bein' drove by the whiskey dealers jest where they want to drive 'em." sez i, "it controls new york village and nobody denies it, and the piety and philanthropy and culture and philosophy of that village has to be drawed along by that ring." and sez i, in low but startlin' tones of principle: "where, where is it a-drawin' 'em to? where is it drawin' the hull nation to? is it drawin' 'em down into a slavery ten times more abject and soul-destroyin' than african slavery ever wuz? tell me," sez i firmly, "tell me!" he did not try to frame a reply, he could not find a frame. he knowed it wuz a conundrum boundless as truth and god's justice, and as solemnly deep in its sure consequences of evil as eternity, and as sure to come as that is. oh, how solemn he looked, and how sorry i felt for him, for i knowed worse wuz to come, i knowed the sharpest arrow serepta pester had sent wuz yet to pierce his sperit. but i sort o' blunted the edge on't what i could conscientiously. sez i, "i think myself serepta is a little onreasonable, i myself am willin' to wait three or four weeks. but she's suffered dretful from intemperance from the rings and from the want of rights, and her sufferin's have made her more voylent in her demands and impatienter," and then i fairly groaned as i did the rest of the errent, and let the sharpest arrow fly from the bo. "serepta told me to tell you if you didn't do these errents you should not be president next year." he trembled like a popple leaf, and i felt that serepta wuz threatenin' him too hard. sez he, "i do not wish to be president again, i shall refuse to be nominated. at the same time i _do_ wish to be president and shall work hard for the nomination if you can understand the paradox." "yes," sez i, "i understand them paradoxes. i've lived with 'em as you may say, all through my married life." a clock struck in the next room and i knowed time wuz passin' swift. sez the president, "i would be glad to do serepta's errents, i think she is justified in askin' for her rights, and to have the ring destroyed, but i am not the one to do them." sez i, "who is the man or men?" he looked all round the room and up and down as if in hopes he could see someone layin' round on the floor, or danglin' from the ceilin', that would take the responsibility offen him, and in the very nick of time the door opened after a quick rap, and the president jumped up with a relieved look on his linement, and sez: "here is the very man to do the errents." and he hastened to introduce me to the senator who entered. and then he bid me a hasty adoo, but cordial and polite, and withdrew himself. v "he wuz dretful polite" i felt glad to have this senator do serepta's errents, but i didn't like his looks. my land! talk about serepta pester bein' disagreeable, he wuz as disagreeable as she any day. he wuz kinder tall and looked out of his eyes and wore a vest. he wuz some bald-headed, and wore a large smile all the while, it looked like a boughten one that didn't fit him, but i won't say it wuz. i presoom he'll be known by this description. but his baldness didn't look to me like josiah allen's baldness, and he didn't have the noble linement of the president, no indeed. he wuz dretful polite, good land! politeness is no name for it, but i don't like to see anybody too good. he drawed a chair up for me and himself and asked me: if he should have the inexpressible honor and delightful joy of aiding me in any way, if so to command him to do it or words to that effect. i can't put down his second-hand smiles and genteel looks and don't want to if i could. but tacklin' hard jobs as i always tackle 'em, i sot down calm in front of him with my umbrell on my lap and told him all of serepta's errents, and how i had brought 'em from jonesville on my tower. i told over all her sufferin's and wrongs from the rings and from not havin' her rights, and all her sister's azuba clapsaddle's, and her aunt cassandra keeler's, and hulda and drusilly's and abagail flanderses injustices and sufferin's. i did her errents as honorable as i'd love to have one done for me, i told him all the petickulars, and as i finished i said firmly: "now can you do serepta pesterses errents and will you?" he leaned forward with that disagreeable boughten smile of hisen and took up one corner of my mantilly, it wuz cut tab fashion, and he took up the tab and said in a low insinuatin' voice, lookin' clost at the edge of the tab: "am i mistaken, or is this beautiful creation pipein' or can it be kensington tattin'?" i drawed the tab back coldly and never dained a reply; agin he sez, in a tone of amiable anxiety, "have i not heard a rumor that bangs are going out of style? i see you do not wear your lovely hair bang-like or a-pompadouris? ah, women are lovely creatures, lovely beings, every one of 'em." and he sithed, "you are very beautiful," and he sithed agin, a sort of a deceitful lovesick sithe. i sot demute as the spinks, and a chippin' bird tappin' his wing aginst her stuny breast would move it jest as much as he moved me by his talk or his sithes. but he kep' on, puttin' on a sort of a sad injured look as if my coldness wuz ondoin' of him. "my dear madam, it is my misfortune that the topics i introduce, however carefully selected by me, do not seem to be congenial to you. have you a leanin' toward natural history, madam? have you ever studied into the habits and traits of our american wad?" "what?" sez i. for truly a woman's curosity, however parlyzed by just indignation, can stand only just so much strain. "the what?" "the wad. the animal from which is obtained the valuable fur that tailors make so much use of." sez i, "do you mean waddin' eight cents a sheet?" "eight cents a pelt--yes, the skins are plentiful and cheap, owing to the hardy habits of the animal." sez i, "cease instantly. i will hear no more." truly, i had heard much of the flattery and little talk statesmen will use to wimmen, and i'd hearn of their lies, etc.; but truly i felt that the half had not been told. and then i thought out-loud and sez: "i've hearn how laws of eternal right and justice are sot one side in washington, d.c., as bein' too triflin' to attend to, while the legislators pondered over and passed laws regardin' hen's eggs and bird's nests. but this is goin' too fur--too fur. but," sez i firmly, "i shall do serepta's errents, and do 'em to the best of my ability, and you can't draw off my attention from her wrongs and sufferin's by talkin' about wads." "i would love to obleege serepta," sez he, "because she belongs to such a lovely sect. wimmen are the loveliest, most angelic creatures that ever walked the earth; they are perfect, flawless, like snow and roses." sez i firmly, "they hain't no such thing; they are disagreeable creeters a good deal of the time. they hain't no better than men, but they ort to have their rights all the same. now serepta is disagreeable and kinder fierce actin', and jest as humbly as they make wimmen, but that hain't no sign she ort to be imposed upon; josiah sez she hadn't ort to have rights she is so humbly, but i don't feel so." "who is josiah?" sez he. sez i, "my husband." "ah, your husband! yes, wimmen should have husbands instead of rights. they do not need rights; they need freedom from all cares and sufferin'. sweet lovely beings! let them have husbands to lift them above all earthly cares and trials! oh! angels of our homes!" sez he, liftin' his eyes to the heavens and kinder shettin' 'em, some as if he wuz goin' into a spazzum. "fly around, ye angels, in your native hants; mingle not with rings and vile laws, flee away, flee above them!" and he kinder waved his hand back and forth in a floatin' fashion up in the air, as if it wuz a woman flyin' up there smooth and serene. it would have impressed some folks dretful, but it didn't me. i sez reasonably: "serepta would have been glad to flew above 'em, but the ring and the vile laws lay holt of her onbeknown to her and dragged her down. and there she is all bruised and broken-hearted by 'em. she didn't meddle with the political ring, but the ring meddled with her. how can she fly when the weight of this infamous traffic is holdin' her down?" "ahem!" sez he. "ahem, as it were. as i was saying, my dear madam, these angelic angels of our homes are too ethereal, too dainty to mingle with rude crowds. we political men would fain keep them as they are now; we are willing to stand the rude buffetin' of--of--voting, in order to guard these sweet delicate creatures from any hardships. sweet tender beings, we would fain guard thee--ah, yes, ah, yes." sez i, "cease instantly, or my sickness will increase, for such talk is like thoroughwort or lobelia to my moral and mental stomach. you know and i know that these angelic tender bein's, half-clothed, fill our streets on icy midnights, huntin' up drunken husbands and fathers and sons. they are driven to death and to moral ruin by the miserable want liquor drinkin' entails. they are starved, they are froze, they are beaten, they are made childless and hopeless by drunken husbands killin' their own flesh and blood. they go down into the cold waves and are drowned by drunken captains; they are cast from railways into death by drunken engineers; they go up on the scaffold and die for crimes committed by the direct aid of this agent of hell. "wimmen had ruther be flyin' round than to do all this, but they can't. if men really believed all they say about wimmen, and i think some on 'em do in a dreamy sentimental way--if wimmen are angels, give 'em the rights of angels. who ever hearn of a angel foldin' up her wings and goin' to a poor-house or jail through the fault of somebody else? who ever hearn of a angel bein' dragged off to police court for fightin' to defend her children and herself from a drunken husband that had broke her wings and blacked her eyes, got the angel into the fight and then she got throwed into the streets and imprisoned by it? who ever hearn of a angel havin' to take in washin' to support a drunken son or father or husband? who ever hearn of a angel goin' out as wet-nurse to git money to pay taxes on her home to a govermunt that in theory idolizes her, and practically despises her, and uses that money in ways abominable to that angel. if you want to be consistent, if you're bound to make angels of wimmen, you ort to furnish a free safe place for 'em to soar in. you ort to keep the angels from bein' tormented and bruised and killed, etc." "ahem," sez he, "as it were, ahem." but i kep' right on, for i begun to feel noble and by the side of myself: "this talk about wimmen bein' outside and above all participation in the laws of her country, is jest as pretty as anything i ever hearn, and jest as simple. why, you might jest as well throw a lot of snowflakes into the street, and say, 'some of 'em are female flakes and mustn't be trompled on.' the great march of life tromples on 'em all alike; they fall from one common sky, and are trodden down into one common ground. "men and wimmen are made with divine impulses and desires, and human needs and weaknesses, needin' the same heavenly light, and the same human aids and helps. the law should mete out to them the same rewards and punishments. "serepta sez you call wimmen angels, and you don't give 'em the rights of the lowest beasts that crawl on the earth. and serepta told me to tell you that she didn't ask the rights of a angel; she would be perfectly contented and proud, if you would give her the rights of a dog--the assured political rights of a yeller dog.' she said yeller and i'm bound on doin' her 'errent jest as she wanted it done, word for word. "a dog, serepta sez, don't have to be hung if it breaks the laws it is not allowed any hand in making; a dog don't have to pay taxes on its bone to a govermunt that withholds every right of citizenship from it; a dog hain't called undogly if it is industrious and hunts quietly round for its bone to the best of its ability, and tries to git its share of the crumbs that falls from that table bills are laid on. "a dog hain't preached to about its duty to keep home sweet and sacred, and then see that home turned into a place of danger and torment under laws that these very preachers have made legal and respectable. a dog don't have to see its property taxed to advance laws it believes ruinous, and that breaks its own heart and the heart of other dear dogs. a dog don't have to listen to soul-sickening speeches from them that deny it freedom and justice, about its bein' a damask rose and a seraph, when it knows it hain't; it knows, if it knows anything, that it is jest a plain dog. "you see serepta has been embittered by the trials that politics, corrupt legislation have brought right onto her. she didn't want nothin' to do with 'em, but they come onto her onexpected and onbeknown, and she feels that she must do everything she can to alter matters. she wants to help make the laws that have such a overpowerin' influence over her. she believes they can't be much worse than they are now, and may be a little better." "ah," interrupted the senator, "if serepta wishes to change political affairs, let her influence her children, her boys, and they will carry her benign and noble influence forward into the centuries." "but the law took her boy, her little boy and girl, away from her. through the influence of the whiskey ring, of which her husband wuz a shinin' member, he got possession of her boy. and so the law has made it perfectly impossible for her to mould it indirectly through him, what serepta duz she must do herself." "ah! my dear woman. a sad thing for serepta; i trust _you_ have no grievance of this kind, i trust that your estimable husband is, as it were, estimable." "yes, josiah allen is a good man, as good as men can be. you know men or wimmen can't be only jest about so good anyway. but he's my choice, and he don't drink a drop." "pardon me, madam, but if you are happy in your married relations, and your husband is a temperate good man, why do you feel so upon this subject?" "why, good land! if you understood the nature of a woman you would know my love for him, my happiness, the content and safety i feel about him and our boy, makes me realize the sufferin's of serepta in havin' her husband and boy lost to her; makes me realize the depth of a wife's and mother's agony when she sees the one she loves goin' down, down so low she can't reach him; makes me feel how she must yearn to help him in some safe sure way. "high trees cast long shadows. the happier and more blessed a woman's life is, the more duz she feel for them that are less blessed than she. highest love goes lowest, like that love that left heaven and descended to earth, and into it that he might lift up the lowly. the pityin' words of him who went about pleasin' not himself, hants me and inspires me; i'm sorry for serepta, sorry for the hull wimmen race of the nation, and for the men too. lots of 'em are good creeters, better than wimmen, some on 'em. they want to do right, but don't exactly see the way to do it. in the old slavery times some of the masters wuz more to be pitied than the slaves. they could see the injustice, feel the wrong they wuz doin', but old chains of custom bound 'em, social customs and idees had hardened into habits of thought. "they realized the size and heft of the evil, but didn't know how to grapple with it, and throw it. so now, many men see the evils of this time, want to help, but don't know the best way to lay holt of 'em. life is a curious conundrum anyway, and hard to guess. but we can try to git the right answer to it as fur as we can. serepta feels that one of the answers to the conundrum is in gittin' her rights. i myself have got all the rights i need or want, as fur as my own happiness is concerned. my home is my castle (a story and a half wooden one, but dear). my towers elevate me, the companionship of my friends give social happiness, our children are prosperous and happy. we have property enough for all the comforts of life. and above all other things my josiah is my love and my theme." "ah, yes!" sez he, "love is a woman's empire, and in that she should find her full content--her entire happiness and thought. a womanly woman will not look outside that lovely and safe and beautious empire." sez i firmly, "if she hain't a idiot she can't help it. love is the most beautiful thing on earth, the most holy and satisfyin'. but i do not ask you as a politician, but as a human bein', which would you like best, the love of a strong, earnest tender nature, for in man or woman 'the strongest are the tenderest, the loving are the daring,' which would you like best, the love and respect of such a nature full of wit, of tenderness, of infinite variety, or the love of a fool? "a fool's love is wearin', it is insipid at best, and it turns to vinegar. why, sweetened water must turn to vinegar, it is its nater. and if a woman is bright and true-hearted, she can't help seein' through an injustice. she may be happy in her own home. domestic affection, social enjoyments, the delights of a cultured home and society, and the companionship of the man she loves and who loves her, will, if she is a true woman, satisfy her own personal needs and desires, and she would far ruther for her own selfish happiness rest quietly in that love, that most blessed home. "but the bright quick intellect that delights you can't help seein' an injustice, can't help seein' through shams of all kinds, sham sentiment, sham compliments, sham justice. the tender lovin' nature that blesses your life can't help feelin' pity for them less blessed than herself. she looks down through the love-guarded lattice of her home from which your care would fain bar out all sights of woe and squaler, she looks down and sees the weary toilers below, the hopeless, the wretched. she sees the steep hills they have to climb, carryin' their crosses, she sees 'em go down into the mire, dragged there by the love that should lift 'em up. she would not be the woman you love if she could restrain her hand from liftin' up the fallen, wipin' tears from weepin' eyes, speakin' brave words for them that can't speak for themselves. the very strength of her affection that would hold you up if you were in trouble or disgrace yearns to help all sorrowin' hearts. "down in your heart you can't help admirin' her for this, we can't help respectin' the one that advocates the right, the true, even if they are our conquerors. wimmen hain't angels; now to be candid, you know they hain't. they hain't any better than men. men are considerable likely; and it seems curious to me that they should act so in this one thing. for men ort to be more honest and open than wimmen. they hain't had to cajole and wheedle and use little trickeries and deceits and indirect ways as wimmen have. why, cramp a tree limb and see if it will grow as straight and vigorous as it would in full freedom and sunshine. "men ort to be nobler than women, sincerer, braver. and they ort to be ashamed of this one trick of theirn, for they know they hain't honest in it, they hain't generous. give wimmen two or three generations of moral and legal freedom and see if men will laugh at 'em for their little deceits and affectations. no, men will be gentler, and wimmen nobler, and they will both come nearer bein' angels, though most probable they won't be any too good then, i hain't a mite afraid of it." vi "concerning moth-millers and minny fish" the senator kinder sithed, and that sithe sort o' brought me down onto my feet agin as it were, and a sense of my duty, and i spoke out agin: "can you and will you do serepta's errents?" he evaded a direct answer by sayin', "as you alluded to the little indirect ways of women, dearest madam, you will pardon me for saying that it is my belief that the soft gentle brains of females are unfitted for the deep hard problems men have to grapple with. they are too doll-like, too angelically and sweetly frivolous." "no doubt," sez i, "some wimmen are frivolous and some men foolish, for as mrs. poyser said, 'god made women to match the men,' but these few hadn't ort to disfranchise the hull race of men and wimmen. and as to soft brains, maria mitchell discovered planets hid from masculine eyes from the beginnin' of time, and do you think that wimmen can't see the black spots on the body politic, that darkens the life of her and her children? "madame curie discovered the light that looks through solid wood and iron, and you think wimmen can't see through unjust laws and practices, the rampant evils of to-day, and see what is on the other side, see a remedy for 'em. florence nightingale could mother and help cure an army, and why hain't men willin' to let wimmen help cure a sick legislation, kinder mother it, and encourage it to do better? she might much better be doin' that, than playin' bridge-whist, or rastlin' with hobble skirts, and it wouldn't devour any more time." he sot demute for a few minutes and then he sez, "while on the subject of women's achievements, dearest madam, allow me to ask you, if they have reached the importance you claim for them, why is it that so few women are made immortal by bein' represented in the hall of fame? and why are the four or five females represented there put away by themselves in a remote unadorned corner with no roof to protect them from the rough winds and storms that beat upon them?" sez i, "that's a good illustration of what i've been sayin'. it wuz owin' to a woman's gift that america has a hall of fame, and it would seem that common courtesy would give wimmen an equally desirable place amongst the immortals. do you spoze that if women formed half the committee of selection--which they should since it wuz a woman's gift that made such a place possible--do you spoze that if she had an equal voice with men, the names of noble wimmen would be tucked away in a remote unroofed corner? "edgar allan poe's genius wuz worthy a place among the immortals, no doubt; his poems and stories excite wonder and admiration. but do they move the soul like mrs. stowe's immortal story that thrilled the world and helped free a race?--yes, two races--for the curse of slavery held the white race in bondage, too. yet she and her three or four woman companions face the stormy winds in an out-of-the-way corner, while poe occupies his honorable sightly place among his fifty or more male companions. "wimmen have always been admonished to not strive for right and justice but to lean on men's generosity and chivalry. here wuz a place where that chivalry would have shone, but it didn't seem to materialize, and if wimmen had leaned on it, it would have proved a weak staff, indeed. "such things as this are constantly occurring and show plain that wimmen needs the ballot to protect her from all sorts of wrongs and indignities. men take wimmen's money, as they did here, and use it to uplift themselves, and lower her, like taxin' her heavily and often unjustly and usin' this money to help forward unjust laws which she abominates. and so it goes on, and will, until women are men's equals legally and politically." "ahem--you present things in a new light. i never looked at this matter with your eyes." "no, you looked at 'em through a man's eyes; such things are so customary that men do 'em without thinkin', from habit and custom, like hushin' up children's talk, when they interrupt grown-ups." agin he sot demute for a short space, and then said, "i feel that natural human instinct is aginst the change. in savage races that knew nothin' of civilization, male force and strength always ruled." "why," sez i, "history tells us of savage races where wimmen always rule, though i don't think they ort to--ability and goodness ort to rule." "nature is aginst it," sez he. but i sez firmly, "bees and lots of other insects and animals always have a female for queen and ruler. they rule blindly and entirely, right on through the centuries, but we are enlightened and should not encourage it. in my opinion the male bee has just as good a right to be monarch as his female pardner has, if he is as good and knows as much. i never believed in the female workin' ones killin' off the male drones to save winterin' 'em; they might give 'em some light chores to do round the hive to pay for their board. i love justice and that would be _my_ way." agin he sithed. "modern history don't seem to favor the scheme--" but his axent wuz as weak as a cat and his boughten smile seemed crackin' and wearin' out; he knowed better. sez i, "we won't argy long on that p'int, for i might overwhelm you if i approved of overwhelmin', but, will merely ask you to cast one eye on england. was the rain of victoria the good less peaceful and prosperous than that of the male rulers who preceded her? and you can then throw your other eye over to holland: is their sweet queen less worthy and beloved to-day than other european monarchs? and is her throne more shaky and tottlin' than theirn?" he didn't try to dispute me and bowed his head on his breast in a almost meachin' way. he knowed he wuz beat on every side, and almost to the end of his chain of rusty, broken old arguments. but anon he brightened up agin and sez, ketchin' holt of the last shackly link of his argument: "you seem to place a great deal of dependence on the bible. the bible is aginst the idee. the bible teaches man's supremacy, man's absolute power and might and authority." "why, how you talk," sez i. "in the very first chapter the bible tells how man wuz turned right round by a woman, tells how she not only turned man round to do as she wanted him to, but turned the hull world over. "that hain't nothin' i approve of; i don't speak of it because i like the idee. that wuzn't done in a open honorable manner as things should be done. no, eve ruled by indirect influence, the gently influencing men way, that politicians are so fond of. and she brought ruin and destruction onto the hull world by it. "a few years later when men and wimmen grew wiser, when we hear of wimmen rulin' israel openly and honestly, like miriam, deborah and other likely old four mothers, things went on better. they didn't act meachin' and tempt, and act indirect." he sithed powerful and sot round oneasy in his chair. and sez he, "i thought wimmen wuz taught by the bible to serve and love their homes." "so they be. and every true woman loves to serve. home is my supreme happiness and delight, and my best happiness is found in servin' them i love. but i must tell the truth, in the house or outdoors." sez he faintly, "the old testament may teach that women have some strength and power. but in the new testament in every great undertaken' and plan men have been chosen by god to carry them through." "why-ee!" sez i, "how you talk! have you ever read the bible?" he said evasively, his grandmother owned one, and he had seen it in early youth. and then he went on in a sort of apologizin' way. he had always meant to read it, but he had entered political life at an early age where the bible wuzn't popular, and he believed that he had never read further than the epistles of gulliver to the liliputians. sez i, "that hain't bible, there hain't no gulliver in it, and you mean galatians." well, he said, that might be it, it wuz some man he knew, and he had always heard and believed that man wuz the only worker that god had chosen. "why," sez i, "the one great theme of the new testament--the salvation of the world through the birth of christ--no man had anything to do with. our divine lord wuz born of god and woman. heavenly plan of redemption for fallen humanity. god himself called woman into that work, the divine work of saving a world, and why shouldn't she continue in it? god called her. mary had no dream of publicity, no desire of a world's work of suffering and renunciation. the soft air of galilee wropped her about in its sweet content, as she dreamed her quiet dreams in maiden peace--dreamed, perhaps, of domestic love and happiness. "from that sweetest silence, the restful peace of happy innocent girlhood, god called her to her divine work of helpin' redeem a world from sin. and did not this woman's love and willin' obedience, and sufferin' set her apart, baptize her for this work of liftin' up the fallen, helpin' the weak? [illustration: "he'd entered political life where the bible wuzn't popular; he'd never read further than gulliver's epistle to the liliputians."] "is it not a part of woman's life that she gave at the birth and crucifixion? her faith, her hope, her sufferin', her glow of divine pity and joyful martyrdom. these, mingled with the divine, the pure heavenly, have they not for nineteen hundred years been blessin' the world? the god in christ would awe us too much; we would shield our eyes from the too blindin' glory of the pure god-like. but the tender christ who wept over a sinful city, and the grave of his friend, who stopped dyin' on the cross to comfort his mother's heart, provide for her future--it is this womanly element in our lord's nature that makes us dare to approach him, dare to kneel at his feet? "and since woman wuz so blessed as to be counted worthy to be co-worker with god in the beginnin' of the world's redemption; since he called her from the quiet obscurity of womanly rest and peace into the blessed martyrdom of renunciation and toil and sufferin', all to help a world that cared nothin' for her, that cried out shame upon her. "he will help her carry on the work of helpin' a sinful world. he will protect her in it, she cannot be harmed or hindered, for the cause she loves of helpin' men and wimmen, is god's cause too, and god will take care of his own. herods full of greed and frightened selfishness may try to break her heart by efforts to kill the child she loves, but she will hold it so clost to her bosom he can't destroy it; and the light of the divine will go before her, showin' the way through the desert and wilderness mebby, but she shall bear it into safety." "you spoke of herod," sez he dreamily, "the name sounds familiar to me. was not mr. herod once in the united states senate?" "not that one," sez i. "he died some time ago, but i guess he has relatives there now, judgin' from laws made there. you ask who herod wuz, and as it all seems a new story to you, i will tell you. when the saviour of the world wuz born in bethlehem, and a woman wuz tryin' to save his life, a man by the name of herod wuz tryin' his best out of selfishness and greed to murder him." "ah! that was not right in herod." "no, it hain't been called so. and what wuzn't right in him hain't right in his relations who are tryin' to do the same thing to-day. sellin' for money the right to destroy the child the mother carries on her heart. surroundin' him with temptations so murderous, yet so enticin' to youthful spirits, that the mother feels that as the laws are now, the grave is the only place of safety that god himself can find for her boy. but because herod wuz so mean it hain't no sign that all men are mean. joseph wuz as likely as he could be." "joseph?" sez he pensively. "do you allude to our venerable speaker, joe cannon?" "no," sez i. "i'm talkin' bible--i'm talkin' about joseph; jest plain joseph." "ah! i see. i am not fully familiar with that work. being so engrossed in politics, and political literature, i don't git any time to devote to less important publications." sez i candidly, "i knew you hadn't read it the minute you mentioned the book of liliputians. but as i wuz sayin', joseph wuz a likely man. he had the strength to lead the way, overcome obstacles, keep dangers from mary, protect her tenderer form with the mantilly of his generous devotion. "_but she carried the child on her bosom_; ponderin' high things in her heart that joseph never dreamed of. that is what is wanted now, and in the future. the man and the woman walkin' side by side. he a little ahead, mebby, to keep off dangers by his greater strength and courage. she a-carryin' the infant christ of love, bearin' the baby peace in her bosom, carryin' it into safety from them that seek to destroy it. "and as i said before, if god called woman into this work, he will enable her to carry it through. he will protect her from her own weaknesses, and the misapprehensions and hard judgments and injustices of a gain-sayin' world. "yes, the star of hope is risin' in the sky brighter and brighter, and wise men are even now comin' to the mother of the new redeemer, led by the star." he sot demute. silence rained for some time; and finally i spoke out solemnly through the rain: "will you do serepta's errents? will you give her her rights? and will you break the whiskey ring?" he said he would love to do the errents, i had convinced him that it would be just and right to do 'em, but the constitution of the united states stood up firm aginst 'em. as the laws of the united states wuz, he could not make any move toward doin' either of the errents. sez i, "can't the laws be changed?" "be changed? change the laws of the united states? tamper with the glorious constitution that our fore-fathers left us--an immortal sacred legacy." he jumped up on his feet and his second-hand smile fell off. he kinder shook as if he wuz skairt most to death and tremblin' with horrow. he did it to skair me, i knew, but i knowed i meant well towards the constitution and our old forefathers; and my principles stiddied me and held me firm and serene. and when he asked me agin in tones full of awe and horrow: "can it be that i heard my ear aright? or did you speak of changin' the unalterable laws of the united states--tampering with the constitution?" "yes, that is what i said. hain't they never been changed?" he dropped that skairful look and put on a firm judicial one. he see that he could not skair me to death; an' sez he, "oh, yes, they've been changed in cases of necessity." sez i, "for instance durin' the oncivil war it wuz changed to make northern men cheap bloodhounds and hunters." "yes," he said, "it seemed to be a case of necessity and economy." "i know it," sez i; "men wuz cheaper than any other breed of bloodhounds the slave-holders could employ to hunt men and wimmen with, and more faithful." "yes," he said, "it wuz a case of clear economy." and sez i: "the laws have been changed to benefit liquor dealers." "well, yes," he said, "it had been changed to enable whiskey dealers to utilize the surplus liquor they import." sez he, gittin' kinder animated, for he wuz on a congenial and familar theme, "nobody, the best calculators in drunkards, can exactly calculate how much whiskey will be drunk in a year; and so, ruther than have the whiskey dealers suffer loss, the law had to be changed. and then," sez he, growin' still more candid in his excitement, "we are makin' a powerful effort to change the laws now so as to take the tax off of whiskey, so it can be sold cheaper, and obtained in greater quantities by the masses. any such great laws would justify a change in the constitution and the laws; but for any frivolous cause, any trivial cause, madam, we male custodians of the sacred constitution stand as walls of iron before it, guarding it from any shadow of change. faithful we will be, faithful unto death." sez i, "as it has been changed, it can be agin. and you jest said i had convinced you that serepta's errents wuz errents of truth and justice, and you would love to do 'em." "well, yes, yes--i would love to--as it were--. but, my dear madam, much as i would like to oblige you, i have not the time to devote to the cause of right and justice. i don't think you realize the constant pressure of hard work that is ageing us and wearing us out, before our day. "as i said, we have to watch the liquor interest constantly to see that the liquor dealers suffer no loss--we have to do that, of course." and he continued dreamily, as if losin' sight of me and talkin' to himself: "the wealthy corporations and trusts, we have to condemn them loudly to please the common people, and help 'em secretly to please ourselves, or our richest perkisits are lost. the canal ring, the indian agency, the land grabbers, the political bosses. in fact, we are surrounded by a host of bandits that we have to appease and profit by; oh, how these matters wear into the gray matter of our brains!" "gray matter!" sez i, with my nose uplifted to its extremest height, "i should call it black matter!" "well, the name is immaterial, but these labors, though pocket filling, are brain wearing. and of late i and the rest of our loyal henchmen have been worn out in our labors in tariff revision. you know how we claim to help the common people by the revision; you've probable read about it in the papers." "yes," sez i coldly, "i've hearn _talk_." "yes," sez he, "but if we do succeed, after the most strenious efforts in getting the duty off champagne, green turtle, olives, etc., and put on to sugar, tea, cotton cloth and such like, with all this brain fag and brain labor--" "and tongue labor!" sez i in a icy axent. "yes, after all this ceaseless toil the common people will not show any gratitude; we statesmen labor oft with aching hearts." and he leaned his forward on his hand and sithed. but my looks wuz like ice-suckles on the north side of a barn. and i stopped his complaints and his sithes by askin' in a voice that demanded a reply: "can you and will you do serepta's errents? errents full of truth and justice and eternal right?" he said he knew they wuz jest runnin' over with them qualities, but happy as it would make him to do 'em, he had to refuse owin' to the fur more important matters he had named, and the many, many other laws and preambles that he hadn't time to name over to me. "mebby you have heard," sez he, "that we are now engaged in making most important laws concerning moth-millers, and minny fish, and hog cholera. and take it with these important bills and the constant strain on our minds in tryin' to pass laws to increase our own salaries, you can see jest how cramped we are for time. and though we would love to pass some laws of truth and righteousness--we fairly ache to--yet not havin' the requisite time we are forced to lay 'em on the table or under it." "well," sez i, "i guess i may as well be a-goin'." and i bid him a cool goodbye and started for the door. but jest as my hand wuz on the nub he jumped up and opened the door, wearin' that boughten second-hand smile agin on his linement, and sez he: "dear madam, perhaps senator b. will do the errents for you." sez i, "where is senator b.?" and he said i would find him at his post of duty at the capitol. "well," i said, "i will hunt up the post," and did. a grand enough place for a emperor or a zar is the capitol of our great nation where i found him, a good natured lookin' boy in buttons showin' me the post. vii "no hamperin' hitchin' straps" well, senator b. wanted to do the errents but said it wuz not his place, and sent me to senator c., and he almost cried, he wanted to do 'em so bad, but stern duty tied him to his post, he said, and he sent me to senator d., and he _did_ cry onto his handkerchief, he wanted to do the errents so bad, and said it would be such a good thing to have 'em done. he bust right into tears as he said he had to refuse to do 'em. whether they wuz wet tears or dry ones i couldn't tell, his handkerchief wuz so big, but i hearn his sithes, and they wuz deep and powerful ones. but as i sez to him, "wet tears, nor dry ones, nor windy sithes didn't help do the errents." so i went on his sobbin' advice to senator e., and he wuz huffy and didn't want to do 'em and said so. and said his wife had thirteen children, and wimmen instead of votin' ort to go and do likewise. and i told him it wouldn't look well in onmarried wimmen and widders, and if they should foller her example folks would talk. and he said, "they ort to marry." and i said, "as the fashion is now, wimmen had to wait for some man to ask 'em, and if they didn't come up to the mark and ask 'em, who wuz to blame?" he wouldn't answer, and looked sulky, but honest, and wouldn't tell me who to go to to git the errents done. but jest outside his door i met the senator i had left sobbin' over the errents. he looked real hilarious, but drawed his face down when he ketched my eye, and sithed several times, and sent me to senator f. and he sent me to senator g. and suffice it to say i wuz sent round, and talked to, and cried at, and sulked to, and smiled at and scowled at, and encouraged and discouraged, 'till my head swum and my knees wobbled under me. and with all my efforts and outlay of oratory and shue leather not one of serepta pester's errents could i git done, and no hopes held out of their ever bein' done. and about the middle of the afternoon i gin up, there wuz no use in tryin' any longer and i turned my weary tracks towards the outside door. but as bad as i felt, i couldn't help my sperit bein' lifted up some by the grandeur about me. oh, my land! to stand in the immense hall and look up, and up, and see all the colors of the rain-bow and see what wonderful pictures there wuz up there in the sky above me as it were. why, it seemed curiouser than any northern lights i ever see in my life, and they stream up dretful curious sometimes. and as i walked through that lofty and most beautiful place and realized the size and majestic proportions of the buildin' i wondered to myself that a small law, a little unjust law could ever be passed in such grand and magnificent surroundin's. and i sez to myself, it can't be the fault of the place anyway; the law-makers have a chance for their souls to soar if they want to, here is room and to spare to pass laws big as elephants and camels, and i wondered that they should ever try to pass laws as small as muskeeters and nats. thinkses i, i wonder them little laws don't git to strollin' round and git lost in them magnificent corridors. but i consoled myself, thinkin' it wouldn't be no great loss if they did. but right here, as i wuz thinkin' on these deep and lofty subjects, i met the good natured young chap that had showed me round and he sez: "you look fatigued, mom." (soarin' even to yourself is tuckerin'.) "you look very fatigued; won't you take something?" i looked at him with a curious silent sort of a look; for i didn't know what he meant. agin he looked clost at me and sort o' pityin'; and sez he, "you look tired out, mom. won't you take something? let me treat you to something; what will you take, mom?" i thought he wuz actin' dretful liberal, but i knew they had strange ways in washington anyway. and i didn't know but it wuz their way to make some present to every woman that comes there, and i didn't want to act awkward and out of style, so i sez: "i don't want to take anything, and don't see any reason why you should insist on't. but if i have got to take sunthin' i had jest as soon have a few yards of factory cloth as anything. that always comes handy." i thought that if he wuz determined to treat me to show his good feelin's towards me, i would git sunthin' useful and that would do me some good, else what wuz the good of bein' treated? and i thought that if i had got to take a present from a strange man, i would make a shirt for josiah out of it. i thought that would save jealousy and make it right so fur as goodness went. "but," sez he, "i mean beer or wine or liquor of some kind." i riz right up in my shues and dignity, and glared at him. sez he, "there is a saloon right here handy in the buildin'." sez i in awful axents, "it is very appropriate to have it here handy!" sez i, "liquor duz more towards makin' the laws of the united states from caucus to convention than anything else duz, and it is highly proper to have it here so they can soak the laws in it right off before they lay 'em onto the table or under 'em, or pass 'em onto the people. it is highly appropriate," sez i. "yes," sez he. "it is very handy for the senators and congressmen, and let me get you a glass." "no, you won't!" sez i firmly. "the nation suffers enough from that room now without havin' josiah allen's wife let in." sez he, "if you have any feeling of delicacy in goin' in there, let me make some wine here. i will get a glass of water and make you some pure grape wine, or french brandy, or corn or rye whiskey. i have all the drugs right here." and he took a little box out of his pocket. "my father is a importer of rare old wines, and i know just how it is done. i have 'em all here, capsicum, coculus indicus, alum, copperas, strychnine; i will make some of the choicest, oldest, and purest imported liquors we have in the country, in five minutes if you say so." "no!" sez i firmly, "when i want to foller cleopatra's fashion and commit suicide, i will hire a rattlesnake and take my pizen as she did, on the outside." well, i got back to hiram cagwin's tired as a dog, and serepta's errents ondone. but my conscience opholded me and told me i had done my very best, and man or woman can do no more. well, the next day but one wuz the big outdoor suffrage meetin'. and we sot off in good season, hiram feelin' well enough to be left with the hired help. polly started before we did with some of her college mates, lookin' pretty as a pink with a red rose pinned over a achin' heart, so i spoze, for she loved the young man who wuz out with another girl may-flowering. burnin' zeal and lofty principle can't take the place in a woman's heart of love and domestic happiness, and men needn't be afraid it will. there is no more danger on't than there is of a settin' hen wantin' to leave her nest to be a commercial traveler. nature has made laws for wimmen and hens that no ballot, male or female, can upset. josiah and lorinda and i went in the trolley in good season, so's to git a sightly place, lorinda protestin' all the time aginst the indelicacy and impropriety of wimmen's appearin' in outdoor meetin's, forgittin', i spose, the dense procession of wimmen that fills the avenues every day, follerin' fashion and display. as nigh as i could make out the impropriety consisted in wimmen's follerin' after justice and right. josiah's face looked dubersome. i guess he wuz worryin' over his offer to represent me, and thinkin' of aunt susan and the twins. but as it turned out i met diantha while josiah wuz in a shop buyin' some peppermint lozengers, and she said her niece had come from the west, and they got along all right. so that lifted my burden. but i thought best not to tell josiah, as he wuz so bound to represent me. i thought it wouldn't do any hurt to let him think it over about the job a man took on himself when he sot out to represent a woman. they wouldn't like it in lots of ways, as willin' as they seem to be in print. wimmen go through lots of things calm and patient that would make a man flinch and shy off like a balky horse, and visey versey. i wouldn't want to represent josiah lots of times, breakin' colts, ploughin' greensward, cuttin' cord-wood etc., etc. men and wimmen want equal legal rights to represent themselves and their own sex which are different, and always must be, and both sexes don't want to be hampered and sot down on by the other one. that is gauldin' to human nater, male or female. we got a good place nigh the speakers' stand, and we hadn't stood there long before the parade hove in sight, the yeller banners streamin' out like sunshine on a rainy day, police outriders, music, etc. more than a hundred automobiles led the parade and five times as many wimmen walkin' afoot. a big grand-stand with the lady speakers and their friends on it, all dressed pretty as pinks. for the old idee that suffragists don't care for attractive dress and domestic life wuz exploded long ago, and many other old superstitions went up in the blaze. those of us who have gray hair can remember when if a man spoke favorably of women's rights the sarcastic question was asked him: "how old is susan b. anthony?" and this fine wit and cuttin' ridicule would silence argument and quench the spirit of the upholder. but the world moves. susan's memory is beloved and revered, and the contemptious ridicule of the onthinkin' and ignorant only nourished the laurels the world lays on her tomb. at that time accordin' to popular opinion a suffragist wuz a slatternly woman with uncombed locks, dangling shoe strings, and bloomers, stridin' through an unswept house onmindful of dirty children or hungry husband, but the world moves onward and public opinion with it. suffragists are the best mothers, the best housekeepers, the best dressers of any wimmen in the land. search the records and you'll find it so, and why? because they know sunthin', it takes common sense to make a gooseberry pie as it ort to be. and the more a woman knows and the more justice she demands, the better for her husband. the same sperit that rebels at tyranny and injustice rebels at dirt, disorder, discomfort, and all unpleasant conditions. i looked ahead with my mind's eye and see them pretty college girls settled down in pleasant homes of their own, where sanitary laws prevailed, where the babies wuzn't fed pickles and cabbage, and kep' in air-tight enclosures. where the husbands did not have to go outside their own homes to find cheer and comfort, and intelligent conversation, and where love and common sense walked hand in hand toward happiness and contentment, justice, with her blinders offen her eyes, goin' ahead on 'em. i never liked the idee of justice wearin' them bandages over her eyes. she ort to have both eyes open; if anybody ever needed good eyesight she duz, to choose the straight and narrer road, lookin' backward to see the mistakes she has made in the past, so's to shun 'em in the future, and lookin' all round her in the present to see where she can help matters, and lookin' fur off in the future to the bright dawn of a tomorrow. to the shinin' mount of equal rights and full liberty. where she sees men and wimmen standin' side by side with no halters or hamperin' hitchin' straps on either on 'em. he more gentle and considerate, and she less cowardly and emotional. good land! what could justice do blind in one eye and wimmen on the blind side? but good sensible wimmen are reachin' up and pullin' the bandages offen her eyes. she's in a fair way to git her eyesight. but i'm eppisodin', and to resoom forward. viii "old mom nater listenin'" there wuz some pleasant talkin' and jokin' between bystanders and suffragettes, and then some good natured but keen and sensible speeches. and one pretty speaker told about the doin's at albany and washington. how women's respectful pleas for justice are treated there. how the law-makers, born and nussed by wimmen and dependent on 'em for comfort and happiness, use the wimmen's tax money to help make laws makin' her of no legal importance only as helpless figgers to hang taxation and punishment on. old mom nater had been listenin' clost, her sky-blue eyes shinin' with joy to see her own sect present such a noble appearance in the parade. but when these insults and indignities wuz brung up to her mind agin and she realized afresh how wimmen couldn't git no more rights accorded to her than a dog or a hen, and worse. for a hen or a dog wouldn't be taxed to raise money for turkle soup and shampain to nourish the law-makers whilst they made the laws agin 'em--mom nater's eyes clouded over with indignation and resentment, and she boo-hooed right out a-cryin'. helpless tears, of no more account than other females have shed, and will, as they set on their hard benches with idiots, lunaticks, and criminals. of course she wiped up her tears pretty soon, not willin' to lose any of the wimmen's bright speeches. but when her tear-drops fell fast, josiah sez to me, "you'll see them wimmen run like hikers now, wimmen always thought more of shiffon and fol-de-rols than they did of principle." but i sez, "wait and see," (we wuz under a awnin' and protected). but the young and pretty speaker who wore a light silk dress and exquisite bunnet, kep' right on talkin' jest as calmly as if she didn't know her pretty dress wuz bein' spilte and her bunnet gittin' wet as sop, and i sez to josiah: "when wimmen are so in earnest, and want anything so much they can stand soakin' in their best dresses, and let their sunday bunnets be spilte on their heads, not noticin' 'em seemin'ly, but keep right on pleadin' for right and justice, they are in a fair way of gittin' what they are after." he looked kinder meachin' but didn't dispute me. the speeches wuz beautiful and convincin', and pretty soon old mom nater stopped cryin' to hear 'em, and she and i both listened full of joy and happiness to see with what eloquence and justice our sect wuz pleadin' our cause. their arguments wuz so reasonable and convincin' that i said to myself, i don't see how anybody can help bein' converted to this righteous cause, the liftin' up of wimmen from her uncomfortable crouchin' poster with criminals and idiots, up to the place she should occupy by the side of other good citizens of the united states, with all the legal and moral rights that go with that noble title. and right whilst i wuz thinkin' this, sunthin' wuz happenin' that proved i wuz right in my eppisodin', and somebody awful sot agin it wuz bein' converted then and there (but of this more anon and bom-bye). we stayed till we heard the last word of the last speech, i happy and proud in sperit, lorinda partly converted, she couldn't help it, though she wouldn't own up to it at that juncter. and josiah lookin' real deprested, the thought of representin' me wuz worryin' him i knew, for i hearn him say (soty vosy), "represent wimmen or not, i hain't goin' to set up all night with no old woman, and lift her round, nor dry nuss no twins." and thinkin' his sperit wuz pierced to a sufficient depth by his apprehension, so reason could be planted and take root, and he wouldn't be so anxious in the future to represent a woman, i told him what diantha said and we all went home in good sperits. the sun shone clear, the rain had washed the face of the earth till it shone, and everything looked gay and joyous. when we got to lorinda's we see a auto standin' in front of the door full of flowery branches in front and the pink posies lookin' no more bright and rosy than the faces of the two young folks settin' there. it wuz polly and royal. it seemed that when he and maud got back from the country (and they didn't stay long, royal wuz so restless and oneasy) maud insisted on his takin' her to the suffrage meetin' jest to make fun on't, so i spoze. she thought she had rubbed out polly's image and made a impression herself on royal's heart that only needed stompin' in a little deeper, and she thought ridicule would be the stomper she needed. but when they got to the meetin' and he see polly settin' like a lily amongst flowers, and read in her lovely face the earnest desire to lift the burden from the heavy laden, comfort the sorrowful, right the wrong, and do what she could in her day and generation-- i spoze his eyes could only see her sweet face. but he couldn't help his ears from hearin' the reasonable, eloquent words of earnest and womanly wimmen, so full of good sense and truth and justice that no reasonable person could dispute 'em, and when he contrasted all this with the sneerin' face, the sarcastic egotistic prattle of maud, the veil dropped from his eyes, and he see with the new vision. you know how it wuz with saul the scoffer who went breathin' out vengeance, and eternal right stopped him on his way with its great light. well, i spoze it wuz a bright ray from that same light that shone down into royal's heart and made him see. he wuz always good hearted and generous--men have always been better than the laws they have made. he left maud at her home not fur away and hastened back, way-laid polly, and bore her home in triumph and a thirty-horse-power car. it don't make much difference i spoze how or where anybody is converted. the bible speaks of some bein' ketched out of the fire, and i spoze it is about the same if they are ketched out of the rain. 'tennyrate the same rain that washed some of the color off maud's cheeks, seemed to wash away the blindin' mist of prejudice and antagonism from royal's mental vision, leavin' his sperit ready for the great white light of truth and justice to strike in. and that very day and hour he come round to polly's way of thinkin', and bein' smart as a whip and so rich, i suppose he will be a great accusation to the cause. well, the next day but one the allens met in a pleasant grove on the river shore and we had a good growin' time. royal bein' as you may say one of the family, took us all to the grove in his big tourin' car, and the fourth trip he took polly alone, and wuzn't it queer that, though the load wuz fur lighter, it took him three times as long as the other three trips together? why, they never got there till dinner wuz on the table, and then they didn't seem to care a mite about the extra good food. but i made allowances, for as i looked into their glowin' faces i knowed they wuz partakin' of fruit from the full branches of first love, true love. rich fruit that gives the divinest satisfaction of any this old earth affords. food that never changes through the centuries, though fashion often changes, and riotous plenty or food famine may exalt or depress the sperit of the householder. nothin' but time has any power over this divine fruitage. he gradually, as the light of the honeymoon wanes, whets his old scythe and mows down some of the luxuriant branches, either cuttin' a full swath, or one at a time, and the blessed consumers have to come down to the ordinary food of mortals. but this wuz still fur away from them. and i knowed too that the ordinary food of ordinary mortals partook of under the full harvest moon of domestic comfort and contentment wuz not to be despised, though fur different. and the light fur different from the glow and the glamour that wropped them two together and all the rest of the world away from 'em. but i'm eppisodin' too much, and to resoom forward. as i said, we had a happy growin' time at the reunion, josiah bein' in fine feather to see the relation on his side presentin' such a noble appearance. and like a good wife i sympathized with him in his pride and happiness, though i told him they didn't present any better appearance than the same number of smiths would. and their cookin', though excellent, wuz no better than the smiths could cook if they sot out to. he bein' so good natered didn't dispute me outright, but said he thought the allens made better nut-cakes than the smiths. but they don't, no such thing. in fact i think the smith nut-cakes are lighter and have a more artistic twist to 'em and don't devour so much fat a-fryin'. but i'd hate to set josiah down to any better vittles. i d'no as i would dast let him loose at the table at a smith reunion, for he eat fur too much as it wuz. i had to give him five pepsin lozengers and some pepper tea. and then i looked out all night for night mairs to ride on his chist. but he come through it alive though with considerable pain. we stayed two or three days longer with lorinda, and then she and hiram went part way with us as we visited our way home. we've got relations livin' all along the river that we owed visits to. and we went to see a number of 'em and enjoyed our four selves first rate. these things all took place more than a year ago and another man sets in the high chair, before which i laid serepta's errents, a man not so hefty mebby weighed by common steelyards, but one of noble weight judged by mental and moral scales. i d'no whether i'd had any better luck if i'd presented serepta's errents to him. sometimes when i look in the kind eyes of his picter, and read his noble and eloquent words that i believe come from his very soul, i think mebby i'd been more lucky if he'd sot in the chair that day. but then i d'no, there are so many influences and hendrances planted like thorns in the cushion of that chair that a man, no matter how earnest he strives to do jest right, can't help bein' pricked by 'em and held back. and i know he could never done them errents in the time she sot, but i'm in hopes he'll throw his powerful influence jest as fur as he can on the side of right, and justice to all the citizens of the u.s., wimmen as well as men. 'tennyrate, he has showed more heroism now than many soldiers who risk life on the battle field. for the worst foe to fight and conquer is ridicule; and he and others in high places have attackted fashion so entrenched in the solid armour of habit that most public men wouldn't have dasted to take arms agin it. and the long waves of time must swash up agin the shores of eternity, before the good it has done can be estimated. how fur the influence has extended. how many weak wills been strengthened. how many broken hearts healed. how many young lives inspired to nobler and saner living. but to resoom forward, i can't nor won't carry them errents of serepta's there again. it is too wearin' for one of my age and my rheumatiz. what a tedious time i did put in there. it wuz a day long to be remembered by me. ix the women's parade josiah come home from jonesville one day, all wrought up. he'd took off a big crate of eggs and got returns from several crates he'd sent to new york, an' he sez to me: "that consarned middleman is cheatin' me the worst kind. i know the yaller plymouth rock eggs ort to bring mor'n the white leghorns; they're bigger and it stands to reason they're worth more, and he don't give nigh so much. i believe he eats 'em himself and that's why he wants to git 'em cheaper." "no middleman," sez i, "could eat fifty dozen a week." "he could if he eat enough at one time. 'tennyrate, i'm goin' to new york to see about it." "when are you goin'?" sez i. "i'm goin' to-morrow mornin'. i'm goin' in onexpected and i lay out to catch him devourin' them big eggs himself." "oh, shaw!" sez i. "the idee!" "well, i say the trusts and middlemen are dishonest as the old harry. don't you remember what one on 'em writ to uncle sime bentley and what he writ back? he'd sent a great load of potatoes to him and he didn't get hardly anything for 'em, only their big bill for sellin' 'em. they charged him for freightage, carage, storage, porterage, weightage, and to make their bill longer, they put in _ratage_ and _satage_. "uncle sime writ back 'you infarnel thief, you, put in "stealage" and keep the whole on't.'" but i sez, "they're not all dishonest. there are good men among 'em as well as bad." "well, i lay out to see to it myself, and if they ever charge me for 'ratage' and 'satage' i'm goin' to see what they are, and how they look." "well," sez i, "if you're bound to go, i'll get up and get a good breakfast and go with you." it was the day of the woman's suffrage parade and i wanted to see it. i wanted to like a dog, and had ever since i hearn of it. though some of the jonesvillians felt different. the creation searchin' society wuz dretful exercised about it. the president's stepma is a strong she aunty and has always ruled philander with an iron hand. i've always noticed that women who didn't want any rights always took the right to have their own way. but 'tennyrate philander come up a very strong he aunty. and he felt that the creation searchers ort to go to new york that day to assist the aunties in sneerin' at the marchers, writin' up the parade, and helpin' count 'em. philander wuz always good at figures, specially at subtraction, and he and his step ma thought he ort to be there to help. i told josiah i guessed the she aunties didn't need no help at that. but philander called a meetin' of the creation searchers to make arrangements to go. and i spoze the speech he made at the meetin' wuz a powerful effort. and the members most all on 'em believin' as he did--they said it wuz a dretful interestin' meetin'. sunthin' like a love feast, only more wrought up and excitin'. the editor of the _auger_ printed the whole thing in his paper, and said it give a staggerin' blow agin woman's suffrage, and he didn't know but it wuz a death blow--he hoped it wuz. "a woman's parade," sez philander, "is the most abominable sight ever seen on our planetary system. onprotected woman dressed up in fine clothes standin' up on her feet, and paradin' herself before strange men. oh! how bold! oh! how onwomanly! no wonder," says he, "the she aunties are shocked at the sight, and say they marched to attract the attention of men. why can't women stay to home and set down and knit? and then men would love 'em. but if they keep on with these bold, forward actions, men won't love 'em, and they will find out so. and it has always been, and is now, man's greatest desire and chiefest aim he has aimed at, to protect women, to throw the shinin' mantilly of his constant devotion about her delikit form and shield her and guard her like the very apples in his eyes. "woman is too sweet and tender a flower to have any such hardship put upon her, and it almost crazes a man, and makes him temporarily out of his head, to see women do anything to hazard that inheriant delicacy of hern, that always appealed so to the male man. "let us go forth, clad in our principles (and ordinary clothing, of course), and show just where we stand on the woman question, and do all we can to assist the gentle feminine she aunties. lovely, retirin' females whose pictures we so often see gracin' the sensational newspapers. their white womanly neck and shoulders, glitterin' with jewels, no brighter than their eyes. they don't appear there for sex appeal, or to win admiration. no indeed! no doubt they shrink from the publicity. and also shrink from making speeches in the senate chambers or the halls of justice, but will do so, angelic martyrs that they are, to hold their erring suffrage sisters back from their brazen efforts at publicity and public speakin'." they said his speech wuz cheered wildly, give out for publication, and entered into the moments of the society. but after all, it happened real curious the day of the parade every leadin' creation searcher had some impediment in his way, and couldn't go, and of course, the society didn't want to go without its leaders. mis' philander daggett, the president's wife, wuz paperin' her settin' room and parlor overhead. she wuz expectin' company and couldn't put it off. and bein' jest married, and thinkin' the world of her, philander said he dassent leave home for fear she'd fall offen the barrel and break her neck. she had a board laid acrost two barrels to stand up on. and every day philander would leave his outside work and come into the house, and set round and watch her--he thought so much of her. i suppose he wanted to catch her if she fell. but i didn't think she would fall. she is young and tuff, and she papered it real good, though it wuz dretful hard on her arm sockets and back. and the secretary's wife wuz puttin' in a piece of onions. she thought she would make considerable by it, and she will, if onions keep up. but it is turrible hard on a woman's back to weed 'em. but she is ambitious; she raised a flock of fifty-six turkeys last year besides doin' her house work, and makin' seventy-five yards of rag carpet. and she thought onions wouldn't be so wearin' on her as turkeys, for onions, she said, will stay where they are put, but turkeys are born wanderers and hikers. and they led her through sun and rain, swamp and swale, uphill and downhill, a-chasin' 'em up, but she made well by 'em. well, in puttin' in her onion seed, she overworked herself and got a crick in her back, so she couldn't stir hand nor foot for two days. and bein' only just them two, her husband had to stay home to see to things. and the treasurer's wife is canvassin' for the life of william j. bryan. and wantin' to make all she could, she took a longer tramp than common, and didn't hear of the parade or meetin' of the c.s.s. at all. she writ home a day or two before the meetin', that she wuz goin' as long as her legs held out, and they needn't write to her, for she didn't know where she would be. well, of course, the creation searchers didn't want to go without their officers. they said they couldn't make no show if they did. so they give up goin'. but i spoze they made fun of the woman's parade amongst theirselves, and mourned over their indelikit onwomanly actions, and worried about it bein' too hard for 'em, and sneered at 'em considerable. well, josiah always loves to have me with him, an' though he'd made light of the parade, he didn't object to my goin'. and suffice it to say that we arrove at that middleman's safe and sound, though why we didn't git lost in that grand immense depo and wander 'round there all day like babes in the woods, is more'n i can tell. the middleman wuzn't dishonest: he convinced josiah on it. he had shipped the colored eggs somewhere, and of course he couldn't pay as much, and he never had hearn of _ratage_ or _satage_. he wuz a real pleasant middleman, and hearing me say how much i wanted to see the woman's parade, he invited us to go upstairs and set by a winder, where there was a good view on't. we'd eat our lunch on the train and we accepted his invitation, and sot down by a winder then and there, though it wuz a hour or so before the time sot for the parade. and i should have taken solid comfort watchin' the endless procession of men and women and vehicles of all sorts and descriptions, but josiah made so many slightin' remarks on the dress of the females passin' below on the sidewalk, that it made me feel bad. and to tell the truth, though i didn't think best to own up to it to him, i _did_ blush for my sect to see the way some on 'em rigged themselves out. "see that thing!" josiah sez, as a woman passed by with her hat drawed down over one eye, and a long quill standin' out straight behind more'n a foot, an' her dress puckered in so 'round the bottom, she couldn't have took a long step if a mad dog wuz chasin' her--to say nothin' of bein' perched up on such high heels, that she fairly tottled when she walked. sez josiah: "does that _thing_ know enough to vote?" "no," sez i, reasonably, "she don't. but most probable if she had bigger things to think about she'd loosen the puckerin' strings 'round her ankles, push her hat back out of her eyes, an' get down on her feet again." "why, samantha," says he, "if you had on one of them skirts tied 'round your ankles, if i wuz a-dyin' on the upper shelf in the buttery, you couldn't step up on a chair to get to me to save your life, an' i'd have to die there alone." "why should you be dyin' on the buttery shelf, josiah?" sez i. "oh, that wuz jest a figger of speech, samantha." "but folks ort to be mejum in figgers of speech, josiah, and not go too fur." "do you think, samantha, that anybody can go too fur in describin' them fool skirts, and them slit skirts, and the immodesty and indecensy of some of them dresses?" [illustration: "sez josiah, 'does that thing know enough to vote?'"] "i don't know as they can," sez i, sadly. "jest look at that thing," sez he again. and as i looked, the hot blush of shame mantillied my cheeks, for i felt that my sect was disgraced by the sight. she wuz real pretty, but she didn't have much of any clothes on, and what she did wear wuzn't in the right place; not at all. sez josiah, "that girl would look much more modest and decent if she wuz naked, for then she might be took for a statute." and i sez, "i don't blame the good priest for sendin' them away from the lord's table, sayin', 'i will give no communion to a jezabel.' and the pity of it is," sez i, "lots of them girls are innocent and don't realize what construction will be put on the dress they blindly copy from some furrin fashion plate." then quite an old woman passed by, also robed or disrobed in the prevailin' fashion, and josiah sez, soty vosy, "i should think she wuz old enough to know sunthin'. who wants to see her old bones?" and he sez to me, real uppish, "do you think them things know enough to vote?" but jest then a young man went by dressed fashionably, but if he hadn't had the arm of a companion, he couldn't have walked a step; his face wuz red and swollen, and dissipated, and what expression wuz left in his face wuz a fool expression, and both had cigarettes in their mouths, and i sez, "does _that_ thing know enough to vote?" and jest behind them come a lot of furrin laborers, rough and rowdy-lookin', with no more expression in their faces than a mule or any other animal. "do _they_ know enough to vote?" sez i. "as for the fitness for votin' it is pretty even on both sides. good intelligent men ortn't to lose the right of suffrage for the vice and ignorance of some of their sect, and that argument is jest as strong for the other sect." but before josiah could reply, we hearn the sound of gay music, and the parade began to march on before us. first a beautiful stately figure seated fearlessly on a dancin' horse, that tossted his head as if proud of the burden he wuz carryin'. she managed the prancin' steed with one hand, and with the other held aloft the flag of our country. jest as women ort to, and have to. they have got to manage wayward pardners, children and domestics who, no matter how good they are, will take their bits in their mouths, and go sideways some of the time, but can be managed by a sensible, affectionate hand, and with her other hand at the same time she can carry her principles aloft, wavin' in every domestic breeze, frigid or torrid, plain to be seen by everybody. then come the wives and relations of senators and congressmen, showin' that bein' right on the spot they knowed what wimmen needed. then the wimmen voters from free suffrage states, showin' by their noble looks that votin' hadn't hurt 'em any. they carried the most gorgeous banner in the whole parade. then the wimmen's political union, showin' plain in their faces that understandin' the laws that govern her ain't goin' to keep woman from looking beautiful and attractive. on and on they come, gray-headed women and curly-headed children from every station in life: the millionairess by the working woman, and the fashionable society woman by the business one. two women on horseback, and one blowin' a bugle, led the way for the carriage of madam antoinette blackwell. i wonder if she ever dreamed when she wuz tryin' to climb the hill of knowledge through the thorny path of sex persecution, that she would ever have a bugle blowed in front of her, to honor her for her efforts, and form a part of such a glorious parade of the sect she give her youth and strength to free. how they swept on, borne by the waves of music, heralded by wavin' banners of purple and white and gold, bearin' upliftin' and noble mottoes. physicians, lawyers, nurses, authors, journalists, artists, social workers, dressmakers, milliners, women from furrin countries dressed in their quaint costumes, laundresses, clerks, shop girls, college girls, all bearin' the pennants and banners of their different colleges: vassar, wellesley, smith, etc., etc. high-school pupils, woman's suffrage league, woman's social league, and all along the brilliant line each division dressed in beautiful costumes and carryin' their own gorgeous banners. and anon or oftener all along the long, long procession bands of music pealin' out high and sweet, as if the spirit of music, who is always depictered as a woman, was glad and proud to do honor to her own sect. and all through the parade you could see every little while men on foot and on horseback, not a great many, but jest enough to show that the really noble men wuz on their side. for, as i've said more formally, that is one of the most convincin' arguments for woman's suffrage. in fact, it don't need any other. that bad men fight against women's suffrage with all their might. down by the big marble library, the grand-stand wuz filled with men seated to see their wives march by on their road to victory. i hearn and believe, they wuz a noble-lookin' set of men. they had seen their wives in the past chasin' fashion and amusement, and why shouldn't they enjoy seein' them follow principle and justice? well, i might talk all day and not begin to tell of the beauty and splendor of the woman's parade. and the most impressive sight to me wuz to see how the leaven of individual right and justice had entered into all these different classes of society, and how their enthusiasm and earnestness must affect every beholder. and in my mind i drawed pictures of the different modes of our american women and our english sisters, each workin' for the same cause, but in what a different manner. of course, our english sisters may have more reason for their militant doin's; more unjust laws regarding marriage--divorce, and care of children, and i can't blame them married females for wantin' to control their own money, specially if they earnt it by scrubbin' floors and washin'. i can't blame 'em for not wantin' their husbands to take that money from them and their children, specially if they're loafers and drunkards. and, of course, there are no men so noble and generous as our american men. but jest lookin' at the matter from the outside and comparin' the two, i wuz proud indeed of our suffragists. while our english sisters feel it their duty to rip and tear, burn and pillage, to draw attention to their cause, and reach the gole (which i believe they have sot back for years) through the smoke and fire of carnage, our american suffragettes employ the gentle, convincin' arts of beauty and reason. some as the quiet golden sunshine draws out the flowers and fruit from the cold bosom of the earth. mindin' their own business, antagonizin' and troublin' no one, they march along and show to every beholder jest how earnest they be. they quietly and efficiently answer that argument of the she auntys, that women don't want to vote, by a parade two hours in length, of twenty thousand. they answer the argument that the ballot would render women careless in dress and reckless, by organizin' and carryin' on a parade so beautiful, so harmonious in color and design that it drew out enthusiastic praise from even the enemies of suffrage. they quietly and without argument answered the old story that women was onbusiness-like and never on time, by startin' the parade the very minute it was announced, which you can't always say of men's parades. it wuz a burnin' hot day, and many who'd always argued that women hadn't strength enough to lift a paper ballot, had prophesied that woman wuz too delicately organized, too "fraguile," as betsy bobbet would say, to endure the strain of the long march in the torrid atmosphere. but i told josiah that women had walked daily over the burning plow shares of duty and domestic tribulation, till their feet had got calloused, and could stand more'n you'd think for. and he said he didn't know as females had any more burnin' plow shares to tread on than men had. and i sez, "i didn't say they had, josiah. i never wanted women to get more praise or justice than men. i simply want 'em to get as much--just an even amount; for," sez i, solemnly, "'male and female created he them.'" josiah is a deacon, and when i quote scripture, he has to listen respectful, and i went on: "i guess it wuz a surprise even to the marchers that of all the ambulances that kept alongside the parade to pick up faint and swoonin' females, the only one occupied wuz by a man." josiah denied it, but i sez, "i see his boots stickin' out of the ambulance myself." josiah couldn't dispute that, for he knows i am truthful. but he sez, sunthin' in the sperit of two little children i hearn disputin'. sez one: "it wuzn't so; you've told a lie." "well," sez the other, "you broke a piece of china and laid it to me." sez josiah, "you may have seen a pair of men's boots a-stickin' out of the ambulance, but i'll bet they didn't have heels on 'em a inch broad, and five or six inches high." "no, josiah," sez i, "you're right. men think too much of their comfort and health to hist themselves up on such little high tottlin' things, and you didn't see many on 'em in the parade." but he went on drivin' the arrow of higher criticism still deeper into my onwillin' breast. "i'll bet you didn't see his legs tied together at the ankles, or his trouses slit up the sides to show gauze stockin's and anklets and diamond buckles. and you didn't see my sect who honored the parade by marchin' in it, have a goose quill half a yard long, standin' up straight in the air from a coal-scuttle hat, or out sideways, a hejus sight, and threatenin' the eyes of friend and foe." "and you didn't see many on 'em in the parade," sez i agin. "women, as they march along to victory, have got to drop some of these senseless things. in fact, they are droppin' em. you don't see waists now the size of a hour glass. it is gettin' fashionable to breathe now, and women on their way to their gole will drop by the way their high heels; it will git fashionable to walk comfortable, and as they've got to take some pretty long steps to reach the ballot in , it stands to reason they've got to have a skirt wide enough at the bottom to step up on the gole of victory. it is a high step, josiah, but women are goin' to take it. they've always tended to cleanin' their own house, and makin' it comfortable and hygenic for its members, big and little. and when they turn their minds onto the best way to clean the national house both sects have to live in to make it clean and comfortable and safe for the weak and helpless as well as for the strong--it stands to reason they won't have time or inclination to stand up on stilts with tied-in ankles, quilled out like savages." "well," said josiah, with a dark, forebodin' look on his linement, "_we shall see_." "yes," sez i, with a real radiant look into the future. "_we shall see_, josiah." but he didn't have no idea of the beautiful prophetic vision i beheld with the eyes of my sperit. good men and good women, each fillin' their different spears in life, but banded together for the overthrow of evil, the uplift of the race. x "the creation searchin' society" it was only a few days after we got home from new york that josiah come into the house dretful excited. he'd had a invitation to attend a meetin' of the creation searchin' society. "why," sez i, "did they invite you? you are not a member?" "no," sez he, "but they want me to help 'em be indignant. it is a indignation meetin'." "indignant about what?" i sez. "fur be it from me, samantha, to muddle up your head and hurt your feelin's by tellin' you what it's fur." and he went out quick and shet the door. but i got a splendid dinner and afterwards he told me of his own accord. i am not a member, of course, for the president, philander daggett, said it would lower the prestige of the society in the eyes of the world to have even one female member. this meetin' wuz called last week for the purpose of bein' indignant over the militant doin's of the english suffragettes. josiah and several others in jonesville wuz invited to be present at this meetin' as sort of honorary members, as they wuz competent to be jest as indignant as any other male men over the tribulations of their sect. josiah said so much about the meetin', and his honorary indignation, that he got me curious, and wantin' to go myself, to see how it wuz carried on. but i didn't have no hopes on't till philander daggett's new young wife come to visit me and i told her how much i wanted to go, and she bein' real good-natered said she would make philander let me in. he objected, of course, but she is pretty and young, and his nater bein' kinder softened and sweetened by the honey of the honeymoon, she got round him. and he said that if we would set up in a corner of the gallery behind the melodeon, and keep our veils on, he would let her and me in. but we must keep it secret as the grave, for he would lose all the influence he had with the other members and be turned out of the presidential chair if it wuz knowed that he had lifted wimmen up to such a hite, and gin 'em such a opportunity to feel as if they wuz equal to men. well, we went early and josiah left me to philander's and went on to do some errents. he thought i wuz to spend the evenin' with her in becomin' seclusion, a-knittin' on his blue and white socks, as a woman should. but after visitin' a spell, jest after it got duskish, we went out the back door and went cross lots, and got there ensconced in the dark corner without anybody seein' us and before the meetin' begun. philander opened the meetin' by readin' the moments of the last meetin', which wuz one of sympathy with the police of washington for their noble efforts to break up the woman's parade, and after their almost herculaneum labor to teach wimmen her proper place, and all the help they got from the hoodlum and slum elements, they had failed in a measure, and the wimmen, though stunned, insulted, spit on, struck, broken boneded, maimed, and tore to pieces, had succeeded in their disgustin' onwomanly undertakin'. but it wuz motioned and carried that a vote of thanks be sent 'em and recorded in the moments that the creation searchers had no blame but only sympathy and admiration for the hard worked policemen for they had done all they could to protect wimmen's delicacy and retirin' modesty, and put her in her place, and no man in washington or jonesville could do more. he read these moments, in a real tender sympathizin' voice, and i spoze the members sympathized with him, or i judged so from their linements as i went forward, still as a mouse, and peeked down on 'em. he then stopped a minute and took a drink of water; i spoze his sympathetic emotions had het him up, and kinder dried his mouth, some. and then he went on to state that this meetin' wuz called to show to the world, abroad and nigh by, the burnin' indignation this body felt, as a society, at the turrible sufferin's and insults bein' heaped onto their male brethren in england by the indecent and disgraceful doin's of the militant suffragettes, and to devise, if possible, some way to help their male brethren acrost the sea. "for," sez he, "pizen will spread. how do we know how soon them very wimmen who had to be spit on and struck and tore to pieces in washington to try to make 'em keep their place, the sacred and tender place they have always held enthroned as angels in a man's heart--" here he stopped and took out his bandanna handkerchief, and wiped his eyes, and kinder choked. but i knew it wuz all a orator's art, and it didn't affect me, though i see a number of the members wipe their eyes, for this talk appealed to the inheriant chivalry of men, and their desire to protect wimmen, we have always hearn so much about. "how do we know," he continued, "how soon they may turn aginst their best friends, them who actuated by the loftiest and tenderest emotions, and determination to protect the weaker sect at any cost, took their valuable time to try to keep wimmen down where they ort to be, _angels of the home_, who knows but they may turn and throw stuns at the capitol an' badger an' torment our noble lawmakers, a-tryin' to make 'em listen to their silly petitions for justice?" in conclusion, he entreated 'em to remember that the eye of the world wuz on 'em, expectin' 'em to be loyal to the badgered and woman endangered sect abroad, and try to suggest some way to stop them woman's disgraceful doin's. cyrenus presly always loves to talk, and he always looks on the dark side of things, and he riz up and said "he didn't believe nothin' could be done, for by all he'd read about 'em, the men had tried everything possible to keep wimmen down where they ort to be, they had turned deaf ears to their complaints, wouldn't hear one word they said, they had tried drivin' and draggin' and insults of all kinds, and breakin' their bones, and imprisonment, and stuffin' 'em with rubber tubes, thrust through their nose down into their throats. and he couldn't think of a thing more that could be done by men, and keep the position men always had held as wimmen's gardeens and protectors, and he said he thought men might jest as well keep still and let 'em go on and bring the world to ruin, for that was what they wuz bound to do, and they couldn't be stopped unless they wuz killed off." phileman huffstater is a old bachelder, and hates wimmen. he had been on a drunk and looked dretful, tobacco juice runnin' down his face, his red hair all towsled up, and his clothes stiff with dirt. he wuzn't invited, but had come of his own accord. he had to hang onto the seat in front of him as he riz up and said: "he believed that wuz the best and only way out on't, for men to rise up and kill off the weaker sect, for their wuzn't never no trouble of any name or nater, but what wimmen wuz to the bottom on't, and the world would be better off without 'em." but philander scorfed at him and reminded him that such hullsale doin's would put an end to the world's bein' populated at all. but phileman said in a hicuppin', maudlin way that "the world had better stop, if there had got to be such doin's, wimmen risin' up on every side, and pretendin' to be equal with men." here his knee jints kinder gin out under him, and he slid down onto the seat and went to sleep. i guess the members wuz kinder shamed of phileman, for lime peedick jumped up quick as scat and said, "it seemed the englishmen had tried most everything else, and he wondered how it would work if them militant wimmen could be ketched and a dose of sunthin' bitter and sickenin' poured down 'em. every time they broached that loathsome doctrine of equal rights, and tried to make lawmakers listen to their petitions, jest ketch 'em and pour down 'em a big dose of wormwood or sunthin' else bitter and sickenin', and he guessed they would git tired on't." but here josiah jumped up quick and said, "he objected," he said, "that would endanger the right wimmen always had, and ort to have of cookin' good vittles for men and doin' their housework, and bearin' and bringin' up their children, and makin' and mendin' and waitin' on 'em. he said nothin' short of a gatlin gun could keep samantha from speakin' her mind about such things, and he wuzn't willin' to have her made sick to the stomach, and incapacitated from cookin' by any such proceedin's." the members argued quite awhile on this pint, but finally come round to josiah's idees, and the meetin' for a few minutes seemed to come to a standstill, till old cornelius snyder got up slowly and feebly. he has spazzums and can't hardly wobble. his wife has to support him, wash and dress him, and take care on him like a baby. but he has the use of his tongue, and he got some man to bring him there, and he leaned heavy on his cane, and kinder stiddied himself on it and offered this suggestion: "how would it do to tie females up when they got to thinkin' they wuz equal to men, halter 'em, rope 'em, and let 'em see if they wuz?" but this idee wuz objected to for the same reason josiah had advanced, as philander well said, "wimmen had got to go foot loose in order to do the housework and cookin'." uncle sime bentley, who wuz awful indignant, said, "i motion that men shall take away all the rights that wimmen have now, turn 'em out of the meetin' house, and grange." but before he'd hardly got the words out of his mouth, seven of the members riz up and as many as five spoke out to once with different exclamations: "that won't do! we can't do that! who'll do all the work! who'll git up grange banquets and rummage sales, and paper and paint and put down carpets in the meetin' house, and git up socials and entertainments to help pay the minister's salary, and carry on the sunday school? and tend to its picnics and suppers, and take care of the children? we can't do this, much as we'd love to." one horsey, sporty member, also under the influence of liquor, riz up, and made a feeble motion, "spozin' we give wimmen liberty enough to work, leave 'em hand and foot loose, and sort o' muzzle 'em so they can't talk." this seemed to be very favorably received, 'specially by the married members, and the secretary wuz jest about to record it in the moments as a scheme worth tryin', when old doctor nugent got up, and sez in a firm, decided way: "wimmen cannot be kept from talking without endangerin' her life; as a medical expert i object to this motion." "how would you put the objection?" sez the secretary. "on the ground of cruelty to animals," sez the doctor. a fat englishman who had took the widder shelmadine's farm on shares, says, "i 'old with brother josiah hallen's hargument. as the father of nine young children and thirty cows to milk with my wife's 'elp, i 'old she musn't be kep' from work, but h'i propose if we can't do anything else that a card of sympathy be sent to hold hengland from the creation searchin' society of america, tellin' 'em 'ow our 'earts bleeds for the men's sufferin' and 'ardships in 'avin' to leave their hoccupations to beat and 'aul round and drive females to jails, and feed 'em with rubber hose through their noses to keep 'em from starvin' to death for what they call their principles." this motion wuz carried unanimously. but here an old man, who had jest dropped in and who wuz kinder deef and slow-witted, asked, "what it is about anyway? what do the wimmen ask for when they are pounded and jailed and starved?" hank yerden, whose wife is a suffragist, and who is mistrusted to have a leanin' that way himself, answered him, "oh, they wanted the lawmakers to read their petitions asking for the rights of ordinary citizens. they said as long as their property wuz taxed they had the right of representation. and as long as the law punished wimmen equally with men, they had a right to help make that law, and as long as men claimed wimmen's place wuz home, they wanted the right to guard that home. and as long as they brought children into the world they wanted the right to protect 'em. and when the lawmakers wouldn't hear a word they said, and beat 'em and drove 'em round and jailed 'em, they got mad as hens, and are actin' like furiation and wild cats. but claim that civil rights wuz never give to any class without warfare." "heavens! what doin's!" sez old zephaniah beezum, "what is the world comin' to!" "angle worms will be risin' up next and demandin' to not be trod on." sez he, "i have studied the subject on every side, and i claim the best way to deal with them militant females is to banish 'em to some barren wilderness, some foreign desert where they can meditate on their crimes, and not bother men." this idee wuz received favorably by most of the members, but others differed and showed the weak p'ints in it, and it wuz gin up. well, at ten p.m., the creation searchers gin up after arguin' pro and con, con and pro, that they could not see any way out of the matter, they could not tell what to do with the wimmen without danger and trouble to the male sect. they looked dretful dejected and onhappy as they come to this conclusion, my pardner looked as if he wuz most ready to bust out cryin'. and as i looked on his beloved linement i forgot everything else and onbeknown to me i leaned over the railin' and sez: "here is sunthin' that no one has seemed to think on at home or abroad. how would it work to stop the trouble by givin' the wimmen the rights they ask for, the rights of any other citizen?" i don't spoze there will ever be such another commotion and upheaval in jonesville till michael blows his last trump as follered my speech. knowin' wimmen wuz kep' from the meetin', some on 'em thought it wuz a voice from another spear. them wuz the skairt and horrow struck ones, and them that thought it wuz a earthly woman's voice wuz so mad that they wuz by the side of themselves and carried on fearful. but when they searched the gallery for wimmen or ghosts, nothin' wuz found, for philander's wife and i had scooted acrost lots and wuz to home a-knittin' before the men got there. and i d'no as anybody but philander to this day knows what, or who it wuz. and i d'no as my idee will be follered, but i believe it is the best way out on't for men and wimmen both, and would stop the mad doin's of the english suffragettes, which i don't approve of, no indeed! much as i sympathize with the justice of their cause. anarchism and other essays emma goldman with biographic sketch by hippolyte havel contents biographic sketch preface anarchism: what it really stands for minorities versus majorities the psychology of political violence prisons: a social crime and failure patriotism: a menace to liberty francisco ferrer and the modern school the hypocrisy of puritanism the traffic in women woman suffrage the tragedy of woman's emancipation marriage and love the drama: a powerful disseminator of radical thought emma goldman propagandism is not, as some suppose, a "trade," because nobody will follow a "trade" at which you may work with the industry of a slave and die with the reputation of a mendicant. the motives of any persons to pursue such a profession must be different from those of trade, deeper than pride, and stronger than interest. george jacob holyoake. among the men and women prominent in the public life of america there are but few whose names are mentioned as often as that of emma goldman. yet the real emma goldman is almost quite unknown. the sensational press has surrounded her name with so much misrepresentation and slander, it would seem almost a miracle that, in spite of this web of calumny, the truth breaks through and a better appreciation of this much maligned idealist begins to manifest itself. there is but little consolation in the fact that almost every representative of a new idea has had to struggle and suffer under similar difficulties. is it of any avail that a former president of a republic pays homage at osawatomie to the memory of john brown? or that the president of another republic participates in the unveiling of a statue in honor of pierre proudhon, and holds up his life to the french nation as a model worthy of enthusiastic emulation? of what avail is all this when, at the same time, the living john browns and proudhons are being crucified? the honor and glory of a mary wollstonecraft or of a louise michel are not enhanced by the city fathers of london or paris naming a street after them--the living generation should be concerned with doing justice to the living mary wollstonecrafts and louise michels. posterity assigns to men like wendel phillips and lloyd garrison the proper niche of honor in the temple of human emancipation; but it is the duty of their contemporaries to bring them due recognition and appreciation while they live. the path of the propagandist of social justice is strewn with thorns. the powers of darkness and injustice exert all their might lest a ray of sunshine enter his cheerless life. nay, even his comrades in the struggle--indeed, too often his most intimate friends--show but little understanding for the personality of the pioneer. envy, sometimes growing to hatred, vanity and jealousy, obstruct his way and fill his heart with sadness. it requires an inflexible will and tremendous enthusiasm not to lose, under such conditions, all faith in the cause. the representative of a revolutionizing idea stands between two fires: on the one hand, the persecution of the existing powers which hold him responsible for all acts resulting from social conditions; and, on the other, the lack of understanding on the part of his own followers who often judge all his activity from a narrow standpoint. thus it happens that the agitator stands quite alone in the midst of the multitude surrounding him. even his most intimate friends rarely understand how solitary and deserted he feels. that is the tragedy of the person prominent in the public eye. the mist in which the name of emma goldman has so long been enveloped is gradually beginning to dissipate. her energy in the furtherance of such an unpopular idea as anarchism, her deep earnestness, her courage and abilities, find growing understanding and admiration. the debt american intellectual growth owes to the revolutionary exiles has never been fully appreciated. the seed disseminated by them, though so little understood at the time, has brought a rich harvest. they have at all times held aloft the banner of liberty, thus impregnating the social vitality of the nation. but very few have succeeding in preserving their european education and culture while at the same time assimilating themselves with american life. it is difficult for the average man to form an adequate conception what strength, energy, and perseverance are necessary to absorb the unfamiliar language, habits, and customs of a new country, without the loss of one's own personality. emma goldman is one of the few who, while thoroughly preserving their individuality, have become an important factor in the social and intellectual atmosphere of america. the life she leads is rich in color, full of change and variety. she has risen to the topmost heights, and she has also tasted the bitter dregs of life. emma goldman was born of jewish parentage on the th day of june, , in the russian province of kovno. surely these parents never dreamed what unique position their child would some day occupy. like all conservative parents they, too, were quite convinced that their daughter would marry a respectable citizen, bear him children, and round out her allotted years surrounded by a flock of grandchildren, a good, religious woman. as most parents, they had no inkling what a strange, impassioned spirit would take hold of the soul of their child, and carry it to the heights which separate generations in eternal struggle. they lived in a land and at a time when antagonism between parent and offspring was fated to find its most acute expression, irreconcilable hostility. in this tremendous struggle between fathers and sons--and especially between parents and daughters--there was no compromise, no weak yielding, no truce. the spirit of liberty, of progress--an idealism which knew no considerations and recognized no obstacles--drove the young generation out of the parental house and away from the hearth of the home. just as this same spirit once drove out the revolutionary breeder of discontent, jesus, and alienated him from his native traditions. what role the jewish race--notwithstanding all anti-semitic calumnies the race of transcendental idealism--played in the struggle of the old and the new will probably never be appreciated with complete impartiality and clarity. only now are we beginning to perceive the tremendous debt we owe to jewish idealists in the realm of science, art, and literature. but very little is still known of the important part the sons and daughters of israel have played in the revolutionary movement and, especially, in that of modern times. the first years of her childhood emma goldman passed in a small, idyllic place in the german-russian province of kurland, where her father had charge of the government stage. at the time kurland was thoroughly german; even the russian bureaucracy of that baltic province was recruited mostly from german junkers. german fairy tales and stories, rich in the miraculous deeds of the heroic knights of kurland, wove their spell over the youthful mind. but the beautiful idyl was of short duration. soon the soul of the growing child was overcast by the dark shadows of life. already in her tenderest youth the seeds of rebellion and unrelenting hatred of oppression were to be planted in the heart of emma goldman. early she learned to know the beauty of the state: she saw her father harassed by the christian chinovniks and doubly persecuted as petty official and hated jew. the brutality of forced conscription ever stood before her eyes: she beheld the young men, often the sole supporter of a large family, brutally dragged to the barracks to lead the miserable life of a soldier. she heard the weeping of the poor peasant women, and witnessed the shameful scenes of official venality which relieved the rich from military service at the expense of the poor. she was outraged by the terrible treatment to which the female servants were subjected: maltreated and exploited by their barinyas, they fell to the tender mercies of the regimental officers, who regarded them as their natural sexual prey. the girls, made pregnant by respectable gentlemen and driven out by their mistresses, often found refuge in the goldman home. and the little girl, her heart palpitating with sympathy, would abstract coins from the parental drawer to clandestinely press the money into the hands of the unfortunate women. thus emma goldman's most striking characteristic, her sympathy with the underdog, already became manifest in these early years. at the age of seven little emma was sent by her parents to her grandmother at konigsberg, the city of emanuel kant, in eastern prussia. save for occasional interruptions, she remained there till her th birthday. the first years in these surroundings do not exactly belong to her happiest recollections. the grandmother, indeed, was very amiable, but the numerous aunts of the household were concerned more with the spirit of practical rather than pure reason, and the categoric imperative was applied all too frequently. the situation was changed when her parents migrated to konigsberg, and little emma was relieved from her role of cinderella. she now regularly attended public school and also enjoyed the advantages of private instruction, customary in middle class life; french and music lessons played an important part in the curriculum. the future interpreter of ibsen and shaw was then a little german gretchen, quite at home in the german atmosphere. her special predilections in literature were the sentimental romances of marlitt; she was a great admirer of the good queen louise, whom the bad napoleon buonaparte treated with so marked a lack of knightly chivalry. what might have been her future development had she remained in this milieu? fate--or was it economic necessity?--willed it otherwise. her parents decided to settle in st. petersburg, the capital of the almighty tsar, and there to embark in business. it was here that a great change took place in the life of the young dreamer. it was an eventful period--the year of --in which emma goldman, then in her th year, arrived in st. petersburg. a struggle for life and death between the autocracy and the russian intellectuals swept the country. alexander ii had fallen the previous year. sophia perovskaia, zheliabov, grinevitzky, rissakov, kibalchitch, michailov, the heroic executors of the death sentence upon the tyrant, had then entered the walhalla of immortality. jessie helfman, the only regicide whose life the government had reluctantly spared because of pregnancy, followed the unnumbered russian martyrs to the etapes of siberia. it was the most heroic period in the great battle of emancipation, a battle for freedom such as the world had never witnessed before. the names of the nihilist martyrs were on all lips, and thousands were enthusiastic to follow their example. the whole intelligenzia of russia was filled with the illegal spirit: revolutionary sentiments penetrated into every home, from mansion to hovel, impregnating the military, the chinovniks, factory workers, and peasants. the atmosphere pierced the very casemates of the royal palace. new ideas germinated in the youth. the difference of sex was forgotten. shoulder to shoulder fought the men and the women. the russian woman! who shall ever do justice or adequately portray her heroism and self-sacrifice, her loyalty and devotion? holy, turgeniev calls her in his great prose poem, on the threshold. it was inevitable that the young dreamer from konigsberg should be drawn into the maelstrom. to remain outside of the circle of free ideas meant a life of vegetation, of death. one need not wonder at the youthful age. young enthusiasts were not then--and, fortunately, are not now--a rare phenomenon in russia. the study of the russian language soon brought young emma goldman in touch with revolutionary students and new ideas. the place of marlitt was taken by nekrassov and tchernishevsky. the quondam admirer of the good queen louise became a glowing enthusiast of liberty, resolving, like thousands of others, to devote her life to the emancipation of the people. the struggle of generations now took place in the goldman family. the parents could not comprehend what interest their daughter could find in the new ideas, which they themselves considered fantastic utopias. they strove to persuade the young girl out of these chimeras, and daily repetition of soul-racking disputes was the result. only in one member of the family did the young idealist find understanding--in her elder sister, helene, with whom she later emigrated to america, and whose love and sympathy have never failed her. even in the darkest hours of later persecution emma goldman always found a haven of refuge in the home of this loyal sister. emma goldman finally resolved to achieve her independence. she saw hundreds of men and women sacrificing brilliant careers to go v narod, to the people. she followed their example. she became a factory worker; at first employed as a corset maker, and later in the manufacture of gloves. she was now years of age and proud to earn her own living. had she remained in russia, she would have probably sooner or later shared the fate of thousands buried in the snows of siberia. but a new chapter of life was to begin for her. sister helene decided to emigrate to america, where another sister had already made her home. emma prevailed upon helene to be allowed to join her, and together they departed for america, filled with the joyous hope of a great, free land, the glorious republic. america! what magic word. the yearning of the enslaved, the promised land of the oppressed, the goal of all longing for progress. here man's ideals had found their fulfillment: no tsar, no cossack, no chinovnik. the republic! glorious synonym of equality, freedom, brotherhood. thus thought the two girls as they travelled, in the year , from new york to rochester. soon, all too soon, disillusionment awaited them. the ideal conception of america was punctured already at castle garden, and soon burst like a soap bubble. here emma goldman witnessed sights which reminded her of the terrible scenes of her childhood in kurland. the brutality and humiliation the future citizens of the great republic were subjected to on board ship, were repeated at castle garden by the officials of the democracy in a more savage and aggravating manner. and what bitter disappointment followed as the young idealist began to familiarize herself with the conditions in the new land! instead of one tsar, she found scores of them; the cossack was replaced by the policeman with the heavy club, and instead of the russian chinovnik there was the far more inhuman slave-driver of the factory. emma goldman soon obtained work in the clothing establishment of the garson co. the wages amounted to two and a half dollars a week. at that time the factories were not provided with motor power, and the poor sewing girls had to drive the wheels by foot, from early morning till late at night. a terribly exhausting toil it was, without a ray of light, the drudgery of the long day passed in complete silence--the russian custom of friendly conversation at work was not permissible in the free country. but the exploitation of the girls was not only economic; the poor wage workers were looked upon by their foremen and bosses as sexual commodities. if a girl resented the advances of her "superiors", she would speedily find herself on the street as an undesirable element in the factory. there was never a lack of willing victims: the supply always exceeded the demand. the horrible conditions were made still more unbearable by the fearful dreariness of life in the small american city. the puritan spirit suppresses the slightest manifestation of joy; a deadly dullness beclouds the soul; no intellectual inspiration, no thought exchange between congenial spirits is possible. emma goldman almost suffocated in this atmosphere. she, above all others, longed for ideal surroundings, for friendship and understanding, for the companionship of kindred minds. mentally she still lived in russia. unfamiliar with the language and life of the country, she dwelt more in the past than in the present. it was at this period that she met a young man who spoke russian. with great joy the acquaintance was cultivated. at last a person with whom she could converse, one who could help her bridge the dullness of the narrow existence. the friendship gradually ripened and finally culminated in marriage. emma goldman, too, had to walk the sorrowful road of married life; she, too, had to learn from bitter experience that legal statutes signify dependence and self-effacement, especially for the woman. the marriage was no liberation from the puritan dreariness of american life; indeed, it was rather aggravated by the loss of self-ownership. the characters of the young people differed too widely. a separation soon followed, and emma goldman went to new haven, conn. there she found employment in a factory, and her husband disappeared from her horizon. two decades later she was fated to be unexpectedly reminded of him by the federal authorities. the revolutionists who were active in the russian movement of the 's were but little familiar with the social ideas then agitating western europe and america. their sole activity consisted in educating the people, their final goal the destruction of the autocracy. socialism and anarchism were terms hardly known even by name. emma goldman, too, was entirely unfamiliar with the significance of those ideals. she arrived in america, as four years previously in russia, at a period of great social and political unrest. the working people were in revolt against the terrible labor conditions; the eight-hour movement of the knights of labor was at its height, and throughout the country echoed the din of sanguine strife between strikers and police. the struggle culminated in the great strike against the harvester company of chicago, the massacre of the strikers, and the judicial murder of the labor leaders, which followed upon the historic haymarket bomb explosion. the anarchists stood the martyr test of blood baptism. the apologists of capitalism vainly seek to justify the killing of parsons, spies, lingg, fischer, and engel. since the publication of governor altgeld's reason for his liberation of the three incarcerated haymarket anarchists, no doubt is left that a fivefold legal murder had been committed in chicago, in . very few have grasped the significance of the chicago martyrdom; least of all the ruling classes. by the destruction of a number of labor leaders they thought to stem the tide of a world-inspiring idea. they failed to consider that from the blood of the martyrs grows the new seed, and that the frightful injustice will win new converts to the cause. the two most prominent representatives of the anarchist idea in america, voltairine de cleyre and emma goldman--the one a native american, the other a russian--have been converted, like numerous others, to the ideas of anarchism by the judicial murder. two women who had not known each other before, and who had received a widely different education, were through that murder united in one idea. like most working men and women of america, emma goldman followed the chicago trial with great anxiety and excitement. she, too, could not believe that the leaders of the proletariat would be killed. the th of november, , taught her differently. she realized that no mercy could be expected from the ruling class, that between the tsarism of russia and the plutocracy of america there was no difference save in name. her whole being rebelled against the crime, and she vowed to herself a solemn vow to join the ranks of the revolutionary proletariat and to devote all her energy and strength to their emancipation from wage slavery. with the glowing enthusiasm so characteristic of her nature, she now began to familiarize herself with the literature of socialism and anarchism. she attended public meetings and became acquainted with socialistically and anarchistically inclined workingmen. johanna greie, the well-known german lecturer, was the first socialist speaker heard by emma goldman. in new haven, conn., where she was employed in a corset factory, she met anarchists actively participating in the movement. here she read the freiheit, edited by john most. the haymarket tragedy developed her inherent anarchist tendencies: the reading of the freiheit made her a conscious anarchist. subsequently she was to learn that the idea of anarchism found its highest expression through the best intellects of america: theoretically by josiah warren, stephen pearl andrews, lysander spooner; philosophically by emerson, thoreau, and walt whitman. made ill by the excessive strain of factory work, emma goldman returned to rochester where she remained till august, , at which time she removed to new york, the scene of the most important phase of her life. she was now twenty years old. features pallid with suffering, eyes large and full of compassion, greet one in her pictured likeness of those days. her hair is, as customary with russian student girls, worn short, giving free play to the strong forehead. it is the heroic epoch of militant anarchism. by leaps and bounds the movement had grown in every country. in spite of the most severe governmental persecution new converts swell the ranks. the propaganda is almost exclusively of a secret character. the repressive measures of the government drive the disciples of the new philosophy to conspirative methods. thousands of victims fall into the hands of the authorities and languish in prisons. but nothing can stem the rising tide of enthusiasm, of self-sacrifice and devotion to the cause. the efforts of teachers like peter kropotkin, louise michel, elisee reclus, and others, inspire the devotees with ever greater energy. disruption is imminent with the socialists, who have sacrificed the idea of liberty and embraced the state and politics. the struggle is bitter, the factions irreconcilable. this struggle is not merely between anarchists and socialists; it also finds its echo within the anarchist groups. theoretic differences and personal controversies lead to strife and acrimonious enmities. the anti-socialist legislation of germany and austria had driven thousands of socialists and anarchists across the seas to seek refuge in america. john most, having lost his seat in the reichstag, finally had to flee his native land, and went to london. there, having advanced toward anarchism, he entirely withdrew from the social democratic party. later, coming to america, he continued the publication of the freiheit in new york, and developed great activity among the german workingmen. when emma goldman arrived in new york in , she experienced little difficulty in associating herself with active anarchists. anarchist meetings were an almost daily occurrence. the first lecturer she heard on the anarchist platform was dr. a. solotaroff. of great importance to her future development was her acquaintance with john most, who exerted a tremendous influence over the younger elements. his impassioned eloquence, untiring energy, and the persecution he had endured for the cause, all combined to enthuse the comrades. it was also at this period that she met alexander berkman, whose friendship played an important part throughout her life. her talents as a speaker could not long remain in obscurity. the fire of enthusiasm swept her toward the public platform. encouraged by her friends, she began to participate as a german and yiddish speaker at anarchist meetings. soon followed a brief tour of agitation taking her as far as cleveland. with the whole strength and earnestness of her soul she now threw herself into the propaganda of anarchist ideas. the passionate period of her life had begun. through constantly toiling in sweat shops, the fiery young orator was at the same time very active as an agitator and participated in various labor struggles, notably in the great cloakmakers' strike, in , led by professor garsyde and joseph barondess. a year later emma goldman was a delegate to an anarchist conference in new york. she was elected to the executive committee, but later withdrew because of differences of opinion regarding tactical matters. the ideas of the german-speaking anarchists had at that time not yet become clarified. some still believed in parliamentary methods, the great majority being adherents of strong centralism. these differences of opinion in regard to tactics led in to a breach with john most. emma goldman, alexander berkman, and other comrades joined the group autonomy, in which joseph peukert, otto rinke, and claus timmermann played an active part. the bitter controversies which followed this secession terminated only with the death of most, in . a great source of inspiration to emma goldman proved the russian revolutionists who were associated in the group znamya. goldenberg, solotaroff, zametkin, miller, cahan, the poet edelstadt, ivan von schewitsch, husband of helene von racowitza and editor of the volkszeitung, and numerous other russian exiles, some of whom are still living, were members of this group. it was also at this time that emma goldman met robert reitzel, the german-american heine, who exerted a great influence on her development. through him she became acquainted with the best writers of modern literature, and the friendship thus begun lasted till reitzel's death, in . the labor movement of america had not been drowned in the chicago massacre; the murder of the anarchists had failed to bring peace to the profit-greedy capitalist. the struggle for the eight-hour day continued. in broke out the great strike in pittsburg. the homestead fight, the defeat of the pinkertons, the appearance of the militia, the suppression of the strikers, and the complete triumph of the reaction are matters of comparatively recent history. stirred to the very depths by the terrible events at the seat of war, alexander berkman resolved to sacrifice his life to the cause and thus give an object lesson to the wage slaves of america of active anarchist solidarity with labor. his attack upon frick, the gessler of pittsburg, failed, and the twenty-two-year-old youth was doomed to a living death of twenty-two years in the penitentiary. the bourgeoisie, which for decades had exalted and eulogized tyrannicide, now was filled with terrible rage. the capitalist press organized a systematic campaign of calumny and misrepresentation against anarchists. the police exerted every effort to involve emma goldman in the act of alexander berkman. the feared agitator was to be silenced by all means. it was only due to the circumstance of her presence in new york that she escaped the clutches of the law. it was a similar circumstance which, nine years later, during the mckinley incident, was instrumental in preserving her liberty. it is almost incredible with what amount of stupidity, baseness, and vileness the journalists of the period sought to overwhelm the anarchist. one must peruse the newspaper files to realize the enormity of incrimination and slander. it would be difficult to portray the agony of soul emma goldman experienced in those days. the persecutions of the capitalist press were to be borne by an anarchist with comparative equanimity; but the attacks from one's own ranks were far more painful and unbearable. the act of berkman was severely criticized by most and some of his followers among the german and jewish anarchists. bitter accusations and recriminations at public meetings and private gatherings followed. persecuted on all sides, both because she championed berkman and his act, and on account of her revolutionary activity, emma goldman was harassed even to the extent of inability to secure shelter. too proud to seek safety in the denial of her identity, she chose to pass the nights in the public parks rather than expose her friends to danger or vexation by her visits. the already bitter cup was filled to overflowing by the attempted suicide of a young comrade who had shared living quarters with emma goldman, alexander berkman, and a mutual artist friend. many changes have since taken place. alexander berkman has survived the pennsylvania inferno, and is back again in the ranks of the militant anarchists, his spirit unbroken, his soul full of enthusiasm for the ideals of his youth. the artist comrade is now among the well-known illustrators of new york. the suicide candidate left america shortly after his unfortunate attempt to die, and was subsequently arrested and condemned to eight years of hard labor for smuggling anarchist literature into germany. he, too, has withstood the terrors of prison life, and has returned to the revolutionary movement, since earning the well deserved reputation of a talented writer in germany. to avoid indefinite camping in the parks emma goldman finally was forced to move into a house on third street, occupied exclusively by prostitutes. there, among the outcasts of our good christian society, she could at least rent a bit of a room, and find rest and work at her sewing machine. the women of the street showed more refinement of feeling and sincere sympathy than the priests of the church. but human endurance had been exhausted by overmuch suffering and privation. there was a complete physical breakdown, and the renowned agitator was removed to the "bohemian republic"--a large tenement house which derived its euphonious appellation from the fact that its occupants were mostly bohemian anarchists. here emma goldman found friends ready to aid her. justus schwab, one of the finest representatives of the german revolutionary period of that time, and dr. solotaroff were indefatigable in the care of the patient. here, too, she met edward brady, the new friendship subsequently ripening into close intimacy. brady had been an active participant in the revolutionary movement of austria and had, at the time of his acquaintance with emma goldman, lately been released from an austrian prison after an incarceration of ten years. physicians diagnosed the illness as consumption, and the patient was advised to leave new york. she went to rochester, in the hope that the home circle would help restore her to health. her parents had several years previously emigrated to america, settling in that city. among the leading traits of the jewish race is the strong attachment between the members of the family, and, especially, between parents and children. though her conservative parents could not sympathize with the idealist aspirations of emma goldman and did not approve of her mode of life, they now received their sick daughter with open arms. the rest and care enjoyed in the parental home, and the cheering presence of the beloved sister helene, proved so beneficial that within a short time she was sufficiently restored to resume her energetic activity. there is no rest in the life of emma goldman. ceaseless effort and continuous striving toward the conceived goal are the essentials of her nature. too much precious time had already been wasted. it was imperative to resume her labors immediately. the country was in the throes of a crisis, and thousands of unemployed crowded the streets of the large industrial centers. cold and hungry they tramped through the land in the vain search for work and bread. the anarchists developed a strenuous propaganda among the unemployed and the strikers. a monster demonstration of striking cloakmakers and of the unemployed took place at union square, new york. emma goldman was one of the invited speakers. she delivered an impassioned speech, picturing in fiery words the misery of the wage slave's life, and quoted the famous maxim of cardinal manning: "necessity knows no law, and the starving man has a natural right to a share of his neighbor's bread." she concluded her exhortation with the words: "ask for work. if they do not give you work, ask for bread. if they do not give you work or bread, then take bread." the following day she left for philadelphia, where she was to address a public meeting. the capitalist press again raised the alarm. if socialists and anarchists were to be permitted to continue agitating, there was imminent danger that the workingmen would soon learn to understand the manner in which they are robbed of the joy and happiness of life. such a possibility was to be prevented at all cost. the chief of police of new york, byrnes, procured a court order for the arrest of emma goldman. she was detained by the philadelphia authorities and incarcerated for several days in the moyamensing prison, awaiting the extradition papers which byrnes intrusted to detective jacobs. this man jacobs (whom emma goldman again met several years later under very unpleasant circumstances) proposed to her, while she was returning a prisoner to new york, to betray the cause of labor. in the name of his superior, chief byrnes, he offered lucrative reward. how stupid men sometimes are! what poverty of psychologic observation to imagine the possibility of betrayal on the part of a young russian idealist, who had willingly sacrificed all personal considerations to help in labor's emancipation. in october, , emma goldman was tried in the criminal courts of new york on the charge of inciting to riot. the "intelligent" jury ignored the testimony of the twelve witnesses for the defense in favor of the evidence given by one single man--detective jacobs. she was found guilty and sentenced to serve one year in the penitentiary at blackwell's island. since the foundation of the republic she was the first woman--mrs. surratt excepted--to be imprisoned for a political offense. respectable society had long before stamped upon her the scarlet letter. emma goldman passed her time in the penitentiary in the capacity of nurse in the prison hospital. here she found opportunity to shed some rays of kindness into the dark lives of the unfortunates whose sisters of the street did not disdain two years previously to share with her the same house. she also found in prison opportunity to study english and its literature, and to familiarize herself with the great american writers. in bret harte, mark twain, walt whitman, thoreau, and emerson she found great treasures. she left blackwell's island in the month of august, , a woman of twenty-five, developed and matured, and intellectually transformed. back into the arena, richer in experience, purified by suffering. she did not feel herself deserted and alone any more. many hands were stretched out to welcome her. there were at the time numerous intellectual oases in new york. the saloon of justus schwab, at number fifty, first street, was the center where gathered anarchists, litterateurs, and bohemians. among others she also met at this time a number of american anarchists, and formed the friendship of voltairine de cleyre, wm. c. owen, miss van etton, and dyer d. lum, former editor of the alarm and executor of the last wishes of the chicago martyrs. in john swinton, the noble old fighter for liberty, she found one of her staunchest friends. other intellectual centers there were: solidarity, published by john edelman; liberty, by the individualist anarchist, benjamin r. tucker; the rebel, by harry kelly; der sturmvogel, a german anarchist publication, edited by claus timmermann; der arme teufel, whose presiding genius was the inimitable robert reitzel. through arthur brisbane, now chief lieutenant of william randolph hearst, she became acquainted with the writings of fourier. brisbane then was not yet submerged in the swamp of political corruption. he sent emma goldman an amiable letter to blackwell's island, together with the biography of his father, the enthusiastic american disciple of fourier. emma goldman became, upon her release from the penitentiary, a factor in the public life of new york. she was appreciated in radical ranks for her devotion, her idealism, and earnestness. various persons sought her friendship, and some tried to persuade her to aid in the furtherance of their special side issues. thus rev. parkhurst, during the lexow investigation, did his utmost to induce her to join the vigilance committee in order to fight tammany hall. maria louise, the moving spirit of a social center, acted as parkhurst's go-between. it is hardly necessary to mention what reply the latter received from emma goldman. incidentally, maria louise subsequently became a mahatma. during the free silver campaign, ex-burgess mcluckie, one of the most genuine personalities in the homestead strike, visited new york in an endeavor to enthuse the local radicals for free silver. he also attempted to interest emma goldman, but with no greater success than mahatma maria louise of parkhurst-lexow fame. in the struggle of the anarchists in france reached its highest expression. the white terror on the part of the republican upstarts was answered by the red terror of our french comrades. with feverish anxiety the anarchists throughout the world followed this social struggle. propaganda by deed found its reverberating echo in almost all countries. in order to better familiarize herself with conditions in the old world, emma goldman left for europe, in the year . after a lecture tour in england and scotland, she went to vienna where she entered the allgemeine krankenhaus to prepare herself as midwife and nurse, and where at the same time she studied social conditions. she also found opportunity to acquaint herself with the newest literature of europe: hauptmann, nietzsche, ibsen, zola, thomas hardy, and other artist rebels were read with great enthusiasm. in the autumn of she returned to new york by way of zurich and paris. the project of alexander berkman's liberation was on hand. the barbaric sentence of twenty-two years had roused tremendous indignation among the radical elements. it was known that the pardon board of pennsylvania would look to carnegie and frick for advice in the case of alexander berkman. it was therefore suggested that these sultans of pennsylvania be approached--not with a view of obtaining their grace, but with the request that they do not attempt to influence the board. ernest crosby offered to see carnegie, on condition that alexander berkman repudiate his act. that, however, was absolutely out of the question. he would never be guilty of such forswearing of his own personality and self-respect. these efforts led to friendly relations between emma goldman and the circle of ernest crosby, bolton hall, and leonard abbott. in the year she undertook her first great lecture tour, which extended as far as california. this tour popularized her name as the representative of the oppressed, her eloquence ringing from coast to coast. in california emma goldman became friendly with the members of the isaak family, and learned to appreciate their efforts for the cause. under tremendous obstacles the isaaks first published the firebrand and, upon its suppression by the postal department, the free society. it was also during this tour that emma goldman met that grand old rebel of sexual freedom, moses harman. during the spanish-american war the spirit of chauvinism was at its highest tide. to check this dangerous situation, and at the same time collect funds for the revolutionary cubans, emma goldman became affiliated with the latin comrades, among others with gori, esteve, palaviccini, merlino, petruccini, and ferrara. in the year followed another protracted tour of agitation, terminating on the pacific coast. repeated arrests and accusations, though without ultimate bad results, marked every propaganda tour. in november of the same year the untiring agitator went on a second lecture tour to england and scotland, closing her journey with the first international anarchist congress at paris. it was at the time of the boer war, and again jingoism was at its height, as two years previously it had celebrated its orgies during the spanish-american war. various meetings, both in england and scotland, were disturbed and broken up by patriotic mobs. emma goldman found on this occasion the opportunity of again meeting various english comrades and interesting personalities like tom mann and the sisters rossetti, the gifted daughters of dante gabriel rossetti, then publishers of the anarchist review, the torch. one of her life-long hopes found here its fulfillment: she came in close and friendly touch with peter kropotkin, enrico malatesta, nicholas tchaikovsky, w. tcherkessov, and louise michel. old warriors in the cause of humanity, whose deeds have enthused thousands of followers throughout the world, and whose life and work have inspired other thousands with noble idealism and self-sacrifice. old warriors they, yet ever young with the courage of earlier days, unbroken in spirit and filled with the firm hope of the final triumph of anarchy. the chasm in the revolutionary labor movement, which resulted from the disruption of the internationale, could not be bridged any more. two social philosophies were engaged in bitter combat. the international congress in , at paris; in , at zurich, and in , at london, produced irreconcilable differences. the majority of social democrats, forswearing their libertarian past and becoming politicians, succeeded in excluding the revolutionary and anarchist delegates. the latter decided thenceforth to hold separate congresses. their first congress was to take place in , at paris. the socialist renegade, millerand, who had climbed into the ministry of the interior, here played a judas role. the congress of the revolutionists was suppressed, and the delegates dispersed two days prior to their scheduled opening. but millerand had no objections against the social democratic congress, which was afterwards opened with all the trumpets of the advertiser's art. however, the renegade did not accomplish his object. a number of delegates succeeded in holding a secret conference in the house of a comrade outside of paris, where various points of theory and tactics were discussed. emma goldman took considerable part in these proceedings, and on that occasion came in contact with numerous representatives of the anarchist movement of europe. owing to the suppression of the congress, the delegates were in danger of being expelled from france. at this time also came the bad news from america regarding another unsuccessful attempt to liberate alexander berkman, proving a great shock to emma goldman. in november, , she returned to america to devote herself to her profession of nurse, at the same time taking an active part in the american propaganda. among other activities she organized monster meetings of protest against the terrible outrages of the spanish government, perpetrated upon the political prisoners tortured in montjuich. in her vocation as nurse emma goldman enjoyed many opportunities of meeting the most unusual and peculiar characters. few would have identified the "notorious anarchist" in the small blonde woman, simply attired in the uniform of a nurse. soon after her return from europe she became acquainted with a patient by the name of mrs. stander, a morphine fiend, suffering excruciating agonies. she required careful attention to enable her to supervise a very important business she conducted,--that of mrs. warren. in third street, near third avenue, was situated her private residence, and near it, connected by a separate entrance, was her place of business. one evening, the nurse, upon entering the room of her patient, suddenly came face to face with a male visitor, bull-necked and of brutal appearance. the man was no other than mr. jacobs, the detective who seven years previously had brought emma goldman a prisoner from philadelphia and who had attempted to persuade her, on their way to new york, to betray the cause of the workingmen. it would be difficult to describe the expression of bewilderment on the countenance of the man as he so unexpectedly faced emma goldman, the nurse of his mistress. the brute was suddenly transformed into a gentleman, exerting himself to excuse his shameful behavior on the previous occasion. jacobs was the "protector" of mrs. stander, and go-between for the house and the police. several years later, as one of the detective staff of district attorney jerome, he committed perjury, was convicted, and sent to sing sing for a year. he is now probably employed by some private detective agency, a desirable pillar of respectable society. in peter kropotkin was invited by the lowell institute of massachusetts to deliver a series of lectures on russian literature. it was his second american tour, and naturally the comrades were anxious to use his presence for the benefit of the movement. emma goldman entered into correspondence with kropotkin and succeeded in securing his consent to arrange for him a series of lectures. she also devoted her energies to organizing the tours of other well known anarchists, principally those of charles w. mowbray and john turner. similarly she always took part in all the activities of the movement, ever ready to give her time, ability, and energy to the cause. on the sixth of september, , president mckinley was shot by leon czolgosz at buffalo. immediately an unprecedented campaign of persecution was set in motion against emma goldman as the best known anarchist in the country. although there was absolutely no foundation for the accusation, she, together with other prominent anarchists, was arrested in chicago, kept in confinement for several weeks, and subjected to severest cross-examination. never before in the history of the country had such a terrible man-hunt taken place against a person in public life. but the efforts of police and press to connect emma goldman with czolgosz proved futile. yet the episode left her wounded to the heart. the physical suffering, the humiliation and brutality at the hands of the police she could bear. the depression of soul was far worse. she was overwhelmed by realization of the stupidity, lack of understanding, and vileness which characterized the events of those terrible days. the attitude of misunderstanding on the part of the majority of her own comrades toward czolgosz almost drove her to desperation. stirred to the very inmost of her soul, she published an article on czolgosz in which she tried to explain the deed in its social and individual aspects. as once before, after berkman's act, she now also was unable to find quarters; like a veritable wild animal she was driven from place to place. this terrible persecution and, especially, the attitude of her comrades made it impossible for her to continue propaganda. the soreness of body and soul had first to heal. during - she did not resume the platform. as "miss smith" she lived a quiet life, practicing her profession and devoting her leisure to the study of literature and, particularly, to the modern drama, which she considers one of the greatest disseminators of radical ideas and enlightened feeling. yet one thing the persecution of emma goldman accomplished. her name was brought before the public with greater frequency and emphasis than ever before, the malicious harassing of the much maligned agitator arousing strong sympathy in many circles. persons in various walks of life began to get interested in her struggle and her ideas. a better understanding and appreciation were now beginning to manifest themselves. the arrival in america of the english anarchist, john turner, induced emma goldman to leave her retirement. again she threw herself into her public activities, organizing an energetic movement for the defense of turner, whom the immigration authorities condemned to deportation on account of the anarchist exclusion law, passed after the death of mckinley. when paul orleneff and mme. nazimova arrived in new york to acquaint the american public with russian dramatic art, emma goldman became the manager of the undertaking. by much patience and perseverance she succeeded in raising the necessary funds to introduce the russian artists to the theater-goers of new york and chicago. though financially not a success, the venture proved of great artistic value. as manager of the russian theater emma goldman enjoyed some unique experiences. m. orleneff could converse only in russian, and "miss smith" was forced to act as his interpreter at various polite functions. most of the aristocratic ladies of fifth avenue had not the least inkling that the amiable manager who so entertainingly discussed philosophy, drama, and literature at their five o'clock teas, was the "notorious" emma goldman. if the latter should some day write her autobiography, she will no doubt have many interesting anecdotes to relate in connection with these experiences. the weekly anarchist publication, free society, issued by the isaak family, was forced to suspend in consequence of the nation-wide fury that swept the country after the death of mckinley. to fill out the gap emma goldman, in co-operation with max baginski and other comrades, decided to publish a monthly magazine devoted to the furtherance of anarchist ideas in life and literature. the first issue of mother earth appeared in the month of march, , the initial expenses of the periodical partly covered by the proceeds of a theater benefit given by orleneff, mme. nazimova, and their company, in favor of the anarchist magazine. under tremendous difficulties and obstacles the tireless propagandist has succeeded in continuing mother earth uninterruptedly since --an achievement rarely equalled in the annals of radical publications. in may, , alexander berkman at last left the hell of pennsylvania, where he had passed the best fourteen years of his life. no one had believed in the possibility of his survival. his liberation terminated a nightmare of fourteen years for emma goldman, and an important chapter of her career was thus concluded. nowhere had the birth of the russian revolution aroused such vital and active response as among the russians living in america. the heroes of the revolutionary movement in russia, tchaikovsky, mme. breshkovskaia, gershuni, and others visited these shores to waken the sympathies of the american people toward the struggle for liberty, and to collect aid for its continuance and support. the success of these efforts was to a considerable extent due to the exertions, eloquence, and the talent for organization on the part of emma goldman. this opportunity enabled her to give valuable services to the struggle for liberty in her native land. it is not generally known that it is the anarchists who are mainly instrumental in insuring the success, moral as well as financial, of most of the radical undertakings. the anarchist is indifferent to acknowledged appreciation; the needs of the cause absorb his whole interest, and to these he devotes his energy and abilities. yet it may be mentioned that some otherwise decent folks, though at all times anxious for anarchist support and co-operation, are ever willing to monopolize all the credit for the work done. during the last several decades it was chiefly the anarchists who had organized all the great revolutionary efforts, and aided in every struggle for liberty. but for fear of shocking the respectable mob, who looks upon the anarchists as the apostles of satan, and because of their social position in bourgeois society, the would-be radicals ignore the activity of the anarchists. in emma goldman participated as delegate to the second anarchist congress, at amsterdam. she was intensely active in all its proceedings and supported the organization of the anarchist internationale. together with the other american delegate, max baginski, she submitted to the congress an exhaustive report of american conditions, closing with the following characteristic remarks: "the charge that anarchism is destructive, rather than constructive, and that, therefore, anarchism is opposed to organization, is one of the many falsehoods spread by our opponents. they confound our present social institutions with organization; hence they fail to understand how we can oppose the former, and yet favor the latter. the fact, however, is that the two are not identical. "the state is commonly regarded as the highest form of organization. but is it in reality a true organization? is it not rather an arbitrary institution, cunningly imposed upon the masses? "industry, too, is called an organization; yet nothing is farther from the truth. industry is the ceaseless piracy of the rich against the poor. "we are asked to believe that the army is an organization, but a close investigation will show that it is nothing else than a cruel instrument of blind force. "the public school! the colleges and other institutions of learning, are they not models of organization, offering the people fine opportunities for instruction? far from it. the school, more than any other institution, is a veritable barrack, where the human mind is drilled and manipulated into submission to various social and moral spooks, and thus fitted to continue our system of exploitation and oppression. "organization, as we understand it, however, is a different thing. it is based, primarily, on freedom. it is a natural and voluntary grouping of energies to secure results beneficial to humanity. "it is the harmony of organic growth which produces variety of color and form, the complete whole we admire in the flower. analogously will the organized activity of free human beings, imbued with the spirit of solidarity, result in the perfection of social harmony, which we call anarchism. in fact, anarchism alone makes non-authoritarian organization of common interests possible, since it abolishes the existing antagonism between individuals and classes. "under present conditions the antagonism of economic and social interests results in relentless war among the social units, and creates an insurmountable obstacle in the way of a co-operative commonwealth. "there is a mistaken notion that organization does not foster individual freedom; that, on the contrary, it means the decay of individuality. in reality, however, the true function of organization is to aid the development and growth of personality. "just as the animal cells, by mutual co-operation, express their latent powers in formation of the complete organism, so does the individual, by co-operative effort with other individuals, attain his highest form of development. "an organization, in the true sense, cannot result from the combination of mere nonentities. it must be composed of self-conscious, intelligent individualities. indeed, the total of the possibilities and activities of an organization is represented in the expression of individual energies. "it therefore logically follows that the greater the number of strong, self-conscious personalities in an organization, the less danger of stagnation, and the more intense its life element. "anarchism asserts the possibility of an organization without discipline, fear, or punishment, and without the pressure of poverty: a new social organism which will make an end to the terrible struggle for the means of existence,--the savage struggle which undermines the finest qualities in man, and ever widens the social abyss. in short, anarchism strives towards a social organization which will establish well-being for all. "the germ of such an organization can be found in that form of trades unionism which has done away with centralization, bureaucracy, and discipline, and which favors independent and direct action on the part of its members." the very considerable progress of anarchist ideas in america can best be gauged by the remarkable success of the three extensive lecture tours of emma goldman since the amsterdam congress of . each tour extended over new territory, including localities where anarchism had never before received a hearing. but the most gratifying aspect of her untiring efforts is the tremendous sale of anarchist literature, whose propagandist effect cannot be estimated. it was during one of these tours that a remarkable incident happened, strikingly demonstrating the inspiring potentialities of the anarchist idea. in san francisco, in , emma goldman's lecture attracted a soldier of the united states army, william buwalda. for daring to attend an anarchist meeting, the free republic court-martialed buwalda and imprisoned him for one year. thanks to the regenerating power of the new philosophy, the government lost a soldier, but the cause of liberty gained a man. a propagandist of emma goldman's importance is necessarily a sharp thorn to the reaction. she is looked upon as a danger to the continued existence of authoritarian usurpation. no wonder, then, that the enemy resorts to any and all means to make her impossible. a systematic attempt to suppress her activities was organized a year ago by the united police force of the country. but like all previous similar attempts, it failed in a most brilliant manner. energetic protests on the part of the intellectual element of america succeeded in overthrowing the dastardly conspiracy against free speech. another attempt to make emma goldman impossible was essayed by the federal authorities at washington. in order to deprive her of the rights of citizenship, the government revoked the citizenship papers of her husband, whom she had married at the youthful age of eighteen, and whose whereabouts, if he be alive, could not be determined for the last two decades. the great government of the glorious united states did not hesitate to stoop to the most despicable methods to accomplish that achievement. but as her citizenship had never proved of use to emma goldman, she can bear the loss with a light heart. there are personalities who possess such a powerful individuality that by its very force they exert the most potent influence over the best representatives of their time. michael bakunin was such a personality. but for him, richard wagner had never written die kunst und die revolution. emma goldman is a similar personality. she is a strong factor in the socio-political life of america. by virtue of her eloquence, energy, and brilliant mentality, she moulds the minds and hearts of thousands of her auditors. deep sympathy and compassion for suffering humanity, and an inexorable honesty toward herself, are the leading traits of emma goldman. no person, whether friend or foe, shall presume to control her goal or dictate her mode of life. she would perish rather than sacrifice her convictions, or the right of self-ownership of soul and body. respectability could easily forgive the teaching of theoretic anarchism; but emma goldman does not merely preach the new philosophy; she also persists in living it,--and that is the one supreme, unforgivable crime. were she, like so many radicals, to consider her ideal as merely an intellectual ornament; were she to make concessions to existing society and compromise with old prejudices,--then even the most radical views could be pardoned in her. but that she takes her radicalism seriously; that it has permeated her blood and marrow to the extent where she not merely teaches but also practices her convictions--this shocks even the radical mrs. grundy. emma goldman lives her own life; she associates with publicans--hence the indignation of the pharisees and sadducees. it is no mere coincidence that such divergent writers as pietro gori and william marion reedy find similar traits in their characterization of emma goldman. in a contribution to la questione sociale, pietro gori calls her a "moral power, a woman who, with the vision of a sibyl, prophesies the coming of a new kingdom for the oppressed; a woman who, with logic and deep earnestness, analyses the ills of society, and portrays, with artist touch, the coming dawn of humanity, founded on equality, brotherhood, and liberty." william reedy sees in emma goldman the "daughter of the dream, her gospel a vision which is the vision of every truly great-souled man and woman who has ever lived." cowards who fear the consequences of their deeds have coined the word of philosophic anarchism. emma goldman is too sincere, too defiant, to seek safety behind such paltry pleas. she is an anarchist, pure and simple. she represents the idea of anarchism as framed by josiah warrn, proudhon, bakunin, kropotkin, tolstoy. yet she also understands the psychologic causes which induce a caserio, a vaillant, a bresci, a berkman, or a czolgosz to commit deeds of violence. to the soldier in the social struggle it is a point of honor to come in conflict with the powers of darkness and tyranny, and emma goldman is proud to count among her best friends and comrades men and women who bear the wounds and scars received in battle. in the words of voltairine de cleyre, characterizing emma goldman after the latter's imprisonment in : the spirit that animates emma goldman is the only one which will emancipate the slave from his slavery, the tyrant from his tyranny--the spirit which is willing to dare and suffer. hippolyte havel. new york, december, . preface some twenty-one years ago i heard the first great anarchist speaker--the inimitable john most. it seemed to me then, and for many years after, that the spoken word hurled forth among the masses with such wonderful eloquence, such enthusiasm and fire, could never be erased from the human mind and soul. how could any one of all the multitudes who flocked to most's meetings escape his prophetic voice! surely they had but to hear him to throw off their old beliefs, and see the truth and beauty of anarchism! my one great longing then was to be able to speak with the tongue of john most,--that i, too, might thus reach the masses. oh, for the naivety of youth's enthusiasm! it is the time when the hardest thing seems but child's play. it is the only period in life worth while. alas! this period is but of short duration. like spring, the sturm und drang period of the propagandist brings forth growth, frail and delicate, to be matured or killed according to its powers of resistance against a thousand vicissitudes. my great faith in the wonder worker, the spoken word, is no more. i have realized its inadequacy to awaken thought, or even emotion. gradually, and with no small struggle against this realization, i came to see that oral propaganda is at best but a means of shaking people from their lethargy: it leaves no lasting impression. the very fact that most people attend meetings only if aroused by newspaper sensations, or because they expect to be amused, is proof that they really have no inner urge to learn. it is altogether different with the written mode of human expression. no one, unless intensely interested in progressive ideas, will bother with serious books. that leads me to another discovery made after many years of public activity. it is this: all claims of education notwithstanding, the pupil will accept only that which his mind craves. already this truth is recognized by most modern educators in relation to the immature mind. i think it is equally true regarding the adult. anarchists or revolutionists can no more be made than musicians. all that can be done is to plant the seeds of thought. whether something vital will develop depends largely on the fertility of the human soil, though the quality of the intellectual seed must not be overlooked. in meetings the audience is distracted by a thousand non-essentials. the speaker, though ever so eloquent, cannot escape the restlessness of the crowd, with the inevitable result that he will fail to strike root. in all probability he will not even do justice to himself. the relation between the writer and the reader is more intimate. true, books are only what we want them to be; rather, what we read into them. that we can do so demonstrates the importance of written as against oral expression. it is this certainty which has induced me to gather in one volume my ideas on various topics of individual and social importance. they represent the mental and soul struggles of twenty-one years,--the conclusions derived after many changes and inner revisions. i am not sanguine enough to hope that my readers will be as numerous as those who have heard me. but i prefer to reach the few who really want to learn, rather than the many who come to be amused. as to the book, it must speak for itself. explanatory remarks do but detract from the ideas set forth. however, i wish to forestall two objections which will undoubtedly be raised. one is in reference to the essay on anarchism; the other, on minorities versus majorities. "why do you not say how things will be operated under anarchism?" is a question i have had to meet thousands of times. because i believe that anarchism can not consistently impose an iron-clad program or method on the future. the things every new generation has to fight, and which it can least overcome, are the burdens of the past, which holds us all as in a net. anarchism, at least as i understand it, leaves posterity free to develop its own particular systems, in harmony with its needs. our most vivid imagination can not foresee the potentialities of a race set free from external restraints. how, then, can any one assume to map out a line of conduct for those to come? we, who pay dearly for every breath of pure, fresh air, must guard against the tendency to fetter the future. if we succeed in clearing the soil from the rubbish of the past and present, we will leave to posterity the greatest and safest heritage of all ages. the most disheartening tendency common among readers is to tear out one sentence from a work, as a criterion of the writer's ideas or personality. friedrich nietzsche, for instance, is decried as a hater of the weak because he believed in the uebermensch. it does not occur to the shallow interpreters of that giant mind that this vision of the uebermensch also called for a state of society which will not give birth to a race of weaklings and slaves. it is the same narrow attitude which sees in max stirner naught but the apostle of the theory "each for himself, the devil take the hind one." that stirner's individualism contains the greatest social possibilities is utterly ignored. yet, it is nevertheless true that if society is ever to become free, it will be so through liberated individuals, whose free efforts make society. these examples bring me to the objection that will be raised to minorities versus majorities. no doubt, i shall be excommunicated as an enemy of the people, because i repudiate the mass as a creative factor. i shall prefer that rather than be guilty of the demagogic platitudes so commonly in vogue as a bait for the people. i realize the malady of the oppressed and disinherited masses only too well, but i refuse to prescribe the usual ridiculous palliatives which allow the patient neither to die nor to recover. one cannot be too extreme in dealing with social ills; besides, the extreme thing is generally the true thing. my lack of faith in the majority is dictated by my faith in the potentialities of the individual. only when the latter becomes free to choose his associates for a common purpose, can we hope for order and harmony out of this world of chaos and inequality. for the rest, my book must speak for itself. emma goldman anarchism: what it really stands for anarchy. ever reviled, accursed, ne'er understood, thou art the grisly terror of our age. "wreck of all order," cry the multitude, "art thou, and war and murder's endless rage." o, let them cry. to them that ne'er have striven the truth that lies behind a word to find, to them the word's right meaning was not given. they shall continue blind among the blind. but thou, o word, so clear, so strong, so pure, thou sayest all which i for goal have taken. i give thee to the future! thine secure when each at least unto himself shall waken. comes it in sunshine? in the tempest's thrill? i cannot tell--but it the earth shall see! i am an anarchist! wherefore i will not rule, and also ruled i will not be! john henry mackay. the history of human growth and development is at the same time the history of the terrible struggle of every new idea heralding the approach of a brighter dawn. in its tenacious hold on tradition, the old has never hesitated to make use of the foulest and cruelest means to stay the advent of the new, in whatever form or period the latter may have asserted itself. nor need we retrace our steps into the distant past to realize the enormity of opposition, difficulties, and hardships placed in the path of every progressive idea. the rack, the thumbscrew, and the knout are still with us; so are the convict's garb and the social wrath, all conspiring against the spirit that is serenely marching on. anarchism could not hope to escape the fate of all other ideas of innovation. indeed, as the most revolutionary and uncompromising innovator, anarchism must needs meet with the combined ignorance and venom of the world it aims to reconstruct. to deal even remotely with all that is being said and done against anarchism would necessitate the writing of a whole volume. i shall therefore meet only two of the principal objections. in so doing, i shall attempt to elucidate what anarchism really stands for. the strange phenomenon of the opposition to anarchism is that it brings to light the relation between so-called intelligence and ignorance. and yet this is not so very strange when we consider the relativity of all things. the ignorant mass has in its favor that it makes no pretense of knowledge or tolerance. acting, as it always does, by mere impulse, its reasons are like those of a child. "why?" "because." yet the opposition of the uneducated to anarchism deserves the same consideration as that of the intelligent man. what, then, are the objections? first, anarchism is impractical, though a beautiful ideal. second, anarchism stands for violence and destruction, hence it must be repudiated as vile and dangerous. both the intelligent man and the ignorant mass judge not from a thorough knowledge of the subject, but either from hearsay or false interpretation. a practical scheme, says oscar wilde, is either one already in existence, or a scheme that could be carried out under the existing conditions; but it is exactly the existing conditions that one objects to, and any scheme that could accept these conditions is wrong and foolish. the true criterion of the practical, therefore, is not whether the latter can keep intact the wrong or foolish; rather is it whether the scheme has vitality enough to leave the stagnant waters of the old, and build, as well as sustain, new life. in the light of this conception, anarchism is indeed practical. more than any other idea, it is helping to do away with the wrong and foolish; more than any other idea, it is building and sustaining new life. the emotions of the ignorant man are continuously kept at a pitch by the most blood-curdling stories about anarchism. not a thing too outrageous to be employed against this philosophy and its exponents. therefore anarchism represents to the unthinking what the proverbial bad man does to the child,--a black monster bent on swallowing everything; in short, destruction and violence. destruction and violence! how is the ordinary man to know that the most violent element in society is ignorance; that its power of destruction is the very thing anarchism is combating? nor is he aware that anarchism, whose roots, as it were, are part of nature's forces, destroys, not healthful tissue, but parasitic growths that feed on the life's essence of society. it is merely clearing the soil from weeds and sagebrush, that it may eventually bear healthy fruit. someone has said that it requires less mental effort to condemn than to think. the widespread mental indolence, so prevalent in society, proves this to be only too true. rather than to go to the bottom of any given idea, to examine into its origin and meaning, most people will either condemn it altogether, or rely on some superficial or prejudicial definition of non-essentials. anarchism urges man to think, to investigate, to analyze every proposition; but that the brain capacity of the average reader be not taxed too much, i also shall begin with a definition, and then elaborate on the latter. anarchism:--the philosophy of a new social order based on liberty unrestricted by man-made law; the theory that all forms of government rest on violence, and are therefore wrong and harmful, as well as unnecessary. the new social order rests, of course, on the materialistic basis of life; but while all anarchists agree that the main evil today is an economic one, they maintain that the solution of that evil can be brought about only through the consideration of every phase of life,--individual, as well as the collective; the internal, as well as the external phases. a thorough perusal of the history of human development will disclose two elements in bitter conflict with each other; elements that are only now beginning to be understood, not as foreign to each other, but as closely related and truly harmonious, if only placed in proper environment: the individual and social instincts. the individual and society have waged a relentless and bloody battle for ages, each striving for supremacy, because each was blind to the value and importance of the other. the individual and social instincts,--the one a most potent factor for individual endeavor, for growth, aspiration, self-realization; the other an equally potent factor for mutual helpfulness and social well-being. the explanation of the storm raging within the individual, and between him and his surroundings, is not far to seek. the primitive man, unable to understand his being, much less the unity of all life, felt himself absolutely dependent on blind, hidden forces ever ready to mock and taunt him. out of that attitude grew the religious concepts of man as a mere speck of dust dependent on superior powers on high, who can only be appeased by complete surrender. all the early sagas rest on that idea, which continues to be the leit-motif of the biblical tales dealing with the relation of man to god, to the state, to society. again and again the same motif, man is nothing, the powers are everything. thus jehovah would only endure man on condition of complete surrender. man can have all the glories of the earth, but he must not become conscious of himself. the state, society, and moral laws all sing the same refrain: man can have all the glories of the earth, but he must not become conscious of himself. anarchism is the only philosophy which brings to man the consciousness of himself; which maintains that god, the state, and society are non-existent, that their promises are null and void, since they can be fulfilled only through man's subordination. anarchism is therefore the teacher of the unity of life; not merely in nature, but in man. there is no conflict between the individual and the social instincts, any more than there is between the heart and the lungs: the one the receptacle of a precious life essence, the other the repository of the element that keeps the essence pure and strong. the individual is the heart of society, conserving the essence of social life; society is the lungs which are distributing the element to keep the life essence--that is, the individual--pure and strong. "the one thing of value in the world," says emerson, "is the active soul; this every man contains within him. the soul active sees absolute truth and utters truth and creates." in other words, the individual instinct is the thing of value in the world. it is the true soul that sees and creates the truth alive, out of which is to come a still greater truth, the re-born social soul. anarchism is the great liberator of man from the phantoms that have held him captive; it is the arbiter and pacifier of the two forces for individual and social harmony. to accomplish that unity, anarchism has declared war on the pernicious influences which have so far prevented the harmonious blending of individual and social instincts, the individual and society. religion, the dominion of the human mind; property, the dominion of human needs; and government, the dominion of human conduct, represent the stronghold of man's enslavement and all the horrors it entails. religion! how it dominates man's mind, how it humiliates and degrades his soul. god is everything, man is nothing, says religion. but out of that nothing god has created a kingdom so despotic, so tyrannical, so cruel, so terribly exacting that naught but gloom and tears and blood have ruled the world since gods began. anarchism rouses man to rebellion against this black monster. break your mental fetters, says anarchism to man, for not until you think and judge for yourself will you get rid of the dominion of darkness, the greatest obstacle to all progress. property, the dominion of man's needs, the denial of the right to satisfy his needs. time was when property claimed a divine right, when it came to man with the same refrain, even as religion, "sacrifice! abnegate! submit!" the spirit of anarchism has lifted man from his prostrate position. he now stands erect, with his face toward the light. he has learned to see the insatiable, devouring, devastating nature of property, and he is preparing to strike the monster dead. "property is robbery," said the great french anarchist, proudhon. yes, but without risk and danger to the robber. monopolizing the accumulated efforts of man, property has robbed him of his birthright, and has turned him loose a pauper and an outcast. property has not even the time-worn excuse that man does not create enough to satisfy all needs. the a b c student of economics knows that the productivity of labor within the last few decades far exceeds normal demand a hundredfold. but what are normal demands to an abnormal institution? the only demand that property recognizes is its own gluttonous appetite for greater wealth, because wealth means power; the power to subdue, to crush, to exploit, the power to enslave, to outrage, to degrade. america is particularly boastful of her great power, her enormous national wealth. poor america, of what avail is all her wealth, if the individuals comprising the nation are wretchedly poor? if they live in squalor, in filth, in crime, with hope and joy gone, a homeless, soilless army of human prey. it is generally conceded that unless the returns of any business venture exceed the cost, bankruptcy is inevitable. but those engaged in the business of producing wealth have not yet learned even this simple lesson. every year the cost of production in human life is growing larger ( , killed, , wounded in america last year); the returns to the masses, who help to create wealth, are ever getting smaller. yet america continues to be blind to the inevitable bankruptcy of our business of production. nor is this the only crime of the latter. still more fatal is the crime of turning the producer into a mere particle of a machine, with less will and decision than his master of steel and iron. man is being robbed not merely of the products of his labor, but of the power of free initiative, of originality, and the interest in, or desire for, the things he is making. real wealth consists in things of utility and beauty, in things that help to create strong, beautiful bodies and surroundings inspiring to live in. but if man is doomed to wind cotton around a spool, or dig coal, or build roads for thirty years of his life, there can be no talk of wealth. what he gives to the world is only gray and hideous things, reflecting a dull and hideous existence,--too weak to live, too cowardly to die. strange to say, there are people who extol this deadening method of centralized production as the proudest achievement of our age. they fail utterly to realize that if we are to continue in machine subserviency, our slavery is more complete than was our bondage to the king. they do not want to know that centralization is not only the death-knell of liberty, but also of health and beauty, of art and science, all these being impossible in a clock-like, mechanical atmosphere. anarchism cannot but repudiate such a method of production: its goal is the freest possible expression of all the latent powers of the individual. oscar wilde defines a perfect personality as "one who develops under perfect conditions, who is not wounded, maimed, or in danger." a perfect personality, then, is only possible in a state of society where man is free to choose the mode of work, the conditions of work, and the freedom to work. one to whom the making of a table, the building of a house, or the tilling of the soil, is what the painting is to the artist and the discovery to the scientist,--the result of inspiration, of intense longing, and deep interest in work as a creative force. that being the ideal of anarchism, its economic arrangements must consist of voluntary productive and distributive associations, gradually developing into free communism, as the best means of producing with the least waste of human energy. anarchism, however, also recognizes the right of the individual, or numbers of individuals, to arrange at all times for other forms of work, in harmony with their tastes and desires. such free display of human energy being possible only under complete individual and social freedom, anarchism directs its forces against the third and greatest foe of all social equality; namely, the state, organized authority, or statutory law,--the dominion of human conduct. just as religion has fettered the human mind, and as property, or the monopoly of things, has subdued and stifled man's needs, so has the state enslaved his spirit, dictating every phase of conduct. "all government in essence," says emerson, "is tyranny." it matters not whether it is government by divine right or majority rule. in every instance its aim is the absolute subordination of the individual. referring to the american government, the greatest american anarchist, david thoreau, said: "government, what is it but a tradition, though a recent one, endeavoring to transmit itself unimpaired to posterity, but each instance losing its integrity; it has not the vitality and force of a single living man. law never made man a whit more just; and by means of their respect for it, even the well disposed are daily made agents of injustice." indeed, the keynote of government is injustice. with the arrogance and self-sufficiency of the king who could do no wrong, governments ordain, judge, condemn, and punish the most insignificant offenses, while maintaining themselves by the greatest of all offenses, the annihilation of individual liberty. thus ouida is right when she maintains that "the state only aims at instilling those qualities in its public by which its demands are obeyed, and its exchequer is filled. its highest attainment is the reduction of mankind to clockwork. in its atmosphere all those finer and more delicate liberties, which require treatment and spacious expansion, inevitably dry up and perish. the state requires a taxpaying machine in which there is no hitch, an exchequer in which there is never a deficit, and a public, monotonous, obedient, colorless, spiritless, moving humbly like a flock of sheep along a straight high road between two walls." yet even a flock of sheep would resist the chicanery of the state, if it were not for the corruptive, tyrannical, and oppressive methods it employs to serve its purposes. therefore bakunin repudiates the state as synonymous with the surrender of the liberty of the individual or small minorities,--the destruction of social relationship, the curtailment, or complete denial even, of life itself, for its own aggrandizement. the state is the altar of political freedom and, like the religious altar, it is maintained for the purpose of human sacrifice. in fact, there is hardly a modern thinker who does not agree that government, organized authority, or the state, is necessary only to maintain or protect property and monopoly. it has proven efficient in that function only. even george bernard shaw, who hopes for the miraculous from the state under fabianism, nevertheless admits that "it is at present a huge machine for robbing and slave-driving of the poor by brute force." this being the case, it is hard to see why the clever prefacer wishes to uphold the state after poverty shall have ceased to exist. unfortunately there are still a number of people who continue in the fatal belief that government rests on natural laws, that it maintains social order and harmony, that it diminishes crime, and that it prevents the lazy man from fleecing his fellows. i shall therefore examine these contentions. a natural law is that factor in man which asserts itself freely and spontaneously without any external force, in harmony with the requirements of nature. for instance, the demand for nutrition, for sex gratification, for light, air, and exercise, is a natural law. but its expression needs not the machinery of government, needs not the club, the gun, the handcuff, or the prison. to obey such laws, if we may call it obedience, requires only spontaneity and free opportunity. that governments do not maintain themselves through such harmonious factors is proven by the terrible array of violence, force, and coercion all governments use in order to live. thus blackstone is right when he says, "human laws are invalid, because they are contrary to the laws of nature." unless it be the order of warsaw after the slaughter of thousands of people, it is difficult to ascribe to governments any capacity for order or social harmony. order derived through submission and maintained by terror is not much of a safe guaranty; yet that is the only "order" that governments have ever maintained. true social harmony grows naturally out of solidarity of interests. in a society where those who always work never have anything, while those who never work enjoy everything, solidarity of interests is non-existent; hence social harmony is but a myth. the only way organized authority meets this grave situation is by extending still greater privileges to those who have already monopolized the earth, and by still further enslaving the disinherited masses. thus the entire arsenal of government--laws, police, soldiers, the courts, legislatures, prisons,--is strenuously engaged in "harmonizing" the most antagonistic elements in society. the most absurd apology for authority and law is that they serve to diminish crime. aside from the fact that the state is itself the greatest criminal, breaking every written and natural law, stealing in the form of taxes, killing in the form of war and capital punishment, it has come to an absolute standstill in coping with crime. it has failed utterly to destroy or even minimize the horrible scourge of its own creation. crime is naught but misdirected energy. so long as every institution of today, economic, political, social, and moral, conspires to misdirect human energy into wrong channels; so long as most people are out of place doing the things they hate to do, living a life they loathe to live, crime will be inevitable, and all the laws on the statutes can only increase, but never do away with, crime. what does society, as it exists today, know of the process of despair, the poverty, the horrors, the fearful struggle the human soul must pass on its way to crime and degradation. who that knows this terrible process can fail to see the truth in these words of peter kropotkin: "those who will hold the balance between the benefits thus attributed to law and punishment and the degrading effect of the latter on humanity; those who will estimate the torrent of depravity poured abroad in human society by the informer, favored by the judge even, and paid for in clinking cash by governments, under the pretext of aiding to unmask crime; those who will go within prison walls and there see what human beings become when deprived of liberty, when subjected to the care of brutal keepers, to coarse, cruel words, to a thousand stinging, piercing humiliations, will agree with us that the entire apparatus of prison and punishment is an abomination which ought to be brought to an end." the deterrent influence of law on the lazy man is too absurd to merit consideration. if society were only relieved of the waste and expense of keeping a lazy class, and the equally great expense of the paraphernalia of protection this lazy class requires, the social tables would contain an abundance for all, including even the occasional lazy individual. besides, it is well to consider that laziness results either from special privileges, or physical and mental abnormalities. our present insane system of production fosters both, and the most astounding phenomenon is that people should want to work at all now. anarchism aims to strip labor of its deadening, dulling aspect, of its gloom and compulsion. it aims to make work an instrument of joy, of strength, of color, of real harmony, so that the poorest sort of a man should find in work both recreation and hope. to achieve such an arrangement of life, government, with its unjust, arbitrary, repressive measures, must be done away with. at best it has but imposed one single mode of life upon all, without regard to individual and social variations and needs. in destroying government and statutory laws, anarchism proposes to rescue the self-respect and independence of the individual from all restraint and invasion by authority. only in freedom can man grow to his full stature. only in freedom will he learn to think and move, and give the very best in him. only in freedom will he realize the true force of the social bonds which knit men together, and which are the true foundation of a normal social life. but what about human nature? can it be changed? and if not, will it endure under anarchism? poor human nature, what horrible crimes have been committed in thy name! every fool, from king to policeman, from the flatheaded parson to the visionless dabbler in science, presumes to speak authoritatively of human nature. the greater the mental charlatan, the more definite his insistence on the wickedness and weaknesses of human nature. yet, how can any one speak of it today, with every soul in a prison, with every heart fettered, wounded, and maimed? john burroughs has stated that experimental study of animals in captivity is absolutely useless. their character, their habits, their appetites undergo a complete transformation when torn from their soil in field and forest. with human nature caged in a narrow space, whipped daily into submission, how can we speak of its potentialities? freedom, expansion, opportunity, and, above all, peace and repose, alone can teach us the real dominant factors of human nature and all its wonderful possibilities. anarchism, then, really stands for the liberation of the human mind from the dominion of religion; the liberation of the human body from the dominion of property; liberation from the shackles and restraint of government. anarchism stands for a social order based on the free grouping of individuals for the purpose of producing real social wealth; an order that will guarantee to every human being free access to the earth and full enjoyment of the necessities of life, according to individual desires, tastes, and inclinations. this is not a wild fancy or an aberration of the mind. it is the conclusion arrived at by hosts of intellectual men and women the world over; a conclusion resulting from the close and studious observation of the tendencies of modern society: individual liberty and economic equality, the twin forces for the birth of what is fine and true in man. as to methods. anarchism is not, as some may suppose, a theory of the future to be realized through divine inspiration. it is a living force in the affairs of our life, constantly creating new conditions. the methods of anarchism therefore do not comprise an iron-clad program to be carried out under all circumstances. methods must grow out of the economic needs of each place and clime, and of the intellectual and temperamental requirements of the individual. the serene, calm character of a tolstoy will wish different methods for social reconstruction than the intense, overflowing personality of a michael bakunin or a peter kropotkin. equally so it must be apparent that the economic and political needs of russia will dictate more drastic measures than would england or america. anarchism does not stand for military drill and uniformity; it does, however, stand for the spirit of revolt, in whatever form, against everything that hinders human growth. all anarchists agree in that, as they also agree in their opposition to the political machinery as a means of bringing about the great social change. "all voting," says thoreau, "is a sort of gaming, like checkers, or backgammon, a playing with right and wrong; its obligation never exceeds that of expediency. even voting for the right thing is doing nothing for it. a wise man will not leave the right to the mercy of chance, nor wish it to prevail through the power of the majority." a close examination of the machinery of politics and its achievements will bear out the logic of thoreau. what does the history of parliamentarism show? nothing but failure and defeat, not even a single reform to ameliorate the economic and social stress of the people. laws have been passed and enactments made for the improvement and protection of labor. thus it was proven only last year that illinois, with the most rigid laws for mine protection, had the greatest mine disasters. in states where child labor laws prevail, child exploitation is at its highest, and though with us the workers enjoy full political opportunities, capitalism has reached the most brazen zenith. even were the workers able to have their own representatives, for which our good socialist politicians are clamoring, what chances are there for their honesty and good faith? one has but to bear in mind the process of politics to realize that its path of good intentions is full of pitfalls: wire-pulling, intriguing, flattering, lying, cheating; in fact, chicanery of every description, whereby the political aspirant can achieve success. added to that is a complete demoralization of character and conviction, until nothing is left that would make one hope for anything from such a human derelict. time and time again the people were foolish enough to trust, believe, and support with their last farthing aspiring politicians, only to find themselves betrayed and cheated. it may be claimed that men of integrity would not become corrupt in the political grinding mill. perhaps not; but such men would be absolutely helpless to exert the slightest influence in behalf of labor, as indeed has been shown in numerous instances. the state is the economic master of its servants. good men, if such there be, would either remain true to their political faith and lose their economic support, or they would cling to their economic master and be utterly unable to do the slightest good. the political arena leaves one no alternative, one must either be a dunce or a rogue. the political superstition is still holding sway over the hearts and minds of the masses, but the true lovers of liberty will have no more to do with it. instead, they believe with stirner that man has as much liberty as he is willing to take. anarchism therefore stands for direct action, the open defiance of, and resistance to, all laws and restrictions, economic, social, and moral. but defiance and resistance are illegal. therein lies the salvation of man. everything illegal necessitates integrity, self-reliance, and courage. in short, it calls for free, independent spirits, for "men who are men, and who have a bone in their backs which you cannot pass your hand through." universal suffrage itself owes its existence to direct action. if not for the spirit of rebellion, of the defiance on the part of the american revolutionary fathers, their posterity would still wear the king's coat. if not for the direct action of a john brown and his comrades, america would still trade in the flesh of the black man. true, the trade in white flesh is still going on; but that, too, will have to be abolished by direct action. trade-unionism, the economic arena of the modern gladiator, owes its existence to direct action. it is but recently that law and government have attempted to crush the trade-union movement, and condemned the exponents of man's right to organize to prison as conspirators. had they sought to assert their cause through begging, pleading, and compromise, trade-unionism would today be a negligible quantity. in france, in spain, in italy, in russia, nay even in england (witness the growing rebellion of english labor unions) direct, revolutionary, economic action has become so strong a force in the battle for industrial liberty as to make the world realize the tremendous importance of labor's power. the general strike, the supreme expression of the economic consciousness of the workers, was ridiculed in america but a short time ago. today every great strike, in order to win, must realize the importance of the solidaric general protest. direct action, having proven effective along economic lines, is equally potent in the environment of the individual. there a hundred forces encroach upon his being, and only persistent resistance to them will finally set him free. direct action against the authority in the shop, direct action against the authority of the law, direct action against the invasive, meddlesome authority of our moral code, is the logical, consistent method of anarchism. will it not lead to a revolution? indeed, it will. no real social change has ever come about without a revolution. people are either not familiar with their history, or they have not yet learned that revolution is but thought carried into action. anarchism, the great leaven of thought, is today permeating every phase of human endeavor. science, art, literature, the drama, the effort for economic betterment, in fact every individual and social opposition to the existing disorder of things, is illumined by the spiritual light of anarchism. it is the philosophy of the sovereignty of the individual. it is the theory of social harmony. it is the great, surging, living truth that is reconstructing the world, and that will usher in the dawn. minorities versus majorities if i were to give a summary of the tendency of our times, i would say, quantity. the multitude, the mass spirit, dominates everywhere, destroying quality. our entire life--production, politics, and education--rests on quantity, on numbers. the worker who once took pride in the thoroughness and quality of his work, has been replaced by brainless, incompetent automatons, who turn out enormous quantities of things, valueless to themselves, and generally injurious to the rest of mankind. thus quantity, instead of adding to life's comforts and peace, has merely increased man's burden. in politics, naught but quantity counts. in proportion to its increase, however, principles, ideals, justice, and uprightness are completely swamped by the array of numbers. in the struggle for supremacy the various political parties outdo each other in trickery, deceit, cunning, and shady machinations, confident that the one who succeeds is sure to be hailed by the majority as the victor. that is the only god,--success. as to what expense, what terrible cost to character, is of no moment. we have not far to go in search of proof to verify this sad fact. never before did the corruption, the complete rottenness of our government stand so thoroughly exposed; never before were the american people brought face to face with the judas nature of that political body, which has claimed for years to be absolutely beyond reproach, as the mainstay of our institutions, the true protector of the rights and liberties of the people. yet when the crimes of that party became so brazen that even the blind could see them, it needed but to muster up its minions, and its supremacy was assured. thus the very victims, duped, betrayed, outraged a hundred times, decided, not against, but in favor of the victor. bewildered, the few asked how could the majority betray the traditions of american liberty? where was its judgment, its reasoning capacity? that is just it, the majority cannot reason; it has no judgment. lacking utterly in originality and moral courage, the majority has always placed its destiny in the hands of others. incapable of standing responsibilities, it has followed its leaders even unto destruction. dr. stockman was right: "the most dangerous enemies of truth and justice in our midst are the compact majorities, the damned compact majority." without ambition or initiative, the compact mass hates nothing so much as innovation. it has always opposed, condemned, and hounded the innovator, the pioneer of a new truth. the oft repeated slogan of our time is, among all politicians, the socialists included, that ours is an era of individualism, of the minority. only those who do not probe beneath the surface might be led to entertain this view. have not the few accumulated the wealth of the world? are they not the masters, the absolute kings of the situation? their success, however, is due not to individualism, but to the inertia, the cravenness, the utter submission of the mass. the latter wants but to be dominated, to be led, to be coerced. as to individualism, at no time in human history did it have less chance of expression, less opportunity to assert itself in a normal, healthy manner. the individual educator imbued with honesty of purpose, the artist or writer of original ideas, the independent scientist or explorer, the non-compromising pioneers of social changes are daily pushed to the wall by men whose learning and creative ability have become decrepit with age. educators of ferrer's type are nowhere tolerated, while the dietitians of predigested food, a la professors eliot and butler, are the successful perpetuators of an age of nonentities, of automatons. in the literary and dramatic world, the humphrey wards and clyde fitches are the idols of the mass, while but few know or appreciate the beauty and genius of an emerson, thoreau, whitman; an ibsen, a hauptmann, a butler yeats, or a stephen phillips. they are like solitary stars, far beyond the horizon of the multitude. publishers, theatrical managers, and critics ask not for the quality inherent in creative art, but will it meet with a good sale, will it suit the palate of the people? alas, this palate is like a dumping ground; it relishes anything that needs no mental mastication. as a result, the mediocre, the ordinary, the commonplace represents the chief literary output. need i say that in art we are confronted with the same sad facts? one has but to inspect our parks and thoroughfares to realize the hideousness and vulgarity of the art manufacture. certainly, none but a majority taste would tolerate such an outrage on art. false in conception and barbarous in execution, the statuary that infests american cities has as much relation to true art, as a totem to a michael angelo. yet that is the only art that succeeds. the true artistic genius, who will not cater to accepted notions, who exercises originality, and strives to be true to life, leads an obscure and wretched existence. his work may some day become the fad of the mob, but not until his heart's blood had been exhausted; not until the pathfinder has ceased to be, and a throng of an idealless and visionless mob has done to death the heritage of the master. it is said that the artist of today cannot create because prometheus-like he is bound to the rock of economic necessity. this, however, is true of art in all ages. michael angelo was dependent on his patron saint, no less than the sculptor or painter of today, except that the art connoisseurs of those days were far away from the madding crowd. they felt honored to be permitted to worship at the shrine of the master. the art protector of our time knows but one criterion, one value,--the dollar. he is not concerned about the quality of any great work, but in the quantity of dollars his purchase implies. thus the financier in mirbeau's les affaires sont les affaires points to some blurred arrangement in colors, saying "see how great it is; it cost , francs." just like our own parvenues. the fabulous figures paid for their great art discoveries must make up for the poverty of their taste. the most unpardonable sin in society is independence of thought. that this should be so terribly apparent in a country whose symbol is democracy, is very significant of the tremendous power of the majority. wendell phillips said fifty years ago: "in our country of absolute democratic equality, public opinion is not only omnipotent, it is omnipresent. there is no refuge from its tyranny, there is no hiding from its reach, and the result is that if you take the old greek lantern and go about to seek among a hundred, you will not find a single american who has not, or who does not fancy at least he has, something to gain or lose in his ambition, his social life, or business, from the good opinion and the votes of those around him. and the consequence is that instead of being a mass of individuals, each one fearlessly blurting out his own conviction, as a nation compared to other nations we are a mass of cowards. more than any other people we are afraid of each other." evidently we have not advanced very far from the condition that confronted wendell phillips. today, as then, public opinion is the omnipresent tyrant; today, as then, the majority represents a mass of cowards, willing to accept him who mirrors its own soul and mind poverty. that accounts for the unprecedented rise of a man like roosevelt. he embodies the very worst element of mob psychology. a politician, he knows that the majority cares little for ideals or integrity. what it craves is display. it matters not whether that be a dog show, a prize fight, the lynching of a "nigger," the rounding up of some petty offender, the marriage exposition of an heiress, or the acrobatic stunts of an ex-president. the more hideous the mental contortions, the greater the delight and bravos of the mass. thus, poor in ideals and vulgar of soul, roosevelt continues to be the man of the hour. on the other hand, men towering high above such political pygmies, men of refinement, of culture, of ability, are jeered into silence as mollycoddles. it is absurd to claim that ours is the era of individualism. ours is merely a more poignant repetition of the phenomenon of all history: every effort for progress, for enlightenment, for science, for religious, political, and economic liberty, emanates from the minority, and not from the mass. today, as ever, the few are misunderstood, hounded, imprisoned, tortured, and killed. the principle of brotherhood expounded by the agitator of nazareth preserved the germ of life, of truth and justice, so long as it was the beacon light of the few. the moment the majority seized upon it, that great principle became a shibboleth and harbinger of blood and fire, spreading suffering and disaster. the attack on the omnipotence of rome was like a sunrise amid the darkness of the night, only so long as it was made by the colossal figures of a huss, a calvin, or a luther. yet when the mass joined in the procession against the catholic monster, it was no less cruel, no less bloodthirsty than its enemy. woe to the heretics, to the minority, who would not bow to its dicta. after infinite zeal, endurance, and sacrifice, the human mind is at last free from the religious phantom; the minority has gone on in pursuit of new conquests, and the majority is lagging behind, handicapped by truth grown false with age. politically the human race would still be in the most absolute slavery, were it not for the john balls, the wat tylers, the tells, the innumerable individual giants who fought inch by inch against the power of kings and tyrants. but for individual pioneers the world would have never been shaken to its very roots by that tremendous wave, the french revolution. great events are usually preceded by apparently small things. thus the eloquence and fire of camille desmoulins was like the trumpet before jericho, razing to the ground that emblem of torture, of abuse, of horror, the bastille. always, at every period, the few were the banner bearers of a great idea, of liberating effort. not so the mass, the leaden weight of which does not let it move. the truth of this is borne out in russia with greater force than elsewhere. thousands of lives have already been consumed by that bloody regime, yet the monster on the throne is not appeased. how is such a thing possible when ideas, culture, literature, when the deepest and finest emotions groan under the iron yoke? the majority, that compact, immobile, drowsy mass, the russian peasant, after a century of struggle, of sacrifice, of untold misery, still believes that the rope which strangles "the man with the white hands"[ ] brings luck. in the american struggle for liberty, the majority was no less of a stumbling block. until this very day the ideas of jefferson, of patrick henry, of thomas paine, are denied and sold by their posterity. the mass wants none of them. the greatness and courage worshipped in lincoln have been forgotten in the men who created the background for the panorama of that time. the true patron saints of the black men were represented in that handful of fighters in boston, lloyd garrison, wendell phillips, thoreau, margaret fuller, and theodore parker, whose great courage and sturdiness culminated in that somber giant, john brown. their untiring zeal, their eloquence and perseverance undermined the stronghold of the southern lords. lincoln and his minions followed only when abolition had become a practical issue, recognized as such by all. about fifty years ago, a meteor-like idea made its appearance on the social horizon of the world, an idea so far-reaching, so revolutionary, so all-embracing as to spread terror in the hearts of tyrants everywhere. on the other hand, that idea was a harbinger of joy, of cheer, of hope to the millions. the pioneers knew the difficulties in their way, they knew the opposition, the persecution, the hardships that would meet them, but proud and unafraid they started on their march onward, ever onward. now that idea has become a popular slogan. almost everyone is a socialist today: the rich man, as well as his poor victim; the upholders of law and authority, as well as their unfortunate culprits; the freethinker, as well as the perpetuator of religious falsehoods; the fashionable lady, as well as the shirtwaist girl. why not? now that the truth of fifty years ago has become a lie, now that it has been clipped of all its youthful imagination, and been robbed of its vigor, its strength, its revolutionary ideal--why not? now that it is no longer a beautiful vision, but a "practical, workable scheme," resting on the will of the majority, why not? with the same political cunning and shrewdness the mass is petted, pampered, cheated daily. its praise is being sung in many keys: the poor majority, the outraged, the abused, the giant majority, if only it would follow us. who has not heard this litany before? who does not know this never-varying refrain of all politicians? that the mass bleeds, that it is being robbed and exploited, i know as well as our vote-baiters. but i insist that not the handful of parasites, but the mass itself is responsible for this horrible state of affairs. it clings to its masters, loves the whip, and is the first to cry crucify! the moment a protesting voice is raised against the sacredness of capitalistic authority or any other decayed institution. yet how long would authority and private property exist, if not for the willingness of the mass to become soldiers, policemen, jailers, and hangmen. the socialist demagogues know that as well as i, but they maintain the myth of the virtues of the majority, because their very scheme of life means the perpetuation of power. and how could the latter be acquired without numbers? yes, power, authority, coercion, and dependence rest on the mass, but never freedom, never the free unfoldment of the individual, never the birth of a free society. not because i do not feel with the oppressed, the disinherited of the earth; not because i do not know the shame, the horror, the indignity of the lives the people lead, do i repudiate the majority as a creative force for good. oh, no, no! but because i know so well that as a compact mass it has never stood for justice or equality. it has suppressed the human voice, subdued the human spirit, chained the human body. as a mass its aim has always been to make life uniform, gray, and monotonous as the desert. as a mass it will always be the annihilator of individuality, of free initiative, of originality. i therefore believe with emerson that "the masses are crude, lame, pernicious in their demands and influence, and need not to be flattered, but to be schooled. i wish not to concede anything to them, but to drill, divide, and break them up, and draw individuals out of them. masses! the calamity are the masses. i do not wish any mass at all, but honest men only, lovely, sweet, accomplished women only." in other words, the living, vital truth of social and economic well-being will become a reality only through the zeal, courage, the non-compromising determination of intelligent minorities, and not through the mass. [ ] the intellectuals. the psychology of political violence to analyze the psychology of political violence is not only extremely difficult, but also very dangerous. if such acts are treated with understanding, one is immediately accused of eulogizing them. if, on the other hand, human sympathy is expressed with the attentater,[ ] one risks being considered a possible accomplice. yet it is only intelligence and sympathy that can bring us closer to the source of human suffering, and teach us the ultimate way out of it. the primitive man, ignorant of natural forces, dreaded their approach, hiding from the perils they threatened. as man learned to understand nature's phenomena, he realized that though these may destroy life and cause great loss, they also bring relief. to the earnest student it must be apparent that the accumulated forces in our social and economic life, culminating in a political act of violence, are similar to the terrors of the atmosphere, manifested in storm and lightning. to thoroughly appreciate the truth of this view, one must feel intensely the indignity of our social wrongs; one's very being must throb with the pain, the sorrow, the despair millions of people are daily made to endure. indeed, unless we have become a part of humanity, we cannot even faintly understand the just indignation that accumulates in a human soul, the burning, surging passion that makes the storm inevitable. the ignorant mass looks upon the man who makes a violent protest against our social and economic iniquities as upon a wild beast, a cruel, heartless monster, whose joy it is to destroy life and bathe in blood; or at best, as upon an irresponsible lunatic. yet nothing is further from the truth. as a matter of fact, those who have studied the character and personality of these men, or who have come in close contact with them, are agreed that it is their super-sensitiveness to the wrong and injustice surrounding them which compels them to pay the toll of our social crimes. the most noted writers and poets, discussing the psychology of political offenders, have paid them the highest tribute. could anyone assume that these men had advised violence, or even approved of the acts? certainly not. theirs was the attitude of the social student, of the man who knows that beyond every violent act there is a vital cause. bjornstjerne bjornson, in the second part of beyond human power, emphasizes the fact that it is among the anarchists that we must look for the modern martyrs who pay for their faith with their blood, and who welcome death with a smile, because they believe, as truly as christ did, that their martyrdom will redeem humanity. francois coppee, the french novelist, thus expresses himself regarding the psychology of the attentater: "the reading of the details of vaillant's execution left me in a thoughtful mood. i imagined him expanding his chest under the ropes, marching with firm step, stiffening his will, concentrating all his energy, and, with eyes fixed upon the knife, hurling finally at society his cry of malediction. and, in spite of me, another spectacle rose suddenly before my mind. i saw a group of men and women pressing against each other in the middle of the oblong arena of the circus, under the gaze of thousands of eyes, while from all the steps of the immense amphitheatre went up the terrible cry, ad leones! and, below, the opening cages of the wild beasts. "i did not believe the execution would take place. in the first place, no victim had been struck with death, and it had long been the custom not to punish an abortive crime with the last degree of severity. then, this crime, however terrible in intention, was disinterested, born of an abstract idea. the man's past, his abandoned childhood, his life of hardship, pleaded also in his favor. in the independent press generous voices were raised in his behalf, very loud and eloquent. 'a purely literary current of opinion' some have said, with no little scorn. it is, on the contrary, an honor to the men of art and thought to have expressed once more their disgust at the scaffold." again zola, in germinal and paris, describes the tenderness and kindness, the deep sympathy with human suffering, of these men who close the chapter of their lives with a violent outbreak against our system. last, but not least, the man who probably better than anyone else understands the psychology of the attentater is m. hamon, the author of the brilliant work, une psychologie du militaire professionel, who has arrived at these suggestive conclusions: "the positive method confirmed by the rational method enables us to establish an ideal type of anarchist, whose mentality is the aggregate of common psychic characteristics. every anarchist partakes sufficiently of this ideal type to make it possible to differentiate him from other men. the typical anarchist, then, may be defined as follows: a man perceptible by the spirit of revolt under one or more of its forms,--opposition, investigation, criticism, innovation,--endowed with a strong love of liberty, egoistic or individualistic, and possessed of great curiosity, a keen desire to know. these traits are supplemented by an ardent love of others, a highly developed moral sensitiveness, a profound sentiment of justice, and imbued with missionary zeal." to the above characteristics, says alvin f. sanborn, must be added these sterling qualities: a rare love of animals, surpassing sweetness in all the ordinary relations of life, exceptional sobriety of demeanor, frugality and regularity, austerity, even, of living, and courage beyond compare.[ ] "there is a truism that the man in the street seems always to forget, when he is abusing the anarchists, or whatever party happens to be his bete noire for the moment, as the cause of some outrage just perpetrated. this indisputable fact is that homicidal outrages have, from time immemorial, been the reply of goaded and desperate classes, and goaded and desperate individuals, to wrongs from their fellowmen, which they felt to be intolerable. such acts are the violent recoil from violence, whether aggressive or repressive; they are the last desperate struggle of outraged and exasperated human nature for breathing space and life. and their cause lies not in any special conviction, but in the depths of that human nature itself. the whole course of history, political and social, is strewn with evidence of this fact. to go no further, take the three most notorious examples of political parties goaded into violence during the last fifty years: the mazzinians in italy, the fenians in ireland, and the terrorists in russia. were these people anarchists? no. did they all three even hold the same political opinions? no. the mazzinians were republicans, the fenians political separatists, the russians social democrats or constitutionalists. but all were driven by desperate circumstances into this terrible form of revolt. and when we turn from parties to individuals who have acted in like manner, we stand appalled by the number of human beings goaded and driven by sheer desperation into conduct obviously violently opposed to their social instincts. "now that anarchism has become a living force in society, such deeds have been sometimes committed by anarchists, as well as by others. for no new faith, even the most essentially peaceable and humane the mind of man has yet accepted, but at its first coming has brought upon earth not peace, but a sword; not because of anything violent or anti-social in the doctrine itself; simply because of the ferment any new and creative idea excites in men's minds, whether they accept or reject it. and a conception of anarchism, which, on one hand, threatens every vested interest, and, on the other, holds out a vision of a free and noble life to be won by a struggle against existing wrongs, is certain to rouse the fiercest opposition, and bring the whole repressive force of ancient evil into violent contact with the tumultuous outburst of a new hope. "under miserable conditions of life, any vision of the possibility of better things makes the present misery more intolerable, and spurs those who suffer to the most energetic struggles to improve their lot, and if these struggles only immediately result in sharper misery, the outcome is sheer desperation. in our present society, for instance, an exploited wage worker, who catches a glimpse of what work and life might and ought to be, finds the toilsome routine and the squalor of his existence almost intolerable; and even when he has the resolution and courage to continue steadily working his best, and waiting until new ideas have so permeated society as to pave the way for better times, the mere fact that he has such ideas and tries to spread them, brings him into difficulties with his employers. how many thousands of socialists, and above all anarchists, have lost work and even the chance of work, solely on the ground of their opinions. it is only the specially gifted craftsman, who, if he be a zealous propagandist, can hope to retain permanent employment. and what happens to a man with his brain working actively with a ferment of new ideas, with a vision before his eyes of a new hope dawning for toiling and agonizing men, with the knowledge that his suffering and that of his fellows in misery is not caused by the cruelty of fate, but by the injustice of other human beings,--what happens to such a man when he sees those dear to him starving, when he himself is starved? some natures in such a plight, and those by no means the least social or the least sensitive, will become violent, and will even feel that their violence is social and not anti-social, that in striking when and how they can, they are striking, not for themselves, but for human nature, outraged and despoiled in their persons and in those of their fellow sufferers. and are we, who ourselves are not in this horrible predicament, to stand by and coldly condemn these piteous victims of the furies and fates? are we to decry as miscreants these human beings who act with heroic self-devotion, sacrificing their lives in protest, where less social and less energetic natures would lie down and grovel in abject submission to injustice and wrong? are we to join the ignorant and brutal outcry which stigmatizes such men as monsters of wickedness, gratuitously running amuck in a harmonious and innocently peaceful society? no! we hate murder with a hatred that may seem absurdly exaggerated to apologists for matabele massacres, to callous acquiescers in hangings and bombardments, but we decline in such cases of homicide, or attempted homicide, as those of which we are treating, to be guilty of the cruel injustice of flinging the whole responsibility of the deed upon the immediate perpetrator. the guilt of these homicides lies upon every man and woman who, intentionally or by cold indifference, helps to keep up social conditions that drive human beings to despair. the man who flings his whole life into the attempt, at the cost of his own life, to protest against the wrongs of his fellow men, is a saint compared to the active and passive upholders of cruelty and injustice, even if his protest destroy other lives besides his own. let him who is without sin in society cast the first stone at such an one."[ ] that every act of political violence should nowadays be attributed to anarchists is not at all surprising. yet it is a fact known to almost everyone familiar with the anarchist movement that a great number of acts, for which anarchists had to suffer, either originated with the capitalist press or were instigated, if not directly perpetrated, by the police. for a number of years acts of violence had been committed in spain, for which the anarchists were held responsible, hounded like wild beasts, and thrown into prison. later it was disclosed that the perpetrators of these acts were not anarchists, but members of the police department. the scandal became so widespread that the conservative spanish papers demanded the apprehension and punishment of the gang-leader, juan rull, who was subsequently condemned to death and executed. the sensational evidence, brought to light during the trial, forced police inspector momento to exonerate completely the anarchists from any connection with the acts committed during a long period. this resulted in the dismissal of a number of police officials, among them inspector tressols, who, in revenge, disclosed the fact that behind the gang of police bomb throwers were others of far higher position, who provided them with funds and protected them. this is one of the many striking examples of how anarchist conspiracies are manufactured. that the american police can perjure themselves with the same ease, that they are just as merciless, just as brutal and cunning as their european colleagues, has been proven on more than one occasion. we need only recall the tragedy of the eleventh of november, , known as the haymarket riot. no one who is at all familiar with the case can possibly doubt that the anarchists, judicially murdered in chicago, died as victims of a lying, bloodthirsty press and of a cruel police conspiracy. has not judge gary himself said: "not because you have caused the haymarket bomb, but because you are anarchists, you are on trial." the impartial and thorough analysis by governor altgeld of that blotch on the american escutcheon verified the brutal frankness of judge gary. it was this that induced altgeld to pardon the three anarchists, thereby earning the lasting esteem of every liberty loving man and woman in the world. when we approach the tragedy of september sixth, , we are confronted by one of the most striking examples of how little social theories are responsible for an act of political violence. "leon czolgosz, an anarchist, incited to commit the act by emma goldman." to be sure, has she not incited violence even before her birth, and will she not continue to do so beyond death? everything is possible with the anarchists. today, even, nine years after the tragedy, after it was proven a hundred times that emma goldman had nothing to do with the event, that no evidence whatsoever exists to indicate that czolgosz ever called himself an anarchist, we are confronted with the same lie, fabricated by the police and perpetuated by the press. no living soul ever heard czolgosz make that statement, nor is there a single written word to prove that the boy ever breathed the accusation. nothing but ignorance and insane hysteria, which have never yet been able to solve the simplest problem of cause and effect. the president of a free republic killed! what else can be the cause, except that the attentater must have been insane, or that he was incited to the act. a free republic! how a myth will maintain itself, how it will continue to deceive, to dupe, and blind even the comparatively intelligent to its monstrous absurdities. a free republic! and yet within a little over thirty years a small band of parasites have successfully robbed the american people, and trampled upon the fundamental principles, laid down by the fathers of this country, guaranteeing to every man, woman, and child "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." for thirty years they have been increasing their wealth and power at the expense of the vast mass of workers, thereby enlarging the army of the unemployed, the hungry, homeless, and friendless portion of humanity, who are tramping the country from east to west, from north to south, in a vain search for work. for many years the home has been left to the care of the little ones, while the parents are exhausting their life and strength for a mere pittance. for thirty years the sturdy sons of america have been sacrificed on the battlefield of industrial war, and the daughters outraged in corrupt factory surroundings. for long and weary years this process of undermining the nation's health, vigor, and pride, without much protest from the disinherited and oppressed, has been going on. maddened by success and victory, the money powers of this "free land of ours" became more and more audacious in their heartless, cruel efforts to compete with the rotten and decayed european tyrannies for supremacy of power. in vain did a lying press repudiate leon czolgosz as a foreigner. the boy was a product of our own free american soil, that lulled him to sleep with, my country, 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty. who can tell how many times this american child had gloried in the celebration of the fourth of july, or of decoration day, when he faithfully honored the nation's dead? who knows but that he, too, was willing to "fight for his country and die for her liberty," until it dawned upon him that those he belonged to have no country, because they have been robbed of all that they have produced; until he realized that the liberty and independence of his youthful dreams were but a farce. poor leon czolgosz, your crime consisted of too sensitive a social consciousness. unlike your idealless and brainless american brothers, your ideals soared above the belly and the bank account. no wonder you impressed the one human being among all the infuriated mob at your trial--a newspaper woman--as a visionary, totally oblivious to your surroundings. your large, dreamy eyes must have beheld a new and glorious dawn. now, to a recent instance of police-manufactured anarchist plots. in that bloodstained city, chicago, the life of chief of police shippy was attempted by a young man named averbuch. immediately the cry was sent to the four corners of the world that averbuch was an anarchist, and that anarchists were responsible for the act. everyone who was at all known to entertain anarchist ideas was closely watched, a number of people arrested, the library of an anarchist group confiscated, and all meetings made impossible. it goes without saying that, as on various previous occasions, i must needs be held responsible for the act. evidently the american police credit me with occult powers. i did not know averbuch; in fact, had never before heard his name, and the only way i could have possibly "conspired" with him was in my astral body. but, then, the police are not concerned with logic or justice. what they seek is a target, to mask their absolute ignorance of the cause, of the psychology of a political act. was averbuch an anarchist? there is no positive proof of it. he had been but three months in the country, did not know the language, and, as far as i could ascertain, was quite unknown to the anarchists of chicago. what led to his act? averbuch, like most young russian immigrants, undoubtedly believed in the mythical liberty of america. he received his first baptism by the policeman's club during the brutal dispersement of the unemployed parade. he further experienced american equality and opportunity in the vain efforts to find an economic master. in short, a three months' sojourn in the glorious land brought him face to face with the fact that the disinherited are in the same position the world over. in his native land he probably learned that necessity knows no law--there was no difference between a russian and an american policeman. the question to the intelligent social student is not whether the acts of czolgosz or averbuch were practical, any more than whether the thunderstorm is practical. the thing that will inevitably impress itself on the thinking and feeling man and woman is that the sight of brutal clubbing of innocent victims in a so-called free republic, and the degrading, soul-destroying economic struggle, furnish the spark that kindles the dynamic force in the overwrought, outraged souls of men like czolgosz or averbuch. no amount of persecution, of hounding, of repression, can stay this social phenomenon. but, it is often asked, have not acknowledged anarchists committed acts of violence? certainly they have, always however ready to shoulder the responsibility. my contention is that they were impelled, not by the teachings of anarchism, but by the tremendous pressure of conditions, making life unbearable to their sensitive natures. obviously, anarchism, or any other social theory, making man a conscious social unit, will act as a leaven for rebellion. this is not a mere assertion, but a fact verified by all experience. a close examination of the circumstances bearing upon this question will further clarify my position. let us consider some of the most important anarchist acts within the last two decades. strange as it may seem, one of the most significant deeds of political violence occurred here in america, in connection with the homestead strike of . during that memorable time the carnegie steel company organized a conspiracy to crush the amalgamated association of iron and steel workers. henry clay frick, then chairman of the company, was intrusted with that democratic task. he lost no time in carrying out the policy of breaking the union, the policy which he had so successfully practiced during his reign of terror in the coke regions. secretly, and while peace negotiations were being purposely prolonged, frick supervised the military preparations, the fortification of the homestead steel works, the erection of a high board fence, capped with barbed wire and provided with loopholes for sharpshooters. and then, in the dead of night, he attempted to smuggle his army of hired pinkerton thugs into homestead, which act precipitated the terrible carnage of the steel workers. not content with the death of eleven victims, killed in the pinkerton skirmish, henry clay frick, good christian and free american, straightway began the hounding down of the helpless wives and orphans, by ordering them out of the wretched company houses. the whole country was aroused over these inhuman outrages. hundreds of voices were raised in protest, calling on frick to desist, not to go too far. yes, hundreds of people protested,--as one objects to annoying flies. only one there was who actively responded to the outrage at homestead,--alexander berkman. yes, he was an anarchist. he gloried in that fact, because it was the only force that made the discord between his spiritual longing and the world without at all bearable. yet not anarchism, as such, but the brutal slaughter of the eleven steel workers was the urge for alexander berkman's act, his attempt on the life of henry clay frick. the record of european acts of political violence affords numerous and striking instances of the influence of environment upon sensitive human beings. the court speech of vaillant, who, in , exploded a bomb in the paris chamber of deputies, strikes the true keynote of the psychology of such acts: "gentlemen, in a few minutes you are to deal your blow, but in receiving your verdict i shall have at least the satisfaction of having wounded the existing society, that cursed society in which one may see a single man spending, uselessly, enough to feed thousands of families; an infamous society which permits a few individuals to monopolize all the social wealth, while there are hundreds of thousands of unfortunates who have not even the bread that is not refused to dogs, and while entire families are committing suicide for want of the necessities of life. "ah, gentlemen, if the governing classes could go down among the unfortunates! but no, they prefer to remain deaf to their appeals. it seems that a fatality impels them, like the royalty of the eighteenth century, toward the precipice which will engulf them, for woe be to those who remain deaf to the cries of the starving, woe to those who, believing themselves of superior essence, assume the right to exploit those beneath them! there comes a time when the people no longer reason; they rise like a hurricane, and pass away like a torrent. then we see bleeding heads impaled on pikes. "among the exploited, gentlemen, there are two classes of individuals: those of one class, not realizing what they are and what they might be, take life as it comes, believe that they are born to be slaves, and content themselves with the little that is given them in exchange for their labor. but there are others, on the contrary, who think, who study, and who, looking about them, discover social iniquities. is it their fault if they see clearly and suffer at seeing others suffer? then they throw themselves into the struggle, and make themselves the bearers of the popular claims. "gentlemen, i am one of these last. wherever i have gone, i have seen unfortunates bent beneath the yoke of capital. everywhere i have seen the same wounds causing tears of blood to flow, even in the remoter parts of the inhabited districts of south america, where i had the right to believe that he who was weary of the pains of civilization might rest in the shade of the palm trees and there study nature. well, there even, more than elsewhere, i have seen capital come, like a vampire, to suck the last drop of blood of the unfortunate pariahs. "then i came back to france, where it was reserved for me to see my family suffer atrociously. this was the last drop in the cup of my sorrow. tired of leading this life of suffering and cowardice, i carried this bomb to those who are primarily responsible for social sufferings. "i am reproached with the wounds of those who were hit by my projectiles. permit me to point out in passing that, if the bourgeois had not massacred or caused massacres during the revolution, it is probable that they would still be under the yoke of the nobility. on the other hand, figure up the dead and wounded on tonquin, madagascar, dahomey, adding thereto the thousands, yes, millions of unfortunates who die in the factories, the mines, and wherever the grinding power of capital is felt. add also those who die of hunger, and all this with the assent of our deputies. beside all this, of how little weight are the reproaches now brought against me! "it is true that one does not efface the other; but, after all, are we not acting on the defensive when we respond to the blows which we receive from above? i know very well that i shall be told that i ought to have confined myself to speech for the vindication of the people's claims. but what can you expect! it takes a loud voice to make the deaf hear. too long have they answered our voices by imprisonment, the rope, rifle volleys. make no mistake; the explosion of my bomb is not only the cry of the rebel vaillant, but the cry of an entire class which vindicates its rights, and which will soon add acts to words. for, be sure of it, in vain will they pass laws. the ideas of the thinkers will not halt; just as, in the last century, all the governmental forces could not prevent the diderots and the voltaires from spreading emancipating ideas among the people, so all the existing governmental forces will not prevent the reclus, the darwins, the spencers, the ibsens, the mirbeaus, from spreading the ideas of justice and liberty which will annihilate the prejudices that hold the mass in ignorance. and these ideas, welcomed by the unfortunate, will flower in acts of revolt as they have done in me, until the day when the disappearance of authority shall permit all men to organize freely according to their choice, when we shall each be able to enjoy the product of his labor, and when those moral maladies called prejudices shall vanish, permitting human beings to live in harmony, having no other desire than to study the sciences and love their fellows. "i conclude, gentlemen, by saying that a society in which one sees such social inequalities as we see all about us, in which we see every day suicides caused by poverty, prostitution flaring at every street corner,--a society whose principal monuments are barracks and prisons,--such a society must be transformed as soon as possible, on pain of being eliminated, and that speedily, from the human race. hail to him who labors, by no matter what means, for this transformation! it is this idea that has guided me in my duel with authority, but as in this duel i have only wounded my adversary, it is now its turn to strike me. "now, gentlemen, to me it matters little what penalty you may inflict, for, looking at this assembly with the eyes of reason, i can not help smiling to see you, atoms lost in matter, and reasoning only because you possess a prolongation of the spinal marrow, assume the right to judge one of your fellows. "ah! gentlemen, how little a thing is your assembly and your verdict in the history of humanity; and human history, in its turn, is likewise a very little thing in the whirlwind which bears it through immensity, and which is destined to disappear, or at least to be transformed, in order to begin again the same history and the same facts, a veritably perpetual play of cosmic forces renewing and transferring themselves forever." will anyone say that vaillant was an ignorant, vicious man, or a lunatic? was not his mind singularly clear, analytic? no wonder that the best intellectual forces of france spoke in his behalf, and signed the petition to president carnot, asking him to commute vaillant's death sentence. carnot would listen to no entreaty; he insisted on more than a pound of flesh, he wanted vaillant's life, and then--the inevitable happened: president carnot was killed. on the handle of the stiletto used by the attentater was engraved, significantly, vaillant! santa caserio was an anarchist. he could have gotten away, saved himself; but he remained, he stood the consequences. his reasons for the act are set forth in so simple, dignified, and childlike manner that one is reminded of the touching tribute paid caserio by his teacher of the little village school, ada negri, the italian poet, who spoke of him as a sweet, tender plant, of too fine and sensitive texture to stand the cruel strain of the world. "gentlemen of the jury! i do not propose to make a defense, but only an explanation of my deed. "since my early youth i began to learn that present society is badly organized, so badly that every day many wretched men commit suicide, leaving women and children in the most terrible distress. workers, by thousands, seek for work and can not find it. poor families beg for food and shiver with cold; they suffer the greatest misery; the little ones ask their miserable mothers for food, and the mothers can not give them, because they have nothing. the few things which the home contained have already been sold or pawned. all they can do is beg alms; often they are arrested as vagabonds. "i went away from my native place because i was frequently moved to tears at seeing little girls of eight or ten years obliged to work fifteen hours a day for the paltry pay of twenty centimes. young women of eighteen or twenty also work fifteen hours daily, for a mockery of remuneration. and that happens not only to my fellow countrymen, but to all the workers, who sweat the whole day long for a crust of bread, while their labor produces wealth in abundance. the workers are obliged to live under the most wretched conditions, and their food consists of a little bread, a few spoonfuls of rice, and water; so by the time they are thirty or forty years old, they are exhausted, and go to die in the hospitals. besides, in consequence of bad food and overwork, these unhappy creatures are, by hundreds, devoured by pellagra--a disease that, in my country, attacks, as the physicians say, those who are badly fed and lead a life of toil and privation. "i have observed that there are a great many people who are hungry, and many children who suffer, whilst bread and clothes abound in the towns. i saw many and large shops full of clothing and woolen stuffs, and i also saw warehouses full of wheat and indian corn, suitable for those who are in want. and, on the other hand, i saw thousands of people who do not work, who produce nothing and live on the labor of others; who spend every day thousands of francs for their amusement; who debauch the daughters of the workers; who own dwellings of forty or fifty rooms; twenty or thirty horses, many servants; in a word, all the pleasures of life. "i believed in god; but when i saw so great an inequality between men, i acknowledged that it was not god who created man, but man who created god. and i discovered that those who want their property to be respected, have an interest in preaching the existence of paradise and hell, and in keeping the people in ignorance. "not long ago, vaillant threw a bomb in the chamber of deputies, to protest against the present system of society. he killed no one, only wounded some persons; yet bourgeois justice sentenced him to death. and not satisfied with the condemnation of the guilty man, they began to pursue the anarchists, and arrest not only those who had known vaillant, but even those who had merely been present at any anarchist lecture. "the government did not think of their wives and children. it did not consider that the men kept in prison were not the only ones who suffered, and that their little ones cried for bread. bourgeois justice did not trouble itself about these innocent ones, who do not yet know what society is. it is no fault of theirs that their fathers are in prison; they only want to eat. "the government went on searching private houses, opening private letters, forbidding lectures and meetings, and practicing the most infamous oppressions against us. even now, hundreds of anarchists are arrested for having written an article in a newspaper, or for having expressed an opinion in public. "gentlemen of the jury, you are representatives of bourgeois society. if you want my head, take it; but do not believe that in so doing you will stop the anarchist propaganda. take care, for men reap what they have sown." during a religious procession in , at barcelona, a bomb was thrown. immediately three hundred men and women were arrested. some were anarchists, but the majority were trade unionists and socialists. they were thrown into that terrible bastille, montjuich, and subjected to most horrible tortures. after a number had been killed, or had gone insane, their cases were taken up by the liberal press of europe, resulting in the release of a few survivors. the man primarily responsible for this revival of the inquisition was canovas del castillo, prime minister of spain. it was he who ordered the torturing of the victims, their flesh burned, their bones crushed, their tongues cut out. practiced in the art of brutality during his regime in cuba, canovas remained absolutely deaf to the appeals and protests of the awakened civilized conscience. in canovas del castillo was shot to death by a young italian, angiolillo. the latter was an editor in his native land, and his bold utterances soon attracted the attention of the authorities. persecution began, and angiolillo fled from italy to spain, thence to france and belgium, finally settling in england. while there he found employment as a compositor, and immediately became the friend of all his colleagues. one of the latter thus described angiolillo: "his appearance suggested the journalist rather than the disciple of guttenberg. his delicate hands, moreover, betrayed the fact that he had not grown up at the 'case.' with his handsome frank face, his soft dark hair, his alert expression, he looked the very type of the vivacious southerner. angiolillo spoke italian, spanish, and french, but no english; the little french i knew was not sufficient to carry on a prolonged conversation. however, angiolillo soon began to acquire the english idiom; he learned rapidly, playfully, and it was not long until he became very popular with his fellow compositors. his distinguished and yet modest manner, and his consideration towards his colleagues, won him the hearts of all the boys." angiolillo soon became familiar with the detailed accounts in the press. he read of the great wave of human sympathy with the helpless victims at montjuich. on trafalgar square he saw with his own eyes the results of those atrocities, when the few spaniards, who escaped castillo's clutches, came to seek asylum in england. there, at the great meeting, these men opened their shirts and showed the horrible scars of burned flesh. angiolillo saw, and the effect surpassed a thousand theories; the impetus was beyond words, beyond arguments, beyond himself even. senor antonio canovas del castillo, prime minister of spain, sojourned at santa agueda. as usual in such cases, all strangers were kept away from his exalted presence. one exception was made, however, in the case of a distinguished looking, elegantly dressed italian--the representative, it was understood, of an important journal. the distinguished gentleman was--angiolillo. senor canovas, about to leave his house, stepped on the veranda. suddenly angiolillo confronted him. a shot rang out, and canovas was a corpse. the wife of the prime minister rushed upon the scene. "murderer! murderer!" she cried, pointing at angiolillo. the latter bowed. "pardon, madame," he said, "i respect you as a lady, but i regret that you were the wife of that man." calmly angiolillo faced death. death in its most terrible form--for the man whose soul was as a child's. he was garroted. his body lay, sun-kissed, till the day hid in twilight. and the people came, and pointing the finger of terror and fear, they said: "there--the criminal--the cruel murderer." how stupid, how cruel is ignorance! it misunderstands always, condemns always. a remarkable parallel to the case of angiolillo is to be found in the act of gaetano bresci, whose attentat upon king umberto made an american city famous. bresci came to this country, this land of opportunity, where one has but to try to meet with golden success. yes, he too would try to succeed. he would work hard and faithfully. work had no terrors for him, if it would only help him to independence, manhood, self-respect. thus full of hope and enthusiasm he settled in paterson, new jersey, and there found a lucrative job at six dollars per week in one of the weaving mills of the town. six whole dollars per week was, no doubt, a fortune for italy, but not enough to breathe on in the new country. he loved his little home. he was a good husband and devoted father to his bambina, bianca, whom he adored. he worked and worked for a number of years. he actually managed to save one hundred dollars out of his six dollars per week. bresci had an ideal. foolish, i know, for a workingman to have an ideal,--the anarchist paper published in paterson, la questione sociale. every week, though tired from work, he would help to set up the paper. until later hours he would assist, and when the little pioneer had exhausted all resources and his comrades were in despair, bresci brought cheer and hope, one hundred dollars, the entire savings of years. that would keep the paper afloat. in his native land people were starving. the crops had been poor, and the peasants saw themselves face to face with famine. they appealed to their good king umberto; he would help. and he did. the wives of the peasants who had gone to the palace of the king, held up in mute silence their emaciated infants. surely that would move him. and then the soldiers fired and killed those poor fools. bresci, at work in the weaving mill at paterson, read of the horrible massacre. his mental eye beheld the defenceless women and innocent infants of his native land, slaughtered right before the good king. his soul recoiled in horror. at night he heard the groans of the wounded. some may have been his comrades, his own flesh. why, why these foul murders? the little meeting of the italian anarchist group in paterson ended almost in a fight. bresci had demanded his hundred dollars. his comrades begged, implored him to give them a respite. the paper would go down if they were to return him his loan. but bresci insisted on its return. how cruel and stupid is ignorance. bresci got the money, but lost the good will, the confidence of his comrades. they would have nothing more to do with one whose greed was greater than his ideals. on the twenty-ninth of july, , king umberto was shot at monzo. the young italian weaver of paterson, gaetano bresci, had taken the life of the good king. paterson was placed under police surveillance, everyone known as an anarchist hounded and persecuted, and the act of bresci ascribed to the teachings of anarchism. as if the teachings of anarchism in its extremest form could equal the force of those slain women and infants, who had pilgrimed to the king for aid. as if any spoken word, ever so eloquent, could burn into a human soul with such white heat as the life blood trickling drop by drop from those dying forms. the ordinary man is rarely moved either by word or deed; and those whose social kinship is the greatest living force need no appeal to respond--even as does steel to the magnet--to the wrongs and horrors of society. if a social theory is a strong factor inducing acts of political violence, how are we to account for the recent violent outbreaks in india, where anarchism has hardly been born. more than any other old philosophy, hindu teachings have exalted passive resistance, the drifting of life, the nirvana, as the highest spiritual ideal. yet the social unrest in india is daily growing, and has only recently resulted in an act of political violence, the killing of sir curzon wyllie by the hindu, madar sol dhingra. if such a phenomenon can occur in a country socially and individually permeated for centuries with the spirit of passivity, can one question the tremendous, revolutionizing effect on human character exerted by great social iniquities? can one doubt the logic, the justice of these words: "repression, tyranny, and indiscriminate punishment of innocent men have been the watchwords of the government of the alien domination in india ever since we began the commercial boycott of english goods. the tiger qualities of the british are much in evidence now in india. they think that by the strength of the sword they will keep down india! it is this arrogance that has brought about the bomb, and the more they tyrannize over a helpless and unarmed people, the more terrorism will grow. we may deprecate terrorism as outlandish and foreign to our culture, but it is inevitable as long as this tyranny continues, for it is not the terrorists that are to be blamed, but the tyrants who are responsible for it. it is the only resource for a helpless and unarmed people when brought to the verge of despair. it is never criminal on their part. the crime lies with the tyrant."[ ] even conservative scientists are beginning to realize that heredity is not the sole factor moulding human character. climate, food, occupation; nay, color, light, and sound must be considered in the study of human psychology. if that be true, how much more correct is the contention that great social abuses will and must influence different minds and temperaments in a different way. and how utterly fallacious the stereotyped notion that the teachings of anarchism, or certain exponents of these teachings, are responsible for the acts of political violence. anarchism, more than any other social theory, values human life above things. all anarchists agree with tolstoy in this fundamental truth: if the production of any commodity necessitates the sacrifice of human life, society should do without that commodity, but it can not do without that life. that, however, nowise indicates that anarchism teaches submission. how can it, when it knows that all suffering, all misery, all ills, result from the evil of submission? has not some american ancestor said, many years ago, that resistance to tyranny is obedience to god? and he was not an anarchist even. i would say that resistance to tyranny is man's highest ideal. so long as tyranny exists, in whatever form, man's deepest aspiration must resist it as inevitably as man must breathe. compared with the wholesale violence of capital and government, political acts of violence are but a drop in the ocean. that so few resist is the strongest proof how terrible must be the conflict between their souls and unbearable social iniquities. high strung, like a violin string, they weep and moan for life, so relentless, so cruel, so terribly inhuman. in a desperate moment the string breaks. untuned ears hear nothing but discord. but those who feel the agonized cry understand its harmony; they hear in it the fulfillment of the most compelling moment of human nature. such is the psychology of political violence. [ ] a revolutionist committing an act of political violence. [ ] paris and the social revolution. [ ] from a pamphlet issued by the freedom group of london. [ ] the free hindustan. prisons: a social crime and failure in , feodor dostoyevsky wrote on the wall of his prison cell the following story of the priest and the devil: "'hello, you little fat father!' the devil said to the priest. 'what made you lie so to those poor, misled people? what tortures of hell did you depict? don't you know they are already suffering the tortures of hell in their earthly lives? don't you know that you and the authorities of the state are my representatives on earth? it is you that make them suffer the pains of hell with which you threaten them. don't you know this? well, then, come with me!' "the devil grabbed the priest by the collar, lifted him high in the air, and carried him to a factory, to an iron foundry. he saw the workmen there running and hurrying to and fro, and toiling in the scorching heat. very soon the thick, heavy air and the heat are too much for the priest. with tears in his eyes, he pleads with the devil: 'let me go! let me leave this hell!' "'oh, my dear friend, i must show you many more places.' the devil gets hold of him again and drags him off to a farm. there he sees workmen threshing the grain. the dust and heat are insufferable. the overseer carries a knout, and unmercifully beats anyone who falls to the ground overcome by hard toil or hunger. "next the priest is taken to the huts where these same workers live with their families--dirty, cold, smoky, ill-smelling holes. the devil grins. he points out the poverty and hardships which are at home here. "'well, isn't this enough?' he asks. and it seems as if even he, the devil, pities the people. the pious servant of god can hardly bear it. with uplifted hands he begs: 'let me go away from here. yes, yes! this is hell on earth!' "'well, then, you see. and you still promise them another hell. you torment them, torture them to death mentally when they are already all but dead physically! come on! i will show you one more hell--one more, the very worst.' "he took him to a prison and showed him a dungeon, with its foul air and the many human forms, robbed of all health and energy, lying on the floor, covered with vermin that were devouring their poor, naked, emaciated bodies. "'take off your silken clothes,' said the devil to the priest, 'put on your ankles heavy chains such as these unfortunates wear; lie down on the cold and filthy floor--and then talk to them about a hell that still awaits them!' "'no, no!' answered the priest, 'i cannot think of anything more dreadful than this. i entreat you, let me go away from here!' "'yes, this is hell. there can be no worse hell than this. did you not know it? did you not know that these men and women whom you are frightening with the picture of a hell hereafter--did you not know that they are in hell right here, before they die?'" this was written fifty years ago in dark russia, on the wall of one of the most horrible prisons. yet who can deny that the same applies with equal force to the present time, even to american prisons? with all our boasted reforms, our great social changes, and our far-reaching discoveries, human beings continue to be sent to the worst of hells, wherein they are outraged, degraded, and tortured, that society may be "protected" from the phantoms of its own making. prison, a social protection? what monstrous mind ever conceived such an idea? just as well say that health can be promoted by a widespread contagion. after eighteen months of horror in an english prison, oscar wilde gave to the world his great masterpiece, the ballad of reading goal: the vilest deeds, like poison weeds, bloom well in prison air; it is only what is good in man that wastes and withers there. pale anguish keeps the heavy gate, and the warder is despair. society goes on perpetuating this poisonous air, not realizing that out of it can come naught but the most poisonous results. we are spending at the present $ , , per day, $ , , , per year, to maintain prison institutions, and that in a democratic country,--a sum almost as large as the combined output of wheat, valued at $ , , , and the output of coal, valued at $ , , . professor bushnell of washington, d.c., estimates the cost of prisons at $ , , , annually, and dr. g. frank lydston, an eminent american writer on crime, gives $ , , , annually as a reasonable figure. such unheard-of expenditure for the purpose of maintaining vast armies of human beings caged up like wild beasts![ ] yet crimes are on the increase. thus we learn that in america there are four and a half times as many crimes to every million population today as there were twenty years ago. the most horrible aspect is that our national crime is murder, not robbery, embezzlement, or rape, as in the south. london is five times as large as chicago, yet there are one hundred and eighteen murders annually in the latter city, while only twenty in london. nor is chicago the leading city in crime, since it is only seventh on the list, which is headed by four southern cities, and san francisco and los angeles. in view of such a terrible condition of affairs, it seems ridiculous to prate of the protection society derives from its prisons. the average mind is slow in grasping a truth, but when the most thoroughly organized, centralized institution, maintained at an excessive national expense, has proven a complete social failure, the dullest must begin to question its right to exist. the time is past when we can be content with our social fabric merely because it is "ordained by divine right," or by the majesty of the law. the widespread prison investigations, agitation, and education during the last few years are conclusive proof that men are learning to dig deep into the very bottom of society, down to the causes of the terrible discrepancy between social and individual life. why, then, are prisons a social crime and a failure? to answer this vital question it behooves us to seek the nature and cause of crimes, the methods employed in coping with them, and the effects these methods produce in ridding society of the curse and horror of crimes. first, as to the nature of crime: havelock ellis divides crime into four phases, the political, the passional, the insane, and the occasional. he says that the political criminal is the victim of an attempt of a more or less despotic government to preserve its own stability. he is not necessarily guilty of an unsocial offense; he simply tries to overturn a certain political order which may itself be anti-social. this truth is recognized all over the world, except in america where the foolish notion still prevails that in a democracy there is no place for political criminals. yet john brown was a political criminal; so were the chicago anarchists; so is every striker. consequently, says havelock ellis, the political criminal of our time or place may be the hero, martyr, saint of another age. lombroso calls the political criminal the true precursor of the progressive movement of humanity. "the criminal by passion is usually a man of wholesome birth and honest life, who under the stress of some great, unmerited wrong has wrought justice for himself."[ ] mr. hugh c. weir, in the menace of the police, cites the case of jim flaherty, a criminal by passion, who, instead of being saved by society, is turned into a drunkard and a recidivist, with a ruined and poverty-stricken family as the result. a more pathetic type is archie, the victim in brand whitlock's novel, the turn of the balance, the greatest american expose of crime in the making. archie, even more than flaherty, was driven to crime and death by the cruel inhumanity of his surroundings, and by the unscrupulous hounding of the machinery of the law. archie and flaherty are but the types of many thousands, demonstrating how the legal aspects of crime, and the methods of dealing with it, help to create the disease which is undermining our entire social life. "the insane criminal really can no more be considered a criminal than a child, since he is mentally in the same condition as an infant or an animal."[ ] the law already recognizes that, but only in rare cases of a very flagrant nature, or when the culprit's wealth permits the luxury of criminal insanity. it has become quite fashionable to be the victim of paranoia. but on the whole the "sovereignty of justice" still continues to punish criminally insane with the whole severity of its power. thus mr. ellis quotes from dr. richter's statistics showing that in germany, one hundred and six madmen, out of one hundred and forty-four criminal insane, were condemned to severe punishment. the occasional criminal "represents by far the largest class of our prison population, hence is the greatest menace to social well-being." what is the cause that compels a vast army of the human family to take to crime, to prefer the hideous life within prison walls to the life outside? certainly that cause must be an iron master, who leaves its victims no avenue of escape, for the most depraved human being loves liberty. this terrific force is conditioned in our cruel social and economic arrangement. i do not mean to deny the biologic, physiologic, or psychologic factors in creating crime; but there is hardly an advanced criminologist who will not concede that the social and economic influences are the most relentless, the most poisonous germs of crime. granted even that there are innate criminal tendencies, it is none the less true that these tendencies find rich nutrition in our social environment. there is close relation, says havelock ellis, between crimes against the person and the price of alcohol, between crimes against property and the price of wheat. he quotes quetelet and lacassagne, the former looking upon society as the preparer of crime, and the criminals as instruments that execute them. the latter find that "the social environment is the cultivation medium of criminality; that the criminal is the microbe, an element which only becomes important when it finds the medium which causes it to ferment; every society has the criminals it deserves."[ ] the most "prosperous" industrial period makes it impossible for the worker to earn enough to keep up health and vigor. and as prosperity is, at best, an imaginary condition, thousands of people are constantly added to the host of the unemployed. from east to west, from south to north, this vast army tramps in search of work or food, and all they find is the workhouse or the slums. those who have a spark of self-respect left, prefer open defiance, prefer crime to the emaciated, degraded position of poverty. edward carpenter estimates that five-sixths of indictable crimes consist in some violation of property rights; but that is too low a figure. a thorough investigation would prove that nine crimes out of ten could be traced, directly or indirectly, to our economic and social iniquities, to our system of remorseless exploitation and robbery. there is no criminal so stupid but recognizes this terrible fact, though he may not be able to account for it. a collection of criminal philosophy, which havelock ellis, lombroso, and other eminent men have compiled, shows that the criminal feels only too keenly that it is society that drives him to crime. a milanese thief said to lombroso: "i do not rob, i merely take from the rich their superfluities; besides, do not advocates and merchants rob?" a murderer wrote: "knowing that three-fourths of the social virtues are cowardly vices, i thought an open assault on a rich man would be less ignoble than the cautious combination of fraud." another wrote: "i am imprisoned for stealing a half dozen eggs. ministers who rob millions are honored. poor italy!" an educated convict said to mr. davitt: "the laws of society are framed for the purpose of securing the wealth of the world to power and calculation, thereby depriving the larger portion of mankind of its rights and chances. why should they punish me for taking by somewhat similar means from those who have taken more than they had a right to?" the same man added: "religion robs the soul of its independence; patriotism is the stupid worship of the world for which the well-being and the peace of the inhabitants were sacrificed by those who profit by it, while the laws of the land, in restraining natural desires, were waging war on the manifest spirit of the law of our beings. compared with this," he concluded, "thieving is an honorable pursuit."[ ] verily, there is greater truth in this philosophy than in all the law-and-moral books of society. the economic, political, moral, and physical factors being the microbes of crime, how does society meet the situation? the methods of coping with crime have no doubt undergone several changes, but mainly in a theoretic sense. in practice, society has retained the primitive motive in dealing with the offender; that is, revenge. it has also adopted the theologic idea; namely, punishment; while the legal and "civilized" methods consist of deterrence or terror, and reform. we shall presently see that all four modes have failed utterly, and that we are today no nearer a solution than in the dark ages. the natural impulse of the primitive man to strike back, to avenge a wrong, is out of date. instead, the civilized man, stripped of courage and daring, has delegated to an organized machinery the duty of avenging his wrongs, in the foolish belief that the state is justified in doing what he no longer has the manhood or consistency to do. the majesty-of-the-law is a reasoning thing; it would not stoop to primitive instincts. its mission is of a "higher" nature. true, it is still steeped in the theologic muddle, which proclaims punishment as a means of purification, or the vicarious atonement of sin. but legally and socially the statute exercises punishment, not merely as an infliction of pain upon the offender, but also for its terrifying effect upon others. what is the real basis of punishment, however? the notion of a free will, the idea that man is at all times a free agent for good or evil; if he chooses the latter, he must be made to pay the price. although this theory has long been exploded, and thrown upon the dustheap, it continues to be applied daily by the entire machinery of government, turning it into the most cruel and brutal tormentor of human life. the only reason for its continuance is the still more cruel notion that the greater the terror punishment spreads, the more certain its preventative effect. society is using the most drastic methods in dealing with the social offender. why do they not deter? although in america a man is supposed to be considered innocent until proven guilty, the instruments of law, the police, carry on a reign of terror, making indiscriminate arrests, beating, clubbing, bullying people, using the barbarous method of the "third degree," subjecting their unfortunate victims to the foul air of the station house, and the still fouler language of its guardians. yet crimes are rapidly multiplying, and society is paying the price. on the other hand, it is an open secret that when the unfortunate citizen has been given the full "mercy" of the law, and for the sake of safety is hidden in the worst of hells, his real calvary begins. robbed of his rights as a human being, degraded to a mere automaton without will or feeling, dependent entirely upon the mercy of brutal keepers, he daily goes through a process of dehumanization, compared with which savage revenge was mere child's play. there is not a single penal institution or reformatory in the united states where men are not tortured "to be made good," by means of the blackjack, the club, the straightjacket, the water-cure, the "humming bird" (an electrical contrivance run along the human body), the solitary, the bullring, and starvation diet. in these institutions his will is broken, his soul degraded, his spirit subdued by the deadly monotony and routine of prison life. in ohio, illinois, pennsylvania, missouri, and in the south, these horrors have become so flagrant as to reach the outside world, while in most other prisons the same christian methods still prevail. but prison walls rarely allow the agonized shrieks of the victims to escape--prison walls are thick, they dull the sound. society might with greater immunity abolish all prisons at once, than to hope for protection from these twentieth century chambers of horrors. year after year the gates of prison hells return to the world an emaciated, deformed, willless, ship-wrecked crew of humanity, with the cain mark on their foreheads, their hopes crushed, all their natural inclinations thwarted. with nothing but hunger and inhumanity to greet them, these victims soon sink back into crime as the only possibility of existence. it is not at all an unusual thing to find men and women who have spent half their lives--nay, almost their entire existence--in prison. i know a woman on blackwell's island, who had been in and out thirty-eight times; and through a friend i learn that a young boy of seventeen, whom he had nursed and cared for in the pittsburg penitentiary, had never known the meaning of liberty. from the reformatory to the penitentiary had been the path of this boy's life, until, broken in body, he died a victim of social revenge. these personal experiences are substantiated by extensive data giving overwhelming proof of the utter futility of prisons as a means of deterrence or reform. well-meaning persons are now working for a new departure in the prison question,--reclamation, to restore once more to the prisoner the possibility of becoming a human being. commendable as this is, i fear it is impossible to hope for good results from pouring good wine into a musty bottle. nothing short of a complete reconstruction of society will deliver mankind from the cancer of crime. still, if the dull edge of our social conscience would be sharpened, the penal institutions might be given a new coat of varnish. but the first step to be taken is the renovation of the social consciousness, which is in a rather dilapidated condition. it is sadly in need to be awakened to the fact that crime is a question of degree, that we all have the rudiments of crime in us, more or less, according to our mental, physical, and social environment; and that the individual criminal is merely a reflex of the tendencies of the aggregate. with the social consciousness awakened, the average individual may learn to refuse the "honor" of being the bloodhound of the law. he may cease to persecute, despise, and mistrust the social offender, and give him a chance to live and breathe among his fellows. institutions are, of course, harder to reach. they are cold, impenetrable, and cruel; still, with the social consciousness quickened, it might be possible to free the prison victims from the brutality of prison officials, guards, and keepers. public opinion is a powerful weapon; keepers of human prey, even, are afraid of it. they may be taught a little humanity, especially if they realize that their jobs depend upon it. but the most important step is to demand for the prisoner the right to work while in prison, with some monetary recompense that would enable him to lay aside a little for the day of his release, the beginning of a new life. it is almost ridiculous to hope much from present society when we consider that workingmen, wage slaves themselves, object to convict labor. i shall not go into the cruelty of this objection, but merely consider the impracticability of it. to begin with, the opposition so far raised by organized labor has been directed against windmills. prisoners have always worked; only the state has been their exploiter, even as the individual employer has been the robber of organized labor. the states have either set the convicts to work for the government, or they have farmed convict labor to private individuals. twenty-nine of the states pursue the latter plan. the federal government and seventeen states have discarded it, as have the leading nations of europe, since it leads to hideous overworking and abuse of prisoners, and to endless graft. rhode island, the state dominated by aldrich, offers perhaps the worst example. under a five-year contract, dated july th, , and renewable for five years more at the option of private contractors, the labor of the inmates of the rhode island penitentiary and the providence county jail is sold to the reliance-sterling mfg. co. at the rate of a trifle less than cents a day per man. this company is really a gigantic prison labor trust, for it also leases the convict labor of connecticut, michigan, indiana, nebraska, and south dakota penitentiaries, and the reformatories of new jersey, indiana, illinois, and wisconsin, eleven establishments in all. the enormity of the graft under the rhode island contract may be estimated from the fact that this same company pays / cents a day in nebraska for the convict's labor, and that tennessee, for example, gets $ . a day for a convict's work from the gray-dudley hardware co.; missouri gets cents a day from the star overall mfg. co.; west virginia cents a day from the kraft mfg. co., and maryland cents a day from oppenheim, oberndorf & co., shirt manufacturers. the very difference in prices points to enormous graft. for example, the reliance-sterling mfg. co. manufactures shirts, the cost of free labor being not less than $ . per dozen, while it pays rhode island thirty cents a dozen. furthermore, the state charges this trust no rent for the use of its huge factory, charges nothing for power, heat, light, or even drainage, and exacts no taxes. what graft! it is estimated that more than twelve million dollars' worth of workingmen's shirts and overalls is produced annually in this country by prison labor. it is a woman's industry, and the first reflection that arises is that an immense amount of free female labor is thus displaced. the second consideration is that male convicts, who should be learning trades that would give them some chance of being self-supporting after their release, are kept at this work at which they can not possibly make a dollar. this is the more serious when we consider that much of this labor is done in reformatories, which so loudly profess to be training their inmates to become useful citizens. the third, and most important, consideration is that the enormous profits thus wrung from convict labor are a constant incentive to the contractors to exact from their unhappy victims tasks altogether beyond their strength, and to punish them cruelly when their work does not come up to the excessive demands made. another word on the condemnation of convicts to tasks at which they cannot hope to make a living after release. indiana, for example, is a state that has made a great splurge over being in the front rank of modern penological improvements. yet, according to the report rendered in by the training school of its "reformatory," were engaged in the manufacture of chains, in that of shirts, and in the foundry--a total of in three occupations. but at this so-called reformatory occupations were represented by the inmates, of which were connected with country pursuits. indiana, like other states, professes to be training the inmates of her reformatory to occupations by which they will be able to make their living when released. she actually sets them to work making chains, shirts, and brooms, the latter for the benefit of the louisville fancy grocery co. broom making is a trade largely monopolized by the blind, shirt making is done by women, and there is only one free chain factory in the state, and at that a released convict can not hope to get employment. the whole thing is a cruel farce. if, then, the states can be instrumental in robbing their helpless victims of such tremendous profits, is it not high time for organized labor to stop its idle howl, and to insist on decent remuneration for the convict, even as labor organizations claim for themselves? in that way workingmen would kill the germ which makes of the prisoner an enemy to the interests of labor. i have said elsewhere that thousands of convicts, incompetent and without a trade, without means of subsistence, are yearly turned back into the social fold. these men and women must live, for even an ex-convict has needs. prison life has made them anti-social beings, and the rigidly closed doors that meet them on their release are not likely to decrease their bitterness. the inevitable result is that they form a favorable nucleus out of which scabs, blacklegs, detectives, and policemen are drawn, only too willing to do the master's bidding. thus organized labor, by its foolish opposition to work in prison, defeats its own ends. it helps to create poisonous fumes that stifle every attempt for economic betterment. if the workingman wants to avoid these effects, he should insist on the right of the convict to work, he should meet him as a brother, take him into his organization, and with his aid turn against the system which grinds them both. last, but not least, is the growing realization of the barbarity and the inadequacy of the definite sentence. those who believe in, and earnestly aim at, a change are fast coming to the conclusion that man must be given an opportunity to make good. and how is he to do it with ten, fifteen, or twenty years' imprisonment before him? the hope of liberty and of opportunity is the only incentive to life, especially the prisoner's life. society has sinned so long against him--it ought at least to leave him that. i am not very sanguine that it will, or that any real change in that direction can take place until the conditions that breed both the prisoner and the jailer will be forever abolished. out of his mouth a red, red rose! out of his heart a white! for who can say by what strange way christ brings his will to light, since the barren staff the pilgrim bore bloomed in the great pope's sight. [ ] crime and criminals. w. c. owen. [ ] the criminal, havelock ellis. [ ] the criminal. [ ] the criminal. [ ] the criminal. patriotism: a menace to liberty what is patriotism? is it love of one's birthplace, the place of childhood's recollections and hopes, dreams and aspirations? is it the place where, in childlike naivety, we would watch the fleeting clouds, and wonder why we, too, could not run so swiftly? the place where we would count the milliard glittering stars, terror-stricken lest each one "an eye should be," piercing the very depths of our little souls? is it the place where we would listen to the music of the birds, and long to have wings to fly, even as they, to distant lands? or the place where we would sit at mother's knee, enraptured by wonderful tales of great deeds and conquests? in short, is it love for the spot, every inch representing dear and precious recollections of a happy, joyous, and playful childhood? if that were patriotism, few american men of today could be called upon to be patriotic, since the place of play has been turned into factory, mill, and mine, while deafening sounds of machinery have replaced the music of the birds. nor can we longer hear the tales of great deeds, for the stories our mothers tell today are but those of sorrow, tears, and grief. what, then, is patriotism? "patriotism, sir, is the last resort of scoundrels," said dr. johnson. leo tolstoy, the greatest anti-patriot of our times, defines patriotism as the principle that will justify the training of wholesale murderers; a trade that requires better equipment for the exercise of man-killing than the making of such necessities of life as shoes, clothing, and houses; a trade that guarantees better returns and greater glory than that of the average workingman. gustave herve, another great anti-patriot, justly calls patriotism a superstition--one far more injurious, brutal, and inhumane than religion. the superstition of religion originated in man's inability to explain natural phenomena. that is, when primitive man heard thunder or saw the lightning, he could not account for either, and therefore concluded that back of them must be a force greater than himself. similarly he saw a supernatural force in the rain, and in the various other changes in nature. patriotism, on the other hand, is a superstition artificially created and maintained through a network of lies and falsehoods; a superstition that robs man of his self-respect and dignity, and increases his arrogance and conceit. indeed, conceit, arrogance, and egotism are the essentials of patriotism. let me illustrate. patriotism assumes that our globe is divided into little spots, each one surrounded by an iron gate. those who have had the fortune of being born on some particular spot, consider themselves better, nobler, grander, more intelligent than the living beings inhabiting any other spot. it is, therefore, the duty of everyone living on that chosen spot to fight, kill, and die in the attempt to impose his superiority upon all the others. the inhabitants of the other spots reason in like manner, of course, with the result that, from early infancy, the mind of the child is poisoned with blood-curdling stories about the germans, the french, the italians, russians, etc. when the child has reached manhood, he is thoroughly saturated with the belief that he is chosen by the lord himself to defend his country against the attack or invasion of any foreigner. it is for that purpose that we are clamoring for a greater army and navy, more battleships and ammunition. it is for that purpose that america has within a short time spent four hundred million dollars. just think of it--four hundred million dollars taken from the produce of the people. for surely it is not the rich who contribute to patriotism. they are cosmopolitans, perfectly at home in every land. we in america know well the truth of this. are not our rich americans frenchmen in france, germans in germany, or englishmen in england? and do they not squander with cosmopolitan grace fortunes coined by american factory children and cotton slaves? yes, theirs is the patriotism that will make it possible to send messages of condolence to a despot like the russian tsar, when any mishap befalls him, as president roosevelt did in the name of his people, when sergius was punished by the russian revolutionists. it is a patriotism that will assist the arch-murderer, diaz, in destroying thousands of lives in mexico, or that will even aid in arresting mexican revolutionists on american soil and keep them incarcerated in american prisons, without the slightest cause or reason. but, then, patriotism is not for those who represent wealth and power. it is good enough for the people. it reminds one of the historic wisdom of frederic the great, the bosom friend of voltaire, who said: "religion is a fraud, but it must be maintained for the masses." that patriotism is rather a costly institution, no one will doubt after considering the following statistics. the progressive increase of the expenditures for the leading armies and navies of the world during the last quarter of a century is a fact of such gravity as to startle every thoughtful student of economic problems. it may be briefly indicated by dividing the time from to into five-year periods, and noting the disbursements of several great nations for army and navy purposes during the first and last of those periods. from the first to the last of the periods noted the expenditures of great britain increased from $ , , , to $ , , , , those of france from $ , , , to $ , , , , those of germany from $ , , to $ , , , , those of the united states from $ , , , to $ , , , , those of russia from $ , , , to $ , , , , those of italy from $ , , , to $ , , , , and those of japan from $ , , to $ , , . the military expenditures of each of the nations mentioned increased in each of the five-year periods under review. during the entire interval from to great britain's outlay for her army increased fourfold, that of the united states was tripled, russia's was doubled, that of germany increased per cent., that of france about per cent., and that of japan nearly per cent. if we compare the expenditures of these nations upon their armies with their total expenditures for all the twenty-five years ending with , the proportion rose as follows: in great britain from per cent. to ; in the united states from to ; in france from to ; in italy from to ; in japan from to . on the other hand, it is interesting to note that the proportion in germany decreased from about per cent. to , the decrease being due to the enormous increase in the imperial expenditures for other purposes, the fact being that the army expenditures for the period of - were higher than for any five-year period preceding. statistics show that the countries in which army expenditures are greatest, in proportion to the total national revenues, are great britain, the united states, japan, france, and italy, in the order named. the showing as to the cost of great navies is equally impressive. during the twenty-five years ending with naval expenditures increased approximately as follows: great britain, per cent.; france per cent.; germany per cent.; the united states per cent.; russia per cent.; italy per cent.; and japan, per cent. with the exception of great britain, the united states spends more for naval purposes than any other nation, and this expenditure bears also a larger proportion to the entire national disbursements than that of any other power. in the period - , the expenditure for the united states navy was $ . out of each $ appropriated for all national purposes; the amount rose to $ . for the next five-year period, to $ . for the next, to $ . for the next, and to $ . for - . it is morally certain that the outlay for the current period of five years will show a still further increase. the rising cost of militarism may be still further illustrated by computing it as a per capita tax on population. from the first to the last of the five-year periods taken as the basis for the comparisons here given, it has risen as follows: in great britain, from $ . to $ . ; in france, from $ . to $ . ; in germany, from $ . to $ . ; in the united states, from $ . to $ . ; in russia, from $ . to $ . ; in italy, from $ . to $ . , and in japan from cents to $ . . it is in connection with this rough estimate of cost per capita that the economic burden of militarism is most appreciable. the irresistible conclusion from available data is that the increase of expenditure for army and navy purposes is rapidly surpassing the growth of population in each of the countries considered in the present calculation. in other words, a continuation of the increased demands of militarism threatens each of those nations with a progressive exhaustion both of men and resources. the awful waste that patriotism necessitates ought to be sufficient to cure the man of even average intelligence from this disease. yet patriotism demands still more. the people are urged to be patriotic and for that luxury they pay, not only by supporting their "defenders," but even by sacrificing their own children. patriotism requires allegiance to the flag, which means obedience and readiness to kill father, mother, brother, sister. the usual contention is that we need a standing army to protect the country from foreign invasion. every intelligent man and woman knows, however, that this is a myth maintained to frighten and coerce the foolish. the governments of the world, knowing each other's interests, do not invade each other. they have learned that they can gain much more by international arbitration of disputes than by war and conquest. indeed, as carlyle said, "war is a quarrel between two thieves too cowardly to fight their own battle; therefore they take boys from one village and another village; stick them into uniforms, equip them with guns, and let them loose like wild beasts against each other." it does not require much wisdom to trace every war back to a similar cause. let us take our own spanish-american war, supposedly a great and patriotic event in the history of the united states. how our hearts burned with indignation against the atrocious spaniards! true, our indignation did not flare up spontaneously. it was nurtured by months of newspaper agitation, and long after butcher weyler had killed off many noble cubans and outraged many cuban women. still, in justice to the american nation be it said, it did grow indignant and was willing to fight, and that it fought bravely. but when the smoke was over, the dead buried, and the cost of the war came back to the people in an increase in the price of commodities and rent--that is, when we sobered up from our patriotic spree--it suddenly dawned on us that the cause of the spanish-american war was the consideration of the price of sugar; or, to be more explicit, that the lives, blood, and money of the american people were used to protect the interests of american capitalists, which were threatened by the spanish government. that this is not an exaggeration, but is based on absolute facts and figures, is best proven by the attitude of the american government to cuban labor. when cuba was firmly in the clutches of the united states, the very soldiers sent to liberate cuba were ordered to shoot cuban workingmen during the great cigarmakers' strike, which took place shortly after the war. nor do we stand alone in waging war for such causes. the curtain is beginning to be lifted on the motives of the terrible russo-japanese war, which cost so much blood and tears. and we see again that back of the fierce moloch of war stands the still fiercer god of commercialism. kuropatkin, the russian minister of war during the russo-japanese struggle, has revealed the true secret behind the latter. the tsar and his grand dukes, having invested money in corean concessions, the war was forced for the sole purpose of speedily accumulating large fortunes. the contention that a standing army and navy is the best security of peace is about as logical as the claim that the most peaceful citizen is he who goes about heavily armed. the experience of every-day life fully proves that the armed individual is invariably anxious to try his strength. the same is historically true of governments. really peaceful countries do not waste life and energy in war preparations, with the result that peace is maintained. however, the clamor for an increased army and navy is not due to any foreign danger. it is owing to the dread of the growing discontent of the masses and of the international spirit among the workers. it is to meet the internal enemy that the powers of various countries are preparing themselves; an enemy, who, once awakened to consciousness, will prove more dangerous than any foreign invader. the powers that have for centuries been engaged in enslaving the masses have made a thorough study of their psychology. they know that the people at large are like children whose despair, sorrow, and tears can be turned into joy with a little toy. and the more gorgeously the toy is dressed, the louder the colors, the more it will appeal to the million-headed child. an army and navy represents the people's toys. to make them more attractive and acceptable, hundreds and thousands of dollars are being spent for the display of these toys. that was the purpose of the american government in equipping a fleet and sending it along the pacific coast, that every american citizen should be made to feel the pride and glory of the united states. the city of san francisco spent one hundred thousand dollars for the entertainment of the fleet; los angeles, sixty thousand; seattle and tacoma, about one hundred thousand. to entertain the fleet, did i say? to dine and wine a few superior officers, while the "brave boys" had to mutiny to get sufficient food. yes, two hundred and sixty thousand dollars were spent on fireworks, theatre parties, and revelries, at a time when men, women, and children through the breadth and length of the country were starving in the streets; when thousands of unemployed were ready to sell their labor at any price. two hundred and sixty thousand dollars! what could not have been accomplished with such an enormous sum? but instead of bread and shelter, the children of those cities were taken to see the fleet, that it may remain, as one of the newspapers said, "a lasting memory for the child." a wonderful thing to remember, is it not? the implements of civilized slaughter. if the mind of the child is to be poisoned with such memories, what hope is there for a true realization of human brotherhood? we americans claim to be a peace-loving people. we hate bloodshed; we are opposed to violence. yet we go into spasms of joy over the possibility of projecting dynamite bombs from flying machines upon helpless citizens. we are ready to hang, electrocute, or lynch anyone, who, from economic necessity, will risk his own life in the attempt upon that of some industrial magnate. yet our hearts swell with pride at the thought that america is becoming the most powerful nation on earth, and that it will eventually plant her iron foot on the necks of all other nations. such is the logic of patriotism. considering the evil results that patriotism is fraught with for the average man, it is as nothing compared with the insult and injury that patriotism heaps upon the soldier himself,--that poor, deluded victim of superstition and ignorance. he, the savior of his country, the protector of his nation,--what has patriotism in store for him? a life of slavish submission, vice, and perversion, during peace; a life of danger, exposure, and death, during war. while on a recent lecture tour in san francisco, i visited the presidio, the most beautiful spot overlooking the bay and golden gate park. its purpose should have been playgrounds for children, gardens and music for the recreation of the weary. instead it is made ugly, dull, and gray by barracks,--barracks wherein the rich would not allow their dogs to dwell. in these miserable shanties soldiers are herded like cattle; here they waste their young days, polishing the boots and brass buttons of their superior officers. here, too, i saw the distinction of classes: sturdy sons of a free republic, drawn up in line like convicts, saluting every passing shrimp of a lieutenant. american equality, degrading manhood and elevating the uniform! barrack life further tends to develop tendencies of sexual perversion. it is gradually producing along this line results similar to european military conditions. havelock ellis, the noted writer on sex psychology, has made a thorough study of the subject. i quote: "some of the barracks are great centers of male prostitution.... the number of soldiers who prostitute themselves is greater than we are willing to believe. it is no exaggeration to say that in certain regiments the presumption is in favor of the venality of the majority of the men.... on summer evenings hyde park and the neighborhood of albert gate are full of guardsmen and others plying a lively trade, and with little disguise, in uniform or out.... in most cases the proceeds form a comfortable addition to tommy atkins' pocket money." to what extent this perversion has eaten its way into the army and navy can best be judged from the fact that special houses exist for this form of prostitution. the practice is not limited to england; it is universal. "soldiers are no less sought after in france than in england or in germany, and special houses for military prostitution exist both in paris and the garrison towns." had mr. havelock ellis included america in his investigation of sex perversion, he would have found that the same conditions prevail in our army and navy as in those of other countries. the growth of the standing army inevitably adds to the spread of sex perversion; the barracks are the incubators. aside from the sexual effects of barrack life, it also tends to unfit the soldier for useful labor after leaving the army. men, skilled in a trade, seldom enter the army or navy, but even they, after a military experience, find themselves totally unfitted for their former occupations. having acquired habits of idleness and a taste for excitement and adventure, no peaceful pursuit can content them. released from the army, they can turn to no useful work. but it is usually the social riff-raff, discharged prisoners and the like, whom either the struggle for life or their own inclination drives into the ranks. these, their military term over, again turn to their former life of crime, more brutalized and degraded than before. it is a well-known fact that in our prisons there is a goodly number of ex-soldiers; while on the other hand, the army and navy are to a great extent supplied with ex-convicts. of all the evil results, i have just described, none seems to me so detrimental to human integrity as the spirit patriotism has produced in the case of private william buwalda. because he foolishly believed that one can be a soldier and exercise his rights as a man at the same time, the military authorities punished him severely. true, he had served his country fifteen years, during which time his record was unimpeachable. according to gen. funston, who reduced buwalda's sentence to three years, "the first duty of an officer or an enlisted man is unquestioned obedience and loyalty to the government, and it makes no difference whether he approves of that government or not." thus funston stamps the true character of allegiance. according to him, entrance into the army abrogates the principles of the declaration of independence. what a strange development of patriotism that turns a thinking being into a loyal machine! in justification of this most outrageous sentence of buwalda, gen. funston tells the american people that the soldier's action was a "serious crime equal to treason." now, what did this "terrible crime" really consist of? simply in this: william buwalda was one of fifteen hundred people who attended a public meeting in san francisco; and, oh, horrors, he shook hands with the speaker, emma goldman. a terrible crime, indeed, which the general calls "a great military offense, infinitely worse than desertion." can there be a greater indictment against patriotism than that it will thus brand a man a criminal, throw him into prison, and rob him of the results of fifteen years of faithful service? buwalda gave to his country the best years of his life and his very manhood. but all that was as nothing. patriotism is inexorable and, like all insatiable monsters, demands all or nothing. it does not admit that a soldier is also a human being, who has a right to his own feelings and opinions, his own inclinations and ideas. no, patriotism can not admit of that. that is the lesson which buwalda was made to learn; made to learn at a rather costly, though not at a useless, price. when he returned to freedom, he had lost his position in the army, but he regained his self-respect. after all, that is worth three years of imprisonment. a writer on the military conditions of america, in a recent article, commented on the power of the military man over the civilian in germany. he said, among other things, that if our republic had no other meaning than to guarantee all citizens equal rights, it would have just cause for existence. i am convinced that the writer was not in colorado during the patriotic regime of general bell. he probably would have changed his mind had he seen how, in the name of patriotism and the republic, men were thrown into bull-pens, dragged about, driven across the border, and subjected to all kinds of indignities. nor is that colorado incident the only one in the growth of military power in the united states. there is hardly a strike where troops and militia do not come to the rescue of those in power, and where they do not act as arrogantly and brutally as do the men wearing the kaiser's uniform. then, too, we have the dick military law. had the writer forgotten that? a great misfortune with most of our writers is that they are absolutely ignorant on current events, or that, lacking honesty, they will not speak of these matters. and so it has come to pass that the dick military law was rushed through congress with little discussion and still less publicity,--a law which gives the president the power to turn a peaceful citizen into a bloodthirsty man-killer, supposedly for the defense of the country, in reality for the protection of the interests of that particular party whose mouthpiece the president happens to be. our writer claims that militarism can never become such a power in america as abroad, since it is voluntary with us, while compulsory in the old world. two very important facts, however, the gentleman forgets to consider. first, that conscription has created in europe a deep-seated hatred of militarism among all classes of society. thousands of young recruits enlist under protest and, once in the army, they will use every possible means to desert. second, that it is the compulsory feature of militarism which has created a tremendous anti-militarist movement, feared by european powers far more than anything else. after all, the greatest bulwark of capitalism is militarism. the very moment the latter is undermined, capitalism will totter. true, we have no conscription; that is, men are not usually forced to enlist in the army, but we have developed a far more exacting and rigid force--necessity. is it not a fact that during industrial depressions there is a tremendous increase in the number of enlistments? the trade of militarism may not be either lucrative or honorable, but it is better than tramping the country in search of work, standing in the bread line, or sleeping in municipal lodging houses. after all, it means thirteen dollars per month, three meals a day, and a place to sleep. yet even necessity is not sufficiently strong a factor to bring into the army an element of character and manhood. no wonder our military authorities complain of the "poor material" enlisting in the army and navy. this admission is a very encouraging sign. it proves that there is still enough of the spirit of independence and love of liberty left in the average american to risk starvation rather than don the uniform. thinking men and women the world over are beginning to realize that patriotism is too narrow and limited a conception to meet the necessities of our time. the centralization of power has brought into being an international feeling of solidarity among the oppressed nations of the world; a solidarity which represents a greater harmony of interests between the workingman of america and his brothers abroad than between the american miner and his exploiting compatriot; a solidarity which fears not foreign invasion, because it is bringing all the workers to the point when they will say to their masters, "go and do your own killing. we have done it long enough for you." this solidarity is awakening the consciousness of even the soldiers, they, too, being flesh of the flesh of the great human family. a solidarity that has proven infallible more than once during past struggles, and which has been the impetus inducing the parisian soldiers, during the commune of , to refuse to obey when ordered to shoot their brothers. it has given courage to the men who mutinied on russian warships during recent years. it will eventually bring about the uprising of all the oppressed and downtrodden against their international exploiters. the proletariat of europe has realized the great force of that solidarity and has, as a result, inaugurated a war against patriotism and its bloody spectre, militarism. thousands of men fill the prisons of france, germany, russia, and the scandinavian countries, because they dared to defy the ancient superstition. nor is the movement limited to the working class; it has embraced representatives in all stations of life, its chief exponents being men and women prominent in art, science, and letters. america will have to follow suit. the spirit of militarism has already permeated all walks of life. indeed, i am convinced that militarism is growing a greater danger here than anywhere else, because of the many bribes capitalism holds out to those whom it wishes to destroy. the beginning has already been made in the schools. evidently the government holds to the jesuitical conception, "give me the child mind, and i will mould the man." children are trained in military tactics, the glory of military achievements extolled in the curriculum, and the youthful minds perverted to suit the government. further, the youth of the country is appealed to in glaring posters to join the army and navy. "a fine chance to see the world!" cries the governmental huckster. thus innocent boys are morally shanghaied into patriotism, and the military moloch strides conquering through the nation. the american workingman has suffered so much at the hands of the soldier, state, and federal, that he is quite justified in his disgust with, and his opposition to, the uniformed parasite. however, mere denunciation will not solve this great problem. what we need is a propaganda of education for the soldier: anti-patriotic literature that will enlighten him as to the real horrors of his trade, and that will awaken his consciousness to his true relation to the man to whose labor he owes his very existence. it is precisely this that the authorities fear most. it is already high treason for a soldier to attend a radical meeting. no doubt they will also stamp it high treason for a soldier to read a radical pamphlet. but then, has not authority from time immemorial stamped every step of progress as treasonable? those, however, who earnestly strive for social reconstruction can well afford to face all that; for it is probably even more important to carry the truth into the barracks than into the factory. when we have undermined the patriotic lie, we shall have cleared the path for that great structure wherein all nationalities shall be united into a universal brotherhood,--a truly free society. francisco ferrer and the modern school experience has come to be considered the best school of life. the man or woman who does not learn some vital lesson in that school is looked upon as a dunce indeed. yet strange to say, that though organized institutions continue perpetrating errors, though they learn nothing from experience, we acquiesce, as a matter of course. there lived and worked in barcelona a man by the name of francisco ferrer. a teacher of children he was, known and loved by his people. outside of spain only the cultured few knew of francisco ferrer's work. to the world at large this teacher was non-existent. on the first of september, , the spanish government--at the behest of the catholic church--arrested francisco ferrer. on the thirteenth of october, after a mock trial, he was placed in the ditch at montjuich prison, against the hideous wall of many sighs, and shot dead. instantly ferrer, the obscure teacher, became a universal figure, blazing forth the indignation and wrath of the whole civilized world against the wanton murder. the killing of francisco ferrer was not the first crime committed by the spanish government and the catholic church. the history of these institutions is one long stream of fire and blood. still they have not learned through experience, nor yet come to realize that every frail being slain by church and state grows and grows into a mighty giant, who will some day free humanity from their perilous hold. francisco ferrer was born in , of humble parents. they were catholics, and therefore hoped to raise their son in the same faith. they did not know that the boy was to become the harbinger of a great truth, that his mind would refuse to travel in the old path. at an early age ferrer began to question the faith of his fathers. he demanded to know how it is that the god who spoke to him of goodness and love would mar the sleep of the innocent child with dread and awe of tortures, of suffering, of hell. alert and of a vivid and investigating mind, it did not take him long to discover the hideousness of that black monster, the catholic church. he would have none of it. francisco ferrer was not only a doubter, a searcher for truth; he was also a rebel. his spirit would rise in just indignation against the iron regime of his country, and when a band of rebels, led by the brave patriot, general villacampa, under the banner of the republican ideal, made an onslaught on that regime, none was more ardent a fighter than young francisco ferrer. the republican ideal,--i hope no one will confound it with the republicanism of this country. whatever objection i, as an anarchist, have to the republicans of latin countries, i know they tower high above the corrupt and reactionary party which, in america, is destroying every vestige of liberty and justice. one has but to think of the mazzinis, the garibaldis, the scores of others, to realize that their efforts were directed, not merely towards the overthrow of despotism, but particularly against the catholic church, which from its very inception has been the enemy of all progress and liberalism. in america it is just the reverse. republicanism stands for vested rights, for imperialism, for graft, for the annihilation of every semblance of liberty. its ideal is the oily, creepy respectability of a mckinley, and the brutal arrogance of a roosevelt. the spanish republican rebels were subdued. it takes more than one brave effort to split the rock of ages, to cut off the head of that hydra monster, the catholic church and the spanish throne. arrest, persecution, and punishment followed the heroic attempt of the little band. those who could escape the bloodhounds had to flee for safety to foreign shores. francisco ferrer was among the latter. he went to france. how his soul must have expanded in the new land! france, the cradle of liberty, of ideas, of action. paris, the ever young, intense paris, with her pulsating life, after the gloom of his own belated country,--how she must have inspired him. what opportunities, what a glorious chance for a young idealist. francisco ferrer lost no time. like one famished he threw himself into the various liberal movements, met all kinds of people, learned, absorbed, and grew. while there, he also saw in operation the modern school, which was to play such an important and fatal part in his life. the modern school in france was founded long before ferrer's time. its originator, though on a small scale, was that sweet spirit, louise michel. whether consciously or unconsciously, our own great louise felt long ago that the future belongs to the young generation; that unless the young be rescued from that mind and soul destroying institution, the bourgeois school, social evils will continue to exist. perhaps she thought, with ibsen, that the atmosphere is saturated with ghosts, that the adult man and woman have so many superstitions to overcome. no sooner do they outgrow the deathlike grip of one spook, lo! they find themselves in the thralldom of ninety-nine other spooks. thus but a few reach the mountain peak of complete regeneration. the child, however, has no traditions to overcome. its mind is not burdened with set ideas, its heart has not grown cold with class and caste distinctions. the child is to the teacher what clay is to the sculptor. whether the world will receive a work of art or a wretched imitation, depends to a large extent on the creative power of the teacher. louise michel was pre-eminently qualified to meet the child's soul cravings. was she not herself of a childlike nature, so sweet and tender, unsophisticated and generous. the soul of louise burned always at white heat over every social injustice. she was invariably in the front ranks whenever the people of paris rebelled against some wrong. and as she was made to suffer imprisonment for her great devotion to the oppressed, the little school on montmartre was soon no more. but the seed was planted, and has since borne fruit in many cities of france. the most important venture of a modern school was that of the great, young old man, paul robin. together with a few friends he established a large school at cempuis, a beautiful place near paris. paul robin aimed at a higher ideal than merely modern ideas in education. he wanted to demonstrate by actual facts that the bourgeois conception of heredity is but a mere pretext to exempt society from its terrible crimes against the young. the contention that the child must suffer for the sins of the fathers, that it must continue in poverty and filth, that it must grow up a drunkard or criminal, just because its parents left it no other legacy, was too preposterous to the beautiful spirit of paul robin. he believed that whatever part heredity may play, there are other factors equally great, if not greater, that may and will eradicate or minimize the so-called first cause. proper economic and social environment, the breath and freedom of nature, healthy exercise, love and sympathy, and, above all, a deep understanding for the needs of the child--these would destroy the cruel, unjust, and criminal stigma imposed on the innocent young. paul robin did not select his children; he did not go to the so-called best parents: he took his material wherever he could find it. from the street, the hovels, the orphan and foundling asylums, the reformatories, from all those gray and hideous places where a benevolent society hides its victims in order to pacify its guilty conscience. he gathered all the dirty, filthy, shivering little waifs his place would hold, and brought them to cempuis. there, surrounded by nature's own glory, free and unrestrained, well fed, clean kept, deeply loved and understood, the little human plants began to grow, to blossom, to develop beyond even the expectations of their friend and teacher, paul robin. the children grew and developed into self-reliant, liberty loving men and women. what greater danger to the institutions that make the poor in order to perpetuate the poor. cempuis was closed by the french government on the charge of co-education, which is prohibited in france. however, cempuis had been in operation long enough to prove to all advanced educators its tremendous possibilities, and to serve as an impetus for modern methods of education, that are slowly but inevitably undermining the present system. cempuis was followed by a great number of other educational attempts,--among them, by madelaine vernet, a gifted writer and poet, author of l'amour libre, and sebastian faure, with his la ruche,[ ] which i visited while in paris, in . several years ago comrade faure bought the land on which he built his la ruche. in a comparatively short time he succeeded in transforming the former wild, uncultivated country into a blooming spot, having all the appearance of a well kept farm. a large, square court, enclosed by three buildings, and a broad path leading to the garden and orchards, greet the eye of the visitor. the garden, kept as only a frenchman knows how, furnishes a large variety of vegetables for la ruche. sebastian faure is of the opinion that if the child is subjected to contradictory influences, its development suffers in consequence. only when the material needs, the hygiene of the home, and intellectual environment are harmonious, can the child grow into a healthy, free being. referring to his school, sebastian faure has this to say: "i have taken twenty-four children of both sexes, mostly orphans, or those whose parents are too poor to pay. they are clothed, housed, and educated at my expense. till their twelfth year they will receive a sound, elementary education. between the age of twelve and fifteen--their studies still continuing--they are to be taught some trade, in keeping with their individual disposition and abilities. after that they are at liberty to leave la ruche to begin life in the outside world, with the assurance that they may at any time return to la ruche, where they will be received with open arms and welcomed as parents do their beloved children. then, if they wish to work at our place, they may do so under the following conditions: one third of the product to cover his or her expenses of maintenance, another third to go towards the general fund set aside for accommodating new children, and the last third to be devoted to the personal use of the child, as he or she may see fit. "the health of the children who are now in my care is perfect. pure air, nutritious food, physical exercise in the open, long walks, observation of hygienic rules, the short and interesting method of instruction, and, above all, our affectionate understanding and care of the children, have produced admirable physical and mental results. "it would be unjust to claim that our pupils have accomplished wonders; yet, considering that they belong to the average, having had no previous opportunities, the results are very gratifying indeed. the most important thing they have acquired--a rare trait with ordinary school children--is the love of study, the desire to know, to be informed. they have learned a new method of work, one that quickens the memory and stimulates the imagination. we make a particular effort to awaken the child's interest in his surroundings, to make him realize the importance of observation, investigation, and reflection, so that when the children reach maturity, they would not be deaf and blind to the things about them. our children never accept anything in blind faith, without inquiry as to why and wherefore; nor do they feel satisfied until their questions are thoroughly answered. thus their minds are free from doubts and fear resultant from incomplete or untruthful replies; it is the latter which warp the growth of the child, and create a lack of confidence in himself and those about him. "it is surprising how frank and kind and affectionate our little ones are to each other. the harmony between themselves and the adults at la ruche is highly encouraging. we should feel at fault if the children were to fear or honor us merely because we are their elders. we leave nothing undone to gain their confidence and love; that accomplished, understanding will replace duty; confidence, fear; and affection, severity. "no one has yet fully realized the wealth of sympathy, kindness, and generosity hidden in the soul of the child. the effort of every true educator should be to unlock that treasure--to stimulate the child's impulses, and call forth the best and noblest tendencies. what greater reward can there be for one whose life-work is to watch over the growth of the human plant, than to see its nature unfold its petals, and to observe it develop into a true individuality. my comrades at la ruche look for no greater reward, and it is due to them and their efforts, even more than to my own, that our human garden promises to bear beautiful fruit."[ ] regarding the subject of history and the prevailing old methods of instruction, sebastian faure said: "we explain to our children that true history is yet to be written,--the story of those who have died, unknown, in the effort to aid humanity to greater achievement."[ ] francisco ferrer could not escape this great wave of modern school attempts. he saw its possibilities, not merely in theoretic form, but in their practical application to every-day needs. he must have realized that spain, more than any other country, stands in need of just such schools, if it is ever to throw off the double yoke of priest and soldier. when we consider that the entire system of education in spain is in the hands of the catholic church, and when we further remember the catholic formula, "to inculcate catholicism in the mind of the child until it is nine years of age is to ruin it forever for any other idea," we will understand the tremendous task of ferrer in bringing the new light to his people. fate soon assisted him in realizing his great dream. mlle. meunier, a pupil of francisco ferrer, and a lady of wealth, became interested in the modern school project. when she died, she left ferrer some valuable property and twelve thousand francs yearly income for the school. it is said that mean souls can conceive of naught but mean ideas. if so, the contemptible methods of the catholic church to blackguard ferrer's character, in order to justify her own black crime, can readily be explained. thus the lie was spread in american catholic papers, that ferrer used his intimacy with mlle. meunier to get possession of her money. personally, i hold that the intimacy, of whatever nature, between a man and a woman, is their own affair, their sacred own. i would therefore not lose a word in referring to the matter, if it were not one of the many dastardly lies circulated about ferrer. of course, those who know the purity of the catholic clergy will understand the insinuation. have the catholic priests ever looked upon woman as anything but a sex commodity? the historical data regarding the discoveries in the cloisters and monasteries will bear me out in that. how, then, are they to understand the co-operation of a man and a woman, except on a sex basis? as a matter of fact, mlle. meunier was considerably ferrer's senior. having spent her childhood and girlhood with a miserly father and a submissive mother, she could easily appreciate the necessity of love and joy in child life. she must have seen that francisco ferrer was a teacher, not college, machine, or diploma-made, but one endowed with genius for that calling. equipped with knowledge, with experience, and with the necessary means; above all, imbued with the divine fire of his mission, our comrade came back to spain, and there began his life's work. on the ninth of september, , the first modern school was opened. it was enthusiastically received by the people of barcelona, who pledged their support. in a short address at the opening of the school, ferrer submitted his program to his friends. he said: "i am not a speaker, not a propagandist, not a fighter. i am a teacher; i love children above everything. i think i understand them. i want my contribution to the cause of liberty to be a young generation ready to meet a new era." he was cautioned by his friends to be careful in his opposition to the catholic church. they knew to what lengths she would go to dispose of an enemy. ferrer, too, knew. but, like brand, he believed in all or nothing. he would not erect the modern school on the same old lie. he would be frank and honest and open with the children. francisco ferrer became a marked man. from the very first day of the opening of the school, he was shadowed. the school building was watched, his little home in mangat was watched. he was followed every step, even when he went to france or england to confer with his colleagues. he was a marked man, and it was only a question of time when the lurking enemy would tighten the noose. it succeeded, almost, in , when ferrer was implicated in the attempt on the life of alfonso. the evidence exonerating him was too strong even for the black crows;[ ] they had to let him go--not for good, however. they waited. oh, they can wait, when they have set themselves to trap a victim. the moment came at last, during the anti-military uprising in spain, in july, . one will have to search in vain the annals of revolutionary history to find a more remarkable protest against militarism. having been soldier-ridden for centuries, the people of spain could stand the yoke no longer. they would refuse to participate in useless slaughter. they saw no reason for aiding a despotic government in subduing and oppressing a small people fighting for their independence, as did the brave riffs. no, they would not bear arms against them. for eighteen hundred years the catholic church has preached the gospel of peace. yet, when the people actually wanted to make this gospel a living reality, she urged the authorities to force them to bear arms. thus the dynasty of spain followed the murderous methods of the russian dynasty,--the people were forced to the battlefield. then, and not until then, was their power of endurance at an end. then, and not until then, did the workers of spain turn against their masters, against those who, like leeches, had drained their strength, their very life-blood. yes, they attacked the churches and the priests, but if the latter had a thousand lives, they could not possibly pay for the terrible outrages and crimes perpetrated upon the spanish people. francisco ferrer was arrested on the first of september, . until october first, his friends and comrades did not even know what had become of him. on that day a letter was received by l'humanite, from which can be learned the whole mockery of the trial. and the next day his companion, soledad villafranca, received the following letter: "no reason to worry; you know i am absolutely innocent. today i am particularly hopeful and joyous. it is the first time i can write to you, and the first time since my arrest that i can bathe in the rays of the sun, streaming generously through my cell window. you, too, must be joyous." how pathetic that ferrer should have believed, as late as october fourth, that he would not be condemned to death. even more pathetic that his friends and comrades should once more have made the blunder in crediting the enemy with a sense of justice. time and again they had placed faith in the judicial powers, only to see their brothers killed before their very eyes. they made no preparation to rescue ferrer, not even a protest of any extent; nothing. "why, it is impossible to condemn ferrer; he is innocent." but everything is possible with the catholic church. is she not a practiced henchman, whose trials of her enemies are the worst mockery of justice? on october fourth ferrer sent the following letter to l'humanite: the prison cell, oct. , . my dear friends--notwithstanding most absolute innocence, the prosecutor demands the death penalty, based on denunciations of the police, representing me as the chief of the world's anarchists, directing the labor syndicates of france, and guilty of conspiracies and insurrections everywhere, and declaring that my voyages to london and paris were undertaken with no other object. with such infamous lies they are trying to kill me. the messenger is about to depart and i have not time for more. all the evidence presented to the investigating judge by the police is nothing but a tissue of lies and calumnious insinuations. but no proofs against me, having done nothing at all. ferrer. october thirteenth, , ferrer's heart, so brave, so staunch, so loyal, was stilled. poor fools! the last agonized throb of that heart had barely died away when it began to beat a hundredfold in the hearts of the civilized world, until it grew into terrific thunder, hurling forth its malediction upon the instigators of the black crime. murderers of black garb and pious mien, to the bar of justice! did francisco ferrer participate in the anti-military uprising? according to the first indictment, which appeared in a catholic paper in madrid, signed by the bishop and all the prelates of barcelona, he was not even accused of participation. the indictment was to the effect that francisco ferrer was guilty of having organized godless schools, and having circulated godless literature. but in the twentieth century men can not be burned merely for their godless beliefs. something else had to be devised; hence the charge of instigating the uprising. in no authentic source so far investigated could a single proof be found to connect ferrer with the uprising. but then, no proofs were wanted, or accepted, by the authorities. there were seventy-two witnesses, to be sure, but their testimony was taken on paper. they never were confronted with ferrer, or he with them. is it psychologically possible that ferrer should have participated? i do not believe it is, and here are my reasons. francisco ferrer was not only a great teacher, but he was also undoubtedly a marvelous organizer. in eight years, between - , he had organized in spain one hundred and nine schools, besides inducing the liberal element of his country to organize three hundred and eight other schools. in connection with his own school work, ferrer had equipped a modern printing plant, organized a staff of translators, and spread broadcast one hundred and fifty thousand copies of modern scientific and sociologic works, not to forget the large quantity of rationalist text books. surely none but the most methodical and efficient organizer could have accomplished such a feat. on the other hand, it was absolutely proven that the anti-military uprising was not at all organized; that it came as a surprise to the people themselves, like a great many revolutionary waves on previous occasions. the people of barcelona, for instance, had the city in their control for four days, and, according to the statement of tourists, greater order and peace never prevailed. of course, the people were so little prepared that when the time came, they did not know what to do. in this regard they were like the people of paris during the commune of . they, too, were unprepared. while they were starving, they protected the warehouses, filled to the brim with provisions. they placed sentinels to guard the bank of france, where the bourgeoisie kept the stolen money. the workers of barcelona, too, watched over the spoils of their masters. how pathetic is the stupidity of the underdog; how terribly tragic! but, then, have not his fetters been forged so deeply into his flesh, that he would not, even if he could, break them? the awe of authority, of law, of private property, hundredfold burned into his soul,--how is he to throw it off unprepared, unexpectedly? can anyone assume for a moment that a man like ferrer would affiliate himself with such a spontaneous, unorganized effort? would he not have known that it would result in a defeat, a disastrous defeat for the people? and is it not more likely that if he would have taken part, he, the experienced entrepreneur, would have thoroughly organized the attempt? if all other proofs were lacking, that one factor would be sufficient to exonerate francisco ferrer. but there are others equally convincing. for the very date of the outbreak, july twenty-fifth, ferrer had called a conference of his teachers and members of the league of rational education. it was to consider the autumn work, and particularly the publication of elisee reclus' great book, l'homme et la terre, and peter kropotkin's great french revolution. is it at all likely, is it at all plausible that ferrer, knowing of the uprising, being a party to it, would in cold blood invite his friends and colleagues to barcelona for the day on which he realized their lives would be endangered? surely, only the criminal, vicious mind of a jesuit could credit such deliberate murder. francisco ferrer had his life-work mapped out; he had everything to lose and nothing to gain, except ruin and disaster, were he to lend assistance to the outbreak. not that he doubted the justice of the people's wrath; but his work, his hope, his very nature was directed toward another goal. in vain are the frantic efforts of the catholic church, her lies, falsehoods, calumnies. she stands condemned by the awakened human conscience of having once more repeated the foul crimes of the past. francisco ferrer is accused of teaching the children the most blood-curdling ideas,--to hate god, for instance. horrors! francisco ferrer did not believe in the existence of a god. why teach the child to hate something which does not exist? is it not more likely that he took the children out into the open, that he showed them the splendor of the sunset, the brilliancy of the starry heavens, the awe-inspiring wonder of the mountains and seas; that he explained to them in his simple, direct way the law of growth, of development, of the interrelation of all life? in so doing he made it forever impossible for the poisonous weeds of the catholic church to take root in the child's mind. it has been stated that ferrer prepared the children to destroy the rich. ghost stories of old maids. is it not more likely that he prepared them to succor the poor? that he taught them the humiliation, the degradation, the awfulness of poverty, which is a vice and not a virtue; that he taught the dignity and importance of all creative efforts, which alone sustain life and build character. is it not the best and most effective way of bringing into the proper light the absolute uselessness and injury of parasitism? last, but not least, ferrer is charged with undermining the army by inculcating anti-military ideas. indeed? he must have believed with tolstoy that war is legalized slaughter, that it perpetuates hatred and arrogance, that it eats away the heart of nations, and turns them into raving maniacs. however, we have ferrer's own word regarding his ideas of modern education: "i would like to call the attention of my readers to this idea: all the value of education rests in the respect for the physical, intellectual, and moral will of the child. just as in science no demonstration is possible save by facts, just so there is no real education save that which is exempt from all dogmatism, which leaves to the child itself the direction of its effort, and confines itself to the seconding of its effort. now, there is nothing easier than to alter this purpose, and nothing harder than to respect it. education is always imposing, violating, constraining; the real educator is he who can best protect the child against his (the teacher's) own ideas, his peculiar whims; he who can best appeal to the child's own energies. "we are convinced that the education of the future will be of an entirely spontaneous nature; certainly we can not as yet realize it, but the evolution of methods in the direction of a wider comprehension of the phenomena of life, and the fact that all advances toward perfection mean the overcoming of restraint,--all this indicates that we are in the right when we hope for the deliverance of the child through science. "let us not fear to say that we want men capable of evolving without stopping, capable of destroying and renewing their environments without cessation, of renewing themselves also; men, whose intellectual independence will be their greatest force, who will attach themselves to nothing, always ready to accept what is best, happy in the triumph of new ideas, aspiring to live multiple lives in one life. society fears such men; we therefore must not hope that it will ever want an education able to give them to us. "we shall follow the labors of the scientists who study the child with the greatest attention, and we shall eagerly seek for means of applying their experience to the education which we want to build up, in the direction of an ever fuller liberation of the individual. but how can we attain our end? shall it not be by putting ourselves directly to the work favoring the foundation of new schools, which shall be ruled as much as possible by this spirit of liberty, which we forefeel will dominate the entire work of education in the future? "a trial has been made, which, for the present, has already given excellent results. we can destroy all which in the present school answers to the organization of constraint, the artificial surroundings by which children are separated from nature and life, the intellectual and moral discipline made use of to impose ready-made ideas upon them, beliefs which deprave and annihilate natural bent. without fear of deceiving ourselves, we can restore the child to the environment which entices it, the environment of nature in which he will be in contact with all that he loves, and in which impressions of life will replace fastidious book-learning. if we did no more than that, we should already have prepared in great part the deliverance of the child. "in such conditions we might already freely apply the data of science and labor most fruitfully. "i know very well we could not thus realize all our hopes, that we should often be forced, for lack of knowledge, to employ undesirable methods; but a certitude would sustain us in our efforts--namely, that even without reaching our aim completely we should do more and better in our still imperfect work than the present school accomplishes. i like the free spontaneity of a child who knows nothing, better than the world-knowledge and intellectual deformity of a child who has been subjected to our present education."[ ] had ferrer actually organized the riots, had he fought on the barricades, had he hurled a hundred bombs, he could not have been so dangerous to the catholic church and to despotism, as with his opposition to discipline and restraint. discipline and restraint--are they not back of all the evils in the world? slavery, submission, poverty, all misery, all social iniquities result from discipline and restraint. indeed, ferrer was dangerous. therefore he had to die, october thirteenth, , in the ditch of montjuich. yet who dare say his death was in vain? in view of the tempestuous rise of universal indignation: italy naming streets in memory of francisco ferrer, belgium inaugurating a movement to erect a memorial; france calling to the front her most illustrious men to resume the heritage of the martyr; england being the first to issue a biography:--all countries uniting in perpetuating the great work of francisco ferrer; america, even, tardy always in progressive ideas, giving birth to a francisco ferrer association, its aim being to publish a complete life of ferrer and to organize modern schools all over the country; in the face of this international revolutionary wave, who is there to say ferrer died in vain? that death at montjuich,--how wonderful, how dramatic it was, how it stirs the human soul. proud and erect, the inner eye turned toward the light, francisco ferrer needed no lying priests to give him courage, nor did he upbraid a phantom for forsaking him. the consciousness that his executioners represented a dying age, and that his was the living truth, sustained him in the last heroic moments. a dying age and a living truth, the living burying the dead. [ ] the beehive. [ ] mother earth, . [ ] ibid. [ ] black crows: the catholic clergy. [ ] mother earth, december, . the hypocrisy of puritanism speaking of puritanism in relation to american art, mr. gutzen burglum said: "puritanism has made us self-centered and hypocritical for so long, that sincerity and reverence for what is natural in our impulses have been fairly bred out of us, with the result that there can be neither truth nor individuality in our art." mr. burglum might have added that puritanism has made life itself impossible. more than art, more than estheticism, life represents beauty in a thousand variations; it is, indeed, a gigantic panorama of eternal change. puritanism, on the other hand, rests on a fixed and immovable conception of life; it is based on the calvinistic idea that life is a curse, imposed upon man by the wrath of god. in order to redeem himself man must do constant penance, must repudiate every natural and healthy impulse, and turn his back on joy and beauty. puritanism celebrated its reign of terror in england during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, destroying and crushing every manifestation of art and culture. it was the spirit of puritanism which robbed shelley of his children, because he would not bow to the dicta of religion. it was the same narrow spirit which alienated byron from his native land, because that great genius rebelled against the monotony, dullness, and pettiness of his country. it was puritanism, too, that forced some of england's freest women into the conventional lie of marriage: mary wollstonecraft and, later, george eliot. and recently puritanism has demanded another toll--the life of oscar wilde. in fact, puritanism has never ceased to be the most pernicious factor in the domain of john bull, acting as censor of the artistic expression of his people, and stamping its approval only on the dullness of middle-class respectability. it is therefore sheer british jingoism which points to america as the country of puritanic provincialism. it is quite true that our life is stunted by puritanism, and that the latter is killing what is natural and healthy in our impulses. but it is equally true that it is to england that we are indebted for transplanting this spirit on american soil. it was bequeathed to us by the pilgrim fathers. fleeing from persecution and oppression, the pilgrims of mayflower fame established in the new world a reign of puritanic tyranny and crime. the history of new england, and especially of massachusetts, is full of the horrors that have turned life into gloom, joy into despair, naturalness into disease, honesty and truth into hideous lies and hypocrisies. the ducking-stool and whipping post, as well as numerous other devices of torture, were the favorite english methods for american purification. boston, the city of culture, has gone down in the annals of puritanism as the "bloody town." it rivaled salem, even, in her cruel persecution of unauthorized religious opinions. on the now famous common a half-naked woman, with a baby in her arms, was publicly whipped for the crime of free speech; and on the same spot mary dyer, another quaker woman, was hanged in . in fact, boston has been the scene of more than one wanton crime committed by puritanism. salem, in the summer of , killed eighteen people for witchcraft. nor was massachusetts alone in driving out the devil by fire and brimstone. as canning justly said: "the pilgrim fathers infested the new world to redress the balance of the old." the horrors of that period have found their most supreme expression in the american classic, the scarlet letter. puritanism no longer employs the thumbscrew and lash; but it still has a most pernicious hold on the minds and feelings of the american people. naught else can explain the power of a comstock. like the torquemadas of ante-bellum days, anthony comstock is the autocrat of american morals; he dictates the standards of good and evil, of purity and vice. like a thief in the night he sneaks into the private lives of the people, into their most intimate relations. the system of espionage established by this man comstock puts to shame the infamous third division of the russian secret police. why does the public tolerate such an outrage on its liberties? simply because comstock is but the loud expression of the puritanism bred in the anglo-saxon blood, and from whose thraldom even liberals have not succeeded in fully emancipating themselves. the visionless and leaden elements of the old young men's and women's christian temperance unions, purity leagues, american sabbath unions, and the prohibition party, with anthony comstock as their patron saint, are the grave diggers of american art and culture. europe can at least boast of a bold art and literature which delve deeply into the social and sexual problems of our time, exercising a severe critique of all our shams. as with a surgeon's knife every puritanic carcass is dissected, and the way thus cleared for man's liberation from the dead weights of the past. but with puritanism as the constant check upon american life, neither truth nor sincerity is possible. nothing but gloom and mediocrity to dictate human conduct, curtail natural expression, and stifle our best impulses. puritanism in this the twentieth century is as much the enemy of freedom and beauty as it was when it landed on plymouth rock. it repudiates, as something vile and sinful, our deepest feelings; but being absolutely ignorant as to the real functions of human emotions, puritanism is itself the creator of the most unspeakable vices. the entire history of asceticism proves this to be only too true. the church, as well as puritanism, has fought the flesh as something evil; it had to be subdued and hidden at all cost. the result of this vicious attitude is only now beginning to be recognized by modern thinkers and educators. they realize that "nakedness has a hygienic value as well as a spiritual significance, far beyond its influences in allaying the natural inquisitiveness of the young or acting as a preventative of morbid emotion. it is an inspiration to adults who have long outgrown any youthful curiosities. the vision of the essential and eternal human form, the nearest thing to us in all the world, with its vigor and its beauty and its grace, is one of the prime tonics of life."[ ] but the spirit of purism has so perverted the human mind that it has lost the power to appreciate the beauty of nudity, forcing us to hide the natural form under the plea of chastity. yet chastity itself is but an artificial imposition upon nature, expressive of a false shame of the human form. the modern idea of chastity, especially in reference to woman, its greatest victim, is but the sensuous exaggeration of our natural impulses. "chastity varies with the amount of clothing," and hence christians and purists forever hasten to cover the "heathen" with tatters, and thus convert him to goodness and chastity. puritanism, with its perversion of the significance and functions of the human body, especially in regard to woman, has condemned her to celibacy, or to the indiscriminate breeding of a diseased race, or to prostitution. the enormity of this crime against humanity is apparent when we consider the results. absolute sexual continence is imposed upon the unmarried woman, under pain of being considered immoral or fallen, with the result of producing neurasthenia, impotence, depression, and a great variety of nervous complaints involving diminished power of work, limited enjoyment of life, sleeplessness, and preoccupation with sexual desires and imaginings. the arbitrary and pernicious dictum of total continence probably also explains the mental inequality of the sexes. thus freud believes that the intellectual inferiority of so many women is due to the inhibition of thought imposed upon them for the purpose of sexual repression. having thus suppressed the natural sex desires of the unmarried woman, puritanism, on the other hand, blesses her married sister for incontinent fruitfulness in wedlock. indeed, not merely blesses her, but forces the woman, oversexed by previous repression, to bear children, irrespective of weakened physical condition or economic inability to rear a large family. prevention, even by scientifically determined safe methods, is absolutely prohibited; nay, the very mention of the subject is considered criminal. thanks to this puritanic tyranny, the majority of women soon find themselves at the ebb of their physical resources. ill and worn, they are utterly unable to give their children even elementary care. that, added to economic pressure, forces many women to risk utmost danger rather than continue to bring forth life. the custom of procuring abortions has reached such vast proportions in america as to be almost beyond belief. according to recent investigations along this line, seventeen abortions are committed in every hundred pregnancies. this fearful percentage represents only cases which come to the knowledge of physicians. considering the secrecy in which this practice is necessarily shrouded, and the consequent professional inefficiency and neglect, puritanism continuously exacts thousands of victims to its own stupidity and hypocrisy. prostitution, although hounded, imprisoned, and chained, is nevertheless the greatest triumph of puritanism. it is its most cherished child, all hypocritical sanctimoniousness notwithstanding. the prostitute is the fury of our century, sweeping across the "civilized" countries like a hurricane, and leaving a trail of disease and disaster. the only remedy puritanism offers for this ill-begotten child is greater repression and more merciless persecution. the latest outrage is represented by the page law, which imposes upon new york the terrible failure and crime of europe; namely, registration and segregation of the unfortunate victims of puritanism. in equally stupid manner purism seeks to check the terrible scourge of its own creation--venereal diseases. most disheartening it is that this spirit of obtuse narrow-mindedness has poisoned even our so-called liberals, and has blinded them into joining the crusade against the very things born of the hypocrisy of puritanism--prostitution and its results. in wilful blindness puritanism refuses to see that the true method of prevention is the one which makes it clear to all that "venereal diseases are not a mysterious or terrible thing, the penalty of the sin of the flesh, a sort of shameful evil branded by purist malediction, but an ordinary disease which may be treated and cured." by its methods of obscurity, disguise, and concealment, puritanism has furnished favorable conditions for the growth and spread of these diseases. its bigotry is again most strikingly demonstrated by the senseless attitude in regard to the great discovery of prof. ehrlich, hypocrisy veiling the important cure for syphilis with vague allusions to a remedy for "a certain poison." the almost limitless capacity of puritanism for evil is due to its intrenchment behind the state and the law. pretending to safeguard the people against "immorality," it has impregnated the machinery of government and added to its usurpation of moral guardianship the legal censorship of our views, feelings, and even of our conduct. art, literature, the drama, the privacy of the mails, in fact, our most intimate tastes, are at the mercy of this inexorable tyrant. anthony comstock, or some other equally ignorant policeman, has been given power to desecrate genius, to soil and mutilate the sublimest creation of nature--the human form. books dealing with the most vital issues of our lives, and seeking to shed light upon dangerously obscured problems, are legally treated as criminal offenses, and their helpless authors thrown into prison or driven to destruction and death. not even in the domain of the tsar is personal liberty daily outraged to the extent it is in america, the stronghold of the puritanic eunuchs. here the only day of recreation left to the masses, sunday, has been made hideous and utterly impossible. all writers on primitive customs and ancient civilization agree that the sabbath was a day of festivities, free from care and duties, a day of general rejoicing and merry-making. in every european country this tradition continues to bring some relief from the humdrum and stupidity of our christian era. everywhere concert halls, theaters, museums, and gardens are filled with men, women, and children, particularly workers with their families, full of life and joy, forgetful of the ordinary rules and conventions of their every-day existence. it is on that day that the masses demonstrate what life might really mean in a sane society, with work stripped of its profit-making, soul-destroying purpose. puritanism has robbed the people even of that one day. naturally, only the workers are affected: our millionaires have their luxurious homes and elaborate clubs. the poor, however, are condemned to the monotony and dullness of the american sunday. the sociability and fun of european outdoor life is here exchanged for the gloom of the church, the stuffy, germ-saturated country parlor, or the brutalizing atmosphere of the back-room saloon. in prohibition states the people lack even the latter, unless they can invest their meager earnings in quantities of adulterated liquor. as to prohibition, every one knows what a farce it really is. like all other achievements of puritanism it, too, has but driven the "devil" deeper into the human system. nowhere else does one meet so many drunkards as in our prohibition towns. but so long as one can use scented candy to abate the foul breath of hypocrisy, puritanism is triumphant. ostensibly prohibition is opposed to liquor for reasons of health and economy, but the very spirit of prohibition being itself abnormal, it succeeds but in creating an abnormal life. every stimulus which quickens the imagination and raises the spirits, is as necessary to our life as air. it invigorates the body, and deepens our vision of human fellowship. without stimuli, in one form or another, creative work is impossible, nor indeed the spirit of kindliness and generosity. the fact that some great geniuses have seen their reflection in the goblet too frequently, does not justify puritanism in attempting to fetter the whole gamut of human emotions. a byron and a poe have stirred humanity deeper than all the puritans can ever hope to do. the former have given to life meaning and color; the latter are turning red blood into water, beauty into ugliness, variety into uniformity and decay. puritanism, in whatever expression, is a poisonous germ. on the surface everything may look strong and vigorous; yet the poison works its way persistently, until the entire fabric is doomed. with hippolyte taine, every truly free spirit has come to realize that "puritanism is the death of culture, philosophy, humor, and good fellowship; its characteristics are dullness, monotony, and gloom." [ ] the psychology of sex. havelock ellis. the traffic in women our reformers have suddenly made a great discovery--the white slave traffic. the papers are full of these "unheard of conditions," and lawmakers are already planning a new set of laws to check the horror. it is significant that whenever the public mind is to be diverted from a great social wrong, a crusade is inaugurated against indecency, gambling, saloons, etc. and what is the result of such crusades? gambling is increasing, saloons are doing a lively business through back entrances, prostitution is at its height, and the system of pimps and cadets is but aggravated. how is it that an institution, known almost to every child, should have been discovered so suddenly? how is it that this evil, known to all sociologists, should now be made such an important issue? to assume that the recent investigation of the white slave traffic (and, by the way, a very superficial investigation) has discovered anything new, is, to say the least, very foolish. prostitution has been, and is, a widespread evil, yet mankind goes on its business, perfectly indifferent to the sufferings and distress of the victims of prostitution. as indifferent, indeed, as mankind has remained to our industrial system, or to economic prostitution. only when human sorrows are turned into a toy with glaring colors will baby people become interested--for a while at least. the people are a very fickle baby that must have new toys every day. the "righteous" cry against the white slave traffic is such a toy. it serves to amuse the people for a little while, and it will help to create a few more fat political jobs--parasites who stalk about the world as inspectors, investigators, detectives, and so forth. what is really the cause of the trade in women? not merely white women, but yellow and black women as well. exploitation, of course; the merciless moloch of capitalism that fattens on underpaid labor, thus driving thousands of women and girls into prostitution. with mrs. warren these girls feel, "why waste your life working for a few shillings a week in a scullery, eighteen hours a day?" naturally our reformers say nothing about this cause. they know it well enough, but it doesn't pay to say anything about it. it is much more profitable to play the pharisee, to pretend an outraged morality, than to go to the bottom of things. however, there is one commendable exception among the young writers: reginald wright kauffman, whose work, the house of bondage, is the first earnest attempt to treat the social evil, not from a sentimental philistine viewpoint. a journalist of wide experience, mr. kauffman proves that our industrial system leaves most women no alternative except prostitution. the women portrayed in the house of bondage belong to the working class. had the author portrayed the life of women in other spheres, he would have been confronted with the same state of affairs. nowhere is woman treated according to the merit of her work, but rather as a sex. it is therefore almost inevitable that she should pay for her right to exist, to keep a position in whatever line, with sex favors. thus it is merely a question of degree whether she sells herself to one man, in or out of marriage, or to many men. whether our reformers admit it or not, the economic and social inferiority of woman is responsible for prostitution. just at present our good people are shocked by the disclosures that in new york city alone, one out of every ten women works in a factory, that the average wage received by women is six dollars per week for forty-eight to sixty hours of work, and that the majority of female wage workers face many months of idleness which leaves the average wage about $ a year. in view of these economic horrors, is it to be wondered at that prostitution and the white slave trade have become such dominant factors? lest the preceding figures be considered an exaggeration, it is well to examine what some authorities on prostitution have to say: "a prolific cause of female depravity can be found in the several tables, showing the description of the employment pursued, and the wages received, by the women previous to their fall, and it will be a question for the political economist to decide how far mere business consideration should be an apology on the part of employers for a reduction in their rates of remuneration, and whether the savings of a small percentage on wages is not more than counter-balanced by the enormous amount of taxation enforced on the public at large to defray the expenses incurred on account of a system of vice, which is the direct result, in many cases, of insufficient compensation of honest labor."[ ] our present-day reformers would do well to look into dr. sanger's book. there they will find that out of , cases under his observation, but few came from the middle classes, from well-ordered conditions, or pleasant homes. by far the largest majority were working girls and working women; some driven into prostitution through sheer want, others because of a cruel, wretched life at home, others again because of thwarted and crippled physical natures (of which i shall speak later on). also it will do the maintainers of purity and morality good to learn that out of two thousand cases, were married women, women who lived with their husbands. evidently there was not much of a guaranty for their "safety and purity" in the sanctity of marriage.[ ] dr. alfred blaschko, in prostitution in the nineteenth century, is even more emphatic in characterizing economic conditions as one of the most vital factors of prostitution. "although prostitution has existed in all ages, it was left to the nineteenth century to develop it into a gigantic social institution. the development of industry with vast masses of people in the competitive market, the growth and congestion of large cities, the insecurity and uncertainty of employment, has given prostitution an impetus never dreamed of at any period in human history." and again havelock ellis, while not so absolute in dealing with the economic cause, is nevertheless compelled to admit that it is indirectly and directly the main cause. thus he finds that a large percentage of prostitutes is recruited from the servant class, although the latter have less care and greater security. on the other hand, mr. ellis does not deny that the daily routine, the drudgery, the monotony of the servant girl's lot, and especially the fact that she may never partake of the companionship and joy of a home, is no mean factor in forcing her to seek recreation and forgetfulness in the gaiety and glimmer of prostitution. in other words, the servant girl, being treated as a drudge, never having the right to herself, and worn out by the caprices of her mistress, can find an outlet, like the factory or shopgirl, only in prostitution. the most amusing side of the question now before the public is the indignation of our "good, respectable people," especially the various christian gentlemen, who are always to be found in the front ranks of every crusade. is it that they are absolutely ignorant of the history of religion, and especially of the christian religion? or is it that they hope to blind the present generation to the part played in the past by the church in relation to prostitution? whatever their reason, they should be the last to cry out against the unfortunate victims of today, since it is known to every intelligent student that prostitution is of religious origin, maintained and fostered for many centuries, not as a shame but as a virtue, hailed as such by the gods themselves. "it would seem that the origin of prostitution is to be found primarily in a religious custom, religion, the great conserver of social tradition, preserving in a transformed shape a primitive freedom that was passing out of the general social life. the typical example is that recorded by herodotus, in the fifth century before christ, at the temple of mylitta, the babylonian venus, where every woman, once in her life, had to come and give herself to the first stranger, who threw a coin in her lap, to worship the goddess. very similar customs existed in other parts of western asia, in north africa, in cyprus, and other islands of the eastern mediterranean, and also in greece, where the temple of aphrodite on the fort at corinth possessed over a thousand hierodules, dedicated to the service of the goddess. "the theory that religious prostitution developed, as a general rule, out of the belief that the generative activity of human beings possessed a mysterious and sacred influence in promoting the fertility of nature, is maintained by all authoritative writers on the subject. gradually, however, and when prostitution became an organized institution under priestly influence, religious prostitution developed utilitarian sides, thus helping to increase public revenue. "the rise of christianity to political power produced little change in policy. the leading fathers of the church tolerated prostitution. brothels under municipal protection are found in the thirteenth century. they constituted a sort of public service, the directors of them being considered almost as public servants."[ ] to this must be added the following from dr. sanger's work: "pope clement ii. issued a bull that prostitutes would be tolerated if they pay a certain amount of their earnings to the church. "pope sixtus iv. was more practical; from one single brothel, which he himself had built, he received an income of , ducats." in modern times the church is a little more careful in that direction. at least she does not openly demand tribute from prostitutes. she finds it much more profitable to go in for real estate, like trinity church, for instance, to rent out death traps at an exorbitant price to those who live off and by prostitution. much as i should like to, my space will not admit speaking of prostitution in egypt, greece, rome, and during the middle ages. the conditions in the latter period are particularly interesting, inasmuch as prostitution was organized into guilds, presided over by a brothel queen. these guilds employed strikes as a medium of improving their condition and keeping a standard price. certainly that is more practical a method than the one used by the modern wage slave in society. it would be one-sided and extremely superficial to maintain that the economic factor is the only cause of prostitution. there are others no less important and vital. that, too, our reformers know, but dare discuss even less than the institution that saps the very life out of both men and women. i refer to the sex question, the very mention of which causes most people moral spasms. it is a conceded fact that woman is being reared as a sex commodity, and yet she is kept in absolute ignorance of the meaning and importance of sex. everything dealing with the subject is suppressed, and persons who attempt to bring light into this terrible darkness are persecuted and thrown into prison. yet it is nevertheless true that so long as a girl is not to know how to take care of herself, not to know the function of the most important part of her life, we need not be surprised if she becomes an easy prey to prostitution, or to any other form of a relationship which degrades her to the position of an object for mere sex gratification. it is due to this ignorance that the entire life and nature of the girl is thwarted and crippled. we have long ago taken it as a self-evident fact that the boy may follow the call of the wild; that is to say, that the boy may, as soon has his sex nature asserts itself, satisfy that nature; but our moralists are scandalized at the very thought that the nature of a girl should assert itself. to the moralist prostitution does not consist so much in the fact that the woman sells her body, but rather that she sells it out of wedlock. that this is no mere statement is proved by the fact that marriage for monetary considerations is perfectly legitimate, sanctified by law and public opinion, while any other union is condemned and repudiated. yet a prostitute, if properly defined, means nothing else than "any person for whom sexual relationships are subordinated to gain."[ ] "those women are prostitutes who sell their bodies for the exercise of the sexual act and make of this a profession."[ ] in fact, banger goes further; he maintains that the act of prostitution is "intrinsically equal to that of a man or woman who contracts a marriage for economic reasons." of course, marriage is the goal of every girl, but as thousands of girls cannot marry, our stupid social customs condemn them either to a life of celibacy or prostitution. human nature asserts itself regardless of all laws, nor is there any plausible reason why nature should adapt itself to a perverted conception of morality. society considers the sex experiences of a man as attributes of his general development, while similar experiences in the life of a woman are looked upon as a terrible calamity, a loss of honor and of all that is good and noble in a human being. this double standard of morality has played no little part in the creation and perpetuation of prostitution. it involves the keeping of the young in absolute ignorance on sex matters, which alleged "innocence," together with an overwrought and stifled sex nature, helps to bring about a state of affairs that our puritans are so anxious to avoid or prevent. not that the gratification of sex must needs lead to prostitution; it is the cruel, heartless, criminal persecution of those who dare divert from the beaten paths, which is responsible for it. girls, mere children, work in crowded, over-heated rooms ten to twelve hours daily at a machine, which tends to keep them in a constant over-excited sex state. many of these girls have no home or comforts of any kind; therefore the street or some place of cheap amusement is the only means of forgetting their daily routine. this naturally brings them into close proximity with the other sex. it is hard to say which of the two factors brings the girl's over-sexed condition to a climax, but it is certainly the most natural thing that a climax should result. that is the first step toward prostitution. nor is the girl to be held responsible for it. on the contrary, it is altogether the fault of society, the fault of our lack of understanding, of our lack of appreciation of life in the making; especially is it the criminal fault of our moralists, who condemn a girl for all eternity, because she has gone from the "path of virtue"; that is, because her first sex experience has taken place without the sanction of the church. the girl feels herself a complete outcast, with the doors of home and society closed in her face. her entire training and tradition is such that the girl herself feels depraved and fallen, and therefore has no ground to stand upon, or any hold that will lift her up, instead of dragging her down. thus society creates the victims that it afterwards vainly attempts to get rid of. the meanest, most depraved and decrepit man still considers himself too good to take as his wife the woman whose grace he was quite willing to buy, even though he might thereby save her from a life of horror. nor can she turn to her own sister for help. in her stupidity the latter deems herself too pure and chaste, not realizing that her own position is in many respects even more deplorable than her sister's of the street. "the wife who married for money, compared with the prostitute," says havelock ellis, "is the true scab. she is paid less, gives much more in return in labor and care, and is absolutely bound to her master. the prostitute never signs away the right over her own person, she retains her freedom and personal rights, nor is she always compelled to submit to a man's embrace." nor does the better-than-thou woman realize the apologist claim of lecky that "though she may be the supreme type of vice, she is also the most efficient guardian of virtue. but for her, happy homes would be polluted, unnatural and harmful practice would abound." moralists are ever ready to sacrifice one-half of the human race for the sake of some miserable institution which they can not outgrow. as a matter of fact, prostitution is no more a safeguard for the purity of the home than rigid laws are a safeguard against prostitution. fully fifty per cent. of married men are patrons of brothels. it is through this virtuous element that the married women--nay, even the children--are infected with venereal diseases. yet society has not a word of condemnation for the man, while no law is too monstrous to be set in motion against the helpless victim. she is not only preyed upon by those who use her, but she is also absolutely at the mercy of every policeman and miserable detective on the beat, the officials at the station house, the authorities in every prison. in a recent book by a woman who was for twelve years the mistress of a "house," are to be found the following figures: "the authorities compelled me to pay every month fines between $ . to $ . , the girls would pay from $ . to $ . to the police." considering that the writer did her business in a small city, that the amounts she gives do not include extra bribes and fines, one can readily see the tremendous revenue the police department derives from the blood money of its victims, whom it will not even protect. woe to those who refuse to pay their toll; they would be rounded up like cattle, "if only to make a favorable impression upon the good citizens of the city, or if the powers needed extra money on the side. for the warped mind who believes that a fallen woman is incapable of human emotion it would be impossible to realize the grief, the disgrace, the tears, the wounded pride that was ours every time we were pulled in." strange, isn't it, that a woman who has a kept a "house" should be able to feel that way? but stranger still that a good christian world should bleed and fleece such women, and give them nothing in return except obloquy and persecution. oh, for the charity of a christian world! much stress is laid on white slaves being imported into america. how would america ever retain her virtue if europe did not help her out? i will not deny that this may be the case in some instances, any more than i will deny that there are emissaries of germany and other countries luring economic slaves into america; but i absolutely deny that prostitution is recruited to any appreciable extent from europe. it may be true that the majority of prostitutes in new york city are foreigners, but that is because the majority of the population is foreign. the moment we go to any other american city, to chicago or the middle west, we shall find that the number of foreign prostitutes is by far a minority. equally exaggerated is the belief that the majority of street girls in this city were engaged in this business before they came to america. most of the girls speak excellent english, are americanized in habits and appearance,--a thing absolutely impossible unless they had lived in this country many years. that is, they were driven into prostitution by american conditions, by the thoroughly american custom for excessive display of finery and clothes, which, of course, necessitates money,--money that cannot be earned in shops or factories. in other words, there is no reason to believe that any set of men would go to the risk and expense of getting foreign products, when american conditions are overflooding the market with thousands of girls. on the other hand, there is sufficient evidence to prove that the export of american girls for the purpose of prostitution is by no means a small factor. thus clifford g. roe, ex-assistant state attorney of cook county, ill., makes the open charge that new england girls are shipped to panama for the express use of men in the employ of uncle sam. mr. roe adds that "there seems to be an underground railroad between boston and washington which many girls travel." is it not significant that the railroad should lead to the very seat of federal authority? that mr. roe said more than was desired in certain quarters is proved by the fact that he lost his position. it is not practical for men in office to tell tales from school. the excuse given for the conditions in panama is that there are no brothels in the canal zone. that is the usual avenue of escape for a hypocritical world that dares not face the truth. not in the canal zone, not in the city limits,--therefore prostitution does not exist. next to mr. roe, there is james bronson reynolds, who has made a thorough study of the white slave traffic in asia. as a staunch american citizen and friend of the future napoleon of america, theodore roosevelt, he is surely the last to discredit the virtue of his country. yet we are informed by him that in hong kong, shanghai, and yokohama, the augean stables of american vice are located. there american prostitutes have made themselves so conspicuous that in the orient "american girl" is synonymous with prostitute. mr. reynolds reminds his countrymen that while americans in china are under the protection of our consular representatives, the chinese in america have no protection at all. every one who knows the brutal and barbarous persecution chinese and japanese endure on the pacific coast, will agree with mr. reynolds. in view of the above facts it is rather absurd to point to europe as the swamp whence come all the social diseases of america. just as absurd is it to proclaim the myth that the jews furnish the largest contingent of willing prey. i am sure that no one will accuse me of nationalistic tendencies. i am glad to say that i have developed out of them, as out of many other prejudices. if, therefore, i resent the statement that jewish prostitutes are imported, it is not because of any judaistic sympathies, but because of the facts inherent in the lives of these people. no one but the most superficial will claim that jewish girls migrate to strange lands, unless they have some tie or relation that brings them there. the jewish girl is not adventurous. until recent years she had never left home, not even so far as the next village or town, except it were to visit some relative. is it then credible that jewish girls would leave their parents or families, travel thousands of miles to strange lands, through the influence and promises of strange forces? go to any of the large incoming steamers and see for yourself if these girls do not come either with their parents, brothers, aunts, or other kinsfolk. there may be exceptions, of course, but to state that large numbers of jewish girls are imported for prostitution, or any other purpose, is simply not to know jewish psychology. those who sit in a glass house do wrong to throw stones about them; besides, the american glass house is rather thin, it will break easily, and the interior is anything but a gainly sight. to ascribe the increase in prostitution to alleged importation, to the growth of the cadet system, or similar causes, is highly superficial. i have already referred to the former. as to the cadet system, abhorrent as it is, we must not ignore the fact that it is essentially a phase of modern prostitution,--a phase accentuated by suppression and graft, resulting from sporadic crusades against the social evil. the procurer is no doubt a poor specimen of the human family, but in what manner is he more despicable than the policeman who takes the last cent from the street walker, and then locks her up in the station house? why is the cadet more criminal, or a greater menace to society, than the owners of department stores and factories, who grow fat on the sweat of their victims, only to drive them to the streets? i make no plea for the cadet, but i fail to see why he should be mercilessly hounded, while the real perpetrators of all social iniquity enjoy immunity and respect. then, too, it is well to remember that it is not the cadet who makes the prostitute. it is our sham and hypocrisy that create both the prostitute and the cadet. until very little was known in america of the procurer. then we were attacked by an epidemic of virtue. vice was to be abolished, the country purified at all cost. the social cancer was therefore driven out of sight, but deeper into the body. keepers of brothels, as well as their unfortunate victims, were turned over to the tender mercies of the police. the inevitable consequence of exorbitant bribes, and the penitentiary, followed. while comparatively protected in the brothels, where they represented a certain monetary value, the girls now found themselves on the street, absolutely at the mercy of the graft-greedy police. desperate, needing protection and longing for affection, these girls naturally proved an easy prey for cadets, themselves the result of the spirit of our commercial age. thus the cadet system was the direct outgrowth of police persecution, graft, and attempted suppression of prostitution. it were sheer folly to confound this modern phase of the social evil with the causes of the latter. mere suppression and barbaric enactments can serve but to embitter, and further degrade, the unfortunate victims of ignorance and stupidity. the latter has reached its highest expression in the proposed law to make humane treatment of prostitutes a crime, punishing any one sheltering a prostitute with five years' imprisonment and $ , fine. such an attitude merely exposes the terrible lack of understanding of the true causes of prostitution, as a social factor, as well as manifesting the puritanic spirit of the scarlet letter days. there is not a single modern writer on the subject who does not refer to the utter futility of legislative methods in coping with the issue. thus dr. blaschko finds that governmental suppression and moral crusades accomplish nothing save driving the evil into secret channels, multiplying its dangers to society. havelock ellis, the most thorough and humane student of prostitution, proves by a wealth of data that the more stringent the methods of persecution the worse the condition becomes. among other data we learn that in france, "in , charles ix. abolished brothels through an edict, but the numbers of prostitutes were only increased, while many new brothels appeared in unsuspected shapes, and were more dangerous. in spite of all such legislation, or because of it, there has been no country in which prostitution has played a more conspicuous part."[ ] an educated public opinion, freed from the legal and moral hounding of the prostitute, can alone help to ameliorate present conditions. wilful shutting of eyes and ignoring of the evil as a social factor of modern life, can but aggravate matters. we must rise above our foolish notions of "better than thou," and learn to recognize in the prostitute a product of social conditions. such a realization will sweep away the attitude of hypocrisy, and insure a greater understanding and more humane treatment. as to a thorough eradication of prostitution, nothing can accomplish that save a complete transvaluation of all accepted values--especially the moral ones--coupled with the abolition of industrial slavery. [ ] dr. sanger, the history of prostitution. [ ] it is a significant fact that dr. sanger's book has been excluded from the u. s. mails. evidently the authorities are not anxious that the public be informed as to the true cause of prostitution. [ ] havelock ellis, sex and society. [ ] guyot, la prostitution. [ ] banger, criminalite et condition economique. [ ] sex and society. woman suffrage we boast of the age of advancement, of science, and progress. is it not strange, then, that we still believe in fetich worship? true, our fetiches have different form and substance, yet in their power over the human mind they are still as disastrous as were those of old. our modern fetich is universal suffrage. those who have not yet achieved that goal fight bloody revolutions to obtain it, and those who have enjoyed its reign bring heavy sacrifice to the altar of this omnipotent deity. woe to the heretic who dare question that divinity! woman, even more than man, is a fetich worshipper, and though her idols may change, she is ever on her knees, ever holding up her hands, ever blind to the fact that her god has feet of clay. thus woman has been the greatest supporter of all deities from time immemorial. thus, too, she has had to pay the price that only gods can exact,--her freedom, her heart's blood, her very life. nietzsche's memorable maxim, "when you go to woman, take the whip along," is considered very brutal, yet nietzsche expressed in one sentence the attitude of woman towards her gods. religion, especially the christian religion, has condemned woman to the life of an inferior, a slave. it has thwarted her nature and fettered her soul, yet the christian religion has no greater supporter, none more devout, than woman. indeed, it is safe to say that religion would have long ceased to be a factor in the lives of the people, if it were not for the support it receives from woman. the most ardent churchworkers, the most tireless missionaries the world over, are women, always sacrificing on the altar of the gods that have chained her spirit and enslaved her body. the insatiable monster, war, robs woman of all that is dear and precious to her. it exacts her brothers, lovers, sons, and in return gives her a life of loneliness and despair. yet the greatest supporter and worshiper of war is woman. she it is who instills the love of conquest and power into her children; she it is who whispers the glories of war into the ears of her little ones, and who rocks her baby to sleep with the tunes of trumpets and the noise of guns. it is woman, too, who crowns the victor on his return from the battlefield. yes, it is woman who pays the highest price to that insatiable monster, war. then there is the home. what a terrible fetich it is! how it saps the very life-energy of woman,--this modern prison with golden bars. its shining aspect blinds woman to the price she would have to pay as wife, mother, and housekeeper. yet woman clings tenaciously to the home, to the power that holds her in bondage. it may be said that because woman recognizes the awful toll she is made to pay to the church, state, and the home, she wants suffrage to set herself free. that may be true of the few; the majority of suffragists repudiate utterly such blasphemy. on the contrary, they insist always that it is woman suffrage which will make her a better christian and homekeeper, a staunch citizen of the state. thus suffrage is only a means of strengthening the omnipotence of the very gods that woman has served from time immemorial. what wonder, then, that she should be just as devout, just as zealous, just as prostrate before the new idol, woman suffrage. as of old, she endures persecution, imprisonment, torture, and all forms of condemnation, with a smile on her face. as of old, the most enlightened, even, hope for a miracle from the twentieth century deity,--suffrage. life, happiness, joy, freedom, independence,--all that, and more, is to spring from suffrage. in her blind devotion woman does not see what people of intellect perceived fifty years ago: that suffrage is an evil, that it has only helped to enslave people, that it has but closed their eyes that they may not see how craftily they were made to submit. woman's demand for equal suffrage is based largely on the contention that woman must have the equal right in all affairs of society. no one could, possibly, refute that, if suffrage were a right. alas, for the ignorance of the human mind, which can see a right in an imposition. or is it not the most brutal imposition for one set of people to make laws that another set is coerced by force to obey? yet woman clamors for that "golden opportunity" that has wrought so much misery in the world, and robbed man of his integrity and self-reliance; an imposition which has thoroughly corrupted the people, and made them absolute prey in the hands of unscrupulous politicians. the poor, stupid, free american citizen! free to starve, free to tramp the highways of this great country, he enjoys universal suffrage, and, by that right, he has forged chains about his limbs. the reward that he receives is stringent labor laws prohibiting the right of boycott, of picketing, in fact, of everything, except the right to be robbed of the fruits of his labor. yet all these disastrous results of the twentieth century fetich have taught woman nothing. but, then, woman will purify politics, we are assured. needless to say, i am not opposed to woman suffrage on the conventional ground that she is not equal to it. i see neither physical, psychological, nor mental reasons why woman should not have the equal right to vote with man. but that can not possibly blind me to the absurd notion that woman will accomplish that wherein man has failed. if she would not make things worse, she certainly could not make them better. to assume, therefore, that she would succeed in purifying something which is not susceptible of purification, is to credit her with supernatural powers. since woman's greatest misfortune has been that she was looked upon as either angel or devil, her true salvation lies in being placed on earth; namely, in being considered human, and therefore subject to all human follies and mistakes. are we, then, to believe that two errors will make a right? are we to assume that the poison already inherent in politics will be decreased, if women were to enter the political arena? the most ardent suffragists would hardly maintain such a folly. as a matter of fact, the most advanced students of universal suffrage have come to realize that all existing systems of political power are absurd, and are completely inadequate to meet the pressing issues of life. this view is also borne out by a statement of one who is herself an ardent believer in woman suffrage, dr. helen l. sumner. in her able work on equal suffrage, she says: "in colorado, we find that equal suffrage serves to show in the most striking way the essential rottenness and degrading character of the existing system." of course, dr. sumner has in mind a particular system of voting, but the same applies with equal force to the entire machinery of the representative system. with such a basis, it is difficult to understand how woman, as a political factor, would benefit either herself or the rest of mankind. but, say our suffrage devotees, look at the countries and states where female suffrage exists. see what woman has accomplished--in australia, new zealand, finland, the scandinavian countries, and in our own four states, idaho, colorado, wyoming, and utah. distance lends enchantment--or, to quote a polish formula--"it is well where we are not." thus one would assume that those countries and states are unlike other countries or states, that they have greater freedom, greater social and economic equality, a finer appreciation of human life, deeper understanding of the great social struggle, with all the vital questions it involves for the human race. the women of australia and new zealand can vote, and help make the laws. are the labor conditions better there than they are in england, where the suffragettes are making such a heroic struggle? does there exist a greater motherhood, happier and freer children than in england? is woman there no longer considered a mere sex commodity? has she emancipated herself from the puritanical double standard of morality for men and women? certainly none but the ordinary female stump politician will dare answer these questions in the affirmative. if that be so, it seems ridiculous to point to australia and new zealand as the mecca of equal suffrage accomplishments. on the other hand, it is a fact to those who know the real political conditions in australia, that politics have gagged labor by enacting the most stringent labor laws, making strikes without the sanction of an arbitration committee a crime equal to treason. not for a moment do i mean to imply that woman suffrage is responsible for this state of affairs. i do mean, however, that there is no reason to point to australia as a wonder-worker of woman's accomplishment, since her influence has been unable to free labor from the thralldom of political bossism. finland has given woman equal suffrage; nay, even the right to sit in parliament. has that helped to develop a greater heroism, an intenser zeal than that of the women of russia? finland, like russia, smarts under the terrible whip of the bloody tsar. where are the finnish perovskaias, spiridonovas, figners, breshkovskaias? where are the countless numbers of finnish young girls who cheerfully go to siberia for their cause? finland is sadly in need of heroic liberators. why has the ballot not created them? the only finnish avenger of his people was a man, not a woman, and he used a more effective weapon than the ballot. as to our own states where women vote, and which are constantly being pointed out as examples of marvels, what has been accomplished there through the ballot that women do not to a large extent enjoy in other states; or that they could not achieve through energetic efforts without the ballot? true, in the suffrage states women are guaranteed equal rights to property; but of what avail is that right to the mass of women without property, the thousands of wage workers, who live from hand to mouth? that equal suffrage did not, and cannot, affect their condition is admitted even by dr. sumner, who certainly is in a position to know. as an ardent suffragist, and having been sent to colorado by the collegiate equal suffrage league of new york state to collect material in favor of suffrage, she would be the last to say anything derogatory; yet we are informed that "equal suffrage has but slightly affected the economic conditions of women. that women do not receive equal pay for equal work, and that, though woman in colorado has enjoyed school suffrage since , women teachers are paid less than in california." on the other hand, miss sumner fails to account for the fact that although women have had school suffrage for thirty-four years, and equal suffrage since , the census in denver alone a few months ago disclosed the fact of fifteen thousand defective school children. and that, too, with mostly women in the educational department, and also notwithstanding that women in colorado have passed the "most stringent laws for child and animal protection." the women of colorado "have taken great interest in the state institutions for the care of dependent, defective, and delinquent children." what a horrible indictment against woman's care and interest, if one city has fifteen thousand defective children. what about the glory of woman suffrage, since it has failed utterly in the most important social issue, the child? and where is the superior sense of justice that woman was to bring into the political field? where was it in , when the mine owners waged a guerilla war against the western miners' union; when general bell established a reign of terror, pulling men out of beds at night, kidnapping them across the border line, throwing them into bull pens, declaring "to hell with the constitution, the club is the constitution"? where were the women politicians then, and why did they not exercise the power of their vote? but they did. they helped to defeat the most fair-minded and liberal man, governor waite. the latter had to make way for the tool of the mine kings, governor peabody, the enemy of labor, the tsar of colorado. "certainly male suffrage could have done nothing worse." granted. wherein, then, are the advantages to woman and society from woman suffrage? the oft-repeated assertion that woman will purify politics is also but a myth. it is not borne out by the people who know the political conditions of idaho, colorado, wyoming, and utah. woman, essentially a purist, is naturally bigotted and relentless in her effort to make others as good as she thinks they ought to be. thus, in idaho, she has disfranchised her sister of the street, and declared all women of "lewd character" unfit to vote. "lewd" not being interpreted, of course, as prostitution in marriage. it goes without saying that illegal prostitution and gambling have been prohibited. in this regard the law must needs be of feminine nature: it always prohibits. therein all laws are wonderful. they go no further, but their very tendencies open all the floodgates of hell. prostitution and gambling have never done a more flourishing business than since the law has been set against them. in colorado, the puritanism of woman has expressed itself in a more drastic form. "men of notoriously unclean lives, and men connected with saloons, have been dropped from politics since women have the vote."[ ] could brother comstock do more? could all the puritan fathers have done more? i wonder how many women realize the gravity of this would-be feat. i wonder if they understand that it is the very thing which, instead of elevating woman, has made her a political spy, a contemptible pry into the private affairs of people, not so much for the good of the cause, but because, as a colorado woman said, "they like to get into houses they have never been in, and find out all they can, politically and otherwise."[ ] yes, and into the human soul and its minutest nooks and corners. for nothing satisfies the craving of most women so much as scandal. and when did she ever enjoy such opportunities as are hers, the politician's? "notoriously unclean lives, and men connected with the saloons." certainly, the lady vote gatherers can not be accused of much sense of proportion. granting even that these busybodies can decide whose lives are clean enough for that eminently clean atmosphere, politics, must it follow that saloon-keepers belong to the same category? unless it be american hypocrisy and bigotry, so manifest in the principle of prohibition, which sanctions the spread of drunkenness among men and women of the rich class, yet keeps vigilant watch on the only place left to the poor man. if no other reason, woman's narrow and purist attitude toward life makes her a greater danger to liberty wherever she has political power. man has long overcome the superstitions that still engulf woman. in the economic competitive field, man has been compelled to exercise efficiency, judgment, ability, competency. he therefore had neither time nor inclination to measure everyone's morality with a puritanic yardstick. in his political activities, too, he has not gone about blindfolded. he knows that quantity and not quality is the material for the political grinding mill, and, unless he is a sentimental reformer or an old fossil, he knows that politics can never be anything but a swamp. women who are at all conversant with the process of politics, know the nature of the beast, but in their self-sufficiency and egotism they make themselves believe that they have but to pet the beast, and he will become as gentle as a lamb, sweet and pure. as if women have not sold their votes, as if women politicians can not be bought! if her body can be bought in return for material consideration, why not her vote? that it is being done in colorado and in other states, is not denied even by those in favor of woman suffrage. as i have said before, woman's narrow view of human affairs is not the only argument against her as a politician superior to man. there are others. her life-long economic parasitism has utterly blurred her conception of the meaning of equality. she clamors for equal rights with men, yet we learn that "few women care to canvas in undesirable districts."[ ] how little equality means to them compared with the russian women, who face hell itself for their ideal! woman demands the same rights as man, yet she is indignant that her presence does not strike him dead: he smokes, keeps his hat on, and does not jump from his seat like a flunkey. these may be trivial things, but they are nevertheless the key to the nature of american suffragists. to be sure, their english sisters have outgrown these silly notions. they have shown themselves equal to the greatest demands on their character and power of endurance. all honor to the heroism and sturdiness of the english suffragettes. thanks to their energetic, aggressive methods, they have proved an inspiration to some of our own lifeless and spineless ladies. but after all, the suffragettes, too, are still lacking in appreciation of real equality. else how is one to account for the tremendous, truly gigantic effort set in motion by those valiant fighters for a wretched little bill which will benefit a handful of propertied ladies, with absolutely no provision for the vast mass of workingwomen? true, as politicians they must be opportunists, must take half measures if they can not get all. but as intelligent and liberal women they ought to realize that if the ballot is a weapon, the disinherited need it more than the economically superior class, and that the latter already enjoy too much power by virtue of their economic superiority. the brilliant leader of the english suffragettes, mrs. emmeline pankhurst, herself admitted, when on her american lecture tour, that there can be no equality between political superiors and inferiors. if so, how will the workingwoman of england, already inferior economically to the ladies who are benefited by the shackleton bill,[ ] be able to work with their political superiors, should the bill pass? is it not probable that the class of annie keeney, so full of zeal, devotion, and martyrdom, will be compelled to carry on their backs their female political bosses, even as they are carrying their economic masters. they would still have to do it, were universal suffrage for men and women established in england. no matter what the workers do, they are made to pay, always. still, those who believe in the power of the vote show little sense of justice when they concern themselves not at all with those whom, as they claim, it might serve most. the american suffrage movement has been, until very recently, altogether a parlor affair, absolutely detached from the economic needs of the people. thus susan b. anthony, no doubt an exceptional type of woman, was not only indifferent but antagonistic to labor; nor did she hesitate to manifest her antagonism when, in , she advised women to take the places of striking printers in new york.[ ] i do not know whether her attitude had changed before her death. there are, of course, some suffragists who are affiliated with workingwomen--the women's trade union league, for instance; but they are a small minority, and their activities are essentially economic. the rest look upon toil as a just provision of providence. what would become of the rich, if not for the poor? what would become of these idle, parasitic ladies, who squander more in a week than their victims earn in a year, if not for the eighty million wage workers? equality, who ever heard of such a thing? few countries have produced such arrogance and snobbishness as america. particularly this is true of the american woman of the middle class. she not only considers herself the equal of man, but his superior, especially in her purity, goodness, and morality. small wonder that the american suffragist claims for her vote the most miraculous powers. in her exalted conceit she does not see how truly enslaved she is, not so much by man, as by her own silly notions and traditions. suffrage can not ameliorate that sad fact; it can only accentuate it, as indeed it does. one of the great american women leaders claims that woman is entitled not only to equal pay, but that she ought to be legally entitled even to the pay of her husband. failing to support her, he should be put in convict stripes, and his earnings in prison be collected by his equal wife. does not another brilliant exponent of the cause claim for woman that her vote will abolish the social evil, which has been fought in vain by the collective efforts of the most illustrious minds the world over? it is indeed to be regretted that the alleged creator of the universe has already presented us with his wonderful scheme of things, else woman suffrage would surely enable woman to outdo him completely. nothing is so dangerous as the dissection of a fetich. if we have outlived the time when such heresy was punishable at the stake, we have not outlived the narrow spirit of condemnation of those who dare differ with accepted notions. therefore i shall probably be put down as an opponent of woman. but that can not deter me from looking the question squarely in the face. i repeat what i have said in the beginning: i do not believe that woman will make politics worse; nor can i believe that she could make it better. if, then, she cannot improve on man's mistakes, why perpetuate the latter? history may be a compilation of lies; nevertheless, it contains a few truths, and they are the only guide we have for the future. the history of the political activities of men proves that they have given him absolutely nothing that he could not have achieved in a more direct, less costly, and more lasting manner. as a matter of fact, every inch of ground he has gained has been through a constant fight, a ceaseless struggle for self-assertion, and not through suffrage. there is no reason whatever to assume that woman, in her climb to emancipation, has been, or will be, helped by the ballot. in the darkest of all countries, russia, with her absolute despotism, woman has become man's equal, not through the ballot, but by her will to be and to do. not only has she conquered for herself every avenue of learning and vocation, but she has won man's esteem, his respect, his comradeship; aye, even more than that: she has gained the admiration, the respect of the whole world. that, too, not through suffrage, but by her wonderful heroism, her fortitude, her ability, will power, and her endurance in the struggle for liberty. where are the women in any suffrage country or state that can lay claim to such a victory? when we consider the accomplishments of woman in america, we find also that something deeper and more powerful than suffrage has helped her in the march to emancipation. it is just sixty-two years ago since a handful of women at the seneca falls convention set forth a few demands for their right to equal education with men, and access to the various professions, trades, etc. what wonderful accomplishment, what wonderful triumphs! who but the most ignorant dare speak of woman as a mere domestic drudge? who dare suggest that this or that profession should not be open to her? for over sixty years she has molded a new atmosphere and a new life for herself. she has become a world power in every domain of human thought and activity. and all that without suffrage, without the right to make laws, without the "privilege" of becoming a judge, a jailer, or an executioner. yes, i may be considered an enemy of woman; but if i can help her see the light, i shall not complain. the misfortune of woman is not that she is unable to do the work of man, but that she is wasting her life force to outdo him, with a tradition of centuries which has left her physically incapable of keeping pace with him. oh, i know some have succeeded, but at what cost, at what terrific cost! the import is not the kind of work woman does, but rather the quality of the work she furnishes. she can give suffrage or the ballot no new quality, nor can she receive anything from it that will enhance her own quality. her development, her freedom, her independence, must come from and through herself. first, by asserting herself as a personality, and not as a sex commodity. second, by refusing the right to anyone over her body; by refusing to bear children, unless she wants them; by refusing to be a servant to god, the state, society, the husband, the family, etc.; by making her life simpler, but deeper and richer. that is, by trying to learn the meaning and substance of life in all its complexities, by freeing herself from the fear of public opinion and public condemnation. only that, and not the ballot, will set woman free, will make her a force hitherto unknown in the world, a force for real love, for peace, for harmony; a force of divine fire, of life giving; a creator of free men and women. [ ] equal suffrage. dr. helen sumner. [ ] equal suffrage. [ ] dr. helen a. sumner. [ ] mr. shackleton was a labor leader. it is therefore self-evident that he should introduce a bill excluding his own constituents. the english parliament is full of such judases. [ ] equal suffrage. dr. helen a. sumner. the tragedy of woman's emancipation i begin with an admission: regardless of all political and economic theories, treating of the fundamental differences between various groups within the human race, regardless of class and race distinctions, regardless of all artificial boundary lines between woman's rights and man's rights, i hold that there is a point where these differentiations may meet and grow into one perfect whole. with this i do not mean to propose a peace treaty. the general social antagonism which has taken hold of our entire public life today, brought about through the force of opposing and contradictory interests, will crumble to pieces when the reorganization of our social life, based upon the principles of economic justice, shall have become a reality. peace or harmony between the sexes and individuals does not necessarily depend on a superficial equalization of human beings; nor does it call for the elimination of individual traits and peculiarities. the problem that confronts us today, and which the nearest future is to solve, is how to be one's self and yet in oneness with others, to feel deeply with all human beings and still retain one's own characteristic qualities. this seems to me to be the basis upon which the mass and the individual, the true democrat and the true individuality, man and woman, can meet without antagonism and opposition. the motto should not be: forgive one another; rather, understand one another. the oft-quoted sentence of madame de stael: "to understand everything means to forgive everything," has never particularly appealed to me; it has the odor of the confessional; to forgive one's fellow-being conveys the idea of pharisaical superiority. to understand one's fellow-being suffices. the admission partly represents the fundamental aspect of my views on the emancipation of woman and its effect upon the entire sex. emancipation should make it possible for woman to be human in the truest sense. everything within her that craves assertion and activity should reach its fullest expression; all artificial barriers should be broken, and the road towards greater freedom cleared of every trace of centuries of submission and slavery. this was the original aim of the movement for woman's emancipation. but the results so far achieved have isolated woman and have robbed her of the fountain springs of that happiness which is so essential to her. merely external emancipation has made of the modern woman an artificial being, who reminds one of the products of french arboriculture with its arabesque trees and shrubs, pyramids, wheels, and wreaths; anything, except the forms which would be reached by the expression of her own inner qualities. such artificially grown plants of the female sex are to be found in large numbers, especially in the so-called intellectual sphere of our life. liberty and equality for woman! what hopes and aspirations these words awakened when they were first uttered by some of the noblest and bravest souls of those days. the sun in all his light and glory was to rise upon a new world; in this world woman was to be free to direct her own destiny--an aim certainly worthy of the great enthusiasm, courage, perseverance, and ceaseless effort of the tremendous host of pioneer men and women, who staked everything against a world of prejudice and ignorance. my hopes also move towards that goal, but i hold that the emancipation of woman, as interpreted and practically applied today, has failed to reach that great end. now, woman is confronted with the necessity of emancipating herself from emancipation, if she really desires to be free. this may sound paradoxical, but is, nevertheless, only too true. what has she achieved through her emancipation? equal suffrage in a few states. has that purified our political life, as many well-meaning advocates predicted? certainly not. incidentally, it is really time that persons with plain, sound judgment should cease to talk about corruption in politics in a boarding-school tone. corruption of politics has nothing to do with the morals, or the laxity of morals, of various political personalities. its cause is altogether a material one. politics is the reflex of the business and industrial world, the mottos of which are: "to take is more blessed than to give"; "buy cheap and sell dear"; "one soiled hand washes the other." there is no hope even that woman, with her right to vote, will ever purify politics. emancipation has brought woman economic equality with man; that is, she can choose her own profession and trade; but as her past and present physical training has not equipped her with the necessary strength to compete with man, she is often compelled to exhaust all her energy, use up her vitality, and strain every nerve in order to reach the market value. very few ever succeed, for it is a fact that women teachers, doctors, lawyers, architects, and engineers are neither met with the same confidence as their male colleagues, nor receive equal remuneration. and those that do reach that enticing equality, generally do so at the expense of their physical and psychical well-being. as to the great mass of working girls and women, how much independence is gained if the narrowness and lack of freedom of the home is exchanged for the narrowness and lack of freedom of the factory, sweat-shop, department store, or office? in addition is the burden which is laid on many women of looking after a "home, sweet home"--cold, dreary, disorderly, uninviting--after a day's hard work. glorious independence! no wonder that hundreds of girls are willing to accept the first offer of marriage, sick and tired of their "independence" behind the counter, at the sewing or typewriting machine. they are just as ready to marry as girls of the middle class, who long to throw off the yoke of parental supremacy. a so-called independence which leads only to earning the merest subsistence is not so enticing, not so ideal, that one could expect woman to sacrifice everything for it. our highly praised independence is, after all, but a slow process of dulling and stifling woman's nature, her love instinct, and her mother instinct. nevertheless, the position of the working girl is far more natural and human than that of her seemingly more fortunate sister in the more cultured professional walks of life--teachers, physicians, lawyers, engineers, etc., who have to make a dignified, proper appearance, while the inner life is growing empty and dead. the narrowness of the existing conception of woman's independence and emancipation; the dread of love for a man who is not her social equal; the fear that love will rob her of her freedom and independence; the horror that love or the joy of motherhood will only hinder her in the full exercise of her profession--all these together make of the emancipated modern woman a compulsory vestal, before whom life, with its great clarifying sorrows and its deep, entrancing joys, rolls on without touching or gripping her soul. emancipation, as understood by the majority of its adherents and exponents, is of too narrow a scope to permit the boundless love and ecstasy contained in the deep emotion of the true woman, sweetheart, mother, in freedom. the tragedy of the self-supporting or economically free woman does not lie in too many but in too few experiences. true, she surpasses her sister of past generations in knowledge of the world and human nature; it is just because of this that she feels deeply the lack of life's essence, which alone can enrich the human soul, and without which the majority of women have become mere professional automatons. that such a state of affairs was bound to come was foreseen by those who realized that, in the domain of ethics, there still remained many decaying ruins of the time of the undisputed superiority of man; ruins that are still considered useful. and, what is more important, a goodly number of the emancipated are unable to get along without them. every movement that aims at the destruction of existing institutions and the replacement thereof with something more advanced, more perfect, has followers who in theory stand for the most radical ideas, but who, nevertheless, in their every-day practice, are like the average philistine, feigning respectability and clamoring for the good opinion of their opponents. there are, for example, socialists, and even anarchists, who stand for the idea that property is robbery, yet who will grow indignant if anyone owe them the value of a half-dozen pins. the same philistine can be found in the movement for woman's emancipation. yellow journalists and milk-and-water litterateurs have painted pictures of the emancipated woman that make the hair of the good citizen and his dull companion stand up on end. every member of the woman's rights movement was pictured as a george sand in her absolute disregard of morality. nothing was sacred to her. she had no respect for the ideal relation between man and woman. in short, emancipation stood only for a reckless life of lust and sin; regardless of society, religion, and morality. the exponents of woman's rights were highly indignant at such representation, and, lacking humor, they exerted all their energy to prove that they were not at all as bad as they were painted, but the very reverse. of course, as long as woman was the slave of man, she could not be good and pure, but now that she was free and independent she would prove how good she could be and that her influence would have a purifying effect on all institutions in society. true, the movement for woman's rights has broken many old fetters, but it has also forged new ones. the great movement of true emancipation has not met with a great race of women who could look liberty in the face. their narrow, puritanical vision banished man, as a disturber and doubtful character, out of their emotional life. man was not to be tolerated at any price, except perhaps as the father of a child, since a child could not very well come to life without a father. fortunately, the most rigid puritans never will be strong enough to kill the innate craving for motherhood. but woman's freedom is closely allied with man's freedom, and many of my so-called emancipated sisters seem to overlook the fact that a child born in freedom needs the love and devotion of each human being about him, man as well as woman. unfortunately, it is this narrow conception of human relations that has brought about a great tragedy in the lives of the modern man and woman. about fifteen years ago appeared a work from the pen of the brilliant norwegian, laura marholm, called woman, a character study. she was one of the first to call attention to the emptiness and narrowness of the existing conception of woman's emancipation, and its tragic effect upon the inner life of woman. in her work laura marholm speaks of the fate of several gifted women of international fame: the genius, eleonora duse; the great mathematician and writer, sonya kovalevskaia; the artist and poet-nature, marie bashkirtzeff, who died so young. through each description of the lives of these women of such extraordinary mentality runs a marked trail of unsatisfied craving for a full, rounded, complete, and beautiful life, and the unrest and loneliness resulting from the lack of it. through these masterly psychological sketches, one cannot help but see that the higher the mental development of woman, the less possible it is for her to meet a congenial mate who will see in her, not only sex, but also the human being, the friend, the comrade and strong individuality, who cannot and ought not lose a single trait of her character. the average man with his self-sufficiency, his ridiculously superior airs of patronage towards the female sex, is an impossibility for woman as depicted in the character study by laura marholm. equally impossible for her is the man who can see in her nothing more than her mentality and her genius, and who fails to awaken her woman nature. a rich intellect and a fine soul are usually considered necessary attributes of a deep and beautiful personality. in the case of the modern woman, these attributes serve as a hindrance to the complete assertion of her being. for over a hundred years the old form of marriage, based on the bible, "till death doth part," has been denounced as an institution that stands for the sovereignty of the man over the woman, of her complete submission to his whims and commands, and absolute dependence on his name and support. time and again it has been conclusively proved that the old matrimonial relation restricted woman to the function of a man's servant and the bearer of his children. and yet we find many emancipated women who prefer marriage, with all its deficiencies, to the narrowness of an unmarried life; narrow and unendurable because of the chains of moral and social prejudice that cramp and bind her nature. the explanation of such inconsistency on the part of many advanced women is to be found in the fact that they never truly understood the meaning of emancipation. they thought that all that was needed was independence from external tyrannies; the internal tyrants, far more harmful to life and growth--ethical and social conventions--were left to take care of themselves; and they have taken care of themselves. they seem to get along as beautifully in the heads and hearts of the most active exponents of woman's emancipation, as in the heads and hearts of our grandmothers. these internal tyrants, whether they be in the form of public opinion or what will mother say, or brother, father, aunt, or relative of any sort; what will mrs. grundy, mr. comstock, the employer, the board of education say? all these busybodies, moral detectives, jailers of the human spirit, what will they say? until woman has learned to defy them all, to stand firmly on her own ground and to insist upon her own unrestricted freedom, to listen to the voice of her nature, whether it call for life's greatest treasure, love for a man, or her most glorious privilege, the right to give birth to a child, she cannot call herself emancipated. how many emancipated women are brave enough to acknowledge that the voice of love is calling, wildly beating against their breasts, demanding to be heard, to be satisfied. the french writer, jean reibrach, in one of his novels, new beauty, attempts to picture the ideal, beautiful, emancipated woman. this ideal is embodied in a young girl, a physician. she talks very cleverly and wisely of how to feed infants; she is kind, and administers medicines free to poor mothers. she converses with a young man of her acquaintance about the sanitary conditions of the future, and how various bacilli and germs shall be exterminated by the use of stone walls and floors, and by the doing away with rugs and hangings. she is, of course, very plainly and practically dressed, mostly in black. the young man, who, at their first meeting, was overawed by the wisdom of his emancipated friend, gradually learns to understand her, and recognizes one fine day that he loves her. they are young, and she is kind and beautiful, and though always in rigid attire, her appearance is softened by a spotlessly clean white collar and cuffs. one would expect that he would tell her of his love, but he is not one to commit romantic absurdities. poetry and the enthusiasm of love cover their blushing faces before the pure beauty of the lady. he silences the voice of his nature, and remains correct. she, too, is always exact, always rational, always well behaved. i fear if they had formed a union, the young man would have risked freezing to death. i must confess that i can see nothing beautiful in this new beauty, who is as cold as the stone walls and floors she dreams of. rather would i have the love songs of romantic ages, rather don juan and madame venus, rather an elopement by ladder and rope on a moonlight night, followed by the father's curse, mother's moans, and the moral comments of neighbors, than correctness and propriety measured by yardsticks. if love does not know how to give and take without restrictions, it is not love, but a transaction that never fails to lay stress on a plus and a minus. the greatest shortcoming of the emancipation of the present day lies in its artificial stiffness and its narrow respectabilities, which produce an emptiness in woman's soul that will not let her drink from the fountain of life. i once remarked that there seemed to be a deeper relationship between the old-fashioned mother and hostess, ever on the alert for the happiness of her little ones and the comfort of those she loved, and the truly new woman, than between the latter and her average emancipated sister. the disciples of emancipation pure and simple declared me a heathen, fit only for the stake. their blind zeal did not let them see that my comparison between the old and the new was merely to prove that a goodly number of our grandmothers had more blood in their veins, far more humor and wit, and certainly a greater amount of naturalness, kind-heartedness, and simplicity, than the majority of our emancipated professional women who fill the colleges, halls of learning, and various offices. this does not mean a wish to return to the past, nor does it condemn woman to her old sphere, the kitchen and the nursery. salvation lies in an energetic march onward towards a brighter and clearer future. we are in need of unhampered growth out of old traditions and habits. the movement for woman's emancipation has so far made but the first step in that direction. it is to be hoped that it will gather strength to make another. the right to vote, or equal civil rights, may be good demands, but true emancipation begins neither at the polls nor in courts. it begins in woman's soul. history tells us that every oppressed class gained true liberation from its masters through its own efforts. it is necessary that woman learn that lesson, that she realize that her freedom will reach as far as her power to achieve her freedom reaches. it is, therefore, far more important for her to begin with her inner regeneration, to cut loose from the weight of prejudices, traditions, and customs. the demand for equal rights in every vocation of life is just and fair; but, after all, the most vital right is the right to love and be loved. indeed, if partial emancipation is to become a complete and true emancipation of woman, it will have to do away with the ridiculous notion that to be loved, to be sweetheart and mother, is synonymous with being slave or subordinate. it will have to do away with the absurd notion of the dualism of the sexes, or that man and woman represent two antagonistic worlds. pettiness separates; breadth unites. let us be broad and big. let us not overlook vital things because of the bulk of trifles confronting us. a true conception of the relation of the sexes will not admit of conqueror and conquered; it knows of but one great thing: to give of one's self boundlessly, in order to find one's self richer, deeper, better. that alone can fill the emptiness, and transform the tragedy of woman's emancipation into joy, limitless joy. marriage and love the popular notion about marriage and love is that they are synonymous, that they spring from the same motives, and cover the same human needs. like most popular notions this also rests not on actual facts, but on superstition. marriage and love have nothing in common; they are as far apart as the poles; are, in fact, antagonistic to each other. no doubt some marriages have been the result of love. not, however, because love could assert itself only in marriage; much rather is it because few people can completely outgrow a convention. there are today large numbers of men and women to whom marriage is naught but a farce, but who submit to it for the sake of public opinion. at any rate, while it is true that some marriages are based on love, and while it is equally true that in some cases love continues in married life, i maintain that it does so regardless of marriage, and not because of it. on the other hand, it is utterly false that love results from marriage. on rare occasions one does hear of a miraculous case of a married couple falling in love after marriage, but on close examination it will be found that it is a mere adjustment to the inevitable. certainly the growing-used to each other is far away from the spontaneity, the intensity, and beauty of love, without which the intimacy of marriage must prove degrading to both the woman and the man. marriage is primarily an economic arrangement, an insurance pact. it differs from the ordinary life insurance agreement only in that it is more binding, more exacting. its returns are insignificantly small compared with the investments. in taking out an insurance policy one pays for it in dollars and cents, always at liberty to discontinue payments. if, however, woman's premium is her husband, she pays for it with her name, her privacy, her self-respect, her very life, "until death doth part." moreover, the marriage insurance condemns her to life-long dependency, to parasitism, to complete uselessness, individual as well as social. man, too, pays his toll, but as his sphere is wider, marriage does not limit him as much as woman. he feels his chains more in an economic sense. thus dante's motto over inferno applies with equal force to marriage. "ye who enter here leave all hope behind." that marriage is a failure none but the very stupid will deny. one has but to glance over the statistics of divorce to realize how bitter a failure marriage really is. nor will the stereotyped philistine argument that the laxity of divorce laws and the growing looseness of woman account for the fact that: first, every twelfth marriage ends in divorce; second, that since divorces have increased from to for every hundred thousand population; third, that adultery, since , as ground for divorce, has increased . per cent.; fourth, that desertion increased . per cent. added to these startling figures is a vast amount of material, dramatic and literary, further elucidating this subject. robert herrick, in together; pinero, in mid-channel; eugene walter, in paid in full, and scores of other writers are discussing the barrenness, the monotony, the sordidness, the inadequacy of marriage as a factor for harmony and understanding. the thoughtful social student will not content himself with the popular superficial excuse for this phenomenon. he will have to dig deeper into the very life of the sexes to know why marriage proves so disastrous. edward carpenter says that behind every marriage stands the life-long environment of the two sexes; an environment so different from each other that man and woman must remain strangers. separated by an insurmountable wall of superstition, custom, and habit, marriage has not the potentiality of developing knowledge of, and respect for, each other, without which every union is doomed to failure. henrik ibsen, the hater of all social shams, was probably the first to realize this great truth. nora leaves her husband, not--as the stupid critic would have it--because she is tired of her responsibilities or feels the need of woman's rights, but because she has come to know that for eight years she had lived with a stranger and borne him children. can there be anything more humiliating, more degrading than a life-long proximity between two strangers? no need for the woman to know anything of the man, save his income. as to the knowledge of the woman--what is there to know except that she has a pleasing appearance? we have not yet outgrown the theologic myth that woman has no soul, that she is a mere appendix to man, made out of his rib just for the convenience of the gentleman who was so strong that he was afraid of his own shadow. perchance the poor quality of the material whence woman comes is responsible for her inferiority. at any rate, woman has no soul--what is there to know about her? besides, the less soul a woman has the greater her asset as a wife, the more readily will she absorb herself in her husband. it is this slavish acquiescence to man's superiority that has kept the marriage institution seemingly intact for so long a period. now that woman is coming into her own, now that she is actually growing aware of herself as being outside of the master's grace, the sacred institution of marriage is gradually being undermined, and no amount of sentimental lamentation can stay it. from infancy, almost, the average girl is told that marriage is her ultimate goal; therefore her training and education must be directed towards that end. like the mute beast fattened for slaughter, she is prepared for that. yet, strange to say, she is allowed to know much less about her function as wife and mother than the ordinary artisan of his trade. it is indecent and filthy for a respectable girl to know anything of the marital relation. oh, for the inconsistency of respectability, that needs the marriage vow to turn something which is filthy into the purest and most sacred arrangement that none dare question or criticize. yet that is exactly the attitude of the average upholder of marriage. the prospective wife and mother is kept in complete ignorance of her only asset in the competitive field--sex. thus she enters into life-long relations with a man only to find herself shocked, repelled, outraged beyond measure by the most natural and healthy instinct, sex. it is safe to say that a large percentage of the unhappiness, misery, distress, and physical suffering of matrimony is due to the criminal ignorance in sex matters that is being extolled as a great virtue. nor is it at all an exaggeration when i say that more than one home has been broken up because of this deplorable fact. if, however, woman is free and big enough to learn the mystery of sex without the sanction of state or church, she will stand condemned as utterly unfit to become the wife of a "good" man, his goodness consisting of an empty brain and plenty of money. can there be anything more outrageous than the idea that a healthy, grown woman, full of life and passion, must deny nature's demand, must subdue her most intense craving, undermine her health and break her spirit, must stunt her vision, abstain from the depth and glory of sex experience until a "good" man comes along to take her unto himself as a wife? that is precisely what marriage means. how can such an arrangement end except in failure? this is one, though not the least important, factor of marriage, which differentiates it from love. ours is a practical age. the time when romeo and juliet risked the wrath of their fathers for love, when gretchen exposed herself to the gossip of her neighbors for love, is no more. if, on rare occasions, young people allow themselves the luxury of romance, they are taken in care by the elders, drilled and pounded until they become "sensible." the moral lesson instilled in the girl is not whether the man has aroused her love, but rather is it, "how much?" the important and only god of practical american life: can the man make a living? can he support a wife? that is the only thing that justifies marriage. gradually this saturates every thought of the girl; her dreams are not of moonlight and kisses, of laughter and tears; she dreams of shopping tours and bargain counters. this soul poverty and sordidness are the elements inherent in the marriage institution. the state and church approve of no other ideal, simply because it is the one that necessitates the state and church control of men and women. doubtless there are people who continue to consider love above dollars and cents. particularly this is true of that class whom economic necessity has forced to become self-supporting. the tremendous change in woman's position, wrought by that mighty factor, is indeed phenomenal when we reflect that it is but a short time since she has entered the industrial arena. six million women wage workers; six million women, who have equal right with men to be exploited, to be robbed, to go on strike; aye, to starve even. anything more, my lord? yes, six million wage workers in every walk of life, from the highest brain work to the mines and railroad tracks; yes, even detectives and policemen. surely the emancipation is complete. yet with all that, but a very small number of the vast army of women wage workers look upon work as a permanent issue, in the same light as does man. no matter how decrepit the latter, he has been taught to be independent, self-supporting. oh, i know that no one is really independent in our economic treadmill; still, the poorest specimen of a man hates to be a parasite; to be known as such, at any rate. the woman considers her position as worker transitory, to be thrown aside for the first bidder. that is why it is infinitely harder to organize women than men. "why should i join a union? i am going to get married, to have a home." has she not been taught from infancy to look upon that as her ultimate calling? she learns soon enough that the home, though not so large a prison as the factory, has more solid doors and bars. it has a keeper so faithful that naught can escape him. the most tragic part, however, is that the home no longer frees her from wage slavery; it only increases her task. according to the latest statistics submitted before a committee "on labor and wages, and congestion of population," ten per cent. of the wage workers in new york city alone are married, yet they must continue to work at the most poorly paid labor in the world. add to this horrible aspect the drudgery of housework, and what remains of the protection and glory of the home? as a matter of fact, even the middle-class girl in marriage can not speak of her home, since it is the man who creates her sphere. it is not important whether the husband is a brute or a darling. what i wish to prove is that marriage guarantees woman a home only by the grace of her husband. there she moves about in his home, year after year, until her aspect of life and human affairs becomes as flat, narrow, and drab as her surroundings. small wonder if she becomes a nag, petty, quarrelsome, gossipy, unbearable, thus driving the man from the house. she could not go, if she wanted to; there is no place to go. besides, a short period of married life, of complete surrender of all faculties, absolutely incapacitates the average woman for the outside world. she becomes reckless in appearance, clumsy in her movements, dependent in her decisions, cowardly in her judgment, a weight and a bore, which most men grow to hate and despise. wonderfully inspiring atmosphere for the bearing of life, is it not? but the child, how is it to be protected, if not for marriage? after all, is not that the most important consideration? the sham, the hypocrisy of it! marriage protecting the child, yet thousands of children destitute and homeless. marriage protecting the child, yet orphan asylums and reformatories overcrowded, the society for the prevention of cruelty to children keeping busy in rescuing the little victims from "loving" parents, to place them under more loving care, the gerry society. oh, the mockery of it! marriage may have the power to bring the horse to water, but has it ever made him drink? the law will place the father under arrest, and put him in convict's clothes; but has that ever stilled the hunger of the child? if the parent has no work, or if he hides his identity, what does marriage do then? it invokes the law to bring the man to "justice," to put him safely behind closed doors; his labor, however, goes not to the child, but to the state. the child receives but a blighted memory of his father's stripes. as to the protection of the woman,--therein lies the curse of marriage. not that it really protects her, but the very idea is so revolting, such an outrage and insult on life, so degrading to human dignity, as to forever condemn this parasitic institution. it is like that other paternal arrangement--capitalism. it robs man of his birthright, stunts his growth, poisons his body, keeps him in ignorance, in poverty, and dependence, and then institutes charities that thrive on the last vestige of man's self-respect. the institution of marriage makes a parasite of woman, an absolute dependent. it incapacitates her for life's struggle, annihilates her social consciousness, paralyzes her imagination, and then imposes its gracious protection, which is in reality a snare, a travesty on human character. if motherhood is the highest fulfillment of woman's nature, what other protection does it need, save love and freedom? marriage but defiles, outrages, and corrupts her fulfillment. does it not say to woman, only when you follow me shall you bring forth life? does it not condemn her to the block, does it not degrade and shame her if she refuses to buy her right to motherhood by selling herself? does not marriage only sanction motherhood, even though conceived in hatred, in compulsion? yet, if motherhood be of free choice, of love, of ecstasy, of defiant passion, does it not place a crown of thorns upon an innocent head and carve in letters of blood the hideous epithet, bastard? were marriage to contain all the virtues claimed for it, its crimes against motherhood would exclude it forever from the realm of love. love, the strongest and deepest element in all life, the harbinger of hope, of joy, of ecstasy; love, the defier of all laws, of all conventions; love, the freest, the most powerful moulder of human destiny; how can such an all-compelling force be synonymous with that poor little state and church-begotten weed, marriage? free love? as if love is anything but free! man has bought brains, but all the millions in the world have failed to buy love. man has subdued bodies, but all the power on earth has been unable to subdue love. man has conquered whole nations, but all his armies could not conquer love. man has chained and fettered the spirit, but he has been utterly helpless before love. high on a throne, with all the splendor and pomp his gold can command, man is yet poor and desolate, if love passes him by. and if it stays, the poorest hovel is radiant with warmth, with life and color. thus love has the magic power to make of a beggar a king. yes, love is free; it can dwell in no other atmosphere. in freedom it gives itself unreservedly, abundantly, completely. all the laws on the statutes, all the courts in the universe, cannot tear it from the soil, once love has taken root. if, however, the soil is sterile, how can marriage make it bear fruit? it is like the last desperate struggle of fleeting life against death. love needs no protection; it is its own protection. so long as love begets life no child is deserted, or hungry, or famished for the want of affection. i know this to be true. i know women who became mothers in freedom by the men they loved. few children in wedlock enjoy the care, the protection, the devotion free motherhood is capable of bestowing. the defenders of authority dread the advent of a free motherhood, lest it will rob them of their prey. who would fight wars? who would create wealth? who would make the policeman, the jailer, if woman were to refuse the indiscriminate breeding of children? the race, the race! shouts the king, the president, the capitalist, the priest. the race must be preserved, though woman be degraded to a mere machine,--and the marriage institution is our only safety valve against the pernicious sex awakening of woman. but in vain these frantic efforts to maintain a state of bondage. in vain, too, the edicts of the church, the mad attacks of rulers, in vain even the arm of the law. woman no longer wants to be a party to the production of a race of sickly, feeble, decrepit, wretched human beings, who have neither the strength nor moral courage to throw off the yoke of poverty and slavery. instead she desires fewer and better children, begotten and reared in love and through free choice; not by compulsion, as marriage imposes. our pseudo-moralists have yet to learn the deep sense of responsibility toward the child, that love in freedom has awakened in the breast of woman. rather would she forego forever the glory of motherhood than bring forth life in an atmosphere that breathes only destruction and death. and if she does become a mother, it is to give to the child the deepest and best her being can yield. to grow with the child is her motto; she knows that in that manner alone can she help build true manhood and womanhood. ibsen must have had a vision of a free mother, when, with a master stroke, he portrayed mrs. alving. she was the ideal mother because she had outgrown marriage and all its horrors, because she had broken her chains, and set her spirit free to soar until it returned a personality, regenerated and strong. alas, it was too late to rescue her life's joy, her oswald; but not too late to realize that love in freedom is the only condition of a beautiful life. those who, like mrs. alving, have paid with blood and tears for their spiritual awakening, repudiate marriage as an imposition, a shallow, empty mockery. they know, whether love last but one brief span of time or for eternity, it is the only creative, inspiring, elevating basis for a new race, a new world. in our present pygmy state love is indeed a stranger to most people. misunderstood and shunned, it rarely takes root; or if it does, it soon withers and dies. its delicate fiber can not endure the stress and strain of the daily grind. its soul is too complex to adjust itself to the slimy woof of our social fabric. it weeps and moans and suffers with those who have need of it, yet lack the capacity to rise to love's summit. some day, some day men and women will rise, they will reach the mountain peak, they will meet big and strong and free, ready to receive, to partake, and to bask in the golden rays of love. what fancy, what imagination, what poetic genius can foresee even approximately the potentialities of such a force in the life of men and women. if the world is ever to give birth to true companionship and oneness, not marriage, but love will be the parent. the modern drama: a powerful disseminator of radical thought so long as discontent and unrest make themselves but dumbly felt within a limited social class, the powers of reaction may often succeed in suppressing such manifestations. but when the dumb unrest grows into conscious expression and becomes almost universal, it necessarily affects all phases of human thought and action, and seeks its individual and social expression in the gradual transvaluation of existing values. an adequate appreciation of the tremendous spread of the modern, conscious social unrest cannot be gained from merely propagandistic literature. rather must we become conversant with the larger phases of human expression manifest in art, literature, and, above all, the modern drama--the strongest and most far-reaching interpreter of our deep-felt dissatisfaction. what a tremendous factor for the awakening of conscious discontent are the simple canvasses of a millet! the figures of his peasants--what terrific indictment against our social wrongs; wrongs that condemn the man with the hoe to hopeless drudgery, himself excluded from nature's bounty. the vision of a meunier conceives the growing solidarity and defiance of labor in the group of miners carrying their maimed brother to safety. his genius thus powerfully portrays the interrelation of the seething unrest among those slaving in the bowels of the earth, and the spiritual revolt that seeks artistic expression. no less important is the factor for rebellious awakening in modern literature--turgeniev, dostoyevsky, tolstoy, andreiev, gorki, whitman, emerson, and scores of others embodying the spirit of universal ferment and the longing for social change. still more far-reaching is the modern drama, as the leaven of radical thought and the disseminator of new values. it might seem an exaggeration to ascribe to the modern drama such an important role. but a study of the development of modern ideas in most countries will prove that the drama has succeeded in driving home great social truths, truths generally ignored when presented in other forms. no doubt there are exceptions, as russia and france. russia, with its terrible political pressure, has made people think and has awakened their social sympathies, because of the tremendous contrast which exists between the intellectual life of the people and the despotic regime that is trying to crush that life. yet while the great dramatic works of tolstoy, tchechov, gorki, and andreiev closely mirror the life and the struggle, the hopes and aspirations of the russian people, they did not influence radical thought to the extent the drama has done in other countries. who can deny, however, the tremendous influence exerted by the power of darkness or night lodging. tolstoy, the real, true christian, is yet the greatest enemy of organized christianity. with a master hand he portrays the destructive effects upon the human mind of the power of darkness, the superstitions of the christian church. what other medium could express, with such dramatic force, the responsibility of the church for crimes committed by its deluded victims; what other medium could, in consequence, rouse the indignation of man's conscience? similarly direct and powerful is the indictment contained in gorki's night lodging. the social pariahs, forced into poverty and crime, yet desperately clutch at the last vestiges of hope and aspiration. lost existences these, blighted and crushed by cruel, unsocial environment. france, on the other hand, with her continuous struggle for liberty, is indeed the cradle of radical thought; as such she, too, did not need the drama as a means of awakening. and yet the works of brieux--as robe rouge, portraying the terrible corruption of the judiciary--and mirbeau's les affaires sont les affaires--picturing the destructive influence of wealth on the human soul--have undoubtedly reached wider circles than most of the articles and books which have been written in france on the social question. in countries like germany, scandinavia, england, and even in america--though in a lesser degree--the drama is the vehicle which is really making history, disseminating radical thought in ranks not otherwise to be reached. let us take germany, for instance. for nearly a quarter of a century men of brains, of ideas, and of the greatest integrity, made it their life-work to spread the truth of human brotherhood, of justice, among the oppressed and downtrodden. socialism, that tremendous revolutionary wave, was to the victims of a merciless and inhumane system like water to the parched lips of the desert traveler. alas! the cultured people remained absolutely indifferent; to them that revolutionary tide was but the murmur of dissatisfied, discontented men, dangerous, illiterate troublemakers, whose proper place was behind prison bars. self-satisfied as the "cultured" usually are, they could not understand why one should fuss about the fact that thousands of people were starving, though they contributed towards the wealth of the world. surrounded by beauty and luxury, they could not believe that side by side with them lived human beings degraded to a position lower than a beast's, shelterless and ragged, without hope or ambition. this condition of affairs was particularly pronounced in germany after the franco-german war. full to the bursting point with its victory, germany thrived on a sentimental, patriotic literature, thereby poisoning the minds of the country's youth by the glory of conquest and bloodshed. intellectual germany had to take refuge in the literature of other countries, in the works of ibsen, zola, daudet, maupassant, and especially in the great works of dostoyevsky, tolstoy, and turgeniev. but as no country can long maintain a standard of culture without a literature and drama related to its own soil, so germany gradually began to develop a drama reflecting the life and the struggles of its own people. arno holz, one of the youngest dramatists of that period, startled the philistines out of their ease and comfort with his familie selicke. the play deals with society's refuse, men and women of the alleys, whose only subsistence consists of what they can pick out of the garbage barrels. a gruesome subject, is it not? and yet what other method is there to break through the hard shell of the minds and souls of people who have never known want, and who therefore assume that all is well in the world? needless to say, the play aroused tremendous indignation. the truth is bitter, and the people living on the fifth avenue of berlin hated to be confronted with the truth. not that familie selicke represented anything that had not been written about for years without any seeming result. but the dramatic genius of holz, together with the powerful interpretation of the play, necessarily made inroads into the widest circles, and forced people to think about the terrible inequalities around them. sudermann's ehre[ ] and heimat[ ] deal with vital subjects. i have already referred to the sentimental patriotism so completely turning the head of the average german as to create a perverted conception of honor. duelling became an every-day affair, costing innumerable lives. a great cry was raised against the fad by a number of leading writers. but nothing acted as such a clarifier and exposer of that national disease as the ehre. not that the play merely deals with duelling; it analyzes the real meaning of honor, proving that it is not a fixed, inborn feeling, but that it varies with every people and every epoch, depending particularly on one's economic and social station in life. we realize from this play that the man in the brownstone mansion will necessarily define honor differently from his victims. the family heinecke enjoys the charity of the millionaire muhling, being permitted to occupy a dilapidated shanty on his premises in the absence of their son, robert. the latter, as muhling's representative, is making a vast fortune for his employer in india. on his return robert discovers that his sister had been seduced by young muhling, whose father graciously offers to straighten matters with a check for , marks. robert, outraged and indignant, resents the insult to his family's honor, and is forthwith dismissed from his position for impudence. robert finally throws this accusation into the face of the philanthropist millionaire: "we slave for you, we sacrifice our heart's blood for you, while you seduce our daughters and sisters and kindly pay for their disgrace with the gold we have earned for you. that is what you call honor." an incidental side-light upon the conception of honor is given by count trast, the principal character in the ehre, a man widely conversant with the customs of various climes, who relates that in his many travels he chanced across a savage tribe whose honor he mortally offended by refusing the hospitality which offered him the charms of the chieftain's wife. the theme of heimat treats of the struggle between the old and the young generations. it holds a permanent and important place in dramatic literature. magda, the daughter of lieutenant colonel schwartz, has committed an unpardonable sin: she refused the suitor selected by her father. for daring to disobey the parental commands she is driven from home. magda, full of life and the spirit of liberty, goes out into the world to return to her native town, twelve years later, a celebrated singer. she consents to visit her parents on condition that they respect the privacy of her past. but her martinet father immediately begins to question her, insisting on his "paternal rights." magda is indignant, but gradually his persistence brings to light the tragedy of her life. he learns that the respected councillor von keller had in his student days been magda's lover, while she was battling for her economic and social independence. the consequence of the fleeting romance was a child, deserted by the man even before birth. the rigid military father of magda demands as retribution from councillor von keller that he legalize the love affair. in view of magda's social and professional success, keller willingly consents, but on condition that she forsake the stage, and place the child in an institution. the struggle between the old and the new culminates in magda's defiant words of the woman grown to conscious independence of thought and action: "...i'll say what i think of you--of you and your respectable society. why should i be worse than you that i must prolong my existence among you by a lie! why should this gold upon my body, and the lustre which surrounds my name, only increase my infamy? have i not worked early and late for ten long years? have i not woven this dress with sleepless nights? have i not built up my career step by step, like thousands of my kind? why should i blush before anyone? i am myself, and through myself i have become what i am." the general theme of heimat was not original. it had been previously treated by a master hand in fathers and sons. partly because turgeniev's great work was typical rather of russian than universal conditions, and still more because it was in the form of fiction, the influence of fathers and sons was limited to russia. but heimat, especially because of its dramatic expression, became almost a world factor. the dramatist who not only disseminated radicalism, but literally revolutionized the thoughtful germans, is gerhardt hauptmann. his first play vor sonnenaufgang[ ], refused by every leading german theatre and first performed in a wretched little playhouse behind a beer garden, acted like a stroke of lightning, illuminating the entire social horizon. its subject matter deals with the life of an extensive landowner, ignorant, illiterate, and brutalized, and his economic slaves of the same mental calibre. the influence of wealth, both on the victims who created it and the possessor thereof, is shown in the most vivid colors, as resulting in drunkenness, idiocy, and decay. but the most striking feature of vor sonnenaufgang, the one which brought a shower of abuse on hauptmann's head, was the question as to the indiscriminate breeding of children by unfit parents. during the second performance of the play a leading berlin surgeon almost caused a panic in the theatre by swinging a pair of forceps over his head and screaming at the top of his voice: "the decency and morality of germany are at stake if childbirth is to be discussed openly from the stage." the surgeon is forgotten, and hauptmann stands a colossal figure before the world. when die weber[ ] first saw the light, pandemonium broke out in the land of thinkers and poets. "what," cried the moralists, "workingmen, dirty, filthy slaves, to be put on the stage! poverty in all its horrors and ugliness to be dished out as an after-dinner amusement? that is too much!" indeed, it was too much for the fat and greasy bourgeoisie to be brought face to face with the horrors of the weaver's existence. it was too much because of the truth and reality that rang like thunder in the deaf ears of self-satisfied society, j'accuse! of course, it was generally known even before the appearance of this drama that capital can not get fat unless it devours labor, that wealth can not be hoarded except through the channels of poverty, hunger, and cold; but such things are better kept in the dark, lest the victims awaken to a realization of their position. but it is the purpose of the modern drama to rouse the consciousness of the oppressed; and that, indeed, was the purpose of gerhardt hauptmann in depicting to the world the conditions of the weavers in silesia. human beings working eighteen hours daily, yet not earning enough for bread and fuel; human beings living in broken, wretched huts half covered with snow, and nothing but tatters to protect them from the cold; infants covered with scurvy from hunger and exposure; pregnant women in the last stages of consumption. victims of a benevolent christian era, without life, without hope, without warmth. ah, yes, it was too much! hauptmann's dramatic versatility deals with every stratum of social life. besides portraying the grinding effect of economic conditions, he also treats of the struggle of the individual for his mental and spiritual liberation from the slavery of convention and tradition. thus heinrich, the bell-forger, in the dramatic prose-poem, die versunkene glocke[ ], fails to reach the mountain peaks of liberty because, as rautendelein said, he had lived in the valley too long. similarly dr. vockerath and anna maar remain lonely souls because they, too, lack the strength to defy venerated traditions. yet their very failure must awaken the rebellious spirit against a world forever hindering individual and social emancipation. max halbe's jugend[ ] and wedekind's fruhling's erwachen[ ] are dramas which have disseminated radical thought in an altogether different direction. they treat of the child and the dense ignorance and narrow puritanism that meet the awakening of nature. particularly this is true of fruhling's erwachen. young boys and girls sacrificed on the altar of false education and of our sickening morality that prohibits the enlightenment of youth as to questions so imperative to the health and well-being of society,--the origin of life, and its functions. it shows how a mother--and a truly good mother, at that--keeps her fourteen-year-old daughter in absolute ignorance as to all matters of sex, and when finally the young girl falls a victim to her own ignorance, the same mother sees her daughter killed by quack medicines. the inscription on her grave states that she died of anaemia, and morality is satisfied. the fatality of our puritanic hypocrisy in these matters is especially illumined by wedekind in so far as our most promising children fall victims to sex ignorance and the utter lack of appreciation on the part of the teachers of the child's awakening. wendla, unusually developed and alert for her age, pleads with her mother to explain the mystery of life: "i have a sister who has been married for two and a half years. i myself have been made an aunt for the third time, and i haven't the least idea how it all comes about.... don't be cross, mother, dear! whom in the world should i ask but you? don't scold me for asking about it. give me an answer.--how does it happen?--you cannot really deceive yourself that i, who am fourteen years old, still believe in the stork." were her mother herself not a victim of false notions of morality, an affectionate and sensible explanation might have saved her daughter. but the conventional mother seeks to hide her "moral" shame and embarrassment in this evasive reply: "in order to have a child--one must love--the man--to whom one is married.... one must love him, wendla, as you at your age are still unable to love.--now you know it!" how much wendla "knew" the mother realized too late. the pregnant girl imagines herself ill with dropsy. and when her mother cries in desperation, "you haven't the dropsy, you have a child, girl," the agonized wendla exclaims in bewilderment: "but it's not possible, mother, i am not married yet.... oh, mother, why didn't you tell me everything?" with equal stupidity the boy morris is driven to suicide because he fails in his school examinations. and melchior, the youthful father of wendla's unborn child, is sent to the house of correction, his early sexual awakening stamping him a degenerate in the eyes of teachers and parents. for years thoughtful men and women in germany had advocated the compelling necessity of sex enlightenment. mutterschutz, a publication specially devoted to frank and intelligent discussion of the sex problem, has been carrying on its agitation for a considerable time. but it remained for the dramatic genius of wedekind to influence radical thought to the extent of forcing the introduction of sex physiology in many schools of germany. scandinavia, like germany, was advanced through the drama much more than through any other channel. long before ibsen appeared on the scene, bjornson, the great essayist, thundered against the inequalities and injustice prevalent in those countries. but his was a voice in the wilderness, reaching but the few. not so with ibsen. his brand, doll's house, pillars of society, ghosts, and an enemy of the people have considerably undermined the old conceptions, and replaced them by a modern and real view of life. one has but to read brand to realize the modern conception, let us say, of religion,--religion, as an ideal to be achieved on earth; religion as a principle of human brotherhood, of solidarity, and kindness. ibsen, the supreme hater of all social shams, has torn the veil of hypocrisy from their faces. his greatest onslaught, however, is on the four cardinal points supporting the flimsy network of society. first, the lie upon which rests the life of today; second, the futility of sacrifice as preached by our moral codes; third, petty material consideration, which is the only god the majority worships; and fourth, the deadening influence of provincialism. these four recur as the leitmotif in ibsen's plays, but particularly in pillars of society, doll's house, ghosts, and an enemy of the people. pillars of society! what a tremendous indictment against the social structure that rests on rotten and decayed pillars,--pillars nicely gilded and apparently intact, yet merely hiding their true condition. and what are these pillars? consul bernick, at the very height of his social and financial career, the benefactor of his town and the strongest pillar of the community, has reached the summit through the channel of lies, deception, and fraud. he has robbed his bosom friend, johann, of his good name, and has betrayed lona hessel, the woman he loved, to marry her step-sister for the sake of her money. he has enriched himself by shady transactions, under cover of "the community's good," and finally even goes to the extent of endangering human life by preparing the indian girl, a rotten and dangerous vessel, to go to sea. but the return of lona brings him the realization of the emptiness and meanness of his narrow life. he seeks to placate the waking conscience by the hope that he has cleared the ground for the better life of his son, of the new generation. but even this last hope soon falls to the ground, as he realizes that truth cannot be built on a lie. at the very moment when the whole town is prepared to celebrate the great benefactor of the community with banquet praise, he himself, now grown to full spiritual manhood, confesses to the assembled townspeople: "i have no right to this homage-- ... my fellow-citizens must know me to the core. then let everyone examine himself, and let us realize the prediction that from this event we begin a new time. the old, with its tinsel, its hypocrisy, its hollowness, its lying propriety, and its pitiful cowardice, shall lie behind us like a museum, open for instruction." with a doll's house ibsen has paved the way for woman's emancipation. nora awakens from her doll's role to the realization of the injustice done her by her father and her husband, helmer torvald. "while i was at home with father, he used to tell me all his opinions, and i held the same opinions. if i had others i concealed them, because he would not have approved. he used to call me his doll child, and play with me as i played with my dolls. then i came to live in your house. you settled everything according to your taste, and i got the same taste as you, or i pretended to. when i look back on it now, i seem to have been living like a beggar, from hand to mouth. i lived by performing tricks for you, torvald, but you would have it so. you and father have done me a great wrong." in vain helmer uses the old philistine arguments of wifely duty and social obligations. nora has grown out of her doll's dress into full stature of conscious womanhood. she is determined to think and judge for herself. she has realized that, before all else, she is a human being, owing the first duty to herself. she is undaunted even by the possibility of social ostracism. she has become sceptical of the justice of the law, the wisdom of the constituted. her rebelling soul rises in protest against the existing. in her own words: "i must make up my mind which is right, society or i." in her childlike faith in her husband she had hoped for the great miracle. but it was not the disappointed hope that opened her vision to the falsehoods of marriage. it was rather the smug contentment of helmer with a safe lie--one that would remain hidden and not endanger his social standing. when nora closed behind her the door of her gilded cage and went out into the world a new, regenerated personality, she opened the gate of freedom and truth for her own sex and the race to come. more than any other play, ghosts has acted like a bomb explosion, shaking the social structure to its very foundations. in doll's house the justification of the union between nora and helmer rested at least on the husband's conception of integrity and rigid adherence to our social morality. indeed, he was the conventional ideal husband and devoted father. not so in ghosts. mrs. alving married captain alving only to find that he was a physical and mental wreck, and that life with him would mean utter degradation and be fatal to possible offspring. in her despair she turned to her youth's companion, young pastor manders who, as the true savior of souls for heaven, must needs be indifferent to earthly necessities. he sent her back to shame and degradation,--to her duties to husband and home. indeed, happiness--to him--was but the unholy manifestation of a rebellious spirit, and a wife's duty was not to judge, but "to bear with humility the cross which a higher power had for your own good laid upon you." mrs. alving bore the cross for twenty-six long years. not for the sake of the higher power, but for her little son oswald, whom she longed to save from the poisonous atmosphere of her husband's home. it was also for the sake of the beloved son that she supported the lie of his father's goodness, in superstitious awe of "duty and decency." she learned, alas! too late, that the sacrifice of her entire life had been in vain, and that her son oswald was visited by the sins of his father, that he was irrevocably doomed. this, too, she learned, that "we are all of us ghosts. it is not only what we have inherited from our father and mother that walks in us. it is all sorts of dead ideas and lifeless old beliefs. they have no vitality, but they cling to us all the same and we can't get rid of them.... and then we are, one and all, so pitifully afraid of light. when you forced me under the yoke you called duty and obligation; when you praised as right and proper what my whole soul rebelled against as something loathsome; it was then that i began to look into the seams of your doctrine. i only wished to pick at a single knot, but when i had got that undone, the whole thing ravelled out. and then i understood that it was all machine-sewn." how could a society machine-sewn, fathom the seething depths whence issued the great masterpiece of henrik ibsen? it could not understand, and therefore it poured the vials of abuse and venom upon its greatest benefactor. that ibsen was not daunted he has proved by his reply in an enemy of the people. in that great drama ibsen performs the last funeral rites over a decaying and dying social system. out of its ashes rises the regenerated individual, the bold and daring rebel. dr. stockman, an idealist, full of social sympathy and solidarity, is called to his native town as the physician of the baths. he soon discovers that the latter are built on a swamp, and that instead of finding relief the patients, who flock to the place, are being poisoned. an honest man, of strong convictions, the doctor considers it his duty to make his discovery known. but he soon learns that dividends and profits are concerned neither with health nor principles. even the reformers of the town, represented in the people's messenger, always ready to prate of their devotion to the people, withdraw their support from the "reckless" idealist, the moment they learn that the doctor's discovery may bring the town into disrepute, and thus injure their pockets. but doctor stockman continues in the faith he entertains for has townsmen. they would hear him. but here, too, he soon finds himself alone. he cannot even secure a place to proclaim his great truth. and when he finally succeeds, he is overwhelmed by abuse and ridicule as the enemy of the people. the doctor, so enthusiastic of his townspeople's assistance to eradicate the evil, is soon driven to a solitary position. the announcement of his discovery would result in a pecuniary loss to the town, and that consideration induces the officials, the good citizens, and soul reformers, to stifle the voice of truth. he finds them all a compact majority, unscrupulous enough to be willing to build up the prosperity of the town on a quagmire of lies and fraud. he is accused of trying to ruin the community. but to his mind "it does not matter if a lying community is ruined. it must be levelled to the ground. all men who live upon lies must be exterminated like vermin. you'll bring it to such a pass that the whole country will deserve to perish." doctor stockman is not a practical politician. a free man, he thinks, must not behave like a blackguard. "he must not so act that he would spit in his own face." for only cowards permit "considerations" of pretended general welfare or of party to override truth and ideals. "party programmes wring the necks of all young, living truths; and considerations of expediency turn morality and righteousness upside down, until life is simply hideous." these plays of ibsen--the pillars of society, a doll's house, ghosts, and an enemy of the people--constitute a dynamic force which is gradually dissipating the ghosts walking the social burying ground called civilization. nay, more; ibsen's destructive effects are at the same time supremely constructive, for he not merely undermines existing pillars; indeed, he builds with sure strokes the foundation of a healthier, ideal future, based on the sovereignty of the individual within a sympathetic social environment. england with her great pioneers of radical thought, the intellectual pilgrims like godwin, robert owen, darwin, spencer, william morris, and scores of others; with her wonderful larks of liberty--shelley, byron, keats--is another example of the influence of dramatic art. within comparatively a few years, the dramatic works of shaw, pinero, galsworthy, rann kennedy, have carried radical thought to the ears formerly deaf even to great britain's wondrous poets. thus a public which will remain indifferent reading an essay by robert owen, on poverty, or ignore bernard shaw's socialistic tracts, was made to think by major barbara, wherein poverty is described as the greatest crime of christian civilization. "poverty makes people weak, slavish, puny; poverty creates disease, crime, prostitution; in fine, poverty is responsible for all the ills and evils of the world." poverty also necessitates dependency, charitable organizations, institutions that thrive off the very thing they are trying to destroy. the salvation army, for instance, as shown in major barbara, fights drunkenness; yet one of its greatest contributors is badger, a whiskey distiller, who furnishes yearly thousands of pounds to do away with the very source of his wealth. bernard shaw, therefore, concludes that the only real benefactor of society is a man like undershaft, barbara's father, a cannon manufacturer, whose theory of life is that powder is stronger than words. "the worst of crimes," says undershaft, "is poverty. all the other crimes are virtues beside it; all the other dishonors are chivalry itself by comparison. poverty blights whole cities; spreads horrible pestilences; strikes dead the very soul of all who come within sight, sound, or smell of it. what you call crime is nothing; a murder here, a theft there, a blow now and a curse there: what do they matter? they are only the accidents and illnesses of life; there are not fifty genuine professional criminals in london. but there are millions of poor people, abject people, dirty people, ill-fed, ill-clothed people. they poison us morally and physically; they kill the happiness of society; they force us to do away with our own liberties and to organize unnatural cruelties for fear they should rise against us and drag us down into their abyss.... poverty and slavery have stood up for centuries to your sermons and leading articles; they will not stand up to my machine guns. don't preach at them; don't reason with them. kill them.... it is the final test of conviction, the only lever strong enough to overturn a social system.... vote! bah! when you vote, you only change the name of the cabinet. when you shoot, you pull down governments, inaugurate new epochs, abolish old orders, and set up new." no wonder people cared little to read mr. shaw's socialistic tracts. in no other way but in the drama could he deliver such forcible, historic truths. and therefore it is only through the drama that mr. shaw is a revolutionary factor in the dissemination of radical ideas. after hauptmann's die weber, strife, by galsworthy, is the most important labor drama. the theme of strife is a strike with two dominant factors: anthony, the president of the company, rigid, uncompromising, unwilling to make the slightest concession, although the men held out for months and are in a condition of semi-starvation; and david roberts, an uncompromising revolutionist, whose devotion to the workingman and the cause of freedom is at white heat. between them the strikers are worn and weary with the terrible struggle, and are harassed and driven by the awful sight of poverty and want in their families. the most marvellous and brilliant piece of work in strife is galsworthy's portrayal of the mob, its fickleness, and lack of backbone. one moment they applaud old thomas, who speaks of the power of god and religion and admonishes the men against rebellion; the next instant they are carried away by a walking delegate, who pleads the cause of the union,--the union that always stands for compromise, and which forsakes the workingmen whenever they dare to strike for independent demands; again they are aglow with the earnestness, the spirit, and the intensity of david roberts--all these people willing to go in whatever direction the wind blows. it is the curse of the working class that they always follow like sheep led to slaughter. consistency is the greatest crime of our commercial age. no matter how intense the spirit or how important the man, the moment he will not allow himself to be used or sell his principles, he is thrown on the dustheap. such was the fate of the president of the company, anthony, and of david roberts. to be sure they represented opposite poles--poles antagonistic to each other, poles divided by a terrible gap that can never be bridged over. yet they shared a common fate. anthony is the embodiment of conservatism, of old ideas, of iron methods: "i have been chairman of this company thirty-two years. i have fought the men four times. i have never been defeated. it has been said that times have changed. if they have, i have not changed with them. it has been said that masters and men are equal. cant. there can be only one master in a house. it has been said that capital and labor have the same interests. cant. their interests are as wide asunder as the poles. there is only one way of treating men--with the iron rod. masters are masters. men are men." we may not like this adherence to old, reactionary notions, and yet there is something admirable in the courage and consistency of this man, nor is he half as dangerous to the interests of the oppressed, as our sentimental and soft reformers who rob with nine fingers, and give libraries with the tenth; who grind human beings like russell sage, and then spend millions of dollars in social research work; who turn beautiful young plants into faded old women, and then give them a few paltry dollars or found a home for working girls. anthony is a worthy foe; and to fight such a foe, one must learn to meet him in open battle. david roberts has all the mental and moral attributes of his adversary, coupled with the spirit of revolt, and the depth of modern ideas. he, too, is consistent, and wants nothing for his class short of complete victory. "it is not for this little moment of time we are fighting, not for our own little bodies and their warmth; it is for all those who come after, for all times. oh, men, for the love of them don't turn up another stone on their heads, don't help to blacken the sky. if we can shake that white-faced monster with the bloody lips that has sucked the lives out of ourselves, our wives, and children, since the world began, if we have not the hearts of men to stand against it, breast to breast and eye to eye, and force it backward till it cry for mercy, it will go on sucking life, and we shall stay forever where we are, less than the very dogs." it is inevitable that compromise and petty interest should pass on and leave two such giants behind. inevitable, until the mass will reach the stature of a david roberts. will it ever? prophecy is not the vocation of the dramatist, yet the moral lesson is evident. one cannot help realizing that the workingmen will have to use methods hitherto unfamiliar to them; that they will have to discard all those elements in their midst that are forever ready to reconcile the irreconcilable, namely capital and labor. they will have to learn that characters like david roberts are the very forces that have revolutionized the world and thus paved the way for emancipation out of the clutches of that "white-faced monster with bloody lips," towards a brighter horizon, a freer life, and a deeper recognition of human values. no subject of equal social import has received such extensive consideration within the last few years as the question of prison and punishment. hardly any magazine of consequence that has not devoted its columns to the discussion of this vital theme. a number of books by able writers, both in america and abroad, have discussed this topic from the historic, psychologic, and social standpoint, all agreeing that present penal institutions and our mode of coping with crime have in every respect proved inadequate as well as wasteful. one would expect that something very radical should result from the cumulative literary indictment of the social crimes perpetrated upon the prisoner. yet with the exception of a few minor and comparatively insignificant reforms in some of our prisons, absolutely nothing has been accomplished. but at last this grave social wrong has found dramatic interpretation in galworthy's justice. the play opens in the office of james how and sons, solicitors. the senior clerk, robert cokeson, discovers that a check he had issued for nine pounds has been forged to ninety. by elimination, suspicion falls upon william falder, the junior office clerk. the latter is in love with a married woman, the abused, ill-treated wife of a brutal drunkard. pressed by his employer, a severe yet not unkindly man, falder confesses the forgery, pleading the dire necessity of his sweetheart, ruth honeywill, with whom he had planned to escape to save her from the unbearable brutality of her husband. notwithstanding the entreaties of young walter, who is touched by modern ideas, his father, a moral and law-respecting citizen, turns falder over to the police. the second act, in the court-room, shows justice in the very process of manufacture. the scene equals in dramatic power and psychologic verity the great court scene in resurrection. young falder, a nervous and rather weakly youth of twenty-three, stands before the bar. ruth, his married sweetheart, full of love and devotion, burns with anxiety to save the young man whose affection brought about his present predicament. the young man is defended by lawyer frome, whose speech to the jury is a masterpiece of deep social philosophy wreathed with the tendrils of human understanding and sympathy. he does not attempt to dispute the mere fact of falder having altered the check; and though he pleads temporary aberration in defense of his client, that plea is based upon a social consciousness as deep and all-embracing as the roots of our social ills--"the background of life, that palpitating life which always lies behind the commission of a crime." he shows falder to have faced the alternative of seeing the beloved woman murdered by her brutal husband, whom she cannot divorce; or of taking the law into his own hands. the defence pleads with the jury not to turn the weak young man into a criminal by condemning him to prison, for "justice is a machine that, when someone has given it a starting push, rolls on of itself.... is this young man to be ground to pieces under this machine for an act which, at the worst, was one of weakness? is he to become a member of the luckless crews that man those dark, ill-starred ships called prisons?... i urge you, gentlemen, do not ruin this young man. for as a result of those four minutes, ruin, utter and irretrievable, stares him in the face.... the rolling of the chariot wheels of justice over this boy began when it was decided to prosecute him." but the chariot of justice rolls mercilessly on, for--as the learned judge says--"the law is what it is--a majestic edifice, sheltering all of us, each stone of which rests on another." falder is sentenced to three years' penal servitude. in prison, the young, inexperienced convict soon finds himself the victim of the terrible "system." the authorities admit that young falder is mentally and physically "in bad shape," but nothing can be done in the matter: many others are in a similar position, and "the quarters are inadequate." the third scene of the third act is heart-gripping in its silent force. the whole scene is a pantomime, taking place in falder's prison cell. "in fast-falling daylight, falder, in his stockings, is seen standing motionless, with his head inclined towards the door, listening. he moves a little closer to the door, his stockinged feet making no noise. he stops at the door. he is trying harder and harder to hear something, any little thing that is going on outside. he springs suddenly upright--as if at a sound--and remains perfectly motionless. then, with a heavy sigh, he moves to his work, and stands looking at it, with his head down; he does a stitch or two, having the air of a man so lost in sadness that each stitch is, as it were, a coming to life. then, turning abruptly, he begins pacing his cell, moving his head, like an animal pacing its cage. he stops again at the door, listens, and, placing the palms of his hands against it with his fingers spread out, leans his forehead against the iron. turning from it, presently, he moves slowly back towards the window, holding his head, as if he felt that it were going to burst, and stops under the window. but since he cannot see out of it he leaves off looking, and, picking up the lid of one of the tins, peers into it, as if trying to make a companion of his own face. it has grown very nearly dark. suddenly the lid falls out of his hand with a clatter--the only sound that has broken the silence--and he stands staring intently at the wall where the stuff of the shirt is hanging rather white in the darkness--he seems to be seeing somebody or something there. there is a sharp tap and click; the cell light behind the glass screen has been turned up. the cell is brightly lighted. falder is seen gasping for breath. a sound from far away, as of distant, dull beating on thick metal, is suddenly audible. falder shrinks back, not able to bear this sudden clamor. but the sound grows, as though some great tumbril were rolling towards the cell. and gradually it seems to hypnotize him. he begins creeping inch by inch nearer to the door. the banging sound, traveling from cell to cell, draws closer and closer; falder's hands are seen moving as if his spirit had already joined in this beating, and the sound swells till it seems to have entered the very cell. he suddenly raises his clenched fists. panting violently, he flings himself at his door, and beats on it." finally falder leaves the prison, a broken ticket-of-leave man, the stamp of the convict upon his brow, the iron of misery in his soul. thanks to ruth's pleading, the firm of james how and son is willing to take falder back in their employ, on condition that he give up ruth. it is then that falder learns the awful news that the woman he loves had been driven by the merciless economic moloch to sell herself. she "tried making skirts ... cheap things.... i never made more than ten shillings a week, buying my own cotton, and working all day. i hardly ever got to bed till past twelve.... and then ... my employer happened--he's happened ever since." at this terrible psychologic moment the police appear to drag him back to prison for failing to report himself as ticket-of-leave man. completely overwhelmed by the inexorability of his environment, young falder seeks and finds peace, greater than human justice, by throwing himself down to death, as the detectives are taking him back to prison. it would be impossible to estimate the effect produced by this play. perhaps some conception can be gained from the very unusual circumstance that it had proved so powerful as to induce the home secretary of great britain to undertake extensive prison reforms in england. a very encouraging sign this, of the influence exerted by the modern drama. it is to be hoped that the thundering indictment of mr. galsworthy will not remain without similar effect upon the public sentiment and prison conditions of america. at any rate, it is certain that no other modern play has borne such direct and immediate fruit in wakening the social conscience. another modern play, the servant in the house, strikes a vital key in our social life. the hero of mr. kennedy's masterpiece is robert, a coarse, filthy drunkard, whom respectable society has repudiated. robert, the sewer cleaner, is the real hero of the play; nay, its true and only savior. it is he who volunteers to go down into the dangerous sewer, so that his comrades "can 'ave light and air." after all, has he not sacrificed his life always, so that others may have light and air? the thought that labor is the redeemer of social well-being has been cried from the housetops in every tongue and every clime. yet the simple words of robert express the significance of labor and its mission with far greater potency. america is still in its dramatic infancy. most of the attempts along this line to mirror life, have been wretched failures. still, there are hopeful signs in the attitude of the intelligent public toward modern plays, even if they be from foreign soil. the only real drama america has so far produced is the easiest way, by eugene walter. it is supposed to represent a "peculiar phase" of new york life. if that were all, it would be of minor significance. that which gives the play its real importance and value lies much deeper. it lies, first, in the fundamental current of our social fabric which drives us all, even stronger characters than laura, into the easiest way--a way so very destructive of integrity, truth, and justice. secondly, the cruel, senseless fatalism conditioned in laura's sex. these two features put the universal stamp upon the play, and characterize it as one of the strongest dramatic indictments against society. the criminal waste of human energy, in economic and social conditions, drives laura as it drives the average girl to marry any man for a "home"; or as it drives men to endure the worst indignities for a miserable pittance. then there is that other respectable institution, the fatalism of laura's sex. the inevitability of that force is summed up in the following words: "don't you know that we count no more in the life of these men than tamed animals? it's a game, and if we don't play our cards well, we lose." woman in the battle with life has but one weapon, one commodity--sex. that alone serves as a trump card in the game of life. this blind fatalism has made of woman a parasite, an inert thing. why then expect perseverance or energy of laura? the easiest way is the path mapped out for her from time immemorial. she could follow no other. a number of other plays could be quoted as characteristic of the growing role of the drama as a disseminator of radical thought. suffice to mention the third degree, by charles klein; the fourth estate, by medill patterson; a man's world, by ida croutchers,--all pointing to the dawn of dramatic art in america, an art which is discovering to the people the terrible diseases of our social body. it has been said of old, all roads lead to rome. in paraphrased application to the tendencies of our day, it may truly be said that all roads lead to the great social reconstruction. the economic awakening of the workingman, and his realization of the necessity for concerted industrial action; the tendencies of modern education, especially in their application to the free development of the child; the spirit of growing unrest expressed through, and cultivated by, art and literature, all pave the way to the open road. above all, the modern drama, operating through the double channel of dramatist and interpreter, affecting as it does both mind and heart, is the strongest force in developing social discontent, swelling the powerful tide of unrest that sweeps onward and over the dam of ignorance, prejudice, and superstition. [ ] honor. [ ] magda. [ ] before sunrise. [ ] the weavers. [ ] the sunken bell. [ ] youth. [ ] the awakening of spring. http://www.ebookforge.net posthumous works of mary wollstonecraft godwin. vol. i. posthumous works of the author of a vindication of the rights of woman. in four volumes. * * * * * vol. i. * * * * * _london:_ printed for j. johnson, no. , st. paul's church-yard; and g. g. and j. robinson, paternoster-row. . the wrongs of woman: or, maria. a fragment. in two volumes. * * * * * vol. i. preface. the public are here presented with the last literary attempt of an author, whose fame has been uncommonly extensive, and whose talents have probably been most admired, by the persons by whom talents are estimated with the greatest accuracy and discrimination. there are few, to whom her writings could in any case have given pleasure, that would have wished that this fragment should have been suppressed, because it is a fragment. there is a sentiment, very dear to minds of taste and imagination, that finds a melancholy delight in contemplating these unfinished productions of genius, these sketches of what, if they had been filled up in a manner adequate to the writer's conception, would perhaps have given a new impulse to the manners of a world. the purpose and structure of the following work, had long formed a favourite subject of meditation with its author, and she judged them capable of producing an important effect. the composition had been in progress for a period of twelve months. she was anxious to do justice to her conception, and recommenced and revised the manuscript several different times. so much of it as is here given to the public, she was far from considering as finished, and, in a letter to a friend directly written on this subject, she says, "i am perfectly aware that some of the incidents ought to be transposed, and heightened by more harmonious shading; and i wished in some degree to avail myself of criticism, before i began to adjust my events into a story, the outline of which i had sketched in my mind[x-a]." the only friends to whom the author communicated her manuscript, were mr. dyson, the translator of the sorcerer, and the present editor; and it was impossible for the most inexperienced author to display a stronger desire of profiting by the censures and sentiments that might be suggested[x-b]. in revising these sheets for the press, it was necessary for the editor, in some places, to connect the more finished parts with the pages of an older copy, and a line or two in addition sometimes appeared requisite for that purpose. wherever such a liberty has been taken, the additional phrases will be found inclosed in brackets; it being the editor's most earnest desire, to intrude nothing of himself into the work, but to give to the public the words, as well as ideas, of the real author. what follows in the ensuing pages, is not a preface regularly drawn out by the author, but merely hints for a preface, which, though never filled up in the manner the writer intended, appeared to be worth preserving. w. godwin. author's preface. the wrongs of woman, like the wrongs of the oppressed part of mankind, may be deemed necessary by their oppressors: but surely there are a few, who will dare to advance before the improvement of the age, and grant that my sketches are not the abortion of a distempered fancy, or the strong delineations of a wounded heart. in writing this novel, i have rather endeavoured to pourtray passions than manners. in many instances i could have made the incidents more dramatic, would i have sacrificed my main object, the desire of exhibiting the misery and oppression, peculiar to women, that arise out of the partial laws and customs of society. in the invention of the story, this view restrained my fancy; and the history ought rather to be considered, as of woman, than of an individual. the sentiments i have embodied. in many works of this species, the hero is allowed to be mortal, and to become wise and virtuous as well as happy, by a train of events and circumstances. the heroines, on the contrary, are to be born immaculate; and to act like goddesses of wisdom, just come forth highly finished minervas from the head of jove. * * * * * [the following is an extract of a letter from the author to a friend, to whom she communicated her manuscript.] * * * * * for my part, i cannot suppose any situation more distressing, than for a woman of sensibility, with an improving mind, to be bound to such a man as i have described for life; obliged to renounce all the humanizing affections, and to avoid cultivating her taste, lest her perception of grace and refinement of sentiment, should sharpen to agony the pangs of disappointment. love, in which the imagination mingles its bewitching colouring, must be fostered by delicacy. i should despise, or rather call her an ordinary woman, who could endure such a husband as i have sketched. these appear to me (matrimonial despotism of heart and conduct) to be the peculiar wrongs of woman, because they degrade the mind. what are termed great misfortunes, may more forcibly impress the mind of common readers; they have more of what may justly be termed _stage-effect_; but it is the delineation of finer sensations, which, in my opinion, constitutes the merit of our best novels. this is what i have in view; and to show the wrongs of different classes of women, equally oppressive, though, from the difference of education, necessarily various. footnotes: [x-a] a more copious extract of this letter is subjoined to the author's preface. [x-b] the part communicated consisted of the first fourteen chapters. errata. page , line , _dele_ half. p. and , _for_ brackets [--], _read_ inverted commas " thus " contents. vol. i. and ii. the wrongs of woman, or maria; a fragment: to which is added, the first book of a series of lessons for children. vol. iii. and iv. letters and miscellaneous pieces. _wrongs_ of woman. chap. i. abodes of horror have frequently been described, and castles, filled with spectres and chimeras, conjured up by the magic spell of genius to harrow the soul, and absorb the wondering mind. but, formed of such stuff as dreams are made of, what were they to the mansion of despair, in one corner of which maria sat, endeavouring to recal her scattered thoughts! surprise, astonishment, that bordered on distraction, seemed to have suspended her faculties, till, waking by degrees to a keen sense of anguish, a whirlwind of rage and indignation roused her torpid pulse. one recollection with frightful velocity following another, threatened to fire her brain, and make her a fit companion for the terrific inhabitants, whose groans and shrieks were no unsubstantial sounds of whistling winds, or startled birds, modulated by a romantic fancy, which amuse while they affright; but such tones of misery as carry a dreadful certainty directly to the heart. what effect must they then have produced on one, true to the touch of sympathy, and tortured by maternal apprehension! her infant's image was continually floating on maria's sight, and the first smile of intelligence remembered, as none but a mother, an unhappy mother, can conceive. she heard her half speaking cooing, and felt the little twinkling fingers on her burning bosom--a bosom bursting with the nutriment for which this cherished child might now be pining in vain. from a stranger she could indeed receive the maternal aliment, maria was grieved at the thought--but who would watch her with a mother's tenderness, a mother's self-denial? the retreating shadows of former sorrows rushed back in a gloomy train, and seemed to be pictured on the walls of her prison, magnified by the state of mind in which they were viewed--still she mourned for her child, lamented she was a daughter, and anticipated the aggravated ills of life that her sex rendered almost inevitable, even while dreading she was no more. to think that she was blotted out of existence was agony, when the imagination had been long employed to expand her faculties; yet to suppose her turned adrift on an unknown sea, was scarcely less afflicting. after being two days the prey of impetuous, varying emotions, maria began to reflect more calmly on her present situation, for she had actually been rendered incapable of sober reflection, by the discovery of the act of atrocity of which she was the victim. she could not have imagined, that, in all the fermentation of civilized depravity, a similar plot could have entered a human mind. she had been stunned by an unexpected blow; yet life, however joyless, was not to be indolently resigned, or misery endured without exertion, and proudly termed patience. she had hitherto meditated only to point the dart of anguish, and suppressed the heart heavings of indignant nature merely by the force of contempt. now she endeavoured to brace her mind to fortitude, and to ask herself what was to be her employment in her dreary cell? was it not to effect her escape, to fly to the succour of her child, and to baffle the selfish schemes of her tyrant--her husband? these thoughts roused her sleeping spirit, and the self-possession returned, that seemed to have abandoned her in the infernal solitude into which she had been precipitated. the first emotions of overwhelming impatience began to subside, and resentment gave place to tenderness, and more tranquil meditation; though anger once more stopt the calm current of reflection, when she attempted to move her manacled arms. but this was an outrage that could only excite momentary feelings of scorn, which evaporated in a faint smile; for maria was far from thinking a personal insult the most difficult to endure with magnanimous indifference. she approached the small grated window of her chamber, and for a considerable time only regarded the blue expanse; though it commanded a view of a desolate garden, and of part of a huge pile of buildings, that, after having been suffered, for half a century, to fall to decay, had undergone some clumsy repairs, merely to render it habitable. the ivy had been torn off the turrets, and the stones not wanted to patch up the breaches of time, and exclude the warring elements, left in heaps in the disordered court. maria contemplated this scene she knew not how long; or rather gazed on the walls, and pondered on her situation. to the master of this most horrid of prisons, she had, soon after her entrance, raved of injustice, in accents that would have justified his treatment, had not a malignant smile, when she appealed to his judgment, with a dreadful conviction stifled her remonstrating complaints. by force, or openly, what could be done? but surely some expedient might occur to an active mind, without any other employment, and possessed of sufficient resolution to put the risk of life into the balance with the chance of freedom. a woman entered in the midst of these reflections, with a firm, deliberate step, strongly marked features, and large black eyes, which she fixed steadily on maria's, as if she designed to intimidate her, saying at the same time--"you had better sit down and eat your dinner, than look at the clouds." "i have no appetite," replied maria, who had previously determined to speak mildly, "why then should i eat?" "but, in spite of that, you must and shall eat something. i have had many ladies under my care, who have resolved to starve themselves; but, soon or late, they gave up their intent, as they recovered their senses." "do you really think me mad?" asked maria, meeting the searching glance of her eye. "not just now. but what does that prove?--only that you must be the more carefully watched, for appearing at times so reasonable. you have not touched a morsel since you entered the house."--maria sighed intelligibly.--"could any thing but madness produce such a disgust for food?" "yes, grief; you would not ask the question if you knew what it was." the attendant shook her head; and a ghastly smile of desperate fortitude served as a forcible reply, and made maria pause, before she added--"yet i will take some refreshment: i mean not to die.--no; i will preserve my senses; and convince even you, sooner than you are aware of, that my intellects have never been disturbed, though the exertion of them may have been suspended by some infernal drug." doubt gathered still thicker on the brow of her guard, as she attempted to convict her of mistake. "have patience!" exclaimed maria, with a solemnity that inspired awe. "my god! how have i been schooled into the practice!" a suffocation of voice betrayed the agonizing emotions she was labouring to keep down; and conquering a qualm of disgust, she calmly endeavoured to eat enough to prove her docility, perpetually turning to the suspicious female, whose observation she courted, while she was making the bed and adjusting the room. "come to me often," said maria, with a tone of persuasion, in consequence of a vague plan that she had hastily adopted, when, after surveying this woman's form and features, she felt convinced that she had an understanding above the common standard; "and believe me mad, till you are obliged to acknowledge the contrary." the woman was no fool, that is, she was superior to her class; nor had misery quite petrified the life's-blood of humanity, to which reflections on our own misfortunes only give a more orderly course. the manner, rather than the expostulations, of maria made a slight suspicion dart into her mind with corresponding sympathy, which various other avocations, and the habit of banishing compunction, prevented her, for the present, from examining more minutely. but when she was told that no person, excepting the physician appointed by her family, was to be permitted to see the lady at the end of the gallery, she opened her keen eyes still wider, and uttered a--"hem!" before she enquired--"why?" she was briefly told, in reply, that the malady was hereditary, and the fits not occurring but at very long and irregular intervals, she must be carefully watched; for the length of these lucid periods only rendered her more mischievous, when any vexation or caprice brought on the paroxysm of phrensy. had her master trusted her, it is probable that neither pity nor curiosity would have made her swerve from the straight line of her interest; for she had suffered too much in her intercourse with mankind, not to determine to look for support, rather to humouring their passions, than courting their approbation by the integrity of her conduct. a deadly blight had met her at the very threshold of existence; and the wretchedness of her mother seemed a heavy weight fastened on her innocent neck, to drag her down to perdition. she could not heroically determine to succour an unfortunate; but, offended at the bare supposition that she could be deceived with the same ease as a common servant, she no longer curbed her curiosity; and, though she never seriously fathomed her own intentions, she would sit, every moment she could steal from observation, listening to the tale, which maria was eager to relate with all the persuasive eloquence of grief. it is so cheering to see a human face, even if little of the divinity of virtue beam in it, that maria anxiously expected the return of the attendant, as of a gleam of light to break the gloom of idleness. indulged sorrow; she perceived, must blunt or sharpen the faculties to the two opposite extremes; producing stupidity, the moping melancholy of indolence; or the restless activity of a disturbed imagination. she sunk into one state, after being fatigued by the other: till the want of occupation became even more painful than the actual pressure or apprehension of sorrow; and the confinement that froze her into a nook of existence, with an unvaried prospect before her, the most insupportable of evils. the lamp of life seemed to be spending itself to chase the vapours of a dungeon which no art could dissipate.--and to what purpose did she rally all her energy?--was not the world a vast prison, and women born slaves? though she failed immediately to rouse a lively sense of injustice in the mind of her guard, because it had been sophisticated into misanthropy, she touched her heart. jemima (she had only a claim to a christian name, which had not procured her any christian privileges) could patiently hear of maria's confinement on false pretences; she had felt the crushing hand of power, hardened by the exercise of injustice, and ceased to wonder at the perversions of the understanding, which systematize oppression; but, when told that her child, only four months old, had been torn from her, even while she was discharging the tenderest maternal office, the woman awoke in a bosom long estranged from feminine emotions, and jemima determined to alleviate all in her power, without hazarding the loss of her place, the sufferings of a wretched mother, apparently injured, and certainly unhappy. a sense of right seems to result from the simplest act of reason, and to preside over the faculties of the mind, like the master-sense of feeling, to rectify the rest; but (for the comparison may be carried still farther) how often is the exquisite sensibility of both weakened or destroyed by the vulgar occupations, and ignoble pleasures of life? the preserving her situation was, indeed, an important object to jemima, who had been hunted from hole to hole, as if she had been a beast of prey, or infected with a moral plague. the wages she received, the greater part of which she hoarded, as her only chance for independence, were much more considerable than she could reckon on obtaining any where else, were it possible that she, an outcast from society, could be permitted to earn a subsistence in a reputable family. hearing maria perpetually complain of listlessness, and the not being able to beguile grief by resuming her customary pursuits, she was easily prevailed on, by compassion, and that involuntary respect for abilities, which those who possess them can never eradicate, to bring her some books and implements for writing. maria's conversation had amused and interested her, and the natural consequence was a desire, scarcely observed by herself, of obtaining the esteem of a person she admired. the remembrance of better days was rendered more lively; and the sentiments then acquired appearing less romantic than they had for a long period, a spark of hope roused her mind to new activity. how grateful was her attention to maria! oppressed by a dead weight of existence, or preyed on by the gnawing worm of discontent, with what eagerness did she endeavour to shorten the long days, which left no traces behind! she seemed to be sailing on the vast ocean of life, without seeing any land-mark to indicate the progress of time; to find employment was then to find variety, the animating principle of nature. chap. ii. earnestly as maria endeavoured to soothe, by reading, the anguish of her wounded mind, her thoughts would often wander from the subject she was led to discuss, and tears of maternal tenderness obscured the reasoning page. she descanted on "the ills which flesh is heir to," with bitterness, when the recollection of her babe was revived by a tale of fictitious woe, that bore any resemblance to her own; and her imagination was continually employed, to conjure up and embody the various phantoms of misery, which folly and vice had let loose on the world. the loss of her babe was the tender string; against other cruel remembrances she laboured to steel her bosom; and even a ray of hope, in the midst of her gloomy reveries, would sometimes gleam on the dark horizon of futurity, while persuading herself that she ought to cease to hope, since happiness was no where to be found.--but of her child, debilitated by the grief with which its mother had been assailed before it saw the light, she could not think without an impatient struggle. "i, alone, by my active tenderness, could have saved," she would exclaim, "from an early blight, this sweet blossom; and, cherishing it, i should have had something still to love." in proportion as other expectations were torn from her, this tender one had been fondly clung to, and knit into her heart. the books she had obtained, were soon devoured, by one who had no other resource to escape from sorrow, and the feverish dreams of ideal wretchedness or felicity, which equally weaken the intoxicated sensibility. writing was then the only alternative, and she wrote some rhapsodies descriptive of the state of her mind; but the events of her past life pressing on her, she resolved circumstantially to relate them, with the sentiments that experience, and more matured reason, would naturally suggest. they might perhaps instruct her daughter, and shield her from the misery, the tyranny, her mother knew not how to avoid. this thought gave life to her diction, her soul flowed into it, and she soon found the task of recollecting almost obliterated impressions very interesting. she lived again in the revived emotions of youth, and forgot her present in the retrospect of sorrows that had assumed an unalterable character. though this employment lightened the weight of time, yet, never losing sight of her main object, maria did not allow any opportunity to slip of winning on the affections of jemima; for she discovered in her a strength of mind, that excited her esteem, clouded as it was by the misanthropy of despair. an insulated being, from the misfortune of her birth, she despised and preyed on the society by which she had been oppressed, and loved not her fellow-creatures, because she had never been beloved. no mother had ever fondled her, no father or brother had protected her from outrage; and the man who had plunged her into infamy, and deserted her when she stood in greatest need of support, deigned not to smooth with kindness the road to ruin. thus degraded, was she let loose on the world; and virtue, never nurtured by affection, assumed the stern aspect of selfish independence. this general view of her life, maria gathered from her exclamations and dry remarks. jemima indeed displayed a strange mixture of interest and suspicion; for she would listen to her with earnestness, and then suddenly interrupt the conversation, as if afraid of resigning, by giving way to her sympathy, her dear-bought knowledge of the world. maria alluded to the possibility of an escape, and mentioned a compensation, or reward; but the style in which she was repulsed made her cautious, and determine not to renew the subject, till she knew more of the character she had to work on. jemima's countenance, and dark hints, seemed to say, "you are an extraordinary woman; but let me consider, this may only be one of your lucid intervals." nay, the very energy of maria's character, made her suspect that the extraordinary animation she perceived might be the effect of madness. "should her husband then substantiate his charge, and get possession of her estate, from whence would come the promised annuity, or more desired protection? besides, might not a woman, anxious to escape, conceal some of the circumstances which made against her? was truth to be expected from one who had been entrapped, kidnapped, in the most fraudulent manner?" in this train jemima continued to argue, the moment after compassion and respect seemed to make her swerve; and she still resolved not to be wrought on to do more than soften the rigour of confinement, till she could advance on surer ground. maria was not permitted to walk in the garden; but sometimes, from her window, she turned her eyes from the gloomy walls, in which she pined life away, on the poor wretches who strayed along the walks, and contemplated the most terrific of ruins--that of a human soul. what is the view of the fallen column, the mouldering arch, of the most exquisite workmanship, when compared with this living memento of the fragility, the instability, of reason, and the wild luxuriancy of noxious passions? enthusiasm turned adrift, like some rich stream overflowing its banks, rushes forward with destructive velocity, inspiring a sublime concentration of thought. thus thought maria--these are the ravages over which humanity must ever mournfully ponder, with a degree of anguish not excited by crumbling marble, or cankering brass, unfaithful to the trust of monumental fame. it is not over the decaying productions of the mind, embodied with the happiest art, we grieve most bitterly. the view of what has been done by man, produces a melancholy, yet aggrandizing, sense of what remains to be achieved by human intellect; but a mental convulsion, which, like the devastation of an earthquake, throws all the elements of thought and imagination into confusion, makes contemplation giddy, and we fearfully ask on what ground we ourselves stand. melancholy and imbecility marked the features of the wretches allowed to breathe at large; for the frantic, those who in a strong imagination had lost a sense of woe, were closely confined. the playful tricks and mischievous devices of their disturbed fancy, that suddenly broke out, could not be guarded against, when they were permitted to enjoy any portion of freedom; for, so active was their imagination, that every new object which accidentally struck their senses, awoke to phrenzy their restless passions; as maria learned from the burden of their incessant ravings. sometimes, with a strict injunction of silence, jemima would allow maria, at the close of evening, to stray along the narrow avenues that separated the dungeon-like apartments, leaning on her arm. what a change of scene! maria wished to pass the threshold of her prison, yet, when by chance she met the eye of rage glaring on her, yet unfaithful to its office, she shrunk back with more horror and affright, than if she had stumbled over a mangled corpse. her busy fancy pictured the misery of a fond heart, watching over a friend thus estranged, absent, though present--over a poor wretch lost to reason and the social joys of existence; and losing all consciousness of misery in its excess. what a task, to watch the light of reason quivering in the eye, or with agonizing expectation to catch the beam of recollection; tantalized by hope, only to feel despair more keenly, at finding a much loved face or voice, suddenly remembered, or pathetically implored, only to be immediately forgotten, or viewed with indifference or abhorrence! the heart-rending sigh of melancholy sunk into her soul; and when she retired to rest, the petrified figures she had encountered, the only human forms she was doomed to observe, haunting her dreams with tales of mysterious wrongs, made her wish to sleep to dream no more. day after day rolled away, and tedious as the present moment appeared, they passed in such an unvaried tenor, maria was surprised to find that she had already been six weeks buried alive, and yet had such faint hopes of effecting her enlargement. she was, earnestly as she had sought for employment, now angry with herself for having been amused by writing her narrative; and grieved to think that she had for an instant thought of any thing, but contriving to escape. jemima had evidently pleasure in her society: still, though she often left her with a glow of kindness, she returned with the same chilling air; and, when her heart appeared for a moment to open, some suggestion of reason forcibly closed it, before she could give utterance to the confidence maria's conversation inspired. discouraged by these changes, maria relapsed into despondency, when she was cheered by the alacrity with which jemima brought her a fresh parcel of books; assuring her, that she had taken some pains to obtain them from one of the keepers, who attended a gentleman confined in the opposite corner of the gallery. maria took up the books with emotion. "they come," said she, "perhaps, from a wretch condemned, like me, to reason on the nature of madness, by having wrecked minds continually under his eye; and almost to wish himself--as i do--mad, to escape from the contemplation of it." her heart throbbed with sympathetic alarm; and she turned over the leaves with awe, as if they had become sacred from passing through the hands of an unfortunate being, oppressed by a similar fate. dryden's fables, milton's paradise lost, with several modern productions, composed the collection. it was a mine of treasure. some marginal notes, in dryden's fables, caught her attention: they were written with force and taste; and, in one of the modern pamphlets, there was a fragment left, containing various observations on the present state of society and government, with a comparative view of the politics of europe and america. these remarks were written with a degree of generous warmth, when alluding to the enslaved state of the labouring majority, perfectly in unison with maria's mode of thinking. she read them over and over again; and fancy, treacherous fancy, began to sketch a character, congenial with her own, from these shadowy outlines.--"was he mad?" she re-perused the marginal notes, and they seemed the production of an animated, but not of a disturbed imagination. confined to this speculation, every time she re-read them, some fresh refinement of sentiment, or acuteness of thought impressed her, which she was astonished at herself for not having before observed. what a creative power has an affectionate heart! there are beings who cannot live without loving, as poets love; and who feel the electric spark of genius, wherever it awakens sentiment or grace. maria had often thought, when disciplining her wayward heart, "that to charm, was to be virtuous." "they who make me wish to appear the most amiable and good in their eyes, must possess in a degree," she would exclaim, "the graces and virtues they call into action." she took up a book on the powers of the human mind; but, her attention strayed from cold arguments on the nature of what she felt, while she was feeling, and she snapt the chain of the theory to read dryden's guiscard and sigismunda. maria, in the course of the ensuing day, returned some of the books, with the hope of getting others--and more marginal notes. thus shut out from human intercourse, and compelled to view nothing but the prison of vexed spirits, to meet a wretch in the same situation, was more surely to find a friend, than to imagine a countryman one, in a strange land, where the human voice conveys no information to the eager ear. "did you ever see the unfortunate being to whom these books belong?" asked maria, when jemima brought her supper. "yes. he sometimes walks out, between five and six, before the family is stirring, in the morning, with two keepers; but even then his hands are confined." "what! is he so unruly?" enquired maria, with an accent of disappointment. "no, not that i perceive," replied jemima; "but he has an untamed look, a vehemence of eye, that excites apprehension. were his hands free, he looks as if he could soon manage both his guards: yet he appears tranquil." "if he be so strong, he must be young," observed maria. "three or four and thirty, i suppose; but there is no judging of a person in his situation." "are you sure that he is mad?" interrupted maria with eagerness. jemima quitted the room, without replying. "no, no, he certainly is not!" exclaimed maria, answering herself; "the man who could write those observations was not disordered in his intellects." she sat musing, gazing at the moon, and watching its motion as it seemed to glide under the clouds. then, preparing for bed, she thought, "of what use could i be to him, or he to me, if it be true that he is unjustly confined?--could he aid me to escape, who is himself more closely watched?--still i should like to see him." she went to bed, dreamed of her child, yet woke exactly at half after five o'clock, and starting up, only wrapped a gown around her, and ran to the window. the morning was chill, it was the latter end of september; yet she did not retire to warm herself and think in bed, till the sound of the servants, moving about the house, convinced her that the unknown would not walk in the garden that morning. she was ashamed at feeling disappointed; and began to reflect, as an excuse to herself, on the little objects which attract attention when there is nothing to divert the mind; and how difficult it was for women to avoid growing romantic, who have no active duties or pursuits. at breakfast, jemima enquired whether she understood french? for, unless she did, the stranger's stock of books was exhausted. maria replied in the affirmative; but forbore to ask any more questions respecting the person to whom they belonged. and jemima gave her a new subject for contemplation, by describing the person of a lovely maniac, just brought into an adjoining chamber. she was singing the pathetic ballad of old rob with the most heart-melting falls and pauses. jemima had half-opened the door, when she distinguished her voice, and maria stood close to it, scarcely daring to respire, lest a modulation should escape her, so exquisitely sweet, so passionately wild. she began with sympathy to pourtray to herself another victim, when the lovely warbler flew, as it were, from the spray, and a torrent of unconnected exclamations and questions burst from her, interrupted by fits of laughter, so horrid, that maria shut the door, and, turning her eyes up to heaven, exclaimed--"gracious god!" several minutes elapsed before maria could enquire respecting the rumour of the house (for this poor wretch was obviously not confined without a cause); and then jemima could only tell her, that it was said, "she had been married, against her inclination, to a rich old man, extremely jealous (no wonder, for she was a charming creature); and that, in consequence of his treatment, or something which hung on her mind, she had, during her first lying-in, lost her senses." what a subject of meditation--even to the very confines of madness. "woman, fragile flower! why were you suffered to adorn a world exposed to the inroad of such stormy elements?" thought maria, while the poor maniac's strain was still breathing on her ear, and sinking into her very soul. towards the evening, jemima brought her rousseau's _heloïse_; and she sat reading with eyes and heart, till the return of her guard to extinguish the light. one instance of her kindness was, the permitting maria to have one, till her own hour of retiring to rest. she had read this work long since; but now it seemed to open a new world to her--the only one worth inhabiting. sleep was not to be wooed; yet, far from being fatigued by the restless rotation of thought, she rose and opened her window, just as the thin watery clouds of twilight made the long silent shadows visible. the air swept across her face with a voluptuous freshness that thrilled to her heart, awakening indefinable emotions; and the sound of a waving branch, or the twittering of a startled bird, alone broke the stillness of reposing nature. absorbed by the sublime sensibility which renders the consciousness of existence felicity, maria was happy, till an autumnal scent, wafted by the breeze of morn from the fallen leaves of the adjacent wood, made her recollect that the season had changed since her confinement; yet life afforded no variety to solace an afflicted heart. she returned dispirited to her couch, and thought of her child till the broad glare of day again invited her to the window. she looked not for the unknown, still how great was her vexation at perceiving the back of a man, certainly he, with his two attendants, as he turned into a side-path which led to the house! a confused recollection of having seen somebody who resembled him, immediately occurred, to puzzle and torment her with endless conjectures. five minutes sooner, and she should have seen his face, and been out of suspense--was ever any thing so unlucky! his steady, bold step, and the whole air of his person, bursting as it were from a cloud, pleased her, and gave an outline to the imagination to sketch the individual form she wished to recognize. feeling the disappointment more severely than she was willing to believe, she flew to rousseau, as her only refuge from the idea of him, who might prove a friend, could she but find a way to interest him in her fate; still the personification of saint preux, or of an ideal lover far superior, was after this imperfect model, of which merely a glance had been caught, even to the minutiæ of the coat and hat of the stranger. but if she lent st. preux, or the demi-god of her fancy, his form, she richly repaid him by the donation of all st. preux's sentiments and feelings, culled to gratify her own, to which he seemed to have an undoubted right, when she read on the margin of an impassioned letter, written in the well-known hand--"rousseau alone, the true prometheus of sentiment, possessed the fire of genius necessary to pourtray the passion, the truth of which goes so directly to the heart." maria was again true to the hour, yet had finished rousseau, and begun to transcribe some selected passages; unable to quit either the author or the window, before she had a glimpse of the countenance she daily longed to see; and, when seen, it conveyed no distinct idea to her mind where she had seen it before. he must have been a transient acquaintance; but to discover an acquaintance was fortunate, could she contrive to attract his attention, and excite his sympathy. every glance afforded colouring for the picture she was delineating on her heart; and once, when the window was half open, the sound of his voice reached her. conviction flashed on her; she had certainly, in a moment of distress, heard the same accents. they were manly, and characteristic of a noble mind; nay, even sweet--or sweet they seemed to her attentive ear. she started back, trembling, alarmed at the emotion a strange coincidence of circumstances inspired, and wondering why she thought so much of a stranger, obliged as she had been by his timely interference; [for she recollected, by degrees, all the circumstances of their former meeting.] she found however that she could think of nothing else; or, if she thought of her daughter, it was to wish that she had a father whom her mother could respect and love. chap. iii. when perusing the first parcel of books, maria had, with her pencil, written in one of them a few exclamations, expressive of compassion and sympathy, which she scarcely remembered, till turning over the leaves of one of the volumes, lately brought to her, a slip of paper dropped out, which jemima hastily snatched up. "let me see it," demanded maria impatiently, "you surely are not afraid of trusting me with the effusions of a madman?" "i must consider," replied jemima; and withdrew, with the paper in her hand. in a life of such seclusion, the passions gain undue force; maria therefore felt a great degree of resentment and vexation, which she had not time to subdue, before jemima, returning, delivered the paper. "whoever you are, who partake of my fate, accept my sincere commiseration--i would have said protection; but the privilege of man is denied me. "my own situation forces a dreadful suspicion on my mind--i may not always languish in vain for freedom--say are you--i cannot ask the question; yet i will remember you when my remembrance can be of any use. i will enquire, _why_ you are so mysteriously detained--and i _will_ have an answer. "henry darnford." by the most pressing intreaties, maria prevailed on jemima to permit her to write a reply to this note. another and another succeeded, in which explanations were not allowed relative to their present situation; but maria, with sufficient explicitness, alluded to a former obligation; and they insensibly entered on an interchange of sentiments on the most important subjects. to write these letters was the business of the day, and to receive them the moment of sunshine. by some means, darnford having discovered maria's window, when she next appeared at it, he made her, behind his keepers, a profound bow of respect and recognition. two or three weeks glided away in this kind of intercourse, during which period jemima, to whom maria had given the necessary information respecting her family, had evidently gained some intelligence, which increased her desire of pleasing her charge, though she could not yet determine to liberate her. maria took advantage of this favourable charge, without too minutely enquiring into the cause; and such was her eagerness to hold human converse, and to see her former protector, still a stranger to her, that she incessantly requested her guard to gratify her more than curiosity. writing to darnford, she was led from the sad objects before her, and frequently rendered insensible to the horrid noises around her, which previously had continually employed her feverish fancy. thinking it selfish to dwell on her own sufferings, when in the midst of wretches, who had not only lost all that endears life, but their very selves, her imagination was occupied with melancholy earnestness to trace the mazes of misery, through which so many wretches must have passed to this gloomy receptacle of disjointed souls, to the grand source of human corruption. often at midnight was she waked by the dismal shrieks of demoniac rage, or of excruciating despair, uttered in such wild tones of indescribable anguish as proved the total absence of reason, and roused phantoms of horror in her mind, far more terrific than all that dreaming superstition ever drew. besides, there was frequently something so inconceivably picturesque in the varying gestures of unrestrained passion, so irresistibly comic in their sallies, or so heart-piercingly pathetic in the little airs they would sing, frequently bursting out after an awful silence, as to fascinate the attention, and amuse the fancy, while torturing the soul. it was the uproar of the passions which she was compelled to observe; and to mark the lucid beam of reason, like a light trembling in a socket, or like the flash which divides the threatening clouds of angry heaven only to display the horrors which darkness shrouded. jemima would labour to beguile the tedious evenings, by describing the persons and manners of the unfortunate beings, whose figures or voices awoke sympathetic sorrow in maria's bosom; and the stories she told were the more interesting, for perpetually leaving room to conjecture something extraordinary. still maria, accustomed to generalize her observations, was led to conclude from all she heard, that it was a vulgar error to suppose that people of abilities were the most apt to lose the command of reason. on the contrary, from most of the instances she could investigate, she thought it resulted, that the passions only appeared strong and disproportioned, because the judgment was weak and unexercised; and that they gained strength by the decay of reason, as the shadows lengthen during the sun's decline. maria impatiently wished to see her fellow-sufferer; but darnford was still more earnest to obtain an interview. accustomed to submit to every impulse of passion, and never taught, like women, to restrain the most natural, and acquire, instead of the bewitching frankness of nature, a factitious propriety of behaviour, every desire became a torrent that bore down all opposition. his travelling trunk, which contained the books lent to maria, had been sent to him, and with a part of its contents he bribed his principal keeper; who, after receiving the most solemn promise that he would return to his apartment without attempting to explore any part of the house, conducted him, in the dusk of the evening, to maria's room. jemima had apprized her charge of the visit, and she expected with trembling impatience, inspired by a vague hope that he might again prove her deliverer, to see a man who had before rescued her from oppression. he entered with an animation of countenance, formed to captivate an enthusiast; and, hastily turned his eyes from her to the apartment, which he surveyed with apparent emotions of compassionate indignation. sympathy illuminated his eye, and, taking her hand, he respectfully bowed on it, exclaiming--"this is extraordinary!--again to meet you, and in such circumstances!" still, impressive as was the coincidence of events which brought them once more together, their full hearts did not overflow.--[ -a] * * * * * [and though, after this first visit, they were permitted frequently to repeat their interviews, they were for some time employed in] a reserved conversation, to which all the world might have listened; excepting, when discussing some literary subject, flashes of sentiment, inforced by each relaxing feature, seemed to remind them that their minds were already acquainted. [by degrees, darnford entered into the particulars of his story.] in a few words, he informed her that he had been a thoughtless, extravagant young man; yet, as he described his faults, they appeared to be the generous luxuriancy of a noble mind. nothing like meanness tarnished the lustre of his youth, nor had the worm of selfishness lurked in the unfolding bud, even while he had been the dupe of others. yet he tardily acquired the experience necessary to guard him against future imposition. "i shall weary you," continued he, "by my egotism; and did not powerful emotions draw me to you,"--his eyes glistened as he spoke, and a trembling seemed to run through his manly frame,--"i would not waste these precious moments in talking of myself. "my father and mother were people of fashion; married by their parents. he was fond of the turf, she of the card-table. i, and two or three other children since dead, were kept at home till we became intolerable. my father and mother had a visible dislike to each other, continually displayed; the servants were of the depraved kind usually found in the houses of people of fortune. my brothers and parents all dying, i was left to the care of guardians, and sent to eton. i never knew the sweets of domestic affection, but i felt the want of indulgence and frivolous respect at school. i will not disgust you with a recital of the vices of my youth, which can scarcely be comprehended by female delicacy. i was taught to love by a creature i am ashamed to mention; and the other women with whom i afterwards became intimate, were of a class of which you can have no knowledge. i formed my acquaintance with them at the theatres; and, when vivacity danced in their eyes, i was not easily disgusted by the vulgarity which flowed from their lips. having spent, a few years after i was of age, [the whole of] a considerable patrimony, excepting a few hundreds, i had no recourse but to purchase a commission in a new-raised regiment, destined to subjugate america. the regret i felt to renounce a life of pleasure, was counter-balanced by the curiosity i had to see america, or rather to travel; [nor had any of those circumstances occurred to my youth, which might have been calculated] to bind my country to my heart. i shall not trouble you with the details of a military life. my blood was still kept in motion; till, towards the close of the contest, i was wounded and taken prisoner. "confined to my bed, or chair, by a lingering cure, my only refuge from the preying activity of my mind, was books, which i read with great avidity, profiting by the conversation of my host, a man of sound understanding. my political sentiments now underwent a total change; and, dazzled by the hospitality of the americans, i determined to take up my abode with freedom. i, therefore, with my usual impetuosity, sold my commission, and travelled into the interior parts of the country, to lay out my money to advantage. added to this, i did not much like the puritanical manners of the large towns. inequality of condition was there most disgustingly galling. the only pleasure wealth afforded, was to make an ostentatious display of it; for the cultivation of the fine arts, or literature, had not introduced into the first circles that polish of manners which renders the rich so essentially superior to the poor in europe. added to this, an influx of vices had been let in by the revolution, and the most rigid principles of religion shaken to the centre, before the understanding could be gradually emancipated from the prejudices which led their ancestors undauntedly to seek an inhospitable clime and unbroken soil. the resolution, that led them, in pursuit of independence, to embark on rivers like seas, to search for unknown shores, and to sleep under the hovering mists of endless forests, whose baleful damps agued their limbs, was now turned into commercial speculations, till the national character exhibited a phenomenon in the history of the human mind--a head enthusiastically enterprising, with cold selfishness of heart. and woman, lovely woman!--they charm every where--still there is a degree of prudery, and a want of taste and ease in the manners of the american women, that renders them, in spite of their roses and lilies, far inferior to our european charmers. in the country, they have often a bewitching simplicity of character; but, in the cities, they have all the airs and ignorance of the ladies who give the tone to the circles of the large trading towns in england. they are fond of their ornaments, merely because they are good, and not because they embellish their persons; and are more gratified to inspire the women with jealousy of these exterior advantages, than the men with love. all the frivolity which often (excuse me, madam) renders the society of modest women so stupid in england, here seemed to throw still more leaden fetters on their charms. not being an adept in gallantry, i found that i could only keep myself awake in their company by making downright love to them. "but, not to intrude on your patience, i retired to the track of land which i had purchased in the country, and my time passed pleasantly enough while i cut down the trees, built my house, and planted my different crops. but winter and idleness came, and i longed for more elegant society, to hear what was passing in the world, and to do something better than vegetate with the animals that made a very considerable part of my household. consequently, i determined to travel. motion was a substitute for variety of objects; and, passing over immense tracks of country, i exhausted my exuberant spirits, without obtaining much experience. i every where saw industry the fore-runner and not the consequence, of luxury; but this country, every thing being on an ample scale, did not afford those picturesque views, which a certain degree of cultivation is necessary gradually to produce. the eye wandered without an object to fix upon over immeasureable plains, and lakes that seemed replenished by the ocean, whilst eternal forests of small clustering trees, obstructed the circulation of air, and embarrassed the path, without gratifying the eye of taste. no cottage smiling in the waste, no travellers hailed us, to give life to silent nature; or, if perchance we saw the print of a footstep in our path, it was a dreadful warning to turn aside; and the head ached as if assailed by the scalping knife. the indians who hovered on the skirts of the european settlements had only learned of their neighbours to plunder, and they stole their guns from them to do it with more safety. "from the woods and back settlements, i returned to the towns, and learned to eat and drink most valiantly; but without entering into commerce (and i detested commerce) i found i could not live there; and, growing heartily weary of the land of liberty and vulgar aristocracy, seated on her bags of dollars, i resolved once more to visit europe. i wrote to a distant relation in england, with whom i had been educated, mentioning the vessel in which i intended to sail. arriving in london, my senses were intoxicated. i ran from street to street, from theatre to theatre, and the women of the town (again i must beg pardon for my habitual frankness) appeared to me like angels. "a week was spent in this thoughtless manner, when, returning very late to the hotel in which i had lodged ever since my arrival, i was knocked down in a private street, and hurried, in a state of insensibility, into a coach, which brought me hither, and i only recovered my senses to be treated like one who had lost them. my keepers are deaf to my remonstrances and enquiries, yet assure me that my confinement shall not last long. still i cannot guess, though i weary myself with conjectures, why i am confined, or in what part of england this house is situated. i imagine sometimes that i hear the sea roar, and wished myself again on the atlantic, till i had a glimpse of you[ -a]." a few moments were only allowed to maria to comment on this narrative, when darnford left her to her own thoughts, to the "never ending, still beginning," task of weighing his words, recollecting his tones of voice, and feeling them reverberate on her heart. footnotes: [ -a] the copy which had received the author's last corrections, breaks off in this place, and the pages which follow, to the end of chap. iv, are printed from a copy in a less finished state. [ -a] the introduction of darnford as the deliverer of maria in a former instance, appears to have been an after-thought of the author. this has occasioned the omission of any allusion to that circumstance in the preceding narration. editor. chap. iv. pity, and the forlorn seriousness of adversity, have both been considered as dispositions favourable to love, while satirical writers have attributed the propensity to the relaxing effect of idleness, what chance then had maria of escaping, when pity, sorrow, and solitude all conspired to soften her mind, and nourish romantic wishes, and, from a natural progress, romantic expectations? maria was six-and-twenty. but, such was the native soundness of her constitution, that time had only given to her countenance the character of her mind. revolving thought, and exercised affections had banished some of the playful graces of innocence, producing insensibly that irregularity of features which the struggles of the understanding to trace or govern the strong emotions of the heart, are wont to imprint on the yielding mass. grief and care had mellowed, without obscuring, the bright tints of youth, and the thoughtfulness which resided on her brow did not take from the feminine softness of her features; nay, such was the sensibility which often mantled over it, that she frequently appeared, like a large proportion of her sex, only born to feel; and the activity of her well-proportioned, and even almost voluptuous figure, inspired the idea of strength of mind, rather than of body. there was a simplicity sometimes indeed in her manner, which bordered on infantine ingenuousness, that led people of common discernment to underrate her talents, and smile at the flights of her imagination. but those who could not comprehend the delicacy of her sentiments, were attached by her unfailing sympathy, so that she was very generally beloved by characters of very different descriptions; still, she was too much under the influence of an ardent imagination to adhere to common rules. there are mistakes of conduct which at five-and-twenty prove the strength of the mind, that, ten or fifteen years after, would demonstrate its weakness, its incapacity to acquire a sane judgment. the youths who are satisfied with the ordinary pleasures of life, and do not sigh after ideal phantoms of love and friendship, will never arrive at great maturity of understanding; but if these reveries are cherished, as is too frequently the case with women, when experience ought to have taught them in what human happiness consists, they become as useless as they are wretched. besides, their pains and pleasures are so dependent on outward circumstances, on the objects of their affections, that they seldom act from the impulse of a nerved mind, able to choose its own pursuit. having had to struggle incessantly with the vices of mankind, maria's imagination found repose in pourtraying the possible virtues the world might contain. pygmalion formed an ivory maid, and longed for an informing soul. she, on the contrary, combined all the qualities of a hero's mind, and fate presented a statue in which she might enshrine them. we mean not to trace the progress of this passion, or recount how often darnford and maria were obliged to part in the midst of an interesting conversation. jemima ever watched on the tip-toe of fear, and frequently separated them on a false alarm, when they would have given worlds to remain a little longer together. a magic lamp now seemed to be suspended in maria's prison, and fairy landscapes flitted round the gloomy walls, late so blank. rushing from the depth of despair, on the seraph wing of hope, she found herself happy.--she was beloved, and every emotion was rapturous. to darnford she had not shown a decided affection; the fear of outrunning his, a sure proof of love, made her often assume a coldness and indifference foreign from her character; and, even when giving way to the playful emotions of a heart just loosened from the frozen bond of grief, there was a delicacy in her manner of expressing her sensibility, which made him doubt whether it was the effect of love. one evening, when jemima left them, to listen to the sound of a distant footstep, which seemed cautiously to approach, he seized maria's hand--it was not withdrawn. they conversed with earnestness of their situation; and, during the conversation, he once or twice gently drew her towards him. he felt the fragrance of her breath, and longed, yet feared, to touch the lips from which it issued; spirits of purity seemed to guard them, while all the enchanting graces of love sported on her cheeks, and languished in her eyes. jemima entering, he reflected on his diffidence with poignant regret, and, she once more taking alarm, he ventured, as maria stood near his chair, to approach her lips with a declaration of love. she drew back with solemnity, he hung down his head abashed; but lifting his eyes timidly, they met her's; she had determined, during that instant, and suffered their rays to mingle. he took, with more ardour, reassured, a half-consenting, half-reluctant kiss, reluctant only from modesty; and there was a sacredness in her dignified manner of reclining her glowing face on his shoulder, that powerfully impressed him. desire was lost in more ineffable emotions, and to protect her from insult and sorrow--to make her happy, seemed not only the first wish of his heart, but the most noble duty of his life. such angelic confidence demanded the fidelity of honour; but could he, feeling her in every pulsation, could he ever change, could he be a villain? the emotion with which she, for a moment, allowed herself to be pressed to his bosom, the tear of rapturous sympathy, mingled with a soft melancholy sentiment of recollected disappointment, said--more of truth and faithfulness, than the tongue could have given utterance to in hours! they were silent--yet discoursed, how eloquently? till, after a moment's reflection, maria drew her chair by the side of his, and, with a composed sweetness of voice, and supernatural benignity of countenance, said, "i must open my whole heart to you; you must be told who i am, why i am here, and why, telling you i am a wife, i blush not to"--the blush spoke the rest. jemima was again at her elbow, and the restraint of her presence did not prevent an animated conversation, in which love, sly urchin, was ever at bo-peep. so much of heaven did they enjoy, that paradise bloomed around them; or they, by a powerful spell, had been transported into armida's garden. love, the grand enchanter, "lapt them in elysium," and every sense was harmonized to joy and social extacy. so animated, indeed, were their accents of tenderness, in discussing what, in other circumstances, would have been common-place subjects, that jemima felt, with surprise, a tear of pleasure trickling down her rugged cheeks. she wiped it away, half ashamed; and when maria kindly enquired the cause, with all the eager solicitude of a happy being wishing to impart to all nature its overflowing felicity, jemima owned that it was the first tear that social enjoyment had ever drawn from her. she seemed indeed to breathe more freely; the cloud of suspicion cleared away from her brow; she felt herself, for once in her life, treated like a fellow-creature. imagination! who can paint thy power; or reflect the evanescent tints of hope fostered by thee? a despondent gloom had long obscured maria's horizon--now the sun broke forth, the rainbow appeared, and every prospect was fair. horror still reigned in the darkened cells, suspicion lurked in the passages, and whispered along the walls. the yells of men possessed, sometimes made them pause, and wonder that they felt so happy, in a tomb of living death. they even chid themselves for such apparent insensibility; still the world contained not three happier beings. and jemima, after again patrolling the passage, was so softened by the air of confidence which breathed around her, that she voluntarily began an account of herself. chap. v. "my father," said jemima, "seduced my mother, a pretty girl, with whom he lived fellow-servant; and she no sooner perceived the natural, the dreaded consequence, than the terrible conviction flashed on her--that she was ruined. honesty, and a regard for her reputation, had been the only principles inculcated by her mother; and they had been so forcibly impressed, that she feared shame, more than the poverty to which it would lead. her incessant importunities to prevail upon my father to screen her from reproach by marrying her, as he had promised in the fervour of seduction, estranged him from her so completely, that her very person became distasteful to him; and he began to hate, as well as despise me, before i was born. "my mother, grieved to the soul by his neglect, and unkind treatment, actually resolved to famish herself; and injured her health by the attempt; though she had not sufficient resolution to adhere to her project, or renounce it entirely. death came not at her call; yet sorrow, and the methods she adopted to conceal her condition, still doing the work of a house-maid, had such an effect on her constitution, that she died in the wretched garret, where her virtuous mistress had forced her to take refuge in the very pangs of labour, though my father, after a slight reproof, was allowed to remain in his place--allowed by the mother of six children, who, scarcely permitting a footstep to be heard, during her month's indulgence, felt no sympathy for the poor wretch, denied every comfort required by her situation. "the day my mother died, the ninth after my birth, i was consigned to the care of the cheapest nurse my father could find; who suckled her own child at the same time, and lodged as many more as she could get, in two cellar-like apartments. "poverty, and the habit of seeing children die off her hands, had so hardened her heart, that the office of a mother did not awaken the tenderness of a woman; nor were the feminine caresses which seem a part of the rearing of a child, ever bestowed on me. the chicken has a wing to shelter under; but i had no bosom to nestle in, no kindred warmth to foster me. left in dirt, to cry with cold and hunger till i was weary, and sleep without ever being prepared by exercise, or lulled by kindness to rest; could i be expected to become any thing but a weak and rickety babe? still, in spite of neglect, i continued to exist, to learn to curse existence," her countenance grew ferocious as she spoke, "and the treatment that rendered me miserable, seemed to sharpen my wits. confined then in a damp hovel, to rock the cradle of the succeeding tribe, i looked like a little old woman, or a hag shrivelling into nothing. the furrows of reflection and care contracted the youthful cheek, and gave a sort of supernatural wildness to the ever watchful eye. during this period, my father had married another fellow-servant, who loved him less, and knew better how to manage his passion, than my mother. she likewise proving with child, they agreed to keep a shop: my step-mother, if, being an illegitimate offspring, i may venture thus to characterize her, having obtained a sum of a rich relation, for that purpose. "soon after her lying-in, she prevailed on my father to take me home, to save the expence of maintaining me, and of hiring a girl to assist her in the care of the child. i was young, it was true, but appeared a knowing little thing, and might be made handy. accordingly i was brought to her house; but not to a home--for a home i never knew. of this child, a daughter, she was extravagantly fond; and it was a part of my employment, to assist to spoil her, by humouring all her whims, and bearing all her caprices. feeling her own consequence, before she could speak, she had learned the art of tormenting me, and if i ever dared to resist, i received blows, laid on with no compunctious hand, or was sent to bed dinnerless, as well as supperless. i said that it was a part of my daily labour to attend this child, with the servility of a slave; still it was but a part. i was sent out in all seasons, and from place to place, to carry burdens far above my strength, without being allowed to draw near the fire, or ever being cheered by encouragement or kindness. no wonder then, treated like a creature of another species, that i began to envy, and at length to hate, the darling of the house. yet, i perfectly remember, that it was the caresses, and kind expressions of my step-mother, which first excited my jealous discontent. once, i cannot forget it, when she was calling in vain her wayward child to kiss her, i ran to her, saying, 'i will kiss you, ma'am!' and how did my heart, which was in my mouth, sink, what was my debasement of soul, when pushed away with--'i do not want you, pert thing!' another day, when a new gown had excited the highest good humour, and she uttered the appropriate _dear_, addressed unexpectedly to me, i thought i could never do enough to please her; i was all alacrity, and rose proportionably in my own estimation. "as her daughter grew up, she was pampered with cakes and fruit, while i was, literally speaking, fed with the refuse of the table, with her leavings. a liquorish tooth is, i believe, common to children, and i used to steal any thing sweet, that i could catch up with a chance of concealment. when detected, she was not content to chastize me herself at the moment, but, on my father's return in the evening (he was a shopman), the principal discourse was to recount my faults, and attribute them to the wicked disposition which i had brought into the world with me, inherited from my mother. he did not fail to leave the marks of his resentment on my body, and then solaced himself by playing with my sister.--i could have murdered her at those moments. to save myself from these unmerciful corrections, i resorted to falshood, and the untruths which i sturdily maintained, were brought in judgment against me, to support my tyrant's inhuman charge of my natural propensity to vice. seeing me treated with contempt, and always being fed and dressed better, my sister conceived a contemptuous opinion of me, that proved an obstacle to all affection; and my father, hearing continually of my faults, began to consider me as a curse entailed on him for his sins: he was therefore easily prevailed on to bind me apprentice to one of my step-mother's friends, who kept a slop-shop in wapping. i was represented (as it was said) in my true colours; but she, 'warranted,' snapping her fingers, 'that she should break my spirit or heart.' "my mother replied, with a whine, 'that if any body could make me better, it was such a clever woman as herself; though, for her own part, she had tried in vain; but good-nature was her fault.' "i shudder with horror, when i recollect the treatment i had now to endure. not only under the lash of my task-mistress, but the drudge of the maid, apprentices and children, i never had a taste of human kindness to soften the rigour of perpetual labour. i had been introduced as an object of abhorrence into the family; as a creature of whom my step-mother, though she had been kind enough to let me live in the house with her own child, could make nothing. i was described as a wretch, whose nose must be kept to the grinding stone--and it was held there with an iron grasp. it seemed indeed the privilege of their superior nature to kick me about, like the dog or cat. if i were attentive, i was called fawning, if refractory, an obstinate mule, and like a mule i received their censure on my loaded back. often has my mistress, for some instance of forgetfulness, thrown me from one side of the kitchen to the other, knocked my head against the wall, spit in my face, with various refinements on barbarity that i forbear to enumerate, though they were all acted over again by the servant, with additional insults, to which the appellation of _bastard_, was commonly added, with taunts or sneers. but i will not attempt to give you an adequate idea of my situation, lest you, who probably have never been drenched with the dregs of human misery, should think i exaggerate. "i stole now, from absolute necessity,--bread; yet whatever else was taken, which i had it not in my power to take, was ascribed to me. i was the filching cat, the ravenous dog, the dumb brute, who must bear all; for if i endeavoured to exculpate myself, i was silenced, without any enquiries being made, with 'hold your tongue, you never tell truth.' even the very air i breathed was tainted with scorn; for i was sent to the neighbouring shops with glutton, liar, or thief, written on my forehead. this was, at first, the most bitter punishment; but sullen pride, or a kind of stupid desperation, made me, at length, almost regardless of the contempt, which had wrung from me so many solitary tears at the only moments when i was allowed to rest. "thus was i the mark of cruelty till my sixteenth year; and then i have only to point out a change of misery; for a period i never knew. allow me first to make one observation. now i look back, i cannot help attributing the greater part of my misery, to the misfortune of having been thrown into the world without the grand support of life--a mother's affection. i had no one to love me; or to make me respected, to enable me to acquire respect. i was an egg dropped on the sand; a pauper by nature, shunted from family to family, who belonged to nobody--and nobody cared for me. i was despised from my birth, and denied the chance of obtaining a footing for myself in society. yes; i had not even the chance of being considered as a fellow-creature--yet all the people with whom i lived, brutalized as they were by the low cunning of trade, and the despicable shifts of poverty, were not without bowels, though they never yearned for me. i was, in fact, born a slave, and chained by infamy to slavery during the whole of existence, without having any companions to alleviate it by sympathy, or teach me how to rise above it by their example. but, to resume the thread of my tale-- "at sixteen, i suddenly grew tall, and something like comeliness appeared on a sunday, when i had time to wash my face, and put on clean clothes. my master had once or twice caught hold of me in the passage; but i instinctively avoided his disgusting caresses. one day however, when the family were at a methodist meeting, he contrived to be alone in the house with me, and by blows--yes; blows and menaces, compelled me to submit to his ferocious desire; and, to avoid my mistress's fury, i was obliged in future to comply, and skulk to my loft at his command, in spite of increasing loathing. "the anguish which was now pent up in my bosom, seemed to open a new world to me: i began to extend my thoughts beyond myself, and grieve for human misery, till i discovered, with horror--ah! what horror!--that i was with child. i know not why i felt a mixed sensation of despair and tenderness, excepting that, ever called a bastard, a bastard appeared to me an object of the greatest compassion in creation. "i communicated this dreadful circumstance to my master, who was almost equally alarmed at the intelligence; for he feared his wife, and public censure at the meeting. after some weeks of deliberation had elapsed, i in continual fear that my altered shape would be noticed, my master gave me a medicine in a phial, which he desired me to take, telling me, without any circumlocution, for what purpose it was designed. i burst into tears, i thought it was killing myself--yet was such a self as i worth preserving? he cursed me for a fool, and left me to my own reflections. i could not resolve to take this infernal potion; but i wrapped it up in an old gown, and hid it in a corner of my box. "nobody yet suspected me, because they had been accustomed to view me as a creature of another species. but the threatening storm at last broke over my devoted head--never shall i forget it! one sunday evening when i was left, as usual, to take care of the house, my master came home intoxicated, and i became the prey of his brutal appetite. his extreme intoxication made him forget his customary caution, and my mistress entered and found us in a situation that could not have been more hateful to her than me. her husband was 'pot-valiant,' he feared her not at the moment, nor had he then much reason, for she instantly turned the whole force of her anger another way. she tore off my cap, scratched, kicked, and buffetted me, till she had exhausted her strength, declaring, as she rested her arm, 'that i had wheedled her husband from her.--but, could any thing better be expected from a wretch, whom she had taken into her house out of pure charity?' what a torrent of abuse rushed out? till, almost breathless, she concluded with saying, 'that i was born a strumpet; it ran in my blood, and nothing good could come to those who harboured me.' "my situation was, of course, discovered, and she declared that i should not stay another night under the same roof with an honest family. i was therefore pushed out of doors, and my trumpery thrown after me, when it had been contemptuously examined in the passage, lest i should have stolen any thing. "behold me then in the street, utterly destitute! whither could i creep for shelter? to my father's roof i had no claim, when not pursued by shame--now i shrunk back as from death, from my mother's cruel reproaches, my father's execrations. i could not endure to hear him curse the day i was born, though life had been a curse to me. of death i thought, but with a confused emotion of terror, as i stood leaning my head on a post, and starting at every footstep, lest it should be my mistress coming to tear my heart out. one of the boys of the shop passing by, heard my tale, and immediately repaired to his master, to give him a description of my situation; and he touched the right key--the scandal it would give rise to, if i were left to repeat my tale to every enquirer. this plea came home to his reason, who had been sobered by his wife's rage, the fury of which fell on him when i was out of her reach, and he sent the boy to me with half-a-guinea, desiring him to conduct me to a house, where beggars, and other wretches, the refuse of society, nightly lodged. "this night was spent in a state of stupefaction, or desperation. i detested mankind, and abhorred myself. "in the morning i ventured out, to throw myself in my master's way, at his usual hour of going abroad. i approached him, he 'damned me for a b----, declared i had disturbed the peace of the family, and that he had sworn to his wife, never to take any more notice of me.' he left me; but, instantly returning, he told me that he should speak to his friend, a parish-officer, to get a nurse for the brat i laid to him; and advised me, if i wished to keep out of the house of correction, not to make free with his name. "i hurried back to my hole, and, rage giving place to despair, sought for the potion that was to procure abortion, and swallowed it, with a wish that it might destroy me, at the same time that it stopped the sensations of new-born life, which i felt with indescribable emotion. my head turned round, my heart grew sick, and in the horrors of approaching dissolution, mental anguish was swallowed up. the effect of the medicine was violent, and i was confined to my bed several days; but, youth and a strong constitution prevailing, i once more crawled out, to ask myself the cruel question, 'whither i should go?' i had but two shillings left in my pocket, the rest had been expended, by a poor woman who slept in the same room, to pay for my lodging, and purchase the necessaries of which she partook. "with this wretch i went into the neighbouring streets to beg, and my disconsolate appearance drew a few pence from the idle, enabling me still to command a bed; till, recovering from my illness, and taught to put on my rags to the best advantage, i was accosted from different motives, and yielded to the desire of the brutes i met, with the same detestation that i had felt for my still more brutal master. i have since read in novels of the blandishments of seduction, but i had not even the pleasure of being enticed into vice. "i shall not," interrupted jemima, "lead your imagination into all the scenes of wretchedness and depravity, which i was condemned to view; or mark the different stages of my debasing misery. fate dragged me through the very kennels of society; i was still a slave, a bastard, a common property. become familiar with vice, for i wish to conceal nothing from you, i picked the pockets of the drunkards who abused me; and proved by my conduct, that i deserved the epithets, with which they loaded me at moments when distrust ought to cease. "detesting my nightly occupation, though valuing, if i may so use the word, my independence, which only consisted in choosing the street in which i should wander, or the roof, when i had money, in which i should hide my head, i was some time before i could prevail on myself to accept of a place in a house of ill fame, to which a girl, with whom i had accidentally conversed in the street, had recommended me. i had been hunted almost into a a fever, by the watchmen of the quarter of the town i frequented; one, whom i had unwittingly offended, giving the word to the whole pack. you can scarcely conceive the tyranny exercised by these wretches: considering themselves as the instruments of the very laws they violate, the pretext which steels their conscience, hardens their heart. not content with receiving from us, outlaws of society (let other women talk of favours) a brutal gratification gratuitously as a privilege of office, they extort a tithe of prostitution, and harrass with threats the poor creatures whose occupation affords not the means to silence the growl of avarice. to escape from this persecution, i once more entered into servitude. "a life of comparative regularity restored my health; and--do not start--my manners were improved, in a situation where vice sought to render itself alluring, and taste was cultivated to fashion the person, if not to refine the mind. besides, the common civility of speech, contrasted with the gross vulgarity to which i had been accustomed, was something like the polish of civilization. i was not shut out from all intercourse of humanity. still i was galled by the yoke of service, and my mistress often flying into violent fits of passion, made me dread a sudden dismission, which i understood was always the case. i was therefore prevailed on, though i felt a horror of men, to accept the offer of a gentleman, rather in the decline of years, to keep his house, pleasantly situated in a little village near hampstead. "he was a man of great talents, and of brilliant wit; but, a worn-out votary of voluptuousness, his desires became fastidious in proportion as they grew weak, and the native tenderness of his heart was undermined by a vitiated imagination. a thoughtless career of libertinism and social enjoyment, had injured his health to such a degree, that, whatever pleasure his conversation afforded me (and my esteem was ensured by proofs of the generous humanity of his disposition), the being his mistress was purchasing it at a very dear rate. with such a keen perception of the delicacies of sentiment, with an imagination invigorated by the exercise of genius, how could he sink into the grossness of sensuality! "but, to pass over a subject which i recollect with pain, i must remark to you, as an answer to your often-repeated question, 'why my sentiments and language were superior to my station?' that i now began to read, to beguile the tediousness of solitude, and to gratify an inquisitive, active mind. i had often, in my childhood, followed a ballad-singer, to hear the sequel of a dismal story, though sure of being severely punished for delaying to return with whatever i was sent to purchase. i could just spell and put a sentence together, and i listened to the various arguments, though often mingled with obscenity, which occurred at the table where i was allowed to preside: for a literary friend or two frequently came home with my master, to dine and pass the night. having lost the privileged respect of my sex, my presence, instead of restraining, perhaps gave the reins to their tongues; still i had the advantage of hearing discussions, from which, in the common course of life, women are excluded. "you may easily imagine, that it was only by degrees that i could comprehend some of the subjects they investigated, or acquire from their reasoning what might be termed a moral sense. but my fondness of reading increasing, and my master occasionally shutting himself up in this retreat, for weeks together, to write, i had many opportunities of improvement. at first, considering money i was right!" (exclaimed jemima, altering her tone of voice) "as the only means, after my loss of reputation, of obtaining respect, or even the toleration of humanity, i had not the least scruple to secrete a part of the sums intrusted to me, and to screen myself from detection by a system of falshood. but, acquiring new principles, i began to have the ambition of returning to the respectable part of society, and was weak enough to suppose it possible. the attention of my unassuming instructor, who, without being ignorant of his own powers, possessed great simplicity of manners, strengthened the illusion. having sometimes caught up hints for thought, from my untutored remarks, he often led me to discuss the subjects he was treating, and would read to me his productions, previous to their publication, wishing to profit by the criticism of unsophisticated feeling. the aim of his writings was to touch the simple springs of the heart; for he despised the would-be oracles, the self-elected philosophers, who fright away fancy, while sifting each grain of thought to prove that slowness of comprehension is wisdom. "i should have distinguished this as a moment of sunshine, a happy period in my life, had not the repugnance the disgusting libertinism of my protector inspired, daily become more painful.--and, indeed, i soon did recollect it as such with agony, when his sudden death (for he had recourse to the most exhilarating cordials to keep up the convivial tone of his spirits) again threw me into the desert of human society. had he had any time for reflection, i am certain he would have left the little property in his power to me: but, attacked by the fatal apoplexy in town, his heir, a man of rigid morals, brought his wife with him to take possession of the house and effects, before i was even informed of his death,--'to prevent,' as she took care indirectly to tell me, 'such a creature as she supposed me to be, from purloining any of them, had i been apprized of the event in time.' "the grief i felt at the sudden shock the information gave me, which at first had nothing selfish in it, was treated with contempt, and i was ordered to pack up my clothes; and a few trinkets and books, given me by the generous deceased, were contested, while they piously hoped, with a reprobating shake of the head, 'that god would have mercy on his sinful soul!' with some difficulty, i obtained my arrears of wages; but asking--such is the spirit-grinding consequence of poverty and infamy--for a character for honesty and economy, which god knows i merited, i was told by this--why must i call her woman?--'that it would go against her conscience to recommend a kept mistress.' tears started in my eyes, burning tears; for there are situations in which a wretch is humbled by the contempt they are conscious they do not deserve. "i returned to the metropolis; but the solitude of a poor lodging was inconceivably dreary, after the society i had enjoyed. to be cut off from human converse, now i had been taught to relish it, was to wander a ghost among the living. besides, i foresaw, to aggravate the severity of my fate, that my little pittance would soon melt away. i endeavoured to obtain needlework; but, not having been taught early, and my hands being rendered clumsy by hard work, i did not sufficiently excel to be employed by the ready-made linen shops, when so many women, better qualified, were suing for it. the want of a character prevented my getting a place; for, irksome as servitude would have been to me, i should have made another trial, had it been feasible. not that i disliked employment, but the inequality of condition to which i must have submitted. i had acquired a taste for literature, during the five years i had lived with a literary man, occasionally conversing with men of the first abilities of the age; and now to descend to the lowest vulgarity, was a degree of wretchedness not to be imagined unfelt. i had not, it is true, tasted the charms of affection, but i had been familiar with the graces of humanity. "one of the gentlemen, whom i had frequently dined in company with, while i was treated like a companion, met me in the street, and enquired after my health. i seized the occasion, and began to describe my situation; but he was in haste to join, at dinner, a select party of choice spirits; therefore, without waiting to hear me, he impatiently put a guinea into my hand, saying, 'it was a pity such a sensible woman should be in distress--he wished me well from his soul.' "to another i wrote, stating my case, and requesting advice. he was an advocate for unequivocal sincerity; and had often, in my presence, descanted on the evils which arise in society from the despotism of rank and riches. "in reply, i received a long essay on the energy of the human mind, with continual allusions to his own force of character. he added, 'that the woman who could write such a letter as i had sent him, could never be in want of resources, were she to look into herself, and exert her powers; misery was the consequence of indolence, and, as to my being shut out from society, it was the lot of man to submit to certain privations.' "how often have i heard," said jemima, interrupting her narrative, "in conversation, and read in books, that every person willing to work may find employment? it is the vague assertion, i believe, of insensible indolence, when it relates to men; but, with respect to women, i am sure of its fallacy, unless they will submit to the most menial bodily labour; and even to be employed at hard labour is out of the reach of many, whose reputation misfortune or folly has tainted. "how writers, professing to be friends to freedom, and the improvement of morals, can assert that poverty is no evil, i cannot imagine." "no more can i," interrupted maria, "yet they even expatiate on the peculiar happiness of indigence, though in what it can consist, excepting in brutal rest, when a man can barely earn a subsistence, i cannot imagine. the mind is necessarily imprisoned in its own little tenement; and, fully occupied by keeping it in repair, has not time to rove abroad for improvement. the book of knowledge is closely clasped, against those who must fulfil their daily task of severe manual labour or die; and curiosity, rarely excited by thought or information, seldom moves on the stagnate lake of ignorance." "as far as i have been able to observe," replied jemima, "prejudices, caught up by chance, are obstinately maintained by the poor, to the exclusion of improvement; they have not time to reason or reflect to any extent, or minds sufficiently exercised to adopt the principles of action, which form perhaps the only basis of contentment in every station[ -a]." * * * * * "and independence," said darnford, "they are necessarily strangers to, even the independence of despising their persecutors. if the poor are happy, or can be happy, _things are very well as they are_. and i cannot conceive on what principle those writers contend for a change of system, who support this opinion. the authors on the other side of the question are much more consistent, who grant the fact; yet, insisting that it is the lot of the majority to be oppressed in this life, kindly turn them over to another, to rectify the false weights and measures of this, as the only way to justify the dispensations of providence. i have not," continued darnford, "an opinion more firmly fixed by observation in my mind, than that, though riches may fail to produce proportionate happiness, poverty most commonly excludes it, by shutting up all the avenues to improvement." "and as for the affections," added maria, with a sigh, "how gross, and even tormenting do they become, unless regulated by an improving mind! the culture of the heart ever, i believe, keeps pace with that of the mind. but pray go on," addressing jemima, "though your narrative gives rise to the most painful reflections on the present state of society." "not to trouble you," continued she, "with a detailed description of all the painful feelings of unavailing exertion, i have only to tell you, that at last i got recommended to wash in a few families, who did me the favour to admit me into their houses, without the most strict enquiry, to wash from one in the morning till eight at night, for eighteen or twenty-pence a day. on the happiness to be enjoyed over a washing-tub i need not comment; yet you will allow me to observe, that this was a wretchedness of situation peculiar to my sex. a man with half my industry, and, i may say, abilities, could have procured a decent livelihood, and discharged some of the duties which knit mankind together; whilst i, who had acquired a taste for the rational, nay, in honest pride let me assert it, the virtuous enjoyments of life, was cast aside as the filth of society. condemned to labour, like a machine, only to earn bread, and scarcely that, i became melancholy and desperate. "i have now to mention a circumstance which fills me with remorse, and fear it will entirely deprive me of your esteem. a tradesman became attached to me, and visited me frequently,--and i at last obtained such a power over him, that he offered to take me home to his house.--consider, dear madam, i was famishing: wonder not that i became a wolf!--the only reason for not taking me home immediately, was the having a girl in the house, with child by him--and this girl--i advised him--yes, i did! would i could forget it!--to turn out of doors: and one night he determined to follow my advice, poor wretch! she fell upon her knees, reminded him that he had promised to marry her, that her parents were honest!--what did it avail?--she was turned out. "she approached her father's door, in the skirts of london,--listened at the shutters,--but could not knock. a watchman had observed her go and return several times--poor wretch!--"the remorse jemima spoke of, seemed to be stinging her to the soul, as she proceeded." "she left it, and, approaching a tub where horses were watered, she sat down in it, and, with desperate resolution, remained in that attitude--till resolution was no longer necessary! "i happened that morning to be going out to wash, anticipating the moment when i should escape from such hard labour. i passed by, just as some men, going to work, drew out the stiff, cold corpse--let me not recal the horrid moment!--i recognized her pale visage; i listened to the tale told by the spectators, and my heart did not burst. i thought of my own state, and wondered how i could be such a monster!--i worked hard; and, returning home, i was attacked by a fever. i suffered both in body and mind. i determined not to live with the wretch. but he did not try me; he left the neighbourhood. i once more returned to the wash-tub. "still this state, miserable as it was, admitted of aggravation. lifting one day a heavy load, a tub fell against my shin, and gave me great pain. i did not pay much attention to the hurt, till it became a serious wound; being obliged to work as usual, or starve. but, finding myself at length unable to stand for any time, i thought of getting into an hospital. hospitals, it should seem (for they are comfortless abodes for the sick) were expressly endowed for the reception of the friendless; yet i, who had on that plea a right to assistance, wanted the recommendation of the rich and respectable, and was several weeks languishing for admittance; fees were demanded on entering; and, what was still more unreasonable, security for burying me, that expence not coming into the letter of the charity. a guinea was the stipulated sum--i could as soon have raised a million; and i was afraid to apply to the parish for an order, lest they should have passed me, i knew not whither. the poor woman at whose house i lodged, compassionating my state, got me into the hospital; and the family where i received the hurt, sent me five shillings, three and six-pence of which i gave at my admittance--i know not for what. "my leg grew quickly better; but i was dismissed before my cure was completed, because i could not afford to have my linen washed to appear decently, as the virago of a nurse said, when the gentlemen (the surgeons) came. i cannot give you an adequate idea of the wretchedness of an hospital; every thing is left to the care of people intent on gain. the attendants seem to have lost all feeling of compassion in the bustling discharge of their offices; death is so familiar to them, that they are not anxious to ward it off. every thing appeared to be conducted for the accommodation of the medical men and their pupils, who came to make experiments on the poor, for the benefit of the rich. one of the physicians, i must not forget to mention, gave me half-a-crown, and ordered me some wine, when i was at the lowest ebb. i thought of making my case known to the lady-like matron; but her forbidding countenance prevented me. she condescended to look on the patients, and make general enquiries, two or three times a week; but the nurses knew the hour when the visit of ceremony would commence, and every thing was as it should be. "after my dismission, i was more at a loss than ever for a subsistence, and, not to weary you with a repetition of the same unavailing attempts, unable to stand at the washing-tub, i began to consider the rich and poor as natural enemies, and became a thief from principle. i could not now cease to reason, but i hated mankind. i despised myself, yet i justified my conduct. i was taken, tried, and condemned to six months' imprisonment in a house of correction. my soul recoils with horror from the remembrance of the insults i had to endure, till, branded with shame, i was turned loose in the street, pennyless. i wandered from street to street, till, exhausted by hunger and fatigue, i sunk down senseless at a door, where i had vainly demanded a morsel of bread. i was sent by the inhabitant to the work-house, to which he had surlily bid me go, saying, he 'paid enough in conscience to the poor,' when, with parched tongue, i implored his charity. if those well-meaning people who exclaim against beggars, were acquainted with the treatment the poor receive in many of these wretched asylums, they would not stifle so easily involuntary sympathy, by saying that they have all parishes to go to, or wonder that the poor dread to enter the gloomy walls. what are the common run of work-houses, but prisons, in which many respectable old people, worn out by immoderate labour, sink into the grave in sorrow, to which they are carried like dogs!" alarmed by some indistinct noise, jemima rose hastily to listen, and maria, turning to darnford, said, "i have indeed been shocked beyond expression when i have met a pauper's funeral. a coffin carried on the shoulders of three or four ill-looking wretches, whom the imagination might easily convert into a band of assassins, hastening to conceal the corpse, and quarrelling about the prey on their way. i know it is of little consequence how we are consigned to the earth; but i am led by this brutal insensibility, to what even the animal creation appears forcibly to feel, to advert to the wretched, deserted manner in which they died." "true," rejoined darnford, "and, till the rich will give more than a part of their wealth, till they will give time and attention to the wants of the distressed, never let them boast of charity. let them open their hearts, and not their purses, and employ their minds in the service, if they are really actuated by humanity; or charitable institutions will always be the prey of the lowest order of knaves." jemima returning, seemed in haste to finish her tale. "the overseer farmed the poor of different parishes, and out of the bowels of poverty was wrung the money with which he purchased this dwelling, as a private receptacle for madness. he had been a keeper at a house of the same description, and conceived that he could make money much more readily in his old occupation. he is a shrewd--shall i say it?--villain. he observed something resolute in my manner, and offered to take me with him, and instruct me how to treat the disturbed minds he meant to intrust to my care. the offer of forty pounds a year, and to quit a workhouse, was not to be despised, though the condition of shutting my eyes and hardening my heart was annexed to it. "i agreed to accompany him; and four years have i been attendant on many wretches, and"--she lowered her voice,--"the witness of many enormities. in solitude my mind seemed to recover its force, and many of the sentiments which i imbibed in the only tolerable period of my life, returned with their full force. still what should induce me to be the champion for suffering humanity?--who ever risked any thing for me?--who ever acknowledged me to be a fellow-creature?"-- maria took her hand, and jemima, more overcome by kindness than she had ever been by cruelty, hastened out of the room to conceal her emotions. darnford soon after heard his summons, and, taking leave of him, maria promised to gratify his curiosity, with respect to herself, the first opportunity. footnotes: [ -a] the copy which appears to have received the author's last corrections, ends at this place. chap. vi. active as love was in the heart of maria, the story she had just heard made her thoughts take a wider range. the opening buds of hope closed, as if they had put forth too early, and the the happiest day of her life was overcast by the most melancholy reflections. thinking of jemima's peculiar fate and her own, she was led to consider the oppressed state of women, and to lament that she had given birth to a daughter. sleep fled from her eyelids, while she dwelt on the wretchedness of unprotected infancy, till sympathy with jemima changed to agony, when it seemed probable that her own babe might even now be in the very state she so forcibly described. maria thought, and thought again. jemima's humanity had rather been benumbed than killed, by the keen frost she had to brave at her entrance into life; an appeal then to her feelings, on this tender point, surely would not be fruitless; and maria began to anticipate the delight it would afford her to gain intelligence of her child. this project was now the only subject of reflection; and she watched impatiently for the dawn of day, with that determinate purpose which generally insures success. at the usual hour, jemima brought her breakfast, and a tender note from darnford. she ran her eye hastily over it, and her heart calmly hoarded up the rapture a fresh assurance of affection, affection such as she wished to inspire, gave her, without diverting her mind a moment from its design. while jemima waited to take away the breakfast, maria alluded to the reflections, that had haunted her during the night to the exclusion of sleep. she spoke with energy of jemima's unmerited sufferings, and of the fate of a number of deserted females, placed within the sweep of a whirlwind, from which it was next to impossible to escape. perceiving the effect her conversation produced on the countenance of her guard, she grasped the arm of jemima with that irresistible warmth which defies repulse, exclaiming--"with your heart, and such dreadful experience, can you lend your aid to deprive my babe of a mother's tenderness, a mother's care? in the name of god, assist me to snatch her from destruction! let me but give her an education--let me but prepare her body and mind to encounter the ills which await her sex, and i will teach her to consider you as her second mother, and herself as the prop of your age. yes, jemima, look at me--observe me closely, and read my very soul; you merit a better fate;" she held out her hand with a firm gesture of assurance; "and i will procure it for you, as a testimony of my esteem, as well as of my gratitude." jemima had not power to resist this persuasive torrent; and, owning that the house in which she was confined, was situated on the banks of the thames, only a few miles from london, and not on the sea-coast, as darnford had supposed, she promised to invent some excuse for her absence, and go herself to trace the situation, and enquire concerning the health, of this abandoned daughter. her manner implied an intention to do something more, but she seemed unwilling to impart her design; and maria, glad to have obtained the main point, thought it best to leave her to the workings of her own mind; convinced that she had the power of interesting her still more in favour of herself and child, by a simple recital of facts. in the evening, jemima informed the impatient mother, that on the morrow she should hasten to town before the family hour of rising, and received all the information necessary, as a clue to her search. the "good night!" maria uttered was peculiarly solemn and affectionate. glad expectation sparkled in her eye; and, for the first time since her detention, she pronounced the name of her child with pleasureable fondness; and, with all the garrulity of a nurse, described her first smile when she recognized her mother. recollecting herself, a still kinder "adieu!" with a "god bless you!"--that seemed to include a maternal benediction, dismissed jemima. the dreary solitude of the ensuing day, lengthened by impatiently dwelling on the same idea, was intolerably wearisome. she listened for the sound of a particular clock, which some directions of the wind allowed her to hear distinctly. she marked the shadow gaining on the wall; and, twilight thickening into darkness, her breath seemed oppressed while she anxiously counted nine.--the last sound was a stroke of despair on her heart; for she expected every moment, without seeing jemima, to have her light extinguished by the savage female who supplied her place. she was even obliged to prepare for bed, restless as she was, not to disoblige her new attendant. she had been cautioned not to speak too freely to her; but the caution was needless, her countenance would still more emphatically have made her shrink back. such was the ferocity of manner, conspicuous in every word and gesture of this hag, that maria was afraid to enquire, why jemima, who had faithfully promised to see her before her door was shut for the night, came not?--and, when the key turned in the lock, to consign her to a night of suspence, she felt a degree of anguish which the circumstances scarcely justified. continually on the watch, the shutting of a door, or the sound of a footstep, made her start and tremble with apprehension, something like what she felt, when, at her entrance, dragged along the gallery, she began to doubt whether she were not surrounded by demons? fatigued by an endless rotation of thought and wild alarms, she looked like a spectre, when jemima entered in the morning; especially as her eyes darted out of her head, to read in jemima's countenance, almost as pallid, the intelligence she dared not trust her tongue to demand. jemima put down the tea-things, and appeared very busy in arranging the table. maria took up a cup with trembling hand, then forcibly recovering her fortitude, and restraining the convulsive movement which agitated the muscles of her mouth, she said, "spare yourself the pain of preparing me for your information, i adjure you!--my child is dead!" jemima solemnly answered, "yes;" with a look expressive of compassion and angry emotions. "leave me," added maria, making a fresh effort to govern her feelings, and hiding her face in her handkerchief, to conceal her anguish--"it is enough--i know that my babe is no more--i will hear the particulars when i am"--_calmer_, she could not utter; and jemima, without importuning her by idle attempts to console her, left the room. plunged in the deepest melancholy, she would not admit darnford's visits; and such is the force of early associations even on strong minds, that, for a while, she indulged the superstitious notion that she was justly punished by the death of her child, for having for an instant ceased to regret her loss. two or three letters from darnford, full of soothing, manly tenderness, only added poignancy to these accusing emotions; yet the passionate style in which he expressed, what he termed the first and fondest wish of his heart, "that his affection might make her some amends for the cruelty and injustice she had endured," inspired a sentiment of gratitude to heaven; and her eyes filled with delicious tears, when, at the conclusion of his letter, wishing to supply the place of her unworthy relations, whose want of principle he execrated, he assured her, calling her his dearest girl, "that it should henceforth be the business of his life to make her happy." he begged, in a note sent the following morning, to be permitted to see her, when his presence would be no intrusion on her grief; and so earnestly intreated to be allowed, according to promise, to beguile the tedious moments of absence, by dwelling on the events of her past life, that she sent him the memoirs which had been written for her daughter, promising jemima the perusal as soon as he returned them. chap. vii. "addressing these memoirs to you, my child, uncertain whether i shall ever have an opportunity of instructing you, many observations will probably flow from my heart, which only a mother--a mother schooled in misery, could make. "the tenderness of a father who knew the world, might be great; but could it equal that of a mother--of a mother, labouring under a portion of the misery, which the constitution of society seems to have entailed on all her kind? it is, my child, my dearest daughter, only such a mother, who will dare to break through all restraint to provide for your happiness--who will voluntarily brave censure herself, to ward off sorrow from your bosom. from my narrative, my dear girl, you may gather the instruction, the counsel, which is meant rather to exercise than influence your mind.--death may snatch me from you, before you can weigh my advice, or enter into my reasoning: i would then, with fond anxiety, lead you very early in life to form your grand principle of action, to save you from the vain regret of having, through irresolution, let the spring-tide of existence pass away, unimproved, unenjoyed.--gain experience--ah! gain it--while experience is worth having, and acquire sufficient fortitude to pursue your own happiness; it includes your utility, by a direct path. what is wisdom too often, but the owl of the goddess, who sits moping in a desolated heart; around me she shrieks, but i would invite all the gay warblers of spring to nestle in your blooming bosom.--had i not wasted years in deliberating, after i ceased to doubt, how i ought to have acted--i might now be useful and happy.--for my sake, warned by my example, always appear what you are, and you will not pass through existence without enjoying its genuine blessings, love and respect. "born in one of the most romantic parts of england, an enthusiastic fondness for the varying charms of nature is the first sentiment i recollect; or rather it was the first consciousness of pleasure that employed and formed my imagination. "my father had been a captain of a man of war; but, disgusted with the service, on account of the preferment of men whose chief merit was their family connections or borough interest, he retired into the country; and, not knowing what to do with himself--married. in his family, to regain his lost consequence, he determined to keep up the same passive obedience, as in the vessels in which he had commanded. his orders were not to be disputed; and the whole house was expected to fly, at the word of command, as if to man the shrouds, or mount aloft in an elemental strife, big with life or death. he was to be instantaneously obeyed, especially by my mother, whom he very benevolently married for love; but took care to remind her of the obligation, when she dared, in the slightest instance, to question his absolute authority. my eldest brother, it is true, as he grew up, was treated with more respect by my father; and became in due form the deputy-tyrant of the house. the representative of my father, a being privileged by nature--a boy, and the darling of my mother, he did not fail to act like an heir apparent. such indeed was my mother's extravagant partiality, that, in comparison with her affection for him, she might be said not to love the rest of her children. yet none of the children seemed to have so little affection for her. extreme indulgence had rendered him so selfish, that he only thought of himself; and from tormenting insects and animals, he became the despot of his brothers, and still more of his sisters. "it is perhaps difficult to give you an idea of the petty cares which obscured the morning of my life; continual restraint in the most trivial matters; unconditional submission to orders, which, as a mere child, i soon discovered to be unreasonable, because inconsistent and contradictory. thus are we destined to experience a mixture of bitterness, with the recollection of our most innocent enjoyments. "the circumstances which, during my childhood, occurred to fashion my mind, were various; yet, as it would probably afford me more pleasure to revive the fading remembrance of new-born delight, than you, my child, could feel in the perusal, i will not entice you to stray with me into the verdant meadow, to search for the flowers that youthful hopes scatter in every path; though, as i write, i almost scent the fresh green of spring--of that spring which never returns! "i had two sisters, and one brother, younger than myself; my brother robert was two years older, and might truly be termed the idol of his parents, and the torment of the rest of the family. such indeed is the force of prejudice, that what was called spirit and wit in him, was cruelly repressed as forwardness in me. "my mother had an indolence of character, which prevented her from paying much attention to our education. but the healthy breeze of a neighbouring heath, on which we bounded at pleasure, volatilized the humours that improper food might have generated. and to enjoy open air and freedom, was paradise, after the unnatural restraint of our fire-side, where we were often obliged to sit three or four hours together, without daring to utter a word, when my father was out of humour, from want of employment, or of a variety of boisterous amusement. i had however one advantage, an instructor, the brother of my father, who, intended for the church, had of course received a liberal education. but, becoming attached to a young lady of great beauty and large fortune, and acquiring in the world some opinions not consonant with the profession for which he was designed, he accepted, with the most sanguine expectations of success, the offer of a nobleman to accompany him to india, as his confidential secretary. "a correspondence was regularly kept up with the object of his affection; and the intricacies of business, peculiarly wearisome to a man of a romantic turn of mind, contributed, with a forced absence, to increase his attachment. every other passion was lost in this master-one, and only served to swell the torrent. her relations, such were his waking dreams, who had despised him, would court in their turn his alliance, and all the blandishments of taste would grace the triumph of love.--while he basked in the warm sunshine of love, friendship also promised to shed its dewy freshness; for a friend, whom he loved next to his mistress, was the confident, who forwarded the letters from one to the other, to elude the observation of prying relations. a friend false in similar circumstances, is, my dearest girl, an old tale; yet, let not this example, or the frigid caution of cold-blooded moralists, make you endeavour to stifle hopes, which are the buds that naturally unfold themselves during the spring of life! whilst your own heart is sincere, always expect to meet one glowing with the same sentiments; for to fly from pleasure, is not to avoid pain! "my uncle realized, by good luck, rather than management, a handsome fortune; and returning on the wings of love, lost in the most enchanting reveries, to england, to share it with his mistress and his friend, he found them--united. "there were some circumstances, not necessary for me to recite, which aggravated the guilt of the friend beyond measure, and the deception, that had been carried on to the last moment, was so base, it produced the most violent effect on my uncle's health and spirits. his native country, the world! lately a garden of blooming sweets, blasted by treachery, seemed changed into a parched desert, the abode of hissing serpents. disappointment rankled in his heart; and, brooding over his wrongs, he was attacked by a raging fever, followed by a derangement of mind, which only gave place to habitual melancholy, as he recovered more strength of body. "declaring an intention never to marry, his relations were ever clustering about him, paying the grossest adulation to a man, who, disgusted with mankind, received them with scorn, or bitter sarcasms. something in my countenance pleased him, when i began to prattle. since his return, he appeared dead to affection; but i soon, by showing him innocent fondness, became a favourite; and endeavouring to enlarge and strengthen my mind, i grew dear to him in proportion as i imbibed his sentiments. he had a forcible manner of speaking, rendered more so by a certain impressive wildness of look and gesture, calculated to engage the attention of a young and ardent mind. it is not then surprising that i quickly adopted his opinions in preference, and reverenced him as one of a superior order of beings. he inculcated, with great warmth, self-respect, and a lofty consciousness of acting right, independent of the censure or applause of the world; nay, he almost taught me to brave, and even despise its censure, when convinced of the rectitude of my own intentions. "endeavouring to prove to me that nothing which deserved the name of love or friendship, existed in the world, he drew such animated pictures of his own feelings, rendered permanent by disappointment, as imprinted the sentiments strongly on my heart, and animated my imagination. these remarks are necessary to elucidate some peculiarities in my character, which by the world are indefinitely termed romantic. "my uncle's increasing affection led him to visit me often. still, unable to rest in any place, he did not remain long in the country to soften domestic tyranny; but he brought me books, for which i had a passion, and they conspired with his conversation, to make me form an ideal picture of life. i shall pass over the tyranny of my father, much as i suffered from it; but it is necessary to notice, that it undermined my mother's health; and that her temper, continually irritated by domestic bickering, became intolerably peevish. "my eldest brother was articled to a neighbouring attorney, the shrewdest, and, i may add, the most unprincipled man in that part of the country. as my brother generally came home every saturday, to astonish my mother by exhibiting his attainments, he gradually assumed a right of directing the whole family, not excepting my father. he seemed to take a peculiar pleasure in tormenting and humbling me; and if i ever ventured to complain of this treatment to either my father or mother, i was rudely rebuffed for presuming to judge of the conduct of my eldest brother. "about this period a merchant's family came to settle in our neighbourhood. a mansion-house in the village, lately purchased, had been preparing the whole spring, and the sight of the costly furniture, sent from london, had excited my mother's envy, and roused my father's pride. my sensations were very different, and all of a pleasurable kind. i longed to see new characters, to break the tedious monotony of my life; and to find a friend, such as fancy had pourtrayed. i cannot then describe the emotion i felt, the sunday they made their appearance at church. my eyes were rivetted on the pillar round which i expected first to catch a glimpse of them, and darted forth to meet a servant who hastily preceded a group of ladies, whose white robes and waving plumes, seemed to stream along the gloomy aisle, diffusing the light, by which i contemplated their figures. "we visited them in form; and i quickly selected the eldest daughter for my friend. the second son, george, paid me particular attention, and finding his attainments and manners superior to those of the young men of the village, i began to imagine him superior to the rest of mankind. had my home been more comfortable, or my previous acquaintance more numerous, i should not probably have been so eager to open my heart to new affections. "mr. venables, the merchant, had acquired a large fortune by unremitting attention to business; but his health declining rapidly, he was obliged to retire, before his son, george, had acquired sufficient experience, to enable him to conduct their affairs on the same prudential plan, his father had invariably pursued. indeed, he had laboured to throw off his authority, having despised his narrow plans and cautious speculation. the eldest son could not be prevailed on to enter the firm; and, to oblige his wife, and have peace in the house, mr. venables had purchased a commission for him in the guards. "i am now alluding to circumstances which came to my knowledge long after; but it is necessary, my dearest child, that you should know the character of your father, to prevent your despising your mother; the only parent inclined to discharge a parent's duty. in london, george had acquired habits of libertinism, which he carefully concealed from his father and his commercial connections. the mask he wore, was so complete a covering of his real visage, that the praise his father lavished on his conduct, and, poor mistaken man! on his principles, contrasted with his brother's, rendered the notice he took of me peculiarly flattering. without any fixed design, as i am now convinced, he continued to single me out at the dance, press my hand at parting, and utter expressions of unmeaning passion, to which i gave a meaning naturally suggested by the romantic turn of my thoughts. his stay in the country was short; his manners did not entirely please me; but, when he left us, the colouring of my picture became more vivid--whither did not my imagination lead me? in short, i fancied myself in love--in love with the disinterestedness, fortitude, generosity, dignity, and humanity, with which i had invested the hero i dubbed. a circumstance which soon after occurred, rendered all these virtues palpable. [the incident is perhaps worth relating on other accounts, and therefore i shall describe it distinctly.] "i had a great affection for my nurse, old mary, for whom i used often to work, to spare her eyes. mary had a younger sister, married to a sailor, while she was suckling me; for my mother only suckled my eldest brother, which might be the cause of her extraordinary partiality. peggy, mary's sister, lived with her, till her husband, becoming a mate in a west-india trader, got a little before-hand in the world. he wrote to his wife from the first port in the channel, after his most successful voyage, to request her to come to london to meet him; he even wished her to determine on living there for the future, to save him the trouble of coming to her the moment he came on shore; and to turn a penny by keeping a green-stall. it was too much to set out on a journey the moment he had finished a voyage, and fifty miles by land, was worse than a thousand leagues by sea. "she packed up her alls, and came to london--but did not meet honest daniel. a common misfortune prevented her, and the poor are bound to suffer for the good of their country--he was pressed in the river--and never came on shore. "peggy was miserable in london, not knowing, as she said, 'the face of any living soul.' besides, her imagination had been employed, anticipating a month or six weeks' happiness with her husband. daniel was to have gone with her to sadler's wells, and westminster abbey, and to many sights, which he knew she never heard of in the country. peggy too was thrifty, and how could she manage to put his plan in execution alone? he had acquaintance; but she did not know the very name of their places of abode. his letters were made up of--how do you does, and god bless yous,--information was reserved for the hour of meeting. "she too had her portion of information, near at heart. molly and jacky were grown such little darlings, she was almost angry that daddy did not see their tricks. she had not half the pleasure she should have had from their prattle, could she have recounted to him each night the pretty speeches of the day. some stories, however, were stored up--and jacky could say papa with such a sweet voice, it must delight his heart. yet when she came, and found no daniel to greet her, when jacky called papa, she wept, bidding 'god bless his innocent soul, that did not know what sorrow was.'--but more sorrow was in store for peggy, innocent as she was.--daniel was killed in the first engagement, and then the _papa_ was agony, sounding to the heart. "she had lived sparingly on his wages, while there was any hope of his return; but, that gone, she returned with a breaking heart to the country, to a little market town, nearly three miles from our village. she did not like to go to service, to be snubbed about, after being her own mistress. to put her children out to nurse was impossible: how far would her wages go? and to send them to her husband's parish, a distant one, was to lose her husband twice over. "i had heard all from mary, and made my uncle furnish a little cottage for her, to enable her to sell--so sacred was poor daniel's advice, now he was dead and gone--a little fruit, toys and cakes. the minding of the shop did not require her whole time, nor even the keeping her children clean, and she loved to see them clean; so she took in washing, and altogether made a shift to earn bread for her children, still weeping for daniel, when jacky's arch looks made her think of his father.--it was pleasant to work for her children.--'yes; from morning till night, could she have had a kiss from their father, god rest his soul! yes; had it pleased providence to have let him come back without a leg or an arm, it would have been the same thing to her--for she did not love him because he maintained them--no; she had hands of her own.' "the country people were honest, and peggy left her linen out to dry very late. a recruiting party, as she supposed, passing through, made free with a large wash; for it was all swept away, including her own and her children's little stock. "this was a dreadful blow; two dozen of shirts, stocks and handkerchiefs. she gave the money which she had laid by for half a year's rent, and promised to pay two shillings a week till all was cleared; so she did not lose her employment. this two shillings a week, and the buying a few necessaries for the children, drove her so hard, that she had not a penny to pay her rent with, when a twelvemonth's became due. "she was now with mary, and had just told her tale, which mary instantly repeated--it was intended for my ear. many houses in this town, producing a borough-interest, were included in the estate purchased by mr. venables, and the attorney with whom my brother lived, was appointed his agent, to collect and raise the rents. "he demanded peggy's, and, in spite of her intreaties, her poor goods had been seized and sold. so that she had not, and what was worse her children, 'for she had known sorrow enough,' a bed to lie on. she knew that i was good-natured--right charitable, yet not liking to ask for more than needs must, she scorned to petition while people could any how be made to wait. but now, should she be turned out of doors, she must expect nothing less than to lose all her customers, and then she must beg or starve--and what would become of her children?--'had daniel not been pressed--but god knows best--all this could not have happened.' "i had two mattrasses on my bed; what did i want with two, when such a worthy creature must lie on the ground? my mother would be angry, but i could conceal it till my uncle came down; and then i would tell him all the whole truth, and if he absolved me, heaven would. "i begged the house-maid to come up stairs with me (servants always feel for the distresses of poverty, and so would the rich if they knew what it was). she assisted me to tie up the mattrass; i discovering, at the same time, that one blanket would serve me till winter, could i persuade my sister, who slept with me, to keep my secret. she entering in the midst of the package, i gave her some new feathers, to silence her. we got the mattrass down the back stairs, unperceived, and i helped to carry it, taking with me all the money i had, and what i could borrow from my sister. "when i got to the cottage, peggy declared that she would not take what i had brought secretly; but, when, with all the eager eloquence inspired by a decided purpose, i grasped her hand with weeping eyes, assuring her that my uncle would screen me from blame, when he was once more in the country, describing, at the same time, what she would suffer in parting with her children, after keeping them so long from being thrown on the parish, she reluctantly consented. "my project of usefulness ended not here; i determined to speak to the attorney; he frequently paid me compliments. his character did not intimidate me; but, imagining that peggy must be mistaken, and that no man could turn a deaf ear to such a tale of complicated distress, i determined to walk to the town with mary the next morning, and request him to wait for the rent, and keep my secret, till my uncle's return. "my repose was sweet; and, waking with the first dawn of day, i bounded to mary's cottage. what charms do not a light heart spread over nature! every bird that twittered in a bush, every flower that enlivened the hedge, seemed placed there to awaken me to rapture--yes; to rapture. the present moment was full fraught with happiness; and on futurity i bestowed not a thought, excepting to anticipate my success with the attorney. "this man of the world, with rosy face and simpering features, received me politely, nay kindly; listened with complacency to my remonstrances, though he scarcely heeded mary's tears. i did not then suspect, that my eloquence was in my complexion, the blush of seventeen, or that, in a world where humanity to women is the characteristic of advancing civilization, the beauty of a young girl was so much more interesting than the distress of an old one. pressing my hand, he promised to let peggy remain in the house as long as i wished.--i more than returned the pressure--i was so grateful and so happy. emboldened by my innocent warmth, he then kissed me--and i did not draw back--i took it for a kiss of charity. "gay as a lark, i went to dine at mr. venables'. i had previously obtained five shillings from my father, towards re-clothing the poor children of my care, and prevailed on my mother to take one of the girls into the house, whom i determined to teach to work and read. "after dinner, when the younger part of the circle retired to the music room, i recounted with energy my tale; that is, i mentioned peggy's distress, without hinting at the steps i had taken to relieve her. miss venables gave me half-a-crown; the heir five shillings; but george sat unmoved. i was cruelly distressed by the disappointment--i scarcely could remain on my chair; and, could i have got out of the room unperceived, i should have flown home, as if to run away from myself. after several vain attempts to rise, i leaned my head against the marble chimney-piece, and gazing on the evergreens that filled the fire-place, moralized on the vanity of human expectations; regardless of the company. i was roused by a gentle tap on my shoulder from behind charlotte's chair. i turned my head, and george slid a guinea into my hand, putting his finger to his mouth, to enjoin me silence. "what a revolution took place, not only in my train of thoughts, but feelings! i trembled with emotion--now, indeed, i was in love. such delicacy too, to enhance his benevolence! i felt in my pocket every five minutes, only to feel the guinea; and its magic touch invested my hero with more than mortal beauty. my fancy had found a basis to erect its model of perfection on; and quickly went to work, with all the happy credulity of youth, to consider that heart as devoted to virtue, which had only obeyed a virtuous impulse. the bitter experience was yet to come, that has taught me how very distinct are the principles of virtue, from the casual feelings from which they germinate. chap. viii. "i have perhaps dwelt too long on a circumstance, which is only of importance as it marks the progress of a deception that has been so fatal to my peace; and introduces to your notice a poor girl, whom, intending to serve, i led to ruin. still it is probable that i was not entirely the victim of mistake; and that your father, gradually fashioned by the world, did not quickly become what i hesitate to call him--out of respect to my daughter. "but, to hasten to the more busy scenes of my life. mr. venables and my mother died the same summer; and, wholly engrossed by my attention to her, i thought of little else. the neglect of her darling, my brother robert, had a violent effect on her weakened mind; for, though boys may be reckoned the pillars of the house without doors, girls are often the only comfort within. they but too frequently waste their health and spirits attending a dying parent, who leaves them in comparative poverty. after closing, with filial piety, a father's eyes, they are chased from the paternal roof, to make room for the first-born, the son, who is to carry the empty family-name down to posterity; though, occupied with his own pleasures, he scarcely thought of discharging, in the decline of his parent's life, the debt contracted in his childhood. my mother's conduct led me to make these reflections. great as was the fatigue i endured, and the affection my unceasing solicitude evinced, of which my mother seemed perfectly sensible, still, when my brother, whom i could hardly persuade to remain a quarter of an hour in her chamber, was with her alone, a short time before her death, she gave him a little hoard, which she had been some years accumulating. "during my mother's illness, i was obliged to manage my father's temper, who, from the lingering nature of her malady, began to imagine that it was merely fancy. at this period, an artful kind of upper servant attracted my father's attention, and the neighbours made many remarks on the finery, not honestly got, exhibited at evening service. but i was too much occupied with my mother to observe any change in her dress or behaviour, or to listen to the whisper of scandal. "i shall not dwell on the death-bed scene, lively as is the remembrance, or on the emotion produced by the last grasp of my mother's cold hand; when blessing me, she added, 'a little patience, and all will be over!' ah! my child, how often have those words rung mournfully in my ears--and i have exclaimed--'a little more patience, and i too shall be at rest!' "my father was violently affected by her death, recollected instances of his unkindness, and wept like a child. "my mother had solemnly recommended my sisters to my care, and bid me be a mother to them. they, indeed, became more dear to me as they became more forlorn; for, during my mother's illness, i discovered the ruined state of my father's circumstances, and that he had only been able to keep up appearances, by the sums which he borrowed of my uncle. "my father's grief, and consequent tenderness to his children, quickly abated, the house grew still more gloomy or riotous; and my refuge from care was again at mr. venables'; the young 'squire having taken his father's place, and allowing, for the present, his sister to preside at his table. george, though dissatisfied with his portion of the fortune, which had till lately been all in trade, visited the family as usual. he was now full of speculations in trade, and his brow became clouded by care. he seemed to relax in his attention to me, when the presence of my uncle gave a new turn to his behaviour. i was too unsuspecting, too disinterested, to trace these changes to their source. my home every day became more and more disagreeable to me; my liberty was unnecessarily abridged, and my books, on the pretext that they made me idle, taken from me. my father's mistress was with child, and he, doating on her, allowed or overlooked her vulgar manner of tyrannizing over us. i was indignant, especially when i saw her endeavouring to attract, shall i say seduce? my younger brother. by allowing women but one way of rising in the world, the fostering the libertinism of men, society makes monsters of them, and then their ignoble vices are brought forward as a proof of inferiority of intellect. the wearisomeness of my situation can scarcely be described. though my life had not passed in the most even tenour with my mother, it was paradise to that i was destined to endure with my father's mistress, jealous of her illegitimate authority. my father's former occasional tenderness, in spite of his violence of temper, had been soothing to me; but now he only met me with reproofs or portentous frowns. the house-keeper, as she was now termed, was the vulgar despot of the family; and assuming the new character of a fine lady, she could never forgive the contempt which was sometimes visible in my countenance, when she uttered with pomposity her bad english, or affected to be well bred. to my uncle i ventured to open my heart; and he, with his wonted benevolence, began to consider in what manner he could extricate me out of my present irksome situation. in spite of his own disappointment, or, most probably, actuated by the feelings that had been petrified, not cooled, in all their sanguine fervour, like a boiling torrent of lava suddenly dashing into the sea, he thought a marriage of mutual inclination (would envious stars permit it) the only chance for happiness in this disastrous world. george venables had the reputation of being attentive to business, and my father's example gave great weight to this circumstance; for habits of order in business would, he conceived, extend to the regulation of the affections in domestic life. george seldom spoke in my uncle's company, except to utter a short, judicious question, or to make a pertinent remark, with all due deference to his superior judgment; so that my uncle seldom left his company without observing, that the young man had more in him than people supposed. in this opinion he was not singular; yet, believe me, and i am not swayed by resentment, these speeches so justly poized, this silent deference, when the animal spirits of other young people were throwing off youthful ebullitions, were not the effect of thought or humility, but sheer barrenness of mind, and want of imagination. a colt of mettle will curvet and shew his paces. yes; my dear girl, these prudent young men want all the fire necessary to ferment their faculties, and are characterized as wise, only because they are not foolish. it is true, that george was by no means so great a favourite of mine as during the first year of our acquaintance; still, as he often coincided in opinion with me, and echoed my sentiments; and having myself no other attachment, i heard with pleasure my uncle's proposal; but thought more of obtaining my freedom, than of my lover. but, when george, seemingly anxious for my happiness, pressed me to quit my present painful situation, my heart swelled with gratitude--i knew not that my uncle had promised him five thousand pounds. had this truly generous man mentioned his intention to me, i should have insisted on a thousand pounds being settled on each of my sisters; george would have contested; i should have seen his selfish soul; and--gracious god! have been spared the misery of discovering, when too late, that i was united to a heartless, unprincipled wretch. all my schemes of usefulness would not then have been blasted. the tenderness of my heart would not have heated my imagination with visions of the ineffable delight of happy love; nor would the sweet duty of a mother have been so cruelly interrupted. but i must not suffer the fortitude i have so hardly acquired, to be undermined by unavailing regret. let me hasten forward to describe the turbid stream in which i had to wade--but let me exultingly declare that it is passed--my soul holds fellowship with him no more. he cut the gordian knot, which my principles, mistaken ones, respected; he dissolved the tie, the fetters rather, that ate into my very vitals--and i should rejoice, conscious that my mind is freed, though confined in hell itself; the only place that even fancy can imagine more dreadful than my present abode. these varying emotions will not allow me to proceed. i heave sigh after sigh; yet my heart is still oppressed. for what am i reserved? why was i not born a man, or why was i born at all? end of vol. i. posthumous works of mary wollstonecraft godwin. vol. ii. posthumous works of the author of a vindication of the rights of woman. in four volumes. * * * * * vol. ii. * * * * * _london:_ printed for j. johnson, no. , st. paul's church-yard; and g. g. and j. robinson, paternoster-row. . the wrongs of woman: or, maria. a fragment. in two volumes. vol. ii. _wrongs_ of woman. chap. ix. "i resume my pen to fly from thought. i was married; and we hastened to london. i had purposed taking one of my sisters with me; for a strong motive for marrying, was the desire of having a home at which i could receive them, now their own grew so uncomfortable, as not to deserve the cheering appellation. an objection was made to her accompanying me, that appeared plausible; and i reluctantly acquiesced. i was however willingly allowed to take with me molly, poor peggy's daughter. london and preferment, are ideas commonly associated in the country; and, as blooming as may, she bade adieu to peggy with weeping eyes. i did not even feel hurt at the refusal in relation to my sister, till hearing what my uncle had done for me, i had the simplicity to request, speaking with warmth of their situation, that he would give them a thousand pounds a-piece, which seemed to me but justice. he asked me, giving me a kiss, 'if i had lost my senses?' i started back, as if i had found a wasp in a rose-bush. i expostulated. he sneered; and the demon of discord entered our paradise, to poison with his pestiferous breath every opening joy. "i had sometimes observed defects in my husband's understanding; but, led astray by a prevailing opinion, that goodness of disposition is of the first importance in the relative situations of life, in proportion as i perceived the narrowness of his understanding, fancy enlarged the boundary of his heart. fatal error! how quickly is the so much vaunted milkiness of nature turned into gall, by an intercourse with the world, if more generous juices do not sustain the vital source of virtue! "one trait in my character was extreme credulity; but, when my eyes were once opened, i saw but too clearly all i had before overlooked. my husband was sunk in my esteem; still there are youthful emotions, which, for a while, fill up the chasm of love and friendship. besides, it required some time to enable me to see his whole character in a just light, or rather to allow it to become fixed. while circumstances were ripening my faculties, and cultivating my taste, commerce and gross relaxations were shutting his against any possibility of improvement, till, by stifling every spark of virtue in himself, he began to imagine that it no where existed. "do not let me lead you astray, my child, i do not mean to assert, that any human being is entirely incapable of feeling the generous emotions, which are the foundation of every true principle of virtue; but they are frequently, i fear, so feeble, that, like the inflammable quality which more or less lurks in all bodies, they often lie for ever dormant; the circumstances never occurring, necessary to call them into action. "i discovered however by chance, that, in consequence of some losses in trade, the natural effect of his gambling desire to start suddenly into riches, the five thousand pounds given me by my uncle, had been paid very opportunely. this discovery, strange as you may think the assertion, gave me pleasure; my husband's embarrassments endeared him to me. i was glad to find an excuse for his conduct to my sisters, and my mind became calmer. "my uncle introduced me to some literary society; and the theatres were a never-failing source of amusement to me. my delighted eye followed mrs. siddons, when, with dignified delicacy, she played calista; and i involuntarily repeated after her, in the same tone, and with a long-drawn sigh, 'hearts like our's were pair'd--not match'd.' "these were, at first, spontaneous emotions, though, becoming acquainted with men of wit and polished manners, i could not sometimes help regretting my early marriage; and that, in my haste to escape from a temporary dependence, and expand my newly fledged wings, in an unknown sky, i had been caught in a trap, and caged for life. still the novelty of london, and the attentive fondness of my husband, for he had some personal regard for me, made several months glide away. yet, not forgetting the situation of my sisters, who were still very young, i prevailed on my uncle to settle a thousand pounds on each; and to place them in a school near town, where i could frequently visit, as well as have them at home with me. "i now tried to improve my husband's taste, but we had few subjects in common; indeed he soon appeared to have little relish for my society, unless he was hinting to me the use he could make of my uncle's wealth. when we had company, i was disgusted by an ostentatious display of riches, and i have often quitted the room, to avoid listening to exaggerated tales of money obtained by lucky hits. "with all my attention and affectionate interest, i perceived that i could not become the friend or confident of my husband. every thing i learned relative to his affairs i gathered up by accident; and i vainly endeavoured to establish, at our fire-side, that social converse, which often renders people of different characters dear to each other. returning from the theatre, or any amusing party, i frequently began to relate what i had seen and highly relished; but with sullen taciturnity he soon silenced me. i seemed therefore gradually to lose, in his society, the soul, the energies of which had just been in action. to such a degree, in fact, did his cold, reserved manner affect me, that, after spending some days with him alone, i have imagined myself the most stupid creature in the world, till the abilities of some casual visitor convinced me that i had some dormant animation, and sentiments above the dust in which i had been groveling. the very countenance of my husband changed; his complexion became sallow, and all the charms of youth were vanishing with its vivacity. "i give you one view of the subject; but these experiments and alterations took up the space of five years; during which period, i had most reluctantly extorted several sums from my uncle, to save my husband, to use his own words, from destruction. at first it was to prevent bills being noted, to the injury of his credit; then to bail him; and afterwards to prevent an execution from entering the house. i began at last to conclude, that he would have made more exertions of his own to extricate himself, had he not relied on mine, cruel as was the task he imposed on me; and i firmly determined that i would make use of no more pretexts. "from the moment i pronounced this determination, indifference on his part was changed into rudeness, or something worse. "he now seldom dined at home, and continually returned at a late hour, drunk, to bed. i retired to another apartment; i was glad, i own, to escape from his; for personal intimacy without affection, seemed, to me the most degrading, as well as the most painful state in which a woman of any taste, not to speak of the peculiar delicacy of fostered sensibility, could be placed. but my husband's fondness for women was of the grossest kind, and imagination was so wholly out of the question, as to render his indulgences of this sort entirely promiscuous, and of the most brutal nature. my health suffered, before my heart was entirely estranged by the loathsome information; could i then have returned to his sullied arms, but as a victim to the prejudices of mankind, who have made women the property of their husbands? i discovered even, by his conversation, when intoxicated, that his favourites were wantons of the lowest class, who could by their vulgar, indecent mirth, which he called nature, rouse his sluggish spirits. meretricious ornaments and manners were necessary to attract his attention. he seldom looked twice at a modest woman, and sat silent in their company; and the charms of youth and beauty had not the slightest effect on his senses, unless the possessors were initiated in vice. his intimacy with profligate women, and his habits of thinking, gave him a contempt for female endowments; and he would repeat, when wine had loosed his tongue, most of the common-place sarcasms levelled at them, by men who do not allow them to have minds, because mind would be an impediment to gross enjoyment. men who are inferior to their fellow men, are always most anxious to establish their superiority over women. but where are these reflections leading me? "women who have lost their husband's affection, are justly reproved for neglecting their persons, and not taking the same pains to keep, as to gain a heart; but who thinks of giving the same advice to men, though women are continually stigmatized for being attached to fops; and from the nature of their education, are more susceptible of disgust? yet why a woman should be expected to endure a sloven, with more patience than a man, and magnanimously to govern herself, i cannot conceive; unless it be supposed arrogant in her to look for respect as well as a maintenance. it is not easy to be pleased, because, after promising to love, in different circumstances, we are told that it is our duty. i cannot, i am sure (though, when attending the sick, i never felt disgust) forget my own sensations, when rising with health and spirit, and after scenting the sweet morning, i have met my husband at the breakfast table. the active attention i had been giving to domestic regulations, which were generally settled before he rose, or a walk, gave a glow to my countenance, that contrasted with his squallid appearance. the squeamishness of stomach alone, produced by the last night's intemperance, which he took no pains to conceal, destroyed my appetite. i think i now see him lolling in an arm-chair, in a dirty powdering gown, soiled linen, ungartered stockings, and tangled hair, yawning and stretching himself. the newspaper was immediately called for, if not brought in on the tea-board, from which he would scarcely lift his eyes while i poured out the tea, excepting to ask for some brandy to put into it, or to declare that he could not eat. in answer to any question, in his best humour, it was a drawling 'what do you say, child?' but if i demanded money for the house expences, which i put off till the last moment, his customary reply, often prefaced with an oath, was, 'do you think me, madam, made of money?'--the butcher, the baker, must wait; and, what was worse, i was often obliged to witness his surly dismission of tradesmen, who were in want of their money, and whom i sometimes paid with the presents my uncle gave me for my own use. "at this juncture my father's mistress, by terrifying his conscience, prevailed on him to marry her; he was already become a methodist; and my brother, who now practised for himself, had discovered a flaw in the settlement made on my mother's children, which set it aside, and he allowed my father, whose distress made him submit to any thing, a tithe of his own, or rather our fortune. "my sisters had left school, but were unable to endure home, which my father's wife rendered as disagreeable as possible, to get rid of girls whom she regarded as spies on her conduct. they were accomplished, yet you can (may you never be reduced to the same destitute state!) scarcely conceive the trouble i had to place them in the situation of governesses, the only one in which even a well-educated woman, with more than ordinary talents, can struggle for a subsistence; and even this is a dependence next to menial. is it then surprising, that so many forlorn women, with human passions and feelings, take refuge in infamy? alone in large mansions, i say alone, because they had no companions with whom they could converse on equal terms, or from whom they could expect the endearments of affection, they grew melancholy, and the sound of joy made them sad; and the youngest, having a more delicate frame, fell into a decline. it was with great difficulty that i, who now almost supported the house by loans from my uncle, could prevail on the _master_ of it, to allow her a room to die in. i watched her sick bed for some months, and then closed her eyes, gentle spirit! for ever. she was pretty, with very engaging manners; yet had never an opportunity to marry, excepting to a very old man. she had abilities sufficient to have shone in any profession, had there been any professions for women, though she shrunk at the name of milliner or mantua-maker as degrading to a gentlewoman. i would not term this feeling false pride to any one but you, my child, whom i fondly hope to see (yes; i will indulge the hope for a moment!) possessed of that energy of character which gives dignity to any station; and with that clear, firm spirit that will enable you to choose a situation for yourself, or submit to be classed in the lowest, if it be the only one in which you can be the mistress of your own actions. "soon after the death of my sister, an incident occurred, to prove to me that the heart of a libertine is dead to natural affection; and to convince me, that the being who has appeared all tenderness, to gratify a selfish passion, is as regardless of the innocent fruit of it, as of the object, when the fit is over. i had casually observed an old, mean-looking woman, who called on my husband every two or three months to receive some money. one day entering the passage of his little counting-house, as she was going out, i heard her say, 'the child is very weak; she cannot live long, she will soon die out of your way, so you need not grudge her a little physic.' "'so much the better,' he replied, 'and pray mind your own business, good woman.' "i was struck by his unfeeling, inhuman tone of voice, and drew back, determined when the woman came again, to try to speak to her, not out of curiosity, i had heard enough, but with the hope of being useful to a poor, outcast girl. "a month or two elapsed before i saw this woman again; and then she had a child in her hand that tottered along, scarcely able to sustain her own weight. they were going away, to return at the hour mr. venables was expected; he was now from home. i desired the woman to walk into the parlour. she hesitated, yet obeyed. i assured her that i should not mention to my husband (the word seemed to weigh on my respiration), that i had seen her, or his child. the woman stared at me with astonishment; and i turned my eyes on the squalid object [that accompanied her.] she could hardly support herself, her complexion was sallow, and her eyes inflamed, with an indescribable look of cunning, mixed with the wrinkles produced by the peevishness of pain. "'poor child!' i exclaimed. 'ah! you may well say poor child,' replied the woman. 'i brought her here to see whether he would have the heart to look at her, and not get some advice. i do not know what they deserve who nursed her. why, her legs bent under her like a bow when she came to me, and she has never been well since; but, if they were no better paid than i am, it is not to be wondered at, sure enough.' "on further enquiry i was informed, that this miserable spectacle was the daughter of a servant, a country girl, who caught mr. venables' eye, and whom he seduced. on his marriage he sent her away, her situation being too visible. after her delivery, she was thrown on the town; and died in an hospital within the year. the babe was sent to a parish-nurse, and afterwards to this woman, who did not seem much better; but what was to be expected from such a close bargain? she was only paid three shillings a week for board and washing. "the woman begged me to give her some old clothes for the child, assuring me, that she was almost afraid to ask master for money to buy even a pair of shoes. "i grew sick at heart. and, fearing mr. venables might enter, and oblige me to express my abhorrence, i hastily enquired where she lived, promised to pay her two shillings a week more, and to call on her in a day or two; putting a trifle into her hand as a proof of my good intention. "if the state of this child affected me, what were my feelings at a discovery i made respecting peggy----?[ -a] footnotes: [ -a] the manuscript is imperfect here. an episode seems to have been intended, which was never committed to paper. editor. chap. x. "my father's situation was now so distressing, that i prevailed on my uncle to accompany me to visit him; and to lend me his assistance, to prevent the whole property of the family from becoming the prey of my brother's rapacity; for, to extricate himself out of present difficulties, my father was totally regardless of futurity. i took down with me some presents for my step-mother; it did not require an effort for me to treat her with civility, or to forget the past. "this was the first time i had visited my native village, since my marriage. but with what different emotions did i return from the busy world, with a heavy weight of experience benumbing my imagination, to scenes, that whispered recollections of joy and hope most eloquently to my heart! the first scent of the wild flowers from the heath, thrilled through my veins, awakening every sense to pleasure. the icy hand of despair seemed to be removed from my bosom; and--forgetting my husband--the nurtured visions of a romantic mind, bursting on me with all their original wildness and gay exuberance, were again hailed as sweet realities. i forgot, with equal facility, that i ever felt sorrow, or knew care in the country; while a transient rainbow stole athwart the cloudy sky of despondency. the picturesque form of several favourite trees, and the porches of rude cottages, with their smiling hedges, were recognized with the gladsome playfulness of childish vivacity. i could have kissed the chickens that pecked on the common; and longed to pat the cows, and frolic with the dogs that sported on it. i gazed with delight on the windmill, and thought it lucky that it should be in motion, at the moment i passed by; and entering the dear green lane, which led directly to the village, the sound of the well-known rookery gave that sentimental tinge to the varying sensations of my active soul, which only served to heighten the lustre of the luxuriant scenery. but, spying, as i advanced, the spire, peeping over the withered tops of the aged elms that composed the rookery, my thoughts flew immediately to the church-yard, and tears of affection, such was the effect of my imagination, bedewed my mother's grave! sorrow gave place to devotional feelings. i wandered through the church in fancy, as i used sometimes to do on a saturday evening. i recollected with what fervour i addressed the god of my youth: and once more with rapturous love looked above my sorrows to the father of nature. i pause--feeling forcibly all the emotions i am describing; and (reminded, as i register my sorrows, of the sublime calm i have felt, when in some tremendous solitude, my soul rested on itself, and seemed to fill the universe) i insensibly breathe soft, hushing every wayward emotion, as if fearing to sully with a sigh, a contentment so extatic. "having settled my father's affairs, and, by my exertions in his favour, made my brother my sworn foe, i returned to london. my husband's conduct was now changed; i had during my absence, received several affectionate, penitential letters from him; and he seemed on my arrival, to wish by his behaviour to prove his sincerity. i could not then conceive why he acted thus; and, when the suspicion darted into my head, that it might arise from observing my increasing influence with my uncle, i almost despised myself for imagining that such a degree of debasing selfishness could exist. "he became, unaccountable as was the change, tender and attentive; and, attacking my weak side, made a confession of his follies, and lamented the embarrassments in which i, who merited a far different fate, might be involved. he besought me to aid him with my counsel, praised my understanding, and appealed to the tenderness of my heart. "this conduct only inspired me with compassion. i wished to be his friend; but love had spread his rosy pinions, and fled far, far away; and had not (like some exquisite perfumes, the fine spirit of which is continually mingling with the air) left a fragrance behind, to mark where he had shook his wings. my husband's renewed caresses then became hateful to me; his brutality was tolerable, compared to his distasteful fondness. still, compassion, and the fear of insulting his supposed feelings, by a want of sympathy, made me dissemble, and do violence to my delicacy. what a task! "those who support a system of what i term false refinement, and will not allow great part of love in the female, as well as male breast, to spring in some respects involuntarily, may not admit that charms are as necessary to feed the passion, as virtues to convert the mellowing spirit into friendship. to such observers i have nothing to say, any more than to the moralists, who insist that women ought to, and can love their husbands, because it is their duty. to you, my child, i may add, with a heart tremblingly alive to your future conduct, some observations, dictated by my present feelings, on calmly reviewing this period of my life. when novelists or moralists praise as a virtue, a woman's coldness of constitution, and want of passion; and make her yield to the ardour of her lover out of sheer compassion, or to promote a frigid plan of future comfort, i am disgusted. they may be good women, in the ordinary acceptation of the phrase, and do no harm; but they appear to me not to have those 'finely fashioned nerves,' which render the senses exquisite. they may possess tenderness; but they want that fire of the imagination, which produces _active_ sensibility, and _positive_ virtue. how does the woman deserve to be characterized, who marries one man, with a heart and imagination devoted to another? is she not an object of pity or contempt, when thus sacrilegiously violating the purity of her own feelings? nay, it is as indelicate, when she is indifferent, unless she be constitutionally insensible; then indeed it is a mere affair of barter; and i have nothing to do with the secrets of trade. yes; eagerly as i wish you to possess true rectitude of mind, and purity of affection, i must insist that a heartless conduct is the contrary of virtuous. truth is the only basis of virtue; and we cannot, without depraving our minds, endeavour to please a lover or husband, but in proportion as he pleases us. men, more effectually to enslave us, may inculcate this partial morality, and lose sight of virtue in subdividing it into the duties of particular stations; but let us not blush for nature without a cause! "after these remarks, i am ashamed to own, that i was pregnant. the greatest sacrifice of my principles in my whole life, was the allowing my husband again to be familiar with my person, though to this cruel act of self-denial, when i wished the earth to open and swallow me, you owe your birth; and i the unutterable pleasure of being a mother. there was something of delicacy in my husband's bridal attentions; but now his tainted breath, pimpled face, and blood-shot eyes, were not more repugnant to my senses, than his gross manners, and loveless familiarity to my taste. "a man would only be expected to maintain; yes, barely grant a subsistence, to a woman rendered odious by habitual intoxication; but who would expect him, or think it possible to love her? and unless 'youth, and genial years were flown,' it would be thought equally unreasonable to insist, [under penalty of] forfeiting almost every thing reckoned valuable in life, that he should not love another: whilst woman, weak in reason, impotent in will, is required to moralize, sentimentalize herself to stone, and pine her life away, labouring to reform her embruted mate. he may even spend in dissipation, and intemperance, the very intemperance which renders him so hateful, her property, and by stinting her expences, not permit her to beguile in society, a wearisome, joyless life; for over their mutual fortune she has no power, it must all pass through his hand. and if she be a mother, and in the present state of women, it is a great misfortune to be prevented from discharging the duties, and cultivating the affections of one, what has she not to endure?--but i have suffered the tenderness of one to lead me into reflections that i did not think of making, to interrupt my narrative--yet the full heart will overflow. "mr. venables' embarrassments did not now endear him to me; still, anxious to befriend him, i endeavoured to prevail on him to retrench his expences; but he had always some plausible excuse to give, to justify his not following my advice. humanity, compassion, and the interest produced by a habit of living together, made me try to relieve, and sympathize with him; but, when i recollected that i was bound to live with such a being for ever--my heart died within me; my desire of improvement became languid, and baleful, corroding melancholy took possession of my soul. marriage had bastilled me for life. i discovered in myself a capacity for the enjoyment of the various pleasures existence affords; yet, fettered by the partial laws of society, this fair globe was to me an universal blank. "when i exhorted my husband to economy, i referred to himself. i was obliged to practise the most rigid, or contract debts, which i had too much reason to fear would never be paid. i despised this paltry privilege of a wife, which can only be of use to the vicious or inconsiderate, and determined not to increase the torrent that was bearing him down. i was then ignorant of the extent of his fraudulent speculations, whom i was bound to honour and obey. "a woman neglected by her husband, or whose manners form a striking contrast with his, will always have men on the watch to soothe and flatter her. besides, the forlorn state of a neglected woman, not destitute of personal charms, is particularly interesting, and rouses that species of pity, which is so near akin, it easily slides into love. a man of feeling thinks not of seducing, he is himself seduced by all the noblest emotions of his soul. he figures to himself all the sacrifices a woman of sensibility must make, and every situation in which his imagination places her, touches his heart, and fires his passions. longing to take to his bosom the shorn lamb, and bid the drooping buds of hope revive, benevolence changes into passion: and should he then discover that he is beloved, honour binds him fast, though foreseeing that he may afterwards be obliged to pay severe damages to the man, who never appeared to value his wife's society, till he found that there was a chance of his being indemnified for the loss of it. "such are the partial laws enacted by men; for, only to lay a stress on the dependent state of a woman in the grand question of the comforts arising from the possession of property, she is [even in this article] much more injured by the loss of the husband's affection, than he by that of his wife; yet where is she, condemned to the solitude of a deserted home, to look for a compensation from the woman, who seduces him from her? she cannot drive an unfaithful husband from his house, nor separate, or tear, his children from him, however culpable he may be; and he, still the master of his own fate, enjoys the smiles of a world, that would brand her with infamy, did she, seeking consolation, venture to retaliate. "these remarks are not dictated by experience; but merely by the compassion i feel for many amiable women, the _out-laws_ of the world. for myself, never encouraging any of the advances that were made to me, my lovers dropped off like the untimely shoots of spring. i did not even coquet with them; because i found, on examining myself, i could not coquet with a man without loving him a little; and i perceived that i should not be able to stop at the line of what are termed _innocent freedoms_, did i suffer any. my reserve was then the consequence of delicacy. freedom of conduct has emancipated many women's minds; but my conduct has most rigidly been governed by my principles, till the improvement of my understanding has enabled me to discern the fallacy of prejudices at war with nature and reason. "shortly after the change i have mentioned in my husband's conduct, my uncle was compelled by his declining health, to seek the succour of a milder climate, and embark for lisbon. he left his will in the hands of a friend, an eminent solicitor; he had previously questioned me relative to my situation and state of mind, and declared very freely, that he could place no reliance on the stability of my husband's professions. he had been deceived in the unfolding of his character; he now thought it fixed in a train of actions that would inevitably lead to ruin and disgrace. "the evening before his departure, which we spent alone together, he folded me to his heart, uttering the endearing appellation of 'child.'--my more than father! why was i not permitted to perform the last duties of one, and smooth the pillow of death? he seemed by his manner to be convinced that he should never see me more; yet requested me, most earnestly, to come to him, should i be obliged to leave my husband. he had before expressed his sorrow at hearing of my pregnancy, having determined to prevail on me to accompany him, till i informed him of that circumstance. he expressed himself unfeignedly sorry that any new tie should bind me to a man whom he thought so incapable of estimating my value; such was the kind language of affection. "i must repeat his own words; they made an indelible impression on my mind: "'the marriage state is certainly that in which women, generally speaking, can be most useful; but i am far from thinking that a woman, once married, ought to consider the engagement as indissoluble (especially if there be no children to reward her for sacrificing her feelings) in case her husband merits neither her love, nor esteem. esteem will often supply the place of love; and prevent a woman from being wretched, though it may not make her happy. the magnitude of a sacrifice ought always to bear some proportion to the utility in view; and for a woman to live with a man, for whom she can cherish neither affection nor esteem, or even be of any use to him, excepting in the light of a house-keeper, is an abjectness of condition, the enduring of which no concurrence of circumstances can ever make a duty in the sight of god or just men. if indeed she submits to it merely to be maintained in idleness, she has no right to complain bitterly of her fate; or to act, as a person of independent character might, as if she had a title to disregard general rules. "'but the misfortune is, that many women only submit in appearance, and forfeit their own respect to secure their reputation in the world. the situation of a woman separated from her husband, is undoubtedly very different from that of a man who has left his wife. he, with lordly dignity, has shaken of a clog; and the allowing her food and raiment, is thought sufficient to secure his reputation from taint. and, should she have been inconsiderate, he will be celebrated for his generosity and forbearance. such is the respect paid to the master-key of property! a woman, on the contrary, resigning what is termed her natural protector (though he never was so, but in name) is despised and shunned, for asserting the independence of mind distinctive of a rational being, and spurning at slavery.' "during the remainder of the evening, my uncle's tenderness led him frequently to revert to the subject, and utter, with increasing warmth, sentiments to the same purport. at length it was necessary to say 'farewell!'--and we parted--gracious god! to meet no more. chap. xi. "a gentleman of large fortune and of polished manners, had lately visited very frequently at our house, and treated me, if possible, with more respect than mr. venables paid him; my pregnancy was not yet visible, his society was a great relief to me, as i had for some time past, to avoid expence, confined myself very much at home. i ever disdained unnecessary, perhaps even prudent concealments; and my husband, with great ease, discovered the amount of my uncle's parting present. a copy of a writ was the stale pretext to extort it from me; and i had soon reason to believe that it was fabricated for the purpose. i acknowledge my folly in thus suffering myself to be continually imposed on. i had adhered to my resolution not to apply to my uncle, on the part of my husband, any more; yet, when i had received a sum sufficient to supply my own wants, and to enable me to pursue a plan i had in view, to settle my younger brother in a respectable employment, i allowed myself to be duped by mr. venables' shallow pretences, and hypocritical professions. "thus did he pillage me and my family, thus frustrate all my plans of usefulness. yet this was the man i was bound to respect and esteem: as if respect and esteem depended on an arbitrary will of our own! but a wife being as much a man's property as his horse, or his ass, she has nothing she can call her own. he may use any means to get at what the law considers as his, the moment his wife is in possession of it, even to the forcing of a lock, as mr. venables did, to search for notes in my writing-desk--and all this is done with a show of equity, because, forsooth, he is responsible for her maintenance. "the tender mother cannot _lawfully_ snatch from the gripe of the gambling spendthrift, or beastly drunkard, unmindful of his offspring, the fortune which falls to her by chance; or (so flagrant is the injustice) what she earns by her own exertions. no; he can rob her with impunity, even to waste publicly on a courtezan; and the laws of her country--if women have a country--afford her no protection or redress from the oppressor, unless she have the plea of bodily fear; yet how many ways are there of goading the soul almost to madness, equally unmanly, though not so mean? when such laws were framed, should not impartial lawgivers have first decreed, in the style of a great assembly, who recognized the existence of an _être suprême_, to fix the national belief, that the husband should always be wiser and more virtuous than his wife, in order to entitle him, with a show of justice, to keep this idiot, or perpetual minor, for ever in bondage. but i must have done--on this subject, my indignation continually runs away with me. "the company of the gentleman i have already mentioned, who had a general acquaintance with literature and subjects of taste, was grateful to me; my countenance brightened up as he approached, and i unaffectedly expressed the pleasure i felt. the amusement his conversation afforded me, made it easy to comply with my husband's request, to endeavour to render our house agreeable to him. "his attentions became more pointed; but, as i was not of the number of women, whose virtue, as it is termed, immediately takes alarm, i endeavoured, rather by raillery than serious expostulation, to give a different turn to his conversation. he assumed a new mode of attack, and i was, for a while, the dupe of his pretended friendship. "i had, merely in the style of _badinage_, boasted of my conquest, and repeated his lover-like compliments to my husband. but he begged me, for god's sake, not to affront his friend, or i should destroy all his projects, and be his ruin. had i had more affection for my husband, i should have expressed my contempt of this time-serving politeness: now i imagined that i only felt pity; yet it would have puzzled a casuist to point out in what the exact difference consisted. "this friend began now, in confidence, to discover to me the real state of my husband's affairs. 'necessity,' said mr. s----; why should i reveal his name? for he affected to palliate the conduct he could not excuse, 'had led him to take such steps, by accommodation bills, buying goods on credit, to sell them for ready money, and similar transactions, that his character in the commercial world was gone. he was considered,' he added, lowering his voice, 'on 'change as a swindler.' "i felt at that moment the first maternal pang. aware of the evils my sex have to struggle with, i still wished, for my own consolation, to be the mother of a daughter; and i could not bear to think, that the _sins_ of her father's entailed disgrace, should be added to the ills to which woman is heir. "so completely was i deceived by these shows of friendship (nay, i believe, according to his interpretation, mr. s--really was my friend) that i began to consult him respecting the best mode of retrieving my husband's character: it is the good name of a woman only that sets to rise no more. i knew not that he had been drawn into a whirlpool, out of which he had not the energy to attempt to escape. he seemed indeed destitute of the power of employing his faculties in any regular pursuit. his principles of action were so loose, and his mind so uncultivated, that every thing like order appeared to him in the shape of restraint; and, like men in the savage state, he required the strong stimulus of hope or fear, produced by wild speculations, in which the interests of others went for nothing, to keep his spirits awake. he one time possessed patriotism, but he knew not what it was to feel honest indignation; and pretended to be an advocate for liberty, when, with as little affection for the human race as for individuals, he thought of nothing but his own gratification. he was just such a citizen, as a father. the sums he adroitly obtained by a violation of the laws of his country, as well as those of humanity, he would allow a mistress to squander; though she was, with the same _sang froid_, consigned, as were his children, to poverty, when another proved more attractive. "on various pretences, his friend continued to visit me; and, observing my want of money, he tried to induce me to accept of pecuniary aid; but this offer i absolutely rejected, though it was made with such delicacy, i could not be displeased. "one day he came, as i thought accidentally, to dinner. my husband was very much engaged in business, and quitted the room soon after the cloth was removed. we conversed as usual, till confidential advice led again to love. i was extremely mortified. i had a sincere regard for him, and hoped that he had an equal friendship for me. i therefore began mildly to expostulate with him. this gentleness he mistook for coy encouragement; and he would not be diverted from the subject. perceiving his mistake, i seriously asked him how, using such language to me, he could profess to be my husband's friend? a significant sneer excited my curiosity, and he, supposing this to be my only scruple, took a letter deliberately out of his pocket, saying, 'your husband's honour is not inflexible. how could you, with your discernment, think it so? why, he left the room this very day on purpose to give me an opportunity to explain myself; _he_ thought me too timid--too tardy.' "i snatched the letter with indescribable emotion. the purport of it was to invite him to dinner, and to ridicule his chivalrous respect for me. he assured him, 'that every woman had her price, and, with gross indecency, hinted, that he should be glad to have the duty of a husband taken off his hands. these he termed _liberal sentiments_. he advised him not to shock my romantic notions, but to attack my credulous generosity, and weak pity; and concluded with requesting him to lend him five hundred pounds for a month or six weeks.' i read this letter twice over; and the firm purpose it inspired, calmed the rising tumult of my soul. i rose deliberately, requested mr. s---- to wait a moment, and instantly going into the counting-house, desired mr. venables to return with me to the dining-parlour. "he laid down his pen, and entered with me, without observing any change in my countenance. i shut the door, and, giving him the letter, simply asked, 'whether he wrote it, or was it a forgery?' "nothing could equal his confusion. his friend's eye met his, and he muttered something about a joke--but i interrupted him--'it is sufficient--we part for ever.' "i continued, with solemnity, 'i have borne with your tyranny and infidelities. i disdain to utter what i have borne with. i thought you unprincipled, but not so decidedly vicious. i formed a tie, in the sight of heaven--i have held it sacred; even when men, more conformable to my taste, have made me feel--i despise all subterfuge!--that i was not dead to love. neglected by you, i have resolutely stifled the enticing emotions, and respected the plighted faith you outraged. and you dare now to insult me, by selling me to prostitution!--yes--equally lost to delicacy and principle--you dared sacrilegiously to barter the honour of the mother of your child.' "then, turning to mr. s----, i added, 'i call on you, sir, to witness,' and i lifted my hands and eyes to heaven, 'that, as solemnly as i took his name, i now abjure it,' i pulled off my ring, and put it on the table; 'and that i mean immediately to quit his house, never to enter it more. i will provide for myself and child. i leave him as free as i am determined to be myself--he shall be answerable for no debts of mine.' "astonishment closed their lips, till mr. venables, gently pushing his friend, with a forced smile, out of the room, nature for a moment prevailed, and, appearing like himself, he turned round, burning with rage, to me: but there was no terror in the frown, excepting when contrasted with the malignant smile which preceded it. he bade me 'leave the house at my peril; told me he despised my threats; i had no resource; i could not swear the peace against him!--i was not afraid of my life!--he had never struck me!' "he threw the letter in the fire, which i had incautiously left in his hands; and, quitting the room, locked the door on me. "when left alone, i was a moment or two before i could recollect myself. one scene had succeeded another with such rapidity, i almost doubted whether i was reflecting on a real event. 'was it possible? was i, indeed, free?'--yes; free i termed myself, when i decidedly perceived the conduct i ought to adopt. how had i panted for liberty--liberty, that i would have purchased at any price, but that of my own esteem! i rose, and shook myself; opened the window, and methought the air never smelled so sweet. the face of heaven grew fairer as i viewed it, and the clouds seemed to flit away obedient to my wishes, to give my soul room to expand. i was all soul, and (wild as it may appear) felt as if i could have dissolved in the soft balmy gale that kissed my cheek, or have glided below the horizon on the glowing, descending beams. a seraphic satisfaction animated, without agitating my spirits; and my imagination collected, in visions sublimely terrible, or soothingly beautiful, an immense variety of the endless images, which nature affords, and fancy combines, of the grand and fair. the lustre of these bright picturesque sketches faded with the setting sun; but i was still alive to the calm delight they had diffused through my heart. "there may be advocates for matrimonial obedience, who, making a distinction between the duty of a wife and of a human being, may blame my conduct.--to them i write not--my feelings are not for them to analyze; and may you, my child, never be able to ascertain, by heart-rending experience, what your mother felt before the present emancipation of her mind! "i began to write a letter to my father, after closing one to my uncle; not to ask advice, but to signify my determination; when i was interrupted by the entrance of mr. venables. his manner was changed. his views on my uncle's fortune made him averse to my quitting his house, or he would, i am convinced, have been glad to have shaken off even the slight restraint my presence imposed on him; the restraint of showing me some respect. so far from having an affection for me, he really hated me, because he was convinced that i must despise him. "he told me, that, 'as i now had had time to cool and reflect, he did not doubt but that my prudence, and nice sense of propriety, would lead me to overlook what was passed.' "'reflection,' i replied, 'had only confirmed my purpose, and no power on earth could divert me from it.' "endeavouring to assume a soothing voice and look, when he would willingly have tortured me, to force me to feel his power, his countenance had an infernal expression, when he desired me, 'not to expose myself to the servants, by obliging him to confine me in my apartment; if then i would give my promise not to quit the house precipitately, i should be free--and--.' i declared, interrupting him, 'that i would promise nothing. i had no measures to keep with him--i was resolved, and would not condescend to subterfuge.' "he muttered, 'that i should soon repent of these preposterous airs;' and, ordering tea to be carried into my little study, which had a communication with my bed-chamber, he once more locked the door upon me, and left me to my own meditations. i had passively followed him up stairs, not wishing to fatigue myself with unavailing exertion. "nothing calms the mind like a fixed purpose. i felt as if i had heaved a thousand weight from my heart; the atmosphere seemed lightened; and, if i execrated the institutions of society, which thus enable men to tyrannize over women, it was almost a disinterested sentiment. i disregarded present inconveniences, when my mind had done struggling with itself,--when reason and inclination had shaken hands and were at peace. i had no longer the cruel task before me, in endless perspective, aye, during the tedious for ever of life, of labouring to overcome my repugnance--of labouring to extinguish the hopes, the maybes of a lively imagination. death i had hailed as my only chance for deliverance; but, while existence had still so many charms, and life promised happiness, i shrunk from the icy arms of an unknown tyrant, though far more inviting than those of the man, to whom i supposed myself bound without any other alternative; and was content to linger a little longer, waiting for i knew not what, rather than leave 'the warm precincts of the cheerful day,' and all the unenjoyed affection of my nature. "my present situation gave a new turn to my reflection; and i wondered (now the film seemed to be withdrawn, that obscured the piercing sight of reason) how i could, previously to the deciding outrage, have considered myself as everlastingly united to vice and folly? 'had an evil genius cast a spell at my birth; or a demon stalked out of chaos, to perplex my understanding, and enchain my will, with delusive prejudices?' "i pursued this train of thinking; it led me out of myself, to expatiate on the misery peculiar to my sex. 'are not,' i thought, 'the despots for ever stigmatized, who, in the wantonness of power, commanded even the most atrocious criminals to be chained to dead bodies? though surely those laws are much more inhuman, which forge adamantine fetters to bind minds together, that never can mingle in social communion! what indeed can equal the wretchedness of that state, in which there is no alternative, but to extinguish the affections, or encounter infamy?' chap. xii. "towards midnight mr. venables entered my chamber; and, with calm audacity preparing to go to bed, he bade me make haste, 'for that was the best place for husbands and wives to end their differences. he had been drinking plentifully to aid his courage. "i did not at first deign to reply. but perceiving that he affected to take my silence for consent, i told him that, 'if he would not go to another bed, or allow me, i should sit up in my study all night.' he attempted to pull me into the chamber, half joking. but i resisted; and, as he had determined not to give me any reason for saying that he used violence, after a few more efforts, he retired, cursing my obstinacy, to bed. "i sat musing some time longer; then, throwing my cloak around me, prepared for sleep on a sopha. and, so fortunate seemed my deliverance, so sacred the pleasure of being thus wrapped up in myself, that i slept profoundly, and woke with a mind composed to encounter the struggles of the day. mr. venables did not wake till some hours after; and then he came to me half-dressed, yawning and stretching, with haggard eyes, as if he scarcely recollected what had passed the preceding evening. he fixed his eyes on me for a moment, then, calling me a fool, asked 'how long i intended to continue this pretty farce? for his part, he was devilish sick of it; but this was the plague of marrying women who pretended to know something.' "i made no other reply to this harangue, than to say, 'that he ought to be glad to get rid of a woman so unfit to be his companion--and that any change in my conduct would be mean dissimulation; for maturer reflection only gave the sacred seal of reason to my first resolution.' "he looked as if he could have stamped with impatience, at being obliged to stifle his rage; but, conquering his anger (for weak people, whose passions seem the most ungovernable, restrain them with the greatest ease, when they have a sufficient motive), he exclaimed, 'very pretty, upon my soul! very pretty, theatrical flourishes! pray, fair roxana, stoop from your altitudes, and remember that you are acting a part in real life.' "he uttered this speech with a self-satisfied air, and went down stairs to dress. "in about an hour he came to me again; and in the same tone said, 'that he came as my gentleman-usher to hand me down to breakfast. "'of the black rod?' asked i. "this question, and the tone in which i asked it, a little disconcerted him. to say the truth, i now felt no resentment; my firm resolution to free myself from my ignoble thraldom, had absorbed the various emotions which, during six years, had racked my soul. the duty pointed out by my principles seemed clear; and not one tender feeling intruded to make me swerve: the dislike which my husband had inspired was strong; but it only led me to wish to avoid, to wish to let him drop out of my memory; there was no misery, no torture that i would not deliberately have chosen, rather than renew my lease of servitude. "during the breakfast, he attempted to reason with me on the folly of romantic sentiments; for this was the indiscriminate epithet he gave to every mode of conduct or thinking superior to his own. he asserted, 'that all the world were governed by their own interest; those who pretended to be actuated by different motives, were only deeper knaves, or fools crazed by books, who took for gospel all the rodomantade nonsense written by men who knew nothing of the world. for his part, he thanked god, he was no hypocrite; and, if he stretched a point sometimes, it was always with an intention of paying every man his own.' "he then artfully insinuated, 'that he daily expected a vessel to arrive, a successful speculation, that would make him easy for the present, and that he had several other schemes actually depending, that could not fail. he had no doubt of becoming rich in a few years, though he had been thrown back by some unlucky adventures at the setting out.' "i mildly replied, 'that i wished he might not involve himself still deeper.' "he had no notion that i was governed by a decision of judgment, not to be compared with a mere spurt of resentment. he knew not what it was to feel indignation against vice, and often boasted of his placable temper, and readiness to forgive injuries. true; for he only considered the being deceived, as an effort of skill he had not guarded against; and then, with a cant of candour, would observe, 'that he did not know how he might himself have been tempted to act in the same circumstances.' and, as his heart never opened to friendship, it never was wounded by disappointment. every new acquaintance he protested, it is true, was 'the cleverest fellow in the world;' and he really thought so; till the novelty of his conversation or manners ceased to have any effect on his sluggish spirits. his respect for rank or fortune was more permanent, though he chanced to have no design of availing himself of the influence of either to promote his own views. "after a prefatory conversation,--my blood (i thought it had been cooler) flushed over my whole countenance as he spoke--he alluded to my situation. he desired me to reflect--'and act like a prudent woman, as the best proof of my superior understanding; for he must own i had sense, did i know how to use it. i was not,' he laid a stress on his words, 'without my passions; and a husband was a convenient cloke.--he was liberal in his way of thinking; and why might not we, like many other married people, who were above vulgar prejudices, tacitly consent to let each other follow their own inclination?--he meant nothing more, in the letter i made the ground of complaint; and the pleasure which i seemed to take in mr. s.'s company, led him to conclude, that he was not disagreeable to me.' "a clerk brought in the letters of the day, and i, as i often did, while he was discussing subjects of business, went to the _piano forte_, and began to play a favourite air to restore myself, as it were, to nature, and drive the sophisticated sentiments i had just been obliged to listen to, out of my soul. "they had excited sensations similar to those i have felt, in viewing the squalid inhabitants of some of the lanes and back streets of the metropolis, mortified at being compelled to consider them as my fellow-creatures, as if an ape had claimed kindred with me. or, as when surrounded by a mephitical fog, i have wished to have a volley of cannon fired, to clear the incumbered atmosphere, and give me room to breathe and move. "my spirits were all in arms, and i played a kind of extemporary prelude. the cadence was probably wild and impassioned, while, lost in thought, i made the sounds a kind of echo to my train of thinking. "pausing for a moment, i met mr. venables' eyes. he was observing me with an air of conceited satisfaction, as much as to say--'my last insinuation has done the business--she begins to know her own interest.' then gathering up his letters, he said, 'that he hoped he should hear no more romantic stuff, well enough in a miss just come from boarding school;' and went, as was his custom, to the counting-house. i still continued playing; and, turning to a sprightly lesson, i executed it with uncommon vivacity. i heard footsteps approach the door, and was soon convinced that mr. venables was listening; the consciousness only gave more animation to my fingers. he went down into the kitchen, and the cook, probably by his desire, came to me, to know what i would please to order for dinner. mr. venables came into the parlour again, with apparent carelessness. i perceived that the cunning man was over-reaching himself; and i gave my directions as usual, and left the room. "while i was making some alteration in my dress, mr. venables peeped in, and, begging my pardon for interrupting me, disappeared. i took up some work (i could not read), and two or three messages were sent to me, probably for no other purpose, but to enable mr. venables to ascertain what i was about. "i listened whenever i heard the street-door open; at last i imagined i could distinguish mr. venables' step, going out. i laid aside my work; my heart palpitated; still i was afraid hastily to enquire; and i waited a long half hour, before i ventured to ask the boy whether his master was in the counting-house? "being answered in the negative, i bade him call me a coach, and collecting a few necessaries hastily together, with a little parcel of letters and papers which i had collected the preceding evening, i hurried into it, desiring the coachman to drive to a distant part of the town. "i almost feared that the coach would break down before i got out of the street; and, when i turned the corner, i seemed to breathe a freer air. i was ready to imagine that i was rising above the thick atmosphere of earth; or i felt, as wearied souls might be supposed to feel on entering another state of existence. "i stopped at one or two stands of coaches to elude pursuit, and then drove round the skirts of the town to seek for an obscure lodging, where i wished to remain concealed, till i could avail myself of my uncle's protection. i had resolved to assume my own name immediately, and openly to avow my determination, without any formal vindication, the moment i had found a home, in which i could rest free from the daily alarm of expecting to see mr. venables enter. "i looked at several lodgings; but finding that i could not, without a reference to some acquaintance, who might inform my tyrant, get admittance into a decent apartment--men have not all this trouble--i thought of a woman whom i had assisted to furnish a little haberdasher's shop, and who i knew had a first floor to let. "i went to her, and though i could not persuade her, that the quarrel between me and mr. venables would never be made up, still she agreed to conceal me for the present; yet assuring me at the same time, shaking her head, that, when a woman was once married, she must bear every thing. her pale face, on which appeared a thousand haggard lines and delving wrinkles, produced by what is emphatically termed fretting, inforced her remark; and i had afterwards an opportunity of observing the treatment she had to endure, which grizzled her into patience. she toiled from morning till night; yet her husband would rob the till, and take away the money reserved for paying bills; and, returning home drunk, he would beat her if she chanced to offend him, though she had a child at the breast. "these scenes awoke me at night; and, in the morning, i heard her, as usual, talk to her dear johnny--he, forsooth, was her master; no slave in the west indies had one more despotic; but fortunately she was of the true russian breed of wives. "my mind, during the few past days, seemed, as it were, disengaged from my body; but, now the struggle was over, i felt very forcibly the effect which perturbation of spirits produces on a woman in my situation. "the apprehension of a miscarriage, obliged me to confine myself to my apartment near a fortnight; but i wrote to my uncle's friend for money, promising 'to call on him, and explain my situation, when i was well enough to go out; mean time i earnestly intreated him, not to mention my place of abode to any one, lest my husband--such the law considered him--should disturb the mind he could not conquer. i mentioned my intention of setting out for lisbon, to claim my uncle's protection, the moment my health would permit.' "the tranquillity however, which i was recovering, was soon interrupted. my landlady came up to me one day, with eyes swollen with weeping, unable to utter what she was commanded to say. she declared, 'that she was never so miserable in her life; that she must appear an ungrateful monster; and that she would readily go down on her knees to me, to intreat me to forgive her, as she had done to her husband to spare her the cruel task.' sobs prevented her from proceeding, or answering my impatient enquiries, to know what she meant. "when she became a little more composed, she took a newspaper out of her pocket, declaring, 'that her heart smote her, but what could she do?--she must obey her husband.' i snatched the paper from her. an advertisement quickly met my eye, purporting, that 'maria venables had, without any assignable cause, absconded from her husband; and any person harbouring her, was menaced with the utmost severity of the law.' "perfectly acquainted with mr. venables' meanness of soul, this step did not excite my surprise, and scarcely my contempt. resentment in my breast, never survived love. i bade the poor woman, in a kind tone, wipe her eyes, and request her husband to come up, and speak to me himself. "my manner awed him. he respected a lady, though not a woman; and began to mutter out an apology. "'mr. venables was a rich gentleman; he wished to oblige me, but he had suffered enough by the law already, to tremble at the thought; besides, for certain, we should come together again, and then even i should not thank him for being accessary to keeping us asunder.--a husband and wife were, god knows, just as one,--and all would come round at last.' he uttered a drawling 'hem!' and then with an arch look, added--'master might have had his little frolics--but--lord bless your heart!--men would be men while the world stands.' "to argue with this privileged first-born of reason, i perceived, would be vain. i therefore only requested him to let me remain another day at his house, while i sought for a lodging; and not to inform mr. venables that i had ever been sheltered there. "he consented, because he had not the courage to refuse a person for whom he had an habitual respect; but i heard the pent-up choler burst forth in curses, when he met his wife, who was waiting impatiently at the foot of the stairs, to know what effect my expostulations would have on him. "without wasting any time in the fruitless indulgence of vexation, i once more set out in search of an abode in which i could hide myself for a few weeks. "agreeing to pay an exorbitant price, i hired an apartment, without any reference being required relative to my character: indeed, a glance at my shape seemed to say, that my motive for concealment was sufficiently obvious. thus was i obliged to shroud my head in infamy. "to avoid all danger of detection--i use the appropriate word, my child, for i was hunted out like a felon--i determined to take possession of my new lodgings that very evening. "i did not inform my landlady where i was going. i knew that she had a sincere affection for me, and would willingly have run any risk to show her gratitude; yet i was fully convinced, that a few kind words from johnny would have found the woman in her, and her dear benefactress, as she termed me in an agony of tears, would have been sacrificed, to recompense her tyrant for condescending to treat her like an equal. he could be kind-hearted, as she expressed it, when he pleased. and this thawed sternness, contrasted with his habitual brutality, was the more acceptable, and could not be purchased at too dear a rate. "the sight of the advertisement made me desirous of taking refuge with my uncle, let what would be the consequence; and i repaired in a hackney coach (afraid of meeting some person who might chance to know me, had i walked) to the chambers of my uncle's friend. "he received me with great politeness (my uncle had already prepossessed him in my favour), and listened, with interest, to my explanation of the motives which had induced me to fly from home, and skulk in obscurity, with all the timidity of fear that ought only to be the companion of guilt. he lamented, with rather more gallantry than, in my situation, i thought delicate, that such a woman should be thrown away on a man insensible to the charms of beauty or grace. he seemed at a loss what to advise me to do, to evade my husband's search, without hastening to my uncle, whom, he hesitating said, i might not find alive. he uttered this intelligence with visible regret; requested me, at least, to wait for the arrival of the next packet; offered me what money i wanted, and promised to visit me. "he kept his word; still no letter arrived to put an end to my painful state of suspense. i procured some books and music, to beguile the tedious solitary days. 'come, ever smiling liberty, 'and with thee bring thy jocund train:' i sung--and sung till, saddened by the strain of joy, i bitterly lamented the fate that deprived me of all social pleasure. comparative liberty indeed i had possessed myself of; but the jocund train lagged far behind! chap. xiii. "by watching my only visitor, my uncle's friend, or by some other means, mr. venables discovered my residence, and came to enquire for me. the maid-servant assured him there was no such person in the house. a bustle ensued--i caught the alarm--listened--distinguished his voice, and immediately locked the door. they suddenly grew still; and i waited near a quarter of an hour, before i heard him open the parlour door, and mount the stairs with the mistress of the house, who obsequiously declared that she knew nothing of me. "finding my door locked, she requested me to 'open it, and prepare to go home with my husband, poor gentleman! to whom i had already occasioned sufficient vexation.' i made no reply. mr. venables then, in an assumed tone of softness, intreated me, 'to consider what he suffered, and my own reputation, and get the better of childish resentment.' he ran on in the same strain, pretending to address me, but evidently adapting his discourse to the capacity of the landlady; who, at every pause, uttered an exclamation of pity; or 'yes, to be sure--very true, sir.' "sick of the farce, and perceiving that i could not avoid the hated interview, i opened the door, and he entered. advancing with easy assurance to take my hand, i shrunk from his touch, with an involuntary start, as i should have done from a noisome reptile, with more disgust than terror. his conductress was retiring, to give us, as she said, an opportunity to accommodate matters. but i bade her come in, or i would go out; and curiosity impelled her to obey me. "mr. venables began to expostulate; and this woman, proud of his confidence, to second him. but i calmly silenced her, in the midst of a vulgar harangue, and turning to him, asked, 'why he vainly tormented me? declaring that no power on earth should force me back to his house.' "after a long altercation, the particulars of which, it would be to no purpose to repeat, he left the room. some time was spent in loud conversation in the parlour below, and i discovered that he had brought his friend, an attorney, with him. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * the tumult on the landing place, brought out a gentleman, who had recently taken apartments in the house; he enquired why i was thus assailed[ -a]? the voluble attorney instantly repeated the trite tale. the stranger turned to me, observing, with the most soothing politeness and manly interest, that 'my countenance told a very different story.' he added, 'that i should not be insulted, or forced out of the house, by any body.' "'not by her husband?' asked the attorney. "'no, sir, not by her husband.' mr. venables advanced towards him--but there was a decision in his attitude, that so well seconded that of his voice, * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * they left the house: at the same time protesting, that any one that should dare to protect me, should be prosecuted with the utmost rigour. "they were scarcely out of the house, when my landlady came up to me again, and begged my pardon, in a very different tone. for, though mr. venables had bid her, at her peril, harbour me, he had not attended, i found, to her broad hints, to discharge the lodging. i instantly promised to pay her, and make her a present to compensate for my abrupt departure, if she would procure me another lodging, at a sufficient distance; and she, in return, repeating mr. venables' plausible tale, i raised her indignation, and excited her sympathy, by telling her briefly the truth. "she expressed her commiseration with such honest warmth, that i felt soothed; for i have none of that fastidious sensitiveness, which a vulgar accent or gesture can alarm to the disregard of real kindness. i was ever glad to perceive in others the humane feelings i delighted to exercise; and the recollection of some ridiculous characteristic circumstances, which have occurred in a moment of emotion, has convulsed me with laughter, though at the instant i should have thought it sacrilegious to have smiled. your improvement, my dearest girl, being ever present to me while i write, i note these feelings, because women, more accustomed to observe manners than actions, are too much alive to ridicule. so much so, that their boasted sensibility is often stifled by false delicacy. true sensibility, the sensibility which is the auxiliary of virtue, and the soul of genius, is in society so occupied with the feelings of others, as scarcely to regard its own sensations. with what reverence have i looked up at my uncle, the dear parent of my mind! when i have seen the sense of his own sufferings, of mind and body, absorbed in a desire to comfort those, whose misfortunes were comparatively trivial. he would have been ashamed of being as indulgent to himself, as he was to others. 'genuine fortitude,' he would assert, 'consisted in governing our own emotions, and making allowance for the weaknesses in our friends, that we would not tolerate in ourselves.' but where is my fond regret leading me! "'women must be submissive,' said my landlady. 'indeed what could most women do? who had they to maintain them, but their husbands? every woman, and especially a lady, could not go through rough and smooth, as she had done, to earn a little bread.' "she was in a talking mood, and proceeded to inform me how she had been used in the world. 'she knew what it was to have a bad husband, or she did not know who should.' i perceived that she would be very much mortified, were i not to attend to her tale, and i did not attempt to interrupt her, though i wished her, as soon as possible, to go out in search of a new abode for me, where i could once more hide my head. "she began by telling me, 'that she had saved a little money in service; and was over-persuaded (we must all be in love once in our lives) to marry a likely man, a footman in the family, not worth a groat. my plan,' she continued, 'was to take a house, and let out lodgings; and all went on well, till my husband got acquainted with an impudent slut, who chose to live on other people's means--and then all went to rack and ruin. he ran in debt to buy her fine clothes, such clothes as i never thought of wearing myself, and--would you believe it?--he signed an execution on my very goods, bought with the money i worked so hard to get; and they came and took my bed from under me, before i heard a word of the matter. aye, madam, these are misfortunes that you gentlefolks know nothing of,--but sorrow is sorrow, let it come which way it will. "'i sought for a service again--very hard, after having a house of my own!--but he used to follow me, and kick up such a riot when he was drunk, that i could not keep a place; nay, he even stole my clothes, and pawned them; and when i went to the pawnbroker's, and offered to take my oath that they were not bought with a farthing of his money, they said, 'it was all as one, my husband had a right to whatever i had.' "'at last he listed for a soldier, and i took a house, making an agreement to pay for the furniture by degrees; and i almost starved myself, till i once more got before-hand in the world. "'after an absence of six years (god forgive me! i thought he was dead) my husband returned; found me out, and came with such a penitent face, i forgave him, and clothed him from head to foot. but he had not been a week in the house, before some of his creditors arrested him; and, he selling my goods, i found myself once more reduced to beggary; for i was not as well able to work, go to bed late, and rise early, as when i quitted service; and then i thought it hard enough. he was soon tired of me, when there was nothing more to be had, and left me again. "'i will not tell you how i was buffeted about, till, hearing for certain that he had died in an hospital abroad, i once more returned to my old occupation; but have not yet been able to get my head above water: so, madam, you must not be angry if i am afraid to run any risk, when i know so well, that women have always the worst of it, when law is to decide.' "after uttering a few more complaints, i prevailed on my landlady to go out in quest of a lodging; and, to be more secure, i condescended to the mean shift of changing my name. "but why should i dwell on similar incidents!--i was hunted, like an infected beast, from three different apartments, and should not have been allowed to rest in any, had not mr. venables, informed of my uncle's dangerous state of health, been inspired with the fear of hurrying me out of the world as i advanced in my pregnancy, by thus tormenting and obliging me to take sudden journeys to avoid him; and then his speculations on my uncle's fortune must prove abortive. "one day, when he had pursued me to an inn, i fainted, hurrying from him; and, falling down, the sight of my blood alarmed him, and obtained a respite for me. it is strange that he should have retained any hope, after observing my unwavering determination; but, from the mildness of my behaviour, when i found all my endeavours to change his disposition unavailing, he formed an erroneous opinion of my character, imagining that, were we once more together, i should part with the money he could not legally force from me, with the same facility as formerly. my forbearance and occasional sympathy he had mistaken for weakness of character; and, because he perceived that i disliked resistance, he thought my indulgence and compassion mere selfishness, and never discovered that the fear of being unjust, or of unnecessarily wounding the feelings of another, was much more painful to me, than any thing i could have to endure myself. perhaps it was pride which made me imagine, that i could bear what i dreaded to inflict; and that it was often easier to suffer, than to see the sufferings of others. "i forgot to mention that, during this persecution, i received a letter from my uncle, informing me, 'that he only found relief from continual change of air; and that he intended to return when the spring was a little more advanced (it was now the middle of february), and then we would plan a journey to italy, leaving the fogs and cares of england far behind.' he approved of my conduct, promised to adopt my child, and seemed to have no doubt of obliging mr. venables to hear reason. he wrote to his friend, by the same post, desiring him to call on mr. venables in his name; and, in consequence of the remonstrances he dictated, i was permitted to lie-in tranquilly. "the two or three weeks previous, i had been allowed to rest in peace; but, so accustomed was i to pursuit and alarm, that i seldom closed my eyes without being haunted by mr. venables' image, who seemed to assume terrific or hateful forms to torment me, wherever i turned.--sometimes a wild cat, a roaring bull, or hideous assassin, whom i vainly attempted to fly; at others he was a demon, hurrying me to the brink of a precipice, plunging me into dark waves, or horrid gulfs; and i woke, in violent fits of trembling anxiety, to assure myself that it was all a dream, and to endeavour to lure my waking thoughts to wander to the delightful italian vales, i hoped soon to visit; or to picture some august ruins, where i reclined in fancy on a mouldering column, and escaped, in the contemplation of the heart-enlarging virtues of antiquity, from the turmoil of cares that had depressed all the daring purposes of my soul. but i was not long allowed to calm my mind by the exercise of my imagination; for the third day after your birth, my child, i was surprised by a visit from my elder brother; who came in the most abrupt manner, to inform me of the death of my uncle. he had left the greater part of his fortune to my child, appointing me its guardian; in short, every step was taken to enable me to be mistress of his fortune, without putting any part of it in mr. venables' power. my brother came to vent his rage on me, for having, as he expressed himself, 'deprived him, my uncle's eldest nephew, of his inheritance;' though my uncle's property, the fruit of his own exertion, being all in the funds, or on landed securities, there was not a shadow of justice in the charge. "as i sincerely loved my uncle, this intelligence brought on a fever, which i struggled to conquer with all the energy of my mind; for, in my desolate state, i had it very much at heart to suckle you, my poor babe. you seemed my only tie to life, a cherub, to whom i wished to be a father, as well as a mother; and the double duty appeared to me to produce a proportionate increase of affection. but the pleasure i felt, while sustaining you, snatched from the wreck of hope, was cruelly damped by melancholy reflections on my widowed state--widowed by the death of my uncle. of mr. venables i thought not, even when i thought of the felicity of loving your father, and how a mother's pleasure might be exalted, and her care softened by a husband's tenderness.--'ought to be!' i exclaimed; and i endeavoured to drive away the tenderness that suffocated me; but my spirits were weak, and the unbidden tears would flow. 'why was i,' i would ask thee, but thou didst not heed me,--'cut off from the participation of the sweetest pleasure of life?' i imagined with what extacy, after the pains of child-bed, i should have presented my little stranger, whom i had so long wished to view, to a respectable father, and with what maternal fondness i should have pressed them both to my heart!--now i kissed her with less delight, though with the most endearing compassion, poor helpless one! when i perceived a slight resemblance of him, to whom she owed her existence; or, if any gesture reminded me of him, even in his best days, my heart heaved, and i pressed the innocent to my bosom, as if to purify it--yes, i blushed to think that its purity had been sullied, by allowing such a man to be its father. "after my recovery, i began to think of taking a house in the country, or of making an excursion on the continent, to avoid mr. venables; and to open my heart to new pleasures and affection. the spring was melting into summer, and you, my little companion, began to smile--that smile made hope bud out afresh, assuring me the world was not a desert. your gestures were ever present to my fancy; and i dwelt on the joy i should feel when you would begin to walk and lisp. watching your wakening mind, and shielding from every rude blast my tender blossom, i recovered my spirits--i dreamed not of the frost--'the killing frost,' to which you were destined to be exposed.--but i lose all patience--and execrate the injustice of the world--folly! ignorance!--i should rather call it; but, shut up from a free circulation of thought, and always pondering on the same griefs, i writhe under the torturing apprehensions, which ought to excite only honest indignation, or active compassion; and would, could i view them as the natural consequence of things. but, born a woman--and born to suffer, in endeavouring to repress my own emotions, i feel more acutely the various ills my sex are fated to bear--i feel that the evils they are subject to endure, degrade them so far below their oppressors, as almost to justify their tyranny; leading at the same time superficial reasoners to term that weakness the cause, which is only the consequence of short-sighted despotism. footnotes: [ -a] the introduction of darnford as the deliverer of maria, in an early stage of the history, is already stated (chap. iii.) to have been an after-thought of the author. this has probably caused the imperfectness of the manuscript in the above passage; though, at the same time, it must be acknowledged to be somewhat uncertain, whether darnford is the stranger intended in this place. it appears from chap. xvii. that an interference of a more decisive nature was designed to be attributed to him. editor. chap. xiv. "as my mind grew calmer, the visions of italy again returned with their former glow of colouring; and i resolved on quitting the kingdom for a time, in search of the cheerfulness, that naturally results from a change of scene, unless we carry the barbed arrow with us, and only see what we feel. "during the period necessary to prepare for a long absence, i sent a supply to pay my father's debts, and settled my brothers in eligible situations; but my attention was not wholly engrossed by my family, though i do not think it necessary to enumerate the common exertions of humanity. the manner in which my uncle's property was settled, prevented me from making the addition to the fortune of my surviving sister, that i could have wished; but i had prevailed on him to bequeath her two thousand pounds, and she determined to marry a lover, to whom she had been some time attached. had it not been for this engagement, i should have invited her to accompany me in my tour; and i might have escaped the pit, so artfully dug in my path, when i was the least aware of danger. "i had thought of remaining in england, till i weaned my child; but this state of freedom was too peaceful to last, and i had soon reason to wish to hasten my departure. a friend of mr. venables, the same attorney who had accompanied him in several excursions to hunt me from my hiding places, waited on me to propose a reconciliation. on my refusal, he indirectly advised me to make over to my husband--for husband he would term him--the greater part of the property i had at command, menacing me with continual persecution unless i complied, and that, as a last resort, he would claim the child. i did not, though intimidated by the last insinuation, scruple to declare, that i would not allow him to squander the money left to me for far different purposes, but offered him five hundred pounds, if he would sign a bond not to torment me any more. my maternal anxiety made me thus appear to waver from my first determination, and probably suggested to him, or his diabolical agent, the infernal plot, which has succeeded but too well. "the bond was executed; still i was impatient to leave england. mischief hung in the air when we breathed the same; i wanted seas to divide us, and waters to roll between, till he had forgotten that i had the means of helping him through a new scheme. disturbed by the late occurrences, i instantly prepared for my departure. my only delay was waiting for a maid-servant, who spoke french fluently, and had been warmly recommended to me. a valet i was advised to hire, when i fixed on my place of residence for any time. "my god, with what a light heart did i set out for dover!--it was not my country, but my cares, that i was leaving behind. my heart seemed to bound with the wheels, or rather appeared the centre on which they twirled. i clasped you to my bosom, exclaiming 'and you will be safe--quite safe--when--we are once on board the packet.--would we were there!' i smiled at my idle fears, as the natural effect of continual alarm; and i scarcely owned to myself that i dreaded mr. venables's cunning, or was conscious of the horrid delight he would feel, at forming stratagem after stratagem to circumvent me. i was already in the snare--i never reached the packet--i never saw thee more.--i grow breathless. i have scarcely patience to write down the details. the maid--the plausible woman i had hired--put, doubtless, some stupifying potion in what i ate or drank, the morning i left town. all i know is, that she must have quitted the chaise, shameless wretch! and taken (from my breast) my babe with her. how could a creature in a female form see me caress thee, and steal thee from my arms! i must stop, stop to repress a mother's anguish; left, in bitterness of soul, i imprecate the wrath of heaven on this tiger, who tore my only comfort from me. "how long i slept i know not; certainly many hours, for i woke at the close of day, in a strange confusion of thought. i was probably roused to recollection by some one thundering at a huge, unwieldy gate. attempting to ask where i was, my voice died away, and i tried to raise it in vain, as i have done in a dream. i looked for my babe with affright; feared that it had fallen out of my lap, while i had so strangely forgotten her; and, such was the vague intoxication, i can give it no other name, in which i was plunged, i could not recollect when or where i last saw you; but i sighed, as if my heart wanted room to clear my head. "the gates opened heavily, and the sullen sound of many locks and bolts drawn back, grated on my very soul, before i was appalled by the creeking of the dismal hinges, as they closed after me. the gloomy pile was before me, half in ruins; some of the aged trees of the avenue were cut down, and left to rot where they fell; and as we approached some mouldering steps, a monstrous dog darted forwards to the length of his chain, and barked and growled infernally. "the door was opened slowly, and a murderous visage peeped out, with a lantern. 'hush!' he uttered, in a threatning tone, and the affrighted animal stole back to his kennel. the door of the chaise flew back, the stranger put down the lantern, and clasped his dreadful arms around me. it was certainly the effect of the soporific draught, for, instead of exerting my strength, i sunk without motion, though not without sense, on his shoulder, my limbs refusing to obey my will. i was carried up the steps into a close-shut hall. a candle flaring in the socket, scarcely dispersed the darkness, though it displayed to me the ferocious countenance of the wretch who held me. "he mounted a wide staircase. large figures painted on the walls seemed to start on me, and glaring eyes to meet me at every turn. entering a long gallery, a dismal shriek made me spring out of my conductor's arms, with i know not what mysterious emotion of terror; but i fell on the floor, unable to sustain myself. "a strange-looking female started out of one of the recesses, and observed me with more curiosity than interest; till, sternly bid retire, she flitted back like a shadow. other faces, strongly marked, or distorted, peeped through the half-opened doors, and i heard some incoherent sounds. i had no distinct idea where i could be--i looked on all sides, and almost doubted whether i was alive or dead. "thrown on a bed, i immediately sunk into insensibility again; and next day, gradually recovering the use of reason, i began, starting affrighted from the conviction, to discover where i was confined--i insisted on seeing the master of the mansion--i saw him--and perceived that i was buried alive.-- "such, my child, are the events of thy mother's life to this dreadful moment--should she ever escape from the fangs of her enemies, she will add the secrets of her prison-house--and--" some lines were here crossed out, and the memoirs broke off abruptly with the names of jemima and darnford. appendix. [advertisement. the performance, with a fragment of which the reader has now been presented, was designed to consist of three parts. the preceding sheets were considered as constituting one of those parts. those persons who in the perusal of the chapters, already written and in some degree finished by the author, have felt their hearts awakened, and their curiosity excited as to the sequel of the story, will, of course, gladly accept even of the broken paragraphs and half-finished sentences, which have been found committed to paper, as materials for the remainder. the fastidious and cold-hearted critic may perhaps feel himself repelled by the incoherent form in which they are presented. but an inquisitive temper willingly accepts the most imperfect and mutilated information, where better is not to be had: and readers, who in any degree resemble the author in her quick apprehension of sentiment, and of the pleasures and pains of imagination, will, i believe, find gratification, in contemplating sketches, which were designed in a short time to have received the finishing touches of her genius; but which must now for ever remain a mark to record the triumphs of mortality, over schemes of usefulness, and projects of public interest.] chap. xv. darnford returned the memoirs to maria, with a most affectionate letter, in which he reasoned on "the absurdity of the laws respecting matrimony, which, till divorces could be more easily obtained, was," he declared, "the most insufferable bondage. ties of this nature could not bind minds governed by superior principles; and such beings were privileged to act above the dictates of laws they had no voice in framing, if they had sufficient strength of mind to endure the natural consequence. in her case, to talk of duty, was a farce, excepting what was due to herself. delicacy, as well as reason, forbade her ever to think of returning to her husband: was she then to restrain her charming sensibility through mere prejudice? these arguments were not absolutely impartial, for he disdained to conceal, that, when he appealed to her reason, he felt that he had some interest in her heart.--the conviction was not more transporting, than sacred--a thousand times a day, he asked himself how he had merited such happiness?--and as often he determined to purify the heart she deigned to inhabit--he intreated to be again admitted to her presence." he was; and the tear which glistened in his eye, when he respectfully pressed her to his bosom, rendered him peculiarly dear to the unfortunate mother. grief had stilled the transports of love, only to render their mutual tenderness more touching. in former interviews, darnford had contrived, by a hundred little pretexts, to sit near her, to take her hand, or to meet her eyes--now it was all soothing affection, and esteem seemed to have rivalled love. he adverted to her narrative, and spoke with warmth of the oppression she had endured.--his eyes, glowing with a lambent flame, told her how much he wished to restore her to liberty and love; but he kissed her hand, as if it had been that of a saint; and spoke of the loss of her child, as if it had been his own.--what could have been more flattering to maria?--every instance of self-denial was registered in her heart, and she loved him, for loving her too well to give way to the transports of passion. they met again and again; and darnford declared, while passion suffused his cheeks, that he never before knew what it was to love.-- one morning jemima informed maria, that her master intended to wait on her, and speak to her without witnesses. he came, and brought a letter with him, pretending that he was ignorant of its contents, though he insisted on having it returned to him. it was from the attorney already mentioned, who informed her of the death of her child, and hinted, "that she could not now have a legitimate heir, and that, would she make over the half of her fortune during life, she should be conveyed to dover, and permitted to pursue her plan of travelling." maria answered with warmth, "that she had no terms to make with the murderer of her babe, nor would she purchase liberty at the price of her own respect." she began to expostulate with her jailor; but he sternly bade her "be silent--he had not gone so far, not to go further." darnford came in the evening. jemima was obliged to be absent, and she, as usual, locked the door on them, to prevent interruption or discovery.--the lovers were, at first, embarrassed; but fell insensibly into confidential discourse. darnford represented, "that they might soon be parted," and wished her "to put it out of the power of fate to separate them." as her husband she now received him, and he solemnly pledged himself as her protector--and eternal friend.-- there was one peculiarity in maria's mind: she was more anxious not to deceive, than to guard against deception; and had rather trust without sufficient reason, than be for ever the prey of doubt. besides, what are we, when the mind has, from reflection, a certain kind of elevation, which exalts the contemplation above the little concerns of prudence! we see what we wish, and make a world of our own--and, though reality may sometimes open a door to misery, yet the moments of happiness procured by the imagination, may, without a paradox, be reckoned among the solid comforts of life. maria now, imagining that she had found a being of celestial mould--was happy,--nor was she deceived.--he was then plastic in her impassioned hand--and reflected all the sentiments which animated and warmed her. -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- chap. xvi. one morning confusion seemed to reign in the house, and jemima came in terror, to inform maria, "that her master had left it, with a determination, she was assured (and too many circumstances corroborated the opinion, to leave a doubt of its truth) of never returning. i am prepared then," said jemima, "to accompany you in your flight." maria started up, her eyes darting towards the door, as if afraid that some one should fasten it on her for ever. jemima continued, "i have perhaps no right now to expect the performance of your promise; but on you it depends to reconcile me with the human race." "but darnford!"--exclaimed maria, mournfully--sitting down again, and crossing her arms--"i have no child to go to, and liberty has lost its sweets." "i am much mistaken, if darnford is not the cause of my master's flight--his keepers assure me, that they have promised to confine him two days longer, and then he will be free--you cannot see him; but they will give a letter to him the moment he is free.--in that inform him where he may find you in london; fix on some hotel. give me your clothes; i will send them out of the house with mine, and we will slip out at the garden-gate. write your letter while i make these arrangements, but lose no time!" in an agitation of spirit, not to be calmed, maria began to write to darnford. she called him by the sacred name of "husband," and bade him "hasten to her, to share her fortune, or she would return to him."--an hotel in the adelphi was the place of rendezvous. the letter was sealed and given in charge; and with light footsteps, yet terrified at the sound of them, she descended, scarcely breathing, and with an indistinct fear that she should never get out at the garden gate. jemima went first. a being, with a visage that would have suited one possessed by a devil, crossed the path, and seized maria by the arm. maria had no fear but of being detained--"who are you? what are you?" for the form was scarcely human. "if you are made of flesh and blood," his ghastly eyes glared on her, "do not stop me!" "woman," interrupted a sepulchral voice, "what have i to do with thee?"--still he grasped her hand, muttering a curse. "no, no; you have nothing to do with me," she exclaimed, "this is a moment of life and death!"-- with supernatural force she broke from him, and, throwing her arms round jemima, cried, "save me!" the being, from whose grasp she had loosed herself, took up a stone as they opened the door, and with a kind of hellish sport threw it after them. they were out of his reach. when maria arrived in town, she drove to the hotel already fixed on. but she could not sit still--her child was ever before her; and all that had passed during her confinement, appeared to be a dream. she went to the house in the suburbs, where, as she now discovered, her babe had been sent. the moment she entered, her heart grew sick; but she wondered not that it had proved its grave. she made the necessary enquiries, and the church-yard was pointed out, in which it rested under a turf. a little frock which the nurse's child wore (maria had made it herself) caught her eye. the nurse was glad to sell it for half-a-guinea, and maria hastened away with the relic, and, re-entering the hackney-coach which waited for her, gazed on it, till she reached her hotel. she then waited on the attorney who had made her uncle's will, and explained to him her situation. he readily advanced her some of the money which still remained in his hands, and promised to take the whole of the case into consideration. maria only wished to be permitted to remain in quiet--she found that several bills, apparently with her signature, had been presented to her agent, nor was she for a moment at a loss to guess by whom they had been forged; yet, equally averse to threaten or intreat, she requested her friend [the solicitor] to call on mr. venables. he was not to be found at home; but at length his agent, the attorney, offered a conditional promise to maria, to leave her in peace, as long as she behaved with propriety, if she would give up the notes. maria inconsiderately consented--darnford was arrived, and she wished to be only alive to love; she wished to forget the anguish she felt whenever she thought of her child. they took a ready furnished lodging together, for she was above disguise; jemima insisting on being considered as her house-keeper, and to receive the customary stipend. on no other terms would she remain with her friend. darnford was indefatigable in tracing the mysterious circumstances of his confinement. the cause was simply, that a relation, a very distant one, to whom he was heir, had died intestate, leaving a considerable fortune. on the news of darnford's arrival [in england, a person, intrusted with the management of the property, and who had the writings in his possession, determining, by one bold stroke, to strip darnford of the succession,] had planned his confinement; and [as soon as he had taken the measures he judged most conducive to his object, this ruffian, together with his instrument,] the keeper of the private mad-house, left the kingdom. darnford, who still pursued his enquiries, at last discovered that they had fixed their place of refuge at paris. maria and he determined therefore, with the faithful jemima, to visit that metropolis, and accordingly were preparing for the journey, when they were informed that mr. venables had commenced an action against darnford for seduction and adultery. the indignation maria felt cannot be explained; she repented of the forbearance she had exercised in giving up the notes. darnford could not put off his journey, without risking the loss of his property: maria therefore furnished him with money for his expedition; and determined to remain in london till the termination of this affair. she visited some ladies with whom she had formerly been intimate, but was refused admittance; and at the opera, or ranelagh, they could not recollect her. among these ladies there were some, not her most intimate acquaintance, who were generally supposed to avail themselves of the cloke of marriage, to conceal a mode of conduct, that would for ever have damned their fame, had they been innocent, seduced girls. these particularly stood aloof.--had she remained with her husband, practising insincerity, and neglecting her child to manage an intrigue, she would still have been visited and respected. if, instead of openly living with her lover, she could have condescended to call into play a thousand arts, which, degrading her own mind, might have allowed the people who were not deceived, to pretend to be so, she would have been caressed and treated like an honourable woman. "and brutus[ -a] is an honourable man!" said mark-antony with equal sincerity. with darnford she did not taste uninterrupted felicity; there was a volatility in his manner which often distressed her; but love gladdened the scene; besides, he was the most tender, sympathizing creature in the world. a fondness for the sex often gives an appearance of humanity to the behaviour of men, who have small pretensions to the reality; and they seem to love others, when they are only pursuing their own gratification. darnford appeared ever willing to avail himself of her taste and acquirements, while she endeavoured to profit by his decision of character, and to eradicate some of the romantic notions, which had taken root in her mind, while in adversity she had brooded over visions of unattainable bliss. the real affections of life, when they are allowed to burst forth, are buds pregnant with joy and all the sweet emotions of the soul; yet they branch out with wild ease, unlike the artificial forms of felicity, sketched by an imagination painful alive. the substantial happiness, which enlarges and civilizes the mind, may be compared to the pleasure experienced in roving through nature at large, inhaling the sweet gale natural to the clime; while the reveries of a feverish imagination continually sport themselves in gardens full of aromatic shrubs, which cloy while they delight, and weaken the sense of pleasure they gratify. the heaven of fancy, below or beyond the stars, in this life, or in those ever-smiling regions surrounded by the unmarked ocean of futurity, have an insipid uniformity which palls. poets have imagined scenes of bliss; but, fencing out sorrow, all the extatic emotions of the soul, and even its grandeur, seem to be equally excluded. we dose over the unruffled lake, and long to scale the rocks which fence the happy valley of contentment, though serpents hiss in the pathless desert, and danger lurks in the unexplored wiles. maria found herself more indulgent as she was happier, and discovered virtues, in characters she had before disregarded, while chasing the phantoms of elegance and excellence, which sported in the meteors that exhale in the marshes of misfortune. the heart is often shut by romance against social pleasure; and, fostering a sickly sensibility, grows callous to the soft touches of humanity. to part with darnford was indeed cruel.--it was to feel most painfully alone; but she rejoiced to think, that she should spare him the care and perplexity of the suit, and meet him again, all his own. marriage, as at present constituted, she considered as leading to immorality--yet, as the odium of society impedes usefulness, she wished to avow her affection to darnford, by becoming his wife according to established rules; not to be confounded with women who act from very different motives, though her conduct would be just the same without the ceremony as with it, and her expectations from him not less firm. the being summoned to defend herself from a charge which she was determined to plead guilty to, was still galling, as it roused bitter reflections on the situation of women in society. footnotes: [ -a] the name in the manuscript is by mistake written cæsar. editor. chap. xvii. such was her state of mind when the dogs of law were let loose on her. maria took the task of conducting darnford's defence upon herself. she instructed his counsel to plead guilty to the charge of adultery; but to deny that of seduction. the counsel for the plaintiff opened the cause, by observing, "that his client had ever been an indulgent husband, and had borne with several defects of temper, while he had nothing criminal to lay to the charge of his wife. but that she left his house without assigning any cause. he could not assert that she was then acquainted with the defendant; yet, when he was once endeavouring to bring her back to her home, this man put the peace-officers to flight, and took her he knew not whither. after the birth of her child, her conduct was so strange, and a melancholy malady having afflicted one of the family, which delicacy forbade the dwelling on, it was necessary to confine her. by some means the defendant enabled her to make her escape, and they had lived together, in despite of all sense of order and decorum. the adultery was allowed, it was not necessary to bring any witnesses to prove it; but the seduction, though highly probable from the circumstances which he had the honour to state, could not be so clearly proved.--it was of the most atrocious kind, as decency was set at defiance, and respect for reputation, which shows internal compunction, utterly disregarded." a strong sense of injustice had silenced every emotion, which a mixture of true and false delicacy might otherwise have excited in maria's bosom. she only felt in earnest to insist on the privilege of her nature. the sarcasms of society, and the condemnation of a mistaken world, were nothing to her, compared with acting contrary to those feelings which were the foundation of her principles. [she therefore eagerly put herself forward, instead of desiring to be absent, on this memorable occasion.] convinced that the subterfuges of the law were disgraceful, she wrote a paper, which she expressly desired might be read in court: "married when scarcely able to distinguish the nature of the engagement, i yet submitted to the rigid laws which enslave women, and obeyed the man whom i could no longer love. whether the duties of the state are reciprocal, i mean not to discuss; but i can prove repeated infidelities which i overlooked or pardoned. witnesses are not wanting to establish these facts. i at present maintain the child of a maid servant, sworn to him, and born after our marriage. i am ready to allow, that education and circumstances lead men to think and act with less delicacy, than the preservation of order in society demands from women; but surely i may without assumption declare, that, though i could excuse the birth, i could not the desertion of this unfortunate babe:--and, while i despised the man, it was not easy to venerate the husband. with proper restrictions however, i revere the institution which fraternizes the world. i exclaim against the laws which throw the whole weight of the yoke on the weaker shoulders, and force women, when they claim protectorship as mothers, to sign a contract, which renders them dependent on the caprice of the tyrant, whom choice or necessity has appointed to reign over them. various are the cases, in which a woman ought to separate herself from her husband; and mine, i may be allowed emphatically to insist, comes under the description of the most aggravated. "i will not enlarge on those provocations which only the individual can estimate; but will bring forward such charges only, the truth of which is an insult upon humanity. in order to promote certain destructive speculations, mr. venables prevailed on me to borrow certain sums of a wealthy relation; and, when i refused further compliance, he thought of bartering my person; and not only allowed opportunities to, but urged, a friend from whom he borrowed money, to seduce me. on the discovery of this act of atrocity, i determined to leave him, and in the most decided manner, for ever. i consider all obligation as made void by his conduct; and hold, that schisms which proceed from want of principles, can never be healed. "he received a fortune with me to the amount of five thousand pounds. on the death of my uncle, convinced that i could provide for my child, i destroyed the settlement of that fortune. i required none of my property to be returned to me, nor shall enumerate the sums extorted from me during six years that we lived together. "after leaving, what the law considers as my home, i was hunted like a criminal from place to place, though i contracted no debts, and demanded no maintenance--yet, as the laws sanction such proceeding, and make women the property of their husbands, i forbear to animadvert. after the birth of my daughter, and the death of my uncle, who left a very considerable property to myself and child, i was exposed to new persecution; and, because i had, before arriving at what is termed years of discretion, pledged my faith, i was treated by the world, as bound for ever to a man whose vices were notorious. yet what are the vices generally known, to the various miseries that a woman may be subject to, which, though deeply felt, eating into the soul, elude description, and may be glossed over! a false morality is even established, which makes all the virtue of women consist in chastity, submission, and the forgiveness of injuries. "i pardon my oppressor--bitterly as i lament the loss of my child, torn from me in the most violent manner. but nature revolts, and my soul sickens at the bare supposition, that it could ever be a duty to pretend affection, when a separation is necessary to prevent my feeling hourly aversion. "to force me to give my fortune, i was imprisoned--yes; in a private mad-house.--there, in the heart of misery, i met the man charged with seducing me. we became attached--i deemed, and ever shall deem, myself free. the death of my babe dissolved the only tie which subsisted between me and my, what is termed, lawful husband. "to this person, thus encountered, i voluntarily gave myself, never considering myself as any more bound to transgress the laws of moral purity, because the will of my husband might be pleaded in my excuse, than to transgress those laws to which [the policy of artificial society has] annexed [positive] punishments.----while no command of a husband can prevent a woman from suffering for certain crimes, she must be allowed to consult her conscience, and regulate her conduct, in some degree, by her own sense of right. the respect i owe to myself, demanded my strict adherence to my determination of never viewing mr. venables in the light of a husband, nor could it forbid me from encouraging another. if i am unfortunately united to an unprincipled man, am i for ever to be shut out from fulfilling the duties of a wife and mother?--i wish my country to approve of my conduct; but, if laws exist, made by the strong to oppress the weak, i appeal to my own sense of justice, and declare that i will not live with the individual, who has violated every moral obligation which binds man to man. "i protest equally against any charge being brought to criminate the man, whom i consider as my husband. i was six-and-twenty when i left mr. venables' roof; if ever i am to be supposed to arrive at an age to direct my own actions, i must by that time have arrived at it.--i acted with deliberation.--mr. darnford found me a forlorn and oppressed woman, and promised the protection women in the present state of society want.--but the man who now claims me--was he deprived of my society by this conduct? the question is an insult to common sense, considering where mr. darnford met me.--mr. venables' door was indeed open to me--nay, threats and intreaties were used to induce me to return; but why? was affection or honour the motive?--i cannot, it is true, dive into the recesses of the human heart--yet i presume to assert, [borne out as i am by a variety of circumstances,] that he was merely influenced by the most rapacious avarice. "i claim then a divorce, and the liberty of enjoying, free from molestation, the fortune left to me by a relation, who was well aware of the character of the man with whom i had to contend.--i appeal to the justice and humanity of the jury--a body of men, whose private judgment must be allowed to modify laws, that must be unjust, because definite rules can never apply to indefinite circumstances--and i deprecate punishment upon the man of my choice, freeing him, as i solemnly do, from the charge of seduction.] "i did not put myself into a situation to justify a charge of adultery, till i had, from conviction, shaken off the fetters which bound me to mr. venables.--while i lived with him, i defy the voice of calumny to sully what is termed the fair fame of woman.--neglected by my husband, i never encouraged a lover; and preserved with scrupulous care, what is termed my honour, at the expence of my peace, till he, who should have been its guardian, laid traps to ensnare me. from that moment i believed myself, in the sight of heaven, free--and no power on earth shall force me to renounce my resolution." the judge, in summing up the evidence, alluded to "the fallacy of letting women plead their feelings, as an excuse for the violation of the marriage-vow. for his part, he had always determined to oppose all innovation, and the new-fangled notions which incroached on the good old rules of conduct. we did not want french principles in public or private life--and, if women were allowed to plead their feelings, as an excuse or palliation of infidelity, it was opening a flood-gate for immorality. what virtuous woman thought of her feelings?--it was her duty to love and obey the man chosen by her parents and relations, who were qualified by their experience to judge better for her, than she could for herself. as to the charges brought against the husband, they were vague, supported by no witnesses, excepting that of imprisonment in a private mad-house. the proofs of an insanity in the family, might render that however a prudent measure; and indeed the conduct of the lady did not appear that of a person of sane mind. still such a mode of proceeding could not be justified, and might perhaps entitle the lady [in another court] to a sentence of separation from bed and board, during the joint lives of the parties; but he hoped that no englishman would legalize adultery, by enabling the adulteress to enrich her seducer. too many restrictions could not be thrown in the way of divorces, if we wished to maintain the sanctity of marriage; and, though they might bear a little hard on a few, very few individuals, it was evidently for the good of the whole." conclusion, by the editor. very few hints exist respecting the plan of the remainder of the work. i find only two detached sentences, and some scattered heads for the continuation of the story. i transcribe the whole. i. "darnford's letters were affectionate; but circumstances occasioned delays, and the miscarriage of some letters rendered the reception of wished-for answers doubtful: his return was necessary to calm maria's mind." ii. "as darnford had informed her that his business was settled, his delaying to return seemed extraordinary; but love to excess, excludes fear or suspicion." * * * * * the scattered heads for the continuation of the story, are as follow[ -a]. i. "trial for adultery--maria defends herself--a separation from bed and board is the consequence--her fortune is thrown into chancery--darnford obtains a part of his property--maria goes into the country." ii. "a prosecution for adultery commenced--trial--darnford sets out for france--letters--once more pregnant--he returns--mysterious behaviour--visit--expectation--discovery--interview--consequence." iii. "sued by her husband--damages awarded to him--separation from bed and board--darnford goes abroad--maria into the country--provides for her father--is shunned--returns to london--expects to see her lover--the rack of expectation--finds herself again with child--delighted--a discovery--a visit--a miscarriage--conclusion." iv. "divorced by her husband--her lover unfaithful--pregnancy--miscarriage--suicide." * * * * * [the following passage appears in some respects to deviate from the preceding hints. it is superscribed] "the end. "she swallowed the laudanum; her soul was calm--the tempest had subsided--and nothing remained but an eager longing to forget herself--to fly from the anguish she endured to escape from thought--from this hell of disappointment. "still her eyes closed not--one remembrance with frightful velocity followed another--all the incidents of her life were in arms, embodied to assail her, and prevent her sinking into the sleep of death.--her murdered child again appeared to her, mourning for the babe of which she was the tomb.--'and could it have a nobler?--surely it is better to die with me, than to enter on life without a mother's care!--i cannot live!--but could i have deserted my child the moment it was born?--thrown it on the troubled wave of life, without a hand to support it?'--she looked up: 'what have i not suffered!--may i find a father where i am going!'--her head turned; a stupor ensued; a faintness--'have a little patience,' said maria, holding her swimming head (she thought of her mother), 'this cannot last long; and what is a little bodily pain to the pangs i have endured?' "a new vision swam before her. jemima seemed to enter--leading a little creature, that, with tottering footsteps, approached the bed. the voice of jemima sounding as at a distance, called her--she tried to listen, to speak, to look! "'behold your child!' exclaimed jemima. maria started off the bed, and fainted.--violent vomiting followed. "when she was restored to life, jemima addressed her with great solemnity: '------ led me to suspect, that your husband and brother had deceived you, and secreted the child. i would not torment you with doubtful hopes, and i left you (at a fatal moment) to search for the child!--i snatched her from misery--and (now she is alive again) would you leave her alone in the world, to endure what i have endured?' "maria gazed wildly at her, her whole frame was convulsed with emotion; when the child, whom jemima had been tutoring all the journey, uttered the word 'mamma!' she caught her to her bosom, and burst into a passion of tears--then, resting the child gently on the bed, as if afraid of killing it,--she put her hand to her eyes, to conceal as it were the agonizing struggle of her soul. she remained silent for five minutes, crossing her arms over her bosom, and reclining her head,--then exclaimed: 'the conflict is over!--i will live for my child!'" * * * * * a few readers perhaps, in looking over these hints, will wonder how it could have been practicable, without tediousness, or remitting in any degree the interest of the story, to have filled, from these slight sketches, a number of pages, more considerable than those which have been already presented. but, in reality, these hints, simple as they are, are pregnant with passion and distress. it is the refuge of barren authors only, to crowd their fictions with so great a number of events, as to suffer no one of them to sink into the reader's mind. it is the province of true genius to develop events, to discover their capabilities, to ascertain the different passions and sentiments with which they are fraught, and to diversify them with incidents, that give reality to the picture, and take a hold upon the mind of a reader of taste, from which they can never be loosened. it was particularly the design of the author, in the present instance, to make her story subordinate to a great moral purpose, that "of exhibiting the misery and oppression, peculiar to women, that arise out of the partial laws and customs of society.--this view restrained her fancy[ -a]." it was necessary for her, to place in a striking point of view, evils that are too frequently overlooked, and to drag into light those details of oppression, of which the grosser and more insensible part of mankind make little account. the end. footnotes: [ -a] to understand these minutes, it is necessary the reader should consider each of them as setting out from the same point in the story, _viz._ the point to which it is brought down in the preceding chapter. [ -a] see author's preface. lessons. advertisement, by the editor. the following pages will, i believe, be judged by every reader of taste to have been worth preserving, among the other testimonies the author left behind her, of her genius and the soundness of her understanding. to such readers i leave the task of comparing these lessons, with other works of the same nature previously published. it is obvious that the author has struck out a path of her own, and by no means intrenched upon the plans of her predecessors. it may however excite surprise in some persons to find these papers annexed to the conclusion of a novel. all i have to offer on this subject, consists in the following considerations: first, something is to be allowed for the difficulty of arranging the miscellaneous papers upon very different subjects, which will frequently constitute an author's posthumous works. * * * * * secondly, the small portion they occupy in the present volume, will perhaps be accepted as an apology, by such good-natured readers (if any such there are), to whom the perusal of them shall be a matter of perfect indifference. * * * * * thirdly, the circumstance which determined me in annexing them to the present work, was the slight association (in default of a strong one) between the affectionate and pathetic manner in which maria venables addresses her infant, in the wrongs of woman; and the agonising and painful sentiment with which the author originally bequeathed these papers, as a legacy for the benefit of her child. lessons. _the first book of a series which i intended to have written for my unfortunate girl[ -a]._ lesson i. cat. dog. cow. horse. sheep. pig. bird. fly. man. boy. girl. child. head. hair. face. nose. mouth. chin. neck. arms. hand. leg. foot. back. breast. house. wall. field. street. stone. grass. bed. chair. door. pot. spoon. knife. fork. plate. cup. box. boy. bell. tree. leaf. stick. whip. cart. coach. frock. hat. coat. shoes. shift. cap. bread. milk. tea. meat. drink. cake. lesson ii. come. walk. run. go. jump. dance. ride. sit. stand. play. hold. shake. speak. sing. cry. laugh. call. fall. day. night. sun. moon. light. dark. sleep. wake. wash. dress. kiss. comb. fire. hot. burn. wind. rain. cold. hurt. tear. break. spill. book. see. look. sweet. good. clean. gone. lost. hide. keep. give. take. one. two. three. four. five. six. seven. eight. nine. ten. white. black. red. blue. green. brown. lesson iii. stroke the cat. play with the dog. eat the bread. drink the milk. hold the cup. lay down the knife. look at the fly. see the horse. shut the door. bring the chair. ring the bell. get your book. hide your face. wipe your nose. wash your hands. dirty hands. why do you cry? a clean mouth. shake hands. i love you. kiss me now. good girl. the bird sings. the fire burns. the cat jumps. the dog runs. the bird flies. the cow lies down. the man laughs. the child cries. lesson iv. let me comb your head. ask betty to wash your face. go and see for some bread. drink milk, if you are dry. play on the floor with the ball. do not touch the ink; you will black your hands. what do you want to say to me? speak slow, not so fast. did you fall? you will not cry, not you; the baby cries. will you walk in the fields? lesson v. come to me, my little girl. are you tired of playing? yes. sit down and rest yourself, while i talk to you. have you seen the baby? poor little thing. o here it comes. look at him. how helpless he is. four years ago you were as feeble as this very little boy. see, he cannot hold up his head. he is forced to lie on his back, if his mamma do not turn him to the right or left side, he will soon begin to cry. he cries to tell her, that he is tired with lying on his back. lesson vi. perhaps he is hungry. what shall we give him to eat? poor fellow, he cannot eat. look in his mouth, he has no teeth. how did you do when you were a baby like him? you cannot tell. do you want to know? look then at the dog, with her pretty puppy. you could not help yourself as well as the puppy. you could only open your mouth, when you were lying, like william, on my knee. so i put you to my breast, and you sucked, as the puppy sucks now, for there was milk enough for you. lesson vii. when you were hungry, you began to cry, because you could not speak. you were seven months without teeth, always sucking. but after you got one, you began to gnaw a crust of bread. it was not long before another came pop. at ten months you had four pretty white teeth, and you used to bite me. poor mamma! still i did not cry, because i am not a child, but you hurt me very much. so i said to papa, it is time the little girl should eat. she is not naughty, yet she hurts me. i have given her a crust of bread, and i must look for some other milk. the cow has got plenty, and her jumping calf eats grass very well. he has got more teeth than my little girl. yes, says papa, and he tapped you on the cheek, you are old enough to learn to eat? come to me, and i will teach you, my little dear, for you must not hurt poor mamma, who has given you her milk, when you could not take any thing else. lesson viii. you were then on the carpet, for you could not walk well. so when you were in a hurry, you used to run quick, quick, quick, on your hands and feet, like the dog. away you ran to papa, and putting both your arms round his leg, for your hands were not big enough, you looked up at him, and laughed. what did this laugh say, when you could not speak? cannot you guess by what you now say to papa?--ah! it was, play with me, papa!--play with me! papa began to smile, and you knew that the smile was always--yes. so you got a ball, and papa threw it along the floor--roll--roll--roll; and you ran after it again--and again. how pleased you were. look at william, he smiles; but you could laugh loud--ha! ha! ha!--papa laughed louder than the little girl, and rolled the ball still faster. then he put the ball on a chair, and you were forced to take hold of the back, and stand up to reach it. at last you reached too far, and down you fell: not indeed on your face, because you put out your hands. you were not much hurt; but the palms of your hands smarted with the pain, and you began to cry, like a little child. it is only very little children who cry when they are hurt; and it is to tell their mamma, that something is the matter with them. now you can come to me, and say, mamma, i have hurt myself. pray rub my hand: it smarts. put something on it, to make it well. a piece of rag, to stop the blood. you are not afraid of a little blood--not you. you scratched your arm with a pin: it bled a little; but it did you no harm. see, the skin is grown over it again. lesson ix. take care not to put pins in your mouth, because they will stick in your throat, and give you pain. oh! you cannot think what pain a pin would give you in your throat, should it remain there: but, if you by chance swallow it, i should be obliged to give you, every morning, something bitter to drink. you never tasted any thing so bitter! and you would grow very sick. i never put pins in my mouth; but i am older than you, and know how to take care of myself. my mamma took care of me, when i was a little girl, like you. she bade me never put any thing in my mouth, without asking her what it was. when you were a baby, with no more sense than william, you put every thing in your mouth to gnaw, to help your teeth to cut through the skin. look at the puppy, how he bites that piece of wood. william presses his gums against my finger. poor boy! he is so young, he does not know what he is doing. when you bite any thing, it is because you are hungry. lesson x. see how much taller you are than william. in four years you have learned to eat, to walk, to talk. why do you smile? you can do much more, you think: you can wash your hands and face. very well. i should never kiss a dirty face. and you can comb your head with the pretty comb you always put by in your own drawer. to be sure, you do all this to be ready to take a walk with me. you would be obliged to stay at home, if you could not comb your own hair. betty is busy getting the dinner ready, and only brushes william's hair, because he cannot do it for himself. betty is making an apple-pye. you love an apple-pye; but i do not bid you make one. your hands are not strong enough to mix the butter and flour together; and you must not try to pare the apples, because you cannot manage a great knife. never touch the large knives: they are very sharp, and you might cut your finger to the bone. you are a little girl, and ought to have a little knife. when you are as tall as i am, you shall have a knife as large as mine; and when you are as strong as i am, and have learned to manage it, you will not hurt yourself. you can trundle a hoop, you say; and jump over a stick. o, i forgot!--and march like the men in the red coats, when papa plays a pretty tune on the fiddle. lesson xi. what, you think that you shall soon be able to dress yourself entirely? i am glad of it: i have something else to do. you may go, and look for your frock in the drawer; but i will tie it, till you are stronger. betty will tie it, when i am busy. i button my gown myself: i do not want a maid to assist me, when i am dressing. but you have not yet got sense enough to do it properly, and must beg somebody to help you, till you are older. children grow older and wiser at the same time. william is not able to take a piece of meat, because he has not got the sense which would make him think that, without teeth, meat would do him harm. he cannot tell what is good for him. the sense of children grows with them. you know much more than william, now you walk alone, and talk; but you do not know as much as the boys and girls you see playing yonder, who are half as tall again as you; and they do not know half as much as their fathers and mothers, who are men and women grown. papa and i were children, like you; and men and women took care of us. i carry william, because he is too weak to walk. i lift you over a stile, and over the gutter, when you cannot jump over it. you know already, that potatoes will not do you any harm: but i must pluck the fruit for you, till you are wise enough to know the ripe apples and pears. the hard ones would make you sick, and then you must take physic. you do not love physic: i do not love it any more than you. but i have more sense than you; therefore i take care not to eat unripe fruit, or any thing else that would make my stomach ache, or bring out ugly red spots on my face. when i was a child, my mamma chose the fruit for me, to prevent my making myself sick. i was just like you; i used to ask for what i saw, without knowing whether it was good or bad. now i have lived a long time, i know what is good; i do not want any body to tell me. lesson xii. look at those two dogs. the old one brings the ball to me in a moment; the young one does not know how. he must be taught. i can cut your shift in a proper shape. you would not know how to begin. you would spoil it; but you will learn. john digs in the garden, and knows when to put the seed in the ground. you cannot tell whether it should be in the winter or summer. try to find it out. when do the trees put out their leaves? in the spring, you say, after the cold weather. fruit would not grow ripe without very warm weather. now i am sure you can guess why the summer is the season for fruit. papa knows that peas and beans are good for us to eat with our meat. you are glad when you see them; but if he did not think for you, and have the seed put in the ground, we should have no peas or beans. lesson xiii. poor child, she cannot do much for herself. when i let her do any thing for me, it is to please her: for i could do it better myself. oh! the poor puppy has tumbled off the stool. run and stroak him. put a little milk in a saucer to comfort him. you have more sense than he. you can pour the milk into the saucer without spilling it. he would cry for a day with hunger, without being able to get it. you are wiser than the dog, you must help him. the dog will love you for it, and run after you. i feed you and take care of you: you love me and follow me for it. when the book fell down on your foot, it gave you great pain. the poor dog felt the same pain just now. take care not to hurt him when you play with him. and every morning leave a little milk in your bason for him. do not forget to put the bason in a corner, lest somebody should fall over it. when the snow covers the ground, save the crumbs of bread for the birds. in the summer they find feed enough, and do not want you to think about them. i make broth for the poor man who is sick. a sick man is like a child, he cannot help himself. lesson x. when i caught cold some time ago, i had such a pain in my head, i could scarcely hold it up. papa opened the door very softly, because he loves me. you love me, yet you made a noise. you had not the sense to know that it made my head worse, till papa told you. papa had a pain in the stomach, and he would not eat the fine cherries or grapes on the table. when i brought him a cup of camomile tea, he drank it without saying a word, or making an ugly face. he knows that i love him, and that i would not give him any thing to drink that has a bad taste, if it were not to do him good. you asked me for some apples when your stomach ached; but i was not angry with you. if you had been as wise as papa, you would have said, i will not eat the apples to-day, i must take some camomile tea. you say that you do not know how to think. yes; you do a little. the other day papa was tired; he had been walking about all the morning. after dinner he fell asleep on the sopha. i did not bid you be quiet; but you thought of what papa said to you, when my head ached. this made you think that you ought not to make a noise, when papa was resting himself. so you came to me, and said to me, very softly, pray reach me my ball, and i will go and play in the garden, till papa wakes. you were going out; but thinking again, you came back to me on your tip-toes. whisper----whisper. pray mama, call me, when papa wakes; for i shall be afraid to open the door to see, lest i should disturb him. away you went.--creep--creep--and shut the door as softly as i could have done myself. that was thinking. when a child does wrong at first, she does not know any better. but, after she has been told that she must not disturb mama, when poor mama is unwell, she thinks herself, that she must not wake papa when he is tired. another day we will see if you can think about any thing else. the end. footnotes: [ -a] this title which is indorsed on the back of the manuscript, i conclude to have been written in a period of desperation, in the month of october, . editor. posthumous works of the author of a vindication of the rights of woman. in four volumes. * * * * * vol. iii. * * * * * _london:_ printed for j. johnson, no. , st. paul's church-yard; and g. g. and j. robinson, paternoster-row. . letters and miscellaneous pieces. in two volumes. vol. i. preface. the following letters may possibly be found to contain the finest examples of the language of sentiment and passion ever presented to the world. they bear a striking resemblance to the celebrated romance of werter, though the incidents to which they relate are of a very different cast. probably the readers to whom werter is incapable of affording pleasure, will receive no delight from the present publication. the editor apprehends that, in the judgment of those best qualified to decide upon the comparison, these letters will be admitted to have the superiority over the fiction of goethe. they are the offspring of a glowing imagination, and a heart penetrated with the passion it essays to describe. to the series of letters constituting the principal article in these two volumes, are added various pieces, none of which, it is hoped, will be found discreditable to the talents of the author. the slight fragment of letters on the management of infants, may be thought a trifle; but it seems to have some value, as presenting to us with vividness the intention of the writer on this important subject. the publication of a few select letters to mr. johnson, appeared to be at once a just monument to the sincerity of his friendship, and a valuable and interesting specimen of the mind of the writer. the letter on the present character of the french nation, the extract of the cave of fancy, a tale, and the hints for the second part of the rights of woman, may, i believe, safely be left to speak for themselves. the essay on poetry and our relish for the beauties of nature, appeared in the monthly magazine for april last, and is the only piece in this collection which has previously found its way to the press. letters. letter i. two o'clock. my dear love, after making my arrangements for our snug dinner to-day, i have been taken by storm, and obliged to promise to dine, at an early hour, with the miss ----s, the _only_ day they intend to pass here. i shall however leave the key in the door, and hope to find you at my fire-side when i return, about eight o'clock. will you not wait for poor joan?--whom you will find better, and till then think very affectionately of her. yours, truly, * * * * i am sitting down to dinner; so do not send an answer. * * * * * letter ii. past twelve o'clock, monday night. [august.] i obey an emotion of my heart, which made me think of wishing thee, my love, good-night! before i go to rest, with more tenderness than i can to-morrow, when writing a hasty line or two under colonel ----'s eye. you can scarcely imagine with what pleasure i anticipate the day, when we are to begin almost to live together; and you would smile to hear how many plans of employment i have in my head, now that i am confident my heart has found peace in your bosom.--cherish me with that dignified tenderness, which i have only found in you; and your own dear girl will try to keep under a quickness of feeling, that has sometimes given you pain--yes, i will be _good_, that i may deserve to be happy; and whilst you love me, i cannot again fall into the miserable state, which rendered life a burthen almost too heavy to be borne. but, good-night!--god bless you! sterne says, that is equal to a kiss--yet i would rather give you the kiss into the bargain, glowing with gratitude to heaven, and affection to you. i like the word affection, because it signifies something habitual; and we are soon to meet, to try whether we have mind enough to keep our hearts warm. * * * * i will be at the barrier a little after ten o'clock to-morrow[ -a].--yours-- * * * * * letter iii. wednesday morning. you have often called me, dear girl, but you would now say good, did you know how very attentive i have been to the ---- ever since i came to paris. i am not however going to trouble you with the account, because i like to see your eyes praise me; and, milton insinuates, that, during such recitals, there are interruptions, not ungrateful to the heart, when the honey that drops from the lips is not merely words. yet, i shall not (let me tell you before these people enter, to force me to huddle away my letter) be content with only a kiss of duty--you _must_ be glad to see me--because you are glad--or i will make love to the _shade_ of mirabeau, to whom my heart continually turned, whilst i was talking with madame ----, forcibly telling me, that it will ever have sufficient warmth to love, whether i will or not, sentiment, though i so highly respect principle.---- not that i think mirabeau utterly devoid of principles--far from it--and, if i had not begun to form a new theory respecting men, i should, in the vanity of my heart, have _imagined_ that _i_ could have made something of his----it was composed of such materials--hush! here they come--and love flies away in the twinkling of an eye, leaving a little brush of his wing on my pale cheeks. i hope to see dr. ---- this morning; i am going to mr. ----'s to meet him. ----, and some others, are invited to dine with us to-day; and to-morrow i am to spend the day with ----. i shall probably not be able to return to ---- to-morrow; but it is no matter, because i must take a carriage, i have so many books, that i immediately want, to take with me.--on friday then i shall expect you to dine with me--and, if you come a little before dinner, it is so long since i have seen you, you will not be scolded by yours affectionately * * * * * * * * * letter iv[ -a]. friday morning [september.] a man, whom a letter from mr. ----previously announced, called here yesterday for the payment of a draft; and, as he seemed disappointed at not finding you at home, i sent him to mr. ----. i have since seen him, and he tells me that he has settled the business. so much for business!--may i venture to talk a little longer about less weighty affairs?--how are you?--i have been following you all along the road this comfortless weather; for, when i am absent from those i love, my imagination is as lively, as if my senses had never been gratified by their presence--i was going to say caresses--and why should i not? i have found out that i have more mind than you, in one respect; because i can, without any violent effort of reason, find food for love in the same object, much longer than you can.--the way to my senses is through my heart; but, forgive me! i think there is sometimes a shorter cut to yours. with ninety-nine men out of a hundred, a very sufficient dash of folly is necessary to render a woman _piquante_, a soft word for desirable; and, beyond these casual ebullitions of sympathy, few look for enjoyment by fostering a passion in their hearts. one reason, in short, why i wish my whole sex to become wiser, is, that the foolish ones may not, by their pretty folly, rob those whose sensibility keeps down their vanity, of the few roses that afford them some solace in the thorny road of life. i do not know how i fell into these reflections, excepting one thought produced it--that these continual separations were necessary to warm your affection.--of late, we are always separating.--crack!--crack!--and away you go.--this joke wears the sallow cast of thought; for, though i began to write cheerfully, some melancholy tears have found their way into my eyes, that linger there, whilst a glow of tenderness at my heart whispers that you are one of the best creatures in the world.--pardon then the vagaries of a mind, that has been almost "crazed by care," as well as "crossed in hapless love," and bear with me a _little_ longer!--when we are settled in the country together, more duties will open before me, and my heart, which now, trembling into peace, is agitated by every emotion that awakens the remembrance of old griefs, will learn to rest on yours, with that dignity your character, not to talk of my own, demands. take care of yourself--and write soon to your own girl (you may add dear, if you please) who sincerely loves you, and will try to convince you of it, by becoming happier. * * * * * * * * * letter v. sunday night. i have just received your letter, and feel as if i could not go to bed tranquilly without saying a few words in reply--merely to tell you, that my mind is serene, and my heart affectionate. ever since you last saw me inclined to faint, i have felt some gentle twitches, which make me begin to think, that i am nourishing a creature who will soon be sensible of my care.--this thought has not only produced an overflowing of tenderness to you, but made me very attentive to calm my mind and take exercise, lest i should destroy an object, in whom we are to have a mutual interest, you know. yesterday--do not smile!--finding that i had hurt myself by lifting precipitately a large log of wood, i sat down in an agony, till i felt those said twitches again. are you very busy? -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- so you may reckon on its being finished soon, though not before you come home, unless you are detained longer than i now allow myself to believe you will.-- be that as it may, write to me, my best love, and bid me be patient--kindly--and the expressions of kindness will again beguile the time, as sweetly as they have done to-night.--tell me also over and over again, that your happiness (and you deserve to be happy!) is closely connected with mine, and i will try to dissipate, as they rise, the fumes of former discontent, that have too often clouded the sunshine, which you have endeavoured to diffuse through my mind. god bless you! take care of yourself, and remember with tenderness your affectionate * * * * i am going to rest very happy, and you have made me so.--this is the kindest good-night i can utter. * * * * * letter vi. friday morning. i am glad to find that other people can be unreasonable, as well as myself--for be it known to thee, that i answered thy _first_ letter, the very night it reached me (sunday), though thou couldst not receive it before wednesday, because it was not sent off till the next day.--there is a full, true, and particular account.-- yet i am not angry with thee, my love, for i think that it is a proof of stupidity, and likewise of a milk-and-water affection, which comes to the same thing, when the temper is governed by a square and compass.--there is nothing picturesque in this straight-lined equality, and the passions always give grace to the actions. recollection now makes my heart bound to thee; but, it is not to thy money-getting face, though i cannot be seriously displeased with the exertion which increases my esteem, or rather is what i should have expected from thy character.--no; i have thy honest countenance before me--pop--relaxed by tenderness; a little--little wounded by my whims; and thy eyes glistening with sympathy.--thy lips then feel softer than soft--and i rest my cheek on thine, forgetting all the world.--i have not left the hue of love out of the picture--the rosy glow; and fancy has spread it over my own cheeks, i believe, for i feel them burning, whilst a delicious tear trembles in my eye, that would be all your own, if a grateful emotion directed to the father of nature, who has made me thus alive to happiness, did not give more warmth to the sentiment it divides--i must pause a moment. need i tell you that i am tranquil after writing thus?--i do not know why, but i have more confidence in your affection, when absent, than present; nay, i think that you must love me, for, in the sincerity of my heart let me say it, i believe i deserve your tenderness, because i am true, and have a degree of sensibility that you can see and relish. yours sincerely * * * * * * * * * letter vii. sunday morning [december .] you seem to have taken up your abode at h----. pray sir! when do you think of coming home? or, to write very considerately, when will business permit you? i shall expect (as the country people say in england) that you will make a _power_ of money to indemnify me for your absence. -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- well! but, my love, to the old story--am i to see you this week, or this month?--i do not know what you are about--for, as you did not tell me, i would not ask mr. ----, who is generally pretty communicative. i long to see mrs. ------; not to hear from you, so do not give yourself airs, but to get a letter from mr. ----. and i am half angry with you for not informing me whether she had brought one with her or not.--on this score i will cork up some of the kind things that were ready to drop from my pen, which has never been dipt in gall when addressing you; or, will only suffer an exclamation--"the creature!" or a kind look, to escape me, when i pass the slippers--which i could not remove from my _salle_ door, though they are not the handsomest of their kind. be not too anxious to get money!--for nothing worth having is to be purchased. god bless you. yours affectionately * * * * * * * * * letter viii. monday night [december .] my best love, your letter to-night was particularly grateful to my heart, depressed by the letters i received by ----, for he brought me several, and the parcel of books directed to mr. ------ was for me. mr. ------'s letter was long and very affectionate; but the account he gives me of his own affairs, though he obviously makes the best of them, has vexed me. a melancholy letter from my sister ------ has also harrassed my mind--that from my brother would have given me sincere pleasure; but for -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- there is a spirit of independence in his letter, that will please you; and you shall see it, when we are once more over the fire together.--i think that you would hail him as a brother, with one of your tender looks, when your heart not only gives a lustre to your eye, but a dance of playfulness, that he would meet with a glow half made up of bashfulness, and a desire to please the----where shall i find a word to express the relationship which subsists between us?--shall i ask the little twitcher?--but i have dropt half the sentence that was to tell you how much he would be inclined to love the man loved by his sister. i have been fancying myself sitting between you, ever since i began to write, and my heart has leaped at the thought!--you see how i chat to you. i did not receive your letter till i came home; and i did not expect it, for the post came in much later than usual. it was a cordial to me--and i wanted one. mr. ---- tells me that he has written again and again.--love him a little!--it would be a kind of separation, if you did not love those i love. there was so much considerate tenderness in your epistle to-night, that, if it has not made you dearer to me, it has made me forcibly feel how very dear you are to me, by charming away half my cares. yours affectionately * * * * * * * * * letter ix. tuesday morning [december .] though i have just sent a letter off, yet, as captain ---- offers to take one, i am not willing to let him go without a kind greeting, because trifles of this sort, without having any effect on my mind, damp my spirits:--and you, with all your struggles to be manly, have some of this same sensibility.--do not bid it begone, for i love to see it striving to master your features; besides, these kind of sympathies are the life of affection: and why, in cultivating our understandings, should we try to dry up these springs of pleasure, which gush out to give a freshness to days browned by care! the books sent to me are such as we may read together; so i shall not look into them till you return; when you shall read, whilst i mend my stockings. yours truly * * * * * * * * * letter x. wednesday night [january .] as i have been, you tell me, three days without writing, i ought not to complain of two: yet, as i expected to receive a letter this afternoon, i am hurt; and why should i, by concealing it, affect the heroism i do not feel? i hate commerce. how differently must ------'s head and heart be organized from mine! you will tell me, that exertions are necessary: i am weary of them! the face of things, public and private, vexes me. the "peace" and clemency which seemed to be dawning a few days ago, disappear again. "i am fallen," as milton said, "on evil days;" for i really believe that europe will be in a state of convulsion, during half a century at least. life is but a labour of patience: it is always rolling a great stone up a hill; for, before a person can find a resting-place, imagining it is lodged, down it comes again, and all the work is to be done over anew! should i attempt to write any more, i could not change the strain. my head aches, and my heart is heavy. the world appears an "unweeded garden," where "things rank and vile" flourish best. if you do not return soon--or, which is no such mighty matter, talk of it--i will throw your slippers out at window, and be off--nobody knows where. * * * * finding that i was observed, i told the good women, the two mrs. ----s, simply that i was with child: and let them stare! and ------, and ------, nay, all the world, may know it for aught i care!--yet i wish to avoid ------'s coarse jokes. considering the care and anxiety a woman must have about a child before it comes into the world, it seems to me, by a _natural right_, to belong to her. when men get immersed in the world, they seem to lose all sensations, excepting those necessary to continue or produce life!--are these the privileges of reason? amongst the feathered race, whilst the hen keeps the young warm, her mate stays by to cheer her; but it is sufficient for man to condescend to get a child, in order to claim it.--a man is a tyrant! you may now tell me, that, if it were not for me, you would be laughing away with some honest fellows in l--n. the casual exercise of social sympathy would not be sufficient for me--i should not think such an heartless life worth preserving.--it is necessary to be in good-humour with you, to be pleased with the world. * * * * * thursday morning. i was very low-spirited last night, ready to quarrel with your cheerful temper, which makes absence easy to you.--and, why should i mince the the matter? i was offended at your not even mentioning it.--i do not want to be loved like a goddess; but i wish to be necessary to you. god bless you[ -a]! * * * * * letter xi. monday night. i have just received your kind and rational letter, and would fain hide my face, glowing with shame for my folly.--i would hide it in your bosom, if you would again open it to me, and nestle closely till you bade my fluttering heart be still, by saying that you forgave me. with eyes overflowing with tears, and in the humblest attitude, i intreat you.--do not turn from me, for indeed i love you fondly, and have been very wretched, since the night i was so cruelly hurt by thinking that you had no confidence in me---- it is time for me to grow more reasonable, a few more of these caprices of sensibility would destroy me. i have, in fact, been very much indisposed for a few days past, and the notion that i was tormenting, or perhaps killing, a poor little animal, about whom i am grown anxious and tender, now i feel it alive, made me worse. my bowels have been dreadfully disordered, and every thing i ate or drank disagreed with my stomach; still i feel intimations of its existence, though they have been fainter. do you think that the creature goes regularly to sleep? i am ready to ask as many questions as voltaire's man of forty crowns. ah! do not continue to be angry with me! you perceive that i am already smiling through my tears--you have lightened my heart, and my frozen spirits are melting into playfulness. write the moment you receive this. i shall count the minutes. but drop not an angry word--i cannot now bear it. yet, if you think i deserve a scolding (it does not admit of a question, i grant), wait till you come back--and then, if you are angry one day, i shall be sure of seeing you the next. ------ did not write to you, i suppose, because he talked of going to h----. hearing that i was ill, he called very kindly on me, not dreaming that it was some words that he incautiously let fall, which rendered me so. god bless you, my love; do not shut your heart against a return of tenderness; and, as i now in fancy cling to you, be more than ever my support.--feel but as affectionate when you read this letter, as i did writing it, and you will make happy, your * * * * * * * * * letter xii. wednesday morning. i will never, if i am not entirely cured of quarrelling, begin to encourage "quick-coming fancies," when we are separated. yesterday, my love, i could not open your letter for some time; and, though it was not half as severe as i merited, it threw me into such a fit of trembling, as seriously alarmed me. i did not, as you may suppose, care for a little pain on my own account; but all the fears which i have had for a few days past, returned with fresh force. this morning i am better; will you not be glad to hear it? you perceive that sorrow has almost made a child of me, and that i want to be soothed to peace. one thing you mistake in my character, and imagine that to be coldness which is just the contrary. for, when i am hurt by the person most dear to me, i must let out a whole torrent of emotions, in which tenderness would be uppermost, or stifle them altogether; and it appears to me almost a duty to stifle them, when i imagine _that i am treated with coldness_. i am afraid that i have vexed you, my own ----. i know the quickness of your feelings--and let me, in the sincerity of my heart, assure you, there is nothing i would not suffer to make you happy. my own happiness wholly depends on you--and, knowing you, when my reason is not clouded, i look forward to a rational prospect of as much felicity as the earth affords--with a little dash of rapture into the bargain, if you will look at me, when we meet again, as you have sometimes greeted, your humbled, yet most affectionate * * * * * * * * * letter xiii. thursday night. i have been wishing the time away, my kind love, unable to rest till i knew that my penitential letter had reached your hand--and this afternoon, when your tender epistle of tuesday gave such exquisite pleasure to your poor sick girl, her heart smote her to think that you were still to receive another cold one.--burn it also, my ----; yet do not forget that even those letters were full of love; and i shall ever recollect, that you did not wait to be mollified by my penitence, before you took me again to your heart. i have been unwell, and would not, now i am recovering, take a journey, because i have been seriously alarmed and angry with myself, dreading continually the fatal consequence of my folly.--but, should you think it right to remain at h--, i shall find some opportunity, in the course of a fortnight, or less perhaps, to come to you, and before then i shall be strong again.--yet do not be uneasy! i am really better, and never took such care of myself, as i have done since you restored my peace of mind. the girl is come to warm my bed--so i will tenderly say, good night! and write a line or two in the morning. morning. i wish you were here to walk with me this fine morning! yet your absence shall not prevent me. i have stayed at home too much; though, when i was so dreadfully out of spirits, i was careless of every thing. i will now sally forth (you will go with me in my heart) and try whether this fine bracing air will not give the vigour to the poor babe, it had, before i so inconsiderately gave way to the grief that deranged my bowels, and gave a turn to my whole system. yours truly * * * * * * * * * * * * * * letter xiv. saturday morning. the two or three letters, which i have written to you lately, my love, will serve as an answer to your explanatory one. i cannot but respect your motives and conduct. i always respected them; and was only hurt, by what seemed to me a want of confidence, and consequently affection.--i thought also, that if you were obliged to stay three months at h--, i might as well have been with you.--well! well, what signifies what i brooded over--let us now be friends! i shall probably receive a letter from you to-day, sealing my pardon--and i will be careful not to torment you with my querulous humours, at least, till i see you again. act as circumstances direct, and i will not enquire when they will permit you to return, convinced that you will hasten to your * * * *, when you have attained (or lost sight of) the object of your journey. what a picture have you sketched of our fire-side! yes, my love, my fancy was instantly at work, and i found my head on your shoulder, whilst my eyes were fixed on the little creatures that were clinging about your knees. i did not absolutely determine that there should be six--if you have not set your heart on this round number. i am going to dine with mrs. ----. i have not been to visit her since the first day she came to paris. i wish indeed to be out in the air as much as i can; for the exercise i have taken these two or three days past, has been of such service to me, that i hope shortly to tell you, that i am quite well. i have scarcely slept before last night, and then not much.--the two mrs. ------s have been very anxious and tender. yours truly * * * * i need not desire you to give the colonel a good bottle of wine. * * * * * letter xv. sunday morning. i wrote to you yesterday, my ----; but, finding that the colonel is still detained (for his passport was forgotten at the office yesterday) i am not willing to let so many days elapse without your hearing from me, after having talked of illness and apprehensions. i cannot boast of being quite recovered, yet i am (i must use my yorkshire phrase; for, when my heart is warm, pop come the expressions of childhood into my head) so _lightsome_, that i think it will not _go badly with me_.--and nothing shall be wanting on my part, i assure you; for i am urged on, not only by an enlivened affection for you, but by a new-born tenderness that plays cheerly round my dilating heart. i was therefore, in defiance of cold and dirt, out in the air the greater part of yesterday; and, if i get over this evening without a return of the fever that has tormented me, i shall talk no more of illness. i have promised the little creature, that its mother, who ought to cherish it, will not again plague it, and begged it to pardon me; and, since i could not hug either it or you to my breast, i have to my heart.--i am afraid to read over this prattle--but it is only for your eye. i have been seriously vexed, to find that, whilst you were harrassed by impediments in your undertakings, i was giving you additional uneasiness.--if you can make any of your plans answer--it is well, i do not think a _little_ money inconvenient; but, should they fail, we will struggle cheerfully together--drawn closer by the pinching blasts of poverty. adieu, my love! write often to your poor girl, and write long letters; for i not only like them for being longer, but because more heart steals into them; and i am happy to catch your heart whenever i can. yours sincerely * * * * * * * * * letter xvi. tuesday morning. i seize this opportunity to inform you, that i am to set out on thursday with mr. ------, and hope to tell you soon (on your lips) how glad i shall be to see you. i have just got my passport, so i do not foresee any impediment to my reaching h----, to bid you good-night next friday in my new apartment--where i am to meet you and love, in spite of care, to smile me to sleep--for i have not caught much rest since we parted. you have, by your tenderness and worth, twisted yourself more artfully round my heart, than i supposed possible.--let me indulge the thought, that i have thrown out some tendrils to cling to the elm by which i wish to be supported.--this is talking a new language for me!--but, knowing that i am not a parasite-plant, i am willing to receive the proofs of affection, that every pulse replies to, when i think of being once more in the same house with you.--god bless you! yours truly * * * * * * * * * letter xvii. wednesday morning. i only send this as an _avant-coureur_, without jack-boots, to tell you, that i am again on the wing, and hope to be with you a few hours after you receive it. i shall find you well, and composed, i am sure; or, more properly speaking, cheerful.--what is the reason that my spirits are not as manageable as yours? yet, now i think of it, i will not allow that your temper is even, though i have promised myself, in order to obtain my own forgiveness, that i will not ruffle it for a long, long time--i am afraid to say never. farewell for a moment!--do not forget that i am driving towards you in person! my mind, unfettered, has flown to you long since, or rather has never left you. i am well, and have no apprehension that i shall find the journey too fatiguing, when i follow the lead of my heart.--with my face turned to h--my spirits will not sink--and my mind has always hitherto enabled my body to do whatever i wished. yours affectionately * * * * * * * * * letter xviii. h--, thursday morning, march . we are such creatures of habit, my love, that, though i cannot say i was sorry, childishly so, for your going, when i knew that you were to stay such a short time, and i had a plan of employment; yet i could not sleep.--i turned to your side of the bed, and tried to make the most of the comfort of the pillow, which you used to tell me i was churlish about; but all would not do.--i took nevertheless my walk before breakfast, though the weather was not very inviting--and here i am, wishing you a finer day, and seeing you peep over my shoulder, as i write, with one of your kindest looks--when your eyes glisten, and a suffusion creeps over your relaxing features. but i do not mean to dally with you this morning--so god bless you! take care of yourself--and sometimes fold to your heart your affectionate * * * * * * * * * letter xix. do not call me stupid, for leaving on the table the little bit of paper i was to inclose.--this comes of being in love at the fag-end of a letter of business.--you know, you say, they will not chime together.--i had got you by the fire-side, with the _gigot_ smoking on the board, to lard your poor bare ribs--and behold, i closed my letter without taking the paper up, that was directly under my eyes!--what had i got in them to render me so blind?--i give you leave to answer the question, if you will not scold; for i am yours most affectionately * * * * * * * * * letter xx. sunday, august . -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- i have promised ------ to go with him to his country-house, where he is now permitted to dine--i, and the little darling, to be sure[ -a]--whom i cannot help kissing with more fondness, since you left us. i think i shall enjoy the fine prospect, and that it will rather enliven, than satiate my imagination. i have called on mrs. ------. she has the manners of a gentlewoman, with a dash of the easy french coquetry, which renders her _piquante_.--but _monsieur_ her husband, whom nature never dreamed of casting in either the mould of a gentleman or lover, makes but an aukward figure in the foreground of the picture. the h----s are very ugly, without doubt--and the house smelt of commerce from top to toe--so that his abortive attempt to display taste, only proved it to be one of the things not to be bought with gold. i was in a room a moment alone, and my attention was attracted by the _pendule_--a nymph was offering up her vows before a smoking altar, to a fat-bottomed cupid (saving your presence), who was kicking his heels in the air.--ah! kick on, thought i; for the demon of traffic will ever fright away the loves and graces, that streak with the rosy beams of infant fancy the _sombre_ day of life--whilst the imagination, not allowing us to see things as they are, enables us to catch a hasty draught of the running stream of delight, the thirst for which seems to be given only to tantalize us. but i am philosophizing; nay, perhaps you will call me severe, and bid me let the square-headed money-getters alone.--peace to them! though none of the social sprites (and there are not a few of different descriptions, who sport about the various inlets to my heart) gave me a twitch to restrain my pen. i have been writing on, expecting poor ------ to come; for, when i began, i merely thought of business; and, as this is the idea that most naturally associates with your image, i wonder i stumbled on any other. yet, as common life, in my opinion, is scarcely worth having, even with a _gigot_ every day, and a pudding added thereunto, i will allow you to cultivate my judgment, if you will permit me to keep alive the sentiments in your heart, which may be termed romantic, because, the offspring of the senses and the imagination, they resemble the mother more than the father[ -a], when they produce the suffusion i admire.--in spite of icy age, i hope still to see it, if you have not determined only to eat and drink, and be stupidly useful to the stupid-- yours * * * * * * * * * letter xxi. h--, august , tuesday. i received both your letters to-day--i had reckoned on hearing from you yesterday, therefore was disappointed, though i imputed your silence to the right cause. i intended answering your kind letter immediately, that you might have felt the pleasure it gave me; but ------ came in, and some other things interrupted me; so that the fine vapour has evaporated--yet, leaving a sweet scent behind, i have only to tell you, what is sufficiently obvious, that the earnest desire i have shown to keep my place, or gain more ground in your heart, is a sure proof how necessary your affection is to my happiness.--still i do not think it false delicacy, or foolish pride, to wish that your attention to my happiness should arise _as much_ from love, which is always rather a selfish passion, as reason--that is, i want you to promote my felicity, by seeking your own.--for, whatever pleasure it may give me to discover your generosity of soul, i would not be dependent for your affection on the very quality i most admire. no; there are qualities in your heart, which demand my affection; but, unless the attachment appears to me clearly mutual, i shall labour only to esteem your character, instead of cherishing a tenderness for your person. i write in a hurry, because the little one, who has been sleeping a long time, begins to call for me. poor thing! when i am sad, i lament that all my affections grow on me, till they become too strong for my peace, though they all afford me snatches of exquisite enjoyment--this for our little girl was at first very reasonable--more the effect of reason, a sense of duty, than feeling--now, she has got into my heart and imagination, and when i walk out without her, her little figure is ever dancing before me. you too have somehow clung round my heart--i found i could not eat my dinner in the great room--and, when i took up the large knife to carve for myself, tears rushed into my eyes.--do not however suppose that i am melancholy--for, when you are from me, i not only wonder how i can find fault with you--but how i can doubt your affection. i will not mix any comments on the inclosed (it roused my indignation) with the effusion of tenderness, with which i assure you, that you are the friend of my bosom, and the prop of my heart. * * * * * * * * * letter xxii. h--, august . i want to know what steps you have taken respecting ----. knavery always rouses my indignation--i should be gratified to hear that the law had chastised ------ severely; but i do not wish you to see him, because the business does not now admit of peaceful discussion, and i do not exactly know how you would express your contempt. pray ask some questions about tallien--i am still pleased with the dignity of his conduct.--the other day, in the cause of humanity, he made use of a degree of address, which i admire--and mean to point out to you, as one of the few instances of address which do credit to the abilities of the man, without taking away from that confidence in his openness of heart, which is the true basis of both public and private friendship. do not suppose that i mean to allude to a little reserve of temper in you, of which i have sometimes complained! you have been used to a cunning woman, and you almost look for cunning--nay, in _managing_ my happiness, you now and then wounded my sensibility, concealing yourself, till honest sympathy, giving you to me without disguise, lets me look into a heart, which my half-broken one wishes to creep into, to be revived and cherished.----you have frankness of heart, but not often exactly that overflowing (_épanchement de coeur_), which becoming almost childish, appears a weakness only to the weak. but i have left poor tallien. i wanted you to enquire likewise whether, as a member declared in the convention, robespierre really maintained a _number_ of mistresses.--should it prove so, i suspect that they rather flattered his vanity than his senses. here is a chatting, desultory epistle! but do not suppose that i mean to close it without mentioning the little damsel--who has been almost springing out of my arm--she certainly looks very like you--but i do not love her the less for that, whether i am angry or pleased with you.-- yours affectionately * * * * * * * * * letter xxiii[ -a]. september . i have just written two letters, that are going by other conveyances, and which i reckon on your receiving long before this. i therefore merely write, because i know i should be disappointed at seeing any one who had left you, if you did not send a letter, were it ever so short, to tell me why you did not write a longer--and you will want to be told, over and over again, that our little hercules is quite recovered. besides looking at me, there are three other things, which delight her--to ride in a coach, to look at a scarlet waistcoat, and hear loud music--yesterday, at the _fête_, she enjoyed the two latter; but, to honour j. j. rousseau, i intend to give her a sash, the first she has ever had round her--and why not?--for i have always been half in love with him. well, this you will say is trifling--shall i talk about alum or soap? there is nothing picturesque in your present pursuits; my imagination then rather chuses to ramble back to the barrier with you, or to see you coming to meet me, and my basket of grapes.--with what pleasure do i recollect your looks and words, when i have been sitting on the window, regarding the waving corn! believe me, sage sir, you have not sufficient respect for the imagination--i could prove to you in a trice that it is the mother of sentiment, the great distinction of our nature, the only purifier of the passions--animals have a portion of reason, and equal, if not more exquisite, senses; but no trace of imagination, or her offspring taste, appears in any of their actions. the impulse of the senses, passions, if you will, and the conclusions of reason, draw men together; but the imagination is the true fire, stolen from heaven, to animate this cold creature of clay, producing all those fine sympathies that lead to rapture, rendering men social by expanding their hearts, instead of leaving them leisure to calculate how many comforts society affords. if you call these observations romantic, a phrase in this place which would be tantamount to nonsensical, i shall be apt to retort, that you are embruted by trade, and the vulgar enjoyments of life--bring me then back your barrier-face, or you shall have nothing to say to my barrier-girl; and i shall fly from you, to cherish the remembrances that will ever be dear to me; for i am yours truly * * * * * * * * * letter xxiv. evening, sept. . i have been playing and laughing with the little girl so long, that i cannot take up my pen to address you without emotion. pressing her to my bosom, she looked so like you (_entre nous_, your best looks, for i do not admire your commercial face) every nerve seemed to vibrate to the touch, and i began to think that there was something in the assertion of man and wife being one--for you seemed to pervade my whole frame, quickening the beat of my heart, and lending me the sympathetic tears you excited. have i any thing more to say to you? no; not for the present--the rest is all flown away; and, indulging tenderness for you, i cannot now complain of some people here, who have ruffled my temper for two or three days past. * * * * * morning. yesterday b---- sent to me for my packet of letters. he called on me before; and i like him better than i did--that is, i have the same opinion of his understanding, but i think with you, he has more tenderness and real delicacy of feeling with respect to women, than are commonly to be met with. his manner too of speaking of his little girl, about the age of mine, interested me. i gave him a letter for my sister, and requested him to see her. i have been interrupted. mr. ----i suppose will write about business. public affairs i do not descant on, except to tell you that they write now with great freedom and truth, and this liberty of the press will overthrow the jacobins, i plainly perceive. i hope you take care of your health. i have got a habit of restlessness at night, which arises, i believe, from activity of mind; for, when i am alone, that is, not near one to whom i can open my heart, i sink into reveries and trains of thinking, which agitate and fatigue me. this is my third letter; when am i to hear from you? i need not tell you, i suppose, that i am now writing with somebody in the room with me, and ---- is waiting to carry this to mr. ----'s. i will then kiss the girl for you, and bid you adieu. i desired you, in one of my other letters, to bring back to me your barrier-face--or that you should not be loved by my barrier-girl. i know that you will love her more and more, for she is a little affectionate, intelligent creature, with as much vivacity, i should think, as you could wish for. i was going to tell you of two or three things which displease me here; but they are not of sufficient consequence to interrupt pleasing sensations. i have received a letter from mr. ----. i want you to bring ----with you. madame s---- is by me, reading a german translation of your letters--she desires me to give her love to you, on account of what you say of the negroes. yours most affectionately, * * * * * * * * * letter xxv. paris, sept. . i have written to you three or four letters; but different causes have prevented my sending them by the persons who promised to take or forward them. the inclosed is one i wrote to go by b----; yet, finding that he will not arrive, before i hope, and believe, you will have set out on your return, i inclose it to you, and shall give it in charge to ----, as mr. ---- is detained, to whom i also gave a letter. i cannot help being anxious to hear from you; but i shall not harrass you with accounts of inquietudes, or of cares that arise from peculiar circumstances.--i have had so many little plagues here, that i have almost lamented that i left h----. ----, who is at best a most helpless creature, is now, on account of her pregnancy, more trouble than use to me, so that i still continue to be almost a slave to the child.--she indeed rewards me, for she is a sweet little creature; for, setting aside a mother's fondness (which, by the bye, is growing on me, her little intelligent smiles sinking into my heart), she has an astonishing degree of sensibility and observation. the other day by b----'s child, a fine one, she looked like a little sprite.--she is all life and motion, and her eyes are not the eyes of a fool--i will swear. i slept at st. germain's, in the very room (if you have not forgot) in which you pressed me very tenderly to your heart.--i did not forget to fold my darling to mine, with sensations that are almost too sacred to be alluded to. adieu, my love! take care of yourself, if you wish to be the protector of your child, and the comfort of her mother. i have received, for you, letters from --------. i want to hear how that affair finishes, though i do not know whether i have most contempt for his folly or knavery. your own * * * * * * * * * letter xxvi. october . it is a heartless task to write letters, without knowing whether they will ever reach you.--i have given two to ----, who has been a-going, a-going, every day, for a week past; and three others, which were written in a low-spirited strain, a little querulous or so, i have not been able to forward by the opportunities that were mentioned to me. _tant mieux!_ you will say, and i will not say nay; for i should be sorry that the contents of a letter, when you are so far away, should damp the pleasure that the sight of it would afford--judging of your feelings by my own. i just now stumbled on one of the kind letters, which you wrote during your last absence. you are then a dear affectionate creature, and i will not plague you. the letter which you chance to receive, when the absence is so long, ought to bring only tears of tenderness, without any bitter alloy, into your eyes. after your return i hope indeed, that you will not be so immersed in business, as during the last three or four months past--for even money, taking into the account all the future comforts it is to procure, may be gained at too dear a rate, if painful impressions are left on the mind.--these impressions were much more lively, soon after you went away, than at present--for a thousand tender recollections efface the melancholy traces they left on my mind--and every emotion is on the same side as my reason, which always was on yours.--separated, it would be almost impious to dwell on real or imaginary imperfections of character.--i feel that i love you; and, if i cannot be happy with you, i will seek it no where else. my little darling grows every day more dear to me--and she often has a kiss, when we are alone together, which i give her for you, with all my heart. i have been interrupted--and must send off my letter. the liberty of the press will produce a great effect here--the _cry of blood will not be vain_!--some more monsters will perish--and the jacobins are conquered.--yet i almost fear the last slap of the tail of the beast. i have had several trifling teazing inconveniencies here, which i shall not now trouble you with a detail of.--i am sending ---- back; her pregnancy rendered her useless. the girl i have got has more vivacity, which is better for the child. i long to hear from you.--bring a copy of ---- and ---- with you. ---- is still here: he is a lost man.--he really loves his wife, and is anxious about his children; but his indiscriminate hospitality and social feelings have given him an inveterate habit of drinking, that destroys his health, as well as renders his person disgusting.--if his wife had more sense, or delicacy, she might restrain him: as it is, nothing will save him. yours most truly and affectionately * * * * * * * * * letter xxvii. october . my dear love, i began to wish so earnestly to hear from you, that the sight of your letters occasioned such pleasurable emotions, i was obliged to throw them aside till the little girl and i were alone together; and this said little girl, our darling, is become a most intelligent little creature, and as gay as a lark, and that in the morning too, which i do not find quite so convenient. i once told you, that the sensations before she was born, and when she is sucking, were pleasant; but they do not deserve to be compared to the emotions i feel, when she stops to smile upon me, or laughs outright on meeting me unexpectedly in the street, or after a short absence. she has now the advantage of having two good nurses, and i am at present able to discharge my duty to her, without being the slave of it. i have therefore employed and amused myself since i got rid of ----, and am making a progress in the language amongst other things. i have also made some new acquaintance. i have almost _charmed_ a judge of the tribunal, r----, who, though i should not have thought it possible, has humanity, if not _beaucoup d'esprit_. but let me tell you, if you do not make haste back, i shall be half in love with the author of the _marseillaise_, who is a handsome man, a little too broad-faced or so, and plays sweetly on the violin. what do you say to this threat?--why, _entre nous_, i like to give way to a sprightly vein, when writing to you, that is, when i am pleased with you. "the devil," you know, is proverbially said to be "in a good humour, when he is pleased." will you not then be a good boy, and come back quickly to play with your girls? but i shall not allow you to love the new-comer best. -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- my heart longs for your return, my love, and only looks for, and seeks happiness with you; yet do not imagine that i childishly wish you to come back, before you have arranged things in such a manner, that it will not be necessary for you to leave us soon again; or to make exertions which injure your constitution. yours most truly and tenderly * * * * p.s. "you would oblige me by delivering the inclosed to mr. ----, and pray call for an answer.--it is for a person uncomfortably situated. * * * * * letter xxviii. dec. . i have been, my love, for some days tormented by fears, that i would not allow to assume a form--i had been expecting you daily--and i heard that many vessels had been driven on shore during the late gale.--well, i now see your letter--and find that you are safe; i will not regret then that your exertions have hitherto been so unavailing. -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- be that as it may, return to me when you have arranged the other matters, which ---- has been crowding on you. i want to be sure that you are safe--and not separated from me by a sea that must be passed. for, feeling that i am happier than i ever was, do you wonder at my sometimes dreading that fate has not done persecuting me? come to me, my dearest friend, husband, father of my child!--all these fond ties glow at my heart at this moment, and dim my eyes.--with you an independence is desirable; and it is always within our reach, if affluence escapes us--without you the world again appears empty to me. but i am recurring to some of the melancholy thoughts that have flitted across my mind for some days past, and haunted my dreams. my little darling is indeed a sweet child; and i am sorry that you are not here, to see her little mind unfold itself. you talk of "dalliance;" but certainly no lover was ever more attached to his mistress, than she is to me. her eyes follow me every where, and by affection i have the most despotic power over her. she is all vivacity or softness--yes; i love her more than i thought i should. when i have been hurt at your stay, i have embraced her as my only comfort--when pleased with you, for looking and laughing like you; nay, i cannot, i find, long be angry with you, whilst i am kissing her for resembling you. but there would be no end to these details. fold us both to your heart; for i am truly and affectionately yours * * * * * * * * * letter xxix. december . -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- i do, my love, indeed sincerely sympathize with you in all your disappointments.--yet, knowing that you are well, and think of me with affection, i only lament other disappointments, because i am sorry that you should thus exert yourself in vain, and that you are kept from me. ------, i know, urges you to stay, and is continually branching out into new projects, because he has the idle desire to amass a large fortune, rather an immense one, merely to have the credit of having made it. but we who are governed by other motives, ought not to be led on by him. when we meet, we will discuss this subject--you will listen to reason, and it has probably occurred to you, that it will be better, in future, to pursue some sober plan, which may demand more time, and still enable you to arrive at the same end. it appears to me absurd to waste life in preparing to live. would it not now be possible to arrange your business in such a manner as to avoid the inquietudes, of which i have had my share since your departure? is it not possible to enter into business, as an employment necessary to keep the faculties awake, and (to sink a little in the expressions) the pot boiling, without suffering what must ever be considered as a secondary object, to engross the mind, and drive sentiment and affection out of the heart? i am in a hurry to give this letter to the person who has promised to forward it with ------'s. i wish then to counteract, in some measure, what he has doubtless recommended most warmly. stay, my friend, whilst it is _absolutely_ necessary.--i will give you no tenderer name, though it glows at my heart, unless you come the moment the settling the _present_ objects permit.--_i do not consent_ to your taking any other journey--or the little woman and i will be off, the lord knows where. but, as i had rather owe every thing to your affection, and, i may add, to your reason, (for this immoderate desire of wealth, which makes ------ so eager to have you remain, is contrary to your principles of action), i will not importune you.--i will only tell you, that i long to see you--and, being at peace with you, i shall be hurt, rather than made angry, by delays.--having suffered so much in life, do not be surprised if i sometimes, when left to myself, grow gloomy, and suppose that it was all a dream, and that my happiness is not to last. i say happiness, because remembrance retrenches all the dark shades of the picture. my little one begins to show her teeth, and use her legs--she wants you to bear your part in the nursing business, for i am fatigued with dancing her, and yet she is not satisfied--she wants you to thank her mother for taking such care of her, as you only can. yours truly * * * * * * * * * letter xxx. december . though i suppose you have later intelligence, yet, as ------ has just informed me that he has an opportunity of sending immediately to you, i take advantage of it to inclose you -- -- -- -- -- -- -- how i hate this crooked business! this intercourse with the world, which obliges one to see the worst side of human nature! why cannot you be content with the object you had first in view, when you entered into this wearisome labyrinth?--i know very well that you have imperceptibly been drawn on; yet why does one project, successful or abortive, only give place to two others? is it not sufficient to avoid poverty?--i am contented to do my part; and, even here, sufficient to escape from wretchedness is not difficult to obtain. and, let me tell you, i have my project also--and, if you do not soon return, the little girl and i will take care of ourselves; we will not accept any of your cold kindness--your distant civilities--no; not we. this is but half jesting, for i am really tormented by the desire which ------ manifests to have you remain where you are.--yet why do i talk to you?--if he can persuade you--let him!--for, if you are not happier with me, and your own wishes do not make you throw aside these eternal projects, i am above using any arguments, though reason as well as affection seems to offer them--if our affection be mutual, they will occur to you--and you will act accordingly. since my arrival here, i have found the german lady, of whom you have heard me speak. her first child died in the month; but she has another, about the age of my ------, a fine little creature. they are still but contriving to live----earning their daily bread--yet, though they are but just above poverty, i envy them.--she is a tender, affectionate mother--fatigued even by her attention.--however she has an affectionate husband in her turn, to render her care light, and to share her pleasure. i will own to you that, feeling extreme tenderness for my little girl, i grow sad very often when i am playing with her, that you are not here, to observe with me how her mind unfolds, and her little heart becomes attached!--these appear to me to be true pleasures--and still you suffer them to escape you, in search of what we may never enjoy.--it is your own maxim to "live in the present moment."--_if you do_--stay, for god's sake; but tell me the truth--if not, tell me when i may expect to see you, and let me not be always vainly looking for you, till i grow sick at heart. adieu! i am a little hurt.--i must take my darling to my bosom to comfort me. * * * * * * * * * letter xxxi. december . should you receive three or four of the letters at once which i have written lately, do not think of sir john brute, for i do not mean to wife you. i only take advantage of every occasion, that one out of three of my epistles may reach your hands, and inform you that i am not of ------'s opinion, who talks till he makes me angry, of the necessity of your staying two or three months longer. i do not like this life of continual inquietude--and, _entre nous_, i am determined to try to earn some money here myself, in order to convince you that, if you chuse to run about the world to get a fortune, it is for yourself--for the little girl and i will live without your assistance, unless you are with us. i may be termed proud--be it so--but i will never abandon certain principles of action. the common run of men have such an ignoble way of thinking, that, if they debauch their hearts, and prostitute their persons, following perhaps a gust of inebriation, they suppose the wife, slave rather, whom they maintain, has no right to complain, and ought to receive the sultan, whenever he deigns to return, with open arms, though his have been polluted by half an hundred promiscuous amours during his absence. i consider fidelity and constancy as two distinct things; yet the former is necessary, to give life to the other--and such a degree of respect do i think due to myself, that, if only probity, which is a good thing in its place, brings you back, never return!--for, if a wandering of the heart, or even a caprice of the imagination detains you--there is an end of all my hopes of happiness--i could not forgive it, if i would. i have gotten into a melancholy mood, you perceive. you know my opinion of men in general; you know that i think them systematic tyrants, and that it is the rarest thing in the world, to meet with a man with sufficient delicacy of feeling to govern desire. when i am thus sad, i lament that my little darling, fondly as i doat on her, is a girl.--i am sorry to have a tie to a world that for me is ever sown with thorns. you will call this an ill-humoured letter, when, in fact, it is the strongest proof of affection i can give, to dread to lose you. ------ has taken such pains to convince me that you must and ought to stay, that it has inconceivably depressed my spirits--you have always known my opinion--i have ever declared, that two people, who mean to live together, ought not to be long separated.--if certain things are more necessary to you than me--search for them--say but one word, and you shall never hear of me more.--if not--for god's sake, let us struggle with poverty--with any evil, but these continual inquietudes of business, which i have been told were to last but a few months, though every day the end appears more distant! this is the first letter in this strain that i have determined to forward to you; the rest lie by, because i was unwilling to give you pain, and i should not now write, if i did not think that there would be no conclusion to the schemes, which demand, as i am told, your presence. * * * *[ -a] * * * * * letter xxxii. january . i just now received one of your hasty _notes_; for business so entirely occupies you, that you have not time, or sufficient command of thought, to write letters. beware! you seem to be got into a whirl of projects and schemes, which are drawing you into a gulph, that, if it do not absorb your happiness, will infallibly destroy mine. fatigued during my youth by the most arduous struggles, not only to obtain independence, but to render myself useful, not merely pleasure, for which i had the most lively taste, i mean the simple pleasures that flow from passion and affection, escaped me, but the most melancholy views of life were impressed by a disappointed heart on my mind. since i knew you, i have been endeavouring to go back to my former nature, and have allowed some time to glide away, winged with the delight which only spontaneous enjoyment can give.--why have you so soon dissolved the charm? i am really unable to bear the continual inquietude which your and ------'s never-ending plans produce. this you may term want of firmness--but you are mistaken--i have still sufficient firmness to pursue my principle of action. the present misery, i cannot find a softer word to do justice to my feelings, appears to me unnecessary--and therefore i have not firmness to support it as you may think i ought. i should have been content, and still wish, to retire with you to a farm--my god! any thing, but these continual anxieties--any thing but commerce, which debases the mind, and roots out affection from the heart. i do not mean to complain of subordinate inconveniences----yet i will simply observe, that, led to expect you every week, i did not make the arrangements required by the present circumstances, to procure the necessaries of life. in order to have them, a servant, for that purpose only, is indispensible--the want of wood, has made me catch the most violent cold i ever had; and my head is so disturbed by continual coughing, that i am unable to write without stopping frequently to recollect myself.--this however is one of the common evils which must be borne with----bodily pain does not touch the heart, though it fatigues the spirits. still as you talk of your return, even in february, doubtingly, i have determined, the moment the weather changes, to wean my child.--it is too soon for her to begin to divide sorrow!--and as one has well said, "despair is a freeman," we will go and seek our fortune together. this is not a caprice of the moment--for your absence has given new weight to some conclusions, that i was very reluctantly forming before you left me.--i do not chuse to be a secondary object.--if your feelings were in unison with mine, you would not sacrifice so much to visionary prospects of future advantage. * * * * * * * * * letter xxxiii. jan. . i was just going to begin my letter with the fag end of a song, which would only have told you, what i may as well say simply, that it is pleasant to forgive those we love. i have received your two letters, dated the th and th of december, and my anger died away. you can scarcely conceive the effect some of your letters have produced on me. after longing to hear from you during a tedious interval of suspense, i have seen a superscription written by you.--promising myself pleasure, and feeling emotion, i have laid it by me, till the person who brought it, left the room--when, behold! on opening it, i have found only half a dozen hasty lines, that have damped all the rising affection of my soul. well, now for business-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- my animal is well; i have not yet taught her to eat, but nature is doing the business. i gave her a crust to assist the cutting of her teeth; and now she has two, she makes good use of them to gnaw a crust, biscuit, &c. you would laugh to see her; she is just like a little squirrel; she will guard a crust for two hours; and, after fixing her eye on an object for some time, dart on it with an aim as sure as a bird of prey--nothing can equal her life and spirits. i suffer from a cold; but it does not affect her. adieu! do not forget to love us--and come soon to tell us that you do. * * * * * * * * * letter xxxiv. jan. . from the purport of your last letters, i would suppose that this will scarcely reach you; and i have already written so many letters, that you have either not received, or neglected to acknowledge, i do not find it pleasant, or rather i have no inclination, to go over the same ground again. if you have received them, and are still detained by new projects, it is useless for me to say any more on the subject. i have done with it for ever--yet i ought to remind you that your pecuniary interest suffers by your absence. -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- for my part, my head is turned giddy, by only hearing of plans to make money, and my contemptuous feelings have sometimes burst out. i therefore was glad that a violent cold gave me a pretext to stay at home, lest i should have uttered unseasonable truths. my child is well, and the spring will perhaps restore me to myself.--i have endured many inconveniences this winter, which should i be ashamed to mention, if they had been unavoidable. "the secondary pleasures of life," you say, "are very necessary to my comfort:" it may be so; but i have ever considered them as secondary. if therefore you accuse me of wanting the resolution necessary to bear the _common_[ -a] evils of life; i should answer, that i have not fashioned my mind to sustain them, because i would avoid them, cost what it would---- adieu! * * * * * * * * * letter xxxv. february . the melancholy presentiment has for some time hung on my spirits, that we were parted for ever; and the letters i received this day, by mr. ----, convince me that it was not without foundation. you allude to some other letters, which i suppose have miscarried; for most of those i have got, were only a few hasty lines, calculated to wound the tenderness the sight of the superscriptions excited. i mean not however to complain; yet so many feelings are struggling for utterance, and agitating a heart almost bursting with anguish, that i find it very difficult to write with any degree of coherence. you left me indisposed, though you have taken no notice of it; and the most fatiguing journey i ever had, contributed to continue it. however, i recovered my health; but a neglected cold, and continual inquietude during the last two months, have reduced me to a state of weakness i never before experienced. those who did not know that the canker-worm was at work at the core, cautioned me about suckling my child too long.--god preserve this poor child, and render her happier than her mother! but i am wandering from my subject: indeed my head turns giddy, when i think that all the confidence i have had in the affection of others is come to this. i did not expect this blow from you. i have done my duty to you and my child; and if i am not to have any return of affection to reward me, i have the sad consolation of knowing that i deserved a better fate. my soul is weary--i am sick at heart; and, but for this little darling, i would cease to care about a life, which is now stripped of every charm. you see how stupid i am, uttering declamation, when i meant simply to tell you, that i consider your requesting me to come to you, as merely dictated by honour.--indeed, i scarcely understand you.--you request me to come, and then tell me, that you have not given up all thoughts of returning to this place. when i determined to live with you, i was only governed by affection.--i would share poverty with you, but i turn with affright from the sea of trouble on which you are entering.--i have certain principles of action: i know what i look for to found my happiness on.--it is not money.--with you i wished for sufficient to procure the comforts of life--as it is, less will do.--i can still exert myself to obtain the necessaries of life for my child, and she does not want more at present.--i have two or three plans in my head to earn our subsistence; for do not suppose that, neglected by you, i will lie under obligations of a pecuniary kind to you!--no; i would sooner submit to menial service.--i wanted the support of your affection--that gone, all is over!--i did not think, when i complained of ----'s contemptible avidity to accumulate money, that he would have dragged you into his schemes. i cannot write.--i inclose a fragment of a letter, written soon after your departure, and another which tenderness made me keep back when it was written.--you will see then the sentiments of a calmer, though not a more determined, moment.--do not insult me by saying, that "our being together is paramount to every other consideration!" were it, you would not be running after a bubble, at the expence of my peace of mind. perhaps this is the last letter you will ever receive from me. * * * * * * * * * letter xxxvi. feb. . you talk of "permanent views and future comfort"--not for me, for i am dead to hope. the inquietudes of the last winter have finished the business, and my heart is not only broken, but my constitution destroyed. i conceive myself in a galloping consumption, and the continual anxiety i feel at the thought of leaving my child, feeds the fever that nightly devours me. it is on her account that i again write to you, to conjure you, by all that you hold sacred, to leave her here with the german lady you may have heard me mention! she has a child of the same age, and they may be brought up together, as i wish her to be brought up. i shall write more fully on the subject. to facilitate this, i shall give up my present lodgings, and go into the same house. i can live much cheaper there, which is now become an object. i have had livres from ----, and i shall take one more, to pay my servant's wages, &c. and then i shall endeavour to procure what i want by my own exertions. i shall entirely give up the acquaintance of the americans. ---- and i have not been on good terms a long time. yesterday he very unmanlily exulted over me, on account of your determination to stay. i had provoked it, it is true, by some asperities against commerce, which have dropped from me, when we have argued about the propriety of your remaining where you are; and it is no matter, i have drunk too deep of the bitter cup to care about trifles. when you first entered into these plans, you bounded your views to the gaining of a thousand pounds. it was sufficient to have procured a farm in america, which would have been an independence. you find now that you did not know yourself, and that a certain situation in life is more necessary to you than you imagined--more necessary than an uncorrupted heart--for a year or two, you may procure yourself what you call pleasure; eating, drinking, and women; but, in the solitude of declining life, i shall be remembered with regret--i was going to say with remorse, but checked my pen. as i have never concealed the nature of my connection with you, your reputation will not suffer. i shall never have a confident: i am content with the approbation of my own mind; and, if there be a searcher of hearts, mine will not be despised. reading what you have written relative to the desertion of women, i have often wondered how theory and practice could be so different, till i recollected, that the sentiments of passion, and the resolves of reason, are very distinct. as to my sisters, as you are so continually hurried with business, you need not write to them--i shall, when my mind is calmer. god bless you! adieu! * * * * this has been such a period of barbarity and misery, i ought not to complain of having my share. i wish one moment that i had never heard of the cruelties that have been practised here, and the next envy the mothers who have been killed with their children. surely i had suffered enough in life, not to be cursed with a fondness, that burns up the vital stream i am imparting. you will think me mad: i would i were so, that i could forget my misery--so that my head or heart would be still.---- * * * * * letter xxxvii. feb. . when i first received your letter, putting off your return to an indefinite time, i felt so hurt, that i know not what i wrote. i am now calmer, though it was not the kind of wound over which time has the quickest effect; on the contrary, the more i think, the sadder i grow. society fatigues me inexpressibly--so much so, that finding fault with every one, i have only reason enough, to discover that the fault is in myself. my child alone interests me, and, but for her, i should not take any pains to recover my health. as it is, i shall wean her, and try if by that step (to which i feel a repugnance, for it is my only solace) i can get rid of my cough. physicians talk much of the danger attending any complaint on the lungs, after a woman has suckled for some months. they lay a stress also on the necessity of keeping the mind tranquil--and, my god! how has mine been harrassed! but whilst the caprices of other women are gratified, "the wind of heaven not suffered to visit them too rudely," i have not found a guardian angel, in heaven or on earth, to ward off sorrow or care from my bosom. what sacrifices have you not made for a woman you did not respect!--but i will not go over this ground--i want to tell you that i do not understand you. you say that you have not given up all thoughts of returning here--and i know that it will be necessary--nay, is. i cannot explain myself; but if you have not lost your memory, you will easily divine my meaning. what! is our life then only to be made up of separations? and am i only to return to a country, that has not merely lost all charms for me, but for which i feel a repugnance that almost amounts to horror, only to be left there a prey to it! why is it so necessary that i should return?--brought up here, my girl would be freer. indeed, expecting you to join us, i had formed some plans of usefulness that have now vanished with my hopes of happiness. in the bitterness of my heart, i could complain with reason, that i am left here dependent on a man, whose avidity to acquire a fortune has rendered him callous to every sentiment connected with social or affectionate emotions.--with a brutal insensibility, he cannot help displaying the pleasure your determination to stay gives him, in spite of the effect it is visible it has had on me. till i can earn money, i shall endeavour to borrow some, for i want to avoid asking him continually for the sum necessary to maintain me.--do not mistake me, i have never been refused.--yet i have gone half a dozen times to the house to ask for it, and come away without speaking----you must guess why--besides, i wish to avoid hearing of the eternal projects to which you have sacrificed my peace--not remembering--but i will be silent for ever.---- * * * * * letter xxxviii. april . here i am at h----, on the wing towards you, and i write now, only to tell you, that you may expect me in the course of three or four days; for i shall not attempt to give vent to the different emotions which agitate my heart--you may term a feeling, which appears to me to be a degree of delicacy that naturally arises from sensibility, pride--still i cannot indulge the very affectionate tenderness which glows in my bosom, without trembling, till i see, by your eyes, that it is mutual. i sit, lost in thought, looking at the sea--and tears rush into my eyes, when i find that i am cherishing any fond expectations.--i have indeed been so unhappy this winter, i find it as difficult to acquire fresh hopes, as to regain tranquillity.--enough of this--lie still, foolish heart!--but for the little girl, i could almost wish that it should cease to beat, to be no more alive to the anguish of disappointment. sweet little creature! i deprived myself of my only pleasure, when i weaned her, about ten days ago.--i am however glad i conquered my repugnance.--it was necessary it should be done soon, and i did not wish to embitter the renewal of your acquaintance with her, by putting it off till we met.--it was a painful exertion to me, and i thought it best to throw this inquietude with the rest, into the sack that i would fain throw over my shoulder.--i wished to endure it alone, in short--yet, after sending her to sleep in the next room for three or four nights, you cannot think with what joy i took her back again to sleep in my bosom! i suppose i shall find you, when i arrive, for i do not see any necessity for your coming to me.--pray inform mr. ------, that i have his little friend with me.--my wishing to oblige him, made me put myself to some inconvenience----and delay my departure; which was irksome to me, who have not quite as much philosophy, i would not for the world say indifference, as you. god bless you! yours truly, * * * * * * * * * letter xxxix. brighthelmstone, saturday, april . here we are, my love, and mean to set out early in the morning; and, if i can find you, i hope to dine with you to-morrow.--i shall drive to ------'s hotel, where ------ tells me you have been--and, if you have left it, i hope you will take care to be there to receive us. i have brought with me mr. ----'s little friend, and a girl whom i like to take care of our little darling--not on the way, for that fell to my share.--but why do i write about trifles?--or any thing?--are we not to meet soon?--what does your heart say! yours truly * * * * i have weaned my ------, and she is now eating away at the white bread. * * * * * letter xl. london, friday, may . i have just received your affectionate letter, and am distressed to think that i have added to your embarrassments at this troublesome juncture, when the exertion of all the faculties of your mind appears to be necessary, to extricate you out of your pecuniary difficulties. i suppose it was something relative to the circumstance you have mentioned, which made ------ request to see me to-day, to _converse about a matter of great importance_. be that as it may, his letter (such is the state of my spirits) inconceivably alarmed me, and rendered the last night as distressing, as the two former had been. i have laboured to calm my mind since you left me--still i find that tranquillity is not to be obtained by exertion; it is a feeling so different from the resignation of despair!--i am however no longer angry with you--nor will i ever utter another complaint--there are arguments which convince the reason, whilst they carry death to the heart.--we have had too many cruel explanations, that not only cloud every future prospect; but embitter the remembrances which alone give life to affection.--let the subject never be revived! it seems to me that i have not only lost the hope, but the power of being happy.--every emotion is now sharpened by anguish.--my soul has been shook, and my tone of feelings destroyed.--i have gone out--and sought for dissipation, if not amusement, merely to fatigue still more, i find, my irritable nerves---- my friend--my dear friend--examine yourself well--i am out of the question; for, alas! i am nothing--and discover what you wish to do--what will render you most comfortable--or, to be more explicit--whether you desire to live with me, or part for ever? when you can once ascertain it, tell me frankly, i conjure you!--for, believe me, i have very involuntarily interrupted your peace. i shall expect you to dinner on monday, and will endeavour to assume a cheerful face to greet you--at any rate i will avoid conversations, which only tend to harrass your feelings, because i am most affectionately yours, * * * * * * * * * letter xli. wednesday. i inclose you the letter, which you desired me to forward, and i am tempted very laconically to wish you a good morning--not because i am angry, or have nothing to say; but to keep down a wounded spirit.--i shall make every effort to calm my mind--yet a strong conviction seems to whirl round in the very centre of my brain, which, like the fiat of fate, emphatically assures me, that grief has a firm hold of my heart. god bless you! yours sincerely * * * * * * * * * letter xlii. --, wednesday, two o'clock. we arrived here about an hour ago. i am extremely fatigued with the child, who would not rest quiet with any body but me, during the night--and now we are here in a comfortless, damp room, in a sort of a tomb-like house. this however i shall quickly remedy, for, when i have finished this letter, (which i must do immediately, because the post goes out early), i shall sally forth, and enquire about a vessel and an inn. i will not distress you by talking of the depression of my spirits, or the struggle i had to keep alive my dying heart.--it is even now too full to allow me to write with composure.--*****,--dear *****, --am i always to be tossed about thus?--shall i never find an asylum to rest _contented_ in? how can you love to fly about continually--dropping down, as it were, in a new world--cold and strange!--every other day? why do you not attach those tender emotions round the idea of home, which even now dim my eyes?--this alone is affection--every thing else is only humanity, electrified by sympathy. i will write to you again to-morrow, when i know how long i am to be detained--and hope to get a letter quickly from you, to cheer yours sincerely and affectionately * * * * ------ is playing near me in high spirits. she was so pleased with the noise of the mail-horn, she has been continually imitating it.----adieu! * * * * * letter xliii. thursday. a lady has just sent to offer to take me to ------. i have then only a moment to exclaim against the vague manner in which people give information -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- but why talk of inconveniences, which are in fact trifling, when compared with the sinking of the heart i have felt! i did not intend to touch this painful string--god bless you! yours truly, * * * * * * * * * letter xliv. friday, june . i have just received yours dated the th, which i suppose was a mistake, for it could scarcely have loitered so long on the road. the general observations which apply to the state of your own mind, appear to me just, as far as they go; and i shall always consider it as one of the most serious misfortunes of my life, that i did not meet you, before satiety had rendered your senses so fastidious, as almost to close up every tender avenue of sentiment and affection that leads to your sympathetic heart. you have a heart, my friend, yet, hurried away by the impetuosity of inferior feelings, you have sought in vulgar excesses, for that gratification which only the heart can bestow. the common run of men, i know, with strong health and gross appetites, must have variety to banish _ennui_, because the imagination never lends its magic wand, to convert appetite into love, cemented by according reason.--ah! my friend, you know not the ineffable delight, the exquisite pleasure, which arises from a unison of affection and desire, when the whole soul and senses are abandoned to a lively imagination, that renders every emotion delicate and rapturous. yes; these are emotions, over which satiety has no power, and the recollection of which, even disappointment cannot disenchant; but they do not exist without self-denial. these emotions, more or less strong, appear to me to be the distinctive characteristic of genius, the foundation of taste, and of that exquisite relish for the beauties of nature, of which the common herd of eaters and drinkers and _child-begeters_, certainly have no idea. you will smile at an observation that has just occurred to me:--i consider those minds as the most strong and original, whose imagination acts as the stimulus to their senses. well! you will ask, what is the result of all this reasoning? why i cannot help thinking that it is possible for you, having great strength of mind, to return to nature, and regain a sanity of constitution, and purity of feeling--which would open your heart to me.--i would fain rest there! yet, convinced more than ever of the sincerity and tenderness of my attachment to you, the involuntary hopes, which a determination to live has revived, are not sufficiently strong to dissipate the cloud, that despair has spread over futurity. i have looked at the sea, and at my child, hardly daring to own to myself the secret wish, that it might become our tomb; and that the heart, still so alive to anguish, might there be quieted by death. at this moment ten thousand complicated sentiments press for utterance, weigh on my heart, and obscure my sight. are we ever to meet again? and will you endeavour to render that meeting happier than the last? will you endeavour to restrain your caprices, in order to give vigour to affection, and to give play to the checked sentiments that nature intended should expand your heart? i cannot indeed, without agony, think of your bosom's being continually contaminated; and bitter are the tears which exhaust my eyes, when i recollect why my child and i are forced to stray from the asylum, in which, after so many storms, i had hoped to rest, smiling at angry fate.--these are not common sorrows; nor can you perhaps conceive, how much active fortitude it requires to labour perpetually to blunt the shafts of disappointment. examine now yourself, and ascertain whether you can live in something-like a settled stile. let our confidence in future be unbounded; consider whether you find it necessary to sacrifice me to what you term "the zest of life;" and, when you have once a clear view of your own motives, of your own incentive to action, do not deceive me! the train of thoughts which the writing of this epistle awoke, makes me so wretched, that i must take a walk, to rouse and calm my mind. but first, let me tell you, that, if you really wish to promote my happiness, you will endeavour to give me as much as you can of yourself. you have great mental energy; and your judgment seems to me so just, that it is only the dupe of your inclination in discussing one subject. the post does not go out to-day. to-morrow i may write more tranquilly. i cannot yet say when the vessel will sail in which i have determined to depart. * * * * * saturday morning. your second letter reached me about an hour ago. you were certainly wrong, in supposing that i did not mention you with respect; though, without my being conscious of it, some sparks of resentment may have animated the gloom of despair--yes; with less affection, i should have been more respectful. however the regard which i have for you, is so unequivocal to myself, i imagine that it must be sufficiently obvious to every body else. besides, the only letter i intended for the public eye was to ----, and that i destroyed from delicacy before you saw them, because it was only written (of course warmly in your praise) to prevent any odium being thrown on you[ -a]. i am harrassed by your embarrassments, and shall certainly use all my efforts, to make the business terminate to your satisfaction in which i am engaged. my friend--my dearest friend--i feel my fate united to yours by the most sacred principles of my soul, and the yearns of--yes, i will say it--a true, unsophisticated heart. yours most truly * * * * if the wind be fair, the captain talks of sailing on monday; but i am afraid i shall be detained some days longer. at any rate, continue to write, (i want this support) till you are sure i am where i cannot expect a letter; and, if any should arrive after my departure, a gentleman (not mr. ----'s friend, i promise you) from whom i have received great civilities, will send them after me. do write by every occasion! i am anxious to hear how your affairs go on; and, still more, to be convinced that you are not separating yourself from us. for my little darling is calling papa, and adding her parrot word--come, come! and will you not come, and let us exert ourselves?--i shall recover all my energy, when i am convinced that my exertions will draw us more closely together. one more adieu! * * * * * letter xlv. sunday, june . i rather expected to hear from you to-day--i wish you would not fail to write to me for a little time, because i am not quite well--whether i have any good sleep or not, i wake in the morning in violent fits of trembling--and, in spite of all my efforts, the child--every thing--fatigues me, in which i seek for solace or amusement. mr. ---- forced on me a letter to a physician of this place; it was fortunate, for i should otherwise have had some difficulty to obtain the necessary information. his wife is a pretty woman (i can admire, you know, a pretty woman, when i am alone) and he an intelligent and rather interesting man.--they have behaved to me with great hospitality; and poor ------ was never so happy in her life, as amongst their young brood. they took me in their carriage to ------, and i ran over my favourite walks, with a vivacity that would have astonished you.--the town did not please me quite so well as formerly--it appeared so diminutive; and, when i found that many of the inhabitants had lived in the same houses ever since i left it, i could not help wondering how they could thus have vegetated, whilst i was running over a world of sorrow, snatching at pleasure, and throwing off prejudices. the place where i at present am, is much improved; but it is astonishing what strides aristocracy and fanaticism have made, since i resided in this country. the wind does not appear inclined to change, so i am still forced to linger--when do you think that you shall be able to set out for france? i do not entirely like the aspect of your affairs, and still less your connections on either side of the water. often do i sigh, when i think of your entanglements in business, and your extreme restlessness of mind.--even now i am almost afraid to ask you, whether the pleasure of being free, does not over-balance the pain you felt at parting with me? sometimes i indulge the hope that you will feel me necessary to you--or why should we meet again?--but, the moment after, despair damps my rising spirits, aggravated by the emotions of tenderness, which ought to soften the cares of life.----god bless you! yours sincerely and affectionately * * * * * * * * * letter xlvi. june . i want to know how you have settled with respect to ------. in short, be very particular in your account of all your affairs--let our confidence, my dear, be unbounded.--the last time we were separated, was a separation indeed on your part--now you have acted more ingenuously, let the most affectionate interchange of sentiments fill up the aching void of disappointment. i almost dread that your plans will prove abortive--yet should the most unlucky turn send you home to us, convinced that a true friend is a treasure, i should not much mind having to struggle with the world again. accuse me not of pride--yet sometimes, when nature has opened my heart to its author, i have wondered that you did not set a higher value on my heart. receive a kiss from ------, i was going to add, if you will not take one from me, and believe me yours sincerely * * * * the wind still continues in the same quarter. * * * * * letter xlvii. tuesday morning. the captain has just sent to inform me, that i must be on board in the course of a few hours.--i wished to have stayed till to-morrow. it would have been a comfort to me to have received another letter from you--should one arrive, it will be sent after me. my spirits are agitated, i scarcely know why----the quitting england seems to be a fresh parting.--surely you will not forget me.--a thousand weak forebodings assault my soul, and the state of my health renders me sensible to every thing. it is surprising that in london, in a continual conflict of mind, i was still growing better--whilst here, bowed down by the despotic hand of fate, forced into resignation by despair, i seem to be fading away--perishing beneath a cruel blight, that withers up all my faculties. the child is perfectly well. my hand seems unwilling to add adieu! i know not why this inexpressible sadness has taken possession of me.--it is not a presentiment of ill. yet, having been so perpetually the sport of disappointment,--having a heart that has been as it were a mark for misery, i dread to meet wretchedness in some new shape.--well, let it come--i care not!--what have i to dread, who have so little to hope for! god bless you--i am most affectionately and sincerely yours * * * * * * * * * letter xlviii. wednesday morning. i was hurried on board yesterday about three o'clock, the wind having changed. but before evening it veered round to the old point; and here we are, in the midst of mists and water, only taking advantage of the tide to advance a few miles. you will scarcely suppose that i left the town with reluctance--yet it was even so--for i wished to receive another letter from you, and i felt pain at parting, for ever perhaps, from the amiable family, who had treated me with so much hospitality and kindness. they will probably send me your letter, if it arrives this morning; for here we are likely to remain, i am afraid to think how long. the vessel is very commodious, and the captain a civil, open-hearted kind of man. there being no other passengers, i have the cabin to myself, which is pleasant; and i have brought a few books with me to beguile weariness; but i seem inclined, rather to employ the dead moments of suspence in writing some effusions, than in reading. what are you about? how are your affairs going on? it may be a long time before you answer these questions. my dear friend, my heart sinks within me!--why am i forced thus to struggle continually with my affections and feelings?--ah! why are those affections and feelings the source of so much misery, when they seem to have been given to vivify my heart, and extend my usefulness! but i must not dwell on this subject.--will you not endeavour to cherish all the affection you can for me? what am i saying?--rather forget me, if you can--if other gratifications are dearer to you.--how is every remembrance of mine embittered by disappointment? what a world is this!--they only seem happy, who never look beyond sensual or artificial enjoyments.--adieu! ------ begins to play with the cabin-boy, and is as gay as a lark.--i will labour to be tranquil; and am in every mood, yours sincerely * * * * * * * * * letter xlix. thursday. here i am still--and i have just received your letter of monday by the pilot, who promised to bring it to me, if we were detained, as he expected, by the wind.--it is indeed wearisome to be thus tossed about without going forward.--i have a violent head-ache--yet i am obliged to take care of the child, who is a little tormented by her teeth, because ------ is unable to do any thing, she is rendered so sick by the motion of the ship, as we ride at anchor. these are however trifling inconveniences, compared with anguish of mind--compared with the sinking of a broken heart.--to tell you the truth, i never suffered in my life so much from depression of spirits--from despair.--i do not sleep--or, if i close my eyes, it is to have the most terrifying dreams, in which i often meet you with different casts of countenance. i will not, my dear ------, torment you by dwelling on my sufferings--and will use all my efforts to calm my mind, instead of deadening it--at present it is most painfully active. i find i am not equal to these continual struggles--yet your letter this morning has afforded me some comfort--and i will try to revive hope. one thing let me tell you--when we meet again--surely we are to meet!--it must be to part no more. i mean not to have seas between us--it is more than i can support. the pilot is hurrying me--god bless you. in spite of the commodiousness of the vessel, every thing here would disgust my senses, had i nothing else to think of--"when the mind's free, the body's delicate;"--mine has been too much hurt to regard trifles. yours most truly * * * * * * * * * letter l. saturday. this is the fifth dreary day i have been imprisoned by the wind, with every outward object to disgust the senses, and unable to banish the remembrances that sadden my heart. how am i altered by disappointment!--when going to ----, ten years ago, the elasticity of my mind was sufficient to ward off weariness--and the imagination still could dip her brush in the rainbow of fancy, and sketch futurity in smiling colours. now i am going towards the north in search of sunbeams!--will any ever warm this desolated heart? all nature seems to frown--or rather mourn with me.--every thing is cold--cold as my expectations! before i left the shore, tormented, as i now am, by these north east _chillers_, i could not help exclaiming--give me, gracious heaven! at least, genial weather, if i am never to meet the genial affection that still warms this agitated bosom--compelling life to linger there. i am now going on shore with the captain, though the weather be rough, to seek for milk, &c. at a little village, and to take a walk--after which i hope to sleep--for, confined here, surrounded by disagreeable smells, i have lost the little appetite i had; and i lie awake, till thinking almost drives me to the brink of madness--only to the brink, for i never forget, even in the feverish slumbers i sometimes fall into, the misery i am labouring to blunt the the sense of, by every exertion in my power. poor ------ still continues sick, and ------ grows weary when the weather will not allow her to remain on deck. i hope this will be the last letter i shall write from england to you--are you not tired of this lingering adieu? yours truly * * * * * * * * * letter li. sunday morning. the captain last night, after i had written my letter to you intended to be left at a little village, offered to go to ---- to pass to-day. we had a troublesome sail--and now i must hurry on board again, for the wind has changed. i half expected to find a letter from you here. had you written one haphazard, it would have been kind and considerate--you might have known, had you thought, that the wind would not permit me to depart. these are attentions, more grateful to the heart than offers of service--but why do i foolishly continue to look for them? adieu! adieu! my friend--your friendship is very cold--you see i am hurt.--god bless you! i may perhaps be, some time or other, independent in every sense of the word--ah! there is but one sense of it of consequence. i will break or bend this weak heart--yet even now it is full. yours sincerely * * * * the child is well; i did not leave her on board. * * * * * letter lii. june , saturday. i arrived in ------ this afternoon, after vainly attempting to land at ----. i have now but a moment, before the post goes out, to inform you we have got here; though not without considerable difficulty, for we were set ashore in a boat above twenty miles below. what i suffered in the vessel i will not now descant upon--nor mention the pleasure i received from the sight of the rocky coast.--this morning however, walking to join the carriage that was to transport us to this place, i fell, without any previous warning, senseless on the rocks--and how i escaped with life i can scarcely guess. i was in a stupour for a quarter of an hour; the suffusion of blood at last restored me to my senses--the contusion is great, and my brain confused. the child is well. twenty miles ride in the rain, after my accident, has sufficiently deranged me--and here i could not get a fire to warm me, or any thing warm to eat; the inns are mere stables--i must nevertheless go to bed. for god's sake, let me hear from you immediately, my friend! i am not well and yet you see i cannot die. yours sincerely * * * * * * * * * letter liii. june . i wrote to you by the last post, to inform you of my arrival; and i believe i alluded to the extreme fatigue i endured on ship-board, owing to ------'s illness, and the roughness of the weather--i likewise mentioned to you my fall, the effects of which i still feel, though i do not think it will have any serious consequences. ------ will go with me, if i find it necessary to go to ------. the inns here are so bad, i was forced to accept of an apartment in his house. i am overwhelmed with civilities on all sides, and fatigued with the endeavours to amuse me, from which i cannot escape. my friend--my friend, i am not well--a deadly weight of sorrow lies heavily on my heart. i am again tossed on the troubled billows of life; and obliged to cope with difficulties, without being buoyed up by the hopes that alone render them bearable. "how flat, dull, and unprofitable," appears to me all the bustle into which i see people here so eagerly enter! i long every night to go to bed, to hide my melancholy face in my pillow; but there is a canker-worm in my bosom that never sleeps. * * * * * * * * * letter liv. july . i labour in vain to calm my mind--my soul has been overwhelmed by sorrow and disappointment. every thing fatigues me--this is a life that cannot last long. it is you who must determine with respect to futurity--and, when you have, i will act accordingly--i mean, we must either resolve to live together, or part for ever, i cannot bear these continual struggles--but i wish you to examine carefully your own heart and mind; and, if you perceive the least chance of being happier without me than with me, or if your inclination leans capriciously to that side, do not dissemble; but tell me frankly that you will never see me more. i will then adopt the plan i mentioned to you--for we must either live together, or i will be entirely independent. my heart is so oppressed, i cannot write with precision--you know however that what i so imperfectly express, are not the crude sentiments of the moment--you can only contribute to my comfort (it is the consolation i am in need of) by being with me--and, if the tenderest friendship is of any value, why will you not look to me for a degree of satisfaction that heartless affections cannot bestow? tell me then, will you determine to meet me at basle?--i shall, i should imagine, be at ------ before the close of august; and, after you settle your affairs at paris, could we not meet there? god bless you! yours truly * * * * poor ------ has suffered during the journey with her teeth. * * * * * letter lv. july . there was a gloominess diffused through your last letter, the impression of which still rests on my mind--though, recollecting how quickly you throw off the forcible feelings of the moment, i flatter myself it has long since given place to your usual cheerfulness. believe me (and my eyes fill with tears of tenderness as i assure you) there is nothing i would not endure in the way of privation, rather than disturb your tranquillity.--if i am fated to be unhappy, i will labour to hide my sorrows in my own bosom; and you shall always find me a faithful, affectionate friend. i grow more and more attached to my little girl--and i cherish this affection without fear, because it must be a long time before it can become bitterness of soul.--she is an interesting creature.--on ship-board, how often as i gazed at the sea, have i longed to bury my troubled bosom in the less troubled deep; asserting with brutus, "that the virtue i had followed too far, was merely an empty name!" and nothing but the sight of her--her playful smiles, which seemed to cling and twine round my heart--could have stopped me. what peculiar misery has fallen to my share! to act up to my principles, i have laid the strictest restraint on my very thoughts--yes; not to sully the delicacy of my feelings, i have reined in my imagination; and started with affright from every sensation, (i allude to ----) that stealing with balmy sweetness into my soul, led me to scent from afar the fragrance of reviving nature. my friend, i have dearly paid for one conviction.--love, in some minds, is an affair of sentiment, arising from the same delicacy of perception (or taste) as renders them alive to the beauties of nature, poetry, &c, alive to the charms of those evanescent graces that are, as it were, impalpable--they must be felt, they cannot be described. love is a want of my heart. i have examined myself lately with more care than formerly, and find, that to deaden is not to calm the mind--aiming at tranquillity, i have almost destroyed all the energy of my soul--almost rooted out what renders it estimable--yes, i have damped that enthusiasm of character, which converts the grossest materials into a fuel, that imperceptibly feeds hopes, which aspire above common enjoyment. despair, since the birth of my child, has rendered me stupid--soul and body seemed to be fading away before the withering touch of disappointment. i am now endeavouring to recover myself--and such is the elasticity of my constitution, and the purity of the atmosphere here, that health unsought for, begins to reanimate my countenance. i have the sincerest esteem and affection for you--but the desire of regaining peace, (do you understand me?) has made me forget the respect due to my own emotions--sacred emotions, that are the sure harbingers of the delights i was formed to enjoy--and shall enjoy, for nothing can extinguish the heavenly spark. still, when we meet again, i will not torment you, i promise you. i blush when i recollect my former conduct--and will not in future confound myself with the beings whom i feel to be my inferiors.--i will listen to delicacy, or pride. * * * * * letter lvi. july . i hope to hear from you by to-morrow's mail. my dearest friend! i cannot tear my affections from you--and, though every remembrance stings me to the soul, i think of you, till i make allowance for the very defects of character, that have given such a cruel stab to my peace. still however i am more alive, than you have seen me for a long, long time. i have a degree of vivacity, even in my grief, which is preferable to the benumbing stupour that, for the last year, has frozen up all my faculties.--perhaps this change is more owing to returning health, than to the vigour of my reason--for, in spite of sadness (and surely i have had my share), the purity of this air, and the being continually out in it, for i sleep in the country every night, has made an alteration in my appearance that really surprises me.--the rosy fingers of health already streak my cheeks--and i have seen a _physical_ life in my eyes, after i have been climbing the rocks, that resembled the fond, credulous hopes of youth. with what a cruel sigh have i recollected that i had forgotten to hope!--reason, or rather experience, does not thus cruelly damp poor ------'s pleasures; she plays all day in the garden with ------'s children, and makes friends for herself. do not tell me, that you are happier without us--will you not come to us in switzerland? ah, why do not you love us with more sentiment?--why are you a creature of such sympathy, that the warmth of your feelings, or rather quickness of your senses, hardens your heart? it is my misfortune, that my imagination is perpetually shading your defects, and lending you charms, whilst the grossness of your senses makes you (call me not vain) overlook graces in me, that only dignity of mind, and the sensibility of an expanded heart can give.--god bless you! adieu. * * * * * letter lvii. july . i could not help feeling extremely mortified last post, at not receiving a letter from you. my being at ------was but a chance, and you might have hazarded it; and would a year ago. i shall not however complain--there are misfortunes so great, as to silence the usual expressions of sorrow--believe me, there is such a thing as a broken heart! there are characters whose very energy preys upon them; and who, ever inclined to cherish by reflection some passion, cannot rest satisfied with the common comforts of life. i have endeavoured to fly from myself, and launched into all the dissipation possible here, only to feel keener anguish, when alone with my child. still, could any thing please me--had not disappointment cut me off from life, this romantic country, these fine evenings, would interest me.--my god! can any thing? and am i ever to feel alive only to painful sensations?--but it cannot--it shall not last long. the post is again arrived; i have sent to seek for letters, only to be wounded to the soul by a negative.--my brain seems on fire, i must go into the air. * * * * * * * * * letter lviii. july . i am now on my journey to ------. i felt more at leaving my child, than i thought i should--and, whilst at night i imagined every instant that i heard the half-formed sounds of her voice,--i asked myself how i could think of parting with her for ever, of leaving her thus helpless? poor lamb! it may run very well in a tale, that "god will temper the winds to the shorn lamb!" but how can i expect that she will be shielded, when my naked bosom has had to brave continually the pitiless storm? yes; i could add, with poor lear--what is the war of elements to the pangs of disappointed affection, and the horror arising from a discovery of a breach of confidence, that snaps every social tie! all is not right somewhere!--when you first knew me, i was not thus lost. i could still confide--for i opened my heart to you--of this only comfort you have deprived me, whilst my happiness, you tell me, was your first object. strange want of judgment! i will not complain; but, from the soundness of your understanding, i am convinced, if you give yourself leave to reflect, you will also feel, that your conduct to me, so far from being generous, has not been just.--i mean not to allude to factitious principles of morality; but to the simple basis of all rectitude.--however i did not intend to argue--your not writing is cruel--and my reason is perhaps disturbed by constant wretchedness. poor ------ would fain have accompanied me, out of tenderness; for my fainting, or rather convulsion, when i landed, and my sudden changes of countenance since, have alarmed her so much, that she is perpetually afraid of some accident--but it would have injured the child this warm season, as she is cutting her teeth. i hear not of your having written to me at ----. very well! act as you please--there is nothing i fear or care for! when i see whether i can, or cannot obtain the money i am come here about, i will not trouble you with letters to which you do not reply. * * * * * letter lix. july . i am here in ----, separated from my child--and here i must remain a month at least, or i might as well never have come. -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- i have begun -------- which will, i hope, discharge all my obligations of a pecuniary kind.--i am lowered in my own eyes, on account of my not having done it sooner. i shall make no further comments on your silence. god bless you! * * * * * * * * * letter lx. july . i have just received two of your letters, dated the th and th of june; and you must have received several from me, informing you of my detention, and how much i was hurt by your silence. -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- write to me then, my friend, and write explicitly. i have suffered, god knows, since i left you. ah! you have never felt this kind of sickness of heart!--my mind however is at present painfully active, and the sympathy i feel almost rises to agony. but this is not a subject of complaint, it has afforded me pleasure,--and reflected pleasure is all i have to hope for--if a spark of hope be yet alive in my forlorn bosom. i will try to write with a degree of composure. i wish for us to live together, because i want you to acquire an habitual tenderness for my poor girl. i cannot bear to think of leaving her alone in the world, or that she should only be protected by your sense of duty. next to preserving her, my most earnest wish is not to disturb your peace. i have nothing to expect, and little to fear, in life--there are wounds that can never be healed--but they may be allowed to fester in silence without wincing. when we meet again, you shall be convinced that i have more resolution than you give me credit for. i will not torment you. if i am destined always to be disappointed and unhappy, i will conceal the anguish i cannot dissipate; and the tightened cord of life or reason will at last snap, and set me free. yes; i shall be happy--this heart is worthy of the bliss its feelings anticipate--and i cannot even persuade myself, wretched as they have made me, that my principles and sentiments are not founded in nature and truth. but to have done with these subjects. -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- i have been seriously employed in this way since i came to ----; yet i never was so much in the air.--i walk, i ride on horseback--row, bathe, and even sleep in the fields; my health is consequently improved. the child, ------informs me, is well. i long to be with her. write to me immediately--were i only to think of myself, i could wish you to return to me, poor, with the simplicity of character, part of which you seem lately to have lost, that first attached to you. yours most affectionately * * * * * * * * * i have been subscribing other letters--so i mechanically did the same to yours. * * * * * letter lxi. august . employment and exercise have been of great service to me; and i have entirely recovered the strength and activity i lost during the time of my nursing. i have seldom been in better health; and my mind, though trembling to the touch of anguish, is calmer--yet still the same.--i have, it is true, enjoyed some tranquillity, and more happiness here, than for a long--long time past.--(i say happiness, for i can give no other appellation to the exquisite delight this wild country and fine summer have afforded me.)--still, on examining my heart, i find that it is so constituted, i cannot live without some particular affection--i am afraid not without a passion--and i feel the want of it more in society, than in solitude-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- writing to you, whenever an affectionate epithet occurs--my eyes fill with tears, and my trembling hand stops--you may then depend on my resolution, when with you. if i am doomed to be unhappy, i will confine my anguish in my own bosom--tenderness, rather than passion, has made me sometimes overlook delicacy--the same tenderness will in future restrain me. god bless you! * * * * * letter lxii. august . air, exercise, and bathing, have restored me to health, braced my muscles, and covered my ribs, even whilst i have recovered my former activity.--i cannot tell you that my mind is calm, though i have snatched some moments of exquisite delight, wandering through the woods, and resting on the rocks. this state of suspense, my friend, is intolerable; we must determine on something--and soon;--we must meet shortly, or part for ever. i am sensible that i acted foolishly--but i was wretched--when we were together--expecting too much, i let the pleasure i might have caught, slip from me. i cannot live with you--i ought not--if you form another attachment. but i promise you, mine shall not be intruded on you. little reason have i to expect a shadow of happiness, after the cruel disappointments that have rent my heart; but that of my child seems to depend on our being together. still i do not wish you to sacrifice a chance of enjoyment for an uncertain good. i feel a conviction, that i can provide for her, and it shall be my object--if we are indeed to part to meet no more. her affection must not be divided. she must be a comfort to me--if i am to have no other--and only know me as her support.--i feel that i cannot endure the anguish of corresponding with you--if we are only to correspond.--no; if you seek for happiness elsewhere, my letters shall not interrupt your repose. i will be dead to you. i cannot express to you what pain it gives me to write about an eternal separation.--you must determine--examine yourself--but, for god's sake! spare me the anxiety of uncertainty!--i may sink under the trial; but i will not complain. adieu! if i had any thing more to say to you, it is all flown, and absorbed by the most tormenting apprehensions, yet i scarcely know what new form of misery i have to dread. i ought to beg your pardon for having sometimes written peevishly; but you will impute it to affection, if you understand any thing of the heart of yours truly * * * * * * * * * letter lxiii. august . five of your letters have been sent after me from ----. one, dated the th of july, was written in a style which i may have merited, but did not expect from you. however this is not a time to reply to it, except to assure you that you shall not be tormented with any more complaints. i am disgusted with myself for having so long importuned you with my affection.---- my child is very well. we shall soon meet, to part no more, i hope--i mean, i and my girl.--i shall wait with some degree of anxiety till i am informed how your affairs terminate. yours sincerely * * * * * * * * * letter lxiv. august . i arrived here last night, and with the most exquisite delight, once more pressed my babe to my heart. we shall part no more. you perhaps cannot conceive the pleasure it gave me, to see her run about, and play alone. her increasing intelligence attaches me more and more to her. i have promised her that i will fulfil my duty to her; and nothing in future shall make me forget it. i will also exert myself to obtain an independence for her; but i will not be too anxious on this head. i have already told you, that i have recovered my health. vigour, and even vivacity of mind, have returned with a renovated constitution. as for peace, we will not talk of it. i was not made, perhaps, to enjoy the calm contentment so termed.-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- you tell me that my letters torture you; i will not describe the effect yours have on me. i received three this morning, the last dated the th of this month. i mean not to give vent to the emotions they produced.--certainly you are right; our minds are not congenial. i have lived in an ideal world, and fostered sentiments that you do not comprehend--or you would not treat me thus. i am not, i will not be, merely an object of compassion--a clog, however light, to teize you. forget that i exist: i will never remind you. something emphatical whispers me to put an end to these struggles. be free--i will not torment, when i cannot please. i can take care of my child; you need not continually tell me that our fortune is inseparable, _that you will try to cherish tenderness_ for me. do no violence to yourself! when we are separated, our interest, since you give so much weight to pecuniary considerations, will be entirely divided. i want not protection without affection; and support i need not, whilst my faculties are undisturbed. i had a dislike to living in england; but painful feelings must give way to superior considerations. i may not be able to acquire the sum necessary to maintain my child and self elsewhere. it is too late to go to switzerland. i shall not remain at ----, living expensively. but be not alarmed! i shall not force myself on you any more. adieu! i am agitated--my whole frame is convulsed--my lips tremble, as if shook by cold, though fire seems to be circulating in my veins. god bless you. * * * * * * * * * letter lxv. september . i received just now your letter of the th. i had written you a letter last night, into which imperceptibly slipt some of my bitterness of soul. i will copy the part relative to business. i am not sufficiently vain to imagine that i can, for more than a moment, cloud your enjoyment of life--to prevent even that, you had better never hear from me--and repose on the idea that i am happy. gracious god! it is impossible for me to stifle something like resentment, when i receive fresh proofs of your indifference. what i have suffered this last year, is not to be forgotten! i have not that happy substitute for wisdom, insensibility--and the lively sympathies which bind me to my fellow-creatures, are all of a painful kind.--they are the agonies of a broken heart--pleasure and i have shaken hands. i see here nothing but heaps of ruins, and only converse with people immersed in trade and sensuality. i am weary of travelling--yet seem to have no home--no resting place to look to.--i am strangely cast off.--how often, passing through the rocks, i have thought, "but for this child, i would lay my head on one of them, and never open my eyes again!" with a heart feelingly alive to all the affections of my nature--i have never met with one, softer than the stone that i would fain take for my last pillow. i once thought i had, but it was all a delusion. i meet with families continually, who are bound together by affection or principle--and, when i am conscious that i have fulfilled the duties of my station, almost to a forgetfulness of myself, i am ready to demand, in a murmuring tone, of heaven, "why am i thus abandoned?" you say now -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- i do not understand you. it is necessary for you to write more explicitly--and determine on some mode of conduct.--i cannot endure this suspense--decide--do you fear to strike another blow? we live together, or eternally part!--i shall not write to you again, till i receive an answer to this. i must compose my tortured soul, before i write on indifferent subjects. -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- i do not know whether i write intelligibly, for my head is disturbed.--but this you ought to pardon--for it is with difficulty frequently that i make out what you mean to say--you write, i suppose, at mr. ----'s after dinner, when your head is not the clearest--and as for your heart, if you have one, i see nothing like the dictates of affection, unless a glimpse when you mention, the child.--adieu! * * * * * letter lxvi. september . i have just finished a letter, to be given in charge to captain ------. in that i complained of your silence, and expressed my surprise that three mails should have arrived without bringing a line for me. since i closed it, i hear of another, and still no letter.--i am labouring to write calmly--this silence is a refinement on cruelty. had captain ------ remained a few days longer, i would have returned with him to england. what have i to do here? i have repeatedly written to you fully. do you do the same--and quickly. do not leave me in suspense. i have not deserved this of you. i cannot write, my mind is so distressed. adieu! * * * * end vol. iii. footnotes: [ -a] the child is in a subsequent letter called the "barrier girl," probably from a supposition that she owed her existence to this interview. editor. [ -a] this and the thirteen following letters appear to have been written during a separation of several months; the date, paris. [ -a] some further letters, written during the remainder of the week, in a similar strain to the preceding, appear to have been destroyed by the person to whom they were addressed. [ -a] the child spoken of in some preceding letters, had now been born a considerable time. [ -a] she means, "the latter more than the former." editor. [ -a] this is the first of a series of letters written during a separation of many months, to which no cordial meeting ever succeeded. they were sent from paris, and bear the address of london. [ -a] the person to whom the letters are addressed, was about this time at ramsgate, on his return, as he professed, to paris, when he was recalled, as it should seem, to london, by the further pressure of business now accumulated upon him. [ -a] this probably alludes to some expression of the person to whom the letters are addressed, in which he treated as common evils, things upon which the letter writer was disposed to bestow a different appellation. editor. [ -a] this passage refers to letters written under a purpose of suicide, and not intended to be opened till after the catastrophe. posthumous works of the author of a vindication of the rights of woman. in four volumes. * * * * * vol. iv. * * * * * _london:_ printed for j. johnson, no. , st. paul's church-yard; and g. g. and j. robinson, paternoster-row. . letters and miscellaneous pieces. in two volumes. * * * * * vol. ii. contents. page letters letter on the present character of the french nation fragment of letters on the management of infants letters to mr. johnson extract of the cave of fancy, a tale on poetry and our relish for the beauties of nature hints errata. page , line , _for_ i write you, _read_ i write to you. ---- , -- , _read_ bring them to ----. ---- , -- from the bottom, after over, insert a comma. letters. * * * * * letter lxvii. september . when you receive this, i shall either have landed, or be hovering on the british coast--your letter of the th decided me. by what criterion of principle or affection, you term my questions extraordinary and unnecessary, i cannot determine.--you desire me to decide--i had decided. you must have had long ago two letters of mine, from ------, to the same purport, to consider.--in these, god knows! there was but too much affection, and the agonies of a distracted mind were but too faithfully pourtrayed!--what more then had i to say?--the negative was to come from you.--you had perpetually recurred to your promise of meeting me in the autumn--was it extraordinary that i should demand a yes, or no?--your letter is written with extreme harshness, coldness i am accustomed to, in it i find not a trace of the tenderness of humanity, much less of friendship.--i only see a desire to heave a load off your shoulders. i am above disputing about words.--it matters not in what terms you decide. the tremendous power who formed this heart, must have foreseen that, in a world in which self-interest, in various shapes, is the principal mobile, i had little chance of escaping misery.--to the fiat of fate i submit.--i am content to be wretched; but i will not be contemptible.--of me you have no cause to complain, but for having had too much regard for you--for having expected a degree of permanent happiness, when you only sought for a momentary gratification. i am strangely deficient in sagacity.--uniting myself to you, your tenderness seemed to make me amends for all my former misfortunes.--on this tenderness and affection with what confidence did i rest!--but i leaned on a spear, that has pierced me to the heart.--you have thrown off a faithful friend, to pursue the caprices of the moment.--we certainly are differently organized; for even now, when conviction has been stamped on my soul by sorrow, i can scarcely believe it possible. it depends at present on you, whether you will see me or not.--i shall take no step, till i see or hear from you. preparing myself for the worst--i have determined, if your next letter be like the last, to write to mr. ------to procure me an obscure lodging, and not to inform any body of my arrival.--there i will endeavour in a few months to obtain the sum necessary to take me to france--from you i will not receive any more.--i am not yet sufficiently humbled to depend on your beneficence. some people, whom my unhappiness has interested, though they know not the extent of it, will assist me to attain the object i have in view, the independence of my child. should a peace take place, ready money will go a great way in france--and i will borrow a sum, which my industry _shall_ enable me to pay at my leisure, to purchase a small estate for my girl.--the assistance i shall find necessary to complete her education, i can get at an easy rate at paris--i can introduce her to such society as she will like--and thus, securing for her all the chance for happiness, which depends on me, i shall die in peace, persuaded that the felicity which has hitherto cheated my expectation, will not always elude my grasp. no poor tempest-tossed mariner ever more earnestly longed to arrive at his port. * * * * i shall not come up in the vessel all the way, because i have no place to go to. captain ------ will inform you where i am. it is needless to add, that i am not in a state of mind to bear suspense--and that i wish to see you, though it be for the last time. * * * * * letter lxviii. sunday, october . i wrote to you by the packet, to inform you, that your letter of the th of last month, had determined me to set out with captain ------; but, as we sailed very quick, i take it for granted, that you have not yet received it. you say, i must decide for myself.--i had decided, that it was most for the interest of my little girl, and for my own comfort, little as i expect, for us to live together; and i even thought that you would be glad, some years hence, when the tumult of business was over, to repose in the society of an affectionate friend, and mark the progress of our interesting child, whilst endeavouring to be of use in the circle you at last resolved to rest in; for you cannot run about for ever. from the tenour of your last letter however, i am led to imagine, that you have formed some new attachment.--if it be so, let me earnestly request you to see me once more, and immediately. this is the only proof i require of the friendship you profess for me. i will then decide, since you boggle about a mere form. i am labouring to write with calmness--but the extreme anguish i feel, at landing without having any friend to receive me, and even to be conscious that the friend whom i most wish to see, will feel a disagreeable sensation at being informed of my arrival, does not come under the description of common misery. every emotion yields to an overwhelming flood of sorrow--and the playfulness of my child distresses me.--on her account, i wished to remain a few days here, comfortless as is my situation.--besides, i did not wish to surprise you. you have told me, that you would make any sacrifice to promote my happiness--and, even in your last unkind letter, you talk of the ties which bind you to me and my child.--tell me, that you wish it, and i will cut this gordian knot. i now most earnestly intreat you to write to me, without fail, by the return of the post. direct your letter to be left at the post-office, and tell me whether you will come to me here, or where you will meet me. i can receive your letter on wednesday morning. do not keep me in suspense.--i expect nothing from you, or any human being: my die is cast!--i have fortitude enough to determine to do my duty; yet i cannot raise my depressed spirits, or calm my trembling heart.--that being who moulded it thus, knows that i am unable to tear up by the roots the propensity to affection which has been the torment of my life--but life will have an end! should you come here (a few months ago i could not have doubted it) you will find me at ------. if you prefer meeting me on the road, tell me where. yours affectionately * * * * * * * * * letter lxix. i write you now on my knees; imploring you to send my child and the maid with ----, to paris, to be consigned to the care of madame ----, rue ----, section de ----. should they be removed, ---- can give their direction. let the maid have all my clothes, without distinction. pray pay the cook her wages, and do not mention the confession which i forced from her--a little sooner or later is of no consequence. nothing but my extreme stupidity could have rendered me blind so long. yet, whilst you assured me that you had no attachment, i thought we might still have lived together. i shall make no comments on your conduct; or any appeal to the world. let my wrongs sleep with me! soon, very soon shall i be at peace. when you receive this, my burning head will be cold. i would encounter a thousand deaths, rather than a night like the last. your treatment has thrown my mind into a state of chaos; yet i am serene. i go to find comfort, and my only fear is, that my poor body will be insulted by an endeavour to recal my hated existence. but i shall plunge into the thames where there is the least chance of my being snatched from the death i seek. god bless you! may you never know by experience what you have made me endure. should your sensibility ever awake, remorse will find its way to your heart; and, in the midst of business and sensual pleasure, i shall appear before you, the victim of your deviation from rectitude. * * * * * * * * * letter lxx. sunday morning. i have only to lament, that, when the bitterness of death was past, i was inhumanly brought back to life and misery. but a fixed determination is not to be baffled by disappointment; nor will i allow that to be a frantic attempt, which was one of the calmest acts of reason. in this respect, i am only accountable to myself. did i care for what is termed reputation, it is by other circumstances that i should be dishonoured. you say, "that you know not how to extricate ourselves out of the wretchedness into which we have been plunged." you are extricated long since.--but i forbear to comment.----if i am condemned to live longer, it is a living death. it appears to me, that you lay much more stress on delicacy, than on principle; for i am unable to discover what sentiment of delicacy would have been violated, by your visiting a wretched friend--if indeed you have any friendship for me.--but since your new attachment is the only thing sacred in your eyes, i am silent--be happy! my complaints shall never more damp your enjoyment--perhaps i am mistaken in supposing that even my death could, for more than a moment.--this is what you call magnanimity--it is happy for yourself, that you possess this quality in the highest degree. your continually asserting, that you will do all in your power to contribute to my comfort (when you only allude to pecuniary assistance), appears to me a flagrant breach of delicacy.--i want not such vulgar comfort, nor will i accept it. i never wanted but your heart--that gone, you have nothing more to give. had i only poverty to fear, i should not shrink from life.--forgive me then, if i say, that i shall consider any direct or indirect attempt to supply my necessities, as an insult which i have not merited--and as rather done out of tenderness for your own reputation, than for me. do not mistake me; i do not think that you value money (therefore i will not accept what you do not care for) though i do much less, because certain privations are not painful to me. when i am dead, respect for yourself will make you take care of the child. i write with difficulty--probably i shall never write to you again.--adieu! god bless you! * * * * * * * * * letter lxxi. monday morning. i am compelled at last to say that you treat me ungenerously. i agree with you, that-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- but let the obliquity now fall on me.--i fear neither poverty nor infamy. i am unequal to the task of writing--and explanations are not necessary.-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- my child may have to blush for her mother's want of prudence--and may lament that the rectitude of my heart made me above vulgar precautions; but she shall not despise me for meanness.--you are now perfectly free.--god bless you. * * * * * * * * * letter lxxiii. saturday night. i have been hurt by indirect enquiries, which appear to me not to be dictated by any tenderness to me.--you ask "if i am well or tranquil?"--they who think me so, must want a heart to estimate my feelings by.--i chuse then to be the organ of my own sentiments. i must tell you, that i am very much mortified by your continually offering me pecuniary assistance--and, considering your going to the new house, as an open avowal that you abandon me, let me tell you that i will sooner perish than receive any thing from you--and i say this at the moment when i am disappointed in my first attempt to obtain a temporary supply. but this even pleases me; an accumulation of disappointments and misfortunes seems to suit the habit of my mind.-- have but a little patience, and i will remove myself where it will not be necessary for you to talk--of course, not to think of me. but let me see, written by yourself--for i will not receive it through any other medium--that the affair is finished.--it is an insult to me to suppose, that i can be reconciled, or recover my spirits; but, if you hear nothing of me, it will be the same thing to you. * * * * even your seeing me, has been to oblige other people, and not to sooth my distracted mind. * * * * * letter lxxiv. thursday afternoon. mr. ------ having forgot to desire you to send the things of mine which were left at the house, i have to request you to let ------ bring them onto ------. i shall go this evening to the lodging; so you need not be restrained from coming here to transact your business.--and, whatever i may think, and feel--you need not fear that i shall publicly complain--no! if i have any criterion to judge of right and wrong, i have been most ungenerously treated: but, wishing now only to hide myself, i shall be silent as the grave in which i long to forget myself. i shall protect and provide for my child.--i only mean by this to say, that you having nothing to fear from my desperation. farewel. * * * * * * * * * letter lxxv. london, november . the letter, without an address, which you put up with the letters you returned, did not meet my eyes till just now.--i had thrown the letters aside--i did not wish to look over a register of sorrow. my not having seen it, will account for my having written to you with anger--under the impression your departure, without even a line left for me, made on me, even after your late conduct, which could not lead me to expect much attention to my sufferings. in fact, "the decided conduct, which appeared to me so unfeeling," has almost overturned my reason; my mind is injured--i scarcely know where i am, or what i do.--the grief i cannot conquer (for some cruel recollections never quit me, banishing almost every other) i labour to conceal in total solitude.--my life therefore is but an exercise of fortitude, continually on the stretch--and hope never gleams in this tomb, where i am buried alive. but i meant to reason with you, and not to complain.--you tell me, "that i shall judge more coolly of your mode of acting, some time hence." but is it not possible that _passion_ clouds your reason, as much as it does mine?--and ought you not to doubt, whether those principles are so "exalted," as you term them, which only lead to your own gratification? in other words, whether it be just to have no principle of action, but that of following your inclination, trampling on the affection you have fostered, and the expectations you have excited? my affection for you is rooted in my heart.--i know you are not what you now seem--nor will you always act, or feel, as you now do, though i may never be comforted by the change.--even at paris, my image will haunt you.--you will see my pale face--and sometimes the tears of anguish will drop on your heart, which you have forced from mine. i cannot write. i thought i could quickly have refuted all your _ingenious_ arguments; but my head is confused.--right or wrong, i am miserable! it seems to me, that my conduct has always been governed by the strictest principles of justice and truth.--yet, how wretched have my social feelings, and delicacy of sentiment rendered me!--i have loved with my whole soul, only to discover that i had no chance of a return--and that existence is a burthen without it. i do not perfectly understand you.--if, by the offer of your friendship, you still only mean pecuniary support--i must again reject it.--trifling are the ills of poverty in the scale of my misfortunes.--god bless you! * * * * i have been treated ungenerously--if i understand what is generosity.----you seem to me only to have been anxious to shake me off--regardless whether you dashed me to atoms by the fall.--in truth i have been rudely handled. _do you judge coolly_, and i trust you will not continue to call those capricious feelings "the most refined," which would undermine not only the most sacred principles, but the affections which unite mankind.----you would render mothers unnatural--and there would be no such thing as a father!--if your theory of morals is the most "exalted," it is certainly the most easy.--it does not require much magnanimity, to determine to please ourselves for the moment, let others suffer what they will! excuse me for again tormenting you, my heart thirsts for justice from you--and whilst i recollect that you approved miss ------'s conduct--i am convinced you will not always justify your own. beware of the deceptions of passion! it will not always banish from your mind, that you have acted ignobly--and condescended to subterfuge to gloss over the conduct you could not excuse.--do truth and principle require such sacrifices? * * * * * letter lxxvi. london, december . having just been informed that ------ is to return immediately to paris, i would not miss a sure opportunity of writing, because i am not certain that my last, by dover has reached you. resentment, and even anger, are momentary emotions with me--and i wished to tell you so, that if you ever think of me, it may not be in the light of an enemy. that i have not been used _well_ i must ever feel; perhaps, not always with the keen anguish i do at present--for i began even now to write calmly, and i cannot restrain my tears. i am stunned!--your late conduct still appears to me a frightful dream.--ah! ask yourself if you have not condescended to employ a little address, i could almost say cunning, unworthy of you?--principles are sacred things--and we never play with truth, with impunity. the expectation (i have too fondly nourished it) of regaining your affection, every day grows fainter and fainter.--indeed, it seems to me, when i am more sad than usual, that i shall never see you more.--yet you will not always forget me.--you will feel something like remorse, for having lived only for yourself--and sacrificed my peace to inferior gratifications. in a comfortless old age, you will remember that you had one disinterested friend, whose heart you wounded to the quick. the hour of recollection will come--and you will not be satisfied to act the part of a boy, till you fall into that of a dotard. i know that your mind, your heart, and your principles of action, are all superior to your present conduct. you do, you must, respect me--and you will be sorry to forfeit my esteem. you know best whether i am still preserving the remembrance of an imaginary being.--i once thought that i knew you thoroughly--but now i am obliged to leave some doubts that involuntarily press on me, to be cleared up by time. you may render me unhappy; but cannot make me contemptible in my own eyes.--i shall still be able to support my child, though i am disappointed in some other plans of usefulness, which i once believed would have afforded you equal pleasure. whilst i was with you, i restrained my natural generosity, because i thought your property in jeopardy.--when i went to --------, i requested you, _if you could conveniently_, not to forget my father, sisters, and some other people, whom i was interested about.--money was lavished away, yet not only my requests were neglected, but some trifling debts were not discharged, that now come on me.--was this friendship--or generosity? will you not grant you have forgotten yourself? still i have an affection for you.--god bless you. * * * * * * * * * letter lxxvii. as the parting from you for ever is the most serious event of my life, i will once expostulate with you, and call not the language of truth and feeling ingenuity! i know the soundness of your understanding--and know that it is impossible for you always to confound the caprices of every wayward inclination with the manly dictates of principle. you tell me "that i torment you."--why do i?----because you cannot estrange your heart entirely from me--and you feel that justice is on my side. you urge, "that your conduct was unequivocal."--it was not.--when your coolness has hurt me, with what tenderness have you endeavoured to remove the impression!--and even before i returned to england, you took great pains to convince me, that all my uneasiness was occasioned by the effect of a worn-out constitution--and you concluded your letter with these words, "business alone has kept me from you.--come to any port, and i will fly down to my two dear girls with a heart all their own." with these assurances, is it extraordinary that i should believe what i wished? i might--and did think that you had a struggle with old propensities; but i still thought that i and virtue should at last prevail. i still thought that you had a magnanimity of character, which would enable you to conquer yourself. --------, believe me, it is not romance, you have acknowledged to me feelings of this kind.--you could restore me to life and hope, and the satisfaction you would feel, would amply repay you. in tearing myself from you, it is my own heart i pierce--and the time will come, when you will lament that you have thrown away a heart, that, even in the moment of passion, you cannot despise.--i would owe every thing to your generosity--but, for god's sake, keep me no longer in suspense!--let me see you once more!-- * * * * * letter lxxviii. you must do as you please with respect to the child.--i could wish that it might be done soon, that my name may be no more mentioned to you. it is now finished.--convinced that you have neither regard nor friendship, i disdain to utter a reproach, though i have had reason to think, that the "forbearance" talked of, has not been very delicate.--it is however of no consequence.--i am glad you are satisfied with your own conduct. i now solemnly assure you, that this is an eternal farewel.--yet i flinch not from the duties which tie me to life. that there is "sophistry" on one side or other, is certain; but now it matters not on which. on my part it has not been a question of words. yet your understanding or mine must be strangely warped--for what you term "delicacy," appears to me to be exactly the contrary. i have no criterion for morality, and have thought in vain, if the sensations which lead you to follow an ancle or step, be the sacred foundation of principle and affection. mine has been of a very different nature, or it would not have stood the brunt of your sarcasms. the sentiment in me is still sacred. if there be any part of me that will survive the sense of my misfortunes, it is the purity of my affections. the impetuosity of your senses, may have led you to term mere animal desire, the source of principle; and it may give zest to some years to come.--whether you will always think so, i shall never know. it is strange that, in spite of all you do, something like conviction forces me to believe, that you are not what you appear to be. i part with you in peace. * * * * * letter on the present character of the french nation. letter _introductory to a series of letters on the present character of the french nation._ paris, february , . my dear friend, it is necessary perhaps for an observer of mankind, to guard as carefully the remembrance of the first impression made by a nation, as by a countenance; because we imperceptibly lose sight of the national character, when we become more intimate with individuals. it is not then useless or presumptuous to note, that, when i first entered paris, the striking contrast of riches and poverty, elegance and slovenliness, urbanity and deceit, every where caught my eye, and saddened my soul; and these impressions are still the foundation of my remarks on the manners, which flatter the senses, more than they interest the heart, and yet excite more interest than esteem. the whole mode of life here tends indeed to render the people frivolous, and, to borrow their favourite epithet, amiable. ever on the wing, they are always sipping the sparkling joy on the brim of the cup, leaving satiety in the bottom for those who venture to drink deep. on all sides they trip along, buoyed up by animal spirits, and seemingly so void of care, that often, when i am walking on the _boulevards_, it occurs to me, that they alone understand the full import of the term leisure; and they trifle their time away with such an air of contentment, i know not how to wish them wiser at the expence of their gaiety. they play before me like motes in a sunbeam, enjoying the passing ray; whilst an english head, searching for more solid happiness, loses, in the analysis of pleasure, the volatile sweets of the moment. their chief enjoyment, it is true, rises from vanity: but it is not the vanity that engenders vexation of spirit; on the contrary, it lightens the heavy burthen of life, which reason too often weighs, merely to shift from one shoulder to the other. investigating the modification of the passion, as i would analyze the elements that give a form to dead matter, i shall attempt to trace to their source the causes which have combined to render this nation the most polished, in a physical sense, and probably the most superficial in the world; and i mean to follow the windings of the various streams that disembogue into a terrific gulf, in which all the dignity of our nature is absorbed. for every thing has conspired to make the french the most sensual people in the world; and what can render the heart so hard, or so effectually stifle every moral emotion, as the refinements of sensuality? the frequent repetition of the word french, appears invidious; let me then make a previous observation, which i beg you not to lose sight of, when i speak rather harshly of a land flowing with milk and honey. remember that it is not the morals of a particular people that i would decry; for are we not all of the same stock? but i wish calmly to consider the stage of civilization in which i find the french, and, giving a sketch of their character, and unfolding the circumstances which have produced its identity, i shall endeavour to throw some light on the history of man, and on the present important subjects of discussion. i would i could first inform you that, out of the chaos of vices and follies, prejudices and virtues, rudely jumbled together, i saw the fair form of liberty slowly rising, and virtue expanding her wings to shelter all her children! i should then hear the account of the barbarities that have rent the bosom of france patiently, and bless the firm hand that lopt off the rotten limbs. but, if the aristocracy of birth is levelled with the ground, only to make room for that of riches, i am afraid that the morals of the people will not be much improved by the change, or the government rendered less venal. still it is not just to dwell on the misery produced by the present struggle, without adverting to the standing evils of the old system. i am grieved--sorely grieved--when i think of the blood that has stained the cause of freedom at paris; but i also hear the same live stream cry aloud from the highways, through which the retreating armies passed with famine and death in their rear, and i hide my face with awe before the inscrutable ways of providence, sweeping in such various directions the besom of destruction over the sons of men. before i came to france, i cherished, you know, an opinion, that strong virtues might exist with the polished manners produced by the progress of civilization; and i even anticipated the epoch, when, in the course of improvement, men would labour to become virtuous, without being goaded on by misery. but now, the perspective of the golden age, fading before the attentive eye of observation, almost eludes my sight; and, losing thus in part my theory of a more perfect state, start not, my friend, if i bring forward an opinion, which at the first glance seems to be levelled against the existence of god! i am not become an atheist, i assure you, by residing at paris: yet i begin to fear that vice, or, if you will, evil, is the grand mobile of action, and that, when the passions are justly poized, we become harmless, and in the same proportion useless. the wants of reason are very few; and, were we to consider dispassionately the real value of most things, we should probably rest satisfied with the simple gratification of our physical necessities, and be content with negative goodness: for it is frequently, only that wanton, the imagination, with her artful coquetry, who lures us forward, and makes us run over a rough road, pushing aside every obstacle merely to catch a disappointment. the desire also of being useful to others, is continually damped by experience; and, if the exertions of humanity were not in some measure their own reward, who would endure misery, or struggle with care, to make some people ungrateful, and others idle? you will call these melancholy effusions, and guess that, fatigued by the vivacity, which has all the bustling folly of childhood, without the innocence which renders ignorance charming, i am too severe in my strictures. it may be so; and i am aware that the good effects of the revolution will be last felt at paris; where surely the soul of epicurus has long been at work to root out the simple emotions of the heart, which, being natural, are always moral. rendered cold and artificial by the selfish enjoyments of the senses, which the government fostered, is it surprising that simplicity of manners, and singleness of heart, rarely appear, to recreate me with the wild odour of nature, so passing sweet? seeing how deep the fibres of mischief have shot, i sometimes ask, with a doubting accent, whether a nation can go back to the purity of manners which has hitherto been maintained unsullied only by the keen air of poverty, when, emasculated by pleasure, the luxuries of prosperity are become the wants of nature? i cannot yet give up the hope, that a fairer day is dawning on europe, though i must hesitatingly observe, that little is to be expected from the narrow principle of commerce which seems every where to be shoving aside _the point of honour_ of the _noblesse_. i can look beyond the evils of the moment, and do not expect muddied water to become clear before it has had time to stand; yet, even for the moment, it is the most terrific of all sights, to see men vicious without warmth--to see the order that should be the superscription of virtue, cultivated to give security to crimes which only thoughtlessness could palliate. disorder is, in fact, the very essence of vice, though with the wild wishes of a corrupt fancy humane emotions often kindly mix to soften their atrocity. thus humanity, generosity, and even self-denial, sometimes render a character grand, and even useful, when hurried away by lawless passions; but what can equal the turpitude of a cold calculator who lives for himself alone, and considering his fellow-creatures merely as machines of pleasure, never forgets that honesty is the best policy? keeping ever within the pale of the law, he crushes his thousands with impunity; but it is with that degree of management, which makes him, to borrow a significant vulgarism, a villain _in grain_. the very excess of his depravation preserves him, whilst the more respectable beast of prey, who prowls about like the lion, and roars to announce his approach, falls into a snare. you may think it too soon to form an opinion of the future government, yet it is impossible to avoid hazarding some conjectures, when every thing whispers me, that names, not principles, are changed, and when i see that the turn of the tide has left the dregs of the old system to corrupt the new. for the same pride of office, the same desire of power are still visible; with this aggravation, that, fearing to return to obscurity after having but just acquired a relish for distinction, each hero, or philosopher, for all are dubbed with these new titles, endeavours to make hay while the sun shines; and every petty municipal officer, become the idol, or rather the tyrant of the day, stalks like a cock on a dunghil. i shall now conclude this desultory letter; which however will enable you to foresee that i shall treat more of morals than manners. yours ------ * * * * * fragment of letters on the management of infants. contents. introductory letter. letter ii. management of the mother during pregnancy: bathing. letter iii. lying-in. letter iv. the first month: diet: clothing. letter v. the three following months. letter vi. the remainder of the first year. letter vii. the second year, &c: conclusion. letters on the management of infants. * * * * * letter i. i ought to apologize for not having written to you on the subject you mentioned; but, to tell you the truth, it grew upon me: and, instead of an answer, i have begun a series of letters on the management of children in their infancy. replying then to your question, i have the public in my thoughts, and shall endeavour to show what modes appear to me necessary, to render the infancy of children more healthy and happy. i have long thought, that the cause which renders children as hard to rear as the most fragile plant, is our deviation from simplicity. i know that some able physicians have recommended the method i have pursued, and i mean to point out the good effects i have observed in practice. i am aware that many matrons will exclaim against me, and dwell on the number of children they have brought up, as their mothers did before them, without troubling themselves with new-fangled notions; yet, though, in my uncle toby's words, they should attempt to silence me, by "wishing i had seen their large" families, i must suppose, while a third part of the human species, according to the most accurate calculation, die during their infancy, just at the threshold of life, that there is some error in the modes adopted by mothers and nurses, which counteracts their own endeavours. i may be mistaken in some particulars; for general rules, founded on the soundest reason, demand individual modification; but, if i can persuade any of the rising generation to exercise their reason on this head, i am content. my advice will probably be found most useful to mothers in the middle class; and it is from them that the lower imperceptibly gains improvement. custom, produced by reason in one, may safely be the effect of imitation in the other.-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- letters to mr. johnson, _bookseller_, in st. paul's church-yard. letters to mr. johnson. * * * * * letter i. dublin, april , [ .] dear sir, i am still an invalid--and begin to believe that i ought never to expect to enjoy health. my mind preys on my body--and, when i endeavour to be useful, i grow too much interested for my own peace. confined almost entirely to the society of children, i am anxiously solicitous for their future welfare, and mortified beyond measure, when counteracted in my endeavours to improve them.--i feel all a mother's fears for the swarm of little ones which surround me, and observe disorders, without having power to apply the proper remedies. how can i be reconciled to life, when it is always a painful warfare, and when i am deprived of all the pleasures i relish?--i allude to rational conversations, and domestic affections. here, alone, a poor solitary individual in a strange land, tied to one spot, and subject to the caprice of another, can i be contented? i am desirous to convince you that i have _some_ cause for sorrow--and am not without reason detached from life. i shall hope to hear that you are well, and am yours sincerely mary wollstonecraft. * * * * * letter ii. henley, thursday, sept . my dear sir, since i saw you, i have, literally speaking, _enjoyed_ solitude. my sister could not accompany me in my rambles; i therefore wandered alone, by the side of the thames, and in the neighbouring beautiful fields and pleasure grounds: the prospects were of such a placid kind, i _caught_ tranquillity while i surveyed them--my mind was _still_, though active. were i to give you an account how i have spent my time, you would smile.--i found an old french bible here, and amused myself with comparing it with our english translation; then i would listen to the falling leaves, or observe the various tints the autumn gave to them--at other times, the singing of a robin, or the noise of a water-mill, engaged my attention--partial attention--, for i was, at the same time perhaps discussing some knotty point, or straying from this _tiny_ world to new systems. after these excursions, i returned to the family meals, told the children stories (they think me _vastly_ agreeable), and my sister was amused.--well, will you allow me to call this way of passing my days pleasant? i was just going to mend my pen; but i believe it will enable me to say all i have to add to this epistle. have you yet heard of an habitation for me? i often think of my new plan of life; and, lest my sister should try to prevail on me to alter it, i have avoided mentioning it to her. i am determined!--your sex generally laugh at female determinations; but let me tell you, i never yet resolved to do, any thing of consequence, that i did not adhere resolutely to it, till i had accomplished my purpose, improbable as it might have appeared to a more timid mind. in the course of near nine-and-twenty years, i have gathered some experience, and felt many _severe_ disappointments--and what is the amount? i long for a little peace and _independence_! every obligation we receive from our fellow-creatures is a new shackle, takes from our native freedom, and debases the mind, makes us mere earthworms--i am not fond of grovelling! i am, sir, yours, &c. mary wollstonecraft. * * * * * letter iii. market harborough, sept. . my dear sir, you left me with three opulent tradesmen; their conversation was not calculated to beguile the way, when the sable curtain concealed the beauties of nature. i listened to the tricks of trade--and shrunk away, without wishing to grow rich; even the novelty of the subjects did not render them pleasing; fond as i am of tracing the passions in all their different forms--i was not surprised by any glimpse of the sublime, or beautiful--though one of them imagined i would be a useful partner in a good _firm_. i was very much fatigued, and have scarcely recovered myself. i do not expect to enjoy the same tranquil pleasures henley afforded: i meet with new objects to employ my mind; but many painful emotions are complicated with the reflections they give rise to. i do not intend to enter on the _old_ topic, yet hope to hear from you--and am yours, &c. mary wollstonecraft. * * * * * letter iv. friday night. my dear sir, though your remarks are generally judicious--i cannot _now_ concur with you, i mean with respect to the preface[ -a], and have not altered it. i hate the usual smooth way of exhibiting proud humility. a general rule _only_ extends to the majority--and, believe me, the few judicious parents who may peruse my book, will not feel themselves hurt--and the weak are too vain to mind what is said in a book intended for children. i return you the italian ms.--but do not hastily imagine that i am indolent. i would not spare any labour to do my duty--and, after the most laborious day, that single thought would solace me more than any pleasures the senses could enjoy. i find i could not translate the ms. well. if it was not a ms, i should not be so easily intimidated; but the hand, and errors in orthography, or abbreviations, are a stumbling-block at the first setting out.--i cannot bear to do any thing i cannot do well--and i should lose time in the vain attempt. i had, the other day, the satisfaction of again receiving a letter from my poor, dear margaret[ -a].--with all a mother's fondness i could transcribe a part of it--she says, every day her affection to me, and dependence on heaven increase, &c.--i miss her innocent caresses--and sometimes indulge a pleasing hope, that she may be allowed to cheer my childless age--if i am to live to be old.--at any rate, i may hear of the virtues i may not contemplate--and my reason may permit me to love a female.--i now allude to ------. i have received another letter from her, and her childish complaints vex me--indeed they do--as usual, good-night. mary. if parents attended to their children, i would not have written the stories; for, what are books--compared to conversations which affection inforces!-- * * * * * letter v. my dear sir, remember you are to settle _my account_, as i want to know how much i am in your debt--but do not suppose that i feel any uneasiness on that score. the generality of people in trade would not be much obliged to me for a like civility, _but you were a man_ before you were a bookseller--so i am your sincere friend, mary. * * * * * letter vi. friday morning. i am sick with vexation--and wish i could knock my foolish head against the wall, that bodily pain might make me feel less anguish from self-reproach! to say the truth, i was never more displeased with myself, and i will tell you the cause.--you may recollect that i did not mention to you the circumstance of ------ having a fortune left to him; nor did a hint of it drop from me when i conversed with my sister; because i knew he had a sufficient motive for concealing it. last sunday, when his character was aspersed, as i thought, unjustly, in the heat of vindication i informed ****** that he was now independent; but, at the same time, desired him not to repeat my information to b----; yet, last tuesday, he told him all--and the boy at b----'s gave mrs. ------ an account of it. as mr. ------ knew he had only made a confident of me (i blush to think of it!) he guessed the channel of intelligence, and this morning came (not to reproach me, i wish he had!) but to point out the injury i have done him.--let what will be the consequence, i will reimburse him, if i deny myself the necessaries of life--and even then my folly will sting me.--perhaps you can scarcely conceive the misery i at this moment endure--that i, whose power of doing good is so limited, should do harm, galls my very soul. ****** may laugh at these qualms--but, supposing mr. ------ to be unworthy, i am not the less to blame. surely it is hell to despise one's self!--i did not want this additional vexation--at this time i have many that hang heavily on my spirits. i shall not call on you this month--nor stir out.--my stomach has been so suddenly and violently affected, i am unable to lean over the desk. mary wollstonecraft. * * * * * letter vii. as i am become a reviewer, i think it right, in the way of business, to consider the subject. you have alarmed the editor of the critical, as the advertisement prefixed to the appendix plainly shows. the critical appears to me to be a timid, mean production, and its success is a reflection on the taste and judgment of the public; but, as a body, who ever gave it credit for much? the voice of the people is only the voice of truth, when some man of abilities has had time to get fast hold of the great nose of the monster. of course, local fame is generally a clamour, and dies away. the appendix to the monthly afforded me more amusement, though every article almost wants energy and a _cant_ of virtue and liberality is strewed over it; always tame, and eager to pay court to established fame. the account of necker is one unvaried tone of admiration. surely men were born only to provide for the sustenance of the body by enfeebling the mind! mary. * * * * * letter viii. you made me very low-spirited last night, by your manner of talking.--you are my only friend--the only person i am _intimate_ with.--i never had a father, or a brother--you have been both to me, ever since i knew you--yet i have sometimes been very petulant.--i have been thinking of those instances of ill-humour and quickness, and they appeared like crimes. yours sincerely mary. * * * * * letter ix. saturday night. i am a mere animal, and instinctive emotions too often silence the suggestions of reason. your note--i can scarcely tell why, hurt me--and produced a kind of winterly smile, which diffuses a beam of despondent tranquillity over the features. i have been very ill--heaven knows it was more than fancy--after some sleepless, wearisome nights, towards the morning i have grown delirious.--last thursday, in particular, i imagined ------ was thrown into great distress by his folly; and i, unable to assist him, was in an agony. my nerves were in such a painful state of irritation--i suffered more than i can express--society was necessary--and might have diverted me till i gained more strength; but i blushed when i recollected how often i had teazed you with childish complaints, and the reveries of a disordered imagination. i even _imagined_ that i intruded on you, because you never called on me--though you perceived that i was not well.--i have nourished a sickly kind of delicacy, which gives me many unnecessary pangs.--i acknowledge that life is but a jest--and often a frightful dream--yet catch myself every day searching for something serious--and feel real misery from the disappointment. i am a strange compound of weakness and resolution! however, if i must suffer, i will endeavour to suffer in silence. there is certainly a great defect in my mind--my wayward heart creates its own misery--why i am made thus i cannot tell; and, till i can form some idea of the whole of my existence, i must be content to weep and dance like a child--long for a toy, and be tired of it as soon as i get it. we must each of us wear a fool's cap; but mine, alas! has lost its bells, and is grown so heavy, i find it intolerably troublesome.----good-night! i have been pursuing a number of strange thoughts since i began to write, and have actually both wept and laughed immoderately--surely i am a fool-- mary w. * * * * * letter x. monday morning. i really want a german grammar, as i intend to attempt to learn that language--and i will tell you the reason why.--while i live, i am persuaded, i must exert my understanding to procure an independence, and render myself useful. to make the task easier, i ought to store my mind with knowledge--the seed time is passing away. i see the necessity of labouring now--and of that necessity i do not complain; on the contrary, i am thankful that i have more than common incentives to pursue knowledge, and draw my pleasures from the employments that are within my reach. you perceive this is not a gloomy day--i feel at this moment particularly grateful to you--without your humane and _delicate_ assistance, how many obstacles should i not have had to encounter--too often should i have been out of patience with my fellow-creatures, whom i wish to love!--allow me to love you, my dear sir, and call friend a being i respect.--adieu! mary w. * * * * * letter xi. i thought you _very_ unkind, nay, very unfeeling, last night. my cares and vexations--i will say what i allow myself to think--do me honour, as they arise from my disinterestedness and _unbending_ principles; nor can that mode of conduct be a reflection on my understanding, which enables me to bear misery, rather than selfishly live for myself alone. i am not the only character deserving of respect, that has had to struggle with various sorrows--while inferior minds have enjoyed local fame and present comfort.--dr. johnson's cares almost drove him mad--but, i suppose, you would quietly have told him, he was a fool for not being calm, and that wise men striving against the stream, can yet be in good humour. i have done with insensible human wisdom,--"indifference cold in wisdom's guise,"--and turn to the source of perfection--who perhaps never disregarded an almost broken heart, especially when a respect, a practical respect, for virtue, sharpened the wounds of adversity. i am ill--i stayed in bed this morning till eleven o'clock, only thinking of getting money to extricate myself out of some of my difficulties--the struggle is now over. i will condescend to try to obtain some in a disagreeable way. mr. ------ called on me just now--pray did you know his motive for calling[ -a]?--i think him impertinently officious.--he had left the house before it occurred to me in the strong light it does now, or i should have told him so--my poverty makes me proud--i will not be insulted by a superficial puppy.--his intimacy with miss ------ gave him a privilege, which he should not have assumed with me--a proposal might be made to his cousin, a milliner's girl, which should not have been mentioned to me. pray tell him that i am offended--and do not wish to see him again!--when i meet him at your house, i shall leave the room, since i cannot pull him by the nose. i can force my spirit to leave my body--but it shall never bend to support that body--god of heaven, save thy child from this living death!--i scarcely know what i write. my hand trembles--i am very sick--sick at heart.---- mary. * * * * * letter xii. tuesday evening. sir, when you left me this morning, and i reflected a moment--your _officious_ message, which at first appeared to me a joke--looked so very like an insult--i cannot forget it--to prevent then the necessity of forcing a smile--when i chance to meet you--i take the earliest opportunity of informing you of my real sentiments. mary wollstonecraft. * * * * * letter xiii. wednesday, o'clock. sir, it is inexpressibly disagreeable to me to be obliged to enter again on a subject, that has already raised a tumult of _indignant_ emotions in my bosom, which i was labouring to suppress when i received your letter. i shall now _condescend_ to answer your epistle; but let me first tell you, that, in my _unprotected_ situation, i make a point of never forgiving a _deliberate insult_--and in that light i consider your late officious conduct. it is not according to my nature to mince matters--i will then tell you in plain terms, what i think. i have ever considered you in the light of a _civil_ acquaintance--on the word friend i lay a peculiar emphasis--and, as a mere acquaintance, you were rude and _cruel_, to step forward to insult a woman, whose conduct and misfortunes demand respect. if my friend, mr. johnson, had made the proposal--i should have been severely hurt--have thought him unkind and unfeeling, but not _impertinent_.--the privilege of intimacy you had no claim to--and should have referred the man to myself--if you had not sufficient discernment to quash it at once. i am, sir, poor and destitute.--yet i have a spirit that will never bend, or take indirect methods, to obtain the consequence i despise; nay, if to support life it was necessary to act contrary to my principles, the struggle would soon be over. i can bear any thing but my own contempt. in a few words, what i call an insult, is the bare supposition that i could for a moment think of _prostituting_ my person for a maintenance; for in that point of view does such a marriage appear to me, who consider right and wrong in the abstract, and never by words and local opinions shield myself from the reproaches of my own heart and understanding. it is needless to say more--only you must excuse me when i add, that i wish never to see, but as a perfect stranger, a person who could so grossly mistake my character. an apology is not necessary--if you were inclined to make one--nor any further expostulations.--i again repeat, i cannot overlook an affront; few indeed have sufficient delicacy to respect poverty, even where it gives lustre to a character--and i tell you sir, i am poor--yet can live without your benevolent exertions. mary wollstonecraft. * * * * * letter xiv. i send you _all_ the books i had to review except dr. j--'s sermons, which i have begun. if you wish me to look over any more trash this month--you must send it directly. i have been so low-spirited since i saw you--i was quite glad, last night, to feel myself affected by some passages in dr. j--'s sermon on the death of his wife--i seemed (suddenly) to _find_ my _soul_ again--it has been for some time i cannot tell where. send me the speaker--and _mary_, i want one--and i shall soon want some paper--you may as well send it at the same time--for i am trying to brace my nerves that i may be industrious.--i am afraid reason is not a good bracer--for i have been reasoning a long time with my untoward spirits--and yet my hand trembles.--i could finish a period very _prettily_ now, by saying that it ought to be steady when i add that i am yours sincerely, mary. if you do not like the manner in which i reviewed dr. j--'s s---- on his wife, be it known unto you--i _will_ not do it any other way--i felt some pleasure in paying a just tribute of respect to the memory of a man--who, spite of his faults, i have an affection for--i say _have_, for i believe he is somewhere--_where_ my soul has been gadding perhaps;--but _you_ do not live on conjectures. * * * * * letter xv. my dear sir, i send you a chapter which i am pleased with, now i see it in one point of view--and, as i have made free with the author, i hope you will not have often to say--what does this mean? you forgot you were to make out my account--i am, of course, over head and ears in debt; but i have not that kind of pride, which makes some dislike to be obliged to those they respect.--on the contrary, when i involuntarily lament that i have not a father or brother, i thankfully recollect that i have received unexpected kindness from you and a few others.--so reason allows, what nature impels me to--for i cannot live without loving my fellow-creatures--nor can i love them, without discovering some virtue. mary. * * * * * letter xvi. paris, december , . i should immediately on the receipt of your letter, my dear friend, have thanked you for your punctuality, for it highly gratified me, had i not wished to wait till i could tell you that this day was not stained with blood. indeed the prudent precautions taken by the national convention to prevent a tumult, made me suppose that the dogs of faction would not dare to bark, much less to bite, however true to their scent; and i was not mistaken; for the citizens, who were all called out, are returning home with composed countenances, shouldering their arms. about nine o'clock this morning, the king passed by my window, moving silently along (excepting now and then a few strokes on the drum, which rendered the stillness more awful) through empty streets, surrounded by the national guards, who, clustering round the carriage, seemed to deserve their name. the inhabitants flocked to their windows, but the casements were all shut, not a voice was heard, nor did i see any thing like an insulting gesture.--for the first time since i entered france, i bowed to the majesty of the people, and respected the propriety of behaviour so perfectly in unison with my own feelings. i can scarcely tell you why, but an association of ideas made the tears flow insensibly from my eyes, when i saw louis sitting, with more dignity than i expected from his character, in a hackney coach, going to meet death, where so many of his race have triumphed. my fancy instantly brought louis xiv before me, entering the capital with all his pomp, after one of the victories most flattering to his pride, only to see the sunshine of prosperity overshadowed by the sublime gloom of misery. i have been alone ever since; and, though my mind is calm, i cannot dismiss the lively images that have filled my imagination all the day.--nay, do not smile, but pity me; for, once or twice, lifting my eyes from the paper, i have seen eyes glare through a glass-door opposite my chair and bloody hands shook at me. not the distant sound of a footstep can i hear.--my apartments are remote from those of the servants, the only persons who sleep with me in an immense hotel, one folding door opening after another.--i wish i had even kept the cat with me!--i want to see something alive; death in so many frightful shapes has taken hold of my fancy.--i am going to bed--and, for the first time in my life, i cannot put out the candle. m. w. footnotes: [ -a] to original stories. [ -a] countess mount cashel. [ -a] this alludes to a foolish proposal of marriage for mercenary considerations, which the gentleman here mentioned thought proper to recommend to her. the two letters which immediately follow, are addressed to the gentleman himself. extract of the cave of fancy. a tale. * * * * * [_begun to be written in the year , but never completed_] cave of fancy. chap. i. ye who expect constancy where every thing is changing, and peace in the midst of tumult, attend to the voice of experience, and mark in time the footsteps of disappointment, or life will be lost in desultory wishes, and death arrive before the dawn of wisdom. in a sequestered valley, surrounded by rocky mountains that intercepted many of the passing clouds, though sunbeams variegated their ample sides, lived a sage, to whom nature had unlocked her most hidden secrets. his hollow eyes, sunk in their orbits, retired from the view of vulgar objects, and turned inwards, overleaped the boundary prescribed to human knowledge. intense thinking during fourscore and ten years, had whitened the scattered locks on his head, which, like the summit of the distant mountain, appeared to be bound by an eternal frost. on the sandy waste behind the mountains, the track of ferocious beasts might be traced, and sometimes the mangled limbs which they left, attracted a hovering flight of birds of prey. an extensive wood the sage had forced to rear its head in a soil by no means congenial, and the firm trunks of the trees seemed to frown with defiance on time; though the spoils of innumerable summers covered the roots, which resembled fangs; so closely did they cling to the unfriendly sand, where serpents hissed, and snakes, rolling out their vast folds, inhaled the noxious vapours. the ravens and owls who inhabited the solitude, gave also a thicker gloom to the everlasting twilight, and the croaking of the former a monotony, in unison with the gloom; whilst lions and tygers, shunning even this faint semblance of day, sought the dark caverns, and at night, when they shook off sleep, their roaring would make the whole valley resound, confounded with the screechings of the bird of night. one mountain rose sublime, towering above all, on the craggy sides of which a few sea-weeds grew, washed by the ocean, that with tumultuous roar rushed to assault, and even undermine, the huge barrier that stopped its progress; and ever and anon a ponderous mass, loosened from the cliff, to which it scarcely seemed to adhere, always threatening to fall, fell into the flood, rebounding as it fell, and the sound was re-echoed from rock to rock. look where you would, all was without form, as if nature, suddenly stopping her hand, had left chaos a retreat. close to the most remote side of it was the sage's abode. it was a rude hut, formed of stumps of trees and matted twigs, to secure him from the inclemency of the weather; only through small apertures crossed with rushes, the wind entered in wild murmurs, modulated by these obstructions. a clear spring broke out of the middle of the adjacent rock, which, dropping slowly into a cavity it had hollowed, soon overflowed, and then ran, struggling to free itself from the cumbrous fragments, till, become a deep, silent stream, it escaped through reeds, and roots of trees, whose blasted tops overhung and darkened the current. one side of the hut was supported by the rock, and at midnight, when the sage struck the inclosed part, it yawned wide, and admitted him into a cavern in the very bowels of the earth, where never human foot before had trod; and the various spirits, which inhabit the different regions of nature, were here obedient to his potent word. the cavern had been formed by the great inundation of waters, when the approach of a comet forced them from their source; then, when the fountains of the great deep were broken up, a stream rushed out of the centre of the earth, where the spirits, who have lived on it, are confined to purify themselves from the dross contracted in their first stage of existence; and it flowed in black waves, for ever bubbling along the cave, the extent of which had never been explored. from the sides and top, water distilled, and, petrifying as it fell, took fantastic shapes, that soon divided it into apartments, if so they might be called. in the foam, a wearied spirit would sometimes rise, to catch the most distant glimpse of light, or taste the vagrant breeze, which the yawning of the rock admitted, when sagestus, for that was the name of the hoary sage, entered. some, who were refined and almost cleared from vicious spots, he would allow to leave, for a limited time, their dark prison-house; and, flying on the winds across the bleak northern ocean, or rising in an exhalation till they reached a sun-beam, they thus re-visited the haunts of men. these were the guardian angels, who in soft whispers restrain the vicious, and animate the wavering wretch who stands suspended between virtue and vice. sagestus had spent a night in the cavern, as he often did, and he left the silent vestibule of the grave, just as the sun, emerging from the ocean, dispersed the clouds, which were not half so dense as those he had left. all that was human in him rejoiced at the sight of reviving life, and he viewed with pleasure the mounting sap rising to expand the herbs, which grew spontaneously in this wild--when, turning his eyes towards the sea, he found that death had been at work during his absence, and terrific marks of a furious storm still spread horror around. though the day was serene, and threw bright rays on eyes for ever shut, it dawned not for the wretches who hung pendent on the craggy rocks, or were stretched lifeless on the sand. some, struggling, had dug themselves a grave; others had resigned their breath before the impetuous surge whirled them on shore. a few, in whom the vital spark was not so soon dislodged, had clung to loose fragments; it was the grasp of death; embracing the stone, they stiffened; and the head, no longer erect, rested on the mass which the arms encircled. it felt not the agonizing gripe, nor heard the sigh that broke the heart in twain. resting his chin on an oaken club, the sage looked on every side, to see if he could discern any who yet breathed. he drew nearer, and thought he saw, at the first glance, the unclosed eyes glare; but soon perceived that they were a mere glassy substance, mute as the tongue; the jaws were fallen, and, in some of the tangled locks, hands were clinched; nay, even the nails had entered sharpened by despair. the blood flew rapidly to his heart; it was flesh; he felt he was still a man, and the big tear paced down his iron cheeks, whose muscles had not for a long time been relaxed by such humane emotions. a moment he breathed quick, then heaved a sigh, and his wonted calm returned with an unaccustomed glow of tenderness; for the ways of heaven were not hid from him; he lifted up his eyes to the common father of nature, and all was as still in his bosom, as the smooth deep, after having closed over the huge vessel from which the wretches had fled. turning round a part of the rock that jutted out, meditating on the ways of providence, a weak infantine voice reached his ears; it was lisping out the name of mother. he looked, and beheld a blooming child leaning over, and kissing with eager fondness, lips that were insensible to the warm pressure. starting at the sight of the sage, she fixed her eyes on him, "wake her, ah! wake her," she cried, "or the sea will catch us." again he felt compassion, for he saw that the mother slept the sleep of death. he stretched out his hand, and, smoothing his brow, invited her to approach; but she still intreated him to wake her mother, whom she continued to call, with an impatient tremulous voice. to detach her from the body by persuasion would not have been very easy. sagestus had a quicker method to effect his purpose; he took out a box which contained a soporific powder, and as soon as the fumes reached her brain, the powers of life were suspended. he carried her directly to his hut, and left her sleeping profoundly on his rushy couch. chap. ii. again sagestus approached the dead, to view them with a more scrutinizing eye. he was perfectly acquainted with the construction of the human body, knew the traces that virtue or vice leaves on the whole frame; they were now indelibly fixed by death; nay more, he knew by the shape of the solid structure, how far the spirit could range, and saw the barrier beyond which it could not pass: the mazes of fancy he explored, measured the stretch of thought, and, weighing all in an even balance, could tell whom nature had stamped an hero, a poet, or philosopher. by their appearance, at a transient glance, he knew that the vessel must have contained many passengers, and that some of them were above the vulgar, with respect to fortune and education; he then walked leisurely among the dead, and narrowly observed their pallid features. his eye first rested on a form in which proportion reigned, and, stroking back the hair, a spacious forehead met his view; warm fancy had revelled there, and her airy dance had left vestiges, scarcely visible to a mortal eye. some perpendicular lines pointed out that melancholy had predominated in his constitution; yet the straggling hairs of his eye-brows showed that anger had often shook his frame; indeed, the four temperatures, like the four elements, had resided in this little world, and produced harmony. the whole visage was bony, and an energetic frown had knit the flexible skin of his brow; the kingdom within had been extensive; and the wild creations of fancy had there "a local habitation and a name." so exquisite was his sensibility, so quick his comprehension, that he perceived various combinations in an instant; he caught truth as she darted towards him, saw all her fair proportion at a glance, and the flash of his eye spoke the quick senses which conveyed intelligence to his mind; the sensorium indeed was capacious, and the sage imagined he saw the lucid beam, sparkling with love or ambition, in characters of fire, which a graceful curve of the upper eyelid shaded. the lips were a little deranged by contempt; and a mixture of vanity and self-complacency formed a few irregular lines round them. the chin had suffered from sensuality, yet there were still great marks of vigour in it, as if advanced with stern dignity. the hand accustomed to command, and even tyrannize, was unnerved; but its appearance convinced sagestus, that he had oftener wielded a thought than a weapon; and that he had silenced, by irresistible conviction, the superficial disputant, and the being, who doubted because he had not strength to believe, who, wavering between different borrowed opinions, first caught at one straw, then at another, unable to settle into any consistency of character. after gazing a few moments, sagestus turned away exclaiming, how are the stately oaks torn up by a tempest, and the bow unstrung, that could force the arrow beyond the ken of the eye! what a different face next met his view! the forehead was short, yet well set together; the nose small, but a little turned up at the end; and a draw-down at the sides of his mouth, proved that he had been a humourist, who minded the main chance, and could joke with his acquaintance, while he eagerly devoured a dainty which he was not to pay for. his lips shut like a box whose hinges had often been mended; and the muscles, which display the soft emotion of the heart on the cheeks, were grown quite rigid, so that, the vessels that should have moistened them not having much communication with the grand source of passions, the fine volatile fluid had evaporated, and they became mere dry fibres, which might be pulled by any misfortune that threatened himself, but were not sufficiently elastic to be moved by the miseries of others. his joints were inserted compactly, and with celerity they had performed all the animal functions, without any of the grace which results from the imagination mixing with the senses. a huge form was stretched near him, that exhibited marks of overgrown infancy; every part was relaxed; all appeared imperfect. yet, some undulating lines on the puffed-out cheeks, displayed signs of timid, servile good nature; and the skin of the forehead had been so often drawn up by wonder, that the few hairs of the eyebrows were fixed in a sharp arch, whilst an ample chin rested in lobes of flesh on his protuberant breast. by his side was a body that had scarcely ever much life in it--sympathy seemed to have drawn them together--every feature and limb was round and fleshy, and, if a kind of brutal cunning had not marked the face, it might have been mistaken for an automaton, so unmixed was the phlegmatic fluid. the vital spark was buried deep in a soft mass of matter, resembling the pith in young elder, which, when found, is so equivocal, that it only appears a moister part of the same body. another part of the beach was covered with sailors, whose bodies exhibited marks of strength and brutal courage.--their characters were all different, though of the same class; sagestus did not stay to discriminate them, satisfied with a rough sketch. he saw indolence roused by a love of humour, or rather bodily fun; sensuality and prodigality with a vein of generosity running through it; a contempt of danger with gross superstition; supine senses, only to be kept alive by noisy, tumultuous pleasures, or that kind of novelty which borders on absurdity: this formed the common outline, and the rest were rather dabs than shades. sagestus paused, and remembered it had been said by an earthly wit, that "many a flower is born to blush unseen, and waste its sweetness on the desart air." how little, he exclaimed, did that poet know of the ways of heaven! and yet, in this respect, they are direct; the hands before me, were designed to pull a rope, knock down a sheep, or perform the servile offices of life; no "mute, inglorious poet" rests amongst them, and he who is superior to his fellow, does not rise above mediocrity. the genius that sprouts from a dunghil soon shakes off the heterogenous mass; those only grovel, who have not power to fly. he turned his step towards the mother of the orphan: another female was at some distance; and a man who, by his garb, might have been the husband, or brother, of the former, was not far off. him the sage surveyed with an attentive eye, and bowed with respect to the inanimate clay, that lately had been the dwelling of a most benevolent spirit. the head was square, though the features were not very prominent; but there was a great harmony in every part, and the turn of the nostrils and lips evinced, that the soul must have had taste, to which they had served as organs. penetration and judgment were seated on the brows that overhung the eye. fixed as it was, sagestus quickly discerned the expression it must have had; dark and pensive, rather from slowness of comprehension than melancholy, it seemed to absorb the light of knowledge, to drink it in ray by ray; nay, a new one was not allowed to enter his head till the last was arranged: an opinion was thus cautiously received, and maturely weighed, before it was added to the general stock. as nature led him to mount from a part to the whole, he was most conversant with the beautiful, and rarely comprehended the sublime; yet, said sagestus, with a softened tone, he was all heart, full of forbearance, and desirous to please every fellow-creature; but from a nobler motive than a love of admiration; the fumes of vanity never mounted to cloud his brain, or tarnish his beneficence. the fluid in which those placid eyes swam, is now congealed; how often has tenderness given them the finest water! some torn parts of the child's dress hung round his arm, which led the sage to conclude, that he had saved the child; every line in his face confirmed the conjecture; benevolence indeed strung the nerves that naturally were not very firm; it was the great knot that tied together the scattered qualities, and gave the distinct stamp to the character. the female whom he next approached, and supposed to be an attendant on the other, was below the middle size, and her legs were so disproportionably short, that, when she moved, she must have waddled along; her elbows were drawn in to touch her long taper, waist, and the air of her whole body was an affectation of gentility. death could not alter the rigid hang of her limbs, or efface the simper that had stretched her mouth; the lips were thin, as if nature intended she should mince her words; her nose was small, and sharp at the end; and the forehead, unmarked by eyebrows, was wrinkled by the discontent that had sunk her cheeks, on which sagestus still discerned faint traces of tenderness; and fierce good-nature, he perceived had sometimes animated the little spark of an eye that anger had oftener lighted. the same thought occurred to him that the sight of the sailors had suggested, men and women are all in their proper places--this female was intended to fold up linen and nurse the sick. anxious to observe the mother of his charge, he turned to the lily that had been so rudely snapped, and, carefully observing it, traced every fine line to its source. there was a delicacy in her form, so truly feminine, that an involuntary desire to cherish such a being, made the sage again feel the almost forgotten sensations of his nature. on observing her more closely, he discovered that her natural delicacy had been increased by an improper education, to a degree that took away all vigour from her faculties. and its baneful influence had had such an effect on her mind, that few traces of the exertions of it appeared on her face, though the fine finish of her features, and particularly the form of the forehead, convinced the sage that her understanding might have risen considerably above mediocrity, had the wheels ever been put in motion; but, clogged by prejudices, they never turned quite round, and, whenever she considered a subject, she stopped before she came to a conclusion. assuming a mask of propriety, she had banished nature; yet its tendency was only to be diverted, not stifled. some lines, which took from the symmetry of the mouth, not very obvious to a superficial observer, struck sagestus, and they appeared to him characters of indolent obstinacy. not having courage to form an opinion of her own, she adhered, with blind partiality, to those she adopted, which she received in the lump, and, as they always remained unopened, of course she only saw the even gloss on the outside. vestiges of anger were visible on her brow, and the sage concluded, that she had often been offended with, and indeed would scarcely make any allowance for, those who did not coincide with her in opinion, as things always appear self-evident that have never been examined; yet her very weakness gave a charming timidity to her countenance; goodness and tenderness pervaded every lineament, and melted in her dark blue eyes. the compassion that wanted activity, was sincere, though it only embellished her face, or produced casual acts of charity when a moderate alms could relieve present distress. unacquainted with life, fictitious, unnatural distress drew the tears that were not shed for real misery. in its own shape, human wretchedness excites a little disgust in the mind that has indulged sickly refinement. perhaps the sage gave way to a little conjecture in drawing the last conclusion; but his conjectures generally arose from distinct ideas, and a dawn of light allowed him to see a great way farther than common mortals. he was now convinced that the orphan was not very unfortunate in having lost such a mother. the parent that inspires fond affection without respect, is seldom an useful one; and they only are respectable, who consider right and wrong abstracted from local forms and accidental modifications. determined to adopt the child, he named it after himself, sagesta, and retired to the hut where the innocent slept, to think of the best method of educating this child, whom the angry deep had spared. [the last branch of the education of sagesta, consisted of a variety of characters and stories presented to her in the cave of fancy, of which the following is a specimen.] chap. a form now approached that particularly struck and interested sagesta. the sage, observing what passed in her mind, bade her ever trust to the first impression. in life, he continued, try to remember the effect the first appearance of a stranger has on your mind; and, in proportion to your sensibility, you may decide on the character. intelligence glances from eyes that have the same pursuits, and a benevolent heart soon traces the marks of benevolence on the countenance of an unknown fellow-creature; and not only the countenance, but the gestures, the voice, loudly speak truth to the unprejudiced mind. whenever a stranger advances towards you with a tripping step, receives you with broad smiles, and a profusion of compliments, and yet you find yourself embarrassed and unable to return the salutation with equal cordiality, be assured that such a person is affected, and endeavours to maintain a very good character in the eyes of the world, without really practising the social virtues which dress the face in looks of unfeigned complacency. kindred minds are drawn to each other by expressions which elude description; and, like the calm breeze that plays on a smooth lake, they are rather felt than seen. beware of a man who always appears in good humour; a selfish design too frequently lurks in the smiles the heart never curved; or there is an affectation of candour that destroys all strength of character, by blending truth and falshood into an unmeaning mass. the mouth, in fact, seems to be the feature where you may trace every kind of dissimulation, from the simper of vanity, to the fixed smile of the designing villain. perhaps, the modulations of the voice will still more quickly give a key to the character than even the turns of the mouth, or the words that issue from it; often do the tones of unpractised dissemblers give the lie to their assertions. many people never speak in an unnatural voice, but when they are insincere: the phrases not corresponding with the dictates of the heart, have nothing to keep them in tune. in the course of an argument however, you may easily discover whether vanity or conviction stimulates the disputant, though his inflated countenance may be turned from you, and you may not see the gestures which mark self-sufficiency. he stopped, and the spirit began. i have wandered through the cave; and, as soon as i have taught you a useful lesson, i shall take my flight where my tears will cease to flow, and where mine eyes will no more be shocked with the sight of guilt and sorrow. before many moons have changed, thou wilt enter, o mortal! into that world i have lately left. listen to my warning voice, and trust not too much to the goodness which i perceive resides in thy breast. let it be reined in by principles, lest thy very virtue sharpen the sting of remorse, which as naturally follows disorder in the moral world, as pain attends on intemperance in the physical. but my history will afford you more instruction than mere advice. sagestus concurred in opinion with her, observing that the senses of children should be the first object of improvement; then their passions worked on; and judgment the fruit, must be the acquirement of the being itself, when out of leading-strings. the spirit bowed assent, and, without any further prelude, entered on her history. my mother was a most respectable character, but she was yoked to a man whose follies and vices made her ever feel the weight of her chains. the first sensation i recollect, was pity; for i have seen her weep over me and the rest of her babes, lamenting that the extravagance of a father would throw us destitute on the world. but, though my father was extravagant, and seldom thought of any thing but his own pleasures, our education was not neglected. in solitude, this employment was my mother's only solace; and my father's pride made him procure us masters; nay, sometimes he was so gratified by our improvement, that he would embrace us with tenderness, and intreat my mother to forgive him, with marks of real contrition. but the affection his penitence gave rise to, only served to expose her to continual disappointments, and keep hope alive merely to torment her. after a violent debauch he would let his beard grow, and the sadness that reigned in the house i shall never forget; he was ashamed to meet even the eyes of his children. this is so contrary to the nature of things, it gave me exquisite pain; i used, at those times, to show him extreme respect. i could not bear to see my parent humble himself before me. however neither his constitution, nor fortune could long bear the constant waste. he had, i have observed, a childish affection for his children, which was displayed in caresses that gratified him for the moment, yet never restrained the headlong fury of his appetites; his momentary repentance wrung his heart, without influencing his conduct; and he died, leaving an encumbered wreck of a good estate. as we had always lived in splendid poverty, rather than in affluence, the shock was not so great; and my mother repressed her anguish, and concealed some circumstances, that she might not shed a destructive mildew over the gaiety of youth. so fondly did i doat on this dear parent, that she engrossed all my tenderness; her sorrows had knit me firmly to her, and my chief care was to give her proofs of affection. the gallantry that afforded my companions, the few young people my mother forced me to mix with, so much pleasure, i despised; i wished more to be loved than admired, for i could love. i adored virtue; and my imagination, chasing a chimerical object, overlooked the common pleasures of life; they were not sufficient for my happiness. a latent fire made me burn to rise superior to my contemporaries in wisdom and virtue; and tears of joy and emulation filled my eyes when i read an account of a great action--i felt admiration, not astonishment. my mother had two particular friends, who endeavoured to settle her affairs; one was a middle-aged man, a merchant; the human breast never enshrined a more benevolent heart. his manners were rather rough, and he bluntly spoke his thoughts without observing the pain it gave; yet he possessed extreme tenderness, as far as his discernment went. men do not make sufficient distinction, said she, digressing from her story to address sagestus, between tenderness and sensibility. to give the shortest definition of sensibility, replied the sage, i should say that it is the result of acute senses, finely fashioned nerves, which vibrate at the slightest touch, and convey such clear intelligence to the brain, that it does not require to be arranged by the judgment. such persons instantly enter into the characters of others, and instinctively discern what will give pain to every human being; their own feelings are so varied that they seem to contain in themselves, not only all the passions of the species, but their various modifications. exquisite pain and pleasure is their portion; nature wears for them a different aspect than is displayed to common mortals. one moment it is a paradise; all is beautiful: a cloud arises, an emotion receives a sudden damp; darkness invades the sky, and the world is an unweeded garden;--but go on with your narrative, said sagestus, recollecting himself. she proceeded. the man i am describing was humanity itself; but frequently he did not understand me; many of my feelings were not to be analyzed by his common sense. his friendships, for he had many friends, gave him pleasure unmixed with pain; his religion was coldly reasonable, because he wanted fancy, and he did not feel the necessity of finding, or creating, a perfect object, to answer the one engraved on his heart: the sketch there was faint. he went with the stream, and rather caught a character from the society he lived in, than spread one around him. in my mind many opinions were graven with a pen of brass, which he thought chimerical: but time could not erase them, and i now recognize them as the seeds of eternal happiness: they will soon expand in those realms where i shall enjoy the bliss adapted to my nature; this is all we need ask of the supreme being; happiness must follow the completion of his designs. he however could live quietly, without giving a preponderancy to many important opinions that continually obtruded on my mind; not having an enthusiastic affection for his fellow creatures, he did them good, without suffering from their follies. he was particularly attached to me, and i felt for him all the affection of a daughter; often, when he had been interesting himself to promote my welfare, have i lamented that he was not my father; lamented that the vices of mine had dried up one source of pure affection. the other friend i have already alluded to, was of a very different character; greatness of mind, and those combinations of feeling which are so difficult to describe, raised him above the throng, that bustle their hour out, lie down to sleep, and are forgotten. but i shall soon see him, she exclaimed, as much superior to his former self, as he then rose in my eyes above his fellow creatures! as she spoke, a glow of delight animated each feature; her countenance appeared transparent; and she silently anticipated the happiness she should enjoy, when she entered those mansions, where death-divided friends should meet, to part no more; where human weakness could not damp their bliss, or poison the cup of joy that, on earth, drops from the lips as soon as tasted, or, if some daring mortal snatches a hasty draught, what was sweet to the taste becomes a root of bitterness. he was unfortunate, had many cares to struggle with, and i marked on his cheeks traces of the same sorrows that sunk my own. he was unhappy i say, and perhaps pity might first have awoke my tenderness; for, early in life, an artful woman worked on his compassionate soul, and he united his fate to a being made up of such jarring elements, that he was still alone. the discovery did not extinguish that propensity to love, a high sense of virtue fed. i saw him sick and unhappy, without a friend to sooth the hours languor made heavy; often did i sit a long winter's evening by his side, railing at the swift wings of time, and terming my love, humanity. two years passed in this manner, silently rooting my affection; and it might have continued calm, if a fever had not brought him to the very verge of the grave. though still deceived, i was miserable that the customs of the world did not allow me to watch by him; when sleep forsook his pillow, my wearied eyes were not closed, and my anxious spirit hovered round his bed. i saw him, before he had recovered his strength; and, when his hand touched mine, life almost retired, or flew to meet the touch. the first look found a ready way to my heart, and thrilled through every vein. we were left alone, and insensibly began to talk of the immortality of the soul; i declared that i could not live without this conviction. in the ardour of conversation he pressed my hand to his heart; it rested there a moment, and my emotions gave weight to my opinion, for the affection we felt was not of a perishable nature.--a silence ensued, i know not how long; he then threw my hand from him, as if it had been a serpent; formally complained of the weather, and adverted to twenty other uninteresting subjects. vain efforts! our hearts had already spoken to each other. feebly did i afterwards combat an affection, which seemed twisted in every fibre of my heart. the world stood still when i thought of him; it moved heavily at best, with one whose very constitution seemed to mark her out for misery. but i will not dwell on the passion i too fondly nursed. one only refuge had i on earth; i could not resolutely desolate the scene my fancy flew to, when worldly cares, when a knowledge of mankind, which my circumstances forced on me, rendered every other insipid. i was afraid of the unmarked vacuity of common life; yet, though i supinely indulged myself in fairy-land, when i ought to have been more actively employed, virtue was still the first mover of my actions; she dressed my love in such enchanting colours, and spread the net i could never break. our corresponding feelings confounded our very souls; and in many conversations we almost intuitively discerned each other's sentiments; the heart opened itself, not chilled by reserve, nor afraid of misconstruction. but, if virtue inspired love, love gave new energy to virtue, and absorbed every selfish passion. never did even a wish escape me, that my lover should not fulfil the hard duties which fate had imposed on him. i only dissembled with him in one particular; i endeavoured to soften his wife's too conspicuous follies, and extenuated her failings in an indirect manner. to this i was prompted by a loftiness of spirit; i should have broken the band of life, had i ceased to respect myself. but i will hasten to an important change in my circumstances. my mother, who had concealed the real state of her affairs from me, was now impelled to make me her confident, that i might assist to discharge her mighty debt of gratitude. the merchant, my more than father, had privately assisted her: but a fatal civil-war reduced his large property to a bare competency; and an inflammation in his eyes, that arose from a cold he had caught at a wreck, which he watched during a stormy night to keep off the lawless colliers, almost deprived him of sight. his life had been spent in society, and he scarcely knew how to fill the void; for his spirit would not allow him to mix with his former equals as an humble companion; he who had been treated with uncommon respect, could not brook their insulting pity. from the resource of solitude, reading, the complaint in his eyes cut him off, and he became our constant visitor. actuated by the sincerest affection, i used to read to him, and he mistook my tenderness for love. how could i undeceive him, when every circumstance frowned on him! too soon i found that i was his only comfort; i, who rejected his hand when fortune smiled, could not now second her blow; and, in a moment of enthusiastic gratitude and tender compassion, i offered him my hand.--it was received with pleasure; transport was not made for his soul; nor did he discover that nature had separated us, by making me alive to such different sensations. my mother was to live with us, and i dwelt on this circumstance to banish cruel recollections, when the bent bow returned to its former state. with a bursting heart and a firm voice, i named the day when i was to seal my promise. it came, in spite of my regret; i had been previously preparing myself for the awful ceremony, and answered the solemn question with a resolute tone, that would silence the dictates of my heart; it was a forced, unvaried one; had nature modulated it, my secret would have escaped. my active spirit was painfully on the watch to repress every tender emotion. the joy in my venerable parent's countenance, the tenderness of my husband, as he conducted me home, for i really had a sincere affection for him, the gratulations of my mind, when i thought that this sacrifice was heroic, all tended to deceive me; but the joy of victory over the resigned, pallid look of my lover, haunted my imagination, and fixed itself in the centre of my brain.--still i imagined, that his spirit was near me, that he only felt sorrow for my loss, and without complaint resigned me to my duty. i was left alone a moment; my two elbows rested on a table to support my chin. ten thousand thoughts darted with astonishing velocity through my mind. my eyes were dry; i was on the brink of madness. at this moment a strange association was made by my imagination; i thought of gallileo, who when he left the inquisition, looked upwards, and cried out, "yet it moves." a shower of tears, like the refreshing drops of heaven, relieved my parched sockets; they fell disregarded on the table; and, stamping with my foot, in an agony i exclaimed, "yet i love." my husband entered before i had calmed these tumultuous emotions, and tenderly took my hand. i snatched it from him; grief and surprise were marked on his countenance; i hastily stretched it out again. my heart smote me, and i removed the transient mist by an unfeigned endeavour to please him. a few months after, my mind grew calmer; and, if a treacherous imagination, if feelings many accidents revived, sometimes plunged me into melancholy, i often repeated with steady conviction, that virtue was not an empty name, and that, in following the dictates of duty, i had not bidden adieu to content. in the course of a few years, the dear object of my fondest affection, said farewel, in dying accents. thus left alone, my grief became dear; and i did not feel solitary, because i thought i might, without a crime, indulge a passion, that grew more ardent than ever when my imagination only presented him to my view, and restored my former activity of soul which the late calm had rendered torpid. i seemed to find myself again, to find the eccentric warmth that gave me identity of character. reason had governed my conduct, but could not change my nature; this voluptuous sorrow was superior to every gratification of sense, and death more firmly united our hearts. alive to every human affection, i smoothed my mothers passage to eternity, and so often gave my husband sincere proofs of affection, he never supposed that i was actuated by a more fervent attachment. my melancholy, my uneven spirits, he attributed to my extreme sensibility, and loved me the better for possessing qualities he could not comprehend. at the close of a summer's day, some years after, i wandered with careless steps over a pathless common; various anxieties had rendered the hours which the sun had enlightened heavy; sober evening came on; i wished to still "my mind, and woo lone quiet in her silent walk." the scene accorded with my feelings; it was wild and grand; and the spreading twilight had almost confounded the distant sea with the barren, blue hills that melted from my sight. i sat down on a rising ground; the rays of the departing sun illumined the horizon, but so indistinctly, that i anticipated their total extinction. the death of nature led me to a still more interesting subject, that came home to my bosom, the death of him i loved. a village-bell was tolling; i listened, and thought of the moment when i heard his interrupted breath, and felt the agonizing fear, that the same sound would never more reach my ears, and that the intelligence glanced from my eyes, would no more be felt. the spoiler had seized his prey; the sun was fled, what was this world to me! i wandered to another, where death and darkness could not enter; i pursued the sun beyond the mountains, and the soul escaped from this vale of tears. my reflections were tinged with melancholy, but they were sublime.--i grasped a mighty whole, and smiled on the king of terrors; the tie which bound me to my friends he could not break; the same mysterious knot united me to the source of all goodness and happiness. i had seen the divinity reflected in a face i loved; i had read immortal characters displayed on a human countenance, and forgot myself whilst i gazed. i could not think of immortality, without recollecting the ecstacy i felt, when my heart first whispered to me that i was beloved; and again did i feel the sacred tie of mutual affection; fervently i prayed to the father of mercies; and rejoiced that he could see every turn of a heart, whose movements i could not perfectly understand. my passion seemed a pledge of immortality; i did not wish to hide it from the all-searching eye of heaven. where indeed could i go from his presence? and, whilst it was dear to me, though darkness might reign during the night of life, joy would come when i awoke to life everlasting. i now turned my step towards home, when the appearance of a girl, who stood weeping on the common, attracted my attention. i accosted her, and soon heard her simple tale; that her father was gone to sea, and her mother sick in bed. i followed her to their little dwelling, and relieved the sick wretch. i then again sought my own abode; but death did not now haunt my fancy. contriving to give the poor creature i had left more effectual relief, i reached my own garden-gate very weary, and rested on it.--recollecting the turns of my mind during the walk, i exclaimed, surely life may thus be enlivened by active benevolence, and the sleep of death, like that i am now disposed to fall into, may be sweet! my life was now unmarked by any extraordinary change, and a few days ago i entered this cavern; for through it every mortal must pass; and here i have discovered, that i neglected many opportunities of being useful, whilst i fostered a devouring flame. remorse has not reached me, because i firmly adhered to my principles, and i have also discovered that i saw through a false medium. worthy as the mortal was i adored, i should not long have loved him with the ardour i did, had fate united us, and broken the delusion the imagination so artfully wove. his virtues, as they now do, would have extorted my esteem; but he who formed the human soul, only can fill it, and the chief happiness of an immortal being must arise from the same source as its existence. earthly love leads to heavenly, and prepares us for a more exalted state; if it does not change its nature, and destroy itself, by trampling on the virtue, that constitutes its essence, and allies us to the deity. on poetry, and our relish for the beauties of nature. on poetry, &c. a taste for rural scenes, in the present state of society, appears to be very often an artificial sentiment, rather inspired by poetry and romances, than a real perception of the beauties of nature. but, as it is reckoned a proof of refined taste to praise the calm pleasures which the country affords, the theme is never exhausted. yet it may be made a question, whether this romantic kind of declamation, has much effect on the conduct of those, who leave, for a season, the crowded cities in which they were bred. i have been led to these reflections, by observing, when i have resided for any length of time in the country, how few people seem to contemplate nature with their own eyes. i have "brushed the dew away" in the morning; but, pacing over the printless grass, i have wondered that, in such delightful situations, the sun was allowed to rise in solitary majesty, whilst my eyes alone hailed its beautifying beams. the webs of the evening have still been spread across the hedged path, unless some labouring man, trudging to work, disturbed the fairy structure; yet, in spite of this supineness, when i joined the social circle, every tongue rang changes on the pleasures of the country. having frequently had occasion to make the same observation, i was led to endeavour, in one of my solitary rambles, to trace the cause, and likewise to enquire why the poetry written in the infancy of society, is most natural: which, strictly speaking (for _natural_ is a very indefinite expression) is merely to say, that it is the transcript of immediate sensations, in all their native wildness and simplicity, when fancy, awakened by the sight of interesting objects, was most actively at work. at such moments, sensibility quickly furnishes similes, and the sublimated spirits combine images, which rising spontaneously, it is not necessary coldly to ransack the understanding or memory, till the laborious efforts of judgment exclude present sensations, and damp the fire of enthusiasm. the effusions of a vigorous mind, will ever tell us how far the understanding has been enlarged by thought, and stored with knowledge. the richness of the soil even appears on the surface; and the result of profound thinking, often mixing, with playful grace, in the reveries of the poet, smoothly incorporates with the ebullitions of animal spirits, when the finely fashioned nerve vibrates acutely with rapture, or when, relaxed by soft melancholy, a pleasing languor prompts the long-drawn sigh, and feeds the slowly falling tear. the poet, the man of strong feelings, gives us only an image of his mind, when he was actually alone, conversing with himself, and marking the impression which nature had made on his own heart.--if, at this sacred moment, the idea of some departed friend, some tender recollection when the soul was most alive to tenderness, intruded unawares into his thoughts, the sorrow which it produced is artlessly, yet poetically expressed--and who can avoid sympathizing? love to man leads to devotion--grand and sublime images strike the imagination--god is seen in every floating cloud, and comes from the misty mountain to receive the noblest homage of an intelligent creature--praise. how solemn is the moment, when all affections and remembrances fade before the sublime admiration which the wisdom and goodness of god inspires, when he is worshipped in a _temple not made with hands_, and the world seems to contain only the mind that formed, and the mind that contemplates it! these are not the weak responses of ceremonial devotion; nor, to express them, would the poet need another poet's aid: his heart burns within him, and he speaks the language of truth and nature with resistless energy. inequalities, of course, are observable in his effusions; and a less vigorous fancy, with more taste, would have produced more elegance and uniformity; but, as passages are softened or expunged during the cooler moments of reflection, the understanding is gratified at the expence of those involuntary sensations, which, like the beauteous tints of an evening sky, are so evanescent, that they melt into new forms before they can be analyzed. for however eloquently we may boast of our reason, man must often be delighted he cannot tell why, or his blunt feelings are not made to relish the beauties which nature, poetry, or any of the imitative arts, afford. the imagery of the ancients seems naturally to have been borrowed from surrounding objects and their mythology. when a hero is to be transported from one place to another, across pathless wastes, is any vehicle so natural, as one of the fleecy clouds on which the poet has often gazed, scarcely conscious that he wished to make it his chariot? again, when nature seems to present obstacles to his progress at almost every step, when the tangled forest and steep mountain stand as barriers, to pass over which the mind longs for supernatural aid; an interposing deity, who walks on the waves, and rules the storm, severely felt in the first attempts to cultivate a country, will receive from the impassioned fancy "a local habitation and a name." it would be a philosophical enquiry, and throw some light on the history of the human mind, to trace, as far as our information will allow us to trace, the spontaneous feelings and ideas which have produced the images that now frequently appear unnatural, because they are remote; and disgusting, because they have been servilely copied by poets, whose habits of thinking, and views of nature must have been different; for, though the understanding seldom disturbs the current of our present feelings, without dissipating the gay clouds which fancy has been embracing, yet it silently gives the colour to the whole tenour of them, and the dream is over, when truth is grossly violated, or images introduced, selected from books, and not from local manners or popular prejudices. in a more advanced state of civilization, a poet is rather the creature of art, than of nature. the books that he reads in his youth, become a hot-bed in which artificial fruits are produced, beautiful to the common eye, though they want the true hue and flavour. his images do not arise from sensations; they are copies; and, like the works of the painters who copy ancient statues when they draw men and women of their own times, we acknowledge that the features are fine, and the proportions just; yet they are men of stone; insipid figures, that never convey to the mind the idea of a portrait taken from life, where the soul gives spirit and homogeneity to the whole. the silken wings of fancy are shrivelled by rules; and a desire of attaining elegance of diction, occasions an attention to words, incompatible with sublime, impassioned thoughts. a boy of abilities, who has been taught the structure of verse at school, and been roused by emulation to compose rhymes whilst he was reading works of genius, may, by practice, produce pretty verses, and even become what is often termed an elegant poet: yet his readers, without knowing what to find fault with, do not find themselves warmly interested. in the works of the poets who fasten on their affections, they see grosser faults, and the very images which shock their taste in the modern; still they do not appear as puerile or extrinsic in one as the other.--why?--because they did not appear so to the author. it may sound paradoxical, after observing that those productions want vigour, that are merely the work of imitation, in which the understanding has violently directed, if not extinguished, the blaze of fancy, to assert, that, though genius be only another word for exquisite sensibility, the first observers of nature, the true poets, exercised their understanding much more than their imitators. but they exercised it to discriminate things, whilst their followers were busy to borrow sentiments and arrange words. boys who have received a classical education, load their memory with words, and the correspondent ideas are perhaps never distinctly comprehended. as a proof of this assertion, i must observe, that i have known many young people who could write tolerably smooth verses, and string epithets prettily together, when their prose themes showed the barrenness of their minds, and how superficial the cultivation must have been, which their understanding had received. dr. johnson, i know, has given a definition of genius, which would overturn my reasoning, if i were to admit it.--he imagines, that _a strong mind, accidentally led to some particular study_ in which it excels, is a genius.--not to stop to investigate the causes which produced this happy _strength_ of mind, experience seems to prove, that those minds have appeared most vigorous, that have pursued a study, after nature had discovered a bent; for it would be absurd to suppose, that a slight impression made on the weak faculties of a boy, is the fiat of fate, and not to be effaced by any succeeding impression, or unexpected difficulty. dr. johnson in fact, appears sometimes to be of the same opinion (how consistently i shall not now enquire), especially when he observes, "that thomson looked on nature with the eye which she only gives to a poet." but, though it should be allowed that books may produce some poets, i fear they will never be the poets who charm our cares to sleep, or extort admiration. they may diffuse taste, and polish the language; but i am inclined to conclude that they will seldom rouse the passions, or amend the heart. and, to return to the first subject of discussion, the reason why most people are more interested by a scene described by a poet, than by a view of nature, probably arises from the want of a lively imagination. the poet contracts the prospect, and, selecting the most picturesque part in his _camera_, the judgment is directed, and the whole force of the languid faculty turned towards the objects which excited the most forcible emotions in the poet's heart; the reader consequently feels the enlivened description, though he was not able to receive a first impression from the operations of his own mind. besides, it may be further observed, that gross minds are only to be moved by forcible representations. to rouse the thoughtless, objects must be presented, calculated to produce tumultuous emotions; the unsubstantial, picturesque forms which a contemplative man gazes on, and often follows with ardour till he is mocked by a glimpse of unattainable excellence, appear to them the light vapours of a dreaming enthusiast, who gives up the substance for the shadow. it is not within that they seek amusement; their eyes are seldom turned on themselves; consequently their emotions, though sometimes fervid, are always transient, and the nicer perceptions which distinguish the man of genuine taste, are not felt, or make such a slight impression as scarcely to excite any pleasurable sensations. is it surprising then that they are often overlooked, even by those who are delighted by the same images concentrated by the poet? but even this numerous class is exceeded, by witlings, who, anxious to appear to have wit and taste, do not allow their understandings or feelings any liberty; for, instead of cultivating their faculties and reflecting on their operations, they are busy collecting prejudices; and are predetermined to admire what the suffrage of time announces as excellent, not to store up a fund of amusement for themselves, but to enable them to talk. these hints will assist the reader to trace some of the causes why the beauties of nature are not forcibly felt, when civilization, or rather luxury, has made considerable advances--those calm sensations are not sufficiently lively to serve as a relaxation to the voluptuary, or even to the moderate pursuer of artificial pleasures. in the present state of society, the understanding must bring back the feelings to nature, or the sensibility must have such native strength, as rather to be whetted than destroyed by the strong exercises of passion. that the most valuable things are liable to the greatest perversion, is however as trite as true:--for the same sensibility, or quickness of senses, which makes a man relish the tranquil scenes of nature, when sensation, rather than reason, imparts delight, frequently makes a libertine of him, by leading him to prefer the sensual tumult of love a little refined by sentiment, to the calm pleasures of affectionate friendship, in whose sober satisfactions, reason, mixing her tranquillizing convictions, whispers, that content, not happiness, is the reward of virtue in this world. hints. [_chiefly designed to have been incorporated in the second part of the_ vindication of the rights of woman.] hints. . indolence is the source of nervous complaints, and a whole host of cares. this devil might say that his name was legion. . it should be one of the employments of women of fortune, to visit hospitals, and superintend the conduct of inferiors. . it is generally supposed, that the imagination of women is particularly active, and leads them astray. why then do we seek by education only to exercise their imagination and feeling, till the understanding, grown rigid by disuse, is unable to exercise itself--and the superfluous nourishment the imagination and feeling have received, renders the former romantic, and the latter weak? . few men have risen to any great eminence in learning, who have not received something like a regular education. why are women expected to surmount difficulties that men are not equal to? . nothing can be more absurd than the ridicule of the critic, that the heroine of his mock-tragedy was in love with the very man whom she ought least to have loved; he could not have given a better reason. how can passion gain strength any other way? in otaheite, love cannot be known, where the obstacles to irritate an indiscriminate appetite, and sublimate the simple sensations of desire till they mount to passion, are never known. there a man or woman cannot love the very person they ought not to have loved--nor does jealousy ever fan the flame. . it has frequently been observed, that, when women have an object in view, they pursue it with more steadiness than men, particularly love. this is not a compliment. passion pursues with more heat than reason, and with most ardour during the absence of reason. . men are more subject to the physical love than women. the confined education of women makes them more subject to jealousy. . simplicity seems, in general, the consequence of ignorance, as i have observed in the characters of women and sailors--the being confined to one track of impressions. . i know of no other way of preserving the chastity of mankind, than that of rendering women rather objects of love than desire. the difference is great. yet, while women are encouraged to ornament their persons at the expence of their minds, while indolence renders them helpless and lascivious (for what other name can be given to the common intercourse between the sexes?) they will be, generally speaking, only objects of desire; and, to such women, men cannot be constant. men, accustomed only to have their senses moved, merely seek for a selfish gratification in the society of women, and their sexual instinct, being neither supported by the understanding nor the heart, must be excited by variety. . we ought to respect old opinions; though prejudices, blindly adopted, lead to error, and preclude all exercise of the reason. the emulation which often makes a boy mischievous, is a generous spur; and the old remark, that unlucky, turbulent boys, make the wisest and best men, is true, spite of mr. knox's arguments. it has been observed, that the most adventurous horses, when tamed or domesticated, are the most mild and tractable. . the children who start up suddenly at twelve or fourteen, and fall into decays, in consequence, as it is termed, of outgrowing their strength, are in general, i believe, those children, who have been bred up with mistaken tenderness, and not allowed to sport and take exercise in the open air. this is analogous to plants: for it is found that they run up sickly, long stalks, when confined. . children should be taught to feel deference, not to practise submission. . it is always a proof of false refinement, when a fastidious taste overpowers sympathy. . lust appears to be the most natural companion of wild ambition; and love of human praise, of that dominion erected by cunning. . "genius decays as judgment increases." of course, those who have the least genius, have the earliest appearance of wisdom. . a knowledge of the fine arts, is seldom subservient to the promotion of either religion or virtue. elegance is often indecency; witness our prints. . there does not appear to be any evil in the world, but what is necessary. the doctrine of rewards and punishments, not considered as a means of reformation, appears to me an infamous libel on divine goodness. . whether virtue is founded on reason or revelation, virtue is wisdom, and vice is folly. why are positive punishments? . few can walk alone. the staff of christianity is the necessary support of human weakness. but an acquaintance with the nature of man and virtue, with just sentiments on the attributes, would be sufficient, without a voice from heaven, to lead some to virtue, but not the mob. . i only expect the natural reward of virtue, whatever it may be. i rely not on a positive reward. the justice of god can be vindicated by a belief in a future state--but a continuation of being vindicates it as clearly, as the positive system of rewards and punishments--by evil educing good for the individual, and not for an imaginary whole. the happiness of the whole must arise from the happiness of the constituent parts, or this world is not a state of trial, but a school. . the vices acquired by augustus to retain his power, must have tainted his soul, and prevented that increase of happiness a good man expects in the next stage of existence. this was a natural punishment. . the lover is ever most deeply enamoured, when it is with he knows not what--and the devotion of a mystic has a rude gothic grandeur in it, which the respectful adoration of a philosopher will never reach. i may be thought fanciful; but it has continually occurred to me, that, though, i allow, reason in this world is the mother of wisdom--yet some flights of the imagination seem to reach what wisdom cannot teach--and, while they delude us here, afford a glorious hope, if not a foretaste, of what we may expect hereafter. he that created us, did not mean to mark us with ideal images of grandeur, the _baseless fabric of a vision_--no--that perfection we follow with hopeless ardour when the whisperings of reason are heard, may be found, when not incompatible with our state, in the round of eternity. perfection indeed must, even then, be a comparative idea--but the wisdom, the happiness of a superior state, has been supposed to be intuitive, and the happiest effusions of human genius have seemed like inspiration--the deductions of reason destroy sublimity. . i am more and more convinced, that poetry is the first effervescence of the imagination, and the forerunner of civilization. . when the arabs had no trace of literature or science, they composed beautiful verses on the subjects of love and war. the flights of the imagination, and the laboured deductions of reason, appear almost incompatible. . poetry certainly flourishes most in the first rude state of society. the passions speak most eloquently, when they are not shackled by reason. the sublime expression, which has been so often quoted, [genesis, ch. , ver. .] is perhaps a barbarous flight; or rather the grand conception of an uncultivated mind; for it is contrary to nature and experience, to suppose that this account is founded on facts--it is doubtless a sublime allegory. but a cultivated mind would not thus have described the creation--for, arguing from analogy, it appears that creation must have been a comprehensive plan, and that the supreme being always uses second causes, slowly and silently to fulfil his purpose. this is, in reality, a more sublime view of that power which wisdom supports: but it is not the sublimity that would strike the impassioned mind, in which the imagination took place of intellect. tell a being, whose affections and passions have been more exercised than his reason, that god said, _let there be light! and there was light_; and he would prostrate himself before the being who could thus call things out of nothing, as if they were: but a man in whom reason had taken place of passion, would not adore, till wisdom was conspicuous as well as power, for his admiration must be founded on principle. . individuality is ever conspicuous in those enthusiastic flights of fancy, in which reason is left behind, without being lost sight of. . the mind has been too often brought to the test of enquiries which only reach to matter--put into the crucible, though the magnetic and electric fluid escapes from the experimental philosopher. . mr. kant has observed, that the understanding is sublime, the imagination beautiful--yet it is evident, that poets, and men who undoubtedly possess the liveliest imagination, are most touched by the sublime, while men who have cold, enquiring minds, have not this exquisite feeling in any great degree, and indeed seem to lose it as they cultivate their reason. . the grecian buildings are graceful--they fill the mind with all those pleasing emotions, which elegance and beauty never fail to excite in a cultivated mind--utility and grace strike us in unison--the mind is satisfied--things appear just what they ought to be: a calm satisfaction is felt, but the imagination has nothing to do--no obscurity darkens the gloom--like reasonable content, we can say why we are pleased--and this kind of pleasure may be lasting, but it is never great. . when we say that a person is an original, it is only to say in other words that he thinks. "the less a man has cultivated his rational faculties, the more powerful is the principle of imitation, over his actions, and his habits of thinking. most women, of course, are more influenced by the behaviour, the fashions, and the opinions of those with whom they associate, than men." (smellie.) when we read a book which supports our favourite opinions, how eagerly do we suck in the doctrines, and suffer our minds placidly to reflect the images which illustrate the tenets we have embraced? we indolently or quietly acquiesce in the conclusion, and our spirit animates and connects the various subjects. but, on the contrary, when we peruse a skilful writer, who does not coincide in opinion with us, how is the mind on the watch to detect fallacy? and this coolness often prevents our being carried away by a stream of eloquence, which the prejudiced mind terms declamation--a pomp of words.--we never allow ourselves to be warmed; and, after contending with the writer, are more confirmed in our own opinion, as much perhaps from a spirit of contradiction as from reason.--such is the strength of man! . it is the individual manner of seeing and feeling, pourtrayed by a strong imagination in bold images that have struck the senses, which creates all the charms of poetry. a great reader is always quoting the description of another's emotions; a strong imagination delights to paint its own. a writer of genius makes us feel; an inferior author reason. . some principle prior to self-love must have existed: the feeling which produced the pleasure, must have existed before the experience. the end. transcriber's notes: . obvious punctuation errors repaired. . this text contains blank space and lines of "--" and "*" characters. these are replicated from the printed pages, presumably they indicate censored text from the original source. . the listed errata at the beginning of volume and volume have been applied to the text. . the text as printed used incipits and 'long s' font. the incipits have not been replicated in this version, but can be viewed on 'long s' html version of the text or the page images linked from the html versions. . corrections: volume , page , "accuteness" changed to "acuteness" volume , page , "unfortutunate" changed to "unfortunate" volume , page , "resource" changed to "recourse" volume , page , "hunted" changed to "shunted" volume , page , "carreer" changed to "career" volume , page , "plased" changed to "pleased" volume , page , "and and" changed to "and" volume , page , "a r" changed to "air" volume , page , "he he" changed to "he" volume , page , "explananations" changed to "explanations" woman in the nineteenth century, and kindred papers relating to the sphere, condition and duties, of woman. by margaret fuller ossoli. edited by her brother, arthur b. fuller. with an introduction by horace greeley. preface. * * * * * it has been thought desirable that such papers of margaret fuller ossoli as pertained to the condition, sphere and duties of woman, should be collected and published together. the present volume contains, not only her "woman in the nineteenth century,"--which has been before published, but for some years out of print, and inaccessible to readers who have sought it,--but also several other papers, which have appeared at various times in the _tribune_ and elsewhere, and yet more which have never till now been published. my free access to her private manuscripts has given to me many papers, relating to woman, never intended for publication, which yet seem needful to this volume, in order to present a complete and harmonious view of her thoughts on this important theme. i have preferred to publish them without alteration, as most just to her views and to the reader; though, doubtless, she would have varied their expression and form before giving them to the press. it seems right here to remark, in order to avoid any misapprehension, that margaret ossoli's thoughts wore not directed so exclusively to the subject of the present volume as have been the minds of some others. as to the movement for the emancipation of woman from the unjust burdens and disabilities to which she has been subject oven in our own land, my sister could neither remain indifferent nor silent; yet she preferred, as in respect to every other reform, to act independently and to speak independently from her own stand-point, and never to merge her individuality in any existing organization. this she did, not as condemning such organizations, nor yet as judging them wholly unwise or uncalled for, but because she believed she could herself accomplish more for their true and high objects, unfettered by such organizations, than if a member of them. the opinions avowed throughout this volume, and wherever expressed, will, then, be found, whether consonant with the reader's or no, in all cases honestly and heartily her own,--the result of her own thought and faith. she never speaks, never did speak, for any clique or sect, but as her individual judgment, her reason and conscience, her observation and experience, taught her to speak. i could have wished that some one other than a brother should have spoken a few fitting words of margaret fuller, as a woman, to form a brief but proper accompaniment to this volume, which may reach some who have never read her "memoirs," recently published, or have never known her in personal life. this seemed the more desirable, because the strictest verity in speaking of her must seem, to such as knew her not, to be eulogy. but, after several disappointments as to the editorship of the volume, the duty, at last, has seemed to devolve upon me; and i have no reason to shrink from it but a sense of inadequacy. it is often supposed that literary women, and those who are active and earnest in promoting great intellectual, philanthropic, or religious movements, must of necessity neglect the domestic concerns of life. it may be that this is sometimes so, nor can such neglect be too severely reprehended; yet this is by no means a necessary result. some of the most devoted mothers the world has ever known, and whose homes were the abode of every domestic virtue, themselves the embodiment of all these, have been women whose minds were highly cultured, who loved and devoted both thought and time to literature, and were active in philanthropic and diffusive efforts for the welfare of the race. the letter to m., which is published on page , is inserted chiefly as showing the integrity and wisdom with which margaret advised her friends; the frankness with which she pointed out to every young woman who asked counsel any deficiencies of character, and the duties of life; and that among these latter she gave due place to the humblest which serve to make home attractive and happy. it is but simple justice for me to bear, in conjunction with many others, my tribute to her domestic virtues and fidelity to all home duties. that her mind found chief delight in the lowest forms of these duties may not be true, and it would be sad if it were; but it is strictly true that none, however humble, were either slighted or shunned. in common with a younger sister and brother, i shared her care in my early instruction, and found over one of the truest counsellors in a sister who scorned not the youngest mind nor the simplest intellectual wants in her love for communion, through converse or the silent page, with the minds of the greatest and most gifted. during a lingering illness, in childhood, well do i remember her as the angel of the sick-chamber, reading much to me from books useful and appropriate, and telling many a narrative not only fitted to wile away the pain of disease and the weariness of long confinement, but to elevate the mind and heart, and to direct them to all things noble and holy; over ready to watch while i slept, and to perform every gentle and kindly office. but her care of the sick--that she did not neglect, but was eminent in that sphere of womanly duty, even when no tie of kindred claimed this of her, mr. cass's letter abundantly shows; and also that this gentleness was united to a heroism which most call manly, but which, i believe, may as justly be called truly womanly. mr. cass's letter is inserted because it arrived too late to find a place in her "memoirs," and yet more because it bears much on margaret ossoli's characteristics as a woman. a few also of her private letters and papers, not bearing, save, indirectly, on the subject of this volume, are yet inserted in it, as further illustrative of her thought, feeling and action, in life's various relations. it is believed that nothing which exhibits a true woman, especially in her relations to others as friend, sister, daughter, wife, or mother, can fail to interest and be of value to her sex, indeed to all who are interested in human welfare and advancement, since these latter so much depend on the fidelity of woman. nor will anything pertaining to the education and care of children be deemed irrelevant, especially by mothers, upon whom these duties must always largely devolve. of the intellectual gifts and wide culture of margaret fuller there is no need that i should speak, nor is it wise that one standing in my relation to her should. those who knew her personally feel that no words ever flowed from her pen equalling the eloquent utterances of her lips; yet her works, though not always a clear oppression of her thoughts, are the evidences to which the world will look as proof of her mental greatness. on one point, however, i do wish to bear testimony--not needed with those who knew her well, but interesting, perhaps, to some readers into whose bands this volume may fall. it is on a subject which one who knew her from his childhood up--at _home_, where best the _heart_ and _soul_ can be known,--in the unrestrained hours of domestic life,--in various scenes, and not for a few days, nor under any peculiar circumstances--can speak with confidence, because he speaks what he "doth know, and testifieth what he hath seen." it relates to her christian faith and hope. "with all her intellectual gifts, with all her high, moral, and noble characteristics," there are some who will ask, "was her intellectual power sanctified by christian faith as its basis? were her moral qualities, her beneficent life, the results of a renewed heart?" i feel no hesitation here, nor would think it worth while to answer such questions at all, were her life to be read and known by all who read this volume, and were i not influenced also, in some degree, by the tone which has characterized a few sectarian reviews of her works, chiefly in foreign periodicals. surely, if the saviour's test, "by their fruits ye shall know them," be the true one, margaret ossoli was preeminently a christian. if a life of constant self-sacrifice,--if devotion to the welfare of kindred and the race,--if conformity to what she believed god's law, so that her life seemed ever the truest form of prayer, active obedience to the deity,--in fine, if carrying christianity into all the departments of action, so far as human infirmity allows,--if these be the proofs of a christian, then whoever has read her "memoirs" thoughtfully, and without sectarian prejudice or the use of sectarian standards of judgment, must feel her to have been a christian. but not alone in outward life, in mind and heart, too, was she a christian. the being brought into frequent and intimate contact with religious persons has been one of the chief privileges of my vocation, but never yet have i met with any person whose reverence for holy things was deeper than hers. abhorring, as all honest minds must, every species of cant, she respected true religious thought and feeling, by whomsoever cherished. god seemed nearer to her than to any person i have over known. in the influences of his holy spirit upon the heart she fully believed, and in experience realized them. jesus, the friend of man, can never have been more truly loved and honored than she loved and honored him. i am aware that this is strong language, but strength of language cannot equal the strength of my conviction on a point where i have had the best opportunities of judgment. rich as is the religion of jesus in its list of holy confessors, yet it can spare and would exclude none who in heart, mind and life, confessed and reverenced him as did she. among my earliest recollections, is her devoting much time to a thorough examination of the evidences of christianity, and ultimately declaring that to her, better than all arguments or usual processes of proof, was the soul's want of a divine religion, and the voice within that soul which declared the teachings of christ to be true and from god; and one of my most cherished possessions is that bible which she so diligently and thoughtfully read, and which bears, in her own handwriting, so many proofs of discriminating and prayerful perusal. as in regard to reformatory movements so here, she joined no organized body of believers, sympathizing with all of them whose views were noble and christian; deploring and bearing faithful testimony against anything she deemed narrowness or perversion in theology or life. this volume from her hand is now before the reader. the fact that a large share of it was never written or revised by its authoress for publication will be kept in view, as explaining any inaccuracy of expression or repetition of thought, should such occur in its pages. nor will it be deemed surprising, if, in papers written by so progressive a person, at so various periods of life, and under widely-varied circumstances, there should not always be found perfect union as to every expressed opinion. it is probable that this will soon be followed by another volume, containing a republication of "summer on the lakes," and also the "letters from europe," by the same hand. in the preparation of this volume much valuable assistance has been afforded by mr. greeley, of the new york _tribune_, who has been earnest in his desire and efforts for the diffusion of what margaret has written. a. b. f. boston, _may th_, . introduction. * * * * * the problem of woman's position, or "sphere,"--of her duties, responsibilities, rights and immunities as woman,--fitly attracts a large and still-increasing measure of attention from the thinkers and agitators of our time, the legislators, so called,--those who ultimately enact into statutes what the really governing class (to wit, the thinkers) have originated, matured and gradually commended to the popular comprehension and acceptance,--are not as yet much occupied with this problem, only fitfully worried and more or less consciously puzzled by it. more commonly they merely echo the mob's shallow retort to the petition of any strong-minded daughter or sister, who demands that she be allowed a voice in disposing of the money wrenched from her hard earnings by inexorable taxation, or in shaping the laws by which she is ruled, judged, and is liable to be sentenced to prison or to death, "it is a woman's business to obey her husband, keep his home tidy, and nourish and train his children." but when she rejoins to this, "very true; but suppose i choose not to have a husband, or am not chosen for a wife--what then? i am still subject to your laws. why am i not entitled, as a rational human being, to a voice in shaping them? i have physical needs, and must somehow earn a living. why should i not be at liberty to earn it in any honest and useful calling?"--the mob's flout is hushed, and the legislator is struck dumb also. they were already at the end of their scanty resources of logic, and it would be cruel for woman to ask further: "suppose me a wife, and my husband a drunken prodigal--what am i to do then? may i not earn food for my babes without being exposed to have it snatched from their mouths to replenish the rumseller's till, and aggravate my husband's madness? if some sympathizing relative sees fit to leave me a bequest wherewith to keep my little ones together, why may i not be legally enabled to secure this to their use and benefit? in short, why am i not regarded by the law as a _soul_, responsible for my acts to god and humanity, and not as a mere body, devoted to the unreasoning service of my husband?" the state gives no answer, and the champions of her policy evince wisdom in imitating her silence. the writer of the following pages was one of the earliest as well as ablest among american women, to demand for her sex equality before the law with her titular lord and master, her writings on this subject have the force which springs from the ripening of profound reflection into assured conviction. she wrote as one who had observed, and who deeply felt what she deliberately uttered. others have since spoken more fluently, more variously, with a greater affluence of illustration; but none, it is believed, more earnestly or more forcibly. it is due to her memory, as well as to the great and living cause of which she was so eminent and so fearless an advocate, that what she thought and said with regard to the position of her sex and its limitations, should be fully and fairly placed before the public. for several years past her principal essay on "woman," here given, has not been purchasable at any price, and has only with great difficulty been accessible to the general reader. to place it within the reach of those who need and require it, is the main impulse to the publication of this volume; but the accompanying essays and papers will be found equally worthy of thoughtful consideration. h. greeley. contents. * * * * * part i. woman in the nineteenth century * * * * * part ii miscellanies aulauron and laurie wrongs and duties of american woman george sand the same subject consuelo jenny lind, the "consuelo" of george sand caroline ever-growing lives household nobleness "glumdalclitches" "ellen; or, forgive and forget," "coubrier des etats unis," the same subject books of travel review of mrs. jameson's essays woman's influence over the insane review of browning's poems christmas children's books woman in poverty the irish character the same subject educate men and women as souls * * * * * part iii. extracts from journal and letters * * * * * appendix preface to woman in the nineteenth century. * * * * * the following essay is a reproduction, modified and expanded, of an article published in "the dial, boston, july, ," under the title of "the great lawsuit.--man _versus_ men; woman _versus_ women." this article excited a good deal of sympathy, add still more interest. it is in compliance with wishes expressed from many quarters that it is prepared for publication in its present form. objections having been made to the former title, as not sufficiently easy to be understood, the present has been substituted as expressive of the main purpose of the essay; though, by myself, the other is preferred, partly for the reason others do not like it,--that is, that it requires some thought to see what it means, and might thus prepare the reader to meet me on my own ground. besides, it offers a larger scope, and is, in that way, more just to my desire. i meant by that title to intimate the fact that, while it is the destiny of man, in the course of the ages, to ascertain and fulfil the law of his being, so that his life shall be seen, as a whole, to be that of an angel or messenger, the action of prejudices and passions which attend, in the day, the growth of the individual, is continually obstructing the holy work that is to make the earth a part of heaven. by man i mean both man and woman; these are the two halves of one thought. i lay no especial stress on the welfare of either. i believe that the development of the one cannot be effected without that of the other. my highest wish is that this truth should be distinctly and rationally apprehended, and the conditions of life and freedom recognized as the same for the daughters and the sons of time; twin exponents of a divine thought. i solicit a sincere and patient attention from those who open the following pages at all. i solicit of women that they will lay it to heart to ascertain what is for them the liberty of law. it is for this, and not for any, the largest, extension of partial privileges that i seek. i ask them, if interested by these suggestions, to search their own experience and intuitions for better, and fill up with fit materials the trenches that hedge them in. from men i ask a noble and earnest attention to anything that can be offered on this great and still obscure subject, such as i have met from many with whom i stand in private relations. and may truth, unpolluted by prejudice, vanity or selfishness, be granted daily more and more as the due of inheritance, and only valuable conquest for us all! _november_, . woman in the nineteenth century. * * * * * "frailty, thy name is woman." "the earth waits for her queen." the connection between these quotations may not be obvious, but it is strict. yet would any contradict us, if we made them applicable to the other side, and began also, frailty, thy name is man. the earth waits for its king? yet man, if not yet fully installed in his powers, has given much earnest of his claims. frail he is indeed,--how frail! how impure! yet often has the vein of gold displayed itself amid the baser ores, and man has appeared before us in princely promise worthy of his future. if, oftentimes, we see the prodigal son feeding on the husks in the fair field no more his own, anon we raise the eyelids, heavy from bitter tears, to behold in him the radiant apparition of genius and love, demanding not less than the all of goodness, power and beauty. we see that in him the largest claim finds a due foundation. that claim is for no partial sway, no exclusive possession. he cannot be satisfied with any one gift of life, any one department of knowledge or telescopic peep at the heavens. he feels himself called to understand and aid nature, that she may, through his intelligence, be raised and interpreted; to be a student of, and servant to, the universe-spirit; and king of his planet, that, as an angelic minister he may bring it into conscious harmony with the law of that spirit. in clear, triumphant moments, many times, has rung through the spheres the prophecy of his jubilee; and those moments, though past in time, have been translated into eternity by thought; the bright signs they left hang in the heavens, as single stars or constellations, and, already, a thickly sown radiance consoles the wanderer in the darkest night. other heroes since hercules have fulfilled the zodiac of beneficent labors, and then given up their mortal part to the fire without a murmur; while no god dared deny that they should have their reward, siquis tamen, hercule, siquis forte deo doliturus erit, daia praemia nollet, sed meruise dari sciet, invitus que probabit, assensere dei sages and lawgivers have bent their whole nature to the search for truth, and thought themselves happy if they could buy, with the sacrifice of all temporal ease and pleasure, one seed for the future eden. poets and priests have strung the lyre with the heart-strings, poured out their best blood upon the altar, which, reared anew from age to age, shall at last sustain the flame pure enough to rise to highest heaven. shall we not name with as deep a benediction those who, if not so immediately, or so consciously, in connection with the eternal truth, yet, led and fashioned by a divine instinct, serve no less to develop and interpret the open secret of love passing into life, energy creating for the purpose of happiness; the artist whose hand, drawn by a preexistent harmony to a certain medium, moulds it to forms of life more highly and completely organized than are seen elsewhere, and, by carrying out the intention of nature, reveals her meaning to those who are not yet wise enough to divine it; the philosopher who listens steadily for laws and causes, and from those obvious infers those yet unknown; the historian who, in faith that all events must have their reason and their aim, records them, and thus fills archives from which the youth of prophets may be fed; the man of science dissecting the statements, testing the facts and demonstrating order, even where he cannot its purpose? lives, too, which bear none of these names, have yielded tones of no less significance. the candlestick set in a low place has given light as faithfully, where it was needed, as that upon the hill, in close alleys, in dismal nooks, the word has been read as distinctly, as when shown by angels to holy men in the dark prison. those who till a spot of earth scarcely larger than is wanted for a grave, have deserved that the sun should shine upon its sod till violets answer. so great has been, from time to time, the promise, that, in all ages, men have said the gods themselves came down to dwell with them; that the all-creating wandered on the earth to taste, in a limited nature, the sweetness of virtue; that the all-sustaining incarnated himself to guard, in space and time, the destinies of this world; that heavenly genius dwelt among the shepherds, to sing to them and teach them how to sing. indeed, "der stets den hirten gnadig sich bewies." "he has constantly shown himself favorable to shepherds." and the dwellers in green pastures and natural students of the stars were selected to hail, first among men, the holy child, whose life and death were to present the type of excellence, which has sustained the heart of so large a portion of mankind in these later generations. such marks have been made by the footsteps of _man_ (still, alas! to be spoken of as the _ideal_ man), wherever he has passed through the wilderness of _men_, and whenever the pigmies stepped in one of those, they felt dilate within the breast somewhat that promised nobler stature and purer blood. they were impelled to forsake their evil ways of decrepit scepticism and covetousness of corruptible possessions. convictions flowed in upon them. they, too, raised the cry: god is living, now, to-day; and all beings are brothers, for they are his children. simple words enough, yet which only angelic natures can use or hear in their full, free sense. these were the triumphant moments; but soon the lower nature took its turn, and the era of a truly human life was postponed. thus is man still a stranger to his inheritance, still a pleader, still a pilgrim. yet his happiness is secure in the end. and now, no more a glimmering consciousness, but assurance begins to be felt and spoken, that the highest ideal man can form of his own powers is that which he is destined to attain. whatever the soul knows how to seek, it cannot fail to obtain. this is the law and the prophets. knock and it shall be opened; seek and ye shall find. it is demonstrated; it is a maxim. man no longer paints his proper nature in some form, and says, "prometheus had it; it is god-like;" but "man must have it; it is human." however disputed by many, however ignorantly used, or falsified by those who do receive it, the fact of an universal, unceasing revelation has been too clearly stated in words to be lost sight of in thought; and sermons preached from the text, "be ye perfect," are the only sermons of a pervasive and deep-searching influence. but, among those who meditate upon this text, there is a great difference of view as to the way in which perfection shall be sought. "through the intellect," say some. "gather from every growth of life its seed of thought; look behind every symbol for its law; if thou canst _see_ clearly, the rest will follow." "through the life," say others. "do the best thou knowest today. shrink not from frequent error in this gradual, fragmentary state. follow thy light for as much as it will show thee; be faithful as far as thou canst, in hope that faith presently will lead to sight. help others, without blaming their need of thy help. love much, and be forgiven." "it needs not intellect, needs not experience," says a third. "if you took the true way, your destiny would be accomplished, in a purer and more natural order. you would not learn through facts of thought or action, but express through them the certainties of wisdom. in quietness yield thy soul to the causal soul. do not disturb thy apprenticeship by premature effort; neither check the tide of instruction by methods of thy own. be still; seek not, but wait in obedience. thy commission will be given." could we indeed say what we want, could we give a description of the child that is lost, he would be found. as soon as the soul can affirm clearly that a certain demonstration is wanted, it is at hand. when the jewish prophet described the lamb, as the expression of what was required by the coming era, the time drew nigh. but we say not, see not as yet, clearly, what we would. those who call for a more triumphant expression of love, a love that cannot be crucified, show not a perfect sense of what has already been given. love has already been expressed, that made all things new, that gave the worm its place and ministry as well as the eagle; a love to which it was alike to descend into the depths of hell, or to sit at the right hand of the father. yet, no doubt, a new manifestation is at hand, a new hour in the day of man. we cannot expect to see any one sample of completed being, when the mass of men still lie engaged in the sod, or use the freedom of their limbs only with wolfish energy. the tree cannot come to flower till its root be free from the cankering worm, and its whole growth open to air and light. while any one is base, none can be entirely free and noble. yet something new shall presently be shown of the life of man, for hearts crave, if minds do not know how to ask it. among the strains of prophecy, the following, by an earnest mind of a foreign land, written some thirty years ago, is not yet outgrown; and it has the merit of being a positive appeal from the heart, instead of a critical declaration what man should _not_ do. "the ministry of man implies that he must be filled from the divine fountains which are being engendered through all eternity, so that, at the mere name of his master, he may be able to cast all his enemies into the abyss; that he may deliver all parts of nature from the barriers that imprison them; that he may purge the terrestrial atmosphere from the poisons that infect it; that he may preserve the bodies of men from the corrupt influences that surround, and the maladies that afflict them; still more, that he may keep their souls pure from the malignant insinuations which pollute, and the gloomy images that obscure them; that he may restore its serenity to the word, which false words of men fill with mourning and sadness; that he may satisfy the desires of the angels, who await from him the development of the marvels of nature; that, in fine, his world may be filled with god, as eternity is." [footnote: st. martin] another attempt we will give, by an obscure observer of our own day and country, to draw some lines of the desired image. it was suggested by seeing the design of crawford's orpheus, and connecting with the circumstance of the american, in his garret at rome, making choice of this subject, that of americans here at home showing such ambition to represent the character, by calling their prose and verse "orphic sayings"--"orphics." we wish we could add that they have shown that musical apprehension of the progress of nature through her ascending gradations which entitled them so to do, but their attempts are frigid, though sometimes grand; in their strain we are not warmed by the fire which fertilized the soil of greece. orpheus was a lawgiver by theocratic commission. he understood nature, and made her forms move to his music. he told her secrets in the form of hymns, nature as seen in the mind of god. his soul went forth toward all beings, yet could remain sternly faithful to a chosen type of excellence. seeking what he loved, he feared not death nor hell; neither could any shape of dread daunt his faith in the power of the celestial harmony that filled his soul. it seemed significant of the state of things in this country, that the sculptor should have represented the seer at the moment when he was obliged with his hand to shade his eyes. each orpheus must to the depths descend; for only thus the poet can be wise; must make the sad persephone his friend, and buried love to second life arise; again his love must lose through too much love, must lose his life by living life too true, for what he sought below is passed above, already done is all that he would do must tune all being with his single lyre, must melt all rooks free from their primal pain, must search all nature with his one soul's fire, must bind anew all forms in heavenly chain. if he already sees what he must do, well may he shade his eyes from the far-shining view. a better comment could not be made on what is required to perfect man, and place him in that superior position for which he was designed, than by the interpretation of bacon upon the legends of the syren coast "when the wise ulysses passed," says he, "he caused his mariners to stop their ears, with wax, knowing there was in them no power to resist the lure of that voluptuous song. but he, the much experienced man, who wished to be experienced in all, and use all to the service of wisdom, desired to hear the song that he might understand its meaning. yet, distrusting his own power to be firm in his better purpose, he caused himself to be bound to the mast, that he might be kept secure against his own weakness. but orpheus passed unfettered, so absorbed in singing hymns to the gods that he could not even hear those sounds of degrading enchantment." meanwhile, not a few believe, and men themselves have expressed the opinion, that the time is come when eurydice is to call for an orpheus, rather than orpheus for eurydice; that the idea of man, however imperfectly brought out, has been far more so than that of woman; that she, the other half of the same thought, the other chamber of the heart of life, needs now take her turn in the full pulsation, and that improvement in the daughters will best aid in the reformation of the sons of this age. it should be remarked that, as the principle of liberty is better understood, and more nobly interpreted, a broader protest is made in behalf of woman. as men become aware that few men have had a fair chance, they are inclined to say that no women have had a fair chance. the french revolution, that strangely disguised angel, bore witness in favor of woman, but interpreted her claims no less ignorantly than those of man. its idea of happiness did not rise beyond outward enjoyment, unobstructed by the tyranny of others. the title it gave was "citoyen," "citoyenne;" and it is not unimportant to woman that even this species of equality was awarded her. before, she could be condemned to perish on the scaffold for treason, not as a citizen, but as a subject. the right with which this title then invested a human being was that of bloodshed and license. the goddess of liberty was impure. as we read the poem addressed to her, not long since, by beranger, we can scarcely refrain from tears as painful as the tears of blood that flowed when "such crimes were committed in her name." yes! man, born to purify and animate the unintelligent and the cold, can, in his madness, degrade and pollute no less the fair and the chaste. yet truth was prophesied in the ravings of that hideous fever, caused by long ignorance and abuse. europe is conning a valued lesson from the blood-stained page. the same tendencies, further unfolded, will bear good fruit in this country. yet, by men in this country, as by the jews, when moses was leading them to the promised land, everything has been done that inherited depravity could do, to hinder the promise of heaven from its fulfilment. the cross, here as elsewhere, has been planted only to be blasphemed by cruelty and fraud. the name of the prince of peace has been profaned by all kinds of injustice toward the gentile whom he said he came to save. but i need not speak of what has been done towards the red man, the black man. those deeds are the scoff of the world; and they have been accompanied by such pious words that the gentlest would not dare to intercede with "father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." here, as elsewhere, the gain of creation consists always in the growth of individual minds, which live and aspire, as flowers bloom and birds sing, in the midst of morasses; and in the continual development of that thought, the thought of human destiny, which is given to eternity adequately to express, and which ages of failure only seemingly impede. only seemingly; and whatever seems to the contrary, this country is as surely destined to elucidate a great moral law, as europe was to promote the mental culture of man. though the national independence be blurred by the servility of individuals; though freedom and equality have been proclaimed only to leave room for a monstrous display of slave-dealing and slave-keeping; though the free american so often feels himself free, like the roman, only to pamper his appetites end his indolence through the misery of his fellow-beings; still it is not in vain that the verbal statement has been made, "all men are born free and equal." there it stands, a golden certainty wherewith to encourage the good, to shame the bad. the new world may be called clearly to perceive that it incurs the utmost penalty if it reject or oppress the sorrowful brother. and, if men are deaf, the angels hear. but men cannot be deaf. it is inevitable that an external freedom, an independence of the encroachments of other men, such as has been achieved for the nation, should be so also for every member of it. that which has once been clearly conceived in the intelligence cannot fail, sooner or later, to be acted out. it has become a law as irrevocable as that of the medes in their ancient dominion; men will privately sin against it, but the law, as expressed by a leading mind of the age, "tutti fatti a semblanza d'un solo, figli tutti d'un solo riscatto, in qual'ora, in qual parte del suolo trascorriamo quest' aura vital, siam fratelli, siam stretti ad un patto: maladetto colui che lo infrange, che s'innalza sul finoco che piange che contrista uno spirto immortal." [footnote: manzoni] "all made in the likeness of the one. all children of one ransom, in whatever hour, in whatever part of the soil, we draw this vital air, we are brothers; we must be bound by one compact; accursed he who infringes it, who raises himself upon the weak who weep, who saddens an immortal spirit." this law cannot fail of universal recognition. accursed be he who willingly saddens an immortal spirit--doomed to infamy in later, wiser ages, doomed in future stages of his own being to deadly penance, only short of death. accursed be he who sins in ignorance, if that ignorance be caused by sloth. we sicken no less at the pomp than the strife of words. we feel that never were lungs so puffed with the wind of declamation, on moral and religious subjects, as now. we are tempted to implore these "word-heroes," these word-catos, word-christs, to beware of cant [footnote: dr. johnson's one piece of advice should be written on every door: "clear your mind of cant." but byron, to whom it was so acceptable, in clearing away the noxious vine, shook down the building. sterling's emendation is worthy of honor: "realize your cant, not cast it off."] above all things; to remember that hypocrisy is the most hopeless as well as the meanest of crimes, and that those must surely be polluted by it, who do not reserve a part of their morality and religion for private use. landor says that he cannot have a great deal of mind who cannot afford to let the larger part of it lie fallow; and what is true of genius is not less so of virtue. the tongue is a valuable member, but should appropriate but a small part of the vital juices that are needful all over the body. we feel that the mind may "grow black and rancid in the smoke" even "of altars." we start up from the harangue to go into our closet and shut the door. there inquires the spirit, "is this rhetoric the bloom of healthy blood, or a false pigment artfully laid on?" and yet again we know where is so much smoke, must be some fire; with so much talk about virtue and freedom, must be mingled some desire for them; that it cannot be in vain that such have become the common topics of conversation among men, rather than schemes for tyranny and plunder, that the very newspapers see it best to proclaim themselves "pilgrims," "puritans," "heralds of holiness." the king that maintains so costly a retinue cannot be a mere boast, or carabbas fiction. we have waited here long in the dust; we are tired and hungry; but the triumphal procession must appear at last. of all its banners, none has been more steadily upheld, and under none have more valor and willingness for real sacrifices been shown, than that of the champions of the enslaved african. and this band it is, which, partly from a natural following out of principles, partly because many women have been prominent in that cause, makes, just now, the warmest appeal in behalf of woman. though there has been a growing liberality on this subject, yet society at large is not so prepared for the demands of this party, but that its members are, and will be for some time, coldly regarded as the jacobins of their day. "is it not enough," cries the irritated trader, "that you have done all you could to break up the national union, and thus destroy the prosperity of our country, but now you must be trying to break up family union, to take my wife away from the cradle and the kitchen-hearth to vote at polls, and preach from a pulpit? of course, if she does such things, she cannot attend to those of her own sphere. she is happy enough as she is. she has more leisure than i have,--every means of improvement, every indulgence." "have you asked her whether she was satisfied with these _indulgences_?" "no, but i know she is. she is too amiable to desire what would make me unhappy, and too judicious to wish to step beyond the sphere of her sex. i will never consent to have our peace disturbed by any such discussions." "'consent--you?' it is not consent from you that is in question--it is assent from your wife." "am not i the head of my house?" "you are not the head of your wife. god has given her a mind of her own. "i am the head, and she the heart." "god grant you play true to one another, then! i suppose i am to be grateful that you did not say she was only the hand. if the head represses no natural pulse of the heart, there can be no question as to your giving your consent. both will be of one accord, and there needs but to present any question to get a full and true answer. there is no need of precaution, of indulgence, nor consent. but our doubt is whether the heart _does_ consent with the head, or only obeys its decrees with a passiveness that precludes the exercise of its natural powers, or a repugnance that turns sweet qualities to bitter, or a doubt that lays waste the fair occasions of life. it is to ascertain the truth that we propose some liberating measures." thus vaguely are these questions proposed and discussed at present. but their being proposed at all implies much thought, and suggests more. many women are considering within themselves what they need that they have not, and what they can have if they find they need it. many men are considering whether women are capable of being and having more than they are and have, _and_ whether, if so, it will be best to consent to improvement in their condition. this morning, i open the boston "daily mail," and find in its "poet's corner" a translation of schiller's "dignity of woman." in the advertisement of a book on america, i see in the table of contents this sequence, "republican institutions. american slavery. american ladies." i open the "_deutsche schnellpost_" published in new york, and find at the head of a column, _juden und frauenemancipation in ungarn_--"emancipation of jews and women in hungary." the past year has seen action in the rhode island legislature, to secure married women rights over their own property, where men showed that a very little examination of the subject could teach them much; an article in the democratic review on the same subject more largely considered, written by a woman, impelled, it is said, by glaring wrong to a distinguished friend, having shown the defects in the existing laws, and the state of opinion from which they spring; and on answer from the revered old man, j. q. adams, in some respects the phocion of his time, to an address made him by some ladies. to this last i shall again advert in another place. these symptoms of the times have come under my view quite accidentally: one who seeks, may, each month or week, collect more. the numerous party, whose opinions are already labeled and adjusted too much to their mind to admit of any new light, strive, by lectures on some model-woman of bride-like beauty and gentleness, by writing and lending little treatises, intended to mark out with precision the limits of woman's sphere, and woman's mission, to prevent other than the rightful shepherd from climbing the wall, or the flock from using any chance to go astray. without enrolling ourselves at once on either side, let us look upon the subject from the best point of view which to-day offers; no better, it is to be feared, than a high house-top. a high hill-top, or at least a cathedral-spire, would be desirable. it may well be an anti-slavery party that pleads for woman, if we consider merely that she does not hold property on equal terms with men; so that, if a husband dies without making a will, the wife, instead of taking at once his place as head of the family, inherits only a part of his fortune, often brought him by herself, as if she were a child, or ward only, not an equal partner. we will not speak of the innumerable instances in which profligate and idle men live upon the earnings of industrious wives; or if the wives leave them, and take with them the children, to perform the double duty of mother and father, follow from place to place, and threaten to rob them of the children, if deprived of the rights of a husband, as they call them, planting themselves in their poor lodgings, frightening them into paying tribute by taking from them the children, running into debt at the expense of these otherwise so overtasked helots. such instances count up by scores within my own memory. i have seen the husband who had stained himself by a long course of low vice, till his wife was wearied from her heroic forgiveness, by finding that his treachery made it useless, and that if she would provide bread for herself and her children, she must be separate from his ill fame--i have known this man come to install himself in the chamber of a woman who loathed him, and say she should never take food without his company. i have known these men steal their children, whom they knew they had no means to maintain, take them into dissolute company, expose them to bodily danger, to frighten the poor woman, to whom, it seems, the fact that she alone had borne the pangs of their birth, and nourished their infancy, does not give an equal right to them. i do believe that this mode of kidnapping--and it is frequent enough in all classes of society--will be by the next age viewed as it is by heaven now, and that the man who avails himself of the shelter of men's laws to steal from a mother her own children, or arrogate any superior right in them, save that of superior virtue, will bear the stigma he deserves, in common with him who steals grown men from their mother-land, their hopes, and their homes. i said, we will not speak of this now; yet i _have_ spoken, for the subject makes me feel too much. i could give instances that would startle the most vulgar and callous; but i will not, for the public opinion of their own sex is already against such men, and where cases of extreme tyranny are made known, there is private action in the wife's favor. but she ought not to need this, nor, i think, can she long. men must soon see that as, on their own ground, woman is the weaker party, she ought to have legal protection, which would make such oppression impossible. but i would not deal with "atrocious instances," except in the way of illustration, neither demand from men a partial redress in some one matter, but go to the root of the whole. if principles could be established, particulars would adjust themselves aright. ascertain the true destiny of woman; give her legitimate hopes, and a standard within herself; marriage and all other relations would by degrees be harmonized with these. but to return to the historical progress of this matter. knowing that there exists in the minds of men a tone of feeling toward women as toward slaves, such as is expressed in the common phrase, "tell that to women and children;" that the infinite soul can only work through them in already ascertained limits; that the gift of reason, man's highest prerogative, is allotted to them in much lower degree; that they must be kept from mischief and melancholy by being constantly engaged in active labor, which is to be furnished and directed by those better able to think, &c., &c.,--we need not multiply instances, for who can review the experience of last week without recalling words which imply, whether in jest or earnest, these views, or views like these,--knowing this, can we wonder that many reformers think that measures are not likely to be taken in behalf of women, unless their wishes could be publicly represented by women? "that can never be necessary," cry the other side. "all men are privately influenced by women; each has his wife, sister, or female friends, and is too much biased by these relations to fail of representing their interests; and, if this is not enough, let them propose and enforce their wishes with the pen. the beauty of home would be destroyed, the delicacy of the sex be violated, the dignity of halls of legislation degraded, by an attempt to introduce them there. such duties are inconsistent with those of a mother;" and then we have ludicrous pictures of ladies in hysterics at the polls, and senate-chambers filled with cradles. but if, in reply, we admit as truth that woman seems destined by nature rather for the inner circle, we must add that the arrangements of civilized life have not been, as yet, such as to secure it to her. her circle, if the duller, is not the quieter. if kept from "excitement," she is not from drudgery. not only the indian squaw carries the burdens of the camp, but the favorites of louis xiv. accompany him in his journeys, and the washerwoman stands at her tub, and carries home her work at all seasons, and in all states of health. those who think the physical circumstances of woman would make a part in the affairs of national government unsuitable, are by no means those who think it impossible for negresses to endure field-work, even during pregnancy, or for sempstresses to go through their killing labors. as to the use of the pen, there was quite as much opposition to woman's possessing herself of that help to free agency as there is now to her seizing on the rostrum or the desk; and she is likely to draw, from a permission to plead her cause that way, opposite inferences to what might be wished by those who now grant it. as to the possibility of her filling with grace and dignity any such position, we should think those who had seen the great actresses, and heard the quaker preachers of modern times, would not doubt that woman can express publicly the fulness of thought and creation, without losing any of the peculiar beauty of her sex. what can pollute and tarnish is to act thus from any motive except that something needs to be said or done. woman could take part in the processions, the songs, the dances of old religion; no one fancied her delicacy was impaired by appearing in public for such a cause. as to her home, she is not likely to leave it more than she now does for balls, theatres, meetings for promoting missions, revival meetings, and others to which she flies, in hope of an animation for her existence commensurate with what she sees enjoyed by men. governors of ladies'-fairs are no less engrossed by such a charge, than the governor of a state by his; presidents of washingtonian societies no less away from home than presidents of conventions. if men look straitly to it, they will find that, unless their lives are domestic, those of the women will not be. a house is no home unless it contain food and fire for the mind as well as for the body. the female greek, of our day, is as much in the street as the male to cry, "what news?" we doubt not it was the same in athens of old. the women, shut out from the market-place, made up for it at the religious festivals. for human beings are not so constituted that they can live without expansion. if they do not get it in one way, they must in another, or perish. as to men's representing women fairly at present, while we hear from men who owe to their wives not only all that is comfortable or graceful, but all that is wise, in the arrangement of their lives, the frequent remark, "you cannot reason with a woman,"--when from those of delicacy, nobleness, and poetic culture, falls the contemptuous phrase "women and children," and that in no light sally of the hour, but in works intended to give a permanent statement of the best experiences,--when not one man, in the million, shall i say? no, not in the hundred million, can rise above the belief that woman was made _for man_,--when such traits as these are daily forced upon the attention, can we feel that man will always do justice to the interests of woman? can we think that he takes a sufficiently discerning and religious view of her office and destiny _ever_ to do her justice, except when prompted by sentiment,--accidentally or transiently, that is, for the sentiment will vary according to the relations in which he is placed? the lover, the poet, the artist, are likely to view her nobly. the father and the philosopher have some chance of liberality; the man of the world, the legislator for expediency, none. under these circumstances, without attaching importance, in themselves, to the changes demanded by the champions of woman, we hail them as signs of the times. we would have every arbitrary barrier thrown down. we would have every path laid open to woman as freely as to man. were this done, and a slight temporary fermentation allowed to subside, we should see crystallizations more pure and of more various beauty. we believe the divine energy would pervade nature to a degree unknown in the history of former ages, and that no discordant collision, but a ravishing harmony of the spheres, would ensue. yet, then and only then will mankind be ripe for this, when inward and outward freedom for woman as much as for man shall be acknowledged as a _right_, not yielded as a concession. as the friend of the negro assumes that one man cannot by right hold another in bondage, so should the friend of woman assume that man cannot by right lay even well-meant restrictions on woman. if the negro be a soul, if the woman be a soul, apparelled in flesh, to one master only are they accountable. there is but one law for souls, and, if there is to be an interpreter of it, he must come not as man, or son of man, but as son of god. were thought and feeling once so far elevated that man should esteem himself the brother and friend, but nowise the lord and tutor, of woman,--were he really bound with her in equal worship,--arrangements as to function and employment would be of no consequence. what woman needs is not as a woman to act or rule, but as a nature to grow, as an intellect to discern, as a soul to live freely and unimpeded, to unfold such powers as were given her when we left our common home. if fewer talents were given her, yet if allowed the free and full employment of these, so that she may render back to the giver his own with usury, she will not complain; nay, i dare to say she will bless and rejoice in her earthly birth-place, her earthly lot. let us consider what obstructions impede this good era, and what signs give reason to hope that it draws near. i was talking on this subject with miranda, a woman, who, if any in the world could, might speak without heat and bitterness of the position of her sex. her father was a man who cherished no sentimental reverence for woman, but a firm belief in the equality of the sexes. she was his eldest child, and came to him at an age when he needed a companion. from the time she could speak and go alone, he addressed her not as a plaything, but as a living mind. among the few verses he ever wrote was a copy addressed to this child, when the first locks were cut from her head; and the reverence expressed on this occasion for that cherished head, he never belied. it was to him the temple of immortal intellect. he respected his child, however, too much to be an indulgent parent. he called on her for clear judgment, for courage, for honor and fidelity; in short, for such virtues as he knew. in so far as he possessed the keys to the wonders of this universe, he allowed free use of them to her, and, by the incentive of a high expectation, he forbade, so far as possible, that she should let the privilege lie idle. thus this child was early led to feel herself a child of the spirit. she took her place easily, not only in the world of organized being, but in the world of mind. a dignified sense of self-dependence was given as all her portion, and she found it a sure anchor. herself securely anchored, her relations with others were established with equal security. she was fortunate in a total absence of those charms which might have drawn to her bewildering flatteries, and in a strong electric nature, which repelled those who did not belong to her, and attracted those who did. with men and women her relations were noble,--affectionate without passion, intellectual without coldness. the world was free to her, and she lived freely in it. outward adversity came, and inward conflict; but that faith and self-respect had early been awakened which must always lead, at last, to an outward serenity and an inward peace. of miranda i had always thought as an example, that the restraints upon the sex were insuperable only to those who think them so, or who noisily strive to break them. she had taken a course of her own, and no man stood in her way. many of her acts had been unusual, but excited no uproar. few helped, but none checked her; and the many men who knew her mind and her life, showed to her confidence as to a brother, gentleness as to a sister. and not only refined, but very coarse men approved and aided one in whom they saw resolution and clearness of design. her mind was often the leading one, always effective. when i talked with her upon these matters, and had said very much what i have written, she smilingly replied; "and yet we must admit that i have been fortunate, and this should not be. my good father's early trust gave the first bias, and the rest followed, of course. it is true that i have had less outward aid, in after years, than most women; but that is of little consequence. religion was early awakened in my soul,--a sense that what the soul is capable to ask it must attain, and that, though i might be aided and instructed by others, i must depend on myself as the only constant friend. this self-dependence, which was honored in me, is deprecated as a fault in most women. they are taught to learn their rule from without, not to unfold it from within. "this is the fault of man, who is still vain, and wishes to be more important to woman than, by right, he should be." "men have not shown this disposition toward you," i said. "no; because the position i early was enabled to take was one of self-reliance. and were all women as sure of their wants as i was, the result would be the same. but they are so overloaded with precepts by guardians, who think that nothing is so much to be dreaded for a woman as originality of thought or character, that their minds are impeded by doubts till they lose their chance of fair, free proportions. the difficulty is to got them to the point from which they shall naturally develop self-respect, and learn self-help. "once i thought that men would help to forward this state of things more than i do now. i saw so many of them wretched in the connections they had formed in weakness and vanity. they seemed so glad to esteem women whenever they could. "'the soft arms of affection,' said one of the most discerning spirits, 'will not suffice for me, unless on them i see the steel bracelets of strength.' "but early i perceived that men never, in any extreme of despair, wished to be women. on the contrary, they were ever ready to taunt one another, at any sign of weakness, with, "'art thou not like the women, who,'-- the passage ends various ways, according to the occasion and rhetoric of the speaker. when they admired any woman, they were inclined to speak of her as 'above her sex.' silently i observed this, and feared it argued a rooted scepticism, which for ages had been fastening on the heart, and which only an age of miracles could eradicate. ever i have been treated with great sincerity; and i look upon it as a signal instance of this, that an intimate friend of the other sex said, in a fervent moment, that i 'deserved in some star to be a man.' he was much surprised when i disclosed my view of my position and hopes, when i declared my faith that the feminine side, the side of love, of beauty, of holiness, was now to have its full chance, and that, if either were better, it was better now to be a woman; for even the slightest achievement of good was furthering an especial work of our time. he smiled incredulously. 'she makes the best she can of it,' thought he. 'let jews believe the pride of jewry, but i am of the better sort, and know better.' "another used as highest praise, in speaking of a character in literature, the words 'a manly woman.' "so in the noble passage of ben jonson: 'i meant the day-star should not brighter ride, nor shed like influence, from its lucent seat; i meant she should be courteous, facile, sweet, free from that solemn vice of greatness, pride; i meant each softest virtue there should meet, fit in that softer bosom to abide, only a learned and a _manly_ soul i purposed her, that should with even powers the rock, the spindle, and the shears control of destiny, and spin her own free hours.'" "me thinks," said i, "you are too fastidious in objecting to this. jonson, in using the word 'manly,' only meant to heighten the picture of this, the true, the intelligent fate, with one of the deeper colors." "and yet," said she, "so invariable is the use of this word where a heroic quality is to be described, and i feel so sure that persistence and courage are the most womanly no less than the most manly qualities, that i would exchange these words for others of a larger sense, at the risk of marring the fine tissue of the verse. read, 'a heavenward and instructed soul,' and i should be satisfied. let it not be said, wherever there is energy or creative genius, 'she has a masculine mind.'" * * * * * this by no means argues a willing want of generosity toward woman. man is as generous towards her as he knows how to be. wherever she has herself arisen in national or private history, and nobly shone forth in any form of excellence, men have received her, not only willingly, but with triumph. their encomiums, indeed, are always, in some sense, mortifying; they show too much surprise. "can this be you?" he cries to the transfigured cinderella; "well, i should never have thought it, but i am very glad. we will tell every one that you have '_surpassed your sex_.'" in every-day life, the feelings of the many are stained with vanity. each wishes to be lord in a little world, to be superior at least over one; and he does not feel strong enough to retain a life-long ascendency over a strong nature. only a theseus could conquer before he wed the amazonian queen. hercules wished rather to rest with dejanira, and received the poisoned robe as a fit guerdon. the tale should be interpreted to all those who seek repose with the weak. but not only is man vain and fond of power, but the same want of development, which thus affects him morally, prevents his intellectually discerning the destiny of woman: the boy wants no woman, but only a girl to play ball with him, and mark his pocket handkerchief. thus, in schiller's dignity of woman, beautiful as the poem is, there is no "grave and perfect man," but only a great boy to be softened and restrained by the influence of girls. poets--the elder brothers of their race--have usually seen further; but what can you expect of every-day men, if schiller was not more prophetic as to what women must be? even with richter, one foremost thought about a wife was that she would "cook him something good." but as this is a delicate subject, and we are in constant danger of being accused of slighting what are called "the functions," let me say, in behalf of miranda and myself, that we have high respect for those who "cook something good," who create and preserve fair order in houses, and prepare therein the shining raiment for worthy inmates, worthy guests. only these "functions" must not be a drudgery, or enforced necessity, but a part of life. let ulysses drive the beeves home, while penelope there piles up the fragrant loaves; they are both well employed if these be done in thought and love, willingly. but penelope is no more meant for a baker or weaver solely, than ulysses for a cattle-herd. the sexes should not only correspond to and appreciate, but prophesy to one another. in individual instances this happens. two persons love in one another the future good which they aid one another to unfold. this is imperfectly or rarely done in the general life. man has gone but little way; now he is waiting to see whether woman can keep step with him; but, instead of calling but, like a good brother, "you can do it, if you only think so," or impersonally, "any one can do what he tries to do;" he often discourages with school-boy brag: "girls can't do that; girls can't play ball." but let any one defy their taunts, break through and be brave and secure, they rend the air with shouts. this fluctuation was obvious in a narrative i have lately seen, the story of the life of countess emily plater, the heroine of the last revolution in poland. the dignity, the purity, the concentrated resolve, the calm, deep enthusiasm, which yet could, when occasion called, sparkle up a holy, an indignant fire, make of this young maiden the figure i want for my frontispiece. her portrait is to be seen in the book, a gentle shadow of her soul. short was the career. like the maid of orleans, she only did enough to verify her credentials, and then passed from a scene on which she was, probably, a premature apparition. when the young girl joined the army, where the report of her exploits had preceded her, she was received in a manner that marks the usual state of feeling. some of the officers were disappointed at her quiet manners; that she had not the air and tone of a stage-heroine. they thought she could not have acted heroically unless in buskins; had no idea that such deeds only showed the habit of her mind. others talked of the delicacy of her sex, advised her to withdraw from perils and dangers, and had no comprehension of the feelings within her breast that made this impossible. the gentle irony of her reply to these self-constituted tutors (not one of whom showed himself her equal in conduct or reason), is as good as her indignant reproof at a later period to the general, whose perfidy ruined all. but though, to the mass of these men, she was an embarrassment and a puzzle, the nobler sort viewed her with a tender enthusiasm worthy of her. "her name," said her biographer, "is known throughout europe. i paint her character that she may be as widely loved." with pride, he shows her freedom from all personal affections; that, though tender and gentle in an uncommon degree, there was no room for a private love in her consecrated life. she inspired those who knew her with a simple energy of feeling like her own. "we have seen," they felt, "a woman worthy the name, capable of all sweet affections, capable of stern virtue." it is a fact worthy of remark, that all these revolutions in favor of liberty have produced female champions that share the same traits, but emily alone has found a biographer. only a near friend could have performed for her this task, for the flower was reared in feminine seclusion, and the few and simple traits of her history before her appearance in the field could only have been known to the domestic circle. her biographer has gathered them up with a brotherly devotion. no! man is not willingly ungenerous. he wants faith and love, because he is not yet himself an elevated being. he cries, with sneering scepticism, "give us a sign." but if the sign appears, his eyes glisten, and he offers not merely approval, but homage. the severe nation which taught that the happiness of the race was forfeited through the fault of a woman, and showed its thought of what sort of regard man owed her, by making him accuse her on the first question to his god,--who gave her to the patriarch as a handmaid, and, by the mosaical law, bound her to allegiance like a serf,--even they greeted, with solemn rapture, all great and holy women as heroines, prophetesses, judges in israel; and, if they made eve listen to the serpent, gave mary as a bride to the holy spirit. in other nations it has been the same down to our day. to the woman who could conquer a triumph was awarded. and not only those whose strength was recommended to the heart by association with goodness and beauty, but those who were bad, if they were steadfast and strong, had their claims allowed. in any age a semiramis, an elizabeth of england, a catharine of russia, makes her place good, whether in a large or small circle. how has a little wit, a little genius, been celebrated in a woman! what an intellectual triumph was that of the lonely aspasia, and how heartily acknowledged! she, indeed, met a pericles. but what annalist, the rudest of men, the most plebeian of husbands, will spare from his page one of the few anecdotes of roman women--sappho! eloisa! the names are of threadbare celebrity. indeed, they were not more suitably met in their own time than the countess colonel plater on her first joining the army. they had much to mourn, and their great impulses did not find due scope. but with time enough, space enough, their kindred appear on the scene. across the ages, forms lean, trying to touch the hem of their retreating robes. the youth here by my side cannot be weary of the fragments from the life of sappho. he will not believe they are not addressed to himself, or that he to whom they were addressed could be ungrateful. a recluse of high powers devotes himself to understand and explain the thought of eloisa; he asserts her vast superiority in soul and genius to her master; he curses the fate that casts his lot in another age than hers. he could have understood her; he would have been to her a friend, such as abelard never could. and this one woman he could have loved and reverenced, and she, alas! lay cold in her grave hundreds of years ago. his sorrow is truly pathetic. these responses, that come too late to give joy, are as tragic as anything we know, and yet the tears of later ages glitter as they fall on tasso's prison bars. and we know how elevating to the captive is the security that somewhere an intelligence must answer to his. the man habitually most narrow towards woman will be flushed, as by the worst assault on christianity, if you say it has made no improvement in her condition. indeed, those most opposed to new acts in her favor, are jealous of the reputation of those which have been done. we will not speak of the enthusiasm excited by actresses, improvisatrici, female singers,--for here mingles the charm of beauty and grace,--but female authors, even learned women, if not insufferably ugly and slovenly, from the italian professor's daughter who taught behind the curtain, down to mrs. carter and madame dacier, are sure of an admiring audience, and, what is far better, chance to use what they have learned, and to learn more, if they can once get a platform on which to stand. but how to get this platform, or how to make it of reasonably easy access, is the difficulty. plants of great vigor will almost always struggle into blossom, despite impediments. but there should be encouragement, and a free genial atmosphere for those of move timid sort, fair play for each in its own kind. some are like the little, delicate flowers which love to hide in the dripping mosses, by the sides of mountain torrents, or in the shade of tall trees. but others require an open field, a rich and loosened soil, or they never show their proper hues. it may be said that man does not have his fair play either; his energies are repressed and distorted by the interposition of artificial obstacles. ay, but he himself has put them there; they have grown out of his own imperfections. if there _is_ a misfortune in woman's lot, it is in obstacles being interposed by men, which do _not_ mark her state; and, if they express her past ignorance, do not her present needs. as every man is of woman born, she has slow but sure means of redress; yet the sooner a general justness of thought makes smooth the path, the better. man is of woman born, and her face bends over him in infancy with an expression he can never quite forget. eminent men have delighted to pay tribute to this image, and it is an hackneyed observation, that most men of genius boast some remarkable development in the mother. the rudest tar brushes off a tear with his coat-sleeve at the hallowed name. the other day, i met a decrepit old man of seventy, on a journey, who challenged the stage company to guess where he was going. they guessed aright, "to see your mother." "yes," said he, "she is ninety-two, but has good eyesight still, they say. i have not seen her these forty years, and i thought i could not die in peace without." i should have liked his picture painted as a companion-piece to that of a boisterous little boy, whom i saw attempt to declaim at a school exhibition-- "o that those lips had language! life has passed with me but roughly since i heard thee last." he got but very little way before sudden tears shamed him from the stage. some gleams of the same expression which shone down upon his infancy, angelically pure and benign, visit man again with hopes of pure love, of a holy marriage. or, if not before, in the eyes of the mother of his child they again are seen, and dim fancies pass before his mind, that woman may not have been born for him alone, but have come from heaven, a commissioned soul, a messenger of truth and love; that she can only make for him a home in which he may lawfully repose, in so far as she is "true to the kindred points of heaven and home." in gleams, in dim fancies, this thought visits the mind of common men. it is soon obscured by the mists of sensuality, the dust of routine, and he thinks it was only some meteor or ignis fatuus that shone. but, as a rosicrucian lamp, it burns unwearied, though condemned to the solitude of tombs; and to its permanent life, as to every truth, each age has in some form borne witness. for the truths, which visit the minds of careless men only in fitful gleams, shine with radiant clearness into those of the poet, the priest, and the artist. whatever may have been the domestic manners of the ancients, the idea of woman was nobly manifested in their mythologies and poems, whore she appears as site in the ramayana, a form of tender purity; as the egyptian isis, [footnote: for an adequate description of the isis, see appendix a.] of divine wisdom never yet surpassed. in egypt, too, the sphynx, walking the earth with lion tread, looked out upon its marvels in the calm, inscrutable beauty of a virgin's face, and the greek could only add wings to the great emblem. in greece, ceres and proserpine, significantly termed "the great goddesses," were seen seated side by side. they needed not to rise for any worshipper or any change; they were prepared for all things, as those initiated to their mysteries knew. more obvious is the meaning of these three forms, the diana, minerva, and vesta. unlike in the expression of their beauty, but alike in this,--that each was self-sufficing. other forms were only accessories and illustrations, none the complement to one like these. another might, indeed, be the companion, and the apollo and diana set off one another's beauty. of the vesta, it is to be observed, that not only deep-eyed, deep-discerning greece, but ruder rome, who represents the only form of good man (the always busy warrior) that could be indifferent to woman, confided the permanence of its glory to a tutelary goddess, and her wisest legislator spoke of meditation as a nymph. perhaps in rome the neglect of woman was a reaction on the manners of etruria, where the priestess queen, warrior queen, would seem to have been so usual a character. an instance of the noble roman marriage, where the stern and calm nobleness of the nation was common to both, we see in the historic page through the little that is told us of brutus and portia. shakspeare has seized on the relation in its native lineaments, harmonizing the particular with the universal; and, while it is conjugal love, and no other, making it unlike the same relation as seen in cymbeline, or othello, even as one star differeth from another in glory. "by that great vow which did incorporate and make us one, unfold to me, yourself, your other half, why you are heavy. ... dwell i but in the suburbs of your good pleasure? if it be no more, portia is brutus' harlot, not his wife." mark the sad majesty of his tone in answer. who would not have lent a life-long credence to that voice of honor? "you are my true and honorable wife; as dear to me as are the ruddy drops that visit this sad heart." it is the same voice that tells the moral of his life in the last words-- "countrymen, my heart doth joy, that, yet in all my life, i found no man but he was true to me." it was not wonderful that it should be so. shakspeare, however, was not content to let portia rest her plea for confidence on the essential nature of the marriage bond: "i grant i am a woman; but withal, a woman that lord brutus took to wife. i grant i am a woman; but withal, a woman well reputed--cato's daughter. think you i am _no stronger than my sex_, being so fathered and so husbanded?" and afterward in the very scene where brutus is suffering under that "insupportable and touching loss," the death of his wife, cassius pleads-- "have you not love enough to bear with me, when that rash humor which my mother gave me makes me forgetful? _brutus_.--yes, cassius, and henceforth, when you are over-earnest with your brutus, he'll think your mother chides, and leaves you so." as indeed it was a frequent belief among the ancients, as with our indians, that the _body_ was inherited from the mother, the _soul_ from the father. as in that noble passage of ovid, already quoted, where jupiter, as his divine synod are looking down on the funeral pyre of hercules, thus triumphs-- "neo nisi _materna_ vulcanum parte potentem, sentiet. aeternum est, a me quod traxit, et expers atque immune neois, nullaque domabile flamma idque ego defunctum terra coelestibus oris accipiam, cunctisque meum laetabile factum dis fore confido. "the part alone of gross _maternal_ flame fire shall devour; while that from me he drew shall live immortal and its force renew; that, when he's dead, i'll raise to realms above; let all the powers the righteous act approve." it is indeed a god speaking of his union with an earthly woman, but it expresses the common roman thought as to marriage,--the same which permitted a man to lend his wife to a friend, as if she were a chattel "she dwelt but in the suburbs of his good pleasure." yet the same city, as i have said, leaned on the worship of vesta, the preserver, and in later times was devoted to that of isis. in sparta, thought, in this respect as in all others, was expressed in the characters of real life, and the women of sparta were as much spartans as the men. the "citoyen, citoyenne" of france was here actualized. was not the calm equality they enjoyed as honorable as the devotion of chivalry? they intelligently shared the ideal life of their nation. like the men they felt: "honor gone, all's gone: better never have been born." they were the true friends of men. the spartan, surely, would not think that he received only his body from his mother. the sage, had he lived in that community, could not have thought the souls of "vain and foppish men will be degraded after death to the forms of women; and, if they do not then make great efforts to retrieve themselves, will become birds." (by the way, it is very expressive of the hard intellectuality of the merely _mannish_ mind, to speak thus of birds, chosen always by the _feminine_ poet as the symbols of his fairest thoughts.) we are told of the greek nations in general, that woman occupied there an infinitely lower place than man. it is difficult to believe this, when we see such range and dignity of thought on the subject in the mythologies, and find the poets producing such ideals as cassandra, iphigenia, antigone, macaria; where sibylline priestesses told the oracle of the highest god, and he could not be content to reign with a, court of fewer than nine muses. even victory wore a female form. but, whatever were the facts of daily life, i cannot complain of the age and nation which represents its thought by such a symbol as i see before me at this moment. it is a zodiac of the busts of gods and goddesses, arranged in pairs. the circle breathes the music of a heavenly order. male and female heads are distinct in expression, but equal in beauty, strength and calmness. each male head is that of a brother and a king,--each female of a sister and a queen. could the thought thus expressed be lived out, there would be nothing more to be desired. there would be unison in variety, congeniality in difference. coming nearer our own time, we find religion and poetry no less true in their revelations. the rude man, just disengaged from the sod, the adam, accuses woman to his god, and records her disgrace to their posterity. he is not ashamed to write that he could be drawn from heaven by one beneath him,--one made, he says, from but a small part of himself. but in the same nation, educated by time, instructed by a succession of prophets, we find woman in as high a position as she has ever occupied, no figure that has ever arisen to greet our eyes has been received with more fervent reverence than that of the madonna. heine calls her the _dame du comptoir_ of the catholic church, and this jeer well expresses a serious truth. and not only this holy and significant image was worshipped by the pilgrim, and the favorite subject of the artist, but it exercised an immediate influence on the destiny of the sex. the empresses who embraced the cross converted sons and husbands. whole calendars of female saints, heroic dames of chivalry, binding the emblem of faith on the heart of the best-beloved, and wasting the bloom of youth in separation and loneliness, for the sake of duties they thought it religion to assume, with innumerable forms of poesy, trace their lineage to this one. nor, however imperfect may be the action, in our day, of the faith thus expressed, and though we can scarcely think it nearer this ideal than that of india or greece was near their ideal, is it in vain that the truth has been recognized, that woman is not only a part of man, bone of his bone, and flesh of his flesh, born that men might not be lonely--but that women are in themselves possessors of and possessed by immortal souls. this truth undoubtedly received a greater outward stability from the belief of the church that the earthly parent of the saviour of souls was a woman. the assumption of the virgin, as painted by sublime artists, as also petrarch's hymn to the madonna, [footnote: appendix b.] cannot have spoken to the world wholly without result, yet oftentimes those who had ears heard not. see upon the nations the influence of this powerful example. in spain look only at the ballads. woman in these is "very woman;" she is the betrothed, the bride, the spouse of man; there is on her no hue of the philosopher, the heroine, the savante, but she looks great and noble. why? because she is also, through her deep devotion, the betrothed of heaven. her upturned eyes have drawn down the light that casts a radiance round her. see only such a ballad as that of "lady teresa's bridal," where the infanta, given to the moorish bridegroom, calls down the vengeance of heaven on his unhallowed passion, and thinks it not too much to expiate by a life in the cloister the involuntary stain upon her princely youth. [footnote: appendix c.] it was this constant sense of claims above those of earthly love or happiness that made the spanish lady who shared this spirit a guerdon to be won by toils and blood and constant purity, rather than a chattel to be bought for pleasure and service. germany did hot need to _learn_ a high view of woman; it was inborn in that race. woman was to the teuton warrior his priestess, his friend, his sister,--in truth, a wife. and the christian statues of noble pairs, as they lie above their graves in stone, expressing the meaning of all the by-gone pilgrimage by hands folded in mutual prayer, yield not a nobler sense of the place and powers of woman than belonged to the _altvater_ day. the holy love of christ which summoned them, also, to choose "the better part--that which could not be taken from them," refined and hallowed in this nation a native faith; thus showing that it was not the warlike spirit alone that left the latins so barbarous in this respect. but the germans, taking so kindly to this thought, did it the more justice. the idea of woman in their literature is expressed both to a greater height and depth than elsewhere. i will give as instances the themes of three ballads: one is upon a knight who had always the name of the virgin on his lips. this protected him all his life through, in various and beautiful modes, both from sin and other dangers; and, when he died, a plant sprang from his grave, which so gently whispered the ave maria that none could pass it by with an unpurified heart. another is one of the legends of the famous drachenfels. a maiden, one of the earliest converts to christianity, was carried by the enraged populace to this dread haunt of "the dragon's fabled brood," to be their prey. she was left alone, but undismayed, for she knew in whom she trusted. so, when the dragons came rushing towards her, she showed them a crucifix and they crouched reverently at her feet. next day the people came, and, seeing these wonders, were all turned to the faith which exalts the lowly. the third i have in mind is another of the rhine legends. a youth is sitting with the maid he loves on the shore of an isle, her fairy kingdom, then perfumed by the blossoming grape-vines which draped its bowers. they are happy; all blossoms with them, and life promises its richest vine. a boat approaches on the tide; it pauses at their foot. it brings, perhaps, some joyous message, fresh dew for their flowers, fresh light on the wave. no! it is the usual check on such great happiness. the father of the count departs for the crusade; will his son join him, or remain to rule their domain, and wed her he loves? neither of the affianced pair hesitates a moment. "i must go with my father,"--"thou must go with thy father." it was one thought, one word. "i will be here again," he said, "when these blossoms have turned to purple grapes." "i hope so," she sighed, while the prophetic sense said "no." and there she waited, and the grapes ripened, and were gathered into the vintage, and he came not. year after year passed thus, and no tidings; yet still she waited. he, meanwhile, was in a moslem prison. long he languished there without hope, till, at last, his patron saint appeared in vision and announced his release, but only on condition of his joining the monastic order for the service of the saint. and so his release was effected, and a safe voyage home given. and once more he sets sail upon the rhine. the maiden, still watching beneath the vines, sees at last the object of all this patient love approach--approach, but not to touch the strand to which she, with outstretched arms, has rushed. he dares not trust himself to land, but in low, heart-broken tones, tells her of heaven's will; and that he, in obedience to his vow, is now on his way to a convent on the river-bank, there to pass the rest of his earthly life in the service of the shrine. and then he turns his boat, and floats away from her and hope of any happiness in this world, but urged, as he believes, by the breath of heaven. the maiden stands appalled, but she dares not murmur, and cannot hesitate long. she also bids them prepare her boat. she follows her lost love to the convent gate, requests an interview with the abbot, and devotes her elysian isle, where vines had ripened their ruby fruit in vain for her, to the service of the monastery where her love was to serve. then, passing over to the nunnery opposite, she takes the veil, and meets her betrothed at the altar; and for a life-long union, if not the one they had hoped in earlier years. is not this sorrowful story of a lofty beauty? does it not show a sufficiently high view of woman, of marriage? this is commonly the chivalric, still more the german view. yet, wherever there was a balance in the mind of man, of sentiment with intellect, such a result was sure. the greek xenophon has not only painted us a sweet picture of the domestic woman, in his economics, but in the cyropedia has given, in the picture of panthea, a view of woman which no german picture can surpass, whether lonely and quiet with veiled lids, the temple of a vestal loveliness, or with eyes flashing, and hair flowing to the free wind, cheering on the hero to fight for his god, his country, or whatever name his duty might bear at the time. this picture i shall copy by and by. yet xenophon grew up in the same age with him who makes iphigenia say to achilles, "better a thousand women should perish than one man cease to see the light." this was the vulgar greek sentiment. xenophon, aiming at the ideal man, caught glimpses of the ideal woman also. from the figure of a cyrus the pantheas stand not afar. they do not in thought; they would not in life. i could swell the catalogue of instances far beyond the reader's patience. but enough have been brought forward to show that, though there has been great disparity betwixt the nations as between individuals in their culture on this point, yet the idea of woman has always cast some rays and often been forcibly represented. far less has woman to complain that she has not had her share of power. this, in all ranks of society, except the lowest, has been hers to the extent that vanity would crave, far beyond what wisdom would accept. in the very lowest, where man, pressed by poverty, sees in woman only the partner of toils and cares, and cannot hope, scarcely has an idea of, a comfortable home, he often maltreats her, and is less influenced by her. in all ranks, those who are gentle and uncomplaining, too candid to intrigue, too delicate to encroach, suffer much. they suffer long, and are kind; verily, they have their reward. but wherever man is sufficiently raised above extreme poverty, or brutal stupidity, to care for the comforts of the fireside, or the bloom and ornament of life, woman has always power enough, if she choose to exert it, and is usually disposed to do so, in proportion to her ignorance and childish vanity. unacquainted with the importance of life and its purposes, trained to a selfish coquetry and love of petty power, she does not look beyond the pleasure of making herself felt at the moment, and governments are shaken and commerce broken up to gratify the pique of a female favorite. the english shopkeeper's wife does not vote, but it is for her interest that the politician canvasses by the coarsest flattery. france suffers no woman on her throne, but her proud nobles kiss the dust at the feet of pompadour and dubarry; for such flare in the lighted foreground where a roland would modestly aid in the closet. spain (that same spain which sang of ximena and the lady teresa) shuts up her women in the care of duennas, and allows them no book but the breviary; but the ruin follows only the more surely from the worthless favorite of a worthless queen. relying on mean precautions, men indeed cry peace, peace, where there is no peace. it is not the transient breath of poetic incense that women want; each can receive that from a lover. it is not life-long sway; it needs but to become a coquette, a shrew, or a good cook, to be sure of that. it is not money, nor notoriety, nor the badges of authority which men have appropriated to themselves. if demands, made in their behalf, lay stress on any of these particulars, those who make them have not searched deeply into the need. the want is for that which at once includes these and precludes them; which would not be forbidden power, lest there be temptation to steal and misuse it; which would not have the mind perverted by flattery from a worthiness of esteem; it is for that which is the birthright of every being capable of receiving it,--the freedom, the religious, the intelligent freedom of the universe to use its means, to learn its secret, as far as nature has enabled them, with god alone for their guide and their judge. ye cannot believe it, men; but the only reason why women over assume what is more appropriate to you, is because you prevent them from finding out what is fit for themselves. were they free, were they wise fully to develop the strength and beauty of woman; they would never wish to be men, or man-like. the well-instructed moon flies not from her orbit to seize on the glories of her partner. no; for she knows that one law rules, one heaven contains, one universe replies to them alike. it is with women as with the slave: "vor dem sklaven, wenn er die kette bricht, vor dem frelen menschen erzittert nicht." tremble not before the free man, but before the slave who has chains to break. in slavery, acknowledged slavery, women are on a par with men. each is a work-tool, an article of property, no more! in perfect freedom, such as is painted in olympus, in swedenborg's angelic state, in the heaven where there is no marrying nor giving in marriage, each is a purified intelligence, an enfranchised soul,--no less. "jene himmlische gestalten sie fragen nicht nach mann und welb, und keine kielder, keine falten umgeben den verklarten leib." the child who song this was a prophetic form, expressive of the longing for a state of perfect freedom, pure love. she could not remain here, but was translated to another air. and it may be that the air of this earth will never be so tempered that such can bear it long. but, while they stay, they must bear testimony to the truth they are constituted to demand. that an era approaches which shall approximate nearer to such a temper than any has yet done, there are many tokens; indeed, so many that only a few of the most prominent can here be enumerated. the reigns of elizabeth of england and isabella of castile foreboded this era. they expressed the beginning of the new state; while they forwarded its progress. these were strong characters, and in harmony with the wants of their time. one showed that this strength did not unfit a woman for the duties of a wife and a mother; the other, that it could enable her to live and die alone, a wide energetic life, a courageous death. elizabeth is certainly no pleasing example. in rising above the weakness, she did not lay aside the foibles ascribed to her sex; but her strength must be respected now, as it was in her own time. mary stuart and elizabeth seem types, moulded by the spirit of the time, and placed upon an elevated platform, to show to the coming ages woman such as the conduct and wishes of man in general is likely to make her. the first shows woman lovely even to allurement; quick in apprehension and weak in judgment; with grace and dignity of sentiment, but no principle; credulous and indiscreet, yet artful; capable of sudden greatness or of crime, but not of a steadfast wisdom, nor self-restraining virtue. the second reveals woman half-emancipated and jealous of her freedom, such as she has figured before or since in many a combative attitude, mannish, not equally manly; strong and prudent more than great or wise; able to control vanity, and the wish to rule through coquetry and passion, but not to resign these dear deceits from the very foundation, as unworthy a being capable of truth and nobleness. elizabeth, taught by adversity, put on her virtues as armor, more than produced them in a natural order from her soul. the time and her position called on her to act the wise sovereign, and she was proud that she could do so, but her tastes and inclinations would have led her to act the weak woman. she was without magnanimity of any kind. we may accept as an omen for ourselves that it was isabella who furnished columbus with the means of coming hither. this land must pay back its debt to woman, without whose aid it would not have been brought into alliance with the civilized world. a graceful and meaning figure is that introduced to us by mr. prescott, in the conquest of mexico, in the indian girl marina, who accompanied cortez, and was his interpreter in all the various difficulties of his career. she stood at his side, on the walls of the besieged palace, to plead with her enraged countrymen. by her name he was known in new spain, and, after the conquest, her gentle intercession was often of avail to the conquered. the poem of the future may be read in some features of the story of "malinche." the influence of elizabeth on literature was real, though, by sympathy with its finer productions, she was no more entitled to give name to an era than queen anne. it was simply that the fact of having a female sovereign on the throne affected the course of a writer's thoughts. in this sense, the presence of a woman on the throne always makes its mark. life is lived before the eyes of men, by which their imaginations are stimulated as to the possibilities of woman. "we will die for our king, maria, theresa," cry the wild warriors, clashing their swords; and the sounds vibrate through the poems of that generation. the range of female character in spenser alone might content us for one period. britomart and belphoebe have as much room on the canvas as florimel; and, where this is the case, the haughtiest amazon will not murmur that una should be felt to be the fairest type. unlike as was the english queen to a fairy queen, we may yet conceive that it was the image of a queen before the poet's mind that called up this splendid court of women. shakspeare's range is also great; but he has left out the heroic characters, such as the macaria of greece, the britomart of spenser. ford and massinger have, in this respect, soared to a higher flight of feeling than he. it was the holy and heroic woman they most loved, and if they could not paint an imogen, a desdemona, a rosalind, yet, in those of a stronger mould, they showed a higher ideal, though with so much less poetic power to embody it, than we see in portia or isabella, the simple truth of cordelia, indeed, is of this sort. the beauty of cordelia is neither male nor female; it is the beauty of virtue. the ideal of love and marriage rose high in the mind of all the christian nations who were capable of grave and deep feeling. we may take as examples of its english aspect the lines, "i could not love thee, dear, so much, loved i not honor more." or the address of the commonwealth's man to his wife, as she looked out from the tower window to see him, for the last time, on his way to the scaffold. he stood up in the cart, waved his hat, and cried, "to heaven, my love, to heaven, and leave you in the storm!" such was the love of faith and honor,--a love which stopped, like colonel hutchinson's, "on this side idolatry," because it was religious. the meeting of two such souls donne describes as giving birth to an "abler soul." lord herbert wrote to his love, "were not our souls immortal made, our equal loves can make them such." in the "broken heart," of ford, penthea, a character which engages my admiration even more deeply than the famous one of calanthe, is made to present to the mind the most beautiful picture of what these relations should be in their purity. her life cannot sustain the violation of what she so clearly feels. shakspeare, too, saw that, in true love, as in fire, the utmost ardor is coincident with the utmost purity. it is a true lover that exclaims in the agony of othello, "if thou art false, o then heaven mocks itself!" the son, framed, like hamlet, to appreciate truth in all the beauty of relations, sinks into deep melancholy when he finds his natural expectations disappointed. he has no other. she to whom he gave the name, disgraces from his heart's shrine all the sex. "frailty, thy name is woman." it is because a hamlet could find cause to say so, that i have put the line, whose stigma has never been removed, at the head of my work. but, as a lover, surely hamlet would not have so far mistaken, as to have finished with such a conviction. he would have felt the faith of othello, and that faith could not, in his more dispassionate mind, have been disturbed by calumny. in spain, this thought is arrayed in a sublimity which belongs to the sombre and passionate genius of the nation. calderon's justina resists all the temptation of the demon, and raises her lover, with her, above the sweet lures of mere temporal happiness. their marriage is vowed at the stake; their goals are liberated together by the martyr flame into "a purer state of sensation and existence." in italy, the great poets wove into their lives an ideal love which answered to the highest wants. it included those of the intellect and the affections, for it was a love of spirit for spirit. it was not ascetic, or superhuman, but, interpreting all things, gave their proper beauty to details of the common life, the common day. the poet spoke of his love, not as a flower to place in his bosom, or hold carelessly in his hand, but as a light toward which he must find wings to fly, or "a stair to heaven." he delighted to speak of her, not only as the bride of his heart, but the mother of his soul; for he saw that, in cases where the right direction had been taken, the greater delicacy of her frame and stillness of her life left her more open than is man to spiritual influx. so he did not look upon her as betwixt him and earth, to serve his temporal needs, but, rather, betwixt him and heaven, to purify his affections and lead him to wisdom through love. he sought, in her, not so much the eve as the madonna. in these minds the thought, which gleams through all the legends of chivalry, shines in broad intellectual effulgence, not to be misinterpreted; and their thought is reverenced by the world, though it lies far from the practice of the world as yet,--so far that it seems as though a gulf of death yawned between. even with such men the practice was, often, widely different from the mental faith. i say mental; for if the heart were thoroughly alive with it, the practice could not be dissonant. lord herbert's was a marriage of convention, made for him at fifteen; he was not discontented with it, but looked only to the advantages it brought of perpetuating his family on the basis of a great fortune. he paid, in act, what he considered a dutiful attention to the bond; his thoughts travelled elsewhere; and while forming a high ideal of the companionship of minds in marriage, he seems never to have doubted that its realization must be postponed to some other state of being. dante, almost immediately after the death of beatrice, married a lady chosen for him by his friends, and boccaccio, in describing the miseries that attended, in this case, "the form of an union where union is none," speaks as if these were inevitable to the connection, and as if the scholar and poet, especially, could expect nothing but misery and obstruction in a domestic partnership with woman. centuries have passed since, but civilized europe is still in a transition state about marriage; not only in practice but in thought. it is idle to speak with contempt of the nations where polygamy is an institution, or seraglios a custom, while practices far more debasing haunt, well-nigh fill, every city and every town, and so far as union of one with one is believed to be the only pure form of marriage, a great majority of societies and individuals are still doubtful whether the earthly bond must be a meeting of souls, or only supposes a contract of convenience and utility. were woman established in the rights of an immortal being, this could not be. she would not, in some countries, be given away by her father, with scarcely more respect for her feelings than is shown by the indian chief, who sells his daughter for a horse, and beats her if she runs away from her new home. nor, in societies where her choice is left free, would she be perverted, by the current of opinion that seizes her, into the belief that she must marry, if it be only to find a protector, and a home of her own. neither would man, if he thought the connection of permanent importance, form it so lightly. he would not deem it a trifle, that he was to enter into the closest relations with another soul, which, if not eternal in themselves, must eternally affect his growth. neither, did he believe woman capable of friendship, [footnote: see appendix d, spinoza's view] would he, by rash haste, lose the chance of finding a friend in the person who might, probably, live half a century by his side. did love, to his mind, stretch forth into infinity, he would not miss his chance of its revelations, that he might the sooner rest from his weariness by a bright fireside, and secure a sweet and graceful attendant "devoted to him alone." were he a step higher, he would not carelessly enter into a relation where he might not be able to do the duty of a friend, as well as a protector from external ill, to the other party, and have a being in his power pining for sympathy, intelligence and aid, that he could not give. what deep communion, what real intercourse is implied in sharing the joys and cares of parentage, when any degree of equality is admitted between the parties! it is true that, in a majority of instances, the man looks upon his wife as an adopted child, and places her to the other children in the relation of nurse or governess, rather than that of parent. her influence with them is sure; but she misses the education which should enlighten that influence, by being thus treated. it is the order of nature that children should complete the education, moral and mental, of parents, by making them think what is needed for the best culture of human beings, and conquer all faults and impulses that interfere with their giving this to these dear objects, who represent the world to them. father and mother should assist one another to learn what is required for this sublime priesthood of nature. but, for this, a religious recognition of equality is required. where this thought of equality begins to diffuse itself, it is shown in four ways. first;--the household partnership. in our country, the woman looks for a "smart but kind" husband; the man for a "capable, sweet-tempered" wife. the man furnishes the house; the woman regulates it. their relation is one of mutual esteem, mutual dependence. their talk is of business; their affection shows itself by practical kindness. they know that life goes more smoothly and cheerfully to each for the other's aid; they are grateful and content. the wife praises her husband as a "good provider;" the husband, in return, compliments her as a "capital housekeeper." this relation is good so far as it goes. next comes a closer tie, which takes the form either of mutual idolatry or of intellectual companionship. the first, we suppose, is to no one a pleasing subject of contemplation. the parties weaken and narrow one another; they lock the gate against all the glories of the universe, that they may live in a cell together. to themselves they seem the only wise; to all others, steeped in infatuation; the gods smile as they look forward to the crisis of cure; to men, the woman seems an unlovely syren; to women, the man an effeminate boy. the other form, of intellectual companionship, has become more and more frequent. men engaged in public life, literary men, and artists, have often found in their wives companions and confidants in thought no less than in feeling. and, as the intellectual development of woman has spread wider and risen higher, they have, not unfrequently, shared the same employment; as in the case of roland and his wife, who were friends in the household and in the nation's councils, read, regulated home affairs, or prepared public documents together, indifferently. it is very pleasant, in letters begun by roland and finished by his wife, to see the harmony of mind, and the difference of nature; one thought, but various ways of treating it. this is one of the best instances of a marriage of friendship. it was only friendship, whose basis was esteem; probably neither party knew love, except by name. roland was a good man, worthy to esteem, and be esteemed; his wife as deserving of admiration as able to do without it. madame roland is the fairest specimen we yet have of her class; as clear to discern her aim, as valiant to pursue it, as spenser's britomart; austerely set apart from all that did not belong to her, whether as woman or as mind. she is an antetype of a class to which the coming time will afford a field--the spartan matron, brought by the culture of the age of books to intellectual consciousness and expansion. self-sufficingness, strength, and clearsightedness were, in her, combined with a power of deep and calm affection. she, too, would have given a son or husband the device for his shield, "return with it or upon it;" and this, not because she loved little, but much. the page of her life is one of unsullied dignity. her appeal to posterity is one against the injustice of those who committed such crimes in the name of liberty. she makes it in behalf of herself and her husband. i would put beside it, on the shelf, a little volume, containing a similar appeal from the verdict of contemporaries to that of mankind, made by godwin in behalf of his wife, the celebrated, the by most men detested, mary wolstonecraft. in his view, it was an appeal from the injustice of those who did such wrong in the name of virtue. were this little book interesting for no other cause, it would be so for the generous affection evinced under the peculiar circumstances. this man had courage to love and honor this woman in the face of the world's sentence, and of all that was repulsive in her own past history. he believed he saw of what soul she was, and that the impulses she had struggled to act out were noble, though the opinions to which they had led might not be thoroughly weighed. he loved her, and he defended her for the meaning and tendency of her inner life. it was a good fact. mary wolstonecraft, like madame dudevant (commonly known as george sand) in our day, was a woman whose existence better proved the need of some new interpretation of woman's rights than anything she wrote. such beings as these, rich in genius, of most tender sympathies, capable of high virtue and a chastened harmony, ought not to find themselves, by birth, in a place so narrow, that, in breaking bonds, they become outlaws. were there as much room in the world for such, as in spenser's poem for britomart, they would not run their heads so wildly against the walls, but prize their shelter rather. they find their way, at last, to light and air, but the world will not take off the brand it has set upon them. the champion of the rights of woman found, in godwin, one who would plead that cause like a brother. he who delineated with such purity of traits the form of woman in the marguerite, of whom the weak st. leon could never learn to be worthy,--a pearl indeed whose price was above rubies,--was not false in life to the faith by which he had hallowed his romance. he acted, as he wrote, like a brother. this form of appeal rarely fails to touch the basest man:--"are you acting toward other women in the way you would have men act towards your sister?" george sand smokes, wears male attire, wishes to be addressed as "mon frere;"--perhaps, if she found those who were as brothers indeed, she would not care whether she were brother or sister. [footnote: a note appended by my sister in this place, in the first edition, is here omitted, because it is incorporated in another article in this volume, treating of george sand more at length.--[ed.]] we rejoice to see that she, who expresses such a painful contempt for men in most of her works, as shows she must have known great wrong from them, depicts, in "la roche mauprat," a man raised by the workings of love from the depths of savage sensualism to a moral and intellectual life. it was love for a pure object, for a steadfast woman, one of those who, the italian said, could make the "stair to heaven." this author, beginning like the many in assault upon bad institutions, and external ills, yet deepening the experience through comparative freedom, sees at last that the only efficient remedy must come from individual character. these bad institutions, indeed, it may always be replied, prevent individuals from forming good character, therefore we must remove them. agreed; yet keep steadily the higher aim in view. could you clear away all the bad forms of society, it is vain, unless the individual begin to be ready for better. there must be a parallel movement in these two branches of life. and all the rules left by moses availed less to further the best life than the living example of one messiah. still the mind of the age struggles confusedly with these problems, better discerning as yet the ill it can no longer bear, than the good by which it may supersede it. but women like sand will speak now and cannot be silenced; their characters and their eloquence alike foretell an era when such as they shall easier learn to lead true lives. but though such forebode, not such shall be parents of it. [footnote: appendix e.] those who would reform the world must show that they do not speak in the heat of wild impulse; their lives must be unstained by passionate error; they must be severe lawgivers to themselves. they must be religious students of the divine purpose with regard to man, if they would not confound the fancies of a day with the requisitions of eternal good. their liberty must be the liberty of law and knowledge. but as to the transgressions against custom which have caused such outcry against those of noble intention, it may be observed that the resolve of eloisa to be only the mistress of abelard, was that of one who saw in practice around her the contract of marriage made the seal of degradation. shelley feared not to be fettered, unless so to be was to be false. wherever abuses are seen, the timid will suffer; the bold will protest. but society has a right to outlaw them till she has revised her law; and this she must be taught to do, by one who speaks with authority, not in anger or haste. if godwin's choice of the calumniated authoress of the "rights of woman," for his honored wife, be a sign of a new era, no less so is an article to which i have alluded some pages back, published five or six years ago in one of the english reviews, where the writer, in doing fall justice to eloisa, shows his bitter regret that she lives not now to love him, who might have known bettor how to prize her love than did the egotistical abelard. these marriages, these characters, with all their imperfections, express an onward tendency. they speak of aspiration of soul, of energy of mind, seeking clearness and freedom. of a like promise are the tracts lately published by goodwyn barmby (the european pariah, as he calls himself) and his wife catharine. whatever we may think of their measures, we see in them wedlock; the two minds are wed by the only contract that can permanently avail, that of a common faith and a common purpose. we might mention instances, nearer home, of minds, partners in work and in life, sharing together, on equal terms, public and private interests, and which wear not, on any side, the aspect of offence shown by those last-named: persons who steer straight onward, yet, in our comparatively free life, have not been obliged to run their heads against any wall. but the principles which guide them might, under petrified and oppressive institutions, have made them warlike, paradoxical, and, in some sense, pariahs. the phenomena are different, the law is the same, in all these cases. men and women have been obliged to build up their house anew from the very foundation. if they found stone ready in the quarry, they took it peaceably; otherwise they alarmed the country by pulling down old towers to get materials. these are all instances of marriage as intellectual companionship. the parties meet mind to mind, and a mutual trust is produced, which can buckler them against a million. they work together for a common, purpose, and, in all these instances, with the same implement,--the pen. the pen and the writing-desk furnish forth as naturally the retirement of woman as of man. a pleasing expression, in this kind, is afforded by the union in the names of the howitts. william and mary howitt we heard named together for years, supposing them to be brother and sister; the equality of labors and reputation, even so, was auspicious; more so, now we find them man and wife. in his late work on germany, howitt mentions his wife, with pride, as one among the constellation of distinguished english-women, and in a graceful, simple manner. and still we contemplate with pleasure the partnership in literature and affection between the howitts,--the congenial pursuits and productions--the pedestrian tours wherein the married pair showed that marriage, on a wide enough basis, does not destroy the "inexhaustible" entertainment which lovers find in one another's company. in naming these instances, i do not mean to imply that community of employment is essential to the union of husband and wife, more than to the union of friends. harmony exists in difference, no less than in likeness, if only the same key-note govern both parts. woman the poem, man the poet! woman the heart, man the head! such divisions are only important when they are never to be transcended. if nature is never bound down, nor the voice of inspiration stifled, that is enough. we are pleased that women should write and speak, if they feel need of it, from having something to tell; but silence for ages would be no misfortune, if that silence be from divine command, and not from man's tradition. while goetz von berlichingen rides to battle, his wife is busy in the kitchen; but difference of occupation does not prevent that community of inward life, that perfect esteem, with which he says, "whom god loves, to him gives he such a wife." manzoni thus dedicates his "adelchi." "to his beloved and venerated wife, enrichetta luigia blondel, who, with conjugal affection and maternal wisdom, has preserved a virgin mind, the author dedicates this 'adelchi,' grieving that he could not, by a more splendid and more durable monument, honor the dear name, and the memory of so many virtues." the relation could not be fairer, nor more equal, if she, too, had written poems. yet the position of the parties might have been the reverse as well; the woman might have sung the deeds, given voice to the life of the man, and beauty would have been the result; as we see, in pictures of arcadia, the nymph singing to the shepherds, or the shepherd, with his pipe, alluring the nymphs; either makes a good picture. the sounding lyre requires not muscular strength, but energy of soul to animate the hand which would control it. nature seems to delight in varying the arrangements, as if to show that she will be fettered by no rule; and we must admit the same varieties that she admits. the fourth and highest grade of marriage union is the religious, which may be expressed as pilgrimage toward a common shrine. this includes the others: home sympathies and household wisdom, for these pilgrims must know how to assist each other along the dusty way; intellectual communion, for how sad it would be on such a journey to have a companion to whom you could not communicate your thoughts and aspirations as they sprang to life; who would have no feeling for the prospects that open, more and more glorious as we advance; who would never see the flowers that may be gathered by the most industrious traveller! it must include all these. such a fellow-pilgrim count zinzendorf seems to have found in his countess, of whom he thus writes: "twenty-five years' experience has shown me that just the help-meet whom i have is the only one that could suit my vocation. who else could have so carried through my family affairs? who lived so spotlessly before the world? who so wisely aided me in my rejection of a dry morality? who so clearly set aside the pharisaism which, as years passed, threatened to creep in among us? who so deeply discerned as to the spirits of delusion which sought to bewilder us? who would have governed my whole economy so wisely, richly and hospitably, when circumstances commanded? who have taken indifferently the part of servant or mistress, without, on the one side, affecting an especial spirituality; on the other, being sullied by any worldly pride? who, in a community where all ranks are eager to be on a level, would, from wise and real causes, have known how to maintain inward and outward distinctions? who, without a murmur, have seen her husband encounter such dangers by land and sea? who undertaken with him, and _sustained_, such astonishing pilgrimages? who, amid such difficulties, would have always held up her head and supported me? who found such vast sums of money, and acquitted them on her own credit? and, finally, who, of all human beings, could so well understand and interpret to others my inner and outer being as this one, of such nobleness in her way of thinking, such great intellectual capacity, and so free from the theological perplexities that enveloped me!" let any one peruse, with all intentness, the lineaments of this portrait, and see if the husband had not reason, with this air of solemn rapture and conviction, to challenge comparison? we are reminded of the majestic cadence of the line whose feet stop in the just proportion of humanity, "daughter of god and mati, accomplished eve!" an observer [footnote: spangenberg] adds this testimony: "we may, in many marriages, regard it as the best arrangement, if the man has so much advantage over his wife, that she can, without much thought of her own, be led and directed by him as by a father. but it was not so with the count and his consort. she was not made to be a copy; she was an original; and, while she loved and honored him, she thought for herself, on all subjects, with so much intelligence, that he could and did look on her as a sister and friend also." compare with this refined specimen of a religiously civilized life the following imperfect sketch of a north american indian, and we shall see that the same causes will always produce the same results, the flying pigeon (ratchewaine) was the wife of a barbarous chief, who had six others; but she was his only true wife, because the only one of a strong and pure character, and, having this, inspired a veneration, as like as the mind of the man permitted to that inspired by the countess zinzendorf. she died when her son was only four years old, yet left on his mind a feeling of reverent love worthy the thought of christian chivalry. grown to manhood, he shed tears on seeing her portrait. the flying pigeon. "ratchewaine was chaste, mild, gentle in her disposition, kind, generous, and devoted to her husband. a harsh word was never known to proceed from her mouth; nor was she ever known to be in a passion. mabaskah used to say of her, after her death, that her hand was shut when those who did not want came into her presence; but when the really poor came in, it was like a strainer full of holes, letting all she held in it pass through. in the exercise of generous feeling she was uniform, it was not indebted for its exercise to whim, nor caprice, nor partiality. no matter of what nation the applicant for her bounty was, or whether at war or peace with her nation; if he were hungry, she fed him; if naked, she clothed him; and, if houseless, she gave him shelter. the continued exercise of this generous feeling kept her poor. and she has been known to give away her last blanket--all the honey that was in the lodge, the last bladder of bear's oil, and the last piece of dried meat. "she was scrupulously exact in the observance of all the religious rites which her faith imposed upon her. her conscience is represented to have been extremely tender. she often feared that her acts were displeasing to the great spirit, when she would blacken her face, and retire to some lone place, and fast and pray." to these traits should be added, but for want of room, anecdotes which show the quick decision and vivacity of her mind. her face was in harmony with this combination. her brow is as ideal and the eyes and lids as devout and modest as the italian picture of the madonna, while the lower part of the face has the simplicity and childish strength of the indian race. her picture presents the finest specimen of indian beauty we have ever seen. such a woman is the sister and friend of all beings, as the worthy man is their brother and helper. with like pleasure we survey the pairs wedded on the eve of missionary effort they, indeed, are fellow-pilgrims on the well-made road, and whether or no they accomplish all they hope for the sad hindoo, or the nearer savage, we feel that in the burning waste their love is like to be a healing dew, in the forlorn jungle a tent of solace to one another. they meet, as children of one father, to read together one book of instruction. we must insert in this connection the most beautiful picture presented by ancient literature of wedded love under this noble form. it is from the romance in which xenophon, the chivalrous greek, presents his ideal of what human nature should be. the generals of cyrus had taken captive a princess, a woman of unequalled beauty, and hastened to present her to the prince as that part of the spoil he would think most worthy of his acceptance. cyrus visits the lady, and is filled with immediate admiration by the modesty and majesty with which she receives him. he finds her name is panthea, and that she is the wife of abradatus, a young king whom she entirely loves. he protects her as a sister, in his camp, till he can restore her to her husband. after the first transports of joy at this reunion, the heart of panthea is bent on showing her love and gratitude to her magnanimous and delicate protector. and as she has nothing so precious to give as the aid of abradatus, that is what she most wishes to offer. her husband is of one soul with her in this, as in all things. the description of her grief and self-destruction, after the death which ensued upon this devotion, i have seen quoted, but never that of their parting when she sends him forth to battle. i shall copy both. if they have been read by any of my readers, they may be so again with profit in this connection, for never were the heroism of a true woman, and the purity of love in a true marriage, painted in colors more delicate and more lively. "the chariot of abradatus, that had four perches and eight horses, was completely adorned for him; and when he was going to put on his linen corslet, which was a sort of armor used by those of his country, panthea brought him a golden helmet, and arm-pieces, broad bracelets for his wrists, a purple habit that reached down to his feet, and hung in folds at the bottom, and a crest dyed of a violet color. these things she had made, unknown to her husband, and by taking the measure of his armor. he wondered when he saw them, and inquired thus of panthea: 'and have you made me these arms, woman, by destroying your own ornaments?' 'no, by jove!' said panthea, 'not what is the most valuable of them; for it is you, if you appear to others to be what i think you, that will be my greatest ornament.' and, saying that, she put on him the armor, and, though she endeavored to conceal it, the tears poured down her checks. when abradatus, who was before a man of fine appearance, was set out in those arms, he appeared the most beautiful and noble of all, especially being likewise so by nature. then, taking the reins from the driver, he was just preparing to mount the chariot, when panthea, after she had desired all that were there to retire, thus said: "'o abradatus! if ever there was a woman who had a greater regard to her husband than to her own soul, i believe you know that i am such an one; what need i therefore speak of things in particular? for i reckon that my actions have convinced you more than any words i can now use. and yet, though i stand thus affected toward you, as you know i do, i swear, by this friendship of mine and yours, that i certainly would rather choose to be put under ground jointly with you, approving yourself a brave man, than to live with you in disgrace and shame; so much do i think you and myself worthy of the noblest things. then i think that we both lie under great obligations to cyrus, that, when i was a captive, and chosen out for himself, he thought fit to treat me neither as a slave, nor, indeed, as a woman of mean account, but he took and kept me for you, as if i were his brother's wife. besides, when araspes, who was my guard, went away from him, i promised him, that, if he would allow me to send for you, you would come to him, and approve yourself a much better and move faithful friend than araspes.' "thus she spoke; and abradatus, being struck with admiration at her discourse, laying, his hand gently on her head, and lifting up his eyes to heaven, made this prayer: 'do thou, o greatest jove! i grant me to appear a husband worthy of panthea, and a friend worthy of cyrus, who has done us so much honor!' "having said this, he mounted the chariot by the door of the driver's seat; and, after he had got up, when the driver shut the door, panthea, who had now no other way to salute him, kissed the seat of the chariot. the chariot then moved, and she, unknown to him, followed, till abradatus turning about, and seeing her, said: 'take courage, panthea! fare you happily and well, and now go your ways.' on this her women and servants carried her to her conveyance, and, laying her down, concealed her by throwing the covering of a tent over her. the people, though abradatus and his chariot made a noble spectacle, were not able to look at him till panthea was gone." after the battle-- "cyrus calling to some of his servants, 'tell me, said he, 'has any one seen abradatus? for i admire that he now does not appear.' one replied, 'my sovereign, it is because he is not living, but died in the battle as he broke in with his chariot on the egyptians. all the rest, except his particular companions, they say, turned off when they saw the egyptians' compact body. his wife is now said to have taken up his dead body, to have placed it in the carriage that she herself was conveyed in, and to have brought it hither to some place on the river pactolus, and her servants are digging a grave on a certain elevation. they say that his wife, after setting him out with all the ornaments she has, is sitting on the ground with his head on her knees.' cyrus, hearing this, gave himself a blow on the thigh, mounted his horse at a leap, and, taking with him a thousand horse, rode away to this scene of affliction; but gave orders to gadatas and gobryas to take with them all the rich ornaments proper for a friend and an excellent man deceased, and to follow after him; and whoever had herds of cattle with him, he ordered them to take both oxen, and horses, and sheep in good number, and to bring them away to the place where, by inquiry, they should find him to be, that he might sacrifice these to abradatus. "as soon as he saw the woman sitting on the ground, and the dead body there lying, he shed tears at the afflicting sight, and said: 'alas! thou brave and faithful soul, hast thou left us, and art thou gone?' at the same time he took him by the right hand, and the hand of the deceased came away, for it had been cut off with a sword by the egyptians. he, at the sight of this, became yet much more concerned than before. the woman shrieked out in a lamentable manner, and, taking the hand from cyrus, kissed it, fitted it to its proper place again, as well as she could, and said: 'the rest, cyrus, is in the same condition, but what need you see it? and i know that i was not one of the least concerned in these his sufferings, and, perhaps, you were not less so; for i, fool that i was! frequently exhorted him to behave in such a manner as to appear a friend to you, worthy of notice; and i know he never thought of what he himself should suffer, but of what he should do to please you. he is dead, therefore,' said she, 'without reproach, and i, who urged him on, sit here alive.' cyrus, shedding tears for some time in silence, then spoke:--'he has died, woman, the noblest death; for he has died victorious! do you adorn him with these things that i furnish you with.' (gobryas and gadatas were then come up, and had brought rich ornaments in great abundance with them.) 'then,' said he, 'be assured that he shall not want respect and honor in all other things; but, over and above, multitudes shall concur in raising him a monument that shall be worthy of us, and all the sacrifices shall be made him that are proper to be made in honor of a brave man. you shall not be left destitute, but, for the sake of your modesty and every other virtue, i will pay you all other honors, as well as place those about you who will conduct you wherever you please. do you but make it known to me where it is that you desire to be conveyed to.' and panthea replied: 'be confident, cyrus, i will not conceal from you to whom it is that i desire to go.' "he, having said this, went away with great pity for her that she should have lost such a husband, and for the man that he should have left such a wife behind him, never to see her more. panthea then gave orders for her servants to retire, 'till such time,' said she, 'as i shall have lamented my husband as i please.' her nurse she bid to stay, and gave orders that, when she was dead, she would wrap her and her husband up in one mantle together. the nurse, after having repeatedly begged her not to do this, and meeting with no success, but observing her to grow angry, sat herself down, breaking out into tears. she, being beforehand provided with a sword, killed herself, and, laying her head down on her husband's breast, she died. the nurse set up a lamentable cry, and covered them both, as panthea had directed. "cyrus, as soon as he was informed of what the woman had done, being struck with it, went to help her if he could. the servants, three in number, seeing what had been done, drew their swords and killed themselves, as they stood at the place where she bad ordered them. and the monument is now said to have been raised by continuing the mound on to the servants; and on a pillar above, they say, the names of the man and woman were written in syriac letters. "below were three pillars, and they were inscribed thus, 'of the servants.' cyrus, when he came to this melancholy scene, was struck with admiration of the woman, and, having lamented over her, went away. he took care, as was proper, that all the funeral rites should be paid them in the noblest manner, and the monument, they say, was raised up to a very great size." * * * * * these be the ancients, who, so many assert, had no idea of the dignity of woman, or of marriage. such love xenophon could paint as subsisting between those who after death "would see one another never more." thousands of years have passed since, and with the reception of the cross, the nations assume the belief that those who part thus may meet again and forever, if spiritually fitted to one another, as abradatus and panthea were, and yet do we see such marriages among them? if at all, how often? i must quote two more short passages from xenophon, for he is a writer who pleases me well. cyrus, receiving the armenians whom he had conquered-- "'tigranes,' said he, 'at what rate would you purchase the regaining of your wife?' now tigranes happened to be _but lately married_, and had a very great love for his wife." (that clause perhaps sounds _modern_.) "'cyrus,' said he, 'i would ransom her at the expense of my life.' "'take then your own to yourself,' said he. ... "when they came home, one talked of cyrus' wisdom, another of his patience and resolution, another of his mildness. one spoke of his beauty and smallness of his person, and, on that, tigranes asked his wife, 'and do you, armenian dame, think cyrus handsome?' 'truly,' said she, 'i did not look at him.' 'at whom, then, _did_ you look?' said tigranes. 'at him who said that, to save me from servitude, he would ransom me at the expense of his own life.'" from the banquet.-- "socrates, who observed her with pleasure, said, 'this young girl has confirmed me in the opinion i have had, for a long time, that the female sex are nothing inferior to ours, excepting only in strength of body, or, perhaps, his steadiness of judgment.'" * * * * * in the economics, the manner in which the husband gives counsel to his young wife presents the model of politeness and refinement. xenophon is thoroughly the gentleman; gentle in breeding and in soul. all the men he describes are so, while the shades of manner are distinctly marked. there is the serene dignity of socrates, with gleams of playfulness thrown across its cool, religious shades, the princely mildness of cyrus, and the more domestic elegance of the husband in the economics. there is no way that men sin more against refinement, as well as discretion, than in their conduct toward their wives. let them look at the men of xenophon. such would know how to give counsel, for they would know how to receive it. they would feel that the most intimate relations claimed most, not least, of refined courtesy. they would not suppose that confidence justified carelessness, nor the reality of affection want of delicacy in the expression of it. such men would be too wise to hide their affairs from the wife, and then expect her to act as if she knew them. they would know that, if she is expected to face calamity with courage, she must be instructed and trusted in prosperity, or, if they had failed in wise confidence, such as the husband shows in the economics, they would be ashamed of anger or querulous surprise at the results that naturally follow. such men would not be exposed to the bad influence of bad wives; for all wives, bad or good, loved or unloved, inevitably influence their husbands, from the power their position not merely gives, but necessitates, of coloring evidence and infusing feelings in hours when the--patient, shall i call him?--is off his guard. those who understand the wife's mind, and think it worth while to respect her springs of action, know bettor where they are. but to the bad or thoughtless man, who lives carelessly and irreverently so near another mind, the wrong he does daily back upon himself recoils. a cyrus, an abradatus, knows where he stands. * * * * * but to return to the thread of my subject. another sign of the times is furnished by the triumphs of female authorship. these have been great, and are constantly increasing. women have taken possession of so many provinces for which men had pronounced them unfit, that, though these still declare there are some inaccessible to them, it is difficult to say just _where_ they must stop. the shining names of famous women have cast light upon the path of the sex, and many obstructions have been removed. when a montague could learn better than her brother, and use her lore afterwards to such purpose as an observer, it seemed amiss to hinder women from preparing themselves to see, or from seeing all they could, when prepared. since somerville has achieved so much, will any young girl be prevented from seeking a knowledge of the physical sciences, if she wishes it? de stael's name was not so clear of offence; she could not forget the woman in the thought; while she was instructing you as a mind, she wished to be admired as a woman; sentimental tears often dimmed the eagle glance. her intellect, too, with all its splendor, trained in a drawing-room, fed on flattery, was tainted and flawed; yet its beams make the obscurest school-house in new england warmer and lighter to the little rugged girls who are gathered together on its wooden bench. they may never through life hear her name, but she is not the less their benefactress. the influence has been such, that the aim certainly is, now, in arranging school instruction for girls, to give them as fair a field as boys. as yet, indeed, these arrangements are made with little judgment or reflection; just as the tutors of lady jane grey, and other distinguished women of her time, taught them latin and greek, because they knew nothing else themselves, so now the improvement in the education of girls is to be made by giving them young men as teachers, who only teach what has been taught themselves at college, while methods and topics need revision for these new subjects, which could better be made by those who had experienced the same wants. women are, often, at the head of these institutions; but they have, as yet, seldom been thinking women, capable of organizing a new whole for the wants of the time, and choosing persons to officiate in the departments. and when some portion of instruction of a good sort is got from the school, the far greater proportion which is infused from the general atmosphere of society contradicts its purport. yet books and a little elementary instruction are not furnished in vain. women are better aware how great and rich the universe is, not so easily blinded by narrowness or partial views of a home circle. "her mother did so before her" is no longer a sufficient excuse. indeed, it was never received as an excuse to mitigate the severity of censure, but was adduced as a reason, rather, why there should be no effort made for reformation. whether much or little has been done, or will be done,--whether women will add to the talent of narration the power of systematizing,--whether they will carve marble, as well as draw and paint,--is not important. but that it should be acknowledged that they have intellect which needs developing--that they should not be considered complete, if beings of affection and habit alone--is important. yet even this acknowledgment, rather conquered by woman than proffered by man, has been sullied by the usual selfishness. too much is said of women being better educated, that they may become better companions and mothers _for_ men. they should be fit for such companionship, and we have mentioned, with satisfaction, instances where it has been established. earth knows no fairer, holier relation than that of a mother. it is one which, rightly understood, must both promote and require the highest attainments. but a being of infinite scope must not be treated with an exclusive view to any one relation. give the soul free course, let the organization, both of body and mind, be freely developed, and the being will be fit for any and every relation to which it may be called. the intellect, no more than the sense of hearing, is to be cultivated merely that woman may be a more valuable companion to man, but because the power who gave a power, by its mere existence signifies that it must be brought out toward perfection. in this regard of self-dependence, and a greater simplicity and fulness of being, we must hail as a preliminary the increase of the class contemptuously designated as "old maids." we cannot wonder at the aversion with which old bachelors and old maids have been regarded. marriage is the natural means of forming a sphere, of taking root in the earth; it requires more strength to do this without such an opening; very many have failed, and their imperfections have been in every one's way. they have been more partial, more harsh, more officious and impertinent, than those compelled by severer friction to render themselves endurable. those who have a more full experience of the instincts have a distrust as to whether the unmarried can be thoroughly human and humane, such as is hinted in the saying, "old-maids' and bachelors' children are well cared for," which derides at once their ignorance and their presumption. yet the business of society has become so complex, that it could now scarcely be carried on without the presence of these despised auxiliaries; and detachments from the army of aunts and uncles are wanted to stop gaps in every hedge. they rove about, mental and moral ishmaelites, pitching their tents amid the fixed and ornamented homes of men. in a striking variety of forms, genius of late, both at home and abroad, has paid its tribute to the character of the aunt and the uncle, recognizing in these personages the spiritual parents, who have supplied defects in the treatment of the busy or careless actual parents. they also gain a wider, if not so deep experience. those who are not intimately and permanently linked with others, are thrown upon themselves; and, if they do not there find peace and incessant life, there is none to flatter them that they are not very poor, and very mean. a position which so constantly admonishes, may be of inestimable benefit. the person may gain, undistracted by other relationships, a closer communion with the one. such a use is made of it by saints and sibyls. or she may be one of the lay sisters of charity, a canoness, bound by an inward vow,--or the useful drudge of all men, the martha, much sought, little prized,--or the intellectual interpreter of the varied life she sees; the urania of a half-formed world's twilight. or she may combine all these. not needing to care that she may please a husband, a frail and limited being, her thoughts may turn to the centre, and she may, by steadfast contemplation entering into the secret of truth and love, use it for the good of all men, instead of a chosen few, and interpret through it all the forms of life. it is possible, perhaps, to be at once a priestly servant and a loving muse. saints and geniuses have often chosen a lonely position, in the faith that if, undisturbed by the pressure of near ties, they would give themselves up to the inspiring spirit, it would enable them to understand and reproduce life better than actual experience could. how many "old maids" take this high stand we cannot say: it is an unhappy fact that too many who have come before the eye are gossips rather, and not always good-natured gossips. but if these abuse, and none make the best of their vocation, yet it has not failed to produce some good results. it has been seen by others, if not by themselves, that beings, likely to be left alone, need to be fortified and furnished within themselves; and education and thought have tended more and more to regard these beings as related to absolute being, as well as to others. it has been seen that, as the breaking of no bond ought to destroy a man, so ought the missing of none to hinder him from growing. and thus a circumstance of the time, which springs rather from its luxury than its purity, has helped to place women on the true platform. perhaps the next generation, looking deeper into this matter, will find that contempt is put upon old maids, or old women, at all, merely because they do not use the elixir which would keep them always young. under its influence, a gem brightens yearly which is only seen to more advantage through the fissures time makes in the casket. [footnote: appendix f.] no one thinks of michael angelo's persican sibyl, or st. theresa, or tasso's leonora, or the greek electra, as an old maid, more than of michael angelo or canova as old bachelors, though all had reached the period in life's course appointed to take that degree. see a common woman at forty; scarcely has she the remains of beauty, of any soft poetic grace which gave her attraction as woman, which kindled the hearts of those who looked on her to sparkling thoughts, or diffused round her a roseate air of gentle love. see her, who was, indeed, a lovely girl, in the coarse, full-blown dahlia flower of what is commonly matron-beauty, "fat, fair, and forty," showily dressed, and with manners as broad and full as her frill or satin cloak. people observe, "how well she is preserved!" "she is a fine woman still," they say. this woman, whether as a duchess in diamonds, or one of our city dames in mosaics, charms the poet's heart no more, and would look much out of place kneeling before the madonna. she "does well the honors of her house,"--"leads society,"--is, in short, always spoken and thought of upholstery-wise. or see that care-worn face, from which every soft line is blotted,--those faded eyes, from which lonely tears have driven the flashes of fancy, the mild white beam of a tender enthusiasm. this woman is not so ornamental to a tea-party; yet she would please better, in picture. yet surely she, no more than the other, looks as a human being should at the end of forty years. forty years! have they bound those brows with no garland? shed in the lamp no drop of ambrosial oil? not so looked the iphigenia in aulis. her forty years had seen her in anguish, in sacrifice, in utter loneliness. but those pains were borne for her father and her country; the sacrifice she had made pure for herself and those around her. wandering alone at night in the vestal solitude of her imprisoning grove, she has looked up through its "living summits" to the stars, which shed down into her aspect their own lofty melody. at forty she would not misbecome the marble. not so looks the persica. she is withered; she is faded; the drapery that enfolds her has in its dignity an angularity, too, that tells of age, of sorrow, of a stern resignation to the _must_. but her eye, that torch of the soul, is untamed, and, in the intensity of her reading, we see a soul invincibly young in faith and hope. her age is her charm, for it is the night of the past that gives this beacon-fire leave to shine. wither more and more, black chrysalid! thou dost but give the winged beauty time to mature its splendors! not so looked victoria colonna, after her life of a great hope, and of true conjugal fidelity. she had been, not merely a bride, but a wife, and each hour had helped to plume the noble bird. a coronet of pearls will not shame her brow; it is white and ample, a worthy altar for love and thought. even among the north american indians, a race of men as completely engaged in mere instinctive life as almost any in the world, and where each chief, keeping many wives as useful servants, of course looks with no kind eye on celibacy in woman, it was excused in the following instance mentioned by mrs. jameson. a woman dreamt in youth that she was betrothed to the sun. she built her a wigwam apart, filled it with emblems of her alliance, and means of on independent life. there she passed her days, sustained by her own exertions, and true to her supposed engagement. in any tribe, we believe, a woman, who lived as if she was betrothed to the sun, would be tolerated, and the rays which made her youth blossom sweetly, would crown her with a halo in age. there is, on this subject, a nobler view than heretofore, if not the noblest, and improvement here must coincide with that in the view taken of marriage. "we must have units before we can have union," says one of the ripe thinkers of the times. if larger intellectual resources begin to be deemed needful to woman, still more is a spiritual dignity in her, or even the mere assumption of it, looked upon with respect. joanna southcote and mother anne lee are sure of a band of disciples; ecstatica, dolorosa, of enraptured believers who will visit them in their lowly huts, and wait for days to revere them in their trances. the foreign noble traverses land and sea to hear a few words from the lips of the lowly peasant girl, whom he believes especially visited by the most high. very beautiful, in this way, was the influence of the invalid of st. petersburg, as described by de maistre. mysticism, which may be defined as the brooding soul of the world, cannot fail of its oracular promise as to woman. "the mothers," "the mother of all things," are expressions of thought which lead the mind towards this side of universal growth. whenever a mystical whisper was heard, from behmen down to st. simon, sprang up the thought, that, if it be true, as the legend says, that humanity withers through a fault committed by and a curse laid upon woman, through her pure child, or influence, shall the new adam, the redemption, arise. innocence is to be replaced by virtue, dependence by a willing submission, in the heart of the virgin-mother of the new race. the spiritual tendency is toward the elevation of woman, but the intellectual by itself is not so. plato sometimes seems penetrated by that high idea of love, which considers man and woman as the two-fold expression of one thought. this the angel of swedenborg, the angel of the coming age, cannot surpass, but only explain more fully. but then again plato, the man of intellect, treats woman in the republic as property, and, in the timaeus, says that man, if he misuse the privileges of one life, shall be degraded into the form of woman; and then, if ho do not redeem himself, into that of a bird. this, as i said above, expresses most happily how antipoetical is this state of mind. for the poet, contemplating the world of things, selects various birds as the symbols of his most gracious and ethereal thoughts, just as he calls upon his genius as muse rather than as god. but the intellect, cold, is ever more masculine than feminine; warmed by emotion, it rushes toward mother-earth, and puts on the forms of beauty. the electrical, the magnetic element in woman has not been fairly brought out at any period. everything might be expected from it; she has far more of it than man. this is commonly expressed by saying that her intuitions are more rapid and more correct. you will often see men of high intellect absolutely stupid in regard to the atmospheric changes, the fine invisible links which connect the forms of life around them, while common women, if pure and modest, so that a vulgar self do not overshadow the mental eye, will seize and delineate these with unerring discrimination. women who combine this organization with creative genius are very commonly unhappy at present. they see too much to act in conformity with those around them, and their quick impulses seem folly to those who do not discern the motives. this is an usual effect of the apparition of genius, whether in man or woman, but is more frequent with regard to the latter, because a harmony, an obvious order and self-restraining decorum, is most expected from her. then women of genius, even more than men, are likely to be enslaved by an impassioned sensibility. the world repels them more rudely, and they are of weaker bodily frame. those who seem overladen with electricity frighten those around them. "when she merely enters the room, i am what the french call _herisse_," said a man of petty feelings and worldly character of such a woman, whose depth of eye and powerful motion announced the conductor of the mysterious fluid. woe to such a woman who finds herself linked to such a man in bonds too close! it is the crudest of errors. he will detest her with all the bitterness of wounded self-love. he will take the whole prejudice of manhood upon himself, and, to the utmost of his power, imprison and torture her by its imperious rigors. yet, allow room enough, and the electric fluid will be found to invigorate and embellish, not destroy life. such women are the great actresses, the songsters. such traits we read in a late searching, though too french, analysis of the character of mademoiselle rachel, by a modern, la rochefeucault. the greeks thus represent the muses; they have not the golden serenity of apollo; they are overflowed with thought; there is something tragic in their air. such are the sibyls of gueroino; the eye is overfull of expression, dilated and lustrous; it seems to have drawn the whole being into it. sickness is the frequent result of this overcharged existence. to this region, however misunderstood, or interpreted with presumptuous carelessness, belong the phenomena of magnetism, or mesmerism, as it is now often called, where the trance of the ecstatica purports to be produced by the agency of one human being on another, instead of, as in her case, direct from the spirit. the worldling has his sneer at this as at the services of religion. "the churches can always be filled with women"--"show me a man in one of your magnetic states, and i will believe." women are, indeed, the easy victims both of priestcraft and self-delusion; but this would not be, if the intellect was developed in proportion to the other powers. they would then have a regulator, and be more in equipoise, yet must retain the same nervous susceptibility while their physical structure is such as it is. it is with just that hope that we welcome everything that tends to strengthen the fibre and develop the nature on more sides. when the intellect and affections are in harmony; when intellectual consciousness is calm and deep; inspiration will not be confounded with fancy. then, "she who advances with rapturous, lyrical glances, singing the song of the earth, singing its hymn to the gods," will not be pitied as a mad-woman, nor shrunk from as unnatural. the greeks, who saw everything in forms, which we are trying to ascertain as law, and classify as cause, embodied all this in the form of cassandra. cassandra was only unfortunate in receiving her gift too soon. the remarks, however, that the world still makes in such cases, are well expressed by the greek dramatist. in the trojan dames there are fine touches of nature with regard to cassandra. hecuba shows that mixture of shame and reverence that prosaic kindred always do toward the inspired child, the poet, the elected sufferer for the race. when the herald announces that cassandra is chosen to be the mistress of agamemnon, hecuba answers, with indignation, betraying the pride and faith she involuntarily felt in this daughter. "_hec_. the maiden of phoebus, to whom the golden-haired gave as a privilege a virgin life! _tal_. love of the inspired maiden hath pierced him. _hec_. then cast away, my child, the sacred keys, and from thy person the consecrated garlands which thou wearest." yet, when, a moment after, cassandra appears, singing, wildly, her inspired song, hecuba calls her, "my _frantic_ child." yet how graceful she is in her tragic _raptus_, the chorus shows. "_chorus_. how sweetly at thy house's ills thou smil'st, chanting what, haply, thou wilt not show true." if hecuba dares not trust her highest instinct about her daughter, still less can the vulgar mind of the herald talthybius, a man not without feeling, but with no princely, no poetic blood, abide the wild, prophetic mood which insults all his prejudices. "_tal_. the venerable, and that accounted wise, is nothing better than that of no repute; for the greatest king of all the greeks, the dear son of atreus, a possessed with the love of this mad-woman. i, indeed, am poor; yet i would not receive her to my bed." the royal agamemnon could see the beauty of cassandra; _he_ was not afraid of her prophetic gifts. the best topic for a chapter on this subject, in the present day, would be the history of the seeress of prevorst, the best observed subject of magnetism in our present times, and who, like her ancestresses of delphos, was roused to ecstasy or phrensy by the touch of the laurel. i observe in her case, and in one known to me here, that what might have been a gradual and gentle disclosure of remarkable powers was broken and jarred into disease by an unsuitable marriage. both these persons were unfortunate in not understanding what was involved in this relation, but acted ignorantly, as their friends desired. they thought that this was the inevitable destiny of woman. but when engaged in the false position, it was impossible for them to endure its dissonances, as those of less delicate perceptions can; and the fine flow of life was checked and sullied. they grew sick; but, even so, learned and disclosed more than those in health are wont to do. in such cases, worldlings sneer; but reverent men learn wondrous news, either from the person observed, or by thoughts caused in themselves by the observation. fenelon learns from guyon, kerner from his seeress, what we fain would know. but to appreciate such disclosures one must be a child; and here the phrase, "women and children," may, perhaps, be interpreted aright, that only little children shall enter into the kingdom of heaven. all these motions of the time, tides that betoken a waxing moon, overflow upon our land. the world at large is readier to let woman learn and manifest the capacities of her nature than it ever was before, and here is a less encumbered field and freer air than anywhere else. and it ought to be so; we ought to pay for isabella's jewels. the names of nations are feminine--religion, virtue and victory are feminine. to those who have a superstition, as to outward reigns, it is not without significance that the name of the queen of our motherland should at this crisis be victoria,--victoria the first. perhaps to us it may be given to disclose the era thus outwardly presaged. another isabella too at this time ascends the throne. might she open a new world to her sex! but, probably, these poor little women are, least of any, educated to serve as examples or inspirers for the rest. the spanish queen is younger; we know of her that she sprained her foot the other day, dancing in her private apartments; of victoria, that she reads aloud, in a distinct voice and agreeable manner, her addresses to parliament on certain solemn days, and, yearly, that she presents to the nation some new prop of royalty. these ladies have, very likely, been trained more completely to the puppet life than any other. the queens, who have been queens indeed, were trained by adverse circumstances to know the world around them and their own powers. it is moving, while amusing, to read of the scottish peasant measuring the print left by the queen's foot as she walks, and priding himself on its beauty. it is so natural to wish to find what is fair and precious in high places,--so astonishing to find the bourbon a glutton, or the guelph a dullard or gossip. in our own country, women are, in many respects, better situated than men. good books are allowed, with more time to read them. they are not so early forced into the bustle of life, nor so weighed down by demands for outward success. the perpetual changes, incident to our society, make the blood circulate freely through the body politic, and, if not favorable at present to the grace and bloom of life, they are so to activity, resource, and would be to reflection, but for a low materialist tendency, from which the women are generally exempt in themselves, though its existence, among the men, has a tendency to repress their impulses and make them doubt their instincts, thus often paralyzing their action during the best years. but they have time to think, and no traditions chain them, and few conventionalities, compared with what must be met in other nations. there is no reason why they should not discover that the secrets of nature are open, the revelations of the spirit waiting, for whoever will seek them. when the mind is once awakened to this consciousness, it will not be restrained by the habits of the past, but fly to seek the seeds of a heavenly future. their employments are more favorable to meditation than those of men. woman is not addressed religiously here more than elsewhere. she is told that she should be worthy to be the mother of a washington, or the companion of some good man.' but in many, many instances, she has already learned that all bribes have the same flaw; that truth and good are to be sought solely for their own sakes. and, already, an ideal sweetness floats over many forms, shines in many eyes. already deep questions are put by young girls on the great theme: what shall i do to enter upon the eternal life? men are very courteous to them. they praise them often, check them seldom. there is chivalry in the feeling toward "the ladies," which gives them the best seats in the stage-coach, frequent admission, not only to lectures of all sorts, but to courts of justice, halls of legislature, reform conventions. the newspaper editor "would be better pleased that the lady's book should be filled up exclusively by ladies. it would then, indeed, be a true gem, worthy, to be presented by young men to the, mistress of their affections." can gallantry go further? in this country is venerated, wherever seen, the character which goethe spoke of as an ideal, which he saw actualized in his friend and patroness, the grand duchess amelia: "the excellent woman is she, who, if the husband dies, can be a father to the children." and this, if read aright, tells a great deal. women who speak in public, if they have a moral power, such as has been felt from angelina grimke and abby kelly,--that is, if they speak for conscience' sake, to serve a cause which they hold sacred,--invariably subdue the prejudices of their hearers, and excite an interest proportionate to the aversion with which it had been the purpose to regard them. a passage in a private letter so happily illustrates this, that it must be inserted here. abby kelly in the town-house of ----. "the scene was not unheroic--to see that woman, true to humanity and her own nature, a centre of rude eyes and tongues, even gentlemen feeling licensed to make part of a species of mob around a female out of her sphere. as she took her seat in the desk amid the great noise, and in the throng, full, like a wave, of something to ensue, i saw her humanity in a gentleness and unpretension, tenderly open to the sphere around her, and, had she not been supported by the power of the will of genuineness and principle, she would have failed. it led her to prayer, which, in woman especially, is childlike; sensibility and will going to the side of god and looking up to him; and humanity was poured out in aspiration. "she acted like a gentle hero, with her mild decision and womanly calmness. all heroism is mild, and quiet, and gentle, for it is life and possession; and combativeness and firmness show a want of actualness. she is as earnest, fresh and simple, as when she first entered the crusade. i think she did much good, more than the men in her place could do, for woman feels more as being and reproducing--this brings the subject more into home relations. men speak through, and mostly from intellect, and this addresses itself to that in others which is combative." not easily shall we find elsewhere, or before this time, any written observations on the same subject, so delicate and profound. the late dr. channing, whose enlarged and tender and religious nature shared every onward impulse of his tune, though his thoughts followed his wishes with a deliberative caution which belonged to his habits and temperament, was greatly interested in these expectations for women. his own treatment of them was absolutely and thoroughly religious. he regarded them as souls, each of which had a destiny of its own, incalculable to other minds, and whose leading it must follow, guided by the light of a private conscience. he had sentiment, delicacy, kindness, taste; but they were all pervaded and ruled by this one thought, that all beings had souls, and must vindicate their own inheritance. thus all beings were treated by him with an equal, and sweet, though solemn, courtesy. the young and unknown, the woman and the child, all felt themselves regarded with an infinite expectation, from which there was no reaction to vulgar prejudice. he demanded of all he met, to use his favorite phrase, "great truths." his memory, every way dear and reverend, is, by many, especially cherished for this intercourse of unbroken respect. at one time, when the progress of harriet martineau through this country, angelina grimke's appearance in public, and the visit of mrs. jameson, had turned his thoughts to this subject, he expressed high hopes as to what the coming era would bring to woman. he had been much pleased with the dignified courage of mrs. jameson in taking up the defence of her sex in from which women usually shrink, because, if they express themselves on such subjects with sufficient force and clearness to do any good, they are exposed to assaults whose vulgarity makes them painful. in intercourse with such a woman, he had shared her indignation at the base injustice, in many respects, and in many regions, done to the sex; and been led to think of it far more than ever before. he seemed to think that he might some time write upon the subject. that his aid is withdrawn from the cause is a subject of great regret; for, on this question as on others, he would have known how to sum up the evidence, and take, in the noblest spirit, middle ground. he always furnished a platform on which opposing parties could stand and look at one another under the influence of his mildness and enlightened candor. two younger thinkers, men both, have uttered noble prophecies, auspicious for woman. kinmont, all whose thoughts tended towards the establishment of the reign of love and peace, thought that the inevitable means of this would be an increased predominance given to the idea of woman. had he lived longer, to see the growth of the peace party, the reforms in life and medical practice which seek to substitute water for wine and drugs, pulse for animal food, he would have been confirmed in his view of the way in which the desired changes are to be effected. in this connection i must mention shelley, who, like all men of genius, shared the feminine development, and, unlike many, knew it. his life was one of the first pulse-beats in the present reform-growth. he, too, abhorred blood and heat, and, by his system and his song, tended to reinstate a plant-like gentleness in the development of energy. in harmony with this, his ideas of marriage were lofty, and, of course, no less so of woman, her nature, and destiny. for woman, if, by a sympathy as to outward condition, she is led to aid the enfranchisement of the slave, must be no less so, by inward tendency, to favor measures which promise to bring the world more thoroughly and deeply into harmony with her nature. when the lamb takes place of the lion as the emblem of nations, both women and men will be as children of one spirit, perpetual learners of the word and doers thereof, not hearers only. a writer in the new york pathfinder, in two articles headed "femality," has uttered a still more pregnant word than any we have named. he views woman truly from the soul, and not from society, and the depth and leading of his thoughts are proportionably remarkable. he views the feminine nature as a harmonizer of the vehement elements, and this has often been hinted elsewhere; but what he expresses most forcibly is the lyrical, the inspiring and inspired apprehensiveness of her being. this view being identical with what i have before attempted to indicate, as to her superior susceptibility to magnetic or electric influence, i will now try to express myself more fully. there are two aspects of woman's nature, represented by the ancients as muse and minerva. it is the former to which the writer in the pathfinder looks. it is the latter which wordsworth has in mind, when he says, "with a placid brow, which woman ne'er should forfeit, keep thy vow." the especial genius of woman i believe to be electrical in movement, intuitive in function, spiritual in tendency. she excels not so easily in classification, or recreation, as in an instinctive seizure of causes, and a simple breathing out of what she receives, that has the singleness of life, rather than the selecting and energizing of art. more native is it to her to be the living model of the artist than to set apart from herself any one form in objective reality; more native to inspire and receive the poem, than to create it. in so far as soul is in her completely developed, all soul is the same, but in so far as it is modified in her as woman, it flows, it breathes, it sings, rather than deposits soil, or finishes work; and that which is especially feminine flushes, in blossom, the face of earth, and pervades, like air and water, all this seeming solid globe, daily renewing and purifying its life. such may be the especially feminine element spoken of as femality. but it is no more the order of nature that it should be incarnated pure in any form, than that the masculine energy should exist unmingled with it in any form. male and female represent the two sides of the great radical dualism. but, in fact, they are perpetually passing into one another. fluid hardens to solid, solid rushes to fluid. there is no wholly masculine man, no purely feminine woman. history jeers at the attempts of physiologists to bind great original laws by the forms which flow from them. they make a rule; they say from observation what can and cannot be. in vain! nature provides exceptions to every rule. she sends women to battle, and sets hercules spinning; she enables women to bear immense burdens, cold, and frost; she enables the man, who feels maternal love, to nourish his infant like a mother. of late she plays still gayer pranks. not only she deprives organizations, but organs, of a necessary end. she enables people to read with the top of the head, and see with the pit of the stomach. presently she will make a female newton, and a male syren. man partakes of the feminine in the apollo, woman of the masculine as minerva. what i mean by the muse is that unimpeded clearness of the intuitive powers, which a perfectly truthful adherence to every admonition of the higher instincts would bring to a finely organized human being. it may appear as prophecy or as poesy. it enabled cassandra to foresee the results of actions passing round her; the seeress to behold the true character of the person through the mask of his customary life. (sometimes she saw a feminine form behind the man, sometimes the reverse.) it enabled the daughter of linnaeus to see the soul of the flower exhaling from the flower. [footnote: the daughter of linnaeus states, that, while looking steadfastly at the red lily, she saw its spirit hovering above it, as a red flame. it is true, this, like many fair spirit-stories, may be explained away as an optical illusion, but its poetic beauty and meaning would, even then, make it valuable, as an illustration of the spiritual fact.] it gave a man, but a poet-man, the power of which he thus speaks: "often in my contemplation of nature, radiant intimations, and as it were sheaves of light, appear before me as to the facts of cosmogony, in which my mind has, perhaps, taken especial part." he wisely adds, "but it is necessary with earnestness to verify the knowledge we gain by these flashes of light." and none should forget this. sight must be verified by light before it can deserve the honors of piety and genius. yet sight comes first, and of this sight of the world of causes, this approximation to the region of primitive motions, women i hold to be especially capable. even without equal freedom with the other sex, they have already shown themselves so; and should these faculties have free play, i believe they will open new, deeper and purer sources of joyous inspiration than have as yet refreshed the earth. let us be wise, and not impede the soul. let her work as she will. let us have one creative energy, one incessant revelation. let it take what form it will, and let us not bind it by the past to man or woman, black or white. jove sprang from rhea, pallas from jove. so let it be. if it has been the tendency of these remarks to call woman rather to the minerva side,--if i, unlike the more generous writer, have spoken from society no less than the soul,--let it be pardoned! it is love that has caused this,--love for many incarcerated souls, that might be freed, could the idea of religious self-dependence be established in them, could the weakening habit of dependence on others be broken up. proclus teaches that every life has, in its sphere, a totality or wholeness of the animating powers of the other spheres; having only, as its own characteristic, a predominance of some one power. thus jupiter comprises, within himself, the other twelve powers, which stand thus: the first triad is _demiurgic or fabricative_, that is, jupiter, neptune, vulcan; the second, _defensive_, vesta, minerva, mars; the third, _vivific_, ceres, juno, diana; and the fourth, mercury, venus, apollo, _elevating and harmonic_. in the sphere of jupiter, energy is predominant--with venus, beauty; but each comprehends and apprehends all the others. when the same community of life and consciousness of mind begin among men, humanity will have, positively and finally, subjugated its brute elements and titanic childhood; criticism will have perished; arbitrary limits and ignorant censure be impossible; all will have entered upon the liberty of law, and the harmony of common growth. then apollo will sing to his lyre what vulcan forges on the anvil, and the muse weave anew the tapestries of minerva. it is, therefore, only in the present crisis that the preference is given to minerva. the power of continence must establish the legitimacy of freedom, the power of self-poise the perfection of motion. every relation, every gradation of nature is incalculably precious, but only to the soul which is poised upon itself, and to whom no loss, no change, can bring dull discord, for it is in harmony with the central soul. if any individual live too much in relations, so that he becomes a stranger to the resources of his own nature, he falls, after a while, into a distraction, or imbecility, from which he can only be cured by a time of isolation, which gives the renovating fountains time to rise up. with a society it is the same. many minds, deprived of the traditionary or instinctive means of passing a cheerful existence, must find help in self-impulse, or perish. it is therefore that, while any elevation, in the view of union, is to be hailed with joy, we shall not decline celibacy as the great fact of the time. it is one from which no vow, no arrangement, can at present save a thinking mind. for now the rowers are pausing on their oars; they wait a change before they can pull together. all tends to illustrate the thought of a wise cotemporary. union is only possible to those who are units. to be fit for relations in time, souls, whether of man or woman, must be able to do without them in the spirit. it is therefore that i would have woman lay aside all thought, such as she habitually cherishes, of being taught and led by men. i would have her, like the indian girl, dedicate herself to the sun, the sun of truth, and go nowhere if his beams did not make clear the path. i would have her free from compromise, from complaisance, from helplessness, because i would have her good enough and strong enough to love one and all beings, from the fulness, not the poverty of being. men, as at present instructed, will not help this work, because they also are under the slavery of habit. i have seen with delight their poetic impulses. a sister is the fairest ideal, and how nobly wordsworth, and even byron, have written of a sister! there is no sweeter sight than to see a father with his little daughter. very vulgar men become refined to the eye when leading a little girl by the hand. at that moment, the right relation between the sexes seems established, and you feel as if the man would aid in the noblest purpose, if you ask him in behalf of his little daughter. once, two fine figures stood before me, thus. the father of very intellectual aspect, his falcon eye softened by affection as he looked down on his fair child; she the image of himself, only more graceful and brilliant in expression. i was reminded of southey's kehama; when, lo, the dream was rudely broken! they were talking of education, and he said, "i shall not have maria brought too forward. if she knows too much, she will never find a husband; superior women hardly ever can." "surely," said his wife, with a blush, "you wish maria to be as good and wise as she can, whether it will help her to marriage or not." "no," he persisted, "i want her to have a sphere and a home, and some one to protect her when i am gone." it was a trifling incident, but made a deep impression. i felt that the holiest relations fail to instruct the unprepared and perverted mind. if this man, indeed, could have looked at it on the other side, he was the last that would have been willing to have been taken himself for the home and protection he could give, but would have been much more likely to repeat the tale of alcibiades with his phials. but men do _not_ look at both sides, and women must leave off asking them and being influenced by them, but retire within themselves, and explore the ground-work of life till they find their peculiar secret. then, when they come forth again, renovated and baptized, they will know how to turn all dross to gold, and will be rich and free though they live in a hut, tranquil if in a crowd. then their sweet singing shall not be from passionate impulse, but the lyrical overflow of a divine rapture, and a new music shall be evolved from this many-chorded world. grant her, then, for a while, the armor and the javelin. let her put from her the press of other minds, and meditate in virgin loneliness. the same idea shall reappear in due time as muse, or ceres, the all-kindly, patient earth-spirit. among the throng of symptoms which denote the present tendency to a crisis in the life of woman,--which resembles the change from girlhood, with its beautiful instincts, but unharmonized thoughts, its blind pupilage and restless seeking, to self-possessed, wise and graceful womanhood,--i have attempted to select a few. one of prominent interest is the unison upon the subject of three male minds, which, for width of culture, power of self-concentration and dignity of aim, take rank as the prophets of the coming age, while their histories and labors are rooted in the past. swedenborg came, he tells us, to interpret the past revelation and unfold a new. he announces the new church that is to prepare the way for the new jerusalem, a city built of precious stones, hardened and purified by secret processes in the veins of earth through the ages. swedenborg approximated to that harmony between the scientific and poetic lives of mind, which we hope from the perfected man. the links that bind together the realms of nature, the mysteries that accompany her births and growths, were unusually plain to him. he seems a man to whom insight was given at a period when the mental frame was sufficiently matured to retain and express its gifts. his views of woman are, in the main, satisfactory. in some details we my object to them, as, in all his system, there are still remains of what is arbitrary and seemingly groundless--fancies that show the marks of old habits, and a nature as yet not thoroughly leavened with the spiritual leaven. at least, so it seems to me now. i speak reverently, for i find such reason to venerate swedenborg, from an imperfect knowledge of his mind, that i feel one more perfect might explain to me much that does not now secure my sympathy. his idea of woman is sufficiently large and noble to interpose no obstacle to her progress. his idea of marriage is consequently sufficient. man and woman share an angelic ministry; the union is of one with one, permanent and pure. as the new church extends its ranks, the needs of woman must be more considered. quakerism also establishes woman on a sufficient equality with man. but, though the original thought of quakerism is pure, its scope is too narrow, and its influence, having established a certain amount of good and made clear some truth, must, by degrees, be merged in one of wider range. [footnote: in worship at stated periods, in daily expression, whether by word or deed, the quakers have placed woman on the same platform with man. can any one assert that they have reason to repent this?] the mind of swedenborg appeals to the various nature of man, and allows room for aesthetic culture and the free expression of energy. as apostle of the new order, of the social fabric that is to rise from love, and supersede the old that was based on strife, charles fourier comes next, expressing, in an outward order, many facts of which swedenborg saw the secret springs. the mind of fourier, though grand and clear, was, in some respects, superficial. he was a stranger to the highest experiences. his eye was fixed on the outward more than the inward needs of man. yet he, too, was a seer of the divine order, in its musical expression, if not in its poetic soul. he has filled one department of instruction for the new era, and the harmony in action, and freedom for individual growth, he hopes, shall exist; and, if the methods he proposes should not prove the true ones, yet his fair propositions shall give many hints, and make room for the inspiration needed for such. he, too, places woman on an entire equality with man, and wishes to give to one as to the other that independence which must result from intellectual and practical development. those who will consult him for no other reason, might do so to see how the energies of woman may be made available in the pecuniary way. the object of fourier was to give her the needed means of self-help, that she might dignify and unfold her life for her own happiness, and that of society. the many, now, who see their daughters liable to destitution, or vice to escape from it, may be interested to examine the means, if they have not yet soul enough to appreciate the ends he proposes. on the opposite side of the advancing army leads the great apostle of individual culture, goethe. swedenborg makes organization and union the necessary results of solitary thought. fourier, whose nature was, above all, constructive, looked to them too exclusively. better institutions, he thought, will make better men. goethe expressed, in every way, the other side. if one man could present better forms, the rest could not use them till ripe for them. fourier says, as the institutions, so the men! all follies are excusable and natural under bad institutions. goethe thinks, as the man, so the institutions! there is no excuse for ignorance and folly. a man can grow in any place, if he will. ay! but, goethe, bad institutions are prison-walls and impure air, that make him stupid, so that he does not will. and thou, fourier, do not expect to change mankind at once, or even "in three generations," by arrangement of groups and series, or flourish of trumpets for attractive industry. if these attempts are made by unready men, they will fail. yet we prize the theory of fourier no less than the profound suggestion of goethe. both are educating the age to a clearer consciousness of what man needs, what man can be; and better life must ensue. goethe, proceeding on his own track, elevating the human being, in the most imperfect states of society, by continual efforts at self-culture, takes as good care of women as of men. his mother, the bold, gay frau aja, with such playful freedom of nature; the wise and gentle maiden, known in his youth, over whose sickly solitude "the holy ghost brooded as a dove;" his sister, the intellectual woman _par excellence_; the duchess amelia; lili, who combined the character of the woman of the world with the lyrical sweetness of the shepherdess, on whose chaste and noble breast flowers and gems were equally at home; all these had supplied abundant suggestions to his mind, as to the wants and the possible excellences of woman. and from his poetic soul grew up forms new and more admirable than life has yet produced, for whom his clear eye marked out paths in the future. in faust margaret represents the redeeming power, which, at present, upholds woman, while waiting for a better day. the lovely little girl, pure in instinct, ignorant in mind, is misled and profaned by man abusing her confidence.[footnote: as faust says, her only fault was a "kindly delusion,"--"ein guter wahn."] to the mater _dolorosa_ she appeals for aid. it is given to the soul, if not against outward sorrow; and the maiden, enlightened by her sufferings, refusing to receive temporal salvation by the aid of an evil power, obtains the eternal in its stead. in the second part, the intellectual man, after all his manifold strivings, owes to the interposition of her whom he had betrayed _his_ salvation. she intercedes, this time, herself a glorified spirit, with the mater _gloriosa_. leonora, too, is woman, as we see her now, pure, thoughtful, refined by much acquaintance with grief. iphigenia he speaks of in his journals as his "daughter," and she is the daughter [footnote: goethe was as false to his ideas, in practice, as lord herbert. and his punishment was the just and usual one of connections formed beneath the standard of right, from the impulses of the baser self. iphigenia was the worthy daughter of his mind; but the son, child of his degrading connection in actual life, corresponded with that connection. this son, on whom goethe vainly lavished so much thought and care, was like his mother, and like goethe's attachment for his mother. "this young man," says a late well-informed writer (m. henri blaze), "wieland, with good reason, called the son of the servant, _der sohn der magd_. he inherited from his father only his name and his _physique_."] whom a man will wish, even if he has chosen his wife from very mean motives. she is the virgin, steadfast, soul, to whom falsehood is more dreadful than any other death. but it is to wilhelm meister's apprenticeship and wandering years that i would especially refer, as these volumes contain the sum of the sage's observations during a long life, as to what man should do, under present circumstances, to obtain mastery over outward, through an initiation into inward life, and severe discipline of faculty. as wilhelm advances into the upward path, he becomes acquainted with better forms of woman, by knowing how to seek, and how to prize them when found. for the weak and immature man will, often, admire a superior woman, but he will not be able to abide by a feeling which is too severe a tax on his habitual existence. but, with wilhelm, the gradation is natural, and expresses ascent in the scale of being. at first, he finds charm in mariana and philina, very common forms of feminine character, not without redeeming traits, no less than charms, but without wisdom or purity. soon he is attended by mignon, the finest expression ever yet given to what i have called the lyrical element in woman. she is a child, but too full-grown for this man; he loves, but cannot follow her; yet is the association not without an enduring influence. poesy has been domesticated in his life; and, though he strives to bind down her heavenward impulse, as art or apothegm, these are only the tents, beneath which he may sojourn for a while, but which may be easily struck, and carried on limitless wanderings. advancing into the region of thought, he encounters a wise philanthropy in natalia (instructed, let us observe, by an _uncle_); practical judgment and the outward economy of life in theresa; pure devotion in the fair saint. further, and last, he comes to the house of macaria, the soul of a star; that is, a pure and perfected intelligence embodied in feminine form, and the centre of a world whose members revolve harmoniously around her. she instructs him in the archives of a rich human history, and introduces him to the contemplation of the heavens. from the hours passed by the side of mariana to these with macaria, is a wide distance for human feet to traverse. nor has wilhelm travelled so far, seen and suffered so much, in vain, he now begins to study how he may aid the next generation; he sees objects in harmonious arrangement, and from his observations deduces precepts by which to guide his course as a teacher and a master, "help-full, comfort-full." in all these expressions of woman, the aim of goethe is satisfactory to me. he aims at a pure self-subsistence, and a free development of any powers with which they may be gifted by nature as much for them as for men. they are units, addressed as souls. accordingly, the meeting between man and woman, as represented by him, is equal and noble; and, if he does not depict marriage, he makes it possible. in the macaria, bound with the heavenly bodies in fixed revolutions, the centre of all relations, herself unrelated, he expresses the minerva side of feminine nature. it was not by chance that goethe gave her this name. macaria, the daughter of hercules, who offered herself as a victim for the good of her country, was canonized by the greeks, and worshipped as the goddess of true felicity. goethe has embodied this felicity as the serenity that arises from wisdom, a wisdom such as the jewish wise man venerated, alike instructed in the designs of heaven, and the methods necessary to carry them into effect upon earth. mignon is the electrical, inspired, lyrical nature. and wherever it appears we echo in our aspirations that of the child, "so let me seem until i be:-- take not the _white robe_ away." * * * * * "though i lived without care and toil, yet felt i sharp pain enough to make me again forever young." all these women, though we see them in relations, we can think of as unrelated. they all are very individual, yet seem nowhere restrained. they satisfy for the present, yet arouse an infinite expectation. the economist theresa, the benevolent natalia, the fair saint, have chosen a path, but their thoughts are not narrowed to it. the functions of life to them are not ends, but suggestions. thus, to them, all things are important, because none is necessary. their different characters have fair play, and each is beautiful in its minute indications, for nothing is enforced or conventional; but everything, however slight, grows from the essential life of the being. mignon and theresa wear male attire when they like, and it is graceful for them to do so, while macaria is confined to her arm-chair behind the green curtain, and the fair saint could not bear a speck of dust on her robe. all things are in their places in this little world, because all is natural and free, just as "there is room for everything out of doors." yet all is rounded in by natural harmony, which will always arise where truth and love are sought in the light of freedom. goethe's book bodes an era of freedom like its own of "extraordinary, generous seeking," and new revelations. new individualities shall be developed in the actual world, which shall advance upon it as gently as the figures come out upon his canvas. i have indicated on this point the coincidence between his hopes and those of fourier, though his are directed by an infinitely higher and deeper knowledge of human nature. but, for our present purpose, it is sufficient to show how surely these different paths have conducted to the same end two earnest thinkers. in some other place i wish to point out similar coincidences between goethe's model school and the plans of fourier, which may cast light upon the page of prophecy. * * * * * many women have observed that the time drew nigh for a better care of the sex, and have thrown out hints that may be useful. among these may be mentioned-- miss edgeworth, who, although restrained by the habits of her age and country, and belonging more to the eighteenth than the nineteenth century, has done excellently as far as she goes. she had a horror of sentimentalism, and of the love of notoriety, and saw how likely women, in the early stages of culture, were to aim at these. therefore she bent her efforts to recommending domestic life. but the methods she recommends are such as will fit a character for any position to which it may be called. she taught a contempt of falsehood, no less in its most graceful, than in its meanest apparitions; the cultivation of a clear, independent judgment, and adherence to its dictates; habits of various and liberal study and employment, and a capacity for friendship. her standard of character is the same for both sexes,--truth, honor, enlightened benevolence, and aspiration after knowledge. of poetry, she knows nothing, and her religion consists in honor and loyalty to obligations once assumed--in short, in "the great idea of duty which holds us upright." her whole tendency is practical. mrs. jameson is a sentimentalist, and, therefore, suits us ill in some respects, but she is full of talent, has a just and refined perception of the beautiful, and a genuine courage when she finds it necessary. she does not appear to have thought out, thoroughly, the subject on which we are engaged, and her opinions, expressed as opinions, are sometimes inconsistent with one another. but from the refined perception of character, admirable suggestions are given in her "women of shakspeare," and "loves of the poets." but that for which i most respect her is the decision with which she speaks on a subject which refined women are usually afraid to approach, for fear of the insult and scurrile jest they may encounter; but on which she neither can nor will restrain the indignation of a full heart. i refer to the degradation of a large portion of women into the sold and polluted slaves of men, and the daring with which the legislator and man of the world lifts his head beneath the heavens, and says, "this must be; it cannot be helped; it is a necessary accompaniment of _civilization_." so speaks the _citizen_. man born of woman, the father of daughters, declares that he will and must buy the comforts and commercial advantages of his london, vienna, paris, new york, by conniving at the moral death, the damnation, so far as the action of society can insure it, of thousands of women for each splendid metropolis. o men! i speak not to you. it is true that your wickedness (for you must not deny that at least nine thousand out of the ten fall through the vanity you have systematically flattered, or the promises you have treacherously broken); yes, it is true that your wickedness is its own punishment. your forms degraded and your eyes clouded by secret sin; natural harmony broken and fineness of perception destroyed in your mental and bodily organization; god and love shut out from your hearts by the foul visitants you have permitted there; incapable of pure marriage; incapable of pure parentage; incapable of worship; o wretched men, your sin is its own punishment! you have lost the world in losing yourselves. who ruins another has admitted the worm to the root of his own tree, and the fuller ye fill the cup of evil, the deeper must be your own bitter draught. but i speak not to you--you need to teach and warn one another. and more than one voice rises in earnestness. and all that _women_ say to the heart that has once chosen the evil path is considered prudery, or ignorance, or perhaps a feebleness of nature which exempts from similar temptations. but to you, women, american women, a few words may not be addressed in vain. one here and there may listen. you know how it was in the oriental clime, one man, if wealth permitted, had several wives and many handmaidens. the chastity and equality of genuine marriage, with "the thousand decencies that flow" from its communion, the precious virtues that gradually may be matured within its enclosure, were unknown. but this man did not wrong according to his light. what he did, he might publish to god and man; it was not a wicked secret that hid in vile lurking-places and dens, like the banquets of beasts of prey. those women were not lost, not polluted in their own eyes, nor those of others. if they were not in a state of knowledge and virtue, they were at least in one of comparative innocence. you know how it was with the natives of this continent. a chief had many wives, whom he maintained and who did his household work; those women were but servants, still they enjoyed the respect of others and their own. they lived together, in peace. they knew that a sin against what was in their nation esteemed virtue, would be as strictly punished in man as in woman. now pass to the countries where marriage is between one and one. i will not speak of the pagan nations, but come to those which own the christian rule. we all know what that enjoins; there is a standard to appeal to. see, now, not the mass of the people, for we all know that it is a proverb and a bitter jest to speak of the "down-trodden million." we know that, down to our own time, a principle never had so fair a chance to pervade the mass of the people, but that we must solicit its illustration from select examples. take the paladin, take the poet. did _they_ believe purity more impossible to man than to woman? did they wish woman to believe that man was less amenable to higher motives,--that pure aspirations would not guard him against bad passions,--that honorable employments and temperate habits would not keep him free from slavery to the body? o no! love was to them a part of heaven, and they could not even wish to receive its happiness, unless assured of being worthy of it. its highest happiness to them was that it made them wish to be worthy. they courted probation. they wished not the title of knight till the banner had been upheld in the heats of battle, amid the rout of cowards. i ask of you, young girls--i do not mean _you_ whose heart is that of an old coxcomb, though your looks have not yet lost their sunny tinge. not of you whose whole character is tainted with vanity, inherited or taught, who have early learned the love of coquettish excitement, and whose eyes rove restlessly in search of a "conquest" or a "beau;" you who are ashamed _not_ to be seen by others the mark of the most contemptuous flattery or injurious desire. to such i do not speak. but to thee, maiden, who, if not so fair, art yet of that unpolluted nature which milton saw when he dreamed of comus and the paradise. thou, child of an unprofaned wedlock, brought up amid the teachings of the woods and fields, kept fancy-free by useful employment and a free flight into the heaven of thought, loving to please only those whom thou wouldst not be ashamed to love; i ask of thee, whose cheek has not forgotten its blush nor thy heart its lark-like hopes, if he whom thou mayest hope the father will send thee, as the companion of life's toils and joys, is not to thy thought pure? is not manliness to thy thought purity, not lawlessness? can his lips speak falsely? can he do, in secret, what he could not avow to the mother that bore him? o say, dost thou not look for a heart free, open as thine own, all whose thoughts may be avowed, incapable of wronging the innocent, or still further degrading the fallen--a man, in short, in whom brute nature is entirely subject to the impulses of his better self? yes! it was thus that thou didst hope; for i have many, many times seen the image of a future life, of a destined spouse, painted on the tablets of a virgin heart. it might be that she was not true to these hopes. she was taken into what is called "the world," froth and scum as it mostly is on the social caldron. there, she saw fair woman carried in the waltz close to the heart of a being who appeared to her a satyr. being warned by a male friend that he was in fact of that class, and not fit for such familiar nearness to a chaste being, the advised replied that "women should know nothing about such things." she saw one fairer given in wedlock to a man of the same class. "papa and mamma said that 'all men were faulty at some time in their lives; they had a great many temptations.' frederick would be so happy at home; he would not want to do wrong." she turned to the married women; they, o tenfold horror! laughed at her supposing "men were like women." sometimes, i say, she was not true, and either sadly accommodated herself to "woman's lot," or acquired a taste for satyr-society, like some of the nymphs, and all the bacchanals of old. but to those who could not and would not accept a mess of pottage, or a circe cup, in lieu of their birthright, and to these others who have yet their choice to make, i say, courage! i have some words of cheer for you. a man, himself of unbroken purity, reported to me the words of a foreign artist, that "the world would never be better till men subjected themselves to the same laws they had imposed on women;" that artist, he added, was true to the thought. the same was true of canova, the same of beethoven. "like each other demi-god, they kept themselves free from stain;" and michael angelo, looking over here from the loneliness of his century, might meet some eyes that need not shun his glance. in private life, i am assured by men who are not so sustained and occupied by the worship of pure beauty, that a similar consecration is possible, is practised; that many men feel that no temptation can be too strong for the will of man, if he invokes the aid of the spirit instead of seeking extenuation from the brute alliances of his nature. in short, what the child fancies is really true, though almost the whole world declares it a lie. man is a child of god; and if he seeks his guidance to keep the heart with diligence, it will be so given that all the issues of life may be pure. life will then be a temple. the temple round spread green the pleasant ground; the fair colonnade be of pure marble pillars made; strong to sustain the roof, time and tempest proof; yet, amidst which, the lightest breeze can play as it please; the audience hall be free to all who revere the power worshipped here, sole guide of youth, unswerving truth. in the inmost shrine stands the image divine, only seen by those whose deeds have worthy been-- priestlike clean. those, who initiated are, declare, as the hours usher in varying hopes and powers; it changes its face, it changes its age, now a young, beaming grace, now nestorian sage; but, to the pure in heart, this shape of primal art in age is fair, in youth seems wise, beyond compare, above surprise; what it teaches native seems, its new lore our ancient dreams; incense rises from the ground; music flows around; firm rest the feet below, clear gaze the eyes above, when truth, to point the way through life, assumes the wand of love; but, if she cast aside the robe of green, winter's silver sheen, white, pure as light, makes gentle shroud as worthy weed as bridal robe had been. [footnote: as described by the historians:-- "the temple of juno is like what the character of woman should be. columns! graceful decorums, attractive yet sheltering. porch! noble, inviting aspect of the life. kaos! receives the worshippers. see here the statue of the divinity. ophistodpmos! sanctuary where the most precious possessions were kept safe from the hand of the spoiler and the eye of the world."] we are now in a transition state, and but few steps have yet been taken. from polygamy, europe passed to the marriage _de convenance_. this was scarcely an improvement an attempt was then made to substitute genuine marriage (the mutual choice of souls inducing a permanent union), as yet baffled on every side by the haste, the ignorance, or the impurity of man. where man assumes a high principle to which he is not yet ripened, it will happen, for a long time, that the few will be nobler than before; the many, worse. thus now. in the country of sidney and milton, the metropolis is a den of wickedness, and a sty of sensuality; in the country of lady russell, the custom of english peeresses, of selling their daughters to the highest bidder, is made the theme and jest of fashionable novels by unthinking children who would stare at the idea of sending them to a turkish slave-dealer, though the circumstances of the bargain are there less degrading, as the will and thoughts of the person sold are not so degraded by it, and it is not done in defiance of an acknowledged law of right in the land and the age. i must here add that i do not believe there ever was put upon record more depravation of man, and more despicable frivolity of thought and aim in woman; than in the novels which purport to give the picture of english fashionable life, which are read with such favor in our drawing-rooms, and give the tone to the manners of some circles. compared with the cold, hard-hearted folly there described, crime is hopeful; for it, at least, shows some power remaining in the mental constitution. to return:--attention has been awakened among men to the stains of celibacy, and the profanations of marriage. they begin to write about it and lecture about it. it is the tendency now to endeavor to help the erring by showing them the physical law. this is wise and excellent; but forget not the better half. cold bathing and exercise will not suffice to keep a life pure, without an inward baptism, and noble, exhilarating employment for the thoughts and the passions. early marriages are desirable, but if (and the world is now so out of joint that there are a hundred thousand chances to one against it) a man does not early, or at all, find the person to whom he can be united in the marriage of souls, will you give him in the marriage _de convenance_? or, if not married, can you find no way for him to lead a virtuous and happy life? think of it well, ye who think yourselves better than pagans, for many of _them_ knew this sure way. [footnote: the persian sacred books, the desatir, describe the great and holy prince ky khosrou, as being "an angel, and the son of an angel," one to whom the supreme says, "thou art not absent from before me for one twinkling of an eye. i am never out of thy heart. and i am contained in nothing but in thy heart, and in a heart like thy heart. and i am nearer unto thee than thou art to thyself." this prince had in his golden seraglio three ladies of surpassing beauty, and all four, in this royal monastery, passed their lives, and left the world as virgins. the persian people had no scepticism when the history of such a mind was narrated.] to you, women of america, it is more especially my business to address myself on this subject, and my advice may be classed under three heads: clear your souls from the taint of vanity. do not rejoice in conquests, either that your power to allure may be seen by other women, or for the pleasure of rousing passionate feelings that gratify your love of excitement. it must happen, no doubt, that frank and generous women will excite love they do not reciprocate, but, in nine cases out of ten, the woman has, half consciously, done much to excite. in this case, she shall not be held guiltless, either as to the unhappiness or injury of the lover. pure love, inspired by a worthy object, must ennoble and bless, whether mutual or not; but that which is excited by coquettish attraction of any grade of refinement, must cause bitterness and doubt, as to the reality of human goodness, so soon as the flush of passion is over. and, that you may avoid all taste for these false pleasures, "steep the soul in one pure love, and it will lost thee long." the love of truth, the love of excellence, whether you clothe them in the person of a special object or not, will have power to save you from following duessa, and lead you in the green glades where una's feet have trod. it was on this one subject that a venerable champion of good, the last representative of the spirit which sanctified the revolution, and gave our country such a sunlight of hope in the eyes of the nations, the same who lately, in boston, offered anew to the young men the pledge taken by the young men of his day, offered, also, his counsel, on being addressed by the principal of a girl's school, thus:-- reply of mr. adams. mr. adams was so deeply affected by the address of miss foster, as to be for some time inaudible. when heard, he spoke as follows: "this is the first instance in which a lady has thus addressed me personally; and i trust that all the ladies present will be able sufficiently to enter into my feelings to know that i am more affected by this honor than by any other i could hare received, "you have been pleased, madam, to allude to the character of my father, and the history of my family, and their services to the country. it is indeed true that, from the existence of the republic as an independent nation, my father and myself have been in the public service of the country, almost without interruption. i came into the world, as a person having personal responsibilities, with the declaration of independence, which constituted us a nation. i was a child at that time, and had then perhaps the greatest of blessings that can be bestowed on man--a mother who was anxious and capable to form her children to be what they ought to be. from that mother i derived whatever instruction--religious especially and moral--has pervaded a long life; i will not say perfectly, and as it ought to be; but i will say, because it is justice only to the memory of her whom i revere, that if, in the course of my life, there has been any imperfection, or deviation from what she taught me, the fault is mine, and not hers. "with such a mother, and such other relations with the sex, of sister, wife, and daughter, it has been the perpetual instruction of my life to love and revere the female sex. and in order to carry that sentiment of love and reverence to its highest degree of perfection, i know of nothing that exists in human society better adapted to produce that result, than institutions of the character that i have now the honor to address. "i have been taught, as i have said, through the course of my life, to love and to revere the female sex; but i have been taught, also--and that lesson has perhaps impressed itself on my mind even more strongly, it may be, than the other--i have been taught not to flatter them. it is not unusual, in the intercourse of man with the other sex--and especially for young men--to think that the way to win the hearts of ladies is by flattery. to love and to revere the sex, is what i think the duty of man; _but not to flatter them;_ and this i would say to the young ladies here--and if they, and others present, will allow me, with all the authority which nearly four score years may have with those who have not yet attained one score--i would say to them what i have no doubt they say to themselves, and are taught here, not to take the flattery of men as proof of perfection. "i am now, however, i fear, assuming too much of a character that does not exactly belong to me. i therefore conclude, by assuring you, madam, that your reception of me has affected me, as you perceive, more than i can express in words; and that i shall offer my best prayers, till my latest hour, to the creator of us all, that this institution especially, and all others of a similar kind, designed to form the female mind to wisdom and virtue, may prosper to the end of time." it will be interesting to add here the character of mr. adams' mother, as drawn by her husband, the first john adams, in a family letter [footnote: journal and correspondence of miss adams, vol. i., p. .] written just before his death. "i have reserved for the last the life of lady russell. this i have not yet read, because i read it more than forty years ago. on this hangs a tale which you ought to know and communicate it to your children. i bought the life and letters of lady russell in the year , and sent it to your grandmother, with an express intent and desire that she should consider it a mirror in which to contemplate herself; for, at that time, i thought it extremely probable, from the daring and dangerous career i was determined to run, that she would one day find herself in the situation of lady russell, her husband without a head. this lady was more beautiful than lady russell, had a brighter genius, more information, a more refined taste, and, at least, her equal in the virtues of the heart; equal fortitude and firmness of character, equal resignation to the will of heaven, equal in all the virtues and graces of the christian life. like lady russell, she never, by word or look, discouraged me from running all hazards for the salvation of my country's liberties; she was willing to share with me, and that her children should share with us both, in all the dangerous consequences we had to hazard." will a woman who loves flattery or an aimless excitement, who wastes the flower of her mind on transitory sentiments, ever be loved with a love like that, when fifty years' trial have entitled to the privileges of "the golden marriage?" such was the love of the iron-handed warrior for her, not his hand-maid, but his help-meet: "whom god loves, to him gives he such a wife." i find the whole of what i want in this relation, in the two epithets by which milton makes adam address _his_ wife. in the intercourse of every day he begins: "daughter of god and man, _accomplished_ eve." [footnote: see appendix h.] in a moment of stronger feeling, "daughter of god and man, immortal eve." what majesty in the cadence of the line; what dignity, what reverence in the attitude both of giver and receiver! the woman who permits, in her life, the alloy of vanity; the woman who lives upon flattery, coarse or fine, shall never be thus addressed, she is _not_ immortal so far as her will is concerned, and every woman who does so creates miasma, whose spread is indefinite. the hand which casts into the waters of life a stone of offence knows not how far the circles thus caused may spread their agitations. a little while since i was at one of the most fashionable places of public resort. i saw there many women, dressed without regard to the season or the demands of the place, in apery, or, as it looked, in mockery, of european fashions. i saw their eyes restlessly courting attention. i saw the way in which it was paid; the style of devotion, almost an open sneer, which it pleased those ladies to receive from men whose expression marked their own low position in the moral and intellectual world. those women went to their pillows with their heads full of folly, their hearts of jealousy, or gratified vanity; those men, with the low opinion they already entertained of woman confirmed. these were american _ladies;_ that is, they were of that class who have wealth and leisure to make full use of the day, and confer benefits on others. they were of that class whom the possession of external advantages makes of pernicious example to many, if these advantages be misused. soon after, i met a circle of women, stamped by society as among the most degraded of their sex. "how," it was asked of them, "did you come here?" for by the society that i saw in the former place they were shut up in a prison. the causes were not difficult to trace: love of dress, love of flattery, love of excitement. they had not dresses like the other ladies, so they stole them; they could not pay for flattery by distinctions, and the dower of a worldly marriage, so they paid by the profanation of their persons. in excitement, more and more madly sought from day to day, they drowned the voice of conscience. now i ask you, my sisters, if the women at the fashionable house be not answerable for those women being in the prison? as to position in the world of souls, we may suppose the women of the prison stood fairest, both because they had misused less light, and because loneliness and sorrow had brought some of them to feel the need of better life, nearer truth and good. this was no merit in them, being an effect of circumstance, but it was hopeful. but you, my friends (and some of you i have already met), consecrate yourselves without waiting for reproof, in free love and unbroken energy, to win and to diffuse a better life. offer beauty, talents, riches, on the altar; thus shall you keep spotless your own hearts, and be visibly or invisibly the angels to others. i would urge upon those women who have not yet considered this subject, to do so. do not forget the unfortunates who dare not cross your guarded way. if it do not suit you to act with those who have organized measures of reform, then hold not yourself excused from acting in private. seek out these degraded women, give them tender sympathy, counsel, employment. take the place of mothers, such as might have saved them originally. if you can do little for those already under the ban of the world,--and the best-considered efforts have often failed, from a want of strength in those unhappy ones to bear up against the sting of shame and the prejudices of the world, which makes them seek oblivion again in their old excitements,--you will at least leave a sense of love and justice in their hearts, that will prevent their becoming utterly embittered and corrupt. and you may learn the means of prevention for those yet uninjured. these will be found in a diffusion of mental culture, simple tastes, best taught by your example, a genuine self-respect, and, above all, what the influence of man tends to hide from woman, the love and fear of a divine, in preference to a human tribunal. but suppose you save many who would have lost their bodily innocence (for as to mental, the loss of that is incalculably more general), through mere vanity and folly; there still remain many, the prey and spoil of the brute passions of man; for the stories frequent in our newspapers outshame antiquity, and vie with the horrors of war. as to this, it must be considered that, as the vanity and proneness to seduction of the imprisoned women represented a general degradation in their sex; so do these acts a still more general and worse in the male. where so many are weak, it is natural there should be many lost; where legislators admit that ten thousand prostitutes are a fair proportion to one city, and husbands tell their wives that it is folly to expect chastity from men, it is inevitable that there should be many monsters of vice. i must in this place mention, with respect and gratitude, the conduct of mrs. child in the case of amelia norman. the action and speech of this lady was of straightforward nobleness, undeterred by custom or cavil from duty toward an injured sister. she showed the case and the arguments the counsel against the prisoner had the assurance to use in their true light to the public. she put the case on the only ground of religion and equity. she was successful in arresting the attention of many who had before shrugged their shoulders, and let sin pass as necessarily a part of the company of men. they begin to ask whether virtue is not possible, perhaps necessary, to man as well as to woman. they begin to fear that the perdition of a woman must involve that of a man. this is a crisis. the results of this case will be important. in this connection i must mention eugene sue, the french novelist, several of whose works have been lately translated among us, as having the true spirit of reform as to women. like every other french writer, he is still tainted with the transmissions of the old _regime_. still, falsehood may be permitted for the sake of advancing truth, evil as the way to good. even george sand, who would trample on every graceful decorum, and every human law, for the sake of a sincere life, does not see that she violates it by making her heroines able to tell falsehoods in a good cause. these french writers need ever to be confronted by the clear perception of the english and german mind, that the only good man, consequently the only good reformer, is he "who bases good on good alone, and owes to virtue every triumph that he knows." still, sue has the heart of a reformer, and especially towards women; he sees what they need, and what causes are injuring them. from the histories of fleur de marie and la louve, from the lovely and independent character of rigolette, from the distortion given to matilda's mind, by the present views of marriage, and from the truly noble and immortal character of the "hump-backed sempstress" in the "wandering jew," may be gathered much that shall elucidate doubt and direct inquiry on this subject. in reform, as in philosophy, the french are the interpreters to the civilized world. their own attainments are not great, but they make clear the post, and break down barriers to the future. observe that the good man of sue is as pure as sir charles grandison. apropos to sir charles. women are accustomed to be told by men that the reform is to come _from them_. "you," say the men, "must frown upon vice; you must decline the attentions of the corrupt; you must not submit to the will of your husband when it seems to you unworthy, but give the laws in marriage, and redeem it from its present sensual and mental pollutions." this seems to us hard. men have, indeed, been, for more than a hundred years, rating women for countenancing vice. but, at the same time, they have carefully hid from them its nature, so that the preference often shown by women for bad men arises rather from a confused idea that they are bold and adventurous, acquainted with regions which women are forbidden to explore, and the curiosity that ensues, than a corrupt heart in the woman. as to marriage, it has been inculcated on women, for centuries, that men have not only stronger passions than they, but of a sort that it would be shameful for them to share or even understand; that, therefore, they must "confide in their husbands," that is, submit implicitly to their will; that the least appearance of coldness or withdrawal, from whatever cause, in the wife is wicked, because liable to turn her husband's thoughts to illicit indulgence; for a man is so constituted that he must indulge his passions or die! accordingly, a great part of women look upon men as a kind of wild beasts, but "suppose they are all alike;" the unmarried are assured by the married that, "if they knew men as they do," that is, by being married to them, "they would not expect continence or self-government from them." i might accumulate illustrations on this theme, drawn from acquaintance with the histories of women, which would startle and grieve all thinking men, but i forbear. let sir charles grandison preach to his own sex; or if none there be who feels himself able to speak with authority from a life unspotted in will or deed, let those who are convinced of the practicability and need of a pure life, as the foreign artist was, advise the others, and warn them by their own example, if need be. the following passage, from a female writer, on female affairs, expresses a prevalent way of thinking on this subject: "it may be that a young woman, exempt from all motives of vanity, determines to take for a husband a man who does not inspire her with a very decided inclination. imperious circumstances, the evident interest of her family, or the danger of suffering celibacy, may explain such a resolution. if, however, she were to endeavor to surmount a personal repugnance, we should look upon this as _injudicious_. such a rebellion of nature marks the limit that the influence of parents, or the self-sacrifice of the young girl, should never pass. _we shall be told that this repugnance is an affair of the imagination_. it may be so; but imagination is a power which it is temerity to brave; and its antipathy is more difficult to conquer than its preference." [footnote: madame necker de saussure.] among ourselves, the exhibition of such a repugnance from a woman who had been given in marriage "by advice of friends," was treated by an eminent physician as sufficient proof of insanity. if he had said sufficient cause for it, he would have been nearer right. it has been suggested by men who were pained by seeing bad men admitted, freely, to the society of modest women,--thereby encouraged to vice by impunity, and corrupting the atmosphere of homes,--that there should be a senate of the matrons in each city and town, who should decide what candidates were fit for admission to their houses and the society of their daughters. [footnote: see goethe's tasso. "a synod of good women should decide,"--if the golden age is to be restored.] such a plan might have excellent results; but it argues a moral dignity and decision which does not yet exist, and needs to be induced by knowledge and reflection. it has been the tone to keep women ignorant on these subjects, or, when they were not, to command that they should seem so. "it is indelicate," says the father or husband, "to inquire into the private character of such an one. it is sufficient that i do not think him unfit to visit you." and so, this man, who would not tolerate these pages in his house, "unfit for family reading," because they speak plainly, introduces there a man whose shame is written on his brow, as well as the open secret of the whole town, and, presently, if _respectable_ still, and rich enough, gives him his daughter to wife. the mother affects ignorance, "supposing he is no worse than most men." the daughter _is_ ignorant; something in the mind of the new spouse seems strange to her, but she supposes it is "woman's lot" not to be perfectly happy in her affections; she has always heard, "men could not understand women," so she weeps alone, or takes to dress and the duties of the house. the husband, of course, makes no avowal, and dreams of no redemption. "in the heart of every young woman," says the female writer above quoted, addressing herself to the husband, "depend upon it, there is a fund of exalted ideas; she conceals, represses, without succeeding in smothering them. _so long as these ideas in your wife are directed to you, they are, no doubt, innocent_, but take care that they be not accompanied with _too much_ pain. in other respects, also, spare her delicacy. let all the antecedent parts of your life, if there are such, which would give her pain, be concealed from her; _her happiness and her respect for you would suffer from this misplaced confidence._ allow her to retain that flower of purity, _which should distinguish her, in your eyes, from every other woman_." we should think so, truly, under this canon. such a man must esteem purity an exotic that could only be preserved by the greatest care. of the degree of mental intimacy possible, in such a marriage, let every one judge for himself! on this subject, let every woman, who has once begun to think, examine herself; see whether she does not suppose virtue possible and necessary to man, and whether she would not desire for her son a virtue which aimed at a fitness for a divine life, and involved, if not asceticism, that degree of power over the lower self, which shall "not exterminate the passions, but keep them chained at the feet of reason." the passions, like fire, are a bad muster; but confine them to the hearth and the altar, and they give life to the social economy, and make each sacrifice meet for heaven. when many women have thought upon this subject, some will be fit for the senate, and one such senate in operation would affect the morals of the civilized world. at present i look to the young. as preparatory to the senate, i should like to see a society of novices, such as the world has never yet seen, bound by no oath, wearing no badge, in place of an oath, they should have a religious faith in the capacity of man for virtue; instead of a badge, should wear in the heart a firm resolve not to stop short of the destiny promised him as a son of god. their service should be action and conservatism, not of old habits, but of a better nature, enlightened by hopes that daily grow brighter. if sin was to remain in the world, it should not be by their connivance at its stay, or one moment's concession to its claims. they should succor the oppressed, and pay to the upright the reverence due in hero-worship by seeking to emulate them. they would not denounce the willingly bad, but they could not be with them, for the two classes could not breathe the same atmosphere. they would heed no detention from the time-serving, the worldly and the timid. they could love no pleasures that were not innocent and capable of good fruit, i saw, in a foreign paper, the title now given to a party abroad, "los exaltados." such would be the title now given these children by the world: los exaltados, las exaltadas; but the world would not sneer always, for from them would issue a virtue by which it would, at last, be exalted too. i have in my eye a youth and a maiden whom i look to as the nucleus of such a class. they are both in early youth; both as yet uncontaminated; both aspiring, without rashness; both thoughtful; both capable of deep affection; both of strong nature and sweet feelings; both capable of large mental development. they reside in different regions of earth, but their place in the soul is the same. to them i look, as, perhaps, the harbingers and leaders of a new era, for never yet have i known minds so truly virgin, without narrowness or ignorance. when men call upon women to redeem them, they mean such maidens. but such are not easily formed under the present influences of society. as there are more such young men to help give a different tone, there will be more such maidens. the english, novelist, d'israeli, has, in his novel of "the young duke," made a man of the most depraved stock be redeemed by a woman who despises him when he has only the brilliant mask of fortune and beauty to cover the poverty of his heart and brain, but knows how to encourage him when he enters on a better course. but this woman was educated by a father who valued character in women. still, there will come now and then one who will, as i hope of my young exaltada, be example and instruction for the rest. it was not the opinion of woman current among jewish men that formed the character of the mother of jesus. since the sliding and backsliding men of the world, no less than the mystics, declare that, as through woman man was lost, so through woman must man be redeemed, the time must be at hand. when she knows herself indeed as "accomplished," still more as "immortal eve," this may be. as an immortal, she may also know and inspire immortal love, a happiness not to be dreamed of under the circumstances advised in the last quotation. where love is based on concealment, it must, of course, disappear when the soul enters the scene of clear vision! and, without this hope, how worthless every plan, every bond, every power! "the giants," said the scandinavian saga, "had induced loke (the spirit that hovers between good and ill) to steal for them iduna (goddess of immortality) and her apples of pure gold. he lured her out, by promising to show, on a marvellous tree he had discovered, apples beautiful as her own, if she would only take them with her for a comparison. thus having lured her beyond the heavenly domain, she was seized and carried away captive by the powers of misrule. "as now the gods could not find their friend iduna, they were confused with grief; indeed, they began visibly to grow old and gray. discords arose, and love grew cold. indeed, odur, spouse of the goddess of love and beauty, wandered away, and returned no more. at last, however, the gods, discovering the treachery of loke, obliged him to win back iduna from the prison in which she sat mourning. he changed himself into a falcon, and brought her back as a swallow, fiercely pursued by the giant king, in the form of an eagle. so she strives to return among us, light and small as a swallow. we must welcome her form as the speck on the sky that assures the glad blue of summer. yet one swallow does not make a summer. let us solicit them in flights and flocks!" * * * * * returning from the future to the present, let us see what forms iduna takes, as she moves along the declivity of centuries to the valley where the lily flower may concentrate all its fragrance. it would seem as if this time were not very near to one fresh from books, such as i have of late been--no: _not_ reading, but sighing over. a crowd of books having been sent me since my friends knew me to be engaged in this way, on woman's "sphere,", woman's "mission," and woman's "destiny," i believe that almost all that is extant of formal precept has come under my eye. among these i read with refreshment a little one called "the whole duty of woman," "indited by a noble lady at the request of a noble lord," and which has this much of nobleness, that the view it takes is a religious one. it aims to fit woman for heaven; the main bent of most of the others is to fit her to please, or, at least, not to disturb, a husband. among these i select, as a favorable specimen, the book i have already quoted, "the study [footnote: this title seems to be incorrectly translated from the french. i have not seen the original] of the life of woman, by madame necker de saussure, of geneva, translated from the french." this book was published at philadelphia, and has been read with much favor here. madame necker is the cousin of madame de stael, and has taken from her works the motto prefixed to this. "cette vie n'a quelque prix que si elle sert a' l'education morale do notre coeur." mde. necker is, by nature, capable of entire consistency in the application of this motto, and, therefore, the qualifications she makes, in the instructions given to her own sex, show forcibly the weight which still paralyzes and distorts the energies of that sex. the book is rich in passages marked by feeling and good suggestions; but, taken in the whole, the impression it leaves is this: woman is, and _shall remain_, inferior to man and subject to his will, and, in endeavoring to aid her, we must anxiously avoid anything that can be misconstrued into expression of the contrary opinion, else the men will be alarmed, and combine to defeat our efforts. the present is a good time for these efforts, for men are less occupied about women than formerly. let us, then, seize upon the occasion, and do what we can to make our lot tolerable. but we must sedulously avoid encroaching on the territory of man. if we study natural history, our observations may be made useful, by some male naturalist; if we draw well, we may make our services acceptable to the artists. but our names must not be known; and, to bring these labors to any result, we must take some man for our head, and be his hands. the lot of woman is sad. she is constituted to expect and need a happiness that cannot exist on earth. she must stifle such aspirations within her secret heart, and fit herself, as well as she can, for a life of resignations and consolations. she will be very lonely while living with her husband. she must not expect to open her heart to him fully, or that, after marriage, he will be capable of the refined service of love. the man is not born for the woman, only the woman for the man. "men cannot understand the hearts of women." the life of woman must be outwardly a well-intentioned, cheerful dissimulation of her real life. naturally, the feelings of the mother, at the birth of a female child, resemble those of the paraguay woman, described by southey as lamenting in such heart-breaking tones that her mother did not kill her the hour she was born,--"her mother, who knew what this life of a woman must be;"--or of those women seen at the north by sir a. mackenzie, who performed this pious duty towards female infants whenever they had an opportunity. "after the first delight, the young mother experiences feelings a little different, according as the birth of a son or a daughter has been announced. "is it a son? a sort of glory swells at this thought the heart of the mother; she seems to feel that she is entitled to gratitude. she has given a citizen, a defender, to her country; to her husband an heir of his name; to herself a protector. and yet the contrast of all these fine titles with this being, so humble, soon strikes her. at the aspect of this frail treasure, opposite feelings agitate her heart; she seems to recognise in him _a nature superior to her own_, but subjected to a low condition, and she honors a future greatness in the object of extreme compassion. somewhat of that respect and adoration for a feeble child, of which some fine pictures offer the expression in the features of the happy mary, seem reproduced with the young mother who has given birth to a son. "is it a daughter? there is usually a slight degree of regret; so deeply rooted is the idea of the superiority of man in happiness and dignity; and yet, as she looks upon this child, she is more and more _softened_ towards it. a deep sympathy--a sentiment of identity with this delicate being--takes possession of her; an extreme pity for so much weakness, a more pressing need of prayer, stirs her heart. whatever sorrows she may have felt, she dreads for her daughter; but she will guide her to become much wiser, much better than herself. and then the gayety, the frivolity of the young woman have their turn. this little creature is a flower to cultivate, a doll to decorate." similar sadness at the birth of a daughter i have heard mothers express not unfrequently. as to this living so entirely for men, i should think when it was proposed to women they would feel, at least, some spark of the old spirit of races allied to our own. "if he is to be my bridegroom _and lord_" cries brunhilda, [footnote: see the nibelungen lays.] "he must first be able to pass through fire and water." "i will serve at the banquet," says the walkyrie, "but only him who, in the trial of deadly combat, has shown himself a hero." if women are to be bond-maids, let it be to men superior to women in fortitude, in aspiration, in moral power, in refined sense of beauty. you who give yourselves "to be supported," or because "one must love something," are they who make the lot of the sex such that mothers are sad when daughters are born. it marks the state of feeling on this subject that it was mentioned, as a bitter censure on a woman who had influence over those younger than herself,--"she makes those girls want to see heroes?" "and will that hurt them?" "certainly; how _can_ you ask? they will find none, and so they will never be married." "_get_ married" is the usual phrase, and the one that correctly indicates the thought; but the speakers, on this occasion, were persons too outwardly refined to use it. they were ashamed of the word, but not of the thing. madame necker, however, sees good possible in celibacy. indeed, i know not how the subject could be better illustrated, than by separating the wheat from the chaff in madame necker's book; place them in two heaps, and then summon the reader to choose; giving him first a near-sighted glass to examine the two;--it might be a christian, an astronomical, or an artistic glass,--any kind of good glass to obviate acquired defects in the eye. i would lay any wager on the result. but time permits not here a prolonged analysis. i have given the clues for fault-finding. as a specimen of the good take the following passage, on the phenomena of what i have spoken of, as the lyrical or electric element in woman. "women have been seen to show themselves poets in the most pathetic pantomimic scenes, where all the passions were depicted full of beauty; and these poets used a language unknown to themselves, and, the performance once over, their inspiration was a forgotten dream. without doubt there is an interior development to beings so gifted; but their sole mode of communication with us is their talent. they are, ill all besides, the inhabitants of another planet." similar observations have been made by those who have seen the women at irish wakes, or the funeral ceremonies of modern greece or brittany, at times when excitement gave the impulse to genius; but, apparently, without a thought that these rare powers belonged to no other planet, but were a high development of the growth of this, and might, by wise and reverent treatment, be made to inform and embellish the scenes of every day. but, when woman has her fair chance, she will do so, and the poem of the hour will vie with that of the ages. i come now with satisfaction to my own country, and to a writer, a female writer, whom i have selected as the clearest, wisest, and kindliest, who has, as yet, used pen here on these subjects. this is miss sedgwick. miss sedgwick, though she inclines to the private path, and wishes that, by the cultivation of character, might should vindicate right, sets limits nowhere, and her objects and inducements are pure. they are the free and careful cultivation of the powers that have been given, with an aim at moral and intellectual perfection. her speech is moderate and sane, but never palsied by fear or sceptical caution. herself a fine example of the independent and beneficent existence that intellect and character can give to woman, no less than man, if she know how to seek and prize it,--also, that the intellect need not absorb or weaken, but rather will refine and invigorate, the affections,--the teachings of her practical good sense come with great force, and cannot fail to avail much. every way her writings please me both as to the means and the ends. i am pleased at the stress she lays on observance of the physical laws, because the true reason is given. only in a strong and clean body can the soul do its message fitly. she shows the meaning of the respect paid to personal neatness, both in the indispensable form of cleanliness, and of that love of order and arrangement, that must issue from a true harmony of feeling. the praises of cold water seem to me an excellent sign in the age. they denote a tendency to the true life. we are now to have, as a remedy for ills, not orvietan, or opium, or any quack medicine, but plenty of air and water, with due attention to warmth and freedom in dress, and simplicity of diet. every day we observe signs that the natural feelings on these subjects are about to be reinstated, and the body to claim care as the abode and organ of the soul; not as the tool of servile labor, or the object of voluptuous indulgence. a poor woman, who had passed through the lowest grades of ignominy, seemed to think she had never been wholly lost, "for," said she, "i would always have good under-clothes;" and, indeed, who could doubt that this denoted the remains of private self-respect in the mind? a woman of excellent sense said, "it might seem childish, but to her one of the most favorable signs of the times was that the ladies had been persuaded to give up corsets." yes! let us give up all artificial means of distortion. let life be healthy, pure, all of a piece. miss sedgwick, in teaching that domestics must have the means of bathing us much as their mistresses, and time, too, to bathe, has symbolized one of the most important of human rights. another interesting sign of the time is the influence exercised by two women, miss martineau and miss barrett, from their sick-rooms. the lamp of life which, if it had been fed only by the affections, depended on precarious human relations, would scarce have been able to maintain a feeble glare in the lonely prison, now shines far and wide over the nations, cheering fellow-sufferers and hallowing the joy of the healthful. these persons need not health or youth, or the charms of personal presence, to make their thoughts available. a few more such, and "old woman" [footnote: an apposite passage is quoted in appendix f.] shall not be the synonyme for imbecility, nor "old maid" a term of contempt, nor woman be spoken of as a reed shaken by the wind. it is time, indeed, that men and women both should cease to grow old in any other way than as the tree does, full of grace and honor. the hair of the artist turns white, but his eye shines clearer than ever, and we feel that age brings him maturity, not decay. so would it be with all, were the springs of immortal refreshment but unsealed within the soul; then, like these women, they would see, from the lonely chamber window, the glories of the universe; or, shut in darkness, be visited by angels. i now touch on my own place and day, and, as i write, events are occurring that threaten the fair fabric approached by so long an avenue. week before last, the gentile was requested to aid the jew to return to palestine; for the millennium, the reign of the son of mary was near. just now, at high and solemn mass, thanks were returned to the virgin for having delivered o'connell from unjust imprisonment, in requital of his having consecrated to her the league formed in behalf of liberty on tara's hill. but last week brought news which threatens that a cause identical with the enfranchisement of jews, irish, women, ay, and of americans in general, too, is in danger, for the choice of the people threatens to rivet the chains of slavery and the leprosy of sin permanently on this nation, through the annexation of texas! ah! if this should take place, who will dare again to feel the throb of heavenly hope, as to the destiny of this country? the noble thought that gave unity to all our knowledge, harmony to all our designs,--the thought that the progress of history had brought on the era, the tissue of prophecies pointed out the spot, where humanity was, at last, to have a fair chance to know itself, and all men be born free and equal for the eagle's flight,--flutters as if about to leave the breast, which, deprived of it, will have no more a nation, no more a home on earth. women of my country!--exaltadas! if such there be,--women of english, old english nobleness, who understand the courage of boadicea, the sacrifice of godiva, the power of queen emma to tread the red-hot iron unharmed,--women who share the nature of mrs. hutchinson, lady russell, and the mothers of our own revolution,--have you nothing to do with this? you see the men, how they are willing to sell shamelessly the happiness of countless generations of fellow-creatures, the honor of their country, and their immortal souls, for a money market and political power. do you not feel within you that which can reprove them, which can check, which can convince them? you would not speak in vain; whether each in her own home, or banded in unison. tell these men that you will not accept the glittering baubles, spacious dwellings, and plentiful service, they mean to offer you through those means. tell them that the heart of woman demands nobleness and honor in man, and that, if they have not purity, have not mercy, they are no longer fathers, lovers, husbands, sons of yours. this cause is your own, for, as i have before said, there is a reason why the foes of african slavery seek more freedom for women; but put it not upon that ground, but on the ground of right. if you have a power, it is a moral power. the films of interest are not so close around you as around the men. if you will but think, you cannot fail to wish to save the country from this disgrace. let not slip the occasion, but do something to lift off the curse incurred by eve. you have heard the women engaged in the abolition movement accused of boldness, because they lifted the voice in public, and lifted the latch of the stranger. but were these acts, whether performed judiciously or no, _so_ bold as to dare before god and man to partake the fruits of such offence as this? you hear much of the modesty of your sex. preserve it by filling the mind with noble desires that shall ward off the corruptions of vanity and idleness. a profligate woman, who left her accustomed haunts and took service in a new york boarding-house, said "she had never heard talk so vile at the five points, as from the ladies at the boarding-house." and why? because they were idle; because, having nothing worthy to engage them, they dwelt, with unnatural curiosity, on the ill they dared not go to see. it will not so much injure your modesty to have your name, by the unthinking, coupled with idle blame, as to have upon your soul the weight of not trying to save a whole race of women from the scorn that is put upon _their_ modesty. think of this well! i entreat, i conjure you, before it is too late. it is my belief that something effectual might be done by women, if they would only consider the subject, and enter upon it in the true spirit,--a spirit gentle, but firm, and which feared the offence of none, save one who is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity. and now i have designated in outline, if not in fulness, the stream which is ever flowing from the heights of my thought. in the earlier tract i was told i did not make my meaning sufficiently clear. in this i have consequently tried to illustrate it in various ways, and may have been guilty of much repetition. yet, as i am anxious to leave no room for doubt, i shall venture to retrace, once more, the scope of my design in points, as wad done in old-fashioned sermons. man is a being of two-fold relations, to nature beneath, and intelligences above him. the earth is his school, if not his birth-place; god his object; life and thought his means of interpreting nature, and aspiring to god. only a fraction of this purpose is accomplished in the life of any one man. its entire accomplishment is to be hoped only from the sum of the lives of men, or man considered as a whole. as this whole has one soul and one body, any injury or obstruction to a part, or to the meanest member, affects the whole. man can never be perfectly happy or virtuous, till all men are so. to address man wisely, you must not forget that his life is partly animal, subject to the same laws with nature. but you cannot address him wisely unless you consider him still more as soul, and appreciate the conditions and destiny of soul. the growth of man is two-fold, masculine and feminine. so far as these two methods can be distinguished, they are so as energy and harmony; power and beauty; intellect and love; or by some such rude classification; for we have not language primitive and pure enough to express such ideas with precision. these two sides are supposed to be expressed in man and woman, that is, as the more and the less, for the faculties have not been given pure to either, but only in preponderance. there are also exceptions in great number, such as men of far more beauty than power, and the reverse. but, as a general rule, it seems to have been the intention to give a preponderance on the one side, that is called masculine, and on the other, one that is called feminine. there cannot be a doubt that, if these two developments were in perfect harmony, they would correspond to and fulfil one another, like hemispheres, or the tenor and bass in music. but there is no perfect harmony in human nature; and the two parts answer one another only now and then; or, if there be a persistent consonance, it can only be traced at long intervals, instead of discoursing an obvious melody. what is the cause of this? man, in the order of time, was developed first; as energy comes before harmony; power before beauty. woman was therefore under his care as an elder. he might have been her guardian and teacher. but, as human nature goes not straight forward, but by excessive action and then reaction in an undulated course, he misunderstood and abused his advantages, and became her temporal master instead of her spiritual sire. on himself came the punishment. he educated woman more as a servant than a daughter, and found himself a king without a queen. the children of this unequal union showed unequal natures, and, more and more, men seemed sons of the handmaid, rather than princess. at last, there were so many ishmaelites that the rest grew frightened and indignant. they laid the blame on hagar, and drove her forth into the wilderness. but there were none the fewer ishmaelites for that. at last men became a little wiser, and saw that the infant moses was, in every case, saved by the pure instincts of woman's breast. for, as too much adversity is better for the moral nature than too much prosperity, woman, in this respect, dwindled less than man, though in other respects still a child in leading-strings. so man did her more and more justice, and grew more and more kind. but yet--his habits and his will corrupted by the past--he did not clearly see that woman was half himself; that her interests were identical with his; and that, by the law of their common being, he could never reach his true proportions while she remained in any wise shorn of hers. and so it has gone on to our day; both ideas developing, but more slowly than they would under a clearer recognition of truth and justice, which would have permitted the sexes their due influence on one another, and mutual improvement from more dignified relations. wherever there was pure love, the natural influences were, for the time, restored. wherever the poet or artist gave free course to his genius, he saw the truth, and expressed it in worthy forms, for these men especially share and need the feminine principle. the divine birds need to be brooded into life and song by mothers. wherever religion (i mean the thirst for truth and good, not the love of sect and dogma) had its course, the original design was apprehended in its simplicity, and the dove presaged sweetly from dodona's oak. i have aimed to show that no age was left entirely without a witness of the equality of the sexes in function, duty and hope. also that, when there was unwillingness or ignorance, which prevented this being acted upon, women had not the less power for their want of light and noble freedom. but it was power which hurt alike them and those against whom they made use of the arms of the servile,--cunning, blandishment, and unreasonable emotion. that now the time has come when a clearer vision and better action are possible--when man and woman may regard one another, as brother and sister, the pillars of one porch, the priests of one worship. i have believed and intimated that this hope would receive an ampler fruition, than ever before, in our own land. and it will do so if this land carry out the principles from which sprang our national life. i believe that, at present, women are the best helpers of one another. let them think; let them act; till they know what they need. we only ask of men to remove arbitrary barriers. some would like to do more. but i believe it needs that woman show herself in her native dignity, to teach them how to aid her; their minds are so encumbered by tradition. when lord edward fitzgerald travelled with the indians, his manly heart obliged him at once to take the packs from the squaws and carry them. but we do not read that the red men followed his example, though they are ready enough to carry the pack of the white woman, because she seems to them a superior being. let woman appear in the mild majesty of ceres, and rudest churls will be willing to learn from her. you ask, what use will she make of liberty, when she has so long been sustained and restrained? i answer; in the first place, this will not be suddenly given. i read yesterday a debate of this year on the subject of enlarging women's rights over property. it was a leaf from the class-book that is preparing for the needed instruction. the men learned visibly as they spoke. the champions of woman saw the fallacy of arguments on the opposite side, and were startled by their own convictions. with their wives at home, and the readers of the paper, it was the same. and so the stream flows on; thought urging action, and action leading to the evolution of still better thought. but, were this freedom to come suddenly, i have no fear of the consequences. individuals might commit excesses, but there is not only in the sex a reverence for decorums and limits inherited and enhanced from generation to generation, which many years of other life could not efface, but a native love, in woman as woman, of proportion, of "the simple art of not too much,"--a greek moderation, which would create immediately a restraining party, the natural legislators and instructors of the rest, and would gradually establish such rules as are needed to guard, without impeding, life. the graces would lead the choral dance, and teach the rest to regulate their steps to the measure of beauty. but if you ask me what offices they may fill, i reply--any. i do not care what case you put; let them be sea-captains, if you will. i do not doubt there are women well fitted for such an office, and, if so, i should be as glad to see them in it, as to welcome the maid of saragossa, or the maid of missolonghi, or the suliote heroine, or emily plater. i think women need, especially at this juncture, a much greater range of occupation than they have, to rouse their latent powers. a party of travellers lately visited a lonely hut on a mountain. there they found an old woman, who told them she and her husband had lived there forty years. "why," they said, "did you choose so barren a spot?" she "did not know; _it was the man's notion."_ and, during forty years, she had been content to act, without knowing why, upon "the man's notion." i would not have it so. in families that i know, some little girls like to saw wood, others to use carpenters' tools. where these tastes are indulged, cheerfulness and good-humor are promoted. where they are forbidden, because "such things are not proper for girls," they grow sullen and mischievous. fourier had observed these wants of women, as no one can fail to do who watches the desires of little girls, or knows the ennui that haunts grown women, except where they make to themselves a serene little world by art of some kind. he, therefore, in proposing a great variety of employments, in manufactures or the care of plants and animals, allows for one third of women as likely to have a taste for masculine pursuits, one third of men for feminine. who does not observe the immediate glow and serenity that is diffused over the life of women, before restless or fretful, by engaging in gardening, building, or the lowest department of art? here is something that is not routine, something that draws forth life towards the infinite. i have no doubt, however, that a large proportion of women would give themselves to the same employments as now, because there are circumstances that must lead them. mothers will delight to make the nest soft and warm. nature would take care of that; no need to clip the wings of any bird that wants to soar and sing, or finds in itself the strength of pinion for a migratory flight unusual to its kind. the difference would be that _all_ need not be constrained to employments for which _some_ are unfit. i have urged upon the sex self-subsistence in its two forms of self-reliance and self-impulse, because i believe them to be the needed means of the present juncture. i have urged on woman independence of man, not that i do not think the sexes mutually needed by one another, but because in woman this fact has led to an excessive devotion, which has cooled love, degraded marriage, and prevented either sex from being what it should be to itself or the other. i wish woman to live, _first_ for god's sake. then she will not make an imperfect man her god, and thus sink to idolatry. then she will not take what is not fit for her from a sense of weakness and poverty. then, if she finds what she needs in man embodied, she will know how to love, and be worthy of being loved. by being more a soul, she will not be less woman, for nature is perfected through spirit. now there is no woman, only an overgrown child. that her hand may be given with dignity, she must be able to stand alone. i wish to see men and women capable of such relations as are depicted by landor in his pericles and aspasia, where grace is the natural garb of strength, and the affections are calm, because deep. the softness is that of a firm tissue, as when "the gods approve the depth, but not the tumult of the soul, a fervent, not ungovernable love." a profound thinker has said, "no married woman can represent the female world, for she belongs to her husband. the idea of woman must be represented by a virgin." but that is the very fault of marriage, and of the present relation between the sexes, that the woman does belong to the man, instead of forming a whole with him. were it otherwise, there would be no such limitation to the thought. woman, self-centred, would never be absorbed by any relation; it would be only an experience to her as to man. it is a vulgar error that love, _a_ love, to woman is her whole existence; she also is born for truth and love in their universal energy. would she but assume her inheritance, mary would not be the only virgin mother. not manzoni alone would celebrate in his wife the virgin mind with the maternal wisdom and conjugal affections. the soul is ever young, ever virgin. and will not she soon appear?--the woman who shall vindicate their birthright for all women; who shall teach them what to claim, and how to use what they obtain? shall not her name be for her era victoria, for her country and life virginia? yet predictions are rash; she herself must teach us to give her the fitting name. an idea not unknown to ancient times has of late been revived, that, in the metamorphoses of life, the soul assumes the form, first of man, then of woman, and takes the chances, and reaps the benefits of either lot. why then, say some, lay such emphasis on the rights or needs of woman? what she wins not as woman will come to her as man. that makes no difference. it is not woman, but the law of right, the law of growth, that speaks in us, and demands the perfection of each being in its kind--apple as apple, woman as woman. without adopting your theory, i know that i, a daughter, live through the life of man; but what concerns me now is, that my life be a beautiful, powerful, in a word, a complete life in its kind. had i but one more moment to live i must wish the same. suppose, at the end of your cycle, your great world-year, all will be completed, whether i exert myself or not (and the supposition is _false_,--but suppose it true), am i to be indifferent about it? not so! i must beat my own pulse true in the heart of the world; for _that_ is virtue, excellence, health. thou, lord of day! didst leave us to-night so calmly glorious, not dismayed that cold winter is coming, not postponing thy beneficence to the fruitful summer! thou didst smile on thy day's work when it was done, and adorn thy down-going as thy up-rising, for thou art loyal, and it is thy nature to give life, if thou canst, and shine at all events! i stand in the sunny noon of life. objects no longer glitter in the dews of morning, neither are yet softened by the shadows of evening. every spot is seen, every chasm revealed. climbing the dusty hill, some fair effigies that once stood for symbols of human destiny have been broken; those i still have with me show defects in this broad light. yet enough is left, even by experience, to point distinctly to the glories of that destiny; faint, but not to be mistaken streaks of the future day. i can say with the bard, "though many have suffered shipwreck, still beat noble hearts." always the soul says to us all, cherish your best hopes as a faith, and abide by them in action. such shall be the effectual fervent means to their fulfilment; for the power to whom we bow has given its pledge that, if not now, they of pure and steadfast mind, by faith exalted, truth refined, _shall_ hear all music loud and clear, whose first notes they ventured here. then fear not thou to wind the horn, though elf and gnome thy courage scorn; ask for the castle's king and queen; though rabble rout may rush between, beat thee senseless to the ground, in the dark beset thee round; persist to ask, and it will come; seek not for rest in humbler home; so shalt thou see, what few have seen, the palace home of king and queen. _th november_, . part ii. * * * * * miscellanies. aglauron and laurie. a drive through the country near boston. aglauron and laurie are two of the pleasantest men i know. laurie combines, with the external advantages of a beautiful person and easy address, all the charm which quick perceptions and intelligent sympathy give to the intercourse of daily life. he has an extensive, though not a deep, knowledge of men and books,--his naturally fine taste has been more refined by observation, both at home and abroad, than is usual in this busy country; and, though not himself a thinker, he follows with care and delight the flights of a rapid and inventive mind. he is one of those rare persons who, without being servile or vacillating, present on no side any barrier to the free action of another mind. yes, he is really an agreeable companion. i do not remember ever to have been wearied or chilled in his company. aglauron is a person of far greater depth and force than his friend and cousin, but by no means as agreeable. his mind is ardent and powerful, rather than brilliant and ready,--neither does he with ease adapt himself to the course of another. but, when he is once kindled, the blaze of light casts every object on which it falls into a bold relief, and gives every scene a lustre unknown before. he is not, perhaps, strictly original in his thoughts; but the severe truth of his character, and the searching force of his attention, give the charm of originality to what he says. accordingly, another cannot, by repetition, do it justice. i have never any doubt when i write down or tell what laurie says, but aglauron must write for himself. yet i almost always take notes of what has passed, for the amusement of a distant friend, who is learning, amidst the western prairies, patience, and an appreciation of the poor benefits of our imperfectly civilized state. and those i took this day, seemed not unworthy of a more general circulation. the sparkle of talk, the free breeze that swelled its current, are always fled when you write it down; but there is a gentle flow, and truth to the moment, rarely attained in more elaborate compositions. my two friends called to ask if i would drive with them into the country, and i gladly consented. it was a beautiful afternoon of the last week in may. nature seemed most desirous to make up for the time she had lost, in an uncommonly cold and wet spring. the leaves were bursting from their sheaths with such rapidity that the trees seemed actually to greet you as you passed along. the vestal choirs of snow-drops and violets were chanting their gentle hopes from every bank, the orchards were white with blossoms, and the birds singing in almost tumultuous glee. we drove for some time in silence, perhaps fearful to disturb the universal song by less melodious accents, when aglauron said: "how entirely are we new-born today! how are all the post cold skies and hostile breezes vanished before this single breath of sweetness! how consoling is the truth thus indicated!" _laurie_. it is indeed the dearest fact of our consciousness, that, in every moment of joy, pain is annihilated. there is no past, and the future is only the sunlight streaming into the far valley. _aglauron._ yet it was the night that taught us to prize the day. _laurie._ even so. and i, you know, object to none of the "dark masters." _aglauron_. nor i,--because i am sure that whatever is, is good; and to find out the _why_ is all our employment here. but one feels so at home in such a day as this! _laurie._ as this, indeed! i never heard so many birds, nor saw so many flowers. do you not like these yellow flowers? _aglauron._ they gleam upon the fields as if to express the bridal kiss of the sun. he seems most happy, if not most wealthy, when first he is wed to the earth. _laurie._ i believe i have some such feeling about these golden flowers. when i did not know what was the asphodel, so celebrated by the poets, i thought it was a golden flower; yet this yellow is so ridiculed as vulgar. _aglauron_. it is because our vulgar luxury depreciates objects not fitted to adorn our dwellings. these yellow flowers will not bear being token out of their places and brought home to the centre-table. but, when enamelling the ground, the cowslip, the king-cup,--nay, the marigold and dandelion even,--are resplendently beautiful. _laurie_. they are the poor man's gold. see that dark, unpointed house, with its lilac shrubbery. as it stands, undivided from the road to which the green bank slopes down from the door, is not the effect of that enamel of gold dandelions beautiful? _aglauron_. it seems as if a stream of peace had flowed from the door-step down to the very dust, in waves of light, to greet the passer-by. that is, indeed, a quiet house. it looks as if somebody's grandfather lived there still. _laurie_. it is most refreshing to see the dark boards amid those houses of staring white. strange that, in the extreme heat of summer, aching eyes don't teach the people better. _aglauron_. we are still, in fact, uncivilized, for all our knowledge of what is done "in foreign parts" cannot make us otherwise. civilization must be homogeneous,--must be a natural growth. this glistening white paint was long preferred because the most expensive; just as in the west, i understand, they paint houses red to make them resemble the hideous red brick. and the eye, thus spoiled by excitement, prefers red or white to the stone-color, or the browns, which would harmonize with other hues. _laurie_. i should think the eye could never be spoiled so far as to like these white palings. these bars of glare amid the foliage are unbearable. _myself_. what color should they be? _laurie_. an invisible green, as in all civilized parts of the globe. then your eye would rest on the shrubbery undisturbed. _myself_. your vaunted italy has its palaces of white stucco and buildings of brick. _laurie_. ay,--but the stucco is by the atmosphere soon mellowed into cream-color, the brick into rich brown. _myself_. i have heard a connoisseur admire our own red brick in the afternoon sun, above all other colors. _laurie_. there are some who delight too much in the stimulus of color to be judges of harmony of coloring. it is so, often, with the italians. no color is too keen for the eye of the neapolitan. he thinks, with little riding-hood, there is no color like red. i have seen one of the most beautiful new palaces paved with tiles of a brilliant red. but this, too, is barbarism. _myself_. you are pleased to call it so, because you make the english your arbiters in point of taste; but i do not think they, on your own principle, are our proper models. with their ever-weeping skies, and seven-piled velvet of verdure, they are no rule for us, whose eyes are accustomed to the keen blue and brilliant clouds of our own realm, and who see the earth wholly green scarce two months in the year. no white is more glistening than our january snows; no house here hurts my eye more than the fields of white-weed will, a fortnight hence. _laurie._ true refinement of taste would bid the eye seek repose the more. but, even admitting what you say, there is no harmony. the architecture is borrowed from england; why not the rest? _aglauron._ but, my friend, surely these piazzas and pipe-stem pillars are all american. _laurie._ but the cottage to which they belong is english. the inhabitants, suffocating in small rooms, and beneath sloping roofs, because the house is too low to admit any circulation of air, are in need, we must admit, of the piazza, for elsewhere they must suffer all the torments of mons. chaubert in his first experience of the oven. but i do not assail the piazzas, at any rate; they are most desirable, in these hot summers of ours, were they but in proportion with the house, and their pillars with one another. but i do object to houses which are desirable neither as summer nor winter residences here. the shingle palaces, celebrated by irving's wit, were far more appropriate, for they, at least, gave free course to the winds of heaven, when the thermometer stood at ninety-five degrees in the shade. _aglauron._ pity that american wit nipped in the bud those early attempts at an american architecture. here in the east, alas! the case is become hopeless. but in the west the log-cabin still promises a proper basis. _laurie._ you laugh at me. but so it is. i am not so silly as to insist upon american architecture, american art, in the th of july style, merely for the gratification of national vanity. but a building, to be beautiful, should harmonize exactly with the uses to which it is to be put, and be an index to the climate and habits of the people. there is no objection to borrowing good thoughts from other nations, if we adopt the new style because we find it will serve our convenience, and not merely because it looks pretty outside. _aglauron._ i agree with you that here, as well as in manners and in literature, there is too ready access to the old stock, and, though i said it in jest, my hope is, in truth, the log-cabin. this the settler will enlarge, as his riches and his family increase; he will beautify as his character refines, and as his eye becomes accustomed to observe objects around him for their loveliness as well as for their utility. he will borrow from nature the forms and coloring most in harmony with the scene in which his dwelling is placed. might growth here be but slow enough! might not a greediness for gain and show cheat men of all the real advantages of their experience! (here a carriage passed.) _laurie._ who is that beautiful lady to whom you bowed? _aglauron._ beautiful do you think her? at this distance, and with the freshness which the open air gives to her complexion, she certainly does look so, and was so still, five years ago, when i knew her abroad. it is mrs. v----. _laurie._ i remember with what interest you mentioned her in your letters. and you promised to tell me her true story. _aglauron._ i was much interested, then, both in her and her story, but, last winter, when i met her at the south, she had altered, and seemed so much less attractive than before, that the bright colors of the picture are well-nigh effaced. _laurie._ the pleasure of telling the story will revive them again. let us fasten our horses and go into this little wood. there is a seat near the lake which is pretty enough to tell a story upon. _aglauron._ in all the idyls i ever read, they were told in caves, or beside a trickling fountain. _laurie._ that was in the last century. we will innovate. let us begin that american originality we were talking about, and make the bank of a lake answer our purpose. * * * * * we dismounted accordingly, but, on reaching the spot, aglauron at first insisted on lying on the grass, and gazing up at the clouds in a most uncitizen-like fashion, and it was some time before we could get the promised story. at last,-- * * * * * i first saw mrs. v---- at the opera in vienna. abroad, i scarcely cared for anything in comparison with music. in many respects the old world disappointed my hopes; society was, in essentials, no better, nor worse, than at home, and i too easily saw through the varnish of conventional refinement. lions, seen near, were scarcely more interesting than tamer cattle, and much more annoying in their gambols and caprices. parks and ornamental grounds pleased me less than the native forests and wide-rolling rivers of my own land. but in the arts, and most of all in music, i found all my wishes more than realized. i found the soul of man uttering itself with the swiftness, the freedom and the beauty, for which i had always pined. i easily conceived how foreigners, once acquainted with this diverse language, pass their lives without a wish for pleasure or employment beyond hearing the great works of the masters. it seemed to me that here was wealth to feed the thoughts for ages. this lady fixed my attention by the rapturous devotion with which she listened. i saw that she too had here found her proper home. every shade of thought and feeling expressed in the music was mirrored in her beautiful countenance. her rapture of attention, during some passages, was enough of itself to make you hold your breath; and a sudden stroke of genius lit her face into a very heaven with its lightning. it seemed to me that in her i should find one who would truly sympathize with me, one who looked on the art not as a connoisseur, but a votary. i took the speediest opportunity of being introduced to her at her own house by a common friend. but what a difference! at home i scarcely knew her. still she was beautiful; but the sweetness, the elevated expression, which the satisfaction of an hour had given her, were entirely fled. her eye was restless, her cheek pale and thin, her whole expression perturbed and sorrowful. every gesture spoke the sickliness of a spirit long an outcast from its natural home, bereft of happiness, and hopeless of good. i perceived, at first sight of her every-day face, that it was not unknown to me. three or four years earlier, staying in the country-house of one of her friends, i had seen her picture. the house was very dull,--as dull as placid content with the mere material enjoyments of life, and an inert gentleness of nature, could make its inhabitants. they were people to be loved, but loved without a thought. their wings had never grown, nor their eyes coveted a wider prospect than could be seen from the parent nest. the friendly visitant could not discompose them by a remark indicating any expansion of mind or life. much as i enjoyed the beauty of the country around, when out in the free air, my hours within the house would have been dull enough but for the contemplation of this picture. while the round of common-place songs was going on, and the whist-players were at their work, i used to sit and wonder how this being, so sovereign in the fire of her nature, so proud in her untamed loveliness, could ever have come of their blood. her eye, from the canvas, even, seemed to annihilate all things low or little, and able to command all creation in search of the object of its desires. she had not found it, though; i felt this on seeing her now. she, the queenly woman, the boadicea of a forlorn hope, as she seemed born to be, the only woman whose face, to my eye, had ever given promise of a prodigality of nature sufficient for the entertainment of a poet's soul, was--i saw it at a glance--a captive in her life, and a beggar in her affections. _laurie._ a dangerous object to the traveller's eye, methinks! _aglauron._ not to mine! the picture had been so; but, seeing her now, i felt that the glorious promise of her youthful prime had failed. she had missed her course; and the beauty, whose charm to the imagination had been that it seemed invincible, was now subdued and mixed with earth. _laurie._ i can never comprehend the cruelty in your way of viewing human beings, aglauron. to err, to suffer, is their lot; all who have feeling and energy of character must share it; and i could not endure a woman who at six-and-twenty bore no trace of the past. _aglauron._ such women and such men are the companions of everyday life. but the angels of our thoughts are those moulds of pure beauty which must break with a fall. the common air must not touch them, for they make their own atmosphere. i admit that such are not for the tenderness of daily life; their influence must be high, distant, starlike, to be pure. such was this woman to me before i knew her; one whose splendid beauty drew on my thoughts to their future home. in knowing her, i lost the happiness i had enjoyed in knowing what she should have been. at first the disappointment was severe, but i have learnt to pardon her, as others who get mutilated or worn in life, and show the royal impress only in their virgin courage. but this subject would detain me too long. let me rather tell you of mrs. v----'s sad history. a friend of mine has said that beautiful persons seem rarely born to their proper family, but amidst persons so rough and uncongenial that _their_ presence commands like that of a reproving angel, or pains like that of some poor prince changed at nurse, and bound for life to the society of churls. so it was with emily. her father was sordid, her mother weak; persons of great wealth and greater selfishness. she was the youngest by many years, and left alone in her father's house. notwithstanding the want of intelligent sympathy while she was growing up, and the want of all intelligent culture, she was not an unhappy child. the unbounded and foolish indulgence with which she was treated did not have an obviously bad effect upon her then; it did not make her selfish, sensual, or vain. her character was too powerful to dwell upon such boons as those nearest her could bestow. she negligently received them all as her due. it was later that the pernicious effects of the absence of all discipline showed themselves; but in early years she was happy in her lavish feelings, and in beautiful nature, on which she could pour them, and in her own pursuits. music was her passion; in it she found food, and an answer for feelings destined to become so fatal to her peace, but which then glowed so sweetly in her youthful form as to enchant the most ordinary observer. when she was not more than fifteen, and expanding like a flower in each sunny day, it was her misfortune that her first husband saw and loved her. emily, though pleased by his handsome person and gay manners, never bestowed a serious thought on him. if she had, it would have been the first ever disengaged from her life of pleasurable sensation. but when he did plead his cause with all the ardor of youth, and the flourishes which have been by usage set apart for such occasions, she listened with delight; for all his talk of boundless love, undying faith, etc., seemed her native tongue. it was like the most glowing sunset sky. it swelled upon the ear like music. it was the only way she ever wished to be addressed, and she now saw plainly why all talk of everyday people had fallen unheeded on her ear. she could have listened all day. but when, emboldened by the beaming eye and ready smile with which she heard, he pressed his suit more seriously, and talked of marriage, she drew back astonished. marry yet?--impossible! she had never thought of it; and as she thought now of marriages, such as she had seen them, there was nothing in marriage to attract. but l---- was not so easily repelled; he made her every promise of pleasure, as one would to a child. he would take her away to journey through scenes more beautiful than she had ever dreamed of; he would take her to a city where, in the fairest home, she should hear the finest music, and he himself, in every scene, would be her devoted slave, too happy if for every now pleasure he received one of those smiles which had become his life. he saw her yielding, and hastened to secure her. her father was delighted, as fathers are strangely wont to be, that he was likely to be deprived of his child, his pet, his pride. the mother was threefold delighted that she would have a daughter married so _young_,--at least three years younger than any of her elder sisters were married. both lent their influence; and emily, accustomed to rely on them against all peril, and annoyance, till she scarcely knew there was pain or evil in the world, gave her consent, as she would have given it to a pleasure-party for a day or a week. the marriage was hurried on; l---- intent on gaining his object, as men of strong will and no sentiment are wont to be, the parents thinking of the eclat of the match. emily was amused by the preparations for the festivity, and full of excitement about the new chapter which was to be opened in her life. yet so little idea had she of the true business of life, and the importance of its ties, that perhaps there was no figure in the future that occupied her less than that of her bridegroom, a handsome man, with a sweet voice, her captive, her adorer. she neither thought nor saw further, lulled by the pictures of bliss and adventure which were floating before her fancy, the more enchanting because so vague. it was at this time that the picture that so charmed me was taken. the exquisite rose had not yet opened its leaves so as to show its heart; but its fragrance and blushful pride were there in perfection. poor emily! she had the promised journeys, the splendid home. amid the former her mind, opened by new scenes, already learned that something she seemed to possess was wanting in the too constant companion of her days. in the splendid home she received not only musicians, but other visitants, who taught her strange things. four little months after her leaving home, her parents were astonished by receiving a letter in which she told them they had parted with her too soon; that she was not happy with mr. l----, as he had promised she should be, and that she wished to have her marriage broken. she urged her father to make haste about it, as she had particular reasons for impatience. you may easily conceive of the astonishment of the good folks at home. her mother wondered and cried. her father immediately ordered his horses, and went to her. he was received with rapturous delight, and almost at the first moment thanked for his speedy compliance with her request. but when she found that he opposed her desire of having her marriage broken, and when she urged him with vehemence and those marks of caressing fondness she had been used to find all-powerful, and he told her at last it could not be done, she gave way to a paroxysm of passion; she declared that she could not and would not live with mr. l----; that, so soon as she saw anything of the world, she saw many men that she infinitely preferred to him; and that, since her father and mother, instead of guarding her, so mere a child as she was, so entirely inexperienced, against a hasty choice, had persuaded and urged her to it, it was their duty to break the match when they found it did not make her happy. "my child, you are entirely unreasonable." "it is not a time to be patient; and i was too yielding before. i am not seventeen. is the happiness of my whole life to be sacrificed?" "emily, you terrify me! do you love anybody else?" "not yet; but i am sure shall find some one to love, now i know what it is. i have seen already many whom i prefer to mr. l----." "is he not kind to you?" "kind! yes; but he is perfectly uninteresting. i hate to be with him. i do not wish his kindness, nor to remain in his house." in vain her father argued; she insisted that she could never be happy as she was; that it was impossible the law could be so cruel as to bind her to a vow she had taken when so mere a child; that she would go home with her father now, and they would see what could be done. she added that she had already told her husband her resolution. "and how did he bear it?" "he was very angry; but it is better for him to be angry once than unhappy always, as i should certainly make him did i remain here." after long and fruitless attempts to reason her into a different state of mind, the father went in search of the husband. he found him irritated and mortified. he loved his wife, in his way, for her personal beauty. he was very proud of her; he was piqued to the last degree by her frankness. he could not but acknowledge the truth of what she said, that she had been persuaded into the match when but a child; for she seemed a very infant now, in wilfulness and ignorance of the world. but i believe neither he nor her father had one compunctious misgiving as to their having profaned the holiness of marriage by such an union. their minds had never been opened to the true meaning of life, and, though they thought themselves so much wiser, they were in truth much less so than the poor, passionate emily,--for her heart, at least, spoke clearly, if her mind lay in darkness. they could do nothing with her, and her father was at length compelled to take her home, hoping that her mother might be able to induce her to see things in a different light. but father, mother, uncles, brothers, all reasoned with her in vain. totally unused to disappointment, she could not for a long time believe that she was forever bound by a bond that sat uneasily on her untamed spirit. when at last convinced of the truth, her despair was terrible. "am i his? his forever? must i never then love? never marry one whom i could really love? mother! it is too cruel. i cannot, will not believe it. you always wished me to belong to him. you do not now wish to aid me, or you are afraid! o, you would not be so, could you but know what i feel!" at last convinced, she then declared that if she could not be legally separated from l----, but must consent to bear his name, and never give herself to another, she would at least live with him no more. she would not again leave her father's house. here she was deaf to all argument, and only force could have driven her away. her indifference to l---- had become hatred, in the course of these thoughts and conversations. she regarded herself as his victim, and him as her betrayer, since, she said, he was old enough to know the importance of the step to which he led her. her mind, naturally noble, though now in this wild state, refused to admit his love as an excuse. "had he loved me," she said, "he would have wished to teach me to love him, before securing me as his property. he is as selfish as he is dull and uninteresting. no! i will drag on my miserable years here alone, but i will not pretend to love him nor gratify him by the sight of his slave!" a year and more passed, and found the unhappy emily inflexible. her husband at last sought employment abroad, to hide his mortification. after his departure, emily relaxed once from the severe coldness she had shown since her return home. she had passed her time there with her music, in reading poetry, in solitary walks. but as the person who had been, however unintentionally, the means of making her so miserable, was further removed from her, she showed willingness to mingle again with the family, and see one or two young friends. one of these, almeria, effected what all the armament of praying and threatening friends had been unable to do. she devoted herself to emily. she shared her employments and her walks; she sympathized with all her feelings, even the morbid ones which she saw to be sincerity, tenderness and delicacy gone astray,--perverted and soured by the foolish indulgence of her education, and the severity of her destiny made known suddenly to a mind quite unprepared. at last, having won the confidence and esteem of emily, by the wise and gentle cheek her justice and clear perceptions gave to all extravagance, almeria ventured on representing to emily her conduct as the world saw it. to this she found her quite insensible. "what is the world to me?" she said. "i am forbidden to seek there all it can offer of value to woman--sympathy and a home." "it is full of beauty still," said almeria, looking out into the golden and perfumed glories of a june day. "not to the prisoner and the slave," said emily. "all are such, whom god hath not made free;" and almeria gently ventured to explain the hopes of larger span which enable the soul that can soar upon their wings to disregard the limitations of seventy years. emily listened with profound attention. the words were familiar to her, but the tone was not; it was that which rises from the depths of a purified spirit,--purified by pain, softened into peace. "have you made any use of these thoughts in your life, almeria?" the lovely preacher hesitated not to reveal a tale before unknown except to her own heart, of woe, renunciation, and repeated blows from a hostile fate. emily heard it in silence, but she understood. the great illusions of youth vanished. she did not suffer alone; her lot was not peculiar. another, perhaps many, were forbidden the bliss of sympathy and a congenial environment. and what had almeria done? revenged herself? tormented all around her? clung with wild passion to a selfish resolve? not at all. she had made the best of a wreck of life, and deserved a blessing on a new voyage. she had sought consolation in disinterested tenderness for her fellow-sufferers, and she deserved to cease to suffer. the lesson was taken home, and gradually leavened the whole being of this spoiled but naturally noble child. a few weeks afterwards, she asked her father when mr. l---- was expected to return. "in about three months," he replied, much surprised. "i should like to have you write to him for me." "what now absurdity?" said the father, who, long mortified and harassed, had ceased to be a fond father to his once adored emily. "say that my views are unchanged as to his soliciting a marriage with me when too childish to know my own mind on that or any other subject; but i have now seen enough of the world to know that he meant no ill, if no good, and was no more heedless in this great matter than many others are. he is not born to know what one constituted like me must feel, in a home where i found no rest for my heart. i have now read, seen and thought, what has made me a woman. i can be what you call reasonable, though not perhaps in your way. i see that my misfortune is irreparable. i heed not the world's opinion, and would, for myself, rather remain here, and keep up no semblance of a connection which my matured mind disclaims. but that scandalizes you and my mother, and makes your house a scene of pain and mortification in your old age. i know you, too, did not neglect the charge of me, in your own eyes. i owe you gratitude for your affectionate intentions at least. "l---- too is as miserable as mortification can make one like him. write, and ask him if he wishes my presence in his house on my own terms. he must not expect from me the affection, or marks of affection, of a wife. i should never have been his wife had i waited till i understood life or myself. but i will be his attentive and friendly companion, the mistress of his house, if he pleases. to the world it will seem enough,--he will be more comfortable there,--and what he wished of me was, in a great measure, to show me to the world. i saw that, as soon as we were in it, i could not give him happiness if i would, for we have not a thought nor employment in common. but if we can agree on the way, we may live together without any one being very miserable except myself, and i have made up my mind." the astonishment of the father may be conceived, and his cavils; l----'s also. to cut the story short, it was settled in emily's way, for she was one of the sultana kind, dread and dangerous. l---- hardly wished her to love him now, for he half hated her for all she had done; yet he was glad to have her back, as she had judged, for the sake of appearances. all was smoothed over by a plausible story. people, indeed, knew the truth as to the fair one's outrageous conduct perfectly, but mr. l---- was rich, his wife beautiful, and gave good parties; so society, as such, bowed and smiled, while individuals scandalized the pair. they had been living on this footing for several years, when i saw emily at the opera. she was a much altered being. debarred of happiness in her affections, she had turned for solace to the intellectual life, and her naturally powerful and brilliant mind had matured into a splendor which had never been dreamed of by those who had seen her amid the freaks end day-dreams of her early youth. yet, as i said before, she was not captivating to me, as her picture had been. she was, in a different way, as beautiful in feature and coloring as in her spring-time. her beauty, all moulded and mellowed by feeling, was far more eloquent; but it had none of the virgin magnificence, the untouched tropical luxuriance, which had fired my fancy. the false position in which she lived had shaded her expression with a painful restlessness; and her eye proclaimed that the conflicts of her mind had strengthened, had deepened, but had not yet hallowed, her character. she was, however, interesting, deeply so; one of those rare beings who fill your eye in every mood. her passion for music, and the great excellence she had attained as a performer, drew us together. i was her daily visitor; but, if my admiration ever softened into tenderness, it was the tenderness of pity for her unsatisfied heart, and cold, false life. but there was one who saw with very different eyes. v---- had been intimate with emily some time before my arrival, and every day saw him more deeply enamored. _laurie._ and pray where was the husband all this time? _aglauron._ l---- had sought consolation in ambition. he was a man of much practical dexterity, but of little thought, and less heart. he had at first been jealous of emily for his honor's sake,--not for any reality,--for she treated him with great attention as to the comforts of daily life; but otherwise, with polite, steady coldness. finding that she received the court, which many were disposed to pay her, with grace and affability, but at heart with imperial indifference, he ceased to disturb himself; for, as she rightly thought, he was incapable of understanding her. a coquette he could have interpreted; but a romantic character like hers, born for a grand passion, or no love at all, he could not. nor did he see that v---- was likely to be more to her than any of her admirers. _laurie._ i am afraid i should have shamed his obtuseness. v---- has nothing to recommend him that i know of, except his beauty, and that is the beauty of a _petit-maitre_--effeminate, without character, and very unlikely, i should judge, to attract such a woman as you give me the idea of. _aglauron._ you speak like a man, laurie; but have you never heard tales of youthful minstrels and pages being preferred by princesses, in the land of chivalry, to stalwart knights, who were riding all over the land, doing their devoirs maugre scars and starvation? and why? one want of a woman's heart is to admire and be protected; but another is to be understood in all her delicate feelings, and have an object who shall know how to receive all the marks of her inventive and bounteous affection. v---- is such an one; a being of infinite grace and tenderness, and an equal capacity for prizing the same in another. effeminate, say you? lovely, rather, and lovable. he was not, indeed, made to grow old; but i never saw a fairer spring-time than shone in his eye when life, and thought, and love, opened on him all together. he was to emily like the soft breathing of a flute in some solitary valley; indeed, the delicacy of his nature made a solitude around him in the world. so delicate was he, and emily for a long time so unconscious, that nobody except myself divined how strong was the attraction which, as it drew them nearer together, invested both with a lustre and a sweetness which charmed all around them. but i see the sun is declining, and warns me to cut short a tale which would keep us here till dawn if i were to detail it as i should like to do in my own memories. the progress of this affair interested me deeply; for, like all persons whose perceptions are more lively than their hopes, i delight to live from day to day in the more ardent experiments of others. i looked on with curiosity, with sympathy, with fear. how could it end? what would become of them, unhappy lovers? one too noble, the other too delicate, ever to find happiness in an unsanctioned tie. i had, however, no right to interfere, and did not, even by a look, until one evening, when the occasion was forced upon me. there was a summer fete given at l----'s. i had mingled for a while with the guests in the brilliant apartments; but the heat oppressed, the conversation failed to interest me. an open window tempted me to the garden, whose flowers and tufted lawns lay bathed in moonlight. i went out alone; but the music of a superb band followed my steps, and gave impulse to my thoughts. a dreaming state, pensive though not absolutely sorrowful, came upon me,--one of those gentle moods when thoughts flow through the mind amber-clear and soft, noiseless, because unimpeded. i sat down in an arbor to enjoy it, and probably stayed much longer than i could have imagined; for when i reentered the large saloon it was deserted. the lights, however, were not extinguished, and, hearing voices in the inner room, i supposed some guests still remained; and, as i had not spoken with emily that evening, i ventured in to bid her good-night. i started, repentant, on finding her alone with v----, and in a situation that announced their feelings to be no longer concealed from each other. she, leaning back on the sofa, was weeping bitterly, while v----, seated at her feet, holding her hands within his own, was pouring forth his passionate words with a fervency which prevented him from perceiving my entrance. but emily perceived me at once, and starting up, motioned me not to go, as i had intended. i obeyed, and sat down. a pause ensued, awkward for me and for v----, who sat with his eyes cast down and blushing like a young girl detected in a burst of feeling long kept secret. emily sat buried in thought, the tears yet undried upon her cheeks. she was pale, but nobly beautiful, as i had never yet seen her. after a few moments i broke the silence, and attempted to tell why i had returned so late. she interrupted me: "no matter, aglauron, how it happened; whatever the chance, it promises to give both v---- and myself, what we greatly need, a calm friend and adviser. you are the only person among these crowds of men whom i could consult; for i have read friendship in your eye, and i know you have truth and honor. v---- thinks of you as i do, and he too is, or should be, glad to have some counsellor beside his own wishes." v---- did not raise his eyes; neither did he contradict her. after a moment he said, "i believe aglauron to be as free from prejudice as any man, and most true and honorable; yet who can judge in this matter but ourselves?" "no one shall judge," said emily; "but i want counsel. god help me! i feel there is a right and wrong; but how can my mind, which has never been trained to discern between them, be confident of its power at this important moment? aglauron, what remains to me of happiness,--if anything do remain; perhaps the hope of heaven, if, indeed, there be a heaven,--is at stake! father and brother have failed their trust. i have no friend able to understand, wise enough to counsel me. the only one whose words ever came true to my thoughts, and of whom you have often reminded me, is distant. will you, this hour, take her place?" "to the best of my ability," i replied without hesitation, struck by the dignity of her manner. "you know," she said, "all my past history; all do so here, though they do not talk loudly of it. you and all others have probably blamed me. you know not, you cannot guess, the anguish, the struggles of my childish mind when it first opened to the meaning of those words, love, marriage, life. when i was bound to mr. l----, by a vow which from my heedless lips was mockery of all thought, all holiness, i had never known a duty, i had never felt the pressure of a tie. life had been, so far, a sweet, voluptuous dream, and i thought of this seemingly so kind and amiable person as a new and devoted ministrant to me of its pleasures. but i was scarcely in his power when i awoke. i perceived the unfitness of the tie; its closeness revolted me. "i had no timidity; i had always been accustomed to indulge my feelings, and i displayed them now. l----, irritated, averted his mastery; this drove me wild; i soon hated him, and despised too his insensibility to all which i thought most beautiful. from all his faults, and the imperfection of our relation, grew up in my mind the knowledge of what the true might be to me. it is astonishing how the thought grow upon me day by day. i had not been married more than three months before i knew what it would be to love, and i longed to be free to do so. i had never known what it was to be resisted, and the thought never came to me that i could now, and for all my life, be bound by so early a mistake. i thought only of expressing my resolve to be free. "how i was repulsed, how disappointed, you know, or could divine if you did not know; for all but me have been trained to bear the burden from their youth up, and accustomed to have the individual will fettered for the advantage of society. for the same reason, you cannot guess the silent fury that filled my mind when i at last found that i had struggled in vain, and that i must remain in the bondage that i had ignorantly put on. "my affections were totally alienated from my family, for i felt they had known what i had not, and had neither put me on my guard, nor warned me against precipitation whose consequences must be fatal. i saw, indeed, that they did not look on life as i did, and could be content without being happy; but this observation was far from making me love them more. i felt alone, bitterly, contemptuously alone. i hated men who had made the laws that bound me. i did not believe in god; for why had he permitted the dart to enter so unprepared a breast? i determined never to submit, though i disdained to struggle, since struggle was in vain. in passive, lonely wretchedness i would pass my days. i would not feign what i did not feel, nor take the hand which had poisoned for me the cup of life before i had sipped the first drops. "a friend--the only one i have ever known--taught me other thoughts. she taught me that others, perhaps all others, were victims, as much as myself. she taught me that if all the wrecked submitted to be drowned, the world would be a desert. she taught me to pity others, even those i myself was paining; for she showed me that they had sinned in ignorance, and that i had no right to make them suffer so long as i myself did, merely because they were the authors of my suffering. "she showed me, by her own pure example, what were duty and benevolence and employment to the soul, even when baffled and sickened in its dearest wishes. that example was not wholly lost: i freed my parents, at least, from their pain, and, without falsehood, became less cruel and more calm. "yet the kindness, the calmness, have never gone deep. i have been forced to live out of myself; and life, busy or idle, is still most bitter to the homeless heart. i cannot be like almeria; i am more ardent; and, aglauron, you see now i might be happy," she looked towards v----. i followed her eye, and was well-nigh melted too by the beauty of his gaze. "the question in my mind is," she resumed, "have i not a right to fly? to leave this vacant life, and a tie which, but for worldly circumstances, presses as heavily on l---- as on myself. i shall mortify him; but that is a trifle compared with actual misery. i shall grieve my parents; but, were they truly such, would they not grieve still more that i must reject the life of mutual love? i have already sacrificed enough; shall i sacrifice the happiness of one i could really bless for those who do not know one native heart-beat of my life?" v---- kissed her hand. "and yet," said she, sighing, "it does not always look so. we must, in that case, leave the world; it will not tolerate us. can i make v---- happy in solitude? and what would almeria think? often it seems that she would feel that now i do love, and could make a green spot in the desert of life over which she mourned, she would rejoice to have me do so. then, again, something whispers she might have objections to make; and i wish--o, i long to know them! for i feel that this is the great crisis of my life, and that if i do not act wisely, now that i have thought and felt, it will be unpardonable. in my first error i was ignorant what i wished, but now i know, and ought not to be weak or deluded." i said, "have you no religious scruples? do you never think of your vow as sacred?" "never!" she replied, with flashing eyes. "shall the woman be bound by the folly of the child? no!--have never once considered myself as l----'s wife. if i have lived in his house, it was to make the best of what was left, as almeria advised. but what i feel he knows perfectly. i have never deceived him. but o! i hazard all! all! and should i be again ignorant, again deceived"---- v---- here poured forth all that can be imagined. i rose: "emily, this case seems to me so extraordinary that i must have time to think. you shall hear from me. i shall certainly give you my best advice, and i trust you will not over-value it." "i am sure," she said, "it will be of use to me, and will enable me to decide what i shall do. v----, now go away with aglauron; it is too late for you to stay here." i do not know if i have made obvious, in this account, what struck me most in the interview,--a certain savage force in the character of this beautiful woman, quite independent of the reasoning power. i saw that, as she could give no account of the past, except that she saw it was fit, or saw it was not, so she must be dealt with now by a strong instalment made by another from his own point of view, which she would accept or not, as suited her. there are some such characters, which, like plants, stretch upwards to the light; they accept what nourishes, they reject what injures them. they die if wounded,--blossom if fortunate; but never learn to analyze all this, or find its reasons; but, if they tell their story, it is in emily's way;--"it was so;" "i found it so." i talked with v----, and found him, as i expected, not the peer of her he loved, except in love. his passion was at its height. better acquainted with the world than emily,--not because he had seen it more, but because he had the elements of the citizen in him,--he had been at first equally emboldened and surprised by the ease with which he won her to listen to his suit. but he was soon still more surprised to find that she would only listen. she had no regard for her position in society as a married woman,--none for her vow. she frankly confessed her love, so far as it went, but doubted as to whether it was _her whole love_, and doubted still more her right to leave l----, since she had returned to him, and could not break the bond so entirely as to give them firm foot-hold in the world. "i may make you unhappy," she said, "and then be unhappy myself; these laws, this society, are so strange, i can make nothing of them. in music i am at home. why is not all life music? we instantly know when we are going wrong there. convince me it is for the best, and i will go with you at once. but now it seems wrong, unwise, scarcely better than to stay as we are. we must go secretly, must live obscurely in a corner. that i cannot bear,--all is wrong yet. why am i not at liberty to declare unblushingly to all men that i will leave the man whom i _do not_ love, and go with him i _do_ love? that is the only way that would suit me,--i cannot see clearly to take any other course." i found v---- had no scruples of conscience, any more than herself. he was wholly absorbed in his passion, and his only wish was to persuade her to elope, that a divorce might follow, and she be all his own. i took my part. i wrote next day to emily. i told her that my view must differ from hers in this: that i had, from early impressions, a feeling of the sanctity of the marriage vow. it was not to me a measure intended merely to insure the happiness of two individuals, but a solemn obligation, which, whether it led to happiness or not, was a means of bringing home to the mind the great idea of duty, the understanding of which, and not happiness, seemed to be the end of life. life looked not clear to me otherwise. i entreated her to separate herself from v---- for a year, before doing anything decisive; she could then look at the subject from other points of view, and see the bearing on mankind as well as on herself alone. if she still found that happiness and v---- were her chief objects, she might be more sure of herself after such a trial. i was careful not to add one word of persuasion or exhortation, except that i recommended her to the enlightening love of the father of our spirits. _laurie_. with or without persuasion, your advice had small chance, i fear, of being followed. _aglauron_. you err. next day v---- departed. emily, with a calm brow and earnest eyes, devoted herself to thought, and such reading as i suggested. _laurie_. and the result? _aglauron_. i grieve not to be able to point my tale with the expected moral, though perhaps the true denouement may lead to one as valuable. l---- died within the year, and she married v----. _laurie_. and the result? _aglauron_. is for the present utter disappointment in him. she was infinitely blest, for a time, in his devotion, but presently her strong nature found him too much hers, and too little his own. he satisfied her as little as l---- had done, though always lovely and dear. she saw with keen anguish, though this time without bitterness, that we are never wise enough to be sure any measure will fulfil our expectations. but--i know not how it is--emily does not yet command the changes of destiny which she feels so keenly and faces so boldly. born to be happy only in the clear light of religious thought, she still seeks happiness elsewhere. she is now a mother, and all other thoughts are merged in that. but she will not long be permitted to abide there. one more pang, and i look to see her find her central point, from which all the paths she has taken lead. she loves truth so ardently, though as yet only in detail, that she will yet know truth as a whole. she will see that she does not live for emily, or for v----, or for her child, but as one link in a divine purpose. her large nature must at last serve knowingly. _myself_. i cannot understand you, aglauron; i do not guess the scope of your story, nor sympathize with your feeling about this lady. she is a strange, and, i think, very unattractive person. i think her beauty must have fascinated you. her character seems very inconsistent. _aglauron_. because i have drawn from life. _myself_. but, surely, there should be a harmony somewhere. _aglauron_. could we but get the right point of view. _laurie_. and where is that? he pointed to the sun, just sinking behind the pine grove. we mounted and rode home without a word more. but i do not understand aglauron yet, nor what he expects from this emily. yet her character, though almost featureless at first, gains distinctness as i think of it more. perhaps in this life i shall find its key. the wrongs of american women. the duty of american women. the same day brought us a copy of mr. burdett's little book,--in which the sufferings and difficulties that beset the large class of women who must earn their subsistence in a city like new york, are delineated with so much simplicity, feeling, and exact adherence to the facts,--and a printed circular, containing proposals for immediate practical adoption of the plan wore fully described in a book published some weeks since, under the title, "the duty of american women to their country," which was ascribed alternately to mrs. stowe and miss catharine beecher. the two matters seemed linked to one another by natural parity. full acquaintance with the wrong must call forth all manner of inventions for its redress. the circular, in showing the vast want that already exists of good means for instructing the children of this nation, especially in the west, states also the belief that among women, as being less immersed in other cares and toils, from the preparation it gives for their task as mothers, and from the necessity in which a great proportion stand of earning a subsistence somehow, at least during the years which precede marriage, if they _do_ marry, must the number of teachers wanted be found, which is estimated already at _sixty thousand_. we cordially sympathize with these views. much has been written about woman's keeping within her sphere, which is defined as the domestic sphere. as a little girl she is to learn the lighter family duties, while she acquires that limited acquaintance with the realm of literature and science that will enable her to superintend the instruction of children in their earliest years. it is not generally proposed that she should be sufficiently instructed and developed to understand the pursuits or aims of her future husband; she is not to be a help-meet to him in the way of companionship and counsel, except in the care of his house and children. her youth is to be passed partly in learning to keep house and the use of the needle, partly in the social circle, where her manners may be formed, ornamental accomplishments perfected and displayed, and the husband found who shall give her the domestic sphere for which she is exclusively to be prepared. were the destiny of woman thus exactly marked out; did she invariably retain the shelter of a parent's or guardian's roof till she married; did marriage give her a sure home and protector; were she never liable to remain a widow, or, if so, sure of finding immediate protection from a brother or new husband, so that she might never be forced to stand alone one moment; and were her mind given for this world only, with no faculties capable of eternal growth and infinite improvement; we would still demand for her a for wider and more generous culture, than is proposed by those who so anxiously define her sphere. we would demand it that she might not ignorantly or frivolously thwart the designs of her husband; that she might be the respected friend of her sons, not less than of her daughters; that she might give more refinement, elevation and attraction, to the society which is needed to give the characters of _men_ polish and plasticity,--no less so than to save them from vicious and sensual habits. but the most fastidious critic on the departure of woman from her sphere can scarcely fail to see, at present, that a vast proportion of the sex, if not the better half, do not, _cannot_ have this domestic sphere. thousands and scores of thousands in this country, no less than in europe, are obliged to maintain themselves alone. far greater numbers divide with their husbands the care of earning a support for the family. in england, now, the progress of society has reached so admirable a pitch, that the position of the sexes is frequently reversed, and the husband is obliged to stay at home and "mind the house and bairns," while the wife goes forth to the employment she alone can secure. we readily admit that the picture of this is most painful;--that nature made an entirely opposite distribution of functions between the sexes. we believe the natural order to be the best, and that, if it could be followed in an enlightened spirit, it would bring to woman all she wants, no less for her immortal than her mortal destiny. we are not surprised that men who do not look deeply and carefully at causes and tendencies, should be led, by disgust at the hardened, hackneyed characters which the present state of things too often produces in women, to such conclusions as they are. we, no more than they, delight in the picture of the poor woman digging in the mines in her husband's clothes. we, no more than they, delight to hear their voices shrilly raised in the market-place, whether of apples, or of celebrity. but we see that at present they must do as they do for bread. hundreds and thousands must step out of that hallowed domestic sphere, with no choice but to work or steal, or belong to men, not as wives, but as the wretched slaves of sensuality. and this transition state, with all its revolting features, indicates, we do believe, an approach of a nobler era than the world has yet known. we trust that by the stress and emergencies of the present and coming time the minds of women will be formed to more reflection and higher purposes than heretofore; their latent powers developed, their characters strengthened and eventually beautified and harmonized. should the state of society then be such that each may remain, as nature seems to have intended, woman the tutelary genius of home, while man manages the outdoor business of life, both may be done with a wisdom, a mutual understanding and respect, unknown at present. men will be no less gainers by this than women, finding in pure and more religious marriages the joys of friendship and love combined,--in their mothers and daughters better instruction, sweeter and nobler companionship, and in society at large, an excitement to their finer powers and feelings unknown at present, except in the region of the fine arts. blest be the generous, the wise, who seek to forward hopes like these, instead of struggling, against the fiat of providence and the march of fate, to bind down rushing life to the standard of the past! such efforts are vain, but those who make them are unhappy and unwise. it is not, however, to such that we address ourselves, but to those who seek to make the best of things as they are, while they also strive to make them better. such persons will have seen enough of the state of things in london, paris, new york, and manufacturing regions everywhere, to feel that there is an imperative necessity for opening more avenues of employment to women, and fitting them better to enter them, rather than keeping them back. women have invaded many of the trades and some of the professions. sewing, to the present killing extent, they cannot long bear. factories seem likely to afford them permanent employment. in the culture of fruit, flowers, and vegetables, even in the sale of them, we rejoice to see them engaged. in domestic service they will be aided, but can never be supplanted, by machinery. as much room as there is here for woman's mind and woman's labor, will always be filled. a few have usurped the martial province, but these must always be few; the nature of woman is opposed to war. it is natural enough to see "female physicians," and we believe that the lace cap and work-bag are as much at home here as the wig and gold-headed cane. in the priesthood, they have, from all time, shared more or less--in many eras more than at the present. we believe there has been no female lawyer, and probably will be none. the pen, many of the fine arts, they have made their own; and in the more refined countries of the world, as writers, as musicians, as painters, as actors, women occupy as advantageous ground as men. writing and music may be esteemed professions for them more than any other. but there are two others--where the demand must invariably be immense, and for which they are naturally better fitted than men--for which we should like to see them better prepared and better rewarded than they are. these are the professions of nurse to the sick, and of the teacher. the first of these professions we have warmly desired to see dignified. it is a noble one, now most unjustly regarded in the light of menial service. it is one which no menial, no servile nature can fitly occupy. we were rejoiced when an intelligent lady of massachusetts made the refined heroine of a little romance select this calling. this lady (mrs. george lee) has looked on society with unusual largeness of spirit and healthiness of temper. she is well acquainted with the world of conventions, but sees beneath it the world of nature. she is a generous writer, and unpretending as the generous are wont to be. we do not recall the name of the tale, but the circumstance above mentioned marks its temper. we hope to see the time when the refined and cultivated will choose this profession, and learn it, not only through experience and under the direction of the doctor, but by acquainting themselves with the laws of matter and of mind, so that all they do shall be intelligently done, and afford them the means of developing intelligence, as well as the nobler, tenderer feelings of humanity; for even this last part of the benefit they cannot receive if their work be done in a selfish or mercenary spirit. the other profession is that of teacher, for which women are peculiarly adapted by their nature, superiority in tact, quickness of sympathy, gentleness, patience, and a clear and animated manner in narration or description. to form a good teacher, should be added to this, sincere modesty combined with firmness, liberal views, with a power and will to liberalize them still further, a good method, and habits of exact and thorough investigation. in the two last requisites women are generally deficient, but there are now many shining examples to prove that if they are immethodical and superficial as teachers, it is because it is the custom so to teach them, and that when aware of these faults, they can and will correct them. the profession is of itself an excellent one for the improvement of the teacher during that interim between youth and maturity when the mind needs testing, tempering, and to review and rearrange the knowledge it has acquired. the natural method of doing this for one's self, is to attempt teaching others; those years also are the best of the practical teacher. the teacher should be near the pupil, both in years and feelings; no oracle, but the eldest brother or sister of the pupil. more experience and years form the lecturer and director of studies, but injure the powers as to familiar teaching. these are just the years of leisure in the lives even of those women who are to enter the domestic sphere, and this calling most of all compatible with a constant progress as to qualifications for that. viewing the matter thus, it may well be seen that we should hail with joy the assurance that sixty thousand _female_ teachers are wanted, and more likely to be, and that a plan is projected which looks wise, liberal and generous, to afford the means, to those whose hearts answer to this high calling, of obeying their dictates. the plan is to have cincinnati as a central point, where teachers shall be for a short time received, examined, and prepared for their duties. by mutual agreement and cooperation of the various sects, funds are to be raised, and teachers provided, according to the wants and tendencies of the various locations now destitute. what is to be done for them centrally, is for suitable persons to examine into the various kinds of fitness, communicate some general views whose value has been tested, and counsel adapted to the difficulties and advantages of their new positions. the central committee are to have the charge of raising funds, and finding teachers, and places where teachers are wanted. the passage of thoughts, teachers and funds, will be from east to west--the course of sunlight upon this earth. the plan is offered as the most extensive and pliant means of doing a good and preventing ill to this nation, by means of a national education; whose normal school shall have an invariable object in the search after truth, and the diffusion of the means of knowledge, while its form shall be plastic according to the wants of the time. this normal school promises to have good effects, for it proposes worthy aims through simple means, and the motive for its formation and support seems to be disinterested philanthropy. it promises to eschew the bitter spirit of sectarianism and proselytism, else we, for one party, could have nothing to do with it. men, no doubt, have oftentimes been kept from absolute famine by the wheat with which such tares are mingled; but we believe the time is come when a purer and more generous food is to be offered to the people at large. we believe the aim of all education to be to rouse the mind to action, show it the means of discipline and of information; then leave it free, with god, conscience, and the love of truth, for its guardians and teachers. woe be to those who sacrifice these aims of universal and eternal value to the propagation of a set of opinions! we can accept such doctrine as is offered by rev. colvin e. stowe, one of the committee, in the following passage: "in judicious practice, i am persuaded there will seldom be any very great difficulty, especially if there be excited in the community anything like a whole-hearted and enlightened sincerity in the cause of public instruction. "it is all right for people to suit their own taste and convictions in respect to sect; and by fair means, and at proper times, to teach their children and those under their influence to prefer the denominations which they prefer; but further than this no one has any right to go. it is all wrong to hazard the well-being of the soul, to jeopardize great public interests for the sake of advancing the interests of a sect. people must learn to practise some self-denial, on christian principles, in respect to their denominational prejudices as well as in respect to other things, before pure religion can ever gain a complete victory over every form of human selfishness." the persons who propose themselves to the examination and instruction of the teachers at cincinnati, till the plan shall be sufficiently under way to provide regularly for the office, are mrs. stowe and miss catharine beecher, ladies well known to fame, as possessing unusual qualifications for the task. as to finding abundance of teachers, who that reads this little book of mr. burdett's, or the account of the compensation of female labor in new york, and the hopeless, comfortless, useless, pernicious lives of those who have even the advantage of getting work must lead, with the sufferings and almost inevitable degradation to which those who cannot are exposed, but must long to snatch such as are capable of this better profession (and among the multitude there must be many who are or could be made so) from their present toils, and make them free, and the means of freedom and growth in others? to many books on such subjects--among others to "woman in the nineteenth century"--the objection has been made, that they exhibit ills without specifying any practical means for their remedy. the writer of the last-named essay does indeed think that it contains one great rule which, if laid to heart, would prove a practical remedy for many ills, and of such daily and hourly efficacy in the conduct of life, that any extensive observance of it for a single year would perceptibly raise the tone of thought, feeling and conduct, throughout the civilized world. but to those who ask not only such a principle, but an external method for immediate use, we say that here is one proposed which looks noble and promising; the proposers offer themselves to the work with heart and hand, with time and purse. go ye and do likewise. george sand. when i first knew george sand, i thought to have found tried the experiment i wanted. i did not value bettine so much. she had not pride enough for me. only now, when i am sure of myself, can i pour out my soul at the feet of another. in the assured soul it is kingly prodigality; in one which cannot forbear it is mere babyhood. i love "abandon" only when natures are capable of the extreme reverse. i know bettine would end in nothing; when i read her book i knew she could not outlive her love. but in _"les sept cordes de la lyre,"_ which i read first, i saw the knowledge of the passions and of social institutions, with the celestial choice which rose above them. i loved helene, who could hear so well the terrene voices, yet keep her eye fixed on the stars. that would be my wish also,--to know all, and then choose. i even revered her, for i was not sure that i could have resisted the call of the _now_; could have left the spirit and gone to god; and at a more ambitious age i could not have refused the philosopher. but i hoped much from her steadfastness, and i thought i heard the last tones of a purified life. gretchen, in the golden cloud, is raised above all past delusions, worthy to redeem and upbear the wise man who stumbled into the pit of error while searching for truth. still, in "andre" and "jacques," i trace the same high morality of one who had tried the liberty of circumstance only to learn to appreciate the liberty of law;--to know that license is the foe of freedom; and, though the sophistry of passion in these books disgusted me, flowers of purest hue seemed to grow upon the dark and dirty ground. i thought she had cast aside the slough of her past life, and begun a new existence beneath the sun of a new ideal. but here, in the _"lettres d'un voyageur,"_ what do i see? an unfortunate, wailing her loneliness, wailing her mistakes, _writing for money!_ she has genius, and a manly grasp of mind, but not a manly heart. will there never be a being to combine a man's mind and a woman's heart, and who yet finds life too rich to weep over? never? when i read in _"leon leoni"_ the account of the jeweller's daughter's life with her mother, passed in dressing, and learning to be looked at when dressed, _"avec un front impassible,"_ it reminded me of ---- and her mother. what a heroine she would be for sand! she has the same fearless softness with juliet, and a sportive _naivete_ a mixture of bird and kitten, unknown to the dupe of leoni. if i were a man, and wished a wife, as many do, merely as an ornament, a silken toy, i would take ---- as soon as any i know. her fantastic, impassioned and mutable nature would yield an inexhaustible amusement. she is capable of the most romantic actions,--wild as the falcon, voluptuous as the tuberose; yet she has not in her the elements of romance, like a deeper or less susceptible nature. my cold and reasoning ----, with her one love lying, perhaps never to be unfolded, beneath such sheaths of pride and reserve, would make a far better heroine. ---- and her mother differ from juliet and _her_ mother by the impulse a single strong character gave them. even at this distance of time there is a light but perceptible taste of iron in the water. george sand disappoints me, as almost all beings do, especially since i have been brought close to her person by the _"lettres d'un voyageur."_ her remarks on lavater seem really shallow, _a la mode du genre feminin._ no self-ruling aspasia she, but a frail woman, mourning over her lot. any peculiarity in her destiny seems accidental; she is forced to this and to that to earn her bread, forsooth! yet her style--with what a deeply smouldering fire it burns! not vehement, but intense, like jean jacques. from a notice of george sand. it is probably known to a great proportion of readers that this writer is a woman, who writes under the name, and frequently assumes the dress and manners, of a man. it is also known that she has not only broken the marriage-bond, and, since that, formed other connections, independent of the civil and ecclesiastical sanction, but that she first rose into notice through works which systematically assailed the present institution of marriage, and the social bonds which are connected with it. no facts are more adapted to startle every feeling of our community; but, since the works of sand are read here, notwithstanding, and cannot fail to be so while they exert so important an influence abroad, it would be well they should be read intelligently, as to the circumstances of their birth and their tendency. george sand we esteem to be a person of strong passions, but of original nobleness and a love of right sufficient to guide them all to the service of worthy aims. but she fell upon evil times. she was given in marriage, according to the fashion of the old regime; she was taken from a convent, where she had heard a great deal about the law of god and the example of jesus, into a society where no vice was proscribed, if it would only wear the cloak of hypocrisy. she found herself impatient of deception, and loudly appealed to by passion; she yielded, but she could not do so, as others did, sinning against what she owned to be the rule of right and the will of heaven. she protested, she examined, she "hacked into the roots of things," and the bold sound of her axe called around her every foe that finds a home amid the growths of civilization. still she persisted. "if it be real," thought she, "it cannot be destroyed; as to what is false, the sooner it goes the better; and i, for one, would rather perish by its fall, than wither in its shade." schiller puts into the mouth of mary stuart these words, as her only plea: "the world knows the worst of me, and i may boast that, though i have erred, i am better than my reputation." sand may say the same. all is open, noble; the free descriptions, the sophistry of passion, are, at least, redeemed by a desire for truth as strong as ever beat in any heart. to the weak or unthinking, the reading of such books may not be desirable, for only those who take exercise as men can digest strong meat. but to any one able to understand the position and circumstances, we believe this reading cannot fail of bringing good impulses, valuable suggestions; and it is quite free from that subtle miasma which taints so large a portion of french literature, not less since the revolution than before. this we say to the foreign reader. to her own country, sand is a boon precious and prized, both as a warning and a leader, for which none there can be ungrateful. she has dared to probe its festering wounds; and if they be not past all surgery, she is one who, most of any, helps towards a cure. would, indeed, the surgeon had come with quite clean hands! a woman of sand's genius--as free, as bold, and pure from even the suspicion of error--might have filled an apostolic station among her people with what force had come her cry, "if it be false, give it up; but if it be true, keep to it,-- one or the other!" but we have read all we wish to say upon this subject lately uttered just from the quarter we could wish. it is such a woman, so unblemished in character, so high in aim, so pure in soul, that should address this other, as noble in nature, but clouded by error, and struggling with circumstances. it is such women that will do such others justice. they are not afraid to look for virtue, and reply to aspiration, among those who have _not_ dwelt "in decencies forever." it is a source of pride and happiness to read this address from the heart of elizabeth barrett:-- to george sand. a desire. thou large-brained woman and large-hearted man, self-called george sand! whose soul amid the lions of thy tumultuous senses moans defiance, and answers roar for roar, as spirits can,-- i would some wild, miraculous thunder ran above the applauding circus, in appliance of thine own nobler nature's strength and science, drawing two pinions, white as wings of swan, from the strong shoulders, to amaze the place with holier light! that thou, to woman's claim, and man's, might join, beside, the angel's grace of a pure genius, sanctified from blame, till child and maiden pressed to thine embrace, to kiss upon thy lips a stainless fame! * * * * * to the same. a recognition. true genius, but true woman! dost deny thy woman's nature with a manly scorn, and break away the gauds and armlets worn by weaker woman in captivity? ah, vain denial! that revolted cry is sobbed in by a woman's voice forlorn:-- thy woman's hair, my sister! all unshorn, floats back dishevelled strength in agony, disproving thy man's name; and while before the world thou burnest in a poet-fire, we see thy woman-heart beat evermore through the large flame. beat purer, heart! and higher, till god unsex thee on the spirit-shore, to which, alone unsexing, purely aspire! * * * * * this last sonnet seems to have been written after seeing the picture of sand, which represents her in a man's dress, but with long, loose hair, and an eye whose mournful fire is impressive, even in the caricatures. for some years sand has quitted her post of assailant. she has seen that it is better to seek some form of life worthy to supersede the old, than rudely to destroy it, heedless of the future. her force is bending towards philanthropic measures. she does not appear to possess much of the constructive faculty; and, though her writings command a great pecuniary compensation, and have a wide sway, it is rather for their tendency than for their thought. she has reached no commanding point of view from which she may give orders to the advanced corps. she is still at work with others in the breach, though she works with more force than almost any. in power, indeed, sand bears the palm above all other french novelists. she is vigorous in conception, often great in the apprehension and the contrast of characters. she knows passion, as has been hinted, at a _white_ heat, when all the lower particles are remoulded by its power. her descriptive talent is very great, and her poetic feeling exquisite. she wants but little of being a poet, but that little is indispensable. yet she keeps us always hovering on the borders of enchanted fields. she has, to a signal degree, that power of exact transcript from her own mind, in which almost all writers fail. there is no veil, no half-plastic integument between us and the thought; we vibrate perfectly with it. this is her chief charm, and next to it is one in which we know no french writer that resembles her, except rousseau, though he, indeed, is vastly her superior in it; that is, of concentrated glow. her nature glows beneath the words, like fire beneath ashes,--deep, deep! her best works are unequal; in many parts written hastily, or carelessly, or with flagging spirits. they all promise far more than they can perform; the work is not done masterly; she has not reached that point where a writer sits at the helm of his own genius. sometimes she plies the oar,--sometimes she drifts. but what greatness she has is genuine; there is no tinsel of any kind, no drapery carefully adjusted, no chosen gesture about her. may heaven lead her, at last, to the full possession of her best self, in harmony with the higher laws of life! we are not acquainted with all her works, but among those we know, mention "_la roche maupart_," "_andre_," "_jacques_," "_les sept cordes de la lyre_," and "_les maitres mosaistes_," as representing her higher inspirations, her sincerity in expression, and her dramatic powers. they are full of faults; still they show her scope and aim with some fairness, which such of her readers as chance first on such of her books as "_leone leoni_" may fail to find; or even such as "_simon_," and "_spiridion_," though into the imperfect web of these are woven threads of pure gold. such is the first impression made by the girl fiamma, so noble, as she appears before us with the words "_e l'onore_;" such the thought in _spiridion_ of making the apparition the reward of virtue. the work she is now publishing, "_consuelo_" with its sequel, "_baroness de rudolstadt_," exhibits her genius poised on a firmer pedestal, breathing a serener air. still it is faulty in conduct, and shows some obliquity of vision. she has not reached the interpreter's house yet. but when she does, she will have clues to guide many a pilgrim, whom one less tried, less tempted than herself could not help on the way. from a criticism on "consuelo." * * * * *. the work itself cannot fail of innumerable readers, and a great influence, for it counts many of the most significant pulse-beats of the tune. apart from its range of character and fine descriptions, it records some of the mystical apparitions, and attempts to solve some of the problems of the time. how to combine the benefits of the religious life with those of the artist-life in an existence more simple, more full, more human in short, than either of the two hitherto known by these names has been,--this problem is but poorly solved in the "countess of rudolstadt," the sequel to consuelo. it is true, as the english reviewer says, that george sand is a far better poet than philosopher, and that the chief use she can be of in these matters is, by her great range of observation and fine intuitions, to help to develop the thoughts of the time a little way further. but the sincerity, the reality of all he can obtain from this writer will be highly valued by the earnest man. in one respect the book is entirely successful--in showing how inward purity and honor may preserve a woman from bewilderment and danger, and secure her a genuine independence. whoever aims at this is still considered, by unthinking or prejudiced minds, as wishing to despoil the female character of its natural and peculiar loveliness. it is supposed that delicacy must imply weakness, and that only an amazon can stand upright, and have sufficient command of her faculties to confront the shock of adversity, or resist the allurements of tenderness. miss bremer, dumas, and the northern novelist, andersen, make women who have a tendency to the intellectual life of an artist fail, and suffer the penalties of arrogant presumption, in the very first steps of a career to which an inward vocation called them in preference to the usual home duties. yet nothing is more obvious than that the circumstances of the time do, more and more frequently, call women to such lives, and that, if guardianship is absolutely necessary to women, many must perish for want of it. there is, then, reason to hope that god may be a sufficient guardian to those who dare rely on him; and if the heroines of the novelists we have named ended as they did, it was for the want of the purity of ambition and simplicity of character which do not permit such as consuelo to be either unseated and depraved, or unresisting victims and breaking reeds, if left alone in the storm and crowd of life. to many women this picture will prove a true consuelo (consolation), and we think even very prejudiced men will not read it without being charmed with the expansion, sweetness and genuine force, of a female character, such as they have not met, but must, when painted, recognize as possible, and may be led to review their opinions, and perhaps to elevate and enlarge their hopes, as to "woman's sphere" and "woman's mission." if such insist on what they have heard of the private life of this writer, and refuse to believe that any good thing can come out of nazareth, we reply that we do not know the true facts as to the history of george sand. there has been no memoir or notice of her published on which any one can rely, and we have seen too much of life to accept the monsters of gossip in reference to any one. but we know, through her works, that, whatever the stains on her life and reputation may have been, there is in her a soul so capable of goodness and honor as to depict them most successfully in her ideal forms. it is her works, and not her private life, that we are considering. of her works we have means of judging; of herself, not. but among those who have passed unblamed through the walks of life, we have not often found a nobleness of purpose and feeling, a sincere religious hope, to be compared with the spirit that breathes through the pages of consuelo. the experiences of the artist-life, the grand and penetrating remarks upon music, make the book a precious acquisition to all whose hearts are fashioned to understand such things. we suppose that we receive here not only the mind of the writer, but of liszt, with whom she has publicly corresponded in the "_lettres d'un voyageur_." none could more avail us, for "in him also is a spark of the divine fire," as beethoven said of ichubert. we may thus consider that we have in this book the benefit of the most electric nature, the finest sensibility, and the boldest spirit of investigation combined, expressing themselves in a little world of beautiful or picturesque forms. although there are grave problems discussed, and sad and searching experiences described in this work, yet its spirit is, in the main, hopeful, serene, almost glad. it is the spirit inspired from a near acquaintance with the higher life of art. seeing there something really achieved and completed, corresponding with the soul's desires, faith is enlivened as to the eventual fulfilment of those desires, and we feel a certainty that the existence which looks at present so marred and fragmentary shall yet end in harmony. the shuttle is at work, and the threads are gradually added that shall bring out the pattern, and prove that what seems at present confusion is really the way and means to order and beauty. jenny lind, the "consuelo" of george sand. jenny lind, the prima donna of stockholm, is among the most distinguished of those geniuses who have been invited to welcome the queen to germany. her name has been unknown among us, as she is still young, and has not wandered much from the scene of her first triumphs; but many may have seen, last winter, in the foreign papers, an account of her entrance into stockholm after an absence of some length. the people received her with loud cries of homage, took the horses from her carriage and drew her home; a tribute of respect often paid to conquerors and statesmen, but seldom, or, as far as we know, never to the priesthood of the muses, who have conferred the higher benefit of raising, refining and exhilarating, the popular mind. an accomplished swede, now in this country, communicated to a friend particulars of jenny lind's career, which suggested the thought that she might have given the hint for the principal figure in sand's late famous novel, "consuelo." this work is at present in process of translation in "the harbinger," a periodical published at brook farm, mass.; but, as this translation has proceeded but a little way, and the book in its native tongue is not generally, though it has been extensively, circulated here, we will give a slight sketch of its plan. it has been a work of deepest interest to those who have looked upon sand for some years back, as one of the best exponents of the difficulties, the errors, the aspirations, the weaknesses, and the regenerative powers of the present epoch. the struggle in her mind and the experiments of her life have been laid bare to the eyes of her fellow-creatures with fearless openness--fearless, not shameless. let no man confound the bold unreserve of sand with that of those who have lost the feeling of beauty and the love of good. with a bleeding heart and bewildered feet she sought the truth, and if she lost the way, returned as soon as convinced she had done so; but she would never hide the fact that she had lost it. "what god knows, i dare avow to man," seems to be her motto. it is impossible not to see in her, not only the distress and doubts of the intellect, but the temptations of a sensual nature; but we see too the courage of a hero and a deep capacity for religion. this mixed nature, too, fits her peculiarly to speak to men so diseased as men are at present. they feel she knows their ailment, and if she find a cure, it will really be by a specific remedy. an upward tendency and growing light are observable in all her works for several years past, till now, in the present, she has expressed such conclusions as forty years of the most varied experience have brought to one who had shrunk from no kind of discipline, yet still cried to god amid it all; one who, whatever you may say against her, you must feel has never accepted a word for a thing, or worn one moment the veil of hypocrisy; and this person one of the most powerful nature, both as to passion and action, and of an ardent, glowing genius. these conclusions are sadly incomplete. there is an amazing alloy in the last product of her crucible, but there is also so much of pure gold that the book is truly a cordial, as its name of consuelo (consolation) promises. the young consuelo lives as a child the life of a beggar. her youth is passed in the lowest circumstances of the streets of venice. she brings the more pertinacious fire of spanish blood to be fostered by the cheerful airs of italy. a vague sense of the benefits to be derived, from such mingling of various influences, in the formation of a character, is to be discerned in several works of art now, when men are really wishing to become citizens of the world, though old habits still interfere on every side with so noble a development. nothing can be more charming than the first volume, which describes the young girl amid the common life of venice. it is sunny, open, and romantic as the place. the beauty of her voice, when a little singing-girl in the streets, arrested the attention of a really great and severe master, porpora, who educated her to music. in this she finds the vent and the echo for her higher self. her affections are fixed on a young companion, an unworthy object, but she does not know him to be so. she judges from her own candid soul, that all must be good, and derives from the tie, for a while, the fostering influences which love alone has for genius. clear perception follows quickly upon her first triumphs in art. they have given her a rival, and a mean rival, in her betrothed, whose talent, though great, is of an inferior grade to hers; who is vain, every way impure. her master, porpora, tries to avail himself of this disappointment to convince her that the artist ought to devote himself to art alone; that private ties must interfere with his perfection and his glory. but the nature of consuelo revolts against this doctrine, as it would against the seclusion of a convent. she feels that genius requires manifold experience for its development, and that the mind, concentrated on a single object, is likely to pay by a loss of vital energy for the economy of thoughts and time. driven by these circumstances into germany, she is brought into contact with the old noblesse, a very different, but far less charming, atmosphere than that of the gondoliers of venice. but here, too, the strong, simple character of our consuelo is unconstrained, if not at home, and when her heart swells and needs expansion, she can sing. here the count de rudolstadt, albert, loves consuelo, which seems, in the conduct of the relation, a type of a religious democracy in love with the spirit of art. we do not mean that any such cold abstraction is consciously intended, but all that is said means this. it shadows forth one of the greatest desires which convulse our age. a most noble meaning is couched in the history of albert, and though the writer breaks down under such great attempts, and the religion and philosophy of the book are clumsily embodied compared with its poesy and rhetoric, yet great and still growing thoughts are expressed with sufficient force to make the book a companion of rare value to one in the same phase of mind. albert is the aristocratic democrat, such as alfieri was; one who, in his keen perception of beauty, shares the good of that culture which ages have bestowed on the more fortunate classes, but in his large heart loves and longs for the good of all men, as if he had himself suffered in the lowest pits of human misery. he is all this and more in his transmigration, real or fancied, of soul, through many forms of heroic effort and bloody error; in his incompetency to act at the present time, his need of long silences, of the company of the dead and of fools, and eventually of a separation from all habitual ties, is expressed a great idea, which is still only in the throes of birth, yet the nature of whose life we begin to prognosticate with some clearness. consuelo's escape from the castle, and even from albert, her admiration of him, and her incapacity to love him till her own character be more advanced, are told with great naturalness. her travels with joseph haydn, are again as charmingly told as the venetian life. here the author speaks from her habitual existence, and far more masterly than of those deep places of thought where she is less at home. she has lived much, discerned much, felt great need of great thoughts, but not been able to think a great way for herself. she fearlessly accompanies the spirit of the age, but she never surpasses it; _that_ is the office of the great thinker. at vienna consuelo is brought fully into connection with the great world as an artist. she finds that its realities, so far from being less, are even more harsh and sordid for the artist than for any other; and that with avarice, envy and falsehood, she must prepare for the fearful combat which awaits noble souls in any kind of arena, with the pain of disgust when they cannot raise themselves to patience--with the almost equal pain, when they can, of pity for those who know not what they do. albert is on the verge of the grave; and consuelo, who, not being able to feel for him sufficient love to find in it compensation for the loss of that artist-life to which she feels nature has destined her, had hitherto resisted the entreaties of his aged father, and the pleadings of her own reverential and tender sympathy with the wants of his soul, becomes his wife just before he dies. the sequel, therefore, of this history is given under the title of countess of rudolstadt. consuelo is still on the stage; she is at the prussian court. the well-known features of this society, as given in the memoirs of the time, are put together with much grace and wit. the sketch of frederic is excellent. the rest of the book is devoted to expression of the author's ideas on the subject of reform, and especially of association as a means thereto. as her thoughts are yet in a very crude state, the execution of this part is equally bungling and clumsy. worse: she falsifies the characters of both consuelo and albert,--who is revived again by subterfuge of trance,--and stains her best arrangements by the mixture of falsehood and intrigue. yet she proceeds towards, if she walks not by, the light of a great idea; and sincere democracy, universal religion, scatter from afar many seeds upon the page for a future time. the book should be, and will be, universally read. those especially who have witnessed all sand's doubts and sorrows on the subject of marriage, will rejoice in the clearer, purer ray which dawns upon her now. the most natural and deep part of the book, though not her main object, is what relates to the struggle between the claims of art and life, as to whether it be better for the world and one's self to develop to perfection a talent which heaven seemed to have assigned as a special gift and vocation, or sacrifice it whenever the character seems to require this for its general development. the character of consuelo is, throughout the first part, strong, delicate, simple, bold, and pure. the fair lines of this picture are a good deal broken in the second part; but we must remain true to the impression originally made upon us by this charming and noble creation of the soul of sand. it is in reference to _our_ consuelo that a correspondent [footnote: we do not know how accurate is this correspondent's statement of facts. the narrative is certainly interesting.--_ed_.] writes, as to jenny lind; and we are rejoiced to find that so many hints were, or might have been, furnished for the picture from real life. if jenny lind did not suggest it, yet she must also be, in her own sphere, a consuelo. "jenny lind must have been born about or . when a young child, she was observed, playing about and singing in the streets of stockholm, by mr. berg, master of singing for the royal opera. pleased and astonished at the purity and suavity of her voice, he inquired instantly for her family, and found her father, a poor innkeeper, willing and glad to give up his daughter to his care, on the promise to protect her and give her an excellent musical education. he was always very careful of her, never permitting her to sing except in his presence, and never letting her appear on the stage, unless as a mute figure in some ballet, such, for instance, as cupid and the graces, till she was sixteen, when she at once executed her part in 'der freyschutz,' to the full satisfaction and surprise of the public of stockholm. from that time she gradually became the favorite of every one. without beauty, she seems, from her innocent and gracious manners, beautiful on the stage and charming in society. she is one of the few actresses whom no evil tongue can ever injure, and is respected and welcomed in any and all societies. "the circumstances that reminded me of consuelo were these: that she was a poor child, taken up by this singing-master, and educated thoroughly and severely by him; that she loved his son, who was a good-for-nothing fellow, like anzoleto, and at last discarded him; that she refused the son of an english earl, and, when he fell sick, his father condescended to entreat for him, just as the count of rudolstadt did for his son; that, though plain and low in stature, when singing her best parts she appears beautiful, and awakens enthusiastic admiration; that she is rigidly correct in her demeanor towards her numerous admirers, having even returned a present sent her by the crown-prince, oscar, in a manner that she deemed equivocal. this last circumstance being noised abroad, the next time she appeared on the stage she was greeted with more enthusiastic plaudits than ever, and thicker showers of flowers fell upon her from the hands of her true friends, the public. she was more fortunate than consuelo in not being compelled to sing to a public of prussian corporals." indeed, the picture of frederic's opera-audience, with the pit full of his tall grenadiers with their wives on their shoulders, never daring to applaud except when he gave the order, as if by tap of drum, opposed to the tender and expansive nature of the artist, is one of the best tragicomedies extant. in russia, too, all is military; as soon as a new musician arrives, he is invested with a rank in the army. even in the church nicholas has lately done the same. it seems as if he could not believe a man to be alive, except in the army; could not believe the human heart could beat, except by beat of drum. but we believe in russia there is at least a mask of gayety thrown over the chilling truth. the great frederic wished no disguise; everywhere he was chief corporal, and trampled with his everlasting boots the fair flowers of poesy into the dust. the north has been generous to us of late; she has sent us _ole bull_. she is about to send _frederika bremer_. may she add jenny lind! caroline. the other evening i heard a gentle voice reading aloud the story of maurice, a boy who, deprived of the use of his limbs by paralysis, was sustained in comfort, and almost in cheerfulness, by the exertions of his twin sister. left with him in orphanage, her affections were centred upon him, and, amid the difficulties his misfortunes brought upon them, grew to a fire intense and pure enough to animate her with angelic impulses and powers. as he could not move about, she drew him everywhere in a little cart; and when at last they heard that sea-bathing might accomplish his cure, conveyed him, in this way, hundreds of miles to the sea-shore. her pious devotion and faith were rewarded by his cure, and (a french story would be entirely incomplete otherwise) with money, plaudits and garlands, from the by-standers. though the story ends in this vulgar manner, it is, in its conduct, extremely sweet and touching, not only as to the beautiful qualities developed by these trials in the brother and sister, but in the purifying and softening influence exerted, by the sight of his helplessness and her goodness, on all around them. those who are the victims of some natural blight often fulfil this important office, and bless those within their sphere more, by awakening feelings of holy tenderness and compassion, than a man healthy and strong can do by the utmost exertion of his good-will and energies. thus, in the east, men hold sacred those in whom they find a distortion or alienation of mind which makes them unable to provide for themselves. the well and sane feel themselves the ministers of providence to carry out a mysterious purpose, while taking care of those who are thus left incapable of taking care of themselves; and, while fulfilling this ministry, find themselves refined and made better. the swiss have similar feelings as to those of their families whom cretinism has reduced to idiocy. they are attended to, fed, dressed clean, and provided with a pleasant place for the day, before doing anything else, even by very busy and poor people. we have seen a similar instance, in this country, of voluntary care of an idiot, and the mental benefits that ensued. this idiot, like most that are called so, was not without a glimmer of mind. his teacher was able to give him some notions, both of spiritual and mental facts; at least she thought she had given him the idea of god, and though it appeared by his gestures that to him the moon was the representative of that idea, yet he certainly did conceive of something above him, and which inspired him with reverence and delight. he knew the names of two or three persons who had done him kindness, and when they were mentioned, would point upward, as he did to the moon, showing himself susceptible, in his degree, of mr. carlyle's grand method of education, hero-worship. she had awakened in him a love of music, so that he could be soothed in his most violent moods by her gentle singing. it was a most touching sight to see him sitting opposite to her at such tunes, his wondering and lack-lustre eyes filled with childish pleasure, while in hers gleamed the same pure joy that we may suppose to animate the looks of an angel appointed by heaven to restore a ruined world. we know another instance, in which a young girl became to her village a far more valuable influence than any patron saint who looks down from his stone niche, while his votaries recall the legend of his goodness in days long past. caroline lived in a little, quiet country village--quiet as no village can now remain, since the railroad strikes its spear through the peace of country life. she lived alone with a widowed mother, for whom, as well as for herself, her needle won bread, while the mother's strength, and skill sufficed to the simple duties of their household. they lived content and hopeful, till, whether from sitting still too much, or some other cause, caroline became ill, and soon the physician pronounced her spine to be affected, and to such a degree that she was incurable. this news was a thunder-bolt to the poor little cottage. the mother, who had lost her elasticity of mind, wept in despair; but the young girl, who found so early all the hopes and joys of life taken from her, and that she was seemingly left without any shelter from the storm, had even at first the faith and strength to bow her head in gentleness, and say, "god will provide." she sustained and cheered her mother. and god did provide. with simultaneous vibration the hearts of all their circle acknowledged the divine obligation of love and mutual aid between human beings. food, clothing, medicine, service, were all offered freely to the widow and her daughter. caroline grew worse, and was at last in such a state that she could only be moved upon a sheet, and by the aid of two persons. in this toilsome service, and every other that she required for years, her mother never needed to ask assistance. the neighbors took turns in doing all that was required, and the young girls, as they were growing up, counted it among their regular employments to work for or read to caroline. not without immediate reward was their service of love. the mind of the girl, originally bright and pure, was quickened and wrought up to the finest susceptibility by the nervous exaltation that often ensues upon affection of the spine. the soul, which had taken an upward impulse from its first act of resignation, grew daily more and more into communion with the higher regions of life, permanent and pure. perhaps she was instructed by spirits which, having passed through a similar trial of pain and loneliness, had risen to see the reason why. however that may be, she grew in nobleness of view and purity of sentiment, and, as she received more instruction from books also than any other person in her circle, had from many visitors abundant information as to the events which were passing around her, and leisure to reflect on them with a disinterested desire for truth, she became so much wiser than her companions as to be at last their preceptress and best friend, and her brief, gentle comments and counsels were listened to as oracles from one enfranchised from the films which selfishness and passion cast over the eyes of the multitude. the twofold blessing conferred by her presence, both in awakening none but good feelings in the hearts of others, and in the instruction she became able to confer, was such, that, at the end of five years, no member of that society would have been so generally lamented as caroline, had death called her away. but the messenger, who so often seems capricious in his summons, took first the aged mother, and the poor girl found that life had yet the power to bring her grief, unexpected and severe. and now the neighbors met in council. caroline could not be left quite alone in the house. should they take turns, and stay with her by night as well as by day? "not so," said the blacksmith's wife; "the house will never seem like home to her now, poor thing! and 't would be kind of dreary for her to change about her _nusses_ so. i'll tell you what; all my children but one are married and gone off; we have property enough; i will have a good room fixed for her, and she shall live with us. my husband wants her to, as much as me." the council acquiesced in this truly humane arrangement, and caroline lives there still; and we are assured that none of her friends dread her departure so much as the blacksmith's wife. "'ta'n't no trouble at all to have her," she says, "and if it was, i shouldn't care; she is so good and still, and talks so pretty! it's as good bein' with her as goin' to meetin'!" de maistre relates some similar passages as to a sick girl in st. petersburgh, though his mind dwelt more on the spiritual beauty evinced in her remarks, than on the good she had done to those around her. indeed, none bless more than those who "only stand and wait." even if their passivity be enforced by fate, it will become a spiritual activity, if accepted in a faith higher above fate than the greek gods were supposed to sit enthroned above misfortune. ever-growing lives. "age could not wither her, nor custom stale her infinite variety." so was one person described by the pen which has made a clearer mark than any other on the history of man. but is it not surprising that such a description should apply to so few? of two or three women we read histories that correspond with the hint given in these lines. they were women in whom there was intellect enough to temper and enrich, heart enough to soften and enliven the entire being. there was soul enough to keep the body beautiful through the term of earthly existence; for while the roundness, the pure, delicate lineaments, the flowery bloom of youth were passing, the marks left in the course of those years were not merely of time and care, but also of exquisite emotions and noble thoughts. with such chisels time works upon his statues, tracery and fretwork, well worth the loss of the first virgin beauty of the alabaster; while the fire within, growing constantly brighter and brighter, shows all these changes in the material, as rich and varied ornaments. the vase, at last, becomes a lamp of beauty, fit to animate the councils of the great, or the solitude of the altar. two or three women there have been, who have thus grown even more beautiful with age. we know of many more men of whom this is true. these have been heroes, or still more frequently poets and artists; with whom the habitual life tended to expand the soul, deepen and vary the experience, refine the perceptions, and immortalize the hopes and dreams of youth. they were persons who never lost their originality of character, nor spontaneity of action. their impulses proceeded from a fulness and certainty of character, that made it impossible they should doubt or repent, whatever the results of their actions might be. they could not repent, in matters little or great, because they felt that their notions were a sincere exposition of the wants of their souls. their impulsiveness was not the restless fever of one who must change his place somehow or some-whither, but the waves of a tide, which might be swelled to vehemence by the action of the winds or the influence of an attractive orb, but was none the less subject to fixed laws. a character which does not lose its freedom of motion and impulse by contact with the world, grows with its years more richly creative, more freshly individual. it is a character governed by a principle of its own, and not by rules taken from other men's experience; and therefore it is that "age cannot wither them, nor custom stale their infinite variety." like violins, they gain by age, and the spirit of him who discourseth through them most excellent music, "like wine well kept and long, heady, nor harsh, nor strong, with each succeeding year is quaffed a richer, purer, mellower draught." our french neighbors have been the object of humorous satire for their new coinage of terms to describe the heroes of their modern romance. a hero is no hero unless he has "ravaged brows," is "blase" or "brise" or "fatigue." his eyes must be languid, and his cheeks hollow. youth, health and strength, charm no more; only the tree broken by the gust of passion is beautiful, only the lamp that has burnt out the better part of its oil precious, in their eyes. this, with them, assumes the air of caricature and grimace, yet it indicates a real want of this time--a feeling that the human being ought to grow more rather than less attractive with the passage of time, and that the decrease in physical charms would, in a fair and full life, be more than compensated by an increase of those which appeal to the imagination and higher feelings. a friend complains that, while most men are like music-boxes, which you can wind up to play their set of tunes, and then they stop, in our society the set consists of only two or three tunes at most that is because no new melodies are added after five-and-twenty at farthest. it is the topic of jest and amazement with foreigners that what is called society is 'given up so much into the hands of boys and girls. accordingly it wants spirit, variety and depth of tone, and we find there no historical presences, none of the charms, infinite in variety, of cleopatra, no heads of julius caesar, overflowing with meanings, as the sun with light. sometimes we hear an educated voice that shows us how these things might be altered. it has lost the fresh tone of youth, but it has gained unspeakably in depth, brilliancy, and power of expression. how exquisite its modulations, so finely shaded, showing that all the intervals are filled up with little keys of fairy delicacy and in perfect tune! its deeper tones sound the depth of the past; its more thrilling notes express an awakening to the infinite, and ask a thousand questions of the spirits that are to unfold our destinies, too far-reaching to be clothed in words. who does not feel the sway of such a voice? it makes the whole range of our capacities resound and tremble, and, when there is positiveness enough to give an answer, calls forth most melodious echoes. the human eye gains, in like manner, by tune and experience. its substance fades, but it is only the more filled with an ethereal lustre which penetrates the gazer till he feels as if "that eye were in itself a soul," and realizes the range of its power "to rouse, to win, to fascinate, to melt, and by its spell of undefined control magnetic draw the secrets of the soul." the eye that shone beneath the white locks of thorwaldsen was such an one,--the eye of immortal youth, the indicator of the man's whole aspect in a future sphere. we have scanned such eyes closely; when near, we saw that the lids were red, the corners defaced with ominous marks, the orb looked faded and tear-stained; but when we retreated far enough for its ray to reach us, it seemed far younger than the clear and limpid gaze of infancy, more radiant than the sweetest beam in that of early youth. the future and the past met in that glance, o for more such eyes! the vouchers of free, of full and ever-growing lives! household nobleness, "mistress of herself, though china fell." women, in general, are indignant that the satirist should have made this the climax to his praise of a woman. and yet, we fear, he saw only too truly. what unexpected failures have we seen, literally, in this respect! how often did the martha blur the mary out of the face of a lovely woman at the sound of a crash amid glass and porcelain! what sad littleness in all the department thus represented! obtrusion of the mop and duster on the tranquil meditation of a husband and brother. impatience if the carpet be defaced by the feet even of cherished friends. there is a beautiful side, and a good reason here; but why must the beauty degenerate, and give place to meanness? to woman the care of home is confided. it is the sanctuary, of which she should be the guardian angel. to all elements that are introduced there she should be the "ordering mind." she represents the spirit of beauty, and her influence should be spring-like, clothing all objects within her sphere with lively, fresh and tender hues. she represents purity, and all that appertains to her should be kept delicately pure. she is modesty, and draperies should soften all rude lineaments, and exclude glare and dust. she is harmony, and all objects should be in their places ready for, and matched to, their uses. we all know that there is substantial reason for the offence we feel at defect in any of these ways. a woman who wants purity, modesty and harmony, in her dress and manners, is insufferable; one who wants them in the arrangements of her house, disagreeable to everybody. she neglects the most obvious ways of expressing what we desire to see in her, and the inference is ready, that the inward sense is wanting. it is with no merely gross and selfish feeling that all men commend the good housekeeper, the good nurse. neither is it slight praise to say of a woman that she does well the honors of her house in the way of hospitality. the wisdom that can maintain serenity, cheerfulness and order, in a little world of ten or twelve persons, and keep ready the resources that are needed for their sustenance and recovery in sickness and sorrow, is the same that holds the stars in their places, and patiently prepares the precious metals in the most secret chambers of the earth. the art of exercising a refined hospitality is a fine art, and the music thus produced only differs from that of the orchestra in this, that in the former case the overture or sonata cannot be played twice in the same manner. it requires that the hostess shall combine true self-respect and repose, "the simple art of _not too much_," with refined perception of individual traits and moods in character, with variety and vivacity, an ease, grace and gentleness, that diffuse their sweetness insensibly through every nook of an assembly, and call out reciprocal sweetness wherever there is any to be found. the only danger in all this is the same that besets us in every walk of life; to wit, that of preferring the outward sign to the inward spirit whenever there is cause to hesitate between the two. "i admire," says goethe, "the chinese novels; they express so happily ease, peace and a finish unknown to other nations in the interior arrangements of their homes. "in one of them i came upon the line, 'i heard the lovely maidens laughing, and found my way to the garden, where they were seated in their light cane-chairs,' to me this brings an immediate animation, by the images it suggests of lightness, brightness and elegance." this is most true, but it is also most true that the garden-house would not seem thus charming unless its light cane-chairs had lovely, laughing maidens seated in them. and the lady who values her porcelain, that most exquisite product of the peace and thorough-breeding of china, so highly, should take the hint, and remember that unless the fragrant herb of wit, sweetened by kindness, and softened by the cream of affability, also crown her board, the prettiest tea-cups in the world might as well lie in fragments in the gutter, as adorn her social show. the show loses its beauty when it ceases to represent a substance. here, as elsewhere, it is only vanity, narrowness and self-seeking, that spoil a good thing. women would never be too good housekeepers for their own peace and that of others, if they considered housekeeping only as a means to an end. if their object were really the peace and joy of all concerned, they could bear to have their cups and saucers broken more easily than their tempers, and to have curtains and carpets soiled, rather than their hearts by mean and small feelings. but they are brought up to think it is a disgrace to be a bad housekeeper, not because they must, by such a defect, be a cause of suffering and loss of time to all within their sphere, but because all other women will laugh at them if they are so. here is the vice,--for want of a high motive there can be no truly good action. we have seen a woman, otherwise noble and magnanimous in a high degree, so insane on this point as to weep bitterly because she found a little dust on her picture-frames, and torment her guests all dinner-time with excuses for the way in which the dinner was cooked. we have known others to join with their servants to backbite the best and noblest friends for trifling derelictions against the accustomed order of the house. the broom swept out the memory of much sweet counsel and loving-kindness, and spots on the table-cloth were more regarded than those they made on their own loyalty and honor in the most intimate relations. "the worst of furies is a woman scorned," and the sex, so lively, mobile, impassioned, when passion is aroused at all, are in danger of frightful error, under great temptation. the angel can give place to a more subtle and treacherous demon, though one, generally, of less tantalizing influence, than in the breast of man. in great crises, woman needs the highest reason to restrain her; but her besetting sin is that of littleness. just because nature and society unite to call on her for such fineness and finish, she can be so petty, so fretful, so vain, envious and base! o, women, see your danger! see how much you need a great object in all your little actions. you cannot be fair, nor can your homes be fair, unless you are holy and noble. will you sweep and garnish the house, only that it may be ready for a legion of evil spirits to enter in--for imps and demons of gossip, frivolity, detraction, and a restless fever about small ills? what is the house for, if good spirits cannot peacefully abide there? lo! they are asking for the bill in more than one well-garnished mansion. they sought a home and found a work-house. martha! it was thy fault! "glumdalclitches." this title was wittily given by an editor of this city to the ideal woman demanded in "woman in the nineteenth century." we do not object to it, thinking it is really desirable that women should grow beyond the average size which has been prescribed for them. we find in the last news from paris these anecdotes of two who "tower" an inch or more "above their sex," if not yet of glumdalclitch stature. "_bravissima!_--the th of may, at paris, a young girl, who was washing linen, fell into the canal st. martin. those around called out for help, but none ventured to give it. just then a young lady elegantly dressed came up and saw the case; in the twinkling of an eye she threw off her hat and shawl, threw herself in, and succeeded in dragging the young girl to the brink, after having sought for her in vain several times under the water. this lady was mlle. adele chevalier, an actress. she was carried, with the girl she had saved, into a neighboring house, which she left, after having received the necessary cares, in a fiacre, and amid the plaudits of the crowd." the second anecdote is of a different kind, but displays a kind of magnanimity still more unusual in this poor servile world: "one of our (french) most distinguished painters of sea-subjects, gudin, has married a rich young english lady, belonging to a family of high rank, and related to the duke of wellington. m. gudin was lately at berlin at the same time with k----, inspector of pictures to the king of holland. the king of prussia desired that both artists should be presented to him, and received gudin in a very flattering manner; his genius being his only letter of recommendation. "monsieur k---- has not the same advantage; but, to make up for it, he has a wife who enjoys in holland a great reputation for her beauty. the king of prussia is a cavalier, who cares more for pretty ladies than for genius. so monsieur and madame k---- were invited to the royal table--an honor which was not accorded to monsieur and madame gudin. "humble representations were made to the monarch, advising him not to make such a marked distinction between the french artist and the dutch amateur. these failing, the wise counsellors went to madame gudin, and, intimating that they did so with the good-will of the king, said that she might be received as cousin to the duke of wellington, as daughter of an english general, and of a family which dates back to the thirteenth century. she could, if she wished, avail herself of her rights of birth to obtain the same honors with madame k----. to sit at the table of the king, she need only cease for a moment to be madame gudin, and become once more lady l----." does not all this sound like a history of the seventeenth century? surely etiquette was never maintained in a more arrogant manner at the court of louis xiv. but madame gudin replied that her highest pride lay in the celebrated name which she bears at present; that she did not wish to rely on any other to obtain so futile a distinction, and that, in her eyes, the most noble escutcheon was the palette of her husband. i need not say that this dignified feeling was not comprehended. madame gudin was not received at the table, but she had shown the nobleness of her character. for the rest, madame k----, on arriving at paris, had the bad taste to boast of having been distinguished above madame gudin, and the story reaching the tuileries, where monsieur and madame gudin are highly favored, excited no little mirth in the circle there. "ellen: or, forgive and forget." we notice this coarsely-written little fiction because it is one of a class which we see growing with pleasure. we see it with pleasure, because, in its way, it is genuine. it is a transcript of the crimes, calumnies, excitements, half-blind love of right, and honest indignation at the sort of wrong which it can discern, to be found in the class from which it emanates. that class is a large one in our country villages, and these books reflect its thoughts and manners as half-penny ballads do the life of the streets of london. the ballads are not more true to the facts; but they give us, in a coarser form, far more of the spirit than we get from the same facts reflected in the intellect of a dickens, for instance, or of any writer far enough above the scene to be properly its artist. so, in this book, we find what cooper, miss sedgwick and mrs. kirkland, might see, as the writer did, but could hardly believe in enough to speak of it with such fidelity. it is a current superstition that country people are more pure and healthy in mind and body than those who live in cities. it may be so in countries of old-established habits, where a genuine peasantry have inherited some of the practical wisdom and loyalty of the past, with most of its errors. we have our doubts, though, from the stamp upon literature, always the nearest evidence of truth we can get, whether, even there, the difference between town and country life is as much in favor of the latter as is generally supposed. but in our land, where the country is at present filled with a mixed population, who come seeking to be purified by a better life and culture from all the ills and diseases of the worst forms of civilization, things often _look_ worse than in the city; perhaps because men have more time and room to let their faults grow and offend the light of day. there are exceptions, and not a few; but, in a very great proportion of country villages, the habits of the people, as to food, air, and even exercise, are ignorant and unhealthy to the last degree. their want of all pure faith, and appetite for coarse excitement, is shown by continued intrigues, calumnies, and crimes. we have lived in a beautiful village, where, more favorably placed than any other person in it, both as to withdrawal from bad associations and nearness to good, we heard inevitably, from domestics, work-people, and school-children, more ill of human nature than we could possibly sift were we to elect such a task from all the newspapers of this city, in the same space of time. we believe the amount of ill circulated by means of anonymous letters, as described in this book, to be as great as can be imported in all the french novels (and that is a bold word). we know ourselves of two or three cases of morbid wickedness, displayed by means of anonymous letters, that may vie with what puzzled the best wits of france in a famous law-suit not long since. it is true, there is, to balance all this, a healthy rebound,--a surprise and a shame; and there are heartily good people, such as are described in this book, who, having taken a direction upward, keep it, and cannot be bent downward nor aside. but, then, the reverse of the picture is of a blackness that would appall one who came to it with any idyllic ideas of the purity and peaceful loveliness of agricultural life. but what does this prove? only the need of a dissemination of all that is best, intellectually and morally, through the whole people. our groves and fields have no good fairies or genii who teach, by legend or gentle apparition, the truths, the principles, that can alone preserve the village, as the city, from the possession of the fiend. their place must be taken by the school-master, and he must be one who knows not only "readin', writin', and 'rithmetic," but the service of god and the destiny of man. our people require a thoroughly-diffused intellectual life, a religious aim, such as no people at large ever possessed before; else they must sink till they become dregs, rather than rise to become the cream of creation, which they are too apt to flatter themselves with the fancy of being already. the most interesting fiction we have ever read in this coarse, homely, but genuine class, is one called "metallek." it may be in circulation in this city; but we bought it in a country nook, and from a pedlar; and it seemed to belong to the country. had we met with it in any other way, it would probably have been to throw it aside again directly, for the author does not know how to write english, and the first chapters give no idea of his power of apprehending the poetry of life. but happening to read on, we became fixed and charmed, and have retained from its perusal the sweetest picture of life lived in this land, ever afforded us, out of the pale of personal observation. that such things are, private observation has made us sure; but the writers of books rarely seem to have seen them; rarely to have walked alone in an untrodden path long enough to hold commune with the spirit of the scene. in this book you find the very life; the most vulgar prose, and the most exquisite poetry. you follow the hunter in his path, walking through the noblest and fairest scenes only to shoot the poor animals that were happy there, winning from the pure atmosphere little benefit except to good appetite, sleeping at night in the dirty hovels, with people who burrow in them to lead a life but little above that of the squirrels end foxes. there is throughout that air of room enough, and free if low forms of human nature, which, at such times, makes bearable all that would otherwise be so repulsive. but when we come to the girl who is the presiding deity, or rather the tutelary angel of the scene, how are all discords harmonized; how all its latent music poured forth! it is a portrait from the life--it has the mystic charm of fulfilled reality, how far beyond the fairest ideals ever born of thought! pure, and brilliantly blooming as the flower of the wilderness, she, in like manner, shares while she sublimes its nature. she plays round the most vulgar and rude beings, gentle and caressing, yet unsullied; in her wildness there is nothing cold or savage; her elevation is soft and warm. never have we seen natural religion more beautifully expressed; never so well discerned the influence of the natural nun, who needs no veil or cloister to guard from profanation the beauty she has dedicated to god, and which only attracts human love to hallow it into the divine. the lonely life of the girl after the death of her parents,--her fearlessness, her gay and sweet enjoyment of nature, her intercourse with the old people of the neighborhood, her sisterly conduct towards her "suitors,"--all seem painted from the life; but the death-bed scene seems borrowed from some sermon, and is not in harmony with the rest. in this connection we must try to make amends for the stupidity of an earlier notice of the novel, called "margaret, or the real and ideal," &c. at the time of that notice we had only looked into it here and there, and did no justice to a work full of genius, profound in its meaning, and of admirable fidelity to nature in its details. since then we have really read it, and appreciated the sight and representation of soul-realities; and we have lamented the long delay of so true a pleasure. a fine critic said, "this is a yankee novel; or rather let it be called _the_ yankee novel, as nowhere else are the thought and dialect of our villages really represented." another discovered that it must have been written in maine, by the perfection with which peculiar features of scenery there are described. a young girl could not sufficiently express her delight at the simple nature with which scenes of childhood are given, and especially at margaret's first going to meeting. she had never elsewhere found written down what she had felt. a mature reader, one of the most spiritualized and harmonious minds we have ever met, admires the depth and fulness in which the workings of the spirit through the maiden's life are seen by the author, and shown to us; but laments the great apparatus with which the consummation of the whole is brought about, and the formation of a new church and state, before the time is yet ripe, under the banner of mons. christi. but all these voices, among those most worthy to be heard, find in the book a _real presence_, and draw from it auspicious omens that an american literature is possible even in our day, because there are already in the mind here existent developments worthy to see the light, gold-fishes amid the moss in the still waters. for ourselves, we have been most charmed with the way the real and ideal are made to weave and shoot rays through one another, in which margaret bestows on external nature what she receives through books, and wins back like gifts in turn, till the pond and the mythology are alternate sections of the same chapter. we delight in the teachings she receives through chilion and his violin, till on the grave of "one who tried to love his fellow-men" grows up the full white rose-flower of her life. the ease with which she assimilates the city life when in it, making it a part of her imaginative tapestry, is a sign of the power to which she has grown. we have much more to think and to say of the book, as a whole, and in parts; and should the mood and summer leisure ever permit a familiar and intimate acquaintance with it, we trust they will be both thought and said. for the present, we will only add that it exhibits the same state of things, and strives to point out such remedies as we have hinted at in speaking of the little book which heads this notice; itself a rude charcoal sketch, but if read as hieroglyphics are, pointing to important meanings and results. "courrier des etats unis." no other nation can hope to vie with the french in the talent of communicating information with ease, vivacity and consciousness. they must always be the best narrators and the best interpreters, so far as presenting a clear statement of outlines goes. thus they are excellent in conversation, lectures, and journalizing. after we know all the news of the day, it is still pleasant to read the bulletin of the _"courrier des etats unis."_ we rarely agree with the view taken; but as a summary it is so excellently well done, every topic put in its best place, with such a light and vigorous hand, that we have the same pleasure we have felt in fairy tales, when some person under trial is helped by a kind fairy to sort the silks and feathers to their different places, till the glittering confusion assumes the order,--of a kaleidoscope. then, what excellent correspondents they have in paris! what a humorous and yet clear account we have before us, now, of the thiers game! we have traced guizot through every day with the utmost distinctness, and see him perfectly in the sick-room. now, here is thiers, playing with his chess-men, jesuits, &c. a hundred clumsy english or american papers could not make the present crisis in paris so clear as we see it in the glass of these nimble frenchmen. certainly it is with newspaper-writing as with food; the english and americans have as good appetites, but do not, and never will, know so well how to cook as the french. the parisian correspondent of the _"schnellpost"_ also makes himself merry with the play of m. thiers. both speak with some feeling of the impressive utterance of lamartine in the late debates. the jesuits stand their ground, but there is a wave advancing which will not fail to wash away what ought to go,--nor are its roarings, however much in advance of the wave itself, to be misinterpreted by intelligent ears. the world is raising its sleepy lids, and soon no organization can exist which from its very nature interferes in any way with the good of the whole. in germany the terrors of the authorities are more and more directed against the communists. they are very anxious to know what communism really is, or means. they have almost forgotten, says the correspondent, the repression of the jews, and like objects, in this new terror. meanwhile, the russian emperor has issued an edict, commanding the polish jews, both men and women, to lay aside their national garb. he hopes thus to mingle them with the rest of the mass he moves. it will be seen whether such work can be done by beginning upon the outward man. the paris correspondent of the _"courrier,"_ who gives an account of amusements, has always many sprightly passages illustrative of the temper of the times. horse-races are now the fashion, in which he rejoices, as being likely to give to france good horses of her own. a famous lottery is on the point of coming off,--to give an organ to the church of st. eustache,--on which it does not require a very high tone of morals to be severe. a public exhibition has been made of the splendid array of prizes, including every article of luxury, from jewels and cashmere shawls down to artificial flowers. a nobleman, president of the horticultural society, had given an entertainment, in which the part of the different flowers was acted by beautiful women, that of fruit and vegetables by distinguished men. such an amusement would admit of much light grace and wit, which may still be found in france, if anywhere in the world. there is also an amusing story of the stir caused among the french political leaders by the visit of a nobleman of one of the great english families, to paris. "he had had several audiences, previous to his departure from london, of queen victoria; he received a despatch daily from the english court. but in reply to all overtures made to induce him to open his mission, he preserved a gloomy silence. all attentions, all signs of willing confidence, are lavished on him in vain. france is troubled. 'has england,' thought she, 'a secret from us, while we have none from her?' she was on the point of inventing one, when, lo! the secret mission turns out to be the preparation of a ball-dress, with whose elegance, fresh from parisian genius, her britannic majesty wished to dazzle and surprise her native realm." 't is a pity americans cannot learn the grace which decks these trifling jests with so much prettiness. till we can import something of that, we have no right to rejoice in french fashions and french wines. such a nervous, driving nation as we are, ought to learn to fly along gracefully, on the light, fantastic toe. can we not learn something of the english beside the knife and fork conventionalities which, with them, express a certain solidity of fortune and resolve? can we not get from the french something beside their worst novels? "courrier des etats unis." our protegee, queen victoria. the _courrier_ laughs, though with features somewhat too disturbed for a graceful laugh, at a notice, published a few days since in the _tribune_, of one of its jests which scandalized the american editor. it does not content itself with a slight notice, but puts forth a manifesto, in formidably large type, in reply. with regard to the jest itself, we must remark that mr. greeley saw this only in a translation, where it had lost whatever of light and graceful in its manner excused a piece of raillery very coarse in its substance. we will admit that, had he seen it as it originally stood, connected with other items in the playful chronicle of pierre durand, it would have impressed him differently. but the cause of irritation in the _courrier_, and of the sharp repartees of its manifesto, is, probably, what was said of the influence among us of "french literature and french morals," to which the "organ of the french-american population" felt called on to make a spirited reply, and has done so with less of wit and courtesy than could have been expected from the organ of a people who, whatever may be their faults, are at least acknowledged in wit and courtesy preeminent. we hope that the french who come to us will not become, in these respects, americanized, and substitute the easy sneer, and use of such terms as "ridiculous," "virtuous misanthropy," &c., for the graceful and poignant raillery of their native land, which tickles even where it wounds. we may say, in reply to the _courrier_, that if fourierism "recoils towards a state of nature," it arises largely from the fact that its author lived in a country where the natural relations are, if not more cruelly, at least more lightly violated, than in any other of the civilized world. the marriage of convention has done its natural office in sapping the morals of france, till breach of the marriage vow has become one of the chief topics of its daily wit, one of the acknowledged traits of its manners, and a favorite--in these modern times we might say the favorite--subject of its works of fiction. from the time of moliere, himself an agonized sufferer behind his comic mask from the infidelities of a wife he was not able to cease to love, through memoirs, novels, dramas, and the volleyed squibs of the press, one fact stares us in the face as one of so common occurrence, that men, if they have not ceased to suffer in heart and morals from its poisonous action, have yet learned to bear with a shrug and a careless laugh that marks its frequency. understand, we do not say that the french are the most deeply stained with vice of all nations. we do not think them so. there are others where there is as much, but there is none where it is so openly acknowledged in literature, and therefore there is none whose literature alone is so likely to deprave inexperienced minds, by familiarizing them with wickedness before they have known the lure and the shock of passion. and we believe that this is the very worst way for youth to be misled, since the miasma thus pervades the whole man, and he is corrupted in head and heart at once, without one strengthening effort at resistance. were it necessary, we might substantiate what we say by quoting from the _courrier_ within the last fortnight, jokes and stories such as are not to be found so _frequently_ in the prints of any other nation. there is the story of the girl adelaide, which, at another time, we mean to quote, for its terrible pathos. there is a man on trial for the murder of his wife, of whom the witnesses say, "he was so fond of her you would never have known she was his wife!" here is one, only yesterday, where a man kills a woman to whom he was married by his relatives at eighteen, she being much older, and disagreeable to him, but their properties matching. after twelve years' marriage, he can no longer support the yoke, and kills both her and her father, and "his only regret is that he cannot kill all who had anything to do with the match." either infidelity or such crimes are the natural result of marriages made as they are in france, by agreement between the friends, without choice of the parties. it is this horrible system, and not a native incapacity for pure and permanent relations, that leads to such results. we must observe, _en passant_, that this man was the father of five children by this hated woman--a wickedness not peculiar to france or any nation, and which cannot foil to do its work of filling the world with sickly, weak, or depraved beings, who have reason to curse their brutal father that he does not murder them as well as their wretched mother,--who, more unhappy than the victim of seduction, is made the slave of sense in the name of religion and law. the last steamer brings us news of the disgrace of victor hugo, one of the most celebrated of the literary men of france, and but lately created one of her peers. the affair, however, is to be publicly "hushed up." but we need not cite many instances to prove, what is known to the whole world, that these wrongs are, if not more frequent, at least more lightly treated by the french, in literature and discourse, than by any nation of europe. this being the case, can an american, anxious that his country should receive, as her only safeguard from endless temptations, good moral instruction and mental food, be otherwise than grieved at the promiscuous introduction among us of their writings? we know that there are in france good men, pure books, true wit. but there is an immensity that is bad, and more hurtful to our farmers, clerks and country milliners, than to those to whose tastes it was originally addressed,--as the small-pox is most fatal among the wild men of the woods,--and this, from the unprincipled cupidity of publishers, is broad-cast recklessly over all the land we had hoped would become a healthy asylum for those before crippled and tainted by hereditary abuses. this cannot be prevented; we can only make head against it, and show that there is really another way of thinking and living,--ay, and another voice for it in the world. we are naturally on the alert, and if we sometimes start too quickly, that is better than to play "_le noir faineant_"--(the black sluggard). we are displeased at the unfeeling manner in which the _courrier_ speaks of those whom he calls _our models_. he did not misunderstand us, and some things he says on this subject deserve and suggest a retort that would be bitter. but we forbear, because it would injure the innocent with the guilty. the _courrier_ ranks the editor of the _tribune_ among "the men who have undertaken an ineffectual struggle against the perversities of this lower world." by _ineffectual_ we presume he means that it has never succeeded in exiling evil from this lower world. we are proud to be ranked among the band of those who at least, in the ever-memorable words of scripture, have "done what they could" for this purpose. to this band belong all good men of all countries, and france has contributed no small contingent of those whose purpose was noble, whose lives were healthy, and whose minds, even in their lightest moods, pure. we are better pleased to act as sutler or pursuivant of this band, whose strife the _courrier_ thinks so _impuissante_, than to reap the rewards of efficiency on the other side. there is not too much of this salt, in proportion to the whole mass that needs to be salted, nor are "occasional accesses of virtuous misanthropy" the worst of maladies in a world that affords such abundant occasion for it. in fine, we disclaim all prejudice against the french nation. we feel assured that all, or almost all, impartial minds will acquiese in what we say as to the tone of lax morality, in reference to marriage, so common in their literature. we do not like it, in joke or in earnest; neither are we of those to whom vice "loses most of its deformity by losing all its grossness." if there be a deep and ulcerated wound, we think the more "the richly-embroidered veil" is torn away the better. such a deep social wound exists in france; we wish its cure, as we wish the health of all nations and of all men; so far indeed would we "recoil towards a state of nature." we believe that nature wills marriage and parentage to be kept sacred. the fact of their not being so is to us not a pleasant subject of jest; and we should really pity the first lady of england for injury here, though she be a queen; while the ladies of the french court, or of parisian society, if they willingly lend themselves to be the subject of this style of jest, or find it agreeable when made, must be to us the cause both of pity, and disgust. we are not unaware of the great and beautiful qualities native to the french--of their chivalry, their sweetness of temper, their rapid, brilliant and abundant genius. we would wish to see these qualities restored to their native lustre, and not receive the base alloy which has long stained the virginity of the gold. on books of travel. [footnote: it need not be said, probably, that margaret fuller did not think the fact that books of travel by women have generally been piquant and lively rather than discriminating and instructive, a result of their nature, and therefore unavoidable; on the contrary, she regarded woman as naturally more penetrating than man, and the fact that in journeying she would see more of home-life than he, would give her a great advantage,--but she did believe woman needed a wider culture, and then she would not fail to _excel_ in writing books of travels. the merits now in such works she considered striking and due to woman's natural quickness and availing herself of all her facilities, and any deficiencies simply proved the need of a broader education.--[edit.]] among those we have, the best, as to observation of particulars and lively expression, are by women. they are generally ill prepared as regards previous culture, and their scope is necessarily narrower than that of men, but their tact and quickness help them a great deal. you can see their minds grow by what they feed on, when they travel. there are many books of travel, by women, that are, at least, entertaining, and contain some penetrating and just observations. there has, however, been none since lady mary wortley montague, with as much talent, liveliness, and preparation to observe in various ways, as she had. a good article appeared lately in one of the english periodicals, headed by a long list of travels by women. it was easy to observe that the personality of the writer was the most obvious thing in each and all of these books, and that, even in the best of them, you travelled with the writer as a charming or amusing companion, rather than as an accomplished or instructed guide. review of "memoirs and essays, by mrs. jameson." mrs. jameson appears to be growing more and more desperately modest, if we may judge from the motto: "what if the little rain should say, 'so small a drop as i can ne'er refresh the thirsty plain,-- i'll tarry in the sky'" and other superstitious doubts and disclaimers proffered in the course of the volume. we thought the time had gone by when it was necessary to plead "request of friends" for printing, and that it was understood now-a-days that, from the facility of getting thoughts into print, literature has become not merely an archive for the preservation of great thoughts, but a means of general communication between all classes of minds, and all grades of culture. if writers write much that is good, and write it well, they are read much and long; if the reverse, people simply pass them by, and go in search of what is more interesting. there needs be no great fuss about publishing or not publishing. those who forbear may rather be considered the vain ones, who wish to be distinguished among the crowd. especially this extreme modesty looks superfluous in a person who knows her thoughts have been received with interest for ten or twelve years back. we do not like this from mrs. jameson, because we think she would be amazed if others spoke of her as this little humble flower, doubtful whether it ought to raise its head to the light. she should leave such affectations to her aunts; they were the fashion in their day. it is very true, however, that she should _not_ have published the very first paragraph in her book, which presents an inaccuracy and shallowness of thought quite amazing in a person of her fine perceptions, talent and culture. we allude to the contrast she attempts to establish between raphael and titian, in placing mind in contradistinction to beauty, as if beauty were merely physical. of course she means no such thing; but the passage means this or nothing, and, as an opening to a paper on art, is indeed reprehensible and fallacious. the rest of this paper, called the house of titian, is full of pleasant chat, though some of the judgments--that passed on canaletti's pictures, for instance--are opposed to those of persons of the purest taste; and in other respects, such as in speaking of the railroad to venice, mrs. jameson is much less wise than those over whom she assumes superiority. the railroad will destroy venice; the two things cannot coexist; and those who do not look upon that wondrous dream in this age, will, probably, find only vestiges of its existence. the picture of adelaide kemble is very pretty, though there is an attempt of a sort too common with mrs. jameson to make more of the subject than it deserves. adelaide kemble was not the true artist, or she could not so soon or so lightly have stept into another sphere. it is enough to paint her as a lovely woman, and a woman-genius. the true artist cannot forswear his vocation; heaven does not permit it; the attempt makes him too unhappy, nor will he form ties with those who can consent to such sacrilege. adelaide kemble loved art, but was not truly an artist. the "xanthian marbles," and "washington allston," are very pleasing papers. the most interesting part, however, are the sentences copied from mr. allston. these have his chaste, superior tone. we copy some of them. "what _light_ is in the natural world, such is _fame_ in the intellectual,--both requiring an _atmosphere_ in order to become perceptible. hence the fame of michel angelo is to some minds a nonentity; even as the sun itself would be invisible _in vacuo_" (a very pregnant statement, containing the true reason why "no man is a hero to his valet de chambre.") "fame does not depend on the will of any man; but reputation may be given and taken away; for fame is the sympathy of kindred intellects, and sympathy is not a subject of _willing_; while reputation, having its source in the popular voice, is a sentence which may be altered or suppressed at pleasure. reputation, being essentially contemporaneous, is always at the mercy of the envious and ignorant. but fame, whose very birth is posthumous, and which is only known to exist by the echoes of its footsteps through congenial minds, can neither be increased nor diminished by any degree of wilfulness." "an original mind is rarely understood until it has been _reflected_ from some half-dozen congenial with it; so averse are men to admitting the true in an unusual form; while any novelty, however fantastic, however false, is greedily swallowed. nor is this to be wondered at, for all truth demands a response, and few people care to _think_, yet they must have something to supply the place of thought. every mind would appear original if every man had the power of projecting his own into the minds of others." "all effort at originality must end either in the quaint or monstrous; for no man knows himself as on original; he can only believe it on the report of others to whom he is made known, as he is by the projecting power before spoken of." "there is an essential meanness in wishing to get the better of any one. the only competition worthy of a wise man is with himself." "reverence is an ennobling sentiment; it is felt to be degrading only by the vulgar mind, which would escape the sense of its own littleness by elevating itself into the antagonist of what is above it." "he that has no pleasure in looking up is not fit to look down; of such minds are the mannerists in art, and in the world--the tyrants of all sorts." "make no man your idol; for the best man must have faults, and his faults will naturally become yours, in addition to your own. this is as true in art as in morals." "the devil's heartiest laugh is at a detracting witticism. hence the phrase 'devilish good' has sometimes a literal meaning." "woman's mission and woman's position" is an excellent paper, in which plain truths ere spoken with an honorable straight-forwardness, and a great deal of good feeling. we despise the woman who, knowing such facts, is afraid to speak of them; yet we honor one, too, who does the plain right thing, for she exposes herself to the assaults of vulgarity, in a way painful to a person who has not strength to find shelter and repose in her motives. we recommend this paper to the consideration of all those, the unthinking, wilfully unseeing million, who are in the habit of talking of "woman's sphere," as if it really were, at present, for the majority, one of protection, and the gentle offices of home. the rhetorical gentlemen and silken dames, who, quite forgetting their washerwomen, their seamstresses, and the poor hirelings for the sensual pleasures of man, that jostle them daily in the streets, talk as if women need be fitted for no other chance than that of growing like cherished flowers in the garden of domestic love, are requested to look at this paper, in which the state of women, both in the manufacturing and agricultural districts of england, is exposed with eloquence, and just inferences drawn. "this, then, is what i mean when i speak of the anomalous condition of women in these days. i would point out, as a primary source of incalculable mischief, the contradiction between her assumed and her real position; between what is called her proper sphere by the laws of god and nature, and what has become her real sphere by the laws of necessity, and through the complex relations of artificial existence. in the strong language of carlyle, i would say that 'here is a lie standing up in the midst of society.' i would say 'down with it, even to the ground;' for while this perplexing and barbarous anomaly exists, fretting like an ulcer at the very heart of society, all new specifics and palliatives are in vain. the question must be settled one way or another; either let the man in all the relations of life be held the natural guardian of the woman, constrained to fulfil that trust, responsible in society for her well-being and her maintenance; or, if she be liable to be thrust from the sanctuary of home, to provide for herself through the exercise of such faculties as god has given her, let her at least have fair play; let it not be avowed, in the same breath that protection is necessary to her, and that it is refused her; and while we send her forth into the desert, and bind the burthen on her back, and put the staff in her hand, let not her steps be beset, her limbs fettered, and her eyes blindfolded." amen. the sixth and last of these papers, on the relative social position of "mothers and governesses," exhibits in true and full colors a state of things in england, beside which the custom in some parts of china of drowning female infants looks mild, generous, and refined;--an accursed state of things, beneath whose influence nothing can, and nothing ought to thrive. though this paper, of which we have not patience to speak further at this moment, is valuable from putting the facts into due relief, it is very inferior to the other, and shows the want of thoroughness and depth in mrs. jameson's intellect. she has taste, feeling and knowledge, but she cannot think out a subject thoroughly, and is unconsciously tainted and hampered by conventionalities. her advice to the governesses reads like a piece of irony, but we believe it was not meant as such. advise them to be burnt at the stake at once, rather than submit to this slow process of petrifaction. she is as bad as the reports of the "society for the relief of distressed and dilapidated governesses." we have no more patience. we must go to england ourselves, and see these victims under the water torture. till then, a dieu! woman's influence over the insane. in reference to what is said of entrusting an infant to the insane, we must relate a little tale which touched the heart in childhood from the eloquent lips of the mother. the minister of the village had a son of such uncommon powers that the slender means on which the large family lived were strained to the utmost to send him to college. the boy prized the means of study as only those under such circumstances know how to prize them; indeed, far beyond their real worth; since, by excessive study, prolonged often at the expense of sleep, he made himself insane. all may conceive the feelings of the family when their star returned to them again, shorn of its beams; their pride, their hard-earned hope, sunk to a thing so hopeless, so helpless, that there could be none so poor to do him reverence. but they loved him, and did what the ignorance of the time permitted. there was little provision then for the treatment of such cases, and what there was was of a kind that they shrunk from resorting to, if it could be avoided. they kept him at home, giving him, during the first months, the freedom of the house; but on his making an attempt to kill his father, and confessing afterwards that his old veneration had, as is so often the case in these affections, reacted morbidly to its opposite, so that he never saw a once-loved parent turn his back without thinking how he could rush upon him and do him an injury, they felt obliged to use harsher measures, and chained him to a post in one room of the house. there, so restrained, without exercise or proper medicine, the fever of insanity came upon him in its wildest form. he raved, shrieked, struck about him, and tore off all the raiment that was put upon him. one of his sisters, named lucy, whom he had most loved when well, had now power to soothe him. he would listen to her voice, and give way to a milder mood when she talked or sang. but this favorite sister married, went to her new home, and the maniac became wilder, more violent than ever. after two or three years, she returned, bringing with her on infant. she went into the room where the naked, blaspheming, raging object was confined. he knew her instantly, and felt joy at seeing her. "but, lucy," said he, suddenly, "is that your baby you have in your arms? give it to me, i want to hold it!" a pang of dread and suspicion shot through the young mother's heart,--she turned pale and faint. her brother was not at that moment so mad that he could not understand her fears. "lucy," said he, "do you suppose i would hurt _your_ child?" his sister had strength of mind and of heart; she could not resist the appeal, and hastily placed the child in his arms. poor fellow! he held it awhile, stroked its little face, and melted into tears, the first he had shed since his insanity. for some time after that he was better, and probably, had he been under such intelligent care as may be had at present, the crisis might have been followed up, and a favorable direction given to his disease. but the subject was not understood then, and, having once fallen mad, he was doomed to live and die a madman. from a criticism on browning's poems. * * * * "the return of the druses," a "blot in the 'scutcheon," and "colombo's birthday," all have the same originality of conception, delicate penetration into the mysteries of human feeling, atmospheric individuality, and skill in picturesque detail. all three exhibit very high and pure ideas of woman, and a knowledge, very rare in man, of the ways in which what is peculiar in her office and nature works. her loftiest elevation does not, in his eyes, lift her out of nature. she becomes, not a mere saint, but the goddess-queen of nature. her purity is not cold, like marble, but the healthy, gentle energy of the flower, instinctively rejecting what is not fit for it, with no need of disdain to dig a gulf between it and the lower forms of creation. her office to man is that of the muse, inspiring him to all good thoughts and deeds. the passions that sometimes agitate these maidens of his verso are the surprises of noble hearts unprepared for evil; and even their mistakes cannot cost bitter tears to their attendant angels. the girl in the "return of the druses" is the sort of nature byron tried to paint in myrrha. but byron could only paint women as they were to him. browning can show what they are in themselves. in "a blot in the 'scutcheon," we see a lily, storm-struck, half-broken, but still a lily. in "colombe's birthday," a queenly rose-bud, which expands into the full-glowing rose before our eyes. it is marvellous in this drama how the characters are unfolded to us by the crisis, which not only exhibits, but calls to life, the higher passions and the thoughts which were latent within them. we bless the poet for these pictures of women, which, however the common tone of society, by the grossness and levity of the remarks bandied from tongue to tongue, would seem to say to the contrary, declare there is still in the breasts of men a capacity for pure and exalting passion,--for immortal tenderness. of browning's delicate sheaths of meaning within meaning, which must be opened slowly, petal by petal, as we seek the heart of a flower, and the spirit-like, distant breathings of his lute, familiar with the secrets of shores distant and enchanted, a sense can only be gained by reading him a great deal; and we wish "bells and pomegranates" might be brought within the reach of all who have time and soul to wait and listen for such! christmas. our festivals come rather too near together, since we have so few of them;--thanksgiving, christmas-day, new-years'-day, and then none again till july. we know not but these four, with the addition of a "day set apart for fasting and prayer," might answer the purposes of rest and edification as well as a calendar full of saints' days, if they were observed in a better spirit. but, thanksgiving is devoted to good dinners; christmas and new-years' days to making presents and compliments; fast-day to playing at cricket and other games, and the fourth of july to boasting of the past, rather than to plans how to deserve its benefits and secure its fruits. we value means of marking time by appointed days, because man, on one side of his nature so ardent and aspiring, is on the other so indolent and slippery a being, that he needs incessant admonitions to redeem the time. time flows on steadily, whether _he_ regards it or not; yet, unless _he keep time_, there is no music in that flow. the sands drop with inevitable speed; yet each waits long enough to receive, if it be ready, the intellectual touch that should turn it to a sand of gold. time, says the grecian fable, is the parent of power, power is the father of genius and wisdom. time, then, is grandfather of the noblest of the human family; and we must respect the aged sire whom we see on the frontispiece of the almanacs, and believe his scythe was meant to mow down harvests ripened for an immortal use. yet the best provision made by the mind of society at large for these admonitions soon loses its efficacy, and requires that individual earnestness, individual piety, should continually reinforce the most beautiful form. the world has never seen arrangements which might more naturally offer good suggestions than those of the church of rome. the founders of that church stood very near a history radiant at every page with divine light. all their rites and ceremonial days illustrate facts of an universal interest. but the life with which piety first, and afterwards the genius of great artists, invested these symbols, waned at last, except to a thoughtful few. reverence was forgotten in the multitude of genuflexions; the rosary became a string of beads rather than a series of religious meditations; and the "glorious company of saints and martyrs" were not regarded so much as the teachers of heavenly truth, as intercessors to obtain for their votaries the temporal gifts they craved. yet we regret that some of those symbols had not been more reverenced by protestants, as the possible occasion of good thoughts, and, among others, we regret that the day set apart to commemorate the birth of jesus should have been stript, even by those who observe it, of many impressive and touching accessories. if ever there was an occasion on which the arts could become all but omnipotent in the service of a holy thought, it is this of the birth of the child jesus. in the palmy days of the catholic religion they may be said to have wrought miracles in its behalf; and in our colder time, when we rather reflect that light from a different point of view than transport ourselves into it, who, that has an eye and ear faithful to the soul, is not conscious of inexhaustible benefits from some of the works by which sublime geniuses have expressed their ideas?--in the adorations of the magi and the shepherds, in the virgin with the infant jesus, or that work which expresses what christendom at large has not begun to realize,--that work which makes us conscious, as we listen, why the soul of man was thought worthy and able to upbear a cross of such dreadful weight,--the messiah of handel. christmas would seem to be the day peculiarly sacred to children; and something of this feeling is beginning to show itself among us, though rather from german influence than of native growth. the ever-green tree is often reared for the children on christmas evening, and its branches cluster with little tokens that may, at least, give them a sense that the world is rich, and that there are some in it who care to bless them. it is a charming sight to see their glistening eyes, and well worth much trouble in preparing the christmas-tree. yet, on this occasion, as on all others, we should like to see pleasure offered to them in a form less selfish than it is. when shall we read of banquets prepared for the halt, the lame, and the blind, on the day that is said to have brought _their_ friend into the world? when will children be taught to ask all the cold and ragged little ones whom they have seen during the day wistfully gazing at the shop-windows, to share the joys of christmas-eve? we borrow the christmas-tree from germany; might we but borrow with it that feeling which pervades all their stories, about the influence of the christ-child, and has, i doubt not (for the spirit of literature is always, though refined, the essence of popular life), pervaded the conduct of children there. we will mention two of these as happily expressive of different sides of the desirable character. one is a legend of the saint hermann joseph. the legend runs that this saint, when a little boy, passed daily by a niche where was an image of the virgin and child, and delighted there to pay his devotions. his heart was so drawn towards the holy child that one day, having received what seemed to him a gift truly precious, a beautiful red and yellow apple, he ventured to offer it, with his prayer. to his unspeakable delight the child put forth his hand and took the apple. after that day, never was a gift bestowed upon the little hermann, that was not carried to the same place. he needed nothing for himself, but dedicated all his childish goods to the altar. after a while he was in trouble. his father, who was a poor man, found it necessary to take him from school, and bind him to a trade. he communicated his woes to his friends of the niche, and the virgin comforted him like a mother, and bestowed on him money, by means of which he rose to be a learned and tender shepherd of men. another still more touching story is that of the holy rupert. rupert was the only child of a princely house, and had something to give besides apples. but his generosity and human love were such that, as a child, he could never see poor children suffering without despoiling himself of all he had with him in their behalf. his mother was, at first, displeased with this; but when he replied, "they are thy children too," her reproofs yielded to tears. one time, when he had given away his coat to a poor child, he got wearied and belated on his homeward way. he lay down a while and fell asleep. then he dreamed that he was on a river-shore, and saw a mild and noble old man bathing many children. after he had plunged them into the water, he would place them on a beautiful island, where they looked white and glorious as little angels. rupert was seized with a strong desire to join them, and begged the old man to bathe him also in the stream. but he was answered, "it is not yet time." just then a rainbow spanned the island, and in its arch was enthroned the child jesus, dressed in a coat that rupert knew to be his own. and the child said to the others, "see this coat; it is one which my brother rupert has just sent to me. he has given us many gifts from his love; shall we not ask him to join us here?" and they shouted a musical "yes!" and rupert started out of his dream. but he had lain too long on the damp bank of the river without his coat, and cold and fever soon sent him to join the band of his brothers in their home. these are legends, superstitious, you will say. but, in casting aside the shell, have we retained the kernel? the image of the child jesus is not seen in the open street. does his heart find other means to express itself there? protestantism does not mean, we suppose, to deaden the spirit in excluding the form. the thought of jesus, as a child, has great weight with children who have learned to think of him at all. in thinking of him they form an image of all that the morning of a pure and fervent life should be and bring. in former days i knew a boy-artist whose genius, at that time, showed high promise. he was not more than fourteen years old--a pale, slight boy, with a beaming eye. the hopes and sympathy of friends, gained by his talent, had furnished him with a studio and orders for some pictures. he had picked up from the streets a boy, still younger and poorer than himself, to take care of the room and prepare his colors, and the two boys were as content in their relation as michael angelo with his urbino. if you went there, you found exposed to view many pretty pictures--"a girl with a dove," "the guitar-player," and such subjects as are commonly supposed to interest at his age. but, hid in a corner, and never shown, unless to the beggar-page or some most confidential friend, was the real object of his love and pride, the slowly-growing work of secret hours. the subject of this picture was christ teaching the doctors. and in those doctors he had expressed all he had already observed of the pedantry and shallow conceit of those in whom mature years have not unfolded the soul: and in the child, all he felt that early youth should be and seek, though, alas! his own feet failed him on the difficult road. this one record of the youth of jesus, had, at least, been much to his mind. in earlier days the little saints thought they best imitated the emanuel by giving apples and cents; but we know not why, in our age, that esteems itself so much enlightened, they should not become also the givers of spiritual gifts. we see in them, continually, impulses that only require a good direction to effect infinite good. see the little girls at work for foreign missions; that is not useless; they devote the time to a purpose that is not selfish; the horizon of their thoughts is extended. but they are perfectly capable of becoming home-missionaries as well. the principle of stewardship would make them so. i have seen a little girl of thirteen, who had much service, too, to do for a hard-working mother, in the midst of a circle of poor children whom she gathered daily to a morning school. she took them from the door-steps and the gutters; she washed their faces and hands; she taught them to read and sew, and told them stories that had delighted her own infancy. in her face, though in feature and complexion plain, was something already of a madonna sweetness, and it had no way eclipsed the gayety of childhood. i have seen a boy, scarce older, brought up for some time with the sons of laborers, who, so soon as he found himself possessed of superior advantages, thought not of surpassing others, but of excelling that he might be able to impart; and he was able to do it. if the other boys had less leisure, and could pay for less instruction, they did not suffer by it. he could not be happy unless they also could enjoy milton, and pass from nature to natural philosophy. he performed, though in a childish way, and in no grecian garb, the part of apollo amidst the herdsmen of admetus. the cause of education would be indefinitely furthered if, in addition to formal means, there were but this principle awakened in the hearts of the young, that what they have they must bestow. all are not natural instructors, but a large proportion are; and those who do possess such a talent are the best possible teachers to those a little younger than themselves. many have more patience with the difficulties they have lately left behind, and enjoy their power of assisting more than those further removed in age and knowledge do. then the intercourse may be far more congenial and profitable than where the teacher receives for hire all sorts of pupils as they are sent him by their guardians. here be need only choose those who have a predisposition for what he is best able to teach; and, as i would have the so-called higher instruction as much diffused in this way as the lower, there would be a chance of awakening all the power that now lies latent. if a girl, for instance, who has only a passable talent for music, but who, from the advantage of social position, has been able to gain thorough instruction, felt it her duty to teach whomsoever she know that had a talent without money to cultivate it, the good is obvious. those who are learning, receive an immediate benefit by the effort to rearrange and interpret what they learn; so the use of this justice would be two-fold. some efforts are made here and there; nay, sometimes there are those who can say they have returned usury for every gift of fate; and would others make the same experiments, they might find utopia not so far off as the children of this world, wise in securing their own selfish ease, would persuade us it must always be. we have hinted what sort of christmas-box we would wish for the children; it must be one as full, as that of the christ-child must be, of the pieces of silver that were lost and are found. but christmas with its peculiar associations has deep interest for men and women no less. at that time thus celebrated, a pure woman saw in her child what the son of man should be as a child of god. she anticipated fur him a life of glory to god, peace and good-will towards men. in any young mother's heart, who has any purity of heart, the same feelings arise. but most of these mothers carelessly let them go without obeying their instructions. if they did not, we should see other children, other men than now throng our streets. the boy could not invariably disappoint the mother, the man the wife, who steadily demanded of him such a career. and man looks upon woman, in this relation, always as he should. does he see in her a holy mother, worthy to guard the infancy of an immortal soul? then she assumes in his eyes those traits which the romish church loved to revere in mary. frivolity, base appetite, contempt, are exorcised, and man and woman appear again, in unprofaned connection, as brother and sister, children and servants of one divine love, and pilgrims to a common aim. were all this right in the private sphere, the public would soon right itself also, and the nations of christendom might join in a celebration such as "kings and prophets waited for," and so many martyrs died to achieve, of christ-mass. children's books. there is no branch of literature that better deserves cultivation, and none that so little obtains it from worthy hands, as this of children's books. it requires a peculiar development of the genius and sympathies, rare among men of factitious life, who are not men enough to revive with force and beauty the thoughts and scenes of childhood. it is all idle to talk baby-talk, and give shallow accounts of deep things, thinking thereby to interest the child. he does not like to be too much puzzled; but it is simplicity be wants, not silliness. we fancy their angels, who are always waiting in the courts of our father, smile somewhat sadly on the ignorance of those who would feed them on milk and water too long, and think it would be quite as well to give them a stone. there is too much amongst us of the french way of palming off false accounts of things on children, "to do them good," and showing nature to them in a magic lantern "purified for the use of childhood," and telling stories of sweet little girls and brave little boys,--o, all so good, or so bad! and above all, so _little_, and everything about them so little! children accustomed to move in full-sized apartments, and converse with full-grown men and women, do not need so much of this baby-house style in their literature. they like, or would like if they could get them, better things much more. they like the _arabian nights_, and _pilgrim's progress_, and _bunyan's emblems_, and _shakspeare_, and the _iliad_ and _odyssey_,--at least, they used to like them; and if they do not now, it is because their taste has been injured by so many sugar-plums. the books that were written in the childhood of nations suit an uncorrupted childhood now. they are simple, picturesque, robust. their moral is not forced, nor is the truth veiled with a well-meant but sure-to-fail hypocrisy. sometimes they are not moral at all,--only free plays of the fancy and intellect. these, also, the child needs, just as the infant needs to stretch its limbs, and grasp at objects it cannot hold. we have become so fond of the moral, that we forget the nature in which it must find its root; so fond of instruction, that we forget development. where ballads, legends, fairy-tales, are moral, the morality is heart-felt; if instructive, it is from the healthy common sense of mankind, and not for the convenience of nursery rule, nor the "peace of schools and families." o, that winter, freezing, snow-laden winter, which ushered in our eighth birthday! there, in the lonely farm-house, the day's work done, and the bright woodfire all in a glow, we were permitted to slide back the panel of the cupboard in the wall,--most fascinating object still in our eyes, with which no stateliest alcoved library can vie,--and there saw, neatly ranged on its two shelves, not--praised be our natal star!--_peter parley_, nor a history of the good little boy who never took anything that did not belong to him; but the _spectator_, _telemachus_, _goldsmith's animated nature_, and the _iliad_. forms of gods and heroes more distinctly seen, and with eyes of nearer love then than now!--our true uncle, sir roger de coverley, and ye, fair realms of nature's history, whose pictures we tormented all grown persons to illustrate with more knowledge, still more,--how we bless the chance that gave to us your great realities, which life has daily helped us, helps us still, to interpret, instead of thin and baseless fictions that would all this time have hampered us, though with only cobwebs! children need some childish talk, some childish play, some childish books. but they also need, and need more, difficulties to overcome, and a sense of the vast mysteries which the progress of their intelligence shall aid them to unravel. this sense is naturally their delight, as it is their religion, and it must not be dulled by premature explanations or subterfuges of any kind. there has been too much of this lately. miss edgeworth is an excellent writer for children. she is a child herself, as she writes, nursed anew by her own genius. it is not by imitating, but by reproducing childhood, that the writer becomes its companion. then, indeed, we have something especially good, for, "like wine, well-kept and long, heady, nor harsh, nor strong, with each succeeding year is quaffed, a richer, purer, mellower draught." miss edgeworth's grown people live naturally with the children; they do not talk to them continually about angels or flowers, but about the things that interest themselves. they do not force them forward, nor keep them back. the relations are simple and honorable; all ages in the family seem at home under one roof and sheltered by one care. the _juvenile miscellany_, formerly published by mrs. child, was much and deservedly esteemed by children. it was a healthy, cheerful, natural and entertaining companion to them. we should censure too monotonously tender a manner in what is written for children, and too constant an attention to moral influence. we should prefer a larger proportion of the facts of natural or human history, and that they should speak for themselves. woman in poverty. woman, even less than man, is what she should be as a whole. she is not that self-centred being, full of profound intuitions, angelic love, and flowing poesy, that she should be. yet there are circumstances in which the native force and purity of her being teach her how to conquer where the restless impatience of man brings defeat, and leaves him crushed and bleeding on the field. images rise to mind of calm strength, of gentle wisdom learning from every turn of adverse fate,--of youthful tenderness and faith undimmed to the close of life, which redeem humanity and make the heart glow with fresh courage as we write. they are mostly from obscure corners and very private walks. there was nothing shining, nothing of an obvious and sounding heroism to make their conduct doubtful, by tainting their motives with vanity. unknown they lived, untrumpeted they died. many hearts were warmed and fed by them, but perhaps no mind but our own ever consciously took account of their virtues. had art but the power adequately to tell their simple virtues, and to cast upon them the light which, shining through those marked and faded faces, foretold the glories of a second spring! the tears of holy emotion which fell from those eyes have seemed to us pearls beyond all price; or rather, whose price will be paid only when, beyond the grave, they enter those better spheres in whose faith they felt and acted here. from this private gallery we will, for the present, bring forth but one picture. that of a black nun was wont to fetter the eyes of visitors in the royal galleries of france, and my sister of mercy, too, is of that complexion. the old woman was recommended as a laundress by my friend, who had long prized her. i was immediately struck with the dignity and propriety of her manner. in the depth of winter she brought herself the heavy baskets through the slippery streets; and, when i asked her why she did not employ some younger person to do what was so entirely disproportioned to her strength, simply said, "she lived alone, and could not afford to hire an errand-boy." "it was hard for her?" "no, she was fortunate in being able to get work at her age, when others could do it better. her friends were very good to procure it for her." "had she a comfortable home?" "tolerably so,--she should not need one long." "was that a thought of joy to her?" "yes, for she hoped to see again the husband and children from whom she had long been separated." thus much in answer to the questions, but at other times the little she said was on general topics. it was not from her that i learnt how the great idea of duty had held her upright through a life of incessant toil, sorrow, bereavement; and that not only she had remained upright, but that her character had been constantly progressive. her latest act had been to take home a poor sick girl who had no home of her own, and could not bear the idea of dying in a hospital, and maintain and nurse her through the last weeks of her life. "her eye-sight was failing, and she should not be able to work much longer,--but, then, god would provide. _somebody_ ought to see to the poor, motherless girl." it was not merely the greatness of the act, for one in such circumstances, but the quiet matter-of-course way in which it was done, that showed the habitual tone of the mind, and made us feel that life could hardly do more for a human being than to make him or her the _somebody_ that is daily so deeply needed, to represent the right, to do the plain right thing. "god will provide." yes, it is the poor who feel themselves near to the god of love. though he slay them, still do they trust him. "i hope," said i to a poor apple-woman, who had been drawn on to disclose a tale of distress that, almost in the mere hearing, made me weary of life, "i hope i may yet see you in a happier condition." "with god's help," she replied, with a smile that raphael would have delighted to transfer to his canvas; a mozart, to strains of angelic sweetness. all her life she had seemed an outcast child; still she leaned upon a father's love. the dignity of a state like this may vary its form in, more or less richness and beauty of detail, but here is the focus of what makes life valuable. it is this spirit which makes poverty the best servant to the ideal of human nature. i am content with this type, and will only quote, in addition, a ballad i found in a foreign periodical, translated from chamisso, and which forcibly recalled my own laundress as an equally admirable sample of the same class, the ideal poor, which we need for our consolation, so long as there must be real poverty. "the old washerwoman. "among yon lines her hands have laden, a laundress with white hair appears, alert as many a youthful maiden, spite of her five-and-seventy years; bravely she won those white hairs, still eating the bread hard toll obtained her, and laboring truly to fulfil the duties to which god ordained her. "once she was young and full of gladness, she loved and hoped,--was wooed and won; then came the matron's cares,--the sadness no loving heart on earth may shun. three babes she bore her mate; she prayed beside his sick-bed,--he was taken; she saw him in the church-yard laid, yet kept her faith and hope unshaken. "the task her little ones of feeding she met unfaltering from that hour; she taught them thrift and honest breeding, her virtues were their worldly dower. to seek employment, one by one, forth with her blessing they departed, and she was in the world alone-- alone and old, but still high-hearted. "with frugal forethought; self-denying, she gathered coin, and flax she bought, and many a night her spindle plying, good store of fine-spun thread she wrought. the thread was fashioned in the loom; she brought it home, and calmly seated to work, with not a thought of gloom, her decent grave-clothes she completed. "she looks on them with fond elation; they are her wealth, her treasure rare, her age's pride and consolation, hoarded with all a miser's care. she dons the sark each sabbath day, to hear the word that falleth never! well-pleased she lays it then away till she shall sleep in it forever! "would that my spirit witness bore me. that, like this woman, i had done the work my master put before me duly from morn till set of sun! would that life's cup had been by me quaffed in such wise and happy measure, and that i too might finally look on my shroud with such meek pleasure!" such are the noble of the earth. they do not repine, they do not chafe, even in the inmost heart. they feel that, whatever else may be denied or withdrawn, there remains the better part, which cannot be taken from them. this line exactly expresses the woman i knew:-- "alone and old, but still high-hearted." will any, poor or rich, fail to feel that the children of such a parent were rich when "her virtues were their worldly dower"? will any fail to bow the heart in assent to the aspiration, "would that my spirit witness bore me that, like this woman, i had done the work my maker put before me duly from morn till set of sun"? may not that suffice to any man's ambition? [perhaps one of the most perplexing problems which beset woman in her domestic sphere relates to the proper care and influence which she should exert over the domestic aids she employs. as these are, and long must be, taken chiefly from one nation, the following pages treating of the irish character, and the true relation between employer and employed, can hardly fail to be of interest. they contain, too, some considerations which woman as well as man is too much in danger of overlooking, and which seem, even more than when first urged, to be timely in this reactionary to-day.--ed.] the irish character. in one of the eloquent passages quoted in the "_tribune_" of wednesday, under the head, "spirit of the irish press," we find these words: "domestic love, almost morbid from external suffering, prevents him (the irishman) from becoming a fanatic and a misanthrope, and reconciles him to life." this recalled to our mind the many touching instances known to us of such traits among the irish we have seen here. we have known instances of morbidness like this. a girl sent "home," after she was well established herself, for a young brother, of whom she was particularly fond. he came, and shortly after died. she was so overcome by his loss that she took poison. the great poet of serious england says, and we believe it to be his serious thought though laughingly said, "men have died, and worms have eaten them, but not for love." whether or not death may follow from the loss of a lover or child, we believe that among no people but the irish would it be upon the loss of a young brother. another poor young woman, in the flower of her youth, denied herself, not only every pleasure, but almost the necessaries of life to save the sum she thought ought to be hers before sending to ireland for a widowed mother. just as she was on the point of doing so she heard that her mother had died fifteen months before. the keenness and persistence of her grief defy description. with a delicacy of feeling which showed the native poetry of the irish mind, she dwelt, most of all, upon the thought that while she was working, and pinching, and dreaming of happiness with her mother, it was indeed but a dream, and that cherished parent lay still and cold beneath the ground. she felt fully the cruel cheat of fate. "och! and she was dead all those times i was thinking of her!" was the deepest note of her lament. they are able, however, to make the sacrifice of even these intense family affections in a worthy cause. we knew a woman who postponed sending for her only child, whom she had left in ireland, for years, while she maintained a sick friend who had no one else to help her. the poetry of which i have spoken shows itself even here, where they are separated from old romantic associations, and begin the new life in the new world by doing all its drudgery. we know flights of poetry repeated to us by those present at their wakes,--passages of natural eloquence, from the lamentations for the dead, more beautiful than those recorded in the annals of brittany or roumelia. it is the same genius, so exquisitely mournful, tender, and glowing, too, with the finest enthusiasm, that makes their national music, in these respects, the finest in the world. it is the music of the harp; its tones are deep and thrilling. it is the harp so beautifully described in "the harp of tara's halls," a song whose simple pathos is unsurpassed. a feeling was never more adequately embodied. it is the genius which will enable emmet's appeal to draw tears from the remotest generations, however much they may be strangers to the circumstances which called it forth, it is the genius which beamed in chivalrous loveliness through each act of lord edward fitzgerald,--the genius which, ripened by english culture, favored by suitable occasions, has shed such glory on the land which has done all it could to quench it on the parent hearth. when we consider all the fire which glows so untamably in irish veins, the character of her people, considering the circumstances, almost miraculous in its goodness, we cannot forbear, notwithstanding all the temporary ills they aid in here, to give them a welcome to our shores. those ills we need not enumerate; they are known to all, and we rank among them, what others would not, that by their ready service to do all the hard work, they make it easier for the rest of the population to grow effeminate, and help the country to grow too fast. but that is her destiny, to grow too fast: there is no use talking against it. their extreme ignorance, their blind devotion to their priesthood, their pliancy in the hands of demagogues, threaten continuance of these ills; yet, on the other hand, we must regard them as most valuable elements in the new race. they are looked upon with contempt for their wont of aptitude in learning new things; their ready and ingenious lying; their eye-service. these are the faults of an oppressed race, which must require the aid of better circumstances through two or three generations to eradicate. their virtues are their own; they are many, genuine, and deeply-rooted. can an impartial observer fail to admire their truth to domestic ties, their power of generous bounty, and more generous gratitude, their indefatigable good-humor (for ages of wrong which have driven them to so many acts of desperation, could never sour their blood at its source), their ready wit, their elasticity of nature? they are fundamentally one of the best nations of the world. would they were welcomed here, not to work merely, but to intelligent sympathy, and efforts, both patient and ardent, for the education of their children! no sympathy could be better deserved, no efforts wiselier timed. future burkes and currans would know how to give thanks for them, and fitzgeralds rise upon the soil--which boasts the magnolia with its kingly stature and majestical white blossoms,--to the same lofty and pure beauty. will you not believe it, merely because that bog-bred youth you placed in the mud-hole tells you lies, and drinks to cheer himself in those endless diggings? you are short-sighted, my friend; you do not look to the future; you will not turn your head to see what may have been the influences of the past. you have not examined your own breast to see whether the monitor there has not commanded you to do your part to counteract these influences; and yet the irishman appeals to you, eye to eye. he is very personal himself,--he expects a personal interest from you. nothing has been able to destroy this hope, which was the fruit of his nature. we were much touched by o'connell's direct appeal to the queen, as "lady!" but she did not listen,--and we fear few ladies and gentlemen will till the progress of destiny compels them. the irish character. since the publication of a short notice under this head in the "_tribune_," several persons have expressed to us that their feelings were awakened on the subject, especially as to their intercourse with the lower irish. most persons have an opportunity of becoming acquainted, if they will, with the lower classes of irish, as they are so much employed among us in domestic service, and other kinds of labor. we feel, say these persons, the justice of what has been said as to the duty and importance of improving these people. we have sometimes tried; but the want of real gratitude which, in them, is associated with such warm and wordy expressions of regard, with their incorrigible habits of falsehood and evasion, have baffled and discouraged us. you say their children ought to be educated; but how can this be effected when the all but omnipotent sway of the catholic religion and the example of parents are both opposed to the formation of such views and habits as we think desirable to the citizen of the new world? we answer first with regard to those who have grown up in another land, and who, soon after arriving here, are engaged in our service. first, as to ingratitude. we cannot but sadly smile on the remarks we hear so often on this subject. just heaven!--and to us how liberal! which has given those who speak thus an unfettered existence, free from religious or political oppression; which has given them the education of intellectual and refined intercourse with men to develop those talents which make them rich in thoughts and enjoyment, perhaps in money, too, certainly rich in comparison with the poor immigrants they employ,--what is thought in thy clear light of those who expect in exchange for a few shillings spent in presents or medicines, a few kind words, a little casual thought or care, such a mighty payment of gratitude? gratitude! under the weight of old feudalism their minds were padlocked by habit against the light; they might be grateful then, for they thought their lords were as gods, of another frame and spirit than theirs, and that they had no right to have the same hopes and wants, scarcely to suffer from the same maladies, with those creatures of silk, and velvet, and cloth of gold. then, the crumbs which fell from the rich man's table might be received with gratitude, and, if any but the dogs came to tend the beggar's sores, such might be received as angels. but the institutions which sustained such ideas have fallen to pieces. it is understood, even in europe, that "the rank is but the guinea's stamp, the man's the gowd for a' that, a man's a man for a' that." and being such, has a claim on this earth for something better than the nettles of which the french peasantry made their soup, and with which the persecuted irish, "under hiding," turned to green the lips white before with famine. and if this begins to be understood in europe, can you suppose it is not by those who, hearing that america opens a mother's arms with the cry, "all men are born free and equal," rush to her bosom to be consoled for centuries of woe, for their ignorance, their hereditary degradation, their long memories of black bread and stripes? however little else they may understand, believe they understand well _this much_. such inequalities of privilege, among men all born of one blood, should not exist. they darkly feel that those to whom much has been given owe to the master an account of stewardship. they know now that your gift is but a small portion of their right. and you, o giver! how did you give? with religious joy, as one who knows that he who loves god cannot fail to love his neighbor as himself? with joy and freedom, as one who feels that it is the highest happiness of gift to us that we have something to give again? didst thou put thyself into the position of the poor man, and do for him what thou wouldst have had one who was able to do for thee? or, with affability and condescending sweetness, made easy by internal delight at thine own wondrous virtue, didst thou give five dollars to balance five hundred spent on thyself? did you say, "james, i shall expect you to do right in everything, and to attend to my concerns as i should myself; and, at the end of the quarter, i will give you my old clothes and a new pocket-handkerchief, besides seeing that your mother is provided with fuel against christmas?" line upon line, and precept upon precept, the tender parent expects from the teacher to whom he confides his child; vigilance unwearied, day and night, through long years. but he expects the raw irish girl or boy to correct, at a single exhortation, the habit of deceiving those above them, which the expectation of being tyrannized over has rooted in their race for ages. if we look fairly into the history of their people, and the circumstances under which their own youth was trained, we cannot expect that anything short of the most steadfast patience and love can enlighten them as to the beauty and value of implicit truth, and, having done so, fortify and refine them in the practice of it. this we admit at the outset: first, you must be prepared for a religious and patient treatment of these people, not merely _un_educated, but _ill_-educated; a treatment far more religious and patient than is demanded by your own children, if they were born and bred under circumstances at all favorable. second, dismiss from your minds all thought of gratitude. do what you do for them for god's sake, and as a debt to humanity--interest to the common creditor upon principal left in your care. then insensibility, forgetfulness, or relapse, will not discourage you, and you will welcome proofs of genuine attachment to yourself chiefly as tokens that your charge has risen into a higher state of thought and feeling, so as to be enabled to value the benefits conferred through you. could we begin so, there would be hope of our really becoming the instructors and guardians of this swarm of souls which come from their regions of torment to us, hoping, at least, the benefits of purgatory. the influence of the catholic priesthood must continue very great till there is a complete transfusion of character in the minds of their charge. but as the irishman, or any other foreigner, becomes americanized, he will demand a new form of religion to suit his new wants. the priest, too, will have to learn the duties of an american citizen; he will live less and less for the church, and more for the people, till at last, if there be catholicism still, it will be under protestant influences, as begins to be the case in germany. it will be, not roman, but american catholicism; a form of worship which relies much, perhaps, on external means and the authority of the clergy,--for such will always be the case with religion while there are crowds of men still living an external life, and who have not learned to make full use of their own faculties,--but where a belief in the benefits of confession and the power of the church, as church, to bind and loose, atone for or decide upon sin, with similar corruptions, must vanish in the free and searching air of a new era. * * * * * between employer and employed there is not sufficient pains taken on the part of the former to establish a mutual understanding. people meet, in the relations of master and servant, who have lived in two different worlds. in this respect we are much worse situated than the same parties have been in europe. there is less previous acquaintance between the upper and lower classes. (we must, though unwillingly, use these terms to designate the state of things as at present existing.) meals are taken separately; work is seldom shared; there is very little to bring the parties together, except sometimes the farmer works with his hired irish laborer in the fields, or the mother keeps the nurse-maid of her baby in the room with her. in this state of things the chances for instruction, which come every day of themselves where parties share a common life instead of its results merely, do not occur. neither is there opportunity to administer instruction in the best manner, nor to understand when and where it is needed. the farmer who works with his men in the field, the farmer's wife who attends with her women to the churn and the oven, may, with ease, be true father and mother to all who are in their employ, and enjoy health of conscience in the relation, secure that, if they find cause for blame, it is not from faults induced by their own negligence. the merchant who is from home all day, the lady receiving visitors or working slippers in her nicely-furnished parlor, cannot be quite so sure that their demands, or the duties involved in them, are clearly understood, nor estimate the temptations to prevarication. it is shocking to think to what falsehoods human beings like ourselves will resort, to excuse a love of amusement, to hide ill-health, while they see us indulging freely in the one, yielding lightly to the other; and yet we have, or ought to have, far more resources in either temptation than they. for us it is hard to resist, to give up going to the places where we should meet our most interesting companions, or do our work with an aching brow. but we have not people over us whose careless, hasty anger drives us to seek excuses for our failures; if so, perhaps,--perhaps; who knows?--we, the better-educated, rigidly, immaculately true as we are at present, _might_ tell falsehoods. perhaps we might, if things were given us to do which we had never seen done, if we were surrounded by new arrangements in the nature of which no one instructed us. all this we must think of before we can be of much use. we have spoken of the nursery-maid as _the_ hired domestic with whom her mistress, or even the master, is likely to become acquainted. but, only a day or two since, we saw, what we see so often, a nursery-maid with the family to which she belonged, in a public conveyance. they were having a pleasant time; but in it she had no part, except to hold a hot, heavy baby, and receive frequent admonitions to keep _it_ comfortable. no inquiry was made as to _her_ comfort; no entertaining remark, no information of interest as to the places we passed, was addressed to her. had she been in that way with that family ten years she might have known _them_ well enough, for their characters lay only too bare to a careless scrutiny; but her joys, her sorrows, her few thoughts, her almost buried capacities, would have been as unknown to them, and they as little likely to benefit her, as the emperor of china. let the employer place the employed first in good physical circumstances, so as to promote the formation of different habits from those of the irish hovel, or illicit still-house. having thus induced feelings of self-respect, he has opened the door for a new set of notions. then let him become acquainted with the family circumstances and history of his new pupil. he has now got some ground on which to stand for intercourse. let instruction follow for the mind, not merely by having the youngest daughter set, now and then, copies in the writing-book, or by hearing read aloud a few verses in the bible, but by putting good books in their way, if able to read, and by intelligent conversation when there is a chance,--the master with the man who is driving him, the lady with the woman who is making her bed. explain to them the relations of objects around them; teach them to compare the old with the new life. if you show a better way than theirs of doing work, teach them, too, _why_ it is better. thus will the mind be prepared by development for a moral reformation; there will be some soil fitted to receive the seed. when the time is come,--and will you think a poor, uneducated person, in whose mind the sense of right and wrong is confused, the sense of honor blunted, easier of access than one refined and thoughtful? surely you will not, if you yourself are refined and thoughtful, but rather that the case requires far more care in the choice of a favorable opportunity,--when, then, the good time is come, perhaps it will be best to do what you do in a way that will make a permanent impression. show the irishman that a vice not indigenous to his nation--for the rich and noble who are not so tempted are chivalrous to an uncommon degree in their openness, bold sincerity, and adherence to their word--has crept over and become deeply rooted in the poorer people from the long oppressions they have undergone. show them what efforts and care will be needed to wash out the taint. offer your aid, as a faithful friend, to watch their lapses, and refine their sense of truth. you will not speak in vain. if they never mend, if habit is too powerful, still, their nobler nature will not have been addressed in vain. they will not forget the counsels they have not strength to follow, and the benefits will be seen in their children or children's children. many say, "well, suppose we do all this; what then? they are so fond of change, they will leave us." what then? why, let them go and carry the good seed elsewhere. will you be as selfish and short-sighted as those who never plant trees to shade a hired house, lest some one else should be blest by their shade? it is a simple duty we ask you to engage in; it is, also, a great patriotic work. you are asked to engage in the great work of mutual education, which must be for this country the system of mutual insurance. we have some hints upon this subject, drawn from the experience of the wise and good, some encouragement to offer from that experience, that the fruits of a wise planting sometimes ripen sooner than we could dare to expect. but this must be for another day. one word as to this love of change. we hear people blaming it in their servants, who can and do go to niagara, to the south, to the springs, to europe, to the seaside; in short, who are always on the move whenever they feel the need of variety to reanimate mind, health, or spirits. change of place, as to family employment, is the only way domestics have of "seeing life"--the only way immigrants have of getting thoroughly acquainted with the new society into which they have entered. how natural that they should incline to it! once more; put yourself in their places, and then judge them gently from your own, if you would be just to them, if you would be of any use. educate men and women as souls. had christendom but been true to its standard, while accommodating its modes of operation to the calls of successive times, woman would now have not only equal _power_ with man,--for of that omnipotent nature will never suffer her to be defrauded,--but a _chartered_ power, too fully recognized to be abused. indeed, all that is wanting is, that man should prove his own freedom by making her free. let him abandon conventional restriction, as a vestige of that oriental barbarity which confined woman to a seraglio. let him trust her entirely, and give her every privilege already acquired for himself,--elective franchise, tenure of property, liberty to speak in public assemblies, &c. nature has pointed out her ordinary sphere by the circumstances of her physical existence. she cannot wander far. if here and there the gods send their missives through women as through men, let them speak without remonstrance. in no age have men been able wholly to hinder them. a deborah must always be a spiritual mother in israel. a corinna may be excluded from the olympic games, yet all men will hear her song, and a pindar sit at her feet. it is man's fault that there ever were aspasias and ninons. these exquisite forms were intended for the shrines of virtue. neither need men fear to lose their domestic deities. woman is born for love, and it is impossible to turn her from seeking it. men should deserve her love as an inheritance, rather than seize and guard it like a prey. were they noble, they would strive rather not to be loved too much, and to turn her from idolatry to the true, the only love. then, children of one father, they could not err nor misconceive one another. society is now so complex, that it is no longer possible to educate woman merely as woman; the tasks which come to her hand are so various, and so large a proportion of women are thrown entirely upon their own resources. i admit that this is not their state of perfect development; but it seems as if heaven, having so long issued its edict in poetry and religion without securing intelligent obedience, now commanded the world in prose to take a high and rational view. the lesson reads to me thus:-- sex, like rank, wealth, beauty, or talent, is but an accident of birth. as you would not educate a soul to be an aristocrat, so do not to be a woman. a general regard to her usual sphere is dictated in the economy of nature. you need never enforce these provisions rigorously. achilles had long plied the distaff as a princess; yet, at first sight of a sword, he seized it. so with woman; one hour of love would teach her more of her proper relations than all your formulas and conventions. express your views, men, of what you _seek_ in women; thus best do you give them laws. learn, women, what you should _demand_ of men; thus only can they become themselves. turn both from the contemplation of what is merely phenomenal in your existence, to your permanent life as souls. man, do not prescribe how the divine shall display itself in woman. woman, do not expect to see all of god in man. fellow-pilgrims and helpmeets are ye, apollo and diana, twins of one heavenly birth, both beneficent, and both armed. man, fear not to yield to woman's hand both the quiver and the lyre; for if her urn be filled with light, she will use both to the glory of god. there is but one doctrine for ye both, and that is the doctrine of the soul. part iii. extracts from journals and letters. [the following extract from margaret's journal will be read with a degree of melancholy interest when connected with the eventful end of her eventful life. it was written many years before her journey to europe, and rings in our ears now almost with the tones of prophecy.--ed.] i like to listen to the soliloquies of a bright child. in this microcosm the philosophical observer may trace the natural progression of the mind of mankind. i often silently observe l---, with this view. he is generally imitative and dramatic; the day-school, the singing-school or the evening party, are acted out with admirable variety in the humors of the scene, end great discrimination of character in its broader features. what is chiefly remarkable is his unconsciousness of his mental processes, and how thoughts it would be impossible for him to recall spring up in his mind like flowers and weeds in the soil. but to-night he was truly in a state of lyrical inspiration, his eyes flashing, his face glowing, and his whole composition chanted out in an almost metrical form. he began by mourning the death of a certain harriet whom he had let go to foreign parts, and who had died at sea. he described her as having "blue, sparkling eyes, and a sweet smile," and lamented that he could never kiss her cold lips again. this part, which he continued for some time, was in prolonged cadences, and a low, mournful tone, with a frequently recurring burden of "o, my harriet, shall i never see thee more!" * * * * * extract from journal. * * * * * it is so true that a woman may be in love with a woman, and a man with a man. it is pleasant to be sure of it, because it is undoubtedly the same love that we shall feel when we are angels, when we ascend to the only fit place for the mignons, where "sie fragen nicht nach mann und welb." it is regulated by the same law as that of love between persons of different sexes, only it is purely intellectual and spiritual, unprefaced by any mixture of lower instincts, undisturbed by any need of consulting temporal interests; its law is the desire of the spirit to realize a whole, which makes it seek in another being that which it finds not in itself. thus the beautiful seek the strong; the mute seek the eloquent; the butterfly settles on the dark flower. why did socrates so love alcibiades? why did korner so love schneider? how natural is the love of wallenstein for max, that of madame de stael for de recamier, mine for -----! i loved ---- for a time with as much passion as i was then strong enough to feel. her face was always gleaming before me; her voice was echoing in my ear; all poetic thoughts clustered round the dear image. this love was for me a key which unlocked many a treasure which i still possess; it was the carbuncle (emblematic gem!) which cast light into many of the darkest corners of human nature. she loved me, too, though not so much, because her nature was "less high, less grave, less large, less deep;" but she loved more tenderly, less passionately. she loved me, for i well remember her suffering when she first could feel my faults, and knew one part of the exquisite veil rent away--how she wished to stay apart and weep the whole day. these thoughts were suggested by a large engraving representing madame recamier in her boudoir. i have so often thought over the intimacy between her and madame de stael. madame recamier is half-reclining on a sofa; she is clad in white drapery, which clings very gracefully to her round, but elegantly-slender form; her beautiful neck and arms are bare; her hair knotted up so as to show the contour of her truly-feminine head to great advantage. a book lies carelessly on her lap; one hand yet holds it at the place where she left off reading; her lovely face is turned towards us; she appears to muse on what she has been reading. when we see a woman in a picture with a book, she seems to be doing precisely that for which she was born; the book gives such an expression of purity to the female figure. a large window, partially veiled by a white curtain, gives a view of a city at some little distance. on one side stand the harp and piano; there are just books enough for a lady's boudoir. there is no picture, except one of de recamier herself, as corinne. this is absurd; but the absurdity is interesting, as recalling the connection. you imagine her to have been reading one of de stael's books, and to be now pondering what those brilliant words of her gifted friend can mean. everything in the room is in keeping. nothing appears to have been put there because other people have it; but there is nothing which shows a taste more noble and refined than you would expect from the fair frenchwoman. all is elegant, modern, in harmony with the delicate habits and superficial culture which you would look for in its occupant. * * * * * to her mother. _sept_. , . * * * * * if i stay in providence, and more money is wanting than can otherwise be furnished, i will take a private class, which is ready for me, and by which, even if i reduced my terms to suit the place, i can earn the four hundred dollars that ---- will need. if i do not stay, i will let her have my portion of our income, with her own, or even capital which i have a right to take up, and come into this or some other economical place, and live at the cheapest rate. it will not be even a sacrifice to me to do so, for i am weary of society, and long for the opportunity for solitary concentration of thought. i know what i say; if i live, you may rely upon me. god be with you, my dear mother! i am sure he will prosper the doings of so excellent a woman if you will only keep your mind calm and be firm. trust your daughter too. i feel increasing trust in mine own good mind. we will take good care of the children and of one another. never fear to trouble me with your perplexities. i can never be so situated that i do not earnestly wish to know them. besides, things do not trouble me as they did, for i feel within myself the power to aid, to serve. most affectionately, your daughter, m. * * * * * part of letter to m. _providence_, oct. , . * * * for yourself, dear ------, you have attained an important age. no plan is desirable for you which is to be pursued with precision. the world, the events of every day, which no one can predict, are to be your teachers, and you must, in some degree, give yourself up, and submit to be led captive, if you would learn from them. principle must be at the helm, but thought must shift its direction with the winds and waves. happy as you are thus far in worthy friends, you are not in much danger of rash intimacies or great errors. i think, upon the whole, quite highly of your judgment about people and conduct; for, though your first feelings are often extravagant, they are soon balanced. i do not know other faults in you beside that want of retirement of mind which i have before spoken of. if m------ and a------ want too much seclusion, and are too severe in their views of life and man, i think you are too little so. there is nothing so fatal to the finer faculties as too ready or too extended a publicity. there is some danger lest there be no real religion in the heart which craves too much of daily sympathy. through your mind the stream of life has coursed with such rapidity that it has often swept away the seed or loosened the roots of the young plants before they had ripened any fruit. i should think writing would be very good for you. a journal of your life, and analyses of your thoughts, would teach you how to generalize, and give firmness to your conclusions. do not write down merely that things are beautiful, or the reverse; but _what_ they are, and _why_ they are beautiful or otherwise; and show these papers, at least at present, to nobody. be your own judge and your own helper. do not go too soon to any one with your difficulties, but try to clear them up for yourself. i think the course of reading you have fallen upon, of late, will be better for you than such books as you formerly read, addressed rather to the taste and imagination than the judgment. the love of beauty has rather an undue development in your mind. see now what it is, and what it has been. leave for a time the ideal, and return to the real. i should think two or three hours a day would be quite enough, at present, for you to give to books. now learn buying and selling, keeping the house, directing the servants; all that will bring you worlds of wisdom if you keep it subordinate to the one grand aim of perfecting the whole being. and let your self-respect forbid you to do imperfectly anything that you do at all. i always feel ashamed when i write with this air of wisdom; but you will see, by my hints, what i mean. your mind wants depth and precision; your character condensation. keep your high aim steadily in view; life will open the path to reach it. i think ----, even if she be in excess, is an excellent friend for you; her character seems to have what yours wants, whether she has or has not found the right way. * * * * * to her brother, a. b. f. _providence, feb_. , my dear a.: * * * * * i wish you could see the journals of two dear little girls, eleven years old, in my school. they love one another like bessie bell and mary gray in the ballad. they are just of a size, both lively as birds, affectionate, gentle, ambitious in good works and knowledge. they encourage one another constantly to do right; they are rivals, but never jealous of one another. one has the quicker intellect, the other is the prettier. i have never had occasion to find fault with either, and the forwardness of their minds has induced me to take both into my reading-class, where they are associated with girls many years their elders. particular pains do they take with their journals. these are written daily, in a beautiful, fair, round hand, well-composed, showing attention, and memory well-trained, with many pleasing sallies of playfulness, and some very interesting thoughts. * * * * * to the same. _jamaica plain, dec_. , . * * * * about your school i do not think i could give you much advice which would be of value, unless i could know your position more in detail. the most important rule is, in all relations with our fellow-creatures, never forget that, if they are imperfect persons, they are immortal souls, and treat them as you would wish to be treated by the light of that thought. as to the application of means, abstain from punishment as much as possible, and use encouragement as far as you can _without flattery_. but be even more careful as to strict truth in this regard, towards children, than to persons of your own age; for, to the child, the parent or teacher is the representative of _justice;_ and as that of life is severe, an education which, in any degree, excites vanity, is the very worst preparation for that general and crowded school. i doubt not you will teach grammar well, as i saw you aimed at principles in your practice. in geography, try to make pictures of the scenes, that they may be present to their imaginations, and the nobler faculties be brought into action, as well as memory. in history, try to study and paint the characters of _great men_; they best interpret the leadings of events amid the nations. i am pleased with your way of speaking of both people and pupils; your view seems from the right point. yet beware of over great pleasure in being popular, or even beloved. as far as an amiable disposition and powers of entertainment make you so, it is a happiness; but if there is one grain of plausibility, it is poison. but i will not play mentor too much, lest i make you averse to write to your very affectionate sister, m. * * * * * to her brother, r. i entirely agree in what you say of _tuition_ and _intuition;_ the two must act and react upon one another, to make a man, to form a mind. drudgery is as necessary, to call out the treasures of the mind, as harrowing and planting those of the earth. and besides, the growths of literature and art are as much nature as the trees in concord woods; but nature idealized and perfected. * * * * * to the same. . i take great pleasure in that feeling of the living presence of beauty in nature which your letters show. but you, who have now lived long enough to see some of my prophecies fulfilled, will not deny, though you may not yet believe the truth of my words when i say you go to an extreme in your denunciations of cities and the social institutions. _these_ are a growth also, and, as well as the diseases which come upon them, under the control of the one spirit as much as the great tree on which the insects prey, and in whose bark the busy bird has made many a wound. when we get the proper perspective of these things we shall find man, however artificial, still a part of nature. meanwhile, let us trust; and while it is the soul's duty ever to bear witness to the best it knows, let us not be hasty to conclude that in what suits us not there can be no good. let us be sure there _must_ be eventual good, could we but see far enough to discern it. in maintaining perfect truth to ourselves and choosing that mode of being which suits us, we had best leave others alone as much as may be. you prefer the country, and i doubt not it is on the whole a better condition of life to live there; but at the country party you have mentioned you saw that no circumstances will keep people from being frivolous. one may be gossipping, and vulgar, and idle in the country,--earnest, noble and wise, in the city. nature cannot be kept from us while there is a sky above, with so much as one star to remind us of prayer in the silent night. as i walked home this evening at sunset, over the mill-dam, towards the city, i saw very distinctly that the city also is a bed in god's garden. more of this some other time. * * * * * to a young friend. _concord, may _ , . my dear: i am passing happy here, except that i am not well,--so unwell that i fear i must go home and ask my good mother to let me rest and vegetate beneath her sunny kindness for a while. the excitement of conversation prevents my sleeping. the drive here with mr. e------ was delightful. dear nature and time, so often calumniated, will take excellent care of us if we will let them. the wisdom lies in schooling the heart not to expect too much. i did that good thing when i came here, and i am rich. on sunday i drove to watertown with the author of "nature." the trees were still bare, but the little birds care not for that; they revel, and carol, and wildly tell their hopes, while the gentle, "voluble" south wind plays with the dry leaves, and the pine-trees sigh with their soul-like sounds for june. it was beauteous; and care and routine fled away, and i was as if they had never been, except that i vaguely whispered to myself that all had been well with me. * * * * * the baby here is beautiful. he looks like his father, and smiles so sweetly on all hearty, good people. i play with him a good deal, and he comes so _natural,_ after dante and other poets. ever faithfully your friend. * * * * * to the same. . my beloved child: i was very glad to get your note. do not think you must only write to your friends when you can tell them you are happy; they will not misunderstand you in the dark hour, nor think you _forsaken_, if cast down. though your letter of wednesday was very sweet to me, yet i knew it could not last as it was then. these hours of heavenly, heroic strength leave us, but they come again: their memory is with us amid after-trials, and gives us a foretaste of that era when the steadfast soul shall be the only reality. my dearest, you must suffer, but you will always be growing stronger, and with every trial nobly met, you will feel a growing assurance that nobleness is not a mere _sentiment_ with you. i sympathize deeply in your anxiety about your mother; yet i cannot but remember the bootless fear and agitation about my mother, and how strangely our destinies were guided. take refuge in prayer when you are most troubled; the door of the sanctuary will never be shut against you. i send you a paper which is very sacred to me. bless heaven that your heart is awakened to sacred duties before any kind of gentle ministering has become impossible, before any relation has been broken. [footnote: it has always been my desire to find appropriate time and place to correct an erroneous impression which has gained currency in regard to my father, and which does injustice to his memory. that impression is that he was exceedingly stern and exacting in the parental relation, and especially in regard to my sister; that he forbid or frowned upon her sports;--excluded her from intercourse with other children when she, a child, needed such companionship, and required her to bend almost unceasingly over her books. this impression has, certainly in part, arisen from an autobiographical sketch, never written for publication nor intended for a literal or complete statement of her father's educational method, or the relation which existed between them, which was most loving and true on both sides. while the narrative is true, it is not the all she would have said, and, therefore, taken alone, conveys an impression which misleads those who did not know our father well. perhaps no better opportunity or place than this may ever arise to correct this impression so for us it is wrong. it is true that my father had a very high standard of scholarship, and did expect conformity to it in his children. he was not stern toward them. it is doubtless true, also, that he did not perfectly comprehend the rare mind of his daughter, or see for some years that she required no stimulating to intellectual effort, as do most children, but rather the reverse. but how many fathers are there who would have understood at once such a child as margaret fuller was, or would have done even as wisely as he? and how long is it since a wiser era has dawned upon the world (its light not yet fully welcomed), in which attention first to physical development to the exclusion of the mental, is an axiom in education! was it so deemed forty years ago? nor has it been considered that so gifted a child would naturally, as she did, _seek_ the companionship of those older than herself, and not of children who had little in unison with her. she needed, doubtless, to be _urged_ into the usual sports of children, and the company of those of her own age; if _not_ urged to enter these she was never excluded from either. she needed to be kept from books for a period, or to be led to those of a lighter cost than such as she read, and which usually task the thoughts of mature men. this simply was not done, and the error arose from no lack of tenderness, or consideration, from no lack of the wisdom of those times, but from the simple fact that the laws of physiology as connected with those of mind were not understood then as now, nor was attention so much directed to physical culture as of the primary importance it is now regarded. our father was indeed exact and strict with himself and others; but none has ever been more devoted to his children than he, or more painstaking with their education, nor more fondly loved them; and in later life they have ever been more and more impressed with the conviction of his fidelity and wisdom. that margaret venerated her father, and that his love was returned, is abundantly evidenced in her poem which accompanies this letter. this, too, was not written for the public eye, but it is too noble a tribute, too honorable both to father and daughter, to be suppressed. i trust that none, passing from one extreme to the other, will infer from the natural self-reproach and upbraiding because of short-comings, felt by every true mind when an honored and loved parent departs, that she lacked fidelity in the relation of daughter. she agreed not always with his views and methods, but this diversity of mind never affected their mutual respect and love.--[ed.]] lines written in march, . "i will not leave you comfortless." o, friend divine! this promise dear falls sweetly on the weary ear! often, in hours of sickening pain, it soothes me to thy rest again. might i a true disciple be, following thy footsteps faithfully, then should i still the succor prove of him who gave his life for love. when this fond heart would vainly beat for bliss that ne'er on earth we meet, for perfect sympathy of soul, from those such heavy laws control; when, roused from passion's ecstasy, i see the dreams that filled it fly, amid my bitter tears and sighs those gentle words before me rise. with aching brows and feverish brain the founts of intellect i drain, and con with over-anxious thought what poets sung and heroes wrought. enchanted with their deeds and lays, i with like gems would deck my days; no fires creative in me burn, and, humbled, i to thee return; when blackest clouds around me rolled of scepticism drear and cold, when love, and hope, and joy and pride, forsook a spirit deeply tried; my reason wavered in that hour, prayer, too impatient, lost its power; from thy benignity a ray, i caught, and found the perfect day. a head revered in dust was laid; for the first time i watched my dead; the widow's sobs were checked in vain, and childhood's tears poured down like rain. in awe i gaze on that dear face, in sorrow, years gone by retrace, when, nearest duties most forgot, i might have blessed, and did it not! ignorant, his wisdom i reproved, heedless, passed by what most he loved, knew not a life like his to prize, of ceaseless toil and sacrifice. no tears can now that hushed heart move, no cares display a daughter's love, the fair occasion lost, no more can thoughts more just to thee restore. what can i do? and how atone for all i've done, and left undone? tearful i search the parting words which the beloved john records. "not comfortless!" i dry my eyes, my duties clear before me rise,-- before thou think'st of taste or pride, see home-affections satisfied! be not with generous _thoughts_ content, but on well-doing constant bent; when self seems dear, self-seeking fair; remember this sad hour in prayer! though all thou wishest fly thy touch, much can one do who loveth much. more of thy spirit, jesus give, not comfortless, though sad, to live. and yet not sad, if i can know to copy him who here below sought but to do his father's will, though from such sweet composure still my heart be far. wilt thou not aid one whose best hopes on thee are stayed? breathe into me thy perfect love, and guide me to thy rest above! * * * * * to her brother, r----. * * * mr. keats, emma's father, is dead. to me this brings unusual sorrow, though i have never yet seen him; but i thought of him as one of the very few persons known to me by reputation, whose acquaintance might enrich me. his character was a sufficient answer to the doubt, whether a merchant can be a man of honor. he was, like your father, a man all whose virtues had stood the test. he was no word-hero. * * * * * to a young friend. _providence, june , _. my dear ------: i pray you, amid all your duties, to keep some hours to yourself. do not let my example lead you into excessive exertions. i pay dear for extravagance of this sort; five years ago i had no idea of the languor and want of animal spirits which torment me now. animal spirits are not to be despised. an earnest mind and seeking heart will not often be troubled by despondency; but unless the blood can dance at proper times, the lighter passages of life lose all their refreshment and suggestion. i wish you and ------- had been here last saturday. our school-house was dedicated, and mr. emerson made the address; it was a noble appeal in behalf of the best interests of culture, and seemingly here was fit occasion. the building was beautiful, and furnished with an even elegant propriety. i am at perfect liberty to do what i please, and there are apparently the best dispositions, if not the best preparation, on the part of the hundred and fifty young minds with whom i am to be brought in contact. i sigh for the country; trees, birds and flowers, assure me that june is here, but i must walk through streets many and long, to get sight of any expanse of green. i had no fine weather while at home, though the quiet and rest were delightful to me; the sun did not shine once really warmly, nor did the apple-trees put on their blossoms until the very day i came away. * * * * * sonnet. to the same. although the sweet, still watches of the night find me all lonely now, yet the delight hath not quite gone, which from thy presence flows. the love, the joy that in thy bosom glows, lingers to cheer thy friend. from thy fresh dawn some golden exhalations have i drawn to make less dim my dusty noon. thy tones are with me still; some plaintive as the moans of dryads, when their native groves must fall, some wildly wailing, like the clarion-call on battle-field, strewn with the noble dead. some in soft romance, like the echoes bred in the most secret groves of arcady; yet all, wild, sad, or soft, how steeped in poesy! _providence, april_, . * * * * * to the same. _providence, oct_. , . * * * * i am reminded by what you say, of an era in my own existence; it is seven years bygone. for bitter months a heavy weight had been pressing on me,--the weight of deceived friendship. i could not be much alone,--a great burden of family cares pressed upon me; i was in the midst of society, and obliged to act my part there as well as i could. at that time i took up the study of german, and my progress was like the rebound of a string pressed almost to bursting. my mind being then in the highest state of action, heightened, by intellectual appreciation, every pang; and imagination, by prophetic power, gave to the painful present all the weight of as painful a future. at this time i never had any consolation, except in long solitary walks, and my meditations then were so far aloof from common life, that on my return my fall was like that of the eagle, which the sportsman's hand calls bleeding from his lofty flight, to stain the earth with his blood. in such hours we feel so noble, so full of love and bounty, that we cannot conceive how any pain should have been needed to teach us. it then seems we are so born for good, that such means of leading us to it were wholly unnecessary. but i have lived to know that the secret of all things is pain, and that nature travaileth most painfully with her noblest product. i was not without hours of deep spiritual insight, and consciousness of the inheritance of vast powers. i touched the secret of the universe, and by that touch was invested with talismanic power which has never left me, though it sometimes lies dormant for a long time. one day lives always in my memory; one chastest, heavenliest day of communion with the soul of things. it was thanksgiving-day. i was free to be alone; in the meditative woods, by the choked-up fountain, i passed its hours, each of which contained ages of thought and emotion. i saw, then, how idle were my griefs; that i had acquired _the thought_ of each object which had been taken from me; that more extended personal relations would only have given me pleasures which then seemed not worth my care, and which would surely have dimmed my sense of the spiritual meaning of all which had passed. i felt how true it was that nothing in any being which was fit for me, could long be kept from me; and that, if separation could be, real intimacy had never been. all the films seemed to drop from my existence, and i was sure that i should never starve in this desert world, but that manna would drop from heaven, if i would but rise with every rising sun to gather it. in the evening i went to the church-yard; the moon sailed above the rosy clouds,--the crescent moon rose above the heavenward-pointing spire. at that hour a vision came upon my soul, whose final scene last month interpreted. the rosy clouds of illusion are all vanished; the moon has waxed to full. may my life be a church, full of devout thoughts end solemn music. i pray thus, my dearest child! "our father! let not the heaviest shower be spared; let not the gardener forbear his knife till the fair, hopeful tree of existence be brought to its fullest blossom and fruit!" * * * * * to the same. _jamaica plain, june_, . * * * i have had a pleasant visit at nahant, but was no sooner there than the air braced me so violently as to drive all the blood to my head. i had headache two of the three days we were there, and yet i enjoyed my stay very much. we had the rocks and piazzas to ourselves, and were on sufficiently good terms not to destroy, if we could not enhance, one another's pleasure. the first night we had a storm, and the wind roared and wailed round the house that ossianic poetry of which you hear so many strains. next day was clear and brilliant, with a high north-west wind. i went out about six o'clock, and had a two hours' scramble before breakfast. i do not like to sit still in this air, which exasperates all my nervous feelings; but when i can exhaust myself in climbing, i feel delightfully,--the eye is so sharpened, and the mind so full of thought. the outlines of all objects, the rocks, the distant sails, even the rippling of the ocean, were so sharp that they seemed to press themselves into the brain. when i see a natural scene by such a light it stays in my memory always as a picture; on milder days it influences me more in the way of reverie. after breakfast, we walked on the beaches. it was quite low tide, no waves, and the fine sand eddying wildly about. i came home with that frenzied headache which you are so unlucky as to know, covered my head with wet towels, and went to bed. after dinner i was better, and we went to the spouting-horn. c---- was perched close to the fissure, far above me, and, in a pale green dress, she looked like the nymph of the place. i lay down on a rock, low in the water, where i could hear the twin harmonies of the sucking of the water into the spout, and the washing of the surge on the foot of the rock. i never passed a more delightful afternoon. clouds of pearl and amber were slowly drifting across the sky, or resting a while to dream, like me, near the water. opposite me, at considerable distance, was a line of rock, along which the billows of the advancing tide chased one another, and leaped up exultingly as they were about to break. that night we had a sunset of the gorgeous, autumnal kind, and in the evening very brilliant moonlight; but the air was so cold i could enjoy it but a few minutes. next day, which was warm and soft, i was out on the rocks all day. in the afternoon i was out alone, and had an admirable place, a cleft between two vast towers of rock with turret-shaped tops. i got on a ledge of rock at their foot, where i could lie and let the waves wash up around me, and look up at the proud turrets rising into the prismatic light. this evening was very fine; all the sky covered with crowding clouds, profound, but not sullen of mood, the moon wading, the stars peeping, the wind sighing very softly. we lay on the high rocks and listened to the plashing of the waves. the next day was good, but the keen light was too much for my eyes and brain; and, though i am glad to have been there, i am as glad to get back to our garlanded rocks, and richly-green fields and groves. i wish you could come to me now; we have such wealth of roses. * * * * * to the same. _jamaica plain, aug., _. * * * * i returned home well, full of earnestness; yet, i know not why, with the sullen, boding sky came a mood of sadness, nay, of gloom, black as hades, which i have vainly striven to fend off by work, by exercise, by high memories. very glad was i of a painful piece of intelligence, which came the same day with your letter, to bring me on excuse for tears. that was a black friday, both above and within. what demon resists our good angel, and seems at such times to have the mastery? only _seems_, i say to myself; it is but the sickness of the immortal soul, and shall by-and-by be cast aside like a film. i think this is the great step of our life,--to change the _nature_ of our self-reliance. we find that the will cannot conquer circumstances, and that our temporal nature must vary its hue here with the food that is given it. only out of mulberry leaves will the silk-worm spin its thread fine and durable. the mode of our existence is not in our own power; but behind it is the immutable essence that cannot be tarnished; and to hold fast to this conviction, to live as far as possible by its light, cannot be denied us if we elect this kind of self-trust. yet is sickness wearisome; and i rejoice to say that my demon seems to have been frightened away by this day's sun. but, conscious of these diseases of the mind, believe that i can sympathize with a friend when subject to the same. do not fail to go and stay with ---------; few live so penetrating and yet so kind, so true, so sensitive. she is the spirit of love as well as of intellect. * * * * * * * * * to the same. my beloved child: i confess i was much disappointed when i first received your letter this evening. i have been quite ill for two or three days, and looked forward to your presence as a restorative. but think not i would have had you act differently; far better is it for me to have my child faithful to duty than even to have her with me. such was the lesson i taught her in a better hour. i am abashed to think how often lately i have found excuses for indolence in the weakness of my body; while now, after solitary communion with my better nature, i feel it was weakness of mind, weak fear of depression and conflict. but the father of our spirits will not long permit a heart fit for worship "--------- to seek from weak recoils, exemptions weak, after false gods to go astray, deck altars vile with garlands gay," etc. his voice has reached me; and i trust the postponement of your visit will give me space to nerve myself to what strength i should, so that, when we do meet, i shall rejoice that you did not come to help or soothe me; for i shall have helped and soothed myself. indeed, i would not so willingly that you should see my short-comings as know that they exist. pray that i may never lose sight of my vocation; that i may not make ill-health a plea for sloth and cowardice; pray that, whenever i do, i may be punished more swiftly than this time, by a sadness as deep as now. * * * * * to her brother, r. _cambridge, august_ , . my dear r.: i want to hear how you enjoyed your journey, and what you think of the world as surveyed from mountain-tops. i enjoy exceedingly staying among the mountains. i am satisfied with reading these bolder lines in the manuscript of nature. merely gentle and winning scenes are not enough for me. i wish my lot had been cast amid the sources of the streams, where the voice of the hidden torrent is heard by night, where the eagle soars, and the thunder resounds in long peals from side to side; where the grasp of a more powerful emotion has rent asunder the rocks, and the long purple shadows fall like a broad wing upon the valley. all places, like all persons, i know, have beauty; but only in some scenes, and with some people, can i expand and feel myself at home. i feel all this the more for having passed my earlier life in such a place as cambridgeport. there i had nothing except the little flower-garden behind the house, and the elms before the door. i used to long and sigh for beautiful places such as i read of. there was not one walk for me, except over the bridge. i liked that very much,--the river, and the city glittering in sunset, and the lively undulating line all round, and the light smokes, seen in some weather. * * * * * letter to the same. _milwaukie, july _ , . dear r.: * * * daily i thought of you during my visit to the rock-river territory. it is only five years since the poor indians have been dispossessed of this region of sumptuous loveliness, such as can hardly be paralleled in the world. no wonder they poured out their blood freely before they would go. on one island, belonging to a mr. h., with whom we stayed, are still to be found their "caches" for secreting provisions,--the wooden troughs in which they pounded their corn, the marks of their tomahawks upon felled trees. when he first came, he found the body of an indian woman, in a canoe, elevated on high poles, with all her ornaments on. this island is a spot, where nature seems to have exhausted her invention in crowding it with all kinds of growths, from the richest trees down to the most delicate plants. it divides the river which there sweeps along in clear and glittering current, between noble parks, richest green lawns, pictured rocks crowned with old hemlocks, or smooth bluffs, three hundred feet high, the most beautiful of all. two of these,--the eagle's nest, and the deer's walk, still the resort of the grand and beautiful creature from which they are named,--were the scene of some of the happiest hours of my life. i had no idea, from verbal description, of the beauty of these bluffs, nor can i hope to give any to others. they lie so magnificently bathed in sunlight, they touch the heavens with so sharp and fair a line. this is one of the finest parts of the river; but it seems beautiful enough to fill any heart and eye all along its course, nowhere broken or injured by the hand of man. and there, i thought, if we two could live, and you could have a farm which would not cost a twentieth part the labor of a new england farm, and would pay twenty times as much for the labor, and have our books and, our pens and a little boat on the river, how happy we might be for four or five years,--at least, _as_ happy as fate permits mortals to be. for we, i think, are congenial, and if i could hope permanent peace on the earth, i might hope it with you. you will be glad to hear that i feel overpaid for coming here. much is my life enriched by the images of the great niagara, of the vast lakes, of the heavenly sweetness of the prairie scenes, and, above all, by the heavenly region where i would so gladly have lived. my health, too, is materially benefited. i hope to come back better fitted for toil and care, as well as with beauteous memories to sustain me in them. affectionately always, &c. * * * * * to miss r. _chicago_, _august_ , . i have hoped from time to time, dear ----, that i should receive a few lines from you, apprizing me how you are this summer, but a letter from mrs. f---- lately comes to tell me that you are not better, but, at least when at saratoga, worse. so writing is of course fatiguing, and i must not expect letters any more. to that i could make up my mind if i could hear that you were well again. i fear, if your malady disturbs you as much as it did, it must wear on your strength very much, and it seems in itself dangerous. however, it is good to think that your composure is such that disease can only do its legitimate work, and not undermine two ways,--the body with its pains, and the body through the mind with thoughts and fears of pains. i should have written to you long ago except that i find little to communicate this summer, and little inclination to communicate that little; so what letters i have sent, have been chiefly to beg some from my friends. i have had home-sickness sometimes here, as do children for the home where they are even little indulged, in the boarding-school where they are only tolerated. this has been in the town, where i have felt the want of companionship, because the dissipation of fatigue, or expecting soon to move again, has prevented my employing myself for myself; and yet there was nothing well worth looking at without. when in the country i have enjoyed myself highly, and my health has improved day by day. the characters of persons are brought out by the little wants and adventures of country life as you see it in this region; so that each one awakens a healthy interest; and the same persons who, if i saw them at these hotels, would not have a word to say that could fix the attention, become most pleasing companions; their topics are before them, and they take the hint. you feel so grateful, too, for the hospitality of the log-cabin; such gratitude as the hospitality of the rich, however generous, cannot inspire; for these wait on you with their domestics and money, and give of their superfluity only; but here the master gives you his bed, his horse, his lamp, his grain from the field, his all, in short; and you see that he enjoys doing so thoroughly, and takes no thought for the morrow; so that you seem in fields full of lilies perfumed with pure kindness; and feel, verily, that solomon in all his glory could not have entertained you so much to the purpose. travelling, too, through the wide green woods and prairies, gives a feeling both of luxury and repose that the sight of highly-cultivated country never can. there seems to be room enough for labor to pause and man to fold his arms and gaze, forgetting poverty, and care, and the thousand walls and fences that in the cultivated region must be built and daily repaired both for mind and body. nature seems to have poured forth her riches so without calculation, merely to mark the fulness of her joy; to swell in larger strains the hymn, "the one spirit doeth all things veil, for its life is love." i will not ask you to write to me now, as i shall so soon be at home. probably, too, i shall reserve a visit to b---- for another summer; i have been so much a rover that when once on the road i shall wish to hasten home. ever yours, m. * * * * * to the same. _cambridge, january_ , . my dear ------: i am anxious to get a letter, telling me how you fare this winter in the cottage. your neighbors who come this way do not give very favorable accounts of your looks; and, if you are well enough, i should like to see a few of those firm, well-shaped characters from your own hand. is there no chance of your coming to boston all this winter? i had hoped to see you for a few hours at least. i wrote you one letter while at the west; i know not if it was ever received; it was sent by a private opportunity, one of those "traps to catch the unwary," as they have been called. it was no great loss, if lost. i did not feel like writing letters while travelling. it took all my strength of mind to keep moving and to receive so many new impressions. surely i never had so clear an idea before of the capacity to bless, of mere _earth_, when fresh from the original breath of the creative spirit. to have this impression, one must see large tracts of wild country, where the traces of man's inventions are too few and slight to break the harmony of the first design. it will not be so, long, even where i have been now; in three or four years those vast flowery plains will be broken up for tillage,--those shapely groves converted into logs and boards. i wished i could have kept on now, for two or three years, while yet the first spell rested on the scene. i feel much refreshed, even by this brief intimacy with nature in an aspect of large and unbroken lineaments. i came home with a treasure of bright pictures and suggestions, and seemingly well. but my strength, which had been sustained by a free, careless life in the open air, has yielded to the chills of winter, and a very little work, with an ease that is not encouraging. however, i have had the influenza, and that has been about as bad as fever to everybody. _now_ i am pretty well, but much writing does not agree with me. * * * i wish you were near enough for me to go in and see you now and then. i know that, sick or well, you are always serene, and sufficient to yourself; but now you are so much shut up, it might animate existence agreeably to hear some things i might have to tell. * * * * * * * * to the same. * * * . just as i was beginning to visit the institutions here, of a remedial and benevolent kind, i was stopped by influenza. so soon as i am quite well i shall resume the survey. i do not expect to do much, practically, for the suffering, but having such an organ of expression as the _tribune_, any suggestions that are well grounded may be of use. i have always felt great interest for those women who are trampled in the mud to gratify the brute appetites of men, and i wished i might be brought, naturally, into contact with them. now i am so, and i think i shall have much that is interesting to tell you when we meet. i go on very moderately, for my strength is not great; but i am now connected with a person who is anxious i should not overtask it. i hope to do more for the paper by-and-by. at present, besides the time i spend in looking round and examining my new field, i am publishing a volume, of which you will receive a copy, called "woman in the nineteenth century." a part of my available time is spent in attending to it as it goes through the press; for, really, the work seems but half done when your book is _written_. i like being here; the streams of life flow free, and i learn much. i feel so far satisfied as to have laid my plans to stay a year and a half, if not longer, and to have told mr. g---- that i probably shall do so. that is long enough for a mortal to look forward, and not too long, as i must look forward in order to get what i want from europe. mr. greeley is a man of genuine excellence, honorable, benevolent, of an uncorrupted disposition, and of great, abilities. in modes of life and manners he is the man of the people, and of the _american_ people. * * * i rejoice to hear that your situation is improved. i hope to pass a day or two with you next summer, if you can receive me when i can come. i want to hear from you now and then, if it be only a line to let me know the state of your health. love to miss g----, and tell her i have the cologne-bottle on my mantle-piece now. i sent home for all the little gifts i had from friends, that my room might look more homelike. my window commands a most beautiful view, for we are quite out of the town, in a lovely place on the east river. i like this, as i can be in town when i will, and here have much retirement. you were right in supposing my signature is the star. ever affectionately yours. * * * * * to her brother, r. _fishkill-landing, nov , ._ dear r.: * * * * * the seven weeks of proposed abode here draw to a close, and have brought what is rarest,--fruition, of the sort proposed from them. i have been here all the time, except that three weeks since i went down to new york, and with ---- visited the prison at sing-sing. on saturday we went up to sing-sing in a little way-boat, thus seeing that side of the river to much greater advantage than we can in the mammoth boats. we arrived in resplendent moonlight, by which we might have supposed the prisons palaces, if we had not known too well what was within. on sunday ---- addressed the male convicts in a strain of most noble and pathetic eloquence. they listened with earnest attention; many were moved to tears,--some, i doubt not, to a better life. i never felt such sympathy with an audience;--as i looked over that sea of faces marked with the traces of every ill, i felt that at least heavenly truth would not be kept out by self-complacency and a dependence on good appearances. i talked with a circle of women, and they showed the natural aptitude of the sex for refinement. these women--some black, and all from the lowest haunts of vice--showed a sensibility and a sense of propriety which would not have disgraced any place. returning, we had a fine storm on the river, clearing up with strong winds. * * * * * to her brother, a. b. f. _rome, jan._ , . my dear a.: your letter and mother's gave me the first account of your illness. some letters were lost during the summer, i do not know how. it did seem very hard upon you to have that illness just after your settlement; but it is to be hoped we shall some time know a good reason for all that seems so strange. i trust you are now becoming fortified in your health, and if this could only be, feel as if things would go well with you in this difficult world. i trust you are on the threshold of an honorable and sometimes happy career. from many pains, many dark hours, let none of the progeny of eve hope to escape! * * * * meantime, i hope to find you in your home, and make you a good visit there. your invitation is sweet in its tone, and rouses a vision of summer woods and new england sunday-morning bells. it seems to me that mother is at last truly in her sphere, living with one of her children. watch over her carefully, and don't let her do too much. her spirit is only all too willing,--but the flesh is weak, and her life so precious to us all! * * * * * * * * * to mazzini. "al cittadino reppresentante del popolo romano." _rome, march_ , . dear mazzini: though knowing you occupied by the most important affairs, i again feel impelled to write a few lines. what emboldens me is the persuasion that the best friends, in point of sympathy and intelligence,--the only friends of a man of ideas and of marked character,--must be women. you have your mother; no doubt you have others, perhaps many. of that i know nothing; only i like to offer also my tribute of affection. when i think that only two years ago you thought of coming into italy with us in disguise, it seems very glorious that you are about to enter republican rome as a roman citizen. it seems almost the most sublime and poetical fact of history. yet, even in the first thrill of joy, i felt "he will think his work but beginning, now." when i read from your hand these words, "ii lungo esilio teste ricominciato, la vita non confortata, fuorche d'affetti lontani e contesi, e la speranza lungamente protrata, e il desiderio che comincia a farmi si supremo, di dormire finalmente in pace, da che non ho potuto, vivere in terra mia,"--when i read these words they made me weep bitterly, and i thought of them always with a great pang at the heart. but it is not so, dear mazzini,--you do not return to sleep under the sod of italy, but to see your thought springing up all over the soil. the gardeners seem to me, in point of instinctive wisdom or deep thought, mostly incompetent to the care of the garden; but on idea like this will be able to make use of any implements. the necessity, it is to be hoped, will educate the men, by making them work. it is not this, i believe, which still keeps your heart so melancholy; for i seem to read the same melancholy in your answer to the roman assembly, you speak of "few and late years," but some full ones still remain. a century is not needed, nor should the same man, in the same form of thought, work too long on an age. he would mould and bind it too much to himself. better for him to die and return incarnated to give the same truth on yet another side. jesus of nazareth died young; but had he not spoken and acted as much truth as the world could bear in his time? a frailty, a perpetual short-coming, motion in a curve-line, seems the destiny of this earth. the excuse awaits us elsewhere; there must be one,--for it is true, as said goethe, "care is taken that the tree grow not up into the heavens." men like you, appointed ministers, must not be less earnest in their work; yet to the greatest, the day, the moment is all their kingdom, god takes care of the increase. farewell! for your sake i could wish at this moment to be an italian and a man of action; but though i am an _american_, i am not even _a woman of action_; so the best i can do is to pray with the whole heart, "heaven bless dear mazzini!--cheer his heart, and give him worthy helpers to carry out his holy purposes." * * * * * to mr. and mrs. spring. _florence, dec._ , . dear m. and r.: * * * your letter, dear r, was written in your noblest and most womanly spirit. i thank you warmly for your sympathy about my little boy. what he is to me, even you can hardly dream; you that have three, in whom the natural thirst of the heart was earlier satisfied, can scarcely know what my one ewe-lamb is to me. that he may live, that i may find bread for him, that i may not spoil him by overweening love, that i may grow daily better for his sake, are the ever-recurring thoughts,--say prayers,--that give their hue to all the current of my life. but, in answer to what you say, that it is still better to give the world a living soul than a portion of my life in a printed book, it is true; and yet, of my book i could know whether it would be of some worth or not; of my child, i must wait to see what his worth will be. i play with him, my ever-growing mystery! but from the solemnity of the thoughts he brings is refuge only in god. was i worthy to be parent of a soul, with its eternal, immense capacity for weal and woe? "god be merciful to me a sinner!" comes so naturally to a mother's heart! * * * * * what you say about the peace way is deeply true; if any one see clearly how to work in that way, let him, in god's name! only, if he abstain from fighting against giant wrongs, let him be sure he is really and ardently at work undermining them, or, better still, sustaining the rights that are to supplant them. meanwhile, i am not sure that i can keep my hands free from blood. cobden is good; but if he had stood in kossuth's place, would he not have drawn his sword against the austrian? you, could you let a croat insult your wife, carry off your son to be an austrian serf, and leave your daughter bleeding in the dust? yet it is true that while moses slew the egyptian, christ stood still to be spit upon; and it is true that death to man could do him no harm. you have the truth, you have the right, but could you act up to it in all circumstances? stifled under the roman priesthood, would you not have thrown it off with all your force? would you have waited unknown centuries, hoping for the moment when you could see another method? yet the agonies of that baptism of blood i feel, o how deeply! in the golden june days of rome. consistent no way, i felt i should have shrunk back,--i could not have had it shed. christ did not have to see his dear ones pass the dark river; he could go alone, however, in prophetic spirit. no doubt he foresaw the crusades. in answer to what you say of ----, i wish the little effort i made for him had been wiselier applied. yet these are not the things one regrets. it does not do to calculate too closely with the affectionate human impulse. we must be content to make many mistakes, or we should move too slowly to help our brothers much. * * * * * to her brother, r. _florence, jan._ , . my dear r.: * * * * the way in which you speak of my marriage is such as i expected from you. now that we have once exchanged words on these important changes in our lives, it matters little to write letters, so much has happened, and the changes are too great to be made clear in writing. it would not be worth while to keep the family thinking of me. i cannot fix precisely the period of my return, though at present it seems to me probable we may make the voyage in may or june. at first we should wish to go and make a little visit to mother. i should take counsel with various friends before fixing myself in any place; see what openings there are for me, &c. i cannot judge at all before i am personally in the united states, and wish to engage myself no way. should i finally decide on the neighborhood of new york, i should see you all, often. i wish, however, to live with mother, if possible. we will discuss it on all sides when i come. climate is one thing i must think of. the change from the roman winter to that of new england might be very trying for ossoli. in new york he would see italians often, hear his native tongue, and feel less exiled. if we had our affairs in new york and lived in the neighboring country, we could find places as quiet as c------, more beautiful, and from which access to a city would be as easy by means of steam. on the other hand, my family and most cherished friends are in new england. i shall weigh all advantages at the time, and choose as may then seem best. i feel also the great responsibility about a child, and the mixture of solemn feeling with the joy its sweet ways and caresses give; yet this is only different in degree, not in kind, from what we should feel in other relations. we may more or less impede or brighten the destiny of all with whom we come in contact. much as the child lies in our power, still god and nature are there, furnishing a thousand masters to correct our erroneous, and fill up our imperfect, teachings. i feel impelled to try for good, for the sake of my child, most powerfully; but if i fail, i trust help will be tendered to him from some other quarter. i do not wish to trouble myself more than is inevitable, or lose the simple, innocent pleasure of watching his growth from day to day, by thinking of his future. at present my care of him is to keep him pure, in body and mind, to give for body and mind simple nutriment when he requires it, and to play with him. now he learns, playing, as we all shall when we enter a higher existence. with him my intercourse thus far has been precious, and if i do not well for _him_, he at least has taught _me_ a great deal. i may say of ossoli, it would be difficult to help liking him, so sweet is his disposition, so disinterested without effort, so simply wise his daily conduct, so harmonious his whole nature. and he is a perfectly unconscious character, and never dreams that he does well. he is studying english, but makes little progress. for a good while you may not be able to talk freely with him, but you will like showing him your favorite haunts,--he is so happy in nature, so sweet in tranquil places. * * * * * to ------. what a difference it makes to come home to a child! how it fills up all the gaps of life just in the way that is most consoling, most refreshing! formerly i used to feel sad at that hour; the day had not been nobly spent,--i had not done my duty to myself or others, and i felt so lonely! now i never feel lonely; for, even if my little boy dies, our souls will remain eternally united. and i feel _infinite_ hope for him,--hope that he will serve god and man more loyally than i have done; and seeing how full he is of life, how much he can afford to throw away, i feel the inexhaustibleness of nature, and console myself for my own incapacities. madame arconati is near me. we have had some hours of great content together, but in the last weeks her only child has been dangerously ill. i have no other acquaintance except in the american circle, and should not care to make any unless singularly desirable; for i want all my time for the care of my child, for my walks, and visits to objects of art, in which again i can find pleasure, end in the evening for study and writing. ossoli is forming some taste for books; he is also studying english; he learns of horace sumner, to whom he teaches italian in turn. * * * * * to mr. and mrs. s. _florence_, feb. , . my dear m. and r.: you have no doubt ere this received a letter written, i think, in december, but i must suddenly write again to thank you for the new year's letter. it was a sweet impulse that led you all to write together, and had its full reward in the pleasure you gave! i have said as little as possible about ossoli and our relation, wishing my old friends to form their own impressions naturally, when they see us together. i have faith that all who ever knew me will feel that i have become somewhat milder, kinder, and more worthy to serve all who need, for my new relations. i have expected that those who have cared for me chiefly for my activity of intellect, would not care for him; but that those in whom the moral nature predominates would gradually learn to love and admire him, and see what a treasure his affection must be to me. but even that would be only gradually; for it is by acts, not by words, that one so simple, true, delicate and retiring, can be known. for me, while some of my friends have thought me exacting, i may say ossoli has always outgone my expectations in the disinterestedness, the uncompromising bounty, of his every act. he was the same to his father as to me. his affections are few, but profound, and thoroughly acted out. his permanent affections are few, but his heart is always open to the humble, suffering, heavy-laden. his mind has little habitual action, except in a simple, natural poetry, that one not very intimate with him would never know anything about. but once opened to a great impulse, as it was to the hope of freeing his country, it rises to the height of the occasion, and stays there. his enthusiasm is quiet, but unsleeping. he is very unlike most italians, but very unlike most americans, too. i do not expect all who cared for me to care for him, nor is it of importance to him that they should. he is wholly without vanity. he is too truly the gentleman not to be respected by all persons of refinement. for the rest, if my life is free, and not too much troubled, if he can enjoy his domestic affections, and fulfil his duties in his own way, he will be content. can we find this much for ourselves in bustling america the next three or four years? i know not, but think we shall come and try. i wish much to see you all, and exchange the kiss of peace. there will, i trust, be peace within, if not without. i thank you most warmly for your gift. be assured it will turn to great profit. i have learned to be a great adept in economy, by looking at my little boy. i cannot bear to spend a cent for fear he may come to want. i understand now how the family-men get so mean, and shall have to begin soon to pray against that danger. my little nino, as we call him for house and pet name, is in perfect health. i wash, and dress, and sew for him; and think i see a great deal of promise in his little ways, and shall know him better for doing all for him, though it is fatiguing and inconvenient at times. he is very gay and laughing, sometimes violent,--for he is come to the age when he wants everything in his own hands,--but, on the whole, sweet as yet, and very fond of me. he often calls me to kiss him. he says, "kiss," in preference to the italian word bacio. i do not cherish sanguine visions about him, but try to do my best by him, and enjoy the present moment. it was a nice account you gave of miss bremer. she found some "neighbors" as good as her own. you say she was much pleased by ----; could she know her, she might enrich the world with a portrait as full of little delicate traits as any in her gallery, and of a higher class than any in which she has been successful. i would give much that a competent person should paint ----. it is a shame she should die and leave the world no copy. * * * * * to mr. cass, charge d'affaires des etats unis d'amerique. _florence, may_ , . dear mr. cass: i shall most probably leave florence and italy the th or th of this month, and am not willing to depart without saying adieu to yourself. i wanted to write the th of april, but a succession of petty interruptions prevented. that was the day i saw you first, and the day the french first assailed rome. what a crowded day that was! i had been to visit ossoli in the morning, in the garden of the vatican. just after my return you entered. i then went to the hospital, and there passed the eight amid the groans of many suffering and some dying men. what a strange first of may it was, as i walked the streets of rome by the early sunlight of the nest day! those were to me grand and impassioned hours. deep sorrow followed,--many embarrassments, many pains! let me once more, at parting, thank you for the sympathy you showed me amid many of these. a thousand years might pass, and you would find it unforgotten by me. i leave italy with profound regret, and with only a vague hope of returning. i could have lived here always, full of bright visions, and expanding in my faculties, had destiny permitted. may you be happy who remain here! it would be well worth while to be happy in italy! i had hoped to enjoy some of the last days, but the weather has been steadily bad since you left florence. since the th of april we have not had a fine day, and all our little plans for visits to favorite spots and beautiful objects, from which we have long been separated, have been marred! i sail in the barque elizabeth for new york. she is laden with marble and rags--a very appropriate companionship for wares of italy! she carries powers' statue of calhoun. adieu! remember that we look to you to keep up the dignity of our country. many important occasions are now likely to offer for the american (i wish i could write the columbian) man to advocate,--more, to _represent_ the cause of truth and freedom in the face of their foes. remember me as their lover, and your friend, m. o. * * * * * to ------. _florence_, _april_ , . * * * there is a bark at leghorn, highly spoken of, which sails at the end of this month, and we shall very likely take that. i find it imperatively necessary to go to the united states to make arrangements that may free me from care. shall i be more fortunate if i go in person? i do not know. i am ill adapted to push my claims and pretensions; but, at least, it will not be such slow work as passing from disappointment to disappointment here, where i wait upon the post-office, and must wait two or three months, to know the fate of any proposition. i go home prepared to expect all that is painful and difficult. it will be a consolation to see my dear mother; and my dear brother e., whom i have not seen for ten years, is coming to new england this summer. on that account i wish to go _this_ year. * * * * * _may_ .--my head is full of boxes, bundles, phials of medicine, and pots of jelly. i never thought much about a journey for myself, except to try and return all the things, books especially, which i had been borrowing; but about my child i feel anxious lest i should not take what is necessary for his health and comfort on so long a voyage, where omissions are irreparable. the unpropitious, rainy weather delays us now from day to day, as our ship; the elizabeth,--(look out for news of shipwreck!) cannot finish taking in her cargo till come one or two good days. i leave italy with most sad and unsatisfied heart,--hoping, indeed, to return, but fearing that may not be permitted in my "cross-biased" life, till strength of feeling and keenness of perception be less than during these bygone rich, if troubled, years! i can say least to those whom i prize most. i am so sad and weary, leaving italy, that i seem paralyzed. * * * * * to the same. _ship elizabeth, off gibraltar, june_ , . my dear m----: you will, i trust, long ere receiving this, have read my letter from florence, enclosing one to my mother, informing her under what circumstances i had drawn on you through ----, and mentioning how i wished the bill to be met in case of any accident to me on my homeward course. that course, as respects weather, has been thus far not unpleasant; but the disaster that has befallen us is such as i never dreamed of. i had taken passage with captain hasty--one who seemed to me one of the best and most high-minded of our american men. he showed the kindest interest in us. his wife, an excellent woman, was with him. i thought, during the voyage, if safe and my child well, to have as much respite from care and pain as sea-sickness would permit. but scarcely was that enemy in some measure quelled, when the captain fell sick. at first his disease presented the appearance of nervous fever. i was with him a great deal; indeed, whenever i could relieve his wife from a ministry softened by great love and the courage of womanly heroism: the last days were truly terrible with disgusts and fatigues; for he died, we suppose,--no physician has been allowed to come on board to see the body,--of confluent small-pox. i have seen, since we parted, great suffering, but nothing physical to be compared to this, where the once fair and expressive mould of man is thus lost in corruption before life has fled. he died yesterday morning, and was buried in deep water, the american consul's barge towing out one from this ship which bore the body, about six o'clock. it was sunday. a divinely calm, glowing afternoon had succeeded a morning of bleak, cold wind. you cannot think how beautiful the whole thing was:--the decent array and sad reverence of the sailors; the many ships with their banners flying; the stern pillar of hercules all bathed in roseate vapor; the little white sails diving into the blue depths with that solemn spoil of the good man, so still, when he had been so agonized and gasping as the last sun stooped. yes, it was beautiful; but how dear a price we pay for the poems of this world! we shall now be in quarantine a week; no person permitted to come on board until it be seen whether disease break out in other cases. i have no good reason to think it will _not_; yet i do not feel afraid. ossoli has had it; so he is safe. the baby is, of course, subject to injury. in the earlier days, before i suspected small-pox, i carried him twice into the sick-room, at the request of the captain, who was becoming fond of him. he laughed and pointed; he did not discern danger, but only thought it odd to see the old friend there in bed. it is vain by prudence to seek to evade the stern assaults of destiny. i submit. should all end well, we shall be in new york later than i expected; but keep a look-out. should we arrive safely, i should like to see a friendly face. commend me to my dear friends; and, with most affectionate wishes that joy and peace may continue to dwell in your house, adieu, and love as you can, your friend, margaret. * * * * * letter from hon. lewis cass, jr., united states charge d'affaires at rome, to mrs. e. k. channing. _legation des etats unis d'amerique, rome, may_ , . madame: i beg leave to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the ---- ult., and to express my regret that the weak state of my eyesight has prevented me from giving it an earlier reply. in compliance with your request, i have the honor to state, succinctly, the circumstances connected with my acquaintance with the late madame ossoli, your deceased sister, during her residence in rome. in the month of april, , rome, as you are no doubt aware, was placed in a state of siege by the approach of the french army. it was filled at that time with exiles and fugitives who had been contending for years, from milan in the north to palermo in the south, for the republican cause; and when the gates were closed, it was computed that there were, of italians alone, thirteen thousand refugees within the walls of the city, all of whom had been expelled from adjacent states, till rome became their last rallying-point, and, to many, their final resting-place. among these was to be seen every variety of age, sentiment, and condition,--striplings and blanched heads; wild, visionary enthusiasts; grave, heroic men, who, in the struggle for freedom, had ventured all, and lost all; nobles and beggars; bandits, felons and brigands. great excitement naturally existed; and, in the general apprehension which pervaded all classes, that acts of personal violence and outrage would soon be committed, the foreign residents, especially, found themselves placed in an alarming situation. on the th of april the first engagement took place between the french and roman troops, and in a few days subsequently i visited several of my countrymen, at their request, to concert measures for their safety. hearing, on that occasion, and for the first time, of miss fuller's presence in rome, and of her solitary mode of life, i ventured to call upon her, and offer my services in any manner that might conduce to her comfort and security. she received me with much kindness, and thus an acquaintance commenced. her residence on the piazzi barberini being considered an insecure abode, she removed to the casa dies, which was occupied by several american families. in the engagements which succeeded between the roman and french troops, the wounded of the former were brought into the city, and disposed throughout the different hospitals, which were under the superintendence of several ladies of high rank, who had formed themselves into associations, the better to ensure care and attention to those unfortunate men. miss fuller took an active part in this noble work; and the greater portion of her time, during the entire siege, was passed in the hospital of the trinity of the pilgrims, which was placed under her direction, in attendance upon its inmates. the weather was intensely hot; her health was feeble and delicate; the dead and dying were around her in every stage of pain and horror; but she never shrank from the duty she had assumed. her heart and soul were in the cause for which those men had fought, and all was done that woman could do to comfort them in their sufferings. i have seen the eyes of the dying, as she moved among them, extended on opposite beds, meet in commendation of her universal kindness; and the friends of those who then passed away may derive consolation from the assurance that nothing of tenderness and attention was wanting to soothe their last moments. and i have heard many of those who recovered speak with all the passionate fervor of the italian nature, of her whose sympathy and compassion, throughout their long illness, fulfilled all the offices of love and affection. mazzini, the chief of the triumvirate, who, better than any man in rome, knew her worth, often expressed to me his admiration of her high character; and the princess belgiojoso. to whom was assigned the charge of the papal palace, on the quirinal, which was converted on this occasion into a hospital, was enthusiastic in her praise. and in a letter which i received not long since from this lady, who was gaining the bread of an exile by teaching languages in constantinople, she alludes with much feeling to the support afforded by miss fuller to the republican party in italy. here, in rome, she is still spoken of in terms of regard and endearment, and the announcement of her death was received with a degree of sorrow not often bestowed upon a foreigner, especially one of a different faith. on the th of june, the bombardment from the french camp was very heavy, shells and grenades falling in every part of the city. in the afternoon of the th, i received a brief note from miss fuller, requesting me to call at her residence. i did so without delay, and found her lying on a sofa, pale and trembling, evidently much exhausted. she informed me that she had sent for me to place in my hand a packet of important papers, which she wished me to keep for the present, and, in the event of her death, to transmit it to her friends in the united states. she then stated that she was married to marquis ossoli, who was in command of a battery on the pincian hill,--that being the highest and most exposed position in rome, and directly in the line of bombs from the french camp. it was not to be expected, she said, that he could escape the dangers of another night, such as the last; and therefore it was her intention to remain with him, and share his fate. at the ave maria, she added, he would come for her, and they would proceed together to his post. the packet which she placed in my possession, contained, she said, the certificates of her marriage, and of the birth and baptism of her child. after a few words more, i took my departure, the hour she named having nearly arrived. at the porter's lodge i met the marquis ossoli, and a few moments afterward i saw them walking toward the pincian hill. happily, the cannonading was not renewed that night, and at dawn of day she returned to her apartments, with her husband by her side. on that day the french army entered rome, and, the gates being opened, madame ossoli, accompanied by the marquis, immediately proceeded to rieti, where she had left her child in the charge of a confidential nurse, formerly in the service of the ossoli family. she remained, as you are no doubt aware, some months at rieti, whence she removed to florence, where she resided until her ill-fated departure for the united states. during this period i received several letters from her, all of which, though reluctant to part with them, i enclose to your address in compliance with your request. i am, madame, very respectfully, your obedient servant, lewis cass, jr. appendix. a. apparition of the goddess isis to her votary, from apulelus. "scarcely had i closed my eyes, when, behold (i saw in a dream), a divine form emerging from the middle of the sea, and raising a countenance venerable even to the gods themselves. afterward, the whole of the most splendid image seemed to stand before me, having gradually shaken off the sea. i will endeavor to explain to you its admirable form, if the poverty of human language will but afford me the power of an appropriate narration; or if the divinity itself, of the most luminous form, will supply me with a liberal abundance of fluent diction. in the first place, then, her most copious and long hairs, being gradually intorted, and promiscuously scattered on her divine neck, were softly defluous. a multiform crown, consisting of various flowers, bound the sublime summit of her head. and in the middle of the crown, just on her forehead, there was a smooth orb, resembling a mirror, or rather a white refulgent light, which indicated that she was the moon. vipers, rising up after the manner of furrows, environed the crown on the right hand and on the left, and cerealian ears of corn were also extended from above. her garment was of many colors, and woven from the finest flax, and was at one time lucid with a white splendor, at another yellow, from the flower of crocus, and at another flaming with a rosy redness. but that which most excessively dazzled my sight, was a very black robe, fulgid with a dark splendor, and which, spreading round and passing under her right side, and ascending to her left shoulder, there rose protuberant, like the centre of a shield, the dependent part of her robe falling in many folds, and having small knots of fringe, gracefully flowing in its extremities. glittering stars were dispersed through the embroidered border of the robe, and through the whole of its surface, and the full moon, shining in the middle of the stars, breathed forth flaming fires. a crown, wholly consisting of flowers and fruits of every kind, adhered with indivisible connection to the border of conspicuous robe, in all its undulating motions. "what she carried in her hands also consisted of things of a very different nature. her right hand bore a brazen rattle, through the narrow lamina of which, bent like a belt, certain rods passing, produced a sharp triple sound through the vibrating motion of her arm. an oblong vessel, in the shape of a boat, depended from her left hand, on the handle of which, in that part which was conspicuous, an asp raised its erect head and largely swelling neck. and shoes, woven from the leaves of the victorious palm-tree, covered her immortal feet. such, and so great a goddess, breathing the fragrant odor of the shores of arabia the happy, deigned thus to address me." the foreign english of the translator, thomas taylor, gives this description the air of being itself a part of the mysteries. but its majestic beauty requires no formal initiation to be enjoyed. * * * * * b. i give this in the original, as it does not bear translation. those who read italian will judge whether it is not a perfect description of a perfect woman. lodi e preghiere a maria. vergine bella che di sol vestita, coronata di stelle, al sommo sole piacesti si, che'n te sua luce ascose; amor mi spinge a dir di te parole; ma non so 'ncominciar senza tu' alta, e di coiul che amando in te si pose. invoco lei che ben sempre rispose, chi la chiamo con fede. vergine, s'a mercede miseria extrema dell' smane cose giammal tivoise, al mio prego t'inohina; soccorri alla mia guerra; bench' l' sia terra, e tu del oiel regina. vergine saggia, e del bel numero una delle beata vergini prudenti; anzi la prima, e con piu chiara lampa; o saldo scudo dell' afflitte gente contra colpi di morte e di fortuna, sotto' l' quai si trionfu, non pur scampa: o refrigerio alcieco ardor ch' avvampa qui fra mortali schiocchi, vergine, que' begli occhi che vider tristi la spietata stampa ne' dolci membri del tuo caro figlio, volgi ai mio dubbio stato; che sconsigliato a te vien per consiglio. vergine pura, d'ognti parte intera, del tuo parto gentil figlluola e madre; che allumi questa vita, e t'altra adorni; per te il tuo figlio e quel del sommo padre, o finestra del ciel lucente altera, venne a salvarne in su gli estremi giorni, e fra tutt' i terreni altri soggiorni sola tu fusti eletta, vergine benedetta; che 'l pianto d' eva in allegrezza torni'; fammi; che puoi; della sua grazia degno, senza fine o beata, gla coronata nel superno regno. vergine santa d'ogni grazia piena; che per vera e altissima umiltate. salisti al ciel, onde miel preghi ascolti; tu partoristi il fonte di pietate, e di giustizia il sol, che rasserena il secol pien d'errori oscuri et tolti; tre dolci et cari nomi ha' in te raccolti, madre, figliuola e sposa: vergine gloriosa, donna del re che nostri lacci a sciolti e fatto 'l mondo libero et felice, nelle cui sante piaghe prego ch'appaghe il cor, vera beatrice. vergine sola al mondo senza exempio che 'l ciel di tue bellezze innamorasti, cui ne prima fu simil ne seconda, santi penseri, atti pietosi et casti al vero dio sacrato et vivo tempio fecero in tua verginita feconda. per te po la mia vita esser ioconda, sa' tuoi preghi, o maria, vergine dolce et pia, ove 'l fallo abondo, la gratia abonda. con le ginocchia de la mente inchine, prego che sia mia scorta, e la mia torta via drizzi a buon fine. vergine chiara et stabile in eterno, di questo tempestoso mare stella, d'ogni fedel nocchier fidata guida, pon' mente in che terribile procella i' mi ritrovo sol, senza governo, et o gia da vicin l'ultime strida. ma pur in te l'anima mia si fida, peccatrice, i' nol nego, vergine; ma ti prego che 'l tuo nemico del mio mal non rida: ricorditi che fece il peccar nostro prender dio, per scamparne, umana carne al tuo virginal chiostro. vergine, quante lagrime ho gia sparte, quante lusinghe et quanti preghi indarno, pur per mia pena et per mio grave danno! da poi ch'i nacqui in su la riva d'arno; cercando or questa ed or quell altra parte, non e stata mia vita altro ch'affanno. mortal bellezza, atti, o parole m' hanno tutta ingombrata l'alma, vergine sacra, ed alma, non tardar; ch' i' non forse all' ultim 'ann, i di miel piu correnti che saetta, fra mierie e peccati sonsen andati, e sol morte n'aspetta. vergine, tale e terra, e posto ha in doglia lo mio cor; che vivendo in pianto il tenne; e di mille miel mali un non sapea; e per saperlo, pur quel che n'avvenne, fora avvento: ch' ogni altra sua voglia era a me morte, ed a lei fama rea or tu, donna del ciel, tu nostra dea, se dir lice, e convicusi; vergine d'alti sensi, tu vedi il tutto; e quel che non potea far oltri, e nulla a e la tua gran virtute; pon fine al mio dolore; ch'a te onore ed a mo fia salute. vergine, in cui ho tutta mia speranza che possi e vogli al gran bisogno altarme; non mi lasciare in su l'estremo passo; non guardar me, ma chi degno crearme; no'l mio valor, ma l'alta sua sembianza; che in me ti mova a curar d'uorm si basso. medusa, e l'error mio lo han fatto un sasso d'umor vano stillante; vergine, tu di sante lagrime, e pie adempi 'l mio cor lasso; ch' almen l'ultlmo pianto sia divoto, senza terrestro limo; come fu'l primo non d'insania voto. vergine umana, e nemica d'orgoglio, del comune principio amor t'induca; miserere d'un cor contrito umile; che se poca mortal terra caduca amar con si mirabil fede soglio; che devro far di te cosa gentile? se dal mio stato assai misero, e vile per le tue man resurgo, vergine; e sacro, e purgo al tuo nome e pensieri e'ngegno, o stile; la lingua, o'l cor, le lagrime, e i sospiri, scorgimi al migilor guado; e prendi in grado i cangiati desiri. il di s'appressa, e non pote esser lunge; si corre il tempo, e vola, vergine unica, e sola; e'l cor' or conscienza, or morte punge. raccommandami al tuo figiluol, verace uomo, e veraco dio; ch'accolga i mio spirto ultimo in pace. as the scandinavian represented frigga the earth, or world-mother, knowing all things, yet never herself revealing them, though ready to be called to counsel by the gods, it represents her in action, decked with jewels and gorgeously attended. but, says the mythes, when she ascended the throne of odin, her consort (heaven), she left with mortals her friend, the goddess of sympathy, to protect them in her absence. since, sympathy goes about to do good. especially she devotes herself to the most valiant and the most oppressed. she consoles the gods in some degree even for the death of their darling baldur. among the heavenly powers she has no consort. * * * * * c. the wedding of the lady theresa. from lockhart's spanish ballads. 'twas when the fifth alphonso in leon held his sway, king abdulla of toledo an embassy did send; he asked his sister for a wife, and in an evil day alphonso sent her, for he feared abdalla to offend; he feared to move his anger, for many times before he had received in danger much succor from the moor. sad heart had fair theresa, when she their paction knew; with streaming tears she heard them tell she 'mong the moors must go; that she, a christian damsel, a christian firm and true, must wed a moorish husband, it well might cause her woe; but all her tears and all her prayers they are of small avail; at length she for her fate prepares, a victim sad and pale. the king hath sent his sister to fair toledo town, where then the moor abdalla his royal state did keep; when she drew near, the moslem from his golden throne came down, and courteously received her, and bade her cease to weep; with loving words he pressed her to come his bower within; with kisses he caressed her, but still she feared the sin. "sir king, sir king, i pray thee,"--'twas thus theresa spake,-- "i pray thee, have compassion, and do to me no wrong; for sleep with thee i may not, unless the vows i break, whereby i to the holy church of christ my lord belong; for thou hast sworn to serve mahoun, and if this thing should be, the curse of god it must bring down upon thy realm and thee. "the angel of christ jesu, to whom my heavenly lord hath given my soul in keeping, is ever by my side; if thou dost me dishonor, he will unsheathe his sword, and smite thy body fiercely, at the crying of thy bride; invisible he standeth; his sword like fiery flame will penetrate thy bosom the hour that sees my shame." the moslem heard her with a smile; the earnest words she said he took for bashful maiden's wile, and drew her to his bower: in vain theresa prayed and strove,--she pressed abdalla's bed, perforce received his kiss of love, and lost her maiden flower. a woeful woman there she lay, a loving lord beside, and earnestly to god did pray her succor to provide. the angel of christ jesu her sore complaint did hear, and plucked his heavenly weapon from out his sheath unseen: he waved the brand in his right hand, and to the king came near, and drew the point o'er limb and joint, beside the weeping queen: a mortal weakness from the stroke upon the king did fall; he could not stand when daylight broke, but on his knees must crawl. abdalla shuddered inly, when he this sickness felt, and called upon his barons, his pillow to come nigh; "rise up," he said, "my liegemen," as round his bed they knelt, "and take this christian lady, else certainly i die; let gold be in your girdles, and precious stones beside, and swiftly ride to leon, and render up my bride." when they were come to leon theresa would not go into her brother's dwelling, where her maiden years were spent; but o'er her downcast visage a white veil she did throw, and to the ancient nunnery of las huelgas went. there, long, from worldly eyes retired, a holy life she led; there she, an aged saint, expired; there sleeps she with the dead. * * * * * d. the following extract from spinoza is worthy of attention, as expressing the view which a man of the largest intellectual scope may take of woman, if that part of his life to which her influence appeals has been left unawakened. he was a man of the largest intellect, of unsurpassed reasoning powers; yet he makes a statement false to history, for we well know how often men and women have ruled together without difficulty, and one in which very few men even at the present day--i mean men who are thinkers, like him--would acquiesce. i have put in contrast with it three expressions of the latest literature. first, from the poems of w. e. channing, a poem called "reverence," equally remarkable for the deep wisdom of its thought and the beauty of its utterance, and containing as fine a description of one class of women as exists in literature. in contrast with this picture of woman, the happy goddess of beauty, the wife, the friend, "the summer queen," i add one by the author of "festus," of a woman of the muse, the sybil kind, which seems painted from living experience. and, thirdly, i subjoin eugene sue's description of a wicked but able woman of the practical sort, and appeal to all readers whether a species that admits of three such varieties is so easily to be classed away, or kept within prescribed limits, as spinoza, and those who think like him, believe. spinoza. tractatus politici de democratia. caput xi. perhaps some one will here ask, whether the supremacy of man over woman is attributable to nature or custom? since, if it be human institutions alone to which this fact is owing, there is no reason why we should exclude women from a share in government. experience most plainly teaches that it is woman's weakness which places her under the authority of man. it has nowhere happened that men and women ruled together; but wherever men and women are found, the world over, there we see the men ruling and the women ruled, and in this order of things men and women live together in peace and harmony. the amazons, it is true, are reputed formerly to have held the reins of government, but they drove men from their dominions; the male of their offspring they invariably destroyed, permitting their daughters alone to live. now, if women were by nature upon an equality with men, if they equalled men in fortitude, in genius (qualities which give to men might, and consequently right), it surely would be the case, that, among the numerous and diverse nations of the earth, some would be found where both sexes ruled conjointly, and others where the men were ruled by the women, and so educated as to be mentally inferior; and since this state of things nowhere exists, it is perfectly fair to infer that the rights of women are not equal to those of men; but that women must be subordinate, and therefore cannot have an equal, far less a superior place in the government. if, too, we consider the passions of men--how the love men feel towards women is seldom anything but lust and impulse, and much less a reverence for qualities of soul than an admiration of physical beauty; observing, too, the jealousy of lovers, and other things of the same character--we shall see at a glance that it would be, in the highest degree, detrimental to peace and harmony, for men and women to possess on equal share in government. reverence. as an ancestral heritage revere all learning, and all thought. the painter's fame is thine, whate'er thy lot, who honorest grace. and need enough in this low time, when they, who seek to captivate the fleeting notes of heaven's sweet beauty, must despair almost, so heavy and obdurate show the hearts of their companions. honor kindly then those who bear up in their so generous arms the beautiful ideas of matchless forms; for were these not portrayed, our human fate,-- which is to be all high, majestical, to grow to goodness with each coming age, till virtue leap and sing for joy to see so noble, virtuous men,--would brief decay; and the green, festering slime, oblivious, haunt about our common fate. o, honor them! but what to all true eyes has chiefest charm, and what to every breast where beats a heart framed to one beautiful emotion,--to one sweet and natural feeling, lends a grace to all the tedious walks of common life, this is fair woman,--woman, whose applause each poet sings,--woman the beautiful. not that her fairest brow, or gentlest form, charm us to tears; not that the smoothest cheek, wherever rosy tints have made their home, so rivet us on her; but that she is the subtle, delicate grace,--the inward grace, for words too excellent; the noble, true, the majesty of earth; the summer queen; in whose conceptions nothing but what's great has any right. and, o! her love for him, who does but his small part in honoring her; discharging a sweet office, sweeter none, mother and child, friend, counsel and repose; naught matches with her, naught has leave with her to highest human praise. farewell to him who reverences not with an excess of faith the beauteous sex; all barren he shall live a living death of mockery. ah! had but words the power, what could we say of woman! we, rude men of violent phrase, harsh action, even in repose inwardly harsh; whose lives walk blustering on high stilts, removed from all the purely gracious influence of mother earth. to single from the host of angel forms one only, and to her devote our deepest heart and deepest mind, seems almost contradiction. unto her we owe our greatest blessings, hours of cheer, gay smiles, and sudden tears, and more than these a sure perpetual love. regard her as she walks along the vast still earth; and see! before her flies a laughing troop of joys, and by her side treads old experience, with never-failing voice admonitory; the gentle, though infallible, kind advice, the watchful care, the fine regardfulness, whatever mates with what we hope to find, all consummate in her--the summer queen. to call past ages better than what now man is enacting on life's crowded stage, cannot improve our worth; and for the world blue is the sky as ever, and the stars kindle their crystal flames at soft fallen eve with the same purest lustre that the east worshipped. the river gently flows through fields where the broad-leaved corn spreads out, and loads its ear as when the indian tilled the soil. the dark green pine,--green in the winter's cold,-- still whispers meaning emblems, as of old; the cricket chirps, and the sweet eager birds in the sad woods crowd their thick melodies; but yet, to common eyes, life's poetry something has faded, and the cause of this may be that man, no longer at the shrine of woman, kneeling with true reverence, in spite of field, wood, river, stars and sea, goes most disconsolate. a babble now, a huge and wind-swelled babble, fills the place of that great adoration which of old man had for woman. in these days no more is love the pith and marrow of man's fate. thou who in early years feelest awake to finest impulses from nature's breath, and in thy walk hearest such sounds of truth as on the common ear strike without heed, beware of men around thee! men are foul with avarice, ambition and deceit; the worst of all, ambition. this is life, spent in a feverish chase for selfish ends, which has no virtue to redeem its toil, but one long, stagnant hope to raise the self. the miser's life to this seems sweet and fair; better to pile the glittering coin, than seek to overtop our brothers and our loves. merit in this? where lies it, though thy name ring over distant lands, meeting the wind even on the extremest verge of the wide world? merit in this? better be hurled abroad on the vast whirling tide, than, in thyself concentred, feed upon thy own applause. thee shall the good man yield no reverence; but, while the idle, dissolute crowd are loud in voice to send thee flattery, shall rejoice that he has 'scaped thy fatal doom, and known how humble faith in the good soul of things provides amplest enjoyment. o, my brother if the past's counsel any honor claim from thee, go read the history of those who a like path have trod, and see a fate wretched with fears, changing like leaves at noon, when the new wind sings in the white birch wood. learn from the simple child the rule of life, and from the movements of the unconscious tribes of animal nature, those that bend the wing or cleave the azure tide, content to be, what the great frame provides,--freedom and grace. thee, simple child, do the swift winds obey, and the white waterfalls with their bold leaps follow thy movements. tenderly the light thee watches, girding with a zone of radiance, and all the swinging herbs love thy soft steps. description of angela, from "festus." i loved her for that she was beautiful, and that to me she seemed to be all nature and all varieties of things in one; would set at night in clouds of tears, and rise all light and laughter in the morning; fear no petty customs nor appearances, but think what others only dreamed about; and say what others did but think; and do what others would but say; and glory in what others dared but do; it was these which won me; and that she never schooled within her breast one thought or feeling, but gave holiday to all; that she told me all her woes, and wrongs, and ills; and so she made them mine in the communion of love; and we grew like each other, for we loved each other; she, mild and generous as the sun in spring; and i, like earth, all budding out with love. * * * * * the beautiful are never desolate; for some one alway loves them; god or man; if man abandons, god himself takes them; and thus it was. she whom i once loved died; the lightning loathes its cloud; the soul its clay. can i forget the hand i took in mine, pale as pale violets; that eye, where mind and matter met alike divine?--ah, no! may god that moment judge me when i do! o! she was fair; her nature once all spring and deadly beauty, like a maiden sword, startlingly beautiful. i see her now! wherever thou art thy soul is in my mind; thy shadow hourly lengthens o'er my brain and peoples all its pictures with thyself; gone, not forgotten; passed, not lost; thou wilt shine in heaven like a bright spot in the sun! she said she wished to die, and so she died, for, cloudlike, she poured out her love, which was her life, to freshen this parched heart. it was thus; i said we were to part, but she said nothing; there was no discord; it was music ceased, life's thrilling, bursting, bounding joy. she sate, like a house-god, her hands fixed on her knee, and her dark hair lay loose and long behind her, through which her wild bright eye flashed like a flint; she spake not, moved not, but she looked the more, as if her eye were action, speech, and feeling. i felt it all, and came and knelt beside her, the electric touch solved both our souls together; then came the feeling which unmakes, undoes; which tears the sea-like soul up by the roots, and lashes it in scorn against the skies. * * * * * it is the saddest and the sorest sight, one's own love weeping. but why call on god? but that the feeling of the boundless bounds all feeling; as the welkin does the world; it is this which ones us with the whole and god. then first we wept; then closed and clung together; and my heart shook this building of my breast like a live engine booming up and down; she fell upon me like a snow-wreath thawing. never were bliss and beauty, love and woe, ravelled and twined together into madness, as in that one wild hour to which all else the past is but a picture. that alone is real, and forever there in front. * * * * * * * * after that i left her, and only saw her once again alive. "mother saint perpetua, the superior of the convent, was a tall woman, of about forty years, dressed in dark gray serge, with a long rosary hanging at her girdle. a white mob-cap, with a long black veil, surrounded her thin, wan face with its narrow, hooded border. a great number of deep, transverse wrinkles ploughed her brow, which resembled yellowish ivory in color and substance. her keen and prominent nose was curved like the hooked beak of a bird of prey; her black eye was piercing and sagacious; her face was at once intelligent, firm, and cold. "for comprehending and managing the material interests of the society, mother saint perpetua could have vied with the shrewdest and most wily lawyer. when women are possessed of what is called _business talent_, and when they apply thereto the sharpness of perception, the indefatigable perseverance, the prudent dissimulation, and, above all, the correctness and rapidity of judgment at first sight, which are peculiar to them, they arrive at prodigious results. "to mother saint perpetua, a woman of a strong and solid head, the vast moneyed business of the society was but child's play. none better than she understood how to buy depreciated properties, to raise them to their original value, and sell them to advantage; the average purchase of rents, the fluctuations of exchange, and the current prices of shares in all the leading speculations, were perfectly familiar to her. never had she directed her agents to make a single false speculation, when it had been the question how to invest funds, with which good souls were constantly endowing the society of saint mary. she had established in the house a degree of order, of discipline, and, above all, of economy, that were indeed remarkable; the constant aim of all her exertions being, not to enrich herself, but the community over which she presided; for the spirit of association, when it is directed to an object of _collective selfishness_, gives to corporations all the faults and vices of individuals." * * * * * e. the following is an extract from a letter addressed to me by one of the monks of the nineteenth century. a part i have omitted, because it does not express my own view, unless with qualifications which i could not make, except by full discussion of the subject. "woman in the nineteenth century should be a pure, chaste, holy being. "this state of being in woman is no more attained by the expansion of her intellectual capacity, than by the augmentation of her physical force. "neither is it attained by the increase or refinement of her love for man, or for any object whatever, or for all objects collectively; but "this state of being is attained by the reference of all her powers and all her actions to the source of universal love, whose constant requisition is a pure, chaste and holy life. "so long as woman looks to man (or to society) for that which she needs, she will remain in an indigent state, for he himself is indigent of it, and as much needs it as she does. "so long as this indigence continues, all unions or relations constructed between man and woman are constructed in indigence, and can produce only indigent results or unhappy consequences. "the unions now constructing, as well as those in which the parties constructing them were generated, being based on self-delight, or lust, can lead to no more happiness in the twentieth than is found in the nineteenth century. "it is not amended institutions, it is not improved education, it is not another selection of individuals for union, that can meliorate the said result, but the _basis_ of the union must be changed. "if in the natural order woman and man would adhere strictly to physiological or natural laws, in physical chastity, a most beautiful amendment of the human race, and human condition, would in a few generations adorn the world. "still, it belongs to woman in the spiritual order, to devote herself wholly to her eternal husband, and become the free bride of the one who alone can elevate her to her true position, and reconstruct her a pure, chaste, and holy being." f. i have mislaid an extract from "the memoirs of an american lady," which i wished to use on this subject, but its import is, briefly, this: observing of how little consequence the indian women are in youth, and how much in age, because in that trying life, good counsel and sagacity are more prized than charms, mrs. grant expresses a wish that reformers would take a hint from observation of this circumstance. in another place she says: "the misfortune of our sex is, that young women are not regarded as the material from which old women must be made." i quote from memory, but believe the weight of the remark is retained. * * * * * g. euripides. sophocles. as many allusions are made in the foregoing pages to characters of women drawn by the greek dramatists, which may not be familiar to the majority of readers, i have borrowed from the papers of miranda some notes upon them. i trust the girlish tone of apostrophising rapture may be excused. miranda was very young at the time of writing, compared with her present mental age. _now_, she would express the same feelings, but in a worthier garb--if she expressed them at all. iphigenia! antigone! you were worthy to live! _we_ are fallen on evil times, my sisters; our feelings have been checked; our thoughts questioned; our forms dwarfed and defaced by a bad nurture. yet hearts like yours are in our breasts, living, if unawakened; and our minds are capable of the same resolves. you we understand at once; those who stare upon us pertly in the street, we cannot--could never understand. you knew heroes, maidens, and your fathers were kings of men. you believed in your country and the gods of your country. a great occasion was given to each, whereby to test her character. you did not love on earth; for the poets wished to show us the force of woman's nature, virgin and unbiased. you were women; not wives, or lovers, or mothers. those are great names, but we are glad to see _you_ in untouched flower. were brothers so dear, then, antigone? we have no brothers. we see no men into whose lives we dare look steadfastly, or to whose destinies we look forward confidently. we care not for their urns; what inscription could we put upon them? they live for petty successes, or to win daily the bread of the day. no spark of kingly fire flashes from their eyes. none! are there _none_? it is a base speech to say it. yes! there are some such; we have sometimes caught their glances. but rarely have they been rocked in the same cradle as we, and they do not look upon us much; for the time is not yet come. thou art so grand and simple! we need not follow thee; thou dost not need our love. but, sweetest iphigenia! who knew _thee_, as to me thou art known? i was not born in vain, if only for the heavenly tears i have shed with thee. she will be grateful for them. i have understood her wholly, as a friend should; better than she understood herself. with what artless art the narrative rises to the crisis! the conflicts in agamemnon's mind, and the imputations of menelaus, give us, at once, the full image of him, strong in will and pride, weak in virtue, weak in the noble powers of the mind that depend on imagination. he suffers, yet it requires the presence of his daughter to make him feel the full horror of what he is to do. "ah me! that breast, those cheeks, those golden tresses!" it is her beauty, not her misery, that makes the pathos. this is noble. and then, too, the injustice of the gods, that she, this creature of unblemished loveliness, must perish for the sake of a worthless woman. even menelaus feels it the moment he recovers from his wrath. "what hath she to do, the virgin daughter, with my helena! * * its former reasonings now my soul foregoes. * * * * for it is not just that thou shouldst groan, while my affairs go pleasantly, that those of thy house should die, and mine see the light." indeed, the overwhelmed aspect of the king of men might well move him. "_men_. brother, give me to take thy right hand. _aga_. i give it, _for_ the victory is thine, and i am wretched. i am, indeed, ashamed to drop the tear, and not to drop the tear i am ashamed." how beautifully is iphigenia introduced; beaming more and more softly on us with every touch of description! after clytemnestra has given orestes (then an infant) out of the chariot, she says: "ye females, in your arms receive her, for she is of tender age. sit here by my feet, my child, by thy mother, iphigenia, and show these strangers how i am blessed in thee, and here address thee to thy father. _iphi_. o, mother! should i run, wouldst thou be angry? and embrace my father heart to heart?" with the same sweet, timid trust she prefers the request to himself, and, as he holds her in his arms, he seems as noble as guido's archangel; as if he never could sink below the trust of such a being! the achilles, in the first scene, is fine. a true greek hero; not too good; all flushed with the pride of youth, but capable of godlike impulses. at first, he thinks only of his own wounded pride (when he finds iphigenia has been decoyed to aulis under the pretest of becoming his wife); but the grief of the queen soon makes him superior to his arrogant chafings. how well he says, "_far as a young man may_, i will repress so great a wrong!" by seeing him here, we understand why he, not hector, was the hero of the iliad. the beautiful moral nature of hector was early developed by close domestic ties, and the cause of his country. except in a purer simplicity of speech and manner, he might be a modern and a christian. but achilles is cast in the largest and most vigorous mould of the earlier day. his nature is one of the richest capabilities, and therefore less quickly unfolds its meaning. the impression it makes at the early period is only of power and pride; running as fleetly with his armor on as with it off; but sparks of pure lustre are struck, at moments, from the mass of ore. of this sort is his refusal to see the beautiful virgin he has promised to protect. none of the grecians must have the right to doubt his motives, how wise and prudent, too, the advice he gives as to the queen's conduct! he will cot show himself unless needed. his pride is the farthest possible remote from vanity. his thoughts are as free as any in our own time. "the prophet? what is he? a man who speaks, 'mong many falsehoods, but few truths, whene'er chance leads him to speak true; when false, the prophet is no more." had agamemnon possessed like clearness of sight, the virgin would not have perished, but greece would have had no religion and no national existence. when, in the interview with agamemnon, the queen begins her speech, in the true matrimonial style, dignified though her gesture be, and true all she says, we feel that truth, thus sauced with taunts, will not touch his heart, nor turn him from his purpose. but when iphigenia, begins her exquisite speech, as with the breathings of a lute,-- "had i, my father, the persuasive voice of orpheus, &c. compel me not what is beneath to view. i was the first to call thee father; me thou first didst call thy child. i was the first that on thy knees fondly caressed thee, and from thee received the fond caress. this was thy speech to me:-- 'shall i, my child, e'er see thee in some house of splendor, happy in thy husband, live and flourish, as becomes my dignity?' my speech to thee was, leaning 'gainst thy cheek, (which with my hand i now caress): 'and what shall i then do for thee? shall i receive my father when grown old, and in my house cheer him with each fond office, to repay the careful nurture which he gave my youth?' these words are in my memory deep impressed; thou hast forgot them, and will kill thy child." then she adjures him by all the sacred ties, and dwells pathetically on the circumstance which had struck even menelaus. "if paris be enamored of his bride, his helen,--what concerns it me? and how comes he to my destruction? look upon me; give me a smile, give me a kiss, my father; that, if my words persuade thee not, in death i may have this memorial of thy love." never have the names of father and daughter been uttered with a holier tenderness than by euripides, as in this most lovely passage, or in the "supplicants," after the voluntary death of evadne. iphis says: "what shall this wretch now do? should i return to my own house?--sad desolation there i shall behold, to sink my soul with grief. or go i to the house of capaneus? that was delightful to me, when i found my daughter there; but she is there no more. oft would she kiss my check, with fond caress oft soothe me. to a father, waxing old, nothing is dearer than a daughter! sons have spirits of higher pitch, but less inclined to sweet, endearing fondness. lead me then, instantly lead me to my house; consign my wretched age to darkness, there to pine and waste away. old age, struggling with many griefs, o, how i hate thee!" but to return to iphigenia,--how infinitely melting is her appeal to orestes, whom she holds in her robe! "my brother, small assistance canst thou give thy friends; yet for thy sister with thy tears implore thy father that she may not die. even infants have a sense of ills; and see, my father! silent though he be, he sues to thee. be gentle to me; on my life have pity. thy two children by this beard entreat thee, thy dear children; one is yet an infant, one to riper years arrived." the mention of orestes, then an infant, though slight, is of a domestic charm that prepares the mind to feel the tragedy of his after lot. when the queen says, "dost thou sleep, my son? the rolling chariot hath subdued thee; wake to thy sister's marriage happily." we understand the horror of the doom which makes this cherished child a parricide. and so, when iphigenia takes leave of him after her fate is by herself accepted,-- "_iphi_. to manhood train orestes. _cly_. embrace him, for thou ne'er shalt see him more. _iphi_. (_to orestes_.) far as thou couldst, thou didst assist thy friends,"-- we know not how to blame the guilt of the maddened wife and mother. in her last meeting with agamemnon, as in her previous expostulations and anguish, we see that a straw may turn the balance, and make her his deadliest foe. just then, came the suit of aegisthus,--then, when every feeling was uprooted or lacerated in her heart. iphigenia's moving address has no further effect than to make her father turn at bay and brave this terrible crisis. he goes out, firm in resolve; and she and her mother abandon themselves to a natural grief. hitherto nothing has been seen in iphigenia, except the young girl, weak, delicate, full of feeling, and beautiful as a sunbeam on the full, green tree. but, in the next scene, the first impulse of that passion which makes and unmakes us, though unconfessed even to herself, though hopeless and unreturned, raises her at once into the heroic woman, worthy of the goddess who demands her. achilles appears to defend her, whom all others clamorously seek to deliver to the murderous knife. she sees him, and, fired with thoughts unknown before, devotes herself at once for the country which has given birth to such a man. "to be too fond of life becomes not me; nor for myself alone, but to all greece, a blessing didst thou bear me. shall thousands, when their country's injured, lift their shields? shall thousands grasp the oar and dare, advancing bravely 'gainst the foe, to die for greece? and shall my life, my single life, obstruct all this? would this be just? what word can we reply? nay more, it is not right that he with all the grecians should contest in fight, should die, _and for a woman_. no! more than a thousand women is one man worthy to see the light of day. * * * for greece i give my life. slay me! demolish troy! for these shall be long time my monuments, my children these, my nuptials and my glory." this sentiment marks woman, when she loves enough to feel what a creature of glory and beauty a true _man_ would be, as much in our own time as that of euripides. cooper makes the weak hetty say to her beautiful sister: "of course, i don't compare you with harry. a handsome man is always far handsomer than any woman." true, it was the sentiment of the age, but it was the first time iphigenia had felt it. in agamemnon she saw _her father_; to him she could prefer her claim. in achilles she saw a _man_, the crown of creation, enough to fill the world with his presence, were all other beings blotted from its spaces. [footnote: men do not often reciprocate this pure love. "her prentice han' she tried on man, and then she made the lasses o'," is a fancy, not a feeling, in their more frequently passionate and strong than noble or tender natures.] the reply of achilles is as noble. here is his bride; he feels it now, and all his vain vaunting are hushed. "daughter of agamemnon, highly blest some god would make me, if i might attain thy nuptials. greece in thee i happy deem, and thee in greece. * * * in thy thought revolve this well; death is a dreadful thing." how sweet it her reply,--and then the tender modesty with which she addresses him here and elsewhere as "_stranger_" "reflecting not on any, thus i speak: enough of wars and slaughters from the charms of helen rise; but die not thou for me, o stranger, nor distain thy sword with blood, but let me save my country if i may. _achilles_. o glorious spirit! naught have i 'gainst this to urge, since such thy will, for what thou sayst is generous. why should not the truth be spoken?" but feeling that human weakness may conquer yet, he goes to wait at the alter, resolved to keep his promise of protection thoroughly. in the next beautiful scene she shows that a few tears might overwhelm her in his absence. she raises her mother beyond weeping them, yet her soft purity she cannot impart. "_iphi_. my father, and my husband do not hate; _cly_. for thy dear sake fierce contest must he bear. _iphi_. for greece reluctant me to death he yields; _cly_. basely, with guile unworthy atreus' son." this is truth incapable of an answer, and iphigenia attempts none. she begins the hymn which is to sustain her: "lead me; mine the glorious fate, to o'erturn the phrygian state." after the sublime flow of lyric heroism, she suddenly sinks back into the tenderer feeling of her dreadful fate. "o my country, where these eyes opened on pelasgic skies! o ye virgins, once my pride, in mycenae who abide! chorus. why of perseus, name the town, which cyclopean ramparts crown? iphigenia me you reared a beam of light, freely now i sink in night." _freely_; as the messenger afterwards recounts it. * * * * * "imperial agamemnon, when he saw his daughter, as a victim to the grave, advancing, groaned, and, bursting into tears, turned from the sight his head, before his eyes, holding his robe. the virgin near him stood, and thus addressed him: 'father, i to thee am present; for my country, and for all the land of greece, i freely give myself a victim: to the altar let them lead me, since such the oracle. if aught on me depends, be happy, and obtain the prize of glorious conquest, and revisit safe your country. of the grecians, for this cause, let no one touch me; with intrepid spirit silent will i present my neck.' she spoke, and all that heard revered the noble soul and virtue of the virgin." how quickly had the fair bud bloomed up into its perfection! had she lived a thousand years, she could not have surpassed this. goethe's iphigenia, the mature woman, with its myriad delicate traits, never surpasses, scarcely equals, what we know of her in euripides. can i appreciate this work in a translation? i think so, impossible as it may seem to one who can enjoy the thousand melodies, and words in exactly the right place, and cadence of the original. they say you can see the apollo belvidere in a plaster cast, and i cannot doubt it, so great the benefit conferred on my mind by a transcript thus imperfect. and so with these translations from the greek. i can divine the original through this veil, as i can see the movements of a spirited horse by those of his coarse grasscloth muffler. besides, every translator who feels his subject is inspired, and the divine aura informs even his stammering lips. iphigenia is more like one of the women shakspeare loved than the others; she is a tender virgin, ennobled and strengthened by sentiment more than intellect; what they call a woman _par excellence_. macaria is more like one of massinger's women. she advances boldly, though with the decorum of her sex and nation: "_macaria_. impute not boldness to me that i come before you, strangers; this my first request i urge; for silence and a chaste reserve is woman's genuine praise, and to remain quiet within the house. but i come forth, hearing thy lamentations, iolaus; though charged with no commission, yet perhaps i may be useful." * * her speech when she offers herself as the victim is reasonable, as one might speak to-day. she counts the cost all through. iphigenia is too timid and delicate to dwell upon the loss of earthly bliss and the due experience of life, even as much as jephtha'a daughter did; but macaria is explicit, as well befits the daughter of hercules. "should _these_ die, myself preserved, of prosperous future could i form one cheerful hope? a poor forsaken virgin who would deign to take in marriage? who would wish for sons from one so wretched? better then to die, than bear such undeserved miseries; one less illustrious this might more beseem. * * * * * i have a soul that unreluctantly presents itself, and i proclaim aloud that for my brothers and myself i die. i am not fond of life, but think i gain an honorable prize to die with glory." still nobler when iolaus proposes rather that she shall draw lots with her sisters. "by _lot_ i will not die, for to such death no thanks are due, or glory--name it not. if you accept me, if my offered life be grateful to you, willingly i give it for these; but by constraint i will not die." very fine are her parting advice and injunctions to them all: "farewell! revered old man, farewell! and teach these youths in all things to be wise, like thee, naught will avail them more." macaria has the clear minerva eye; antigone's is deeper and more capable of emotion, but calm; iphigenia's glistening, gleaming with angel truth, or dewy as a hidden violet. i am sorry that tennyson, who spoke with such fitness of all the others in his "dream of fair women," has not of iphigenia. of her alone he has not made a fit picture, but only of the circumstances of the sacrifice. he can never have taken to heart this work of euripides, yet he was so worthy to feel it. of jephtha's daughter he has spoken as he would of iphigenia, both in her beautiful song, and when "i heard him, for he spake, and grief became a solemn scorn of ills. it comforts me in this one thought to dwell-- that i subdued me to my father's will; because the kiss he gave me, ere i fell, sweetens the spirit still. moreover it is written, that my race hewed ammon, hip and thigh, from arroer or arnon unto minneth. here her face glowed as i looked on her. she looked her lips; she left me where i stood; 'glory to god,' she sang, and past afar, thridding the sombre boskage of the woods, toward the morning-star." in the "trojan dames" there are fine touches of nature with regard to cassandra. hecuba shows that mixture of shame and reverence that prose kindred always do, towards the inspired child, the poet, the elected sufferer for the race. when the herald announces that she is chosen to be the mistress of agamemnon, hecuba answers indignant, and betraying the involuntary pride and faith she felt in this daughter. "the virgin of apollo, whom the god, radiant with golden looks, allowed to live. in her pure vow of maiden chastity? _tal_. with love the raptured virgin smote his heart. _hec_. cast from thee, o my daughter, cast away thy sacred wand; rend off the honored wreaths, the splendid ornaments that grace thy brows." but the moment cassandra appears, singing wildly her inspired song, hecuba, calls her "my _frantic_ child." yet how graceful she is in her tragic phrenzy, the chorus shows-- "how sweetly at thy house's ills thou smilest, chanting what haply thou wilt not show true!" but if hecuba dares not trust her highest instinct about her daughter, still less can the vulgar mind of the herald (a man not without tenderness of heart, but with no princely, no poetic blood) abide the wild, prophetic mood which insults his prejudices both as to country and decorums of the sex. yet agamemnon, though not a noble man, is of large mould, and could admire this strange beauty which excited distaste in common minds. "_tal_. what commands respect, and is held high as wise, is nothing better than the mean of no repute; for this most potent king of all the grecians, the much-honored son of atreus, is enamored with his prize, this frantic raver. i am a poor man, yet would i not receive her to my bed." cassandra answers, with a careless disdain, "this is a busy slave." with all the lofty decorum of manners among the ancients, how free was their intercourse, man to man, how full the mutual understanding between prince and "busy slave!" not here in adversity only, but in the pomp of power it was so. kings were approached with ceremonious obeisance, but not hedged round with etiquette; they could see and know their fellows. the andromache here is just as lovely as that of the iliad. to her child whom they are about to murder, the same that was frightened at the "glittering plume," she says, "dost thou weep, my son? hast thou a sense of thy ill fate? why dost thou clasp me with thy hands, why hold my robes, and shelter thee beneath my wings, like a young bird? no more my hector comes, returning from the tomb; he grasps no more his glittering spear, bringing protection to thee." * * * * * * * "o, soft embrace, and to thy mother dear. o, fragrant breath! in vain i swathed thy infant limbs, in vain i gave thee nurture at this breast, and tolled, wasted with care. _if ever_, now embrace, now clasp thy mother; throw thine arms around my neck, and join thy cheek, thy lips to mine." as i look up, i meet the eyes of beatrice cenci, beautiful one! these woes, even, were less than thine, yet thou seemest to understand them all. thy clear, melancholy gaze says, they, at least, had known moments of bliss, and the tender relations of nature had not been broken and polluted from the very first. yes! the gradations of woe are all but infinite: only good can be infinite. certainly the greeks knew more of real home intercourse and more of woman than the americans. it is in vain to tell me of outward observances. the poets, the sculptors, always tell the truth. in proportion as a nation is refined, women _must_ have an ascendency. it is the law of nature. beatrice! thou wert not "fond of life," either, more than those princesses. thou wert able to cut it down in the full flower of beauty, as an offering to _the best_ known to thee. thou wert not so happy as to die for thy country or thy brethren, but thou wert worthy of such an occasion. in the days of chivalry, woman was habitually viewed more as an ideal; but i do not know that she inspired a deeper and more home-felt reverence than iphigenia in the breast of achilles, or macarla in that of her old guardian, iolaus. we may, with satisfaction, add to these notes the words to which haydn has adapted his magnificent music in "the creation." "in native worth and honor clad, with beauty, courage, strength adorned, erect to heaven, and tall, he stands, a man!--the lord and king of all! the large and arched front sublime of wisdom deep declares the seat, and in his eyes with brightness shines the soul, the breath and image of his god. with fondness leans upon his breast the partner for him formed,--a woman fair, and graceful spouse. her softly smiling virgin looks, of flowery spring the mirror, bespeak him love, and joy and bliss." whoever has heard this music must have a mental standard as to what man and woman should be. such was marriage in eden when "erect to heaven _he_ stood;" but since, like other institutions, this must be not only reformed, but revived, the following lines may be offered as a picture of something intermediate,--the seed of the future growth:-- h. the sacred marriage. and has another's life as large a scope? it may give due fulfilment to thy hope, and every portal to the unknown may ope. if, near this other life, thy inmost feeling trembles with fateful prescience of revealing the future deity, time is still concealing; if thou feel thy whole force drawn more and more to launch that other bark on seas without a shore; and no still secret must be kept in store; if meannesses that dim each temporal deed, the dull decay that mars the fleshly weed, and flower of love that seems to fall and leave no seed-- hide never the full presence from thy sight of mutual aims and tasks, ideals bright, which feed their roots to-day on all this seeming blight. twin stars that mutual circle in the heaven, two parts for spiritual concord given, twin sabbaths that inlock the sacred seven; still looking to the centre for the cause, mutual light giving to draw out the powers, and learning all the other groups by cognizance of one another's laws. the parent love the wedded love includes; the one permits the two their mutual moods; the two each other know, 'mid myriad multitudes; with child-like intellect discerning love, and mutual action energising love, in myriad forms affiliating love. a world whose seasons bloom from pole to pole, a force which knows both starting-point and goal, a home in heaven,--the union in the soul. selected works of voltairine de cleyre edited by alexander berkman biographical sketch by hippolyte havel new york mother earth publishing association set up and electrotyped. published may, . contents poems page the burial of my past self . . . . . . night on the graves . . . . . . . . . the christian's faith . . . . . . . . the freethinker's plea . . . . . . . . to my mother . . . . . . . . . . . . . betrayed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . optimism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . at the grave in waldheim . . . . . . . the hurricane . . . . . . . . . . . . ut sementem feceris, ita metes . . . . bastard born . . . . . . . . . . . . . hymn . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . you and i . . . . . . . . . . . . . . the toast of despair . . . . . . . . . in memoriam--to dyer d. lum . . . . . out of the darkness . . . . . . . . . mary wollstonecraft . . . . . . . . . the gods and the people . . . . . . . john p. altgeld . . . . . . . . . . . the cry of the unfit . . . . . . . . . in memoriam--to gen. m. m. trumbull . the wandering jew . . . . . . . . . . the feast of vultures . . . . . . . . the suicide's defense . . . . . . . . a novel of color . . . . . . . . . . . germinal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . "light upon waldheim" . . . . . . . . love's compensation . . . . . . . . . the road builders . . . . . . . . . . angiolillo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ave et vale . . . . . . . . . . . . . marsh-bloom . . . . . . . . . . . . . written--in--red . . . . . . . . . . . essays page the dominant idea . . . . . . . . . . anarchism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . anarchism and american traditions . . anarchism in literature . . . . . . . the making of an anarchist . . . . . . the eleventh of november, . . . . crime and punishment . . . . . . . . . in defense of emma goldman . . . . . . direct action . . . . . . . . . . . . the paris commune . . . . . . . . . . the mexican revolution . . . . . . . . thomas paine . . . . . . . . . . . . . dyer d. lum . . . . . . . . . . . . . francisco ferrer . . . . . . . . . . . modern educational reform . . . . . . sex slavery . . . . . . . . . . . . . literature the mirror of man . . . . . the drama of the nineteenth century . sketches and stories page a rocket of iron . . . . . . . . . . . the chain gang . . . . . . . . . . . . the heart of angiolillo . . . . . . . the reward of an apostate . . . . . . at the end of the alley--i . . . . . . alone--ii . . . . . . . . . . . . . . to strive and fail . . . . . . . . . . the sorrows of the body . . . . . . . the triumph of youth . . . . . . . . . the old shoemaker . . . . . . . . . . where the white rose died . . . . . . transcriber's notes: consistent spelling and hyphen usage are maintained within each poem/essay. punctuation typos with a single solution are corrected; those having more than one solution remain unchanged. in the essay "literature the mirror of man," the reference to "bosworth's life of johnson" is corrected to "boswell's life of johnson." words printed in the text as mixed small caps are surrounded by equal signs, as in =voltairine de cleyre=. introduction "nature has the habit of now and then producing a type of human being far in advance of the times; an ideal for us to emulate; a being devoid of sham, uncompromising, and to whom the truth is sacred; a being whose selfishness is so large that it takes in the whole human race and treats self only as one of the great mass; a being keen to sense all forms of wrong, and powerful in denunciation of it; one who can reach into the future and draw it nearer. such a being was =voltairine de cleyre=." what could be added to this splendid tribute by jay fox to the memory of =voltairine de cleyre=? these admirable words express the sentiments of all the friends and comrades of that remarkable woman whose whole life was dedicated to a dominant idea. like many other women in public life, =voltairine de cleyre= was a voluminous letter writer. those letters addressed to her comrades, friends, and admirers would form her real biography; in them we trace her heroic struggles, her activity, her beliefs, her doubts, her mental changes--in short, her whole life, mirrored in a manner no biographer will ever be able to equal. to collect and publish this correspondence as a part of =voltairine de cleyre's= works is impossible; the task is too big for the present undertaking. but let us hope that we will find time and means to publish at least a part of this correspondence in the near future. the average american still holds to the belief that anarchism is a foreign poison imported into the states from decadent europe by criminal paranoiacs. hence the ridiculous attempt of our lawmakers to stamp out anarchy, by passing a statute which forbids anarchists from other lands to enter the country. those wise solons are ignorant of the fact that anarchist theories and ideas were propounded in our commonwealth ere proudhon or bakunin entered the arena of intellectual struggle and formulated their thesis of perfect freedom and economic independence in anarchy. neither are they acquainted with the writings of lysander spooner, josiah warren, stephen pearl andrews, william b. greene, or benjamin tucker, nor familiar with the propagandistic work of albert r. parsons, dyer d. lum, c. l. james, moses harman, ross winn, and a host of other anarchists who sprang from the native stock and soil. to call their attention to these facts is quite as futile as to point out that the tocsin of revolt resounds in the writings of emerson, thoreau, hawthorne, whitman, garrison, wendell phillips, and other seers of america; just as futile as to prove to them that the pioneers in the movement for woman's emancipation in america were permeated with anarchist thoughts and feelings. hardened by a fierce struggle and strengthened by a vicious persecution, those brave champions of sex-freedom defied the respectable mob by proclaiming their independence from prevailing cant and hypocrisy. they inaugurated the tremendous sex revolt among the american women--a purely native movement which has yet to find its historian. =voltairine de cleyre= belongs to this gallant array of rebels who swore allegiance to the cause of universal liberty, thus forfeiting the respect of all "honorable citizens," and bringing upon their heads the persecution of the ruling class. in the real history of the struggle for human emancipation, her name will be found among the foremost of her time. born shortly after the close of the civil war, she witnessed during her life the most momentous transformation of the nation; she saw the change from an agricultural community into an industrial empire; the tremendous development of capital in this country, with the accompanying misery and degradation of labor. her life path was sketched ere she reached the age of womanhood: she had to become a rebel! to stand outside of the struggle would have meant intellectual death. she chose the only way. =voltairine de cleyre= was born on november , , in the town of leslie, michigan. she died on june , , in chicago. she came from french-american stock, on her mother's side of puritan descent. her father, auguste de cleyre, was a native of western flanders, but his family was of french origin. he emigrated to america in . being a freethinker and a great admirer of voltaire, he insisted on the birthday of the child that the new member of the family should be called voltairine. though born in leslie, the earliest recollections of voltairine were of the small town of st. john's, in clinton county, her parents having removed to that place a year after her birth. voltairine did not have a happy childhood; her earliest life was embittered by want of the common necessities, which her parents, hard as they tried, could not provide. a vein of sadness can be traced in her earliest poems--the songs of a child of talent and great fantasy. a deep sorrow fell into her heart at the age of four, when the teacher of the primary school refused to admit her because she was too young. but she soon succeeded in forcing her entrance into the temple of knowledge. an earnest student, she was graduated from the grammar school at the age of twelve. strength of mind does not seem to have been a characteristic of auguste de cleyre, for he recanted his libertarian ideas, returned to the fold of the church, and became obsessed with the idea that the highest vocation for a woman was the life of a nun. he determined to put the child into a convent. thus began the great tragedy of =voltairine's= _early life_. her beloved mother, a member of the presbyterian church, opposed this idea with all her strength, but in vain: the will of the lord of the household prevailed, and the child was sent to the convent of our lady of lake huron, at sarnia, in the province of ontario, canada. here she experienced four years of terrible ordeal; only after much repression, insubordination, and atonement, she forced her way back into the living world. in the sketch, "the making of an anarchist," she tells us of the strain she underwent in that living tomb: "how i pity myself now, when i remember it, poor lonesome little soul, battling solitary in the murk of religious superstition, unable to believe and yet in hourly fear of damnation, hot, savage, and eternal, if i do not instantly confess and profess! how well i recall the bitter energy with which i repelled my teacher's enjoinder, when i told her i did not wish to apologize for an adjudged fault as i could not see that i had been wrong and would not feel my words. 'it is not necessary,' said she, 'that we should feel what we say, but it is always necessary that we obey our superiors.' 'i will not lie,' i answered hotly, and at the same time trembled lest my disobedience had finally consigned me to torment! i struggled my way out at last, and was a freethinker when i left the institution, three years later, though i had never seen a book or heard a word to help me in my loneliness. it had been like the valley of the shadow of death, and there are white scars on my soul yet, where ignorance and superstition burnt me with their hell-fire in those stifling days. am i blasphemous? it is their word, not mine. beside that battle of my young days all others have been easy, for whatever was without, within my own will was supreme. it has owed no allegiance, and never shall; it has moved steadily in one direction, the knowledge and assertion of its own liberty, with all the responsibility falling thereon." during her stay at the convent there was little communication between her and her parents. in a letter from mrs. eliza de cleyre, the mother of =voltairine=, we are informed that she decided to run away from the convent after she had been there a few weeks. she escaped before breakfast, and crossed the river to port huron; but, as she had no money, she started to walk home. after covering seventeen miles, she realized that she never could do it; so she turned around and walked back, and entering the house of an acquaintance in port huron asked for something to eat. they sent for her father, who afterwards took her back to the convent. what penance they inflicted she never told, but at sixteen her health was so bad that the convent authorities let her come home for a vacation, telling her, however, that she would find her every movement watched, and that everything she said would be reported to them. the result was that she started at every sound, her hands shaking and her face as pale as death. she was about five weeks from graduating at that time. when her vacation was over, she went back and finished her studies. and then she started for home again, but this time she had money enough for her fare, and she got home to stay, never to go back to the place that had been a prison to her. she had seen enough of the convent to decide for herself that she could not be a nun. the child who had sung: "there's a love supreme in the great hereafter, the buds of earth are bloom in heaven, the smiles of the world are ripples of laughter when back to its aidenn the soul is given, and the tears of the world, though long in flowing, water the fields of the bye-and-bye; they fall as dews on the sweet grass growing, when the fountains of sorrow and grief run dry. though clouds hang over the furrows now sowing there's a harvest sun-wreath in the after-sky. "no love is wasted, no heart beats vainly, there's a vast perfection beyond the grave; up the bays of heaven the stars shine plainly-- the stars lying dim on the brow of the wave. and the lights of our loves, though they flicker and wane, they shall shine all undimmed in the ether nave. for the altars of god are lit with souls fanned to flaming with love where the star-wind rolls." returned from the convent a strong-minded freethinker. she was received with open arms by her mother, almost as one returned from the grave. with the exception of the education derived from books, she knew no more than a child, having almost no knowledge of practical things. already in the convent she had succeeded in impressing her strong personality upon her surroundings. her teachers could not break her; they were therefore forced to respect her. in a polemic with the editor of the catholic _buffalo union_ and _times_, a few years ago, =voltairine= wrote: "if you think that i, as your opponent, deserve the benefit of truth, but as a stranger you doubt my veracity, i respectfully request you to submit this letter to sister mary medard, my former teacher, now superioress at windsor, or to my revered friend, father siegfried, overbrook seminary, overbrook, pa., who will tell you whether, in their opinion, my disposition to tell the truth may be trusted." reaction from the repression and the cruel discipline of the catholic church helped to develop =voltairine's= inherent tendency toward free-thought; the five-fold murder of the labor leaders in chicago, in , shocked her mind so deeply that from that moment dates her development toward anarchism. when in the bomb fell on the haymarket square, and the anarchists were arrested, =voltairine de cleyre=, who at that time was a free-thought lecturer, shouted: "they ought to be hanged!" they were hanged, and now her body rests in waldheim cemetery, near the grave of those martyrs. speaking at a memorial meeting in honor of those comrades, in , she said: "for that ignorant, outrageous, bloodthirsty sentence i shall never forgive myself, though i know the dead men would have forgiven me, though i know those who loved them forgive me. but my own voice, as it sounded that night, will sound so in my ears till i die--a bitter reproach and a shame. i have only one word of extenuation for myself and the millions of others who did as i did that night--ignorance." she did not remain long in ignorance. in "the making of an anarchist" she describes why she became a convert to the idea and why she entered the movement. "till then," she writes, "i believed in the essential justice of the american law and trial by jury. after that i never could. the infamy of that trial has passed into history, and the question it awakened as to the possibility of justice under law has passed into clamorous crying across the world." at the age of nineteen =voltairine= had consecrated herself to the service of humanity. in her poem, "the burial of my past self," she thus bids farewell to her youthful life: "and now, humanity, i turn to you; i consecrate my service to the world! perish the old love, welcome to the new-- broad as the space-aisles where the stars are whirled!" yet the pure and simple free-thought agitation in its narrow circle could not suffice her. the spirit of rebellion, the spirit of anarchy, took hold of her soul. the idea of universal rebellion saved her; otherwise she might have stagnated like so many of her contemporaries, suffocated in the narrow surroundings of their intellectual life. a lecture of clarence darrow, which she heard in , led her to the study of socialism, and then there was for her but one step to anarchism. dyer d. lum, the fellow worker of the chicago martyrs, had undoubtedly the greatest influence in shaping her development; he was her teacher, her confidant, and comrade; his death in was a terrible blow to =voltairine=. =voltairine= spent the greater part of her life in philadelphia. here, among congenial friends, and later among the jewish emigrants, she did her best work. in she went on a lecture tour to england and scotland, and in , after an insane youth had tried to take her life, she went for a short trip to norway to recuperate from her wounds. hers was a life of bitter economic struggle and an unceasing fight with physical weakness, partly resulting from this very economic struggle. one wonders how, under such circumstances, she could have produced such an amount of work. her poems, sketches, propagandistic articles and essays may be found in the _open court_, _twentieth century_, _magazine of poetry_, _truth_, _lucifer_, _boston investigator_, _rights of labor_, _truth seeker_, _liberty_, _chicago liberal_, _free society_, _mother earth_, and in _the independent_. she translated jean grave's "moribund society and anarchy" from the french, and left an unfinished translation of louise michel's work on the paris commune. in _mother earth_ appeared her translations from the jewish of libin and peretz. in collaboration with dyer d. lum she wrote a novel on social questions, which has unfortunately remained unfinished. =voltairine de cleyre's= views on the sex-question, on agnosticism and free-thought, on individualism and communism, on non-resistance and direct action, underwent many changes. in the year she wrote: "the spread of tolstoy's 'war and peace' and 'the slavery of our times,' and the growth of the numerous tolstoy clubs having for their purpose the dissemination of the literature of non-resistance, is an evidence that many receive the idea that it is easier to conquer war with peace. i am one of these. i can see no end of retaliation, unless some one ceases to retaliate." she adds, however: "but let no one mistake this for servile submission or meek abnegation; my right shall be asserted no matter at what cost to me, and none shall trench upon it without my protest." but as she used to quote her comrade, dyer d. lum: "events proved to be the true schoolmasters." the last years of her life were filled with the spirit of direct action, and especially with the social importance of the mexican revolution. the splendid propaganda work of wm. c. owen in behalf of this tremendous upheaval inspired her to great effort. she, too, had found out by experience that only action counts, that only a direct participation in the struggle makes life worth while. =voltairine de cleyre= was one of the most remarkable personalities of our time. she was a born iconoclast; her spirit was too free, her taste too refined, to accept any idea that has the slightest degree of limitation. a great sadness, a knowledge that there is a universal pain, filled her heart. through her own suffering and through the suffering of others she reached the highest exaltation of mind; she was conscious of all the vanities of life. in the service of the poor and oppressed she found her life mission. in an exquisite tribute to her memory, leonard d. abbott calls =voltairine de cleyre= a priestess of pity and of vengeance, whose voice has a vibrant quality that is unique in literature. we are convinced that her writings will live as long as humanity exists. =hippolyte havel.= poems the burial of my past self poor heart, so weary with thy bitter grief! so thou art dead at last, silent and chill! the longed-for death-dart came to thy relief, and there thou liest, heart, forever still. dead eyes, pain-pressed beneath their black-fringed pall! dead cheeks, dark-furrowed with so many tears! so thou art passed far, far beyond recall, and all thy hopes are past, and all thy fears. thy lips are closed at length in the long peace! pale lips! so long they have thy woe repressed, they seem even now when life has run its lease all dumbly pitiful in their mournful rest. and now i lay thee in thy silent tomb, printing thy brow with one last solemn kiss; laying upon thee one fair lily bloom, a symbol of thy rest;--oh, rest is bliss. no, heart, i would not call thee back again; no, no; too much of suffering hast thou known; but yet, but yet, it was not all in vain-- thy unseen tears, thy solitary moan! for out of sorrow joy comes uppermost; where breaks the thunder soon the sky smiles blue; a better love replaces what is lost, and phantom sunlight pales before the true! the seed must burst before the germ unfolds, the stars must fade before the morning wakes; down in her depths the mine the diamond holds; a new heart pulses when the old heart breaks. and now, humanity, i turn to you; i consecrate my service to the world! perish the old love, welcome to the new-- broad as the space-aisles where the stars are whirled! =greenville, mich., .= night on the graves o'er the sweet, quiet homes in the silent grave-city, softly the dewdrops, the night-tears, fall; broadly about, like the wide arms of pity, the silver-shot darkness lies over all. heroes, asleep 'neath the red-hearted rose-wreaths, leaf-crowned with honor, flower-crowned with rest, gently above you each moon-dripping bough breathes a far-echoed whisper, "sleep well; ye are blest." oh! never, as long as the heart pulses quicker at the dear name of country may yours be forgot; nor may we, till the last puny life spark shall flicker, your deeds from the tablets of memory blot! spirits afloat in the night-shrouds that bound us, souls of the "has-been" and of the "to-be," keep the fair light of liberty shining around us, till our souls may go back to the mighty soul-sea. =st. johns, mich., = (decoration day). the christian's faith (the two following poems were written at that period of my life when the questions of the existence of god and the divinity of jesus had but recently been settled, and they present the pros and cons which had been repeating themselves over and over again in my brain for some years.) we contrast light and darkness,--light of god, and darkness from the stygian shades of hell; fumes of the pit infernal rising up have clouded o'er the brain, laid reason low;-- for when the eye looks on fair nature's face and sees not god, then is she blind indeed! no night so starless, even in its gloom, as his who wanders on without a hope in that great, just hereafter all must meet!-- no heart so dull, so heavy, and so void, as that which lives for this chill world alone! no soul so groveling, unaspiring, base, as that which, here, forgets the afterhere! and still through all the darkness and the gloom its voice will not be stilled, its hopes be quenched; it cries, it screams, it struggles in its chains, and bleeds upon the altar of the mind,-- unwilling sacrifice to thought misled. the soul that knows no god can know no peace. thus speaketh light, the herald of our god! in that far dawn where shone each rolling world first lit with shadowed splendor of the stars, in that fair morning when creation sang its praise of god, e'er yet it dreamed of sin, pure and untainted as the source of life man dwelt in eden. there no shadows came, no question of the goodness of our lord, until the prince of darkness tempted man, and, yielding to the newly born desire, he fell! sank in the mire of ignorance! and man, who put himself in satan's power, since then has wandered far in devious ways, seeing but now and then a glimpse of light, till christ is come, the living son of god! far in his heavenly home he viewed the world, saw all her sadness and her sufferings, saw all her woes, her struggles, and her search for some path leading up from out the night. within his breast the fount of tears was touched; his great heart swelled with pity, and he said: "father, i go to save the world from sin." ah! what power but a soul divinely clad in purity, in holiness and love, could leave a home of happiness and light for this lost world of suffering and death? he came: the world tossed groaning in her sleep; he touched her brow: the nightmare passed away; he soothed her heart, red with the stain of sin; and she forgot her guilt in penitence; she washed the ruby out with pearls of tears. he came, he suffered, and he died for us; he felt the bitterest woes a soul can feel; he probed the darkest depths of human grief; he sounded all the deeps and shoals of pain; was cursed for all his love; thanked with the cross, whereon he hung nailed, bleeding, glorified, as the last smoke of holocaust divine. "ah! this was all two thousand years ago!" two thousand years ago, and still he cries, with voice sweet calling through the distant dark: "o souls that labor, struggling in your pain, come unto me, and i will give you rest! for every woe of yours, and every smart, i, too, have felt:--the mockery, the shame, the sneer, the scoffing lip, the hate, the lust, the greed of gain, the jealousy of man, unstinted have been measured out to me. i know them all, i feel them all with you! and i have known the pangs of poverty, the cry of hunger and the weary heart of childhood burdened with the weight of age! o sufferers, ye all are mine to love! the pulse-beats of my heart go out with you, and every drop of agony that drips from my nailed hands adown this bitter cross, cries out, 'o god! accept the sacrifice, and ope the gates of heaven to the world!' ye vermin of the garret, who do creep your weary lives away within its walls; ye children of the cellar, who behold the sweet, pale light, strained through the lothsome air and doled to you in tid-bits, as a thing too precious for your use; ye rats in mines, who knaw within the black and somber pits to seek poor living for your little ones; ye women who stitch out your lonely lives, unmindful whether sun or stars keep watch; ye slaves of wheels; ye worms that bite the dust where pride and scorn have ground you 'neath the heel; ye toilers of the earth, ye weary ones,-- i know your sufferings, i feel your woes; my peace i give you; in a little while the pain will all be over, and the grave will sweetly close above your folded hands! and then?--ah, death, no conqueror art thou! for i have loosed thy chains; i have unbarred the gates of heaven! in my father's house of many mansions i prepare a place; and rest is there for every heart that toils! oh, all ye sick and wounded ones who grieve for the lost health that ne'er may come again; ye who do toss upon a couch of pain, upon whose brow disease has laid his hand, within whose eyes the dull and heavy sight burns like a taper burning very low, upon whose lips the purple fever-kiss rests his hot breath, and dries the sickened palms, scorches the flesh and e'en the very air; ye who do grope along without the light; ye who do stumble, halting on your way; ye whom the world despises as unclean; know that the death-free soul has none of these: the unbound spirit goes unto its god, pure, whole, and beauteous as newly born! oh, all ye mourners, weeping for the dead; your tears i gather as the grateful rain which rises from the sea and falls again, to nurse the withering flowers from its touch; no drop is ever lost! they fall again to nurse the blossoms of some other heart! i would not dry one single dew of grief: the sorrow-freighted lashes which bespeak the broken heart and soul are dear to me; i mourn with them, and mourning so i find the grief-bowed soul with weeping oft grows light! but yet ye mourn for them not without hope: beyond the woes and sorrows of the earth, as stars still shine though clouds obscure the sight, the friends ye mourn as lost immortal live; and ye shall meet and know their souls again, through death transfigured, through love glorified! oh, all ye patient waiters for reward, scorned and despised by those who know not worth, i know your merit and i give you hope; for in my father's law is justice found. see how the seed-germ, toiling underground, waits patiently for time to burst its shell; and by and by the golden sunlight warms the dark, cold earth; the germ begins to shoot. and upward trends until two small green leaves unfold and wave and drink the pure, fresh air. the blossoms come and go with summer's breath, and autumn brings the fruit-time in her hand. so ye, who patient watch and wait and hope, trusting the sun may bring the blossoms out, shall reap the fruited labor by and by. i am your friend; i wait and hope with you, rejoice with you when the hard vict'ry's won! and still for you, o prisoners in cells, i hold the dearest gifts of penitence, forgiveness and charity and hope! i stretch the hands of mercy through the bars; white hands,--like doves they bring the branch of peace! repent, believe,--and i will expiate upon this bitter cross all your deep guilt! oh, take my gift, accept my sacrifice! i ask no other thing but only--trust! oh, all ye martyrs, bleeding in your chains; oh, all ye souls that live for others' good; oh, all ye mourners, all ye guilty ones, and all ye suffering ones, come unto me! ye are all my brothers, all my sisters, all! and as i love one, so i love you all. accept my love, accept my sacrifice; make not my cross more bitter than it is by shrinking from the peace i bring to you!" =st. johns, mich., april, .= the freethinker's plea grand eye of liberty, light up my page! like promised morning after night of age thy dawning youth breaks in the distant east! thy cloudy robes like silken curtains creased and swung in folds are floating fair and free! the shadows of the cycles turn and flee; the budding stars, bright minds that gemmed the night, are bursting into broad, bright-petaled light! sweet liberty, how pure thy very breath! how dear in life, how doubly dear in death! ah, slaves that suffer in your self-forged chains, praying your christ to touch and heal your pains, tear off your shackling irons, unbind your eyes, seize the grand hopes that burn along the skies! worship not god in temples built of gloom; far sweeter incense is the flower-bloom than all the fires that sacrifice may light; and grander is the star-dome gleaming bright with glowing worlds, than all your altar lamps pale flickering in your clammy, vaulted damps; and richer is the broad, full, fair sun sheen, dripping its orient light in streams between the fretted shafting of the forest trees, throwing its golden kisses to the breeze, lifting the grasses with its finger-tips, and pressing the young blossoms with warm lips, show'ring its glory over plain and hill, wreathing the storm and dancing in the rill; far richer in wild freedom falling there, shaking the tresses of its yellow hair, than all subdued within the dim half-light of stained glass windows, drooping into night. oh, grander far the massive mountain walls which bound the vista of the forest halls, than all the sculptured forms which guard the piles that arch your tall, dim, gray, cathedral aisles! and gladder is the carol of a bird than all the anthems that were ever heard to steal in somber chanting from the tone of master voices praising the unknown. in the great wild, where foot of man ne'er trod, there find we nature's church and nature's god! here are no fetters! though is free as air; its flight may spread far as its wings may dare; and through it all one voice cries, "god is love, and love is god!" around, within, above, behold the working of the perfect law,-- the law immutable in which no flaw exists, and from which no appeal is made; ev'n as the sunlight chases far the shade and shadows chase the light in turn again, so every life is fraught with joy and pain; the stinging thorn lies hid beside the rose; the bud is blighted ere its leave unclose; so pleasure born of hope may oft-time yield a stinging smart of thorns, a barren field! but let it be: the buds will bloom again, the fields will freshen in the summer rain; and never storm scowls dark but still, somewhere, a bow is bending in the upper air. then learn the law if thou wouldst live aright; and know no unseen power, no hand of might, can set aside the law which wheels the stars; no incompleteness its perfection mars; the buds will wake in season, and the rain will fall when clouds hang heavy, and again the snows will tremble when the winter's breath congeals the cloud-tears, as the touch of death congeals the last drop on the sufferer's cheek. thus do all nature's tongues in chorus speak: "think not, o man, that thou canst e'er escape one jot of justice's law, nor turn thy fate by yielding sacrifice to the unseen! purged by thyself alone canst thou be clean. one guide to happiness thou mayst learn: _love toward the world begets love in return._ and if to others you the measure mete of love, be sure your harvest will be sweet; but if ye sow broadcast the seed of hate, ye'll reap again, albeit ye reap it late. then let your life-work swell the great flood-tide of love towards all the world; the world is wide, the sea of life is broad; its waves stretch far; no range, no barrier, its sweep may bar; the world is filled, is trodden down with pain; the sea of life is gathered up of rain,-- a throat, a bed, a sink, for human tears, a burial of hopes, a miasm of fears! but see! the sun of love shines softly out, flinging its golden fingers all about, pressing its lips in loving, soft caress, upon the world's pale cheek; the pain grows less, the tears are dried upon the quivering lashes, an answering sunbeam 'neath the white lids flashes! the sea of life is dimpled o'er with smiles, the sun of love the cloud of woe beguiles, and turns its heavy brow to forehead fair, framed in the glory of its sun-gilt hair. be thine the warming touch, the kiss of love; vainly ye seek for comfort from above, vainly ye pray the gods to ease your pain; the heavy words fall back on you again! vainly ye cry for christ to smooth your way; the thorns sting sharper while ye kneeling pray! vainly ye look upon the world of woe, and cry, "o god, avert the bitter blow!" ye cannot turn the lightning from its track, nor call one single little instant back; the law swerves not, and with unerring aim the shaft of justice falls; he bears the blame who violates the rule: do well your task, for justice overtakes you all at last. vainly ye patient ones await reward, trusting th' almighty's angel to record each bitter tear, each disappointed sigh; reward descends not, gifted from on high, but is the outgrowth of the eternal law: as from the earth the toiling seed-germs draw the food which gives them life and strength to bear the storms and suns which sweep the upper air, so ye must draw from out the pregnant earth the metal true wherewith to build your worth; so shall ye brave the howling of the blast, and smile triumphant o'er the storm at last. nor dream these trials are without their use; between your joys and griefs ye cannot choose, and say your life with either is complete: ever the bitter mingles with the sweet. the dews must press the petals down at night, if in the dawning they would glisten bright; if sunbeams needs must ripen out the grain not less the early blades must woo the rain: if now your eyes be wet with weary tears, ye'll gather them as gems in after years; and if the rains now sodden down your path, ye'll reap rich harvest in the aftermath. ye idle mourners, crying in your grief, the souls ye weep have found the long relief: why grieve for those who fold their hands in peace? their sore-tried hearts have found a glad release; their spirits sink into the solemn sea! mourn ye the prisoner from his chains let free? nay, ope your ears unto the living cry that pleads for living comfort! hark, the sigh of million heartaches rising in your ears! kiss back the living woes, the living tears! go down into the felon's gloomy cell; send there the ray of love: as tree-buds swell when spring's warm breath bids the cold winter cease, so will his heart swell with the hope of peace. be filled with love, for love is nature's god; the god which trembles in the tender sod, the god which tints the sunset, lights the dew, sprinkles with stars the firmament's broad blue, and draws all hearts together in a free wide sweep of love, broad as the ether-sea. no other law or guidance do we need; the world's our church, to do good is our creed. =st. johns, mich., .= to my mother some souls there are which never live their life; some suns there are which never pierce their cloud; some hearts there are which cup their perfume in, and yield no incense to the outer air. cloud-shrouded, flower-cupped heart: such is thine own: so dost thou live with all thy brightness hid; so dost thou dwell with all thy perfume close; rich in thy treasured wealth, aye, rich indeed-- and they are wrong who say thou "dost not feel." but i--i need blue air and opened bloom; to keep my music means that it must die; and when the thrill, the joy, the love of life is gone, i, too, am dead--a corpse, though not entombed. let me live then--but a while--the gloom soon comes, the flower closes and the petals shut; through them the perfume slips out, like a soul-- the long, still sleep of death--and then the grave. =cleveland, ohio=, march, . betrayed so, you're the chaplain! you needn't say what you have come for; i can guess. you've come to talk about jesus' love, and repentance and rest and forgiveness! you've come to say that my sin is great, yet greater the mercy heaven will mete, if i, like magdalen, bend my head, and pour my tears at your saviour's feet. your promise is fair, but i've little faith: i relied on promises once before; they brought me to this--this prison cell, with its iron-barred window, its grated door! yet he, too, was fair who promised me, with his tender mouth and his christ-like eyes; and his voice was as sweet as the summer wind that sighs through the arbors of paradise. and he seemed to me all that was good and pure, and noble and strong, and true and brave! i had given the pulse of my heart for him, and deemed it a precious boon to crave. you say that jesus so loved the world he died to redeem it from its sin: it isn't redeemed, or no one could be so fair without, and so black within. i trusted his promise, i gave my life;--the truth of my love is known on high, if there is a god who knows all things;--his promise was false, his _love_ was a lie! it was over soon, oh! soon, the dream,--and me, he had called "his life," "his light," he drove me away with a sneering word, and you christians said that "it served me right." i was proud, mr. chaplain, even then; i set my face in the teeth of fate, and resolved to live honestly, come what might, and sink beneath neither scorn nor hate. yes, and i prayed that the christ above would help to bear the bitter cross, and put something here, where my heart had been, to fill up the aching void of loss. it's easy for you to say what i should do, but none of you ever dream how hard is the way that you christians make for us, with your "sin no more," "trust the lord." when for days and days you are turned from work with cold politeness, or open sneer, you get so you don't trust a far-off god, whose creatures are cold, and they, so near. you hold your virtuous lives aloof, and refuse us your human help and hand, and set us apart as accursèd things, marked with a burning, cain-like brand. but i didn't bend, though many days i was weary and hungry, and worn and weak, and for many a starless night i watched, through tears that grooved down my pallid cheek. they are all dry now! they say i'm hard, because i never weep or moan! you can't draw blood when the heart's bled out! you can't find tears or sound in a stone! and i don't know why _i_ should be mild and meek: no one has been very mild to me. you say that jesus would be--perhaps! but heaven's a long way off, you see. that will do; i know what you're going to say: "i can have it right here in this narrow cell." the _soul_ is slow to accept christ's heav'n when his followers chain the body in hell. not but i'm just as well off here,--better, perhaps, than i was outside. the world was a prison-house to me, where i dwelt, defying and defied. i don't know but i'd think more of what you say, if they'd given us both a common lot; if justice to me had been justice to him, and covered our names with an equal blot; but they took him into the social court, and pitied, and said he'd been "led astray"; in a month the stain on _his_ name had passed, as a cloud that crosses the face of day! he joined the church, and he's preaching now, just as you are, the love of god, and the duty of sinners to kneel and pray, and humbly to kiss the chastening rod. if they'd dealt with me as they dealt by him, may be i'd credit your christian love; if they'd dealt with him as they dealt by me, i'd have more faith in a just above. i don't know, but sometimes i used to think that she, who was told there was no room in the inn at bethlehem, might look down with softened eyes thro' the starless gloom. christ wasn't a woman--he couldn't know the pain and endurance of it; but _she_, the mother who bore him, she might know, and mary in heaven might pity me. still that was useless: it didn't bring a single mouthful for me to eat, nor work to get it, nor sheltering from the dreary wind and the howling street. heavenly pity won't pass as coin, and earthly shame brings a higher pay. sometimes i was tempted to give it up, and go, like others, the easier way; but i didn't; no, sir, i kept my oath, though my baby lay in my arms and cried, and at last, to spare it--i poisoned it; and kissed its murdered lips when it died. i'd never seen him since it was born (he'd said that it wasn't his, you know); but i took its body and laid it down at the steps of his door, in the pallid glow of the winter morning; and when he came, with a love-tune hummed on those lips of lies, it lay at his feet, with its pinched white face staring up at him from its dead, blue eyes; i hadn't closed them; they were like his, and so was the mouth and the curled gold hair, and every feature so like his own,--for i am dark, sir, and he is fair. 'twas a moment of triumph, that showed me yet there was a passion i could feel, when i saw him bend o'er its meagre form, and, starting backwards, cry out and reel! if there _is_ a time when all souls shall meet the reward of the deeds that are done in the clay, when accused and accuser stand face to face, he will cry out so in the judgment day! the rest? oh, nothing. they hunted me, and with virtuous lawyers' virtuous tears to a virtuous jury, convicted me; and i'm sentenced to stay here for twenty years. do i repent? yes, i do; but wait till i tell you of what i repent, and why. i repent that i ever believed a man could be anything but a living lie! i repent because every noble thought, or hope, or ambition, or earthly trust, is as dead as dungeon-bleached bones in me,--as dead as my child in its murdered dust! do i repent that i killed the babe? am i repentant for that, you ask? i'll answer the truth as i feel it, sir; i leave to others the pious mask. am i repentant because i saved its starving body from famine's teeth? because i hastened what time would do, to spare it pain and relieve its death? am i repentant because i held it were better a _grave_ should have no name than a _living being_, whose only care must come from a mother weighed with shame? am i repentant because i thought it were better the tiny form lay hid from the heartless stings of a brutal world, unknown, unnamed, 'neath a coffin lid? am i repentant for the act, the last on earth in my power, to save from the long-drawn misery of life, in the early death and the painless grave? i'm _glad_ that i did it! start if you will! i'll repeat it over; i say i'm _glad_! no, i'm neither a fiend, nor a maniac--don't look as if i were going mad! did i not love it? yes, i loved with a strength that you, sir, can never feel; it's only a strong love can kill to save, tho' itself be torn where time cannot heal. you see my hands--they are red with its blood! yet i would have cut them, bit by bit, and fed them, and smiled to see it eat, if that would have saved and nourished it! "beg!" i _did_ beg,--and "pray!" i _did_ pray! god was as stony and hard as earth, and christ was as deaf as the stars that watched, or the night that darkened above his birth! and i--i feel stony now, too, like them; deaf to sorrow and mute to grief! am i heartless?--yes:--it-is-_all_-=cut=-out! torn! gone! all gone! like my dead belief. do i not fear for the judgment hour? so unrepentant, so hard and cold? wait! it is little i trust in that; but if ever the scrolled sky shall be uprolled, and the lives of men shall be read and known, and their acts be judged by their very worth, and the christ you speak of shall come again, and the thunders of justice shake the earth, you will hear the cry, "who murdered here? come forth to the judgment, false heart and eyes, that pulsed with accurséd strength of lust, and loaded faith with envenomed lies! come forth to the judgment, haughty dames, who scathed the mother with your scorn, and answer here, to the poisoned child, _who_ decreed its murder ere it was born? come forth to the judgment ye who heaped the gold of earth in your treasured hoard, and answer, 'guilty,' to those who stood all naked and starving, beneath your board. depart, accurséd! i know you not! ye heeded not the command of heaven, 'unto the least of these ye give, it is even unto the master given.'" judgment! ah, sir, to see that day, i'd willingly pass thro' a hundred hells! i'd believe, then, the justice that hears each voice buried alive in these prison cells! but, no--it's not that; that will never be! i trusted too long, and he answered not. there _is_ no avenging god on high!--we live, we struggle, and--_we rot_. _yet does justice come!_ and, o future years! sorely ye'll reap, and in weary pain, when ye garner the sheaves that are sown to-day, when the clouds that are gathering fall in rain! the time will come, aye! the time _will_ come, when the child ye conceive in lust and shame, quickened, will mow you like swaths of grass, with a sickle born of steel and flame. aye, tremble, shrink, in your drunken den, coward, traitor, and child of lie! the unerring avenger stands close to you, and the dread hour of parturition's nigh! aye! wring your hands, for the air is black! thickly the cloud-troops whirl and swarm! see! yonder, on the horizon's verge, play the lightning-shafts of the coming storm! =adrian, mich.,= july, . optimism there's a love supreme in the great hereafter, the buds of earth are blooms in heaven; the smiles of the world are ripples of laughter when back to its aidenn the soul is given: and the tears of the world, though long in flowing, water the fields of the bye-and-bye; they fall as dews on the sweet grass growing when the fountains of sorrow and grief run dry. though clouds hang over the furrows now sowing there's a harvest sun-wreath in the after-sky! no love is wasted, no heart beats vainly, there's a vast perfection beyond the grave; up the bays of heaven the stars shine plainly, the stars lying dim on the brow of the wave. and the lights of our loves, though they flicker and wane, they shall shine all undimmed in the ether-nave. for the altars of god are lit with souls fanned to flaming with love where the star-wind rolls. =st. johns, michigan, .= at the grave in waldheim quiet they lie in their shrouds of rest, their lids kissed close 'neath the lips of peace; over each pulseless and painless breast the hands lie folded and softly pressed, as a dead dove presses a broken nest; ah, broken hearts were the price of these! the lips of their anguish are cold and still, for them are the clouds and the gloom all past; no longer the woe of the world can thrill the chords of those tender hearts, or fill the silent dead-house! the "people's will" has mapped asunder the strings at last. "the people's will!" ah, in years to come, dearly ye'll weep that ye did not save! do ye not hear now the muffled drum, the tramping feet and the ceaseless hum, of the million marchers,--trembling, dumb, in their tread to a yawning, giant grave? and yet, ah! yet there's a rift of white! 'tis breaking over the martyrs' shrine! halt there, ye doomed ones,--it scathes the night, as lightning darts from its scabbard bright and sweeps the face of the sky with light! "no more shall be spilled out the blood-red wine!" these are the words it has written there, keen as the lance of the northern morn; the sword of justice gleams in its glare, and the arm of justice, upraised and bare, is true to strike, aye, 'tis strong to dare; it will fall where the curse of our land is born. no more shall the necks of the nations be crushed, no more to dark tyranny's throne bend the knee; no more in abjection be ground to the dust! by their widows, their orphans, our dead comrades' trust, by the brave heart-beats stilled, by the brave voices hushed, we swear that humanity yet shall be free! =pittsburg, .= the hurricane[a] ("we are the birds of the coming storm."--_august spies._) the tide is out, the wind blows off the shore; bare burn the white sands in the scorching sun; the sea complains, but its great voice is low. bitter thy woes, o people, and the burden hardly to be borne! wearily grows, o people, all the aching of thy pierced heart, bruised and torn! but yet thy time is not, and low thy moaning. desert thy sands! not yet is thy breath hot, vengefully blowing; it wafts o'er lifted hands. the tide has turned; the vane veers slowly round; slow clouds are sweeping o'er the blinding light; white crests curl on the sea,--its voice grows deep. angry thy heart, o people, and its bleeding fire-tipped with rising hate! thy clasped hands part, o people, for thy praying warmed not the desolate! god did not hear thy moan: now it is swelling to a great drowning cry; a dark wind-cloud, a groan, now backward veering from that deaf sky! the tide flows in, the wind roars from the depths, the whirled-white sand heaps with the foam-white waves; thundering the sea rolls o'er its shell-crunched wall! strong is thy rage, o people, in its fury hurling thy tyrants down! thou metest wage, o people. very swiftly, now that thy hate is grown: thy time at last is come; thou heapest anguish, where thou thyself wert bare! no longer to thy dumb god clasped and kneeling, _thou answerest thine own prayer._ =sea isle city, n. j.=, august, . [a] since the death of the author this poem has been put to music by the young american composer, george edwards. ut sementem feceris, ita metes (to the czar, on a woman, a political prisoner, being flogged to death in siberia.) how many drops must gather to the skies before the cloud-burst comes, we may not know; how hot the fires in under hells must glow ere the volcano's scalding lavas rise, can none say; but all wot the hour is sure! who dreams of vengeance has but to endure! he may not say how many blows must fall, how many lives be broken on the wheel, how many corpses stiffen 'neath the pall, how many martyrs fix the blood-red seal; but certain is the harvest time of hate! and when weak moans, by an indignant world re-echoed, to a throne are backward hurled, who listens, hears the mutterings of fate! =philadelphia=, february, . bastard born why do you clothe me with scarlet of shame? why do you point with your finger of scorn? what is the crime that you hissingly name when you sneer in my ears, "thou bastard born?" am i not as the rest of you, with a hope to reach, and a dream to live? with a soul to suffer, a heart to know the pangs that the thrusts of the heartless give? i am no monster! look at me-- straight in my eyes, that they do not shrink! is there aught in them you can see to merit this hemlock you make me drink? this poison that scorches my soul like fire, that burns and burns until love is dry, and i shrivel with hate, as hot as a pyre, a corpse, while its smoke curls up to the sky? will you touch my hand? it is flesh like yours; perhaps a little more brown and grimed, for it could not be white while the drawers' and hewers', my brothers, were calloused and darkened and slimed. yet touch it! it is no criminal's hand! no children are toiling to keep it fair! it is free from the curse of the stolen land, it is clean of the theft of the sea and air! it has set no seals to a murderous law, to sign a bitter, black league with death! no covenants false do these fingers draw in the name of "the state" to barter faith! it bears no stain of the yellow gold that earth's wretches give as the cost of heaven! no priestly garment of silken fold i wear as the price of their "sins forgiven"! still do you shrink! still i hear the hiss between your teeth, and i feel the scorn that flames in your gaze! well, what is this, this crime i commit, being "bastard born"? what! you whisper my "eyes are gray," the "color of hers," up there on the hill, where the white stone gleams, and the willow spray falls over her grave in the starlight still! my "hands are shaped like" those quiet hands, folded away from their life, their care; and the sheen that lies on my short, fair strands gleams darkly down on her buried hair! my voice is toned like that silent tone that might, if it could, break up through the sod with such rebuke as would shame your stone, stirring the grass-roots in their clod! and my heart-beats thrill to the same strong chords; and the blood that was hers is mine to-day; and the thoughts she loved, i love; and the words that meant most to her, to me most say! _she was my mother--i her child!_ could ten thousand priests have made us more? do you curse the bloom of the heather wild? do you trample the flowers and cry "impure"? do you shun the bird-songs' silver shower? does their music arouse your curling scorn that none but god blessed them? the whitest flower, the purest song, were but "bastard born"! _this is my sin_,--i was born of her! _this is my crime_,--that i reverence deep! god, that her pale corpse may not stir, press closer down on her lids--the sleep! would you have me hate her? me, who knew that the gentlest soul in the world looked there, out of the gray eyes that pitied you e'en while you cursed her? the long brown hair that waved from her forehead, has brushed my cheek, when her soft lips have drunk up my salt of grief; and the voice, whose echo you hate, would speak the hush of pity and love's relief! and those still hands that are folded now have touched my sorrows for years away! would you have me question her whence and how the love-light streamed from her heart's deep ray? do you question the sun that it gives its gold? do you scowl at the cloud when it pours its rain till the fields that were withered and burnt and old are fresh and tender and young again? do you search the source of the breeze that sweeps the rush of the fever from tortured brain? do you ask whence the perfume that round you creeps when your soul is wrought to the quick with pain? she was my sun, my dew, my air, the highest, the purest, the holiest; =peace=--was the shade of her beautiful hair, =love=--was all that i knew on her breast! would you have me forget? or remembering say that her love had bloomed from hell? then =blessed be hell=! and let heaven sing "_te deum laudamus_," until it swell and ring and roll to the utterest earth, that the damned are free,--since out of sin came the whiteness that shamed all ransomed worth till god opened the gates, saying "enter in!" * * * * * what! in the face of the witness i bear to her measureless love and her purity, still of your hate would you make me to share, despising that she gave life to me? you would have me stand at her helpless grave, to dig through its earth with a venomed dart! this is honor! and right! and brave! to fling a stone at her pulseless heart! this is virtue! to blast the lips speechless beneath the silence dread! to lash with slander's scorpion whips the voiceless, defenseless, helpless dead! * * * * * god! i turn to an adder now! back upon you i hurl your scorn! bind the scarlet upon your brow! _ye_ it is, who are "bastard born"! touch me not! these hands of mine despise your fairness--the leper's white! tanned and hardened and black with grime, they are clean beside your souls to-night! basely born! 'tis ye are base! ye who would guerdon holy trust with slavish law to a tyrant race, to sow the earth with the seed of lust. base! by heaven! prate of peace, when your garments are red with the stain of wars. reeling with passion's mad release by your sickly gaslight damn the stars! blurred with wine ye behold the snow smirched with the foulness that blots within! what of purity can ye know, ye ten-fold children of hell and sin? ye to judge her! ye to cast the stone of wrath from your house of glass! know ye the law, that ye dare to blast the bell of gold with your clanging brass? know ye the harvest the reapers reap who drop in the furrow the seed of scorn? out of this anguish ye harrow deep, ripens the sentence: "_ye_, bastard born!" ay, sin-begotten, hear the curse; not mine--not hers--but the fatal law! "who bids one suffer, shall suffer worse; who scourges, himself shall be scourgèd raw! "for the thoughts ye think, and the deeds ye do, move on, and on, till the flood is high, and the dread dam bursts, and the waves roar through, hurling a cataract dirge to the sky! "to-night ye are deaf to the beggar's prayer; to-morrow the thieves shall batter your wall! ye shall feel the weight of a starved child's care when your warders under the mob's feet fall! "'tis the roar of the whirlwind ye invoke when ye scatter the wind of your brother's moans; 'tis the red of your hate on your own head broke, when the blood of the murdered spatters the stones! "hark ye! out of the reeking slums, thick with the fetid stench of crime, boiling up through their sickening scums, bubbles that burst through the crimson wine, "voices burst--with terrible sound, crying the truth your dull souls ne'er saw! _we_ are _your_ sentence! the wheel turns round! the bastard spawn of your bastard law!" this is bastard: that man should say how love shall love, and how life shall live! setting a tablet to groove god's way, measuring how the divine shall give! * * * * * o, evil hearts! ye have maddened me, that i should interpret the voice of god! quiet! quiet! o angered sea! quiet! i go to her blessed sod! * * * * * mother, mother, i come to you! down in your grasses i press my face! under the kiss of their cold, pure dew, i may dream that i lie in the dear old place! mother, sweet mother, take me back, into the bosom from whence i came! take me away from the cruel rack, take me out of the parching flame! fold me again with your beautiful hair, speak to this terrible heaving sea! over me pour the soothing of prayer, the words of the love-child of galilee: "=peace--be still=!" still,--could i but hear! softly,--i listen.--o fierce heart, cease! softly,--i breathe not,--low,--in my ear,-- mother, mother--i heard you!--=peace=! =enterprise, kansas,= january, . hymn (this hymn was written at the request of a christian science friend who proposed to set it to music. it did not represent my beliefs either then or since, but rather what i wish might be my beliefs, had i not an inexorable capacity for seeing things as they are,--a vast scheme of mutual murder, with no justice anywhere, and no god in the soul or out of it.) i am at peace--no storm can ever touch me; on my clear heights the sunshine only falls; far, far below glides the phantom voice of sorrows, in peace-lifted light the silence only calls. ah, soul, ascend! the mountain way, up-leading, bears to the heights whereon the blest have trod! lay down the burden;--stanch the heart's sad bleeding; =be ye at peace=, for know that ye are god! not long the way, not far in a dim heaven; in the locked self seek ye the guiding star: clear shine its rays, illumining the shadow; there, where god is, there, too, o souls ye are. ye are at one, and bound in him forever, ev'n as the wave is bound in the great sea; never to drift beyond, below him, never! whole as god is, so, even so, are ye. =philadelphia,= . you and i (a reply to "you and i in the golden weather," by dyer d. lum.) you and i, in the sere, brown weather, when clouds hang thick in the frowning sky, when rain-tears drip on the bloomless heather, unheeding the storm-blasts will walk together, and look to each other--you and i. you and i, when the clouds are shriven to show the cliff-broods of lightnings high; when over the ramparts, swift, thunder-driven, rush the bolts of hate from a hell-lit heaven, will smile at each other--you and i. you and i, when the bolts are falling, the hot air torn with the earth's wild cries, will lean through the darkness where death is calling, will search through the shadows where night is palling, and find the light in each other's eyes. you and i, when black sheets of water drench and tear us and drown our breath, below this laughter of hell's own daughter, above the smoke of the storm-girt slaughter, will hear each other and gleam at death. you and i, in the gray night dying, when over the east-land the dawn-beams fly, down in the groans, in the low, faint crying, down where the thick blood is blackly lying, will reach out our weak arms, you and i. you and i, in the cold, white weather, when over our corpses the pale lights lie, will rest at last from the dread endeavor, pressed to each other, for parting--never! our dead lips together, you and i. you and i, when the years in flowing have left us behind with all things that die, with the rot of our bones shall give soil for growing the loves of the future, made sweet for blowing by the dew of the kiss of a last good-bye! =philadelphia=, . the toast of despair we have cried,--and the gods are silent; we have trusted,--and been betrayed; we have loved,--and the fruit was ashes; we have given,--the gift was weighed. we know that the heavens are empty, that friendship and love are names; that truth is an ashen cinder, the end of life's burnt-out flames. vainly and long have we waited, through the night of the human roar, for a single song on the harp of hope, or a ray from a day-lit shore. songs aye come floating, marvelous sweet, and bow-dyed flashes gleam; but the sweets are lies, and the weary feet run after a marsh-light beam. in the hour of our need the song departs, and the sea-moans of sorrow swell; the siren mocks with a gurgling laugh that is drowned in the deep death-knell. the light we chased with our stumbling feet as the goal of happier years, swings high and low and vanishes,-- the bow-dyes were of our tears. god is a lie, and faith is a lie, and a tenfold lie is love; life is a problem without a why, and never a thing to prove. it adds, and subtracts, and multiplies, and divides without aim or end; its answers all false, though false-named true,-- wife, husband, lover, friend. we know it now, and we care no more; what matters life or death? we tiny insects emerge from earth, suffer, and yield our breath. like ants we crawl on our brief sand-hill, dreaming of "mighty things,"-- lo, they crunch, like shells in the ocean's wrath, in the rush of time's awful wings. the sun smiles gold, and the planets white, and a billion stars smile, still; yet, fierce as we, each wheels towards death, and cannot stay his will. then build, ye fools, your mighty things, that time shall set at naught; grow warm with the song the sweet lie sings, and the false bow your tears have wrought. for us, a truce to gods, loves, and hopes, and a pledge to fire and wave; a swifter whirl to the dance of death, and a loud huzza for the grave! =philadelphia,= . in memoriam (to dyer d. lum, my friend and teacher, who died april , .) great silent heart! these barren drops of grief are not for you, attained unto your rest; this sterile salt upon the withered leaf of love, is mine--mine the dark burial guest. far, far within that deep, untroubled sea we watched together, walking on the sands, your soul has melted,--painless, silent, free; mine the wrung heart, mine the clasped, useless hands. into the whirl of life, where none remember, i bear your image, ever unforgot; the "whip-poor-will," still "wailing in december," cries the same cry--cries, cries, and ceases not. the future years with all their waves of faces roll shoreward singing the great undertone; yours is not there;--in the old, well-loved places i look, and pass, and watch the sea alone. alone along the gleaming, white sea-shore, the sea-spume spraying thick around my head, through all the beat of waves and winds that roar, i go, remembering that you are dead. that you are dead, and nowhere is there one like unto you;--and nowhere love leaps death;-- and nowhere may the broken race be run;-- nowhere unsealed the seal that none gainsaith. yet in my ear that deep, sweet undertone grows deeper, sweeter, solemner to me,-- dreaming your dreams, watching the light that shone so whitely to you, yonder, on the sea. your voice is there, there in the great life-sound-- your eyes are there, out there, within the light; your heart, within the pulsing race-heart drowned, beats in the immortality of right. o life, i love you for the love of him who showed me all your glory and your pain! "unto nirvana"--so the deep tones sing-- and there--and there--we--shall--be--one--again. =greensburg, pa.,= april th, . out of the darkness who am i? only one of the commonest common people, only a worked-out body, a shriveled and withered soul, what right have i to sing then? none; and i do not, i cannot. why ruin the rhythm and rhyme of the great world's songs with moaning? i know not--nor why whistles must shriek, wheels ceaselessly mutter; nor why all i touch turns to clanging and clashing and discord; i know not;--i know only this,--i was born to this, live in it hourly, go round with it, hum with it, curse with it, would laugh with it, had it laughter; it is my breath--and that breath goes outward from me in moaning. o you, up there, i have heard you; i am "god's image defaced," "in heaven reward awaits me," "hereafter i shall be perfect"; ages you've sung that song, but what is it to me, think you? if you heard down here in the smoke and the smut, in the smear and the offal, in the dust, in the mire, in the grime and in the slime, in the hideous darkness, how the wheels turn your song into sounds of horror and loathing and cursing, the offer of lust, the sneer of contempt and acceptance, thieves' whispers, the laugh of the gambler, the suicide's gasp, the yell of the drunkard, if you heard them down here you would cry, "the reward of such is damnation," if you heard them, i say, your song of "rewarded hereafter" would fail. you, too, with your science, your titles, your books, and your long explanations that tell me how i am come up out of the dust of the cycles, out of the sands of the sea, out of the unknown primeval forests,-- out of the growth of the world have become the bud and the promise,-- out of the race of the beasts have arisen, proud and triumphant,-- you, if you knew how your words rumble round in the wheels of labor! if you knew how my hammering heart beats, "liar, liar, you lie! out of all buds of the earth we are most blasted and blighted! what beast of all the beasts is not prouder and freer than we?" you, too, who sing in high words of the glory of man universal, the beauty of sacrifice, debt of the future, the present immortal, the glory of use, absorption by death of the being in being, you, if you knew what jargon it makes, down here, would be quiet. oh, is there no one to find or to speak a meaning to _me_, to me as i am,--the hard, the ignorant, withered-souled worker? to me upon whom god and science alike have stamped "failure," to me who know nothing but labor, nothing but sweat, dirt, and sorrow, to me whom you scorn and despise, you up there who sing while i moan? to me as i am,--for me as i am--not dying but living; _not_ my future, my present! my body, my needs, my desires! is there no one, in the midst of this rushing of phantoms--of gods, of science, of logic, of philosophy, morals, religion, economy,--all this that helps not, all these ghosts at whose altars you worship, these ponderous, marrowless fictions, is there no one who thinks, is there nothing to help this dull moaning me? =philadelphia,= april, . mary wollstonecraft the dust of a hundred years is on thy breast, and thy day and thy night of tears are centurine rest. thou to whom joy was dumb, life a broken rhyme, lo, thy smiling time is come, and our weeping time. thou who hadst sponge and myrrh and a bitter cross, smile, for the day is here that we know our loss;-- loss of thine undone deed, thy unfinished song, th' unspoken word for our need, th' unrighted wrong; smile, for we weep, we weep, for the unsoothed pain, the unbound wound burned deep, that we might gain. mother of sorrowful eyes in the dead old days, mother of many sighs, of pain-shod ways; mother of resolute feet through all the thorns, mother soul-strong, soul-sweet,-- lo, after storms have broken and beat thy dust for a hundred years, thy memory is made just, and the just man hears. thy children kneel and repeat: "though dust be dust, though sod and coffin and sheet and moth and rust have folded and molded and pressed, yet they cannot kill; in the heart of the world at rest she liveth still." =philadelphia,= april th, . the gods and the people what have you done, o skies, that the millions should kneel to you? why should they lift wet eyes, grateful with human dew? why should they clasp their hands, and bow at thy shrines, o heaven, thanking thy high commands for the mercies that thou hast given? what have those mercies been, o thou, who art called the good, who trod through a world of sin, and stood where the felon stood? what is that wondrous peace vouchsafed to the child of dust, for whom all doubt shall cease in the light of thy perfect trust? how hast thou heard their prayers smoking up from the bleeding sod, who, crushed by their weight of cares, cried up to thee, most high god? * * * * * where the swamps of humanity sicken, read the answer, in dumb, white scars! you, skies, gave the sore and the stricken the light of your far-off stars! the children who plead are driven, shelterless, through the street, receiving the mercy of heaven hard-frozen in glittering sleet! the women who prayed for pity, who called on the saving name, through the walks of your merciless city are crying the rent of shame. the starving, who gazed on the plenty in which they might not share, have died in their hunger, rent by the anguish of unheard prayer! the weary who plead for remission, for a moment, only, release, have sunk, with unheeded petition: this is the christ-pledged peace. these are the mercies of heaven, these are the answers of god, to the prayers of the agony-shriven, from the paths where the millions plod! the silent scorn of the sightless! the callous ear of the deaf! the wrath of might to the mightless! the shroud, and the mourning sheaf! light--to behold their squalor! breath--to draw in life's pain! voices to plead and call for heaven's help!--hearts to bleed--in vain! * * * * * what have you done, o church, that the weary should bless your name? should come with faith's holy torch to light up your altar'd fane? why should they kiss the folds of the garment of your high priest? or bow to the chalice that holds the wine of your sacred feast? have you blown out the breath of their sighs? have you strengthened the weak, the ill? have you wiped the dark tears from their eyes, and bade their sobbings be still? have you touched, have you known, have you felt, have you bent and softly smiled in the face of the woman, who dwelt in lewdness--to feed her child? have you heard the cry in the night going up from the outraged heart, masked from the social sight by the cloak that but angered the smart? have you heard the children's moan, by the light of the skies denied? answer, o walls of stone, in the name of your crucified! * * * * * out of the clay of their heart-break, from the red dew of its sod, you have mortar'd your brick, for christ's sake, and reared a palace to god! your painters have dipped their brushes in the tears and the blood of the race, whom, living, your dark frown crushes-- and limned--a dead savior's face! you have seized, in the name of god, the child's crust from famine's dole; you have taken the price of its body and sung a mass for its soul! you have smiled on the man, who, deceiving, paid exemption to ease your wrath! you have cursed the poor fool who believed him, though her body lay prone in your path! you have laid the seal on the lip! you have bid us to be content! to bow 'neath our master's whip, and give thanks for the scourge--"heav'n sent." these, o church, are your thanks; these are the fruits without flaw, that flow from the chosen ranks who keep in your perfect law; doors hard-locked on the homeless! stained glass windows for bread! on the living, the law of dumbness, and the law of need, for--the _dead_! better the dead, who, not needing, go down to the vaults of the earth, than the living whose hearts lie bleeding, crushed by you at their very birth. * * * * * what have you done, o state, that the toilers should shout your ways; should light up the fires of their hate if a "traitor" should dare dispraise? how do you guard the trust that the people repose in you? do you keep to the law of the just, and hold to the changeless true? what do you mean when you say "the home of the free and brave"? how free are your people, pray? have you no such thing as a slave? what are the lauded "rights," broad-sealed, by your sovereign grace? what are the love-feeding sights you yield to your subject race? * * * * * the rights!--ah! the right to toil, that another, idle, may reap; the right to make fruitful the soil and a meagre pittance to keep! the right of a woman to own her body, spotlessly pure, and starve in the street--alone! the right of the wronged--to endure! the right of the slave--to his yoke! the right of the hungry--to pray! the right of the toiler--to vote for the master who buys his day! you have sold the sun and the air! you have dealt in the price of blood! you have taken the lion's share while the lion is fierce for food! you have laid the load of the strong on the helpless, the young, the weak! you have trod out the purple of wrong;-- beware where its wrath shall wreak! "let the voice of the people be heard! o----" you strangled it with your rope! denied the last dying word, while your trap and your gallows spoke! but a thousand voices rise where the words of the martyr fell; the seed springs fast to the skies watered deep from that bloody well! * * * * * hark! low down you will hear the storm in the underground! listen, tyrants, and fear! quake at that muffled sound! "heavens, that mocked our dust, smile on, in your pitiless blue! silent as you are to us, so silent are we to you! "churches that scourged our brains! priests that locked fast our hands! we planted the torch in your chains: now gather the burning brands! "states that have given us law, when we asked for the right to earn bread! the sword that damocles saw by a hair swings over your head! "what ye have sown ye shall reap: teardrops, and blood, and hate, gaunt gather before your seat, and knock at your palace gate! "there are murderers on your thrones! there are thieves in your justice-halls! white leprosy cancers their stones, and gnaws at their worm-eaten walls! "and the hand of belshazzar's feast writes over, in flaming light: =thought's kingdom no more to the priest; nor the law of right unto might=." john p. altgeld (after an incarceration of six long years in joliet state prison for an act of which they were entirely innocent, namely, the throwing of the haymarket bomb, in chicago, may th, , oscar neebe, michael schwab and samuel fielden, were liberated by gov. altgeld, who thus sacrificed his political career to an act of justice.) there was a tableau! liberty's clear light shone never on a braver scene than that. here was a prison, there a man who sat high in the halls of state! beyond, the might of ignorance and mobs, whose hireling press yells at their bidding like the slaver's hounds, ready with coarse caprice to curse or bless, to make or unmake rulers!--lo, there sounds a grating of the doors! and three poor men, helpless and hated, having naught to give, come from their long-sealed tomb, look up, and live, and thank this man that they are free again. and he--to all the world this man dares say, "curse as you will! i have been just this day." =philadelphia,= june, . the cry of the unfit the gods have left us, the creeds have crumbled; there are none to pity and none to care: our fellows have crushed us where we have stumbled; they have made of our bodies a bleeding stair. loud rang the bells in the christmas steeples; we heard them ring through the bitter morn: the promise of old to the weary peoples came floating sweetly,--"christ is born." but the words were mocking, sorely mocking, as we sought the sky through our freezing tears, we children, who've hung the christmas stocking, and found it empty two thousand years. no, there is naught in the old creed for us; love and peace are to those who win; to them the delight of the golden chorus, to us the hunger and shame and sin. why then live on since our lives are fruitless, since peace is certain and death is rest; since our masters tell us the strife is bootless, and nature scorns her unwelcome guest? you who have climbed on our aching bodies, you who have thought because we have toiled, priests of the creed of a newer goddess, searchers in depths where the past was foiled. speak in the name of the faith that you cherish! give us the truth! we have bought it with woe! must we forever thus worthlessly perish, burned in the desert and lost in the snow? trampled, forsaken, foredoomed, and forgotten,-- helplessly tossed like the leaf in the storm? bred for the shambles, with curses begotten, useless to all save the rotting grave-worm? give us some anchor to stay our mad drifting! give, for your own sakes! for lo, where our blood, a red tide to drown you, is steadily lifting! help! or you die in the terrible flood! =philadelphia,= . in memoriam to gen. m. m. trumbull. (no man better than gen. trumbull defended my martyred comrades in chicago.) back to thy breast, o mother, turns thy child, he whom thou garmentedst in steel of truth, and sent forth, strong in the glad heart of youth, to sing the wakening song in ears beguiled by tyrants' promises and flatterers' smiles; these searched his eyes, and knew nor threats nor wiles might shake the steady stars within their blue, nor win one truckling word from off those lips,-- no--not for gold nor praise, nor aught men do to dash the sun of honor with eclipse, o mother liberty, those eyes are dark, and the brave lips are white and cold and dumb; but fair in other souls, through time to come, fanned by thy breath glows the immortal spark. =philadelphia,= may, . the wandering jew (the above poem was suggested by the reading of an article describing an interview with the "wandering jew," in which he was represented as an incorrigible grumbler. the jew has been, and will continue to be, the grumbler of earth,--until the prophetic ideal of justice shall be realized: "blessed be he.") _"go on."--"thou shalt go on till i come."_ pale, ghostly vision from the coffined years, planting the cross with thy world-wandering feet, stern watcher through the centuries' storm and beat, in those sad eyes, between those grooves of tears,-- those eyes like caves where sunlight never dwells and stars but dimly shine--stand sentinels that watch with patient hope, through weary days, that somewhere, sometime, he indeed may "come," and thou at last find thee a resting place, blast-driven leaf of man, within the tomb. aye, they have cursed thee with the bitter curse, and driven thee with scourges o'er the world; tyrants have crushed thee, ignorance has hurled its black anathema;--but death's pale hearse, that bore them graveward, passed them silently; and vainly didst thou stretch thy hands and cry, "take me instead";--not yet for thee the time, not yet--not yet: thy bruised and mangled limbs must still drag on, still feed the vulture, crime, with bleeding flesh, till rust its steel beak dims. aye, "till he come,"--=he,--freedom, justice, peace=-- till then shalt thou cry warning through the earth, unheeding pain, untouched by death and birth, proclaiming "woe, woe, woe," till men shall cease to seek for christ within the senseless skies, and, joyous, find him in each other's eyes. then shall be builded such a tomb for thee shall beggar kings' as diamonds outshine dew! the universal heart of man shall be the sacred urn of "the accursed jew." =philadelphia,= . the feast of vultures (as the three anarchists, vaillant, henry and caserio, were led to their several executions, a voice from the prison cried loudly, "vive l'anarchie!" through watch and ward the cry escaped, and no man owned the voice; but the cry is still resounding through the world.) a moan in the gloam in the air-peaks heard-- the bird of omen--the wild, fierce bird, aflight in the night, like a whizz of light, arrowy winging before the storm, far away flinging, the whistling, singing, white-curdled drops, wind-blown and warm, from its beating, flapping, thunderous wings; crashing and clapping the split night swings, and rocks and totters, bled of its levin, and reels and mutters a curse to heaven! reels and mutters and rolls and dies, with a wild light streaking its black, blind eyes. far, far, far, through the red, mad morn, like a hurtling star, through the air upborne, the herald-singer, the terror-bringer, speeds--and behind, through the cloud-rags torn, gather and wheel a million wings, clanging as iron where the hammer rings; the whipped sky shivers, the white gate shakes, the ripped throne quivers, the dumb god wakes, and feels in his heart the talon-stings-- the dead bodies hurled from beaks for slings. "ruin! ruin!" the whirlwind cries, and it leaps at his throat and tears his eyes; "death for death, as ye long have dealt; the heads of your victims your heads shall pelt; the blood ye wrung to get drunk upon, drink, and be poisoned! on, herald, on!" behold, behold, how a moan is grown! a cry hurled high 'gainst a scaffold's joist! the voice of defiance--the loud, wild voice! whirled through the world, a smoke-wreath curled (breath 'round hot kisses) around a fire! see! the ground hisses with curses, and glisses with red-streaming blood-clots of long-frozen ire, waked by the flying wild voice as it passes; groaning and crying, the surge of the masses rolls and flashes with thunderous roar-- seams and lashes the livid shore-- seams and lashes and crunches and beats, and drags a ragged wall to its howling retreats! swift, swift, swift, 'thwart the blood-rain's fall, through the fire-shot rift of the broken wall, the prophet-crying the storm-strong sighing, flies--and from under night's lifted pall, swarming, menace ten million darts, uplifting fragments of human shards! ah, white teeth chatter, and dumb jaws fall, while winged fires scatter till gloom gulfs all save the boom of the cannon that storm the forts that the people bombard with their comrades' hearts; "vengeance! vengeance!" the voices scream, and the vulture pinions whirl and stream! "knife for knife, as ye long have dealt; the edge ye whetted for us be felt, ye chopper of necks, on your own, your own! bare it, coward! on, prophet, on!" behold how high rolls a prison cry! =philadelphia,= august . the suicide's defense (of all the stupidities wherewith the law-making power has signaled its own incapacity for dealing with the disorders of society, none appears so utterly stupid as the law which punishes an attempted suicide. to the question "what have you to say in your defense?" i conceive the poor wretch might reply as follows:) to say in my defense? defense of what? defense to whom? and why defense at all? have i wronged any? let that one accuse! some priest there mutters i "have outraged god"! let god then try me, and let none dare judge himself as fit to put heaven's ermine on! again i say, let the wronged one accuse. aye, silence! there is none to answer me. and whom could i, a homeless, friendless tramp, to whom all doors are shut, all hearts are locked, all hands withheld--whom could i wrong, indeed by taking that which benefited none and menaced all? aye, since ye will it so, know then your risk. but mark, 'tis not defense, 'tis accusation that i hurl at you. see to't that ye prepare your own defense. my life, i say, is an eternal threat to you and yours; and therefore it were well to have foreborne your unasked services. and why? because i hate you! every drop of blood that circles in your plethoric veins was wrung from out the gaunt and sapless trunks of men like me, who in your cursed mills were crushed like grapes within the wine-press ground. to us ye leave the empty skin of life; the heart of it, the sweet of it, ye pour to fete your dogs and mistresses withal! your mistresses! our daughters! bought, for bread, to grace the flesh that once was father's arms! yes, i accuse you that ye murdered me! ye killed the man--and this that speaks to you is but the beast that ye have made of me! what! is it life to creep and crawl and beg, and slink for shelter where rats congregate? and for one's ideal dream of a fat meal? is it, then, life, to group like pigs in sties, and bury decency in common filth, because, forsooth, your income must be made, though human flesh rot in your plague-rid dens? is it, then, life, to wait another's nod, for leave to turn yourself to gold for him? would it be life to you? and was i less than you? was i not born with hopes and dreams and pains and passions even as were you? but these ye have denied. ye seized the earth, though it was none of yours, and said: "hereon shall none rest, walk or work, till first to me ye render tribute!" every art of man, born to make light of the burdens of the world, ye also seized, and made a tenfold curse to crush the man beneath the thing he made. houses, machines, and lands--all, all are yours; and us you do not need. when we ask work ye shake your heads. homes?--ye evict us. bread?-- "here, officer, this fellow's begging. jail's the place for him!" after the stripes, what next?-- poison!--i took it!--now you say 'twas sin to take this life which troubled you so much. sin to escape insult, starvation, brands of felony, inflicted for the crime of asking food! ye hypocrites! within your secret hearts the sin is that i _failed_! because i failed ye judge me to the stripes, and the hard toil denied when i was free. so be it. but beware!--a prison cell's an evil bed to grow morality! black swamps breed black miasms; sickly soils yield poison fruit; snakes warmed to life will sting. this time i was content to go alone; perchance the next i shall not be so kind. =philadelphia=, september, . a novel of color (the following is a true and particular account of what happened on the night of december , ; but it is likely to be unintelligible to all save the chipmunks and the elephant, who, however, will no doubt recognize themselves.) chapter i. chipmunks three sat on a tree, and they were as green as green could be; they cracked nuts early, they cracked nuts late, and chirruped and chirruped, and ate and ate; "'tis a pity of chipmunks without nuts, and a gnawing hunger in their guts; but they should be wise like you and me, and color themselves to suit the tree. ah chee, ah chee, ah chee, ah chee! gay chaps are we, we chipmunks three!" an elephant white in sorry plight, hungry and dirty and sad bedight, straggled one day on the nutting ground; "lo," chattered the chipmunks, "our chance is found! behold the beast's color; were he as we, green and sleek and nut-full were he! but the beast is big, and the beast is white, and his skin full of emptiness serves him right! ah chee, ah chee, ah chee, ah chee! let us 'sit on him, sit on him,' chipmunks three." chapter ii. three chipmunks green right gay were seen to leap on the beast his brows between; they munched at his ears and chiffered his chin, and sat and sat and sat on him! not a single available spot of hide where a well-sleeked chipmunk could sit with pride, but was chipped and chipped and chip-chip-munked, till aught but an elephant must have flunked. "ah chee, ah chee, ah chee, ah chee! what a ride we're having, we chipmunks three!" chapter iii. br-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-f-f-f-f-f!!! chapter iv. "what was it blew? ah whew, ah whew!" three green chipmunks have all turned blue! the elephant smiles a peaceful smile, and lifts off a tree-trunk sans haste or guile. "seize him, seize him! he's stealing our tree! we're undone, undone," shriek the chipmunks three. the elephant calmly upraised his trunk, and said, "did i hear a green chipmunk?" * * * * * "ah chee, ah chee, ah chee, ah choo!" "chippy, you're blue!" "so're you!" "so're you!" =philadelphia=, december, . germinal (the last word of angiolillo.) germinal!--the field of mars is plowing, and hard the steel that cuts, and hot the breath of the great oxen, straining flanks and bowing beneath his goad, who guides the share of death. germinal!--the dragon's teeth are sowing, and stern and white the sower flings the seed he shall not gather, though full swift the growing; straight down death's furrow treads, and does not heed. germinal!--the helmet heads are springing far up the field of mars in gleaming files; with wild war notes the bursting earth is ringing. * * * * * within his grave the sower sleeps, and smiles. =london=, october, . "light upon waldheim" (the figure on the monument over the grave of the chicago martyrs in waldheim cemetery is a warrior woman, dropping with her left hand a crown upon the forehead of a fallen man just past his agony, and with her right drawing a dagger from her bosom.) light upon waldheim! and the earth is gray; a bitter wind is driving from the north; the stone is cold, and strange cold whispers say: "what do ye here with death? go forth! go forth!" is this thy word, o mother, with stern eyes, crowning thy dead with stone-caressing touch? may we not weep o'er him that martyred lies, slain in our name, for that he loved us much? may we not linger till the day is broad? nay, none are stirring in this stinging dawn-- none but poor wretches that make no moan to god: what use are these, o thou with dagger drawn? "go forth, go forth! stand not to weep for these, till, weakened with your weeping, like the snow ye melt, dissolving in a coward peace!" light upon waldheim! brother, let us go! =london=, october, . love's compensation i went before god, and he said, "what fruit of the life i gave?" "father," i said, "it is dead, and nothing grows on the grave." wroth was the lord and stern: "hadst thou not to answer me? shall the fruitless root not burn, and be wasted utterly?" "father," i said, "forgive! for thou knowest what i have done; that another's life might live mine turned to a barren stone." but the father of life sent fire and burned the root in the grave; and the pain in my heart is dire for the thing that i could not save. for the thing it was laid on me by the lord of life to bring; fruit of the ungrown tree that died for no watering. another has gone to god, and his fruit has pleased him well; for he sitteth high, while i--plod the dry ways down towards hell. though thou knowest, thou knowest, lord, whose tears made that fruit's root wet; yet thou drivest me forth with a sword, and thy guards by the gate are set. thou wilt give me up to the fire, and none shall deliver me; for i followed my heart's desire, and i labored not for thee: i labored for him thou hast set on thy right hand, high and fair; thou lovest him, lord; and yet 'twas my love won him there. but this is the thing that hath been, hath been since the world began,-- that love against self must sin, and a woman die for a man. and this is the thing that shall be, shall be till the whole world die, _kismet_:--my doom is on me! why murmur since i am i? =philadelphia=, august, . the road builders ("who built the beautiful roads?" queried a friend of the present order, as we walked one day along the macadamised driveway of fairmount park.) i saw them toiling in the blistering sun, their dull, dark faces leaning toward the stone, their knotted fingers grasping the rude tools, their rounded shoulders narrowing in their chest, the sweat drops dripping in great painful beads. i saw one fall, his forehead on the rock, the helpless hand still clutching at the spade, the slack mouth full of earth. and he was dead. his comrades gently turned his face, until the fierce sun glittered hard upon his eyes, wide open, staring at the cruel sky. the blood yet ran upon the jagged stone; but it was ended. he was quite, quite dead: driven to death beneath the burning sun, driven to death upon the road he built. he was no "hero," he; a poor, black man, taking "the will of god" and asking naught; think of him thus, when next your horse's feet strike out the flint spark from the gleaming road; think that for this, this common thing, the road, a human creature died; 'tis a blood gift, to an o'erreaching world that does not thank. ignorant, mean and soulless was he? well,-- still human; and you drive upon his corpse. =philadelphia=, july , . angiolillo we are the souls that crept and cried in the days when they tortured men; his was the spirit that walked erect, and met the beast in its den. ours are the eyes that were dim with tears for the thing they shrunk to see; his was the glance that was crystal keen with the light that makes men free. ours are the hands that were wrung in pain, in helpless pain and shame; his was the resolute hand that struck, steady and keen to its aim. ours are the lips that quivered with rage, that cursed and prayed in a breath: his was the mouth that opened but once to speak from the throat of death. "assassin, assassin!" the world cries out, with a shake of its dotard head; "germinal!" rings back the grave where lies the dead that is not dead. "germinal, germinal," sings the wind that is driving before the storm; "few are the drops that have fallen yet,--scattered, but red and warm." "germinal, germinal," sing the fields, where furrows of men are plowed; "ye shall gather a harvest over-rich, when the ear at the full is bowed." springing, springing, at every breath, the word of invincible strife, the word of the dead, that is calling loud down the battle ranks of life! for these are the dead that live, though the earth upon them lie: but the doers of deeds of the night of the dead, they are the live that die. =torresdale, pa.=, august , . ave et vale comrades, what matter the watch-night tells that a new year comes or goes? what to us are the crashing bells that clang out the century's close? what to us is the gala dress? the whirl of the dancing feet? the glitter and blare in the laughing press, and din of the merry street? do we not know that our brothers die in the cold and the dark to-night? shelterless faces turned toward the sky will not see the new year's light! wandering children, lonely, lost, drift away on the human sea, while the price of their lives in a glass is tossed and drunk in a revelry! ah, know we not in their feasting halls where the loud laugh echoes again, that brick and stone in the mortared walls are the bones of murdered men? slowly murdered! by day and day, the beauty and strength are reft, till the man is sapped and sucked away, and a human rind is left! a human rind, with old, thin hair, and old, thin voice to pray for alms in the bitter winter air,-- a knife at his heart alway. and the pure in heart are impure in flesh for the cost of a little food: lo, when the gleaner of time shall thresh, let these be accounted good. for these are they who in bitter blame eat the bread whose salt is sin; whose bosoms are burned with the scarlet shame, till their hearts are seared within. the cowardly jests of a hundred years will be thrown where they pass to-night, too callous for hate, and too dry for tears, the saddest of human blight. do we forget them, these broken ones, that our watch to-night is set? nay, we smile in the face of the year that comes _because we do not forget._ we do not forget the tramp on the track, thrust out in the wind-swept waste, the curses of man upon his back, and the curse of god in his face. the stare in the eyes of the buried man face down in the fallen mine; the despair of the child whose bare feet ran to tread out the rich man's wine; the solemn light in the dying gaze of the babe at the empty breast, the wax accusation, the sombre glaze of its frozen and rigid rest; they are all in the smile that we turn to the east to welcome the century's dawn; they are all in our greeting to night's high priest, as we bid the old year begone. begone and have done, and go down and be dead deep drowned in your sea of tears! we smile as you die, for we wait the red morn-gleam of a hundred-years that shall see the end of the age-old wrong,-- the reapers that have not sown,-- the reapers of men with their sickles strong who gather, but have not strown. for the earth shall be his and the fruits thereof and to him the corn and wine, who labors the hills with an even love and knows not "thine and mine." and the silk shall be to the hand that weaves, the pearl to him who dives, the home to the builder; and all life's sheaves to the builder of human lives. and none go blind that another see, or die that another live; and none insult with a charity that is not theirs to give. for each of his plenty shall freely share and take at another's hand: equals breathing the common air and toiling the common land. a dream? a vision? aye, what you will; let it be to you as it seems: of this nightmare real we have our fill; to-night is for "pleasant dreams." dreams that shall waken the hope that sleeps and knock at each torpid heart till it beat drum taps, and the blood that creeps with a lion's spring upstart! for who are we to be bound and drowned in this river of human blood? who are we to lie in a swound, half sunk in the river mud? are we not they who delve and blast and hammer and build and burn? without us not a nail made fast! not a wheel in the world should turn! must we, the giant, await the grace that is dealt by the puny hand of him who sits in the feasting place, while we, his blind jest, stand between the pillars? nay, not so: aye, if such thing were true, better were gaza again, to show what the giant's rage may do! but yet not this: it were wiser far to enter the feasting hall and say to the masters, "these things are not for you alone, but all." and this shall be in the century that opes on our eyes to-night; so here's to the struggle, if it must be, and to him who fights the fight. and here's to the dauntless, jubilant throat that loud to its comrade sings, till over the earth shrills the mustering note, and the world strike's signal rings. =philadelphia=, january , . marsh-bloom (to gaetano bresci.) requiem, requiem, requiem, blood-red blossom of poison stem broken for man, swamp-sunk leafage and dungeon bloom, seeded bearer of royal doom, what now is the ban? what to thee is the island grave? with desert wind and desolate wave will they silence death? can they weight thee now with the heaviest stone? can they lay aught on thee with "be alone," that hast conquered breath? lo, "it is finished"--a man for a king! mark you well who have done this thing: the flower has roots; bitter and rank grow the things of the sea; ye shall know what sap ran thick in the tree when ye pluck its fruits. requiem, requiem, requiem, sleep on, sleep on, accursed of them who work our pain; a wild marsh-blossom shall blow again from a buried root in the slime of men, on the day of the great red rain. =philadelphia=, july, . written--in--red[a] (to our living dead in mexico's struggle.) written in red their protest stands, for the gods of the world to see; on the dooming wall their bodiless hands have blazoned "upharsin," and flaring brands illumine the message: "seize the lands! open the prisons and make men free!" flame out the living words of the dead written--in--red. gods of the world! their mouths are dumb! your guns have spoken and they are dust. but the shrouded living, whose hearts were numb, have felt the beat of a wakening drum within them sounding--the dead men's tongue-- calling: "smite off the ancient rust!" have beheld "resurrexit," the word of the dead, written--in--red. bear it aloft, o roaring flame! skyward aloft, where all may see. slaves of the world! our cause is the same; one is the immemorial shame; one is the struggle, and in one name-- =manhood=--we battle to set men free. "uncurse us the land!" burn the words of the dead, written--in--red. [a] voltairine de cleyre's last poem. essays the dominant idea in everything that lives, if one looks searchingly, is limned the shadow line of an idea--an idea, dead or living, sometimes stronger when dead, with rigid, unswerving lines that mark the living embodiment with the stern, immobile cast of the non-living. daily we move among these unyielding shadows, less pierceable, more enduring than granite, with the blackness of ages in them, dominating living, changing bodies, with dead, unchanging souls. and we meet, also, living souls dominating dying bodies--living ideas regnant over decay and death. do not imagine that i speak of human life alone. the stamp of persistent or of shifting will is visible in the grass-blade rooted in its clod of earth, as in the gossamer web of being that floats and swims far over our heads in the free world of air. regnant ideas, everywhere! did you ever see a dead vine bloom? i have seen it. last summer i trained some morning-glory vines up over a second-story balcony; and every day they blew and curled in the wind, their white, purple-dashed faces winking at the sun, radiant with climbing life. higher every day the green heads crept, carrying their train of spreading fans waving before the sun-seeking blossoms. then all at once some mischance happened,--some cut-worm or some mischievous child tore one vine off below, the finest and most ambitious one, of course. in a few hours the leaves hung limp, the sappy stem wilted and began to wither; in a day it was dead,--all but the top, which still clung longingly to its support, with bright head lifted. i mourned a little for the buds that could never open now, and pitied that proud vine whose work in the world was lost. but the next night there was a storm, a heavy, driving storm, with beating rain and blinding lightning. i rose to watch the flashes, and lo! the wonder of the world! in the blackness of the mid-=night=, in the fury of wind and rain, the dead vine had flowered. five white, moon-faced blossoms blew gaily round the skeleton vine, shining back triumphant at the red lightning. i gazed at them in dumb wonder. dear, dead vine, whose will had been so strong to bloom that in the hour of its sudden cut-off from the feeding earth it sent the last sap to its blossoms; and, not waiting for the morning, brought them forth in storm and flash, as white night-glories, which should have been the children of the sun. in the daylight we all came to look at the wonder, marveling much, and saying, "surely these must be the last." but every day for three days the dead vine bloomed; and even a week after, when every leaf was dry and brown, and so thin you could see through it, one last bud, dwarfed, weak, a very baby of a blossom, but still white and delicate, with five purple flecks, like those on the live vine beside it, opened and waved at the stars, and waited for the early sun. over death and decay the dominant idea smiled: the vine was in the world to bloom, to bear white trumpet blossoms dashed with purple; and it held its will beyond death. our modern teaching is that ideas are but attendant phenomena, impotent to determine the actions or relations of life, as the image in the glass which should say to the body it reflects: "_i_ shall shape _thee_." in truth we know that directly the body goes from before the mirror, the transient image is nothingness; but the real body has its being to live, and will live it, heedless of vanished phantoms of itself, in response to the ever-shifting pressure of things without it. it is thus that the so-called materialist conception of history, the modern socialists, and a positive majority of anarchists would have us look upon the world of ideas,--shifting, unreal reflections, having naught to do in the determination of man's life, but so many mirror appearances of certain material relations, wholly powerless to act upon the course of material things. mind to them is in itself a blank mirror, though in fact never wholly blank, because always facing the reality of the material and bound to reflect some shadow. to-day i am somebody, to-morrow somebody else, if the scenes have shifted; my ego is a gibbering phantom, pirouetting in the glass, gesticulating, transforming, hourly or momentarily, gleaming with the phosphor light of a deceptive unreality, melting like the mist upon the hills. rocks, fields, woods, streams, houses, goods, flesh, blood, bone, sinew,--these are realities, with definite parts to play, with essential characters that abide under all changes; but my ego does not abide; it is manufactured afresh with every change of these. i think this unqualified determinism of the material is a great and lamentable error in our modern progressive movement; and while i believe it was a wholesome antidote to the long-continued blunder of middle age theology, viz.: that mind was an utterly irresponsible entity making laws of its own after the manner of an absolute emperor, without logic, sequence, or relation, ruler over matter, and its own supreme determinant, not excepting god (who was himself the same sort of a mind writ large)--while i do believe that the modern reconception of materialism has done a wholesome thing in pricking the bubble of such conceit and restoring man and his "soul" to its "place in nature," i nevertheless believe that to this also there is a limit; and that the absolute sway of matter is quite as mischievous an error as the unrelated nature of mind; even that in its direct action upon personal conduct, it has the more ill effect of the two. for if the doctrine of free-will has raised up fanatics and persecutors, who, assuming that men may be good under all conditions if they merely wish to be so, have sought to persuade other men's wills with threats, fines, imprisonments, torture, the spike, the wheel, the axe, the fagot, in order to make them good and save them against their obdurate wills; if the doctrine of spiritualism, the soul supreme, has done this, the doctrine of materialistic determinism has produced shifting, self-excusing, worthless, parasitical characters, who are _this_ now and _that_ at some other time, and anything and nothing upon principle. "my conditions have made me so," they cry, and there is no more to be said; poor mirror-ghosts! how could they help it! to be sure, the influence of such a character rarely reaches so far as that of the principled persecutor; but for every one of the latter, there are a hundred of these easy, doughy characters, who will fit any baking tin, to whom determinist self-excusing appeals; so the balance of evil between the two doctrines is _about_ maintained. what we need is a true appraisement of the power and rôle of the idea. i do not think i am able to give such a true appraisement; i do not think that any one--even _much_ greater intellects than mine--will be able to do it for a long time to come. but i am at least able to suggest it, to show its necessity, to give a rude approximation of it. and first, against the accepted formula of modern materialism, "men are what circumstances make them," i set the opposing declaration, "circumstances are what men make them"; and i contend that both these things are true up to the point where the combating powers are equalized, or one is overthrown. in other words, my conception of mind, or character, is not that it is a powerless reflection of a momentary condition of stuff and form, but an active modifying agent, reacting on its environment and transforming circumstances, sometimes greatly, sometimes, though not often, entirely. all over the kingdom of life, i have said, one may see dominant ideas working, if one but trains his eyes to look for them and recognize them. in the human world there have been many dominant ideas. i cannot conceive that ever, at any time, the struggle of the body before dissolution can have been aught but agony. if the reasoning that insecurity of conditions, the expectation of suffering, are circumstances which make the soul of man uneasy, shrinking, timid, what answer will you give to the challenge of old ragnar lodbrog, to that triumphant death-song hurled out, not by one cast to his death in the heat of battle, but under slow prison torture, bitten by serpents, and yet singing: "the goddesses of death invite me away--now end i my song. the hours of my life are run out. i shall smile when i die"? nor can it be said that this is an exceptional instance, not to be accounted for by the usual operation of general law, for old king lodbrog the skalder did only what his fathers did, and his sons and his friends and his enemies, through long generations; they set the force of a dominant idea, the idea of the superascendant ego, against the force of torture and of death, ending life as they wished to end it, with a smile on their lips. but a few years ago, did we not read how the helpless kaffirs, victimized by the english for the contumacy of the boers, having been forced to dig the trenches wherein for pleasant sport they were to be shot, were lined up on the edge, and seeing death facing them, began to chant barbaric strains of triumph, smiling as they fell? let us admit that such exultant defiance was owing to ignorance, to primitive beliefs in gods and hereafters; but let us admit also that it shows the power of an idea dominant. everywhere in the shells of dead societies, as in the shells of the sea-slime, we shall see the force of purposive action, of intent _within_ holding its purpose against obstacles _without_. i think there is no one in the world who can look upon the steadfast, far-staring face of an egyptian carving, or read a description of egypt's monuments, or gaze upon the mummied clay of its old dead men, without feeling that the dominant idea of that people in that age was to be enduring and to work enduring things, with the immobility of their great still sky upon them and the stare of the desert in them. one must feel that whatever other ideas animated them, and expressed themselves in their lives, this was the dominant idea. _that which was_ must remain, no matter at what cost, even if it were to break the everlasting hills: an idea which made the live humanity beneath it, born and nurtured in the coffins of caste, groan and writhe and gnaw its bandages, till in the fullness of time it passed away: and still the granite mould of it stares with empty eyes out across the world, the stern old memory of the _thing-that-was_. i think no one can look upon the marbles wherein greek genius wrought the figuring of its soul, without feeling an apprehension that the things are going to leap and fly; that in a moment one is like to be set upon by heroes with spears in their hands, by serpents that will coil around him; to be trodden by horses that may trample and flee; to be smitten by these gods that have as little of the idea of stone in them as a dragon-fly, one instant poised upon a wind-swayed petal edge. i think no one can look upon them without realizing at once that those figures came out of the boil of life; they seem like rising bubbles about to float into the air, but beneath them other bubbles rising, and others, and others,--there will be no end of it. when one's eyes are upon one group, one feels that behind one, perhaps, a figure is uptoeing to seize the darts of the air and hurl them on one's head; one must keep whirling to face the miracle that appears about to be wrought--stone leaping! and this though nearly every one is minus some of the glory the old greek wrought into it so long ago; even the broken stumps of arms and legs live. and the dominant idea is activity, and the beauty and strength of it. change, swift, ever-circling change! the making of things and the casting of them away, as children cast away their toys, not interested that these shall endure, so that they themselves realize incessant activity. full of creative power, what matter if the creature perished. so there was an endless procession of changing shapes in their schools, their philosophies, their dramas, their poems, till at last it wore itself to death. and the marvel passed away from the world. but still their marbles live to show what manner of thoughts dominated them. and if we wish to know what master-thought ruled the lives of men when the mediæval period had had time to ripen it, one has only at this day to stray into some quaint, out-of-the-way english village, where a strong old towered church yet stands in the midst of little straw-thatched cottages, like a brooding mother-hen surrounded by her chickens. everywhere the greatening of god, and the lessening of man: the church so looming, the home so little. the search for the spirit, for the _enduring_ thing (not the poor endurance of granite which in the ages crumbles, but the eternal), the eternal,--and contempt for the body which perishes, manifest in studied uncleanliness, in mortifications of the flesh, as if the spirit should have spat its scorn upon it. such was the dominant idea of that middle age which has been too much cursed by modernists. for the men who built the castles and the cathedrals were men of mighty works, though they made no books, and though their souls spread crippled wings, because of their very endeavors to soar too high. the spirit of voluntary subordination for the accomplishment of a great work, which proclaimed the aspiration of the common soul,--that was the spirit wrought into the cathedral stones; and it is not wholly to be condemned. in waking dream, when the shadow-shapes of world-ideas swim before the vision, one sees the middle-age soul an ill-contorted, half-formless thing, with dragon wings and a great, dark, tense face, strained sunward with blind eyes. if now we look around us to see what idea dominates our own civilization, i do not know that it is even as attractive as this piteous monster of the old darkness. the relativity of things has altered: man has risen and god has descended. the modern village has better homes and less pretentious churches. also the conception of dirt and disease as much-sought afflictions, the patient suffering of which is a meet offering to win god's pardon, has given place to the emphatic promulgation of cleanliness. we have public school nurses notifying parents that "pediculosis capitis" is a very contagious and unpleasant disease; we have cancer associations gathering up such cancers as have attached themselves to impecunious persons, and carefully experimenting with a view to cleaning them out of the human race; we have tuberculosis societies attempting the herculean labor of clearing the augean stables of our modern factories of the deadly bacillus, and they have got as far as spittoons with water in them in some factories; and others, and others, and others, which, while not yet overwhelmingly successful in their avowed purposes, are evidence sufficient that humanity no longer seeks dirt as a means of grace. we laugh at those old superstitions, and talk much about exact experimental knowledge. we endeavor to galvanize the greek corpse, and pretend that we enjoy physical culture. we dabble in many things; but the one great real idea of our age, not copied from any other, not pretended, not raised to life by any conjuration, is the much making of things,--not the making of beautiful things, not the joy of spending living energy in creative work; rather the shameless, merciless driving and over-driving, wasting and draining of the last bit of energy, only to produce heaps and heaps of things,--things ugly, things harmful, things useless, and at the best largely unnecessary. to what end are they produced? mostly the producer does not know; still less does he care. but he is possessed with the idea that he _must_ do it, every one is doing it, and every year the making of things goes on more and faster; there are mountain ranges of things made and making, and still men go about desperately seeking to increase the list of created things, to start fresh heaps and to add to the existing heaps. and with what agony of body, under what stress and strain of danger and fear of danger, with what mutilations and maimings and lamings they struggle on, dashing themselves out against these rocks of wealth! verily, if the vision of the mediæval soul is painful in its blind staring and pathetic striving, grotesque in its senseless tortures, the soul of the modern is most amazing with its restless, nervous eyes, ever searching the corners of the universe, its restless, nervous hands ever reaching and grasping for some useless toil. and certainly the presence of things in abundance, things empty and things vulgar and things absurd, as well as things convenient and useful, has produced the desire for the possession of things, the exaltation of the possession of things. go through the business street of any city, where the tilted edges of the strata of things are exposed to gaze, and look at the faces of the people as they pass,--not at the hungry and smitten ones who fringe the sidewalks and plaint dolefully for alms, but at the crowd,--and see what idea is written on their faces. on those of the women, from the ladies of the horse-shows to the shop girls out of the factory, there is a sickening vanity, a consciousness of their clothes, as of some jackdaw in borrowed feathers. look for the pride and glory of the free, strong, beautiful body, lithe-moving and powerful. you will not see it. you will see mincing steps, bodies tilted to show the cut of a skirt, simpering, smirking faces, with eyes cast about seeking admiration for the gigantic bow of ribbon in the overdressed hair. in the caustic words of an acquaintance, to whom i once said, as we walked, "look at the amount of vanity on all these women's faces," "no: look at the little bit of womanhood showing out of all that vanity!" and on the faces of the men, coarseness! coarse desires for coarse things, and lots of them: the stamp is set so unmistakably that "the wayfarer though a fool need not err therein." even the frightful anxiety and restlessness begotten of the creation of all this, is less distasteful than the abominable expression of lust for the things created. such is the dominant idea of the western world, at least in these our days. you may see it wherever you look, impressed plainly on things and on men; very likely, if you look in the glass, you will see it there. and if some archæologist of a long future shall some day unbury the bones of our civilization, where ashes or flood shall have entombed it, he will see this frightful idea stamped on the factory walls he shall uncover, with their rows and rows of square lightholes, their tons upon tons of toothed steel, grinning out of the skull of this our life; its acres of silk and velvet, its square miles of tinsel and shoddy. no glorious marbles of nymphs and fawns, whose dead images are yet so sweet that one might wish to kiss them still; no majestic figures of winged horses, with men's faces and lions' paws casting their colossal symbolism in a mighty spell forward upon time, as those old stone chimeras of babylon yet do; but meaningless iron giants, of wheels and teeth, whose secret is forgotten, but whose business was to grind men up, and spit them out as housefuls of woven stuffs, bazaars of trash, wherethrough other men might wade. the statues he shall find will bear no trace of mythic dream or mystic symbol; they will be statues of merchants and iron-masters and militiamen, in tailored coats and pantaloons and proper hats and shoes. but the dominant idea of the age and land does not necessarily mean the dominant idea of any single life. i doubt not that in those long gone days, far away by the banks of the still nile, in the abiding shadow of the pyramids, under the heavy burden of other men's stolidity, there went to and fro restless, active, rebel souls who hated all that the ancient society stood for, and with burning hearts sought to overthrow it. i am sure that in the midst of all the agile greek intellect created, there were those who went about with downbent eyes, caring nothing for it all, seeking some higher revelation, willing to abandon the joys of life, so that they drew near to some distant, unknown perfection their fellows knew not of. i am certain that in the dark ages, when most men prayed and cowered, and beat and bruised themselves, and sought afflictions, like that st. teresa who said, "let me suffer, or die," there were some, many, who looked on the world as a chance jest, who despised or pitied their ignorant comrades, and tried to compel the answers of the universe to their questionings, by the patient, quiet searching which came to be modern science. i am sure there were hundreds, thousands of them, of whom we have never heard. and now, to-day, though the society about us is dominated by thing-worship, and will stand so marked for all time, that is no reason any single soul should be. because the one thing seemingly worth doing to my neighbor, to all my neighbors, is to pursue dollars, that is no reason i should pursue dollars. because my neighbors conceive they need an inordinate heap of carpets, furniture, clocks, china, glass, tapestries, mirrors, clothes, jewels--and servants to care for them, and detectives to keep an eye on the servants, judges to try the thieves, and politicians to appoint the judges, jails to punish the culprits, and wardens to watch in the jails, and tax collectors to gather support for the wardens, and fees for the tax collectors, and strong houses to hold the fees, so that none but the guardians thereof can make off with them,--and therefore, to keep this host of parasites, need other men to work for them, and make the fees; because my neighbors want all this, is that any reason i should devote myself to such a barren folly? and bow my neck to serve to keep up the gaudy show? must we, because the middle age was dark and blind and brutal, throw away the one good thing it wrought into the fibre of man, that the inside of a human being was worth more than the outside? that to conceive a higher thing than oneself and live toward that is the only way of living worthily? the goal strived for should, and must, be a very different one from that which led the mediæval fanatics to despise the body and belabor it with hourly crucifixions. but one can recognize the claims and the importance of the body without therefore sacrificing truth, honor, simplicity, and faith, to the vulgar gauds of body-service, whose very decorations debase the thing they might be supposed to exalt. i have said before that the doctrine that men are nothing and circumstances all, has been, and is, the bane of our modern social reform movements. our youth, themselves animated by the spirit of the old teachers who believed in the supremacy of ideas, even in the very hour of throwing away that teaching, look with burning eyes to the social east, and believe that wonders of revolution are soon to be accomplished. in their enthusiasm they foreread the gospel of circumstances to mean that very soon the pressure of material development must break down the social system--they give the rotten thing but a few years to last; and then, they themselves shall witness the transformation, partake in its joys. the few years pass away and nothing happens; enthusiasm cools. behold these same idealists then, successful business men, professionals, property owners, money lenders, creeping into the social ranks they once despised, pitifully, contemptibly, at the skirts of some impecunious personage to whom they have lent money, or done some professional service gratis; behold them lying, cheating, tricking, flattering, buying and selling themselves for any frippery, any cheap little pretense. the dominant social idea has seized them, their lives are swallowed up in it; and when you ask the reason why, they tell you that circumstances compelled them so to do. if you quote their lies to them, they smile with calm complacency, assure you that when circumstances demand lies, lies are a great deal better than truth; that tricks are sometimes more effective than honest dealing; that flattering and duping do not matter, if the end to be attained is desirable; and that under existing "circumstances" life isn't possible without all this; that it is going to be possible whenever circumstances have made truth-telling easier than lying, but till then a man must look out for himself, by all means. and so the cancer goes on rotting away the moral fibre, and the man becomes a lump, a squash, a piece of slippery slime, taking all shapes and losing all shapes, according to what particular hole or corner he wishes to glide into, a disgusting embodiment of the moral bankruptcy begotten by thing-worship. had he been dominated by a less material conception of life, had his will not been rotted by the intellectual reasoning of it out of its existence, by its acceptance of its own nothingness, the unselfish aspirations of his earlier years would have grown and strengthened by exercise and habit; and his protest against the time might have been enduringly written, and to some purpose. will it be said that the pilgrim fathers did not hew, out of the new england ice and granite, the idea which gathered them together out of their scattered and obscure english villages, and drove them in their frail ships over the atlantic in midwinter, to cut their way against all opposing forces? were they not common men, subject to the operation of common law? will it be said that circumstances aided them? when death, disease, hunger, and cold had done their worst, not one of those remaining was willing by an _easy lie_ to return to material comfort and the possibility of long days. had our modern social revolutionists the vigorous and undaunted conception of their own powers that these had, our social movements would not be such pitiful abortions,--core-rotten even before the outward flecks appear. "give a labor leader a political job, and the system becomes all right," laugh our enemies; and they point mockingly to terence powderly and his like; and they quote john burns, who as soon as _he_ went into parliament declared: "the time of the agitator is past; the time of the legislator has come." "let an anarchist marry an heiress, and the country is safe," they sneer:--and they have the right to sneer. but would they have that right, could they have it, if our lives were not in the first instance dominated by more insistent desires than those we would fain have others think we hold most dear? it is the old story: "aim at the stars, and you may hit the top of the gatepost; but aim at the ground, and you will hit the ground." it is not to be supposed that any one will attain to the full realization of what he purposes, even when those purposes do not involve united action with others; he _will_ fall short; he will in some measure be overcome by contending or inert opposition. but something he will attain, if he continues to aim high. what, then, would i have? you ask. i would have men invest themselves with the dignity of an aim higher than the chase for wealth; choose a thing to do in life outside of the making of things, and keep it in mind,--not for a day, nor a year, but for a lifetime. and then keep faith with themselves! not be a light-o'-love, to-day professing this and to-morrow that, and easily reading oneself out of both whenever it becomes convenient; not advocating a thing to-day, and to-morrow kissing its enemies' sleeve, with that weak, coward cry in the mouth, "circumstances make me." take a good look into yourself, and if you love things and the power and the plenitude of things better than you love your own dignity, human dignity, oh, say so, say so! say it to yourself, and abide by it. but do not blow hot and cold in one breath. do not try to be a social reformer and a respected possessor of things at the same time. do not preach the straight and narrow way while going joyously upon the wide one. _preach the wide one_, or do not preach at all; but do not fool yourself by saying you would like to help usher in a free society, but you cannot sacrifice an armchair for it. say honestly, "i love armchairs better than free men, and pursue them because i choose; not because circumstances make me. i love hats, large, large hats, with many feathers and great bows; and i would rather have those hats than trouble myself about social dreams that will never be accomplished in my day. the world worships hats, and i wish to worship with them." but if you choose the liberty and pride and strength of the single soul, and the free fraternization of men, as the purpose which your life is to make manifest, then do not sell it for tinsel. think that your soul is strong and will hold its way; and slowly, through bitter struggle perhaps, the strength will grow. and the foregoing of possessions for which others barter the last possibility of freedom, will become easy. at the end of life you may close your eyes, saying: "i have not been dominated by the dominant idea of my age; i have chosen mine own allegiance, and served it. i have proved by a lifetime that there is that in man which saves him from the absolute tyranny of circumstance, which in the end conquers and remoulds circumstance,--the immortal fire of individual will, which is the salvation of the future." let us have men, men who will say a word to their souls and keep it--keep it not when it is easy, but keep it when it is hard--keep it when the storm roars and there is a white-streaked sky and blue thunder before, and one's eyes are blinded and one's ears deafened with the war of opposing things; and keep it under the long leaden sky and the gray dreariness that never lifts. hold unto the last: that is what it means to have a dominant idea, where the same idea has been worked out by a whole and unmake circumstance. anarchism there are two spirits abroad in the world,--the spirit of caution, the spirit of dare, the spirit of quiescence, the spirit of unrest; the spirit of immobility, the spirit of change; the spirit of hold-fast-to-that-which-you-have, the spirit of let-go-and-fly-to-that-which-you-have-not; the spirit of the slow and steady builder, careful of its labors, loath to part with any of its achievements, wishful to keep, and unable to discriminate between what is worth keeping and what is better cast aside, and the spirit of the inspirational destroyer, fertile in creative fancies, volatile, careless in its luxuriance of effort, inclined to cast away the good together with the bad. society is a quivering balance, eternally struck afresh, between these two. those who look upon man, as most anarchists do, as a link in the chain of evolution, see in these two social tendencies the sum of the tendencies of individual men, which in common with the tendencies of all organic life are the result of the action and counteraction of inheritance and adaptation. inheritance, continually tending to repeat what has been, long, long after it is outgrown; adaptation continually tending to break down forms. the same tendencies under other names are observed in the inorganic world as well, and anyone who is possessed by the modern scientific mania for monism can easily follow out the line to the vanishing point of human knowledge. there has been, in fact, a strong inclination to do this among a portion of the more educated anarchists, who having been working men first and anarchists by reason of their instinctive hatred to the boss, later became students and, swept away by their undigested science, immediately conceived that it was necessary to fit their anarchism to the revelations of the microscope, else the theory might as well be given up. i remember with considerable amusement a heated discussion some five or six years since, wherein doctors and embryo doctors sought for a justification of anarchism in the development of the amoeba, while a fledgling engineer searched for it in mathematical quantities. myself at one time asserted very stoutly that no one could be an anarchist and believe in god at the same time. others assert as stoutly that one cannot accept the spiritualist philosophy and be an anarchist. at present i hold with c. l. james, the most learned of american anarchists, that one's metaphysical system has very little to do with the matter. the chain of reasoning which once appeared so conclusive to me, namely, that anarchism being a denial of authority over the individual could not co-exist with a belief in a supreme ruler of the universe, is contradicted in the case of leo tolstoy, who comes to the conclusion that none has a right to rule another just because of his belief in god, just because he believes that all are equal children of one father, and therefore none has a right to rule the other. i speak of him because he is a familiar and notable personage, but there have frequently been instances where the same idea has been worked out by a whole sect of believers, especially in the earlier (and persecuted) stages of their development. it no longer seems necessary to me, therefore, that one should base his anarchism upon any particular world conception; it is a theory of the relations due to man and comes as an offered solution to the societary problems arising from the existence of these two tendencies of which i have spoken. no matter where those tendencies come from, all alike recognize them as existent; and however interesting the speculation, however fascinating to lose oneself back, back in the molecular storm-whirl wherein the figure of man is seen merely as a denser, fiercer group, a livelier storm centre, moving among others, impinging upon others, but nowhere separate, nowhere exempt from the same necessity that acts upon all other centers of force,--it is by no means necessary in order to reason oneself into anarchism. sufficient are a good observant eye and a reasonably reflecting brain, for anyone, lettered or unlettered, to recognize the desirability of anarchistic aims. this is not to say that increased knowledge will not confirm and expand one's application of this fundamental concept; (the beauty of truth is that at every new discovery of fact we find how much wider and deeper it is than we at first thought it). but it means that first of all anarchism is concerned with present conditions, and with the very plain and common people; and is by no means a complex or difficult proposition. anarchism, alone, apart from any proposed economic reform, is just the latest reply out of many the past has given, to that daring, breakaway, volatile, changeful spirit which is never content. the society of which we are part puts certain oppressions upon us,--oppressions which have arisen out of the very changes accomplished by this same spirit, combined with the hard and fast lines of old habits acquired and fixed before the changes were thought of. machinery, which as our socialistic comrades continually emphasize, has wrought a revolution in industry, is the creation of the dare spirit; it has fought its way against ancient customs, privilege, and cowardice at every step, as the history of any invention would show if traced backward through all its transformations. and what is the result of it? that a system of working, altogether appropriate to hand production and capable of generating no great oppressions while industry remained in that state, has been stretched, strained to fit production in mass, till we are reaching the bursting point; once more the spirit of dare must assert itself--claim new freedoms, since the old ones are rendered null and void by the present methods of production. to speak in detail: in the old days of master and man--not so old but what many of the older workingmen can recall the conditions, the workshop was a fairly easy-going place where employer and employed worked together, knew no class feelings, chummed it out of hours, as a rule were not obliged to rush, and when they were, relied upon the principle of common interest and friendship (not upon a slave-owner's power) for overtime assistance. the proportional profit on each man's labor may even have been in general higher, but the total amount possible to be undertaken by one employer was relatively so small that no tremendous aggregations of wealth could arise. to be an employer gave no man power over another's incomings and outgoings, neither upon his speech while at work, nor to force him beyond endurance when busy, nor to subject him to fines and tributes for undesired things, such as ice-water, dirty spittoons, cups of undrinkable tea and the like; nor to the unmentionable indecencies of the large factory. the individuality of the workman was a plainly recognized quantity: his life was his own; he could not be locked in and driven to death, like a street-car horse, for the good of the general public and the paramount importance of society. with the application of steam-power and the development of machinery, came these large groupings of workers, this subdivision of work, which has made of the employer a man apart, having interests hostile to those of his employes, living in another circle altogether, knowing nothing of them but as so many units of power, to be reckoned with as he does his machines, for the most part despising them, at his very best regarding them as dependents whom he is bound in some respects to care for, as a humane man cares for an old horse he cannot use. such is his relation to his employes; while to the general public he becomes simply an immense cuttle-fish with tentacles reaching everywhere,--each tiny profit-sucking mouth producing no great effect, but in aggregate drawing up such a body of wealth as makes any declaration of equality or freedom between him and the worker a thing to laugh at. the time is come therefore when the spirit of dare calls loud through every factory and workshop for a change in the relations of master and man. there must be some arrangement possible which will preserve the benefits of the new production and at the same time restore the individual dignity of the worker,--give back the bold independence of the old master of his trade, together with such added freedoms as may properly accrue to him as his special advantage from society's material developments. this is the particular message of anarchism to the worker. it is not an economic system; it does not come to you with detailed plans of how you, the workers, are to conduct industry; nor systemized methods of exchange; nor careful paper organizations of "the administration of things." it simply calls upon the spirit of individuality to rise up from its abasement, and hold itself paramount in no matter what economic reorganization shall come about. be men first of all, not held in slavery by the things you make; let your gospel be, "things for men, not men for things." socialism, economically considered, is a positive proposition for such reorganization. it is an attempt, in the main, to grasp at those great new material gains which have been the special creation of the last forty or fifty years. it has not so much in view the reclamation and further assertion of the personality of the worker as it has a just distribution of products. now it is perfectly apparent that anarchy, having to do almost entirely with the relations of men in their thoughts and feelings, and not with the positive organization of production and distribution, an anarchist needs to supplement his anarchism by some economic propositions, which may enable him to put in practical shape to himself and others this possibility of independent manhood. that will be his test in choosing any such proposition,--the measure in which individuality is secured. it is not enough for him that a comfortable ease, a pleasant and well-ordered routine, shall be secured; free play for the spirit of change--that is his first demand. every anarchist has this in common with every other anarchist, that the economic system must be subservient to this end; no system recommends itself to him by the mere beauty and smoothness of its working; jealous of the encroachments of the machine, he looks with fierce suspicion upon an arithmetic with men for units, a society running in slots and grooves, with the precision so beautiful to one in whom the love of order is first, but which only makes him sniff--"pfaugh! it smells of machine oil." there are, accordingly, several economic schools among anarchists; there are anarchist individualists, anarchist mutualists, anarchist communists and anarchist socialists. in times past these several schools have bitterly denounced each other and mutually refused to recognize each other as anarchists at all. the more narrow-minded on both sides still do so; true, they do not consider it is narrow-mindedness, but simply a firm and solid grasp of the truth, which does not permit of tolerance towards error. this has been the attitude of the bigot in all ages, and anarchism no more than any other new doctrine has escaped its bigots. each of these fanatical adherents of either collectivism or individualism believes that no anarchism is possible without that particular economic system as its guarantee, and is of course thoroughly justified from his own standpoint. with the extension of what comrade brown calls the new spirit, however, this old narrowness is yielding to the broader, kindlier and far more reasonable idea, that all these economic conceptions may be experimented with, and there is nothing un-anarchistic about any of them until the element of compulsion enters and obliges unwilling persons to remain in a community whose economic arrangements they do not agree to. (when i say "do not agree to" i do not mean that they have a mere distaste for, or that they think might well be altered for some other preferable arrangement, but with which, nevertheless, they quite easily put up, as two persons each living in the same house and having different tastes in decoration, will submit to some color of window shade or bit of bric-a-brac which he does not like so well, but which nevertheless, he cheerfully puts up with for the satisfaction of being with his friend. i mean serious differences which in their opinion threaten their essential liberties. i make this explanation about trifles, because the objections which are raised to the doctrine that men may live in society freely, almost always degenerate into trivialities,--such as, "what would you do if two ladies wanted the same hat?" etc. we do not advocate the abolition of common sense, and every person of sense is willing to surrender his preferences at times, provided he is not _compelled_ to at all costs.) therefore i say that each group of persons acting socially in freedom may choose any of the proposed systems, and be just as thorough-going anarchists as those who select another. if this standpoint be accepted, we are rid of those outrageous excommunications which belong properly to the church of rome, and which serve no purpose but to bring us into deserved contempt with outsiders. furthermore, having accepted it from a purely theoretical process of reasoning, i believe one is then in an attitude of mind to perceive certain material factors in the problem which account for these differences in proposed systems, and which even demand such differences, so long as production is in its present state. i shall now dwell briefly upon these various propositions, and explain, as i go along, what the material factors are to which i have just alluded. taking the last first, namely, anarchist socialism,--its economic program is the same as that of political socialism, in its entirety;--i mean before the working of practical politics has frittered the socialism away into a mere list of governmental ameliorations. such anarchist socialists hold that the state, the centralized government, has been and ever will be the business agent of the property-owning class; that it is an expression of a certain material condition purely, and with the passing of that condition the state must also pass; that socialism, meaning the complete taking over of all forms of property from the hands of men as the indivisible possession of man, brings with it as a logical, inevitable result the dissolution of the state. they believe that every individual having an equal claim upon the social production, the incentive to grabbing and holding being gone, crimes (which are in nearly all cases the instinctive answer to some antecedent denial of that claim to one's share) will vanish, and with them the last excuse for the existence of the state. they do not, as a rule, look forward to any such transformations in the material aspect of society, as some of the rest of us do. a londoner once said to me that he believed london would keep on growing, the flux and reflux of nations keep on pouring through its serpentine streets, its hundred thousand 'buses keep on jaunting just the same, and all that tremendous traffic which fascinates and horrifies continue rolling like a great flood up and down, up and down, like the sea-sweep,--after the realization of anarchism, as it does now. that londoner's name was john turner; he said, on the same occasion, that he believed thoroughly in the economics of socialism. now this branch of the anarchist party came out of the old socialist party, and originally represented the revolutionary wing of that party, as opposed to those who took up the notion of using politics. and i believe the material reason which accounts for their acceptance of that particular economic scheme is this (of course it applies to all european socialists) that the social development of europe is a thing of long-continued history; that almost from time immemorial there has been a recognized class struggle; that no workman living, nor yet his father, nor his grandfather, nor his great-grandfather has seen the land of europe pass in vast blocks from an unclaimed public inheritance into the hands of an ordinary individual like himself, without a title or any distinguishing mark above himself, as we in america have seen. the land and the land-holder have been to him always unapproachable quantities,--a recognized source of oppression, class, and class-possession. again, the industrial development in town and city--coming as a means of escape from feudal oppression, but again bringing with it its own oppressions, also with a long history of warfare behind it, has served to bind the sense of class fealty upon the common people of the manufacturing towns; so that blind, stupid, and church-ridden as they no doubt are, there is a vague, dull, but very certainly existing feeling that they must look for help in association together, and regard with suspicion or indifference any proposition which proposes to help them by helping their employers. moreover, socialism has been an ever recurring dream through the long story of revolt in europe; anarchists, like others, are born into it. it is not until they pass over seas, and come in contact with other conditions, breathe the atmosphere of other thoughts, that they are able to see other possibilities as well. if i may venture, at this point, a criticism of this position of the anarchist socialist, i would say that the great flaw in this conception of the state is in supposing it to be of _simple_ origin; the state is not merely the tool of the governing classes; it has its root far down in the religious development of human nature; and will not fall apart merely through the abolition of classes and property. there is other work to be done. as to the economic program, i shall criticise that, together with all the other propositions, when i sum up. anarchist communism is a modification, rather an evolution, of anarchist socialism. most anarchist communists, i believe, do look forward to great changes in the distribution of people upon the earth's surface through the realization of anarchism. most of them agree that the opening up of the land together with the free use of tools would lead to a breaking up of these vast communities called cities, and the formation of smaller groups or communes which shall be held together by a free recognition of common interests only. while socialism looks forward to a further extension of the modern triumph of commerce--which is that it has brought the products of the entire earth to your door-step--free communism looks upon such a fever of exportation and importation as an unhealthy development, and expects rather a more self-reliant development of home resources, doing away with the mass of supervision required for the systematic conduct of such world exchange. it appeals to the plain sense of the workers, by proposing that they who now consider themselves helpless dependents upon the boss's ability to give them a job, shall constitute themselves independent producing groups, take the materials, do the work (they do that now), deposit the products in the warehouses, taking what they want for themselves, and letting others take the balance. to do this no government, no employer, no money system is necessary. there is only necessary a decent regard for one's own and one's fellow-worker's self-hood. it is not likely, indeed it is devoutly to be hoped, that no such large aggregations of men as now assemble daily in mills and factories, will ever come together by mutual desire. (a factory is a hot-bed for all that is vicious in human nature, and largely because of its crowding only.) the notion that men cannot work together unless they have a driving-master to take a percentage of their product, is contrary both to good sense and observed fact. as a rule bosses simply make confusion worse confounded when they attempt to mix in a workman's snarls, as every mechanic has had practical demonstration of; and as to social effort, why men worked in common while they were monkeys yet; if you don't believe it, go and watch the monkeys. they don't surrender their individual freedom, either. in short, the real workmen will make their own regulations, decide when and where and how things shall be done. it is not necessary that the projector of an anarchist communist society shall say in what manner separate industries shall be conducted, nor do they presume to. he simply conjures the spirit of dare and do in the plainest workmen--says to them: "it is you who know how to mine, how to dig, how to cut; you will know how to organize your work without a dictator; we cannot tell you, but we have full faith that you will find the way yourselves. you will never be free men until you acquire that same self-faith." as to the problem of the exact exchange of equivalents which so frets the reformers of other schools, to him it does not exist. so there is enough, who cares? the sources of wealth remain indivisible forever; who cares if one has a little more or less, so all have enough? who cares if something goes to waste? let it waste. the rotted apple fertilizes the ground as well as if it had comforted the animal economy first. and, indeed, you who worry so much about system and order and adjustment of production to consumption, you waste more human energy in making your account than the precious calculation is worth. hence money with all its retinue of complications and trickeries is abolished. small, independent, self-resourceful, freely cooperating communes--this is the economic ideal which is accepted by most of the anarchists of the old world to-day. as to the material factor which developed this ideal among europeans, it is the recollection and even some still remaining vestiges of the mediæval village commune--those oases in the great sahara of human degradation presented in the history of the middle ages, when the catholic church stood triumphant upon man in the dust. such is the ideal glamored with the dead gold of a sun which has set, which gleams through the pages of morris and kropotkin. we in america never knew the village commune. white civilization struck our shores in a broad tide-sheet and swept over the country inclusively; among us was never seen the little commune growing up from a state of barbarism independently, out of primary industries, and maintaining itself within itself. there was no gradual change from the mode of life of the native people to our own; there was a wiping out and a complete transplantation of the latest form of european civilization. the idea of the little commune, therefore, comes instinctively to the anarchists of europe,--particularly the continental ones; with them it is merely the conscious development of a submerged instinct. with americans it is an importation. i believe that most anarchist communists avoid the blunder of the socialists in regarding the state as the offspring of material conditions purely, though they lay great stress upon its being the tool of property, and contend that in one form or another the state will exist so long as there is property at all. i pass to the extreme individualists,--those who hold to the tradition of political economy, and are firm in the idea that the system of employer and employed, buying and selling, banking, and all the other essential institutions of commercialism, centering upon private property, are in themselves good, and are rendered vicious merely by the interference of the state. their chief economic propositions are: land to be held by individuals or companies for such time and in such allotments as they use only; redistribution to take place as often as the members of the community shall agree; what constitutes use to be decided by each community, presumably in town meeting assembled; disputed cases to be settled by a so-called free jury to be chosen by lot out of the entire group; members not coinciding in the decisions of the group to betake themselves to outlying lands not occupied, without let or hindrance from any one. money to represent all staple commodities, to be issued by whomsoever pleases; naturally, it would come to individuals depositing their securities with banks and accepting bank notes in return; such bank notes representing the labor expended in production and being issued in sufficient quantity, (there being no limit upon any one's starting in the business, whenever interest began to rise more banks would be organized, and thus the rate per cent would be constantly checked by competition), exchange would take place freely, commodities would circulate, business of all kinds would be stimulated, and, the government privilege being taken away from inventions, industries would spring up at every turn, bosses would be hunting men rather than men bosses, wages would rise to the full measure of the individual production, and forever remain there. property, real property, would at last exist, which it does not at the present day, because no man gets what he makes. the charm in this program is that it proposes no sweeping changes in our daily retinue; it does not bewilder us as more revolutionary propositions do. its remedies are self-acting ones; they do not depend upon conscious efforts of individuals to establish justice and build harmony; competition in freedom is the great automatic valve which opens or closes as demands increase or diminish, and all that is necessary is to let well enough alone and not attempt to assist it. it is sure that nine americans in ten who have never heard of any of these programs before, will listen with far more interest and approval to this than to the others. the material reason which explains this attitude of mind is very evident. in this country outside of the negro question we have never had the historic division of classes; we are just making that history now; we have never felt the need of the associative spirit of workman with workman, because in our society it has been the individual that did things; the workman of to-day was the employer to-morrow; vast opportunities lying open to him in the undeveloped territory, he shouldered his tools and struck out single-handed for himself. even now, fiercer and fiercer though the struggle is growing, tighter and tighter though the workman is getting cornered, the line of division between class and class is constantly being broken, and the first motto of the american is "the lord helps him who helps himself." consequently this economic program, whose key-note is "let alone", appeals strongly to the traditional sympathies and life habits of a people who have themselves seen an almost unbounded patrimony swept up, as a gambler sweeps his stakes, by men who played with them at school or worked with them in one shop a year or ten years before. this particular branch of the anarchist party does not accept the communist position that government arises from property; on the contrary, they hold government responsible for the denial of real property (viz.: to the producer the exclusive possession of what he has produced). they lay more stress upon its metaphysical origin in the authority-creating fear in human nature. their attack is directed centrally upon the idea of authority; thus the material wrongs seem to flow from the spiritual error (if i may venture the word without fear of misconstruction), which is precisely the reverse of the socialistic view. truth lies not "_between_ the two," but in a synthesis of the two opinions. anarchist mutualism is a modification of the program of individualism, laying more emphasis upon organization, co-operation and free federation of the workers. to these the trade union is the nucleus of the free co-operative group, which will obviate the necessity of an employer, issue time-checks to its members, take charge of the finished product, exchange with different trade groups for their mutual advantage through the central federation, enable its members to utilize their credit, and likewise insure them against loss. the mutualist position on the land question is identical with that of the individualists, as well as their understanding of the state. the material factor which accounts for such differences as there are between individualists and mutualists, is, i think, the fact that the first originated in the brains of those who, whether workmen or business men, lived by so-called independent exertion. josiah warren, though a poor man, lived in an individualist way and made his free-life social experiment in small country settlements, far removed from the great organized industries. tucker also, though a city man, has never had personal association with such industries. they had never known directly the oppressions of the large factory, nor mingled with workers' associations. the mutualists had; consequently their leaning towards a greater communism. dyer d. lum spent the greater part of his life in building up workmen's unions, himself being a hand worker, a book-binder by trade. i have now presented the rough skeleton of four different economic schemes entertained by anarchists. remember that the point of agreement in all is: _no compulsion_. those who favor one method have no intention of forcing it upon those who favor another, so long as equal tolerance is exercised toward themselves. remember, also, that none of these schemes is proposed for its own sake, but because through it, its projectors believe, liberty may be best secured. every anarchist, as an anarchist, would be perfectly willing to surrender his own scheme directly, if he saw that another worked better. for myself, i believe that all these and many more could be advantageously tried in different localities; i would see the instincts and habits of the people express themselves in a free choice in every community; and i am sure that distinct environments would call out distinct adaptations. personally, while i recognize that liberty would be greatly extended under any of these economies, i frankly confess that none of them satisfies me. socialism and communism both demand a degree of joint effort and administration which would beget more regulation than is wholly consistent with ideal anarchism; individualism and mutualism, resting upon property, involve a development of the private policeman not at all compatible with my notions of freedom. my ideal would be a condition in which all natural resources would be forever free to all, and the worker individually able to produce for himself sufficient for all his vital needs, if he so chose, so that he need not govern his working or not working by the times and seasons of his fellows. i think that time may come; but it will only be through the development of the modes of production and the taste of the people. meanwhile we all cry with one voice for the freedom _to try_. are these all the aims of anarchism? they are just the beginning. they are an outline of what is demanded for the material producer. if as a worker, you think no further than how to free yourself from the horrible bondage of capitalism, then that is the measure of anarchism for you. but you yourself put the limit there, if there it is put. immeasurably deeper, immeasurably higher, dips and soars the soul which has come out of its casement of custom and cowardice, and dared to claim its self. ah, once to stand unflinchingly on the brink of that dark gulf of passions and desires, once at last to send a bold, straight-driven gaze down into the volcanic me, once, and in that once, and in that once _forever_, to throw off the command to cover and flee from the knowledge of that abyss,--nay, to dare it to hiss and seethe if it will, and make us writhe and shiver with its force! once and forever to realize that one is not a bundle of well-regulated little reasons bound up in the front room of the brain to be sermonized and held in order with copy-book maxims or moved and stopped by a syllogism, but a bottomless, bottomless depth of all strange sensations, a rocking sea of feeling wherever sweep strong storms of unaccountable hate and rage, invisible contortions of disappointment, low ebbs of meanness, quakings and shudderings of love that drives to madness and will not be controlled, hungerings and moanings and sobbing that smite upon the inner ear, now first bent to listen, as if all the sadness of the sea and the wailing of the great pine forests of the north had met to weep together there in that silence audible to you alone. to look down into that, to know the blackness, the midnight, the dead ages in oneself, to feel the jungle and the beast within,--and the swamp and the slime, and the desolate desert of the heart's despair--to see, to know, to feel to the uttermost,--and then to look at one's fellow, sitting across from one in the street-car, so decorous, so well got up, so nicely combed and brushed and oiled and to wonder what lies beneath that commonplace exterior,--to picture the cavern in him which somewhere far below has a narrow gallery running into your own--to imagine the pain that racks him to the finger-tips perhaps while he wears that placid ironed-shirt-front countenance--to conceive how he too shudders at himself and writhes and flees from the lava of his heart and aches in his prison-house not daring to see himself--to draw back respectfully from the self-gate of the plainest, most unpromising creature, even from the most debased criminal, because one knows the nonentity and the criminal in oneself--to spare all condemnation (how much more trial and sentence) because one knows the stuff of which man is made and recoils at nothing since all is in himself,--this is what anarchism may mean to you. it means that to me. and then, to turn cloudward, starward, skyward, and let the dreams rush over one--no longer awed by outside powers of any order--recognizing nothing superior to oneself--painting, painting endless pictures, creating unheard symphonies that sing dream sounds to you alone, extending sympathies to the dumb brutes as equal brothers, kissing the flowers as one did when a child, letting oneself go free, go free beyond the bounds of what _fear_ and _custom_ call the "possible,"--this too anarchism may mean to you, if you dare to apply it so. and if you do some day,--if sitting at your work-bench, you see a vision of surpassing glory, some picture of that golden time when there shall be no prisons on the earth, nor hunger, nor houselessness, nor accusation, nor judgment, and hearts open as printed leaves, and candid as fearlessness, if then you look across at your low-browed neighbor, who sweats and smells and curses at his toil,--remember that as you do not know his depth neither do you know his height. he too might dream if the yoke of custom and law and dogma were broken from him. even now you know not what blind, bound, motionless chrysalis is working there to prepare its winged thing. anarchism means freedom to the soul as to the body,--in every aspiration, every growth. a few words as to the methods. in times past anarchists have excluded each other on these grounds also; revolutionists contemptuously said "quaker" of peace men; "savage communists" anathematized the quakers in return. this too is passing. i say this: all methods are to the individual capacity and decision. there is tolstoy,--christian, non-resistant, artist. his method is to paint pictures of society as it is, to show the brutality of force and the uselessness of it; to preach the end of government through the repudiation of all military force. good! i accept it in its entirety. it fits his character, it fits his ability. let us be glad that he works so. there is john most--old, work-worn, with the weight of prison years upon him,--yet fiercer, fiercer, bitterer in his denunciations of the ruling class than would require the energy of a dozen younger men to utter--going down the last hills of life, rousing the consciousness of wrong among his fellows as he goes. good! that consciousness must be awakened. long may that fiery tongue yet speak. there is benjamin tucker--cool, self-contained, critical,--sending his fine hard shafts among foes and friends with icy impartiality, hitting swift and cutting keen,--and ever ready to nail a traitor. holding to passive resistance as most effective, ready to change it whenever he deems it wise. that suits him; in his field he is alone, invaluable. and there is peter kropotkin appealing to the young, and looking with sweet, warm, eager eyes into every colonizing effort, and hailing with a child's enthusiasm the uprisings of the workers, and believing in revolution with his whole soul. him too we thank. and there is george brown preaching peaceable expropriation through the federated unions of the workers; and this is good. it is his best place; he is at home there; he can accomplish most in his own chosen field. and over there in his coffin cell in italy, lies the man whose method was to kill a king, and shock the nations into a sudden consciousness of the hollowness of their law and order. him too, him and his act, without reserve i accept, and bend in silent acknowledgement of the strength of the man. for there are some whose nature it is to think and plead, and yield and yet return to the address, and so make headway in the minds of their fellowmen; and there are others who are stern and still, resolute, implacable as judah's dream of god;--and those men strike--strike once and have ended. but the blow resounds across the world. and as on a night when the sky is heavy with storm, some sudden great white flare sheets across it, and every object starts sharply out, so in the flash of bresci's pistol shot the whole world for a moment saw the tragic figure of the italian people, starved, stunted, crippled, huddled, degraded, murdered; and at the same moment that their teeth chattered with fear, they came and asked the anarchists to explain themselves. and hundreds of thousands of people read more in those few days than they had ever read of the idea before. ask a method? do you ask spring her method? which is more necessary, the sunshine or the rain? they are contradictory--yes; they destroy each other--yes, but from this destruction the flowers result. each choose that method which expresses your self-hood best, and condemn no other man because he expresses his self otherwise. anarchism and american traditions american traditions, begotten of religious rebellion, small self-sustaining communities, isolated conditions, and hard pioneer life, grew during the colonization period of one hundred and seventy years from the settling of jamestown to the outburst of the revolution. this was in fact the great constitution-making epoch, the period of charters guaranteeing more or less of liberty, the general tendency of which is well described by wm. penn in speaking of the charter for pennsylvania: "i want to put it out of my power, or that of my successors, to do mischief." the revolution is the sudden and unified consciousness of these traditions, their loud assertion, the blow dealt by their indomitable will against the counter force of tyranny, which has never entirely recovered from the blow, but which from then till now has gone on remolding and regrappling the instruments of governmental power, that the revolution sought to shape and hold as defenses of liberty. to the average american of to-day, the revolution means the series of battles fought by the patriot army with the armies of england. the millions of school children who attend our public schools are taught to draw maps of the siege of boston and the siege of yorktown, to know the general plan of the several campaigns, to quote the number of prisoners of war surrendered with burgoyne; they are required to remember the date when washington crossed the delaware on the ice; they are told to "remember paoli," to repeat "molly stark's a widow," to call general wayne "mad anthony wayne," and to execrate benedict arnold; they know that the declaration of independence was signed on the fourth of july, , and the treaty of paris in ; and then they think they have learned the revolution--blessed be george washington! they have no idea why it should have been called a "revolution" instead of the "english war," or any similar title: it's the name of it, that's all. and name-worship, both in child and man, has acquired such mastery of them, that the name "american revolution" is held sacred, though it means to them nothing more than successful force, while the name "revolution" applied to a further possibility, is a spectre detested and abhorred. in neither case have they any idea of the content of the word, save that of armed force. that has already happened, and long happened, which jefferson foresaw when he wrote: "the spirit of the times may alter, will alter. our rulers will become corrupt, our people careless. a single zealot may become persecutor, and better men be his victims. it can never be too often repeated that the time for fixing every essential right, on a legal basis, is while our rulers are honest, ourselves united. _from the conclusion of this war we shall be going down hill._ it will not then be necessary to resort every moment to the people for support. they will be forgotten, therefore, and their rights disregarded. they will forget themselves in the sole faculty of making money, and will never think of uniting to effect a due respect for their rights. the shackles, therefore, which shall not be knocked off at the conclusion of this war, will be heavier and heavier, till our rights shall revive or expire in a convulsion." to the men of that time, who voiced the spirit of that time, the battles that they fought were the least of the revolution; they were the incidents of the hour, the things they met and faced as part of the game they were playing; but the stake they had in view, before, during, and after the war, the real revolution, was a change in political institutions which should make of government not a thing apart, a superior power to stand over the people with a whip, but a serviceable agent, responsible, economical, and trustworthy (but never so much trusted as not to be continually watched), for the transaction of such business as was the common concern, and to set the limits of the common concern at the line where one man's liberty would encroach upon another's. they thus took their starting point for deriving a minimum of government upon the same sociological ground that the modern anarchist derives the no-government theory; viz., that equal liberty is the political ideal. the difference lies in the belief, on the one hand, that the closest approximation to equal liberty might be best secured by the rule of the majority in those matters involving united action of any kind (which rule of the majority they thought it possible to secure by a few simple arrangements for election), and, on the other hand, the belief that majority rule is both impossible and undesirable; that any government, no matter what its forms, will be manipulated by a very small minority, as the development of the state and united states governments has strikingly proved; that candidates will loudly profess allegiance to platforms before elections, which as officials in power they will openly disregard, to do as they please; and that even if the majority will could be imposed, it would also be subversive of equal liberty, which may be best secured by leaving to the voluntary association of those interested in the management of matters of common concern, without coercion of the uninterested or the opposed. among the fundamental likenesses between the revolutionary republicans and the anarchists is the recognition that the little must precede the great; that the local must be the basis of the general; that there can be a free federation only when there are free communities to federate; that the spirit of the latter is carried into the councils of the former, and a local tyranny may thus become an instrument for general enslavement. convinced of the supreme importance of ridding the municipalities of the institutions of tyranny, the most strenuous advocates of independence, instead of spending their efforts mainly in the general congress, devoted themselves to their home localities, endeavoring to work out of the minds of their neighbors and fellow-colonists the institutions of entailed property, of a state-church, of a class-divided people, even the institution of african slavery itself. though largely unsuccessful, it is to the measure of success they did achieve that we are indebted for such liberties as we do retain, and not to the general government. they tried to inculcate local initiative and independent action. the author of the declaration of independence, who in the fall of ' declined a re-election to congress in order to return to virginia and do his work in his own local assembly, in arranging there for public education which he justly considered a matter of "common concern," said his advocacy of public schools was not with any "view to take its ordinary branches out of the hands of private enterprise, which manages _so much better_ the concerns to which it is equal"; and in endeavoring to make clear the restrictions of the constitution upon the functions of the general government, he likewise said: "let the general government be reduced to foreign concerns only, and let our affairs be disentangled from those of all other nations, except as to commerce, _which the merchants will manage the better the more they are left free to manage for themselves_, and the general government may be reduced to a very simple organization, and a very inexpensive one; a few plain duties to be performed by a few servants." this then was the american tradition, that private enterprise manages better all that to which it is equal. anarchism declares that private enterprise, whether individual or co-operative, is equal to all the undertakings of society. and it quotes the particular two instances, education and commerce, which the governments of the states and of the united states have undertaken to manage and regulate, as the very two which in operation have done more to destroy american freedom and equality, to warp and distort american tradition, to make of government a mighty engine of tyranny, than any other cause, save the unforeseen developments of manufacture. it was the intention of the revolutionists to establish a system of common education, which should make the teaching of history one of its principal branches; not with the intent of burdening the memories of our youth with the dates of battles or the speeches of generals, nor to make of the boston tea party indians the one sacrosanct mob in all history, to be revered but never on any account to be imitated, but with the intent that every american should know to what conditions the masses of people had been brought by the operation of certain institutions, by what means they had wrung out their liberties, and how those liberties had again and again been filched from them by the use of governmental force, fraud, and privilege. not to breed security, laudation, complacent indolence, passive acquiescence in the acts of a government protected by the label "home-made," but to beget a wakeful jealousy, a never-ending watchfulness of rulers, a determination to squelch every attempt of those entrusted with power to encroach upon the sphere of individual action--this was the prime motive of the revolutionists in endeavoring to provide for common education. "confidence," said the revolutionists who adopted the kentucky resolutions, "is everywhere the parent of despotism; free government is founded in jealousy, not in confidence; it is jealousy, not confidence, which prescribes limited constitutions to bind down those whom we are obliged to trust with power; our constitution has accordingly fixed the limits to which, and no further, our confidence may go. * * * in questions of power, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the constitution." these resolutions were especially applied to the passage of the alien laws by the monarchist party during john adams' administration, and were an indignant call from the state of kentucky to repudiate the right of the general government to assume undelegated powers, for, said they, to accept these laws would be "to be bound by laws made, not with our consent, but by others against our consent--that is, to surrender the form of government we have chosen, and to live under one deriving its powers from its own will, and not from our authority." resolutions identical in spirit were also passed by virginia, the following month; in those days the states still considered themselves supreme, the general government subordinate. to inculcate this proud spirit of the supremacy of the people over their governors was to be the purpose of public education! pick up to-day any common school history, and see how much of this spirit you will find therein. on the contrary, from cover to cover you will find nothing but the cheapest sort of patriotism, the inculcation of the most unquestioning acquiescence in the deeds of government, a lullaby of rest, security, confidence,--the doctrine that the law can do no wrong, a te deum in praise of the continuous encroachments of the powers of the general government upon the reserved rights of the states, shameless falsification of all acts of rebellion, to put the government in the right and the rebels in the wrong, pyrotechnic glorifications of union, power, and force, and a complete ignoring of the essential liberties to maintain which was the purpose of the revolutionists. the anti-anarchist law of post-mckinley passage, a much worse law than the alien and sedition acts which roused the wrath of kentucky and virginia to the point of threatened rebellion, is exalted as a wise provision of our all-seeing father in washington. such is the spirit of government-provided schools. ask any child what he knows about shays's rebellion, and he will answer, "oh, some of the farmers couldn't pay their taxes, and shays led a rebellion against the court-house at worcester, so they could burn up the deeds; and when washington heard of it he sent over an army quick and taught 'em a good lesson"--"and what was the result of it?" "the result? why--why--the result was--oh yes, i remember--the result was they saw the need of a strong federal government to collect the taxes and pay the debts." ask if he knows what was said on the other side of the story, ask if he knows that the men who had given their goods and their health and their strength for the freeing of the country now found themselves cast into prison for debt, sick, disabled, and poor, facing a new tyranny for the old; that their demand was that the land should become the free communal possession of those who wished to work it, not subject to tribute, and the child will answer "no." ask him if he ever read jefferson's letter to madison about it, in which he says: "societies exist under three forms, sufficiently distinguishable. . without government, as among our indians. . under government wherein the will of every one has a just influence; as is the case in england in a slight degree, and in our states in a great one. . under government of force, as is the case in all other monarchies, and in most of the other republics. to have an idea of the curse of existence in these last, they must be seen. it is a government of wolves over sheep. it is a problem not clear in my mind that the first condition is not the best. but i believe it to be inconsistent with any great degree of population. the second state has a great deal of good in it.... it has its evils, too, the principal of which is the turbulence to which it is subject.... but even this evil is productive of good. it prevents the degeneracy of government, and nourishes a general attention to public affairs. i hold that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing." or to another correspondent: "god forbid that we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion!... what country can preserve its liberties if its rulers are not warned from time to time that the people preserve the spirit of resistance? let them take up arms.... the tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. it is its natural manure." ask any school child if he was ever taught that the author of the declaration of independence, one of the great founders of the common school, said these things, and he will look at you with open mouth and unbelieving eyes. ask him if he ever heard that the man who sounded the bugle note in the darkest hour of the crisis, who roused the courage of the soldiers when washington saw only mutiny and despair ahead, ask him if he knows that this man also wrote, "government at best is a necessary evil, at worst an intolerable one," and if he is a little better informed than the average he will answer, "oh well, _he_ was an infidel!" catechize him about the merits of the constitution which he has learned to repeat like a poll-parrot, and you will find his chief conception is not of the powers withheld from congress, but of the powers granted. such are the fruits of government schools. we, the anarchists, point to them and say: if the believers in liberty wish the principles of liberty taught, let them never intrust that instruction to any government; for the nature of government is to become a thing apart, an institution existing for its own sake, preying upon the people, and teaching whatever will tend to keep it secure in its seat. as the fathers said of the governments of europe, so say we of this government also after a century and a quarter of independence: "the blood of the people has become its inheritance, and those who fatten on it will not relinquish it easily." public education, having to do with the intellect and spirit of a people, is probably the most subtle and far-reaching engine for molding the course of a nation; but commerce, dealing as it does with material things and producing immediate effects, was the force that bore down soonest upon the paper barriers of constitutional restriction, and shaped the government to its requirements. here, indeed, we arrive at the point where we, looking over the hundred and twenty-five years of independence, can see that the simple government conceived by the revolutionary republicans was a foredoomed failure. it was so because of ( ) the essence of government itself; ( ) the essence of human nature; ( ) the essence of commerce and manufacture. of the essence of government, i have already said, it is a thing apart, developing its own interests at the expense of what opposes it; all attempts to make it anything else fail. in this anarchists agree with the traditional enemies of the revolution, the monarchists, federalists, strong government believers, the roosevelts of to-day, the jays, marshalls, and hamiltons of then,--that hamilton, who, as secretary of the treasury, devised a financial system of which we are the unlucky heritors, and whose objects were twofold: to puzzle the people and make public finance obscure to those that paid for it; to serve as a machine for corrupting the legislatures; "for he avowed the opinion that man could be governed by two motives only, force or interest;" force being then out of the question, he laid hold of interest, the greed of the legislators, to set going an association of persons having an entirely separate welfare from the welfare of their electors, bound together by mutual corruption and mutual desire for plunder. the anarchist agrees that hamilton was logical, and understood the core of government; the difference is, that while strong governmentalists believe this is necessary and desirable, we choose the opposite conclusion, no government whatever. as to the essence of human nature, what our national experience has made plain is this, that to remain in a continually exalted moral condition is not human nature. that has happened which was prophesied: we have gone down hill from the revolution until now; we are absorbed in "mere money-getting." the desire for material ease long ago vanquished the spirit of ' . what was that spirit? the spirit that animated the people of virginia, of the carolinas, of massachusetts, of new york, when they refused to import goods from england; when they preferred (and stood by it) to wear coarse homespun cloth, to drink the brew of their own growths, to fit their appetites to the home supply, rather than submit to the taxation of the imperial ministry. even within the lifetime of the revolutionists the spirit decayed. the love of material ease has been, in the mass of men and permanently speaking, always greater than the love of liberty. nine hundred and ninety-nine women out of a thousand are more interested in the cut of a dress than in the independence of their sex; nine hundred and nine-nine men out of a thousand are more interested in drinking a glass of beer than in questioning the tax that is laid on it; how many children are not willing to trade the liberty to play for the promise of a new cap or a new dress? this it is which begets the complicated mechanism of society; this it is which, by multiplying the concerns of government, multiplies the strength of government and the corresponding weakness of the people; this it is which begets indifference to public concern, thus making the corruption of government easy. as to the essence of commerce and manufacture, it is this: to establish bonds between every corner of the earth's surface and every other corner, to multiply the needs of mankind, and the desire for material possession and enjoyment. the american tradition was the isolation of the states as far as possible. said they: we have won our liberties by hard sacrifice and struggle unto death. we wish now to be let alone and to let others alone, that our principles may have time for trial; that we may become accustomed to the exercise of our rights; that we may be kept free from the contaminating influence of european gauds, pagents, distinctions. so richly did they esteem the absence of these that they could in all fervor write: "we shall see multiplied instances of europeans coming to america, but no man living will ever see an instance of an american removing to settle in europe, and continuing there." alas! in less than a hundred years the highest aim of a "daughter of the revolution" was, and is, to buy a castle, a title, and a rotten lord, with the money wrung from american servitude! and the commercial interests of america are seeking a world-empire! in the earlier days of the revolt and subsequent independence, it appeared that the "manifest destiny" of america was to be an agricultural people, exchanging food stuffs and raw materials for manufactured articles. and in those days it was written: "we shall be virtuous as long as agriculture is our principal object, which will be the case as long as there remain vacant lands in any part of america. when we get piled upon one another in large cities, as in europe, we shall become corrupt as in europe, and go to eating one another as they do there." which we are doing, because of the inevitable development of commerce and manufacture, and the concomitant development of strong government. and the parallel prophecy is likewise fulfilled: "if ever this vast country is brought under a single government, it will be one of the most extensive corruption, indifferent and incapable of a wholesome care over so wide a spread of surface." there is not upon the face of the earth to-day a government so utterly and shamelessly corrupt as that of the united states of america. there are others more cruel, more tyrannical, more devastating; there is none so utterly venal. and yet even in the very days of the prophets, even with their own consent, the first concession to this later tyranny was made. it was made when the constitution was made; and the constitution was made chiefly because of the demands of commerce. thus it was at the outset a merchant's machine, which the other interests of the country, the land and labor interests, even then foreboded would destroy their liberties. in vain their jealousy of its central power made them enact the first twelve amendments. in vain they endeavored to set bounds over which the federal power dare not trench. in vain they enacted into general law the freedom of speech, of the press, of assemblage and petition. all of these things we see ridden rough-shod upon every day, and have so seen with more or less intermission since the beginning of the nineteenth century. at this day, every police lieutenant considers himself, and rightly so, as more powerful than the general law of the union; and that one who told robert hunter that he held in his fist something stronger than the constitution, was perfectly correct. the right of assemblage is an american tradition which has gone out of fashion; the police club is now the mode. and it is so in virtue of the people's indifference to liberty, and the steady progress of constitutional interpretation towards the substance of imperial government. it is an american tradition that a standing army is a standing menace to liberty; in jefferson's presidency the army was reduced to , men. it is american tradition that we keep out of the affairs of other nations. it is american practice that we meddle with the affairs of everybody else from the west to the east indies, from russia to japan; and to do it we have a standing army of , men. it is american tradition that the financial affairs of a nation should be transacted on the same principles of simple honesty that an individual conducts his own business; viz., that debt is a bad thing, and a man's first surplus earnings should be applied to his debts; that offices and office-holders should be few. it is american practice that the general government should always have millions of debt, even if a panic or a war has to be forced to prevent its being paid off; and as to the application of its income, office-holders come first. and within the last administration it is reported that , offices have been created at an annual expense of $ , , . shades of jefferson! "how are vacancies to be obtained? those by deaths are few; by resignation none." roosevelt cuts the knot by making , new ones! and few will die,--and none resign. they will beget sons and daughters, and taft will have to create , more! verily, a simple and a serviceable thing is our general government. it is american tradition that the judiciary shall act as a check upon the impetuosity of legislatures, should these attempt to pass the bounds of constitutional limitation. it is american practice that the judiciary justifies every law which trenches on the liberties of the people and nullifies every act of the legislature by which the people seek to regain some measure of their freedom. again, in the words of jefferson: "the constitution is a mere thing of wax in the hands of the judiciary, which they may twist and shape in any form they please." truly, if the men who fought the good fight for the triumph of simple, honest, free life in that day, were now to look upon the scene of their labors, they would cry out together with him who said: "i regret that i am now to die in the belief that the useless sacrifice of themselves by the generation of ' to acquire self-government and happiness to their country, is to be thrown away by the unwise and unworthy passions of their sons, and that my only consolation is to be that i shall not live to see it." and now, what has anarchism to say to all this, this bankruptcy of republicanism, this modern empire that has grown up on the ruins of our early freedom? we say this, that the sin our fathers sinned was that they did not trust liberty wholly. they thought it possible to compromise between liberty and government, believing the latter to be "a necessary evil", and the moment the compromise was made, the whole misbegotten monster of our present tyranny began to grow. instruments which are set up to safeguard rights become the very whip with which the free are struck. anarchism says, make no laws whatever concerning speech, and speech will be free; so soon as you make a declaration on paper that speech shall be free, you will have a hundred lawyers proving that "freedom does not mean abuse, nor liberty license"; and they will define and define freedom out of existence. let the guarantee of free speech be in every man's determination to use it, and we shall have no need of paper declarations. on the other hand, so long as the people do not care to exercise their freedom, those who wish to tyrannize will do so; for tyrants are active and ardent, and will devote themselves in the name of any number of gods, religious and otherwise, to put shackles upon sleeping men. the problem then becomes, is it possible to stir men from their indifference? we have said that the spirit of liberty was nurtured by colonial life; that the elements of colonial life were the desire for sectarian independence, and the jealous watchfulness incident thereto; the isolation of pioneer communities which threw each individual strongly on his own resources, and thus developed all-around men, yet at the same time made very strong such social bonds as did exist; and, lastly, the comparative simplicity of small communities. all this has mostly disappeared. as to sectarianism, it is only by dint of an occasional idiotic persecution that a sect becomes interesting; in the absence of this, outlandish sects play the fool's role, are anything but heroic, and have little to do with either the name or the substance of liberty. the old colonial religious parties have gradually become the "pillars of society," their animosities have died out, their offensive peculiarities have been effaced, they are as like one another as beans in a pod, they build churches and--sleep in them. as to our communities, they are hopelessly and helplessly interdependent, as we ourselves are, save that continuously diminishing proportion engaged in all around farming; and even these are slaves to mortgages. for our cities, probably there is not one that is provisioned to last a week, and certainly there is none which would not be bankrupt with despair at the proposition that it produce its own food. in response to this condition and its correlative political tyranny, anarchism affirms the economy of self-sustenance, the disintegration of the great communities, the use of the earth. i am not ready to say that i see clearly that this _will_ take place; but i see clearly that this _must_ take place if ever again men are to be free. i am so well satisfied that the mass of mankind prefer material possessions to liberty, that i have no hope that they will ever, by means of intellectual or moral stirrings merely, throw off the yoke of oppression fastened on them by the present economic system, to institute free societies. my only hope is in the blind development of the economic system and political oppression itself. the great characteristic looming factor in this gigantic power is manufacture. the tendency of each nation is to become more and more a manufacturing one, an exporter of fabrics, not an importer. if this tendency follows its own logic, it must eventually circle round to each community producing for itself. what then will become of the surplus product when the manufacturer shall have no foreign market? why, then mankind must face the dilemma of sitting down and dying in the midst of it, or confiscating the goods. indeed, we are partially facing this problem even now; and so far we are sitting down and dying. i opine, however, that men will not do it forever; and when once by an act of general expropriation they have overcome the reverence and fear of property, and their awe of government, they may waken to the consciousness that things are to be used, and therefore men are greater than things. this may rouse the spirit of liberty. if, on the other hand, the tendency of invention to simplify, enabling the advantages of machinery to be combined with smaller aggregations of workers, shall also follow its own logic, the great manufacturing plants will break up, population will go after the fragments, and there will be seen not indeed the hard, self-sustaining, isolated pioneer communities of early america, but thousands of small communities stretching along the lines of transportation, each producing very largely for its own needs, able to rely upon itself, and therefore able to be independent. for the same rule holds good for societies as for individuals,--those may be free who are able to make their own living. in regard to the breaking up of that vilest creation of tyranny, the standing army and navy, it is clear that so long as men desire to fight, they will have armed force in one form or another. our fathers thought they had guarded against a standing army by providing for the voluntary militia. in our day we have lived to see this militia declared part of the regular military force of the united states, and subject to the same demands as the regulars. within another generation we shall probably see its members in the regular pay of the general government. since any embodiment of the fighting spirit, any military organization, inevitably follows the same line of centralization, the logic of anarchism is that the least objectionable form of armed force is that which springs up voluntarily, like the minute-men of massachusetts, and disbands as soon as the occasion which called it into existence is past: that the really desirable thing is that all men--not americans only--should be at peace; and that to reach this, all peaceful persons should withdraw their support from the army, and require that all who make war shall do so at their own cost and risk; that neither pay nor pensions are to be provided for those who choose to make man-killing a trade. as to the american tradition of non-meddling, anarchism asks that it be carried down to the individual himself. it demands no jealous barrier of isolation; it knows that such isolation is undesirable and impossible; but it teaches that by all men's strictly minding their own business, a fluid society, freely adapting itself to mutual needs, wherein all the world shall belong to all men, as much as each has need or desire, will result. and when modern revolution has thus been carried to the heart of the whole world--if it ever shall be, as i hope it will,--then may we hope to see a resurrection of that proud spirit of our fathers which put the simple dignity of man above the gauds of wealth and class, and held that to be an american was greater than to be a king. in that day there shall be neither kings nor americans,--only men; over the whole earth, men. anarchism in literature in the long sweep of seventeen hundred years which witnessed the engulfment of a moribund roman civilization, together with its borrowed greek ideals, under the red tide of a passionate barbarism that leaped to embrace the idea of triumph over death, and spat upon the grecian joys of life with the superb contempt of the norse savage, there was, for europe and america, but one great animating word in art and literature--christianity. it boots not here to inquire how close or how remote the christian ideal as it developed was in comparison with the teachings of the nazarene. distorted, blackened, almost effaced, it was yet some faint echo from the hillsides of olivet, some indistinct vision of the cross, some dull perception of the white glory of renunciation, that shaped the dreams of the evolving barbarian, and moulded all his work, whether of stone or clay, upon canvas or parchment. wherever we turn we find a general fixup or caste, an immovable solidity of orders built upon orders, an unquestioning subordination of the individual, ruling every effort of genius. ascetic shadow upon all; nowhere does a sun-ray of self-expression creep, save as through water, thin and perturbed. the theologic pessimism which appealed to the fighting man as a proper extension of his own superstition--perhaps hardly that, for heaven was but a change of name for valhalla,--fell heavily upon the man of dreams, whose creations must come forth, lifeless, after the uniform model, who must bless and ban not as he saw before his eyes but as the one eternal purpose demanded. at last the barbarian is civilized; he has accomplished his own refinement--and his own rottenness. still he preaches (and practices) contempt of death--when others do the dying! still he preaches submission to the will of god--but that others may submit to him! still he proclaims the cross--but that others may bear it. where rome was in the glut of her vanity and her blood-drunkenness--limbs wound in cloth of gold suppurating with crime, head boastfully nodding as jove and feet rocking upon slipping slime--there stand the empires and republics of those whose forefathers slew rome. and now for these three hundred years the men of dreams have been watching the christian ideal go bankrupt. one by one as they have dared, and each according to his mood, they have spoken their minds; some have reasoned, and some have laughed, and some have appealed, logician, satirist, and exhorter all feeling in their several ways that humanity stood in need of a new moral ideal. consciously or unconsciously, within the pale of the church or without, this has been "the spirit moving upon the face of the waters" within them, and at last the creation is come forth, the dream that is to touch the heart-strings of the world anew, and make it sing a stronger song than any it has sung of old. mark you, it must be stronger, wider, deeper, or it cannot be at all. it must sing all that has been sung, and something more. its mission is not to deny the past but to reaffirm it and explain it, all of it; and to-day too, and to-morrow too. and this ideal, the only one that has power to stir the moral pulses of the world, the only word that can quicken "dead souls" who wait this moral resurrection, the only word which can animate the dreamer, poet, sculptor, painter, musician, artist of chisel or pen, with power to fashion forth his dream, is =anarchism=. for anarchism means fulness of being. it means the return of greek radiance of life, greek love of beauty, without greek indifference to the common man; it means christian earnestness and christian communism, without christian fanaticism and christian gloom and tyranny. it means this because it means perfect freedom, material and spiritual freedom. the light of greek idealism failed because with all its love of life and the infinite diversity of beauty, and all the glory of its free intellect, it never conceived of material freedom; to it the helot was as eternal as the gods. therefore the gods passed away, and their eternity was as a little wave of time. the christian ideal has failed because with all its sublime communism, its doctrine of universal equality, it was bound up with a spiritual tyranny seeking to mould into one pattern the thoughts of all humanity, stamping all men with the stamp of submission, throwing upon all the dark umber of _life lived for the purpose of death_, and fruitful of all other tyrannies. anarchism will succeed because its message of freedom comes down the rising wind of social revolt first of all to the common man, the material slave, and bids him know that he, too, should have an independent will, and the free exercise thereof; that no philosophy, and no achievement, and no civilization is worth considering or achieving, if it does not mean that he shall be free to labor at what he likes and when he likes, and freely share all that free men choose to produce; that he, the drudge of all the ages, is the cornerstone of the building without whose sure and safe position no structure can nor should endure. and likewise it comes to him who sits in fear of himself, and says: "fear no more, neither what is without or within. search fully and freely your self; hearken to all the voices that rise from that abyss from which you have been commanded to shrink. learn for yourself what these things are. belike what they have told you is good, is bad; and this cast mould of goodness, a vile prison-house. learn to decide your own measure of restraint. value for yourself the merits of selfishness and unselfishness; and strike you the balance between these two: for if the first be all accredited you make slaves of others, and if the second, your own abasement raises tyrants over you; and none can decide the matter for you so well as you for yourself; for even if you err you learn by it, while if he errs the blame is his, and if he advises well the credit is his, and you are nothing. _be yourself_; and by self-expression learn self-restraint. the wisdom of the ages lies in the reassertion of all past positivisms, and the denial of all negations, that is, all that has been claimed by the individual for himself is good, but every denial of the freedom of another is bad; whereby it will be seen that many things supposed to be claimed for oneself involve the freedom of others and must be surrendered because they do not come within the sovereign limit, while many things supposed to be evil, since they in nowise infringe upon the liberty of others are wholly good, bringing to dwarfed bodies and narrow souls the vigor and full growth of healthy exercise, and giving a rich glow to life that had else paled out like a lamp in a grave-vault." to the sybarite it says, learn to do your own share of hard work; you will gain by it; to the "man with the hoe," think for yourself and boldly take your time for it. the division of labor which makes of one man a brain and of another a hand is evil. away with it. this is the ethical gospel of anarchism to which these three hundred years of intellectual ferment have been leading. he who will trace the course of literature for three hundred years will find innumerable bits of drift here and there, indicative of the moral and intellectual revolt. protestantism itself, in asserting the supremacy of the individual conscience, fired the long train of thought which inevitably leads to the explosion of all forms of authority. the great political writers of the eighteenth century, in asserting the right of self-government, carried the line of advance one step further. america had her jefferson declaring: "societies exist under three forms: . without government as among the indians. . under governments wherein every one has a just influence. . under governments of force. it is a problem not clear in my mind that the first condition is not the best." she had, or she and england together had, her paine, more mildly asserting: "governments are, at best, a necessary evil." and england had also godwin, who, though still milder in manner and consequently less effective during the troublous period in which he lived, was nevertheless more deeply radical than either, presaging that application of the political ideal to economic concerns so distinctive of modern anarchism. "my neighbor," says he, "has just as much right to put an end to my existence with dagger or poison as to deny me that pecuniary assistance without which i must starve." nor did he stop here: he carried the logic of individual sovereignty into the chiefest of social institutions, and declared that the sex relation was a matter concerning the individuals sharing it only. thus he says: "the institution of marriage is a system of fraud.... marriage is law and the worst of all laws.... marriage is an affair of property and the worst of all properties. so long as two human beings are forbidden by positive institution to follow the dictates of their own mind prejudice is alive and vigorous.... the abolition of marriage will be attended with no evils. we are apt to consider it to ourselves as the harbinger of brutal lust and depravity; but it really happens in this, as in other cases, that the positive laws which are made to restrain our vices, irritate and multiply them." the grave and judicial style of "political justice" prevented its attaining the great popularity of "the rights of man," but the indirect influence of its author bloomed in the rich profusion of shelleyan fancy, and in all that coterie of young litterateurs who gathered about godwin as their revered teacher. nor was the principle of no-government without its vindication from one who moved actively in official centers, and whose name has been alternately quoted by conservatives and radicals, now with veneration, now with execration. in his essay "on government," edmund burke, the great political weathercock, aligned himself with the germinating movement towards anarchism when he exclaimed: "they talk of the abuse of government; the thing, the thing itself is the abuse!" this aphoristic utterance will go down in history on its own merits, as the sayings of great men often do, stripped of its accompanying explanations. men have already forgotten to inquire how and why he said it; the words stand, and will continue a living message, long after the thousands of sheets of rhetoric which won him the epithet of "the dinner-bell of the house" have been relegated to the dust of museums. in later days an essayist whose brilliancy of style and capacity for getting on all sides of a question connect him with burke in some manner as his spiritual offspring, has furnished the anarchists with one of their most frequent quotations. in his essay on "john milton," macaulay declares, "the only cure for the evils of newly acquired liberty is--more liberty." that he nevertheless possessed a strong vein of conservatism, sat in parliament, and took part in legal measures, simply proves that he had his tether and could not go the length of his own logic; that is no reason others should not. the anarchists accept this fundamental declaration and proceed to its consequence. but the world-thought was making way, not only in england, where, indeed, constitutional phlegmatism, though stirred beyond its wont by the events of the close of the last century, acted frigidly upon it, but throughout europe. in france, rabelais drew the idyllic picture of the abbey of thelemes, a community of persons agreeing to practise complete individual freedom among themselves. rousseau, however erroneous his basis for the "social contract," moved all he touched with his belief that humanity was innately good, and capable of so manifesting itself in the absence of restrictions. furthermore, his "confessions" appears the most famous fore-runner of the tendency now shaping itself in literature--that of the free expression of a whole man--not in his stage-character only, but in his dressing-room, not in his decent, scrubbed and polished moral clothes alone, but in his vileness and his meanness and his folly, too, these being indisputable factors in his moral life, and no solution but a false one to be obtained by hiding them and playing they are not there. this truth, acknowledged in america, in our own times, by two powerful writers of very different cast, is being approached by all the manifold paths of the soul's travel. "i have in me the capacity for every crime," says emerson the transcendentalist. and whitman, the stanch proclaimer of blood and sinew, and the gospel of the holiness of the body, makes himself one with drunken revelers and the creatures of debauchery as well as with the anchorite and the christ-soul, that fulness of being may be declared. in the genesis of these declarations we shall find the "confessions." it is not the "social contract" alone that is open to the criticism of having reasoned from false premises; all the early political writers we have named were equally mistaken, all suffering from a like insufficiency of facts. partly this was the result of the habit of thought fostered by the church for seventeen hundred years,--which habit was to accept by faith a sweeping generalization and fit all future discoveries of fact into it; but partly also it is in the nature of all idealism to offer itself, however vaguely in the mist of mind-struggle, and allow time to correct and sharpen the detail. probably initial steps will always be taken with blunders, while those who are not imaginative enough to perceive the half-shapen figure will nevertheless accept it later and set it upon a firm foundation. this has been the task of the modern historian, who, no less than the political writer, consciously or unconsciously, is swayed by the anarchistic ideal and bends his services towards it. it is understood that when we speak of history we do not allude to the unspeakable trash contained in public school text-books (which in general resemble a cellar junk-shop of chronologies, epaulettes, bad drawings, and silly tales, and are a striking instance of the corrupting influence of state management of education, by which the mediocre, nay the absolutely empty, is made to survive), history which is undertaken with the purpose of discovering the real course of the development of human society. among such efforts, the broken but splendid fragment of his stupendous project, is buckle's "history of civilization,"--a work in which the author breaks away utterly from the old method of history writing, viz. that of recording court intrigues, the doings of individuals in power as a matter of personal interest, the processions of military pageant, to inquire into the real lives and conditions of the people, to trace their great upheavals, and in what consisted their progress. gervinus in germany, who, within only recent years, drew upon himself a prosecution for treason, took a like method, and declared that progress consists in a steady decline of centralized power and the development of local autonomy and the free federation. supplementing the work of the historian proper, there has arisen a new class of literature, itself the creation of the spirit of free inquiry, since, up till that had asserted itself, such writings were impossible; it embraces a wide range of studies into the conditions and psychology of prehistoric man, of which sir john lubbock's works will serve as the type. from these, dark as the subject yet is, we are learning the true sources of all authority, and the agencies which are rendering it obsolete; moreover, a curious cycle of development reveals itself; namely, that starting from the point of no authority unconsciously accepted, man, in the several manifestations of his activity, evolves through stages of belief in many authorities to one authority, and finally to _no authority_ again, but this time conscious and reasoned. crowning the work of historian and prehistorian, comes the labor of the sociologist. herbert spencer, with infinite patience for detail and marvelous power of classification and generalization, takes up the facts of the others, and deduces from them the great law of equal freedom: "a man should have the freedom to do whatsoever he wills, provided that in the doing thereof he infringes not the equal freedom of every other man." the early edition of "social statics" is a logical, scientific, and bold statement of the great fundamental freedoms which anarchists demand. from the rather taxing study of authors like these, it is a relief to turn to those intermediate writers who dwell between them and the pure fictionists, whose writings are occupied with the facts of life as related to the affections and aspirations of humanity, among whom, "representative men," we immediately select emerson, thoreau, edward carpenter. now, indeed, we cease to reason upon the past evolution of liberty, and begin to feel it; begin to reach out after what it _shall_ mean. none who are familiar with the thought of emerson can fail to recognize that it is spiritual anarchism; from the serene heights of self-possession, the ego looks out upon its possibilities, unawed by aught without. and he who has dwelt in dream by walden, charmed by that pure life he has not himself led but wished that, like thoreau, he might lead, has felt that call of the anarchistic ideal which pleads with men to renounce the worthless luxuries which enslave them and those who work for them, that the buried soul which is doomed to mummy cloths by the rush and jangle of the chase for wealth, may answer the still small voice of the resurrection, there, in the silence, the solitude, the simplicity of the free life. a similar note is sounded in carpenter's "civilization: its cause and cure," a work which is likely to make the "civilizer" see himself in a very different light than that in which he usually beholds himself. and again the same vibration shudders through "the city of dreadful night," the masterpiece of an obscure genius who was at once essayist and poet of too high and rare a quality to catch the ear stunned by strident commonplaces, but loved by all who seek the violets of the soul, one thomson, known to literature as "b. v." similarly obscure, and similarly sympathetic is the "english peasant," by richard heath, a collection of essays so redolent of abounding love, so overflowing with understanding for characters utterly contradictory, painted so tenderly and yet so strongly, that none can read them without realizing that here is a man, who, whatever he _believes_ he believes, in reality desires freedom of expression for the whole human spirit, which implies for every separate unit of it. something of the emersonian striving after individual attainment plus the passionate sympathy of heath is found in a remarkable book, which is too good to have obtained a popular hearing, entitled "the story of my heart." no more daring utterance was ever given voice than this: "i pray to find the highest soul,--greater than deity, better than god." in the concluding pages of the tenth chapter of this wonderful little book occur the following lines: "that any human being should dare to apply to another the epithet of 'pauper' is to me the greatest, the vilest, the most unpardonable crime that could be committed. each human being, by mere birth, has a birthright in this earth and all its productions; and if they do not receive it, then it is they who are injured; and it is not the 'pauper'--oh! inexpressibly wicked world!--it is the well-to-do who are the criminals. it matters not in the least if the poor be improvident, drunken, or evil in any way. food and drink, roof and clothes, are the inalienable right of every child born into the light. if the world does not provide it freely--not as a grudging gift, but as a right, as the son of the house sits down to breakfast,--then is the world mad. but the world is not mad, only in ignorance." in catholic sympathy like this, in heart-hunger after a wider righteousness, a higher idea than god, does the anarchistic ideal come to those who have lived through old phases of religious and social beliefs and "found them wanting." it is the shelleyan outburst: "more life and fuller life we want." _he_ was the prometheus of the movement, he, the wild bird of song, who flew down into the heart of storm and night, singing unutterably sweet the song of the free man and woman as he passed. poor shelley! happy shelley! he died not knowing the triumph of his genius; but also he died while the white glow within was yet shining higher, higher! in the light of it, he smiled above the world; had he lived, he might have died alive, as swinburne and as tennyson whose old days belie their early strength. yet men will remember "slowly comes a hungry people as a lion drawing nigher. glares at one who nods and winks beside a slowly dying fire." and "let the great world swing forever down the ringing grooves of change." and "glory to man in the highest for man is the master of things" and "while three men hold together, the kingdoms are less by three" until the end "of kingdoms and of kings," though their authors "take refuge in the kingdom" and quaver palsied hymns to royalty with their cracked voices and broken lutes. for this is the glory of the living ideal, that all that is in accord with it lives, whether the mouthpiece through which it spoke would recall it or not. the manifold voice which is one speaks out through all the tongues of genius in its greatest moments, whether it be a heine writing, in supreme contempt, "for the law has got long arms, priests and parsons have long tongues and the people have long ears," a nekrassoff cursing the railroad built of men, a hugo painting the battle of the individual man "with nature, with the law, with society," a lowell crying: "law is holy ay, but what law? is there nothing more divine than the patched up broils of congress,--venal, full of meat and wine? is there, say you, nothing higher--naught, god save us, that transcends laws of cotton texture wove by vulgar men for vulgar ends? law is holy: but not your law, ye who keep the tablets whole while ye dash the law in pieces, shatter it in life and soul." and again, "one faith against a whole world's unbelief, one soul against the flesh of all mankind." nor do the master dramatists lag behind the lyric writers; they, too, feel the intense pressure within, which is, quoting the deathword of a man of far other stamp, "germinal." ibsen's drama, intensely real, common, accepting none of the received rules as to the conventional plot, but having to do with serious questions of the lives of the plain people, holds ever before us the supreme duty of truth to one's inner being in defiance of custom and law; it is so in nora, who renounces all notions of family duty to "find herself"; it is so in dr. stockman, who maintains the rectitude of his own soul against the authorities and against the mob; it should have been so in mrs. alving, who learns too late that her yielding to social custom has brought a fore-ruined life into the world besides wrecking her own; the master builder, john gabriel borkman, all his characters are created to vindicate the separate soul supreme within its sphere; those that are miserable and in evil condition are so because they have not lived true to themselves but in obedience to some social hypocrisy. gerhart hauptmann likewise feels the new pulsation: he has no hero, no heroine, no intrigue; his picture is the image of the headless and tailless body of struggle,--the struggle of the common man. it begins in the middle, it ends in nothing--as yet. to end in defeat would be to premise surrender--a surrender humanity does not intend; to triumph would be to anticipate the future, and paint life other than it is. hence it ends where it began, in murmurs. thus his "weavers." octave mirbeau, likewise, offers his criticism on a world of sheep in "the bad shepherds," and sara bernhardt plays it. in england and america we have another phase of the rebel drama--the drama of the bad woman, as a distinct figure in social creation with a right to be herself. have we not the "second mrs. tanqueray" who comes to grief through an endeavor to conform to a moral standard that does not fit? and have we not zaza, who is worth a thousand of her respectable lover and his respectable wife? and does not all the audience go home in love with her? and begin to quest the libraries for literary justifications of their preference? and these are not hard to find, for it is in the novel particularly, the novel which is the special creation of the last century, that the new ideal is freest. in a recent essay in reply to walter besant, henry james pleads most anarchistically for his freedom in the novel. all such pleas will always come as justifications, for as to the freedom it is already won, and all the formalists from besant to the end of days will never tempt the litterateurs into chains again. but the essay is well worth reading as a specimen of right reasoning on art. as in other modes of literary expression this tendency in the novel dates back; and it is strange enough that out of the mouth of a toady like walter scott should have spoken the free, devil-may-care, outlaw spirit (read notably "quentin durward"), which is, perhaps, the first phase of self-assertion that has the initial strength to declare itself against the tyranny of custom; this is why it happens that the fore-runners of social change are often shocking in their rudeness and contempt of manners, and, in fact, more or less uncomfortable persons to have to do with. but they have their irresistible charm all the same, and scott, who was a true genius despite his toadyism, felt it and responded to it, by always making us love his outlaws best no matter how gently he dealt with kings. another phase of the free man appears in george borrow's rollicking, full-blooded, out-of-door gypsies who do not take the trouble to despise law, but simply ignore it, live unconscious of it altogether. george meredith, in another vein, develops the strong soul over-riding social barriers. our own hawthorne in his preface to the "scarlet letter," and still more in the "marble faun," depicts the vacuity of a life sucking a parasitic existence through government organization, and asserts over and over that the only strength is in him or her--and it is noteworthy that the strongest is in "her"--who resolutely chooses and treads an unbeaten path. from far away africa, there speaks again the note of soul rebellion in the exquisite "dreams" of olive schreiner, wherethrough "_the hunter walks alone_." grant allen, too, in numerous works, especially "the woman who did," voices the demand for self-hood. morris gives us his idyllic "news from nowhere." zola, the fertile creator of dungheaps crowned with lilies, whose pages reek with the stench of bodies, laboring, debauching, rotting, until the words of christ cry loud in the ears of him who would put the vision away, "whited sepulchres, full of dead men's bones and all uncleanliness"--zola was more than an unconscious anarchist, he is a conscious one, did so proclaim himself. and close beside him, maxim gorki, spokesman of the tramp, visionary of the despised, who whatever his personal political views may be, and notwithstanding the condemnations he has visited upon the anarchist, is still an anarchistic voice in literature. and over against these, austere, simple, but oh! so loving, the critic who shows the world its faults but does not condemn, the man who first took the way of renunciation and then _preached_ it, the christian whom the church casts out, the anarchist whom the worst government in the world dares not slay, the author of "resurrection" and "the slavery of our times." they come together, from the side of passionate hate and limitless love--the volcano and the sea--they come together in one demand, freedom from this wicked and debasing tyranny called government, which makes indescribable brutes of all who feel its touch, but worse still of all who touch it. as for contemporaneous light literature, there are magazine articles and papers innumerable displaying here and there the grasp of the idea. have we not the _philistine_ and its witty editor, boldly proclaiming in anarchistic spelling, "i am an anarkist?" by the way, he may now expect a visitation of the criminal anarchy law. and a few years since, julian hawthorne, writing in the denver _post_, inquired, "did you ever notice that all the interesting people you meet are anarchists?" reason why: there is no other living dream to him who has character enough to be interesting. it is the uninteresting, the dull, the ready-made minds who go on accepting "dead limbs of gibbeted gods," as they accept their dinner and their bed, which someone else prepares. let two names, standing for strangely opposing appeals yet standing upon common ground, close this sketch--two strong flashes of the prismatic fires which blent together in the white ray of our ideal. the first, nietzsche, he who proclaims "the overman," the receiver of the mantle of max stirner, the scintillant rhetorician, the pride of young germany, who would have the individual acknowledge nothing, neither science, nor logic, nor any other creation of his thought, as having authority over him, its creator. the last, whitman, the great sympathetic, all-inclusive quaker, whose love knew no limits, who said to society's most utterly despised outcast, "not until the sun excludes you, will i exclude you," and who, whether he be called poet, philosopher, or peasant was supremely anarchist, and in a moment of weariness with human slavery, cried: "i think i could turn and live with animals, they seem so placid and self-contained, i stand and look at them long and long. they do not sweat and whine about their conditions, they do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins, they do not make me sick discussing their duty to god; not one is dissatisfied, not one is demented with the mania of owning things; not one kneels to another, nor to his kind that lived thousands of years ago, not one is respectable or unhappy over the whole earth." the making of an anarchist "here was one guard, and here was the other at this end; i was here opposite the gate. you know those problems in geometry of the hare and the hounds--they never run straight, but always in a curve, so, see? and the guard was no smarter than the dogs; if he had run straight to the gate he would have caught me." it was peter kropotkin telling of his escape from the petro-paulovsky fortress. three crumbs on the table marked the relative position of the outwitted guards and the fugitive prisoner; the speaker had broken them from the bread on which he was lunching and dropped them on the table with an amused smile. the suggested triangle had been the starting-point of the life-long exile of the greatest man, save tolstoy alone, that russia has produced; from that moment began the many foreign wanderings and the taking of the simple, love-given title "comrade," for which he had abandoned the "prince," which he despises. we were three together in the plain little home of a london workingman--will wess, a one-time shoemaker--kropotkin, and i. we had our "tea" in homely english fashion, with thin slices of buttered bread; and we talked of things nearest our hearts, which, whenever two or three anarchists are gathered together, means present evidences of the growth of liberty and what our comrades are doing in all lands. and as what they do and say often leads them into prisons, the talk had naturally fallen upon kropotkin's experience and his daring escape, for which the russian government is chagrined unto this day. presently the old man glanced at the time, and jumped briskly to his feet: "i am late. good-by, voltairine; good-by, will. is this the way to the kitchen? i must say good-by to mrs. turner and lizzie." and out to the kitchen he went, unwilling, late though he was, to leave without a hand-clasp to those who had so much as washed a dish for him. such is kropotkin, a man whose personality is felt more than any other in the anarchist movement--at once the gentlest, the most kindly, and the most invincible of men. communist as well as anarchist, his very heart-beats are rhythmic with the great common pulse of work and life. communist am not i, though my father was, and his father before him during the stirring times of ' , which is probably the remote reason for my opposition to things as they are: at bottom convictions are mostly temperamental. and if i sought to explain myself on other grounds, i should be a bewildering error in logic; for by early influences and education i should have been a nun, and spent my life glorifying authority in its most concentrated form, as some of my schoolmates are doing at this hour within the mission houses of the order of the holy names of jesus and mary. but the old ancestral spirit of rebellion asserted itself while i was yet fourteen, a schoolgirl at the convent of our lady of lake huron, at sarnia, ontario. how i pity myself now, when i remember it, poor lonesome little soul, battling solitary in the murk of religious superstition, unable to believe and yet in hourly fear of damnation, hot, savage, and eternal, if i do not instantly confess and profess! how well i recall the bitter energy with which i repelled my teacher's enjoinder, when i told her that i did not wish to apologize for an adjudged fault, as i could not see that i had been wrong, and would not _feel_ my words. "it is not necessary," said she, "that we should feel what we say, but it is always necessary that we obey our superiors." "i will not lie," i answered hotly, and at the same time trembled lest my disobedience had finally consigned me to torment! i struggled my way out at last, and was a freethinker when i left the institution, three years later, though i had never seen a book or heard a word to help me in my loneliness. it had been like the valley of the shadow of death, and there are white scars on my soul yet, where ignorance and superstition burnt me with their hell-fire in those stifling days. am i blasphemous? it is their word, not mine. beside that battle of my young days all others have been easy, for whatever was without, within my own will was supreme. it has owed no allegiance, and never shall; it has moved steadily in one direction, the knowledge and the assertion of its own liberty, with all the responsibility falling thereon. this, i am sure, is the ultimate reason for my acceptance of anarchism, though the specific occasion which ripened tendencies to definition was the affair of - , when five innocent men were hanged in chicago for the act of one guilty who still remains unknown. till then i believed in the essential justice of the american law and trial by jury. after that i never could. the infamy of that trial has passed into history, and the question it awakened as to the possibility of justice under law has passed into clamorous crying across the world. with this question fighting for a hearing at a time when, young and ardent, all questions were pressing with a force which later life would in vain hear again, i chanced to attend a paine memorial convention in an out-of-the-way corner of the earth among the mountains and the snow-drifts of pennsylvania. i was a freethought lecturer at this time, and had spoken in the afternoon on the lifework of paine; in the evening i sat in the audience to hear clarence darrow deliver an address on socialism. it was my first introduction to any plan for bettering the condition of the working-classes which furnished some explanation of the course of economic development, and i ran to it as one who has been turning about in darkness runs to the light. i smile now at how quickly i adopted the label "socialist" and how quickly i cast it aside. let no one follow my example; but i was young. six weeks later i was punished for my rashness, when i attempted to argue for my faith with a little russian jew, named mozersky, at a debating club in pittsburgh. he was an anarchist, and a bit of a socrates. he questioned me into all kinds of holes, from which i extricated myself most awkwardly, only to flounder into others he had smilingly dug while i was getting out of the first ones. the necessity of a better foundation became apparent: hence began a course of study in the principles of sociology and of modern socialism and anarchism as presented in their regular journals. it was benjamin tucker's _liberty_, the exponent of individualist anarchism, which finally convinced me that "liberty is not the daughter but the mother of order." and though i no longer hold the particular economic gospel advocated by tucker, the doctrine of anarchism itself, as then conceived, has but broadened, deepened, and intensified itself with years. to those unfamiliar with the movement, the various terms are confusing. anarchism is, in truth, a sort of protestantism, whose adherents are a unit in the great essential belief that all forms of external authority must disappear to be replaced by self-control only, but variously divided in our conception of the form of future society. individualism supposes private property to be the cornerstone of personal freedom; asserts that such property should consist in the absolute possession of one's own product and of such share of the natural heritage of all as one may actually use. communist-anarchism, on the other hand, declares that such property is both unrealizable and undesirable; that the common possession and use of all the natural sources and means of social production can alone guarantee the individual against a recurrence of inequality, and its attendants, government and slavery. my personal conviction is that both forms of society, as well as many intermediations, would, in the absence of government, be tried in various localities, according to the instincts and material condition of the people, but that well founded objections may be offered to both. liberty and experiment alone can determine the best forms of society. therefore i no longer label myself otherwise than as "anarchist" simply. i would not, however, have the world think that i am an "anarchist by trade." outsiders have some very curious notions about us, one of them being that anarchists never work. on the contrary, anarchists are nearly always poor, and it is only the rich who live without work. not only this, but it is our belief that every healthy human being will, by the laws of his own activity, choose to work, though certainly not as now, for at present there is little opportunity for one to find his true vocation. thus i, who in freedom would have selected otherwise, am a teacher of language. some twelve years since, being in philadelphia and without employment, i accepted the proposition of a small group of russian jewish factory workers to form an evening class in the common english branches. i know well enough that behind the desire to help me to make a living lay the wish that i might thus take part in the propaganda of our common cause. but the incidental became once more the principal, and a teacher of working men and women i have remained from that day. in those twelve years that i have lived and loved and worked with foreign jews i have taught over a thousand, and found them, as a rule, the brightest, the most persistent and sacrificing students, and in youth dreamers of social ideals. while the "intelligent american" has been cursing him as the "ignorant foreigner," while the short-sighted workingman has been making life for the "sheeny" as intolerable as possible, silent and patient the despised man has worked his way against it all. i have myself seen such genuine heroism in the cause of education practiced by girls and boys, and even by men and women with families, as would pass the limits of belief to the ordinary mind. cold, starvation, self-isolation, all endured for years in order to obtain the means for study; and, worse than all, exhaustion of body even to emaciation--this is common. yet in the midst of all this, so fervent is the social imagination of the young that most of them find time besides to visit the various clubs and societies where radical thought is discussed, and sooner or later ally themselves either with the socialist sections, the liberal leagues, the single tax clubs, or the anarchist groups. the greatest socialist daily in america is the jewish _vorwaerts_, and the most active and competent practical workers are jews. so they are among the anarchists. i am no propagandist at all costs, or i would leave the story here; but the truth compels me to add that as the years pass and the gradual filtration and absorption of american commercial life goes on, my students become successful professionals, the golden mist of enthusiasm vanishes, and the old teacher must turn for comradeship to the new youth, who still press forward with burning eyes, seeing what is lost forever to those whom common success has satisfied and stupified. it brings tears sometimes, but as kropotkin says, "let them go; we have had the best of them." after all, who are the really old? those who wear out in faith and energy, and take to easy chairs and soft living; not kropotkin, with his sixty years upon him, who has bright eyes and the eager interest of a little child; not fiery john most, "the old war-horse of the revolution," unbroken after his ten years of imprisonment in europe and america; not grey-haired louise michel, with the aurora of the morning still shining in her keen look which peers from behind the barred memories of new caledonia; not dyer d. lum, who still smiles in his grave, i think; nor tucker, nor turner, nor theresa clairmunt, nor jean grave--not these. i have met them all, and felt the springing life pulsating through heart and hand, joyous, ardent, leaping into action. not such are the old, but your young heart that goes bankrupt in social hope, dry-rotting in this stale and purposeless society. would you be always young? then be an anarchist, and live with the faith of hope, though you be old. i doubt if any other hope has the power to keep the fire alight as i saw it in , when we met the spanish exiles released from the fortress of montjuich. comparatively few persons in america ever knew the story of that torture, though we distributed fifty thousand copies of the letters smuggled from the prison, and some few newspapers did reprint them. they were the letters of men incarcerated on mere suspicion for the crime of an unknown person, and subjected to tortures the bare mention of which makes one shudder. their nails were torn out, their heads compressed in metal caps, the most sensitive portions of the body twisted between guitar strings, their flesh burned with red hot irons; they had been fed on salt codfish after days of starvation, and refused water; juan ollé, a boy nineteen years old, had gone mad; another had confessed to something he had never done and knew nothing of. this is no horrible imagination. i who write have myself shaken some of those scarred hands. indiscriminately, four hundred people of all sorts of beliefs--republicans, trade unionists, socialists, free masons, as well as anarchists--had been cast into dungeons and tortured in the infamous "zero." is it a wonder that most of them came out anarchists? there were twenty-eight in the first lot that we met at euston station that august afternoon,--homeless wanderers in the whirlpool of london, released without trial after months of imprisonment, and ordered to leave spain in forty-eight hours! they had left it, singing their prison songs; and still across their dark and sorrowful eyes one could see the eternal maytime bloom. they drifted away to south america chiefly, where four or five new anarchist papers have since arisen, and several colonizing experiments along anarchist lines are being tried. so tyranny defeats itself, and the exile becomes the seed-sower of the revolution. and not only to the heretofore unaroused does he bring awakening, but the entire character of the world movement is modified by this circulation of the comrades of all nations among themselves. originally the american movement, the native creation which arose with josiah warren in , was purely individualistic; the student of economy will easily understand the material and historical causes for such development. but within the last twenty years the communist idea has made great progress, owing primarily to that concentration in capitalist production which has driven the american workingman to grasp at the idea of solidarity, and, secondly, to the expulsion of active communist propagandists from europe. again, another change has come within the last ten years. till then the application of the idea was chiefly narrowed to industrial matters, and the economic schools mutually denounced each other; to-day a large and genial tolerance is growing. the young generation recognizes the immense sweep of the idea through all the realms of art, science, literature, education, sex relations and personal morality, as well as social economy, and welcomes the accession to the ranks of those who struggle to realize the free life, no matter in what field. for this is what anarchism finally means, the whole unchaining of life after two thousand years of christian asceticism and hypocrisy. apart from the question of ideals, there is the question of method. "how do you propose to get all this?" is the question most frequently asked us. the same modification has taken place here. formerly there were "quakers" and "revolutionists"; so there are still. but while they neither thought well of the other, now both have learned that each has his own use in the great play of world forces. no man is in himself a unit, and in every soul jove still makes war on christ. nevertheless, the spirit of peace grows; and while it would be idle to say that anarchists in general believe that any of the great industrial problems will be solved without the use of force, it would be equally idle to suppose that they consider force itself a desirable thing, or that it furnishes a final solution to any problem. from peaceful experiment alone can come final solution, and that the advocates of force know and believe as well as the tolstoyans. only they think that the present tyrannies provoke resistance. the spread of tolstoy's "war and peace" and "the slavery of our times," and the growth of numerous tolstoy clubs having for their purpose the dissemination of the literature of non-resistance, is an evidence that many receive the idea that it is easier to conquer war with peace. i am one of these. i can see no end of retaliations unless someone ceases to retaliate. but let no one mistake this for servile submission or meek abnegation; my right shall be asserted no matter at what cost to me, and none shall trench upon it without my protest. good-natured satirists often remark that "the best way to cure an anarchist is to give him a fortune." substituting "corrupt" for "cure," i would subscribe to this; and believing myself to be no better than the rest of mortals, i earnestly hope that as so far it has been my lot to work, and work hard, and for no fortune, so i may continue to the end; for let me keep the integrity of my soul, with all the limitations of my material conditions, rather than become the spineless and ideal-less creation of material needs. my reward is that i live with the young; i keep step with my comrades; i shall die in the harness with my face to the east--the east and the light. the eleventh of november, memorial oration[a] let me begin my address with a confession. i make it sorrowfully and with self-disgust; but in the presence of great sacrifice we learn humility, and if my comrades could give their lives for their belief, why, let me give my pride. yet i would not give it, for personal utterance is of trifling importance, were it not that i think at this particular season it will encourage those of our sympathizers whom the recent outburst of savagery may have disheartened, and perhaps lead some who are standing where i once stood to do as i did later. this is my confession: fifteen years ago last may when the echoes of the haymarket bomb rolled through the little michigan village where i then lived, i, like the rest of the credulous and brutal, read one lying newspaper headline, "anarchists throw a bomb in a crowd in the haymarket in chicago," and immediately cried out, "they ought to be hung."--this, though i had never believed in capital punishment for ordinary criminals. for that ignorant, outrageous, bloodthirsty sentence i shall never forgive myself, though i know the dead men would have forgiven me, though i know those who loved them forgive me. but my own voice, as it sounded that night, will sound so in my ears till i die,--a bitter reproach and shame. what had i done? credited the first wild rumor of an event of which i knew nothing, and, in my mind, sent men to the gallows without asking one word of defense! in one wild, unbalanced moment threw away the sympathies of a lifetime, and became an executioner at heart. and what i did that night millions did, and what i said millions said. i have only one word of extenuation for myself and all those people--ignorance. i did not know what anarchism was. i had never seen it used save in histories, and there it was always synonymous with social confusion and murder. i believed the newspapers. i thought these men had thrown that bomb, unprovoked, into a mass of men and women, from a wicked delight in killing. and so thought all those millions of others. but out of those millions there were some few thousand--i am glad i was one of them--who did not let the matter rest there. i know not what resurrection of human decency first stirred within me after that,--whether it was an intellectual suspicion that may be i did not know all the truth of the case and could not believe the newspapers, or whether it was the old strong undercurrent of sympathy which often prompts the heart to go out to the accused, without a reason; but this i do know that though i was no anarchist at the time of the execution, it was long and long before that, that i came to the conclusion that the accusation was false, the trial a farce, that there was no warrant either in justice or in law for their conviction; and that the hanging, if hanging there should be, would be the act of a society composed of people who had said what i said on the first night, and who had kept their eyes and ears fast shut ever since, determined to see nothing and to know nothing but rage and vengeance. till the very end i hoped that mercy might intervene, though justice did not; and from the hour i knew neither would nor ever could again, i distrusted law and lawyers, judges and governors alike. and my whole being cried out to know what it was these men had stood for, and why they were hanged, seeing it was not proven they knew anything about the throwing of the bomb. little by little, here and there, i came to know that what they had stood for was a very high and noble ideal of human life, and what they were hanged for was preaching it to the common people,--the common people who were as ready to hang them, in their ignorance, as the court and the prosecutor were in their malice! little by little i came to know that these were men who had a clearer vision of human right than most of their fellows; and who, being moved by deep social sympathies, wished to share their vision with their fellows, and so proclaimed it in the market-place. little by little i realized that the misery, the pathetic submission, the awful degradation of the workers, which from the time i was old enough to begin to think had borne heavily upon my heart, (as they must bear upon all who have hearts to feel at all), had smitten theirs more deeply still,--so deeply that they knew no rest save in seeking a way out,--and that was more than i had ever had the sense to conceive. for me there had never been a hope there should be no more rich and poor; but a vague idea that there might not be so rich and so poor, if the workingmen by combining could exact a little better wages, and make their hours a little shorter. it was the message of these men, (and their death swept that message far out into ears that would never have heard their living voices), that all such little dreams are folly. that not in demanding little, not in striking for an hour less, not in mountain labor to bring forth mice, can any lasting alleviation come; but in demanding, much,--all,--in a bold self-assertion of the worker to toil any hours he finds sufficient, not that another finds for him,--here is where the way out lies. that message, and the message of others, whose works, associated with theirs, their death drew to my notice, took me up, as it were, upon a mighty hill, wherefrom i saw the roofs of the workshops of the little world. i saw the machines, the things that men had made to ease their burden, the wonderful things, the iron genii, i saw them set their iron teeth in the living flesh of the men who made them; i saw the maimed and crippled stumps of men go limping away into the night that engulfs the poor, perhaps to be thrown up in the flotsam and jetsam of beggary for a time, perhaps to suicide in some dim corner where the black surge throws its slime. i saw the rose fire of the furnace shining on the blanched face of the man who tended it, and knew surely as i knew anything in life, that never would a free man feed his blood to the fire like that. i saw swart bodies, all mangled and crushed, borne from the mouths of the mines to be stowed away in a grave hardly less narrow and dark than that in which the living form had crouched ten, twelve, fourteen hours a day; and i knew that in order that i might be warm--i, and you, and those others who never do any dirty work--those men had slaved away in those black graves, and been crushed to death at last. i saw beside city streets great heaps of horrible colored earth, and down at the bottom of the trench from which it was thrown, so far down that nothing else was visible, bright gleaming eyes, like a wild animal's hunted into its hole. and i knew that free men never chose to labor there, with pick and shovel in that foul, sewage-soaked earth, in that narrow trench, in that deadly sewer gas ten, eight, even six hours a day. only slaves would do it. i saw deep down in the hull of the ocean liner the men who shoveled the coal--burned and seared like paper before the grate; and i knew that "the record" of the beautiful monster, and the pleasure of the ladies who laughed on the deck, were paid for with these withered bodies and souls. i saw the scavenger carts go up and down, drawn by sad brutes driven by sadder ones; for never a man, a man in full possession of his self-hood, would freely choose to spend all his days in the nauseating stench that forces him to swill alcohol to neutralize it. and i saw in the lead works how men were poisoned, and in the sugar refineries how they went insane; and in the factories how they lost their decency; and in the stores how they learned to lie; and i knew it was slavery made them do all this. i knew the anarchists were right,--the whole thing must be changed, the whole thing was wrong,--the whole system of production and distribution, the whole ideal of life. and i questioned the government then; they had taught me to question it. what have you done--you the keepers of the declaration and the constitution--what have you done about all this? what have you done to preserve the conditions of freedom to the people? lied, deceived, fooled, tricked, bought and sold and got gain! you have sold away the land, that you had no right to sell. you have murdered the aboriginal people, that you might seize the land in the name of the white race, and then steal it away from them again, to be again sold by a second and a third robber. and that buying and selling of the land has driven the people off the healthy earth and away from the clean air into these rot-heaps of humanity called cities, where every filthy thing is done, and filthy labor breeds filthy bodies and filthy souls. our boys are decayed with vice before they come to manhood; our girls--ah, well might john harvey write: "another begetteth a daughter white and gold, she looks into the meadow land water, and the world knows her no more; they have sought her field and fold but the city, the city hath bought her, it hath sold her piecemeal, to students, rats, and reek of the graveyard mould." you have done this thing, gentlemen who engineer the government; and not only have you caused this ruin to come upon others; you yourselves are rotten with this debauchery. you exist for the purpose of granting privileges to whoever can pay most for you, and so limiting the freedom of men to employ themselves that they must sell themselves into this frightful slavery or become tramps, beggars, thieves, prostitutes, and murderers. and when you have done all this, what then do you do to them, these creatures of your own making? you, who have set them the example in every villainy? do you then relent, and remembering the words of the great religious teacher to whom most of you offer lip service on the officially religious day, do you go to these poor, broken, wretched creatures and love them? love them and help them, to teach them to be better? no: you build prisons high and strong, and there you beat, and starve, and hang, finding by the working of your system human beings so unutterably degraded that they are willing to kill whomsoever they are told to kill at so much monthly salary. this is what the government is, has always been, the creator and defender of privilege; the organization of oppression and revenge. to hope that it can ever become anything else is the vainest of delusions. they tell you that anarchy, the dream of social order without government, is a wild fancy. the wildest dream that ever entered the heart of man is the dream that mankind can ever help itself through an appeal to law, or to come to any order that will not result in slavery wherein there is any excuse for government. it was for telling the people this that these five men were killed. for telling the people that the only way to get out of their misery was first to learn what their rights upon this earth were;--freedom to use the land and all within it and all the tools of production--and then to stand all together and take them, themselves, and not to appeal to the jugglers of the law. abolish the law--that is abolish privilege,--and crime will abolish itself. they will tell you these men were hanged for advocating force. what! these creatures who drill men in the science of killing, who put guns and clubs in hands they train to shoot and strike, who hail with delight the latest inventions in explosives, who exult in the machine that can kill the most with the least expenditure of energy, who declare a war of extermination upon people who do not want their civilization, who ravish, and burn, and garotte and guillotine, and hang, and electrocute, they have the impertinence to talk about the unrighteousness of force! true, these men did advocate the right to resist invasion by force. you will find scarcely one in a thousand who does not believe in that right. the one will be either a real christian or a non-resistant anarchist. it will not be a believer in the state. no, no; it was not for advocating forcible resistance on principle, but for advocating forcible resistance to their tyrannies, and for advocating a society which would forever make an end of riches and poverty, of governors and governed. the spirit of revenge, which is always stupid, accomplished its brutal act. had it lifted its eyes from its work, it might have seen in the background of the scaffold that bleak november morning the dawn-light of anarchy whiten across the world. so it came first,--a gleam of hope to the proletaire, a summons to rise and shake off his material bondage. but steadily, steadily the light has grown, as year by year the scientist, the literary genius, the artist, and the moral teacher, have brought to it the tribute of their best work, their unpaid work, the work they did for love. to-day it means not only material emancipation, too; it comes as the summing up of all those lines of thought and action which for three hundred years have been making towards freedom; it means fulness of being, the free life. and i say it boldly, notwithstanding the recent outburst of condemnation, notwithstanding the cry of lynch, burn, shoot, imprison, deport, and the scarlet letter a to be branded low down upon the forehead, and the latest excuse for that fond esthetic decoration "the button," that for two thousand years no idea has so stirred the world as this,--none which had such living power to break down barriers of race and degree, to attract prince and proletaire, poet and mechanic, quaker and revolutionist. no other ideal but the free life is strong enough to touch the man whose infinite pity and understanding goes alike to the hypocrite priest and the victim of siberian whips; the loving rebel who stepped from his title and his wealth to labor with all the laboring earth; the sweet strong singer who sang "no master, high or low"; the lover who does not measure his love nor reckon on return; the self-centered one who "will not rule, but also will not ruled be"; the philosopher who chanted the over-man; the devoted woman of the people; ay, and these too,--these rebellious flashes from the vast cloud-hung ominous obscurity of the anonymous, these souls whom governmental and capitalistic brutality has whipped and goaded and stung to blind rage and bitterness, these mad young lions of revolt, these winkelrieds who offer their hearts to the spears. [a] delivered on november , , in chicago. crime and punishment men are of three sorts: the turn backs, the rush-aheads, and the indifferents. the first and second are comparatively few in number. the really conscientious conservative, eternally looking backward for his models and trying hard to preserve that which is, is almost as scarce an article as the genuine radical, who is eternally attacking that which is and looking forward to some indistinct but glowing vision of a purified social life. between them lies the vast nitrogenous body of the indifferents, who go through life with no large thoughts or intense feelings of any kind, the best that can be said of them being that they serve to dilute the too fierce activities of the other two. into the callous ears of these indifferents, nevertheless, the opposing voices of conservative and radical are continually shouting; and for years, for centuries, the conservative wins the day, not because he really touches the consciences of the indifferent so much (though in a measure he does that) as because his way causes his hearer the least mental trouble. it is easier to this lazy, inert mentality to nod its head and approve the continuance of things as they are, than to listen to proposals for change, to consider, to question, to make an innovating decision. these require activity, application,--and nothing is so foreign to the hibernating social conscience of your ordinary individual. i say "social" conscience, because i by no means wish to say that these are conscienceless people; they have, for active use, sufficient conscience to go through their daily parts in life, and they think that is all that is required. of the lives of others, of the effects of their attitude in cursing the existences of thousands whom they do not know, they have no conception; they sleep; and they hear the voices of those who cry aloud about these things, dimly, as in dreams; and they do not wish to awaken. nevertheless, at the end of the centuries they always awaken. it is the radical who always wins at last. at the end of the centuries institutions are reviewed by this aroused social conscience, are revised, sometimes are utterly rooted out. thus it is with the institutions of crime and punishment. the conservative holds that these things have been decided from all time; that crime is a thing-in-itself, with no other cause than the viciousness of man; that punishment was decreed from mt. sinai, or whatever holy mountain happens to be believed in in his country; that society is best served by strictness and severity of judgment and punishment. and he wishes only to make his indifferent brothers keepers of other men's consciences along these lines. he would have all men be hunters of men, that crime may be tracked down and struck down. the radical says: all false, all false and wrong. crime has not been decided from all time: crime, like everything else, has had its evolution according to place, time, and circumstance. "the demons of our sires become the saints that we adore,"--and the saints, the saints and the heroes of our fathers, are criminals according to our codes. abraham, david, solomon,--could any respectable member of society admit that he had done the things they did? crime is not a thing-in-itself, not a plant without roots, not a something proceeding from nothing; and the only true way to deal with it is to seek its causes as earnestly, as painstakingly, as the astronomer seeks the causes of the perturbations in the orbit of the planet he is observing, sure that there must be one, or many, somewhere. and punishment, too, must be studied. the holy mountain theory is a failure. punishment is a failure. and it is a failure not because men do not hunt down and strike enough, but because they hunt down and strike at all; because in the chase of those who do ill, they do ill themselves; they brutalize their own characters, and so much the more so because they are convinced that this time the brutal act is done in accord with conscience. the murderous deed of the criminal was _against_ conscience, the torture or the murder of the criminal by the official is _with_ conscience. thus the conscience is diseased and perverted, and a new class of imbruted men created. we have punished and punished for untold thousands of years, and we have not gotten rid of crime, we have not diminished it. let us consider then. the indifferentist shrugs his shoulders and remarks to the conservative: "what have i to do with it? i will hunt nobody and i will save nobody. let every one take care of himself. i pay my taxes; let the judges and the lawyers take care of the criminals. and as for you, mr. radical, you weary me. your talk is too heroic. you want to play atlas and carry the heavens on your shoulders. well, do it if you like. but don't imagine i am going to act the stupid hercules and transfer your burden to my shoulders. rave away until you are tired, but let me alone." "i will not let you alone. i am no atlas. i am no more than a fly; but i will annoy you, i will buzz in your ears; i will not let you sleep. you must think about this." that is about the height and power of my voice, or of any individual voice, in the present state of the question. i do not deceive myself. i do not imagine that the question of crime and punishment will be settled till long, long after the memory of me shall be as completely swallowed up by time as last year's snow is swallowed by the sea. two thousand years ago a man whose soul revolted at punishment, cried out: "judge not, that ye be not judged," and yet men and women who have taken his name upon their lips as holy, have for all those two thousand years gone on judging as if their belief in what he said was only lip-belief; and they do it to-day. and judges sit upon benches and send men to their death,--even judges who do not themselves believe in capital punishment; and prosecutors exhaust their eloquence and their tricks to get men convicted; and women and men bear witness against sinners; and then they all meet in church and pray, "forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us!" do they mean anything at all by it? and i know that just as the voice of jesus was not heard, and is not heard, save here and there; just as the voice of tolstoy is not heard, save here and there; and others great and small are lost in the great echoless desert of indifferentism, having produced little perceptible effect, so my voice also will be lost, and barely a slight ripple of thought be propagated over that dry and fruitless expanse; even that the next wind of trial will straighten and leave as unimprinted sand. nevertheless, by the continued and unintermitting action of forces infinitesimal compared with the human voice, the greatest effects are at length accomplished. a wave-length of light is but the fifty-thousandth part of an inch, yet by the continuous action of waves like these have been produced all the creations of light, the entire world of sight, out of masses irresponsive, dark, colorless. and doubt not that in time this cold and irresponsive mass of indifference will feel and stir and realize the force of the great sympathies which will change the attitude of the human mind as a whole towards crime and punishment, and erase both from the world. not by lawyers and not by judges shall the final cause of the criminal be tried; but lawyer and judge and criminal together shall be told by the social conscience, "depart in peace." * * * * * a great ethical teacher once wrote words like unto these: "i have within me the capacity for every crime." few, reading them, believe that he meant what he said. most take it as the sententious utterance of one who, in an abandonment of generosity, wished to say something large and leveling. but i think he meant exactly what he said. i think that with all his purity emerson had within him the turbid stream of passion and desire; for all his hard-cut granite features he knew the instincts of the weakling and the slave; and for all the sweetness, the tenderness, and the nobility of his nature, he had the tiger and the jackal in his soul. i think that within every bit of human flesh and spirit that has ever crossed the enigma bridge of life, from the prehistoric racial morning until now, all crime and all virtue were germinal. out of one great soul-stuff are we sprung, you and i and all of us; and if in you the virtue has grown and not the vice, do not therefore conclude that you are essentially different from him whom you have helped to put in stripes and behind bars. your balance may be more even, you may be mixed in smaller proportions altogether, or the outside temptation has not come upon you. i am no disciple of that school whose doctrine is summed up in the teaching that man's will is nothing, his material surroundings all. i do not accept that popular socialism which would make saints out of sinners only by filling their stomachs. i am no apologist for characterlessness, and no petitioner for universal moral weakness. i believe in the individual. i believe that the purpose of life (in so far as we can give it a purpose, and it has none save what we give it) is the assertion and the development of strong, self-centered personality. it is therefore that no religion which offers vicarious atonement for the misdoer, and no philosophy which rests on the cornerstone of irresponsibility, makes any appeal to me. i believe that immeasurable mischief has been wrought by the ceaseless repetition for the last two thousand years of the formula: "not through any merit of mine shall i enter heaven, but through the sacrifice of christ."--not through the sacrifice of christ, nor any other sacrifice, shall any one attain strength, save in so far as he takes the spirit and the purpose of the sacrifice into his own life and lives it. nor do i see anything as the result of the teaching that all men are the helpless victims of external circumstance and under the same conditions will act precisely alike, than a lot of spineless, nerveless, bloodless crawlers in the tracks of stronger men,--too desirous of ease to be honest, too weak to be successful rascals. let this be put as strongly as it can now, that nothing i shall say hereafter may be interpreted as a gospel of shifting and shirking. but the difference between us, the anarchists, who preach self-government and none else, and moralists who in times past and present have asked for individual responsibility, is this, that while they have always framed creeds and codes for the purpose of _holding others to account_, we draw the line upon ourselves. set the standard as high as you will; live to it as near as you can; and if you fail, try yourself, judge yourself, condemn yourself, if you choose. teach and persuade your neighbor if you can; consider and compare his conduct if you please; speak your mind if you desire; but if he fails to reach your standard or his own, try him not, judge him not, condemn him not. he lies beyond your sphere; you cannot know the temptation nor the inward battle nor the weight of the circumstances upon him. you do not know how long he fought before he failed. therefore you cannot be just. let him alone. this is the ethical concept at which we have arrived, not by revelation from any superior power, not through the reading of any inspired book, not by special illumination of our inner consciousness; but by the study of the results of social experiment in the past as presented in the works of historians, psychologists, criminologists, sociologists and legalists. very likely so many "ists" sound a little oppressive, and there may be those to whom they may even have a savor of pedantry. it sounds much simpler and less ostentatious to say "thus saith the lord," or "the good book says." but in the meat and marrow these last are the real presumptions, these easy-going claims of familiarity with the will and intent of omnipotence. it may sound more pedantic to you to say, "i have studied the accumulated wisdom of man, and drawn certain deductions therefrom," than to say "i had a talk with god this morning and he said thus and so"; but to me the first statement is infinitely more modest. moreover there is some chance of its being true, while the other is highly imaginative fiction. this is not to impugn the honesty of those who inherit this survival of an earlier mental state of the race, and who accept it as they accept their appetites or anything else they find themselves born with. nor is it to belittle those past efforts of active and ardent souls who claimed direct divine inspiration as the source of their doctrines. all religions have been, in their great general outlines, the intuitive graspings of the race at truths which it had not yet sufficient knowledge to demonstrate,--rude and imperfect statements of ideas which were yet but germinal, but which, even then, mankind had urgent need to conceive, and upon which it afterwards spent the efforts of generations of lives to correct and perfect. thus the very ethical concept of which i have been speaking as peculiarly anarchistic, was preached as a religious doctrine by the fifteenth century tolstoy, peter chilciky; and in the sixteenth century, the fanatical sect of the anabaptists shook germany from center to circumference by a doctrine which included the declaration that "pleadings in courts of law, oaths, capital punishment, and all absolute power were incompatible with the christian faith." it was an imperfect illumination of the intellect, such only as was possible in those less enlightened days, but an illumination that defined certain noble conceptions of justice. they appealed to all they had, the bible, the inner light, the best that they knew, to justify their faith. we to whom a wider day is given, who can appeal not to one book but to thousands, who have the light of science which is free to all that can command the leisure and the will to know, shining white and open on these great questions, dim and obscure in the days of peter chilciky, we should be the last to cast a sneer at them for their heroic struggle with tyranny and cruelty; though to-day the man who would claim their claims on their grounds would justly be rated atavist or charlatan. nothing or next to nothing did the anabaptists know of history. for genuine history, history which records the growth of a whole people, which traces the evolution of its mind as seen in its works of peace,--its literature, its art, its constructions--is the creation of our own age. only within the last seventy-five years has the purpose of history come to have so much depth as this. before that it was a mere register of dramatic situations, with no particular connection, a chronicle of the deeds of prominent persons, a list of intrigues, scandals, murders big and little; and the great people, the actual builders and preservers of the race, the immense patient, silent mass who painfully filled up all the waste places these destroyers made, almost ignored. and no man sought to discover the relations of even the recorded acts to any general causes; no man conceived the notion of discovering what is political and moral growth or political and moral suicide. that they did not do so is because writers of history, who are themselves incarnations of their own time spirit, could not get beyond the unscientific attitude of mind, born of ignorance and fostered by the christian religion, that man is something entirely different from the rest of organized life; that he is a free moral agent, good if he pleases and bad if he pleases, that is, according as he accepts or rejects the will of god; that every act is isolated, having no antecedent, morally, but the will of its doer. nor until modern science had fought its way past prisons, exilements, stakes, scaffolds, and tortures, to the demonstration that man is no free-will freak thrust by an omnipotent joker upon a world of cause and sequence to play havoc therein, but just a poor differentiated bit of protoplasm as much subject to the general processes of matter and mind as his ancient progenitor in the depths of the silurian sea, not until then was it possible for any real conception of the scope of history to begin. not until then was it said: "the actions of men are the effects of large and general causes. humanity as a whole has a regularity of movement as fixed as the movement of the tides; and given certain physical and social environments, certain developments may be predicted with the certainty of a mathematical calculation." thus crime, which for so many ages men have gone on punishing more or less light-heartedly, so far from having its final cause in individual depravity, bears a steady and invariable relation to the production and distribution of staple food supplies, a thing over which society itself at times can have no control (as on the occasion of great natural disturbances), and in general does not yet know how to manage wisely: how much less, then, the individual! this regularity of the recurrence of crime was pointed out long before by the greatest statisticians of europe, who, indeed, did not go so far as to question why it was so, nor to compare these regularities with other regularities, but upon whom the constant repetition of certain figures in the statistics of murder, suicide, assault, etc., made a profound impression. it was left to the new historians, the great pioneer among whom was h. t. buckle in england, to make the comparisons in the statistics, and show that individual crimes as well as virtues are always calculable from general material conditions. this is the basis from which we argue, and it is a basis established by the comparative history of civilizations. in no other way could it have been really established. it might have been guessed at, and indeed was. but only when the figures are before us, figures obtained "by millions of observations extending over different grades of civilization, with different laws, different opinions, different habits, different morals" (i am quoting buckle), only then are we able to say surely that the human mind proceeds with a regularity of operation overweighing all the creeds and codes ever invented, and that if we would begin to understand the problem of the treatment of crime, we must go to something far larger than the moral reformation of the criminal. no prayers, no legal enactments, will ever rid society of crime. if they would, there have been prayers enough and preachments enough and laws enough and prisons enough to have done it long ago. but pray that the attraction of gravitation shall cease. will it cease? enact that water shall freeze at ° heat. will it freeze? and no more will men be sane and honest and just when they are compelled to live in an insane, dishonest, and unjust society, when the natural operation of the very elements of their being is warred upon by statutes and institutions which must produce outbursts destructive both to themselves and to others. away back in quetelet, the french statistician, wrote: "experience demonstrates, in fact, by every possible evidence, this opinion, which may seem paradoxical at first, that it is society which prepares the crime, and that the guilty one is but the instrument which executes it." every crime, therefore, is a charge against society which can only be rightly replied to when society consents to look into its own errors and rectify the wrong it has done. this is one of the results which must, in the end, flow from the labors of the real historians; one of the reasons why history was worth writing at all. now the next point in the problem is the criminal himself. admitting what cannot be impeached, that there is cause and sequence in the action of man; admitting the pressure of general causes upon all alike, what is the reason that one man is a criminal and another not? from the days of the roman jurisconsults until now the legalists themselves have made a distinction between crimes against the law of nature and crimes merely against the law of society. from the modern scientific standpoint no such distinction can be maintained. nature knows nothing about crime, and nothing ever was a crime until the social conscience made it so. neither is it easy when one reads their law books, even accepting their view-point, to understand why certain crimes were catalogued as against the law of nature, and certain others as of the more artificial character. but i presume what were in general classed as crimes against nature were acts of violence committed against persons. aside from these we have a vast, an almost interminable number of offenses big and little, which are in the main attacks upon the institution of property, concerning which some very different things have to be said than concerning the first. as to these first there is no doubt that these are real crimes, by which i mean simply anti-social acts. any action which violates the life or liberty of any individual is an anti-social act, whether done by one person, by two, or by a whole nation. and the greatest crime that ever was perpetrated, a crime beside which all individual atrocities diminish to nothing, is war; and the greatest, the least excusable of murderers are those who order it and those who execute it. nevertheless, this chiefest of murderers, the government, its own hands red with the blood of hundreds of thousands, assumes to correct the individual offender, enacting miles of laws to define the varying degrees of his offense and punishment, and putting beautiful building stone to very hideous purposes for the sake of caging and tormenting him therein. we do get a fig from a thistle--sometimes! out of this noisome thing, the prison, has sprung the study of criminology. it is very new, and there is considerable painstaking nonsense about it. but the main results are interesting and should be known by all who wish to form an intelligent conception of what a criminal is and how he should be treated. these men who are cool and quiet and who move among criminals and study them as darwin did his plants and animals, tell us that these prisoners are reducible to three types: the born criminal, the criminaloid, and the accidental criminal. i am inclined to doubt a great deal that is said about the born criminal. prof. lombroso gives us very exhaustive reports of the measurements of their skulls and their ears and their noses and their thumbs and their toes, etc. but i suspect that if a good many respectable, decent, never-did-a-wrong-thing-in-their-lives people were to go up for measurement, malformed ears and disproportionately long thumbs would be equally found among them if they took the precaution to represent themselves as criminals first. still, however few in number (and they are really very few), there are some born criminals,--people who through some malformation or deficiency or excess of certain portions of the brain are constantly impelled to violent deeds. well, there are some born idiots and some born cripples. do you punish them for their idiocy or for their unfortunate physical condition? on the contrary, you pity them, you realize that life is a long infliction to them, and your best and tenderest sympathies go out to them. why not to the other, equally a helpless victim of an evil inheritance? granting for the moment that you have the right to punish the mentally responsible, surely you will not claim the right to punish the mentally irresponsible! even the law does not hold the insane man guilty. and the born criminal is irresponsible; he is a sick man, sick with the most pitiable chronic disease; his treatment is for the medical world to decide, and the best of them,--not for the prosecutor, the judge, and the warden. it is true that many criminologists, including prof. lombroso himself, are of opinion that the best thing to do with the born criminal is to kill him at once, since he can be only a curse to himself and others. very heroic treatment. we may inquire, is he to be exterminated at birth because of certain physical indications of his criminality? such neo-spartanism would scarcely commend itself to any modern society. moreover the diagnosis might be wrong, even though we had a perpetual and incorruptible commission of the learned to sit in inquiry upon every pink-skinned little suspect three days old! what then? is he to be let go, as he is now, until he does some violent deed and then be judged more hardly because of his natural defect? either proposition seems not only heartless and wicked but,--what the respectable world is often more afraid of being than either,--ludicrous. if one is really a born criminal he will manifest criminal tendencies in early life, and being so recognized should be cared for according to the most humane methods of treating the mentally afflicted. the second, or criminaloid, class is the most numerous of the three. these are criminals, first, because being endowed with strong desires and unequal reasoning powers they cannot maintain the uneven battle against a society wherein the majority of individuals must all the time deny their natural appetites, if they are to remain unstained with crime. they are, in short, the ordinary man (who, it must be admitted, has a great deal of paste in him) plus an excess of wants of one sort and another, but generally physical. society outside of prisons is full of these criminaloids, who sometimes have in place of the power of genuine moral resistance a sneaking cunning by which they manage to steer a shady course between the crime and the punishment. it is true these people are not pleasant subjects to contemplate; but then, through that very stage of development the whole human race has had to pass in its progress from the beast to the man,--the stage, i mean, of overplus of appetite opposed by weak moral resistance; and if now some, it is not certain that their number is very great, have reversed the proportion, it is only because they are the fortunate inheritors of the results of thousands of years of struggle and failure, struggle and failure, but _struggle_ again. it is precisely these criminaloids who are most sinned against by society, for they are the people who need to have the right of doing things made easy, and who, when they act criminally, need the most encouragement to help the feeble and humiliated moral sense to rise again, to try again. the third class, the accidental or occasional criminals, are perfectly normal, well balanced people, who, through tremendous stress of outward circumstance, and possibly some untoward mental disturbance arising from those very notions of the conduct of life which form part of their moral being, suddenly commit an act of violence which is at utter variance with their whole former existence; such as, for instance, the murder of a seducer by the father of the injured girl, or of a wife's paramour by her husband. if i believed in severity at all i should say that these were the criminals upon whom society should look with most severity, because they are the ones who have most mental responsibility. but that also is nonsense; for such an individual has within him a severer judge, a more pitiless jailer than any court or prison,--his conscience and his memory. leave him to these; or no, in mercy take him away from these whenever you can; he will suffer enough, and there is no fear of his action being repeated. now all these people are with us, and it is desirable that something be done to help the case. what does society do? or rather what does government do with them? remember we are speaking now only of crimes of violence. it hangs, it electrocutes, it exiles, it imprisons. why? for punishment. and why punishment? "not," says blackstone, "by way of atonement or expiation for the crime committed, for that must be left to the just determination of the supreme being, but as a precaution against future offenses of the same kind." this is supposed to be effected in three ways: either by reforming him, or getting rid of him altogether, or by deterring others by making an example of him. let us see how these precautions work. exile, which is still practised by some governments, and imprisonment are, according to the theory of law, for the purpose of reforming the criminal that he may no longer be a menace to society. logic would say that anyone who wished to obliterate cruelty from the character of another must himself show no cruelty; one who would teach regard for the rights of others must himself be regardful. yet the story of exile and prison is the story of the lash, the iron, the chain and every torture that the fiendish ingenuity of _the non-criminal class can devise by way of teaching criminals to be good_! to teach men to be good, they are kept in airless cells, made to sleep on narrow planks, to look at the sky through iron grates, to eat food that revolts their palates, and destroys their stomachs,--battered and broken down in body and soul; and this is what they call reforming men! not very many years ago the philadelphia dailies told us (and while we cannot believe all of what they say, and are bound to believe that such cases are exceptional, yet the bare facts were true) that judge gordon ordered an investigation into the workings of the eastern penitentiary officials; and it was found that an insane man had been put into a cell with two sane ones, and when he cried in his insane way and the two asked that he be put elsewhere, the warden gave them a strap to whip him with; and they tied him in some way to the heater, with the strap, so that his legs were burned when he moved; all scarred with the burns he was brought into the court, and the other men frankly told what they had done and why they had done it. this is the way they reform men. do you think people come out of a place like that better? with more respect for society? with more regard for the rights of their fellow men? i don't. i think they come out of there with their hearts full of bitterness, much harder than when they went in. that this is often the case is admitted by those who themselves believe in punishment, and practice it. for the fact is that out of the criminaloid class there develops the habitual criminal, the man who is perpetually getting in prison; no sooner is he out than he does something else and gets in again. the brand that at first scorched him has succeeded in searing. he no longer feels the ignominy. he is a "jail-bird," and he gets to have a cynical pride in his own degradation. every man's hand is against him, and his hand is against every man's. such are the reforming effects of punishment. yet there was a time when he, too, might have been touched, had the right word been spoken. it is for society to find and speak that word. this for prison and exile. hanging? electrocution? these of course are not for the purpose of reforming the criminal. these are to deter others from doing as he did; and the supposition is that the severer the punishment the greater the deterrent effect. in commenting upon this principle blackstone says: "we may observe that punishments of unreasonable severity ... have less effect in preventing crimes and amending the manners of a people than such as are more merciful in general...." he further quotes montesquieu: "for the excessive severity of laws hinders their execution; when the punishment surpasses all measure, the public will frequently, out of humanity, prefer impunity to it." again blackstone: "it is a melancholy truth that among the variety of actions which men are daily liable to commit, no less than one hundred and sixty have been declared by act of parliament to be felonies ... worthy of instant death. so dreadful a list instead of diminishing _increases_ the number of offenders." robert ingersoll, speaking on "crimes against criminals" before the new york bar association, a lawyer addressing lawyers, treating of this same period of which blackstone writes, says: "there is something in injustice, in cruelty, which tends to defeat itself. there never were so many traitors in england as when the traitor was drawn and quartered, when he was tortured in every possible way,--when his limbs, torn and bleeding, were given to the fury of mobs, or exhibited pierced by pikes or hung in chains. the frightful punishments produced intense hatred of the government, and traitors increased until they became powerful enough to decide what treason was and who the traitors were and to inflict the same torments on others." the fact that blackstone was right and ingersoll was right in saying that severity of punishment increases crime, is silently admitted in the abrogation of those severities by acts of parliament and acts of congress. it is also shown by the fact that there are no more murders, proportionately, in states where the death penalty does not exist than in those where it does. severity is therefore admitted by the state itself to have no deterrent influence on the intending criminal. and to take the matter out of the province of the state, we have only to instance the horrible atrocities perpetrated by white mobs upon negroes charged with outrage. nothing more fiendishly cruel can be imagined; yet these outrages multiply. it would seem, then, that the notion of making a horrible example of the misdoer is a complete failure. as a specific example of this, ingersoll (in this same lecture) instanced that "a few years before a man was hanged in alexandria, va. one who witnessed the execution on that very day murdered a peddler in the smithsonian grounds at washington. he was tried and executed; and one who witnessed his hanging went home and on the same day murdered his wife." evidently the brute is rather aroused than terrified by scenes of execution. what then? if extreme punishments do not deter, and if what are considered mild punishments do not reform, is any measure of punishment conceivable or attainable which will better our case? before answering this question let us consider the class of crimes which so far has not been dwelt upon, but which nevertheless comprises probably nine-tenths of all offenses committed. these are all the various forms of stealing,--robbery, burglary, theft, embezzlement, forgery, counterfeiting, and the thousand and one ramifications and offshoots of the act of taking what the law defines as another's. it is impossible to consider crimes of violence apart from these, because the vast percentage of murders and assaults committed by the criminaloid class are simply incidental to the commission of the so-called lesser crime. a man often murders in order to escape with his booty, though murder was no part of his original intention. why, now, have we such a continually increasing percentage of stealing? will you persistently hide your heads in the sand and say it is because men grow worse as they grow wiser? that individual wickedness is the result of all our marvelous labors to compass sea and land, and make the earth yield up her wealth to us? dare you say that? it is not so. =the reason men steal is because their rights are stolen from them before they are born.= a human being comes into the world; he wants to eat, he wants to breathe, he wants to sleep; he wants to use his muscles, his brain; he wants to love, to dream, to create. these wants constitute him, the whole man; he can no more help expressing these activities than water can help running down hill. if the freedom to do any of these things is denied him, then by so much he is a crippled creature, and his energy will force itself into some abnormal channel or be killed altogether. now i do not mean that he has a "natural right" to do these things inscribed on any lawbook of nature. nature knows nothing of rights, she knows power only, and a louse has as much natural right as a man to the extent of its power. what i do mean to say is that man, in common with many other animals, has found that by associative life he conquers the rest of nature, and that this society is slowly being perfected; and that this perfectionment consists in realizing that the solidarity and safety of the whole arises from the freedom of the parts; that such freedom constitutes man's social right; and that any institution which interferes with this right will be destructive of the association, will breed criminals, will work its own ruin. this is the word of the sociologist, of the greatest of them, herbert spencer. now do we see that all men eat,--eat well? you know we do not. some have so much that they are sickened with the extravagance of dishes, and know not where next to turn for a new palatal sensation. they cannot even waste their wealth. some, and they are mostly the hardest workers, eat poorly and fast, for their work allows them no time to enjoy even what they have. some,--i have seen them myself in the streets of new york this winter, and the look of their wolfish eyes was not pleasant to see--stand in long lines waiting for midnight and the plate of soup dealt out by some great newspaper office, stretching out, whole blocks of them, as other men wait on the first night of some famous star at the theater! some die because they cannot eat at all. pray tell me what these last have to lose by becoming thieves. and why shall they not become thieves? and is the action of the man who takes the necessities which have been denied to him really criminal? is he morally worse than the man who crawls in a cellar and dies of starvation? i think not. he is only a little more assertive. cardinal manning said: "a starving man has a natural right to his neighbor's bread." the anarchist says: "a hungry man has a social right to bread." and there have been whole societies and races among whom that right was never questioned. and whatever were the mistakes of those societies, whereby they perished, this was not a mistake, and we shall do well to take so much wisdom from the dead and gone, the simple ethics of the stomach which with all our achievement we cannot despise, or despising, shall perish as our reward. "but," you will say, and say truly, "to begin by taking loaves means to end by taking everything and murdering, too, very often." and in that you draw the indictment against your own system. if there is no alternative between starving and stealing (and for thousands there is none), then there is no alternative between society's murdering its members, or the members disintegrating society. let society consider its own mistakes, then: let it answer itself for all these people it has robbed and killed: let it cease its own crimes first! to return to the faculties of man. all would breathe; and some do breathe. they breathe the air of the mountains, of the seas, of the lakes,--even the atmosphere in the gambling dens of monte carlo, for a change! some, packed thickly together in closed rooms where men must sweat and faint to save tobacco, breathe the noisome reek that rises from the spittle of their consumptive neighbors. some, mostly babies, lie on the cellar doors along bainbridge street, on summer nights, and bathe their lungs in that putrid air where a thousand lungs have breathed before, and grow up pale and decayed looking as the rotting vegetables whose exhalations they draw in. some, far down underground, meet the choke-damp, and--do not breathe at all! do you expect healthy morals out of all these poisoned bodies? some sleep. they have so much time that they take all manner of expensive drugs to try what sleeping it off a different way is like! some sleep upon none too easy beds a few short hours, too few not to waken more tired than ever, and resume the endless grind of waking life. some sleep bent over the books they are too tired to study, though the mind clamors for food after the long day's physical toil. some sleep with hand upon the throttle of the engine, after twenty-six hours of duty, and--crash!--they have sleep enough! some use their muscles: they use them to punch bags, and other gentlemen's stomachs when their heads are full of wine. some use them to club other men and women, at $ . a day. some exhaust them welding them into iron, or weaving them into wool, for ten or eleven hours a day. and some become atrophied sitting at desks till they are mere specters of men and women. some love; and there is no end to the sensualities of their love, because all normal expressions have lost their savor through excess. some love, and see their love tried and worn and threadbare, a skeleton of love, because the practicality of life is always there to repress the purely emotional. some are stricken in health, so robbed of power to feel, that they never love at all. and some dream, think, create; and the world is filled with the glory of their dreams. but who knows the glory of the dream that never was born, lost and dead and buried away somewhere there under the roofs where the exquisite brain was ruined by the heavy labor of life? and what of the dream that turned to madness and destroyed the thing it loved the best? these are the things that make criminals, the perverted forces of man, turned aside by the institution of property, which is the giant social mistake to-day. it is your law which keeps men from using the sources and the means of wealth production unless they pay tribute to other men; it is this, and nothing else, which is responsible for all the second class of crimes and all those crimes of violence incidentally committed while carrying out a robbery. let me quote here a most sensible and appropriate editorial which recently appeared in the philadelphia _north american_, in comment upon the proposition of some foolish preacher to limit the right of reproduction to rich families: "the earth was constructed, made habitable, and populated without the advice of a commission of superior persons, and until they appeared and began meddling with affairs, making laws and setting themselves up as rulers, poverty and its evil consequences were unknown to humanity. when social science finds a way to remove obstructions to the operation of natural law and to the equitable distribution of the products of labor, poverty will cease to be the condition of the masses of people, and misery, crime and problems of population will disappear." and they will never disappear until it does. all hunting down of men, all punishments, are but so many ineffective efforts to sweep back the tide with a broom. the tide will fling you, broom and all, against the idle walls that you have built to fence it in. tear down those walls or the sea will tear them down for you. have you ever watched it coming in,--the sea? when the wind comes roaring out of the mist and a great bellowing thunders up from the water? have you watched the white lions chasing each other towards the walls, and leaping up with foaming anger as they strike, and turn and chase each other along the black bars of their cage in rage to devour each other? and tear back? and leap in again? have you ever wondered in the midst of it all _which particular drops of water_ would strike the wall? if one could know all the factors one might calculate even that. but who can know them all? of one thing only we are sure: _some must strike it_. they are the criminals, those drops of water pitching against that silly wall and broken. just why it was these particular ones we cannot know; but some had to go. do not curse them; you have cursed them enough. let the people free. there is a class of crimes of violence which arises from another set of causes than economic slavery--acts which are the result of an antiquated moral notion of the true relations of men and women. these are the nemesis of the institution of property in love. if every one would learn that the limit of his right to demand a certain course of conduct in sex relations is himself; that the relation of his beloved ones to others is not a matter for him to regulate, any more than the relations of those whom he does not love; if the freedom of each is unquestioned, and whatever moral rigors are exacted are exacted of oneself only; if this principle is accepted and followed, crimes of jealousy will cease. but religions and governments uphold this institution and constantly tend to create the spirit of ownership, with all its horrible consequences. ah, you will say, perhaps it is true; perhaps when this better social condition is evolved, and this freer social spirit, we shall be rid of crime,--at least nine-tenths of it. but meanwhile must we not punish to protect ourselves? the protection does not protect. the violent man does not communicate his intention; when he executes it, or attempts its execution, more often than otherwise it is some unofficial person who catches or stops him. if he is a born criminal, or in other words an insane man, he should, i reiterate, be treated as a sick person--not punished, not made to suffer. if he is one of the accidental criminals, his act will not be repeated; his punishment will always be with him. if he is of the middle class, your punishment will not reform him, it will only harden him; and it will not deter others. as for thieves, the great thief is within the law, or he buys it; and as for the small one, see what you do! to protect yourself against him, you create a class of persons who are sworn to the service of the club and the revolver; a set of spies; a set whose business it is to deal constantly with these unhappy beings, who in rare instances are softened thereby, but in the majority of cases become hardened to their work as butchers to the use of the knife; a set whose business it is to serve cell and lock and key; and lastly, the lowest infamy of all, the hangman. does any one want to shake his hand, the hand that kills for pay? now against all these persons individually there is nothing to be said: they may probably be very humane, well-intentioned persons when they start in; but the end of all this is imbrutement. one of our dailies recently observed that "the men in charge of prisons have but too often been men who ought themselves to have been prisoners." the anarchist does not agree with that. he would have no prisons at all. but i am quite sure that if that editor himself were put in the prison-keeper's place, he too would turn hard. and the opportunities of the official criminal are much greater than those of the unofficial one. lawyer and governmentalist as he was, ingersoll said: "it is safe to say that governments have committed far more crimes than they have prevented." then why create a second class of parasites worse than the first? why not put up with the original one? moreover, you have another thing to consider than the simple problem of a wrong inflicted upon a guilty man. how many times has it happened that the innocent man has been convicted! i remember an instance of a man so convicted of murder in michigan. he had served twenty-seven years in jackson penitentiary (for michigan is not a hang-state) when the real murderer, dying, confessed. and the state _pardoned_ that innocent man! because it was the quickest legal way to let him out! i hope he has been able to pardon the state. not very long ago a man was hanged here in this city. he had killed his superintendent. some doctors said he was insane; the government experts said he was not. they said he was faking insanity when he proclaimed himself jesus christ. and he was hanged. afterwards the doctors found two cysts in his brain. the state of pennsylvania had killed a sick man! and as long as punishments exist, these mistakes will occur. if you accept the principle at all, you must accept with it the blood-guilt of innocent men. not only this, but you must accept also the responsibility for all the misery which results to others whose lives are bound up with that of the convict, for even he is loved by some one, much loved perhaps. it is a foolish thing to turn adrift a house full of children, to become criminals in turn, perhaps, in order to frighten some indefinite future offender by making an example of their father or mother. yet how many times has it not happened! and this is speaking only from the practical, selfish side of the matter. there is another, one from which i would rather appeal to you, and from which i think you would after all prefer to be appealed to. ask yourselves, each of you, whether you are quite sure that you have feeling enough, understanding enough, and _have you suffered_ enough, to be able to weigh and measure out another man's life or liberty, no matter what he has done? and if you have not yourself, are you able to delegate to any judge the power which you have not? the great russian novelist, dostoyevsky, in his psychological study of this same subject, traces the sufferings of a man who had committed a shocking murder; his whole body and brain are a continual prey to torture. he gives himself up, seeking relief in confession. he goes to prison, for in barbarous russia they have not the barbarity of capital punishment for murderers, unless political ones. but he finds no relief. he remains for a year, bitter, resentful, a prey to all miserable feelings. but at last he is touched by love, the silent, unobtrusive, all-conquering love of one who knew it all and forgave it all. and the regeneration of his soul began. "the criminal slew," says tolstoy: "are you better, then, when you slay? he took another's liberty; and is it the right way, therefore, for you to take his? violence is no answer to violence." "have good will to all that lives, letting unkindness die, and greed and wrath; so that your lives be made as soft airs passing by." so said lord buddha, the light of asia. and another said: "ye have heard that it hath been said 'an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth'; but i say unto you, resist not him that is evil." yet the vengeance that the great psychologist saw was futile, the violence that the greatest living religious teacher and the greatest dead ones advised no man to wreak, that violence is done daily and hourly by every little-hearted prosecutor who prosecutes at so much a day, by every petty judge who buys his way into office with common politicians' tricks, and deals in men's lives and liberties as a trader deals in pins, by every neat-souled and cheap-souled member of the "unco guid" whose respectable bargain-counter maxims of morality have as much effect to stem the great floods and storms that shake the human will as the waving of a lady's kid glove against the tempest. those who have not suffered cannot understand how to punish; those who have understanding _will_ not. i said at the beginning and i say again, i believe that in every one of us all things are germinal: in judge and prosecutor and prison-keeper too, and even in those small moral souls who cut out one undeviating pattern for all men to fit, even in them there are the germs of passion and crime and sympathy and forgiveness. and some day things will stir in them and accuse them and awaken them. and that awakening will come when suddenly one day there breaks upon them with realizing force the sense of the unison of life, the irrevocable relationship of the saint to the sinner, the judge to the criminal; that all personalities are intertwined and rushing upon doom together. once in my life it was given to me to see the outward manifestation of this unison. it was in . we stood upon the base of the nelson monument in trafalgar square. below were ten thousand people packed together with upturned faces. they had gathered to hear and see men and women whose hands and limbs were scarred all over with the red-hot irons of the tortures in the fortress of montjuich. for the crime of an unknown person these twenty-eight men and women, together with four hundred others, had been cast into that terrible den and tortured with the infamies of the inquisition to make them reveal that of which they knew nothing. after a year of such suffering as makes the decent human heart sick only to contemplate, with nothing proven against them, some even without trial, they were suddenly released with orders to leave the country within twenty-four hours. they were then in trafalgar square, and to the credit of old england be it said, harlot and mother of harlots though she is, for there was not another country among the great nations of the earth to which those twenty-eight innocent people could go. for they were paupers impoverished by that cruel state of spain in the terrible battle for their freedom; they would not have been admitted to free america. when francesco gana, speaking in a language which most of them did not understand, lifted his poor, scarred hands, the faces of those ten thousand people moved together like the leaves of a forest in the wind. they waved to and fro, they rose and fell; the visible moved in the breath of the invisible. it was the revelation of the action of the unconscious, the fatalistic unity of man. sometimes, even now as i look upon you, it is as if the bodies that i see were as transparent bubbles wherethrough the red blood boils and flows, a turbulent stream churning and tossing and leaping, and behind us and our generation, far, far back, endlessly backwards, where all the bubbles are broken and not a ripple remains, the silent pouring of the great red river, the unfathomable river,--backwards through the unbroken forest and the untilled plain, backwards through the forgotten world of savagery and animal life, back somewhere to its dark sources in deep sea and old night, the rushing river of blood--no fancy--real, tangible blood, the blood that hurries in your veins while i speak, bearing with it the curses and the blessings of the past. through what infinite shadows has that river rolled! through what desolate wastes has it not spread its ooze! through what desperate passages has it been forced! what strength, what invincible strength is in that hot stream! you are just the bubble on its crest; where will the current fling you ere you die? at what moment will the fierce impurities borne from its somber and tenebrous past be hurled up in you? shall you then cry out for punishment if they are hurled up in another? if, flung against the merciless rocks of the channel, while you swim easily in the midstream, they fall back and hurt other bubbles? can you not feel that "men are the heart-beats of man, the plumes that feather his wings, storm-worn since being began with the wind and the thunder of things. things are cruel and blind; their strength detains and deforms. and the wearying wings of the mind still beat up the stream of their storms. still, as one swimming up-stream, they strike out blind in the blast, in thunder of vision and dream, and lightning of future and past. we are baffled and caught in the current and bruised upon edges of shoals: as weeds or as reeds in the torrent of things are the wind-shaken souls. spirit by spirit goes under, a foam-bell's bubble of breath, that blows and opens asunder and blurs not the mirror of death." is it not enough that "things are cruel and blind"? must we also be cruel and blind? when the whole thing amounts to so little at the most, shall we embitter it more, and crush and stifle what must so soon be crushed and stifled anyhow? can we not, knowing what remnants of things dead and drowned are floating through us, haunting our brains with specters of old deeds and scenes of violence, can we not learn to pardon our brother to whom the specters are more real, upon whom greater stress was laid? can we not, recalling all the evil things that we have done, or left undone only because some scarcely perceptible weight struck down the balance, or because some kindly word came to us in the midst of our bitterness and showed that not all was hateful in the world; can we not understand him for whom the balance was not struck down, the kind word unspoken? believe me, forgiveness is better than wrath,--better for the wrong-doer, who will be touched and regenerated by it, and better for you. and you are wrong if you think it is hard: it is easy, far easier than to hate. it may sound like a paradox, but the greater the injury the easier the pardon. let us have done with this savage idea of punishment, which is without wisdom. let us work for the freedom of man from the oppressions which make criminals, and for the enlightened treatment of all the sick. and though we may never see the fruit of it, we may rest assured that the great tide of thought is setting our way, and that "while the tired wave, vainly breaking, seems here no painful inch to gain, far back, through creeks and inlets making, comes silent, flooding in, the main." in defense of emma goldman and the right of expropriation the light is pleasant, is it not, my friends? it is good to look into each other's faces, to see the hands that clasp our own, to read the eyes that search our thoughts, to know what manner of lips give utterance to our pleasant greetings. it is good to be able to wink defiance at the night, the cold, unseeing night. how weird, how gruesome, how chilly it would be if i stood here in blackness, a shadow addressing shadows, in a house of blindness! yet each would know that he was not alone; yet might we stretch hands and touch each other, and feel the warmth of human presence near. yet might a sympathetic voice ring thro' the darkness, quickening the dragging moments.--the lonely prisoners in the cells of blackwell's island have neither light nor sound! the short day hurries across the sky, the short day still more shortened in the gloomy walls. the long chill night creeps up so early, weaving its sombre curtain before the imprisoned eyes. and thro' the curtain comes no sympathizing voice, beyond the curtain lies the prison silence, beyond that the cheerless, uncommunicating land, and still beyond the icy, fretting river, black and menacing, ready to drown. a wall of night, a wall of stone, a wall of water! thus has the great state of new york answered =emma goldman=; thus have the classes replied to the masses; thus do the rich respond to the poor; thus does the institution of property give its ultimatum to hunger! "give us work," said =emma goldman=; "if you will not give us work, then give us bread; if you do not give us either work or bread, then we shall take bread." it wasn't a very wise remark to make to the state of new york, that is--wealth and its watch-dogs, the police. but i fear me much that the apostles of liberty, the fore-runners of revolt, have never been very wise. there is a record of a seditious person, who once upon a time went about with a few despised followers in palestine, taking corn out of other people's corn-fields, (on the sabbath day, too). that same person, when he wished to ride into jerusalem told his disciples to go forward to where they would find a young colt tied, to unloose it and bring it to him, and if any one interfered or said anything to them, were to say: "my master hath need of it." that same person said: "give to him that asketh of thee, and from him that taketh away thy goods ask them not back again." that same person once stood before the hungry multitudes of galilee and taught them, saying: "the scribes and the pharisees sit in moses' seat; therefore whatever they bid you observe, that observe and do. but do not ye after their works, for they say, and do not. for they bind heavy burdens, and grievous to be borne, and lay them on men's shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers. but all their works they do to be seen of men; they make broad their phylacteries, and enlarge the borders of their garments: and love the uppermost rooms at feasts, and the chief seats in the synagogues, and greeting in the markets, and to be called of men, 'rabbi, rabbi.'" and turning to the scribes and the pharisees, he continued: "woe unto you, scribes and pharisees, hypocrites! for ye devour widows' houses, and for a pretense make long prayers: therefore shall ye receive the greater damnation. woe unto you scribes and pharisees, hypocrites! for ye pay tithe of mint, and anise, and cummin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgement, and mercy, and faith: these ought ye to have done and not left the other undone. ye blind guides, that strain at a gnat and swallow a camel! woe unto you, scribes and pharisees, hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and platter, but within they are full of extortion and excess. woe unto you, scribes and pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but within are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness. even so ye outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity. woe unto you, scribes and pharisees, hypocrites! because ye build the tombs of the prophets and garnish the sepulchres of the righteous; and say 'if we had been in the days of our fathers we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets'. wherefore ye be witnesses unto yourselves that ye are the children of them which killed the prophets. fill ye up then the measure of your fathers! ye serpents! ye generation of vipers! how can ye escape the damnation of hell!" yes; these are the words of the outlaw who is alleged to form the foundation stone of modern civilization, to the authorities of his day. hypocrites, extortionists, doers of iniquity, robbers of the poor, blood-partakers, serpents, vipers, fit for hell! it wasn't a very wise speech, from beginning to end. perhaps he knew it when he stood before pilate to receive his sentence, when he bore his heavy crucifix up calvary, when nailed upon it, stretched in agony, he cried: "my god, my god, why hast thou forsaken me!" no, it wasn't wise--but it was very grand. this grand, foolish person, this beggar-tramp, this thief who justified the action of hunger, this man who set the right of property beneath his foot, this individual who defied the state, do you know why he was so feared and hated, and punished? because, as it is said in the record, "the common people heard him gladly"; and the accusation before pontius pilate was, "we found this fellow perverting the whole nation. he stirreth up the people, teaching throughout all jewry." ah, the dreaded "common people"! when cardinal manning wrote: "necessity knows no law, and a starving man has a natural right to a share of his neighbor's bread," who thought of arresting cardinal manning? his was a carefully written article in the _fortnightly review_. who read it? not the people who needed bread. without food in their stomachs, they had not fifty cents to spend for a magazine. it was not the voice of the people themselves asserting their rights. no one for one instant imagined that cardinal manning would put himself at the head of ten thousand hungry men to loot the bakeries of london. it was a piece of ethical hair-splitting to be discussed in after-dinner speeches by the wine-muddled gentlemen who think themselves most competent to consider such subjects when their dress-coats are spoiled by the vomit of gluttony and drunkenness. but when =emma goldman= stood in union square and said, "if they do not give you work or bread, take bread," the common people heard her gladly; and as of old the wandering carpenter of nazareth addressed his own class, teaching throughout all jewry, stirring up the people against the authorities, so the dressmaker of new york addressing the unemployed working-people of new york was the menace of the depths of society, crying in its own tongue. the authorities heard and were afraid: therefore the triple wall. it is the old, old story. when thomas paine, one hundred years ago, published the first part of "the rights of man," the part in which he discusses principles only, the edition was a high-priced one, reaching comparatively few readers. it created only a literary furore. when the second part appeared, the part in which he treats of the application of principles, in which he declares that "men should not petition for rights but take them," it came out in a cheap form, so that one hundred thousand copies were sold in a few weeks. that brought down the prosecution of the government. it had reached the people that might act, and prosecution followed prosecution till botany bay was full of the best men of england. thus were the limitations of speech and press declared, and thus will they ever be declared so long as there are antagonistic interests in human society. understand me clearly. i believe that the term "constitutional right of free speech" is a meaningless phrase, for this reason: the constitution of the united states, and the declaration of independence, and particularly the latter, were, in their day, progressive expressions of progressive ideals. but they are, throughout, characterized by the metaphysical philosophy which dominated the thought of the last century. they speak of "inherent rights," "inalienable rights," "natural rights," etc. they declare that men are equal because of a supposed metaphysical something-or-other, called equality, existing in some mysterious way apart from material conditions, just as the philosophers of the eighteenth century accounted for water being wet by alleging a metaphysical wetness, existing somehow apart from matter. i do not say this to disparage those grand men who dared to put themselves against the authorities of the monarchy, and to conceive a better ideal of society, one which they certainly thought would secure equal rights to men; because i realize fully that no one can live very far in advance of the time-spirit, and i am positive in my own mind that, unless some cataclysm destroys the human race before the end of the twentieth century, the experience of the next hundred years will explode many of our own theories. but the experience of this age has proven that metaphysical quantities do not exist apart from materials, and hence humanity can not be made equal by declarations on paper. unless the material conditions for equality exist, it is worse than mockery to pronounce men equal. and unless there is equality (and by equality i mean equal chances for every one to make the most of himself), unless, i say, these equal chances exist, freedom, either of thought, speech, or action, is equally a mockery. i once read that one million angels could dance at the same time on the point of a needle; possibly one million angels might be able to get a decent night's lodging by virtue of their constitutional rights; one single tramp couldn't. and whenever the tongues of the non-possessing class threaten the possessors, whenever the disinherited menace the privileged, that moment you will find that the constitution isn't made for you. therefore i think anarchists make a mistake when they contend for their constitutional rights. as a prominent lawyer, mr. thomas earle white, of philadelphia, himself an anarchist, said to me not long since: "what are you going to do about it? go into the courts, and fight for your legal rights? anarchists haven't got any." "well," says the governmentalist, "you can't consistently claim any. you don't believe in constitutions and laws." exactly so; and if any one will right my constitutional wrongs, i will willingly make him a present of my constitutional rights. at the same time i am perfectly sure no one will ever make this exchange; nor will any help ever come to the wronged class from the outside. salvation on the vicarious plan isn't worth despising. redress of wrongs will not come by petitioning "the powers that be." "he has rights who dare maintain them." "the lord helps them who help themselves." (and when one is able to help himself, i don't think he is apt to trouble the lord much for his assistance.) as long as the working people fold hands and pray the gods in washington to give them work, so long they will not get it. so long as they tramp the streets, whose stones they lay, whose filth they clean, whose sewers they dig, yet upon which they must not stand too long lest the policeman bid them "move on"; so long as they go from factory to factory, begging for the opportunity to be a slave, receiving the insults of bosses and foremen, getting the old "no," the old shake of the head, in these factories which they build, whose machines they wrought; so long as they consent to herd like cattle, in the cities, driven year after year, more and more, off the mortgaged land, the land they cleared, fertilized, cultivated, rendered of value; so long as they stand shivering, gazing through plate glass windows at overcoats, which they made but cannot buy, starving in the midst of food they produced but cannot have; so long as they continue to do these things vaguely relying upon some power outside themselves, be it god, or priest, or politician, or employer, or charitable society, to remedy matters, so long deliverance will be delayed. when they conceive the possibility of a complete international federation of labor, whose constituent groups shall take possession of land, mines, factories, all the instruments of production, issue their own certificates of exchange, and, in short, conduct their own industry without regulative interference from law-makers or employers, then we may hope for the only help which counts for aught--self-help; the only condition which can guarantee free speech (and no paper guarantee needed). but meanwhile, while we are waiting, for there is yet much grist of the middle class to be ground between the upper and nether millstones of economic evolution; while we await the formation of the international labor trust; while we watch for the day when there are enough of people with nothing in their stomachs and desperation in their heads, to go about the work of expropriation; what shall those do who are starving now? that is the question which =emma goldman= had to face; and she answered it by saying: "ask, and if you do not receive, take--take bread." i do not give you that advice. not because i do not think the bread belongs to you; not because i do not think you would be morally right in taking it; not that i am not more shocked and horrified and embittered by the report of one human being starving in the heart of plenty, than by all the pittsburgs, and chicagos, and homesteads, and tennessees, and coeur d'alenes, and buffalos, and barcelonas, and parises; not that i do not think one little bit of sensitive human flesh is worth all the property rights in new york city; not that i do not think the world will ever be saved by the sheep's virtue of going patiently to the shambles; not that i do not believe the expropriation of the possessing classes is inevitable, and that that expropriation will begin by just such acts as =emma goldman= advised, viz.: the taking possession of wealth already produced; not that i think you owe any consideration to the conspirators of wall street, or those who profit by their operations, as such, nor ever will till they are reduced to the level of human beings having equal chances with you to earn their share of social wealth, and no more. i have said that i do not give you the advice given by =emma goldman=, not that i would have you forget the consideration the expropriators have shown to you; that they have advised lead for strikers, strychnine for tramps, bread and water as good enough for working people; not that i cannot hear yet in my ears the words of one who said to me of the studebaker wagon works' strikers, "if i had my way i'd mow them down with gatling guns", not that i would have you forget the electric wire of fort frick, nor the pinkertons, nor the militia, nor the prosecutions for murder and treason; not that i would have you forget the th of may, when your constitutional right of free speech was vindicated, nor the th of november when it was assassinated; not that i would have you forget the single dinner at delmonico's which ward mcallister tells us cost ten thousand dollars! would i have you forget that the wine in the glasses was your children's blood? it must be a rare drink--children's blood! i have read of the wonderful sparkle on costly champagne--i have never seen it. if i did i think it would look to me like mothers' tears over the little, white, wasted forms of dead babies--dead because there was no milk in their breasts! yes, i want you to remember that these rich are blood-drinkers, tearers of human flesh, gnawers of human bones! yes, if i had the power i would burn your wrongs upon your hearts in characters that should glow like coals in the night! i have not a tongue of fire as =emma goldman= has; i cannot "stir the people"; i must speak in my own cold, calculated way. (perhaps that is the reason i am allowed to speak at all.) but if i had the power, my will is good enough. you know how shakespeare's marc antony addressed the populace at rome: "i am no orator, as brutus is, but as you know me well, a plain blunt man that love my friend. and that they know full well that gave me public leave to speak of him. for i have neither wit, nor words, nor worth, action, nor utterance, nor the power of speech to stir men's blood. i only speak right on. i tell you that which you yourselves do know, show you sweet cæsar's wounds, poor, poor dumb mouths, and bid them speak for me. but were i brutus and brutus antony, there were an antony would ruffle up your spirits, and put a tongue in every wound of cæsar's, that should move the stones of rome to rise and mutiny." if, therefore, i do not give you the advice which =emma goldman= gave, let not the authorities suppose it is because i have any more respect for their constitution and their law than she has, or that i regard them as having any rights in the matter. no! my reasons for not giving that advice are two. first, if i were giving advice at all, i would say: "my friends, that bread belongs to you. it is you who toiled and sweat in the sun to sow and reap the wheat; it is you who stood by the thresher, and breathed the chaff-filled atmosphere in the mills, while it was ground to flour; it is you who went into the eternal night of the mine and risked drowning, fire damp, explosion, and cave-in, to get the fuel for the fire that baked it; it is you who stood in the hell-like heat, and struck the blows that forged the iron for the ovens wherein it is baked; it is you who stand all night in the terrible cellar shops, and tend the machines that knead the flour into dough; it is you, you, you, farmer, miner, mechanic, who make the bread; but you haven't the power to take it. at every transformation wrought by toil, some one who didn't toil has taken part from you; and now he has it all, and you haven't the power to take it back! you are told you have the power because you have the numbers. never make so silly a blunder as to suppose that power resides in numbers. one good, level-headed policeman with a club, is worth ten excited, unarmed men; one detachment of well-drilled militia has a power equal to that of the greatest mob that could be raised in new york city. do you know i admire compact, concentrated power. let me give you an illustration. out in a little town in illinois there is a certain capitalist, and if ever a human creature sweat and ground the grist of gold from the muscle of man, it is he. well, once upon a time, his workmen, (not his slaves, his workmen,) were on strike; and fifteen hundred muscular polacks armed with stones, brick-bats, red-hot pokers, and other such crude weapons as a mob generally collects, went up to his house for the purpose of smashing the windows, and so forth; possibly to do as those people in italy did the other day with the sheriff who attempted to collect the milk tax. he alone, one man, met them on the steps of his porch, and for two mortal hours, by threats, promises, cajoleries held those fifteen hundred poles at bay. and finally they went away, without smashing a pane of glass or harming a hair of his head. now that was power; and you can't help but admire it, no matter if it was your enemy who displayed it; and you must admit that so long as numbers can be overcome by such relative quantity, power does not reside in numbers. therefore, if i were giving advice, i would not say, "take bread," but take counsel with yourselves how to get the power to take bread. there is no doubt but that power is latently in you; there is no doubt it can be developed; there is no doubt the authorities know this, and fear it, and are ready to exert as much force as is necessary to repress any signs of its development. and this is the explanation of =emma goldman='s imprisonment. the authorities do not fear you as you are; they only fear what you may become. the dangerous thing was "the voice crying in the wilderness", foretelling the power which was to come after it. you should have seen how they feared it in philadelphia. they got out a whole platoon of police and detectives, and executed a military manoeuvre to catch the woman who had been running around under their noses for three days. and when she walked up to them, then they surrounded and captured her, and guarded the city hall where they kept her over night, and put a detective in the next cell to make notes. why so much fear? did they shrink from the stab of the dressmaker's needle? or did they dread some stronger weapon? ah! the accusation before the new york pontius pilate was: "she stirreth up the people." and pilate sentenced her to the full limit of the law, because, he said, "you are more than ordinarily intelligent." why is intelligence dealt thus harshly with? because it is the beginning of power. strive, then, for power. my second reason for not repeating =emma goldman='s words is, that i, as an anarchist, have no right to advise another to do anything involving a risk to himself; nor would i give a fillip for an action done by the advice of some one else, unless it is accompanied by a well-argued, well settled conviction on the part of the person acting, that it really is the best thing to do. anarchism, to me, means not only the denial of authority, not only a new economy, but a revision of the principles of morality. it means the development of the individual, as well as the assertion of the individual. it means self-responsibility, and not leader-worship. i say it is your business to decide whether you will starve and freeze in sight of food and clothing, outside of jail, or commit some overt act against the institution of property and take your place beside =timmermann= and =goldman=. and in saying this i mean to cast no reflection whatever upon =miss goldman= for doing otherwise. she and i hold many different views on both economy and morals; and that she is honest in hers she has proved better than i have proved mine. =miss goldman= is a communist; i am an individualist. she wishes to destroy the right of property; i wish to assert it. i make my war upon privilege and authority, whereby the right of property, the true right in that which is proper to the individual, is annihilated. she believes that co-operation would entirely supplant competition; i hold that competition in one form or another will always exist, and that it is highly desirable it should. but whether she or i be right, or both of us be wrong, of one thing i am sure: _the spirit which animates emma goldman is the only one which will emancipate the slave from his slavery, the tyrant from his tyranny--the spirit which is willing to dare and suffer_. that which dwells in the frail body in the prison-room to-night is not the new york dressmaker alone. transport yourselves there in thought a moment; look steadily into those fair, blue eyes, upon the sun-brown hair, the sea-shell face, the restless hands, the woman's figure; look steadily till in place of the person, the individual of time and place, you see that which transcends time and place, and flits from house to house of life, mocking at death. swinburne in his magnificent "before a crucifix," says: "with iron for thy linen bands, and unclean cloths for winding-sheet, they bind the people's nail-pierced hands, they hide the people's nail-pierced feet: and what man, or what angel known shall roll back the sepulchral stone?" perhaps in the presence of this untrammeled spirit we shall feel that something has rolled back the sepulchral stone; and up from the cold wind of the grave is borne the breath that animated =anaxagoras=, =socrates=, =christ=, =hypatia=, =john huss=, =bruno=, =robert emmet=, =john brown=, =sophia perovskaya=, =parsons=, =fischer=, =engel=, =spies=, =lingg=, =berkman=, =pallas=; and all those, known and unknown, who have died by tree, and axe, and fagot, or dragged out forgotten lives in dungeons, derided, hated, tortured by men. perhaps we shall know ourselves face to face with that which leaps from the throat of the strangled when the rope chokes, which smokes up from the blood of the murdered when the axe falls; that which has been forever hunted, fettered, imprisoned, exiled, executed, and never conquered. lo, from its many incarnations it comes forth again, the immortal race-christ of the ages! the gloomy walls are glorified thereby, the prisoner is transfigured, and we say, reverently we say: "o sacred head, o desecrate, o labor-wounded feet and hands, o blood poured forth in pledge to fate of nameless lives in divers lands! o slain, and spent, and sacrificed people! the grey-grown, speechless christ." direct action from the standpoint of one who thinks himself capable of discerning an undeviating route for human progress to pursue, if it is to be progress at all, who, having such a route on his mind's map, has endeavored to point it out to others; to make them see it as he sees it; who in so doing has chosen what appeared to him clear and simple expressions to convey his thoughts to others,--to such a one it appears matter for regret and confusion of spirit that the phrase "direct action" has suddenly acquired in the general mind a circumscribed meaning, not at all implied in the words themselves, and certainly never attached to it by himself or his co-thinkers. however, this is one of the common jests which progress plays on those who think themselves able to set metes and bounds for it. over and over again, names, phrases, mottoes, watchwords, have been turned inside out, and upside down, and hindside before, and sideways, by occurrences out of the control of those who used the expressions in their proper sense; and still, those who sturdily held their ground, and insisted on being heard, have in the end found that the period of misunderstanding and prejudice has been but the prelude to wider inquiry and understanding. i rather think this will be the case with the present misconception of the term direct action, which through the misapprehension, or else the deliberate misrepresentation, of certain journalists in los angeles, at the time the mcnamaras pleaded guilty, suddenly acquired in the popular mind the interpretation, "forcible attacks on life and property." this was either very ignorant or very dishonest of the journalists; but it has had the effect of making a good many people curious to know all about direct action. as a matter of fact, those who are so lustily and so inordinately condemning it, will find on examination that they themselves have on many occasions practised direct action, and will do so again. every person who ever thought he had a right to assert, and went boldly and asserted it, himself, or jointly with others that shared his convictions, was a direct actionist. some thirty years ago i recall that the salvation army was vigorously practising direct action in the maintenance of the freedom of its members to speak, assemble, and pray. over and over they were arrested, fined, and imprisoned; but they kept right on singing, praying, and marching, till they finally compelled their persecutors to let them alone. the industrial workers are now conducting the same fight, and have, in a number of cases, compelled the officials to let them alone by the same direct tactics. every person who ever had a plan to do anything, and went and did it, or who laid his plan before others, and won their co-operation to do it with him, without going to external authorities to please do the thing for them, was a direct actionist. all co-operative experiments are essentially direct action. every person who ever in his life had a difference with any one to settle, and went straight to the other persons involved to settle it, either by a peaceable plan or otherwise, was a direct actionist. examples of such action are strikes and boycotts; many persons will recall the action of the housewives of new york who boycotted the butchers, and lowered the price of meat; at the present moment a butter boycott seems looming up, as a direct reply to the price-makers for butter. these actions are generally not due to any one's reasoning overmuch on the respective merits of directness or indirectness, but are the spontaneous retorts of those who feel oppressed by a situation. in other words, all people are, most of the time, believers in the principle of direct action, and practisers of it. however, most people are also indirect or political actionists. and they are both these things at the same time, without making much of an analysis of either. there are only a limited number of persons who eschew political action under any and all circumstances; but there is nobody, nobody at all, who has ever been so "impossible" as to eschew direct action altogether. the majority of thinking people are really opportunists, leaning, some, perhaps, more to directness, some more to indirectness, as a general thing, but ready to use either means when opportunity calls for it. that is to say, there are those who hold that balloting governors into power is essentially a wrong and foolish thing; but who, nevertheless, under stress of special circumstance, might consider it the wisest thing to do, to vote some individual into office at that particular time. or there are those who believe that, in general, the wisest way for people to get what they want is by the indirect method of voting into power some one who will make what they want legal; yet who, all the same, will occasionally, under exceptional conditions, advise a strike; and a strike, as i have said, is direct action. or they may do as the socialist party agitators, who are mostly declaiming now against direct action, did last summer, when the police were holding up their meetings. they went in force to the meeting-places, prepared to speak whether-or-no; and they made the police back down. and while that was not logical on their part, thus to oppose the legal executors of the majority's will, it was a fine, successful piece of direct action. those who, by the essence of their belief, are committed to direct action only are--just who? why, the non-resistants; precisely those who do not believe in violence at all! now do not make the mistake of inferring that i say direct action means non-resistance; not by any means. direct action may be the extreme of violence, or it may be as peaceful as the waters of the brook of siloa that go softly. what i say is, that the real non-resistants can believe in direct action only, never in political action. for the basis of all political action is coercion; even when the state does good things, it finally rests on a club, a gun, or a prison, for its power to carry them through. now every school child in the united states has had the direct action of certain non-resistants brought to his notice by his school history. the case which every one instantly recalls is that of the early quakers who came to massachusetts. the puritans had accused the quakers of "troubling the world by preaching peace to it." they refused to pay church taxes; they refused to bear arms; they refused to swear allegiance to any government. (in so doing, they were direct actionists; what we may call negative direct actionists.) so the puritans, being political actionists, passed laws to keep them out, to deport, to fine, to imprison, to mutilate, and finally, to hang them. and the quakers just kept on coming (which was positive direct action); and history records that after the hanging of four quakers, and the flogging of margaret brewster at the cart's tail through the streets of boston, "the puritans gave up trying to silence the new missionaries"; that "quaker persistence and quaker non-resistance had won the day." another example of direct action in early colonial history, but this time by no means of the peaceable sort, was the affair known as bacon's rebellion. all our historians certainly defend the action of the rebels in that matter, as reason is, for they were right. and yet it was a case of violent direct action against lawfully constituted authority. for the benefit of those who have forgotten the details, let me briefly remind them that the virginia planters were in fear of a general attack by the indians; with reason. being political actionists, they asked, or bacon as their leader asked, that the governor grant him a commission to raise volunteers in their own defense. the governor feared that such a company of armed men would be a threat to him; also with reason. he refused the commission. whereupon the planters resorted to direct action. they raised the volunteers without the commission, and successfully fought off the indians. bacon was pronounced a traitor by the governor; but the people being with him, the governor was afraid to proceed against him. in the end, however, it came so far that the rebels burned jamestown; and but for the untimely death of bacon, much more might have been done. of course the reaction was very dreadful, as it usually is where a rebellion collapses, or is crushed. yet even during the brief period of success, it had corrected a good many abuses. i am quite sure that the political-action-at-all-costs advocates of those times, after the reaction came back into power, must have said: "see to what evils direct action brings us! behold, the progress of the colony has been set back twenty-five years"; forgetting that if the colonists had not resorted to direct action, their scalps would have been taken by the indians a year sooner, instead of a number of them being hanged by the governor a year later. in the period of agitation and excitement preceding the revolution, there were all sorts and kinds of direct action from the most peaceable to the most violent; and i believe that almost everybody who studies united states history finds the account of these performances the most interesting part of the story, the part which dents into his memory most easily. among the peaceable moves made, were the non-importation agreements, the leagues for wearing homespun clothing and the "committees of correspondence." as the inevitable growth of hostility progressed, violent direct action developed; e. g., in the matter of destroying the revenue stamps, or the action concerning the tea-ships, either by not permitting the tea to be landed, or by putting it in damp storage, or by throwing it into the harbor, as in boston, or by compelling a tea-ship owner to set fire to his own ship, as at annapolis. these are all actions which our commonest text-books record, certainly not in a condemnatory way, not even in an apologetic one, though they are all cases of direct action against legally constituted authority and property rights. if i draw attention to them, and others of like nature, it is to prove to unreflecting repeaters of words that _direct action has always been used, and has the historical sanction of the very people now reprobating it_. george washington is said to have been the leader of the virginia planters' non-importation league: he would now be "enjoined," probably, by a court, from forming any such league; and if he persisted, he would be fined for contempt. when the great quarrel between the north and the south was waxing hot and hotter, it was again direct action which preceded and precipitated political action. and i may remark here that political action is never taken, nor even contemplated, until slumbering minds have first been aroused by direct acts of protest against existing conditions. the history of the anti-slavery movement and the civil war is one of the greatest of paradoxes, although history is a chain of paradoxes. politically speaking, it was the slave-holding states that stood for greater political freedom, for the autonomy of the single state against the interference of the united states; politically speaking, it was the non-slave-holding states that stood for a strong centralized government, which, secessionists said, and said truly, was bound progressively to develop into more and more tyrannical forms. which happened. from the close of the civil war on, there has been continuous encroachment of the federal power upon what was formerly the concern of the states individually. the wage-slaves, in their struggles of to-day, are continually thrown into conflict with that centralized power, against which the slave-holder protested (with liberty on his lips but tyranny in his heart). ethically speaking, it was the non-slave-holding states that, in a general way, stood for greater human liberty, while the secessionists stood for race-slavery. in a general way only; that is, the majority of northerners, not being accustomed to the actual presence of negro slavery about them, thought it was probably a mistake; yet they were in no great ferment of anxiety to have it abolished. the abolitionists only, and they were relatively few, were the genuine ethicals, to whom slavery itself--not secession or union--was the main question. in fact, so paramount was it with them, that a considerable number of them were themselves for the dissolution of the union, advocating that the north take the initiative in the matter of dissolving, in order that the northern people might shake off the blame of holding negroes in chains. of course, there were all sorts of people with all sorts of temperaments among those who advocated the abolition of slavery. there were quakers like whittier (indeed it was the peace-at-all-costs quakers who had advocated abolition even in early colonial days); there were moderate political actionists, who were for buying off the slaves, as the cheapest way; and there were extremely violent people, who believed and did all sorts of violent things. as to what the politicians did, it is one long record of "how-not-to-do-it," a record of thirty years of compromising, and dickering, and trying to keep what was as it was, and to hand sops to both sides when new conditions demanded that something be done, or be pretended to be done. but "the stars in their courses fought against sisera"; the system was breaking down from within, and the direct actionists from without, as well, were widening the cracks remorselessly. among the various expressions of direct rebellion was the organization of the "underground railroad." most of the people who belonged to it believed in both sorts of action; but however much they theoretically subscribed to the right of the majority to enact and enforce laws, they didn't believe in it on that point. my grandfather was a member of the "underground"; many a fugitive slave he helped on his way to canada. he was a very patient, law-abiding man, in most respects, though i have often thought he probably respected it because he didn't have much to do with it; always leading a pioneer life, law was generally far from him, and direct action imperative. be that as it may, and law-respecting as he was, he had no respect whatever for slave laws, no matter if made by ten times of a majority; and he conscientiously broke every one that came in his way to be broken. there were times when in the operation of the "underground", violence was required, and was used. i recollect one old friend relating to me how she and her mother kept watch all night at the door, while a slave for whom a posse was searching hid in the cellar; and though they were of quaker descent and sympathies, there was a shot-gun on the table. fortunately it did not have to be used that night. when the fugitive slave law was passed, with the help of the political actionists of the north who wanted to offer a new sop to the slave-holders, the direct actionists took to rescuing recaptured fugitives. there was the "rescue of shadrach," and the "rescue of jerry," the latter rescuers being led by the famous gerrit smith; and a good many more successful and unsuccessful attempts. still the politicals kept on pottering and trying to smooth things over, and the abolitionists were denounced and decried by the ultra-law-abiding pacificators, pretty much as wm. d. haywood and frank bohn are being denounced by their own party now. the other day i read a communication in the chicago _daily socialist_ from the secretary of the louisville local, socialist party, to the national secretary, requesting that some safe and sane speaker be substituted for bohn, who had been announced to speak there. in explaining why, mr. dobbs, secretary, makes this quotation from bohn's lecture: "had the mcnamaras been successful in defending the interests of the working class, they would have been right, just as john brown would have been right, had he been successful in freeing the slaves. ignorance was the only crime of john brown, and ignorance was the only crime of the mcnamaras." upon this mr. dobbs comments as follows: "we dispute emphatically the statements here made. the attempt to draw a parallel between the open--if mistaken--revolt of john brown on the one hand, and the secret and murderous methods of the mcnamaras on the other, is not only indicative of shallow reasoning, but highly mischievous in the logical conclusions which may be drawn from such statements." evidently mr. dobbs is very ignorant of the life and work of john brown. john brown was a man of violence; he would have scorned anybody's attempt to make him out anything else. and when once a person is a believer in violence, it is with him only a question of the most effective way of applying it, which can be determined only by a knowledge of conditions and means at his disposal. john brown did not shrink at all from conspiratical methods. those who have read the autobiography of frederick douglas and the reminiscences of lucy colman, will recall that one of the plans laid by john brown was to organize a chain of armed camps in the mountains of west virginia, north carolina, and tennessee, send secret emissaries among the slaves inciting them to flee to these camps, and there concert such measures as times and conditions made possible for further arousing revolt among the negroes. that this plan failed was due to the weakness of the desire for liberty among the slaves themselves, more than anything else. later on, when the politicians in their infinite deviousness contrived a fresh proposition of how-not-to-do-it, known as the kansas-nebraska act, which left the question of slavery to be determined by the settlers, the direct actionists on both sides sent bogus settlers into the territory, who proceeded to fight it out. the pro-slavery men, who got in first, made a constitution recognizing slavery, and a law punishing with death any one who aided a slave to escape; but the free soilers, who were a little longer in arriving, since they came from more distant states, made a second constitution, and refused to recognize the other party's laws at all. and john brown was there, mixing in all the violence, conspiratical or open; he was "a horse-thief and a murderer," in the eyes of decent, peaceable, political actionists. and there is no doubt that he stole horses, sending no notice in advance of his intention to steal them, and that he killed pro-slavery men. he struck and got away a good many times before his final attempt on harper's ferry. if he did not use dynamite, it was because dynamite had not yet appeared as a practical weapon. he made a great many more intentional attacks on life than the two brothers secretary dobbs condemns for their "murderous methods." and yet, history has not failed to understand john brown. mankind knows that though he was a violent man, with human blood upon his hands, who was guilty of high treason and hanged for it, yet his soul was a great, strong, unselfish soul, unable to bear the frightful crime which kept , , people like dumb beasts, and thought that making war against it was a sacred, a god-called duty, (for john brown was a very religious man--a presbyterian). it is by and because of the direct acts of the fore-runners of social change, whether they be of peaceful or warlike nature, that the human conscience, the conscience of the mass, becomes aroused to the need for change. it would be very stupid to say that no good results are ever brought about by political action; sometimes good things do come about that way. but never until individual rebellion, followed by mass rebellion, has forced it. direct action is always the clamorer, the initiator, through which the great sum of indifferentists become aware that oppression is getting intolerable. we have now an oppression in the land,--and not only in this land, but throughout all those parts of the world which enjoy the very mixed blessings of civilization. and just as in the question of chattel slavery, so this form of slavery has been begetting both direct action and political action. a certain per cent. of our population (probably a much smaller per cent. than politicians are in the habit of assigning at mass meetings) is producing the material wealth upon which all the rest of us live; just as it was the , , chattel blacks who supported all the crowd of parasites above them. these are the _land workers_ and the _industrial workers_. through the unprophesied and unprophesiable operation of institutions which no individual of us created, but found in existence when he came here, these workers, the most absolutely necessary part of the whole social structure, without whose services none can either eat, or clothe, or shelter himself, are just the ones who get the least to eat, to wear, and to be housed withal--to say nothing of their share of the other social benefits which the rest of us are supposed to furnish, such as education and artistic gratifications. these workers have, in one form or another, mutually joined their forces to see what betterment of their condition they could get; primarily by direct action, secondarily through political action. we have had the grange, the farmers' alliance, co-operative associations, colonization experiments, knights of labor, trade unions, and industrial workers of the world. all of them have been organized for the purpose of wringing from the masters in the economic field a little better price, a little better conditions, a little shorter hours; or on the other hand, to resist a reduction in price, worse conditions, or longer hours. none of them has attempted a final solution of the social war. none of them, except the industrial workers, has recognized that there is a social war, inevitable so long as present legal-social conditions endure. they accepted property institutions as they found them. they were made up of average men, with average desires, and they undertook to do what appeared to them possible and very reasonable things. they were not committed to any particular political policy when they were organized, but were associated for direct action of their own initiation, either positive or defensive. undoubtedly there were, and are, among all these organizations, members who looked beyond immediate demands; who did see that the continuous development of forces now in operation was bound to bring about conditions to which it is impossible that life continue to submit, and against which, therefore, it will protest, and violently protest; that it will have no choice but to do so; that it must do so, or tamely die; and since it is not the nature of life to surrender without struggle, it will not tamely die. twenty-two years ago i met farmers' alliance people who said so, knights of labor who said so, trade unionists who said so. they wanted larger aims than those to which their organizations were looking; but they had to accept their fellow members as they were, and try to stir them to work for such things as it was possible to make them see. and what they could see was better prices, better wages, less dangerous or tyrannical conditions, shorter hours. at the stage of development when these movements were initiated, the land workers could not see that their struggle had anything to do with the struggle of those engaged in the manufacturing or transporting service; nor could these latter see that theirs had anything to do with the movement of the farmers. for that matter very few of them see it yet. they have yet to learn that there is one common struggle against those who have appropriated the earth, the money, and the machines. unfortunately the great organization of the farmers frittered itself away in a stupid chase after political power. it was quite successful in getting the power in certain states; but the courts pronounced its laws unconstitutional, and there was the burial hole of all its political conquests. its original program was to build its own elevators, and store the products therein, holding these from the market till they could escape the speculator. also, to organize labor exchanges, issuing credit notes upon products deposited for exchange. had it adhered to this program of direct mutual aid, it would, to some extent, for a time at least, have afforded an illustration of how mankind may free itself from the parasitism of the bankers and the middlemen. of course, it would have been overthrown in the end, unless it had so revolutionized men's minds by the example as to force the overthrow of the legal monopoly of land and money; but at least it would have served a great educational purpose. as it was, it "went after the red herring," and disintegrated merely from its futility. the knights of labor subsided into comparative insignificance, not because of failure to use direct action, nor because of its tampering with politics, which was small, but chiefly because it was a heterogeneous mass of workers who could not associate their efforts effectively. the trade unions grew strong about as the k. of l. subsided, and have continued slowly but persistently to increase in power. it is true the increase has fluctuated; that there have been set-backs; that great single organizations have been formed and again dispersed. but on the whole, trade unions have been a growing power. they have been so because, poor as they are, inefficient as they are, they have been a means whereby a certain section of the workers have been able to bring their united force to bear directly upon their masters, and so get for themselves some portion of what they wanted,--of what their conditions dictated to them they must try to get. the strike is their natural weapon, that which they themselves forged. it is the direct blow of the strike which nine times out of ten the boss is afraid of. (of course there are occasions when he is glad of one, but that's unusual.) and the reason he dreads a strike is not so much because he thinks he cannot win out against it, but simply and solely because he does not want an interruption of his business. the ordinary boss isn't in much dread of a "class-conscious vote"; there are plenty of shops where you can talk socialism or any other political program all day long; but if you begin to talk unionism, you may forthwith expect to be discharged, or at best warned to shut up. why? not because the boss is so wise as to know that political action is a swamp in which the workingman gets mired, or because he understands that political socialism is fast becoming a middle-class movement; not at all. he thinks socialism is a very bad thing; but it's a good way off! but he knows that if his shop is unionized, he will have trouble right away. his hands will be rebellious, he will be put to expense to improve his factory conditions, he will have to keep workingmen that he doesn't like, and in case of strike he may expect injury to his machinery or his buildings. it is often said, and parrot-like repeated, that the bosses are "class-conscious," that they stick together for their class interest, and are willing to undergo any sort of personal loss rather than be false to those interests. it isn't so at all. the majority of business people are just like the majority of workingmen; they care a whole lot more about their individual loss or gain than about the gain or loss of their class. and it is his individual loss the boss sees, when threatened by a union. now everybody knows that a strike of any size means violence. no matter what any one's ethical preference for peace may be, he knows it will not be peaceful. if it's a telegraph strike, it means cutting wires and poles, and getting fake scabs in to spoil the instruments. if it is a steel rolling mill strike, it means beating up the scabs, breaking the windows, setting the gauges wrong, and ruining the expensive rollers together with tons and tons of material. if it's a miners' strike, it means destroying tracks and bridges, and blowing up mills. if it is a garment workers' strike, it means having an unaccountable fire, getting a volley of stones through an apparently inaccessible window, or possibly a brickbat on the manufacturer's own head. if it's a street-car strike, it means tracks torn up or barricaded with the contents of ash-carts and slop-carts, with overturned wagons or stolen fences, it means smashed or incinerated cars and turned switches. if it is a system federation strike, it means "dead" engines, wild engines, derailed freights, and stalled trains. if it is a building trades strike, it means dynamited structures. and always, everywhere, all the time, fights between strike-breakers and scabs against strikers and strike-sympathizers, between people and police. on the side of the bosses, it means search-lights, electric wires, stockades, bull-pens, detectives and provocative agents, violent kidnapping and deportation, and every device they can conceive for direct protection, besides the ultimate invocation of police, militia, state constabulary, and federal troops. everybody knows this; everybody smiles when union officials protest their organizations to be peaceable and law-abiding, because everybody knows they are lying. they know that violence is used, both secretly and openly; and they know it is used because the strikers cannot do any other way, without giving up the fight at once. nor do they mistake those who thus resort to violence under stress for destructive miscreants who do what they do out of innate cussedness. the people in general understand that they do these things, through the harsh logic of a situation which they did not create, but which forces them to these attacks in order to make good in their struggle to live, or else go down the bottomless descent into poverty, that lets death find them in the poorhouse hospital, the city street, or the river-slime. this is the awful alternative that the workers are facing; and this is what makes the most kindly disposed human beings,--men who would go out of their way to help a wounded dog, or bring home a stray kitten and nurse it, or step aside to avoid walking on a worm--resort to violence against their fellow-men. they know, for the facts have taught them, that this is the only way to win, if they can win at all. and it has always appeared to me one of the most utterly ludicrous, absolutely irrelevant things that a person can do or say, when approached for relief or assistance by a striker who is dealing with an immediate situation, to respond with, "vote yourself into power!" when the next election is six months, a year, or two years away. unfortunately, the people who know best how violence is used in union warfare, cannot come forward and say: "on such a day, at such a place, such and such a specific action was done, and as the result such and such a concession was made, or such and such a boss capitulated." to do so would imperil their liberty, and their power to go on fighting. therefore those that know best must keep silent, and sneer in their sleeves, while those that know little prate. events, not tongues, must make their position clear. and there has been a very great deal of prating these last few weeks. speakers and writers, honestly convinced, i believe, that political action, and political action only, can win the workers' battle, have been denouncing what they are pleased to call "direct action" (what they really mean is conspiratical violence) as the author of mischief incalculable. one oscar ameringer, as an example, recently said at a meeting in chicago that the haymarket bomb of ' had set back the eight-hour movement twenty-five years, arguing that the movement would have succeeded then but for the bomb. it's a great mistake. no one can exactly measure in years or months the effect of a forward push or a reaction. no one can demonstrate that the eight-hour movement could have been won twenty-five years ago. we know that the eight-hour day was put on the statute books of illinois in , by political action, and has remained a dead letter. that the direct action of the workers could have won it, then, can not be proved; but it can be shown that many more potent factors than the haymarket bomb worked against it. on the other hand, if the reactive influence of the bomb was really so powerful, we should naturally expect labor and union conditions to be worse in chicago than in the cities where no such thing happened. on the contrary, bad as they are, the general conditions of labor are better in chicago than in most other large cities, and the power of the unions is more developed there than in any other american city except san francisco. so if we are to conclude anything for the influence of the haymarket bomb, keep these facts in mind. personally i do not think its influence on the labor movement, as such, was so very great. it will be the same with the present furore about violence. nothing fundamental has been altered. two men have been imprisoned for what they did (twenty-four years ago they were hanged for what they did not do); some few more may yet be imprisoned. but the forces of life will continue to revolt against their economic chains. there will be no cessation in that revolt, no matter what ticket men vote or fail to vote, until the chains are broken. how will the chains be broken? political actionists tell us it will be only by means of working-class party action at the polls; by voting themselves into possession of the sources of life and the tools; by voting that those who now command forests, mines, ranches, waterways, mills and factories, and likewise command the military power to defend them, shall hand over their dominion to the people. and meanwhile? meanwhile be peaceable, industrious, law-abiding, patient, and frugal (as madero told the mexican peons to be, after he had sold them to wall street)! even if some of you are disfranchised, don't rise up even against that, for it might "set back the party." well, i have already stated that some good is occasionally accomplished by political action,--not necessarily working-class party action either. but i am abundantly convinced that the occasional good accomplished is more than counterbalanced by the evil; just as i am convinced that though there are occasional evils resulting from direct action, they are more than counterbalanced by the good. nearly all the laws which were originally framed with the intention of benefiting the workers, have either turned into weapons in their enemies' hands, or become dead letters, unless the workers through their organizations have directly enforced the observance. so that in the end, it is direct action that has to be relied on anyway. as an example of getting the tarred end of a law, glance at the anti-trust law, which was supposed to benefit the people in general, and the working class in particular. about two weeks since, some union leaders were cited to answer to the charge of being trust formers, as the answer of the illinois central to its strikers. but the evil of pinning faith to indirect action is far greater than any such minor results. the main evil is that it destroys initiative, quenches the individual rebellious spirit, teaches people to rely on some one else to do for them what they should do for themselves, what they alone can do for themselves; finally renders organic the anomalous idea that by massing supineness together until a majority is acquired, then, through the peculiar magic of that majority, this supineness is to be transformed into energy. that is, people who have lost the habit of striking for themselves as individuals, who have submitted to every injustice while waiting for the majority to grow, are going to become metamorphosed into human high-explosives by a mere process of packing! i quite agree that the sources of life, and all the natural wealth of the earth, and the tools necessary to co-operative production, must become free of access to all. it is a positive certainty to me that unionism must widen and deepen its purposes, or it will go under; and i feel sure that the logic of the situation will force them to see it gradually. they must learn that the workers' problem can never be solved by beating up scabs, so long as their own policy of limiting their membership by high initiation fees and other restrictions helps to make scabs. they must learn that the course of growth is not so much along the line of higher wages, but shorter hours, which will enable them to increase membership, to take in everybody who is willing to come into the union. they must learn that if they want to win battles, all allied workers must act together, act quickly (serving no notice on bosses), and retain their freedom so to do at all times. and finally they must learn that even then (when they have a complete organization), they can win nothing permanent unless they strike for everything,--not for a wage, not for a minor improvement, but for the whole natural wealth of the earth. and proceed to the direct expropriation of it all! they must learn that their power does not lie in their voting strength, that their power lies in their ability to stop production. it is a great mistake to suppose that the wage-earners constitute a majority of the voters. wage-earners are here to-day and there to-morrow, and that hinders a large number from voting; a great percentage of them in this country are foreigners without a voting right. the most patent proof that socialist leaders know this is so, is that they are compromising their propaganda at every point to win the support of the business class, the small investor. their campaign papers proclaimed that their interviewers had been assured by wall street bond purchasers that they would be just as ready to buy los angeles bonds from a socialist as a capitalist administration; that the present milwaukee administration has been a boon to the small investor; their reading notices assure their readers in this city that we need not go to the great department stores to buy,--buy rather of so-and-so on milwaukee avenue, who will satisfy us quite as well as a "big business" institution. in short, they are making every desperate effort to win the support, and to prolong the life, of that middle-class which socialistic economy says must be ground to pieces, because they know they cannot get a majority without them. the most that a working-class party could do, even if its politicians remained honest, would be to form a strong faction in the legislatures, which might, by combining its vote with one side or the other, win certain political or economic palliatives. but what the working-class can do, when once they grow into a solidified organization, is to show the possessing classes, through a sudden cessation of all work, that the whole social structure rests on them; that the possessions of the others are absolutely worthless to them without the workers' activity; that such protests, such strikes, are inherent in the system of property, and will continually recur until the whole thing is abolished,--and having shown that, effectively, proceed to expropriate. "but the military power," says the political actionist; "we must get political power, or the military will be used against us!" against a real general strike, the military can do nothing. oh, true, if you have a socialist briand in power, he may declare the workers "public officials" and try to make them serve against themselves! but against the solid wall of an immobile working-mass, even a briand would be broken. meanwhile, until this international awakening, the war will go on as it has been going, in spite of all the hysteria which well-meaning people, who do not understand life and its necessities, may manifest; in spite of all the shivering that timid leaders have done; in spite of all the reactionary revenges that may be taken; in spite of all the capital politicians make out of the situation. it will go on because life cries to live, and property denies its freedom to live; and life will not submit. and should not submit. it will go on until that day when a self-freed humanity is able to chant swinburne's hymn of man: "glory to man in the highest, for man is the master of things." the paris commune the paris commune, like other spectacular events in human history, has become the clinging point for many legends, alike among its enemies and among its friends. indeed, one must often question which was the real commune, the legend or the fact,--what was actually lived, or the conception of it which has shaped itself in the world-mind during those forty odd years that have gone since the th of march, . it is thus with doctrines, it is thus with personalities, it is thus with events. which is the real christianity, the simple doctrine attributed to christ or the practical preaching and realizing of organized christianity? which is the real abraham lincoln,--the clever politician who emancipated the chattel slaves as an act of policy, or the legendary apostle of human liberty, who rises like a gigantic figure of iconoclastic right smiting old wrongs and receiving the martyr's crown therefor? which is the real commune,--the thing that was, or the thing our orators have painted it? which will be the influencing power in the days that are to come? our commune commemorators are wont to say, and surely they believe, that the declaration of the commune was the spontaneous assertion of independence by the parisian masses, consciously alive to the fact that the national government of france had treated them most outrageously in the matter of defense against the prussian army. they believe that the farce of the situation in which the city found itself, had opened the eyes of the general populace to the fact that the national government, so far from serving the supposed prime purpose of government, viz., as a means of defense against a foreign invader, was in reality a thing so apart from them and their interests that it preferred to leave them to the mercy of the prussians, to endangering its own supremacy by assisting in their defense, or permitting them to defend themselves. it is a pity that this legendary figure of awakened paris is not a true one. the commune, in fact, was not the work of the whole people of paris, nor of a majority of the people of paris. the commune was really established by a comparatively small number of able, nay brilliant, and supremely devoted men and women from _every_ walk in life, but with a relatively high percentage of military men, engineers, and political journalists, some of whom had time and again been in prison before for seditious writing or acts of rebellion. they flocked in from their exile in the neighboring countries, thinking that now they saw the opportunity for retrieving former errors, and arousing the people to renew and to extend the struggle of . it is true that there were also teachers, artists, designers, architects and builders, skilled craftsmen of every sort. and perhaps no chapter in the whole story is more inspiring than the description of the gatherings of the workers, which took place night after night in every quarter of the beleaguered city, previous to the th of march and thereafter. to such meetings went those who burned with fervor of faith in what the people might and would accomplish, and, with the radiant vision of a new social day shining in their eyes, endeavored to make it clear to those who listened. one almost catches the redolence of outbursting faith, that rising of the sap of hope and courage and daring, like an incense of spring; almost feels himself there, partaking in the work, the danger, the glorious, mistaken assurance which was theirs. and yet the truth must have been that these apostles of the commune were blinded by their own enthusiasm, deafened by the enthusiasm they evoked in others, to the fact that the great unvoiced majority who did not attend public meetings, who sat within their houses or kept silent in the shops, were not converted or affected by their teachings. we are told by those who should know, the survivors among the communards themselves, that the actual number of persons who were aggressive, moving spirits in the great uprising was not greatly above , . the mass of the people were, as they would probably be in this city to-day under like circumstances, indifferent as to what went on over their heads, so that the peace and quiet of their individual lives was restored, so that the siege of the prussians was raised, and themselves permitted to go about their business. if the commune could assure that, good luck to it! they were tired of the siege; and they longed for their old familiar miseries to which they were in some respect accustomed; they hardly dreamed of anything better. but, as is usually the case when strategic moments arise, these same plain, stolid, indifferent people, who neither know nor care about fine theories of political right, municipal sovereignty, and so forth, see more directly into the logic of a situation than those who have confused their minds with much theorizing. likewise the people of paris in general, when the commune had become an established fact, saw that the only consequent proceeding would be to make war economically as well as politically, to cut off any source of supply to the national army which lay within the city. instead of doing that, the government of the commune, anxious to prove itself more law-abiding than the old regime, stupidly defended the property right of its enemies, and continued to let the bank of france furnish supplies to those who were financing the army of versailles, the very army which was to cut their throats. naturally, the plain people grew disgusted with so senseless a program, and in the main took no part in the final struggle with the versailles troops, nor even opposed the idea of their entrance into the city. probably a goodly number even drew a sigh of relief at the prospect of a return to the smaller evil of the two. little enough did they dream that the way back lay through their own blood, and that they, who had never lifted hand or voice for the commune, would become its martyrs. little did they conceive the wild revenge of law and order upon rebellion, the saturnalia of restored power. did they sleep, i wonder, on the night before the th of may, when that dark thunder of vengeance was gathering to break? many slept well the next night, and still sleep; for "then began a murder grim and great,"--a murder whose painted image, even after these forty years have risen and sunk upon it, sends the blood shuddering backward, and sets the teeth in uttermost horror and hate. macmahon placarded the streets with peace and sent his troops to make it; in the name of that peace, gallifet, an incarnation of hell, set his men the example and rode up and down the streets of paris, dashing out children's brains. did a hand appear at a shutter, the window was riddled with bullets. did a cry of protest escape from any throat, the house was invaded, its inhabitants driven out, lined against the walls, and shot where they stood. the doctors and the nurses at the bedsides of the wounded, the very sick in the hospitals, themselves were slaughtered where they lay. such was macmahon's peace. after the street massacres, the organized massacres at the bastions, the stakes of satory, the huddled masses of prisoners, the grim visitor with the lantern, the ghastly call to rise and follow, the trenches dug by the condemned in the slippery, blood-soaked ground for their own corpses to fall in. thirty thousand people butchered! butchered by the sateless vengeance of authority and the insane blood-lust of the professional soldier! butchered without a pretence of reason, a shadow of inquiry, merely as the gust of insensate rage blew! after the orgy of fury, the orgy of the inquisition. the gathering of the prisoners in cellar holes, where they must squat or lie upon damp earth, and see the light daily only for some short half hour when an unexpellable sun ray shot through some unstopped crevice. the shifting of them day and night across the country, sometimes in stock yard wagons, stifled, starved, and jammed together, as even our butchering civilization is ashamed to jam pigs for the slaughter; sometimes by dreadful marches, mostly by night, often with the rain beating on them, the butts of the soldiers' muskets striking them, as they lagged through weakness or through lameness. then the detention prisons, with their long-drawn agonies of hunger, cold, vermin, and disease, and the ever-looming darkness of waiting death. follow the tortures of friends and relatives of communards or suspected communards, to make them betray the whereabouts of their friends. could they who had seen these things "forgive and forget"? they who had seen ten year old children lashed to make them tell where their fathers were? women driven mad before the terrible choice of giving up their sons who had fought, or their daughters who had not, to the brutality of the soldiery. after the tortures of the hunt, the tortures of the trials, solemn farces, cat-like cruelties. then the long hopeless line of exiles marching from the prison to the port, crowded on the transport ships, watched like caged animals, forbidden to speak, the cannon always threatening above them, and so drifted away, away to exile lands, to barren islands and fever shores--there to waste away in loneliness, in uselessness, in futile dreams of freedom that ended in chains upon the ankles or death on the coral reefs--all this was the mercy and the wisdom shown by the national government to the rebel city whose works are the glory of france, and whose beauty is the beauty of the world. whatever other lesson we have to learn, this one is certain: the glutless revenge of restored authority. if ever one rebels, let him rebel to the end; there is no hope so futile as hope in either the justice or the mercy of a power against which a rebellion has been raised. no faith so simple or so foolish as faith in the discrimination, the judgement, or the wisdom of a reconquering government. whether at that time the essential principle of the independent commune could have been realized or not, through a general response of the other cities of france by like action (in case paris had continued to maintain the struggle some months longer), i am not historian enough, nor historic prophet enough, to say. i incline to think not. but certainly the struggle would have been far other, far more fruitful in its results, both then and later, (even if finally overthrown), had it really been a movement of all those people who were so indiscriminately murdered for it, so vilely tortured, so mercilessly exiled. for had it really been the deliberate expression of a million people's will to be free, they would have seized whatever supplies were being furnished the enemy from within their own gates; they would have repudiated property rights created by the very power they were seeking to overthrow. they would have seen what was necessary, and done it. had the real communards themselves seen the logic of their own effort, and understood that to overset the political system of dependence which enslaves the communes they must overset the economic institutions which beget the centralized state; had they proclaimed a general communalization of the city's resources they might have won the people to full faith in the struggle and aroused a ten-fold effort to win out. if that again had been followed by a like contagion in the other cities of france, (which was a possibility) the flame might have caught throughout latin europe, and those countries might now be giving a practical example of the extension of a modified socialism and local autonomy. this is what is likely to happen at the next similar outbreak, if politicians are so impolitic as to provoke the like. there are those among the best social students who feel sure that such will be the course of progress. i frankly say that i cannot see the path of future progress,--my vision is not large enough, nor my viewpoint high enough. where others perhaps behold the morning sunlight, i can discern only mists--blowing dust and moving glooms which obscure the future. i do not know where the path leads nor how it goes. only when looking backward, i can catch glimpses of that long, terrible, toilsome way by which humanity has gone forward; even that i do not see clearly,--just stretches of it here and there. but i see enough of it to know that never has it been a straight, undeviating line. always the path winds and returns, and even in the moment of gaining something, there is something lost. against the onslaught of nature, man collects his social strength, and loses thereby the freedom of his more isolated condition. against the inconveniences of primitive society, he hurls his inventive genius,--compasses land, sea, and air,--and by the very act of conquering his limitations binds fresh fetters on himself, creating a wealth which he enslaves himself to produce! and this is the path of progress, which there was no foreseeing! what waits them? and what hope is there? and what help is there? what waits? the unknown waits, as it has always waited,--dark, vague, immense, impenetrable--the mystery which allures the young and strong saying, "come and cope with me"; the mystery from which the old and wise shrink back, saying, "better to endure the evils that we have than fly to others that we know not of"; the old and wise, but alas! the cold-blooded! the mystery of the still unbound strengths of earth, sun, and depths, the loosing of any one of which may so alter the face of all that has been done that what now we think a guarantee of liberty may become the very chain of slavery, as has been the case before with freedoms laboriously won by act, and then set down in words for unborn men to abide by. and yet--it waits. are you strong and courageous? the unknown invites you to the struggle, dares you to its conquering. nay, it is perhaps your future beloved, waiting to reward your daring passion with the fervors of fresh creation. are you feeble and timid of spirit? bow your head to the ground. still you must meet the future; still you must go in the track of the others. you may hinder them, you may make them lag; you cannot stop them, nor yourself. struggle waits--abortive struggle, crushed struggle, mistaken struggle, long and often. and worse than all this, _waiting waits_,--the long dead-level of inaction, when no one does anything, when even the daring can only move in self-returning circles; when no one knows what to do, except to endure the ever-tightening pressure of intolerable conditions, how to better which he knows not; when living appears a monotonous journey through a featureless wilderness, wherein the same pitiless word "useless" stares at one from every aimless path one seeks to follow in the despairing search for a way out. and happier is he who perishes in the mistaken struggle than he who, with a hot and chafing soul, but with clear discernment, sees that he is doomed to go on indefinitely in submission to the wrongs that are. what hope is there? that the increasing pressure of conditions may quicken intelligences; that even out of mistaken struggle, frustrate struggle, unforeseen good consequences may flow, just as out of undeniable improvements in material life, unforeseeable ill results are consequent. the commune hoped to free paris, and by so setting an example free many other cities. it went down in utter defeat, and no city was freed thereby. but out of this defeat the knowledge and skill of craftsmanship of its people went abroad over other lands, both into civilized centers and to wild waste places; and wherever its art went, its idea went also, so that the "commune," the idealized commune, has become a watchword through the workshops of the world, wherever there are even a few workers seeking to awaken their fellows. there are those who have definite hopes; those who think they know precisely how overwork and underwork and poverty, and all their consequences of spiritual enslavement, are to be abolished. such are they who think they can see the way of progress broad and clear through the slit in a ballot box. i fear their works will have some uncalculated consequences also, if ever they execute them; i fear their narrowly enclosed view deceives them much. climbing a hill is a different affair from voting oneself at the top. no matter: man always hopes; life always hopes. when a definite object cannot be outlined, the indomitable spirit of hope still impels the living mass to move toward something--something that shall somehow be better. what help is there? no help from outside power; no help from overhead; no help from the sky, pray to it ever so much; no help from the strong hand of wise men, nor of good men, however wise or good. such help always ends in despotism. nor yet is there help in the abnegation of generous fanatics whose efforts end in deplorable fiasco, as did the commune. help lies only in the general will of those who do the work to say how, when, and where they shall do it. the force of the lesson of the commune is that people cannot be made free who have not conceived freedom; yet through such examples they may learn to conceive it. it cannot be bestowed as a gift; it must be taken by those who want it. let us hope that those who would have given it, bought that much by their sacrifice, that they touched the unseeing eyes of the somnambulist proletariat with a light which has made them dream, at least, of waking. the mexican revolution that a nation of people considering themselves enlightened, informed, alert to the interests of the hour, should be so generally and so profoundly ignorant of a revolution taking place in their backyard, so to speak, as the people of the united states are ignorant of the present revolution in mexico, can be due only to profoundly and generally acting causes. that people of revolutionary principles and sympathies should be so, is inexcusable. it is as one of such principles and sympathies that i address you,--as one interested in every move the people make to throw off their chains, no matter where, no matter how,--though naturally my interest is greatest where the move is such as appears to me to be most in consonance with the general course of progress, where the tyranny attacked is what appears to me the most fundamental, where the method followed is to my thinking most direct and unmistakable. and i add that those of you who have such principles and sympathies are in the logic of your own being bound, first, to inform yourselves concerning so great a matter as the revolt of millions of people--what they are struggling for, what they are struggling against, and how the struggle stands--from day to day, if possible; if not, from week to week, or month to month, as best you can; and second, to spread this knowledge among others, and endeavor to do what little you can to awaken the consciousness and sympathy of others. one of the great reasons why the mass of the american people know nothing of the revolution in mexico, is, that they have altogether a wrong conception of what "revolution" means. thus ninety-nine out of a hundred persons to whom you broach the subject will say, "why, i thought that ended long ago. that ended last may"; and this week the press, even the _daily socialist,_ reports, "a _new_ revolution in mexico." it isn't a new revolution at all; it is the same revolution, which did not begin with the armed rebellion of last may, which has been going on steadily ever since then, and before then, and is bound to go on for a long time to come, if the other nations keep their hands off and the mexican people are allowed to work out their own destiny. what is _a_ revolution? and what is _this_ revolution? a revolution means some great and subversive change in the social institutions of a people, whether sexual, religious, political, or economic. the movement of the reformation was a great religious revolution; a profound alteration in human thought--a refashioning of the human mind. the general movement towards political change in europe and america about the close of the eighteenth century, was a revolution. the american and the french revolutions were only prominent individual incidents in it, culminations of the teachings of the rights of man. the present unrest of the world in its economic relations, as manifested from day to day in the opposing combinations of men and money, in strikes and bread-riots, in literature and movements of all kinds demanding a readjustment of the whole or of parts of our wealth-owning and wealth-distributing system,--this unrest is the revolution of our time, the economic _revolution,_ which is seeking social change, and will go on until it is accomplished. we are in it; at any moment of our lives it may invade our own homes with its stern demand for self-sacrifice and suffering. its more violent manifestations are in liverpool and london to-day, in barcelona and vienna to-morrow, in new york and chicago the day after. humanity is a seething, heaving mass of unease, tumbling like surge over a slipping, sliding, shifting bottom; and there will never be any ease until a rock bottom of economic justice is reached. the mexican revolution is one of the prominent manifestations of this world-wide economic revolt. it possibly holds as important a place in the present disruption and reconstruction of economic institutions, as the great revolution of france held in the eighteenth century movement. it did not begin with the odious government of diaz nor end with his downfall, any more than the revolution in france began with the coronation of louis xvi, or ended with his beheading. it began in the bitter and outraged hearts of the peasants, who for generations have suffered under a ready-made system of exploitation, imported and foisted upon them, by which they have been dispossessed of their homes, compelled to become slave-tenants of those who robbed them; and under diaz, in case of rebellion to be deported to a distant province, a killing climate, and hellish labor. it will end only when that bitterness is assuaged by very great alteration in the land-holding system, or until the people have been absolutely crushed into subjection by a strong military power, whether that power be a native or a foreign one. now the political overthrow of last may, which was followed by the substitution of one political manager for another, did not at all touch the economic situation. it promised, of course; politicians always promise. it promised to consider measures for altering conditions; in the meantime, proprietors are assured that the new government intends to respect the rights of landlords and capitalists, and exhorts the workers to be patient and--_frugal!_ frugal! yes, that was the exhortation in madero's paper to men who, when they are able to get work, make twenty-five cents a day. a man owning , , acres of land exhorts the disinherited workers of mexico to be frugal! the idea that such a condition can be dealt with by the immemorial remedy offered by tyrants to slaves, is like the idea of sweeping out the sea with a broom. and unless that frugality, or in other words, starvation, is forced upon the people by more bayonets and more strategy than appear to be at the government's command, the mexican revolution will go on to the solution of mexico's land question with a rapidity and directness of purpose not witnessed in any previous upheaval. for it must be understood that the main revolt is a revolt against the system of land tenure. the industrial revolution of the cities, while it is far from being silent, is not to compare with the agrarian revolt. let us understand why. mexico consists of twenty-seven states, two territories and a federal district about the capital city. its population totals about , , . of these, , , are of unmixed indian descent, people somewhat similar in character to the pueblos of our own southwestern states, primitively agricultural for an immemorial period, communistic in many of their social customs, and like all indians, invincible haters of authority. these indians are scattered throughout the rural districts of mexico, one particularly well-known and much talked of tribe, the yaquis, having had its fatherland in the rich northern state of sonora, a very valuable agricultural country. the indian population--especially the yaquis and the moquis--have always disputed the usurpations of the invaders' government, from the days of the early conquest until now, and will undoubtedly continue to dispute them as long as there is an indian left, or until their right to use the soil out of which they sprang _without paying tribute in any shape_ is freely recognized. the communistic customs of these people are very interesting, and very instructive too; they have gone on practising them all these hundreds of years, in spite of the foreign civilization that was being grafted upon mexico (grafted in all senses of the word); and it was not until forty years ago (indeed the worst of it not till twenty-five years ago), that the increasing power of the government made it possible to destroy this ancient life of the people. by them, the woods, the waters, and the lands were held in common. any one might cut wood from the forest to build his cabin, make use of the rivers to irrigate his field or garden patch (and this is a right whose acknowledgment none but those who know the aridity of the southwest can fully appreciate the imperative necessity for). tillable lands were allotted by mutual agreement before sowing, and reverted to the tribe after harvesting, for reallotment. pasturage, the right to collect fuel, were for all. the habits of mutual aid which always arise among sparsely settled communities were instinctive with them. neighbor assisted neighbor to build his cabin, to plough his ground, to gather and store this crop. no legal machinery existed--no taxgatherer, no justice, no jailer. all that they had to do with the hated foreign civilization was to pay the periodical rent-collector, and to get out of the way of the recruiting officer when he came around. those two personages they regarded with spite and dread; but as the major portion of their lives was not in immediate contact with them, they could still keep on in their old way of life in the main. with the development of the diaz regime, which came into power in (and when i say the diaz regime i do not especially mean the man diaz, for i think he has been both overcursed and overpraised, but the whole force which has steadily developed centralized power from then on, and the whole policy of "civilizing mexico," which was the diaz boast), with its development, i say, this indian life has been broken up, violated with as ruthless a hand as ever tore up a people by the roots and cast them out as weeds to wither in the sun. historians relate with horror the iron deeds of william the conqueror, who in the eleventh century created the new forest by laying waste the farms of england, destroying the homes of the people to make room for the deer. but his edicts were mercy compared with the action of the mexican government toward the indians. in order to introduce "progressive civilization" the diaz regime granted away immense concessions of land, to native and foreign capitalists--chiefly foreign indeed, though there were enough of native sharks as well. mostly these concessions were granted to capitalistic combinations, which were to build railroads (and in some cases did so in a most uncalled for and uneconomic way), "develop" mineral resources, or establish "modern industries." the government took no note of the ancient tribal rights or customs, and those who received the concessions proceeded to enforce their property rights. they introduced the unheard of crime of "trespass." they forbade the cutting of a tree, the breaking of a branch, the gathering of the fallen wood in the forests. they claimed the watercourses, forbidding their free use to the people; and it was as if one had forbidden to us the rains of heaven. the unoccupied land was theirs; no hand might drive a plow into the soil without first obtaining permission from a distant master--a permission granted on the condition that the product be the landlord's, a small, pitifully small, wage, the worker's. nor was this enough: in was passed "the law of unappropriated lands." by that law, not only were the great stretches of _vacant_, in the old time _common_, land appropriated, but the occupied lands themselves to _which the occupants could not show a legal title_ were to be "denounced"; that is, the educated and the powerful, who were able to keep up with the doings of the government, went to the courts and said that there was no legal title to such and such land, and put in a claim for it. and the usual hocus-pocus of legality being complied with (the actual occupant of the land being all the time blissfully unconscious of the law, in the innocence of his barbarism supposing that the working of the ground by his generations of forbears was title all-sufficient) one fine day the sheriff comes upon this hapless dweller on the heath and drives him from his ancient habitat to wander an outcast. such are the blessings of education. mankind invents a written sign to aid its intercommunication; and forthwith all manner of miracles are wrought with the sign. even such a miracle as that a part of the solid earth passes under the mastery of an impotent sheet of paper; and a distant bit of animated flesh which never even saw the ground, acquires the power to expel hundreds, thousands, of like bits of flesh, though they grew upon that ground as the trees grow, labored it with their hands, and fertilized it with their bones for a thousand years. "this law of unappropriated lands," says william archer, "has covered the country with naboth's vineyards." i think it would require a biblical prophet to describe the "abomination of desolation" it has made. it was to become lords of this desolation that the men who play the game--landlords who are at the same time governors and magistrates, enterprising capitalists seeking investments--connived at the iniquities of the diaz regime; i will go further and say devised them. the madero family alone owns some , square miles of territory; more than the entire state of new jersey. the terrazas family, in the state of chihuahua, owns , square miles; rather more than the entire state of west virginia, nearly one-half the size of illinois. what was the plantation owning of our southern states in chattel slavery days, compared with this? and the peon's share for his toil upon these great estates is hardly more than was the chattel slave's--wretched housing, wretched food, and wretched clothing. it is to slaves like these that madero appeals to be "frugal." it is of men who have thus been disinherited that our complacent fellow-citizens of anglo-saxon origin, say: "mexicans! what do you know about mexicans? their whole idea of life is to lean up against a fence and smoke cigarettes". and pray, what idea of life should a people have whose means of life in their own way have been taken from them? should they be so mighty anxious to convert their strength into wealth for some other man to loll in? it reminds me very much of the answer given by a negro employee on the works at fortress monroe to a companion of mine who questioned him good-humoredly on his easy idleness when the foreman's back was turned. "ah ain't goin' to do no white man's work, fo' ah don' get no white man's pay." but for the yaquis, there was worse than this. not only were their lands seized, but they were ordered, a few years since, to be deported to yucatan. now sonora, as i said, is a northern state, and yucatan one of the southernmost. yucatan hemp is famous, and so is yucatan fever, and yucatan slavery on the hemp plantations. it was to that fever and that slavery that the yaquis were deported, in droves of hundreds at a time, men, women and children--droves like cattle droves, driven and beaten like cattle. they died there, like flies, as it was meant they should. sonora was desolated of her rebellious people, and the land became "pacific" in the hands of the new landowners. too pacific in spots. they had not left people enough to reap the harvests. then the government suspended the deportation act, but with the provision that for every crime committed by a yaqui, five hundred of his people be deported. this statement is made in madero's own book. now what in all conscience would any one with decent human feeling expect a yaqui to do? fight! as long as there was powder and bullet to be begged, borrowed, or stolen; as long as there is a garden to plunder, or a hole in the hills to hide in! when the revolution burst out, the yaquis and other indian peoples, said to the revolutionists: "promise us our lands back, and we will fight with you." and they are keeping their word, magnificently. all during the summer they have kept up the warfare. early in september, the chihuahua papers reported a band of , yaquis in sonora about to attack el anil; a week later yaquis had seized the former quarters of the federal troops at pitahaya. this week it is reported that federal troops are dispatched to ponoitlan, a town in jalisco, to quell the indians who have risen in revolt again because their delusion that the maderist government was to restore their land has been dispelled. like reports from sinaloa. in the terrible state of yucatan, the mayas are in active rebellion; the reports say that "the authorities and leading citizens of various towns have been seized by the malcontents and put in prison." what is more interesting is, that the peons have seized not only "the leading citizens," but still more to the purpose have seized the plantations, parceled them, and are already gathering the crops for themselves. of course, it is not the pure indians alone who form the peon class of mexico. rather more than double the number of indians are mixed breeds; that is, about , , , leaving less than , , of pure white stock. the mestiza, or mixed breed population, have followed the communistic instincts and customs of their indian forbears; while from the latin side of their make-up, they have certain tendencies which work well together with their indian hatred of authority. the mestiza, as well as the indians, are mostly ignorant in book-knowledge, only about sixteen per cent. of the whole population of mexico being able to read and write. it was not within the program of the "civilizing" regime to spend money in putting the weapon of learning in the people's hands. but to conclude that people are necessarily unintelligent because they are illiterate, is in itself a rather unintelligent proceeding. moreover, a people habituated to the communal customs of an ancient agricultural life do not need books or papers to tell them that the soil is the source of wealth, and they must "get back to the land," even if their intelligence is limited. accordingly, they have got back to the land. in the state of morelos, which is a small, south-central state, but a very important one--being next to the federal district, and by consequence to the city of mexico--there has been a remarkable land revolution. general zapata, whose name has figured elusively in newspaper reports now as having made peace with madero, then as breaking faith, next wounded and killed, and again resurrected and in hiding, then anew on the warpath and proclaimed by the provisional government the arch-rebel who must surrender unconditionally and be tried by court-martial; who has seized the strategic points on both the railroads running through morelos, and who just a few days ago broke into the federal district, sacked a town, fought successfully at two or three points, with the federals, blew out two railroad bridges and so frightened the deputies in mexico city that they are clamoring for all kinds of action; this zapata, the fires of whose military camps are springing up now in guerrero, oaxaca and puebla as well, is an indian with a long score to pay, and all an indian's satisfaction in paying it. he appears to be a fighter of the style of our revolutionary marion and sumter; the country in which he is operating is mountainous, and guerilla bands are exceedingly difficult of capture; even when they are defeated, they have usually succeeded in inflicting more damage than they have received, and they always get away. zapata has divided up the great estates of morelos from end to end, telling the peasants to take possession. they have done so. they are in possession, and have already harvested their crops. morelos has a population of some , . in puebla reports in september told us that eighty leading citizens had waited on the governor to protest against the taking possession of the land by the peasantry. the troops were deserting, taking horses and arms with them. it is they no doubt who are now fighting with zapata. in chihuahua, one of the largest states, prisons have been thrown open and the prisoners recruited as rebels; a great hacienda was attacked and the horses run off, whereupon the peons rose and joined the attacking party. in sinaloa, a rich northern state--famous in the southwestern united states some years ago as the field of a great co-operative experiment in which mr. c. b. hoffman, one of the former editors of _the chicago daily socialist,_ was a leading spirit--this week's paper reports that the former revolutionary general, juan banderas, is heading an insurrection second in importance only to that led by zapata. in the southern border state of chiapas, the taxes in many places could not be collected. last week news items said that the present government had sent general paz there, with federal troops, to remedy that state of affairs. in tabasco, the peons refused to harvest the crops for their masters; let us hope they have imitated their brothers in morelos and gathered them for themselves. the maderists have announced that a stiff repressive campaign will be inaugurated at once; if we are to believe the papers, we are to believe madero guilty of the imbecility of saying, "five days after my inauguration the rebellion will be crushed." just why the crushing has to wait till five days after the inauguration does not appear. i conceive there must have been some snickering among the reactionary deputies if such an announcement was really made; and some astonished query among his followers. what are we to conclude from all these reports? that the mexican people are satisfied? that it's all good and settled? what should we think if we read that the people, not of lower but of upper, california had turned out the ranch owners, had started to gather in the field products for themselves and that the secretary of war had sent united states troops to attack some thousands of armed men (zapata has had , under arms the whole summer and that force is now greatly increased) who were defending that expropriation? if we read that in the state of illinois the farmers had driven off the tax collector? that the coast states were talking of secession and forming an independent combination? that in pennsylvania a division of the federal army was to be dispatched to overpower a rebel force of fifteen hundred armed men doing guerilla work from the mountains? that the prison doors of maryland, within hailing distance of washington city, were being thrown open by armed revoltees? should we call it a condition of peace? regard it a proof that the people were appeased? we would not: we would say that revolution was in full swing. and the reason you have thought it was all over in mexico, from last may till now, is that the chicago press, like the eastern, northern, and central press in general, has said nothing about this steady march of revolt. even _the socialist_ has been silent. now that the flame has shot up more spectacularly for the moment, they call it "a new revolution." that the papers pursue this course is partly due to the generally acting causes that produce our northern indifference, which i shall presently try to explain, and partly to the settled policy of capitalized interest in controlling its mouthpieces in such a manner as to give their present henchmen, the maderists, a chance to pull their chestnuts out of the fire. they invested some $ , , in this bunch, in the hope that they may be able to accomplish the double feat of keeping capitalist possessions intact and at the same time pacifying the people with specious promises. they want to lend them all the countenance they can, till the experiment is well tried; so they deliberately suppress revolutionary news. among the later items of interest reported by the _los angeles times_ are those which announce an influx of ex-officials and many-millioned landlords of mexico, who are hereafter to be residents of los angeles. what is the meaning of it? simply that life in mexico is not such a safe and comfortable proposition as it was, and that for the present they prefer to get such income as their agents can collect without themselves running the risk of actual residence. of course it is understood that some of this notable efflux (the supporters of reyes, for example, who have their own little rebellions in tabasco and san luis potosi this week) are political reactionists, scheming to get back the political loaves and fishes into their own hands. but most are simply those who know that their property right is safe enough to be respected by the maderist government, but that the said government is not strong enough to put down the innumerable manifestations of popular hatred which are likely to terminate fatally to themselves if they remain there. nor is all of this fighting revolutionary; not by any means. some is reactionary, some probably the satisfaction of personal grudge, much, no doubt, the expression of general turbulency of a very unconscious nature. but granting all that may be thrown in the balance, the main thing, the mighty thing, the regenerative revolution is the _reappropriation of the land by the peasants._ thousands upon thousands of them are doing it. ignorant peasants: peasants who know nothing about the jargon of land reformers or of socialists. yes: that's just the glory of it! just the fact that it is done by ignorant people; that is, people ignorant of book theories; but _not_ ignorant, not so ignorant by half, of life on the land, as the theory-spinners of the cities. their minds are simple and direct; they act accordingly. for them, there is _one way_ to "get back to the land"; i. e., to ignore the machinery of paper land-holding (in many instances they have burned the records of the title-deeds) and proceed to plough the ground, to sow and plant and gather, and _keep the product themselves_. economists, of course, will say that these ignorant people, with their primitive institutions and methods, will not develop the agricultural resources of mexico, and that they must give way before those who will so develop its resources; that such is the law of human development. in the first place, the abominable political combination, which gave away, as recklessly as a handful of soap-bubbles, the agricultural resources of mexico--gave them away to the millionaire speculators who were to _develop the country_--were the educated men of mexico. and this is what they saw fit to do with their higher intelligence and education. so the ignorant may well distrust the good intentions of educated men who talk about improvements in land development. in the second place, capitalistic land-ownership, so far from developing the land in such a manner as to support a denser population, has depopulated whole districts, immense districts. in the third place, what the economists do not say is, that the only justification for intense cultivation of the land is, that the product of such cultivation may build up the bodies of men (by consequence their souls) to richer and fuller manhood. it is not merely to pile up figures of so many million bushels of wheat and corn produced in a season; but that this wheat and corn shall first go into the stomachs of those who planted it--and in abundance; to build up the brawn and sinew of the arms that work the ground, not meanly maintaining them in a half-starved condition. and second, to build up the strength of the rest of the nation who are willing to give needed labor in exchange. but never to increase the fortunes of idlers who dissipate it. this is the purpose, and the only purpose, of tilling soil; and the working of it for any other purpose is _waste_, waste both of land and of men. in the fourth place, no change ever was, or ever can be, worked out in any society, except by the mass of the people. theories may be propounded by educated people, and set down in books, and discussed in libraries, sitting-rooms and lecture-halls; but they will remain barren, unless the people in mass work them out. if the change proposed is such that it is not adaptable to the minds of the people for whose ills it is supposed to be a remedy, then it will remain what it was, a barren theory. now the conditions in mexico have been and are so desperate that some change is imperative. the action of the peasants proves it. even if a strong military dictator shall arise, he will have to allow some provision going towards peasant proprietorship. these unlettered, but determined, people must be dealt with _now_; there is no such thing as "waiting till they are educated up to it." therefore the wisdom of the economists is wisdom out of place--rather, _relative unwisdom_. the people never _can_ be educated, if their conditions are to remain what they were under the diaz regime. bodies and minds are both too impoverished to be able to profit by a spread of theoretical education, even if it did not require unavailable money and indefinite time to prepare such a spread. whatever economic change is wrought, then, must be such as the people in their present state of comprehension can understand and make use of. and we see by the reports what they understand. they understand they have a right upon the soil, a right to use it for themselves, a right to drive off the invader who has robbed them, to destroy landmarks and title-deeds, to ignore the taxgatherer and his demands. and however primitive their agricultural methods may be, one thing is sure; that they are more economical than any system which heaps up fortunes by destroying men. moreover, who is to say how they may develop their methods once they have a free opportunity to do so? it is a common belief of the anglo-saxon that the indian is essentially lazy. the reasons for his thinking so are two: under the various tyrannies and robberies which white men in general, and anglo-saxons in particular (they have even gone beyond the spaniard) have inflicted upon indians, there is no possible reason why an indian should want to work, save the idiotic one that work in itself is a virtuous and exalted thing, even if by it the worker increases the power of his tyrant. as william archer says: "if there are men, _and this is not denied_, who work for no wage, and with no prospect or hope of any reward, it would be curious to know by what motive other than the lash or the fear of the lash, they are induced to go forth to their labor in the morning." the second reason is, that an indian really has a different idea of what he is alive for than an anglo-saxon has. and so have the latin peoples. this different idea is what i meant when i said that the mestiza have certain tendencies inherited from the latin side of their make-up which work well together with their indian hatred of authority. the indian likes to _live_; to be his own master; to work when he pleases and stop when he pleases. he does not crave many things, but he craves the enjoyment of the things that he has. he feels himself more a part of nature than a white man does. all his legends are of wanderings with nature, of forests, fields, streams, plants, animals. he wants to live with the same liberty as the other children of earth. his philosophy of work is, work so as to live care-free. this is not laziness; this is sense--to the person who has that sort of make-up. your latin, on the other hand, also wants to live; and having artistic impulses in him, his idea of living is very much in gratifying them. he likes music and song and dance, picture-making, carving, and decorating. he doesn't like to be forced to create his fancies in a hurry; he likes to fashion them, and admire them, and improve and refashion them, and admire again; and all for the fun of it. if he is ordered to create a certain design or a number of objects at a fixed price in a given time, he loses his inspiration; the play becomes work, and hateful work. so he, too, does not want to work, except what is requisite to maintain himself in a position to do those things that he likes better. your anglo-saxon's idea of life, however, is to create the useful and the profitable--whether he has any use or profit out of it or not--and to keep busy, busy; to bestir himself "like the devil in a holy water font." like all other people, he makes a special virtue of his own natural tendencies, and wants all the world to "get busy"; it doesn't so much matter to what end this business is to be conducted, provided the individual--_scrabbles_. whenever a true anglo-saxon seeks to enjoy himself, he makes work out of that too, after the manner of a certain venerable english shopkeeper who in company with his son visited the louvre. being tired out with walking from room to room, consulting his catalogue, and reading artists' names, he dropped down to rest; but after a few moments rose resolutely and faced the next room, saying, "well, alfred, we'd better be getting through our work." there is much question as to the origin of the various instincts. most people have the impression that the chief source of variation lies in the difference in the amount of sunlight received in the native countries inhabited of the various races. whatever the origin is, these are the broadly marked tendencies of the people. and "business" seems bent not only upon fulfilling its own fore-ordained destiny, but upon making all the others fulfill it too. which is both unjust and stupid. there is room enough in the world for the races to try out their several tendencies and make their independent contributions to the achievements of humanity, without imposing them on those who revolt at them. granting that the population of mexico, if freed from this foreign "busy" idea which the government imported from the north and imposed on them with such severity in the last forty years, would not immediately adopt improved methods of cultivation, even when they should have free opportunity to do so, still we have no reason to conclude that they would not adopt so much of it as would fit _their_ idea of what a man is alive for; and if that actually proved good, it would introduce still further development. so that there would be a natural, and therefore solid, economic growth which would stick; while a forced development of it through the devastation of the people is no true growth. the only way to make it go, is to kill out the indians altogether, and transport the "busy" crowd there, and then keep on transporting for several generations, to fill up the ravages the climate will make on such an imported population. the indian population of our states was in fact dealt with in this murderous manner. i do not know how grateful the reflection may be to those who materially profited by its extermination; but no one who looks forward to the final unification and liberation of man, to the incorporation of the several goodnesses of the various races in the one universal race, can ever read those pages of our history without burning shame and fathomless regret. i have spoken of the meaning of revolution in general; of the meaning of the mexican revolution--chiefly an agrarian one; of its present condition. i think it should be apparent to you that in spite of the electoral victory of the now ruling power, it has not put an end even to the armed rebellion, and cannot, until it proposes some plan of land restoration; and that it not only has no inward disposition to do, but probably would not dare to do, in view of the fact that immense capital financed it into power. as to what amount of popular sentiment was actually voiced in the election, it is impossible to say. the dailies informed us that in the federal district where there are , , voters, the actual vote was less than , . they offered no explanation. it is impossible to explain it on the ground that we explain a light vote in our own communities, that the people are indifferent to public questions; for the people of mexico are not now _indifferent_, whatever else they may be. two explanations are possible: the first, and most probable, that of _governmental_ intimidation; the second, that the people are convinced of the uselessness of voting as a means of settling their troubles. in the less thickly populated agricultural states, _this is_ very largely the case; they are relying upon direct revolutionary action. but although there was guerilla warfare in the federal district, even before the election, i find it unlikely that more than half the voting population there abstained from voting out of conviction, though i should be glad to be able to believe they did. however, madero and his aids are in, as was expected; the question is, how will they stay in? as diaz did, and in no other way--if they succeed in developing diaz's sometime ability; which so far they are wide from having done, though they are resorting to the most vindictive and spiteful tactics in their persecution of the genuine revolutionists, wherever such come near their clutch. to this whole turbulent situation three outcomes are possible: . a military dictator must arise, with sense enough to make some substantial concessions, and ability enough to pursue the crushing policy ably; or . the united states must intervene in the interests of american capitalists and landholders, in case the peasant revolt is not put down by the maderist power. and that will be the worst thing that can possibly happen, and against which every worker in the united states should protest with all his might; or . the mexican peasantry will be successful, and freedom in land become an actual fact. and that means the death-knell of great land-holding in this country also, for what people is going to see its neighbor enjoy so great a triumph, and sit on tamely itself under landlordism? whatever the outcome be, one thing is certain: it is a _great_ movement, which all the people of the world should be eagerly watching. yet as i said at the beginning, the majority of our population know no more about it than of a revolt on the planet jupiter. first because they are so, so, _busy_; they scarcely have time to look over the baseball score and the wrestling match; how _could_ they read up on a revolution! second, they are supremely egotistic and concerned in their own big country with its big deeds--such as divorce scandals, vice-grafting, and auto races. third, they do not read spanish, and they have an ancient hostility to all that smells spanish. fourth, from our cradles we were told that whatever happened in mexico was a joke. revolutions, or rather rebellions, came and went, about like april showers, and they never meant anything serious. and in this indeed there was only too much truth--it was usually an excuse for one place-hunter to get another one's scalp. and lastly, as i have said, the majority of our people do not know that a revolution means a fundamental change in social life, and not a spectacular display of armies. it is not much a few can do to remove this mountain of indifference; but to me it seems that every reformer, of whatever school, should wish to watch this movement with the most intense interest, as a practical manifestation of a wakening of the landworkers themselves to the recognition of what all schools of revolutionary economics admit to be the primal necessity--the social repossession of the land. and whether they be victorious or defeated, i, for one, bow my head to those heroic strugglers, no matter how ignorant they are, who have raised the cry land and liberty, and planted the blood-red banner on the burning soil of mexico. thomas paine to speak of thomas paine is to mention in one breath daring tempered by judgment, courage both mental and physical, foresight and prudence coupled with unstinted generosity, patience and endurance for the long race, constancy to the unwon ideal, that superior power over men, conferred by no extrinsic dictum, typified best perhaps by the loadstone, which always bursts forth in times of revolution from the unexpected place, the unbought and the unsought glory of the man who is a hero because a hero is required and does not measure his services nor reckon on their reward; not that he underrates himself; (it is as impossible as it is undesirable that a powerful personality should not know itself as such) but simply that in the moment of decisions the value of self is abandoned. so far as any or all of these qualities are concerned thomas paine is a name for them all, in their highest expression. and one feels in approaching him that there is something like treason in paying him any but a perfect tribute. yet such is the position into which i am forced,--to say less than i should, less than i would had not words and the art of using them almost failed me. i do not like lecturers who come before the public with apologies, nor do i propose to make any; i simply say this to let you know that i shall feel, perhaps more keenly than any of you, my failure to do paine justice. for the half century that his history has been being unmined from the cellar of calumny and filth that the orthodox had cast upon it, unmined chiefly by small groups of freethinkers scattered here and there and spreading his words among men, like the little foxes with the firebrands going in among the corn, the principal endeavor has been to establish paine's reputation as a great reformer in religion. and such he undoubtedly was. whoever reads his "age of reason" in anything but a spirit of predisposition against it, must feel this, however much he may disagree with paine's criticism, or consider that he has come short in his constructive philosophy. and it is meet, too, that the book that cost him most, both before and after death, should be the one selected for defense. nevertheless the effect has been rather to lose sight of what appear to me greater thoughts and acts. for just as the orthodox have forgotten, so have many freethinkers forgotten, his immense labors in the field of active struggle against the domination of man by man. it is true that his mind did not transcend the mental vesture of the time, and it was all the better in one of his marvelous capacities for _swinging_ masses of men that it did not. the lonely heralds of the opening dawn go upon their paths solitary; no matter how much they desire to draw others with them, they cannot. and had paine been one of these that break through the forms of thought such as was copernicus, or kant, or darwin, he would have been at constant war with himself. half his nature would have chosen the lonely path; the other half, the zealot, the propagandist, would have cried out, they _must_ go with me; i must do something to make them _go with_ me. now the secret of paine's success was that he was so thoroughly at one with himself, he believed so utterly what he preached, he had faith, he hoped, and so strongly that others were drawn to believe and to hope. for spite of all intellectual pride this is the man whom we love and admire; this is the man who overcomes us, who gets his way; this man consistent in himself, who has a remedy for the world's wrongs and hopes _everything_ from it! from the point of vantage of years' experience it is seen that paine's political creed, like his religious one, will no longer fit. but that does not matter. neither will ours fit in a hundred years, and none of us, no, not one, is great enough to foresee where the misfit will arise. it is not our business to bear the evils of the thrice unborn upon our necks; nor was it paine's to bear ours. yet while not claiming for him the prophetic gift, it is still true that he did see the moral patchwork in our constitution, the trouble of brewing, and the greater trouble of ' -' . when he first came to this country he wrote a number of contributions to the _pennsylvania magazine_, in one of which he pleaded justice for the negro, basing his plea then as always upon the natural equality of man irrespective of color. afterwards when the constitution was framed, he objected that nothing had been done for the negro, and in his letters to the american people, written after his imprisonment in france, in which the constitution was caustically reviewed, he cries out again for this yoked man not yet to be freed for more than half a hundred years,--foreseeing that nothing good can in the end come from slavery, that every evil must bring a compensating evil. the soldiers' graves in the national cemeteries, the thousands of limping, haggard tatters and rags of white men attest how well paine foresaw time's revenges. in the letter to washington, partially unjust as it is in view of the fact that gouverneur morris and not washington was responsible for the failure to save paine from prison in france, as we now know, thanks to moncure conway, but which paine did _not_ know,--in this letter, i say, will be found the most terrible arraignment of the constitution ever penned. we who are anarchists are called traitors for much calmer talk. yet here was the man "whose pen had done more for the revolution than washington's sword," as his bitterest enemy declared; who believed heart and soul in the republic, who had given his money and his substance and taken the chances of his life in battle for it; the man whose devotion to america could not be gainsaid; this man declared that the american constitution was the mirror of the most vicious features of the british constitution, a fecund soil for monopolies with all their ills. it is we who experience those ills, we who know what a gigantic tool of oppression the constitution and the cumbersome machinery of the lawmaking power have become. yet probably even we do not feel so keenly as he the fatal blunder; for while we know how it grinds us in our flesh and souls, rears its prisons and scaffolds for us, we have had the yoke about our necks always,--while he _had once seen_ the country free. he had been through all the battle, had fought his fight and won his victory, only to see it lost through cowardice of thought. that was indeed bitter; and it is that bitter outcry against this sacrifice which marks paine out among most of his time for influence on future history. the fact that he was the initiator of the direct movement for political independence in america, in the famous meeting where adams, franklin and washington all shrank from uttering the thought heavy upon their souls, is a matter of past history. the fact that he was the one man in america to write the right thing at the right time, his voice the wind to sweep the scattering flames of insubordination and revolt into the conflagration of revolution; the fact that he proposed and headed with the whole contents of his purse the subscription to save the army when even washington was in despair at the prospect of mutiny and desertion among the soldiers; the fact that he raised all the feeling possible against the fiction of divine rights and so got himself hunted out of england; the fact that he took the most active part possible in aiding the work of the french revolutionists, which he believed would be the beginning of the breakdown of monarchy throughout europe and the building up either of one universal continental republic or a confederation of sister republics; the fact that he was the one man in the convention who dared to stand for the life of louis the xvi, and thereby got himself suspected, thrown into prison, and condemned to death--all these facts are of import in reading the character of the man, and in comprehending the record of those days when they were making history fast. yet none of these has so much influence upon the demands of to-day as the voice of discontent crying for eternal vigilance, which sounds through these almost unknown letters. these are the things which it will pay to reprint in the day when american liberty feels in its tomb the first stirrings of the resurrection. did we like paine believe in god, we might say "pray god it may not be far away." such are the characters whose historic influence is greatest; they who hew, and hew hard to the line laid down for them by the events of their time; yet are not blinded by the stir and roll of things; who see clearly where the deflection from the line is likely to occur, and where it will lead; who raise the warning treble that goes shrilling to the future, startling, waking with its eerie cry custom-dulled ears, and sodden souls, who start to ask, was it not a ghost of the revolution? in that day which may not be so distant as we fear, paine will be more alive than ever; he will be watching at a million firesides with the old keen, strong eyes. while i have deprecated the fact that the religious reformer has been exalted to the neglect of the political one, i cannot omit that part of his life-work so well-known to all, yet never old. the "age of reason" has long been both exaggerated and despised as an iconoclastic work. but we are indebted to conway, the greatest of paine students, who out of the many biographies he has written has chosen that of paine to be the master-piece of his life (and it is a work which any author might be proud to regard his master-piece), to him i say we are indebted for a different view of the "age of reason." i know not whether mr. conway's own unitarian bias may not have influenced him; it is possible. it is possible that his eager search for positivism may have unconsciously determined his attitude towards the great hero, and modified his interpretation of paine's words. i believe it has; because i believe _that_ is inevitable. i believe we read our own ideals into other people, and must do so if we think at all. but making all allowance for the biographer's prejudgment, conway has still a magnificent argument for putting paine in the defendant's position. we are no longer to view the book as an attack upon religion but as its defense,--the defense of what is beneficial, permanent, necessary, in the religious element of human nature against the scribes and pharisees on the one hand and the philistines on the other. it was the plea for the redemption of the edifice from the dirt and cobwebs, the protest against smashing the stones to kill the spiders. the great prerequisite to the understanding of the "age of reason" is an acquaintance with the literature of that time--especially french literature. the pamphlets, periodicals, and books are the crystals wherein _the zeitgeist_ of the th century is preserved. without this acquaintance we cannot realize how the people continually thought, and what was new and what was old, what was acceptable and what unacceptable to them. and we shall find by it that the fashion of sneering popularized by voltaire, and so admirably embodied by the _finesse_ of the french language (always a language of double meanings and hemi-demi-semi-shaded insinuations), the still more reprehensible habit of deducing immense generals from very scanty particulars, or in fact contriving the generals first and then fitting in or suavely waiving the particulars altogether, had so permeated not only french philosophy, but the heads of the common people as well, that religion had become almost a byword, a baseless superstition unaccounted for by, and unnecessary according to, the all-accepted theory of natural law. to defend it, to maintain that there was something else in it, was equivalent to pleading for the life of the king before the convention! that was to maintain that there were claims of the human--after the king had been stripped; this was to say that underneath the gewgaws and tinsel of religions the undying heart of man, the man of all the past, had been expressing its noblest aspirations. and paine stripped off the tinsel and said, "put your hand here,--it beats"; and because he tore the tinsel, the orthodox would have stoned him; and because he said "it beats," the philosophers would have whetted the knife. and between the two he stood firm, proclaiming what he believed, not counting the cost. we may not believe as he; most of us do not. but that is the man we love: who has something in him superior to the judgments of men; who holds steadfast--steadfast even in persecution, even to death. perhaps there is no more pathetic thing than the last years, the death, and the burial of paine. the world would have been poorer had he died sooner; but to him, to the man, the gun-shot or the guillotine had been kinder than the unhappy life rejected by the nation he had given all to free, shunned by political cowards and persecuted by religious bigots,--even on his death-bed. but though so lonely, so pathetically lonely, there is something that sends a fine, cold thrill along the nerves in that strange procession and burial--that poor procession, that procession of the hicksite quaker, the two negroes, the widowed frenchwoman and her son. i wonder what sort of day it was; whether the sun shone or the clouds lowered over the solitary grave on the little farm, when margaret bonneville said to her child, "stand you there at his feet, for france; and i will here, for america." i do not know where the negroes and the hicksite stood when that august corpse was lowered to the depths, but there, close, somewhere, stood the unfreed race, for whom he had vainly plead, and there, close, somewhere, the soul's revolt at spiritual masters. and from that tomb there went away the scattering fires, of the risen ghost, the ' living paine, the grand reality. dyer d. lum (february , --april , ) one of the silent martyrs whose graves are trodden to the level by their fellows' feet, almost before it is seen that they have fallen, completed his martyrdom one year ago to-night. there are thousands of such, why then commemorate this one? let our answer be that in this one we commemorate all the others, and if we have chosen his day and name, it is because his genius, his work, his character was one of those rare gems produced in the great mine of suffering and flashing backward with all its changing lights the hopes, the fears, the gaieties, the griefs, the dreams, the doubts, the loves, the hates, the sum of that which is buried, low down there, in the human mine. no more modest a man than dyer d. lum ever lived; partly, nay mostly, indeed, it was inborn, instinctive; but it was also fostered by his conception of life, which led him to consider self as the veriest of soap-bubbles, a thing to be dispelled by the merest whiff of wind, so to speak; and therefore, personal recognition or personal gain as the most silly, as well as unworthy, of motives. for this reason his works have often gone where his name did not, and thousands of persons have been influenced by his logic and his sentiments who never heard of his personality. indeed there were some of us who wondered when he died, what certain labor leaders would henceforth do for a cheap scribe to furnish them brains. i have often heard him quote as his motto, both for organization and for literary effort, the expressive sentence: "_get in your work._" "let fools take the credit if they want it," was the implication of his tone, and i shall never forget the delightful smile with which he repeated charles mackay's lines, most singularly transposing the author's meaning: "grub little moles----." he took an especial pleasure in grubbing, and smiling when a streak of sunlight fell on some one else. i have said that this distinguishing characteristic, so fruitful in results in his later life, was partly instinctive and partly a philosophic conviction. the instinctive side may be best understood by a brief sketch of his ancestry. it is generally complained that the troublesome people who are never satisfied to let society alone, must necessarily be foreigners; at least they can never belong to the same nation as we, the good, the respectable. the easy method of laying everything pestilent to the charge of the foreigner, will not serve a conservative american against dyer d. lum. the first of the lums to set foot in this country was samuel l., a scotchman, in the year . they rooted in new england soil, and at the time of the revolution, dyer's great grandfather was a minute-man in the very town, northampton, where his own corpse was laid a year ago. on the maternal side the tappan family were also revolutionists, and back of revolutionists reformationists in the days of queen elizabeth, and still back of that, crusaders. all this would be important enough and indeed even distinguishing, were i relating it by way of "gilding refined gold"; but they acquire meaning the moment we regard them as data for a character. they are fraught with mysterious symbolism, and he himself becomes a symbol of the deep-rooted faith of humanity, when we see that subterranean stream of blood running from jerusalem through europe and across the sea to america. it shows how profound is the well-spring of devotion to cause in the human heart; through how many centuries the spirit of rebellion lives. but what, say you, had it to do with his instinctive modesty? this: _the devotee of a cause is never the devotee of self_. now as to his philosophic convictions, it would be easy to deliver a whole lecture upon them; and unfortunately his profoundest work on that subject has not yet been printed. of course, i can present them but briefly. i must preface that, as you will no doubt observe later on, his beliefs were in his own case a plain testimony to their own correctness. it sounds ridiculous to say that a thing can prove itself; but you will understand me when i explain that he regarded the conscious life of man, which includes, of course, his processes of reasoning and therefore his philosophy, as the merest fragment of him; that this process itself, which we are wont so fondly to consider as setting us higher than the brute, is but an upgrowth of our instincts. man, the race man, psychologically as well as bodily, might be likened to a tree, which every year adds small new growths whose bright green verdure opens to the sunlight, while below and supporting them quivers the great dark green mass of the tree, which year after year repeats itself, whispering in its shadows the old whispers of the centuries. the new verdure would represent the conscious life and growth of individuals, budding upward in response to the conditions surrounding them and adding what tiny mite they may to the experience of the race; but beneath and through, and all about them rustle the traditions of the dead--dead as individuals, but living, more potently living than ever, in the great trunk and branches of unconscious, or instinctive life. and as the shape of the newly budding leaf, the shade of its green, the length of its stem, its size, are determined more by the nature of the tree than by surrounding circumstances, so the philosophy of the individual is determined by the instinctive life of the race. the winter of death comes; the individual withers like the leaf; but the small item of growth that he has added is there, brown and barren though the twig appear. from him new buds will shoot, though its own leaves hereafter rustle in the deep green shadows of unconsciousness. as time passes away useless boughs wither and die, and are stricken utterly from the life of the race; such are the worthless lives, the abnormal growths, which no longer add anything either to the beauty or the service of the whole. or, to adopt one of comrade lum's own figures, the useless or brutish elements in man slowly sink down like sediment deposited by the moving current. now, in a case where we are able to trace a strain of blood as far back as this of his, and further are able to look at the conscious work of the man, and see that the one was the offspring of the other, modified of course by circumstances, we are able to make the seemingly absurd statement that the belief proves its own correctness. let me particularize concerning this belief. first he was in all his writings the advocate of resistance, the champion of rebellion. but long before he had reduced the matter to a syllogism, he was a resistant in fact. what else could you expect from the crusader, the reformationist, the revolutionist? it might be said by the people who believe in the supreme influence of circumstances, that it was his social environment which made him such--that given the ideal social order and he would have been as mild a pacificator as jesus: which is equivalent to saying that given the outward circumstances and an ear of wheat will grow from a seed corn. lum was the resistant, the man of action; the man who while scarcely more than a boy, enlisted as a volunteer in the th new york infantry to fight a cause he then deemed just; who being taken prisoner, twice effected his escape; who sick of the inaction of superiors, while a third-time prisoner waiting to be exchanged, took his exchange in his own hands, at the risk of death for desertion, and within a month re-enlisted in the cavalry, where by sheer force of daring he rose from private to captain; the man who smashed the idol of the greenback movement, sooner than let him betray its voters, reckless himself of the rebound of hate from the politicians; the man who cast all business prospects and journalistic hopes aside as so much chaff, when he picked up the fallen banner of the fight in chicago, by editing the paper of albert parsons, then in prison and doomed to die; the man who could say to his well-beloved friend, when that friend asked him whether he should petition governor oglesby for his life, knowing that that petition would be granted, the man who, under these circumstances could say: "die, parsons"; the man who poor, defeated, dirty, ragged, hungry, could proudly refuse the proffered hand of the then king of the labor movement, that king who had kept his kingdom by repudiating the martyrs of chicago from the limitless height of one soul over another, answer "there's blood on it, powderly"; the man who faced a public audience to defend the shooting of frick by alexander berkman, a few days after the occurrence, because he felt that when another has done a thing which you approve as leading in the direction of your own aspirations, it is your duty to share the effects of the counterblast his action may have provoked; the man who seized the unknown monster, death, with a smile on his lips--all of this man was germinating in the child of the pious home who even when a mere boy had dared jehovah. having "weighed him, tried him, found him naught," he threw the jewish god and cosmogony overboard with as much equanimity as he would have eaten his dinner, and set about finding a more reasonable explanation of phenomena. in this, as in all other matters, the man of action has a certain advantage over a pure theorist, which is this: he plunges immediately into the conflict, he throws the gauntlet, rashly sometimes, but boldly; he settles the question at once; if there is any suffering attached to the attempt, he suffers once and has done with it; while the theorist, the fellow who walks tiptoe round the edge of the battle-field, dies a hundred times and still suffers on. my own conversion from orthodoxy to freethought was of this latter sort. i never dared god; i always tried to propitiate him with prayers and tears even while i was doubting his existence; i suffered hell a thousand times while i was wondering where it was located. but my teacher winked at the heavens, braved hell, and then tossed the whole affair aside with a joke. nevertheless, he did not, as nearly all of our modern image-breakers have done, deny all religions in their entirety, because he had run a lance through a stuffed mumbo-jumbo. indeed, the spirit of devotion to something greater than self, which will be found as the kernel of every religion, was so thoroughly in him, or indeed _was_ he himself that whether he fancied himself _willing_ it or not, his inclinations directed all his conscious efforts to read the riddle of life into the channel of buddhism. i do not know whether he ever accepted its peculiarly fanciful side or not; but if he did, it was early corrected by a no less characteristic trait, also an inheritance of the tappan family, that of critical analysis. an omnivorous reader, he was always abreast of the times in matters of scientific discovery; and his inexorable logic would never have permitted him to retain a creed which necessitated any doctoring of facts; he rather doctored the creed to fit the facts and thus evolved a species of modern buddhism which he called "evolutional ethics," whose principles may be briefly stated as follows: man is the continuation of the process of evolution up to date. he is thus united to all other products of evolution, and is governed by the same laws. the two factors which determine form in the organic world are _adaptation_ and _inheritance_; and since evolution is no less a matter of psychology than physiology, the soul of man as well as the soul of animals and plants, must be moulded by these factors. that inheritance tends to crystallize existing forms, while _adaptation_, or the influence of environment, ever tends to modification of forms, whether physical or intellectual. that mind as much as body is unconscious, so far as there is perfect adaptation to surroundings; and that only when inharmony of the organism with the environment as the result of change in the latter, arises, can there be _consciousness_. that this consciousness is a state of pain, more or less sharply defined; and will continue to increase in intensity until the necessary adaptation is accomplished, when _as a result_ a feeling of satisfaction or pleasure will ensue, gradually sinking into the blissful unconsciousness of perfect harmony. that progress thus demands this stepping constantly up the rough stairway of pain; and that not even one step is passed until moistened by the blood of many generations. that the path up the mountain side is not laid out _by_ us, but _for_ us, and that we _must_ travel there whether it pleases us or not. that the chances are it will _not_ please us; that our whole lives, in so far as they are conscious, will probably be one record of never achieved struggle; and that rest will come only when we descend to the unconsciousness of death. thus he was a pessimist of the darkest hue; and yet he never wasted a moment's regret on the facts. he watched this passing spectre man, gliding among the whirling dance of atoms, contemplated his final extinction with composure, sneered at metaphysicians while he himself was buried in metaphysics, and cracked jokes either at his own expense or somebody else's. the result of all this speculation was the conclusion that man, being a social animal, must adapt himself to social ends (not determined by him but for him--unconsciously); that therefore the one who sets himself and his egotistic desires against the social ideal is the supreme traitor. he had a peculiar power of expressing volumes in an epithet; and the epithet he gave to the egoist was "dung-beetle." for the sake of those who may not be familiar with the insect referred to, i may explain that a dung-beetle is a sort of bug that exhibits its instincts by rolling a ball of dung, and who sometimes appears to meditate when he rolls over the ball that the universe has turned bottom up--because he has. now, it is well known that the greater part of the reform camp--particularly the anarchistic camp--is made up of dung-beetles, i mean of egoists; people who declare that the desire for pleasure is the motive of action, who think a great deal of their egos and don't care a rap for society. the result was they sharpened their pencils and wrote scathing editorials denouncing him. to which he answered never a word. first, because he didn't consider himself worth fighting about; and second, if he had, he was altogether too good a general to do it. his opponents were a disputatious sort, who liked nothing better than argument; he knew what his enemy wanted and _didn't do it_. but when a question worth discussing arose, then woe to those who had courted the rapier of his wit, or challenged to duel with the diamond-tipped dagger of his sarcasm. he could answer columns with a paragraph. i do not know whether this philosophy of his had crystallized in his own mind before he became an anarchist or not. i believe, however, it had not; i think it grew along with his other conceptions, being broadened and corrected, and in turn broadening and correcting his thought in other channels. but at any rate, fully developed or not, it certainly influenced his conclusions on economic subjects greatly. true to his instincts he was always at the front of battle, and when the war closed his first move was to attach himself to the greenback party, the first widespread expression of organized protest against monopoly of the means of production in america. he still had faith in the saving grace of politics, and was active enough in the agitation to be nominated for lieut. governor of massachusetts with wendell phillips for governor. the fight, which besides being a demand for fiat money, embodied a short-hour movement, took on a national character; and dyer d. lum with five others, including albert r. parsons, was appointed on a committee to push the matter before congress. this was in . six years later, time and the tide had driven both of them into the great current of socialism, and final repudiation of politics as a means of attaining socialistic ideals. and here came in the philosophy of the unconscious. the socialization of industry was the next step up the mountain side, not because men wished or planned it; but the pressure of surroundings made it the only possible move; but on the other hand the reactionary, system-building socialism advocated by the great master marx, and all his train of little repeaters, was seen to be at variance with a no less marked feature of the evolving social ideal, viz., elasticity, mobility, constantly increasing differentiation; which is only possible when units of society are left free to adapt themselves to the slightest changes, unforced by the opinions of other people who know nothing of the matters in question, but who, being in the majority (for where is ignorance not in the majority?) could suppress the free movements of the minority by enacting their ignorance into laws. thus it will be seen that he looked forward to free socialism as the industrial ideal; the requirements of that ideal are laid down in his "economics of anarchy." a few of his caustic sentences may here be quoted: "the statist assumes that rights increase in some metaphysical manner, and become incarnate in half the whole plus one." "politics discovers wisdom by taking a general poll of ignorance." "every appeal to legislation to do aught but _undo_ is as futile as sending a flag of truce to the enemy for munitions of war." "when caesar conquered greece, he subjugated olympus, and the gods now measure tape behind counters with christian decorum." lum had faith in humankind. he always trusted the people; the people that maligned him, the people that injured him, the people that killed him. when i asked him once why he did not get angry at an individual who industriously circulated lies about him, he answered with a twinkling laugh, "for the same reason that i don't kick the house-cat." and yet he had an abiding faith in that man, and other similar men, to work out the judgments of the human race, undisturbed by the fact that they let their only honest leaders die in garrets. and underneath the speculative philosopher who confused you with long words; underneath the cold logician who mercilessly scouted at sentiment; underneath the pessimistic poet that sent the mournful cry of the whip-poor-will echoing through the widowed chambers of the heart, that hung and sung over the festival walls of life the wreaths and dirges of death; underneath the gay joker who delighted to play tricks on politicians, police and detectives; was the man who took the children on his knees and told them stories while the night was falling, the man who gave up a share of his own meagre meals to save five blind kittens from drowning; the man who lent his arm to a drunken washerwoman whom he did not know, and carried her basket for her, that she might not be arrested and locked up; the man who gathered four-leafed clovers and sent them to his friends, wishing them "all the luck which superstition attached to them"; the man whose heart was beating with the great common heart, who was one with the simplest and the poorest. lum held that evolutional ethics, or anarchist ethics, in fact, must take account of both the altruistic and egoistic impulses; that while determining causes will ever lie in the mysterious realm of the unconscious life, consciousness may discern the trend of development and throw in its quota of influence for or against. that in its endeavor to comprehend the trend of development, it should take fair account of ancient truths, however enveloped in superstitious husks; should aim to extract the virtue even in the much mistaken altruistic doctrines of vicarious atonement and personal abasement; and while emphasizing the negation of human rulership as destructive of the possibilities of true growth, at the same time to acknowledge the vain conceit of self as anything more than a temporary grouping of instinct developed in beast, in plant, in man; to acknowledge the individual creature as a sort of mirrored reflection of the cosmos, constantly shifting, now scintillant, now vague and evanescent, now gone forever as death breaks the mirror. the notion of immortality which grows from such a conception of self is purged of the old vain conceit. it has been most beautifully voiced in george eliot's "choir invisible," mr. lum's favorite poem; and in the lines is expressed the last great limitless shadow which engulfs even this immortality, the blind, tremendous darkness which lies at the end of all, the sense of the invincibility of which must have lain upon our teacher's soul when after the last searching, inexplicable, farewell look into a friend's eyes he went out into the april night and took his last walk in the roar of the great city--he who should soon be so silent! most of his comrades were surprised. they said: "i never thought dyer d. lum would go alone." but i who know how often and how wearily he said "what's the use," am sure that that mocking question lay at his heart, and paralyzed the _will_ to do. like olive schreiner's stars in the african farm, the soul about to depart sees the earth so coldly--all the ages are as one night--and like them he watches little helpless creatures of the earth come out and crawl awhile upon its skin, then go back beneath it, and it does not matter--nothing matters. francisco ferrer in all unsuccessful social upheavals there are two terrors: the red--that is, the people, the mob; the white--that is, the reprisal. when a year ago to-day the lightning of the white terror shot out of that netherest blackness of social depth, the spanish torture house, and laid in the ditch of montjuich a human being who but a moment before had been the personification of manhood, in the flower of life, in the strength and pride of a balanced intellect, full of the purpose of a great and growing undertaking,--that of the modern schools,--humanity at large received a blow in the face which it could not understand. stunned, bewildered, shocked, it recoiled and stood gaping with astonishment. how to explain it? the average individual--certainly the average individual in america--could not believe it possible that any group of persons calling themselves a government, let it be of the worst and most despotic, could slay a man for being a teacher, a teacher of modern sciences, a builder of hygienic schools, a publisher of text-books. no: they could not believe it. their minds staggered back and shook refusal. it was not so; it could not be so. the man was shot,--that was sure. he was dead, and there was no raising him out of the ditch to question him. the spanish government had certainly proceeded in an unjustifiable manner in court-martialing him and sentencing him without giving him a chance at defense. but surely he had been guilty of something; surely he must have rioted, or instigated riot, or done some desperate act of rebellion; for never could it be that in the twentieth century a country of europe could kill a peaceful man whose aim in life was to educate children in geography, arithmetic, geology, physics, chemistry, singing, and languages. no: it was not possible!--and, for all that, it was possible; it was done, on the th of october, one year ago to-day, in the face of europe, standing with tied hands to look on at the murder. and from that day on, controversy between the awakened who understood, the reactionists who likewise understood, and their followers on both sides who have half understood, has surged up and down and left confusion pretty badly confounded in the mind of him who did not understand, but sought to. the men who did him to death, and the institutions they represent have done all in their power to create the impression that ferrer was a believer in violence, a teacher of the principles of violence, a doer of acts of violence, and an instigator of widespread violence perpetrated by a mass of people. in support of the first they have published reports purporting to be his own writings, have pretended to reproduce seditious pictures from the walls of his class-rooms, have declared that he was seen mingling with the rebels during the catalonian uprising of last year, and that upon trial he was found guilty of having conceived and launched the spanish rebellion against the moroccan war. and that his death was a just act of reprisal. on the other hand, we have had a storm of indignant voices clamoring in his defense, alternately admitting and denying him to be a revolutionist, alternately contending that his schools taught social rebellion and that they taught nothing but pure science; we have had workmen demonstrating and professors and litterateurs protesting on very opposite grounds; and almost none were able to give definite information for the faith that was in them. and indeed it has been very difficult to obtain exact information, and still is so. after a year's lapse, it is yet not easy to get the facts disentangled from the fancies,--the truths from the lies, and above all from the half-lies. and even when we have the truths as to the facts, it is still difficult to valuate them, because of american ignorance of spanish ignorance. please understand the phrase. america has not too much to boast of in the way of its learning; but yet it has that much of common knowledge and common education that it does not enter into our minds to conceive of a population % of which are unable to read and write, and a good share of the remaining % can only read, not write; neither does it at all enter our heads to think that of this % of the better informed, the most powerful contingent is composed of those whose distinct, avowed, and deliberate purpose it is to keep the ignorant ignorant. whatever may be the sins of government in this country, or of the churches--and there are plenty of such sins--at least they have not (save in the case of negro slaves) constituted themselves a conspiratical force to keep out enlightenment,--to prevent the people from learning to read and write, or to acquire whatever scientific knowledge their economic circumstances permitted them to. what the unconscious conspiracy of economic circumstance has done, and what conscious manipulations the government school is guilty of, to render higher education a privilege of the rich and a maintainer of injustice is another matter. but it cannot be charged that the rulers of america seek to render the people illiterate. people, therefore, who have grown up in a general atmosphere of thought which regards the government as a provider of education, even as a compeller of education, do not, unless their attention is drawn to the facts, conceive of a state of society in which government is a hostile force, opposed to the enlightenment of the people,--its politicians exercising all their ingenuity to sidetrack the demand of the people for schools. how much less do they conceive the hostile force and power of a church, having behind it an unbroken descent from feudal ages, whose direct interest it is to maintain a closed monopoly of learning, and to keep out of general circulation all scientific information which would tend to destroy the superstitions whereby it thrives. i say that the american people in general are not informed as to these conditions, and therefore the phenomenon of a teacher killed for instituting and maintaining schools staggers their belief. and when they read the assertions of those who defend the murder, that it was because his schools were instigating the overthrow of social order in spain, they naturally exclaim: "ah, that explains it! the man taught sedition, rebellion, riot, in his schools! that is the reason." now the truth is, that what ferrer was teaching in his schools was really instigating the overthrow of the social order of spain; furthermore it was not only instigating it, but it was making it as certain as the still coming of the daylight out of the night of the east. but not by the teaching of riot; of the use of dagger, bomb, or knife; but by the teaching of the same sciences which are taught in our public schools, through a generally diffused knowledge of which the power of spain's despotic church must crumble away. likewise it was laying the primary foundation for the overthrow of such portions of the state organization as exist by reason of the general ignorance of the people. the social order of spain ought to be overthrown; must be overthrown, will be overthrown; and ferrer was doing a mighty work in that direction. the men who killed him knew and understood it well. and they consciously killed him for what he really did; but they have let the outside world suppose they did it, for what he did not do. knowing there are no words so hated by all governments as "sedition and rebellion," knowing that such words will make the most radical of governments align itself with the most despotic at once, knowing there is nothing which so offends the majority of conservative and peace-loving people everywhere as the idea of violence unordered by authority, they have wilfully created the impression that ferrer's schools were places where children and youths were taught to handle weapons, and to make ready for armed attacks on the government. they have, as i said before, created this impression in various ways; they have pointed to the fact that the man who in made the attack on alfonso's life, had acted as a translator of books used by ferrer in his schools; they have scattered over europe and america pictures purporting to be reproductions of drawings in prominent wall-spaces in his schools, recommending the violent overthrow of the government. as to the first of these accusations, i shall consider it later in the lecture; but as to the last, it should be enough to remind any person with an ordinary amount of reflection, that the schools were public places open to any one, as our schools are; and that if any such pictures had existed, they would have been sufficient cause for shutting up the schools and incarcerating the founder within a day after their appearance on the walls. the spanish government has that much sense of how to preserve its own existence, that it would not allow such pictures to hang in a public place for one day. nor would books preaching sedition have been permitted to be published or circulated.--all this is foolish dust sought to be thrown in foolish eyes. no; the real offense was the real thing that he did. and in order to appreciate its enormity, from the spanish ruling force's standpoint, let us now consider what that ruling force is, what are the economic and educational conditions of the spanish people, why and how ferrer founded the modern schools, and what were the subjects taught therein. up to the year there existed no legal provision for general elementary education in spain. in that year, owing to the liberals having gotten into power in madrid, after a bitter contest aroused partially by the general political events of europe, a law making elementary education compulsory was passed. this was two years before ferrer's birth. now it is one thing for a political party, temporarily in possession of power, to pass a law. it is quite another thing to make that law effective, even when wealth and general sentiment are behind it. but when joined to the fact that there is a strong opposition is added the fact that this opposition is in possession of the greatest wealth of the country, that the people to be benefited are often quite as bitterly opposed to their own enlightenment as those who profit by their ignorance, and that those who do ardently desire their own uplift are extremely poor, the difficulty of practicalizing this educational law is partially appreciated. ferrer's own boyhood life is an illustration of how much benefit the children of the peasantry reaped from the educational law. his parents were vine dressers; they were eminently orthodox and believed what their priest (who was probably the only man in the little village of alella able to read) told them: that the liberals were the emissaries of satan and that whatever they did was utterly evil. they wanted no such evil thing as popular education about, and would not that their children should have it. accordingly, even at years of age, the boy was without education,--a circumstance which in after years made him more anxious that others should not suffer as he had. it is self-understood that if it was difficult to found schools in the cities where there existed a degree of popular clamor for them, it was next to impossible in the rural districts where people like ferrer's parents were the typical inhabitants. the best result obtained by this law in the years from to was that, out of , , people, , , were then able to read and write,-- % remaining illiterate. at the end of the proportion was altered to , , literate out of , , population, which may be considered as a fairly correct approximate of the present condition. one of the very great accounting causes for this situation is the extreme poverty of the mass of the populace. in many districts of spain a laborer's wages are less than $ . a week, and nowhere do they equal the poorest workman's wages in america. of course, it is understood that the cost of living is likewise low; but imagine it as low as you please, it is still evident that the income of the workers is too small to permit them to save anything, even from the most frugal living. the dire struggle to secure food, clothing and shelter is such that little energy is left wherewith to aspire to anything, to demand anything, either for themselves or their children. unless, therefore, the government provided the buildings, the books, and appliances, and paid the teachers' salaries, it is easy to see that the people most in need of education are least able, and least likely, to provide it for themselves. furthermore the government itself, unless it can tax the wealthier classes for it, cannot out of such an impoverished source wring sufficient means to provide adequate schools and school equipments. now, the wealthiest classes are just the religious orders. according to the statement of monsignor josé valeda de gunjado, these orders own two-thirds of the money of the country and one-third of the wealth in property. these orders are utterly opposed to all education except such as they themselves furnish--a lamentable travesty on learning. as a writer who has investigated these conditions personally, observes, in reply to the question, "does not the church provide numbers of schools, day and night, at its own expense?"--"it does,--unhappily for spain." it provides schools whose principal aim is to strengthen superstition, follow a mediaeval curriculum, _keep out_ scientific light,--and prevent other and better schools from being established. a spanish educational journal (_la escuela espanola_), not ferrer's journal, declared in that these schools were largely "without light or ventilation, dens of death, ignorance, and bad training." it was estimated that , children died every year in consequence of the mischievous character of the school rooms. and even to schools like these, there were half a million children in spain who could gain no admittance. as to the teachers, they are allowed a salary ranging from $ . to $ . a year; but this is provided, not by the state, but through voluntary donations from the parents. so that a teacher, in addition to his legitimate functions, must perform those of collector of his own salary. now conceive that he is endeavoring to collect it from parents whose wages amount to two or three dollars a week; and you will not be surprised at the case reported by a madrid paper in of a master's having canvassed a district to find how many parents would contribute if he opened a school. out of one hundred families, three promised their support! is it any wonder that the law of compulsory education is a mockery? how could it be anything else? now let us look at the products of this popular ignorance, and we shall presently understand why the church fosters it, why it fights education; and also why the catalonian insurrection of , which began as a strike of workers in protest against the moroccan war, ended in mob attacks upon convents, monasteries, and churches. i have already quoted the statement of a high spanish prelate that the religious orders of spain own two-thirds of the money of spain, and one-third of the wealth in property. whether this estimate is precisely correct or not, it is sufficiently near correctness to make us aware that at least a great portion of the wealth of the country has passed into their hands,--a state not widely differing from that existing in france prior to the great revolution. before the insurrection of last year, the city of barcelona alone had convents, many of which were exceedingly rich. the province of catalonia maintained , of these institutions. aside from these religious orders with their accumulations of wealth, the church itself, the united body of priests not in orders, is immensely wealthy. conceive that in the cathedral at toledo there is an image of the virgin whose wardrobe alone would be sufficient to build hundreds of schools. imagine that this doll, which is supposed to symbolize the forlorn young woman who in her pain and sorrow and need was driven to seek shelter in a stable, whose life was ever lowly, and who is called the mother of sorrows,--imagine that this image of her has become a vulgar coquette sporting a robe whereinto are sown , pearls, besides as many more sapphires, amethysts, and diamonds! oh, what a decoration for the mother of the carpenter of nazareth! what a vision for the dying eyes on the cross to look forward to! what an outcome of the gospel of salvation free to the poor and lowly, taught by the poorest and the lowliest,--that the humble keeper of the humble household of the despised little village of judea should be imaged forth as a queen of gauds, bedizened with a crown worth $ , and bracelets valued at $ , more. the virgin mary, the daughter of the stable, transformed into a diamond merchant's showcase! and this in the midst of men and women working for just enough to keep the skin upon the bone; in the midst of children who are denied the primary necessities of childhood. now i ask you, when the fury of these people burst, as under the provocation they received it was inevitable that it should burst, was it any wonder that it manifested itself in mob violence against the institutions which mock their suffering by this useless, senseless, criminal waste of wealth in the face of utter need? will some one now whisper in our ears that there are women in america who decorate themselves with more jewels than the virgin of toledo, and throw away the price of a school on a useless decoration in a single night; while within a radius of five miles from them there are also uneducated children, for whom our school boards can provide no place? yes, it is so; let them remember the mobs of barcelona! and let me remember i am talking about spain! the question naturally intrudes, how does the church, how do the religious orders manage to accumulate such wealth? remember first that they are old, and of unbroken continuance for hundreds of years. that various forms of acquisition, in operation for centuries, would produce immense accumulations, even supposing nothing but legitimate purchases and gifts. but when we consider the actual means whereby money is daily absorbed from the people by these institutions we receive a shock which sets all our notions of the triumph of modern science topsy-turvy. it is almost impossible to realize, and yet it is true, that the spanish church still deals in that infamous "graft" against which martin luther hurled the splendid force of his wrath four hundred years ago. the church of spain still sells indulgences. every catholic bookstore, and every priest, has them for sale. they are called "bulas." their prices range from about to cents, and they constitute an elastic excuse for doing pretty much what the possessor pleases to do, providing it is not a capital crime, for a definitely named period. probably there is no one in america so little able to believe this condition to exist, as the ordinary well-informed roman catholic. i have myself listened to priests of the roman faith giving the conditions on which pardon for venal offenses might be obtained; and they had nothing to do with money. they consisted in saying a certain number of prayers at stated periods, with specified intent. while that may be a very illogical way of putting things together that have no connection, there is nothing in it to offend one's ideas of honesty. the enlightened conscience of an entire mass of people has demanded that a spiritual offense be dealt with by spiritual means. it would revolt at the idea that such grace could be written out on paper and sold either to the highest bidder or for a fixed price. but now conceive what happens where a people are illiterate, regarding written documents with that superstitious awe which those who cannot read always have for the mysterious language of learning; regarding them besides with the combination of fear and reverence which the ignorant believer entertains for the visible sign of supernatural power, the power which holds over him the threat of eternal punishment,--and you will have what goes on in spain. add to this that such a condition of fear and gullibility on the side of the people, is the great opportunity of the religious "grafter." whatever number of honest, self-sacrificing, devoted people may be attracted to the service of the church, there will certainly be found also, the cheat, the impostor, the searcher for ease and power. these indulgences, which for or cents pardon the buyer for his past sins, but are good only till he sins again, constitute a species of permission to do what otherwise is forbidden; the most expensive one, the c-one, is practically a license to hold stolen property up to a certain amount. both rich and poor buy these things, the rich of course paying a good deal more than the stipulated sum. but it hardly requires the statement that an immense number of the very poor buy them also. and from this horrible traffic the church of spain annually draws millions. there are other sources of income such as the sale of scapulars, agnus-deis, charms, and other pieces of trumpery, which goes on all over the catholic world also, but naturally to no such extent as in spain, portugal, and italy, where popular ignorance may be again measured by the materialism of its religion. now, is it reasonable to suppose that the individuals who are thriving upon these sales, want a condition of popular enlightenment? do they not know how all this traffic would crumble like the ash of a burnt-out fire, once the blaze of science were to flame through spain? _they_ educate! yes; they educate the people to believe in these barbaric relics of a dead time,--_for their own material interest_. spain and portugal are the last resort of the mediaeval church; the monasticism and the jesuitry which have been expelled from other european countries, and compelled to withdraw from cuba and the philippines, have concentrated there; and there they are making their last fight. there they will go down into their eternal grave; but not till science has invaded the dark corners of the popular intellect. the political condition is parallel with the religious condition of the people, with the exception that the state is poor while the church is rich. there are some elements in the government which are opposed to the church religiously, which nevertheless do not wish to see its power as an institution upset, because they foresee that the same people who would overthrow the church, would later overthrow them. these, too, wish to see the people kept ignorant. nevertheless, there have been numerous political rebellions in spain, having for their object the establishment of a republic. in there occurred such a rebellion, under the leadership of ruiz zorilla. at that time, ferrer was not quite years old. he had acquired an education by his own efforts. he was a declared republican, as it seems that every young, ardent, bright-minded youth, seeing what the condition of his country was, and wishing for its betterment, would be. zorilla was for a short time minister of public instruction, under the new government, and very zealous for popular education. naturally he became an object of admiration and imitation to ferrer. in the early eighties, after various fluctuations of political power, zorilla, who had been absent from spain, returned to it, and began the labor of converting the soldiers to republicanism. ferrer was then a director of railways, and of much service to zorilla in the practical work of organization. in this movement culminated in an abortive revolution, wherein both ferrer and zorilla took active part, and were accordingly compelled to take refuge in france upon the failure of the insurrection. it is therefore certain that from his entrance into public agitation till the year , ferrer was an active revolutionary republican, believing in the overthrow of spanish tyranny by violence. there is no question that at that time he said and wrote things which, whether we shall consider them justifiable or not, were openly in favor of forcible rebellion. such utterances charged against him at the alleged trial in , which were really his, were quotations from this period. remember he was then years old. when the trial occurred, he was years old. what had been his mental evolution during those years? in paris, where, with the exception of a short intermission in when he visited spain, he remained for about fifteen years, he naturally drifted into a method of making a living quite common to educated exiles in a foreign land; viz., giving private lessons in his native language. but while this is with most a mere temporary makeshift, which they change for something else as soon as they are able, to ferrer it revealed what his real business in life should be; he found teaching to be his genuine vocation; so much so that he took part in several movements for popular education in paris, giving much free service. this participation in the labor of training the mind, which is always a slow and patient matter, began to have its effect on his conceptions of political change. slowly the idea of a spain regenerated through the storm blasts of revolution, mightily and suddenly, faded out of his belief, being replaced, probably almost insensibly, by the idea that a thorough educational enlightenment must precede political transformation, if that transformation were to be permanent. this conviction he voiced with strange power and beauty of expression, when he said to his old revolutionary republican friend, alfred naquet: "time respects those works alone which time itself has helped to build." naquet himself, old and sinking man as he is, is at this day and hour heart and soul for forcible revolution; admitting all the evils which it engenders and all the dangers of miscarriage which accompany it, he still believes, to quote his own words, that "revolutions are not only the marvelous accoucheurs of societies; they are also fecundating forces. they fructify men's intelligences; and if they determine the final realization of matured evolutions, they also become, through their action on human minds, points of departure for newer evolutions." yet he, who thus sings the paean of the uprisen people, with a fire of youth and an ardor of love that sound like the singing of some strong young blacksmith marching at the head of an insurgent column, rather than the quavering voice of an old spent man; he, who was the warm personal friend of ferrer for many years, and who would surely have wished that his ideal love should also have been his friend's love, he expressly declares that ferrer was of those who feel themselves drawn to the field of preparative labor, making sure the ground over which the revolution may march to enduring results. this then was the ripened condition of his mind, especially after the death of zorilla, and all his subsequent life and labor is explicable only with this understanding of his mental attitude. in the confusion of deafening voices, it has been declared that not only did he not take part in last year's manifestations, nor instigate them; but that he in fact had become a tolstoyan, a non-resistant. this is not true: he undoubtedly understood that the introduction of popular education into spain means revolt, sooner or later. and he would certainly have been glad to see a successful revolt overthrow the monarchy at madrid. he did not wish the people to be submissive; it is one of the fundamental teachings of the schools he founded that the assertive spirit of the child is to be encouraged; that its will is not to be broken; that the sin of other schools is the forcing of obedience. he hoped to help to form a young spain which would not submit; which would resist, resist consciously, intelligently, steadily. he did not wish to enlighten people merely to render them more sensitive to their pains and deprivations, but that they might so use their enlightenment as to rid themselves of the system of exploitation by church and state which is responsible for their miseries. by what means they would choose to free themselves, he did not make his affair. how and when were these schools founded? it was during his long sojourn in paris, that he had as a private pupil in spanish, a middle-aged, wealthy, unmarried, catholic lady. after much conflict over religion between teacher and pupil, the latter modified her orthodoxy greatly; and especially after her journeys to spain, where she herself saw the condition of public instruction. eventually she became interested in ferrer's conceptions of education, and his desire to establish schools in his own country. and when she died in (she was then somewhat over years old) she devised a certain part of her property to ferrer, to be used as he saw fit, feeling assured no doubt that he would see fit to use it not for his personal advantage, but for the purpose so dear to his heart. which he did. the bequest amounted to about $ , ; and the first expenditure was for the establishment of the modern school of barcelona, in the year . it should be said that this was not the first of the modern school movement in spain; for previous to that, and for several years, there had sprung up, in various parts of the country, a spontaneous movement towards self-education; a very heroic effort, in a way, considering that the teachers were generally workingmen who had spent their day in the shops, and were using the remainder of their exhausted strength to enlighten their fellow-workers and the children. these were largely night-schools. as there were no means behind these efforts, the buildings in which they were held were of course unsuitable; there was no proper plan of work; no sufficient equipment, and little co-ordination of labor. a considerable percentage of these schools were already on the decline, when ferrer, equipped with his splendid organizing ability, his teacher's experience, and mlle. meunier's endowment, opened the barcelona school, having as pupils eighteen boys and twelve girls. so proper to the demand was this effort, that at the end of four years' earnest activity, fifty schools had been established, ten in barcelona, and forty in the provinces. in , that is, after five years' work, a banquet was held on good friday, at which , pupils were present. from to , ,--that is something. and a banquet in catholic spain on good friday! a banquet of children who have bade good-bye to the salvation of the soul by the punishment of the stomach! we here may laugh; but in spain it was a triumph and a menace, which both sides understood. i have said that ferrer brought to his work splendid organizing ability. this he speedily put to purpose by enlisting the co-operation of a number of the greatest scientists of europe in the preparation of text-books embodying the discoveries of science, couched in language comprehensible to young minds. so far, i am sorry to say, i have not succeeded in getting copies of these manuals; the spanish government confiscated most of them, and has probably destroyed them. still there are some uncaptured sets (one is already in the british museum) and i make no doubt that within a year or so we shall have translations of most of them. there were thirty of these manuals all told, comprising the work of the three sections, primary, intermediate, and superior, into which the pupils were divided. from what i have been able to find out about these books, i believe the most interesting of them all would be the first reading book. it was prepared by dr. odon de buen, and is said to be at the same time "a speller, a grammar and an illustrated manual of evolution," "the majestic story of the evolution of the cosmos from the atom to the thinking being, related in a language simple, comprehensible to the child." , copies of this book were rapidly sold. imagine what that meant to catholic schools! that the babies of spain should learn nothing about eternal punishment for their deadly sins, and _should_ learn that they are one in a long line of unfolding life that started in the lowly sea-slime! the books on geography, physics, and minerology were written in like manner and with like intent by the same author; on anthropology, dr. enguerrand wrote, and on evolution, dr. letourneau of paris. among the very suggestive works was one on "the universal substance," a collaborate production of albert bloch and paraf javal, in which the mysteries of existence are resolved into their chemical equivalents, so that the foundations for magic and miracle are unceremoniously cleared out of the intellectual field. this book was prepared at ferrer's special request, as an antidote to ancestral leanings, inherited superstitions, the various outside influences counteracting the influences of the school. the methods of instruction were modeled after earlier attempts in france, and were based on the general idea that physical and intellectual education must continually supplement each other. that no one is really educated, so long as his knowledge is merely the recollection of what he has read or seen in a book. accordingly a lesson often consisted of a visit to a factory, a workshop, a studio, or a laboratory, where things were explained and illustrated; or in a class journey to the hills, or the sea, or the open country, where the geological or topographical conditions were studied, or botanical specimens collected and individual observation encouraged. very often even book classes were held out of doors, and the children insensibly put in touch with the great pervading influences of nature, a touch too often lost, or never felt at all, in our city environments. how different was all this from the incomprehensible theology of the catholic schools to be learned and believed but not understood, the impractical rehearsing of strings of words characteristic of mediaeval survivals! no wonder the modern schools grew and grew, and the hatred of the priests waxed hotter and hotter. their opportunity came; indeed, they did not wait long. in the year , on the st day of may, not so very long after that good friday banquet, occurred the event which they seized upon to crush the modern school and its founder. i am not here to speak either for or against mateo morral. he was a wealthy young man, of much energy and considerable learning. he had helped to enrich the library of the modern school and being an excellent linguist, he had offered to make translations of text-books. ferrer had accepted the offer. that is all morral had to do with the modern school. but on the day of royal festivities, morral had it in his head to throw a bomb where it would do some royal hurt. he missed his calculations, and the hurt intended did not take place; but after a short interval, finding himself about to be captured, he killed himself. think of him as you please: think that he was a madman who did a madman's act; think that he was a generous enthusiast who in an outburst of long chafing indignation at his country's condition wanted to strike a blow at a tyrannical monarchy, and was willing to give his own life in exchange for the tyrant's; or better than this, reserve your judgment, and say that you know not the man nor his personal condition, nor the special external conditions that prompted him; and that without such knowledge he cannot be judged. but whatever you think of morral, pray why was ferrer arrested and the modern school of barcelona closed? why was he thrown in prison and kept there for more than a year? why was it sought to railroad him before a court martial, and that attempt failing, the civil trial postponed for all that time? =why? why?= because ferrer taught science to the children of spain,--and for no other thing. his enemies would have killed him then; but having been compelled to yield an open trial, by the outcry of europe, they were also compelled to release him. but i imagine i hear, yea hear, the resolute mutter behind the closed walls of the monasteries, the day ferrer went free. "go, then; we shall get you again. and then----" and then they would do what three years later they did,--_damn him to the ditch of_ =montjuich=. yea, they shut their lips together like the thin lips of fate and--waited. the hatred of an order has something superb in it,--it hates so relentlessly, so constantly, so transcendently; its personnel changes, its hate never alters; it wears one priest's face or another's; itself is identical, inexorable; it pursues to the end. did ferrer know this? undoubtedly in a general way he did. and yet he was so far from conceiving its appalling remorselessness, that even when he found himself in prison again, and utterly in their power, he could not believe that he would not be freed. what was this opportunity for which the jesuitry of spain waited with such terrible security? the catalonian uprising. how did they know it would come? as any sane man, not over-optimistic, knows that uprising must come in spain. ferrer hoped to sap away the foundations of tyranny through peaceful enlightenment. he was right. but they are also right who say that there are other forces hurling towards those foundations; the greatest of these,--_starvation_. now it was plain and simple starvation that rose to rend its starvers when the catalonian women rose in mobs to cry against the command that was taking away their fathers and sons to their death in morocco. the spanish people did not want the moroccan war; the government, in the interest of a number of capitalists, did; but like all governments and all capitalists, it wanted workingmen to do the dying. and they did not want to die, and leave their wives and children to die too. so they rebelled. at first it was the conscious, orderly protest of organized workingmen. but starvation no more respects the commands of workingmen's unions, than the commands of governments, and other orderly bodies. it has nothing to lose: and it gets away, in its fury, from all management; and it riots. where churches and monasteries are offensively rich and at ease in the face of hunger, hunger takes its revenge. it has long fangs, it rends, and tears, and tramples--the innocent with the guilty--always. it is very horrible! but remember,--remember how much more horrible is the long, slow systematic crushing, wasting, drying of men upon their bones, which year after year, century after century, has begotten the monster, hunger. remember the , innocent children annually slaughtered, the blinded and the crippled children, maimed and forsaken by social power; and behind the smoke and flame of the burning convents of july, , see the staring of those sightless eyes. ferrer instigate that mad frenzy! oh, no; it was a mightier than ferrer! "our lady of pain"--our lady of hunger--our lady with uncut nails and wolf-like teeth--our lady who bears the man-flesh in her body that cannon are to tear--our lady the workingwoman of spain, ahungered. she incarnated the red terror. and the enemies of ferrer in , as in , knew that such things would come; and they bided their time. it is one of those pathetic things which destiny deals, that it was only for love's sake--and most for the love of a little child--who died moreover--that the uprising found ferrer in spain at all. he had been in england, investigating schools and methods there from april until the middle of june. word came that his sister-in-law and his niece were ill, so the th of june found him at the little girl's bedside. he intended soon after to go to paris, but delayed to make some inquiries for a friend concerning the proceedings of the electrical society of barcelona. so the storm caught him as it caught thousands of others. he went about the business of his publishing house as usual, making the observations of an interested spectator of events. to his friend naquet he sent a postal card on the th of july, in which he spoke of the heroism of the women, the lack of co-ordination in the people's movements, and the total absence of leaders, as a curious phenomenon. hearing soon after that he was to be arrested, he secluded himself for five weeks. the "white terror" was in full sway; , men, women, and children had been arrested, incarcerated, inhumanly treated. then the chief prosecutor issued the statement that ferrer was "the director of the revolutionary movement." too indignant to listen to the appeals of his friends, he started to barcelona to give himself up and demand trial. he was arrested on the way. and they court-martialed him. the proceedings were utterly infamous. no chance to confront witnesses against him; no opportunity to bring witnesses; not even the books accused of sedition allowed to offer their mute testimony in their own defense; no opportunity given to his defender to prepare; letters sent from england and france to prove what had been the doomed man's purposes and occupations during his stay there, "lost in transit"; the old articles of twenty-four years before, made to appear as if recent utterances; forgeries imposed; and with all this, nothing but hearsay evidence even from his accusers; and yet--he was sentenced to death. sentenced to death and shot. and all modern schools closed, and his property sequestrated. and the virgin of toledo may wear her gorgeous robes in peace, since the shadow of the darkness has stolen back over the circle of light he lit. only,--somewhere, somewhere, down in the obscurity--hovers the menacing figure of her rival, "our lady of pain." she is still now,--but she is not dead. and if all things be taken from her, and the light not allowed to come to her, nor to her children,--then--some day--she will set her own lights in the darkness. ferrer--ferrer is with the immortals. his work is spreading over the world; it will yet return, and rid spain of its tyrants. modern educational reform questions of genuine importance to large masses of people, are not posed by a single questioner, nor even by a limited number. they are put with more or less precision, with more or less consciousness of their scope and demand by all classes involved. this is a fair test of its being a genuine question, rather than a temporary fad. such is the test we are to apply to the present inquiry, what is wrong with our present method of child education? what is to be done in the way of altering or abolishing it? the posing of the question acquired a sudden prominence, through the world-shocking execution of a great educator for alleged complicity in the revolutionary events of spain during the moroccan war. people were not satisfied with the spanish government's declarations as to this official murder; they were not convinced that they were being told the truth. they inquired why the government should be so anxious for that man's death. and they learned that as a teacher he had founded schools wherein ideas hostile to governmental programs for learning, were put in practice. and they have gone on asking to know what these ideas were, how they were taught, and how can those same ideas be applied to the practical questions of education confronting them in the persons of their own children. but it would be a very great mistake to suppose that the question was raised out of nothingness, or out of the brilliancy of his own mind, by francisco ferrer. if it were, if he were the creator of the question instead of the response to it, his martyr's death could have given it but an ephemeral prominence which would speedily have subsided. on the contrary, the inquiry stimulated by that tragic death was but the first loud articulation of what has been asked in thousands of school-rooms, millions of homes, all over the civilized world. it has been put, by each of the three classes concerned, each in its own peculiar way, from its own peculiar viewpoint,--by the educator, by the parent, and by the child itself. there is a fourth personage who has had a great deal to say, and still has; but to my mind he is a pseudo-factor, to be eliminated as speedily as possible. i mean the "statesman." he considers himself profoundly important, as representing the interests of society in general. he is anxious for the formation of good citizens to support the state, and directs education in such channels as he thinks will produce these. i prefer to leave the discussion of his peculiar functions for a later part of this address, here observing only that if he is a legitimate factor, if by chance he is a genuine educator strayed into statesmanship, _as_ a statesman he is interested only from a secondary motive; i. e., he is not interested in the actual work of schools, in the children as persons, but in the producing of a certain type of character to serve certain subsequent ends. the criticism offered by the child itself upon the prevailing system of instruction, is the most simple,--direct; and at the same time, the critic is utterly unconscious of its force. who has not heard a child say, in that fretted whine characteristic of a creature who knows its protest will be ineffective: "but what do i have to learn that for?"--"oh, i don't see what i have to know that for; i can't remember it anyway." "i hate to go to school; i'd just as lief take a whipping!" "my teacher's a mean old thing; she expects you to sit quiet the whole morning, and if you just make the least little noise, she keeps you in at recess. why do we have to keep still so long? what good does it do?" i remember well the remark made to me once by one of my teachers--and a very good teacher, too, who nevertheless did not see what her own observation ought to have suggested. "school-children," she said, "regard teachers as their natural enemies." the thought which it would have been logical to suppose would have followed this observation is, that if children in general are possessed of that notion, it is because there is a great deal in the teacher's treatment of them which runs counter to the child's nature: that possibly this is so, not because of natural cussedness on the part of the child, but because of inapplicability of the knowledge taught, or the manner of teaching it, or both, to the mental and physical needs of the child. i am quite sure no such thought entered my teacher's mind,--at least regarding the system of knowledge to be imposed; being a sensible woman, she perhaps occasionally admitted to herself that she might make mistakes in applying the rules, but that the body of knowledge to be taught was indispensable, and must somehow be injected into children's heads, under threat of punishment, if necessary, i am sure she never questioned. it did not occur to her any more than to most teachers, that the first business of an educator should be to find out what are the needs, aptitudes, and tendencies of children, before he or she attempts to outline a body of knowledge to be taught, or rules for teaching it. it does not occur to them that the child's question, "what do i have to learn that for?" is a perfectly legitimate question; and if the teacher cannot answer it to the child's satisfaction, something is wrong either with the thing taught, or with the teaching; either the thing taught is out of rapport with the child's age, or his natural tendencies, or his condition of development; or the method by which it is taught repels him, disgusts him, or at best fails to interest him. when a child says, "i don't see why i have to know that; i can't remember it anyway," he is voicing a very reasonable protest. of course, there are plenty of instances of wilful shirking, where a little effort can overcome the slackness of memory; but every teacher who is honest enough to reckon with himself knows he cannot give a sensible reason why things are to be taught which have so little to do with the child's life that to-morrow, or the day after examination, they will be forgotten; things which he himself could not remember were he not repeating them year in and year out, as a matter of his trade. and every teacher who has thought at all for himself about the essential nature of the young humanity he is dealing with, knows that six hours of daily herding and in-penning of young, active bodies and limbs, accompanied by the additional injunction that no feet are to be shuffled, no whispers exchanged, and no paper wads thrown, is a frightful violation of all the laws of young life. any gardener who should attempt to raise healthy, beautiful, and fruitful plants by outraging all those plants' instinctive wants and searchings, would meet as his reward--sickly plants, ugly plants, sterile plants, dead plants. he will not do it; he will watch very carefully to see whether they like much sunlight, or considerable shade, whether they thrive on much water or get drowned in it, whether they like sandy soil, or fat mucky soil; the plant itself will indicate to him when he is doing the right thing. and every gardener will watch for indications with great anxiety. if he finds the plant revolts against his experiments, he will desist at once, and try something else; if he finds it thrives, he will emphasize the particular treatment so long as it seems beneficial. but what he will surely not do, will be to prepare a certain area of ground all just alike, with equal chances of sun and amount of moisture in every part, and then plant everything together without discrimination,--mighty close together!--saying beforehand, "if plants don't want to thrive on this, they ought to want to; and if they are stubborn about it, they must be made to." or if a raiser of animals were to start in feeding them on a regimen adapted not to their tastes but to his; if he were to insist on stuffing the young ones with food only fitted for the older ones; if he were to shut them up and compel them somehow to be silent, stiff, and motionless for hours together,--he would--well, he would very likely be arrested for cruelty to animals. of course there is this difference between the grower of plants or animals and the grower of children; the former is dealing with his subject as a superior power with a force which will always remain subject to his, while the latter is dealing with a force which is bound to become his equal, and taking it in the long and large sense, bound ultimately to supersede him. the fear of "the footfalls of the young generation" is in his ears, whether he is aware of it or not, and he instinctively does what every living thing seeks to do; viz., to preserve his power. since he cannot remain forever the superior, the dictator, he endeavors to put a definite mould upon that power which he must share--to have the child learn what he has learned, as he has learned it, and to the same end that he has learned it. the grower of flowers, or fruits, or vegetables, or the raiser of animals, secure in his forever indisputable superiority, has nothing to fear when he inquires into the ways of his subjects; he will never think: "but if i heed such and such manifestation of the flower's or the animal's desire or repulsion, it will develop certain tendencies as a result, which will eventually overturn me and mine, and all that i believe in and labor to preserve." the grower of children is perpetually beset by this fear. he must not listen to a child's complaint against the school: it breaks down the mutual relation of authority and obedience; it destroys the faith of the child that his olders know better than he; it sets up little centers of future rebellion in the brain of every child affected by the example. no: complaint as to the wisdom of the system must be discouraged, ignored, frowned down, crushed by superior dignity; if necessary, punished. the very best answer a child ever gets to its legitimate inquiry, "why do i have to learn such and such a thing?" is, "wait till you get older, and you will understand it all. just now you are a little too young to understand the reasons."--(in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred the answerer got the same reply to his own question twenty years before; and he has never found out since, either). "do as we tell you to, now," say the teachers, "and be sure that we are instructing you for your good. the explanations will become clear to you some time." and the child smothers his complaint, cramps his poor little body to the best of his ability, and continues to repeat definitions which mean nothing to him but strings of long words, and rules which to him are simply torture--apparatus invented by his "natural enemies" to plague children.--i recall quite distinctly the bitter resentment i felt toward the inverted divisor. the formula was easy enough to remember: "invert the terms of the divisor and proceed as in multiplication of fractions." i memorized it in less than a minute, and followed the prescription, and got my examples, correct. but "oh, how, how was the miracle accomplished? why should a fraction be made to stand on its head? and how did that change a division suddenly into a multiplication?"--and i never found out till i undertook to teach some one else, years afterward. yet the thing could have been made plain then; perhaps would have been, but for the fact that as a respectful pupil i was so trained to think that my teachers' methods must not be questioned or their explanations reflected upon, that i sat mute, mystified, puzzled, and silently indignant. in the end i swallowed it as i did a lot of other "pre-digested" knowledge (?) and consented to use its miraculous nature, very much as my christian friends use the body and blood of christ to "wash their sins away" without very well understanding the modus operandi. another advantage which the botanical or zoölogical cultivator has over the child-grower, by which incidentally the plants and animals profit, is that since he is not seeking to produce a universal type, but rather to develop as many new and interesting types as he can, he is very studious to notice the inclinations of his subjects, observing possible beginnings of differentiation, and adapting his treatment to the development of such beginnings. of course he also does what no child-cultivator could possibly do,--he ruthlessly destroys weaklings; and as the superior intermeddling divinity, he fosters those special types which are more serviceable to himself, irrespective of whether they are more serviceable to plant or animal life apart from man. but is the fact that children are of the same race as ourselves, the fact that their development should be regarded from the point of how best shall they serve themselves, their own race and generation, not that of a discriminating overlord, assuming the power of life and death over them,--a reason for us to disregard their tendencies, aptitudes, likes and dislikes, altogether?--a reason for us to treat their natural manifestations of non-adaptation to our methods of treatment with less consideration than we give to a fern or a hare? i should, on the contrary, suppose it was a reason to consider them all the more. i think the difficulty lies in the immeasurable vanity of the human adult, particularly the pedagogical adult, (i presume i may say it with less offense since i am a teacher myself), which does not permit him to recognize as good any tendency in children to fly in the face of his conceptions of a correct human being; to recognize that may be here is something highly desirable, to be encouraged, rather than destroyed as pernicious. a flower-gardener doesn't expect to make another voter or householder out of his fern, so he lets it show what it wants to be, without being at all horrified at anything it does; but your teacher has usually well-defined conceptions of what men and women have to be. and if a boy is too lively, too noisy, too restless, too curious, to suit the concept, he must be trimmed and subdued. and if he is lazy, he has to be spurred with all sorts of whips, which are offensive both to the handler and the handled. the weapons of shaming and arousing the spirit of rivalry are two which are much used,--the former with sometimes fatal results, as in the case of the nine year old boy who recently committed suicide because his teacher drew attention to his torn coat, or young girls who have worried themselves into fevers from a scornful word respecting their failures in scholarship, and arousing rivalry brings an evil train behind it of spites and jealousies. i do not say, as some enthusiasts do, "there are no bad children," or "there are no lazy children"; but i am quite sure that both badness and laziness often result from lack of understanding and lack of adaptation; and that these can only be attained by teachers comprehending that they must seek to understand as well as to be understood. badness is sometimes only dammed up energy, which can no more help flooding over than dammed up water. laziness is often the result of forcing a child to a task for which it has no natural liking, while it would be energetic enough, given the thing it liked to do. at any rate, it is worth while to try to find out what is the matter, in the spirit of a searcher after truth. which is the first point i want to establish: that the general complaints of children are true criticisms of the school system; and superintendents of public instruction, boards of education, and teachers have as their first duty to heed and consider these complaints. let us now consider the complaints of parents. it must be admitted that the parents of young children, particularly their mothers, and especially these latter when they are the wives of workingmen with good-sized families, regard the school rather as a convenience for getting rid of the children during a certain period of the day than anything else. they are not to be blamed for this. they have obeyed the imperative mandate of nature in having families, with no very adequate conception of what they were doing; they find themselves burdened with responsibilities often greatly beyond their capacity. they have all they can do, sometimes more than they can do, to manage the financial end of things, to see to their children's material wants and to get through the work of a house; very often they are themselves deficient in even the elementary knowledge of the schools; they feel that their children need to know a great deal that they have never known, but they are utterly without the ability to say whether what they learn is useful and important or not. with the helplessness of ignorance towards wisdom, they receive the system provided by the state on trust, presuming it is good; and with the pardonable relief of busy and overburdened people, they look at the clock as school hour approaches, and breathe a sigh of relief when the last child is out of the house. they would be shocked at the idea that they regard their children as nuisances; they would vigorously defend themselves by saying that they feel that the children are in better hands than their own, safe and well treated. but before long even these ignorant ones observe that their children have learned a number of things which are not good. they have mixed with a crowd of others, and somewhere among them they have learned bad language, bad ideas, and bad habits. these are complaints which may be heard from intelligent, educated, and conservative parents also,--parents who may be presumed to be satisfied with the spirit and general purpose of the knowledge imparted in the class-room. also the children suffer in health through their schools; and later on, when the cramming and crowding of their brains goes on in earnest, as it does in the higher grades, and particularly the high schools, oh then springs up a terrible crop of headache, nervous prostration, hysterics, over-delicacy, anaemia, heart-palpitation (especially among the girls), and a harvest of other physical disorders which were very probably planted back in the primary departments, and fostered in the higher rooms. the students are so overtrained that they often "become good for nothing in the house," the parents say, and too late the mothers discover that they themselves become servants to the whimsical little ladies and gentlemen they have raised up, who are more interested in text-books than in practical household matters. such are the ordinary complaints heard on every side, uttered by those who really have no fault to find with the substance of the instruction itself,--some because they do not know, and some because it fairly represents their own ideas. the complaint becomes much more vital and definite when it proceeds from a parent who is an informed person, with a conception of life at variance with that commonly accepted. i will instance that of a philadelphia physician, who recently said to me: "in my opinion many of the most horrid effects of malformations which i have to deal with, are the results of the long hours of sitting imposed on children in the schools. it is impossible for a healthy active creature to sit stiffly straight so many hours; no one can do it. they will inevitably twist and squirm themselves down into one position or another which throws the internal organs out of position, and which by iteration and reiteration results in a continuously accentuating deformity. motherhood often becomes extremely painful and dangerous through the narrowing of the pelvis produced in early years of so much uncomfortable sitting. i believe that the sort of schooling which necessitates it should not begin till a child is fourteen years of age." he added also that the substance of our education should be such as would fit the person for the conditions and responsibilities he or she may reasonably be expected to encounter in life. since the majority of boys and girls will most likely become fathers and mothers in the future, why does not our system of education take account of it, and instruct the children not in the latin names of bones and muscles so much, as in the practical functioning and hygiene of the body? every teacher knows, and most of our parents know, that no subject is more carefully ignored by our text-books on physiology than the reproductive system. a like book on zoölogy has far more to say about the reproduction of animals than is thought fit to be said by human beings to human beings about themselves. and yet upon such ignorance often depends the ruin of lives. such is the criticism of an intelligent physician, himself the father of five children. it is a typical complaint of those who have to deal with the physical results of our school system. a still more forcible complaint is rising up from a class of parents who object not only negatively, but positively, to the instruction of the schools. these are saying: i do not want to have my children taught things which are positively untrue, nor truths which have been distorted to fit some one's political or religious conception. i do not want any sort of religion or politics to be put into his head. i want the accepted facts of natural science and discovery to be taught him, in so far as they are within the grasp of his intellect. i do not want them colored with the prejudice of any system. i want a school system which will be suited to his physical well-being. i want what he learns to become his, by virtue of its appealing to his taste, his aptitude for experiment and proof; i do not want it to be a foreign stream pouring over his lips like a brook over its bed, leaving nothing behind. i do not want him to be tortured with formal examinations, nor worried by credit marks with averages and per cents and tenths of per cents, which haunt him waking and sleeping, as if they were the object of his efforts. and more than that, and above all, i do not want him made an automaton. i do not want him to become abjectly obedient. i do not want his free initiative destroyed. i want him, by virtue of his education, to be well-equipped bodily and mentally to face life and its problems. this is my second point: that parents, conservatives and radicals, criticise the school st, as the producer of unhealthy bodies; d, as teaching matter inappropriate to life; or rather, perhaps, as not teaching what is appropriate to life; d, as perverting truth to serve a political and religious system; and as putting an iron mould upon the will of youth, destroying all spontaneity and freedom of expression. the third critic is the teacher. owing to his peculiarly dependent position, it is very, very seldom that any really vital criticism comes out of the mouth of an ordinary employé in the public school service: first, if he has any subversive ideas, he dares not voice them for fear of his job; second, it is extremely unlikely that any one with subversive ideas either will apply for the job, or having applied, will get it; and third, if through some fortuitous combination of circumstances, a rebellious personage has smuggled himself into the camp, with the naive notion that he is going to work reforms in the system, he finds before long that the system is rather remoulding him; he falls into the routine prescribed, and before long ceases to struggle against it. still, however conservative and system-logged teachers may be, they will all agree upon one criticism; viz., that they have too much to do; that it is utterly impossible for them to do justice to every pupil; that with from thirty to fifty pupils all depending upon one teacher for instruction, it is out of the question to give any single one sufficient attention, to say nothing of any special attention which his peculiar backwardness might require. he could do so only at the expense of injustice to the rest. and, indeed, the best teacher in the world could not attend properly to the mental needs of fifty children, nor even of thirty. furthermore, this overcrowding makes necessary the stiff regulation, the formal discipline, in the maintenance of which so much of the teacher's energy is wasted. the everlasting roll-call, the record of tardiness and absence, the eye forever on the watch to see who is whispering, the ear forever on the alert to catch the scraper of feet, the mischievous disturber, the irrepressible noisemaker; with such a divided and subdivided attention, how is it possible to teach? here and there we find a teacher with original ideas, not of subjects to be taught, but of the means of teaching. sometimes there is one who inwardly revolts at what he has to teach, and takes such means as he can to counteract the glorifications of political aggrandizement, with which our geographies and histories are redolent. in general, however, public school teachers, like government clerks, believe very much in the system whereby they live. what they do find fault with, and what they have very much reason to find fault with, is not the school system, but the counteracting influences of bad homes. teachers are often heard to say that they think they could do far better with the children, if they had entire control of them, or, as they more commonly express themselves, "if only their parents had some common sense!" lessons of order, neatness, cleanliness, and hygiene, are often entirely thrown away, because the children regard them as statements to be memorized, not things to be practised. those children whose mothers know nothing of ventilation, the necessity for exercise, the chemistry of food, and the functioning of the organs of the body, will forget instructions because they are never made part of their lives. (which criticism is a sort of confirmation of that sage observation: "if you want to reform a man, begin with his grandmother.") so much for criticism. what, now, can we offer in the way of suggestions for reform? speaking abstractly, i should say that the purpose of education should be to furnish a child with such fundamental knowledge and habits as will preserve and strengthen his body, and make him a self-reliant social being, having an all-around acquaintance with the life which is to surround him and an adaptability to circumstances which will render him able to meet varying conditions. but we are immediately confronted by certain practical queries, when we attempt to conceive such a school system. the fact is that the training of the body should be begun in very early childhood; and can never be rightly done in a city. no other animal than man ever conceived such a frightful apparatus for depriving its young of the primary rights of physical existence as the human city. the mass of our city children know very little of nature. what they have learned of it through occasional picnics, excursions, visits in the country, etc., they have learned as a foreign thing, having little relation to themselves; their "natural" habitat is one of lifeless brick and mortar, wire and iron, poles, pavements, and noise. yet all this ought to be utterly foreign to children. _this_ ought to be the thing visited once in a while, not lived in. there is no pure air in a city; it is _all_ poisoned. yet the first necessity of lunged animals--especially little ones--is pure air. moreover, every child ought to know the names and ways of life of the things it eats; how to grow them, etc. how are gardens possible in a city? every child should know trees, not as things he has read about, but as familiar presences in his life, which he recognizes as quickly as his eyes greet them. he should know his oneness with nature, not through the medium of a theory, but through feeling it daily and hourly. he should know the birds by their songs, and by the quick glimpse of them among the foliage; the insect in its home, the wild flower on its stalk, the fruit where it hangs. can this be done in a city? it is the city that is wrong, and its creations can never be right; they may be improved; they can never be what they should. let me quote luther burbank here: he expressed so well, and just in the tumultuous disorder and un-coordination dear to a child's soul, the early rights of children. "every child should have mud-pies, grasshoppers, water-bugs, tadpoles, frogs, mud-turtles, elderberries, wild strawberries, acorns, chestnuts, trees to climb, brooks to wade in, water-lilies, woodchucks, bats, bees, butterflies, various animals to pet, hay-fields, pine-cones, rocks to roll, sand, snakes, huckleberries, and hornets; and any child who has been deprived of these has been deprived of the best part of his education." he is of opinion that until ten years of age, these things should be the real educators of children,--not books. i agree with him. but neither city homes nor city schools can give children these things. furthermore, i believe that education should be integral; that the true school must combine physical and intellectual education from the beginning to the end. but i am confronted by the fact that this is impossible to the mass of the people, because of the economic condition in which we are all floundering. what is possible can be only a compromise. physical education will go on in the home principally, and intellectual education in the school. something might be done to organize the teaching of parents; lectures and demonstrations at the public schools might be given weekly, in the evenings, for parents, by competent nurses or hygienists. but they would remain largely ineffective. until the whole atrocious system of herding working people in close-built cities, by way of making them serviceable cogwheels in the capitalistic machine for grinding out rent and profit, comes to an end, the physical education of children will remain at best a pathetic compromise. we have left to consider what may be done in the way of improving intellectual education. what is really necessary for a child to know which he is not taught now? and what is taught that is unnecessary? as to reading and writing there is no dispute, though there is much dispute about the way of doing it. but beyond that children should know--_things_; from their earlier school days they should know the geography of their own locality, not rehearsing it from a book, but by going over the ground, having the relations of places explained to them, and by being shown how to model relief maps themselves. they should know the indications of the weather, being taught the use of instruments for measuring air-pressures, temperatures, amount of sunshine, etc.; they should know the special geology of their own locality, the nature of the soil and its products, through practical exhibition; they should be allowed to construct, from clay, stone, or brick, such little buildings as they usually like to make, and from them the simple principles of geometry taught. you see, every school needs a big yard, and play-rooms with tools in them,--the use of which tools they should be taught. arithmetic, to be sure, they need to know--but arithmetic connected with things. let them learn fractions by cutting up things and putting them together, and not be bothered by abstractions running into the hundreds of thousands, the millions, which never in time will they use. and drop all that tiresome years' work in interest and per cent; if decimals are understood, every one who has need will be amply able to work out systems of interest when necessary. children should know the industrial life through which they live, into which they are probably going. they should see how cloth is woven, thread is spun, shoes are made, iron forged and wrought; again not alone by written description, but by eye-witness. they should, as they grow older, learn the history of the arts of peace. what they do not need to know, is so much of the details of the history of destruction; the general facts and results of wars are sufficient. they do not need to be impressed with the details of killings, which they sensibly forget, and inevitably also. moreover, the revolting patriotism which is being inculcated, whereby children learn to be proud of their country, not for its contributions to the general enlightenment of humanity, but for its crimes against humanity; whereby they are taught to consider themselves, their country, their flag, their institutions, as things to be upheld and maintained, right or wrong; whereby the stupid and criminal life of the soldier is exalted as honorable, should be wholly omitted from the educational system. however, it is utterly impossible to expect that it will be, by anything short of general public sentiment against it; and at present such sentiment is for it. i have alluded before to the function of the statesman in directing education. so long as schools are maintained by governments, the statesman, not the true educator, will determine what sort of history is to be taught; and it will be what it is now, only continually growing worse. political institutions must justify themselves to the young generation. they begin by training childish minds to believe that what they do is to be accepted, not criticised. a history becomes little better than a catechism of patriotic formulas in glorification of the state. now there is no way of escaping this, for those who disapprove it, short of eliminating the statesman, establishing voluntarily supported schools, wherein wholly different notions shall be taught; in which the spirit of teaching history shall be one of honest statement and fearless criticism; wherein the true image of war and the army and all that it means shall be honestly given. the really ideal school, which would not be a compromise, would be a boarding school built in the country, having a farm attached, and workshops where useful crafts might be learned, in daily connection with intellectual training. it presupposes teachers able to train little children to habits of health, order, and neatness, in the utmost detail, and yet not tyrants or rigid disciplinarians. in free contact with nature, the children would learn to use their limbs as nature meant, feel their intimate relationship with the growing life of other sorts, form a profound respect for work and an estimate of the value of it; wish to become real doers in the world, and not mere gatherers in of other men's products; and with the respect for work, the appreciation of work, the desire to work, will come the pride of the true workman who will know how to maintain his dignity and the dignity of what he does. at present the major portion of our working people are sorry they are working people (as they have good reason to be). they take little joy or pride in what they do; they consider themselves as less gifted and less valuable persons in society than those who have amassed wealth and, by virtue of that amassment, live upon their employees; or those who by attaining book knowledge have gotten out of the field of manual production, and lead an easier life. they educate their children in the hope that these, at least, may attain that easier existence, without work, which has been beyond them. even when such parents themselves have dreams of a reorganization of society, wherein all shall labor and all have leisure due, they impress upon the children that no one should be a common workingman if he can help it. workingmen are slaves, and it is not well to be a slave. our radicals fail to realize that to accomplish the reorganization of work, it is necessary to have _workers_,--and workers with the free spirit, the rebellious spirit, which will consider its own worth and refuse to accept the slavish conditions of capitalism. these must be bred in schools where work is done, and done proudly, and in full consciousness of its value; where the dubious services of the capitalist will likewise be rated at their true worth; and no man reckoned as above another, unless he has done a greater social service. where political institutions and the politicians who operate them--judges, lawmakers, or executives--will be candidly criticised, and repudiated when justice dictates so, whether in the teaching of their past history, or their present actions in current events. whether the workers, upon whom so many drains are already made, will be able to establish and maintain such schools, is a question to be solved upon trial through their organizations. the question is, will you breed men for the service of the cannon, to be aimed at you in the hour of strikes and revolts, men to uphold the machine which is crushing you, or will you train them in the knowledge of the true worth of labor and a determination to reorganize it as it should be? sex slavery night in a prison cell! a chair, a bed, a small washstand, four blank walls, ghastly in the dim light from the corridor without, a narrow window, barred and sunken in the stone, a grated door! beyond its hideous iron latticework, within the ghastly walls,--a man! an old man, gray-haired and wrinkled, lame and suffering. there he sits, in his great loneliness, shut in from all the earth. there he walks, to and fro, within his measured space, apart from all he loves! there, for every night in five long years to come, he will walk alone, while the white age-flakes drop upon his head, while the last years of the winter of life gather and pass, and his body draws near the ashes. every night, for five long years to come, he will sit alone, this chattel slave, whose hard toil is taken by the state,--and without recompense save that the southern planter gave his negroes,--every night he will sit there so within those four white walls. every night, for five long years to come, a suffering woman will lie upon her bed, longing, longing for the end of those three thousand days; longing for the kind face, the patient hand, that in so many years had never failed her. every night, for five long years to come, the proud spirit must rebel, the loving heart must bleed, the broken home must lie desecrated. as i am speaking now, as you are listening, there within the cell of that accursed penitentiary whose stones have soaked up the sufferings of so many victims, murdered, as truly as any outside their walls, by that slow rot which eats away existence inch-meal,--as i am speaking now, as you are listening, _there sits moses harman_! why? why, when murder now is stalking in your streets, when dens of infamy are so thick within your city that competition has forced down the price of prostitution to the level of the wages of your starving shirt-makers; when robbers sit in state and national senate and house, when the boasted "bulwark of our liberties," the elective franchise, has become a u. s. dice-box, wherewith great gamblers play away your liberties; when debauchees of the worst type hold all your public offices and dine off the food of fools who support them, why, then, sits moses harman there within his prison cell? if he is so _great_ a criminal, why is he not with the rest of the spawn of crime, dining at delmonico's or enjoying a trip to europe? if he is so bad a man, why in the name of wonder did he ever get in the penitentiary? ah, no; it is not because he has done any evil thing; but because he, a pure enthusiast, searching, searching always for the cause of misery of the kind which he loved with that broad love of which only the pure soul is capable, searched for the data of evil. and searching so he found the vestibule of life to be a prison cell; the holiest and purest part of the temple of the body, if indeed one part can be holier or purer than another, the altar where the most devotional love in truth should be laid, he found this altar ravished, despoiled, trampled upon. he found little babies, helpless, voiceless little things, generated in lust, cursed with impure moral natures, cursed, prenatally, with the germs of disease, forced into the world to struggle and to suffer, to hate themselves, to hate their mothers for bearing them, to hate society and to be hated by it in return,--a bane upon self and race, draining the lees of crime. and he said, this felon with the stripes upon his body, "let the mothers of the race go free! let the little children be pure love children, born of the mutual desire for parentage. let the manacles be broken from the shackled slave, that no more slaves be born, no more tyrants conceived." he looked, this obscenist, looked with clear eyes into this ill-got thing you call morality, sealed with the seal of marriage, and saw in it the consummation of _im_morality, impurity, and injustice. he beheld every married woman what she is, a bonded slave, who takes her master's name, her master's bread, her master's commands, and serves her master's passion; who passes through the ordeal of pregnancy and the throes of travail at _his_ dictation,--not at her desire; who can control no property, not even her own body, without his consent, and from whose straining arms the children she bears may be torn at his pleasure, or willed away while they are yet unborn. it is said the english language has a sweeter word than any other,--_home_. but moses harman looked beneath the word and saw the fact,--a prison more horrible than that where he is sitting now, whose corridors radiate over all the earth, and with so many cells, that none may count them. yes, our masters! the earth is a prison, the marriage-bed is a cell, women are the prisoners, and you are the keepers! he saw, this corruptionist, how in those cells are perpetrated such outrages as are enough to make the cold sweat stand upon the forehead, and the nails clench, and the teeth set, and the lips grow white in agony and hatred. and he saw too how from those cells might none come forth to break her fetters, how no slave dare cry out, how all these murders are done quietly, beneath the shelter-shadow of home, and sanctified by the angelic benediction of a piece of paper, within the silence-shade of a marriage certificate, adultery and rape stalk freely and at ease. yes, for that is adultery where woman submits herself sexually to man, without desire on her part, for the sake of "keeping him virtuous," "keeping him at home," the women say. (well, if a man did not love me and respect himself enough to be "virtuous" without prostituting me, he might go, and welcome. he has no virtue to keep.) and that is rape, where a man forces himself sexually upon a woman whether he is licensed by the marriage law to do it or not. and that is the vilest of all tyranny where a man compels the woman he says he loves, to endure the agony of bearing children that she does not want, and for whom, as is the rule rather than the exception, they cannot properly provide. it is worse than any other human oppression; it is fairly _god_-like! to the sexual tyrant there is no parallel upon earth; one must go to the skies to find a fiend who thrusts life upon his children only to starve and curse and outcast and damn them! and only through the marriage law is such tyranny possible. the man who deceives a woman outside of marriage (and mind you, such a man will deceive _in_ marriage too) may deny his own child, if he is mean enough. he cannot tear it from her arms--he cannot touch it! the girl he wronged, thanks to your very pure and tender morality-standard, may die in the street for want of food. _he_ cannot force his hated presence upon her again. but his wife, gentlemen, his wife, the woman he respects so much that he consents to let her merge her individuality into his, lose her identity and become his chattel, his wife he may not only force unwelcome children upon, outrage at his own good pleasure, and keep as a general cheap and convenient piece of furniture, but if she does not get a divorce (and she cannot for such cause) he can follow her wherever she goes, come into her house, eat her food, force her into the cell, _kill_ her by virtue of his sexual authority! and she has no redress unless he is indiscreet enough to abuse her in some less brutal but unlicensed manner. i know a case in your city where a woman was followed so for ten years by her husband. i believe he finally developed grace enough to die; please applaud him for the only decent thing he ever did. oh, is it not rare, all this talk about the preservation of morality by marriage law! o splendid carefulness to preserve that which you have not got! o height and depth of purity, which fears so much that the children will not know who their fathers are, because, forsooth, they must rely upon their mother's word instead of the hired certification of some priest of the church, or the law! i wonder if the children would be improved to know what their fathers have done. i would rather, much rather, not know who my father was than know he had been a tyrant to my mother. i would rather, much rather, be illegitimate according to the statutes of men, than illegitimate according to the unchanging law of nature. for what is it to be legitimate, born "according to law"? it is to be, nine cases out of ten, the child of a man who acknowledges his fatherhood simply because he is forced to do so, and whose conception of virtue is realized by the statement that "a woman's duty is to keep her husband at home"; to be the child of a woman who cares more for the benediction of mrs. grundy than the simple honor of her lover's word, and conceives prostitution to be purity and duty when exacted of her by her husband. it is to have tyranny as your progenitor, and slavery as your prenatal cradle. it is to run the risk of unwelcome birth, "legal" constitutional weakness, morals corrupted before birth, possibly a murder instinct, the inheritance of excessive sexuality or no sexuality, either of which is disease. it is to have the value of a piece of paper, a rag from the tattered garments of the "social contract," set above health, beauty, talent or goodness; for i never yet had difficulty in obtaining the admission that illegitimate children are nearly always prettier and brighter than others, even from conservative women. and how supremely disgusting it is to see them look from their own puny, sickly, lust-born children, upon whom lie the chain-traces of their own terrible servitude, look from these to some healthy, beautiful "natural" child, and say, "what a pity its _mother_ wasn't virtuous!" never a word about _their_ children's fathers' virtue, they know too much! virtue! disease, stupidity, criminality! what an _obscene_ thing "virtue" is! what is it to be illegitimate? to be despised, or pitied, by those whose spite or whose pity isn't worth the breath it takes to return it. to be, possibly, the child of some man contemptible enough to deceive a woman; the child of some woman whose chief crime was belief in the man she loved. to be free from the prenatal curse of a slave mother, to come into the world without the permission of any law-making set of tyrants who assume to corner the earth, and say what terms the unborn must make for the privilege of coming into existence. this is legitimacy and illegitimacy! choose. the man who walks to and fro in his cell in lansing penitentiary to-night, this vicious man, said: "the mothers of the race are lifting their dumb eyes to me, their sealed lips to me, their agonizing hearts to me. they are seeking, seeking for a voice! the unborn in their helplessness, are pleading from their prisons, pleading for a voice! the criminals, with the unseen ban upon their souls, that has pushed them, pushed them to the vortex, out of their whirling hells, are looking, waiting for a voice! _i will be their voice._ i will unmask the outrages of the marriage-bed. i will make known how criminals are born. i will make one outcry that shall be heard, and let what will be, _be_!" he cried out through the letter of dr. markland, that a young mother lacerated by unskilful surgery in the birth of her babe, but recovering from a subsequent successful operation, had been stabbed, remorselessly, cruelly, brutally stabbed, not with a knife, but with the procreative organ of her husband, stabbed to the doors of death, and yet there was no redress! and because he called a spade a spade, because he named that organ by its own name, so given in webster's dictionary and in every medical journal in the country, because of this moses harman walks to and fro in his cell to-night. he gave a concrete example of the effect of sex slavery, and for it he is imprisoned. it remains for us now to carry on the battle, and lift the standard where they struck him down, to scatter broadcast the knowledge of this crime of society against a man and the reason for it; to inquire into this vast system of licensed crime, its cause and its effect, broadly upon the race. the cause! let woman ask herself, "why am i the slave of man? why is my brain said not to be the equal of his brain? why is my work not paid equally with his? why must my body be controlled by my husband? why may he take my labor in the household, giving me in exchange what he deems fit? why may he take my children from me? will them away while yet unborn?" let every woman ask. there are two reasons why, and these ultimately reducible to a single principle--the authoritarian, supreme-power, _god_-idea, and its two instruments, the church--that is, the priests--and the state--that is, the legislators. from the birth of the church, out of the womb of fear and the fatherhood of ignorance, it has taught the inferiority of woman. in one form or another through the various mythical legends of the various mythical creeds, runs the undercurrent of the belief in the fall of man through the persuasion of woman, her subjective condition as punishment, her natural vileness, total depravity, etc.; and from the days of adam until now the christian church, with which we have specially to deal, has made _woman_ the excuse, the scapegoat for the evil deeds of _man_. so thoroughly has this idea permeated society that numbers of those who have utterly repudiated the church, are nevertheless soaked in this stupefying narcotic to true morality. so pickled is the male creation with the vinegar of authoritarianism, that even those who have gone further and repudiated the state still cling to the god, society as it is, still hug the old theological idea that they are to be "heads of the family"--to that wonderful formula "of simple proportion" that "man is the head of the woman even as christ is the head of the church." no longer than a week since an anarchist (?) said to me, "i will be boss in my own house"--a "communist-anarchist," if you please, who doesn't believe in "_my_ house." about a year ago a noted libertarian speaker said, in my presence, that his sister, who possessed a fine voice and had joined a concert troupe, should "stay at home with her children; that is _her place_." the old church idea! this man was a socialist, and since an anarchist; yet his highest idea for woman was serfhood to husband and children, in the present mockery called "home." stay at home, ye malcontents! be patient, obedient, submissive! darn our socks, mend our shirts, wash our dishes, get our meals, wait on us and _mind the children_! your fine voices are not to delight the public nor yourselves; your inventive genius is not to work, your fine art taste is not to be cultivated, your business faculties are not to be developed; you made the great mistake of being born with them, suffer for your folly! you are _women_! therefore housekeepers, servants, waiters, and child's nurses! at macon, in the sixth century, says august bebel, the fathers of the church met and proposed the decision of the question, "has woman a soul?" having ascertained that the permission to own a nonentity wasn't going to injure any of their parsnips, a small majority vote decided the momentous question in our favor. now, holy fathers, it was a tolerably good scheme on your part to offer the reward of your pitiable "salvation or damnation" (odds in favor of the latter) as a bait for the hook of earthly submission; it wasn't a bad sop in those days of faith and ignorance. but fortunately fourteen hundred years have made it stale. you, tyrant radicals (?), have no heaven to offer,--you have no delightful chimeras in the form of "merit cards"; you have (save the mark) the respect, the good offices, the smiles--of a slave-holder! this in return for our chains! thanks! the question of souls is old--we demand our bodies, now. we are tired of promises, god is deaf, and his church is our worst enemy. against it we bring the charge of being the moral (or immoral) force which lies behind the tyranny of the state. and the state has divided the loaves and fishes with the church, the magistrates, like the priests take marriage fees; the two fetters of authority have gone into partnership in the business of granting patent-rights to parents for the privilege of reproducing themselves, and the state cries as the church cried of old, and cries now: "see how we protect women!" the state has done more. it has often been said to me, by women with decent masters, who had no idea of the outrages practiced on their less fortunate sisters, "why don't the wives leave?" why don't you run, when your feet are chained together? why don't you cry out when a gag is on your lips? why don't you raise your hands above your head when they are pinned fast to your sides? why don't you spend thousands of dollars when you haven't a cent in your pocket? why don't you go to the seashore or the mountains, you fools scorching with city heat? if there is one thing more than another in this whole accursed tissue of false society, which makes me angry, it is the asinine stupidity which with the true phlegm of impenetrable dullness says, "why don't the women leave!" will you tell me where they will go and what they shall do? when the state, the legislators, has given to itself, the politicians, the utter and absolute control of the opportunity to live; when, through this precious monopoly, already the market of labor is so overstocked that workmen and workwomen are cutting each others' throats for the dear privilege of serving their lords; when girls are shipped from boston to the south and north, shipped in carloads, like cattle, to fill the dives of new orleans or the lumber-camp hells of my own state (michigan), when seeing and hearing these things reported every day, the proper prudes exclaim, "why don't the women leave," they simply beggar the language of contempt. when america passed the fugitive slave law compelling men to catch their fellows more brutally than runaway dogs, canada, aristocratic, unrepublican canada, still stretched her arms to those who might reach her. but there is no refuge upon earth for the enslaved sex. right where we are, there we must dig our trenches, and win or die. this, then, is the tyranny of the state; it denies, to both woman and man, the right to earn a living, and grants it as a privilege to a favored few who for that favor must pay ninety per cent. toll to the granters of it. these two things, the mind domination of the church, and the body domination of the state are the causes of sex slavery. first of all, it has introduced into the world the constructed crime of obscenity: it has set up such a peculiar standard of morals that to speak the names of the sexual organs is to commit the most brutal outrage. it reminds me that in your city you have a street called "callowhill." once it was called gallows' hill, for the elevation to which it leads, now known as "cherry hill," has been the last touching place on earth for the feet of many a victim murdered by the law. but the sound of the word became too harsh; so they softened it, though the murders are still done, and the black shadow of the gallows still hangs on the city of brotherly love. obscenity has done the same; it has placed virtue in the shell of an idea, and labelled all "good" which dwells within the sanction of law and respectable (?) custom; and all bad which contravenes the usage of the shell. it has lowered the dignity of the human body, below the level of all other animals. who thinks a dog is impure or obscene because its body is not covered with suffocating and annoying clothes? what would you think of the meanness of a man who would put a skirt upon his horse and compel it to walk or run with such a thing impeding its limbs? why, the "society for the prevention of cruelty to animals" would arrest him, take the beast from him, and he would be sent to a lunatic asylum for treatment on the score of an _impure_ mind. and yet, gentlemen, you expect your wives, the creatures you say you respect and love, to wear the longest skirts and the highest necked clothing, in order to conceal the _obscene human body_. there is no society for the prevention of cruelty to women. and you, yourselves, though a little better, look at the heat you wear in this roasting weather! how you curse your poor body with the wool you steal from the sheep! how you punish yourselves to sit in a crowded house with coats and vests on, because dead mme. grundy is shocked at the "vulgarity" of shirt sleeves, or the naked arm! look how the ideal of beauty has been marred by this obscenity notion. divest yourselves of prejudice for once. look at some fashion-slaved woman, her waist surrounded by a high-board fence called a corset, her shoulders and hips angular from the pressure above and below, her feet narrowest where they should be widest, the body fettered by her everlasting prison skirt, her hair fastened tight enough to make her head ache and surmounted by a thing of neither sense nor beauty, called a hat, ten to one a hump upon her back like a dromedary,--look at her, and then imagine such a thing as that carved in marble! fancy a statue in fairmount park with a corset and bustle on. picture to yourselves the image of the equestrienne. we are permitted to ride, providing we sit in a position ruinous to the horse; providing we wear a riding-habit long enough to hide the obscene human foot, weighed down by ten pounds of gravel to cheat the wind in its free blowing, so running the risk of disabling ourselves completely should accident throw us from the saddle. think how we swim! we must even wear clothing in the water, and run the gauntlet of derision, if we dare battle in the surf minus stockings! imagine a fish trying to make headway with a water-soaked flannel garment upon it. nor are you yet content. the vile standard of obscenity even kills the little babies with clothes. the human race is murdered, horribly, "in the name of" dress. and in the name of purity what lies are told! what queer morality it has engendered. for fear of it you dare not tell your own children the truth about their birth; the most sacred of all functions, the creation of a human being, is a subject for the most miserable falsehood. when they come to you with a simple, straightforward question, which they have a right to ask, you say, "don't ask such questions," or tell some silly hollow-log story; or you explain the incomprehensibility by another--god! you say "god made you." you know you are lying when you say it. you know, or you ought to know, that the source of inquiry will not be dammed up so. you know that what you could explain purely, reverently, rightly (if you have any purity in you), will be learned through many blind gropings, and that around it will be cast the shadow-thought of wrong, embryo'd by your denial and nurtured by this social opinion everywhere prevalent. if you do not know this, then you are blind to facts and deaf to experience. think of the double social standard the enslavement of our sex has evolved. women considering themselves very pure and very moral, will sneer at the street-walker, yet admit to their homes the very men who victimized the street-walker. men, at their best, will pity the prostitute, while they themselves are the worst kind of prostitutes. pity yourselves, gentlemen--you need it! how many times do you see where a man or woman has shot another through jealousy! the standard of purity has decided that it is right, "it shows spirit," "it is justifiable" to--murder a human being for doing exactly what you did yourself,--love the same woman or same man! morality! honor! virtue!! passing from the moral to the physical phase; take the statistics of any insane asylum, and you will find that, out of the different classes, unmarried women furnish the largest one. to preserve your cruel, vicious, indecent standard of purity (?) you drive your daughters insane, while your wives are killed with excess. such is marriage. don't take my word for it; go through the report of any asylum or the annals of any graveyard. look how your children grow up. taught from their earliest infancy to curb their love natures--restrained at every turn! your blasting lies would even blacken a child's kiss. little girls must not be tomboyish, must not go barefoot, must not climb trees, must not learn to swim, must not do anything they desire to do which madame grundy has decreed "improper." little boys are laughed at as effeminate, silly girl-boys if they want to make patchwork or play with a doll. then when they grow up, "oh! men don't care for home or children as women do!" why should they, when the deliberate effort of your life has been to crush that nature out of them. "women can't rough it like men." train any animal, or any plant, as you train your girls, and it won't be able to rough it either. now _will_ somebody tell me why either sex should hold a corner on athletic sports? why any child should not have free use of its limbs? these are the effects of your purity standard, your marriage law. this is your work--look at it! half your children dying under five years of age, your girls insane, your married women walking corpses, your men so bad that they themselves often admit _prostitution holds against_ =purity= _a bond of indebtedness_. this is the beautiful effect of your god, marriage, before which natural desire must abase and belie itself. be proud of it! now for the remedy. it is in one word, the only word that ever brought equity anywhere--=liberty=! centuries upon centuries of liberty is the only thing that will cause the disintegration and decay of these pestiferous ideas. liberty was all that calmed the blood-waves of religious persecution! you cannot cure serfhood by any other substitution. not for you to say "in this way shall the race love." let the race _alone_. will there not be atrocious crimes? certainly. he is a fool who says there will not be. but you can't stop them by committing the arch-crime and setting a block between the spokes of progress-wheels. you will never get right until you start right. as for the final outcome, it matters not one iota. i have my ideal, and it is very pure, and very sacred to me. but yours, equally sacred, may be different and we may both be wrong. but certain am i that with free contract, that form of sexual association will survive which is best adapted to time and place, thus producing the highest evolution of the type. whether that shall be monogamy, variety, or promiscuity matters naught to us; it is the business of the future, to which we dare not dictate. for freedom spoke moses harman, and for this he received the felon's brand. for this he sits in his cell to-night. whether it is possible that his sentence be shortened, we do not know. we can only try. those who would help us try, let me ask to put your signatures to this simple request for pardon addressed to benjamin harrison. to those who desire more fully to inform themselves before signing; i say: your conscientiousness is praiseworthy--come to me at the close of the meeting and i will quote the exact language of the markland letter. to those extreme anarchists who cannot bend their dignity to ask pardon for an offense not committed, and of an authority they cannot recognize, let me say: moses harman's back is bent, low bent, by the brute force of the law, and though i would never ask anyone to bow for himself, i can ask it, and easily ask it, for him who fights the slave's battle. your dignity is criminal; every hour behind the bars is a seal to your partnership with comstock. no one can hate petitions worse than i; no one has less faith in them than i. but for _my_ champion i am willing to try any means that invades no other's right, even though i have little hope in it. if, beyond these, there are those here to-night who have ever forced sexual servitude from a wife, those who have prostituted themselves in the name of virtue, those who have brought diseased, immoral or unwelcome children to the light, without the means of provision for them, and yet will go from this hall and say, "moses harman is an unclean man--a man rewarded by just punishment," then to _you_ i say, and may the words ring deep within your ears until you die: go on! drive your sheep to the shambles! crush that old, sick, crippled man beneath your juggernaut! in the name of virtue, purity and morality, do it! in the name of god, home, and heaven, do it! in the name of the nazarene who preached the golden rule, do it! in the name of justice, principle, and honor, do it! in the name of bravery and magnanimity put yourself on the side of the robber in the government halls, the murderer in the political convention, the libertine in public places, the whole brute force of the police, the constabulary, the court, and the penitentiary, to persecute one poor old man who stood alone against your licensed crime! do it. and if moses harman dies within your "kansas hell," be satisfied _when you have murdered him_! kill him! and you hasten the day when the future shall bury you ten thousand fathoms deep beneath its curses. kill him! and the stripes upon his prison clothes shall lash you like the knout! kill him! and the insane shall glitter hate at you with their wild eyes, the unborn babes shall cry their blood upon you, and the graves that you have filled in the name of marriage, shall yield food for a race that will pillory you, until the memory of your atrocity has become a nameless ghost, flitting with the shades of torquemada, calvin and jehovah over the horizon of the world! would you smile to see him dead? would you say, "we are rid of this obscenist"? fools! the corpse would laugh at you from its cold eyelids! the motionless lips would mock, and the solemn hands, the pulseless, folded hands, in their quietness would write the last indictment, which neither time nor you can efface. kill him! and you write his glory and your shame! moses harman in his felon stripes stands far above you now, and moses harman _dead_ will live on, immortal in the race he died to free! kill him! literature the mirror of man perhaps i had better say the mirror-reflection,--the reflection of all that he has been and is, the hinting fore-flashing of something of what he may become. in so considering it, let it be understood that i speak of no particular form of literature, but the entire body of a people's expressed thought, preserved either traditionally, in writing, or in print. the majority of lightly thinking, fairly read people, who make use of the word "literature" rather easily, do so with a very indistinct idea of its content. to them it usually means a certain limited form of human expression, chiefly works of the imagination--poetry, drama, the various forms of the novel. history, philosophy, science are rather frowning names,--stern second cousins, as it were, to the beguiling companions of their pleasant leisure hours,--not legitimately "literature." biography,--well, it depends on who writes it! if it can be made so much like a work of fiction that the subject sketched serves the purposes of a fictive hero, why then--maybe. to such talkers about literature, evidence of familiarity with it, and title to have one's opinions thereon asked and respected, are witnessed by the ability to run glibly off the names of the personages in the dramas of ibsen, björnson, maeterlinck, hauptmann or shaw; or in the novels of gorki, andreyev, tolstoy, zola, maupassant, hardy, and the dozen or so of lesser lights who revolve with these through the cycle of the magazine issues. not only do these same people thus limit the field of literature, (at least in their ordinary conversation,--if you press them they will dubiously admit that the field may be extended) but they are also possessed of the notion that only one particular mode even of fiction, is in fact the genuine thing. that this mode has not always been in vogue they are aware; and they allow other modes to have been literature in the past, as a sort of kindly concession to the past--a blanket-indulgence to its unevolved state. at present, however, no indulgences are allowed; whatever is not the mode, is anathema; it is not literature at all. when confronted by the _very_ great names of the past, which they can neither consign to oblivion, nor patronize by toleration for their undeveloped condition, names which are names for all ages, which they need to use as conjuration words in their comparisons and criticisms, names such as shakespeare or hugo, they complacently close their eyes to contradictions and swear that fundamentally these men's works _are in the modern mode, the accepted mode, the one and only enduring mode_, the mode that they approve. "which is?"--i hear you ask. _which is_ what they are pleased to call "realism." if you wish to know how far they are obsessed by this notion, go pick yourself a quiet corner in some café where light literature readers meet to make comparisons, and listen to the comments. before very long, voices will be getting loud about some character at present stalking across the pages of the magazines, or bestirring itself among the latest ton of novel; and the dispute will be, "does such a type exist?"--"of course he exists,"--"he does not exist,"--"he must exist,"--"he cannot exist,"--"under such conditions,"--"there are no such conditions,"--"but be reasonable: you have not been in all places, and you cannot say there may not be such conditions; supposing--" "all right: i will give you the conditions; all the same, no man would act so under any conditions." "i swear l have seen such men--" "impossible--" "what is there impossible about it?--" and the voices get louder and louder, as the disputants proceed to pick the character to pieces, speech by speech, and action by action, till, nothing being left, each finally subsides somehow, each confirmed in his own opinion, each convinced that the main purpose of literature--realism--has either been served, or not served, by the author under discussion. to such disputants "literature the mirror of man," means that only such literature as gives so-called absolutely faithful representations of life as it is demonstrably lived, is a genuine mirror. no author is to be considered worthy of a place, unless his works can be at least twisted to fit this conception. with some slight refinement of idea, in so far as it recognizes the obscurer recesses of the mind as entitled to representation as well as the externals, it corresponds to the one-time development of portrait painting, which esteemed it necessary to paint the exact number of hairs in the wart on oliver cromwell's nose, in order to have a true likeness of him. as before suggested, i do not, when i speak of literature as the mirror of man, have any such x mirror in view; nor the limitation of literature to any one form of it, to any one age of it, to any set of standard names; nor the limitation of man to any preconceived notion of just what he may logically be allowed to be. the composite image we are seeking to find is an image wrought as much of his dreams of what he would like to be, as of his actual being; that is no true picture of man, which does not include his cravings for the impossible, as well as his daily performance of the possible. indeed, the logical, calculable man, the man who under certain circumstances may be figured out to turn murderer and under others saint, is hardly so interesting as the illogical being who upsets the calculation by becoming neither, but something not at all predictable. the objects of my lecture then are these: . to insist on a wider view of literature itself than that generally accepted. . to suggest to readers a more satisfactory way of considering what they read than that usually received. . to point to certain phases of the human appearance reflected in the mirror which are not generally noticed, but which i find interesting and suggestive. you would think it very unreasonable, would you not, for any one to insist that because your highly polished glass backed by quicksilver, gives back so clear and excellent an image, _therefore_ the watery vision you catch of yourself in the shifting, glancing ripples of a clear stream is not an image at all! with all the curious elongating and drifting and shortening back and breaking up into wavering circles, done by that unresting image, you know very certainly that is you; and if you look into the still waters of some summer pool, or mountain rain-cup, the image there is almost as sharp-lined as that in your polished glass, except for the vague tremor that seems to move under the water rather than on its surface, and suggest an ethereal something missing in your drawing-room shadow. yet that vision conjured in the water-depth is you--surely you. nay, even more,--that _first_ image of you, you perceived when as a child you danced in the firelight and saw a misshapen darkness rising and falling along the wall in teasing mockery,--that too was surely an image of you--an image of interception, not of reflection; a blur, a vacancy, a horror, from which you fled shrieking to your mother's arms;--and yet it was the distorted outline of you. you grew familiar with it later, amused yourself with it, twisted your hands into strange positions to see what curious shapes they would form upon the wall, and made whole stories with the shadows. long afterward you went back to them with deliberate and careful curiosity, to see how the figures stumbled on by accident could be definitely produced, at will, according to the laws of interception. even so the first _man-images_, cast back from the blank wall of language, are uncouth, ungraspable, vague, vacant, menacing--to the men who saw them, frightful. mankind produced this paradox: the early _lights_ of literature were _darkness_! later these darknesses grew less fearsome; the child-man began to jest with them; to multiply figures and send them chasing past each other up and down the wall, with fresh glee at each newly created shadow-sport. the wall at last became luminous, the shadows shining. and out of the old monosyllabic horror of the primitive legend, out of man's fright at the projection of his own soul, out of his wide stare at those terrific giants on the wall who suddenly with shadow-like shifting became grotesque dwarfs, and mocking little beasts that danced and floated, ever most fearful because of their elusive emptiness; out of this, bit by bit, grew the steady contemplation, the gradual effacement of fright, the feeling of power and amusement, and the sense of creative mastery, which, understanding the shadows, began to command them, till there arose all the beauty of fairy tales and shining myths and singing legends. now any one who desires to see in literature the most that there is in it; who desires to read not merely for the absorption of the moment but for the sake of permanent impression; who wishes to have an idea of man not only as he is now, but through the whole articulate record of his existence; who would know the thoughts of his infancy and the connected course of his development,--and no one has any adequate conception of the glory of literature, unless he includes this much in it--any such a reader, i say, must find among its most attractive pages, the stories of early superstitions, the fictions of fear, the struggles of the race-child's intelligence with overlooming problems. think of the ages and ages that men saw the demon electricity riding the air; think that even now they do not know what he is; and yet he played mightily with their daily lives for all those ages. think how this staring savage was put face to face with world-games which were spun and tossed around him, and compelled by the nature of his own activity to try to find an explanation to them; think that most of us, if we were not the heritors of the ages that have passed since then, should be staggered and out-breathed even now by all these lights and forms through which we move; and then turn to the record of those pathetic strivings of the frightened child with some little tenderness and sympathy, some solemn curiosity to know _what_ men were able to think and feel when they led their lives as in a threatening wonder-house, where everything was an unknown, invested with crouching hostility. and never be too sure you know just how men will act, or try to act, under any conditions, if you have not read the record of what they have thought and fancied and done; and after you have read it, oh, then you will never be sure you know! for then you will realize that every man is a burial-house, full of dead men's ghosts,--and the ghosts of very, very ancient days are there, forever whispering in an ancient, ancient tongue of ancient passions and desires, and prompting many actions which the doer thereof can give himself no accounting for. there are two ways of reading these old stories; and as one who has gotten pleasure and profit, too, from both, i would recommend them both to be used. the first way is to read yourself backward into it as much as possible. do not be a critic, on first reading; put the critic asleep. let yourself _seem to believe it_, as did he who wrote it. read it aloud, if you are where you will not annoy anybody; let the words sing themselves over your lips, as they sung themselves over the lips of the people who were dead so long ago,--in their strange far-away homes with their vanished surroundings; sung themselves, just as the wind sung through the echoing forests, and murmured back from the rocks; just as the songs slipped out of the birds' throats. you will find that half the beauty and the farce of old-time legend lies in the bare sound of it. far, far more is it dependent on the voice, than any modern writings are. and surely, the reason is simple enough: for _it_ was not _writing_ in its creation; ancient literature addressed itself to the ear, always, while modern literature speaks to the eye. if once you can get your ears washing with the sounds of the old language, as with the washing of the seas when you sit on the beach, or the lapping of the rivers when the bank-grass caresses you some idle summer afternoon, it will be much easier for you to forget that you are the child of another age and thought. you will begin to luxuriate in fancies and prefigure impossibilities; then you will know how it feels to be fancy free, loosed from the chain of the possible; and once having felt, you will also understand better, when you re-read with other intent. when you are ready for such re-reading, then be as critical as you please,--which does not necessarily mean be condemnatory. it means rather take notice of all generals and particulars, and question them. you will naturally pose yourself the question, why is it that the bare sounds of these old stories are so much more vibrating, drum-like, shrilling, at times, than any modern song or poem? you will find that the mitigating influence of civilization,--knowledge, moderation,--creeping into expression, produces flat, neutral, diluted sounds,--watery words, so to speak, long-drawn out and glidingly inoffensive. in any modern writing remarkable for strength, will be found a preponderance of "barbaric yawp"--as whitman called it. fear creates sharp cries; the rebound of fear, which is bravado, produces drum-tones, roars, and growls; unrestrained passions howl in wind-notes, irregular, breaking short off. god carries a hammer, and love a spear. the hymn clangs, and the love-song clashes. through those fierce sounds one feels again hot hearts. those who perceive colors accompanying sounds, sense clean cut lights streaking the night-ground of these early word-pictures; sharp, hard, reds and yellows. it is our later world which has produced green tintings not to be told from gray, nor gray from blue, nor anything from anything. in our fondness for smoothness and gradation we have attained practical colorlessness. if it appears to you that i am talking nonsense, permit me to tell you it is because you have dulled your own powers of perception; in seeking to become too intellectually appreciative, you have lost the power to feel primitive things. try to recover it. another source of interesting observation, especially in english literature of early writing: this time the eye. it is admitted by everybody that as a serviceable instrument for expressing definite sounds in an expeditious and comprehensible manner, english written language is a woeful failure. if any inventor of a theory of symbols should, would, or could have devised such a ridiculous conception of spelling, such a hodge-podge of contradictory jumbles, he would properly have been adjudged to an insane asylum; and that, every man who ever contrived an english spelling-book, and every teacher who is obliged to worry this incongruous mess through the steadily revolting reason-and-memory process of children, is ably convinced. but man, english-speaking man, has actually--_executed_ such conception; (he probably executed it first and conceived it afterward, as most of our poor victims do when they start on that terrible blind road through the spelling-book). whether or no, the thing is here, and we've all to accept it, and deal with it as best we may, sadly hoping that possibly the tenth generation from now may at least be rid of a few unnecessary "e's." and since the thing is here, and is a mighty creation, and very indicative of how the human brain in large sections works; since we've got to put up with it anyway, we may as well, in revenge for its many inconveniences, get what little satisfaction we can out of it. and i find it one of the most delightful little side amusements of wandering through the field of old literature, while in the critical vein, to stray around among the old stumps and crooked cowpaths of english spelling. much pleasure is to be derived from seeing what old words grew together and made new ones; what syllables or letters got lopped off or twisted, how silent letters became silent and why; from what older language planted, and what its relatives are. it is much the same pleasure that one gets from trailing around through the narrow crooked streets and senseless meanderings of london city. everybody knows it's a foolish way to build a city; that all streets should be straight and wide and well-distributed. but since they are not, and london is too big for one's individual exertion to reform, one consents to take interest in explaining the crookedness--in mentally dissolving the great city into the hundred little villages which coalesced to make it; in marking this point as the place where st. somebody-or-other knelt and prayed once and therefore there had to be a cross-street here; and this other point as the place where the road swept round because martyrs were wont to be burnt there, etc., etc. the trouble is that after a while one gets to love all that quaint illogical tangle, seeing always the thousand years of history in it; and so one's senses actually become vitiated enough to permit him to love the outrages of english spelling, because of the features of men's souls that are imaged therein. when i look at the word "laugh," i fancy i hear the joyous deep guttural "gha-gha-gha" of the old saxon who died long before the foreign graft on the english stock softened the "gh" to an "f"! really one must become more patient with the "un-system," knowing how it grew, and feeling that this is the way of man,--the way he always grows,--not as he ought, but as he can. i have spoken of forms: word-sounds, word-symbols; as to the spirit of those early writings, full of inarticulate religious sentiment, emotions so strong they burst from the utterer's throat one might almost say in barks; gloomy and foreboding; these gradually changing to more lightsome fancies,--beauty, delicacy, airiness taking their place, as in the fairy tales and folk-songs of the people, wherein the deeds of supernaturals are sported with, and it becomes evident that love and winsomeness are usurping the kingdom of power and fear,--through all we are compelled to observe one constant tendency of the human mind,--the desire to free itself from its own conditions, to be what it is not, to represent itself as something beyond its powers of accomplishment. in their minds, men had wings, and breathed in water, and swam on land, and ate air, and thrived in deserts, and walked through seas, and gathered roses off ice-bergs, and collected frozen dew off the tails of sunbeams, dispersed mountains with mustard seeds of faith, and climbed into solid caves under the rainbow; did everything which it was impossible for them to do. it is in fact this imaginative faculty which has fore-run the accomplishments of science and while, under the influence of practical experiment and the extension of knowledge such dreams have passed away, this much remains and will long, long remain in humankind, covered over and shamefacedly concealed as much as may be--that men perpetually conceive themselves as chrysalid heroes and wonder workers; and, under strain of occasion, this element crops out in their actions, making them do all manner of curious things which the standard-setters of realism will declare utterly illogical and impossible. often it is the commonest men who do them. i have a fondness for realism myself; at least i have a very wicked feeling towards what is called "symbolism," and various other things which i don't understand; but as the "unrealists," the "exaggeratists," the whatever-you-call-them express what i believe to be a very permanent characteristic of humankind, as evidenced in all the traces of its work, i think they probably give quite as true reflections of man's soul as the present favorites. these early literatures, most of which have of course been lost, were the embryos of our more imposing creations; and it is a pleasant and an instructive thing to follow the unfolding of monster tales into great religious literatures; to compare them and see how the same few simple figures, either transplanted or spontaneously produced at different points, evolved into all manner of creators, redeemers and miracles in their various altered habitats. no one can so thoroughly appreciate what is in the face of a man turned upward in prayer, as he who has followed the evolution of the black monster up to that impersonal conception of god prettily called by quakers "the inner light." fairy tales on the other hand have evolved into allegories and dramas,--first the dramas of the sky, now the dramas of earth. tales of sexual exploits have become novels, novelettes, short stories, sketches,--a many-expressioned countenance of man. but the old heroic legend,--and the hero is always the next born after the monster in the far-back dawn-days, is the lineal progenitor of history,--history which was first the glorification of a warrior and his aids; then the story of kings, courts, and intrigues; now mostly the report of the deeds of nations in their ugly moods; and _to become_ the record of what people have done in their more amiable moments,--the record of the conquests of peace; how men have lived and labored; dug and built, hewn and cleared, gardened and reforested, organized and coöperated, manufactured and used, educated and amused themselves. those of us who aspire to be more or less suggesters of social change, are greatly at a loss, if we do not know the face of man as reflected in history; and i mean as much the reflection of the minds of historians as seen in their histories as the reflection of the minds of others they sought to give; not so much in the direct expression of their opinion either, as in the choice of what they thought it worth while to try to stamp perpetuity upon. when we read in the anglo-saxon chronicle these items which are characteristic of the whole: "a. d. . this year cynegils succeeded to the government in wessex, and held it winters. cynegils was the son of ceol, ceol of cutha, cutha of cymric." and then, " . this year cynegils and cuiehelm fought at bampton and slew of the welsh." and then " . this year appeared the comet star in august, and shone every morning during three months like a sunbeam. bishop wilfred being driven from his bishopric by king everth, two bishops were consecrated in his stead." --when we read these we have not any very adequate conception of what the anglo-saxon people were doing; but we have a very striking and lasting impression of what the only men who tried to write history at all in that period of english existence, thought it was worth while to record. "cynegils was the son of ceol, and he of cutha, and cutha of cymric." it reads considerably like a stock-raiser's pedigree book. the trouble is, we have no particular notion of cymric. probably if we went back we should find he was the son of somebody. but at any rate, he had a grandson, and the grandson was a king, and the chronicler therefore recorded him. nothing happened for three years; and then the chronicle records that two kings fought and slew men. then comes the momentous year when a comet appeared and a bishop lost his job. no doubt the comet foretold the loss. there are no records of when shoemakers lost their jobs that i know of, nor how many shoemakers were put in their places; and i imagine it would have been at least as interesting for us to know as the little matter of bishop wilfred. but the chronicler did not think so; he preserved the bishop's troubles--no doubt he did just what the shoemakers of the time would also have done, providing they had been also chroniclers. it is a fair sample of what was in men's minds as important.--if any one fancies that this disposition has quite vanished, let him pick up any ordinary history, and see how many pages, relatively, are devoted to the doings of persons intent on slaying, and those intent on peaceful occupation; and how many times we are told that certain politicians lost their jobs, and how we are not told anything about the ordinary people losing their jobs; and then reflect whether the old face of man-the-historian is quite another face yet. biography, as a sort of second offspring of the hero legend, is another revelation, when we read it, not only to know its subject, but to know its writer,--the standpoint from which he values another man's life. ordinarily there is a great deal of "cynegils the son of cutha the son of cymric" in it; and a great deal of emphasis upon the man as an individual phenomenon; when really he would be more interesting and more comprehensible left in connection with the series of phenomena of which he was part. as an example of what to me is a perfect biography, i instance conway's life of thomas paine, itself a valuable history. but it is not so correct a mirror of the general attitude of biographers and readers of biography as bosworth's life of johnson, except in so far as it indicates that the great face in the glass is changing. it is rather the type of what biography is _becoming_, than what it has been, or is. there are two divisions of literature which are generally named in one breath, and are certainly closely connected; and yet the one came to highly perfected forms long, long ago, while the other is properly speaking very young; and for all that, the older is the handmaid of the younger. i mean the literatures of philosophy and science. philosophy is simply the coördination of the sciences; the formulation of the general, and related principles deduced from the collection and orderly arrangement of the facts of existence. yet man had rich literatures of philosophy, while his knowledge of facts was yet so extremely limited as hardly to be worth while writing books about. none of the appearances of man's soul is more interesting than that reflected in the continuous succession of philosophies he has poured out. let him who reads them, read them always twice; first, simply to know and grasp what is said, to become familiar with the idea as it formed itself in the minds of those who conceived it; second, for the sake of figuring the restless activity of brain, the positive need of the mind under all conditions to formulate what knowledge it has, or thinks it has, into some sort of connected whole. this is one of the most pronounced and permanent features seen in the mirror: the positive refusal of the mind to accept the isolation of existences; no matter how far apart they lie, man proceeds to spin connecting threads somehow. the woven texture is often comical enough, but the weaver is just as positively revealed in the cobwebs of ancient philosophy as in the reasoning of herbert spencer. concerning the literature of science itself, in strict terms, i should be very presumptuous to speak of it, because i know extremely little about it; but of those general popularizations of it, which we have in some of the works of haeckel, darwin, and their similars, i should say that beyond the important information they contain in themselves (which surely no one can afford to be in ignorance of) they present the most transformed reflection of man which any literature gives. their words are cold, colorless, burdened with the labor of exactness, machine like, sustained, uncompromising, careless of effect. the spirit they embody is like unto them. they offer the image of man's soul in the time while imagination is in abeyance, reason ascendent. this coldness and quietness sound the doom of poetry. a people which shall be fully permeated with the spirit and word of science will never conceive great poems. they will never be overcome long enough at a time by their wonder and admiration, by their primitive impulses, by their power of simple impression, to think or to speak poetically. they will never see trees as impaled giants any more; they will see them as evolved descendants of phytoplasm. dewdrops are no more the jewels of the fairies; they are the produce of condensation under given atmospheric conditions. singing stones are not the prisons of punished spirits, but problems in acoustics. the basins of fjords are not the track of the anger of thor, but the pathways of glaciation. the roar and blaze and vomit of etna, are not the rebellion of the titan, but the explosion of so and so many million cubic feet of gas. the comet shall no more be the herald of the wrath of heaven, it is a nebulous body revolving in an elliptical orbit of great elongation. love--love will not be the wound of cupid, but the manifestation of universal reproductive instincts. no, the great poems of the world _have been_ produced; they have sung their song and gone their way. imagination remains to us, but weakened, mixed, tamed, calmed. verses we shall have,--and _many_ fragments,--fragments of beauty and power; but never again the thunder-roll of the mighty early song. we have the benefits of science; we must have its derogations also. the powerful fragments will be such as deal with the still unexplored regions of man's own internity--if i may coin the word. science is still balking here. but not for long. we shall soon have madmen turned inside out, and their madness painstakingly reduced to so-and-so many excessive or deficient nerve-vibrations per second. then no more of poe's "raven" and ibsen's "brand." i have said that i intended to indicate a wider concept of literature than that generally allowed. so far i have not done it; at least all that i have dealt with is usually mentioned in works on literature. but i wish now to maintain that some very lowly forms of written expression must be included in literature,--always remembering that i am seeking the complete composite of man's soul. here then: i include in literature, beside what i have spoken on, not only standard novels, stories, sketches, travels, and magazine essays of all sorts, but the poorest, paltriest dime novel, detective story, daily newspaper report, baseball game account, and splash advertisement. oh, what a charming picture of ourselves we see therein! and a faithful one, mind you! think what a speaking likeness of ourselves was the report of national, international, racial importance--the jeffries-johnson fight! nay, i am not laughing. the people of the future are going to look back at the record a thousand years from now; and say, "this is what interested men in the year ." i wonder which will appear most ludicrous then, bishop wilfred in juxtaposition with the comet star, or the destiny of the white race put in jeopardy by a pugilistic contest between one white and one black man! o the bated breath, the expectant eyes, the inbitten lip, the taut muscles, the riveted attention, of hundreds of thousands of people watching the great "scientific" combat. i wonder whether the year will admire it more or less than the song of beowulf and the battle of brunanburh. consider the soul reflected on the sporting page. oh, how mercilessly correct it is! consider the soul reflected on the advertising page. oh, the consummate liar that strides across it! oh, the gull, the simpleton, the would-be getter of something for nothing whose existence it argues! yea, commercial man has set his image therein; let him regard himself when he gets time. and the body of our reform literature, which really reflects the very best social aspirations of men, how prodigal in words it is,--how indefinite in ideas! how generous of brotherhood--and sisterhood--in the large; how chary in the practice! do we not appear therein as curious little dwarfs who have somehow gotten "big heads"? mites gesticulating at the stars and imagining they are afraid because they twinkle. i would not discourage any comrade of mine in the social struggle, but sometimes it is a wholesome thing to reconsider our size. a word in defense of the silly story. let us not forget that lowly minds have lowly needs; and the mass of minds are lowly, and have a right to such gratification as is not beyond their comprehension. so long as i do not _have to read_ those stories, i feel quite glad for the sake of those who are not able to want better that such gratification is not denied them. i would not wish to frown the silly story out of existence so long as it is a veritable expression of many people's need. there are those who have only learned the art of reading at all because of the foolish story. and quite in a side way i learned the other day through the grave assertion of a physician that the ability to read even these, whereby some little refinement of conception is introduced into the idea of love, is one of the restraining influences upon sexual degradation common among poor and ignorant young women. the face of man revealed in them is therefore not altogether without charm, though it may look foolish to us. i said there were some appearances in the mirror not generally remarked, but which to me are suggestive. one of these is the evident delight of the human soul in _smut_. in the older literature these things are either badly set down, as law and cursing, as occasionally in the bible; or they are clothed and mixed with sprightly imaginations as in the tales of boccaccio and chaucer; or they are thinly veiled with a possible modest meaning as in the puns of the shakespearian period; but in our day, they compose a subterranean literature of themselves, like segregated harlots among books. should i say that i blush for this face of man? i ought to, perhaps, but i do not: all i say is, the thing is there, a very real, a very persistent image in the glass; no one who looks straight into it can avoid seeing it. mixed with the humorous, as it often--rather usually--is, it seems to be one of the normal expressions of normal men. we deceive ourselves greatly if we fancy that man has become purified of such imaginations because they are not used openly in modern dramas and stories, as they were in the older ones. it may be dangerous to say it, but i believe from the evidence of literature as a whole, that a moderate amount of amusement in smut is a saving balance in the psychology of nearly every man and woman,--a sign of anchorage in a robust sanity, which takes things as they are--and laughs at them. i believe it is a much more wholesome appearance, than that betrayed in our fever-bred stories and sketches which deal with the abnormalities of men, and which are growing more and more in vogue, in spite of our cry about realism. personally, i am more interested in the abnormalities, which i find very fascinating. and i am very eager to know whether they will prove to be the result of the abnormal conditions of life which modern man has created for himself in his tampering with the forces of nature,--his strenuous industrial existence, his turning of night into day, his whirling himself over the world at a pace not at all in conformity with his native powers of locomotion, and other matters in accordance. or will they prove to be the revenge of the dammed up, cribbed, cabined, and confined imagination, which can no longer exert itself upon externals,--since the investigating man has explained and mastered these or is doing so--and now turns in to wreak frightful wreck upon the mind itself? at any rate, the fact is that we have some very curious appearances in the mirror just now; madmen explaining their own madness, diseased men picking apart their own diseases, perverted men analyzing their own perversions, anything, everything but sane and normal men. does it mean that in our day there is nothing interesting in good health, in well-ordered lives? or does it mean that the rarest thing in all the world is the so-called normal man, whom tacit consent assumes to be the commonest? that everybody, while outwardly wearing a mask of reputable common sense, is within a raging conglomeration of psychic elements that hurl themselves on one another like hissing flames? or does it mean simply that the most powerful writers are themselves diseased, and can only paint disease? i put these questions and do not presume to answer them. i point to the mirror,--the ibsen drama, the andreyev story, the maeterlinck poem, the artzibashev novel,--and i say the image is there. explain it as you can. for the rest, let me recall to you what i told you was my intent: first: to insist on a more inclusive view of literature; you see i would have it extended both up and down,--_down_ even to the advertisement, the sporting page, and the surreptitious anecdote,--_up_ to the fullest and most comprehensive statements of the works of reason. second: to suggest that readers acquire the habit of reading twice, or at least with a double intent. when serious literature is to be considered, i would insist on actually reading twice; but of course it would be both impractical and undesirable to apply such a method to most of the print we look at. those who are confirmed in the habits of would-be critics will have the greatest trouble in learning to read a book from the simple man's standpoint,--and yet no one can ever form a genuine appreciation of a work who has not first forgotten that he is a critic, and allowed himself to be carried away into the events and personalities depicted therein. in that first reading, also, one should train himself to feel and hear the music of language,--this great instrument which men have jointly built, and out of which come great organ tones, and trumpet calls, and thin flute notes, sweeping and wailing, an articulate storm--a conjuring key whereby all the passions of the dead, the millions of the dead, have given to the living the power to call their ghosts out of the grave and make them walk. yea, every word is the mystic embodiment of a thousand years of vanished passion, hope, desire, thought--all that battled through the living figures turned to dust and ashes long ago. train your ears to hear the song of it; it helps to feel what the writer felt. and after that read critically, with one eye on the page, so to speak, and the other on the reflection in the mirror, looking for the mind behind the work, the things which interested the author and those he wrote for. third: to suggest inquiry into the curious paradox of the people of the most highly evolved scientific and mechanical age taking especial delight in psychic abnormalities and morbidities,--whereby the most utterly unreasonable fictive creation becomes the greatest center of curiosity and attraction to the children of reason. a mirror maze is literature, wherein man sees all faces of himself, lengthened here, widened there, distorted in another place, restored again to due proportion, with every possible expression on his face, from abjectness to heroic daring, from starting terror to icy courage, from love to hate and back again to worship, from the almost sublime down to the altogether grotesque,--now giant, now dwarf,--but always with one persistent character,--his _superb curiosity to see himself_. the drama of the nineteenth century the passions of men are actors, events are their motions, all history is their speech. in the long play of the ages a human being sometimes becomes an event; a nation's passion takes a _personnel_. such beings are the expression of the gathered mind-force of millions. he only who keeps himself aloof from all feeling can remain the spectator of the hour. all that humanity which is held within the beating, coiling, surging tides of passion, has no individuality; it sinks its personality to become a vein in the limb of this giant, a pulse in the heart of that titan. only when out of the spirit of the times the event is born, only when the act is complete, the curtain rung down, only then does the intellectuality of the vein, the pulse, rise to the level of the dispassionate. only then can it survey a tragedy and say, "this was necessary"--a reaction, and say, "this was inevitable." yet as a drop of blood is a quivering, living, flashing ruby beside the dead, pale pearl of a stagnant pool, so is one drop of feeling a shining thing, a living thing, beside the deadness of the intellect which judges while the heart is stone; beside those quiet bayous of brain which reflect back the images before them very purely, very stilly, giving no heed to the great rushing river of heart that rolls on, hurries on so close beside them. bye and bye, bye and bye, the river reaches the grand, great sea, and the waters spread out calm and deep, so deep that the stars of the upper sea, the lights of the higher life, shine far up from them as a babe smiles up into its mother's eyes, and up still to the distant source of the light within the eyes. it is to men and women of feeling that i speak, men and women of the millions, men and women in the hurrying current! not to the shallow egotist who holds himself apart and with the phariseeism of intellectuality exclaims, "i am more just than thou"; but to those whose every fiber of being is vibrating with emotion as aspen leaves quiver in the breath of storm! to those whose hearts swell with a great pity at the pitiful toil of women, the weariness of young children, the handcuffed helplessness of strong men! to those whose blood runs quick along the veins like wild-fire on the dry grass of prairies when the wind whirls aside the smokings of the holocaust, and, courting the teeth of the flame, the black priestess, injustice, beckons it on while her feet stamp on the cinders of the sacrifice! to those whose heart-strings thrill at the touch of love like the sweet, low, musical laugh of childhood, or thrum with hate like the singing vibration of the bowstring speeding the arrow of death! i speak to those whose eyes behold all things through a haze of gray, or rose, or gold, born of their surroundings, and which mist slips away only when the gaze is leveled on that dead past whose passions and whose deeds are ended: to whom the present is always a morning with the dimness of morning around it--the past clear and still--no veil on its face, for the veil has been shredded asunder. for he only who intensely perceives the nature of his surroundings, he, and he only, who has felt, and keenly felt, all the throbs and throes of life, can judge with any degree of truth of the action of that which is past. you, you who have loved, you who have joyed, you who have suffered, it belongs to you to people the silent streets of the silent cities with forms now vanished, to comprehend something of the passions which animated their action; it belongs to you to understand how the fury of a great energy, striking terrible aimless blows in the dark, may yet, across the chasm of awful mistake, touch the hand of a greater justice. if from a panoramic survey of the past some wisdom may be gathered, then let the dramas of old ages tell us what have been the mainsprings of their motions; so we shall understand what action ushered in the drama of the nineteenth century. "westward the star of empire holds its way." following the course of those majestic spheres of fire which whirl each in its vast ellipse, trending away in a long, southwesterly path athwart the heavens, obedient to that superior attraction which through all the universe holds good, the attraction of greater for lesser things, the tide of life upon our world has risen and swelled and rolled away to the south and west. away in the orient source of the sunlight, away where the glitter of ice shines up to meet the morning, nations have risen and plunged down impetuously over the sleeping regions of darkness and of heat, bearing with them the breeze-stirring life of the north and the on-trending light of the east. and out of this conquered earth have arisen the mixed passions of another life and another race. still the governing stars wheel on, and the tide of life which paused only to gather strength rolls up again; and once more a nation is born, and new passions dictate the action of the peoples. down, down it sweeps over the altaian hills, over the himalayan ranges, over the land of the euphrates and tigris, over the deserts of arabia the barren, the fields of arabia the stony, and the grasses and waters of arabia the happy, to those low shores, the home of dark mausoleums and darker pyramids, on to the now classic land of greece, and golden italy, and the home of the dark-eyed moors. sweeps till it touches the frothing sea, and brightly borne upon its upper crest shines the glory, the splendor, the magnificence of the warring powers which dictated the action of greece and rome. for centuries their hoisted spears send back the burnished glitter of the sun, and then--the light dies out; down rushing from the north-land again the tide of vigor pours, and the health and strength of barbarism conquers the weakness of a tottering civilization! far away--away over the miles of sparkling sea, in the darkness and the silence a continent lies waiting; waiting for the coming of the light, waiting for the swelling of the tide. slowly at last a ripple creeps up over the strange beach, and the flood rolls on, and again a continent becomes a cradle, and the empire star sends on its rays to kiss the forehead of the rising world. over the breadth of all our continent that mighty wave is flowing still. standing to-day almost upon the threshold of another world, and looking back down this long-vista'd past, gradually there dawns upon reflection's vision, gradually there grows out of the confusion of forms and the babel of sounds, a clearer perception of the motor powers which have dictated the action of this past, a better idea of the grand plot which, driven by these motor powers, the passions are working out. for, above the long procession of scenes and events, above the monster massings of happiness and woe, above the war and peace of centuries, above the nations that have risen and fallen, above the life and above the grave, the winged and shadowy embodiments of two great ideas float and rest. and those two principles are called authority and liberty; or, if it please you better, _god_ and liberty. the one is all clad in the purple and scarlet of pomp and of power, while the other stands a glorious shining center in the white radiance of freedom. yet not always; far back in time authority stood on thrones and altars, with the plumed sables of despotism waving on his brow, while in his hands he held two iron gyves, the one to fetter thought, the other to fetter action; and these two gyves were called _the church and state_. liberty! ah, liberty was then a name scarcely to pass the lips; dreamed of only in solitude, spoken of only in dungeons! yet out of the blackest mire the whitest lily blooms! out of the dungeon, out of the sorrow, out of the sacrifice, out of the pain, grew this child of the heart; and pure and strong she grew until the sabled plumes have tottered on the despot's brow, and a great palsy shakes the hands that once so firmly held the gyves of church and state. for, ever seeking to overthrow each other, the one for the aggrandizement of self, the other for the love of all mankind, these two powers have contended; and every energy, every passion, every desire, good or evil, has been ranged on this side or on that, blunderingly or wisely, and nations have swung to and fro in their breath as upon a hinge. and one by one the powers of authority have been crippled, and step by step liberty has advanced, until to-day mankind is beginning to measure the forces that, struggling blindly together, are yet evolving light, to drink in the sublime ideal of freedom. yet, oh, how long the struggle with vested ignorance, with greed in power! when upon the drama of the nineteenth century the curtain rose, liberty, triumphant on the younger shores, lay prone and hurled in europe. against fifteen centuries of crowned and throned and tithed curse and woe unutterable, she had risen with such a fearful convulsive strength that when she had mown down king, priest and throne, and gorged the guillotine with blood, she sank back, exhausted from the struggle, and the hated tyrant rose again. the wild desire to conquer, to possess, to control, to hold in subjection, seemed to dominate with an unconquerable strength, and the gathered mind-force of millions of people wrought itself into the single brain of napoleon bonaparte. this human being became an event--this nation's passion took a _personnel_! the spirit of the times produced this man, and authority smiled as one after another the despots of europe plotted and planned, only to be overthrown by this incarnation of ambition, while the scenes were shifted from the vine-land to the rhine-land, from the sun-land to the snow-land, and through them all the great event glowed out, lit high by the rust-red light. how well the plot was working! the empire triumphant, nations subjected, the fetter of action closing its terrible teeth! liberty manacled on the left! the armies of god massing their forces--advancing--preparing to close down the iron jaw of the iron gyve upon the right; to imprison thought, to re-establish the union of fetters, to link up the broken chains, to burden human hope and human will and human life once more with the awful oppression of church and state! but liberty will not, cannot die! wounded and bruised and pinioned sore, condemned to the use of instruments that were none of hers, she wrought with england's jealousy, with wellington's emulation, with fear, with love, with hate! impelled by one motive or another the nations of the coalition moved in concert. napoleon had been marengo--he had been austerlitz! he became _waterloo!_ and when across that awful field rolled the last long cannon boom, when the silence settled, when the quick and the dead lay sleeping and the wounded died, justice and suffering touched hands across the gulf of blood, and liberty heard them whisper, _"sic semper tyrannis."_ in the tableau that followed, she, the ideal of our dreams, still stood pale and fettered; but a smile lit up her face and a light gleamed in her eyes as she saw authority reel and stagger from the blow which, though it did not sever, yet shattered half the strength of both its fetters. for the strength of god lies in a vast unity, an ownership of ideas backed up by the brute force under the command of the individual in whom that ownership of ideas is vested; while the strength of liberty lies in the very essence of things themselves, the fact that no law or force ever _can_ destroy the individualities of existence; and of necessity the natural tendency to break all bonds which seek to control thought, and all force which locks up those bonds entailing liberty of action as the outcome of liberty of thought. and just in proportion as churches have been dismembered and states have been broken up, no matter that each new church and each new state were but another form of despotism, just in that proportion has the principle of liberty been served; for each new religious establishment has been an assertion of the right to think differently from the fashionable creed, each change has been a movement away from the centralization of power. so with waterloo in the background, with authority lashed to impotent rage before it, and liberty pinioned, yet with the lit smile still upon her countenance, the tableau light flames up and dies, and the curtain falls upon the first great act. those who think, those who feel, those who hope, know why that smile was there. for looking away over the long blue roll of water that swelled like an interlude between, she beheld the sublime opening scene of the act that followed. far up the wonderful stage the distant mountains lift their circling crests, at their feet the waters sweep like a march of music, vast acres of untrodden grass-land shower their emerald wealth, nearer the front the lower hills rise up, and then the short atlantic slope, all rife with busy life, bends down to meet the sea. on the right the hoar-frost sheens and shines on the majestic northern forests, while the glittering earth, dipped in its bath of frozen crystal, spreads like a field of diamonds; on the left the white flakes of the orange bloom fall like a shimmering bridal veil, the wind floats up like a perfume, and the hazy, lazy languor of warmth creeps all about. behind it all, behind the hills and the prairies and the lifted summits, the mystical golden light of the west drops down, filling the dim-lit distance with the glory of promise. the silver light of the empire star glides over the atlantic slope, and its rays, like guiding fingers, point onward to the gathering shadows. now the passions of men begin to move upon this vast platform with an energy never before witnessed. diverted from their old-time channels of struggle against the oppression of gods and kings and the bitterness of birth-hatred, with a freedom of opportunity denied in the old world, and with such unstinted natural resources waiting for the magic transformer, the genius of humanity, ambition of power, avarice, pride, jealousy, all those motors born out of the old _régime_ of a state-propped god, bred and multiplied through generations till they have come to be looked upon as natural laws of human existence, begin to work together to plant this untrodden earth, to sow in its furrows the seed of a newer race--and, paradoxical as it may sound, to work for their own destruction, their final elimination from the human brain. or perhaps it were more correct to say, that, with the barriers of old institutions taken away, they naturally begin their retransformation into those beautiful sentiments from which they were originally warped, distorted, misshapen by that warped, distorted, misshapen idea called god. so do they inaugurate the grand era of development; so do they answer the oft-repeated question, "what incentive would there be for labor or genius if the institutions that compel them to struggle were broken down?" look at the stage of the past and see! never before had thought been so free, never before had ability been less cramped, less starved or less compelled! and never before did genius dare so much for purposes so great; never before did the engines which drive the tide of life along a continent send forth a stream of so much vigor. a new light breaks along the pathway of the stars, and swells and rolls and floods the great scene with a dawn-burst so magnificent that the very hills blush in its rising splendor. it is the dawn which the night of god so long held shrouded; it is that which is born when superstition dies; it is that phoenix which rises from the ashes of religion; it is that clear blent flame of all the great forces of nature, brought to the knowledge of mankind by delving reason, and shot like northern streamers from the heart of her the church of god so long held throttled--science! it is that which shone reflected in the eyes of liberty when pale and manacled she stood before the field of waterloo! the ray of the under earth came up to join the ray of the clouds shot down, the energies of sky and mine and sea were clasped to bring down the wealth of the mountains to the shore, and to transport the life of the now populous strip of slope to the unclaimed regions of the west. in the broad blaze of light the scene is shifted, the golden effulgence melts and flows round that sea-girdled kingdom, where quietly but surely the two great engines of authority are being shriven apart. the dynasties of kings are growing dusty--much of their power is but a legend; the church is shrinking in her garments. the desires of this people are slow to move, but deeply rooted and strong; and so far as they have moved forward, they have never moved back. there have been no gigantic strides, no reactions. little by little the idea of divinely-delegated power has been crippled till the english bishop and the english lord have become mere titled mockeries in comparison with their ancient feudal meaning. but stop! close lying there, almost beneath her stretching shadows, another island flashes like a green star in its sea-blue setting. and from that island there rises up the cry of a great devotion, clinging blindly to its greatest curse, its priest-hedged god, while persecuted even unto death by the fanaticism of another faith; and the pleading of hunger while day long and night long the shuttle flies in the flax loom, and the earth yields her golden fruition, only to lade the ships that bear it away from the famine-white lips and the toil-hardened hands that produced it. blindly devotion prays to its god, that god whom it calls all-wise, all-powerful and all-just, and the english lord, who cannot thus subdue his own countrymen, reaches out the long arm of the law across the channel for his rent--and, with god looking on, it is given; and still while the hollow-eyed women kneel at the altar for help, the scene widens out, and away in the distance the seven-hilled city lifts up from the sea, and from the dome of the vatican, from that great mortared hill of god, the vicar of christ calls out, "my tribute, my peter pence!" and with god looking on, it is given! and then from the foot of that tear-stained altar, where so many lips of woe have pressed, where so many helpless hands have clasped, where so many hearts have broken, comes the ironical promise of jehovah, "ask and thou shalt receive." oh, god is a very promising personage indeed--very promising, but, like some of his disciples, very poor pay. liberty! shadowed, invisible! yet a muffled voice is repeating the words which not so long ago rang from the lips of one who stood almost beneath the shadow of the scaffold, who walks to-day in prison gloom: "ye see me only in your cells, ye see me only in the grave, ye see me only wand'ring lone beside the exile's sullen wave! ye fools! do i not also live where you have sought to pierce in vain? rests not a nook for me to dwell in every heart, in every brain? not every brow that boldly thinks erect with manhood's honest pride? does not each bosom shelter me that beats with honor's generous tide? not every workshop brooding woe, not every hut that harbors grief? ha! am i not the breath of life that pants and struggles for relief?" ah, poor, panting, struggling, misery-laden ireland! how god laughs with glee to see his shackles weight your misery! the scene is shifting, the stage is dark'ning--a strange eclipse obscures the shafted light! darker, darker! now a low, red fire gleams like a winking eye along the foreground; it runs, it hisses like a snake; there another leaps up, there another; france, germany, italy--the continent blazes with the fires of the commune! that spirit which, drunken with blood, reeled from the guillotine at ' , to be crushed beneath the upbuilding of the empire, has once more arisen. and out of the hot hells of fury, and jealousy, and hate, out of the pitiless struggle between "vested rights" and wrongs with high ancestral lineage, and the great outcrying of a piteous ignorance against an oppression whose injustice it feels but cannot analyze, grows the sublime idea which priests have anathematized and states have outlawed--"the sacred dogma of =equality.=" in so far as that ideal was made possible of conception, in so far as the masses began to understand something of the causes of their ills, in so far the purpose of liberty was served: no matter that the arms of oppression were triumphant, the dawn of the thought of equal liberty upon the mass of the unthinking was a far greater victory than any triumph of arms. so when the fires died down, and the low reflection gleamed for an instant over those quiescent indian valleys and altaian ranges, where the main plot of old centuries had been laid, and then paled out before the white flare lighting the tableau of the second act, liberty stood with chained hands lifted toward her enemy, while a proud look, playing like an iridescent flame in her eyes, said, plain as lips could speak it, "i have unbound their thoughts; they will one day unbind my hands." slowly the curtain falls on the fair prisoner and the glowering god. the solemn ocean interlude rolls in again; again the rising curtain shows the curving slope, the rock-romance of hills, the wide, green valley with its threading silver, the sweeping mountains with the mirage of the blue pacific lifted high in the sky behind them, the frosted pines, the orange groves. moving upon the nearer stage two great masses of humanity are seen facing each other; the fires of ambition, of stubborn pride, of determination for the mastery flash like flint-sparks in the eyes of both. rage is gathering as the stage-light darkens! yet these two opposing forces are not all. from under the groves of bridal bloom comes a mournful, chant-like requiem; under the bloom four million voices cry in pain; upon the darkened faces, upturned to that darkening day, fall the white petals helplessly, as hope falls on the faces of the dead--to die beside them. in the beautiful land of the sun four million human beings clank the chains of the chattel slave! ah! what music! liberty! liberty was a wraith, fleeting ghost-like through the lonely rice-swamps, terrible _ignis fatuus_ of the quagmire, strange, mystical, vanishing moon-shimmer on the darkly ominous waters lying so silent, so level, beneath the droop of spanish moss and cypress! there it was they drove thee, _there_--=there=--where the quaking earth shivered with its branded burden, where the fever and the miasm were thy breathing, and thy sacred eyes were dimmed with winding-sheets of mist that floated, o so dankly, o so coldly, a steam of tears that rose as fast as their dews might fall: there wast thou exiled, thou, the god-hunted, thou, the law-driven, =thou, the immortal=! yet, oh, so dear men love thee, liberty, that even here in thy last terrible citadel of woe, humanity linked arms with death, and wooed thee still! wooed thee, with the ringing bay of bloodhounds in its ears; wooed thee, with the wolf of hunger gnawing at its throat; wooed thee with the clinging miasm winding its anacondine folds around its fever-thin body; wooed thee with the dark pathos of a dying eye, while the diseased and hungered limbs lay stiffening in their agony. and thou wast true, o liberty! out of thy bitter exile thou didst call to them, and point them on to hope; and thou didst call, too, to those strange-eyed dreamers, whose faces shone amidst the rank and file of those dominated by local hate alone, as shines a clear star among driving clouds. against them authority has hurled his curses. spit upon by the godly, despised by the law abiding, they yet have dared to say to church and law, "think what you please of me, but free the slave." aye, the church persecuted, and the law hunted down, and for the love of god, men set traps to catch their fellow-men: even the "wise men," the wise men at washington, against whose mandates it is treason to speak, aye, a matter for the scaffold in these days, even the wise men built a trap to uphold the divine institution and sent it forth to the people labelled, "the fugitive slave law", and as in other days, human beings died for their opinions--_but the opinions did not die_. has not one of our latter-day martyrs said, "men die, but principles live"? see! the light which has been slowly fading from the right and left shines with a frightful brilliancy upon one point: north and south lie darkened, but harper's ferry glows! there is a wild, mad charge, a shifting of the light, a scaffold, a doomed old man bending his grand, white head, to mount the fatal steps with a child-slave's kiss yet warm upon his lips, and then--only a dull, lifeless pendulum in human form, swinging to and fro. and the church and the law were satisfied, when those dumb lips were cold, and the dead limbs were stiff, and god and harper's ferry had no more to fear from old john brown. but the church and the law have not always been wise; they have not always understood that the martyrs _to_ creed and code have done as much by their death for the propagation of their principles as the martyrs _of_ creed and code; and god and the state sowed a wind whose reaping was a terrible whirlwind, when they hung john brown. across the dim platform the passions of hate and pride move toward each other; it is the old combat of the forces of authority, each contending not for the vindication of right, but for the maintenance of power over the other. it is a terrific struggle of brute strength and strategy and cunning and ferocity, and well might those who conceived the ideal beautiful of freedom, shrink horror-struck from the blood-soaked path their feet must tread to reach it. not strange if some should pause and shudder and cry out, "is it worth the sacrifice?" but up from the dust where hope lay trodden, and out of the trenches where the sacrificed lay hid, and over the plains all scarred with bullets and plowed with shells, breathed the whisper, "it is not vain." it was not in vain; for as at waterloo the struggle of ambition against ambition defeated the first purpose of authority, the centralization of power, and gave a partial victory to her whom both hated, so antietam, fredericksburg, vicksburg, gettysburg, while in themselves representing only the brutish struggle of opposition, based on the desire to domineer, really wrought out the victory of that ideal which dwelt in the minds of those anathematized by god and outlawed by the state. for when the hot lips of the iron mouths grew cold, liberty forsook her lonely fastness, came forth upon the desolated plain, and mounting still to the summits of the blue-hazed hills looked away over the ruined homes, the depopulated cities, the gloom-clouded faces, and though her tears fell fast, an ineffable tenderness shone upon her features as the torrent of pale light flowed round her form, defining its snow-whiteness in relief against the sable of four million freedmen smiling o'er their stricken chains. swiftly following the tableau fire comes the eastern scene, where, in the very center of its power the church is shaken by an invader, and garibaldi becomes the _personnel_ of the event. then follows the conclave of the vatican, where by that singular logic known to the roman church, the vote of fallible beings renders the pope infallible; upon the heels of this, the breaking of that strong tooth of the church in the expulsion of the order of the society of jesus by the german reichstag, and the overthrow of kingcraft in france. the curtain falls. behind, the scene is being prepared for the last great act! and now, in the interval of waiting, let us think. so far we have been surveying the completed. while we can understand something of the passions which animated this past, can feel something of the pulsations which throbbed in its arteries, flowed in its veins, we yet can speak of it without over-riding emotion either upon one side or the other. the river of heart has reached the sea--the troubled waters have spread out deep, and up from their depths shine the still reflections of those great lights which gilt the stages of the past. calmly now we can look at the reaction from the french revolution to the empire, and say, "this was inevitable,"--of napoleon's fall, "this was necessary"; of the awakening of science, "this was a natural result"; of the uprising of ' , "this was the premature birth of an idea forced upon the people by the oppression of authority"; we can forget the choking agony of john brown, and declare his death a victory. we can look upon the awful waste of blood in the civil war and say, "it was pitiful, but the goblet of woe must needs have been spilled full of red life wine, ere the hoarse and hollow throat of tyranny were satisfied." we can see where each of the contending principles has lost and gained, and measuring the sum totals against each other, _must_ decide that the old despotism is losing ground; that instead of the supreme authority of god, the supreme sovereignty of the individual is the growing idea. but now we have come to a stage where we can no longer be cool spectators. in what happens now we too must be part and parcel of the action; we too must hope, and toil, and struggle and suffer. we are no longer looking through the clear still atmosphere of the dead: around our forms the wheeling mists are circled, and before our eyes the haze lies thick--the haze of gold or the haze of gray. the dimness of the "yet to be" befogs our sight, and the rush of hope and fear blinds all our faculties. you who stand well upon the heights of love, of comfort, of happiness, heeding not the darkness and the sorrow beneath you, behold, with up-cast eyes, the great figures of god and freedom wound about, showered with light. to you there is no menace in their darting eyes, there is no purpose in their full-drawn statures, there is no jarring in their clarion voices. no! for your senses are stupid in your luxury, your brains are dulled, too dulled to think, your ears are glutted with the ring of gold. in your vain and foolish hearts you dream that what you see there is a shadowy bridal; that there, at last, religion and science, statecraft and freedom, are meeting to embrace each other. ah, go on, book-makers, press-writers, doctors and lawyers and preachers and teachers! go on talking your incompatibilities; go on teaching your absurdities! dream out your short-lived dream! at your feet, beneath the shadow of your capitols and domes, under the tuition of your few-facted, much-fictioned literature, from out your chaos of truth-flavored lies, from before your pulpits, your rostrums and your seats of learning, something is growing. something that is looking _you_ in the eyes, that is analyzing your statements, that is revolving your institutions in its brain, that is crushing your sophistries in its merciless machinery as fine as grain is ground between the whitened mill-rollers. freethought is looking at you, gentlemen!--more than that, it questions you, it puts you on the witness-stand, it cross-examines you. it says, "do you believe in god?" and you answer, "yes." "do you believe him to be omnipotent, omniscient, and all-just?" "certainly; less than this would not be god." "then you believe he has the power to order all things as he wills, and being all-just he wills all things according to justice?" "yes." "then you believe him to be the impartially-loving father of all his created children?" "yes." "and each one of those children has an equal right to life and liberty?" "yes." then look upon this earth beneath you, this earth of beings whose lives are of so poor account to you, and tell us, where _is_ god and _what_ is he doing? everyone has a right to life! what mockery! when the control of the necessaries of life is given to the few by the state, and above the seal of the law the priest has set the seal of the church! verily, "you do take my life when you take that whereby i live." is this your divine justice? what irony to tell me i am free if at that same time you have it in your power to withhold the means of my existence! free! will you look down here at these whose sight is shadowed with the ebon shadow of despair, these, the homeless, the disinherited, the product of whose toil you take and leave them barely enough to live upon--live to toil on and keep you in your luxury! you, the monied idlers, you, the book-makers and the journalists, who do more to cry down truth, to laud our social lies, our economic despots and our pious frauds, than any other propaganda can! you, the doctors, whose drugs have cursed the world with poison-eaten bodies, corroded the health of unborn generations with your medicated slime, and when the sources of life have yielded to the hungry body so poor a stream that for lack of air, and earth, and sun, and food, and clothing, and recreation, it drooped and sickened, have bottled up some nauseating stuff, and with oracular wisdom have taught them to imagine it could undo what years of misery had done! you, the law-makers, who have twisted nature's code till to be natural is to be a criminal; you, who have lawed away the earth that was not yours to give; you, who even seek to charter the sea and make the commandment "across the middle of this river thou shalt not go unless thou render tribute unto cæsar!" you, who never inquire "what is _justice,_" but "what is law!" and you, the teachers, you who prate of the glory of knowledge as the remedy for the evils of the world, and boast your compulsory law of education, while a stronger law than all the wordy sentences ever graven upon statute books, is driving the children out of the schoolground into the factory, into the saw-mill, into the shaft, into the furrow, into the myriad camps of toil, to the dust of the wheel, to the heat of the furnace, till their pallid cheeks and bloodless lips are bleached like bones beneath the desert sun, and their clogged lungs rattle in their breathing pain! will you look at these, the under-stratum of your social earth, and tell them they are free? will you tell them ignorance is their greatest curse and education their only remedy? will you say to these children, "we have provided free schools for you, and now we compel you to attend them whether you have anything to eat and wear or not"? will you tell these people there is a good, kind, merciful god who loves them, meting out justice to them from the skies? no, you _will_ not, you _cannot_. the words will die upon your lips ere you utter them. do you know what it is they see up there above you, they whose eyes look through the mist of gray and the shroud of darkness? they see your god of justice a pitiless slave-driver, his church more brutal than the lash, his state more merciless than the bloodhound; they see themselves a thousand million serfs more hopelessly enthralled, more helplessly chained down than e'en the lashed and tortured body of the chattel slave. for them there is no refuge, no escape; in every land the master rules; no fugitive slave law need now be passed--there is no place to flee--the whole horizon is iron-bound. white and black alike are yoked together, and the master yields no distinction, shows no mercy. the bare pittance of existence is the meed for him who toils, and for him who _cannot_--starvation! with a preacher to help him die! that is the justice that they see there, in the shadow lines above your golden haze. and they see, too, a conflict preparing between those two antagonistic forces such as never before the world has witnessed. they see your god concentrating his strength to fight so bitter a battle with liberty as shall crush the spirit of individuality forever from the race. they see him ranging his forces, those forces blood-imbrued through all the anguished past, the blacklist, the club, the sword, the rifle, the prison, aye, the scaffold; they see them all, and know that ere your god will yield his vested rights, the noblest of the race will have been stricken, the most unselfish will have been tortured in his dungeons, the white robes of innocence will have been reddened in her own martyr's blood, and death will have shadowed many and many a home, unless you shall hearken to the voice of liberty and save yourselves while there is yet time. they see the wide stage spreading out, they see the passions moving over it; they see there, in the center, beneath the rolling brilliance of the empire state, the tragic inauguration of the act! they see a grim and blackened thing, a silent thing, the demoniac effigy of torquemada's spirit, the frozen laugh of the dark ages at our boasted civilization; they see twelve stolid fools before this nineteenth century gallows; they see the hiding place of that thing masquerading under the sacred name of justice, which shrinks even from the gaze of the lauding press and the imbecile jurymen, and does unknown its deed of murder; they see four shrouded forms, they hear four muffled voices, a broken sentence, and--an awful hush! and then, o crowning irony of all, they see advancing to speak to them over the bodies of the murdered (and mouthed back from a hundred pulpits comes the echo), jehovah masked as jesus. ah, the divine cowardice of it! mild is the light in the nazarene eyes, tender the tone of the nazarene voice! "ah, people whom i love! for whom my life was given long ago on calvary! what rashness is it that you meditate? is it that you are weary of the yoke of love i lay on you? is this your faith? have i not promised you a sweet release when your dark pilgrimage on earth is o'er? exiles ye are upon this world of pain and if oppression comes to weigh you down, if hunger shows his long fangs at your hearth, if your chilled limbs are cramped with bitter cold the while your neighbor hoards his fuel up, if you are driven out upon the street with crying children clinging piteously and begging you for shelter from the storm, if your hard toil is taken by the law to satisfy a corporation's greed, if fever and distress gnaw at your heart and still you tread the weary wine-press out, knowing no rest until the death-hour comes; if all these things discourage and perplex, know 'tis for love of you i order it. for thus would i point you to paradise, win you from all the pleasure of the world, and fix your hopes on heaven's eternity. 'whom the lord loveth, him he chasteneth'; so then it is for love that these things are. for love of you i press your life-blood out; for love of you i load you down with pain; for love of you i take your rights away; for love of you i institute the law that slaves you to the grasping millionaire; for love of you i pile the glutted hoards of vanderbilt and gould and rothschild and the rest; for love of you i rent the right to breathe in a poor tenement of dingy dirt; for love of you i make machines a curse; for love of you i make you toil long hours, and those who cannot toil, i turn adrift to wander as they may--sons into dens where thievery is learned as a fine art, daughters to barter their virginity till competition forces down the price of lust and death is left them as a last resort. ah, what a golden crown, and sweet-toned harp, what a resplendent whit robe, await the soul whom so god loves while on the earth it dwells. aye, for the love of you these men were murdered, and for my glory; and through my holy love they roast in hell: for they would take away the instruments whereby i lure you to my blest abode. they would have taught you what your freedom meant; they would have told you to regain your rights; they would have contradicted my commands and lost you heaven, perchance--and if not heaven, _hell_. keep to your faith, my people, trust in god! break not the altars where your fathers knelt; trust to your teachers, keep within the law; bow to the church and kiss the state's great toe! so shall good order be observed, obeyed, and as 'peace reigned in warsaw,' so anon shall 'peace, good-will to men reign on the earth.'" these are the words that fall from the lips of him you call "the merciful," "the just." these are the sounds that sink into the ears of those upon whose toil _you_ are dependent for your existence; judge you how they will be received. and now, you, the dwellers on the lifted heights, listen to the voice that follows him, for these are words that concern _you_, and if you listen to their warning you may yet save yourselves the desolation and the ruin that otherwise must come. this deep, bell-pealing voice that echoes through the corridors of thought till almost death's chill sleepers might arise again, is the voice which called for centuries to the empire, "cease your oppressions or the people rise"; and to the kingdom, "curse not the new world with your tyrannies, it will rebel"; and to the master, "put not the lash upon your bonded slave, for the time will come when every stroke will rise like a warrior armed, to burn and waste and kill." the empire laughed, the kingdom ignored, the planter sneered; but the time came when laugh and sneer died to white ashes. the time came when "france got drunk with blood, to vomit crime," when england "lost the brightest jewel in her coronal," when the south waded in blood and tears and knelt her pride before a conqueror. and now, she, the liberator, the destined conqueror of god, calls out to you, "yield up your scepters ere they be torn from you; give back the stolen earth, the mine, the sea! give back the source of life, give back the light! for a black, bitter hour is waiting you, an awful gulf unfathomed in its depth, if now you do not pause and render _justice_." ah, thou, whatever be thy awful name, which like a serpent's trail hath marked the earth, whether jehovah, buddha, joss, or christ! thou who hast done for _love_ what others do for most envenomed _hate_, how hast thou hated these the happy ones! is this impartial justice then to these, to pour the golden treasures of the earth into their laps, that these may feast and toast and so forget thee and thy promised heaven? truly thou hast been most unkind to them, since kindness means with thee a tearing out of e'en the heart and entrails of existence. bah! how thou liest! to what most pitiable trick of speech hast thou been forced! think'st thou the dwellers in the darkness longer take thy creed of crystalline deception! no! they laugh at thee, they spew thee out, they spit at thee. love! say! look--this long procession coming here! here are the murderers, with their red-hued eyes; here the adulterers, with their lecherous glance; here are the prostitutes, with their mark of shame; here are the gamblers, with their itching hands; here are the thieves, with furtive lips and eyes; here are the liars with their dastard tongues; here all the train that crime can muster up reviews before thee! and after them, a ghastly, fearful sight, follow the victims of their blackened hearts, slain, ruined, desolated by thy love! and now, behold, another train comes on--a train whose name is legion! here the dark, bruted faces from the mines, here the hard, sun-browned cheeks from out the furrow, here the dull visage from the lumber-camp, here the wan eyes from whirling factory, here the gaunt giants from the furnace fire, here the tarred hands from off the stream and sea, here all the aching limbs that stand behind the fashionable counter, here, o pitiful sight of all, those whose home is in the street, whose table is the garbage pile, the vast, helpless body of the unemployed. and, ever as they march, they drop, and drop, into the earth that swallows them, and over their graves the march goes on. these are thy victims, god! these are the creatures of thy church and law! speak no more of the breaking of altars, thou who hast broken every altar that the human heart holds dear! take thy position at the head of the murderers' column! and when thou hast marched away into the past, thou and thy preachers and thy praters of justice, then will the world _return_ to justice and the great law of nature reign upon the earth. then will her broad, green acres yield their wealth to him who toils, and him alone; then will the store-houses of nature yield her fuel and her light, not to the corporation whose high-priced lobbying can buy it, for in that time no wealth nor intrigue can purchase the heritage of all, but to all the sons and daughters of labor. and then upon _this_ earth there shall be no hungry mouths, no freezing limbs; no children spending the hours of youth in gaining a miserable livelihood, no women crying, "it's oh, to be a slave along with the barbarous turk, where woman has never a soul to save if this is _christian_ work!" no men wandering aimlessly in search of a master for their slavery. but o, careless dwellers upon the heights, awaken now!--do not wait till reason, persuasion, judgment, coolness are swept down before the rising whirlwind. bend your energies _now_ to the eradication of the authority idea, to righting the wrongs of your fellow-men. do it for your own interest, for if you slumber on--ah me! ye will awaken one day when an ominous rumble prefaces the waking of a terrific underground thunder, when the earth shakes in a frightful ague fit, when from out the parched throats of the people a burning cry will come like lava from a crater, "'bread, bread, bread!' no more preachers, no more politicians, no more lawyers, no more gods, no more heavens, no more promises! bread!" and then, when you hear a terrible leaden groan, know that at last, here in your free america, beneath the floating banner of the stars and stripes, more than fifty million human hearts have burst! a dynamite bomb that will shock the continent to its foundations and knock the sea back from its shores! "it is no boast, it is no threat, thus history's iron law decrees; the day grows hot! o babylon, 'tis cool beneath thy willow trees!" sketches and stories a rocket of iron it was one of those misty october nightfalls of the north, when the white fog creeps up from the river, and winds itself like a corpse-sheet around the black, ant-like mass of human insignificance, a cold menace from nature to man, till the foreboding of that irresistible fatality which will one day lay us all beneath the ice-death sits upon your breast, and stifles you, till you start up desperately crying, "let me out, let me out!" for an hour i had been staring through the window at that chill steam, thickening and blurring out the lines that zig-zagged through it indefinitely, pale drunken images of facts, staggering against the invulnerable vapor that walled me in--a sublimated grave marble. were they all ghosts, those figures wandering across the white night, hardly distinguishable from the posts and pickets that wove in and out, like half-dismembered bodies writhing in pain? my own fingers were curiously numb and inert; had i, too, become a shadow? it grew unbearable at last, the pressure of the foreboding at my heart, the sense of that on-creeping of universal death. i ran out of doors, impelled by the vague impulse to assert my own being, to seek relief in struggle, even though foredoomed futile--to seek warmth, fellowship, somewhere, though but with those ineffective pallors in the mist, that dissolved even while i looked at them. once in the street, i ran on indifferently, glad to be jostled, glad of the snarling of dogs and the curses of laborers calling to one another. the penumbra of the mist, that menacing dim foreshadow, had not chilled these, then! on, on, through the alleys where human flesh was close, and when one listened one could hear breathings and many feet, drifting at last into the current that swept through the main channel of the city, and presently, whirled round in an eddy, i found myself staring through the open door of the great iron works. perhaps it was the sensation of warmth that held me there first, some feeling of exhilaration and wakening defiance in the flash and swirl of the yellow flames--this, mixed with an indistinct desire to clutch at something, anything, that seemed stationary in the midst of all this that slipped and wavered and fell away.... no, i remember now: there was something before that; there was a sound--a sound that had stopped my feet in their going, and smote me with a long shudder--a sound of hammers, beating, beating, beating a terrific hail, momentarily faster and louder, and in between a panting as of some great monster catching breath beneath the driving of that iron rain. faster, faster--clang! a long reverberant shriek! the giant had rolled and shivered in his pain. involuntarily i was drawn down into the valley of the sound, words muttering themselves through my lips as i passed: "forging, forging--what are they forging there? frankenstein makes his monster. how the iron screams!" but i heard it no more now; i only saw!--saw the curling yellow flames, and the red, red iron that panted, and the masters of the hammers. how they moved there, like demons in the abyss, their bodies swinging, their eyes tense and a-glitter, their faces covered with the gloom of the torture-chamber! only _one_ face i saw, young and fair--young and very fair--whereon the gloom seemed not to settle. the skin of it was white and shining there in the midst of that black haze; over the wide forehead fell tumbling waves of thick brown hair, and two great dark eyes looked steadily into the red iron, as if they saw therein something i did not see; only now and then they were lifted, and looked away upward, as if beyond the smoke-pall they beheld a vision. once he turned so that the rose-light cast forth his profile as a silhouette; and i shivered, it was so fine and hard! hard with the hardness of beaten iron, and fine with the fineness of a keen chisel. had the hammers been beating on that fair young face? a comrade called, a sudden terrified cry. there was a wild rush, a mad stampede of feet, a horrible screech of hissing metal, and a rocket of iron shot upward toward the black roof, bursting and falling in a burning shower. three figures lay writhing along the floor, among the leaping, demoniac sparks. the first to lift them was the man with the white face. he had stood still in the storm, and ran forward when the others shrank back. now he passed by me, bearing his dying burden, and i saw no quiver upon brow or chin; only, when he laid it in the ambulance, i fancied i saw upon the delicate curved lips a line of purpose deepen, and the reflection of the iron-fire glow in the strange eyes, as if for an instant the door of a hidden furnace had been opened and smouldering coals had breathed the air. and even then he looked up! it was all over in half an hour. there would be weeping in three little homes; and one was dead, and one would die, and one would crawl, a seared human stump, to the end of his weary days. the crowd that had gathered was gone; they would not know the stump when it begged from them with its maimed hands, six months after, on some street corner. "fakir" they would say, and laugh. there would be an entry on the company's books, and a brief line in the newspapers next day. but the welding of the iron would go on, and the man who gave his easy money for it would fancy he had paid for it, not seeing the stiff figures in their graves, nor the crippled beggar, nor the broken homes. the rocket of iron is already cold; dull, inert, fireless, the black fragments lie upon the floor whereon they lately rained their red revenge. do with them what you will, you cannot undo their work. the men are clearing way. only he with the white face does not go back to his place. still set and silent he takes his coat, "presses his soft hat down upon his thick, damp locks," and goes out into the fog and night. so close he passed me, i might have touched him; but he never saw me. perhaps he was still carrying the burden of the dying man upon his heart; perhaps some mightier burden. for one instant the shapely, boyish figure was in full light, then it vanished away in the engulfing mist--the mist which the vision of him had made me forget. for i knew i had seen a man of iron, into whose soul the iron had driven, whose nerves were tempered as cold steel, but behind whose still, impassive features slumbered a white-hot heart. and others should see a rocket and a ruin, and feel the vengeance of beaten iron, before the mist comes and swallows all. * * * * * i had forgotten! upon that face, that young, fair face, so smooth and fine that even the black smoke would not rest upon it, there bloomed the roses of early death. hot-house flowers! the chain gang it is far, far down in the southland, and i am back again, thanks be, in the land of wind and snow, where life lives. but that was in the days when i was a wretched thing, that crept and crawled, and shrunk when the wind blew, and feared the snow. so they sent me away down there to the world of the sun, where the wind and the snow are afraid. and the sun was kind to me, and the soft air that does not move lay around me like folds of down, and the poor creeping life in me winked in the light and stared out at the wide caressing air; stared away to the north, to the land of wind and rain, where my heart was,--my heart that would be at home. yes, there, in the tender south, my heart was bitter and bowed, for the love of the singing wind and the frost whose edge was death,--bitter and bowed for the strength to bear that was gone, and the strength to love that abode. day after day i climbed the hills with my face to the north and home. and there, on those southern heights, where the air was resin and balm, there smote on my ears the sound that all the wind of the north can never sing down again, the sound i shall hear till i stand at the door of the last silence. cling--clang--cling--from the georgian hills it sounds; and the snow and the storm cannot drown it,--the far-off, terrible music of the chain gang. i met it there on the road, face to face, with all the light of the sun upon it. do you know what it is? do you know that every day men run in long procession, upon the road they build for others' safe and easy going, bound to a chain? and that other men, with guns upon their shoulders, ride beside them--with orders to kill if the living links break? there it stretched before me, a serpent of human bodies, bound to the iron and wrapped in the merciless folds of justified cruelty. clank--clink--clank--there was an order given. the living chain divided; groups fell to work upon the road; and then i saw and heard a miracle. have you ever, out of a drowsy, lazy conviction that all knowledges, all arts, all dreams, are only patient sums of many toils of many millions dead and living, suddenly started into an uncanny consciousness that knowledges and arts and dreams are things more real than any living being ever was, which suddenly reveal themselves, unasked and unawaited, in the most obscure corners of soul-life, flashing out in prismatic glory to dazzle and shock all your security of thought, toppling it with vague questions of what is reality, that you cannot silence? when you hear that an untaught child is able, he knows not how, to do the works of the magicians of mathematics, has it never seemed to you that suddenly all books were swept away, and there before you stood a superb, sphinx-like creation, mathematics itself, posing problems to men whose eyes are cast down, and all at once, out of whim, incorporating itself in that wide-eyed, mysterious child? have you ever felt that all the works of the masters were swept aside in the burst of a singing voice, unconscious that it sings, and that music itself, a master-presence, has entered the throat and sung? no, you have never felt it? but you have never heard the chain gang sing! their faces were black and brutal and hopeless; their brows were low, their jaws were heavy, their eyes were hard; three hundred years of the scorn that brands had burned its scar upon the face and form of ignorance,--ignorance that had sought dully, stupidly, blindly, and been answered with that pitiless brand. but wide beyond the limits of high man and his little scorn, the great, sweet old music-soul, the chords of the world, smote through the black man's fibre in the days of the making of men; and it sings, it sings, with its ever-thrumming strings, through all the voices of the chain gang. and never one so low that it does not fill with the humming vibrancy that quivers and bursts out singing things always new and new and new. i heard it that day. the leader struck his pick into the earth, and for a moment whistled like some wild, free, living flute in the forest. then his voice floated out, like a low booming wind, crying an instant, and fell; there was the measure of a grave in the fall of it. another voice rose up, and lifted the dead note aloft, like a mourner raising his beloved with a kiss. it drifted away to the hills and the sun. then many voices rolled forward, like a great plunging wave, in a chorus never heard before, perhaps never again; for each man sung his own song as it came, yet all blent. the words were few, simple, filled with a great plaint; the wail of the sea was in it; and no man knew what his brother would sing, yet added his own without thought, as the rhythm swept on, and no voice knew what note its fellow voice would sing, yet they fell in one another as the billow falls in the trough or rolls to the crest, one upon the other, one within the other, over, under, all in the great wave; and now one led and others followed, then it dropped back and another swelled upward, and every voice was soloist and chorister, and never one seemed conscious of itself, but only to sing out the great song. and always, as the voices rose and sank, the axes swung and fell. and the lean white face of the man with the gun looked on with a stolid, paralyzed smile. oh, that wild, sombre melody, that long, appealing plaint, with its hope laid beyond death,--that melody that was made only there, just now, before me, and passing away before me! if i could only seize it, hold it, stop it from passing! that all the world might hear the song of the chain gang! might know that here, in these red georgian hills, convicts, black, brutal convicts, are making the music that is of no man's compelling, that floods like the tide and ebbs away like the tide, and will not be held--and is gone, far away and forever, out into the abyss where the voices of the centuries have drifted and are lost! something about jesus, and a lamp in the darkness--a gulfing darkness. oh, in the mass of sunshine must they still cry for light? all around the sweep and the glory of shimmering ether, sun, sun, a world of sun, and these still calling for light! sun for the road, sun for the stones, sun for the red clay--and no light for this dark living clay? only heat that burns and blaze that blinds, but does not lift the darkness! "and lead me to that lamp----" the pathetic prayer for light went trembling away out into the luminous gulf of day, and the axes swung and fell; and the grim dry face of the man with the gun looked on with its frozen smile. "so long as they sing, they work," said the smile, still and ironical. "a friend to them that's got no friend"--man of sorrows, lifted up upon golgotha, in the day when the forces of the law and the might of social order set you there, in the moment of your pain and desperate accusation against heaven, when that piercing "eloi, eloi, lama sabachthani?" went up to a deaf sky, did you presage this desolate appeal coming to you out of the unlived depths of nineteen hundred years? hopeless hope, that cries to the dead! futile pleading that the cup may pass, while still the lips drink! for, as of old, order and the law, in shining helmets and gleaming spears, ringed round the felon of golgotha, so stand they still in that lean, merciless figure, with its shouldered gun and passive smile. and the moan that died within the place of skulls is born again in this great dark cry rising up against the sun. if but the living might hear it, not the dead! for these are dead who walk about with vengeance and despite within their hearts, and scorn for things dark and lowly, in the odor of self-righteousness, with self-vaunting wisdom in their souls, and pride of race, and iron-shod order, and the preservation of things that are; walking stones are these, that cannot hear. but the living are those who seek to know, who wot not of things lowly or things high, but only of things wonderful; and who turn sorrowfully from things that are, hoping for things that may be. if these should hear the chain gang chorus, seize it, make all the living hear it, see it! if, from among themselves, one man might find "the lamp," lift it up! paint for all the world these georgian hills, these red, sunburned roads, these toiling figures with their rhythmic axes, these brutal, unillumined faces, dull, groping, depth-covered,--and then unloose that song upon their ears, till they feel the smitten, quivering hearts of the sons of music beating against their own; and under and over and around it, the chain that the dead have forged clinking between the heart-beats! clang--cling--clang--ng--it is sundown. they are running over the red road now. the voices are silent; only the chain clinks. the heart of angiolillo some women are born to love stories as the sparks fly upward. you see it every time they glance at you, and you feel it every time they lay a finger on your sleeve. there was a party the other night, and a four-year old baby who couldn't sleep for the noise crept down into the parlor half frightened to death and transfixed with wonderment at the crude performances of an obtuse visitor who was shouting out the woes of othello. one kindly little woman took the baby in her arms and said: "what would they do to you, if you made all that noise."--"whip me," whispered the child, her round black eyes half admiration and half terror, and altogether coquettish, as she hid and peered round the woman's neck. and every man in the room forthwith fell in love with her, and wanted to smother his face in the bewitching rings of dark hair that crowned the dainty head, and carry her about on his shoulders, or get down on his hands and knees to play horse for her, or let her walk on his neck, or obliterate his dignity in any other way she might prefer. the boys tolerated their fathers with a superior "huh!" fourteen or fifteen years from now they will be playing the humble cousin of the horse before the same little ringed-haired lady, and having sported nick bottom's ears to no purpose, half a dozen or so will go off and hang themselves, or turn monk, or become "bold, bad men," and revenge themselves on the sex. but her conquests will go on, and when those gracious rings are white as snow the children of those boys will follow in their grandfathers' and fathers' steps and dangle after her, and make drawings on their fly leaves of that sweet kiss-cup of a mouth of hers, and call her their elder sister, and other devotional names. and the other girls of her generation, who were not born with that marvelous entangling grace in every line and look, will dread her and spite her, and feel mean satisfaction when some poor fool does swallow laudanum on her account. smiles of glacial virtue will creep over their faces like slippery sunshine, when one by one her devotees come trailing off to them to say that such a woman could never fill a man's heart nor become the ornament of his hearthstone; the quiet virtues that wear, are all their desire; of course they have just been studying her character and that of the foolish men who dance her attendance, but even those are not doing it with any serious motives. and the neglected girls will serve him with home-made cake and wine which he will presently convert into agony in that pearl shell ear of hers. and all the while the baby will have done nothing but be what she was born to be through none of her own choosing, which is her lot and portion; and that is another thing the gods will have to explain when the day comes that they go on trial before men; which is the real day of judgment. but this isn't the baby's story, which has yet to be made, but the story of one who somehow received a wrong portion. some inadvertent little angel in the destiny shop took down her name when the heroine of a romance was called for, and put her where she shouldn't have been, and then ran off to play no doubt, not stopping to look twice. for even the most insouciant angel that looked twice would have seen that effie was no woman to play the game of hearts, and there's only one thing more undiscerning than an angel, and that is a social reformer. effie ran up against both. they say she had blood in her girlhood, that it shone red and steady through that thin, pure skin of hers; but when i saw her, with her nursing baby in her arms, down in the smutching grime of london, there was only a fluctuant blush, a sort of pink ghost of blood, hovering back and forth on her face. and that was for shame of the poverty of her neat bare room. not that she had ever known riches. she was the daughter of scotch peasants, and had gone out to service when she was still a child; her chest was hollowed in and her back bowed with that unnatural labor. there was no gloss on the pale sandy hair, no wilding tendrils clinging round the straight smooth forehead, no light of coquetry or grace in the glimmering blue eyes, no beauty in her at all, unless it lay in the fine, hard sculptured line of her nose and mouth and chin when she turned her head sideways. you could read in that line that having spoken a word to her heart, she would not forget it nor unsay it; and if it took her down into gethsemane, she would never cry out though by all forsaken. and that was where it had taken her then. some ready condemner of all that has been tried for less than a thousand years, will say it was because she had the just reward of those who, holding that love is its own sanction and that it cannot be anything but degraded by seeking permissions from social authorities, live their love lives without the consent of church and state. but you and i know that the same dark garden has awaited the woman whose love has been blessed by both, and that many such a life lamp has flickered out in a night as profound as poverty and utter loneliness could make it. so if it was justice to effie, what is it to that other woman? in truth, justice had nothing to do with it; she loved the wrong man, that was all; and married or unmarried, it would have been the same, for a formula doesn't make a man, nor the lack of it unmake him. the fellow was superior in intellect. it is honesty only which can wring so much from those who knew them both, for as to any other thing she sat as high over him as the stars are. not that he was an actively bad man; just one of those weak, uncertain, tumbling about characters, having sense enough to know it is a fine thing to stand alone, and vanity enough to want the name without the game, and cowardice enough to creep around anything stronger than itself, and hang there, and spread itself about, and say, "lo, how straight am i!" and if the stronger thing happens to be a father or a brother or some such tolerant piece of friendly, self-sufficient energy, he amuses himself awhile, and finally gives the creeper a shake and says, "here, now, go hang on somebody else if you can't stand alone", and the world says he should have done it before. but if it happens to be a mother or a sister or a wife or a sweetheart, she encourages him to think he is a wonderful person, that all she does is really his own merit, and she is proud and glad to serve him. if after a while she doesn't exactly believe it any more, she says and does the same; and the world says she is a fool,--which she is. but if, in some sudden spurt of masculine self-assertiveness, she decides to fling him off, the world says she is an unwomanly woman,--which again she is; so much the better. effie's creeper dabbled in literature. he wanted to be a translator and several other things. his appearance was mild and gentlemanly, even super-modest. he always spoke respectfully of effie, and as if momentously impressed with a sense of duty towards her. they had started out to realize the free life together, and the glory of the new ideal had beckoned them forward. so no doubt he believed, for a pretender always deceives himself worse than anybody else. but still, at that particular period, he used to droop his head wearily and admit that he had made a great mistake. it was nobody's fault but his own, but of course--effie and he were hardly fitted for each other. she could not well enter into his hopes and ambitions, never having had the opportunity to develop when she was younger. he had hoped to stimulate her in that direction, but he feared it was too late. so he said in a delicate and gentlemanly way, as he went from one house to the other, and was invited to dinner and supper and made himself believe he was looking for work. effie, meanwhile, was taking home boys' caps to make, and worrying along incredibly on bread and tea, and walking the streets with the baby in her arms when she had no caps to make. of course when a man drinks other people's teas a great many times, and sits in their houses, and borrows odd shillings now and then, and assumes the gentleman, he is ultimately brought to the necessity of asking some one to tea with him; so one spring night the creeper approached effie rather dubiously with the statement that he had asked two or three acquaintances to come in the next evening, and he supposed she would need to prepare tea. the girl was just fainting from starvation then, and she asked him wearily where he thought she was to get it. he cast about a while in his pusillanimous way for things that _she_ might do, and finally proposed that she pawn the baby's dress,--the white dress she had made from one of her own girlhood dresses, and the only thing it had to wear when she took it out for air. that was the limit, even for effie. she said she would take anything of her own if she had it, but not the baby's; and she turned her face to the wall and clung to the child. when the tea-time came next day she went out with the baby and walked up and down the surging london streets looking in the windows and crushing back tears. what the creeper did with his guests she never knew, for she did not return till long after dusk, when she was too weary to wander any more, and she found no one there but himself and a dark stranger, who spoke little and with an italian accent, but who measured her with serious, intense eyes. he listened to the creeper, but he looked at her; she was quite fagged out and more bloodless than ever as she sat motionless on the edge of the bed. when he went away he lifted his hat to her with the grace of an old time courtier, and begged her pardon if he had intruded. some days after that he came in again, and brought a toy for the baby, and asked her if he might carry the child out a little for her; it looked sickly shut up there, but he knew it must be heavy for her to carry. the creeper suddenly discovered that he could carry the baby. all this happened in the days when a pious queen sat on the throne of spain. with eyes turned upward in much holiness, she failed to see the things done in her prisons, or hear the groans that rose up from the "zero" chamber in the fortress of montjuich, though all europe heard, and even in america the echo rang. while she told her beads her minister gave the order to "torture the anarchists"; and scarred with red-hot irons, maimed and deformed and maddened with the nameless horrors that the good devise to correct the bad, even unto this day the evidences of that infamous order live. but two men do not live,--the one who gave the order, and the one who revenged it. it happened one night, in april, that effie and the creeper and their sometime visitor met all three in one of those long low smothering london halls where many movements have originated, which in their developed proportions have taken possession of the house of commons, and even stirred the dust in the house of lords. there was a crowd of excited people talking all degrees of sense and nonsense in every language of the continent. letters smuggled from the prison had been received; new tales of torture were passing from mouth to mouth; fresh propositions to arouse a general protest from civilization were bubbling up with the anger of every indignant man and woman. drifting to the buzzing knots effie heard some one translating: it was the letter of the tortured noguès, who a month later was shot beneath the fortress wall. the words smote her ears like something hot and stinging: "you know i am one of the three accusers (the other two are ascheri and molas) who figure in the trial. i could not bear the atrocious tortures of so many days. on my arrest i spent eight days without food or drink, obliged to walk continually to and fro or be flogged; and as if that did not suffice, i was made to trot as though i were a horse trained at the riding school, until worn with fatigue i fell to the ground. then the hangmen burnt my lips with red-hot irons, and when i declared myself the author of the attempt they replied, 'you do not tell the truth. we know that the author is another one, but we want to know your accomplices. besides you still retain six bombs, and along with little oller you deposited two bombs in the rue fivaller. who are your accomplices?' "in spite of my desire to make an end of it i could not answer anything. whom should i accuse since all are innocent? finally six comrades were placed before me, whom i had to accuse, and of whom i beg pardon. thus the declarations and the accusations that i made.... i cannot finish; the hangmen are coming. --noguès." sick with horror effie would have gone away, but her feet were like lead. she heard the next letter, the pathetic prayer of sebastian sunyer, indistinctly; the tortures had already seared her ears, but the crying for help seemed to go up over her head like great sobs; she felt herself washed round, sinking, in the desperate pain of it. the piteous reiteration, "listen you with your honest hearts," "you with your pure souls," "good and right-minded people," "good and right-feeling people," wailed through her like the wild pleading of a child who, shrieking under the whip "dear papa, good, sweet papa, please don't whip me, please, please," seeks terror-wrung flattery to escape the lash. the last cry, "aid us in our helplessness; think of our misery," made her quiver like a reed. she walked away and sat down in a corner alone; what could she do, what could any one do? miserable creature that she was herself, her own misery seemed so worthless beside that prison cry. and she thought on, "why does he want to live at all, why does any one want to live, why do i want to live myself?" after a while the creeper and his friend came to her, and the latter sat down beside her, undemonstrative as usual. at the next buzz in the room they two were left alone. she looked at him once as she said, "what do you think the people will do about it?" he glanced at the crowd with a thin smile: "do? talk." in a little time he said quietly: "it does you no good here. i will take you home and come back for david afterward." she had no idea of contradicting him; so they went out together. at the threshold of her room he said firmly, "i will come in for a few minutes; i have to speak to you." she struck a light, put the baby on the bed, and looked at him questioningly. he had sat down with his back against the wall, and with rigidly folded arms stared straight ahead of him. seeing that he did not speak, she said softly, falling into her native dialect, as all scotch women do when they feel most: "i canna get thae poor creetyer's cries oot o' ma head. it's no human." "no," he said shortly, and then with a sudden look at her, "effie, what do you think love is?" she answered him with surprised eyes and said nothing. he went on: "you love the child, don't you? you do for it, you serve it. that shows you love it. but do you think it's love that makes david act as he does to you? if he loved you, would he let you work as you work? would he live off you? wouldn't he wear the flesh off his fingers instead of yours? he doesn't love you. he isn't worth you. he isn't a bad man, but he isn't worth you. and you make him less worth. you ruin him, you ruin yourself, you kill the child. i can't see it any more. i come here, and i see you weaker every time, whiter, thinner. and i know if you keep on you'll die. i can't see it. i want you to leave him; let me work for you. i don't make much, but enough to let you rest. at least till you are well. i would wait till you left him of yourself, but i can't wait when i see you dying like this. i don't want anything of you, except to serve you, to serve the child because it's yours. come away, to-night. you can have my room; i'll go somewhere else. to-morrow i'll find you a better place. you needn't see him any more. i'll tell him myself. he won't do anything, don't be afraid. come." and he stood up. effie had sat astonished and dumb. now she looked up at the dark tense eyes above her, and said quietly, "i dinna understand." a sharp contraction went across the strong bent face: "no? you don't understand what you are doing with yourself? you don't understand that i love you, and i can't see it? i don't ask you to love me; i ask you to let me serve you. only a little, only so much as to give you health again; is that too much? you don't know what you are to me. others love beauty, but i--i see in you the eternal sacrifice; your thin fingers that always work, your face--when i look at it, it's just a white shadow; you are the child of the people, that dies without crying. oh, let me give myself for you. and leave this man, who doesn't care for you, doesn't know you, thinks you beneath him, uses you. i don't want you to be his slave any more." effie clasped her hands and looked at them; then she looked at the sleeping baby, smoothed the quilt, and said quietly: "i didna take him the day to leave him the morra. it's no my fault if ye're daft aboot me." the dark face sharpened as one sees the agony in a dying man, but his voice was very gentle, speaking always in his blurred english: "no, there is no fault in you at all. did i accuse you?" the girl walked to the window and looked out. some way it was a relief from the burning eyes which seemed to fill the room, no matter that she did not look at them. and staring off into the twinkling london night, she heard again the terrible sobs of sebastian sunyer's letter rising up and drowning her with its misery. without turning around she said, low and hard, "i wonder ye can thenk aboot thae things, an' yon deils burnin' men alive." the man drew his hand across his forehead. "would you like to hear that they,--one,--the worst of them, was dead?" "i thenk the worl' wadna be muckle the waur o't," she answered, still looking away from him. he came up and laid his hand on her shoulder. "will you kiss me once? i'll never ask again." she shook him off: "i dinna feel for't." "good-bye then. i'll go back for david." and he returned to the hall and got the creeper and told him very honestly what had taken place; and the creeper, to his credit be it said, respected him for it, and talked a great deal about being better in future to the girl. the two men parted at the foot of the stairs, and the last words that echoed through the hallway were: "no, i am going away. but you will hear of me some day." now, what went on in his heart that night no one knows; nor what indecision still kept him lingering fitfully about effie's street a few days more; nor when the indecision finally ceased; for no one spoke to him after that, except as casual acquaintances meet, and in a week he was gone. but what he did the whole world knows; for even the queen of spain came out of her prayers to hear how her torturing prime minister had been shot at santa agueda, by a stern-faced man, who, when the widow, grief-mad, spit in his face, quietly wiped his cheek, saying, "madam, i have no quarrel with women." a few weeks later they garrotted him, and he said one word before he died,--one only, "germinal." over there in the long low london hall the gabbling was hushed, and some one murmured how he had sat silent in the corner that night when all were talking. the creeper passed round a book containing the history of the tortures, watching it jealously all the while, for said he, "angiolillo gave it to me himself; he had it in his own hands." effie lay beside the baby in her room, and hid her face in the pillow to keep out the stare of the burning eyes that were dead; and over and over again she repeated, "was it my fault, was it my fault?" the hot summer air lay still and smothering, and the immense murmur of the city came muffled like thunder below the horizon. her heart seemed beating against the walls of a padded room. and gradually, without losing consciousness, she slipped into the world of illusion; around her grew the stifling atmosphere of the torture-chamber of montjuich, and the choked cries of men in agony. she was sure that if she looked up she should see the demoniac face of portas, the torturer. she tried to cry, "mercy, mercy," but her dry lips clave. she had a whirling sensation, and the illusion changed; now there was the clank of soldiers' arms, a moment of insufferable stillness as the garrotte shaped itself out of the shadows in her eyes, then loud and clear, breaking the sullen quiet like the sharp ringing of a storm-bringing wind, "germinal." she sprang up: the long vibration of the bell of st. pancras was waving through the room; but to her it was the prolongation of the word, "germ-inal-l-l--germinal-l-l--" then suddenly she threw out her arms in the darkness, and whispered hoarsely, "ay, i'll kiss ye the noo." an hour later she was back at the old question, "was it my fault?" poor girl, it is all over now, and all the same to the grass that roots in her bone, whether it was her fault or not. for the end that the man who had loved her foresaw, came, though it was slow in the coming. let the creeper get credit for all that he did. he stiffened up in a year or so, and went to paris and got some work; and there the worn little creature went to him, and wrote to her old friends that she was better off at last. but it was too late for that thin shell of a body that had starved so much; at the first trial she broke and died. and so she sleeps and is forgotten. and the careless boy-angel who mixed all these destinies up so unobservantly has never yet whispered her name in the ear of the widowed lady canovas del castillo. nor will the birds that fly thither carry it now; for _it was not "effie."_ the reward of an apostate i have sinned: and i am rewarded according to my sin, which was great. there is no forgiveness for me; let no man think there is forgiveness for sin: the gods cannot forgive. this was my sin, and this is my punishment, that i forsook my god to follow a stranger--only a while, a very brief, brief while--and when i would have returned there was no more returning. i cannot worship any more,--that is my punishment; i cannot worship any more. oh, that my god will none of me? that is an old sorrow! my god was beauty, and i am all unbeautiful, and ever was. there is no grace in these harsh limbs of mine, nor was at any time. i, to whom the glory of a lit eye was as the shining of stars in a deep well, have only dull and faded eyes, and always had; the chiseled lip and chin whereover runs the radiance of life in bubbling gleams, the cup of living wine was never mine to taste or kiss. i am earth-colored, and for my own ugliness sit in the shadow, that the sunlight may not see me, nor the beloved of my god. but, once, in my hidden corner, behind the curtain of shadows, i blinked at the glory of the world, and had such joy of it as only the ugly know, sitting silent and worshiping, forgetting themselves and forgotten. here in my brain it glowed, the shimmering of the dying sun upon the shore, the long gold line between the sand and sea, where the sliding foam caught fire and burned to death. here in my brain it shone, the white moon on the wrinkling river, running away, a dancing ghost line in the illimitable night. here in my brain rose the mountain curves, the great still world of stone, summit upon summit sweeping skyward, lonely and conquering. here in my brain, my little brain, behind this tiny ugly wall of bone stretched over with its dirty yellow skin, glittered the far high blue desert with its sand of stars, as i have watched it, nights and nights, alone, hid in the shadows of the prairie grass. here rolled and swelled the seas of corn, and blossoming fields of nodding bloom; and flower-flies on their hovering wings went flickering up and down. and the quick spring of lithe-limbed things went scattering dew across the sun; and singing streams went shining down the rocks, spreading bright veils upon the crags. here in my brain, my silent unrevealing brain, were the eyes i loved, the lips i dared not kiss, the sculptured heads and tendriled hair. they were here always in my wonder-house, my house of beauty, the temple of my god. i shut the door on common life and worshiped here. and no bright, living, flying thing, in whose body beauty dwells as guest, can guess the ecstatic joy of a brown, silent creature, a toad-thing, squatting on the shadowed ground, self-blotted, motionless, thrilling with the presence of all-beauty, though it has no part therein. but the gods are many. and once a strange god came to me. sharp upon the shadowy ground he stood, and beckoned me with knotted fingers. there was no beauty in his lean figure and sunken cheeks; but up and down the muscles ran like snakes beneath his skin, and his dark eyes had somber fires in them. and as i looked at him, i felt the leap of prisoned forces in myself, in the earth, in the air, in the sun; all throbbed with the pulse of the wild god's heart. beauty vanished from my wonder-house; and where his images had been i heard the clang and roar of machinery, the forging of links that stretched to the sun, chains for the tides, chains for the winds; and curious lights went shining through thick walls as through air, and down through the shell of the world itself, to the great furnaces within. into those seething depths, the god's eyes peered, smiling and triumphing; then with an up-glance at the sky and a waste-glance at me, he strode off. this is my great sin, for which there is no pardon: i followed him, the rude god energy; followed him, and in that abandoned moment swore to be quit of beauty, which had given me nothing, and to be worshiper of him to whom i was akin, ugly but sinuous, resolute, daring, defiant, maker and breaker of things, remoulder of the world. i followed him, i would have run abreast with him; i loved him, not with that still ecstasy of flooding joy wherewith my own god filled me of old, but with impetuous, eager fires, that burned and beat through all the blood-threads of me. "i love you, love me back," i cried, and would have flung myself upon his neck. then he turned on me with a ruthless blow, and fled away over the world, leaving me crippled, stricken, powerless, a fierce pain driving through my veins--gusts of pain!--and i crept back into my old cavern, stumbling, blind and deaf, only for the haunting vision of my shame and the rushing sound of fevered blood. the pain is gone. i see again; i care no more for the taunt and blow of that fierce god who was never mine. but in my wonder-house it is all still and bare; no image lingers on the blank mirrors any more. no singing bell floats in the echoless dome. forms rise and pass; but neither mountain curve nor sand nor sea, nor shivering river, nor the faces of the flowers, nor flowering faces of my god's beloved, touch aught within me now. not one poor thrill of vague delight for me, who felt the glory of the stars within my finger tips. it slips past me like water. brown without and clay within! no wonder now behind the ugly wall; an empty temple! i cannot worship, i cannot love, i cannot care. all my life-service is unweighed against that faithless hour of my forswearing. it is just; it is the law; i am forsworn, and the gods have given me the reward of an apostate. at the end of the alley it is a long narrow pocket opening on a little street which runs like a tortuous seam up and down the city, over there. it was at the end of the summer; and in summer, in the evening, the mouth of the pocket is hard to find, because of the people, in it and about, who sit across the passage, gasping at the dirty winds that come loafing down the street like crafty beggars seeking a hole to sleep in--like mean beggars, bereft of the spirit of free windhood. down in the pocket itself the air is quite dead; one feels oneself enveloped in a scum-covered pool of it, and at every breath long filaments of invisible roots, swamp-roots, tear and tangle in your floundering lungs. i had to go to the very end, to the bottom of the pocket. there, in the deepest of these alley-holes, lives the woman to whom i am indebted for the whiteness of this waist i wear. how she does it, i don't know; poverty works miracles like that, just as the black marsh mud gives out lilies. at the very last door i knocked, and presently a man's voice, weak and suffocated, called from a window above. i explained.--"there's a chair there; sit down. she'll be home soon." and the voice was caught in a cough. this, then, was the consumptive husband she had told me of! i looked up at the square hole dimly outlined in the darkness, whence the cough issued, and suddenly felt a horrible pressure at my heart and a curious sense of entanglement, as if all the invisible webs of disease had momentarily acquired a conscious sense of prey within their clutch, and tightened on it like an octopus. the haunting terror of the unknown, the dim horror of an inimic presence, recoil before the merciless creeping and floating of an enemy one cannot grasp or fight, repulsive turning from a thing that has reached behind while you have been seeking to face it, that is there awaiting you with the frightful ironic laughter of the silence--all this swept round and through me as i stared up through the night. up there on the bed he was lying, he who had been meshed in the fatal web for three long years--and was struggling still! in the darkness i felt his breath draw. the sharp barking of a dog came as a relief. i turned to the broken chair, and sat down to wait. the alley was hemmed in by a high wall, and from the farther side of it there towered up four magnificent old trees, whose great crowns sent down a whispering legend of vanished forests and the limitless sweep of clean air that had washed through them, long ago, and that would never come again. how long, how long since those far days of purity, before the plague spot of man had crept upon them! how strong those proud old giants were that had not yet been strangled! how beautiful they were! how mean and ugly were the misshapen things that sat in the doorways of the foul dens that they had made, chattering, chattering, as ages ago the apes had chattered in the forest! what curious beasts they were, with their paws and heads sticking out of the coverings they had twisted round their bodies--chattering, chattering always, and always moving about, unable to understand the still strong growths of silence. so a half hour passed. at last i saw a parting in the group of bodies across the entrance of the pocket, and a familiar weary figure carrying a basket, coming down the brickway. she stopped half way where a widening of the alley furnished the common drying place, and a number of clothes lines crossed and recrossed each other, casting a net of shadows on the pavement; after a glance at the sky, which had clouded over, she sighed heavily and again advanced. in the sickly light of the alley lamp the rounded shoulders seemed to droop like an old crone's. yet the woman was still young. that she might not be startled, i called "good evening." the answer was spoken in that tone of forced cheerfulness which the wretched always give to their employers; but she sank upon the step with the habitual "my, but i'm glad to sit down," of one who seldom sits. "tired out, i suppose. the day has been so hot." "yes, and i've got to go to work and iron again till eleven o'clock, and it's awful hot in that kitchen. i don't mind the washing so much in summer; i wash out here. but it's hot ironing. are you in a hurry?" i said no, and sat on. "how much rent do you pay?" i asked. "seven dollars." "three rooms?" "yes." "one over the other?" "yes. it's an awful rent, and he won't fix anything. the door is half off its hinges, and the paper is a sight." "have you lived here long?" "over three years. we moved here before he got sick. i don't keep nothing right now, but it used to be nice. it's so quiet back here away from the street; you don't hear no noise. that fence ought to be whitewashed. i used to keep it white, and everything clean. and it was so nice to sit out here in summer under them trees. you could just think you were in the park." a curious wonder went through me. somewhere back in me a voice was saying, "to him that hath shall be given, and from him that hath not, it shall be taken away even that which he hath." this horrible pool had been "nice" to her! again i felt the abyss seizing me with its tentacles, and high overhead in the tree-crowns i seemed to hear a spectral mockery of laughter. "yes," i forced myself to say, "they are splendid trees. i wonder they have lived so long." "'tis funny, aint it? that's a great big yard in there; the man that used to own it was a gardener, and there's a lot of the curiousest flowers there yet. but he's dead now, and the folks that's got it don't keep up nothing. they're waiting to sell it, i suppose." above, over our heads, the racking cough sounded again. "aint it terrible?" she murmured. "day and night, day and night; he don't get no rest, and neither do i. it's no wonder some people commits suicide." "does he ever speak of it?" i asked. her voice dropped to a semi-whisper. "not now so much, since the church people's got hold of him. he used to; i think he'd a done it if it hadn't been for them. but they've been kind o' talkin' to him lately, and tellin' him it wouldn't be right,--on account of the insurance, you know." my heart gave a wild bound of revolt, and i shut my teeth fast. o man, man, what have you made of yourself! more stupid than all the beasts of the earth, for a dole of the things you make to be robbed of, living,--to be robbed of and poisoned with--you consent to the death that eats with a million mouths, eats inexorably. you submit to unnamable torture in the holy name of--insurance! and in the name of insurance this miserable woman keeps alive the bones of a man! i took my bundle and went. and all the way i felt myself tearing through the tendrils of death that hung and swayed from the noisome wall, and caught at things as they passed. and all the way there pressed upon me pictures of the skeleton and the woman, clothed in firm flesh, young and joyous, and thrilling with the love of the well and strong. ah, if some one had said to her then, "some day you will slave to keep him alive through fruitless agonies, that for your last reward you may take the price of his pain"! ii.--alone i was wrong. i thought she wanted the insurance money, but i misunderstood her. i found it out one wild october day more than a year later, when for the second time i sought the end of the alley. the sufferer had "suffered out"; the gaunt and wasted shell of the man lay no more by the window in the upper story. the woman was free. "rest at last," i thought, "for both of them." but it was not as i thought. i expected ease to come into the woman's drawn face, and relaxation to her stooping figure. but something else came upon both, something quite unwonted and inexplicable; a wandering look in the eyes, a stupid drop to the mouth, an uncertainty in her walk, as of one who is half minded to go back and look for something. there was, too, an irritating irregularity in the performance of her work, which began to be annoying. at last, on that october day, this new unreliability reached the limit of provocation. i was leaving the city; i needed my laundry, needed it at once; and here it was four o'clock in the afternoon, the train due at night, and packing impossible till the wash came. it was five days overdue. the wind was howling furiously, the rain driving in sheets, but there was no alternative; i must get to the "end of the alley" and back, somehow. the gray, rain-drenched atmosphere was still grayer in the alley,--still, still grayer at the end. and what with the gray of it and the rain of it, i could scarcely see the thing that sat facing me when i opened the door,--a sort of human blur, hunched in a rocking-chair, its head sunken on its breast. in response to my startled exclamation, the face was lifted vacantly for a second, and then dropped again. but i had seen: drunk, dead drunk! and this woman had never drunk. i looked around the wretched room. by the window, where the gray light trailed in, stood a table covered with unwashed dishes; some late flies were crawling in the gutters of slop, besotted derelicts of insects, stupidly staggering up and down the cracked china. on the stove stood a number of flat-irons, but there was no fire. a mass of unironed clothes lay on an old couch and over the backs of two unoccupied chairs. on the wall above the couch, hung the portrait of the dead man. i walked to the slumping figure in the rocker, and with ill-contained brutality demanded: "so this is why you did not bring my clothes! where are they?" i heard my own voice cutting like the edge of a knife, and felt half-ashamed when that weak, shaking thing lifted up its foolish face, and stared at me with watery, uncomprehending eyes. "my clothes," i reiterated; "are they here or upstairs?" "guess-s-so," stammered the uncertain voice, "g-guess so." "nothing for it but to find them myself," i muttered, beginning the search through the pile on the couch. nothing of mine there, so i needs must climb to the golgotha on the second floor, from which the cross had disappeared, but which still bore traces of its victim's long crucifixion,--a pair of old bed-slippers still by the window, a sleeping-cap on the wall. some cannot but leave so the things that have touched their dead. one by one i found the "rough-dry" garments, here, there, in the hallway, in the garret, hanging or crumpled up among dozens of others. and all the while i hunted, the rain beat and the wind blew, and a low third sound kept mingling with them, rising from the lower floor. my heart smote me when i heard it, for i knew it was the woman sobbing. the self-righteous pharisee within me gave an impatient sneer: "alcohol tears!" but something else clutched at my throat, and i found myself glancing at the dead man's shoes. when i went downstairs, i avoided the rocking-chair, tied up my bundle, counted out the money, laid it on the table, and then turning round said, deliberately and harshly: "there is your money; don't buy whisky with it, mrs. bossert." crying had a little sobered her. she looked up, still with less light in her face than in an intelligent dog's, but with some dim self-consciousness. it was as a face that had appeared behind deforming bubbles of water. she half lifted her hand, let it fall, and stammered, "no, i won't, i won't. it don't do nobody no good." the senseless desire to preach seized hold of me. "mrs. bossert," i cried out, "aren't you ashamed of yourself? a woman like you, who went through so much, and so long, and so bravely! and now, when you could get along all right, to act like this!" the soggy mouth dropped open, the glazy eyes stared at me, fixedly and foolishly, then shifted to the portrait on the wall; and with a mawkish simper, as of some old drab playing sixteen, she slobbered out, nodding to the portrait: "all--for the love--o' him." it was so utterly ludicrous that i laughed. then a cold rage took me: "look here," i said (and again i heard my own voice, grim and quiet, cutting the air like a whip), "if you believe, as i have heard you say, that your husband can look down on you from anywhere, remember you couldn't do a thing to hurt him worse than you're doing now. 'love' indeed!" the lash went home. the stricken figure huddled closer; the voice came out like a dumb thing's moan: "oh--i'm all alone." then suddenly i understood. i had taken it for mockery, and profanation, that leering look at the shadow on the wall, that driveling stammer, "all--for the love--o' him." and it had been a solemn thing! no lover's word spoken in the morning of youth with the untried day before it, under the seductive witchery of answering breath and kisses, rushing blood and throbbing bodies; but the word of a woman bent with service, seamed with labor, haggard with watching; the word of a woman who, at the washtub, had kept her sufferer by the work of her hands, and watched him between the snatches of her sleep. the immemorial passion of a common heart, that _is_ not much, that _had_ not much, and has lost all. years were in it. for years she had had her burden to carry; and she had carried it to the edge of the grave. there it had fallen from her, and her arms were empty. nothing to do any more. alone. she sat up suddenly with a momentary flare of light in her face.--"as long as i had him," she said, "i could do. i thought i'd be glad when he was gone, a many and many a time. but i'd rather he was up there yet.... i did everything. i didn't put him away mean. there was a hundred and twenty-five dollars insurance. i spent it all on him. he was covered with flowers." the flare died down, and she fell together like a collapsing bag. i saw the gray vacancy moving inward toward the last spark of intelligence in her eyes, as an ashing coal whitens inward toward the last dull red point of fire. then this heap of rags shuddered with an inhuman whine, "a-l-o-n-e." in the crowding shadows i felt the desolation pressing me like a vise. behind that sunken heap in the chair gathered a midnight specter; for a moment i caught a flash from its royal, malignant eyes, the monarch of human ruins, the murderous bridegroom of widowed souls, king alcohol. "after all, as well that way as another," i muttered; and aloud (but the whip-cord had gone out of my voice), "the money is on the table." she did not hear me; the bridegroom "had given his beloved sleep." i went out softly into the wild rain, and overhead, among the lashing arms of the leafless trees, and around the alley pocket, the wind was whining: "a-l-o-n-e." to strive and fail there was a lonely wind crying around the house, and wailing away through the twilight, like a child that has been refused and gone off crying. every now and then the trees shivered with it, and dropped a few leaves that splashed against the windows like big, soft tears, and then fell down on the dark, dying grass, and lay there till the next wind rose and whirled them away. rain was gathering. close by the gray patch of light within the room a white face bent over a small table, and dust-dim fingers swept across the strings of a zither. the low, pathetic opening chords of albert's "herbst-klage" wailed for a moment like the wind; then a false note sounded, and the player threw her arms across the table and rested her face upon them. what was the use? she knew how it ought to be, but she could never do it,--never make the strings strike true to the song that was sounding within, sounding as the wind and the rain and the falling leaves sounded it, as long ago the wizard albert had heard and conjured it out of the sound-sea, before the little black notes that carried the message over the world were written. the weary brain wandered away over the mystery of the notes, and she whispered dully, "a sign to the eye, and a sound to the ear--and that is his gift to the world--his will--and he is dead, dead, dead;--he was so great, and they are so silly, those little black foolish dots--and yet they are there--and by them his soul sings--" the numb pain at her heart forced some sharp tears from the closed eyes. she bent and unbent her fingers hopelessly, two or three times, and then let them lie out flat and still. it was not their fault, not the fingers' fault; they could learn to do it, if they only had the chance; but they could never, never have the chance. they must always do something else, always a hundred other things first, always save and spare and patch and contrive; there was never time to do the thing she longed for most. only the odd moments, the unexpected freedoms, the stolen half-hours, in which to live one's highest dream, only the castaway time for one's soul! and every year the fleeting glory waned, wavered, sunk away more and more sorrowfully into the gray, soundless shadows of an unlived life. once she had heard it so clearly,--long ago, on the far-off sun-spaced, wind-singing fields of home,--the wild sweet choruses, the songs no man had ever sung. still she heard them sometimes in the twilight, in the night, when she sat alone and work was over; high and thin and fading, only sound-ghosts, but still with the incomparable glory of a first revelation, a song no one else has ever heard, a marvel to be seized and bodied; only,--they faded away into the nodding sleep that would conquer, and in the light and rush of day were mournfully silent. and she never captured them, never would; life was half over now. with the thought she started up, struck the chords again, a world of plaint throbbing through the strings; surely the wizard himself would have been satisfied. but ah, once more the fatal uncertainty of the fingers.... she bit the left hand savagely, then touched it, softly and remorsefully, with the other, murmuring: "poor fingers! not your fault." at last she rose and stood at the window, looking out into the night, and thinking of the ruined gift, the noblest gift, that had been hers and would die dumb; thinking of the messages that had come to her up out of the silent dark and sunk back into it, unsounded; of the voices she would have given to the messages of the masters, and never would give now; and with a bitter compression of the lips she said: "well, i was born to strive and fail." and suddenly a rush of feeling swept her own life out of sight, and away out in the deepening night she saw the face of an old, sharp-chinned, white-haired, dead man; he had been her father once, strong and young, with chestnut hair and gleaming eyes, and with his own dream of what he had to do in life. perhaps he, too, had heard sounds singing in the air, a new message waiting for deliverance. it was all over now; he had grown old and thin-faced and white, and had never done anything in the world; at least nothing for himself, his very own; he had sewn clothes,--thousands, millions of stitches in his work-weary life--no doubt there were still in existence scraps and fragments of his work,--in same old ragbag perhaps--beautiful, fine stitches, into which the keen eyesight and the deft hand had passed, still showing the artist-craftsman. but _that_ was not his work; that was the service society had asked of him and he had rendered; himself, his own soul, that wherein he was different from other men, the unbought thing that the soul does for its own outpouring,--that was nowhere. and over there, among the low mounds of the soldiers' graves, his bed was made, and he was lying in it, straight and still, with the rain crying softly above him. he had been so full of the lust of life, so alert, so active! and nothing of it all!--"poor father, you failed too," she muttered softly. and then behind the wraith of the dead man there rose an older picture, a face she had never seen, dead fifty years before; but it shone through the other face, and outshone it, luminous with great suffering, much overcoming, and complete and final failure. it was the face of a woman not yet middle-aged, smitten with death, with the horror of utter strangeness in the dying eyes; the face of a woman lost in a strange city of a strange land, and with her little crying, helpless children about her, facing the inexorable agony there on the pavement, where she was sinking down, and only foreign words falling in the dying ears!--she, too, had striven; how she had striven! against the abyss of poverty there in the old world; against the load laid on her by nature, law, society, the triune god of terror; against the inertia of another will. she had bought coppers with blood, and spared and saved and endured and waited; she had bent the gods to her will; she had sent her husband to america, the land of freedom and promise; she had followed him at last, over the great blue bitter water with its lapping mouths that had devoured one of her little ones upon the way; she had been driven like a cow in the shambles at the landing stage; she had been robbed of all but her ticket, and with her little children had hungered for three days on the overland journey; she had lived it through, and set foot in the promised land; but somehow the waiting face was not there, had missed her or she, him,--and lost and alone with death and the starving babes, she sank at the foot of the soldiers' monument, and the black mist came down on the courageous eyes, and the light was flickering out forever. with a bitter cry the living figure in the room stretched its hands toward the vision in the night. there was nothing there, she knew it; nothing in the heavens above nor the earth beneath to hear the cry,--not so much as a crumbling bone any more,--but she called brokenly, "oh, why must she die so, with nothing, nothing, not one little reward after all that struggle? to fall on the pavement and die in the hospital at last!" and shuddering, with covered eyes and heavy breath, she added wearily, "no wonder that i fail; i come of those who failed; my father, his mother,--and before her?" behind the fading picture, stretched dim, long shadows of silent generations, with rounded shoulders and bent backs and sullen, conquered faces. and they had all, most likely, dreamed of some wonderful thing they had to do in the world, and all had died and left it undone. and their work had been washed away, as if writ in water, and no one knew their dreams. and of the fruit of their toil other men had eaten, for that was the will of the triune god; but of themselves was left no trace, no sound, no word, in the world's glory; no carving upon stone, no indomitable ghost shining from a written sign, no song singing out of black foolish spots on paper,--nothing. they were as though they had not been. and as they all had died, she too would die, slave of the triple terror, sacrificing the highest to the meanest, that somewhere in some lighted ball-room or gas-bright theater, some piece of vacant flesh might wear one more jewel in her painted hair. "my soul," she said bitterly, "my soul for their diamonds!" it was time to sleep, for to-morrow--work. the sorrows of the body i have never wanted anything more than the wild creatures have,--a broad waft of clean air, a day to lie on the grass at times, with nothing to do but slip the blades through my fingers, and look as long as i pleased at the whole blue arch, and the screens of green and white between; leave for a month to float and float along the salt crests and among the foam, or roll with my naked skin over a clean long stretch of sunshiny sand; food that i liked, straight from the cool ground, and time to taste its sweetness, and time to rest after tasting; sleep when it came, and stillness, that the sleep might leave me when it would, not sooner--air, room, light rest, nakedness when i would not be clothed, and when i would be clothed, garments that did not fetter; freedom to touch my mother earth, to be with her in storm and shine, as the wild things are,--this is what i wanted,--this, and free contact with my fellows;--not to love, and lie and be ashamed, but to love and say i love, and be glad of it; to feel the currents of ten thousand years of passion flooding me, body to body, as the wild things meet. i have asked no more. but i have not received. over me there sits that pitiless tyrant, the soul; and i am nothing. it has driven me to the city, where the air is fever and fire, and said, "breathe this;--i would learn; i cannot learn in the empty fields; temples are here,--stay." and when my poor, stifled lungs have panted till it seemed my chest must burst, the soul has said, "i will allow you, then, an hour or two; we will ride, and i will take my book and read meanwhile." and when my eyes have cried out with tears of pain for the brief vision of freedom drifting by, only for leave to look at the great green and blue an hour, after the long, dull-red horror of walls, the soul has said, "i cannot waste the time altogether; i must know! read." and when my ears have plead for the singing of the crickets and the music of the night, the soul has answered, "no: gongs and whistles and shrieks are unpleasant if you listen; but school yourself to hearken to the spiritual voice, and it will not matter." when i have beat against my narrow confines of brick and mortar, brick and mortar, the soul has said, "miserable slave! why are you not as i, who in one moment fly to the utterest universe? it matters not where you are, _i_ am free." when i would have slept, so that the lids fell heavily and i could not lift them, the soul has struck me with a lash, crying, "awake! drink some stimulant for those shrinking nerves of yours! there is no time to sleep till the work is done." and the cursed poison worked upon me, till _its_ will was done. when i would have dallied over my food, the soul has ordered, "hurry, hurry! do i have time to waste on this disgusting scene? fill yourself and be gone!" when i have envied the very dog, rubbing its bare back along the ground in the sunlight, the soul has exclaimed, "would you degrade me so far as to put yourself on a level with beasts?" and my bands were drawn tighter. when i have looked upon my kind, and longed to embrace them, hungered wildly for the press of arms and lips, the soul has commanded sternly, "cease, vile creature of fleshly lusts! eternal reproach! will you forever shame me with your beastliness?" and i have always yielded: mute, joyless, fettered, i have trod the world of the soul's choosing, and served and been unrewarded. now i am broken before my time; bloodless, sleepless, breathless,--half-blind, racked at every joint, trembling with every leaf. "perhaps i have been too hard," said the soul; "you shall have a rest." the boon has come too late. the roses are beneath my feet now, but the perfume does not reach me; the willows trail across my cheek and the great arch is overhead, but my eyes are too weary to lift to it; the wind is upon my face, but i cannot bare my throat to its caress; vaguely i hear the singing of the night through the long watches when sleep does not come, but the answering vibration thrills no more. hands touch mine--i longed for them so once--but i am as a corpse. i remember that i wanted all these things, but now the power to want is crushed from me, and only the memory of my denial throbs on, with its never-dying pain. and still i think, if i were left alone long enough--but already i hear the tyrant up there plotting to slay me.--"yes," it keeps saying, "it is about time! i will not be chained to a rotting carcass. if my days are to pass in perpetual idleness i may as well be annihilated. i will make the wretch do me one more service.--you have clamored to be naked in the water. go now, and lie in it forever." yes: that is what it is saying, and i--the sea stretches down there---- the triumph of youth the afternoon blazed and glittered along the motionless tree-tops and down into the yellow dust of the road. under the shadows of the trees, among the powdered grass and bushes, sat a woman and a man. the man was young and handsome in a way, with a lean eager face and burning eyes, a forehead in the old poetic mould crowned by loose dark waves of hair; his chin was long, his lips parted devouringly and his glances seemed to eat his companion's face. it was not a pretty face, not even ordinarily good looking,--sallow, not young, only youngish; but there was a peculiar mobility about it, that made one notice it. she waved her hand slowly from east to west, indicating the horizon, and said dreamingly: "how wide it is, how far it is! one can get one's breath. in the city i always feel that the walls are squeezing my chest." after a little silence she asked without looking at him: "what are you thinking of, bernard?" "you," he murmured. she glanced at him under her lids musingly, stretched out her hand and touched his eyelids with her finger-tips, and turned aside with a curious fleeting smile. he caught at her hand, but failing to touch it as she drew it away, bit his lip and forcedly looked off at the sky and the landscape: "yes," he said in a strained voice, "it is beautiful, after the city. i wish we could stay in it." the woman sighed: "that's what i have been wishing for the last fifteen years." he bent towards her eagerly: "do you think--" he stopped and stammered, "you know we have been planning, a few of us, to club together and get a little farm somewhere near--would you--do you think--would you be one of us?" she laughed, a little low, sad laugh: "i wouldn't be any good, you know. i couldn't do the work that ought to be done. i would come fast enough and i would try. but i'm a little too old, bernard. the rest are young enough to make mistakes and live to make them good; but when i would have my lesson learned, my strength would be gone. it's half gone now." "no, it isn't," burst out the youth. "you're worth half a dozen of those young ones. old, old--one would think you were seventy. and you're not old; you will never be old." she looked up where a crow was wheeling in the air. "if," she said slowly, following its motions with her eyes, "you once plant your feet on my face, and you will, you impish bird--my bernard will sing a different song." "no, bernard won't," retorted the youth. "bernard knows his own mind, even if he is 'only a boy.' i don't love you for your face, you--" she interrupted him with a shrug and a bitter sneer. "evidently! who would?" a look of mingled pain and annoyance overspread his features. "how you twist my words. you are beautiful to me; and you know what i meant." "well," she said, throwing herself backward against a tree-trunk and stretching out her feet on the grass, ripples of amusement wavering through the cloudy expression, "tell me what do you love in me." he was silent, biting his lower lip. "i'll tell you then," she said. "it's my energy, the life in me. that is youth, and my youth has overlived its time. i've had a long lease, but it's going to expire soon. so long as you don't see it, so long as my life seems fuller than yours--well--; but when the failure of life becomes visible, while your own is still in its growth, you will turn away. when my feet won't spring any more, yours will still be dancing. and you will want dancing feet with you." "i will not," he answered shortly. "i've seen plenty of other women; i saw all the crowd coming up this morning and there wasn't a woman there to compare with you. i don't say i'll never love others, but now i don't; if i see another woman like you--but i never could love one of those young girls." "sh--sh," she said glancing down the road where a whirl of dust was making towards them, in the center of which moved a band of bright young figures, "there they come now. don't they look beautiful?" there were four young girls in front, their faces radiant with sun and air, and daisy wreaths in their gleaming hair; they had their arms around each other's waists and sang as they walked, with neither more accord nor discord than the birds about them. the voices were delicious in their youth and joy; one heard that they were singing not to produce a musical effect, but from the mere wish to sing. behind them came a troop of young fellows, coats off, heads bare, racing all over the roadside, jostling each other and purposely provoking scrambles. the tallest one had a nimbus of bright curls crowning a glowing face, dimpled and sparkling as a child's. the girls glanced shyly at him under their lashes as he danced about now in front and now behind them, occasionally tossing them a flower, but mostly hustling his comrades about. behind these came older people with three or four very little children riding on their backs. as the group came abreast of our couple they stopped to exchange a few words, then went on. when they had passed out of hearing the woman sat with a sphinx-like stare in her eyes, looking steadily at the spot where the bright head had nodded to her as it passed. "like a wildflower on a stalk," she murmured softly, narrowing her eyes as if to fix the vision, "like a tall tiger-lily." her companion's face darkened perceptibly. "what do you mean? what do you see?" he asked. "the vision of youth and beauty," she answered in the tone of a sleep-walker, "and the glory and triumph of it,--the immortality of it--its splendid indifference to its ruined temples, and all its humble worshipers. do you know," turning suddenly to him with a sharp change in face and voice, "what i would be wicked enough to do, if i could?" he smiled tolerantly: "you, wicked? dear one, you couldn't be wicked." "oh, but i could! if there were any way to fix davy's head forever, just as he passed us now,--forever, so that all the world might keep it and see it for all time, i would cut it off with this hand! yes, i would." her eyes glittered mercilessly. he shook his head smiling: "you wouldn't kill a bug, let alone davy." "i tell you i would. do you remember when nathaniel died? i felt bad enough, but do you know the week before when he was so very sick, i went out one day to a beautiful glen we used to visit together. they had been improving it! they had improved it so much that the water is all dying out of the creek; the little boats that used to float like pond lilies lie all helpless in the mud, and hardly a ribbon of water goes over the fall, and the old giant trees are withering. oh, it hurt me so to think the glory of a thousand years was vanishing before my eyes and i couldn't hold it. and suddenly the question came into my head: 'if you had the power would you save nathaniel's life or bring back the water to the glen?' and i didn't hesitate a minute. i said, 'let nathaniel die and all my best loved ones and i myself, but bring back the glory of the glen!" "when i think," she went on turning away and becoming dreamy again, "of all the beauty that is gone that i can never see, that is lost forever--the beauty that had to alter and die,--it stifles me with the pain of it. why must it all die?" he looked at her wonderingly. "it seems to me," he said slowly, "that beauty worship is almost a disease with you. i wouldn't like to care so much for mere outsides." "we never long for the thing we are rich in," she answered in a dry, changed voice. nevertheless his face lighted, it was pleasant to be rich in the thing she worshiped. he had gradually drawn near her feet and now suddenly bent forward and kissed them passionately. "don't," she cried sharply, "it's too much like self-abasement. and besides--" his face was white and quivering, his voice choked. "well--what besides--" "the time will come when you will wish you had reserved that kiss for some other foot. some one to whom it will all be new, who will shudder with the joy of it, who will meet you half way, who will believe all that you say, and say like things in fullness of heart. and i perhaps will see you, and know that in your heart you are sorry you gave something to me that you would have ungiven if you could." he buried his face in his hands. "you do not love me at all," he said. "you do not believe me." a curious softness came into the answer: "oh, yes, dear, i believe you. years ago i believed myself when i said the same sort of thing. but i told you i am getting old. i can not unmake what the years have made, nor bring back what they have stolen. i love you _for your face_", the words had a sting in them, "and for your soul too. and i am glad to be loved by you. but, do you know what i am thinking?" he did not answer. "i am thinking that as i sit here, beloved by you and others who are young and beautiful--it is no lie--in a--well, in a triumph i have not sought, but which i am human enough to be glad of, envied no doubt by those young girls,--i am thinking how the remorseless feet of youth will tramp on me soon, and carry you away. and"--very slowly--"in my day of pain, you will not be near, nor the others. i shall be alone; age and pain are unlovely." "you won't let me come near you," he said wildly. "i would do anything for you. i always want to do things for you to spare you, and you never let me. when you are in pain you will push me away." a fairly exultant glitter flashed in her face. "yes," she said, "i know my secret. that is how i have stayed young so long. see," she said, stretching out her arms, "other women at my age are past the love of men. their affections have gone to children. and i have broken the law of nature and prolonged the love of youth because--i have been strong and stood alone. but there is an end. things change, seasons change, you, i, all change; what's the use of saying 'never--forever, forever--never,' like the old clock on the stairs? it's a big lie." "i won't talk any more," he said, "but when the time comes you will see." she nodded: "yes, i will see." "do you think all people alike?" "as like as ants. people are vessels which life fills and breaks, as it does trees and bees and other sorts of vessels. they play when they are little, and then they love and then they have children and then they die. ants do the same." "to be sure. but i don't deceive myself as to the scope of it." the crowd were returning now, and by tacit consent they arose and joined the group. down the road they jumped a fence into a field and had to cross a little stream. "where is our bridge?" called the boys. "we made a bridge. some one has stolen our bridge." "oh, come on," cried davy, "let's jump it." three ran and sprang; they landed laughing and taunting the rest. bernard sought out his beloved. "shall i help you over?" he asked. "no," she said shortly, "help the girls," and brushing past him she jumped, falling a little short and muddying a foot, but scrambling up unaided. the rest debated seeking an advantageous point. at last they found a big stone in the middle, and pulling off his shoes, bernard waded in the creek, helping the girls across. the smallest one, large-eyed and timid, clung to his arm and let him almost carry her over. "he does it real natural," observed davy, who was whisking about in the daisy field like some flashing butterfly. they gathered daisies and laughed and sang and chattered till the sun went low. then they gathered under a big tree and spread their lunch on the ground. and after they had eaten, the conversation lay between the sallow-faced woman and one of the older men, a clever conversation filled with quaint observations and curious sidelights. the boys sat all about the woman questioning her eagerly, but behind in the shadow of the drooping branches sat the girls, silent, unobtrusive, holding each other's hands. now and then the talker cast a furtive glance from bernard's rather withdrawn face to the faces in the shadow, and the enigmatic smile hovered and flitted over her lips. * * * * * three years later on the anniversary of that summer day the woman sat at an upstairs window in the house on the little farm that was a reality now, the little co-operative farm where ten free men and women labored and loved. she had come with the others and done her best, but the cost of it, hard labor and merciless pain, was stamped on the face that looked from the window. she was watching bernard's figure as it came swinging through the orchard. presently he came in and up the stairs. his feet went past her door, then turned back irresolutely, and a low knock followed. her eyebrows bent together almost sternly as she answered, "come in." he entered with a smile: "can i do anything for you this morning?" "no," she said quietly, "you know i like my own cranky ways. i--i'd rather do things myself." he nodded: "i know. i always get the same answer. shall you go to the picnic? you surely will keep our foundation-day picnic?" "perhaps--later. and perhaps not." there was a curious tone of repression in the words. "well," he answered good-naturedly, "if you won't let me do anything for you, i'll have to find some one who will. is bella ready to go?" "this half hour. bella. here is bernard." and bella came in. bella, the timid girl with the brilliant complexion and gazelle soft eyes, bella radiant in her youth and feminine daintiness, more lovely than she had been three years before. she gave bernard a lunch basket to carry and a shawl and a workbag and a sun umbrella, and when they went out she clung to his arm besides. she stopped near one of their own rose bushes and told him to choose a bud for her, and she put it coquettishly in her dark hair. the woman watched them till they disappeared down the lane; he had never once looked back. then her mouth settled in a quiet sneer and she murmured: "how long is 'forever'? three years." after a while she rose and crossed to an old mirror that hung on the opposite wall. staring at the reflection it gave back, she whispered drearily: "you are ugly, you are eaten with pain! do you still expect the due of youth and beauty? did you not know it all long ago?" then something flashed in the image, something as if the features had caught fire and burned. "i will not," she said hoarsely, her fingers clenching. "i will not surrender. was it he i loved? it was his youth, his beauty, his life. and younger youth shall love me still, stronger life. i will not, i will not die alive." she turned away and ran down into the yard and out into the fields. she would not go on the common highway where all went, she would find a hard way through woods and over hills, and she would come there before them and sit and wait for them where the ways met. bareheaded, ill-dressed and careless she ran along, finding a fierce pleasure in trampling and breaking the brush that impeded her. there was the road at last, and right ahead of her an old, old man hobbling along with bent back and eyes upon the ground. just before him was a bad hole in the road; he stopped, irresolute, and looked around like a crippled insect stretching its antenna to find a way for its mangled feet. she called cheerily, "let me help you." he looked up with dim blue eyes helplessly seeking. she led him slowly around the dangerous place, and then they sat down together on the little covered wooden bridge beyond. "ah!" murmured the old man, shaking his head, "it is good to be young." and there was the ghost of admiration in his watery eyes, as he looked at her tall straight figure. "yes," she answered sadly, looking away down the road where she saw bella's white dress fluttering, "it is good to be young." the lovers passed without noticing them, absorbed in each other. presently the old man hobbled away. "it will come to that too," she muttered looking after him. "the husks of life!" the old shoemaker he had lived a long time there, in the house at the end of the alley, and no one had ever known that he was a great man. he was lean and palsied and had a crooked back; his beard was grey and ragged and his eyebrows came too far forward; there were seams and flaps in the empty, yellow old skin, and he gasped horribly when he breathed, taking hold of the lintel of the door to steady himself when he stepped out on the broken bricks of the alley. he lived with a frightful old woman who scrubbed the floors of the rag-shop, and drank beer, and growled at the children who poked fun at her. he had lived with her eighteen years, she said, stroking the furry little kitten that curled up in her neck as if she had been beautiful. eighteen years they had been drinking and quarreling together--and suffering. she had seen the flesh sucking away from the bones, and the skin falling in upon them, and the long, lean fingers growing more lean and trembling, as they crooked round his shoemaking tools. it was very strange she had not grown thin; the beer had bloated her, and rolls of weak, shaking flesh lapped over the ridges of her uncouth figure. her pale, lack-lustre blue eyes wandered aimlessly about as she talked: no--he had never told her, not even in their quarrels, not even when they were drunken together, of the great visitor who had come up the little alley, yesterday, walking so stately over the sun-beaten bricks, taking no note of the others, and coming in at the door without asking. she had not expected such an one; how could she? but the old shoemaker had shown no surprise at the mighty one. he smiled and set down the teacup he was holding, and entered into communion with the stranger. he noticed no others, but continued to smile; and the infinite dignity of the unknown fell upon him, and covered the wasted old limbs and the hard, wizened face, so that all we who entered, bowed, and went out, and did not speak. but we understood, for the mighty one gave understanding without words. we had been in the presence of freedom! we had stood at the foot of tabor, and seen this worn, old, world-soiled soul lose all its dross and commonplace, and pass upward smiling, to the transfiguration. in the hands of the mighty one the crust had crumbled, and dropped away in impalpable powder. souls should be mixed of it no more. only that which passed upward, the fine white playing flame, the heart of the long, life-long watches of patience, should rekindle there in the perennial ascension of the great soul of man. where the white rose died it was late at night, a raw, rough-shouldering night, that shoved men in corners as having no business in the street, and the few people in the northbound car drew themselves into themselves, radiating hedgehog quills of feeling at their neighbors. presently there came in a curious figure, clothed in the drapery of its country's honor, the blue flannel flapping very much about its legs. i looked at its feet first, because they were so very small and girlish, and because the owner of them adjusted the flapping pants with the coquetry of a maiden switching her skirts. then i glanced at the hands: they also were small and womanish, and constantly in motion. at last, the face, expecting a fresh young boy's, not long away from some country village. it was the sunk, seamed face of a man of forty-five, seared, and with iron-gray eyebrows, but lit by twinkling young eyes, that gleamed at everything good-humoredly. the sailor's pancake with its official lettering was pushed rakishly down and forward, and looking at hat and wearer, one instinctively turned milliner and decorated the "shape" with aigrette and bows,--they would nod so accordant with the flirting head. presently the restless hands went up and gave the hat another tilt, went down and straightened the "divided skirt," folded themselves an instant while the little feet began tattooing the car floor, and the scintillant eyes looked general invitation all round the car. no perceptible shrinkage of quills, however, so the eyes wandered over to their image in the plate glass, and directly the hat got another coquettish dip, and the skirts another flirt and settle. the conductor came in: some one to talk to at last! "will you let me off at ninth and race?" the dim chill of a smile shivered over the other faces in the car. ninth and race! who ever heard a defender of his country's glory ask a conductor on a street car in philadelphia for any other point than ninth and race! the conductor nodded appreciatively. "just come to the city, i suppose," he said interlocutively. the sailor plucked off his hat, exhibiting his label with child-like vanity: "s. s. alabama. here for three days just. been over in new york." "like it?" remarked the conductor, prolonging his stay inside the car. the hat went on again, proudly. "sixteen years in the service. yes, sir. _six_-teen years. the service is all right. the service is good enough for me. live there. expect to die there. sixteen years. you won't forget to let me off at ninth and race." "no. going to see chinatown?" "sure. chinatown's all right. seen it in hong kong. want to see it in philadelphia." o cradle of my country's freedom! these are your defenders,--these to whom your chief delight is your stews and your brothels, your fantans and your opium dens, your sinks of filth and your cesspools of slime! let them only be as they were "at hong kong"--or worse--and "the service" asks no more. he will live in it and die in it, and it's good enough for him. oh, not your old-time patriotic legends, nor the halls of the great rebel birth, nor the solemn, silent bell that once proclaimed liberty throughout the land, nor the piteous relics of your dead wise men, nor any dream of your bright, pure young days when yet you were "a fair greene country towne," swims up in the vision of "the service" when he sets his foot within your borders, filling him with devotion to our lady liberty, and drawing him to new world pilgrim shrines. not these, oh no, not these. but your leper spot, your old world plague-house, your breeding-ground of pest-begotten human vermin! so there is chinatown, and electric glare enough upon it, and rat-holes enough within it, "the service" is good enough for him,--he will shoot to order in your defense till he dies! rat-tat-tat went the little feet upon the floor, and the pancake got another rakish pull. presently the active figure squared sharply about and faced the door. the car had stopped, and a drunken man was staggering in. the sailor caught him good-humoredly in his arms, swung him about, and seated him beside himself with a comforting "now you're all right, sir; sit right here, my friend." the drunkard had a sodden, stupid face and bleary eyes from which the alcohol was oozing. in his shaking hand he held a bunch of delicate half-opened roses, hothouse roses, cream and pink; the odor of them drifted faintly through the car like a whiff of summer. something like a sigh of relaxation exhaled from the hedge-hogs, and a dozen commiserating eyes were fastened on the ill-fated flowers,--so fragile, so sweet, so inoffensive, so wantonly sacrificed. the hot, unsteady, clutching hand had already burned the stems, and the pale, helpless faces of the roses drooped heavily. the drunkard, full of beery effervescence, cast a bubbling look over the car, and spying a young lady opposite, suddenly stood up and offered the bouquet to her. she stared resolutely through him, seeing and hearing nothing, not even the piteous child-blossoms, with their pleading, downbent heads, and with a confused muttering of "no offense, no offense, you know," the man sank back again. as he did so the uncertain fingers released one stem, and a cream-white bloom went fluttering down, like a butterfly with broken wings. there it lay, jolting back and forth on the dirty floor, and no one dared to pick it up. presently the drunkard sopped over comfortably on the sailor's shoulder, who, with a generally directed wink of bonhomie, settled him easily, bestowing a sympathetic pat upon the bloated cheek. the conductor disturbed the situation by asking for his fare. the drunkard stupidly rubbed his eyes and offered his flowers in place of the nickel. again they were refused; and after a fluctuant search in his pockets between intervals of nodding, the dirty, over-fingered bit of metal was produced, accepted--and still the dying blossoms shivered in the torturer's hands. he was drowsing off again, when, by some sudden turn of the obstructed machinery in his skull, his lids opened and he struggled up; the image of myself must have swum suddenly across the momentarily acting eye-nerve, and with gurgling deference, at the immanent risk of losing his equilibrium once more, he proffered the bouquet to me, grabbing the heads and presenting them stem-end towards. a smothered snuffle went round the car. i wanted them, oh, how i wanted them! my heart beat suffocatingly with the sense of baffled pity and rage and cowardice. who was he, that drunken sot, with his smirching, wabbling hand, that i should fear to take the roses from him? why must i grind my teeth and sit there helpless, while those beautiful things were crushed and blasted and torn in living fragments? i could take them home, i could give them drink, they would lift up their heads, they would open wide, for days they would make the room sweet, and the pale, soft glory of their inimitable petals would shine like a luminous promise across the winter. nobody wanted them, nobody cared; this sodden beast in the flare-up of his consciousness wished to be quit of them. _why_ might i not take them? something sharp bit and burned my eyelids as i glanced at the one on the floor. the conductor had stepped on it and crushed it open; and there lay the marvelous creamy leaves, curled at their edges like kiss-seeking lips, each with its glory greater than solomon's, all fouled and ruined in the human reek. and i dared not save the others! miserable coward! i forced my hands tighter in my pockets and turned my head away towards the outside night and the backward slipping street. between me and it, a dim reflection wavered, the image of the thing that stood there before me; and somewhere, like a far-off, dulled bell, i heard the words, "and god created man in his own image, in the image of god created he him." the sailor, no doubt with the kindly intention of relieving me from annoyance, and not averse to play with anything, made pretence of seizing the roses. then the drunkard, in an abandon of generosity, began tearing off the blossoms by the heads, scrutinizing, and casting each away as unfit for the exalted service of his "friend," till the latter reaching out managed to get hold of a white one with a stem. he trimmed its sheltering green carefully, brought out a long black pin, stuck it through the stalk, and fastened the pale shining head against his dark blue blouse. all hedgehoggery smiled. we had thrust the roses through with our forbidding quills,--what matter that a barbarian nail crucified this last one? the drunkard slept again, limply holding his scattering bunch of headless stems and torn foliage. pink and cream the petals strewed the floor. where was the loving hand that had nursed them to bloom in this hard, unwonted weather; loved and nursed and--_sold_ them? "ninth and race," sang out the conductor. the sailor sprang up with a merry grin, bowed gaily to everyone, twinkled his fingers in the air with a blithe "ta ta; i'm off for chinatown," as he slid through the door, and was away in a trice, tripping down to the pestiferous sink that was awaiting him somewhere. and on his breast he wore the pallid flower that had offered its stainless beauty to me, that i had loved,--and had not loved enough to save. the rest were dead; but that one--somewhere down there in a den where even the gas-choked lights were leering like prostitutes' eyes, down there in that trough of swill and swine, that pure, still thing had yet to die. _an important human document_ prison memoirs of an anarchist by alexander berkman an earnest portrayal of the revolutionary psychology of the author, as manifested by his _attentat_ during the great labor struggle of homestead, in . the whole truth about prisons has never before been told as this book tells it. the memoirs deal frankly and intimately with prison life in its various phases. $ . , by mail $ . mother earth publishing association west th street new york anarchism _=and other essays=_ by emma goldman including a biographic sketch of the author's interesting career, a splendid portrait, and twelve of her most important lectures, some of which have been suppressed by the police authorities of various cities. this book expresses the most advanced ideas on social questions--economics, politics, education and sex. _second revised edition_ emma goldman--the notorious, insistent, rebellious, enigmatical emma goldman--has published her first book, "anarchism and other essays." in it she records "the mental and soul struggles of twenty-one years," and recites all the articles of that strange and subversive creed in behalf of which she has suffered imprisonment, contumely and every kind of persecution. the book is a vivid revelation of a unique personality. it appears at a time when anarchistic ideas are 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thought in sociology, economics, education, and life. articles by leading anarchists and radical thinkers.--international notes giving a summary of the revolutionary activities in various countries.--reviews of modern books and the drama. ten cents a copy one dollar a year emma goldman _publisher_ alexander berkman _editor_ west th street new york bound volumes - , two dollars per volume david widger facts and fictions of life by helen hamilton gardener third edition "but something may be done, that we will not: and sometimes we are devils to ourselves, when we will tempt the frailty of our powers, presuming on their changeful potency." --shakespeare. boston arena publishing company copley square copyright preface there are at least two sides to every question. usually there are several times two sides; or at least there are several phases in which the question has a different aspect. i am led to state these seemingly unnecessary truisms because i have been confronted by hearers or readers who assumed, since i had presented a certain phase or manifestation of heredity in a given article or lecture, that i was intending to argue that a fixed rule of transmission would necessarily follow the line i had then and there drawn. nothing could be farther from my idea of the workings of the law of heredity. nothing could be more absurdly inadequate to the solution and comprehension of a great basic principle. again; an auditor or critic remarks that "we must not forget that we, also, get our heredity from god;" which is much as if one were to say, in teaching the multiplication table, "remember that three times three is nine except, only, the times when god makes it fifteen." so absolute a misconception of the very meaning of the word heredity could hardly be illustrated in any other way as in the idea of "getting it from god." scientific terms and facts of this nature cannot be confounded with metaphysical and religious speculation without hopeless confusion as to ideas, and absolute worthlessness as to the results of the investigation. the very foundation principle of evolution, itself, depends upon the persistence of the laws of hereditary traits, habits and conditions, modified and diversified by environment and by the introduction of other hereditary strains from other lines of ancestry. of course, there are people who do not believe that evolution evolves with any greater degree of regularity and persistence than is consistent with the idea of a deity who is liable to change his plans to meet the prayers or plaints of aspiration or repentance of those who chance to beg or demand of him certain immunities from the workings of the laws of nature. but with this type of mentality--with this grade of intellectual grasp--it were fruitless to pause to argue. they must be left to an education and an evolution of a less emotional and imaginative cast before they will be able to take part intelligently in a scientific discussion even where the merest alphabet of the science is touched, as is the case in these essays. they must learn a method of thought which keeps inside of what is, or can be, known and demonstrated, and cease to vitiate the very basic premises by injecting into them what is merely hoped or prayed for. the two phases of thought are quite distinct and totally dissimilar in method. the essays here collected, which do not deal directly with heredity and its possibilities, have been included in the book because of the repeated calls for them upon the different magazines in which they appeared and because they are rightly classed among the facts and fictions of life with which we wish here to deal. that most of them touch chiefly the dark side of the topics discussed is due to the fact that they were one and all written for a purpose in which that method of handling seemed most effective. that there is a brighter side goes without saying; but when a physician is writing a lecture upon cholera or consumption he does not devote his time and space to pointing out the indubitable fact that many of us have not, and are not likely to contract, either one. in pointing out and commenting upon certain social and hereditary conditions and evils, which it is desirable to correct or to guard against, and which it is all-important we shall first recognize as existing and as in need of improvement, i have, it is true, dwelt chiefly upon the evil possibilities contained in these conditions. i am not, therefore, a pessimist. i do not fail to recognize the fact that both men and conditions are undoubtedly evolving into better and higher states than of old. if one may so express it, these essays are the expressions of a pessimistic optimist,--one who is pessimistic upon certain phases of the present for the present, and optimistic as to and for the future. let me illustrate: the housewife who does not have the house cleaned because it stirs up a dust to do it, is in the position of those critics who insist that it is all wrong to call attention to abuses because abuses are not pleasant things to have held up to public gaze. or like a physician who would say: "for heaven's sake don't remove that bandage from the broken skull to dress the wound or you will see something even uglier than this soiled and ill-arranged cloth. trust to luck. some people have recovered from even worse conditions than this without intelligent care and treatment. let him do it." i have often been asked how and why i ever chanced to think or to write upon these topics. "how can a woman in your station and of your type know about them?" it is always difficult to say just how or why one mind _does_ and another does _not_ grasp any given thing. when i was a very young girl i heard a famous judge read and discuss a series of papers which were then appearing in the popular science monthly, and which were called "the relations of women to crime." i was the only person admitted to the club, where the consideration of the papers took place, who was not mature in years and connected with one of the learned professions. i was admitted because i begged the privilege as the guest of the family of the judge at whose house the club met. more than any other one thing, perhaps, the thoughts and suggestions that came to me--a silent and unnoticed child--while listening to the discussions of those papers which hinted at the various possibilities of inherited criminal tendencies--hearing the lawyers comment upon it from the point of view furnished by their court-room experiences, and the medical men from their side of the topic, as practitioners upon those who had inherited mental or physical diseases, and the educators from their outlook and experience with children and youths who had not yet begun an open criminal course but who showed in their tendencies the need of intelligent training to modify or correct their faulty inheritance,--more than any other one thing, perhaps, this experience of my childhood led me into the study of anthropology and heredity. that other people have been interested in what i have written from time to time upon this subject, and that i was, for this reason, asked to present certain phases of it at the recent world's congress of representative women, accounts for the publication of this book at this time. i presume it will be said that it is not "pleasant reading for the summer season." it is not intended for that purpose. it has been asked for by many teachers, college professors, students and medical practitioners, the latter of whom have shown extraordinary interest in its early issue and wide circulation, and for whose kind encouragement and aid i am glad to offer here renewed thanks. i had intended to elaborate and enlarge and republish in book form "sex in brain," but since there have been hundreds of calls made for it and since i have not yet found the time to combine, verify and arrange the large amount of additional material which i have been steadily collecting through correspondence with leading anthropologists and brain anatomists in england, scotland, germany, france and the united states and other countries, ever since they received, with such cordial and kindly recognition, the within printed essay, which they have had translated into several languages, i have concluded to include it with these, leaving it as it was abridged and delivered before the international council in washington in . later on i hope to find time to arrange and verify and issue the new material on the subject. it has grown in confirmatory evidence as it has grown in bulk, with steady and assuring regularity. helen hamilton gardener. the fictions of fiction i read--on a recent railway journey--a popular magazine. its leading story was labeled as a "story for girls." in it the traditional gentleman of reduced fortunes continued to still further deplete the family-resources by speculation, and the three daughters who figure in most such stories went through the regular paces, so to speak. one taught music; one painted well and sold her bits of canvas for ten dollars each; but the third girl had no talent except that of a cheerful temperament and the ability to drape curtains and arrange furniture attractively. these girls talked over the fact, that they were now reduced to their last ten dollars and the pantry was empty, father ill, and mother--not counted. they joked a little, wept a few tears, and prayed devoutly. then the talentless one received an invitation in the very nick of time to visit the richest lady in town (a cripple with a grand house). she went, she saw, and, of course, she conquered--earned money by giving artistic touches to the houses of all the rich people in town, and eight months later married the nephew of the opulent cripple. no more mention is made of the empty pantry, the sick father, and the two talented girls whose labor did not previously keep the wolf from the door. but it is only fair to suppose that the new husband was to be henceforth the head of the entire establishment--surely a warning to most young men contemplating matrimony under such trying circumstances. all is supposed to move on well, however, and every hapless girl who reads such a story, is led to believe that _she_ is the household fairy who will meet the prince and somehow (not stated) redeem her father's family from want and despair. for it is the object of such stories to convey the impression that everything is quite comfortable and settled after the wedding. the young girl who reads these stories looks out upon life through the absurd spectacle thus furnished her. she sees nothing as it is. such little plans as she can make, are based upon wholly incorrect data. her whole existence is unconsciously made to bend to the idea of matrimony as a means of salvation for herself and such persons as may be in any way objects of care to her. indeed, what are commonly known as "safe stories for girls," are made up of just such rubbish, which if it were only rubbish, might be tolerated; but the harm all this sort of thing does can hardly be estimated. i do not now refer to the harm of a more vicious sort that is sometimes spoken of as the result of story reading. i am not considering the deliberately scheming nor the consciously self-sacrificing girl who struts her day on the stage and in fiction marries to save the farm or her father or any one else. i am thinking of the every-day girl, who is simply led to see life exactly as it is likely _not_ to be, and is therefore disarmed at the outset. she is filled with all sorts of dreamy ideas of rescue by prayer or by means of some suddenly developed--previously undreamed-of--rich relation or lover or, i had almost said--fairy. and why not? literature used to bristle with these intangible aids to the helpless or stranded author. the name is changed now, it is true, but the fairy business goes bravely on at the old stand, and the young are fed with views of life, and of what they will be called upon to meet, which are none the less harmful and visionary because of the changed nomenclature. a gentleman of middle age said to me not long ago: "i grew up with the idea that people were like those i met in books. i went out into life with that belief. i measured myself by those standards, and i have spent much time in my later years re-adjusting myself to fit the facts. it placed me at a great disadvantage. i saw people and deeds as they were not--as they are never likely to be in this world--and i could not believe that my own case was not wholly exceptional. i began to look at myself as quite out of the ordinary. my experiences were such as belied my reading, and it was a very long time and after serious struggle, that i discovered that it was my false standards, derived from reading popular fiction, that had deceived me and that, after all, life had to be met upon very different lines from the ones laid down by the ordinary writers of fiction. i really believe i was unfitted for life as i found it, more by the fictions of fiction than by any other one influence." another gentleman--a writer of renown--said to me: "we may not 'hold the mirror up to nature' as nature is. the critics will not have it. we must hold it up to what we are led to think nature _ought_ to be." now that would be all very well, no doubt, if the picture were labeled to fit the facts. if it were distinctly understood by the reader that in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred the outcome of real life would be wholly different, that the right man would not turn up, in the nick of time, to point out to the defenseless widow that there was a flaw in the deed; if the reader was warned that honest effort often precedes failure; that virtue and vice not only may, but do, walk hand in hand down many a life-long path and sometimes get the boundary lines quite obliterated between them; if he understood that in life the biggest scoundrel often wears the most benign countenance and does not go about with a leer and a scowl that labels him, all might be well. a prominent woman, an authority on social topics, who is also a writer, a short time ago announced to her audience of ladies who gave the smiling response of a thoughtless yes, that "no one ever committed a despicable act with the head erect and the chest well out." "a dishonest man, a criminal, a mean woman," she said, always carry themselves so and so! if that were true--if it bore only the relationship of probability to truth--courts of law to determine upon questions of guilt or innocence, would be quite unnecessary. a photograph and an anatomical expert would do the business. the doing of a wrong act would become impossible to a gymnast, and the graceful "bareback lady" in the circus would be farther removed from all meanness of soul than any other woman living. yet some such idea--stated a little less absurdly--runs through fiction, the drama, and poetry. ferdinand ward or carlyle harris would figure in orthodox fiction with " furtive eyes," "a hunted look," and with very hard and repellant features, indeed; yet those who knew them well never discovered any such expressions. jesse james would look like a ruffian and treat his old mother like a brute. but in life he was a mild, quiet, fair-appearing man who adored his mother, and was shot in the back (while tenderly wiping the dust from her picture) by a despicable wretch who was living upon his bounty at the time and accepted a bribe to murder him. young girls do not need to be warned against "mother frouchards." no girl of fair sense would require such warning; but the plausible, good-looking, and often nobly-acting man or woman who lapses from rectitude in one path while carefully treading the straight and narrow way in all earnestness and with honest intent in others are the ones for whom the fictions of fiction leave us unprepared. in short the people who do not exist--the villain who is consistently and invariably villainous, the woman who is an angel, the people who never make mistakes, or who are able and wise enough to rectify them nobly, and all the endless brood are familiar enough. we know all of them, and are prepared for them when we meet them--which we never do. but for the real people we are not prepared. for the exigencies of life that come; for the decisions and judgments we are called upon to make, the fictions of fiction have contributed to disarm us. we are hampered. there is no precedent. we feel ourselves imposed upon; we are face to face, so we believe--with a condition that no one ever met before. we are dazed; we wait for the orthodox denouement. it does not come. we pray. there is no angel visitant who cools our fevered brow with gentle wings and lulls our fears with promise of help from other than human agencies--which promises are straightway fulfilled, of course, in fiction. we sit down and wait but no rich relation dies and leaves us a legacy, nor does the prince appear and wed us. nothing is orthodox, but we have lost much valuable time, and strength, and hope in waiting for it to be so. we have failed to adjust ourselves to life as it is. we do not measure ourselves nor others by standards that have a par value. we are discouraged and we are at sea. a short time ago i read a story of the late war. the burden of it was that, if a soldier had been brave and loyal, he could also be depended upon to be honest. i happened to read the story while under the same roof with an old soldier who was at that time a judge on the bench. he had served faithfully while in the army; he was brave and he, no doubt, deserved the honorable discharge he received, and yet while he sat on the bench, he applied for a pension on the ground of incurable disease "contracted in active service." while those papers were being investigated and one doctor was examining him for his pension, he also applied and was examined for life insurance as a perfectly sound man and healthy risk, _and he got both_. the fact is, human nature is very much mixed. good and bad is not divided by classes but is pretty well distributed in the same individual. weakness and strength, wisdom and ignorance, impulse and reason, play their part in the same life with all the other attributes, passions, and conditions, and the literature which makes any individual the personification of good or of evil leads astray its confiding readers. woman has been represented in literature as emotion culminating in self-sacrifice and matrimony. that was all. and even unto this day many persons can conceive of her in no other light. the idea has always been productive of infinite misery to woman whose whole book of life was read by these pages only, as well as to man who had carefully to spell out the other pages in the characters of wife or daughter when it was too late for him to learn new lessons, or to develop a taste for an unknown language. man has been known as pure reason touched with chivalry and devotion, or else as a dangerous animal who preys upon his kind. there may be--in some other life or world--representatives of both of these classes, but they are not the men with whom we live, and, therefore, whose acquaintance it is desirable we should make as early as possible. that a large family is a crown of glory to the parents and an inestimable boon to the state, is an idea running through literature. is it a fact or is it one of the fictions of fiction which it were well to stimulate and galvanize into life less persistently? what is the answer from reform schools and penal institutions, filled by ignorance and passion held in bondage by poverty; from cemeteries where mothers and babies of the poor and ill-nurtured are strewn like leaves; from, the homes of the educated and well to do where small families are the rule--large ones the deplored exception? what is the logical reply in countries whose sociological students sigh over the struggle for existence and a scarcity of supplies; "over population" and desperate emigration? misery and vice bearing strict proportion to density of population and poverty, surely offer a hint that at least one of the fictions of fiction has gone far to do a serious injury to man. but the fiction of fictions which has done more real harm to the human race than any other, perhaps, is the one which dominates it--the idea that woman was created for the benefit and pleasure of man, while man exists for and because of himself. fiction has utilized even her hours of leisure and amusement to sap the self-respect of womanhood while it helped very greatly to brutalize and lower man by keeping--in this insidious form--the thought ever before him that woman is a function only and not a person, and that even in this limited sphere she is and should be proud to be man's subject. "he for god only, she for god in him." it is true that since the advent of women writers fiction has shown a tendency to modify, to a limited extent, this previously universal dictum, but the thought still dominates literature greatly to the detriment of morals and of the dignity of both men and women. "the woman who has no history is the woman to be envied," says literature--and yet people do not envy her any more than they do the man of like inconspicuous position. no one wishes that she might go down to history, if one may so express it, as history less. no one points with pride to jane smith as his illustrious ancestor any more than if jane had chanced to be john. to have been a mary somerville, or an elizabeth barrett browning, or a george eliot, most historyless women would be willing to change places even now, and as for "those who come after," can there be a question as to which would give more pride or pleasure to man or woman, to say--"i am the son, or the brother, or the niece of mrs. browning," or to say, "jane smith, of amityville, is my most famous relative?" i have my suspicions that even * mr. fitzgerald would waver in favor of elizabeth in case both women were his cousins. in public, at least, he would mention jane less frequently and with less of a touch of pride. personally he might like her quite as well. that is aside from the question. i have no doubt that he might like john smith as well as shakespeare, personally, too, and john may have led a happier life than william, but is a man with no history to be envied for that reason? the application is obvious. one of the most insidious fictions of fiction, which it seems to me is harmful, is the theory that the good are so because they resist temptation, while the bad are vicious because they yield easily--make a poor fight. leaving out heredity and its tremendous power, it is likely that you would have yielded under as strong pressure as it took to carry your neighbor down. i say as strong pressure--not the _same_ pressure--for your tastes not being the same, your temptations will take different forms. ** * fitzgerald "thanked god" when mrs. browning died. see reply by robert browning in athenaeum. ** "our lives progress on the lines of least resistance." --van dbr waukr, m. d. if you had been born of similar parents and on cherry hill; if you had been one of a family of ten; if you had been stunted in mind and in body by want of nourishment; if you had been given little or no education; if you had helped to get bread for the family almost from the time you could remember; your record in the police court would not differ very greatly from that of those about you. in nine cases out of ten you would be where you sent that convict last year. your pretty daughter would be the associate of toughs. she might be pure--in the sense in which the word is applied to women--but she would have a mind muddy and foul with the murk and odors of a life fit only for swine. she would marry a brute who honestly believes that so soon as the words of a priest or a magistrate are said over them, she belongs to him to abuse if he sees fit, to impose upon, lie to, or to let down into the valley of death for his pleasure whenever he sees fit, and quite without regard to her opinions or desires in the matter. she would be an old and broken woman at thirty, ugly, misshapen, and hopeless, with hungry-faced children about her, whose next meal would be a piece of bread, whose next word would be too foul to repeat, whose next act would disgrace a wolf. in turn they would perpetuate their kind in much the same fashion, and some of your grandchildren would be in the poor-house, some in prison, some in houses of ill-repute, and perchance some doing honest work--sweeping the streets or making shirts for forty cents a dozen for the patrons of a literature that goes on promoting the theory that the chief duty of the poor is to irresponsibly bring more children into the world--to work for them as cheaply as possible. to the end that they may restrict their own families to smaller limits and--by means of cheaper labor caused largely by over population from below--clothe their loved ones in purple and build untaxed temples of worship, where poverty and crime is taught to believe in that other fiction of fictions--the "providence" that places us where we deserve to be and where a loving god wishes us to be content. indeed, this supernatural finger in literature has gone farther, perhaps, to place and keep fiction where it is, as a misleading picture of life and reality, than has any other influence. it has dominated talent and either starved or broken the pen of genius. "oh, if i might be allowed to draw a man as he is!" exclaims thackeray, as he leaves the office of his publisher, with downcast eyes and bowed head. he goes home and "cuts out most of his facts," and returns the manuscript which is acceptable now, because it is _not_ true to life! because it is now fiction based upon other fiction and has eliminated from it the elements of probability which might have been educative or stimulating or prophetic. now, thackeray was not a man who would have mistaken preachments for novels if he had been left to his own judgment; neither would he have painted vice with a hand that made it attractive, but he chafed under the dictum that he must not hold the mirror up to the face of nature, but must adjust it carefully so as to reflect a steel engraving of a water color from a copy of the "old masters." it might be well if silver dollars grew on trees and if each person could step out and gather them at his pleasure; but since they do not, what good purpose could it serve if fiction were to iterate and reiterate that such is the case, until people believed that it was their trees which were at fault and not their fiction? it might be a good idea, too, if babies were born with a knowledge of latin and mathematics, but to convince young people that such is the case and that they are pitiful exceptions to a general rule, is to place them at a humiliating disadvantage from the outset. it is one of the most firmly rooted of these fictions of fiction, that such tales as i have mentioned above are "good reading--safe, clean literature" for girls. nothing could be farther from the facts. indeed, the outcry about girls not being allowed to read this or that, because it deals with some topic "unfit" for the girls' ears, is another fiction of fiction which robs the girl of her most important armor--the armor of truth and the ability to adjust it to life. a famous man once said in my presence--"the theory that to keep a girl pure you must keep her ignorant of life--of real life--is based upon a belief degrading to her and false as to facts. some people appear to believe that if they keep girls entirely ignorant of all truth, they will necessarily become devotees of truth, and if you could succeed in finding a girl who is a perfect idiot, you would find one who is also a perfect angel." "we are a variegated lot at best and worst," said a lady to me the other day, when discussing the character of a man who is in the public eye, "i know a different side of his character. the side i know i like. the side the public knows is so different." but in fiction he would be all one way. he would be a scamp and know it, or he would be a saint--and know that too. the fact is he is neither; and we _are_ a variegated set at best and worst. why not out with it in fiction and be armed and equipped for character and life as it is? there is a school of critics who will say this is not the province of fiction. fiction is to entertain, not to instruct. with this i do not agree--only in part. but accepting the standard for the moment, i am sure that a picture of life as it is, is far more entertaining than is that shadowy and vague photograph of ghosts taken by moonlight, which "safe stories for the young" generally present. but to enumerate the fictions of fiction would be to undertake an arduous task--to comment upon them all would be impossible. how much remorse--how many heartbreaks--have been caused by the one of these which may be indicated briefly in a sentence thus--"stolen pleasures are always the sweetest." "she sullied _his_ honor," "he avenged his sullied honor," and all the brood of ideas that follows in this line have built up theories and caused more useless bloodshed and sorrow than most others. no wife can stain the honor of her husband. he, only, can do that, and it is interesting to note the fact that he who struts through fiction with a broken heart and a drawn sword "avenging" said honor (in the sense in which the word is used), seldom had any to avenge, having quite effectively divested himself of it before his wife had the chance. "she begged him to make an honest woman of her." what fiction of fiction (and, alas, of law) could be more degrading to womanhood--and hence to humanity--than the thought here presented? the whole chain of ideas linked here is vicious and vicious only. why sustain the fiction that a woman can be elevated by making her the permanent victim of one who has already abused her confidence, and now holds himself--because of his own perfidy--as in a position to confer honor upon his victim? he who is not possessed of honor cannot confer it upon another. "the purity of family life" is another fiction of fiction which never did and never can exist, while based upon a double standard of morals. that there ever was or ever will be a "union of souls" in a family where a double standard holds sway, or that women are truthful or frank with men upon whom they are dependent, are fictions which it were time to face and controvert with facts. dependence and frankness never co-existed in this world in an adult brain--whether it were the dependence of the serf or of the wife or daughter, the result is ever the same. the elements of character which tend to self-respect and hence to open and truthful natures, are not possible in a dependent--or in a social or political inferior. do the peasants tell the lord exactly what they think of him, or do they tell him what they know he wishes them to think? did the black men, while yet slaves, give to the master their own unbiased opinion of the institution of slavery? not with any degree of frequency. the application is obvious. another of the fictions of fiction upon which the vicious build, and which has disarmed thousands before the battle, is the insistency with which the idea is presented that a man (or woman) who is honestly and truly and conscientiously religious, is therefore necessarily moral or honorable; that he is a hypocrite in his religion if he is a knave in his life. observation and history and logic are all against the theory. some of the most exaltedly religious men have been the most wholly immoral. it was honest religion that burned servetus and bruno. they were not hypocrites who hunted witches. it is not hypocrisy that draws its skirts aside from a "fallen" sister, and immorally marries her companion in illicit love to purity and innocence. do you know any religious father (or many mothers) in this world who would refuse to allow their son, whom they know to be of bad character, to marry a girl who is as pure and spotless and suspicion-less as a flower? "she will reform him," they say. "it will be good for him to marry such a girl." and how will it be for her? does the religious man or woman not take this view of morals? has right and wrong, sex? is honor and truthfulness toward others limited in application? have you a right to deceive certain people for the pleasure or benefit of other people? if so where is the boundary line? would the girl marry you or your son if she knew the exact truth--if she were to see with her own and not with your eyes--_all_ of your life? would you be willing to take her with you, or for her to go unknown to you, through all the experiences of your past and present? no? would you be willing to marry her if she had exactly your record? no? you truly believe then that she is worthy of less than you are? honor does not demand as much of you for her as it does of her for you? you would think she had a right--you would not resent it if her life had been exactly what yours was and is, and if she had deceived you? is that which is coarse or low for women not so for men? why is it that men will not submit to, if it comes from women, that which they impose upon women whom they "adore" and "truly respect?" would women accept this sort of respect and adoration if they were not dependents? does literature throw a true or a fictitious light on such questions as these? to whose advantage is it to sustain such fictitious standard of morals, of justice, of love, of right, of manliness, of honor, of womanly dignity and worth? to whose advantage is it to teach by all the arts of fiction that contentment with one's lot--whatever the lot may be--is a virtue? yet it is one of the fictions of fiction that the contented man or woman is the admirable person. all progress proves the contrary. to whose advantage is it to insist that virtue is always rewarded--vice punished? we know it is not true. is it not bad enough to have been virtuous and still have failed, without having also the stigma which this failure implies under such a code? we all know that vicious success is common--that often vice and success are partners for life and that in death they are not divided; that the wicked flourish like a green bay-tree--why blink it in fiction? why add suspicion to failure and misfortune, and gloss success with the added glory that it is necessarily the result of virtue? to those who know how false the theory is, it is a bad lesson--to those who do not know it, it is a disarmament against imposition. some of the fictions of fiction have their droll side in their nâive contradictions of each other. these examples occur to me: "women are timid and secretive." "they can't keep a secret." "they are the custodians of virtue." "they are the 'frailer' sex." "frailty, thy name is woman." "with the passionate purity of woman." "abstract justice is an attribute of the masculine mind." "man's inhumanity to man makes countless thousands mourn." "no class was ever able to be just to--to do justly by another class--hence the need of popular representation." "women should take no part in politics." "women are harder upon women than men are." "he disgraced his honored name by actually marrying his paramour." "we are happy if we are good." "he was one of the best and therefore one of the saddest of men." but why multiply examples. many--and different ones--will occur to every thinking mind, while illustrations of the particular fictions of fiction, which have gone farthest to cripple you or your neighbor, will present themselves without more suggestions. a day in court i. criminal court. to those accustomed to the atmosphere and tone of a court room, it is doubtful if its message is impressive. to one who spends a day in a criminal court for the first time after reaching an age of thoughtfulness, it is more than impressive; it is a revelation not easily forgotten. the message conveyed to such an observer arouses questions, and suggests thoughts which may be of interest to thousands to whom a criminal court room is merely a name. i went early. i was told by the officer at the door that it was the summing up of a homicide case. "are you a witness?" he asked when i inquired if i was at liberty to enter. "were you subpoenaed?" "no," i replied, "i simply wish to listen, if i may, to the court proceedings. i am told that i am at liberty to do so." he eyed me closely, but opened the door. just as i was about to pass in he bent forward and asked quickly: "friend of the prisoner?" "no." he said something to another officer and i was taken to an enclosed space (around which was a low railing) and given a chair. i afterward learned that it was in this place the witnesses were seated. he had evidently not believed what i said. there was a hum of quiet talk in the room, which was ill-ventilated and filled with men and boys and a few women. of the latter there were but two who were not of the lower grades of life. but there were all grades of men and boys. the boys appeared to look upon it as a sort of matinee to which they had gained free admission. the trial was one of unusual interest. it had been going on for several days. the man on trial (who was twenty-four years of age and of a well-to-do laboring class,) had shot and killed his rival in the affections of a girl of fourteen. some months previous, he had been cut in the face, and one eye destroyed, by the man he afterward killed, who was at the time of the killing out on bail for this offense. i had learned these points from the scraps of conversation outside the court room, and from the court officer. this was the last day of the trial. there was to be the summing up of the defense, the speech of the prosecutor, the charge of the judge, and the verdict of the jury. the prisoner sat near the jury box, pale and stolid looking. the spectators laughed and joked. court officers and lawyers moved about and chaffed one another. there was nothing solemn, nothing dignified, nothing to suggest the awful fact that here was a man on trial for his life, who, if found guilty, was to be deliberately killed by the state after days of inquiry, even as his victim had been killed, in the heat of passion and jealousy, by him. the state was proposing to take this man's life to teach other men _not_ to commit murder. "hats off!" the door near the judge's dais had been opened by an officer, who had shouted the command as a rotund and pleasant-faced gentleman, with decidedly hibernian features, entered. he took his seat on the raised platform beneath a red canopy. the buzz of voices had ceased when the order to remove hats was given. it now began again in more subdued tones. in a few moments the prisoner's lawyer--one of the prominent men of the bar--began his review of the case. he pointed out the provocation, the jealousy, the previous assault--the results of which were the ghastly marks and the sightless eye of the face before them. he plead self defense and said over and over again, "if i had been tried as he was, if i had been disfigured for life, if i had had the girl i loved taken from me, i'd have killed the man who did it, _long_ ago! we can only wonder at this man's forbearance!" i think from a study of the faces that there was not a boy in the room who did not agree with that sentiment--and there were boys present who were not over thirteen years of age. the lawyer dwelt, too, upon the fact that the prosecutor would say this or that against his client. "he will try to befog this case. he will tell you this and he will try to make you think that; but every man on this jury knows full well that _he_ would have done what my client did under the same conditions." "the prosecutor told you the other day so and so. he lied and he knew it." the defender warmed to his work and shook his finger threateningly at the prosecutor. every one in the room appeared to think it an excellent bit of acting and a thoroughly good joke. no one seemed to think it at all serious, and when he closed and the state's attorney arose to reply there was a smile and rustle of quiet satisfaction as if the audience had said: "now the fur will fly. look out! it is going to be pretty lively for he has to pay off several hard thrusts." there was a life at stake; but to all appearances no one was controlled by a trifle like that when so much more important a thing was risked also--the professional pride of two gentlemen of the bar. in the speech which followed, it did not dawn upon the state's attorney--if one may judge from his words--that he was "attorney for the people," and that the prisoner was one of "the people." it did not appear in his attitude if he realized that the state does not elect him to convict its citizens, but to see that they are properly protected and represented. surely the state is not desirous of convicting its citizens of crime. it does not employ an attorney upon that theory; but is this not the theory upon which the prosecutor invariably conducts his cases? does he not labor first of all to secure every scrap of evidence against the accused and to make light of or cover up anything in his favor? is not the state quite as anxious that he--its representative--find citizens guiltless, if they are so, as that he convict them if they are offenders against the law? is not the prosecutor offending against the law of the land as well as against that of ordinary humanity when he bends all the vast machinery of his office to collect evidence against and refuses to admit--tries to rule out--evidence in favor of one of "the people" whose employee he is? these questions came forcibly to my mind as i listened to the prosecutor in the trial for homicide. he not only presented the facts as they were, but he drew inferences, twisted meanings, asserted that the case had but one side; that the defendant was a dangerous animal to be at large; that his witnesses had all lied; that his lawyer was a notorious special pleader and had wilfully distorted every fact in the case. he waxed wroth and shook his fist in the face of his antagonist and appealed to every prejudice and sentiment of the jury which might be played upon to the disadvantage of the accused. he sat down mopping his face and flashing his eyes. the judge gave his charge, which, to my mind, was clearly indicative of the fact that he, at least, felt that there were two very serious sides to the case. the audience which had so relished the two preceding speeches, found the judge tame, and when the jury filed out, half of the audience went also. most of them were laughing, highly amused by "the way the prosecutor gave it to him" as i heard one lad of seventeen say. the moment the judge left the stand there was great chaffing amongst the lawyers, and much merry-making. the prisoner and his friends sat still. the prosecutor smilingly poked his late legal adversary under the ribs and asked in a tone perfectly audible to the prisoner, "lied, did i? well, i rather think i singed your bird a little, didn't i?" when he reached the door, he called back over his shoulder--making a motion of a pendant body--"down goes mcginty!" everyone laughed. that is to say, everyone except the white-faced prisoner and his mother. he turned a shade paler and she raised a handkerchief to her eyes. several boys walked past him and stopped to examine him closely. one of them said, so that the prisoner could not fail to hear, "he done just right. i'd 'adone it long before, just like his lawyer said." "me too. you bet," came from several other lads--all under twenty years of age. and still we waited for the jury to return. the prisoner grew restless and was taken away by an officer to the pen. there was great laughter and joking going on in the room. several were eating luncheons abstracted from convenient pockets. i turned to an officer, and asked: "do you not think all this is bad training for boys? it must show them very clearly that it is a mere game of chance between the lawyers with a life for stakes. the best player wins. they must lose all sense of the seriousness of crime to see it treated in this way." "upon the other hand," said he, "they learn, if they stay about criminal courts much, that not one in ten who is brought here escapes conviction, and not one in ten who is once convicted, fails to be convicted and sent up over and over again. once a criminal, always a criminal. if they get fetched here once they might as well throw up the sponge." "is it so bad as that?" i asked. he nodded. "is there not something wrong with the penal institutions then?" i queried. "how?" "you told me a while ago," i explained, "that almost all first crimes or convictions were of boys under seventeen years of age. now you say that not one in ten brought here, accused, escapes conviction, and not one in ten of these fails to be convicted over and over again. now it seems to me that a boy of that age ought not to be a hopeless case even if he has been guilty of one crime; yet practically he is convicted for life if found guilty of larceny, we will say. is there not food for reflection in that?" "i do' know," he responded, "mebby. if anybody wanted to reflect. i guess most boys that hang around here don't spend none too much time reflectin' though--till _after_ they get sent up. they get more time for it then," he added, dryly. "another thing that impresses me as strange," i went on, "is the apparent determination of the prosecutor to convict even where there is a very wide question as to the degree of guilt." "i don't see anything queer in that. he's human. he likes to beat the other lawyer. why, did you know that the prosecutor you heard just now is cousin to a lord? his first cousin married lord--------." this was said with a good deal of pride and a sort of proprietary interest in both the lord and the fortunate prosecutor. i failed to grasp just its connection with the question in point to which i returned. "but the public prosecutor is not, as i understand it, hired to convict but to represent the 'people,' one of whom is the accused. now, is the state interested in convictions only--does it employ a man to see that its citizens are found guilty of crime, or is it to see that justice is done and the facts arrived at in the interest of _all_ the people, including the accused?" "i guess that is about the theory of the state," he replied, laughing as he started for the door, "but the practice of the prosecuting attorney is to convict every time if he can, and don't you forget it." i have not forgotten that nor several other things, more or less important to the public, since my day in a criminal court. it may be interesting to the reader to know that the jury in the case cited, disagreed. at a new trial the accused was acquitted on the grounds of self defense and the prosecutor no doubt felt that he was in very poor luck, indeed: "for," as i was told by a court officer, "he has lost his three last homicide cases and he's bound to convict the next time in spite of everything, or he won't be elected again. i wouldn't like to be the next fellow indicted for murder if he prosecutes the case, even if i was as innocent as a spring lamb," said he succinctly. nor should i. but aside from this thought of the strangely anomalous attitude of the state's attorney; aside from the thought of the possible influence of such court room scenes upon the boys who flock there--who are largely of the class easily led into, and surrounded by, temptation; aside from the suggestions contained in the officer's statement--which i cannot but feel to be somewhat too sweeping, but none the less illustrative, that only one in ten brought before the criminal court escapes conviction, and only one in that ten fails to be reconvicted until it becomes practically a conviction for life to be once sent to a penal institution; aside from all this, there is much food for thought furnished by a day in a criminal court room. a study of the jury, and of the judge, is perhaps as productive of mental questions that reach far and mean much, as are those which i have briefly mentioned; for i am assured by those who are old in criminal court practice, that my day in court might be duplicated by a thousand days in a thousand courts and that in this day there were, alas, no unusual features. one suggestive feature was this. when the jury--an unusually intelligent looking body of men--was sworn for the next case, seven took the oath on the bible and five refused to do so, simply affirming. this impressed me as a large proportion who declined to go through the ordinary form; but since it created no comment in the court room, i inferred that it was not sufficiently rare to attract attention, while only a few years ago, so i was told, it would have created a sensation. there appeared to be a growing feeling, too, against capital punishment. quite a number of the talesmen were excused from serving on the jury on the ground of unalterable objection to this method of dealing with murderers. they would not hang a man, they said, no matter what his crime. "do you see any relation between the refusal to take the old form of oath, and the growth of a sentiment or conscientious scruple against hanging as a method of punishment"? i inquired of the officer. "i do' know. never thought of that. they're both a growin'; but i don't see as they've got anything to do with each other." but i thought possibly they had. ii. in the police court. the next week i concluded to visit two of the police courts. i reached court at nine o'clock, but it had been in session for half an hour or more then, and i was informed that "the best of it was over." i asked at what time it opened. the replies varied "usually about this time." "some where around nine o'clock as a rule." "any time after seven," etc. i got no more definite replies than these, although i asked policemen, doorkeeper, court officer, and justice. of one justice i asked, "what time do you close?" "any time when the cases for the day are run through," he replied. "to-day i want to get off early and i think we can clear the calendar by : this morning. there is very little beside excise cases to-day and they are simply held over with $ bail to answer to a higher court for keeping their public houses open on sunday. monday morning hardly ever has much else in this court." i was seated on the "bench" beside the judge. at this juncture a police officer stepped in front of the desk with his prisoner, and the justice turned to him. "do you swear to tell the truth, the whole tr--'n--g b tr'th--selp y' god. kissthebook." the policeman had lifted the greasy volume, and with more regard for his health than for the form of oath, had carried it in the neighborhood of his left cheek and as quickly replaced it on the desk. "what is the charge?" inquired the justice. "open on sunday," replied the officer succinctly. "see him selling anything?" "no. i asked for a drink an' he told me he was only lighting up for the night and wasn't sellin' nothing." "anybody inside?" "only him an' me." "you understand that you are entitled to counsel at every stage of this proceeding," said the justice to the accused man. "what have you to say for yourself?" "your honor, i have a dye house, and a small saloon in the corner. i always light the gas at night in both and have it turned low. i had on these clothes. i was not dressed for work. i went in to light up and he followed me in, and arrested me and i have been in jail all night. i sold nothing." "is that so, officer?" asked the justice. "yes, your honor, it is so far as i know. i seen him in there lighting the gas, an' i went in an' asked for a drink, an' he said he wasn't selling an' i arrested him." "give the record to the clerk. discharged," said the justice, and then turning to me he explained: "you see he had to arrest the man for his own protection. if a police officer goes into a saloon and is seen coming out, and doesn't make some sort of an arrest, he'll get into trouble; so, for his protection he had to arrest the man after he once went in, and i have to require that record, by the clerk, to show why, after he was brought before me, i discharged him. that is for my protection." "what is for the man's protection?" i asked. "he has been in jail all night. he has been dragged here as a criminal to-day, and he has a court record of arrest against him all because he lighted his own gas in his own house that seems a little hard, don't you think so?" the judge smiled. "so it does, but he ought to have locked the door when he went in to light up. perhaps he was afraid to go in a dark room and lock his door behind him before he struck a light, but that was his mistake and this is his punishment. next!" most of the cases were like this or not so favorable for the accused. in the latter instance they were held in bail to answer to a higher court. two or three were accused of being what the officer called "plain drunks" and as many more of being "fighting drunks" or "concealed weapon drunks." in these cases the charge was made by the officer who had arrested them. there was no suggestion that "you are entitled to counsel," etc., and a fine of from "$ or ten days" to "$ or three months" or both was usually imposed. a pitiful sight was a woman, sick, and old, and hungry. "what is the charge against her, officer?" inquired the justice. "nothing, your honor. she wants to be sent to the workhouse. she has no home, her feet are so swollen she can't work, and--" "six months," said the justice, and turned to me. "now she will go to the workhouse, from there to the hospital, and from there to the dissecting table. next." i shuddered, and the door closed on the poor wretch who, asking the city for a home, only, even if that home were among criminals, received a free pass to three of the public institutions sustained to receive such as she--at least so said the justice to whom such cases were not rare enough to arouse the train of suggestions that came unbidden to me. he impressed me as a kind-hearted man, and one who tried to be a justice in fact as well as in name. he told me that it was not particularly unusual for him to be called from his bed at midnight, go to court, light up, send for his clerk and hold a short session on one case of immediate importance--such as the commitment of a lunatic or the bailing of some important prisoner who declined to spend a night in jail while only a charge and not a conviction hung over him. "i have never committed anyone without seeing him personally," he explained. "some judges do; but i never have. only last night a man's brother and sister and two doctors tried to have me commit him as a lunatic, but i insisted on being taken to where he was. they begged me not to go in as he was dangerous; but i did, and one glance was all i needed. he was a maniac, but i would not take even such strong evidence as his relations and two doctors afforded without seeing him personally." "and some judges do, you say?" i inquired. "oh yes. next." "next" had been waiting before the desk for some time. the officer went through the same form of oath. i did not see a policeman or court officer actually "kiss the book" during the two days which i spent in the police courts. some witnesses did kiss it in fact and not only in theory. a loud resounding smack frequently prefaced the most patent perjury. indeed in two cases after swearing to one set of lies and kissing the bible in token of good faith, the accused changed their pleas from not guilty to guilty and accepted a sentence without trial. these facts did not appear to shake the confidence in the efficacy of such oaths and the onlookers in the court did not seem either surprised or shocked. certainly the court officials were not, and yet the swearing went on. that it was a farce to the swearers who were quite willing to say they believed they would "go to hell" if they did not tell the truth and were equally willing to run the risk, looked to me like a very strong argument for a form of oath which should carry its punishment for perjury with it to be applied in a world more immediate and tangible. the afternoon found me in a more crowded police court. the justice was rushing business. i stood outside the railing in front of which the accused were ranged. the charges were made by the police officer who faced the judge. the accused stood almost directly behind the policemen something like four feet away. i was by the officer's side and so near as to touch his sleeve, and yet i can truly say that i was wholly unable to hear one-half of the charges made; most of them appeared to relate to intoxication, fighting, quarreling in the street, breaking windows and similar misdeeds. some of the "cases" took less than a minute and the accused did not hear one word of the charge made. what he did hear in most cases and _all_ he could possibly hear was something like one of these: "ten dollars or ten days." "three months." "ever been here before?" "no, your honor." "ten days." "officer says you were quarreling in a hallway with this woman. say for yourself?" "well, your honor, i was a little full and i got in the wrong hall and she tried to put me out and--" "ten dollars." "your honor, i'll lose my place and i've got a wife and--" the officer led him away. ten dollars meant ten days in prison to him and the loss of his situation. what it may have meant to his family did not transpire. to the next "case" which was of a similar nature, the fine meant the going down into a well-filled pocket, a laugh with the clerk and the police officer who took the proffered cigar and touched his hat to the object of his arrest, who, having slept off his "plain drunk," was in a rather merry mood. many of the accused did not hear the charges made against them by the officer; in but few cases were they told that they had a right to counsel; almost all were fined and at least two-thirds of the fines meant imprisonment. a little more care was taken, a little more time spent if the face or clothing of the accused indicated that he was of the well-to-do or educated class. indeed i left this court feeling that the inequality of the administration of justice as applied by the system of fines was carried to its farthest limit, and that it would be perfectly possible--easy indeed--to find a man (if he chanced to be poor and somewhat common looking) behind prison walls without his knowing even upon what charge he had been put there and without having made the slightest defense. if he were frightened, or ill, or unused to courts, and through uncertainty or slowness of speech, or not knowing what the various steps meant, had suddenly heard the judge say "ten dollars," and had realized that so far as he was concerned it might as well have been ten thousand; it was quite possible, i say, for such a man to find himself a convict before he knew or realized what it meant or with what he was charged. i wondered if all this was necessary, or if attention were called to it from the outside if it might not set people to thinking and if the thought might not result in action that would lead to better things. i wondered if a rapid picture of a boy of sixteen arrested for fighting, shot through this court into association with criminals for ten days, being found in their company afterward and sent by the criminal court to prison for three months for larceny, and afterward appearing and re-appearing as a long or short term criminal, would suggest to others what the idea suggested to me? i wondered, in short, if there were less machinery for the production and punishment of crime and more for its prevention, if life might not be made less of a battlefield and hospital for the poor or unfortunate. i wondered if the farce of oaths, the flippancy of trials, the passion of the prosecutor for conviction and all the train of evils growing out of these were necessary; and if they were not, i wondered if the vast non-court-attending public might not suggest a remedy if its attention were called to certain of the many suggestive features of our courts that presented themselves to me during my first two days as an observer of the legal machinery that grinds out our criminal population. thrown in with the city's dead i read that headline in a newspaper one morning. then i asked myself: why should the city's dead be "thrown in?" where and how are they "thrown in?" why are they _thrown_ in? why, in a civilized land, should such an expression as that arouse no surprise--be taken as a matter of course? what is its full meaning? are others as little informed upon the subject as i? would the city's dead continue to be "thrown in" if the public stopped to think; if it understood the meaning of that single, obscure headline? believing that the power of a free and fearless press is the greatest power for good that has yet been devised; and believing most sincerely, that wrongs grow greatest where silence is imposed or ignorance of the facts stands between the wrong doer, or the wrong deed, and enlightened public opinion, i decided to learn and to tell just the meaning--_all_ of the meaning--of those six sadly and shockingly suggestive words. suppose you chanced to be very poor and to die in new york; or suppose, unknown to you, your mother, a stranger passing through the city, were to die suddenly. suppose, in either case, no money were forthcoming to bury the body, would it be treated as well, with as humane and civilized consideration as if the question of money were not in the case? we are fond of talking about giving "tender christian burial," and of showing horror and disgust for those who may wilfully observe other methods. we are fond of saying that death levels all distinctions. let us see whether these are facts or fictions of life. the island where the "city's dead" are buried--that is, all the friendless and poor or unidentified, who are not cared for by some church or society--is a mere scrap of land, from almost any point of which you easily overlook it all, with its marshy border and desolate, unkempt surface. it contains, as the officer in charge told me, about seventy-nine acres at low tide. at high tide much of the border is submerged. upon this scrap of land--about one mile long and less than half a mile wide at its _widest_ point--is concentrated so much of misery and human sorrow and anguish, that it is difficult to either grasp the idea one's self or convey it to others. there are three classes of dead sent here by the city. those who are imbecile or insane--dead to thought or reason; those who are dead to society and hope--medium term criminals; and those whom want, and sorrow, and pain, and wrong can touch no more after the last indignity is stamped upon their dishonored clay. i will deal first with these happier ones who have reached the end of the journey which the other two classes sit waiting for. or, perhaps some of them stand somewhat defiantly as they look on what they know is to be their own last home, and recognize the estimate placed upon them by civilized, christian society. upon this scrap of land there are already buried--or "thrown in"--over seventy thousand bodies. stop and think what that means. it is a large city. we have but few larger in this country. remember that this island is about one mile long and less than a half mile wide at the widest point. in places it is not much wider than broadway. the spot on which those seventy thousand are "thrown in" is but a small part of this miniature island. this is laid off in plots with paths between. these sections are forty-five feet by fifteen, and are dug out seven feet deep. again, stop and picture that. it looks like the beginning of a cellar for a small city house. but in that little cellar are buried one hundred and fifty bodies, packed three deep. remembering the depth of a coffin, and remembering that a layer of earth is put on each, it is easy to estimate about how near the surface of the earth lie festering seventy thousand bodies. they are not in metallic cases, as may well be imagined; but i need only add that i could distinctly see the corpse through wide cracks in almost every rough board box, for you to understand that sickening odors and deadly gases are nowhere absent. but there is one thing more to add before this picture can be grasped. three of these trenches are kept constantly open. this means that something like four hundred bodies, dead from three days to two weeks, lie in open pine boxes almost on the surface of the earth. you will say, "that is bad, but the island is far away and is for the dead only. they cannot injure each other." if that were true, a part of the ghastly horror would be removed, but, as i have said, the city sends two other classes of dead here. two classes who are beyond hope, perhaps, but surely not beyond injury and a right to consideration by those who claim to be civilized. standing near the "general" or protestant trench--for while christian society permits its poor and unknown to be buried in trenches three deep; while it forces its other poor and friendless to dig the trenches and "throw in" their brother unfortunates; while it condemns its imbeciles and lunatics to the sights, and sounds, and odors, and poisoned air and earth of this island, it cannot permit the catholic and protestant dead to lie in the same trenches!--standing near the general trench, in air too foul to describe, where five "short term men" were working to lower their brothers, the officer explained. "we have to keep three trenches open all the time, because the catholics have to go in consecrated ground and they don't allow the 'generals' and protestants in there. then the other trench is for dissected bodies from hospitals and the like." "are not many, indeed most of those, also, catholics?" i asked. "yes, i guess so; but they don't go in consecrated ground, because they aint whole." this with no sense of levity. "are not many of the unknown likely to be catholics, too?" "yes, but when we find that out afterward, we dig them out if they were not suicides, and put them in the other trench. if they were suicides, of course, they have to stay with the generals. you see, we number each section; then we number each box, and begin at one end with number one and lay them right along, so a record is kept and you can dig any one out at any time." "then this earth--if we may call it so--is constantly being dug into and opened up?" i queried. "i should think it would kill the men who work, and the insane and imbecile who must live here." "well," he replied, smiling, "prisoners have to do what they are told to, whether it kills 'em or not, and i guess it don't hurt the idiots and lunatics none. they're past hurting. they're incurables. they never leave here." "i should think not," i replied. "and if by any chance they were not wholly incurable when they came, i should suppose it would not be long before they would be. where does the drinking water come from?" "drive wells, and--" "what!" i exclaimed, in spite of my determination when i went that i would show surprise at nothing. he looked at me in wonder. "yes, it is easy to drive wells here. get water easy." this time i remained silent. i did not wish to frighten away any farther confidences which he might feel like imparting. there is one road from end to end of the island. the houses for the male lunatics and imbeciles are on the highest point overlooking at all times the trenches and at all times within hearing of whatever goes on there. the odors are everywhere so that night and day, every one who is on the island breathes nothing else but this polluted air, except as a strong wind blows it, at times, from one direction over another. the women's quarters--much larger and better houses--are at the other end of the island. not all of these overlook the trenches. every fair day all these wretched creatures are taken out to walk. where? along this one road; back and forth, back and forth, beside the "dead trenches." to step aside is to walk on "graves" for about half the way. we sometime smile over the old joke that the blue laws allowed nothing more cheerful than a walk to the cemetery on sunday. all days are sundays to these wretches who depend on the "civilized" charity of our city. all laws are very, very blue; all walks lead through what can by only the wildest abandon of charity be called by so happy a name as a "cemetery," and even the air and water the city gives them is neither air nor water; it is pollution. a gentleman by my side watched the long procession of helpless creatures walk past. one man waved his hand to me and mumbled something and smiled--then he called back, "wie geht's? wie geht's?" and smiled again. several of the wretched creatures laughed at him; but when i smiled and bowed, nearly half of the line of three hundred, turned and joined in his salutation. they filed past four times (the whole walk is so short), and they did not fail each time to recognize me and bid for recognition. if they know me as a stranger, i thought, they know enough to understand something of all this ghastliness. the line of women was a long, long line. i was told that in all there were fourteen hundred women, and nearly five hundred men on the island. the line of women broke now and then as some poor creature would run out on the grass and pluck a weed or flower, and hold it gayly up or hide it in her skirts. one waved her hand at us, and said in tones that indicated that she was trying to assume the voice and manner of a public speaker: "the lord deserteth not his chosen!" i did not know whether in her poor brain, they or we represented the chosen who were not to be deserted. another said gayly and in an assumed lisp and voice of a little girl (although she must have been past fifty), "there's papa, oh, papa, papa, papa! my papa!" this to the gentleman who stood beside me. he smiled and waved his hand to her. then he said, between his teeth: "civilized savages! to have them _here!_" "it don't hurt 'em," said the officer beside us. "they're incurables. they won't any of 'em remember what they saw for ten minutes. people don't understand crazy folks and idiots. they're the easiest cowed people in the world. long as they know they're watched, they'll do whatever you tell them--this kind will. they're harmless." "but why have them here?" i insisted. "if they are to be poisoned, why not do it more quickly and--" "poisoned!" he exclaimed, astonished. "why, if one of the attendants was caught even striking one, he'd be dismissed quick. they get treated well. only it is hard to keep attendants. we can't get 'em to stay here more than a month or so--just till they get paid. we have to go to the raw immigrants to get them even then. nobody else will come." "naturally," remarked the gentleman beside me. "yes, it's kind of natural. this kind of folks are hard to work with, and the men attendants get only about seventeen to twenty dollars a month, and the women from ten to twelve dollars." "so the attendants of these helpless creatures are raw immigrants," i said; "who, perhaps, do not speak english, who are constantly changing. the water they get is from driven wells, the sights and exercise are obtained from and in and by the dead trenches. the air they breathe is like this, night and day, you say, and no one ever leaves alive when once sent here." "no one." "who does the work--the digging, the burying, the handling of the dead, the carting, and the work for the insane?" "medium term prisoners. all these are from one to six months men," waving his hand over the men working below us in the horrible trench. "do you think they leave here with an admiration for our system of caring for the city's dead--whether the death be social, mental, or physical? do they go back with a desire to reform and become like those who devise and conduct this sort of thing?" he laughed. "why, it's just a picnic for them to come up here. you can't hardly keep 'em away with a club. of course, the same ones don't work right _here_ long; but when a fellow gets sent up to _any_ of these places, he comes over and over until he gets ambitious to go to sing sing and be higher toned." i thought of the same information given me at the police and criminal courts a little while ago. i wondered if there might not be some flaw somewhere in the whole reformatory and punitive system. from the time a fourteen-year-old boy is taken up for breaking a window; sent to the reform school, where he is herded with older and worse boys, until he passes through the police court again,--let us say at sixteen, as a "ten-day drunk,"--to herd again in a windowless prison van, packed close with fifteen hardened criminals (as i saw a messenger boy of fifteen on my way to the island), and taken where for ten days he enjoys the society of the most abandoned; returns to town the companion of thieves; and goes the next time for three or six months for petit larceny, then for some graver crime, on and up. at last, when he has no more to learn or to teach, he is given a cell or room alone until the state relieves him of the necessity of following the course which has been mapped out for and steadily followed by so many. he knows when he is a three months' man where he is going at last. has he not helped to dig the trenches for the men who looked so hard and vile to him when he broke that window and stood in the police court by their sides? perhaps you will ask: "why did he not take the warning, and follow a better course, turn the other way?" perchance it might be asked on the other hand--since court, and morgue, and cemetery officials unite in the assertion that the above record is almost universal, and that our present methods not only do not reform, but actually prevent the reform of offenders--why this system is still followed by the state, and if the warning has not been ample and severe here, also. are we to expect greater wisdom, more far-seeing judgment and a loftier aim in these unfortunates of society than is developed in those who control them? since it is all such a dismal failure, why not plan a better way? why not begin at the other end of the line to keep offenders apart? why herd them--good, bad, and indifferent--together, in the stage of their career when there is hope for some, at least, to reform; and begin to separate them only when the last mile of the road is reached? why, if the city _must_ bury its dead in trenches and under the conditions only half described above (because much of it is too sickening to present), why, if cremation or some better mode of burial is not possible--and certainly i think it is--why, at least, need the awful, the ghastly, the inhuman combination be made of burying together medium term criminals, imbeciles, lunatics, and thousands of corpses all on one mere scrap of land? if a seven-foot mass of corruption exhaling through the air and percolating through land and water must be devoted to the dead poor of a great city, why in the name of all that is civilized or humane, permit any living thing to be detained and poisoned on the same bit of earth? i saw a woman who had come to visit her mother who was one of these poor, insane creatures. "i can't afford to keep her at home," she said, "and then at times she gets 'snags' and acts so that people are afraid of her, so i had to let her come here. it is kind of awful, ain't it?" i thought it was "kind of awful," for more reasons than the poor woman could realize, for she was so used to foul air and knew so little of sanitary conditions that she was mercifully spared certain thoughts that seem to have escaped the authorities also. "it is her birthday and i brought her this," she said, showing me a colored cookie. "she will like it. we can visit here one day each month if we have friends." "how many bodies do you carry each week?" i asked of the captain of the city boat. "about fifty," he said. but later on both he and the official on the island told me that there were six thousand buried here yearly, so it will be seen that his estimate per week was less than half what it should have been. i looked at the stack of pine boxes, the ends of which showed from beneath a tarpaulin on the deck. they were stacked five deep. there were seven wee ones, hardly larger than would be filled by a good-sized kitten. i said: "they are so _very_ small. i don't see how a baby was put inside." the man to whom i spoke--a deck hand who was a "ten-day-self-committed," so the captain told me later--smiled a grim, sly smile and said: "i reckon you're allowin' fer trimmin's. this kind don't get piliers and satin linin's. it don't take much room for a baby with no trimmin's an' mighty little clothes." "why are two of them dark wood and all the rest light?" i asked of the same man. "i reckon the folks of them two had a few cents to pay fergittin' their baby's box stained. it kind of looks nicer to them, and when they get a little more money, they'll come and get it dug up and put it in a grave by itself or some other place. it seems kind of awful to some folks to have their little baby put in amongst such a lot." he said it all quite simply, quite apologetically, as if i might think it rather unreasonable--this feeling that it was "kind of awful to think of the baby in amongst such a lot." at that time, i did not know that he was a prisoner. he showed me a number of things about the boxes and spoke of the open cracks and knot holes through which one could see what was inside. i declined to look after the first glance. "you don't mind it very much after you're used to it," he said. "of course, _you_ would, but i mean _us_." i began to understand that he was a prisoner. "when you're a prisoner, you get used to a good deal," he said, later on, when they were unloading the bodies and some of the men looked white and sick. "they're new to it," he explained to me. "it makes them sick and scared; but it won't after a while." "why are most of them here?" i asked. "most of them look honest--and--" "honest!" he exclaimed, with the first show he had made of rebellion or resentment. "honest! of course most of us are honest. it is liquor does it mostly. none of _us_ are thieves--yet!" i noticed the "us," but still evaded putting him in with the rest. "why do they not let liquor alone, after such a hard lesson?" he laughed. he had a red, bloated, but not a bad face. he was an englishman. "some of us can't. some don't want to, and some--some--it is about all some can get." later on, i was told that this man was honest, a good worker, and that he was "self-committed to get the liquor out of him. he's been here before. when he gets out, he will be drunk before he gets three blocks away from the dock, and he'll be sent here again--or to the island!" "and has this system gone on for a hundred years," i asked, "without finding some remedy?" "well, since the women began to take a hand, some little has been done," the officer replied. "they built a coffee and lodging house right near the landing, and take returning prisoners there, and give them a chance to work if they want to--in a broom factory they built. some get a start that way and if they work and are honest, they get a letter saying so when they find places. it is only a drop in the bucket, but it helps a few." "it looks a little as though, if women were to take a hand in public, municipal, or governmental affairs, that reform, and not punishment, might be made the object of imprisonment if imprisonment became necessary, doesn't it?" he laughed. "politics is no place for women. this they are doing is charity. that is all very well, but they got no business meddling with city government, and courts, and prisoners only _as_ charity." "yet you say that, for a hundred years, those who look after the criminal population, thought very little of helping the men who came out, much less did they think of beginning at the other end and trying to keep them from going in. women have been allowed to devise public charities, even, for only a few years past. they had no experience in building manufactories and conducting coffee and lodging houses; they have but little money of their own to put into such things and yet they have bethought them to start, in embryo, right here where the returning convict lands, what appears to have vast possibilities as you say. now if this effort for the prevention of crime and want were at the other end of the line in municipal government, don't you think it might go even nearer the root of the matter and do more good?" "how would you like to be a ward politician and a heeler?" he inquired, wiping a smile away and looking at my gloves. "i should not like it at all." "well, now, look at that! of course no lady would, so--" "do you think it possible that the world might get on fairly comfortably without having 'heelers' and 'ward politicians'--in the sense you mean--in municipal or state government? and that it might be better without such crime producers?" i added, as he began to laugh. "you women are always visionary. never practical. you--" "i thought you said that the one and only really practical measure yet taken to reduce the criminal population as it returns from the islands was invented and is conducted by women and--" "you can just make up your mind that in every family of six there'll be one hypocrite and one fool, either one of which is liable to be a criminal, too, and the state has got to take care of 'em somehow. but the prisons _are_ getting too full and the almshouses and insane asylums _are_ growing very large. but there is the two brothers' island. i've got to attend to my business now. take the trip with me again some time." but it seems to me, i shall not need to go again, and that no judge or legislator would need to take the journey more than once, unless, perchance, he took it in the person of either the hypocrite or the fool of his family; which, let us hope, no judge and no legislator is in a position to do. an irresponsible educated class education, using the word in its restricted scholastic sense, is always productive of restlessness and discontent, unless education, in its practical relations to life, furnishes an outlet and safety valve for the whetted and strengthened faculties. mere mental gymnastics are unsatisfactory after the first flush of pleasurable excitement produced in the mind newly awakened to its own capabilities. there seems to be something within us which demands that our knowledge be in some way applied, and that the logic of thought find fruition in the logic of events. the moment the laborers of the country found time and opportunity to whet their minds, they also developed a vast and persistent unrest--a dissatisfaction with the order of things which gave to them the tools with which to carve a fuller, broader life, but had not yet furnished them the material upon which they might work. their plane of thought was raised, their outlook was expanded, their possibilities multiplied; but the materials to work with remained the same. their status and condition clashed with their new hopes and needs. this state of things produced what we call "labor troubles," with all their complications. capital and labor had no contest until labor became (to a degree) educated. if--"in those good old days"--labor was not satisfied, it did not know how to make the fact very clearly understood. capital smiled and patronized labor, and labor smiled and said it was quite content to work for so kind a master. it was safer to do that way--in those good old days. then, too, so long as labor's wits had not been sharpened, so long as the laborer had not learned the relative values of things, perhaps he was content. certainly he was far more so than he is to-day. it is well that, in his present state of angry unrest, he feels that he has but to organize and elect his own representatives to help enact just and repeal unjust laws as they bear upon his own immediate needs. but for this outlet to his feelings, and this hope for his own future, the labor troubles would be troubles indeed, and every additional book read by labor, every new schoolhouse built for labor, would but add flame to fire. but education brings with it--when taken into practical life--a certain sense of the responsibilities of life and of the relations of things. the laborer begins to argue, "am not i partly responsible for my own condition? is not my salvation in my own hands and in the hands of my fellows? we are units in our own government. we are in the majority numerically, and we are, therefore, at least partially responsible for not only what we do, but for that which is done to us." it is this feeling that sobers and steadies while it inspires the so-called working classes to-day. if, with their present enlightenment, ambitions, and needs, laboring men felt themselves wholly irresponsible for the present or future legislation, riots and lawlessness would be the inevitable result. a sense of responsibility alone makes educational development safe either in individuals or in classes. witness the truth of this in the lives of the "gilded youths" of all countries whose sharpened wits are not steadied by, or applied in, any useful occupation. the results are disastrous to themselves and to those who fall under their sway or influence. broadened ambitions, sharpened mental capacities, developed intellectuality, demand corresponding outlets and responsibilities. lacking these, education is but an added danger. especially is this true in a republic where the theory of legal and political equality is held. at the present time there are but two wholly irresponsible classes in our republic--indians and women. i place the indians first because it has recently been decided in south dakota that if an indian (male) will "accept land in severalty," he thereby becomes a sovereign, and is henceforth presumed to have sufficient interest in the welfare of his government and the stability of affairs in general to entitle him to be looked upon as a desirable citizen, capable of legislating and desiring to legislate wisely for the public weal. since the government has not yet come to believe that any amount of land in severalty entitles women to so much confidence, and since the lack of responsibility develops in woman, as in man, a reckless and wanton spirit, we have the spectacle of this irresponsible element taking property laws into its own hands, and proudly destroying in public the belongings of other people where those belongings chanced to be in the form of beverages which these women disapproved of as articles of merchandise and use. and we have seen, farther, the grave spectacle of courts of law which will not or dare not enforce the law for their punishment. the due recognition of property rights is one of the earliest developments of personal, legal, and political responsibility. the negro notoriously disregarded these when his own human rights and individual responsibility were unrecognized. his desires were likely to be the measure of your loss. he is not the light-fingered being that he was. mine and thine have a new meaning for him since--for the first time in his life--"thine" has any meaning to his one-time master. he is also beginning to look to his ballot for his safety and to himself to work out his future status, whereas one day his legs were his sole dependence when trickery or blandishment failed him. woman still depends--where she wishes to compass an end--upon blandishment, deception, or a type of force which she believes will not or cannot be resented in the way it would unquestionably be resented if offered by men. a body of respectable men in a quiet community do not calmly walk into another man's business house, and without process of law destroy his property. their sense of personal and legal and political responsibility is a most effective police force; and no matter how rabid a prohibitionist john smith is, he does not collect a band of otherwise respectable men about him and proceed to destroy--with praise and prayer as an accompaniment--the belongings of his neighbor. no; he goes to a legal infant and a political nonexistent, and gets her to do it if it is to be done. he knows that to her the limit of responsibility is the verge of her desires on this question. he knows that she recognizes no right of property in a beverage she does not approve and a traffic she hopes to destroy. he knows that her sense of helplessness within the law--where she has no voice--gives her that reckless spirit of the political non-existent of all classes, which finds its revenge in lawlessness so long as it may not hope to have a voice in lawfulness. while woman was uneducated and wholly a dependent, there was little danger from her. she had too much at stake, in a purely physical sense. then, too, she had not reasoned out the logical sequence between the pretension that a republic of political equals before the law exists, while in fact one-half of that republic has no political status whatever and no voice in the laws they obey. uneducated and wholly dependent as woman was, this was safe enough. educated, and to a degree financially independent, as she now is, she is a menace to social order so long as she stands without legal responsibility or political outlet for the expression of her opinions and desires in matters of government. so long as her only means of expression on the subject of the liquor traffic is a hatchet and prayer, she will use both, and we will have the shocking spectacle, witnessed a little over a year ago, of a court refusing to even fine those who committed as clear and wanton an outrage on property rights as often finds record. the steadying sense of personal and mental responsibility can develop only under the exercise of such responsibility. man passed through the stage of regulative and prohibitive thought, and learned the true significance and value of liberty only by its possession. by being responsible he learned the folly and danger of undue restrictive legislation, and the utter futility of the attempt to legislate taste, moral sense and lofty ideals (i. e. his personal taste and ideals) into his neighbors. he also learned the futility and danger of lawless raids upon those who were not of his way of thinking as to what they should eat or drink, or wherewithal they should be clothed. woman will have to learn the same important lesson in the same way. she will abuse the personal rights and liberties of others who disagree with her (now that she is educated and has the power) unless she is steadied, given legal and political responsibility, and held to the same account for her acts as are her brothers. being helpless within the law--having no means of expression nor of making her will and opinions felt, having no voice in municipal or governmental management--she has begun to find lawless outlet for her newly acquired talents and intellectual activity. she is playing the part of border "regulator" and lobbyist--two very dangerous and degrading rôles in any case but doubly so in the hands of an educated but unrepresented class. it has been argued, by men who are otherwise favorable to woman suffrage, that to grant the ballot to woman would be to yield up, upon the altar of fanaticism and narrow personal desires, much of the liberty for which man has fought and struggled. they argue that women do not stop to consider whether they have the right to interfere with what others do, but that they only ask whether they like the thing done. the argument goes further and asserts that women only want the ballot that they may restrict the liberty of other people, pass prohibitory, sumptuary, and religious laws; and that the ballot in the hands of woman means a return to a union of church and state, and the meddlesome, personal legislation of the type known to us as blue laws. it is no doubt true that there are many half-developed thinkers among women who demand the ballot, who desire political power for these petty reasons. it is also undoubtedly true that many of these would travel the same road trod by their fathers before them, and learn political wisdom slowly and only after a struggle with their own narrow ideas of liberty, which means their own liberty to restrict and regulate the liberty of other people. it may be readily admitted, i say, that woman will make some of the same mistakes, political, religious, and sociological, that have been made by men in the reach after a better way. but what has taught thoughtful men wisdom? what has broadened the conception of political liberty? what taught men the danger and folly of religious and restrictive (sumptuary) legislation? what but experience and responsibility? nothing so steadies the hasty and narrow judgment as power, coupled with the recognition that responsibility for the use of that power is sure to be demanded. many a man will advise, as secret lobbyist, what he would not do in open legislature. many a man in private life asserts that "if i were judge or president," or what not, so and so should not be done. when the power and responsibility once rests upon him, his outlook is broadened, and he recognizes that he would endanger a far more sacred principle were he to adhere to his plan. this holds true with woman. with her newly acquired intellectual and financial power she is seeking an outlet for her capacities. she sees certain municipal and governmental ills. having no direct power of expression, no legal, political status in a country which claims to have no political classes, she does what all disqualified, irresponsible, dissatisfied classes of men have done before her when deprived of equal opportunity with their fellows; she seeks by subterfuge (indirection) or lawlessness to compass that which she may not attempt lawfully and which, had she the steadying influence and discipline of responsibility and power, she would not do. inexperience, coupled with irresponsibility and a lax sense of the rights of others, always did and always will produce tyrants. unite this naturally produced and inevitable social and political condition and outlook with the developed mental capacities and consequent restless, undirected, and unabsorbed ambition of the women of to-day, and we have a dangerous lobby--working in secret by indirection and without open responsibility for their words, deed, or influence--to handle in our republic. sex in brain _mrs. elizabeth cady stanton, in introducing the speaker said: "the first speaker of the evening is helen gardener, who is to give us an address on the brain. you know the last stronghold of the enemy is scientific. men have decided that we must not enter the colleges and study very hard; must not have the responsibility of government laid on our heads, because our brains weigh much less than the brains of men. dr. hammond, of new york, has published several very elaborate articles in the popular science monthly to prove this fact. but helen gardener has spent about fourteen months in investigation, and has conferred with twenty able specialists upon the subject, and will give us to-night the result of her investigation. she will show to us that it is impossible to prove any of the positions that dr. hammond has maintained._" read before the international council of women in washington, . ladies and gentlemen:--the political conditions of woman are very greatly influenced to-day by what is taught to her and about her by those two conservative moulders of public opinion--clergymen and physicians. our law-makers have long since ceased to merely sneer at the simple claim of human rights by one-half of humanity, and for refuge they have flown to priest and practitioner, who do not fail them in this their hour of great tribulation. it is true that men, most of whom never enter a church, have grown somewhat ashamed to press the theological arguments against the equality of the sexes, and to these the medical argument has become an ever-present help in their time of trouble. in the early days woman was under the absolute sway of club and fist. then came censer and gown, swinging hell in the perfumed depths of the one and hiding in the folds of the other, thumb-screw and fagot for the woman who dared to think. at last the theory of the primal curse upon her head has grown weaker. mankind struggles to be less brutal and more just. manly men are beginning to blush when they hear repeated the well-worn fable of the fall of man through woman's crime and her inferiority of position and opportunity, justified by priest and pleader, because of legends inherited from barbarians--mental deformities worthy of their parentage. when religious influence and dogma began to lose their terrors, legal enactments were slowly modified in woman's favor and hell went out of fashion. then conservatism, ignorance, and egotism, in dismay and terror, took counsel together and called in medical science, still in its infancy, to aid in staying the march of progress which is inevitable to civilization and so necessary to anything like a real republic. equality of opportunity began to be denied to woman, for the first time, upon natural and so-called scientific grounds. she was pronounced physically and mentally incapable, because of certain anatomical conditions, and she must be prevented--for her own good and that of the race _here_--from competition with her mental and physical superiors. it was no longer her soul, but her body, that needed saving from herself. her thirst for knowledge the clergy declared had already damned the souls of a very large majority of mankind--in a hereafter known only to them. the same vicious tendency, the doctors echoed, will be the ruin of the physical bodies of the race in this world, as we are prepared to prove. the case began to look hopeless again. opportunity must be denied, these doctors say, because capacity does not exist. where capacity seems to exist, it is, it must be, at the expense of individual health and future maternal capabilities. as a person, she has no status with these consistent believers in "equal rights to all mankind." as a potential mother only, can she hope for consideration either by religious or medical theorist. this has been a difficult combination to meet. few who cared to contest their verdict, possessed the bravery to fearlessly face the religious dictators, and fewer still had the anatomical and anthropological information to risk a fight on a field which assumed to be held by those who based all of their arguments upon scientific facts, collected by microscope and scales and reduced to unanswerable statistics. the priest, reinforced by the doctor, promised a long and bitter struggle, on new grounds, to those who fought for simple justice to the individual, aside from her sex relations; who wished for neither malediction nor mercy; those who claim only the right of a unit to enjoy the common heritage untrammeled by superstition and artificial difficulties. they do not ask to be helped--only not to be hindered. they had hailed science as their friend and ally; and behold, pseudo-science adopted theories, invented statistics, and published personal prejudices as demonstrated fact. all this has done a vast deal of harm to the cause of woman. educators, theorists, and politicians readily accept the data and statistics of prominent physicians, and, in good faith, make them a basis of action, while the victims of their misinformation have been helpless. it is, therefore, very important to learn, if possible, just how far medical science and anthropology have really discovered demonstrable natural sex differences in the brains of men and women, and how far the usual theories advanced are gratuitous assumptions, founded upon legend and fed by mental habit and personal egotism. i began an investigation into this matter a little while ago by questioning the arguments and logic of the medical pseudo-scientists from their own basis of facts. i ended by questioning the facts themselves, upon the evidence furnished me by leading members of the profession, some of whom are known in this country and abroad as leaders in original investigation as brain students and anatomists. none of these gentlemen knew the aim or motive of my inquiries, and they gave me all the information to be had on this subject without bias and quite freely. the specialists and brain students to whom my questions were submitted, were of widely different religious beliefs, which beliefs, of course, colored their theories as well as their motives, either consciously or unconsciously. but the profession has reason to be proud of the ability of the most of these men, no less than of their sincerity and willingness to confess to ignorance of facts where proof was lacking. the abler the man the more willing was he to do this. one or two tried to explain, and, as it seemed to me, to force an agreement between scientific facts which they did possess, and their inherited belief in "revelation." others, who did not themselves recognize it, performed the same mental gymnastics from mere force of habit, and gave a black eye to their facts in preserving a blind eye to their faith. but in the following results are to be found the opinions of eminent medical men, some of whom are roman catholic, some protestant, and some of the negative systems of religion. so far as i know, not one is a believer in "woman suffrage," nor even in the more radical but less comprehensive measures for her development. not one, who touched directly upon the subject, believed in sex equality in its entirety or had not personal prejudice and long-cherished sentiments opposed to it, if his reason approved. by some of them this was frankly stated, even while giving facts in her favor. not more than one, so far as i know, is "agnostic" in religion or a believer in evolution in its entirety. i have mentioned these latter points, because i found in this line of investigation, as in all others, that a man's religious leanings inevitably color and modify all of his opinions, and govern his entire mental outlook. they even add bitterness to his "jalop" and fizz in his "seltzer". if he absolutely believe in the "garden of eden" story he deals with "adam" as a creature after "god's own heart and in his image," and therefore capable and deserving of all opportunity and development for and because of himself, and to promote his own happiness. "eve," of course, receives due attention as a physical, anatomical specimen, "with intuitions"--a mere bone or rib of contention, as it were, between man and man. the more orthodox the man the bonier the rib. the more literal and consistent his faith the less likely is he to deal with woman as an intellectual being, capable of and entitled to the same or as liberal, mental, social, and financial opportunities or rights as are universally conceded in this country to be the birthright of man, and quite beyond farther controversy in his case. evidence in her favor which cannot be evaded, must be overwhelming, indeed, then, if an investigator starts out handicapped with the theory of "revelation" as a part of his mental equipment, and with the "sphere of woman" formulated for him by the ancient hebrews. i went to the men whom the doctors themselves told me were the best authority to be found on the subject of brain anatomy and microscopy. one of these men, dr. e. c. spitzka, of new york, was referred to by physicians of all schools of practice as undoubtedly the best informed man in america, and second to none in the world, in this branch of the profession. they, one and all, told me that what he could not tell me himself on this subject, or could not tell me where to find, could not be of the slightest importance. i have been asked to tell you just what i started out to learn, and how far i succeeded. but before i do this it may not be out of place to tell you an anecdote of my experience in this undertaking: i went personally with my questions to about twenty of the leading physicians of new york. [i had them submitted in other ways to many more in this and other cities. i got written communications from the old world as well as the new.] nearly every one of these twenty, after very kindly telling me what he himself knew and what he believed on the subject, referred me to the same man as the final appeal; but not one of them was willing to introduce me to him. they would introduce me to anybody and everybody else, but they did not like to risk sending me to him. he was, they said, utterly impatient of ignorance, and might treat me with scant courtesy. he would very likely tell me flatly that he could not waste time on so trivial a matter--that i and everybody else ought to know all about "sex in brain." now, this is a secret--i would not have it get out for a good deal. it took me a long while to get my courage up to go to that man without an introduction--a thing i did not do with any of the others. i finally, with fear and trembling, made up my mind to learn what he knew on this subject or perish in the attempt. so i took my life in my hands, put on my best gown--i had previously discovered that even brain anatomists are subject to the spell of good clothes--and went. i fully expected to be reduced to mere pulp before i left; but he listened quite patiently, asked me a few questions as to why i had come to him; told me to read him my questions; asked me sharply, "who wrote those questions?" i said meekly, "i did." he looked at me critically, wrote something on a card, and dismissed me. i was uncertain whether, he had been so kind in his manner, because he considered me a harmless lunatic or not. once in the street i read the card. i was to call again when he could give me more time. i went not once, but many times. i devoted some months to brain anatomy and anthropology. in his laboratory he had brains from those of a mouse to those of the largest whale on record. he showed me the peculiarities of brains as shown by microscope and scales. he looked up points in foreign journals to which i had not access. in short, he did all he could to aid me; and he said that no such investigation as i was trying to learn about had ever yet been made, although no fair record of the difference of sex in brain, of which we hear so much, could possibly be made without it. he was delightfully frank, earnest, and thoroughly honest. he knew--and, what is better, he was willing to tell--where knowledge stopped and guessing began; a point sadly confused, i found, by even prominent members of the profession. "i do not know," was a hard sentence to get from a doctor so long as he was under the impression that others of his profession would know. "i do not know; nobody knows," came freely enough from the man who was sure of the boundaries of investigation, who recognized the vast difference between theories and proof. from him, and through him, i collected material that is of intense interest and importance to woman in this stage of the movement for her elevation. it is only right that i say here that i am of opinion that he does not himself believe in the equality of the sexes, but he is too thoroughly scientific to allow his hereditary bias to color his statements of facts on this or any subject. in the hands of a man who has arrived at that point of mental poise and dignity, our case is safe, no matter what his sentiments may be. such men do not go to their emotions for premises when it comes to a statement of scientific facts. there are writers on this subject who do. as you all know, any statement calmly and persistently made is reasonably sure to be accepted as true, even by its victims. frequency of iteration passes as proof. even thoughtful men, after spending years of time in trying to explain why a thing is true, often end with the discovery that it is not true, after all. we are all familiar with the story of the wrangle of the philosophers as to why a vessel containing water weighed no more with a fish weighing a pound in it than it did after the fish was removed. after long and acrimonious debate over the principle of philosophy involved, some one bethought him to weigh it, and, of course, discovered that no unfamiliar principle was involved, since it was a simple misstatement as to facts. the assumptions of "divine rights" by kings and priests stood as unquestioned facts for centuries by those who were the victims of both. the "divine right" of men rests still on the same bare-faced fraud, and is simply the last of this interesting trinity to die, and it naturally dies hard, as its fellows did. if a charlatan loudly asserts that he can do a certain thing, no matter how unlikely that thing is, if he insists that he has done it often, he will find many believers who will spend much time in an attempt to explain how he does it, while only the few will think to question first if he does it. upon this basis of calm assumption on the one side, and credulous acceptance on the other, has grown up a very general belief that there are great and well-defined natural anatomical differences between the brains of the sexes of the human race; that these differences are well known to the medical practitioner or anatomist, and that they plainly indicate inferiority of capacity in the female brain, which is structural, while, strangely enough, no one argues that this is the case in the lower animals. it therefore occurred to me to question--admitting that the microscope and scales really do show the differences to exist in adults--whether it would not be fair to assume, at least, that they are not natural and necessary sex differences, but that they are due to difference of opportunity and environment, and, under like conditions, would be produced between members of the same sex; that since this superiority of brain in the male sex is said to appear in the human race only, where alone, in all nature, superior opportunities and environments are held as a sex right and condition by the males, that the so-called "superiority of structure" is simply better development of the equally capable but restricted brain of the other sex. i proposed to test this by an appeal to the brains of infants. and my assumption although not new, appeared to be borne out by the accepted, though unproven theory, that the brains of the men and women are nearer alike the lower we go into the human scale. this assumption is clearly based upon the idea that where the mental opportunities of the men and women are nearer equal the physical results are also similar. indeed, topinard plainly states this fact in his anthropology. he says: "the reason that the brain of woman is lighter than that of man is that she has less cerebral activity to exercise in her sphere of duty. in former times it was relatively larger in the department of lozère, because then the woman and man mutually shared the burdens of the daily labor. the truth is that the weight of the brain increases with the use we make of it." since women are not given diversified and stimulating mental employment, they can not be expected to show the results of such training on the brain itself. "of the physiology of the brain comparatively little is known," says dr. mcdonald, author of "criminology." i was started on my work in this matter by several articles written by the boldest of the medical men in this country, who is the leader of the medical party which claims to be opposed to the educational and political advancement of women because of the inevitable injury to her physical constitution. the writings of such a man, aided by the circulation and prestige of the leading journals of the country, which publish them as authoritative, must inevitably influence school directors, voters, and legislators, and go far to crystalize the belief that facts are well known to the medical profession, with which it would be dangerous to trifle, when the truth is that the positive knowledge on the subject is not sufficient at this moment to form even an intelligent guess upon. in spite of this fact the well-known physician of whom i speak, dr. wm. a. hammond, reiterates in these articles all of the old, and adds one or two new arguments to prove that woman should not be allowed to develop what brain she has, because she possesses very little and even that little is of inferior quality. professor romanes, who is said by many to stand second only to herbert spencer in his branch of science, has also recently published a very extensive paper on mental differences of the sexes and the proper education of woman, which is, unfortunately, but most likely honestly, based upon this same assumption, under the belief that it was a demonstrated fact. his paper has been very widely copied in spite of its extreme length, and the fact that the same journals "absolutely can not find space" for even a moderately long one on the other side. the editors say, "the public is not interested in it"--that is, in its correction. i mention these two men not because they are peculiar in, but because they are honored representatives of, the so-called scientific school of objectors to human equality, and claim to base the right of male supremacy upon important scientific facts. of course all this is an old assumption and as such has been dealt with before. but dr. hammond now boldly asserts that these differences are easily discoverable by microscope and scale, and that they are natural, necessary sex differences. he claims: ( .) that woman's brain is inferior to man's in size and quality, and, therefore, in possibility. ( .) that these marks of inferiority are natural and potential, and not produced by environment. ( .) that they are easily recognizable in the brain mass itself. ( .) that in consequence of these natural organic and fundamental differences the female brain is incapable of, first, accuracy; second, sustained or abstract thought; third, unbiased judgment (judicial fairness); fourth, the accomplishment of any really first-class or original work in the fields of science, art, politics, invention, or even literature. he points out the great danger to woman herself, and to the race, as her children, if she is allowed to attempt those things for which the structure of her brain shows her to be incapacitated. from this outlook it is easy to see that the nonprofessional voter, the school director, and the legislator might really feel it to be his duty to protect woman against her own ambition. it is in this way that the assertions of such men can, and do, cause the greatest injury to women. there are a number of other indictments; but for the present let us examine these. first, in the matter of size, the doctor concedes that the relative size and weight of the brain in the sexes is about the same, slightly in woman's favor, which he says does not count; although, when he finds this same difference between men, as between higher and lower races, he argues that it does count for a great deal. but in the dilemma to which this seemed to reduce him in proving his case, he says: "numerous observations show beyond doubt that the intellectual power does not depend upon the weight of the brain relative to that of the body so much as it depends upon absolute brain weight." now, if this were the case, an elephant would out-think any of us, and the whale, whose intellectual achievements have never been looked upon as absolutely incendiary (if we except jonah's friend), would rank the greatest man on record, and have brain enough left to furnish material for a fair-sized female seminary. the average human male brain is said to weigh from , to , grammes, and even a very young whale furnishes , grammes of "intellect-producing substance," as the doctor felicitously terms it, while the brain of a large whale weighed in tipped the beam at , grammes. truly, then, if absolute brain weight and not relative weight is the test, here was a "mute inglorious milton," indeed. almost any elephant is several cuviers in disguise, or perhaps an entire medical faculty. the doctor says: "the female brain, however, is not only smaller than that of man, but it is different in structure, and this fact involves much more as regards the character of the mental faculties than does the element of size." again he says: "thus accurate measurements show that the anterior portion of the brain, comprising the frontal lobes, in which the highest intellectual faculties re side, is much more developed in man than in woman, and this not only as regards its size, but its convolutions also. now, the part of the brain which is especially concerned in the evolution of mind is the gray matter, and this is increased or diminished in accordance with the number and complexity of the convolutions. the frontal lobes contain a greater amount of gray cortical matter than any other part of the brain, and they are, as we have seen, larger in man than in woman." accepting these sweeping statements for the moment--although many of them are questioned by the highest authority--would it not be fair to test the case as to whether this difference in adults is fundamental and pre-natal, or whether it is the result of outside artificial influences, by an appeal to the brain of infants. if the brains of one hundred infants (each child weighing ten pounds) were examined, would the brains of the fifty males be distinguishable from those of the fifty females? in other words, when the weight of the body, the age, and other conditions are the same as to health, parentage, etc., and before the artificial means of development, educational stimulus and opportunity are applied to the one and withheld from the other, could the sex be determined by the difference in brain, weight, shape, size, quality, or convolutions? that would be the test, although it would not allow for the ages of hereditary dwarfage of the one, and healthy exercise of the brains of the other sex; but, as an opening, i was willing to stand on that test. it was in pursuance of this idea that i caused the following questions to be submitted to a large number of the leading brain students of america, went myself somewhat into the study of anthropology, and collected from several countries certain bits of information as to just how much basis there is for all this cry about the difference in men's and women's brains. being a matter of heads, i wanted to know how much was "cry" and how much was "wool." these are the questions submitted to the doctors, brain anatomists and microscopists at the outset of my task: ( .) is it known to the medical profession whether in infants (of the same age, size, health, and inheritance at birth) the quantity, quality, and specific gravity of the gray matter differs in the sexes? does the relative amount of gray matter differ? ( .) do the convolutions? form? actual amount of gray matter, differ? ( .) given the brain, only, of a number of infants of the same age, weight, etc., could the sex be determined by the difference in shape, quantity, quality, and convolutions? ( .) if so, are the differences more or less marked in infants than in adults? is the frontal region of the brain larger and more developed in male than in female infants? is the difference as marked as in adults? ( .) does use, training, etc., develop gray matter, change texture, size, shape, etc., of the brain mass, or are these determined and fixed at birth? the same as to convolutions? ( .) does use have to do with the location of the fissure of rolando, or is that fixed at birth? in an uneducated man would there be as much of the brain in front of this fissure as in a man of trained and developed mind? ( .) does use or development of the mental powers change the specific gravity of the brain mass? would it be the same in a great scholar as in a common laborer of the same general size and health? ( .) is there unanimity of opinion on these questions? are the facts known or only conjectured? ( .) if ten boys of the same weight, health, and general inheritance were taken in infancy and five of them subjected for fifty years to the conditions of a street or farm laborer, while the other five received all the advantages of the life of a scholar, would the ten brains present the same relative likenesses at death as at birth? would opportunity and mental exercise make a change in the brains of the five students that would be discoverable by microscope and scales? in reply to the last question, the universal opinion was that it would be fair to assume that such difference would be perceptible. but one of the replies was that these points must necessarily remain only conjectural, since we can not do as the scotch villager who shows to a wondering public the remains of a famous criminal, with this bit of history: "this is the skull and brain of a man who was hanged, at the age of forty, for murdering his entire family. this is the skull and brain of the same man at the age of seven. you can readily trace in the boy the man that was to be." since it might be looked upon with disfavor if we were to attempt to brain people from time to time in an effort to discover the effects of culture upon the fissure of rolando, we must base all such arguments upon reason and analogy. is it not a fair presumption, since reason and analogy lead to this universally accepted theory as between man and man, that the same causes would produce the same results when applied between man and woman? strangely enough, this is not held to be the case by these acute reasoners against sex equality in brain. but to illustrate once more the necessity of questioning facts first and the reasons for them afterward, i am assured by the most profound and capable students of these branches of science, that if such differences exist in the brains of infants as are indicated by my questions, it is not known to those who make a specialty of brain study; but, upon the contrary, the differences between individuals of the same sex--in adults, at least--are known to be much more marked than any that are known to exist between the sexes. take the brains of the two poets, byron and dante. byron's weighed , grms., while dante's weighed only , grms., a difference of grms.; or take two statesmen, cromwell and gambetta. cromwell's brain weighed , grms., which, by the way, is the greatest healthy brain on record--although cuvier's is usually quoted as the largest, a part of the weight of his was due to disease, and if a diseased or abnormal brain is to be taken as the standard, then the greatest on record is that of a negro, criminal idiot--while gambetta's was only , grms., a difference of grms. surely it would not be held because of this, that gambetta and dante should have been denied the educational and other advantages which were the natural right of byron and cromwell. yet it is upon this very ground, by this very system of reasoning, that it is proposed to deny women equal advantages and opportunities, although the difference in brain weight between man and woman is claimed to be only grms., and even this does not allow for difference in body weight, and is based upon a system of averages, which is neither complete nor accurate. there is, then, not only no proof that the sex of infants could be distinguished by their brains, but all of the evidence which does exist on this subject is wholly against the assumption. up to this point in my investigation i learned only what i had fully expected to learn. at the next step, and in connection with it, i met with information which seems to me to offer an opportunity for reflection upon the matter of mental--not to say verbal--accuracy in the sex which does not wear "bangs." in the papers referred to, dr. hammond asserted, and no male voice or pen has seen fit to publicly correct him, that "it is only necessary to compare an average male with an average female brain to perceive at once how numerous and striking are the differences existing between them." he then submits a formidable list of striking differences which include these: "the male brain is larger, its vertical and transverse diameters are greater proportionately, the shape is quite different, the convolutions are more intricate, the sulci deeper, the secondary fissures more numerous, and the gray matter of the corresponding parts of the brain decidedly thicker." but as if all these were not enough to enable the merest novice to distinguish the one from the other, even if he were near-sighted, he offers these reinforcements: "it is quite certain, as the observations of the writer show, that the specific gravity of both the white and gray matter of the brain is greater in man than in woman." this would seem to leave woman without a reef to hang to; for if by any chance her brain did not fall short in gray matter, the specific gravity of the rest of it would enable the doctor to ticket her as accurately as though she were to appear with ear-rings and train in a ballroom. of this point this is what the leading brain anatomist in america wrote me: "the only article recognized by the profession as important and of recent date which takes this theory as a working basis is by morselli, and he is compelled to make the sinister admission, while asserting that the specific gravity is less in the female, that with old age and with insanity the specific gravity increases." if this is the case, i don't know that women need sigh over their short-coming in the item of specific gravity. there appear to be two very simple methods open to them by which they may emulate their brothers in the matter of specific gravity if they so desire. one of these is certain, if they live long enough, and the other--well, there is no protective tariff on insanity. but to finally clinch his argument, dr. hammond continues: "the question is, therefore, not so much that of quantity" (which appears to collide with his statement that it was the "absolute brain weight" which was the sublime test, and drops my whale into the water again), "as it is of quality. the brain of woman is different from that of man in structure." again i applied my test. does all this difference of structure and quality appear in the infant or only in the adult brains? since it is held that these very differences are the ones produced by education and properly diversified mental stimulus--as between man and man--is it not fair to assume that like causes produce like results as between man and woman? since woman has never had the advantages of these brain-developing processes, is it not fair to assume, if all these differences do exist, that it is less a matter of natural and characteristic inferiority than of environment and opportunity, unless it exists in the same ratio in infants? that would be the test as to whether these are natural, necessary, pre-natal sex characteristics, or whether they are developed by external circumstances and environment. the physical sex characteristics, which are natural, are as readily distinguished at birth as at maturity. but after a woman's waist and brain are put into tight laces and shaped to fit the fashion, it is rather a poor time to judge of her natural figure, either physical or mental. there was but one reply to my questions. it was this: "no such test has ever been made with the brains of infants, and the wildest imagination could only stand appalled at the effort. it would be impossible to distinguish the male from the female child by these 'radical, natural, easily-discovered sex differences' in brain." i held, then, that the inference was perfectly legitimate that the great and numerous differences in the brains of adults, in so far as that was not, also, a mere flight of fancy, was not natural, pre-natal, and necessary, but that it was certainly fair to assume it to be produceable, by outside measures or environment, and that it could be no more natural nor desirable, for the digestive organs and the brain of one sex to be decreased and deformed by pressure, than it is for those of the other. but i confess i was wholly unprepared for the final result of my last question and argument. i discovered that these differences are not only not known to exist in infants, but that in spite of all the talk, the pathetic warnings, and the absolute statements to the contrary, that in a like number of adult brains such differences are not only not to be "perceived at once," but that if dr. hammond or anybody else will agree to allow me to furnish him with twenty well-preserved adult brains to be marked in cipher, so that he will not have his information before he makes his test, he will find that his "numerous, striking, and easily perceived" differences will not appear with any relation to sex, so far as is known at the present time. i made this offer to him through the _popular science monthly_ some six months ago. up to date the twenty brains i offered him to try on have not been called for. upon the contrary there will be found greater difference between individuals of the same sex than any known to exist between the sexes in any and all of these test characteristics; that, in the main, since women weigh less than men, it would be pretty safe to guess that most of the lighter brains belonged to the women, but that this test would prove wrong in many cases, and that the others would fail utterly. i asked them why they did not correct the general impression which men of their profession had given out in this matter. they said they did not see the use of it; what difference did it make, anyhow? and then it was a good enough working theory. i said, "but suppose it worked the other way, do you think that you would say that it made no difference, and that a working theory that worked all one way was a safe or an honest one to put forth as an established fact?" "well, we are willing to tell you the truth about it," they said; "the fact is, it is all theory as yet; there has not been a sufficient number of tests made to warrant the least dogmatism in the matter; what more can you ask of us than that?" what indeed? i made another discovery; it was this: the brain of no remarkable woman has ever been examined! woman is ticketed to fit the hospital subjects and tramps, the unfortunates whose brains fall into the hands of the profession, as it were, by mere accident; while man is represented by the brains of the cromwells, cuviers, byrons and spurzheims. by this method the average of men's brains is carried to its highest level in the matter of weight and texture; while that of women is kept at its lowest, and even then there is only claimed grammes difference! it is with such statistics as these, it is with such dissimilar material, that they and we are judged. finally, i discovered that there is absolutely no definite information on the subject now in the hands of the medical profession which can justify the least show of dogmatism in the matter; or that, if it were on the other side, would not be explained entirely away in five minutes, and there would not be the least question as to the desirability of the explanation, either. they told me not only that they did not know, but that no one could possibly know upon the statistics and with the instruments in the hands of the profession to-day. this being the case, perhaps it will be just as well for women themselves to take a hand in the future investigations and statements, and i sincerely hope that the brains of some of our able women may be preserved and examined by honest brain students, so that we may hereafter have our cuviers and web sters and cromwells. and i think i know where some of them can be found without a search-warrant--when miss anthony, mrs. stanton, and some others i have the honor to know, are done with theirs. until that is done, no honest or fair comparison is possible. at present there is too great a desire on the part of these large-brained gentlemen, like dr. hammond, to look upon themselves and their brains as "infant industries," entitled to and in need of a very high protective tariff, to prevent anything like a fair and equal competition with the feminine product. but the fact is that we have heard so much on the one side about woman's physical and mental short-comings, and on the other side, from our prohibition friends and others, so much of the moral delinquencies of men, that it seems to me that we are in danger of believing both. and i, for one, am beginning to feel a good deal like mark twain's irishman, whenever i hear either one discussed. he had been having a controversy with another man, and, as a final "clincher" to his side of the argument, said, with emphasis: "now, i don't want to hear anything more from you on that subject but silence--and mighty little of that." allow me to read the closing paragraph of a letter to me from dr. e. c. spitzka, the celebrated new york brain specialist, to whom i am greatly indebted for much valuable information: "you may hold me responsible for the following declaration: that any statement to the effect that an observer can tell by looking at a brain, or examining it microscopically, whether it belonged to a female or a male subject, is not founded on carefully-observed facts. the balance and the compasses show slight differences; the weight of the male brain being greater, and the angle formed by the sulcus of rolando, forming a larger expansion of the frontal lobes; but both these points of differences have been determined by the method of averages. they do not necessarily apply to the individual brain and hence can not be utilized to determine the sex of a single brain, except by those who are willing to take the chances of guessing. the assertion that the microscope reveals definite characteristic points of difference between the male and female brain is utterly incorrect. no such difference has ever been demonstrated, nor do i think it will be by more elaborate methods than those we now possess. numerous female brains exceed numerous male brains in absolute weight, in complexity of convolutions, and in what brain anatomists would call the nobler proportions. so that he who takes these as his criteria of the male brain may be grievously mistaken in attempting to assert the sex of a brain dogmatically. if i had one hundred female brains and one hundred male brains together, i should select the one hundred containing the largest and best developed brains as probably containing fewer female brains than the remaining one hundred. more than this no cautious, experienced brain anatomist would venture to declare." woman as an annex ladies and gentlemen:--if it were not often tragic and always humiliating, it would be exceedingly amusing to observe the results of a method of thought and a civilization which has proceeded always upon the idea that man is the race and that woman is merely an annex to him and because of his desires, needs and dictum. strangely enough, the bigotry or sex bias and pride does not carry this theory below the human animal. among scientists and evolutionists, and, indeed, even among the various religious explanations of the source and cause of things, the male and female of all species of animals, birds and insects come into life and tread its paths together and as equals. the male tiger does not assume to teach his mate what her "sphere" is, and the female hippopotamus is supposed to have sufficient brain power of her own to enable her to live her own life and plan her own occupations, decide upon her own needs and generally regulate her own existence, without being compelled to call upon the gentleman of her family in particular, and all of the gentlemen of her species in general, to decide for her when she is doing the proper thing. the laws of their species are not made and executed by one sex for the other, and the same food, sun, covering, educational and general conduct and opportunities of life which open to the one sex are equally open and free for the other. no protective tariff is put upon masculine prerogative to enable him to control all the necessaries of life for both sexes, to assure to him all the best opportunities, occupations, education and results of achievement which is the common need of their kind. in short, the female is in no way his subordinate. in captivity it is the female which has been, as a rule, most prized, best cared for and preserved. in the barnyard, field and stable alike, it is deemed wise to sell or kill most of the males. they are looked upon as good food, so to speak, but not as useful citizens. what they add to the world is not thought so much of--their capacities for the future are less valued than are those of the other sex. even the man-made, religious legends bring all of these animals into life in pairs. neither has precedence of the other. neither is subject to the other. but when it comes to the human animal--the final blossom of creative thought, as religionists word it, or of universal energy, as scientists put it--the male, for the first time, becomes the whole idea. a helpmate for him is an after-thought, and according to man's teaching up to the present time, an after-thought only half matured and very badly executed. in spite of all the practice on other pairs--one of each sex--it remained for the almighty, or nature, to make the mistake (for the first time) of creating the human race with one of its halves a mere "annex" to the other. a subject. a subordinate. without brains to do its own thinking, without judgment to be its own guide. this blunder is not made with any other pair. in the case of all other animals each sex has its own brain power with which it directs its own affairs, makes its own laws of conduct, and so preserves its own individuality, its personal liberty, its freedom of action and of development. i am not ignorant of, nor do i forget, the scientific fact that in nature among ants, birds and beasts there are tribes and communities where some are slaves or are subject to others; but what i do assert is this, that this is not a sex distinction or degradation. it is not infrequently the males who are the subjects in these communities where liberty is not equal and where, therefore, the very basic principal of equality is impossible or unknown. and did it ever occur to you that a community or a people which recognizes in its fundamental laws and customs--in its very forms of expression--that it is right to preserve inequality of opportunity, of education, of emolument and of conduct has yet to learn the meaning of the words "liberty" and "justice?" nowhere in all nature is the mere fact of sex--and that the race-producing sex--made a reason for fixed inequality of liberty, of subjugation, of subordination and of determined inferiority of opportunity in education, in acquirement, in position--in a word, in freedom. nowhere until we reach man! here, where for the first time in nature there enter artificial social conditions and needs, these artificial demands coupled with the great fact of maternity (everywhere else in nature absolutely under its own control), maternity under sex subjection, linked with financial dependence upon the one not so burdened, has fixed this subordinate status upon that part of the race which is the producer of the race. this fact alone is enough to account for the slow, the distorted, the diseased and the criminal progress of humanity. subordinates cannot give lofty character. servile temperaments cannot blossom into liberty-loving, liberty-giving descendants. many of the lower animals destroy their young if they are born in captivity. they demand that maternity shall be free. free from man's conditions or captivity, as it always has been free from the tyranny of sex control in their own species. * * while reading the proof for this book this corroborative and interesting illustration appeared in the new york world of date june : the tragedy which has been expected to occur any time at the zoo was enacted yesterday, when alice, the lioness who gave birth to three whelps on wednesday morning, ate one and killed another. the third was only rescued by strategy. animals never kill their young in their wild state, except the male lion, from whom the female hides the young. in captivity it's a common thing. keeper downey first discovered the deed, and when the director arrived alice was just finishing one of her offspring. another lay dead in the corner and the third had crawled away and was crying pitifully. director smith had the door raised which leads into another cage and alice was coaxed inside. then the door was let down and keepers downy and snyder caught the only survivor and secured the body of the other. it was a dangerous proceeding, as alice was terribly angry and beat her great body against the thick iron bars. the dead cub was sent to the museum of natural history, and after a good deal of skirmishing around by keepers downey and shannon a newfoundland dog belonging to an employee of clausen's brewery, on east fifty-fifth street, who yesterday morning gave birth to eight pups, was found, and last evening the survivor of the triplets was taken to the brewery. the director will pay the owner of the dog $ per week for the baby's board and lodging, and, to the credit of the generous-hearted mother dog, she has taken the little lioness to her breast without so much as a questioning look. she licked it and snuggled it as she did her own and caressed it into nursing. after it is a few weeks old and is strong it can be taken away from the dog and, with little trouble, can be brought up on a bottle. it is the fashion in this country now-a-days to say that women are treated as equals. some of the most progressive and best of men truly believe what they say in this regard. one of our leading daily papers, which insists that this is true, and even goes so far as to say that american gentlemen believe in and act upon the theory that their mothers and daughters are of a superior quality--and are always of the very first consideration to and by men--recently had an editorial headlined "universal suffrage the birthright of the free born." i read it through, and if you will believe me, the writer had so large a bump of sex arrogance that he never once thought of one-half of humanity in the entire course of an elaborate and eloquent two-column article! "universal" suffrage did not touch but one sex. there was but one sex "free born." there was but one which was born with "rights." the words "persons," "citizens," "residents of the state" and all similar terms were used quite freely, but not once did it dawn upon the mind of the writer that every one of those words, every argument for freedom, every plea for liberty and justice, equality and right, applied to the human race and not merely to one-half of that race. sex bias, sex arrogance, sex pride, sex assumption is so ingrained that it simply does not occur to the male logicians, scientists, philosophers and politicians that there is a humanity. they see, think of and argue for and about only a sex of man--with an annex to him--woman. they call this the race; but they do not mean the race--they mean men. they write and talk of "human beings;" of their needs, their education, their capacity and development; but they are not thinking of humanity at all. they are thinking of, planning for and executing plans which subordinate the race--the human entity--to a subdivision, the mark and sign of which is the lowest and most universal possession of male nature--the mere procreative instinct and possibility. and this has grown to be the habit of thought until in science, in philosophy, in religion, in law, in politics--one and all--we must translate all language into other terms than those used. for the word "universal" we must read "male;" for the "people," the "nation," we must read "men." the "will of the majority--majority rule"--really means the larger number of masculine citizens. and so with all our common language, it is in a false tense. it is mere democratic verbal gymnastics, clothing the same old monarchial, aristocratic mental beliefs, with man now the "divine right" ruler and with woman his subject and perquisite. its gender is misstated and its import multiplied by two. it does not mean what it says, and it does not say what it means. our thoughts are adjusted to false verbal forms, and so the thoughts do not ring true. they are merely hereditary forms of speech. all masculine thought and expression up to the present time has been in the language of sex, and not in the language of race; and so it has come about that the music of humanity has been set in one key and played on one chord. it has been well said that an englishman cannot speak french correctly until he has learned to think in french. it is far more true that no one can speak or write the language of human liberty and equality until he has learned to think in that language, and to feel without stopping to argue with himself, that right is not masculine only and that justice knows no sex. were the claim to superior opportunity, status and position based upon capacity, character or wealth, upon perfection of form or grace of bearing, one could understand, if not accept, the reasonableness of the position, for it would then rest upon some sort of recognized superiority, but while it is based upon sex--a mere accident of form carrying with it a brute instinct, which is not even glorified by the capacity to produce, and seldom throughout nature, to suffer for and protect the blossom of that instinct--surely no lower, less vital or more degraded a basis could possibly be chosen. not long ago a heated argument arose here in chicago over the teaching of german in the public schools. this argument was used by one of the leading contestants in one of the leading journals: the whole amount of education that per cent, of our public school pupils receive is lamentably small. it is far less than we could wish it to be. most of these children, who are to be the citizens, and by their ballots the rulers of this nation, can often remain but a few years in the schoolroom. for the average american citizen who is not a professional man, or who is not destined for diplomatic service abroad, english can afford all the mental and intellectual pabulum needed. now here is an amusing and also a humiliating illustration of the way these matters are handled, and it is for that reason, only, that i have used a local question here. "ninety-five per cent, of our public school pupils," etc., "by their ballots are to be rulers of the nation," etc., "future citizens," forsooth! now it simply did not occur to the gentleman who wrote this, and to the hundreds who so write and speak daily, that the most of those per cent have no ballots, do not "rule," are not "future citizens," but that they belong to the proscribed sex, have committed the crime of being girls, even before they entered the public schools, and so have permanently outlawed themselves for citizenship in this glorious republic of "equals." but his entire argument (made upon so large a per cent) really rests upon a much smaller number. but the girls made good ballast for the argument. they answered to fill in the "awful example," but they are not allowed the justice of real citizenship, nor to be the future "rulers" for and because of whom the whole argument is made, for whose educational rights and needs, alone, because of their future ballots, he cares so tenderly. it will not do to attempt to avoid this issue by the hackneyed plea. "the hand that rocks the cradle rules the world." every one knows that this is not true in the sense in which it is used. it is true, alas! in a sense never dreamed of by politician and publican. it is true that the degraded status of maternity has ruled and does rule the world, in that it has been, and is, the most potent power to keep the race from lofty achievement. subject mothers never did, and subject mothers never will, produce a race of free, well poised, liberty-loving, justice-practicing children. maternity is an awful power. it blindly strikes back at injustice with a force that is a fearful menace to mankind. and the race which is born of mothers who are harassed, bullied, subordinated and made the victims of blind passion or power, or of mothers who are simply too petty and self-debased to feel their subject status, cannot fail to continue to give the horrible spectacles we have always had of war, of crime, of vice, of trickery, of double-dealing, of pretense, of lying, of arrogance, of subserviency, of incompetence, of brutality, and, alas! of insanity, idiocy and disease added to a fearful and unnecessary mortality. to a student of anthropology and heredity it requires no great brain power to trace these results to causes. we need only remember that the mental, as well as the physical conditions, capacities and potentialities are inherited, to understand how the dead level of hopeless mediocrity must be preserved as the rule of the race so long as the potentialities of that race must be filtered always through and take its impetus from a mere annex to man's power, ambition, desires and opinions. let me respond right here to those who will--who always do--insist that woman is not so held to-day at least in england and america. that her present status is a dignified, an equal or even a superior one. i will illustrate: in a recent speech by the hon. william e. gladstone he pleaded most eloquently and earnestly for the right of irishmen to rule and govern themselves. among many other things he said: "the principal weapons of the opposition are bold assertion, persistent exaggeration, constant misconstruction and copious, arbitrary and baseless prophecies. true there are conflicting financial arrangements to be dealt with, but among the difficulties nothing exists which ought to abash or terrify men desirous to accomplish a great object. for the first time in ninety years the bill will secure the supremacy of parliament as founded upon right as well as backed by power." had these remarks been made with an eye single to the "woman question," they could not have been more exactly descriptive of the facts in the case; but with irishmen only on his mind he continued thus: "the persistent distrust of the irish people, despite all they can do, comes simply to this, that they are to be pressed below the level of civilized mankind. when the boon of self government is given to the british colonies is ireland alone to be excepted from its blessings? to deny ireland home rule is to say that she lacks the ordinary faculties of humanity." he said "irish people," but he meant irish men only. but see to what his argument leads. he says it is "pressing them below the level of civilized mankind" to deny them the right to stand erect, to use their own brains and wills in their own government; and a great party in his own country and a great party in this country echo with mad enthusiasm his opinions--for men! they call it "mankind." they mean one-half of mankind only, for not even mr. gladstone is able to rise high enough above his sex bias to see that the denial of all self-government, all representation in the making of the laws she is to obey "presses woman below the level of civilized mankind." words cease to have a par value even with the stickler for verbal accuracy the instant their own arguments are applied to the other sex. eloquently men can and do portray the wrongs, the outrages, the abuses which always have arisen, which always must arise from class legislation--from that condition which makes it impossible for one class or condition of citizens of a country to make their needs, desires, preferences and opinions felt in the organic law of their country on an equal and level footing with their fellows. men have needed no great ability to enable them to prove that tyranny unspeakable always did and always will follow unlimited power over others so long as their arguments applied between man and man, but the instant the identical arguments are used to apply between man and woman that instant their whole attitude changes. that instant words lose all par value. that instant all men, including those who have but just waxed eloquent over the injustice and the real danger of permitting inequality before the law, become aristocrats. claiming to be the logical sex, man throws logic to the winds. claiming to have fought and bled to enthrone "liberty," he forgets its very name! asserting that in his own hand alone can the scales of justice be held level, he makes of justice, of liberty and of equality a mockery and a pretense! he has so far read all of those words in the masculine gender only. he has not yet learned to think them in a universal language. he stultifies his every utterance and makes of his mind a jailer, and of his laws slave drivers, for all who cannot by physical force wrench from him the right to their own liberty and to their human status of equality of opportunity. men have everywhere grown to believe that they have been born and that they rule women by divine right. woman is a mere annex to and for his glory. she exists for him to rule, to think for, to adore, to tolerate or to abuse as he sees fit, or as is his type or nature. her appeal must not be to an equal standard of justice which she has helped to frame, administer and live by; but it must be to his generosity, his tenderness, his toleration or his chivalry--in short, to his absolute power over her. "no people can be free without an equal legal footing for all of its citizens!" exclaims the statesman, and drums beat and trumpets blare and men march and countermarch in enthusiastic response to the sentiment. "we must have a government of the people, by the people, for the people" is cheered to the echo whenever heard, and nobody realizes that what is meant always is a government of men, by men, for men, with woman as an annex. only three weeks ago all of our papers had leaders, editorials and cablegrams to announce that "universal suffrage has been granted in belgium." they all grew enthusiastic over it. one of our leading new york editors said (and i use his editorial simply because it is a very good example of what almost all of our important journals said): "the triumph of the belgian democracy is an event of the first significance. the masses had long appealed in vain for a removal of the property qualification which restricted the right of suffrage to , persons out of a population of over ,- , but the chambers, dominated by the wealthy classes, resolutely refused to comply with the demand until a dangerous revolution was inaugurated. "even how the change in the constitution granting universal suffrage is coupled with the right of plural voting by the property-owners, but it is quite certain that this obnoxious feature will be soon abandoned by the chambers and universal suffrage will prevail, as in the adjoining nations of france and germany. "when these newly enfranchised electors choose the next legislature important changes may be expected in the laws applicable to the employment of labor, which have hitherto been framed solely in the interest of the mine-owners and the manufacturers. fortunately for the king, he seems to be in sympathy with this effort of the masses to acquire a fair representation in the government. in the recent riots the hostility of the people was directed against the assembly rather than against the crown. it is very evident that the democratic spirit is gaining ground throughout europe. its influence is manifest in the home rule movement in england, in the hostility to the army bill in germany, and in the rapid changes of the ministers of france. it steadily advances in every direction and never loses ground once acquired. it progresses peacefully if it can, but forcibly if it must. its triumph in belgium is one of the signs of the times in the old world." "the people" are all male in belgium, in france, germany and america, or else all of these statements are mere figures of speech, are wholly untrue, for the women of belgium, of france, of germany--and, alas! of democratic america, were not even thought of when the words "people," "citizens," "masses," "laborers," etc., were used. they are counted in the estimates of the population as all of these. they are used to fill vacancies, to swell estimates, to round out statistics, but in the result of these arguments and statistics, in the victories won for liberty to the individual, woman has no part. she is the one outlaw in human progress. in a recent magazine this passage occurs: "austria.--on april dr. victor adler, a socialist leader, spoke to about , workingmen in favor of universal suffrage. he said that two-thirds of the adult men had not the suffrage. only half-civilized countries, like russia and spain, now placed their citizens in such inequality before the law. the workingmen of austria had never before this winter suffered such hardships, and now in vienna , workmen were without shelter." yet there is no report that dr. adler nor the editor of the magazine, who waxed eloquent over it, saw any special "hardship" or "inequality" in a degraded status for all women. "universal suffrage," indeed! and has austria no women citizens? were the working women who have not the ballot, better sheltered than the men? or do they need no shelter? another editor says: "don't talk about a free ballot while the bread of the masses is in the giving of the classes." yet, had a venturesome girl type-setter made it read, "don't talk about a free ballot, a democracy or freedom while the bread of women is in the giving of men," the editor would have said: "she is insane, and besides that, she is talking unwomanly nonsense." it is the same in science, in literature, in religion. all estimates are made on and for the "human race," "the people of a country," etc. the "will of the people" is spoken of; we are told all about the brain size and capacity and convolutions, etc., of the different "peoples"; we hear learned discourses about it all, and when you sift them, woman--one-half of the race talked about--is used always simply and only as ballast, as filling to make a point in man's favor. she does not figure in the benefits. he is the race--she his annex. not long ago an amusing illustration of this came to my knowledge. as you may perhaps know, there is more money invested in life insurance than in any other great financial enterprise in the world. this is the way insurance experts look at the woman question. the estimates of longevity, desirability of risk, etc., are based upon male standards. this is not in itself unnatural or unreasonable, since men have been the chief insurers, but few companies, indeed, being willing to insure women at all. but not long ago a lady applied for a policy on her life in a first-class company. she had three little children for whom she wished to provide in case of her death. she believed that she could properly support them so long as she lived. to her surprise she was told that the rate at which she must pay was $ on each $ , more than her brother had to pay at the same age. she asked the actuary--a very profound man--why this was so. he told her that women had been found to be not so good risks as men, since they were subject to more dangers of death than were men, and that to make the companies safe it had been found necessary to charge women a higher rate. she had heard much and eloquently all her life long of the dangers of men's lives; of the shielded, sheltered state of feminine humanity, and she had never dreamed that it was--from a mortuary point of view--"extra hazardous" to be a woman. she assumed, however, that it must be so and paid her extra hazardous premium, just as if she belonged to the army or was a blaster or miner or "contemplated going up in a balloon." a short time afterward her mother, an elderly lady, had some money to invest. she did not wish to care for it herself, as she had never had the least business experience. she applied to the same actuary to know how much of an annual income or annuity she could buy for the sum she had. he figured on it for a while and told her. it was a good deal less than a man could get for the same amount. she had the temerity to ask why. "well," said the actuary, gazing benignly over his glasses at her in a congratulatory fashion, "you see women live longer than men do--" "but you told my daughter that they did not live so long, and so she pays at a higher rate on insurance to make you safe lest she should die too young. now you charge me more for an annuity on the theory that a woman lives longer than a man." "well," said he, readjusting his glasses and going carefully over the mortuary table again, "that does seem to be the fact. if a woman assures her life she beats the company by dying sooner than a man and if she takes an annuity she beats us by living longer than he would. don't know how it happens, but we charge extra to cover the facts as we find 'em." such is masculine logic upon feminine perversity even in death. yet men say that they understand us and our needs so much better than we do ourselves that they abandon all of their reasoning, logic, enthusiasm and beliefs on the great fundamental principles of justice, equality, liberty and law the moment their own arguments are applied to women instead of to "labor," the "irish question" or to any other phase of class legislation as applied between man and man. the fact is simply and only this, that the arrogance of sex power and perversion is now so thoroughly ingrained that man really believes himself to be--by divine right--the human race and that woman is his perquisite. he has no universal language. he thinks in the language of sex. but more than this, and worse than this, he insists upon no one else being allowed to think in the language of humanity, and to translate that thought into action. the moral responsibility of woman in heredity read before the world's congress of representative women, chicago, ladies and gentlemen:--poets, statesmen, novelists, and artists have for ages untold striven to eclipse each other in the eulogies of motherhood. on the stage nothing is so sure of rapturous applause as is some touching bit of sacrifice which has reached its climax in a mother's love wherein she has yielded all to shield, to protect, or to better the condition of husband or child. from the crude topical songs which advise the son to "stick to your mother when her hair turns gray," through the various phases of maternal love and devotion or sacrifice in the "camille" type of thought, on up to the loftiest touches in art and literature, there is alike the effort to celebrate the power, the potentiality and the beauty of motherhood and to stimulate the sentiments of gratitude and love and of admiration for and emulation of the ideal depicted. but through it all, in the building and nurturing of the ideal, there runs--ever and always--the thread of thought that self-sacrifice, self-abnegation, self-effacement, are the grandest attributes of maternity. that in order to be a perfect, an ideal wife and mother, the woman must be sunk, the individual immolated, the ego subjugated. to a degree and in a sense, that is, of course, true. for the willingness to go down to the gates of death; to face its possibility for long, weary months; to know that suffering, and to fear that death, stands as a sure and inevitable host at the end of a long journey--to know this and to be willing to face it for the sake of others is a heroism, a bravery, a self-abnegation so infinitely above and beyond the small heroism of camp or battlefield that comparison is almost sacrilege. the condemned man, upon whom the death watch has been set, who cannot hope for executive clemency, who is helpless in the hands of absolute power, still knows that, although death may be sure, physical suffering is unlikely or at the worst will be but brief; but he alone stands in the position to know--even to a degree--the nervous strain, the mental anguish, the unthinking but uncontrollable panics of flesh and blood and nerve which woman faces at the behests of love and maternity and, alas, that it can be true, at the behests of sex power and financial dependence! but when we study anthropology and heredity we come to realize the indisputable facts that her love, her physical heroism and her bravery, linked with her political and financial subject status, has cast a physical blight, a moral shadow and a mental threat upon the world, we cease to clap quite so vigorously at the theater and our tears or smiles are mingled with mental reservations and a sigh for a loftier ideal of the meaning and purpose of maternity than the merely physical one that man has depicted as material sacrifice to the child and self-abnegation and subjection to him. we begin to wonder if much of the vice, the crime, the wrong, the insanity, the disease, the incompetence and the woe of the world is not the direct lineal descendant of this very self-debasement of the individual character of woman in maternity! we wonder if an unwilling, a forced or supinely yielding (and not self-controlled), a subject motherhood, in short, is not responsible to the race for the weak, the deformed, the depraved, the double dealing, pretense-soaked natures which curse the world with failure, with disease, with war, with insanity and with crime. we wonder if the awful power with which nature clothes maternity in heredity does not strike blindly back at the race for man's artificial and cruel requirements at the hands of the producer of the race. we wonder if mothers do not owe a higher duty to their offspring than that of mere nurse. we wonder if she has the moral right to give her children the inheritance that accident and subserviency stamps upon body and mind. we wonder how she dares face her child and know that she did not fit herself by self-development and by direct, sincere, firm and thorough qualifications for maternity before she dared to assume its responsibilities. we wonder that man has been so slow in learning to read the message that nature has telegraphed to him in letters of fire and photographed with a terrible persistency upon the distorted, diseased bodies and minds of his children and upon the moral imbeciles she has set before him as an answer to his message of sex domination.* * "alienists bold, in general, that a large proportion of mental diseases is the result of degeneracy; that is, they are the offspring of drunken, insane, syphilitic and consumptive parents, and suffer from the action of heredity."--dr. macdonald; author of criminology. "who has sinned, this man or his parents that he was blind?" bible. self-abnegation, subserviency to man--whether he be father, lover, or husband--is the most dangerous that can be taught to, or forced upon her, whose character shall mould the next generation! she has no right to transmit a nature and a character that is subservient, subject, inefficient, undeveloped--in short, a slavish character, which is either blindly obedient or blindly rebellious and is therefore set, as is a time-lock, to prey or to be preyed upon by society in the future! if woman is not brave enough personally to demand, and to obtain, absolute personal liberty of action, equality of status and entire control of her great and race-endowing function of maternity, she has no right to dare to stamp upon a child, and to curse a race with the descendants of a servile, a dwarfed, a time-and-master-serving character. we have been taught that it is an awful thing to commit murder--to take a human life. there are students of anthropology and heredity who think that it is a far more awful thing to thrust, unasked, upon a human being a life that is handicapped before he gets it. it is a far more solemn responsibility to give than to take a human life! in the one case you invade personal liberty and put a stop to an existence more or less valuable and happy, but at least all pain is over for that invaded individuality. in the other case--in giving life--you invade the liberty of infinite oblivion and thrust into an inhospitable world another human entity to struggle, to sink, to swim, to suffer or to enjoy. whether the one or the other no mortal knows, but surely knows it must contend not only with its environment but with its heredity--with itself. not long ago a great man, who is successful beyond most human units, who is wealthy, socially to be envied, who enjoys almost ideal family relations, who is in all regards a man of broad intellect, of large heart, who is beloved, successful and powerful--not long ago this man said to me, when talking of life and its chances, its joys and its burdens and wrongs: "well, the more i think of it all, the more i know, the more i delve into philosophy and science, the more i understand life as it is and as it must be for long years to come, if not forever, the more i wonder at the sturdy bravery of those who are less fortunate than i. does it pay me to live? would i choose to be born again? were i to-day unborn, could i be asked for my vote, knowing all i do of life, would i vote to come into this world? taking life at its best estate are we not assuming a tremendous risk to thrust it unasked upon those who are at least safe from its pitfalls? i ask myself these questions very often," he said, and then hesitatingly, "i sometimes think it pays after all. of course, since i am here i am bound to make the best of it, but for all that i am not sure how i would vote on my birth if i had the chance to try it--not quite sure." "if you are so impressed with life for yourself--you, a fortunate, healthy, wealthy, happily married, successful man," said i, "don't you think it is a pretty serious thing to assume the right to cast that vote for another human pawn, who could hardly conceivably stand your chances in the world?" "serious," he exclaimed. "serious! with the world's conditions what they are to-day, with the physical, moral and mental chances to run, with woman, the character-forming producer of the race a half-educated subordinate to masculine domination, it is little short of madness; it is not far from a crime. it is a crime unless the mother is a physically healthy, a mentally developed and comprehending, morally clear, strong, vigorous entity who knows her personal responsibility in maternity and, knowing, dares maintain it." it has been the fashion to hold that the mothers of the race should not be the thinkers of the race. indeed, in commenting upon this congress of representative women, the most widely read newspaper on this continent last week said editorially: "there is to be a great series of women's congresses held at chicago during the fair. the purpose is to illustrate and celebrate the progress of women. accordingly there will be sessions to discuss the achievements of women in art, authorship, business, science, histrionic endeavor, law, medicine and a variety of other activities. "but so far as the published programmes enable us to judge not one thing is to be done to show the progress of women as women. there will be no showing made of any increased capacity on their part to make homes happier, to make their husbands stronger for their work in the world, to encourage high endeavors, to maintain the best standards of honor and duty, to stimulate, encourage, uplift--which--from the beginning of civilization--has been the supreme feminine function. nothing, it appears, is to be done at the congresses to show that a higher education and a larger intellectual advancement has enabled women to bear healthier children or to bring them up in a manner more surely tending to make this a better world to live in, the noblest of all work that can be done by women. "we need no congress to show us that women are more thoroughly educated than they once were, or that they can successfully do things once forbidden to them. but have wider culture and wider opportunities made them better wives and mothers? a congress which should show that would make all men advocates of still larger endeavors for woman's advancement. a congress, on the other hand, which assumes that the only thing to be celebrated is an increased capacity to win fame or money will teach a disastrously false and dangerous lesson to our growing girls." this fatal blunder as to woman's development as woman--quite aside from her home relations, which the editor confuses with it--has retarded the real civilization and caused to be transmitted--unnecessarily transmitted--the characteristics which have gone far to make insanity, disease and deformity of mind and body, the heritage of well-nigh every family in the land. a great medical expert said to me not long ago, "there is not more than one family in ten who can show a clean bill of health, mental and physical--aye, and moral--from hereditary taints that are serious in threat and almost certain of development in one form or another. "now, if a man with a contagious disease enters a community he is quarantined for the benefit of his fellows, who might never take it if he were not restrained and isolated. but if a man with a hereditary or transmittible disorder, which is certain, enters a community, he is allowed to marry and transmit it to the helpless unborn--to establish a line of posterity--who are far more directly his victims than would be those who were exposed to a cholera contagion by a lack of quarantine. fathers, physicians, society, and all educational and economic conditions have conspired to keep mothers ignorant of all the facts of life of which mothers should know everything; and so it has come about that the race is the victim of the narrow and dangerous doctrine of sex domination and sex restriction, and of selfish reckless indulgence. if not one family in ten can show a clean bill of heredity, is it not more than time that the mothers learn why, learn where, and in what they are responsible, and that they cease 'to close the doors of mercy on mankind?'" maternity, its duties, needs and responsibilities has been exploited in all ages and climes; in all phases and spheres, from one point of view only--the point of view of the male owner. if you think that this statement is extreme i beg of you to read "the evolution of marriage" by letourneau. read it all. read it with care. it is the production of a man of profound learning and research, a man who sees the light of the future dawning, although even he sometimes lapses from a universal, language of humanity into hereditary forms of speech, hedged in by sex bias. but in all the past arguments maternity with its duties to itself; maternity with its duties to the race, has never been more than merely touched upon, and even then it has been chiefly from the side of the present, and not with the tremendous search-light of heredity and of future generations turned upon it. it has been ever and always in its relations to the desires, opinions and prejudices of the present man power which controls it. some time ago a famous doctor in new york took up the cudgel against higher education for women, and under the heading of "education and maternity; woman's proper sphere; the dangers which threaten intellectual and society women;" wrote in favor of ignorant wives and a larger number of children. a great journal published his article without protest, thus giving added prestige to the opinions expressed. this, too, in spite of the fact that at that very time the same journal was appealing for alms, for free nurses, for volunteer doctors and for a fresh-air fund to enable the ignorant mothers of the crime-infested, disease-pol-luted, over populated tenements of the city to get even a breath of fresh air by the sea, which is only two miles from its doors! in spite of the fact, too, that lombroso, ricardo, mendel, spitzka, macdonald and other famous anthropologists and experts have pointed out so plainly in their criminal, insane, imbecile and mortuary statistics the all-pervading evil of rapid, ill advised, irresponsible parentage. professor edward s. morse, in a recent paper called "natural selection in crime," which he courteously sent to me, said: "to one at all familiar with the external aspects of insanity in its various forms it seems incredible that its physical nature was not sooner realized. had the laws of heredity been earlier understood it would have been seen that mental derangements, like physical diseases and tendencies, were transmitted." of late years there has sprung into existence a school of criminal anthropology, with societies, journals, and a rapidly increasing literature. a most admirable summary of the work thus far accomplished has recently been given by dr. robert fletcher in his address as retiring president of the anthropological society of washington. in his opening paragraphs dr. fletcher thus graphically portrays the scourge of the criminal and his rapid increase: "in the cities, towns and villages of the civilized world every year thousands of unoffending men and women are slaughtered; millions of money, the product of honest toil and careful saving, are carried away by the conqueror, and incendiary fires light his pathway of destruction. who is this devastator, this modern "scourge of god," whose deeds are not recorded in history? the criminal! statistics unusually trustworthy show that if the carnage yearly produced by him could be brought together at one time and place it would excel the horrors of many a well-contested field of battle. in nine great countries of the world, including our own favored land, in one year, , cases of homicide were recorded, and in the six years extending from to , in the united states alone, , murders came under cognizance of the law. "and what has society done to protect itself against this aggressor? true, there are criminal codes, courts of law, and that surprising survival of the unfittest, trial by jury. vast edifices have been built as prisons and reformatories, and philanthropic persons have formed societies for the instruction of the criminal and to care for him when his prison gates are opened. but, in spite of it all, the criminal becomes more numerous. he breeds criminals; the taint is in the blood, and there is no royal touch can expel it." commenting on this professor morse says: "certain results of the modern school of anthropology, as presented by dr. fletcher, may be briefly summed up by stating broadly that in studying the criminal classes from the standpoint of anatomy, physiology, external appearance, even to the minuter shades of difference in the form of the skull and facial proportions, the criminal is a marked man. his abnormities are characteristic, and are to be diagnosticated in only one way. that these propositions are being rapidly established there can be no doubt. as an emphatic evidence of their truth, the criminal is able to transmit his criminal propensities even beyond the number of generations allotted to inheritance by scripture." and where do all these lunatics and criminals come from? from educated mothers? from mothers who are in even a small and limited sense allowed to own themselves, to think for themselves, control their own lives? not at all. they are the mothers whose lives belong to their men, as this learned doctor, who objects to the higher education of women, argues that all wives should. maternity is an awful power, and i repeat that it strikes back at the race, with a blind, fierce, far-reaching force, in revenge for its subject status. dr. arthur macdonald, in his "criminology," says: "the intellectual physiognomy shows an inferiority in criminals, and when in an exceptional way there is a superiority, it is rather in the nature of cunning and shrewdness.... poverty, misery and organic debility are not infrequently the cause of crime." who is likely to transmit "organic debility?" the mother of many children or of few? who is likely to stamp a child with low intellectual physiognomy? the mother who is educated or she who is the willing or unwilling subordinate in life's benefits? again he says: "every asymmetry is not necessarily a defect of cerebral development, for, as suggested above, under the influence of education defects of function can be corrected, covered up or eradicated." can this be true of criminals and not of normal women? again he says: "when we consider the early surroundings, unhygienic conditions, alcoholic parents, etc., of the criminal, where he may begin vice as soon as consciousness awakes, malformation, due to neglect and rough treatment, are not surprising. yet the criminal malformations may be frequently due to osteological conditions. but here still hereditary influence and surrounding conditions in early life exert their power." benedikt says: "to suppose that an atypically constructed brain can function normally is out of the question." so long as motherhood is kept ignorant, dependent and subject in status just that long will heredity avenge the outrage upon her womanhood, upon her personality, upon her individual right to a dignified, personal, equal human status, by striking telling blows on the race. but let me return to the arguments of the author of "higher education and woman's sphere," since he represents all the reactionary thought on this topic and because he ignores utterly, as do all of his fellows, woman's duty to herself and her awful power for good or evil upon the race, according as she makes herself a dignified, developed, educated and independent individuality first and a function of maternity second. it seems to me that in discussing no other question in life is there so little logical reasoning and so much arbitrary dogmatism as in the ones which are usually embraced under "woman's sphere." in the first place, it is assumed that because women are mothers they are nothing else; that because this is her sphere she can have, should have, no other. men are fathers. that is their sphere, therefore they should not be mentally developed, legally and politically emancipated, socially civilized or economically independent. this would appear to most men, doubtless, as a somewhat absurd proposition. it appears so to me, but it is not one whit less absurd when applied to women. yet this is constantly done. because women are mothers is the very reason why they should be developed mentally and physically and socially to their highest possible capacity. the old theory that a teacher was good enough for a primary class if she knew the "a b c's" and little else has long since been exploded. a high degree of intellectual capacity and a broad mental grasp are more important in those who have the training and molding of small children than if the children were older. the younger the mind the less capable it is to guide itself intelligently and therefore the more important is it that the guide be both wise and well informed. in a college, if the professor is only a little wiser than his class it does not make so much difference. in a post-graduate course it makes even less, for here all are supposed to be somewhat mature. each has within himself an intelligent guide, a reasoner, a questioner and one to answer questions. with little children the one who has them in charge most closely must be all this and more. she must understand the proportions and relations of things and wherein they touch--the bearing and trend of mental and physical phenomena. she must furnish self-poise to the nervous child and stimulus to the phlegmatic one. she must be able to read signs and interpret indications in the mental and moral, as well as in the physical being of those within her care. all this she must be able to do readily and with apparent unconsciousness if she is best fitted to deal with and develop small children. more than this, she must be not only able to detect wants but have the wisdom to guide, to stimulate, to restrain, to develop the plastic creature in her keeping. if she had the wisdom of the fabled gods and the self-poise of the milo she would not be too well equipped for bearing and educating the race in her keeping. but more than this the ideal mother should know and be. she must have love too loyal and sense of obligation too profound to recklessly bring into the world children she cannot properly endow or care for. it does not appear to occur to the physicians and politicians who discuss this question that it may be due to other causes than incapacity that the educated women are the mothers of fewer children than are the "ideal wives and mothers" of whom they speak in their arguments against her higher education--the squaws of the kaffirs and black-feet indian women, who "devote but a few hours to the completion of this act of nature," as our doctor felicitously expresses it. it is no doubt true that habits of civilization do tend to make the dangers of motherhood greater. so do they tend to render men less sturdy--less perfect animals. a kaffir or an indian buck would not find it necessary to stay at home from his office, for example, because of a broken arm, or a gun shot wound in the leg. he would tramp sturdily through the forest, and sleep in the jungle with an arrow imbedded in his flesh. he would sit stolidly down on a log and cut it out of himself with a scalping-knife. yet nobody would think it a desirable thing for a member of the union league club to stop on his way up fifth avenue and attend to his own surgery on the sidewalk. they would expect him to faint, and to be "carried tenderly into the nearest drug store" and a doctor would be sent for. he would be put under the influence of an anaesthetic drug during the operation, and carefully nursed for weeks afterward by his devoted wife, and intelligent physician. then if he pulled through it would be heralded far and wide as because of his "magnificent physique, his pluck and the excellent treatment he received." well now, is he a less "manly man" than is the kaffir or the indian buck? is he a less desirable husband and father? is he "deteriorating in his sphere?" the fact is, the more sensitive men have become to pain, whether it be mental or physical, the more manly have they grown, the more nearly fitted to be the fathers of a race of men and women who are not mere brutes. the race does not need the brute type any longer. it has already too many mere human animals to deal with--in its asylums, almshouses, prisons and impoverished districts. this world is in no danger of suffering from a lack of children, the cry has always been "over population" and even in our new country the wail has begun. not more children, but a better kind of children is what is needed. who will be likely to furnish these? the ideal "squaw wife" or the educated woman, who knows that her obligation to her child begins before it is born, and does not end even with her death, for she must leave it the heritage of a good name, an earnest life, a noble example, even after she is gone. if by "being unfitted for the sphere of wife and mother" it is meant that this sphere is truly that of a mere animal--a healthy animal--if in order to be an ideal wife to civilized man, woman should remain a savage; if to be a mother to an intellectually advancing race she need not even comprehend the advance, then truly are these arguments against her higher education and intellectual development logical. but even then they are not fair. why? simply because she has not been consulted as to her choice in the matter. the argument is still based on the tremendous assumption that man's happiness, man's desires, man's wishes, man's rights, are the sum total of all desire, all right, all freedom, all happiness and all justice. it omits two tremendous equations--that of the woman herself and that of her offspring, who will have a right to demand of her how she dared equip him so badly for the life into which she has taken the liberty to bring him. to demand of her how she dared equip herself so ill for her self-imposed task of creator of a human soul! up to the present time woman's moral responsibility in heredity has been below the point of zero, for the reason that she has had no voice in her own control nor in that of her children. with the present knowledge of heredity she who permits herself to become a mother without having demanded and obtained ( ) her own freedom from sex dominion and ( ) fair and free conditions of development for herself and her child, will commit a crime against herself, against her child and against the race. but the learned doctor deplores the fact that educated women are bringing fewer children into the world, and argues that, this being the case, it shows that education is not within woman's sphere. now, if a man does not choose to become the father of ten or twelve children nobody on earth feels called upon to criticise him as not properly filling his sphere--as out of his proper sphere--in case he prefers to spend more of his time on mental development and progress than upon irresponsible physical indulgence and paternity. if he makes up his mind that he cannot or does not wish to become responsible for the mental and physical endowment and well-being of more than one or two children, or of none, nobody says that his "college training unfitted him for the holy position of husband and father, which is his sphere." perhaps the college training may have a good deal to do with it in the sense that with his developed mind and wider information, his sense of right and of personal obligation to the unborn has tended in that direction. we do not often notice a vast degree of self discipline of this nature in the uneducated, whether it be man or woman, but is this a reason for deprecating intellectual training for our boys? why then for the girls? it appears to me that it is one of the greatest possible arguments in favor of higher education for women, unless, indeed, it is desirable to be mere kaffirs, both male and female, which has its strong points. kaffirs are healthier, hardier, more irresponsibly, happily brutal. they have few nervous moments, i fancy, over the future good of wife or child or friend. their sense of obligation does not keep them awake nights. they are neither afraid nor ashamed to create helpless human beings simply to furnish targets for another tribe. they have not even a glimmer of the thought--still embryonic, indeed, in civilized man--that the woman whose life is risked, and the child upon whom life is thrust unasked, are of the least consideration in the matter. these have no rights which the kaffir lord is bound to respect. i fancy if he were asked a question on the subject he would look at you in stupid, silent wonder, if he did not ask: "what have they got to do with it? i am the race. what she and my children are for is to look after me, to make me comfortable, to be my inferiors, for my glory." most likely he would be so stupidly unequal to even the shadow of a thought not purely egotistic that he could not even formulate such preposterous questions and self-evident statements as these. but his civilized brother does it for him--so why complain?* * the report of the marriage of another educated and refined white woman to a full-blooded sioux indian shows the species of lunacy that attacks those who make a hobby of indian education. the woman who has cast in her lot with an indian, whose savagery is only veneered with civilized manners, will repent of her act, as all her sisters in misery have done before her. as a husband the american indian is not a model, for even long training among white people fails to uproot his native idea that a woman is simply provided to bear him children and to do hard work which is beneath his dignity.-- n. y. press. june, . now, suppose a woman would prefer to enjoy her mental capabilities to the full and develop these rather than to be the mother of a large brood; suppose she thinks she should be a developed woman first before daring to become a mother, whose right is it to object? if men prefer kaffir wives there is a large assortment on hand. squaws, both white and red, are to be had for the asking. whose right is it to decide that all women shall be squaws in mental development, in social position, in legal status and in political and economic relations, if all women do not choose to be such? has a woman not the right to be a human being and count one in the economy of life before she is a mother---quite aside from her maternal capabilities? if not, when and where did she forfeit that right? when and where did _man_ get his? every man has and maintains the right to be a man first--a unit, a responsible human being; after that--aside from it--he may, if he choose, become also a husband and a father. is it not more than possible that the whole human race has been dwarfed and retarded and hampered in its upward struggle because of this unaccountable effort to climb one side at a time, because brute force and phenomenal egotism have always refused to place humanity on terms of equal opportunity and leave nature alone? we are constantly informed that those who insist on equal opportunities, on equal status before the law for women are making an effort to subvert nature; that nature has done this and that and the other thing with and for women. well if she has, then she will take care of the results in an open field. she does not need special, restrictive laws placed on the sex that she has already put under the ban of inferiority. if the superior sex cannot still more than hold its own without putting a high protective tariff on itself then how can it claim to be the superior sex? nature has managed very well with the lower animals, giving them equal surroundings and opportunities. that nature is not allowed to manage for women is the very point we object to. men have made all sorts of laws for and about women that are not made for and about men. why not make laws and make them apply to the human being, leaving the sex of that human being out of the question? it is the special, restrictive, unnatural sex provisions in the laws and in the conditions of life that are objected to. no woman objects to nature's decree that she is a potential mother any more than men object to her decree that they are potential fathers. it is the fact that men insist that women are this and nothing more--which nature did not say--to which women object. nowhere else in nature does the male claim all of the other avenues of life as his special sex privilege, except alone the one which he cannot perform--that of maternity. the sexes stand on an exact equality as to opportunity until we come to man. the brain of each is developed to the extent of its capacity. the freedom and opportunity for food and pleasure are enjoyed by the sexes alike. when the desire for maternity is strong upon her is the only time that the female brute animal ever becomes a mother. she decides when she is a mere mother, and when she is an animal with all the rights and privileges of her genus. with the human race alone is one-half governed upon the theory, and its opportunities fitted to the idea, that the female is never a unit, never a human being, never a person, but that she is simply, solely and only a potential mother, whose one "sphere" even then is to be controlled and regulated as to time, place and conditions--not by nature, not by herself, as with the lower animals, but by the other half of the race, which holds itself as first human, individual, and with rights, duties, privileges and ambitions pertaining to him as such. his sex relation, his potential paternity, is truly his "sphere" also, but that it is his whole sphere he has never dreamed. there are women who look at life the same way, for the other half of humanity, and decline to read nature's teachings--are unable to read them--in any other way. but aside from all this the doctor first claims that it is the intellectual development which cripples maternal capabilities and then he proceeds to give the reasons for the poor health of girls, which turn out to be bad ventilation in their schools, unwholesome sanitary conditions, injudicious or insufficient nourishment or physical and mental habits, and a lack of intelligent mothers and teachers, who dress and train the girls unhealthfully and in vitiated surroundings. how would boys fare under like conditions? would the doctor say that it was the intellectual training which wrecked the health of the boys or would he say that it was the absurd conditions under which they got their training? would he advise less mental work or less vile air; fewer studies or better light; more healthful clothing and food and exercise, or that the boys go homeland devote themselves to the sphere nature marked out for them--paternity? again the doctor appears to confuse society women with college women. as a rule they are totally distinct classes. the mere society woman who--so the doctor says--"wrecks her health in rounds of pleasure and bears sickly children or none," is, in nine cases out of ten, the exact opposite of the intellectual woman--the college-bred girl--who has learned before she leaves college the value of health and the obligation to herself and others to be well. it is true that certain of the fashionable schools which fit girls for society and for nothing else on earth call their girls educated; but, since no one else does, it were futile to confuse the two classes. the mere society girl, as a rule, is, so far as real mental development and higher education and capacity to think logically, are concerned, as truly a squaw as if she wore blanket and feathers. indeed, this is what she does wear mentally. she should be a perfect wife for the men who wish wives to be physical and not mental companions; she would be second only to the kaffir women in that she wears a trifle more clothing. but even in her case, would it not be wise to infer that she has not necessarily physically incapacitated herself for maternity by her frivolous life, so much as that she does not care for children, and would find them troublesome to a brain, which holds nothing more serious and valuable than jewels and reception dates? and, if she did reproduce her kind, would this world be benefited? why this constant cry for more children in a world crushed by the weight of sorrow, suffering and wrong to those already here? until children can be born into better conditions let us be thankful that there is one class of women too narrowly selfish and another class too full of the sense of obligation to add very rapidly to this bee hive of misery and discontent and wrong. the world needs healthier, wiser, truer children, not more of them, and until mothers are both educated and rank before the law as human beings, they will never be able to give that kind to the world. just so long as men must get their brains from the proscribed sex, just that long will their minds remain an "infant industry" and be in need of a high protective tariff in the shape of restrictive laws on women to shield men from equal competition in a fair field as and with human units. the laws of heredity are as inflexible as death. invariable, they are not; but so surely as there is a family likeness in faces, there are hereditary reasons for crime, for insanity, for disease, for mental and for moral imbecility, and women owe it to themselves, and to the world which they populate, not to allow themselves to be made either the unwilling, or the supine, transmitters or creators of a mentally, morally or physically dwarfed or distorted progeny. while reading the proof for this book, this interesting article comes to me from germany and shows how thoroughly the false basis of thought is being undermined, in other countries than our own. h. h. g. "there has been so much discussion concerning the physical and mental differences between men and women, and the representatives of social science have expressed so many contradictory opinions regarding this question, that i feel it my duty, as a physiologist, to give my opinion on this important matter. several fathers of the church have entirely denied that woman has a soul. the canonists write: 'woman is not formed after the image of god; and many philosophers in the same manner have considered women of small consequence. in a discourse 'concerning the education and culture of women,' prof sergi has followed the lead of this pessimistic school. the differences between the sexes, to which prof. sergi lias called attention, are doubtless significant for anthropology and physiology but, in my opinion, do not depend on the original condition of woman, but are caused by the barriers which have been raised by society regarding her destiny. in order to obtain an unprejudiced judgment, we must free woman from the yoke which man has placed upon her. we must observe her in the natural position, where she represents a particular language in the zoological scale. the ladies must now pardon me if i compare them with the lower animals, for in this way i can the better exalt them. "as objects of comparison we will observe the most intelligent and faithful animals. with regard to dogs and horses we notice little difference between either the strength or the temperament of males and females. the hunter fears the lioness more than the lion, and the same is true of tigers and panthers. prof. sergi, in the above-named discourse, has expressed the following condemnatory opinion: "neither in her physical nor mental capacities has woman reached man's normal scale of development, but on an average has remained so far behind that this sex seems to have come to a standstill in the general development of the race." this statement has surprised me in the highest degree. it appears to me that the marks of the human race, and the real physical characteristics which distinguish us from the animals, are feminine peculiarities. the principle has been adduced that the structure of the brain shows the abyss between man and animals. this is incorrect. there is no immeasurable difference between our brain and that of the gorilla, and the effects of the central cavities are shown only in the advancing development of the expressions of physical activity, not in their formation and character. a greater morphological difference between man and the animals is shown in the form of the pelvis. no physician, even twenty steps away, could mistake the pelvis of man for that of an anthropoid ape. the pelvis of woman is a new type which has appeared on the earth. until now we have sought in vain for that animal which shall complete the chain between us and animals. it is striking: the narrow, high pelvis of the man is more ape-like than that of the woman. if the assertion is correct that the upright gait (on two feet) is the mark of distinction, and the noblest one for man, then woman certainly possesses the advantage of a pelvis particularly suitable for upright walking. darwin has also demonstrated that female animals often revert to the masculine type, while the reverse seldom happens. more favorable conditions are necessary for the production of a female animal than a male, because the female embryo exhibits a greater fulness of life. statistics have shown that under unfavorable conditions more men than women are born; also, male animals die more easily than female. "several judges of the woman question who consider that the brain of woman cannot compare with that of man, add that women should not enter into emulation with men in the mental domain lest they should lose the charm of their femininity, and because they should give themselves up completely to their vocation as wife and mother. this division of the work is certainly very useful for man and has greatly assisted him to his position of power, and has pushed woman into the background. but it is incorrect that woman loses her womanliness by cultivating her mind." [from the deutsche revue.] heredity in its relations to a double standard of morals read before the world's congress of representative women, chicago, ladies and gentlemen:--as a student of anthropology and heredity one is sometimes compelled to make statements which seem to the thoughtless listener either too radical or too horrible to be true. if i were to assert, for example, that good men, men who have the welfare of the community at heart, men who are kind fathers and indulgent husbands, men who believe in themselves as pure, upright and good citizens, if i were to say that even such men are thorough believers in and supporters of the theory that it is right and wise to sacrifice the liberty, purity, health and life of young girls and women and, through the terrible power of heredity, to curse the race, rather than permit men and boys to suffer in their own persons the results of their own misdeeds, mistakes or crimes, i would be accused of being "morbid" and a "man hater." but let us see if the above statement is not quite within the facts. i shall take as an illustration the words and arguments of a man who stands second, only, to our chief police officer in the largest city in the united states, and since he was permitted to present his arguments in the most widely read journals of the country it seems fitting that these opinions be dealt with as of unusual importance. all the more is this the case since they were intended to influence legislation in the interest of state-regulated vice. among other things he said: "of course there are disorderly houses, but they are more hidden, and less of that vice is flaunted, than in any other city in the world. such places have existed since the world began and men of observation know that this fact is a safe-guard around their homes and daughters. men of candid judgment, religious men, know, too, that they had ten thousand times rather have their live, robust boys err in this indulgence, than think of them in the places of those unfortunates on the island, whose hands are muffled or tied behind them. this is a desperately practical question with more than a theoretical and sentimental side. it ought to be talked about and better understood among fathers. "thank god that vice is so hidden that dr. park-hurst has to get detectives to find disorderly houses, and that thousands of wives and daughters do not know even of their existence. such horrible disclosures as were made before innocent women and girls in dr. parkhurst's audience do vastly more harm in arousing their curiosity and polluting their minds than a host of sin that is compelled to hide its head. when i was captain of the twenty-ninth precinct, i went with dr. talmage on his errand for sensational information for his sermons. i know, from observation and from reports which i was careful to gather, that never in their history were the places he described as thronged by patrons, largely from brooklyn, or so much money spent there for debauchery as after those sermons." now i assume that this police inspector is a good citizen, father, husband and man. i assume that he is sincere and earnest in his desire and efforts to suppress crime and promote--so far as he is able--the welfare of the community. i assume, in short, that he is, in intent and in fact, a loyal citizen and a conscientious officer. i have no reason to believe that he is not doing what he conceives is best and right, and yet even he is quoted as advocating the sacrifice of purity to impurity, the creating of moral and social lepers in one sex in order that moral and social lepers or the ignorantly vicious of the other sex may escape the results of their own mistakes or vice. it impresses me anew that such teaching, from such authority, is not only the most unfortunate that can be put before a boy but that it goes farther perhaps than anything else can to confirm in men that conditions of sex mania which the inspector says is more desirable should be cultivated by means of regularly recognized state institutions for the utter sacrifice and death of young girls than that it should end in the wreck of the sex maniac himself and in his own destruction. but were our statesmen students of heredity, they would not need to be told that there is, there can be, no "safeguards around wives and daughters" so long as their husbands, fathers and sons are polluting the streams of life before they transmit that life itself to those who are to be "our daughters and wives." but not going so deeply into the subject, for the moment, as to deal with its hereditary bearings; upon what principle his argument can be valid, i fail to see. why is it better that some girl shall be sacrificed, body, mind and soul; why is it better that she shall be his victim than that he shall be his own? and then again, the problem is not solved when she is sacrificed. he has simply changed the form of his disease, and in the change, while it is possible that he has delayed for himself the day of destruction, he has, in the process, corrupted not only his victim but the social conscience, as well. were this all perhaps it would be still thought wise to follow the advice of the inspector--and alas, of some physicians--and continue to sacrifice under the bestial wheel of sex power those who are from first to last prey to the conditions of social and legal environment in which they are allowed no voice. but this is not all. the seeming "cure" is no cure at all. it is simply a postponement of the awful day for the sex maniac himself and, worse than this--more terrible than this--it is the cause of the continuance of the mania not only in himself but in his children. he marries some honest girl by and by and thus associates, with the burnt-out dregs of his life, one who would loathe him did she know his true character and his concealed but burning flame of insanely inherited, insanely indulged, bestially developed disease. but he is now--under the shadow of social respectability and church sanction--to perpetuate his unfortunate mania in those who are helpless--the unborn. heredity is not a slip-shod thing. it does not follow one parent and one alone. the children of a father who "sowed his wild oats" by the method prescribed by the inspector (and alas, by social custom) are as truly his victims as is the pariah of humanity who is to be quarantined in some given locality, made a social leper and a physical wreck that he, personally, may be neither the one nor the other. but nature is a terrible antagonist. she bides her time and when she strikes she does not forget to strike a harder, wider-reaching, more terrible blow than can be compassed by a single individuality or a single generation. this is the lesson that, so far, we have absolutely refused to learn. i do not hesitate to take issue with the inspector, therefore, and say that it is far better for society, far better for the fathers of unfortunate victims of sex mania, far better for the victim himself that he be "on the island with hands muffled or tied behind him," where death to one will end the misery to all, than that by applying the remedy which the inspector recommends, the result should be, as it is, a future generation of sex maniacs, scrofulous, epileptic or simply constitutionally undermined weaklings. the boys who are encouraged to "sow their wild oats" and taught that it is safe to do so under state regulation should hear the reports of some of the students of hereditary traits, conditions and developments. there is to-day in an asylum not so far from the inspector's own door but that its records are easy of access, one victim of this pernicious theory whose history runs thus: he was a gentleman of good social, financial and mental surroundings. he was a "young man about town." he possessed, (perhaps it was an hereditary trait) more consciousness of the fact that he was a male animal than that he was an intelligent, self-respecting human being who had no moral right to degrade another human being for his gratification, while he assumed to still retain a higher and safer plane than his companions in vice. he was, in brief, no better and no worse than many young fellows who--alas, that they are so taught by men who believe themselves good and honorable--"turn out to be good family men." after his system was thoroughly inoculated, physically, mentally, and morally or ethically, with the tone, the condition, the _trend_ of the life which the inspector, and many other good men, insist is unfit for the ears of women, but necessary to the welfare of men and "best" for them; after his life and flesh had this trend and absorption he married a lovely wife from a good family. all went well. society smiled (this is history, not fiction), and said that rapid men when they did marry, made the best husbands after all. it said such men knew better how to fully appreciate purity at home. society did not state that there could be no purity in a stream where half of the tributaries are polluted. but society was satisfied to talk of "pure homes" so long as there was one pure partner to the compact, which resulted in the home. it does not talk of an honest firm if but one of its members is (privately and in his own person,) honest while he accedes to the dishonest practices of his associates. but society was satisfied. a child was born, society was charmed. four more children came. society said that this late profligate was doing his duty as a good citizen of the state. he is now about forty-seven years old. he is a "paretic" in an asylum, and, if that were all, then the inspector's theory might still stand, because he would say that at least the awful calamity had been staved off all these years while he had built a "pure" home and left to his country others to take his place. the facts are these: his oldest son is an epileptic, the second is a physical caricature of a man, the third is a moral idiot. he has no moral sense at all, while he is mentally bright. he delights in victimizing dogs, cats, or even smaller children. all things, in fact, which are in his power are his legitimate prey. then there is a girl. in the phraseology of the doctor she "shows only the general, constitutional signs of her inheritance." the youngest son is now less than seven years old; he is such a hopeless sex maniac even now that the parents of other children do not dare allow them to be alone with him for one moment. in telling me of this case the asylum physician, himself a profound student of heredity, said of the child: "he would shame an old parisian debauchee. the spartans were not so far wrong after all. they killed all such children as these before they had the chance to grow up and still further pollute the stream of life." and so our good citizen followed only the usual course prescribed by the inspector--and by society--and the result is (leaving out the horrible, necessary sacrifice of a woman--some woman or some number of women)--the result of the plan is this; a house of vice, (in a secluded quarter "for greater safety"); a few years of license which he believed to be his legitimate perquisite in the world and "no harm done;" the association of the later years of his wasted energies, and his pretense and vice-soaked life and flesh with the life of a pure girl, and then the legacy to society of five more sex maniacs, (who, being born in a wedlock, which, by its present terms, laws, and theories, still further develops sex mania in men and thereby implants the disease in each generation to be fought with or yielded to again); a doddering, drivelling wreck of a man in an asylum at the prime of his manhood; a worse than widowed wife with a knowledge in her soul which is an undying serpent as she looks in despair upon the five lives she has given, in her pathetic ignorance and trust. and his is not an unusual record. of course its details are seldom known outside of the family and physicians. it is legitimate fruit of a tree which society in its avarice and ignorance and vice carefully fosters. it is the tree, the fruit of which fills our jails, mad-houses, asylums, poorhouses and prisons year after year, and yet we tend it carefully and keep its root strong and vigorous by exactly the methods recommended by the police inspector and by all believers in state regulated and state licensed vice, that is: it must be systematically continued for the good of "robust boys who might else be on the island with muffled hands. it must be kept in certain quarters and secret for greater safety to men, and that our wives and daughters may not hear of it." not hear of it until when? not until the years come when the honest physician must tell her, if not the cause, at least the horrible facts, when it is too late for her to prevent the awful crime of giving life to the children of such a husband. we hold it a terrible crime to take life. is it not far more terrible in such a case to give life? in the one instance the results to the victims are simply the sudden ending of a more or less desirable existence in a more or less comfortable world. in the other case it is assuming to thrust unasked upon helpless children a living death, an inheritance of pollution which must, and does, develop itself in one or another form as the years go by. which is the greater, more awful responsibility, to give or to take life? the law says the latter. is it certain that heredity--nature's surest and least heeded voice--does not in many cases say the former? when society is wiser it will be a bit more like the spartans. it will say: far better that they be "on the island" than that they lay their fatal curse upon the world to expand and blight to the third and fourth generation, and, i believe, it was to be the "sin of the _fathers_" which was thus to follow the children, was it not? what was that sin? are not its roots to be found in the very soil advocated as good by believers in state regulation and in a double standard of morals, and in the ignorance which they say is desirable for "our wives and daughters." ignorance that such things exist as the secret, legalized, regulated slaughter (social, moral, and actually physical) of hundreds and thousands of one sex at the demands and for the gratification of the other? are there not sex maniacs in more directions than one? is not this very double standard theory in itself a sex mania? are not the men who advocate and the legislators who make laws which recognize these double moral standards, and who ignore the plainest fingerboards set up by nature in hereditary conditions--are not these, in a sense, one and all sex maniacs? when they talk of "keeping our wives and daughters" pure and ignorant they do not seem to realize that the taint of blood which flows in the veins of that very daughter, which she herself does not understand, and which an ignorant mother does not dream of, and therefore cannot stand guard over, flows as an ever present threat that she shall be one of those very outcasts whom her own father is laboring to quarantine in darkness and oblivion! nature has no favorites. heredity does not spare _your_ daughter, and yet men who plant the seeds of sex perversion in their own families have the infinite impudence to cast from their doors the blossom of their own tillage! they go into heroics about being "disgraced." "you are no longer child of mine!" that rings in a thousand pages of literature, in one hundred cases out of one hundred and one should be met by the reply: this act of mine proves as no other could that _i am_, indeed, _your_ daughter! blood of your blood and flesh of your flesh! nature has told your secret through me. let us cry quits. you put the cursed taint in my blood when i could not protect myself. _i_ am the one to complain, not you. do not cry out for quarter like a very coward. face your record made in flesh and blood. this polluted life of mine is nature's reply to _your_ life of license and uncleanness! _i_ am nature's reply to your uncontrolled passions--_inside of marriage and out_; i, the moral or mental idiot; i, the disease polluted wreck; i, the epileptic; i, the lunatic; i, the drunkard; i, the wrecker of the lives of others--i am your lineal descendant! you sacrificed others recklessly, by act and by law, to your desires and your arbitrary sex power; you cultivated a taint in your blood. it is true that you took the precaution to transmit it through purity and ignorance to me. that very purity and ignorance of my mother served to save your peace of mind and enable you to take advantage of her for infinite opportunity for mischief. it, alas, could not save me, for i am your child also. her ignorance was your partner in a crime against me, her helpless infant! do not complain. dislike my face as you will; presented to you in whatsoever form or phase of distortion it may be, i am your direct, lineal descendant! build better! or go down with the structure you planned for other men's daughters and in which you locked me before i was born! if, because of their sex, men demand privileges, rights, emoluments, honors, opportunities and freedom, which they claim as good for and necessary to them and their welfare, while they insist that all these are not to be allowed to women--would be her damnation--are not these, also, sex maniacs? has not humanity been long enough cursed by so degrading and degraded, so ignorant and so fatally wrong a mental, moral, social and legal outlook? i am attacking no individual. i am using an individual utterance on this subject simply to the better present the side of the case which is sustained by all of our present laws, conditions and male sentiment. i am wishing to present the reverse side of this awful picture. from man's point of view it is often presented--and in many ways. but once or twice have i ever seen the other side in print where it was looked at from a rational or scientific point of view. a short time ago a book was written which touched, to a moderate degree, woman's side as well as the general human side of this problem. it was put in the form of a novel that it might appeal to a larger reading public than would an essay or magazine article. it had a tremendous sale, and the only--or the chief--adverse criticism made upon it was, that it pictured a type of father which either did not exist or was too rare to be even taken as an illustration in fiction. now, it is this very type of father of which the inspector speaks thus: "men of candid judgment, religious men, know too, that they had rather have their live, robust boys err in this indulgence than think of them in the places of those unfortunates on the island, etc., etc." that is exactly the point made by the book referred to, and which was criticised by one man as "morbid in its imaginings about fathers." is this inspector "morbid?" he said: "this is a desperately practical question with more than a theoretical or sentimental side. it ought to be talked about and better understood among fathers." and i agree with him perfectly so far. it is indeed, a desperately practical question for both men and women and anthropology and heredity teach, in all peoples and in each succeeding generation, that the question has not been solved by the adoption of the double standard of morals! it is so desperately practical that the land is literally covered with the deplorable results, in hospitals, in prisons, in imbecile asylums and in mad houses; but when he goes on to "thank god that this vice is hidden, and that thousands of wives and daughters do not know of even its existence," it impresses me that the inspector is, in deploring the ignorance of fathers and commending it in mothers, attempting to still farther hedge boys about with a condition which inevitably makes of them sex maniacs in more directions than one. is not his mother as deeply interested in her boy's welfare as is his father? is it not to her eyes and wisdom his younger days are most left and to whose watchfulness, intelligence and information he must be trusted not to develop or acquire fatal habits? or if he has them in his blood as a heritage from his father, or from his father's father, by whom vice was looked upon as "safe" if only kept from the ears and eyes of wife and daughter; is it not imperative that the trained eye and mind of a woman who is not ignorant of nor blind to the very earliest indications that nature has sent a message that there is a blood taint, so that, in so far as it is possible she may labor to modify and control his awful inheritance before it has him in a fatal grip? instead of this being the case it is advocated as desirable that she be even "ignorant of the existence of such vice!" it is due more to the fact that she has been ignorant than to any other one thing that, later on, the boy's developed hereditary curse, or his acquired bad habits, have so fixed themselves upon his young mind and body that the inspector and the boy's father find themselves in a position to choose between a straight jacket for the boy himself, or first a wrecked and outraged womanhood and later on descendants that are marked with a brand that is worse than cain's. the inspector says that such disclosures as dr. talmage's sermon before innocent women and girls do vastly more harm than a host of sin that is compelled to hide its head. now what is the implication? did he mean to imply that those places have, since the sermon, been thronged with the "wives and daughters of brooklyn?" if not, how did he know that it "polluted _their_ minds?" has he not jumped at that conclusion and cast a slur upon the wrong sex? the sex that did _not_ "squander its money in patronizing these resorts?" was not that a rather desperate effort to sustain an argument by a _non-sequitur?_ are women's minds polluted by a knowledge of vice which they avoid intelligently rather than simply escape from ignorantly? are ignorance and innocence the same thing? did the inspector believe that a knowledge of the degradation into which their sons are led and pushed by just such theories as these backed by a blind hereditary impulse which has no intelligent care from a wise parentage, did he believe that such knowledge would drive or lure "wives and daughters" into polluting vice? and is it not strange to hear of a condition of things which can be spoken of as good and desirable for boys and men which is in the same breath depicted as pollution even to the ears of women? can good women live with these same men and not be polluted? how about the children? man has for ages past, claimed to be the logical animal. beasts have no logic at all, and in this regard woman has been gallantly classed, if not exactly with the beasts, certainly not with man. we may say she has been counted by him as a sort of missing link. she had logic--if she agreed with all he said. otherwise she was an emotional, irrational, unclassified creature. now, when it comes to dealing with his fellows, man has--in the main--a fair amount of reason and logic; but the moment he is called upon to think of woman as simply a human being like himself, to deal with and for her as such, to give her a chance to do the same with, and by, and for herself, that moment man becomes an emotional, irrational sex maniac. he is absolutely unable to look upon woman as first of all, a free individuality, a human being on exactly the same plane as himself. she is instantly "wife," "daughter," or victim to his mind always. never for one instant does he contemplate her as an entity entitled to life and liberty, for, and because of herself. always it is her relation to him that he sees and deals with--and alas for his theories of justice, gallantry or right--always it is as his subordinate, for his use, abuse, or pleasure, that he thinks of and plans for her. why confine gilded houses to one quarter? to keep their vicious inmates away from "our wives and daughters, and the streets which they are on," says the inspector. but that is making sex irregularity a reason for restricting liberty of residence and resort--even of promenade and pleasure. that is to say, it restricts the liberty of one party to the vice--to the irregularity of sex relations. and unfortunately it is the wrong party who is restricted to compass the object claimed! the one whose vice can and actually does injure--the wife and daughter--(the pure woman who is his victim in marriage, and the daughter who is his victim in heredity) the one who can do infinite wrong, is left to roam at large! it is the wrong partner in vice from whom state regulation seeks to "protect" "our wives and daughters." it is the one who can do the intelligent wife or daughter no harm whatever! man, we are told, is the logical animal. why not apply a bit of logic right here? why not set a watch on and restrict the one who does the real and permanent harm to the race? men claim that it is necessary to their health, happiness and comfort to sacrifice utterly the characters, health, lives, and even liberty of locomotion of thousands of women every year. this is simply infamous and nature teaches its infamy and unnaturalness. from the protozoan to the highest beast or bird there is no distinction of right, or opportunity or privilege as to the occupation, life, liberty or the pursuit of happiness anywhere in nature between the sexes until we reach the one species of animal where one sex has been subordinated to the other by artificial industrial conditions--by financial dependence. now, it so happens that as civilization goes on, nature is taking a most terrible revenge upon the human race for this sex perversion. asylums multiply, weaklings abound, criminals and lunatics blossom out from heretofore honored ancestry. nature is a terrible antagonist. having the power, man may pollute the fountain of life if he will, but nature revenges herself on him still. he may cover his vice with the shimmer of gold, but the curse of the serpent is there as of old. he may bind up the eyes of justice and right; but he learns at the last 'tis a desperate fight. a cover for vice in the father may be as fatal as ignorant maternity. combined they sow broadcast on the air the horrors of life and breed its despair. it is to the "ignorance of our wives and daughters" on these points, combined with the silence of law-protected vice for men and "regulated" infamy for women that is due the possibility of passing in some states a bill to reduce to ten years the "age of consent" at which a girl is held legally responsible for her own ruin. if there was one good woman in the legislature no such bill would have a ghost of a chance to pass, or be kept from the public knowledge and rushed through a "secret session." yet fathers of daughters pass such bills! is it true, after all, that men are not so good protectors of women as is woman of her sister? ten years of age! why, a girl is a baby then! think of your own little girl at ten! do not dare to stop thinking and talking and writing on the subject until such infamous laws are an impossibility! do not allow any one to make you believe that it is not "modest" or becoming for a woman to know about--and fight to the bitter death--any and all such laws! you have no right _not_ to know it! you have no right to dare to bring into this world a child who shall be subject to such a law! it seems beyond belief but it is true. and then men talk of "protecting" women! men who hold that a girl is not old enough to give lawful consent to lawful marriage or to the sale of property until she is years old, say she is, at the age of ten, to be held old enough to give consent to her own eternal disgrace, ruin, degradation! that such atrocious acts are possible is largely due to the fact that "our wives and daughters" do not know these things. the ignorance of one sex in all the vital affairs of life coupled with its financial dependence upon the other sex has gone far to make of all men sex maniacs and of so many children the victims of a polluted ancestry and the future progenitors of an enfeebled race. a famous physician who is an expert in these matters says in one of his articles, read before his brother practitioners: "there are few families in this country not tainted with one or another form of sex pollution. if it is not physical in its demonstrations it is mental. often it is both, and to the trained eye, and thought, of a student of anthropology and heredity, the present outlook is pitiful, indeed." and again he says--and remember that it is not said by a woman about man. it is the serious warning of a famous expert to his fellows who were to meet and guard, in their profession, against the hereditary results of just the sort of legislative provision which has gone far to make of man the sex maniac he is. he said: "the wild beast is slumbering in us all. it is not necessary, always, to invoke insanity to account for its awakening." and if you will take the trouble to understand those few sentences by a great specialist you will have found the whole of my essay a mere illustration. divorce and the proposed national laws in discussing any question which involves the welfare and happiness of people who live to-day, or are to live hereafter, i think we may take it for granted that we must consider it in the light of conditions now existing or those likely to exist in the future. we must clearly understand to what domain the question fairly belongs; whether it is a question of vital importance between human beings in their relations to each other, and whether it is a matter in which the law is the final appeal. we may fairly assume that the questions of marriage and divorce have to do with this world only. indeed, that point is yielded by the marriage service adopted by the various christian churches when it says, "until death us do part," and by the reply said to have been given by christ himself, to the somewhat puzzling query put to him as to whose wife the seven times married woman would be in heaven. according to the record, he evaded (somewhat skilfully it must be admitted) the real question; but his reply at least warrants us in saying that he held the view that the marriage relation had nothing whatever to do with another life, but belonged to the province of this world only, and the necessities and duties of human beings toward each other here. this point is conceded, too, by every church when it permits the widowed to re-marry, and gives them clerical sanction. therefore the religious and the civil basis of discussion are logically on the same premises, and in america, at least, where there is no contest as to the established fact that all divorces must be legal and not ecclesiastical, it is clear that the law does not recognize religion at all in the matter. while a religious marriage service may hold in law, a religious divorce would be illegal, in fact, fraudulent. it is conceded on all sides then, as we have seen, that marriage is a matter pertaining strictly to this world. it affects the happiness or misery of men and women in their relations with each other, and not at all in any assumed relation with another life, or a supposititious duty to a deity. this would logically take marriage, as it has already taken divorce, out of the hands of the clergy, since religion and its duties are based primarily and necessarily upon the relations of human beings to another life and to a supernatural or supreme being. the terms of marriage and divorce--so far as the public is concerned--are questions of morals and economics. that is to say, if there were but one man and one woman in the world it would be for them to say whether they would be married at all, or--having been married--whether they would stay married, if they discovered that the relation was productive of misery to one or both. they could divorce themselves at will without injury and without fear. but since humanity is associated in groups constituting what is called society or the state, and since under present conditions men are the chief producers and owners of wealth and the means of livelihood, the support of women and children is a matter which affects the welfare of all so associated, in case the parents separate. the question of divorce is, therefore, partly in the field of economics and has to do with the general welfare. this being the case, law and not religion rightly regulates its terms. people marry because they believe that it will promote their happiness to do so. i am talking now of ordinary people under ordinary circumstances, and not of those victims of institutions--such as kings and princesses--who are married for state reasons. nor am i writing of those still greater victims who are taught that it is their "duty" to marry in order to produce as many of their kind as possible in a world already sadly overpopulated by the very class thus influenced and controlled by greed and power. that is to say, they are so taught by those who are benefited by the unintelligent increase of an ignorant population. since marriage is the most important, solemn, aed sacred contract into which two people can enter, and since it affects--or may affect--others than themselves, the state requires that it be public, that the form of contract be legal and that its terms be respected by both parties, to the end that others may not be deceived or left helpless. but if the parties to this contract learn to their sorrow that the association is productive of misery, if they grow to loathe each other, if instead of happiness, it results in sorrow or ill health, then surely the state is not interested in forcing those two people to continue in a condition which is opposed to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. it is however, concerned in the terms of the separation since these do or may affect others than the two principals, and since one or both of these, having entered into a contract (in which the state was a witness) and now being desirous of terminating said contract, may be defrauded in a manner which vitally affects society. it can hardly be claimed that society is benefited by forcing two people to live in the same house and become the parents of children, when these two people have for each other only loathing or contempt. if it cannot benefit society, then who is benefited by the forced continuance of the marriage relation? the children? can any rational person believe that it is well to rear children in an atmosphere of hatred, of contention, of rebellion? do not our penal institutions answer this question? are the inmates of these from homes where harmony reigned? statistics show plainly that they are not; and they also show that an enormous per cent, of them come from the families of those who are not allowed by their church the relief of divorce from bonds grown galling. children conceived by hatred and fear, overpowered by the lowest grade of passion known to the world (which cannot be called brutal, because the brutes are not guilty of it), bred in an atmosphere of contention, deception, and dread, are fit material for, and statistics prove that they are the class from which are recruited the inmates of, the reformatory and penal institutions. is it fair to a child that it be so reared? is it not right--is it not the duty of the state to secure, so far as it may, quite the opposite conditions of life for its helpless future citizens? are the highest and best types of character bred in discord? is the state interested in the high character of its future citizens? all these questions and many others are involved. but setting aside these most important features i would like to ask who is benefited by keeping together those whom hate has separated? the wife? not at all. she is simply degraded below the frail creatures of the street whom men deride. she becomes the helpless instrument of her own degradation. the woman of the street may own herself, she may change her life, she may refuse to continue in the course which has lost her her self-respect. the unwilling wife is helpless. she has lost all. she has no refuge. she is a more degraded slave than ever felt the lash, for her slavery is one which sears her soul and will, if she becomes a mother, sear the bodies and souls of children borne by her unwillingly. it can hardly be urged that it could add to the dignity or honor of womanhood for a tie to be indissoluble which in itself, under such conditions, is a degradation and an insult. take for example a drunken, a dissolute or a brutal husband. can it be said to strike at anything dear or noble for womankind that some wife is absolutely freed from such companionship? that she be no longer forced to bear his society or even his name? surely no good end can be served by the outward continuance of a tie already broken in fact. no one can be made better, no one happier. if it is urged that a god is to be considered, surely such a state of things could hardly excite his pleasure or admiration. if marriages are made in heaven those that prove a misfit--so to speak--can scarcely be claimed by believers in an all-wise ruler to emanate from there. religious people will, i fancy, be the last to assert that wrong had its source in such a locality; while people who look upon this question as wholly outside of sacramental lines will be slow to see beauty or good in a relation which is a servitude and a degradation on the one side and a brutal domination on the other. how does the question stand then? the wife is degraded, the children are brutalized--are born with evil tendencies--a god can hardly be overjoyed; society is endangered and robbed, is deprived from its very cradle of its inalienable right to happiness. who is left to be considered? the husband? would any man worthy the name wish to be the husband of an unwilling wife? if he has a spark of honor or manhood in him could such a relationship, held by force, give him happiness? would it not be unendurable to him? if he is so far below the brutes in his relationship with his mate that he can hold his position only by force is he a fit father of children? is the state interested in reproducing his kind? it is true that there are several reasons why divorce is far more important to women than to men--notwithstanding which fact the question is usually discussed in the press and legislature by men only, the other interested party not being supposed to have enough at stake to be consulted or heard in the matter at all. but it is also true that an uncongenial marriage deprives a man of all of the best that is in him; it reduces his home to a mere den of discomfort and wretchedness; it forces him to be either a hypocrite at or an absentee from his own hearthstone and deprives him of the blessedness and sympathy--the holy tenderness and beauty--that should be the star in the crown of every man entitled to the name of husband and father. but he still owns his own body. he cannot be made an unwilling father of timid, diseased, or brutalized children; he is not a financial dependent. for these and other reasons an unhappy marriage can never mean to a man what it must always mean to a woman. there is an argument frequently put forward that divorce is wrong and unfair to the children of those so separated in case the divorced parties remarry and other children are added to the family. one great prelate asked in his article on this subject: "can we look with anything short of horror upon such a condition of things? here is a family, we will say, composed of the children of three divorced fathers--all by one mother." this is an extreme and not a pleasing case, we may admit; but suppose the divorce were by death would the distinguished prelate be so shocked? is it especially uncommon, indeed, for the most devout men and women to marry three times? are "half" brothers and sisters and "step" children a subject of moral shock to the most rigid religionists? jesus appeared to approve of a woman marrying seven times. how about a mixed family there? does the distinguished prelate take issue with his lord? no, the whole question hinges on the continuance of the life of the parties separated or divorced. if one of them dies the mixed family relation is not counted either a sin or a shame. if they live and the divorce is granted by law instead of by nature it is pronounced both. in whose interest is this distinction maintained? we have seen that it is not for the honor of the wife that a loathsome marriage relation be indissoluble, that it can lend neither dignity nor happiness to the husband, that it is one of the fruitful causes of diseased and criminal childhood and that it is, therefore, necessarily, a menace to society. legally, morally, economically, then, it is a mistake, and it is productive of great misery. who then is benefited? why is the attempt so strongly made to revise the laws and check the growing liberality in divorce legislation? who are the movers in that direction and upon what do they base their arguments? what is the final appeal of these combatants? i shall answer the two last questions first. the orthodox clergy and their followers, basing their arguments on the bible as the final appeal, demand that this reform go backward. why? because their creeds and tenets have always claimed that marriage is a sacrament and not a legal contract, that it is or should be under the control of the clergy, and that the bible and st. paul say so and so about it. the catholic church has, by keeping control of the marriage of its believers, made sure of the children--their education--and therefore insured to itself their future adherence. it has perpetuated itself and its power by this means. it is, therefore, not difficult to see why that church so warmly opposes any movement which can only result in disaster to its growth and power. her communicants are taught that it is their duty to increase and multiply, and this in spite of the fact that poverty and crime, want and ignorance stare in the face a large per cent, of the very class which it is thus sought to swell. the catholics are the most prolific and furnish _by far_ the largest per cent, of both paupers and criminals of any other class of the community. with them marriage is a sacrament; divorce is not allowed, or if allowed, remarriage is prohibited. children are born with astounding frequency of subject mothers to brutal fathers. they are bred in a constant atmosphere of contention, bickering, and in short, warfare. the result is inevitable. contest--war--brings out all the worst elements and passions in human nature. this fact is well understood where war is conducted between large bodies of men; but in such case there is supposed to be a motive--some patriotic principle involved to stir and call out, also, some of the better nature; but in the petty warfare of the wretched household there is nothing to redeem life from the basest. but suppose all this is true, say the advocates of the forced continuance of the marriage relation; the bible--our creeds--teach us to refuse the relief of divorce, and we are bound at any cost to sustain the indissolubility of the marriage bond. true, for those who accept these creeds or the bible as a finality; but to those who do not, the state owes a duty. church and state are separated in america, it is claimed. a magistrate can marry a man and woman, just as he can draw up another contract. when the state went that far it told the people that it did not hold marriage as a sacrament. it then and there took the ground that it was a legal contract, and had no necessary connection with religious belief or observance. it logically follows, then, that if the state deals with marriage as a thing not touched by religious belief or biblical injunction, that the question of divorce--the terms of the contract--are also quite outside of the province of the clergy. this being the case, it appears as futile and as foolish to discuss this question--making of it a religious one--from the basis of the creeds or the bible, as it would be to discuss the rate of interest on money or the wages per day for labor, from the same outlook. believers in the finality of biblical teaching are at liberty to hold their marriages as indissoluble, but have no right to insist upon forcing their religious dogmas upon others, nor to attempt to crystalize them into law for those who believe otherwise. no doubt the bible gave the best light of the jews, in the day in which it was written, on these and other subjects. we are quite willing to suppose that the various creeds and usages of the churches did the same, for the people whom they represented, but the creeds and the bible have nothing whatever to do with the social and economic problems of our day, nor with the legal questions of our time. the more they are dragged into places where they do not belong, the more it is discovered that "revision" is necessary. the old creeds and the bible are fast undergoing revision and are recut to fit the people and the present. it is quite impossible to revise and recut the people and the present to fit the old creeds and the literature of the jews. let us have done with such trifling with the serious problems of the day. it is not at all a question of whether st. paul said or thought this or that about divorce. it is not at all important what some dead and gone potentate said; the question before us is: what is best for society as it is now? indeed it appears to me futile to discuss this subject at all if it is to be done from a theological basis. every fairly intelligent person knows what the church teaches in the matter. one paragraph and a half dozen biblical references with a notable name appended is all the space necessary to consume. we all know that in substance the catholic church's answer to the question "is divorce wrong?" is emphatically, "yes." we are also aware that that church revises its opinions more slowly than does any other. it is equally well known to the intelligent reader that the variations from the emphatic yes of the catholic church, run the scale in the protestant denominations from a moderately firm yes to a distinctly audible no. given the denomination and a slight knowledge of its history--whether it claims to be infallible and divine, as the catholic and episcopal, or only partly so as the methodist, presbyterian, and congregational, or whether as the unitarian and universalist they claim to be human only--and you are prepared to state what the adherents of those churches will hold as to the marriage and divorce questions without resort to long papers or circumlocution. now, for the various sects to teach or believe what they please on this and other subjects is their undoubted right so long as they do not attempt to control other people in matters which are outside of the province of the church, and so long as their own adherents are satisfied to abide by the decisions of the communion to which they belong. the question is, then, what is best for society as it is and as it is likely to be? what is best for society as it is now? who is benefited or who harmed by the continuance of a loathesome relationship? is the state and are the people interested in refusing to allow two people to correct a mistake once made? is it for the good of anyone to make mistakes perpetual? i repeat that it is a question in economics and morals. it has nothing whatever to do with religion. let us keep our minds clear of rubbish, and above all let us request that our legislators do not tamper with a question of such vital importance to women, in any manner (as is just now proposed) to crystalize the divorce laws into national form and application, until women be heard in the matter, freely and fully, without fear or intimidation. if it were proposed to make a national law for railroads without giving a hearing to but one side of the question; if it were suggested that congress pass an educational bill of universal application without permitting any but its friends to be heard; if a general measure to control interest on money were up, and none of the money-lenders were given a hearing--only borrowers--there would be a great stir made about the injustice and inequity of such legislation. but it is deliberately proposed to pass a national marriage and divorce law, to regulate the one condition of life which is absolutely vital to women under present conditions, and to make this law a part of the national constitution, without taking the trouble to hear one word from her on the subject. let us agitate this question thoroughly. let us discuss it on the basis where it belongs; where our laws have already put it--the economic, and moral, and social basis. let us clear the track of both sentimentality and superstition. let us hear from both sides--from both parties interested. we do not drag religion into the interstate commerce debate. when a bill comes up for street-paving, nobody inquires what kind of stone st. paul was interested in having put down. when the chinese bill is before us, it is not necessary to know what st. sebastian thought of the laundry business. their views may have been sound; but they do not apply. i repeat, therefore, let us keep to the subject, keep the subject on the basis where it belongs, have our conclusions at least blood relatives of our premises, and let us hear from both sides of the fireplace. and finally, let us discuss this matter thoroughly but let us keep clear of passing a national law until both parties to the contract be heard, not only in the press, but in the legislative deliberations. a recent writer of one of the ablest and clearest papers yet contributed on this subject, in arguing in favor of an amendment to the constitution, which shall make divorce laws uniform, says: "let it clearly be shown that congress can best legislate in the interests of the _whole people_ (the italics are mine) upon the subject, and the people, and their representatives, the legislative assemblies, can be trusted to authorize it." it does not occur to even this able writer that half of the "whole people" will have no representation in either the legislative assemblies nor in congress, and that on this subject above all others, this unrepresented half has far more at stake than has the other, and that when an amendment to the national constitution is accomplished, it is a very much more difficult thing to correct any blunder it may contain, than it would be if the blunder were not made a part of that instrument. all men appear to agree that marriage is preeminently woman's "sphere." certainly under existing conditions, and under conditions as they are likely to be for some time to come, it is the one field open to her--it is her "lot." at present she has nothing to say as to the laws which control--as to the terms of this single contract of her life--the one disposition she is free to make of herself and still retain her social status and secure support. it would seem only humane to place no farther thorns in her path. until she has a voice--is represented--the "whole people" cannot amend the constitution in respect to marriage and divorce--in respect to the "one sphere" which all men concede is woman's one peculiar right. no laws on these subjects--above all others--should be crystalized into national form and appended to the constitution until it is done by the help and with the consent of the half of the people whom it will most seriously affect. lawsuit or legacy many of the worst features in life assurance contracts or policies, mentioned in this essay, have been amended or corrected since its publication, but there remain enough other conditions of doubtful fairness to the policy holder to, i think, justify including this essay in this book. among these conditions, is the clause, in all tontine policies,--and nearly all policies now issued are tontine in one form or another,--which puts all accumulations on policies derived from "dividends," premiums, etc., on lapsed policies etc., into the hands of directors or officers of the companies, to do with as they choose, the policy holder being made, by the terms of his contract or policy, to agree to accept whatever proportion of surplus there may be "apportioned by the society" or company, to his policy, when it shall have matured. that is, the policy holder is not represented as against the company, in the determining of what, if any surplus, his policy is or should be entitled to. "at the end of the tontine period, if the person proposed for assurance be then living, and the policy in force, the policy shall participate in the accumulated surplus, derived from policies on the free tontine plan, both existing and discontinued, as may then be apportioned by the society." (italics mine.) this leaves the policy holder absolutely at the mercy of the company, or its actuary who is, or may be, the instrument of the officers of the company. and it will not do to reply that "the policy holders are the company" for it is well known, at least among insurance experts, that this is one of the fictions of the business in its practical management. in illustration of certain other abuses in the management of this beneficent and important business, i have also included, brief, humorous sketch, which touches some of these, a propoi of the fictions versus the facts. within the past twenty years the business of life-insurance has grown with such wonderful rapidity, and changed so radically in its methods and contracts, that it is to-day as unlike its old self as the railway-car is unlike the stage-coach. the old life-insurance contract undertook to define burglary, riot, and rebellion, and the companies held themselves free from obligations which they had deliberately assumed, if the other party to the contract did not conform to the rules of conduct laid down under their definition and requirements. nowhere else in the history of large business organizations has the debtor regulated his obligation by the morals of his creditor and liquidated his debt by acknowledging its existence, and then simply charging moral obliquity on the part of said creditor as the reason for not paying it. if a owes b fifty dollars, and b is known to be a thief or a murderer, it does not liquidate a's debt to simply show that fact. but life-insurance companies have held, and some of them still claim, the right to so indemnify creditors, and, strange to say, they have been able to conduct business on that basis. they have even gone further, and said that a debt to b's heirs is forfeited in like manner--thus making the destruction of a man's reputation after his death of pecuniary advantage to the company. they have been enabled to do this because many men do not read the insurance contract which they sign, and hence have no idea of its complicated and, in many cases, unfair nature. if men insisted upon understanding the contract before they sign it, as they do in other business, the more unfair features would necessarily disappear from all insurance contracts. if i deposit a thousand dollars in a bank, it is my money--i can withdraw it when i please, subject, of course, to business rules, which have nothing to do with my standing as a citizen. the bank has nothing to say in regard to my loyalty or my honesty in other affairs. my money can not revert to the bank on outside ethical or moral grounds. but in life-insurance--a business in which more money is invested than in banking--the opposite rule has been, and to some extent still is, in operation. there are a few companies, it is true, which have rarely taken advantage of their reserved right to mulct a family of money actually received, upon the plea of outside ethical delinquencies of the dead--which had nothing to do with his length of life--and there are companies, at the present time, which have voluntarily eliminated the greater part of these oppressive regulations and reserved rights from their forms of contract. but in many of the companies they still remain in full force, and in almost all there are improvements of a most important nature needed even yet. in other words, while one or two companies have made their contracts, in large part, what contracts purport to be, a guarantee of good faith--that, if so much money is paid to them during a stated interval, they will return to the party insured, or to his heirs, a stated sum at a given time--there are still many which have not so improved their contracts, and are doing business in the old way, depending for success on the ignorance of their applicants in regard to the unfair conditions of the contracts which they sign. a few have left out most of the thousand and one ifs and ands and provideds of the old regime, and have at last undertaken to conduct this important and rapidly-growing business on strictly business principles, and the results have abundantly attested the wisdom of the new departure and indicate the advisability of still more liberal measures. a man may now, if he is careful and wise with his choice of a company, insure his life, or, if insured, he may have the temerity to die, without a fairly-grounded expectation of leaving his family a lawsuit for a legacy. he may also be reasonably sure that he is not placing his own reputation (after he is unable to defend it) at the mercy of a powerful corporation intent upon saving its funds from the inroads of a just debt. and i question if it is too much to say that, given enough money, a strong motive, and a powerful corporation, on the one hand, and only a sorrowing family upon the other, and no man ever lived or died whose reputation could not be blackened beyond repair, after he was himself unable to explain or refute seeming irregularities of conduct or dishonesty of motive. no man's character is invulnerable, and no man's reputation can afford the strain or test of such a contest. millions of dollars have been withheld from rightful heirs by threats of an exposure--the more vague the more frightful--of the unsuspected crimes or misdeeds of the beloved dead. thousands of cases never known to the public have been "compromised," and hundreds of heartaches and unjust suspicions and fears about the dead, which can never be corrected, are aroused in sorrowing but loving breasts by this method of doing "business." it is, of course, of the utmost importance that every precaution be taken by life insurance companies to protect against fraud and trickery, the funds held by them in trust for others. but with the agent, the examining physician, the medical directors, and the inspectors all employed by, and answerable to, the company represented, if fraud is committed in getting into the company, one or all of these paid officers must, almost of necessity, be party to that fraud. with all these safeguards in the hands of the company, if a man is accepted as a "good risk," if he pays his premiums, surely his family has the right to expect a legacy and not a lawsuit, nor a "compromise" which must cast reproach on the dead. if it were not for the enormous value and benefits of this method of making provision for his family, surely no man in his senses would ever have risked--would not risk to-day--signing a contract which gives the other interested party not only an absolute fixed sum of his money, year by year, but also reserves to it the right to investigate and construe his actions and motives after he is unable to contest its verdict. and not only this, but upon the finding of some slight, wholly immaterial flaw in his statements (which it failed to find when he was in the hands of its agents and officers), in some companies he not only forfeits the right of his heirs to their purchased inheritance, but the company retains his money which he has paid in besides! this is surely a dangerous contract for any man to sign. it is placing a temptation and a power in the hands of a corporation that it has never yet been in the nature of corporations not to abuse. "if any statement in this application is in any respect untrue, it voids the policy, and all payments which shall have been made revert to the company," gives a wide field and doubtful motive of action when it is remembered that many of the questions are of such a nature that not one man in a thousand could be absolutely sure that he knew the correct reply. "at what age did your grandparents die?" all four of them. how many men are sure that they can answer that question correctly? "of what did each one die?" you do not know. you have a general idea. you express it. you pay your premiums ten years. you die (one doctor says of consumption--another says of blood-poison); the company finds some old person who says your grandmother on your father's side died of the same thing, and there is a rumor that along-forgotten (or never known) country cousin also had it. the company sends a representative to the widow.. he assures her (and by the very terms of the contract, signed by the dead husband, he is right and she is helpless) that they can refuse to pay a cent; that her husband got his policy by fraud--although no indication of his physical disorder appeared to any of the numerous officers employed by the company for its own protection, when he made his application, and by general reports he was (and believed himself to be) a sound man. he assures her that they want to be generous rather than just, and if she will sign a release, or "compromise," she will be given a small part of the sum named in the policy. he makes her feel the necessity of keeping this bargain a secret, lest other policy holders object to the company paying anything on the life of one who "attempted a fraud" upon them! he impresses upon her that in case of contest she could get absolutely nothing; that she is poor, and the company is rich and strong; and if he fails to arouse her gratitude for his generosity in offering to pay her anything whatever, he usually succeeds in intimidating her in her poverty and distress. a sparrow in the hand is worth more than an eagle on mount washington to a widow with a hungry family, especially if the eagle has successfully maimed his pursuer in the beginning of the flight. the company knows this. the widow knows it. the conclusion is therefore certain before the premises are stated, and the "compromise" is made or the claim quietly dropped. it is easy to say that a man died of some bad habit unknown to his family, and his family would rather forego their claim than drag into light, or into disgrace, the memory of the loved dead. all this is well understood by those on the "inside," and by thousands of sad hearts that dare not speak. is there no remedy for all this? is there no way that a useful and powerful business can be rid of features which make it both dangerous and ghoulish? the recent steps taken by the best companies are undoubtedly in the right direction, as those still using the old forms of contract will sooner or later learn. but there is room yet for improvement even in the best forms written to-day. the fairest insurance contract written still has room for improvement. is there no way to protect these great corporations against the frauds of individuals, and at the same time protect the individual against the frauds of the corporations? must life-insurance contracts be absolutely one-sided, and that be the side of the strong against the weak; the guarded against the unguarded; the living against the dead? it seems to me that this is wholly unnecessary. a life-insurance company which has the agents, the doctors, the medical directors, and inspectors all on its side can well afford to offer a fair field--a plain, fair contract--to its patrons and then pay its debts like any other debtor when its obligation falls due. if it can not find out within a year (with all the machinery in its own hands), and while the man is alive, that he is a bad risk, it is too late to make the discovery after he is dead. if the indications are sufficiently in his favor for them to accept his money from year to year while he lives, they are sufficiently favorable to him for his family to receive the company's money when he has died. life-insurance is too valuable and too necessary a means of provision for the family for it to be overlaid with abuses that make many men hesitate to avail themselves of its benefits; and which put a power for evil into strong hands, and make temptation to do wrong inevitable and constant. it is said by some, whose attention has been called to this important subject, that the form of contract does not so much matter, since almost any court or jury will decide a suit against the company, and in favor of the family, in any event. this is taking it for granted that the heirs are in position, and are willing, to bring suit, and risk the reputation of the dead as well as the financial drain. but, as a matter of fact, this is not true--nor is it desirable that it should be. the rights of these corporations should be as jealously guarded by our courts as the rights of the individual; and perverted justice is a dangerous tool to handle. the man who signs an oppressive contract depending upon a court to nullify it after he is dead, is clinging to a rope of sand. the letter of the bond is what the court is bound to enforce, and every man should be sure that he signs only such as shall deal fairly with his heirs on that basis. the following extract is from the decision of the court of appeals in the famous dwight case, which is so recently decided as to most forcibly illustrate this point: "if an insurance policy in plain and unambiguous language makes the observance of an apparently immaterial requirement the condition of a valid contract, neither courts nor juries have the right to disregard it or to construct, by implication or otherwise, a new contract in the place of that deliberately made by the parties... such contracts are open in construction,... but are subject to it only when, upon the face of the instrument, it appears that its meaning is doubtful or its language ambiguous or uncertain. "an elementary writer says; 'indeed, the very idea and purpose of construction imply a previous uncertainty as to the meaning of a contract, for when this is clear and unambiguous there is no room for construction and nothing for construction to do.'" for this reason the court of appeals cited as the ground, and the only ground, for its decision against the widow, the following clause from the policy of the contesting company: "this policy is issued, and the same is accepted by the said assured, upon the following express conditions and agreements: that the same shall cease and be null and void and of no effect... if the representations made in the application for this policy, upon the faith of which this contract is made, shall be found in any respect untrue." colonel dwight was in the habit of making large business ventures. several times, when he had done so, he had taken heavy amounts of life-insurance, so that in case of the failure of his undertakings, and his own death before he could regain his financial feet, his family would not suffer. on previous occasions he had dropped the greater part of his insurance as soon as his business ventures had terminated successfully. this is not an uncommon thing for rich or speculative men to do. in colonel dwight died, with an insurance on his life of about $ , , some of which he had carried for years; but a large part of it had been recently taken for the reasons above stated, and as he had done before under similar circumstances. fifty thousand of this sum was in old and new policies against one company. this company paid at once, thus giving the widow means to fight for her claims against the other companies. in a short time one of the other companies, against which she had a small claim of $ , , also paid. the other nineteen companies contested. the widow employed senator conkling, and the fight has been the hardest, the bitterest, and the most ghoulish insurance contest ever had in this country; and finally the companies have won in the court of appeals on a purely technical point, after having dug colonel dwight's body up several times, in the effort to prove that he was poisoned, that he hung himself, and that he was not dead at all! they failed utterly to prove any material cause of contest; but they finally won on the ground that, in answering a question in the application for insurance, colonel dwight did not state that he had ever engaged in the liquor business, whereas it had been known that he had owned a hotel where liquor was sold. now, when it is remembered that at one time these companies tried to prove that colonel dwight had committed suicide, but that they never had any grounds upon which to claim that he had died of intemperance, the purely technical grounds for the decision of the court of appeals is apparent. ninety-nine policies out of a hundred could be contested on such ground as that; and so long as insurance contracts retain these unreasonable and oppressive features, no man can be sure that he is not leaving a lawsuit and bitter sorrow to his family, and, worst of all, a blasted reputation for himself, when he applies for insurance under such a form. an officer of one of the companies was heard to boast of the fact, but a few days ago, that his company had spent nearly ten times the amount of the claim against it in this dwight contest! this is economy indeed! whose money was this spent? the policy-holder's. for what? to defeat one of the policy-holders in a contest for a claim no doubt as honest as any one of the others will present in his turn. but suppose that this was not an honest claim; suppose that colonel dwight was not a "good risk," is it not a rather suggestive indication of the value of the medical examinations by the expert medical examiners and directors of twenty-one life-insurance companies? a risk good enough to "pass" some forty-five doctors employed by, and for the protection of, the companies is, on the face of it, a good enough risk to pay. if this is not so, then the companies, and not the public, should be made to bear the responsibility of the incompetency of their own officers. but for the reputation of these medical men, it is a fortunate fact that the contest did not prove colonel dwight to be an unsafe risk. after his body was dug up several times, and a number of autopsies held, and most of him analyzed, they succeeded in proving that he owned a hotel where liquor was sold! but under these forms of contract, the companies undoubtedly had a legal right to refuse payment upon even so absurdly technical a misstatement of "occupation." it was claimed by his family that his hotel was a side issue; that he did not think of himself as in that business, and that his failure to say, because of it, that he was "in any way connected with the manufacture or sale of spirituous liquors," was a natural one under the circumstances. how many men give, in answering the question as to occupation in their applications for insurance, all of the numerous "plants" in which they have an interest of a financial nature, more or less important? one man says he is a bookkeeper, but he may possibly, also, own stock in a mine. his claim could be contested on that ground. suppose that he really thought nothing of his mining-stock when he made his application and signed his contract? suppose that in a short time he was called to see the mine, went into it, and died of the results of that trip? his policy would not, if it contained the usual conditions, be worth, in a legal fight, the paper it was written on. that companies often waive their reserved right to contest on such grounds, is used as an argument to prove the innocent nature of these forfeiture clauses and other oppressive conditions. but so long as they hold the legal power to do so, the temptation to contest will be too great for flesh and blood, not to say for corporations, to bear without yielding sometimes. the "get thee behind me, satan," of a fair, plain contract will be the best safeguard for the heirs in the matter of money, and for the companies in the matter of morals; while the "economy for the sake of surviving policy-holders" might be directed, as there is surely room for believing that it needs to be, into other and more legitimate channels. economizing on debts to dead policy-holders is not a very good recommendation to living ones, for the companies which thus lock the wrong stable-door. the new move toward furnishing fair contracts is in the right direction, and it now rests with insurers--the public--to see that it does not stop short of fulfilling the promise of still better things in the future. points humorous and otherwise about life insurance. printed in twentieth century. i made up my mind to get my life insured. as i had heard some one say it was not wise to put all of one's eggs into the same basket, i decided to apply for a small policy in two of the leading companies at the same time. i was never seriously ill in my life, so when i was informed that i had been "held off" by the examining physician of one company who found theoretical traces of diseased kidneys, i was a good deal astonished. professional etiquette prevented the examining physician of the other company from passing me until this matter was settled, although he confessed that he could find no such traces himself. in his opinion my weak spot was my lungs. "but doctor," said i, "i've got lungs like a bellows. i was stroke oar at college." "it doesn't make any difference to our doctor whether you were stroke oar or a stroke of lightning if he discovers that any of your ancestors died of consumption," remarked the agent, who had lost his temper. "you ought to have had better sense than to tell dr. pulmonary that your great aunt coughed before she died. he'd find evidence of lung trouble in a copper-bottomed boiler if it wheezed letting off steam. who examined you over at the other place? old albumen? i'll bet ten dollars he'd find traces of his pet disorder in a ham if he examined one." i was getting a little piqued. i concluded to put my application in to several other companies and take the first policy issued. in pursuance of this idea i was examined by dr. palpitation of the m. of n. y. company, and he discovered that i was liable to drop off at any time from heart failure. he said that he did not wish to alarm me, but i needed medical care and a very wise and sustained course of treatment. at this stage of the proceedings i went to the only physician i had ever employed for any slight ills during my past career and had him put me through a thorough and exhaustive physical examination without disclosing anything of my motive for so doing. he pronounced me fit for the coming boat race, which was to be an unusually trying one. "any trace of albumen, doctor?" i asked. "none--not a trace." "nothing wrong with my heart or lungs?" "look here, boy. if you never die until they give out, you're going under from old age. i tell you, you are as sound a man as ever lived. there is absolutely nothing to hang a suspicion of any disorder on. for my sake i wish there was," he added, laughing and slapping his pocket. the next day i had a call from the doctor who had examined me for the e. of y. he said that he'd like to have a second pass at my eyes. he thought there was a look in one of them that indicated softening of the brain. i laughed. he remarked that people in the first stages of that trouble usually took it just that way. it was a symptom. "you confounded old fool!" said i, losing my temper. "are you in earnest? i supposed you were joking from the first but if you're talking as good sense as you've got just leave this office. i--" he left. he reported to his company that i was in a more advanced stage of the disorder than he had at first feared. i had arrived at the unnecessarily irritable condition. of course my case was settled with that company. professional etiquette again stepped in, and the doctor for the m. b. of c. took another whack at my liver. he said that the organ was badly enlarged and he'd hold me off for one year to see if it would return to its normal proportions. according to his diagnosis fully nine-tenths of the population of new york were carrying around livers that were enough to tire out an ox. he could tell a big livered man as far as he could see him, and he pointed out five who passed while he was talking. he said that enlargment of the liver was getting to be a very real danger to the population of all of the chief cities, and if the cause was not soon discovered by the medical profession and a reducing process, so to speak, clapped on to the metropolitan liver, life insurance companies would have to keep a mighty sharp eye on all applicants, or the death rates would wreck the most prosperous of them in pretty short order. i was led to infer from the way he poked and prodded around me and measured and sounded that my liver was rather badly sagged at one side and that the other lobe was swelled up like a bladder. it seems as if a person would notice a thing like that himself, but the doctor said that as like as not i'd never have discovered it at all if he had not--fortunately for me--been called in to examine me. he said that he never prescribed for men, he is required to examine for insurance, but he told me to take a certain remedy for the next three months and then report to him. meantime his company would "hold me off." "we won't reject you outright," he explained "because this thing may be only temporary--may not be organic--and it wouldn't be a fair thing to your heirs to decline you outright, because that would most likely prevent you from ever getting life insurance anywhere in the future." that was a new idea to me and gave me a good deal of a scare. it occurred to me that the future of a man's family--where it depended on the insurance money of its head--was subject to considerable uncertainty from the various fads of the doctors. here i was in danger of being rejected--pronounced an unsound risk--by four separate and distinct companies for four separate and distinct ailments of which my own doctor could find not the least trace and i could feel not the faintest twinge. if any one of them decided positively against me the future of my family was nil--so far as insurance went, for the examining physician of no other company would be bold enough or sufficiently lacking in "professional courtesy" to pronounce in my favor, whether he could find anything wrong with me himself or not. i began to realize that what i had so far looked upon as rather a good joke might be serious after all. it occurred to me, too, that it would be a good deal more far reaching than i had supposed. if old pulmonary--as the agent called him--stuck to his theory of my lungs, not only i, but my children, would be unable to get insurance. it would establish a family history--a "heredity"--hard to get rid of. my little joke in speaking of the fact that my aunt had been said to cough before she died, together with dr. pulmonary's ability to scent lung trouble in the breathing apparatus of a porous plaster, might lead to a serious complication not only for me but for my children. i concluded to make a clean breast of it. i did not quite dare tell dr. pulmonary that i had been deliberately guying the profession--and in fact that was not my first intention--but i asked if he did not think it a little odd that no two of them had held me off for the same reason and that each one had found indications of the particular disorder for which he had a special leaning. he pricked up his ears at once and asked all about the others. i told him that one had found albumen, another enlarged liver, and the third was afraid of heart failure or softening of the brain, and one was still waiting, because he could find no trouble--on account of professional etiquette--before reporting at all. "meantime my own doctor--the one who has known me from childhood--pronounces me fit for a scull race," said i a little drily. "does your physician know of these examinations?*' he inquired. "no, he doesn't," i responded rather hotly this time, "or no doubt he'd have discovered that i had inflammatory rheumatism and gangrene. he is a good deal of a professional ethic man, himself." the doctor turned and walked into his private room, promising to overhaul the papers again and talk with his subordinate. i hunted up the agent who had first called upon me and complained that this sort of nonsense had gone about as far as i wanted it to go. "that old donkey at the head of your medical department upholds the idiotic report of the young gosling that first examined me here, notwithstanding the fact that he says himself that he can't find the first trace of the trouble. now, if insurance companies employ impecunious young physicians with little experience, because they can get them cheap, and then insist upon it that professional etiquette forbids any other examiner from correcting their blunders, it seems to me--" the agent had been looking about carefully to be sure that no one overheard. at this point he said: "sh! don't talk so loud. you see young cardiac, who had you first, passed a man a short while ago who died in about six months and it was discovered that he had only a part of one lung and had been that way for years. the referee--old pulmonary is our referee, you know--gave him a pretty bad scare, and he's afraid to pass anybody at all since. 'fraid he'll lose his place. all the agents are mad about it. manage to hold their men over for examination until he leaves the office and then take 'em to another one of the examiners. he'll refuse every body now for a while--or hold him off. fully one-half the men he examined last month were rejected outright or held over. i didn't know it when i took you to him or i'd have taken you to some one else to be examined." "that would be all very well," said i, "if it wasn't for the absurdity of what the doctors are pleased to call professional etiquette, which prevents any other examiner for any other company from finding a man so held or rejected, sound. in the first place nearly all the big companies refuse to allow any but an 'old school' or 'regular' allopathic physician to examine a man. then if that examiner has a fad, or makes a mistake, they are all banded together to sustain him in it and not to correct it, even if they can't find the first symptom of a disease about him. i tell you it is not only outrageous to the man and his family, but the result will be that men who know it will refuse to place themselves in any such danger. they won't want a family record of hereditary diseases made and put on file to stare them and their descendants in the face just for the sake of professional etiquette toward some young m. d., who just as like as not got his place from the fact that he married a daughter of a director of the company and had to be supported some way and hadn't the skill to do it in an open field in his profession. men are not going to stand it. it will injure them, and it is bound to react on the company too. i'd never have applied at all if i'd known of it in time. what business has a company to ask whether an applicant has or has not been rejected by another company? if their own examiner can't find anything wrong with him, isn't that enough? this thing of the doctors of all the companies combining to keep a record against a man is outrageous. why can't a company depend on the capacity of its own medical staff? if it wants any other information of a medical nature, why isn't the applicant's own family physician quite enough? i consider the thing a good deal of an outrage, and the company that omits from its papers the sort of questions that result in this absurd and oppressive professional etiquette folderol, is going to be the company of the future. intelligent men know too well the chaotic state of medical science to be willing to risk it. why, good lord, man, that softening of the brain--paresis--idiot over at the £. of y. can, and no doubt will, give me a record that may cling to me and my family in a way that might, in many a business or other contingency, cause the very greatest hardship." i looked up and saw that the medical referee who had really indicated that he meant to reconsider my case was standing where he had heard me. his face was a study* he was angry clear through. he would have (in a medical journal or debate) taken issue with, and proved the utter incapacity of nine-tenths of the profession, but to have a layman criticise their action when it might mean even life or death to him and his was more than the doctor's adherence to professional etiquette could bear. * my friend, the agent, saw his face. "i'll bet you four dollars, john, that you not only won't get a policy here now but that no other company will pass you," said he under his breath. "the old man is on the war path." that was eight months ago and i'm "held off" in eleven companies now. i was never sick in my life. i'm as sound in person and in heredity as any man who ever lived, but i am at the mercy of that absurdest of all covers for personal incapacity--professional etiquette--combined with the unreasonable fact that insurance companies require an applicant to tell their examiners just what piece of idiotic prejudice has been launched at him by the doctor of every other company, so that they can all hold together and fit his case to the reports, and not the reports to the facts in his case as they find them. meantime, jack howard, who died last week, poor fellow, was accepted by five of them because the first examiner who got hold of him, not being a kidney fiend but having his whole mind on lung trouble--and jack had splendid lungs--didn't discover that he was in the last stages of bright's disease. his family made $ , out of professional etiquette, and mine--when i die--will most likely lose that much, together with a reputation for a sound heredity which may affect the insurers to the third and fourth generation of them that love truth and tell that their father was rejected by all the leading life insurance companies for pulmonary trouble, heart disease, kidney affection, paresis, and enlargement of the liver. meantime the first good company that shows enough sense and sufficient confidence in its own medical men to omit that sort of questions from its form of examination is going to get me--and a good many others like me. common sense in surgery there are certain forms of expression which once heard fit themselves into the mind so firmly, and re-appear in one connection or another so frequently, that one scarcely recognizes the fact even when one changes a word or two in order to make the original idea fit the case in point. so when i stood watching the ingenious method by which the trainers of the english fox-hounds induced each dog to perform his own surgical operations after a hunt, i remarked, with no recognition of the plagiarism from dr. holmes, "every dog his own doctor." "no," replied the trainer, with a fine sense of distinction which i had not before observed--"no; i am the doctor; the dogs are the surgeons. i prescribe; they perform the operation. they do that part far better than i could; but they wouldn't do it in time to save the pain and trouble of a much more serious operation that they could not perform, if i did not set them at it in time, and keep them at work until all danger of inflammation is past." it was after a hunt. the dogs--splendid blooded fellows, a great pack of over sixty of them--had gotten many thorns and briers in their feet. they came back limping, foot-sore, and with troubled eyes that looked up piteously for relief from their pain. they were very hungry too, after the long chase; but "no doctor will allow a patient to eat just before a surgical operation," remarked the trainer, dryly. "now watch." he threw open a door leading into an outer room of the splendid hunt club kennel, and gave the word of command. there was a rush, and the entire pack burst through the wide entrance. then every dog lay suddenly down, and began with great vigor to lick his feet. why? simply because in rushing through that door they had waded through a wide, shallow trough or sink of pretty warm soup. this basin was sunk in the stone floor, and reached entirely across the door, and was too wide to jump over, even had it been visible from the outside, which it was not. the dogs had plunged into it before they knew it was there, and were instantly out of its rather uncomfortable heat. each dog worked at his feet with vigor. he was hungry. the soup was good; but dogs object to soup on their feet. this process was continued and repeated until it was thought that all thorns and briers and pebbles had been licked and picked from the crippled feet. then the dogs were fed and put to bed--or allowed to lie down and sleep--in their fresh straw-filled bunks. "a doctor and a surgeon may be the same person," remarked the philosophical trainer, oracularly, "but they seldom are. if you whine--as the dogs do when their feet hurt after a hunt--or if you limp or complain, a doctor guesses what is the matter with you. then he guesses what will cure you. if both guesses are right, you are in luck, and he is a skilful diagnostician. in nine cases out of ten he is giving you something harmless, while he is taking a second and a third look at you (at your expense, of course) to guess over after himself." his medical pessimism and his surgical optimism amused and entertained me, and i encouraged him to go on. "now with a surgeon it is different. surgery is an exact science. before i took this position i was a surgeon's assistant in a hospital. in some places we are called trained nurses. in our place we were called surgeons' assistants. that's why i make such a distinction between doctors and surgeons. i've seen the two work side by side so long. i've seen some of the funniest mistakes made, and i've seen mistakes that were not funny. i've seen post-mortem examinations that would have made a surgeon ashamed that he had ever been born, looked upon by the doctor who treated the case as not at all strange; didn't stagger him a bit in his own opinion of himself and his scientific knowledge next time. i remember one case. it was a japanese boy. he was as solid as a little ox, but he told dr. g------ that he'd been taking a homoeopathic prescription for a cold. that was enough for dr. g------. a red rag in the van of a bovine animal is nothing to the word 'homoeopathy' to dr. g------. hydropathy gives him fits, and eclecticism almost, lays him out. not long ago he sat on a jury which sent to prison a man who had failed in a case of 'mind cure.' that gave deep delight to his 'regular' soul. well, dr. g------ questioned the little jap, who could not speak good english, and had the national inclination to agree with whatever you say. ever been in japan? no? well, they are a droll lot. always strive to agree with all you say or suggest. "'did you ever spit blood?' asked dr. g------, by-and-by, after he could find nothing else wrong except the little cold for which the homoeopathic physician was treating the boy. "'once,' replied that youthful victim. "'aha! we are getting at the root of this matter now,' said dr. g------. 'now tell me truly. be careful! did you spit much blood?' "'yes, sir; a good deal.' "the doctor sniffed. he always knew that a homoeopathic humbug could not diagnose a case, and would be likely to get just about as near the facts as a light cold would come to tuberculosis. "'how long did this last?' he inquired of the smiling boy. "'i think--it seems to me-- "'a half-hour?' queried the doctor; 'twenty minutes?' "'i think so. yes, sir. about half an hour--twenty minutes,' responded the obliging youth. "i heard that talk. common-sense told me the boy's lungs were all right; but it was none of my business, and so i watched him treated, off and on, for lung trouble for over a month before i got a chance to ask him any questions. then i asked, incidentally: "'what made you spit that blood that time, gihi?' "'i didn't know i ought to swallow him,' he replied, wide-eyed and anxious. 'dentist pull tooth he say to me, "spit blood here." i do like he tell me. your doctor say ver' bad for lungs, spit blood. next time i swallow him.' "i helped another practitioner, in good and regular standing, to examine a man's heart. he found a pretty bad wheeze in the left side. i had to nurse that man. he had been on a bat, and all on earth that ailed him was that spree, but he got treated for heart trouble. it scared the man almost to death. "i'd learned how a heart should sound, so one day i tried his. he was in bed then, and it sounded all right, so when the doctor came in, i took him aside, and told him that i didn't want to interfere, but that man was scared about to death over his heart, and it seemed to me it was all right--sounded like other hearts--and his pulse was all right too. the doctor was mad as a march h*are, though he had told me to make two or three tests, and keep the record for him against the time of his next visit. well, to make a long matter short, the final discovery was--the man don't know it yet, and he is going around in dread of dropping off any minute with heart failure--that at the first examination the man had removed only his coat and vest, and his new suspender on his starched shirt had made the squeak. that is a cold fact, and that man paid over eighty dollars for the treatment he had for his heart, or rather, for his suspender." i was so interested in the drollery of this ex-nurse, and in his scorn for one branch of a profession, while he entertained almost a superstitious awe and admiration for surgery _per se_, that i decided upon my return to new york to visit a great surgeon, and ask him to allow me to see an operation that would fairly represent the advance-guard so to speak, the upward reach of the profession as it is to day. we all know the physician who follows his profession strictly and solely as a means of support. most of us also happily know something of one or more medical men who are a credit to humanity, in that they subordinate their ability to extort money from suffering to their desire to relieve pain, even though such relief conduces not to their own financial opulence. very few of us who are not close students of the medical profession realize, i think, some of the magnificent developments not only of surgery, but of the character of the surgeon. we are led to think of them as rather hard and brutal men. the side of their work and nature that means tenderness and devotion to the relief of those who, but for the skilled and brave surgeon, must die or suffer for life, is seldom laid before us. the quiet, sweet, and simple devotion of such men does not reach the public ear. the operation of which i learned, and which is the first of its kind on record, was so strange, so great, and so far-reaching in its suggestion and promise that it seemed to me it could not fail to interest and inspire the general reader, who never sees a medical or surgical journal, and who would not read it if he did. can you think of an operation that would create a mind? can you conceive of the meaning to humanity of a discovery that would transform a congenital imbecile into a rational being? such an operation was the one i was privileged to see. the patient was a child about one year old, of good parentage and of healthy bodily growth, aside from the fact that its skull was that of a new-born child, and it had hardened and solidified into that shape and size. the "soft spot" was not there, and the sutures or seams of the skull had grown fast and solid, so that the brain within was cramped and compressed by its unyielding bony covering. the body could grow--did grow--but the poor little compressed brain, the director of the intelligent and voluntary actions of the body, was kept at its first estate. even worse than this, its struggle with its bony cage made a pressure which caused distortion and aimless or unmeaning movement--the arm and leg turned in, in that helpless, pathetic way that tells of imbecility. in short, the baby was a physically healthy imbecile--the most pathetic object on this sad earth. upon examination, the surgeon, a gentle, sweet-natured man, whose enthusiasm for his profession--for the relief of suffering--makes him the object of devotion of many to whom he has given life and health, and the inspirer and final appeal for many a brother practitioner, discovered what he believed to be the trouble. led by that most uncommon of all things, common sense, he believed that this little victim of nature's mistake might be changed from a condition far worse than death to one of comfort for itself, and to those who now looked upon it only in anguish of soul. after explaining to the parents and the surgeons who had come to witness the wonderful experiment (for, after all, at this stage it was but an experiment based upon common-sense) that it might fail; after a modest and simple statement of his reason for undertaking so dangerous an operation, with no precedent before him; after explaining that the parents fully understood that not to try it meant hopeless idiocy, and that the trial might mean death--he began the work. i shall try to tell what it was in language that is not scientific, and may seem to those accustomed to surgical terms inadequate and unlearned; but to those who are not technical medical students i believe the less technical language will be far clearer. the child's skull was laid bare in front. two tracks were cut from a little above the base (or top) of the nose up and over to the back of the head. one of these tracks was cut on each side, the surgeon explained, because it would give equal expansion to the two sides of the brain, and because it would cause death to cut through the middle of the top of the head, where lies "the superior longitudinal sinus." he left, therefore, the solid track of bone through the middle, and cut two grooves or tracks through the bone, one on either side, where nature (when she does not make a mistake) leaves soft or yielding edges, by means of which the normal skull expands to fit the needs of the brain within. the trench made displaced, or cut away, one-quarter of an inch of solid bone all the way from near the base of the nose to the back part of the head. in the middle of the top of the head on each side a cross-wise cut was made, and one inch of bone divided. another cut was made on either side, slanting toward the ears. this was one inch and a half long. the surgeon then tenderly inserted his forefinger, pressed the internal mass loose from the bones where it adhered, and pushed the bones wider apart. this process widened the trenches to one inch. the wound was now dressed with the wonderfully effective new aseptics, and the flesh and skin closed over. the operation had taken an hour and a half. there was little bleeding. the baby was, of course, unconscious during the entire time. oh, the blessings of anaesthetics! and now comes the wonderful result of this bold and radical but tender and humane operation. the baby rallied well. in three days it showed improved intelligence. in eight days this improvement was marked. from a creature that sat listless, deformed, and unmindful of all about it, it began to "take notice," like other children. from an "it," it had been transformed into a "he." it had been given personality. it ate and slept fairly well. on the tenth day the wound was exposed and dressed. it had healed, or "united by first intention," as the doctors say; and again one can but exclaim, "oh, those wonderful aseptic dressings!" it had united without suppuration. it was a clean wound, cleanly healing. one month after the operation the feet and hands had straightened out, and lost their jerky, aimless movements. the child is now a child. it acts and thinks like other children, laughs and cooes and makes glad the hearts of those who love it. not like other children of its age, perhaps, for it has several months yet to "catch up," but the last report, in one of the leading medical journals, said: "one month after the operation the change in its condition was surprising and gratifying. the deformities in the extremities had entirely disappeared, and there was evidently a remarkable increase in intelligence. it noticed those about it, took hold of objects offered it, laughed, and behaved much as children of ordinary development at six or eight months. the pupils were no longer widely dilated, but appeared normal. it eats and sleeps well, and is in general greatly improved as a result of the operation." if in one month the little imprisoned brain was able to "catch up" six or eight months, we may surely believe that the remaining four or five months which it lost, because nature sealed the little thinking-machine firmly in too small a casket, will be wiped away also, and the little victim of nature's mistake be given full and normal opportunity through the skill and genius of man.* *it has now been several years since the operation, and the child is like other children.--h. h. g. is not that common-sense in surgery? could anything be more wonderful? could any operation open to the future of the race wider possibilities and offer more brilliant hope? i may quote here farther from the same medical journal the report of dr. wyeth, himself: "the operation differs from any yet done. lanne-longue, keen, and others cut a trench about a quarter of an inch in width, and on one side, at a single operation. it seemed to me if the brain was penned in by premature ossification of the cranial bones, these should be torn loose and permanently lifted, thus allowing a thorough expansion. should only temporary benefit be secured, the operation should be repeated. experience alone can demonstrate whether the expansion of the brain will be able to spread the cranial bones to such an extent that it may reach even an ordinary development. the condition of these patients is so hopeless and deplorable that, in my opinion, very great risk is justifiable in any surgical interference which offers even a hope of amelioration." thus the race is quietly achieving mastery over the blind forces of nature, and the steady hand of science, coupled with tenderness and sincerity, is pushing back some of the worst horrors of life, and throwing a flood of light and hope into the future! it makes one's step lighter and one's face happier only to think of these marvellous achievements and victories. a new impulse of hope and happiness dawns upon life. i owed this new inspiration to my pessimistic acquaintance--he of the hunt club kennel--and the introduction he gave me to the rudiments of applied surgery. it was indeed a long sweep from the one operation to the other. my first and second glimpses of the operating-room were surely the two extremes, and yet when i suggested this to dr. wyeth, the great and gentle surgeon who performed this operation, he smilingly replied that, after all; either or both--indeed, all of it--was simply common-sense in surgery. heredity: is acquired character or condition transmittible? it has been well said by herbert spencer, and more recently by professor osborn, the able biologist of columbia college, that the question involved in the discussion of heredity is not a temporary issue and that its solution will affect all future thought. whether or not acquired character is transmitted to children is the most important question that confronts the human race; for it is upon the character of the race that depends and will depend the condition of the race. no school of scientists questions the fact of heredity; but there is a warm and greatly misunderstood contest over the exact method used by nature in the transmission. now so far as the general public is concerned, so far as the sociological features of the case go, so far as personal conduct is involved, it does not matter a straw's weight whether the theory of heredity held by lamarck and darwin, or the one advanced recently by weismann, be correct. it matters not whether your drunkenness, for example, is transmitted to your child directly as plain drunkenness, or whether it descends to him as a merely weakened and undermined "germ plasm" which "will tend to inebriety, insanity, imbecility" or what not. it matters not a farthing's worth, from the point of view of the laity, whether the transmission is direct, via "pangenesis," or whether it is indirect, via a weakened and vitiated "germ plasm" as per weismann, or whether the exact method and process may not still lie in the unsolved problems of the laboratory. whichever or whatever the exact process may be (which interests the scientist only), the facts and results are before us and concern each of us more vitally than does the question of what we shall eat or what we shall drink or wherewithal we shall be clothed. it is all the more unfortunate, therefore, that even an untested scientific theory cannot be advanced without the ignorant, the half-educated and the vicious taking it in some distorted form as a basis of action. indeed it would seem to be wise, if one is about to make a scientific suggestion of importance, to take the precaution to say in advance that you don't mean it--for the benefit of that large class of intellectual batrachians who hop to the conclusion that you said something totally different from your intent. because a surgeon might say to you that he knows a boy who carries a bullet about in his brain and that the youth appears to be no worse for it in either body or mind, it would not be safe to imply that he proposes to teach you that it would be a particularly judicious thing for you to attempt to convert your skull into a cartridge box. because weismann asserts and attempts to prove that nature's method of hereditary transmission precludes (for example) the possibility of producing a race of short-tailed cats from tom and tabby from whose caudal appendages a few inches have been artificially subtracted, some of his followers exclaim in glee: "it does not make the least difference in the world what we do or refrain from doing in one lifetime. our children do not receive the results; we cannot transmit to them our vices or our virtues. we cannot taint their blood by our ill conduct nor purify it by our clean living. the 'germ plasm' from which they came is and has been immortal; we are simply its transmitters--not its creators. our children were created and their characters and natures determined centuries before we were bom. we are in no sense responsible for what they may be; germ plasm is eternal; we are exempt from responsibility to posterity. long live weismann!" now this is about the sort of thing that is springing up on every side as a result of the new discussion as to how we are to account for the facts of heredity. one sometimes hears, also, from these half-informed jubilators that "weismann does not believe in heredity; that old theory is quite exploded." the fact is that weismann is particularly strong in his belief in heredity--so strong as to give almost no weight to any possible process of intervention in its original workings. he simply holds that the transmission of "acquired character" is not proven, and he doubts the fact of these "acquired" transmissions. in his illustrations he deals chiefly (when in the higher animals) with mutilations, and in the human race shows that the most proficient linguist does not produce children who can read without being taught! of course there are many and varied points in his theory of heredity with which only the biologist is capable of dealing. but as i intimated at first, the lamarck-darwin-weismann controversy, so far as the sociological aspect of the question is involved, does not touch us. it belongs to the laboratory--to the how and not to the fact of transmission. but since the opposite impression has taken root in even some thoughtful minds, it is well to meet it in a direct and easily grasped form. there is a simple and direct method; i undertook it. i went to a number of well-known biologists and physicians and asked these questions;-- . are there any diseases known to you, which you are absolutely certain are contracted by individuals whose ancestors did not have them, which diseases you can trace as to time and place of contraction, and which are of a nature to produce physical and mental changes that are recognizable in the child as due to the parent's condition? . have you ever had such cases under your own care? . have you a record of cases where the children of your patients received the effects of the disease of the parent in a manner that would show that "acquired character or condition" is transmittible? . is this true in a kind of disorder which would produce in the child a change of structure or condition so profound as to change its character and run it in a channel distinctly the result of the "acquirement" of the parent? i thought it best to go to specialists in brain and nerve disorders and to those who had had large hospital or asylum experiences. one of these, dr. henry smith williams, ex-medical superintendent of randall's island, where the city of new york sends its imbecile and epileptic children, and where many hundreds of these came under his care, replied that there could be no doubt of the fact that such "acquired" characters or conditions are transmitted. one case which he gave me, however, from his private practice will illustrate the point most clearly. b., a healthy man with no hereditary taint of the kind, acquired syphilis at a given time and in a known way. before this time he was the father of one daughter. several years later another daughter was born to him. the first girl is and has always been absolutely free from any and all taint. the other one has all the inherited marks of her father's "acquired character" and condition, which even went the length in her of producing the recognized change in the form of the teeth due to this disease. now for all practical purposes it does not matter in the faintest degree whether that transmission was in accordance with pangenesis or by means of a vitiated environment of the "germ plasm." the fact is the appalling thing for the reader to face. and i give this case only because it was one of a vast number of similar ones which came to me in reply to my questions addressed to different practitioners and specialists. among other places, i went to the head of a maternity hospital. this is what i got there: "if weismann or any of his followers doubts for one second the distinct, absolute, unmistakable transmission of acquired disease of a kind to modify 'character' both mental and physical--if they doubt its results on humanity--they have never given even a slight study to the hospital side of life. "i can give you hundreds of cases where there is no escape from the proof that the children are born with the taint of an 'acquired character' from which they cannot free themselves. sometimes it is shown in one form, sometimes in another, but it is as unmistakable as the color of the eyes or the number of the toes. to deny it is to deny all experience. i am not a biologist and i do not undertake to explain how it is done, but i will undertake to prove that it is done to the satisfaction of the most sceptical. come in this ward. there is a child whose parents were robust, healthy, strong country folk until"--and then followed the history of the parents who had "acquired" the "character" which they transmitted--which had made the mental, moral and physical cripple in the ward before me. "now here is what they transmitted. do you fancy that if that half idiot should ever have children they will be 'whole'? no argument but vision is needed here. that child's condition is the result of acquired character. its children and its children's children will carry the acquirement--for we are not wise enough yet to eliminate even such as that from among active propagators of the race! if it were possible (which, thank heaven, is not likely) that the other parent of this half imbecile's children would be of a sane and lofty type there might be a modification upward again in the progeny, but even then we would not soon lose the direct, undeniable, patent 'acquirement' which you see here." it was the same story from each and every practitioner. the hospital and asylum experts, the specialists in diseases of mind or body which were due to direct acquirement (such as drunkenness, syphilis and acquired epilepsy), were particularly strong in their contempt for even the theory that acquired character and condition are not transmittible. one laughingly said: "i'll grant that if i cut off a man's leg or a few of his fingers, his children will not be likely to be deformed because of that operation. this is not a permeating constitutional condition, it is a mere local mutilation. but if i were to take out a part of his brain so as to produce ["acquired"] epilepsy upon him i believe his children will be affected, and if he is a bad syphilitic [acquired] i know his children will be. mind you, i don't say exactly what they will have, and they may not all have the same thing, but i do say that their 'germ plasm' or whatever they come from, will carry the results of the acquired condition and character." * *"brown-sequard observed that injury to the central or peripheral nervous system (spinal cord, oblongata, peduncle, corpora quadrigem-ina, sciatic nerve) of guinea pigs produced epilepsy, and this condition even became hereditary. westphal made guinea pigs epileptic by repeated blows on the skull, and this condition also became hereditary."--** manual of human physiology," by l. landou, translated with additions by w. sterling. . dr. l. putzell, in his "treatise on the common forms of functional nervous diseases," , after describing the methods by which brown-sequard produced epilepsy traumatically in guinea pigs, says: "brown sequard also made the curious observation that the young of guinea pigs who had been made epileptic in this manner, may develop the disease spontaneously. these experiments have been verified by schiff, westphal and numerous other observers." so i beg of you to remember that while the fact and law of heredity is as certain as death itself, its course of action, its variability of operation, is as the march winds. to say that the constitutions of your children will be de* termined in great part by the condition of your body and mind is but to utter a truism; but to say exactly how--in what given channel this effect will flow--is not, in the present state of biological knowledge, possible. for the sake of illustration it is usually the part of wisdom to give the most probable trend of a given disorder; but to assert dogmatically that the son of a lunatic will be insane or that the daughter of a woman of the street will live as her mother did, is quite as unsafe as to say that a fall from a fourth-story window on to an iron door would be certain death. you must not forget that you may, if you want to take the chances, drop an infant out of a fourth-story window on to an iron door with no bad results to the infant (door not heard from), for i have known that to happen; you may sleep with a bad case of small-pox and not take it--as i once did; you may shoot a ball into a boy's head, taking in with it several pieces of bone, you may extract the bone and leave the ball there and the boy appear to be as good as new afterward; you may live all your life long with a roue and your children not be inmates of hospital, lunatic asylum or prison. all these things have been done, but it is not the part of wisdom to infer that for this reason either one of them would be a safe or desirable course of action; for in this world it behooves us to deal--when we are attempting to study nature--with the law of probability. the accidents, the exceptions, will take care of themselves. notwithstanding this fact it will not be exactly fair to me for you to report that i say that every single one of jane smith's children will have fits and fall in the fire before they are twenty-one because she or their father is an epileptic. perhaps one or two of those children may die in infancy, instead, or go insane--or to congress; one may have hydrocephalus, and another be a moral idiot and astonish the natives because "his parents were such upright people." one may simply have a generally weak constitution--and another may win the american cup for wrestling; but the chances are that confirmed epilepsy (or what not) of the parent is going to "tell" in one form or another in the children. what i say of epilepsy is equally true of syphilis. this latter is so true that it can be readily told by the teeth of the children of a seriously infected case. that will strike the average "unprofessional" reader as impossible, yet it is well known to biologists, medical men and many dentists, so that a great many wholly innocent people who sit in a dentist's chair reveal more private family history than could be drawn from them with stronger instruments than mere forceps. i have been asked to write this paper because at the present time there is a tendency to discredit some of the well-known and easily proven facts of heredity, as a result of certain statements supposed to have been made by the recent school of biologists headed by weismann. but in the hands of the laity much that weismann did say is misunderstood and misstated and much that he never said is inferred. to professional biologists the loose inferences from weismann's suggestions and speculations are absurd, and to experienced medical men and experts in the lines of practice indicated above, the arguments are beneath discussion. it is in this particular line of practice that proof is easy and abundant, where the "acquired" nature of the modified "character" is readily traced and the transmission (or heredity) susceptible of proof beyond controversy. it is for this reason that the illustrations are all taken from this field of investigation. if they were taken from consumption, tuberculosis or any of the various ordinary "transmittible" disorders, the cheerful opponent would assert (and no one could disprove if he held to the "germ plasm" theory back far enough) that the "tendency" had been inherent in the plasm since the days of "adam"--that it was not an "acquired" character or condition which was transmitted. but with artificially produced epilepsy (either by accident or purposely as in the cases of brown-sequard's guinea pigs) or in the other so frequent and so frightful disorder mentioned above, it is a simple matter to trace the "acquirement" as well as the transmission. but when a new light arises in the literary or scientific world there are always many persons ready to spring forth with the declaration that they agree with the new point of view without first taking the precaution to ascertain what the recent theory really is. "oh, i agree with him, the old theory is quite dead," greets the ear, and the placid pupils of the rising light so warp and distort the real opinion of the master as to make of him an absurdity. this has been markedly true of weismann and his theory of heredity. in ordinary cases of scientific discussion the misconceptions of the laity would soon adjust themselves and little or no harm would be done meantime; but in such a problem as the present far more is involved than appears upon the surface. the ethical and moral results--not to mention the physical--of a reckless mistranslation or misconception of a scientific theory of this nature cannot be readily estimated, nor can it be confined to one generation. it is pathetic to realize that many fairly well-educated and well-meaning people, who would protect with their lives the children they give to the world and shield them against all possible physical, moral or mental distortion, mutilation or deformity, will stamp upon those children far worse mutilations and distortions (and even physical disorders) through and because of a half-understood version of u the new theory of heredity. therefore i repeat that so far as the public is concerned, so far as the sociological features of the problem of heredity are involved, so far as the new theory relates to conduct and to physical and mental condition and their transmission, this controversy belongs to the laboratory--to the how and not to the fact of hereditary transmission, as i trust the above illustrations (which might be multiplied a thousand times) will serve to show. environment: can heredity be modified but heredity is not the whole story, any more than the foundation is the whole house. several times when i have spoken or written upon the basic principle of heredity, i have been met by questions like this: "then you must think it is hopeless. with these awful facts and illustrations of the power and persistence of heredity before us, we must recognize that we are doomed before we are born, must we not? if there is, as you say, no escape from our heredity and its power and influence, what is the use of trying? why not let go and just drift on the tide of inherited conditions? if these conditions are unfortunate for us, why not just accept the tragedy; if favorable, drift in the sunlight that our ancestors turned upon us, and let the world wag as it will?--we are not responsible." i confess that each time this sort of reasoning comes to me it finds me in a state of surprise that it is possible for thoughtful people--and naturally those are the ones interested in reading or talking upon the subject--i confess it surprises me anew each time to find that it is possible for such people to reason so inadequately and to see with but one eye. it is undoubtedly true that, do what we will, labor as we may, heredity has established beyond the possibility of doubt that an apple cannot be cultivated into a peach. once an apple always an apple. that is the power of heredity. that is the foundation of the house. but there is another story. plant your apple tree in hard and rugged soil; give it too little light and too much rain; let some one hack its bark with a knife from time to time; when the boys climb the tree let them strain and break it; let bridget throw all sorts of liquids about its roots,--in short, let it take "pot luck" on a barren farm with ignorance for an owner and shiftlessness for his wife, and the best apple tree in the world will not remain so for many years. the apples will not degenerate into potatoes, however; heredity will attend to this. but they will become hard and knotty and sour and feeble and few as to apples; environment will see to that. now suppose you had sold that farm to intelligence and given him for a wife observation or thrift. suppose that they had dug and fertilized and nourished and pruned that tree (i do not mean after it had been ruined, but from the start). it is quite true that you need never expect it to bear malaga grapes. heredity will still hold its own, and the kind of fruit was determined at birth (if i maybe permitted the form of speech), but very much of the quality of the fruit will depend upon the conditions under which it grew--the environment. so while it is true that our heredity is as certain as the eternal hills, and, as a famous biologist recently said in my hearing, dates back of the foundation of the sierra nevada mountain range, so that each of us carries within us mementos of an age when language was not and, as he humorously said, "man has in his anatomy a collection of antiques--we are full of reminiscences"; still it is equally true that the power of environment, the conditions under which we develop or restrict our inherited tendencies, will determine in large part whether heredity shall be our slave-driver or our companion in the race for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. let me illustrate in another way. suppose that you are born from a family which has for its heritage a history of many and early deaths from consumption. suppose that you have discovered that the tendency is strong within yourself. is it for that reason absolutely necessary that you buy a coffin-plate to-morrow and proceed to die with lung trouble? by no means. knowing your inherited weakness you guard with jealous care the health you have, and it may be that your intelligent consideration may secure to you, in spite of your undoubted inheritance, the threescore years and ten; while your robust neighbor, with lungs like a bellows and the inheritance from a race of athletes, may succumb to the march winds which he braved and you did not. maybe "quick consumption" will carry him off while you remain to mourn his loss, and quite possibly leave with your posterity a growing tendency toward strong lungs. i know a man in new york city who had what is called a "family history" of consumption, who was rejected on that account by every life insurance company in this country thirty years ago. well, that frightened him within an inch of his life; but with that inch he set to work to build his house "facing the other way," as he expressed it to me when i met him ten years ago, when he was, as he still is, a hale, hearty old gentleman. he is not and never could have been exactly robust; but he is as well, as happy and as content as the average man who has not inherited his unfortunate potentiality. it is true that nothing but intelligent and wise care all these years, nothing but his temperate and judicious life, could have compassed this end. i use the word temperate in its general sense. so far as i know he has not denied himself any of the best of life, which he has been amply able to secure; but he has at all times kept his house "facing the other way." his hereditary threat, while it has not driven him with a lash, has, it is true, lived in the back yard--which it does and will and must with us all, no matter what our environment or wisdom may be; but we need not foolishly throw open the windows, swing back the doors and invite it to take possession, while our own individuality moves down into the coal cellar. i have taken as illustrations in both of these papers inherited disease and its developments, but this is done only for convenience and because it will explain more fully, clearly and easily to most people what is meant. that our heredity is equally strong and certain in its mental and moral potentialities and tendencies is also true.* it is likewise true that the environment--the conditions under which we develop, curb or direct our natural tendencies--has a great and modifying rôle to play. * "alienists hold, in general, that a large proportion of mental diseases are the result of degeneracy; that is, they are the offspring of drunken, insane, syphilitic and consumptive parents, and suffer from the action of heredity."--dr. arthur mcdonald, author of "criminology." it is sometimes asked, if children were changed in the cradle, and those of fortunate parentage carried to the slums to be nurtured and taught and those from the slums. "to one at all familiar with the external aspect of insanity in its various forms, it seems incredible that its physical nature was not sooner realized. had the laws of heredity been earlier understood, it would have been seen that mental derangements, like physical diseases and tendencies, were transmitted."--prof. edward s. morse. if placed in the cradles of luxury, would not all trace of mental, moral and physical heredity of a fortunate type disappear from the darlings of murray hill in their adopted environment of squalor and vice; and would not the haggard and half-starved, ill-nurtured waifs of mulberry bend blossom as the rose in strength and virtue in their new environment of luxury and of wholesome and healthful surroundings? just here a digression seems necessary; for while i have no doubt that the change (even on the terms usually implied) would work wonders in both sets of infants, still it is to be remembered that for such a test to tell anything of real value to science, the exchange would need to be made upon another basis from that which is generally used as an argument, because it is incorrectly assumed that the children of luxury (as a rule) are born with clean and lofty heredity. this is, alas, so far from the case that it is almost a truism that "the highest and the lowest" (meaning the richest and the poorest) are "nearest together in action and farthest apart in appearance, only." they both frequently give to their children tainted mental, moral and physical natures with which to contend. the self-indulgence of the young men of the "upper classes" leaves a burned-out, undermined and tainted physical heredity almost a certainty for their children, while the ethical tone of such men--their moral fibre--is higher only in appearance and the ability to do secretly that which puts the tough of mulberry bend in the penitentiary because he has not the gold to gild his vices and to dazzle the eyes of society. the exchanged children, therefore, would not be so totally different in inherited qualities, after all. they would have alike a tainted ancestry. their physical natures are the hotbeds of vices or diseases that are to be developed or curbed according as environment shall determine. but the foundation in both cases--the ground--both mental, moral and physical, is sowed down and harrowed in with the tainted heredity. the mother in both instances, as a rule, is but an aimless puppet who dances to the tune played by her male owner--a mere weak transmitter or adjunct of and for and to his scale of life. therefore to point to the fact that to change these classes of infants in the cradle is to exchange (by means of their environment only) their mature development, also, from that of a wall street magnate to a sing sing convict, tells nothing whatever against the power and force of heredity. it tells only what is always claimed for fortunate or unfortunate environment--that "it gilds the straitened forehead of the fool," or that "through tattered clothes small vices do appear; robes and furr'd gowns hide all; plate sin with gold, and the strong lance of justice hurtless breaks; arm it with rags, a pigmy's straw doth pierce it." let us start fair. let us understand that no environment can create what is not within the individuality--that heredity has fixed this; but that environment does and must act as the one tremendous and vital power to develop or to control the inheritance which parents stamp upon their children. notwithstanding, you are personally responsible for the trend, the added power and development you give to much that you inherit. you are personally responsible to the coming generation for the fight it will have to make and for the strength you transmit to it to make that fight. many a father and mother transmitted to their "fallen" daughter the weakness and the tendency to commit the acts which they and their fellows whine about afterward as "tarnishing the family honor." if they had tied her hand and foot and cast her into the midst of the waves of the sea expecting her to save herself they would be no more truly responsible for her death, be it moral or physical. and let me emphasize here that i do not attribute all of the moral and physical disasters of the race to the fathers of the race. by no means. i believe with all my heart that the mothers have to answer for their full share of the vice, sorrow and suffering of humanity. woman has not, perhaps, been such an active agent, and much of the wrong she has done to her children has been compassed, through what have been regarded as her very virtues--her sweetest qualities--submission, compliance, self-abnegation! in so far as the mothers of the race have been weakly subservient, in that far have they a terrible score against them in the transmission of the qualities which has made the race too weak to do the best that it knew--too cowardly to be honest even with its own soul. i do not believe that the sexes, in a normal state, would differ materially in moral tone. why? simply because throughout all nature there is no line of demarcation between the sexes on moral grounds. the male and the female differ in qualities, but neither is "better," "purer" nor "wiser" than the other--dividing them on the basis of sex alone. i do not believe that women are (under natural and equal conditions) better or purer than men, as is so often claimed. i do not believe that men are (under natural and equal conditions) wiser and abler than women. these are all artificially built up conditions, and they have fixed upon the race a very large share of its sorrow, its crime, its insanity, its disease and its despair. they have weakened woman and brutalized man. children have been bom from two parents, one of whom is weakly self-effacing and trivial, narrow in outlook and petty in interests--a dependant, and therefore servile; while the other parent is unclean, unjust, self-assertive and willing to demand more than he is willing to give. these conditions have morally perverted the race so that it will continue long to need those evidences against, instead of for, civilization--almshouses, insane asylums, reformatories and prisons. it is usual to point with vast pride to the immense sums of money we spend year by year to support such charitable and eleemosynary institutions, instead of realizing, in humiliation and shame, that what we need to do, and what we can do, in great part, is to lock the stable door before the horse is stolen; that what we need to do, and what we can do, in large measure, is to regulate conditions and heredity so that we may congratulate ourselves in pointing to the small sums of money needed year by year to care for the unfortunate victims of inherited weakness or vice. we don't want our country covered with magnificently equipped hospitals, asylums, poor-houses and prisons. what we want is intelligent and wise parentage which shall depopulate eleemosynary, charitable and penal institutions. we don't want to continue to boast of a tremendous and increasing population of sick or weak minds encased in sick or weak bodies--half-matured, ill-born, mental, moral and physical weaklings who drag out a few wretched years in some retreat and then miserably perish. we want men and women on this continent who shall be well and intelligent and free and wise enough to see that not numbers but quality in population will solve the questions that perplex the souls of men. we want parents who are wise and self-controlled enough to refuse to curse the world and their own helpless children with vitiated lives, and who, if they cannot give whole, clean, fine children to the world, will refuse to give it any. nothing but a low, perverted and weak moral and ethical sense makes possible the need of an argument on this subject. it is self-evident the moment one stops to ask himself a few simple and primitive questions: "am i willing to buy my own comfort and pleasure at the expense of those who are helpless? am i willing to be a moral and physical pauper preying upon the rights of my children? am i willing to be a thief and misappropriate their physical, mental and moral heritage? am i willing to be a murderer and taint with slow poison their lives before they get them? am i willing to do this by giving to them a weak and dependant and silly mother and a father who is less than the best he can be--who arrogates to himself the prerogative of dictator who has no account to render?" all these questions apply to the health of the nation and to what it shall be in the future. when we speak of the health of a nation, we are so given to thinking of the physical condition, only, of its citizens that the more comprehensive thought of their mental, moral, ethical and business health is likely to escape our minds. indeed, i fancy that few persons realize that even in the matter of business ethics and general moral outlook (including the nation's political policy, of course) heredity cuts a very wide swath. but it is true that national business morals are as distinctive from generation to generation as are the physical characteristics, well-being or mental qualities of the different peoples. some one will say, "true, but all this is due to difference of environment,"--forgetting that the special features of our environment itself (outside of climate and soil) are due primarily to the hereditary habits and bias of a people. natural selection, _per se_, ceased to have full force the moment man reached the stage when he was able to control artificial means of protection or power.. the "fittest" ceased to be so upon the basis of inborn quality. artificial means--from the use of a sharp stone to overcome a stronger (or "fitter") antagonist, on up to the skilful application of money where it will do the most good--took the place of primary "natural selection," and the "fittest" to survive in the mental, moral, physical, financial or political arena became he who could command the artificial means of guiding and controlling the natural forces of primary "selection." the "tough" lives in the "slums" primarily because his parents did. he inherited his social and ethical outlook as well as his physical form, and the mould in which his thoughts have run was fashioned by nature and secondarily fixed by an environment or surrounding which also came to him as a part of his inheritance. heredity and environment act and react upon each other with the regularity and inevitability of succession of night and day. neither tells the whole story; together they make up the sum of life; and yet it is true that the first half--the part or foundation upon which all else is based and upon which all else must depend--has been taken into account so little in the conduct and scheme of human affairs that total ignorance of its very principle has been looked upon as a charming attribute of the young mothers upon whose weak or undeveloped shoulders rest the responsibility, the welfare, the shame or the glory, the very sanity and capacity, of the generations that are to come! http://www.archive.org/details/feminismsexextin kenerich feminism and sex-extinction * * * * * olive schreiner's great book woman & labour _large crown vo. cloth._ s. d. net "the feelings which are behind the various women's movements could not find clearer or more eloquent expression than they do in this remarkable book." _the daily mail._ "at last there has come the book which is destined to be the prophecy and the gospel of the whole awakening." _the nation._ t. fisher unwin, ltd., london. * * * * * feminism and sex-extinction by arabella kenealy l.r.c.p. (dublin) "_a good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit._" "_wherefore, by their fruits ye shall know them._" london t. fisher unwin, ltd. adelphi terrace first published in all rights reserved foreword feminism, the extremist--and of late years the predominant cult of the woman's movement, is masculinism. it makes for such training and development in woman, of male characteristics, as shall equip her to compete with the male in every department of life; academic, athletic, professional, political, industrial. and it neither recognises nor admits in her natural aptitudes differing from those of men, and fitting her, accordingly, for different functions in these. it rejects all concessions to her womanhood; even to her mother-function. it repudiates all privileges for her. boldly it demands a fair field only and no favour; equal rights, political and social, identical education and training, identical economic opportunities and avocations, an identical morale, personal and public. in _woman and labour_, miss olive schreiner sums in a line the feminist objective: "_we take all labour for our province._" and this is the text of the feminist creed; the elimination of sex-differences and the abolition of sex-distinctions in every department of life and activity. feminists anticipate--the militant faction with zest--fierce economic encounters between the sexes now that, war ended, our men, having fought their own and woman's battle in the trenches, are returning to reclaim their places in the world of work. secure in that possession which is "nine-tenths of the law," and armed with their new powers of enfranchisement, it is further anticipated that the usurpers will be able triumphantly to stem the masculine reflux, and to retain, on all hands, their new industrial footing. by showing that, contrary to feminist doctrine, the division of labour into two sexes, so to speak, is as natural and is as indispensable to human progress as is the division of life into two sexes, the purpose of this book is to dissuade women from exploiting a world's misfortunes for their own immediate profit, and to reconcile them, in their profounder and more vital interests and in those of the race, to surrender freely all the essentially masculine employments into which mischance has cast them. human evolution and progress have resulted absolutely from an opposite trend, in inherence and development, of the two sexes, as regards life and characteristics, aptitude and avocation. the progressive differentiations and specialisations of vital processes and living forms, whereby human character and faculty have been increasingly advanced to higher powers, reach their most admirable culmination in the complex division of humanity into two genders; each of which is enabled, by way of such complex specialisation, to promote, to intensify and to dignify its own allotted order of qualities. to oppose and frustrate this natural dispensation, whereby human development is achieved by the two sexes travelling along diametrically opposite lines of ascent, is to nullify all that civilisation has secured, and to transform the impulse of progress into one of decadence. nature, marvellously prescient in all her processes, has provided that the sexes, by being constituted wholly different in body, brain and bent, do not normally come into rivalry and antagonism in the fulfilment of their respective life-rôles. their faculties and functions, being complementary and supplementary (and obviously best applied, therefore, in different departments of life and of labour), men and women are naturally dependent upon one another in every human relation; a dispensation which engenders reciprocal trust, affection and comradeship. feminist doctrine and practice menace these most excellent previsions and provisions of nature by thrusting personal rivalries, economic competition and general conflict of interests between the sexes. should any reader find in these pages allusions and passages which, without biological or medical knowledge, may not be wholly clear to him, let him remember that these are addressed to such as have dipped more deeply into the subjects dealt with. the main outlines and implications of the new hypothesis presented here, of the origin and evolution of sex, are all that he requires to grasp, in order to follow the argument of the book in its relation to feminist methods. arabella kenealy, l.r.c.p. contents chap. page foreword v book i woman's part in human evolution i. impassioned fallacies of feminism ii. increasing differences between male and female sex-characteristics and functions are the main feature of human advance iii. the mystery of sex and sex-transmission iv. one side of body is male, the other side is female v. masculine mothers produce emasculate sons by misappropriating the life-potential of male offspring book ii woman's part in human decadence i. decline and fall of ancient civilisations due to feminism ii. the evolution of sex in adolescence iii. the extinction of sex in adolescence iv. the woman brain: its powers and disabilities v. male and female sex-instincts and morale diametrically different vi. feminist doctrine and practice disastrous to infant-life and human faculty vii. feminist doctrine and practice destructive of womanly attributes, morale and progress viii. dangerous separation of women into two orders: feminists and femininists ix. the impending subjection of man appendix further evidences in support of biological and mendelian propositions advanced in book i book i woman's part in human evolution chapter i impassioned fallacies of feminism "the sexual love which has its origin in what is external and accidental may easily be turned to hate, a kind of madness that is nourished on discord; but that love, on the other hand, is lasting which has its source in freedom of soul and in the will to bear and bring up children."--_spinoza._ i there is no subject save that of religion about which so much impassioned fallacy has been spoken and written as has been spoken and written round the woman question. for more than half a century--since mill wrote his famous _subjection_, indeed--it has become an increasing vogue to regard woman as a martyr; more or less sainted, more or less crushed and effaced beneath the iron-heeled tyrannies, personal, economic, and political, of the oppressor, man. and it has been in the spirit of this conviction and in fervid endeavours--indignant and chivalrous on the part of the one sex, and still more indignant and but little less chivalrous on the part of the other--to liberate unhappy victims from a barbarous oppression, that most of the impassioned fallacy has been spoken and written, and doughty deeds done. at the certain cost, therefore, of being stigmatised as a reactionary (severely qualified), i propose to unmask some of these which i believe to be baseless obsessions, and to present a wholly new--and, i hope, a more veracious and inspiring version of the case between the sexes. to begin with, i assert boldly that the so-called subjection of woman, very far from having been a cruel injustice merely, on the part of man, has served, on the contrary, as a blessing and an inestimable benefit not only to herself but to the race bound up in her. a blessing often rough and painful in its methods, during epochs when all other methods were both rough and painful, attended, too, by wrongs and cruelties; yet, in the main, operating vastly to her well-being and advancement and, in hers, to those of the race. looking back upon the hard and bloody routes of evolution whereby the human races have attained to present-day developments, we see our forbears groping blindly, fighting blindly, advancing blindly; stumbling, falling, picking up again; making new departures only hopelessly to lose the road; making new departures, now to find it and trudge on. in all its painful and laborious phases, a terrible and sordid climb. yet, nevertheless, in its great annals of ascent, a noble and a wondrous march of progress. and whether we are religionists or evolutionists--or are sufficiently broad-minded to be both--the history of life is seen to have been a history of deathless effort, never ceasing, never waning; renewed with every generation; intensified by every further acquisition of new power, as, with every further recognition of new goals and problems, the ever-increasing purpose and the ever-increasing perplexity and complexity of the purpose revealed itself at every step. it becomes increasingly clear, moreover, that creation, or creative evolution (to employ professor bergson's phrase), has been the resultant of a progressive aggregation of atomic matter about some vast immanent _idea_, slowly and by infinitesimal degrees materialising in the objective. very much as bricks are grouped about the pre-conceived plan of a house, and could not be assembled in the building of the simplest tool-hut without predetermination of the site of every brick, and of the relation of every brick to every other. and in all those past ages of conflict, bringing order out of chaos, progress out of order, and an ever-increasing domination of blind energy and inorganic matter by mind and purpose, the fighting male it has been who, in his conquest of the earth as in his conquest of other fighting males, both brute and human, has borne the greater heat and burden of the day. women have striven also--toil has been the crux of their development as of their mates. but men have striven twofold. while women toiled in the security of homes, the sword, the blunderbuss or press-gang, or the equivalent of these, according to the epoch, awaited men and still await them at most street-corners of the arduous male career. women have suffered more, _psychically_; because this way lay their nature and their human lot. men have suffered more, _materially_; because here lay theirs. and since advancement comes by suffering, women are reaping to-day the harvest of past travail of their sex, in the higher psychical development which now characterises that sex. during centuries when men were vastly too hard-pressed by the struggle for barest existence to have been aware that they possessed souls, women were privileged to be aware of theirs--by the affliction thereof. the immediate purpose of this fencing of the women behind the stronger frames, the stronger wills, and stronger brains of fighting males was the racial one, of course. while men battled with environment and with alien aggressors for their lives and for their food, as for those of the family, the sheltered women were alike the loom and cradle of the race. as well, they made havens, or homes, for the fighters to return to for sleep and refreshment. they plied a simple, primitive agriculture, practised a primitive healing art, and otherwise evolved the humanities. but since mortal power is limited, power expended in one direction is power withdrawn from some other. power spent in battle is power lost to progress. the woman who, with the instinct for home and as shelter for her babes, laid the foundations of architecture in a hut of mud, was enabled to do this solely by virtue of masculine protection. it is in peace only that progress arises, in leisure that the arts evolve. and woman, walled in by the lives of the males, found leisure of body and mind to pluck flowers for the adorning of her hut, to shape platters of clay, and, later, even for embellishment of these with crude designs. thus she was the first artist. the fighting male was--by necessity--destructive. he invented a club. the female was--by privilege--constructive. she invented the needle (a fish-bone, doubtless). and while the male transmitted to offspring his virile fighting and destructive qualities, woman tempered and humanised these by incorporating with them her milder traits and artistries of peace. lacking the male aggressive and protective faculties, however, increasing in skill and resource with his ever further adaptation to (and of) environment, woman's gentler and humanising aptitudes would have had neither opportunity for evolution, nor scope for exercise and further sway. ii i have been reading an account, by a naturalist, of some phases in the life-history of crabs. and it is interesting to find even among creatures so low in the life-scale (although darwin regarded these as the most intelligent of _crustaceæ_) that same instinct of protection of the female which is seen in the higher orders of creation. a crab, being encased in an unyielding shell, is able to increase its growth only by "casting" its shell and developing one of larger size over its increased bulk. during the interval between casting an old shell and acquiring a new one, the crab in its soft, pulpy condition is readily injured, or falls prey to its natural enemies. to protect itself as well as may be, it shelters in rocky crevices or in other available hiding-places. this shell-casting occurs in both sexes, of course. but the circumstances under which the change is made differ widely in the sexes. for while the male-crab has no protector during his defenceless, shell-less state, his shell is cast a month or more earlier than occurs in the female; after which he feeds up, in order to be in superior fighting trim for her protection during her shell-casting phase. fishermen describe him as then spreading himself over her as a hen covers her chicks, and in her defence desperately attacking all comers. the result of such protection of the female is that, although males are larger and fiercer, "hen-crabs" are numerous, while males are scarce. the like is true of nearly every species. the males protect the females. even the gorilla, savage and most terrible of beasts, lies at night on guard beneath the tree in which his mate and offspring sleep. if need arise, he fights to the death in their defence. with regard to the chivalrous devotion of male-birds, olive schreiner thus comments in _woman and labour_ (an example of that i have ventured to describe as the "impassioned fallacy" hurtling round the woman question): "along the line of bird-life and among certain of its species, sex has attained its highest æsthetic, and one might almost say intellectual, development on earth ... represents the realisation of the highest sexual ideal which haunts humanity." (this however, less, i fear, to accredit the male-sex with chivalry than to discredit the human male by ornithological comparison!) * * * * * one does not profess that such protective rôle of males--beast and bird and crab--is the outcome of sentiment. it is instinctive, subconscious. nature's purpose being to preserve and to perpetuate species, she achieves this by safeguarding the female. the province of the male in reproduction is but slight and brief. it exacts so little from him as to interfere not at all with those other masculine activities which are the function of his sex. whereas, as professor lester ward says, "woman [and the female of all species] _is_ the race." out of her blood and bone and vital powers she evolves and fashions it, nurtures and ministers to it. iii for the preservation of species, two rôles are essential: the male rôle of combat, demanding strength and boldness, resource and fighting-quality, in order to protect and provide for the female and offspring; and the female rôle of devotion and self-surrender, in order to nurture offspring ante-natally, and, after birth, to nurture and to tend its helplessness. now all but biologists, perhaps, take it as matter-of-course that love had its origin in sex. seeing love between the sexes as the strongest and most dominant of the civilised passions, it is natural to infer that it was born of the instinctive attraction between male and female, and that this instinctive attraction, with the growth and expansion of faculty, mental and temperamental, has evolved to the high and tender issues to be found in latter-day romantic passion; theme of poets, novelists, artists; richest and most exquisite of life's emotions; inspiration and motive of the finest human achievements. a passion which, for a space at least, transfigures the natures and ennobles the lives of all but the crass and the sordid. nevertheless--love did not arise out of sex. the sex-relation in primal men and women held no element of affection; no sympathy, tenderness, self-sacrifice, or other attribute of love. on the part of the female, it was compulsory surrender and the habit of surrender to superior strength, mitigated, doubtless, by a subconscious instinct to secure offspring. in the male, it was impulse as tyrannous and selfish as was the instinct to kill. like the instinct to kill, a factor in it made for fitness for survival. there was in it, accordingly, an element of instinctive selection. but the selection made for survival-fitness merely in the mate. it owed nothing to sentimental appeal exercised by one female, and lacking in another. the instinct to mate was implanted by nature for the continuation of species. if its observance contained an element of gratification, it held no more of reciprocity than did the gratification of that stronger lust, to kill, include a consideration of the feelings of the prey, or than greed of any other form of possession extends a grace of reciprocal benefit to the thing acquired. modern savages have no conception of sexual love. there are no love-songs, no courtship, no affection in their matings. the males marry mainly in order to secure wives to work for them. and they select strong women because these are best fitted for work. or they select women who have some or another small possession. biological instinct is a factor, doubtless, but it is not a factor of sentiment. in his fine book, _natural law in the spiritual world_, professor drummond says: "probably we have all taken for granted that husbands and wives have always loved one another. evolution takes nothing for granted ... in the lower reaches of human nature, husband and wife do not love one another ... for the vast mass of mankind during the long ages which preceded historic times, conjugal love was probably all but unknown.... "the idea that the existence of sex accounts for the existence of love is untrue. marriage among early races has nothing to do with love. among savage peoples, the phenomenon everywhere confronts us of wedded life without a grain of love. love then is no necessary ingredient of the sex-relation; it is not an outgrowth of passion. love is love and has always been love, and has never been anything lower." even to-day, despite the evolution of the higher faculties, despite long centuries of inherited habit and tradition, and despite the circumstance that in all the nobler types of men and women the sex-instinct is spiritualised by affection and understanding--even in this late day of civilisation, the male sex-instinct may be seen still in all its native tyranny and selfishness; seeking gratification in sensuality and cruelty, with callous disregard alike of the welfare as of the suffering of its victim. in the violation of women and children that occurs both in peace and in war, the instinct manifests as an impulse of aggression, and the sex-function as one of brutality or ruthless lust. iv respecting the origin of mind and emotion, charles darwin said: "in what manner the mental powers were first developed in the lowest organisms, is as hopeless an inquiry as how life itself first originated." and huxley: "i know nothing, and never hope to know anything of the steps by which the passage from molecular movement to states of consciousness is effected. the two things are on two utterly different platforms, the physical facts go along by themselves and the mental facts go along by themselves." while dr. alfred russel wallace (the biologist who was working out the theory of natural selection simultaneously with darwin, both unaware that the other was working in the same direction) attributes to a creative act of god, all the moral and intellectual qualities which have been super-added in man to those lesser and simpler ones he possesses in common with the higher animals. wallace describes this as a "divine influx," and regards it as being wholly distinct and apart from the slow and gradual processes of natural selection. but yet, in point of fact, what was it that inspired and energised the earlier processes, if not this same divine influx? the simpler processes must, from their earliest rudimentary beginnings, have been leading up to the later and more complex. and the later and more complex were, surely, continuous with the simpler--since nature abhors miracles, and works by slow progressive biological sequences. nothing shows as more impersonal than a crystal; cold, hard, senseless, motionless. and yet in crystals is the element of life, even the power of reproduction, showing factors of sex already operative in them. while living bodies, charged with warmth, mobility, sentience, intelligence, have inorganic matter for their basis of construction. and that inorganic elements are very far from being the impersonal things they seem, but are linked by subtle correspondences to living mind and vital powers, is shown by their effects on living processes and consciousness. given as medicines, digestion (which is a species of rapid evolution from lower to higher forms of energy) develops such vital inherences within them as prove their apparent impersonality to contain a principle continuous not only with living processes, but with the highest mentality. professor leduc observes in his illuminating book, "the mechanism of life," "_the ordinary physical forces have, in fact, a power of organisation infinitely greater than has been hitherto supposed by the boldest imagination_." coralline structures and beautiful shells, fungi, leaves, and plants bearing coloured, flowerlike blooms spring into growth when a formless fragment of calcium salt is dropped into a chemical solution. and these "osmotic growths," artificially produced, possess far greater complexity of structure and of function than do the simpler living organisms of nature. the evidences of a vast stupendous plan, which every further scientific discovery still further emphasises, are slowly forcing from our men of science the confession that behind the marvellous phenomena their findings reveal, and which they are powerless to explain, must lie a cause, occult and irresistible, an impulse, all-pervading, incomprehensible. bergson describes an _élan vital_--a living impetus--determining such phenomena. in his presidential address to the british association at dublin, in , professor j. s. haldane summed up as follows the position of physiological science: "the point now reached is that the conceptions of physics and chemistry are insufficient to enable us to understand physiological phenomena." weismann says: "behind the co-operating forces of nature, we must admit a cause ... inconceivable in its nature, of which we can only say one thing with certainty, that it must be theological." drummond says: "evolution is advolution,--better, it is revelation--the phenomenal expression of the divine, the progressive realisation of the ideal, the ascent of love." if, then, we admit life to be the product of a divine influx, whereby inorganic matter has been, by way of evolutionary processes, increasingly empowered to fructify in living form and faculty, human attributes are seen to be the flower of spiritual seed, which, sown in life, has germinated; has struck roots of biological function into living flesh and put forth leaves in living traits; has developed in physiological processes and blossomed in powers of mind and of body. and as the stronger and deeper the grip of its roots in the earth, the taller and nobler the oak towers heavenward, so it must be with human characteristics. the deeper and more firmly the seedling faculties strike roots in living function, the fuller and more potent springs the impulse toward that evolutionary perfection which is the goal of human being. if, however, living processes are the resultant of a divine influx, they are spiritual processes. life is then a manifestation in matter, of spirit. all the developments of life are spiritual phenomena, therefore. the imperfection and evil found in living creatures are not attributes of life. they are crudities of rudimentary organisation, or are failures in or aberrations from the normal development of life. v in the evolution of faculty, living traits are seen to have been all the while attaining to higher power by the differentiation and development of special organs to subserve their fuller function, their finer conscious apprehension, and their more complex manifestation on the material plane. the brain has been specialised thus to serve as the organ of consciousness; the eye, of vision; the ear, of hearing; the hand, of touch and of manipulation. the lowest organisms possess no such specialised organs of sense or of consciousness. nor are they equipped with special reproductive organs. they reproduce by cleavage; by budding a small portion of themselves, which, when separated, grows to a mature organism. with other differentiations and specialisations of function and faculty, there has developed--for the all-important racial purpose of creating ever higher and more potent living species--the highly-complex human reproductive system, which, by its close and subtle nervous alliance with the brain, has become the medium and the instrument of a new and irresistible emotion. so that it serves not only for the perpetuation of a complex species, but, moreover, for the attraction, by natural affinity, of the mates best suited to one another. and in course of evolutionary progress, the emotion of love has been all the while more and more so leavening and inspiring sex-attraction with its purer and more tender attributes, that human passion has come to combine--in those of higher nature--the flame and energy of physical attraction with the tenderness and devotion of altruistic affection. with the result that human parenthood, thus quickened and spiritualised, has become ever further empowered to evolve more highly intelligised, more beautiful and more efficient types of offspring. that passion, pure and simple, has evolved out of the male sex-instinct is certain. even in its chivalrous development of romantic passion, are found, in transfigured form, that flame and urgence for possession which manifest crudely and cruelly in the primal male-instinct. without this virile ardour, indeed, the sex-relation is but a poor and tepid, or a cold and sensual thing. yet passion is not love. that meekness and forbearance, humility and self-surrender have been reared in the female sex-instinct of submission to passion (primarily in aversion and fear more often than in acquiescence) is equally certain. and without these chastening factors to temper, soften and anneal, the sex-relation is a fierce and tyrannous concern. but no more than passion, is submission love. neither in passion nor in submission, pure and simple, is there joy of surrender or welding communion. nevertheless, since every human faculty must have its roots in living function, and every living function must possess some physical organ in which its processes occur, from what human function sprang the love that is selfless, altruistic and pitiful; soul and inspiration of the most sacred emotions--self-sacrifice, charity, mercy, devotion, tenderness? in what nursery of human consciousness was this fair and gentle blossom sown; to spring, to develop, and to make for gracious growth? since, although it has come to lend its purity and sweetness to the sex-passion, it neither sprang from nor has been reared in sex-instinct, is it a product of parental affection? is it an evolution of the self-negation and the tenderness of parents for their children? vi throughout nature, the parental instinct is seen as a unique development, detached from and high above all other developments. demanding, as it does, the complete surrender and self-denying labours of one individual in the interests of another, it differs from and traverses all other dictates. it impels a creature whose every instinct it had been--whose religion of biological survival it had been, indeed--to be wholly self-centred in its every aim and action, all at once to make another creature the focus of its interests and efforts. where for a scratch, for a glance, the fierce female would have fallen tooth and nail upon another, now she surrenders meekly to the pangs of bringing offspring into life--and straightway licks and suckles the frail being that has riven her. where she would furiously have driven off, or would have killed, another creature that approached her food, now she gives herself as food for this. where lesser fitness for survival on another's part had been signal for making such her prey, now unfitness in the extremest degree claims her devotion and care. superfluous to cite cases of maternal altruism. the mildest and most timid among creatures becomes fierce and courageous in defence of her young. style it "merely instinct," if you will. it is none the less heroic on the part of every individual that obeys it, and does not obey it blindly and mechanically merely, but employs all her poor wit and resource to suit her heroism to the special circumstance. without care and attention from the moment of its birth, the life of an infant would be reckoned in hours. the higher the organism, the more and for the longer period its infancy exacts unceasing devotion and nurture. fish and moth and other species of low order are cast off in the egg. chicks scramble out of the shell. the higher their grade in the scale of organisation and intelligence, the more helpless and incapable young creatures are to feed and to fend for themselves. kittens are born blind and helpless, but after a few days they see and crawl about. the elephant-mother suckles and safeguards her baby-elephant for two whole years. now, were there no purpose in all this--were it not that such devotion to offspring serves as impulse and spur to the evolution and development of faculty in parents, nature, in planning the complex human species, would, surely, have endowed the human infant and child with fuller powers of self-preservation. were there other functions and aptitudes the exercise whereof would better stimulate and foster human progress, it is inconceivable that children would be, and would be for so long, the helpless, feckless, dependent mortals that they are. for ten long lunar months, the human babe is part of its mother; homed in the nest of her body, warmed by her warmth, fed by her blood. she breathes for it, digests for it, assimilates for it, exercises for it. for ten further lunar months, it is dependent upon her for the food by which it lives. for nearly a year, save for an inept power of creeping, with but small sense of direction, it requires to be moved and carried everywhere. for years it must be washed, dressed, combed, laid down to sleep at night, got up in the morning, taken for rides or for walks, played with, bidden, chidden; comforted, warmed, cooled; defended, cherished, instructed--in a hundred ways to be gently and progressively adapted to life, by way of a more or less highly-specialised environment. even when no longer helpless, it must be provided for in the matters of housing, food, clothing, education. it must be instructed in a means of livelihood, and started on its young career. among the poorer classes the child depends upon its hard-worked parents for a period varying between twelve and sixteen years. in the professional classes, the young son and daughter are not fully qualified for independent existence before the ages of twenty-three or twenty-five. in ill-health, in brain defect, and in other incapacities, parents must provide for their offspring for life. and seeing how the demands of the young, and the response and exactions of the parents multiply and amplify proportionally with the higher evolution of both, we are forced to believe that the small survival-value of the child, owing to its native unadaptedness to environment, is part of the plan, and that it subserves some high and complex purpose in human development. vii an essential obligation of parenthood is, that, in order to fulfil this duly, the parents require to undergo a wholly new and intrinsic adjustment of faculty. having arrived already at a complex adaptation to a complex civilised environment, in physique and character, in mentality and habit, now, by a revolutionary reversal of their human progress, they must re-adapt to the simplest of all creatures and conditions--a helpless, puling infant in a cradle. where they had had a whole world, perhaps, of intellectual interests and social pursuits to engage them, now they forgather beside a cot and--according as they are human or are not--lose themselves, brain and heart and soul, in the puling, impotent thing. they make themselves eyes and ears, arms and legs for it; carriage, chair and bed. they gaze, entranced, upon the marvel of the opening and shutting of its eyes. it yawns; they tremble lest it dislocate a jaw. it sneezes; now they shudder lest it may have taken cold. it gurgles, and they are transported to a seventh heaven. never has either been equally fluttered at their recognition by an exalted personage as both exult when flattered by the flicker of an eyelash that it distinguishes its father from its mother; or either from its nurse. both perhaps are self-contained and philosophic beings, yet its cry distracts them; scatters their composure to the winds. the inept thing cannot even tell them what it wants. its cry for food is much the same as is its cry when it requires to be laid down, or lifted up. when its milk is not sweet enough, its inarticulate fury is expressed in notes identical--so far as they can judge--with those of its impotent wrath when a pin-point pricks it. but whatsoever the cause, to the winds the parental composure is scattered, as hither and thither they scurry, distraught, seeking a reason and a remedy. and this, of course, had been their tyrant's purpose. he had meant to strike panic in his parents' hearts. he was vexed or empty, or was otherwise uneasy. and behold the penalties of those who suffer him to be vexed or empty, or otherwise uneasy! and whether they are rough, hard-working persons who have neither time nor taste for fuss and nonsense; whether they are the archbishop of canterbury and mrs. archbishop, sir isaac and lady newton, or the emperor and empress of japan, it is all the same to baby. no other uses have they in his absurd judgment than to obey his slightest gurgle. and the wonder of the business is that they too--provided they be normal, wholesome-minded, natural-hearted persons--are of similar opinion. even a professor of archæology must feel a twinge of some emotion when his first baby cuts its first tooth. king lion himself suffers it with patience when his cub scratches his royal countenance, or gets its milk-teeth into his prize-bone. the whole face of the earth is transformed by the baby, indeed. and how much it is transformed for the better! it is not too much to say that it is humanised, redeemed. the most grudging of curmudgeons murmurs only a little to surrender his place at the fire to the baby. the thirsty thief forbears to drink his infant's milk. in his great story, _the luck of roaring camp_, bret harte has shown, and has shown as probable, the uplifting and regenerating influence that "the luck"--its mother a sinner, its father, heaven alone knew who!--exercised upon a rough community of vicious men. "it wrastled wi' my finger," says one in an awed whisper. to cover sentiment he adds, "the durn'd little cuss!" but carefully he segregates the member sanctified by the tiny, satin touch, from the other fingers of his wicked hand. chapter ii increasing differences between male and female sex-characteristics and functions are the main feature of human advance "the most beautiful witness to the evolution of man is the mind of a little child.... it was ages before darwin or lamarck or lucretius, that maternity, bending over the hollowed cradle in the forest for a first smile of recognition from her babe, expressed the earliest trust in the doctrine of development. every mother since then is an unconscious evolutionist, and every little child a living witness to ascent."--_professor drummond._ i tracing the attribute of love to its source in the parental function, it becomes clear that this function cannot be dismissed thus in a phrase. there are two parents. and the parts played by these, respectively, not only differ widely in their nature, but they are signally disproportionate in their share of the labours involved. for while the male bears the brunt of the struggle with environment, for his own and for survival of his mate and offspring, upon the female falls the biological stress of pregnancy and lactation, and the material cares of upbringing. the reproductive function of the male is but slight and cursory. with the female lies the tax of havening the embryo before birth, of nurturing it with her blood and substance, of suffering the drain it makes upon her vital energy, the burden of its weight; with, finally, the anguish and the dangers of delivery. and having come through all this, the subconscious and involuntary sacrifice is replaced by further--but now voluntary sacrifices. she not only continues to feed it with her living substance, but she employs brain and wit and bodily effort in tending, safeguarding and rearing it. meanwhile the sire--among the lower creatures, at all events--detaches himself with lordly indifference from any portion in these later, as he went free of the earlier obligations. he shares his prey with her and with their young. he defends them from the natural enemies of all. sometimes he condescends to play for minutes with his cubs. but excepting among birds, the male parent takes little or no part in the upbringing of his family. as with love, so with fatherhood, we take it as matter-of-course that this sprang and has evolved to present developments directly out of natural instinct. but as love did not evolve out of the sex-instinct, neither did father-love evolve from a paternal instinct inherent in the lower animals and in primal man. of this, professor drummond says: "the world was now beginning to fill with mothers, but there were no fathers, ... while nature has succeeded in moulding a human mother and a human child, he still wanders in the forest, a savage and unblessed soul. "this time for him is not lost. in his own way he also is at school, and learning lessons which will one day be equally needed by humanity. the acquisitions of the manly life are as necessary to human character as the virtues which gather their sweetness by the cradle; and these robuster elements--strength, courage, manliness, endurance, self-reliance--could only have been secured away from domestic cares.... the evolution of a father is not so beautiful a process as the evolution of a mother, but it was almost as formidable a problem to attack.... if maternity was at a feeble level in the lower reaches of nature, paternity was non-existent.... when we leave the birds and pass on to the mammals, the fathers are nearly all backsliders. many are not only indifferent to their young, but hostile; and among the carnivora the mothers have frequently to hide their little ones in case the father eats them." in place of saying, therefore, that love sprang in, and has developed from the exercise of the parental function, we must say that love--in all its higher aspects--sprang and has developed in the _maternal_ function. but since every attribute, in order to be conscious and realised, is not only rooted but is reared in living function--out of what living function did mother-love evolve? in the exercise of what vital processes has it been fostered and furthered? in so far as these involve sacrifice of self in the interests of the child, the maternal ante-natal processes are processes of self-surrender. but these, when once incurred, are subconscious and involuntary. the prospective mother has no choice but to submit to physiological exactions. and only a few women--those in whom maternal love is deep beyond the average--feel affection for their infants before birth. since love must have an object upon which to exercise its faculties and lavish its devotion, it is not, therefore, until the babe is in the mother's arms that the love-attribute begins to function. and then the primal fount of all conscious and voluntary human selflessness and sacrifice springs afresh in the individual when, in yearning toward the helpless being in her arms, she wells with tenderness and gives herself to be its life. in the altruistic tender yearning of the mother to her babe, whereat her blood transforms itself to milk, human love first sprang and functioned consciously. _this is my body which is given for you.... this is my blood ... which is shed for you._ says goethe, "there is no outward sign of courtesy that does not rest on a deep moral foundation." he might have added "and on a great biological function." every act of voluntary sacrifice, every impulse of compassion, mercy, tenderness, devotion, has had its inspiration and its source in this which is discredited by some as being a merely physical, and is despised, accordingly, as being an inferior process; this mystical transmutation of the mother's blood to milk, and the self-forgetting yearning wherein she yields herself as food for offspring. by the evolution, upon ever higher planes of consciousness, of this primarily instinctive sacrifice, not only motherhood but fatherhood too, and the love-passion between the sexes have been fructified and purified, and uplifted down the ages. other acts of devotion arise out of maternal ministry. but this is the intrinsic source of all. travelling up through all the rudimentary phases of development, simultaneously and side by side with the male fierce methods for the survival of _fitness_, there was evolving in the female, subconsciously and secretly, this sacramental impulse which was to inaugurate a new era--an era wherein charity and ruth were to be born as response to the claims of _unfitness_. the first woman who, of her free-will, gave her breast to her babe was the mother of all the humanities. she it was who prepared the way for the coming of christ. by her, love entered first into human consciousness. and by countless generations of such willing tender sacrifice upon the part of mothers, human love has climbed out of the darkness of blind subconscious instinct into the light of a great transfiguration. it is weighty evidence of the evolutionary impulse inherent in the function of lactation, that the development of this maternal trait engenders species so far higher in organisation and morale than those of creatures unequipped to suckle offspring, as to set the mammalia in a class by themselves in the van of progressive advance. the higher organisation and morale of such result not only from the self-surrendering instinct in the mothers of species, but doubtless also from the superior nutrition promoted in the developing tissues of the young of species, by the highly-individualised food elements which are secreted by the maternal living cells. the vital significance of this new potence in blood to transform itself to milk for sustenance of offspring is emphasised by the fact that the mammalia are warm-blooded creatures. while that this new quickening of life by the altruistic parental instinct originates in the female shows her as medium of that divine influx inspiring creative evolution, and evolving faculty by way of living function. ii the question now arises: if love and the higher affections had their origin in the maternal function, how happens it that man, in whom this capacity is absent, and who is devoid, moreover, of an inherent paternal instinct, has come, notwithstanding, to possess these higher affections? one may answer off-hand, with the lightness of the tyro, that these have been transmitted to him by maternal inheritance. but complex biological problems are not thus easily explained. nature works by processes, not by implications. and the physical functions and the mental attributes of the sexes are so dissimilar, and have, with evolution, so diverged by ever further accentuation, that we must seek for definite biological processes by way of which the male has become endowed with, and whereby his primal characteristics have been transformed by the evolution in him of the maternal instinct--under guise of the wholly new and alien trait of fatherhood. a study of evolution shows the differentiation and intensification of sex-characteristics to have been the main feature in human advance, and to have been progressively achieved by incalculable centuries of increasing differentiation and intensification of two opposite orders of impulse and faculty. in savages and in all the less civilised races, the personal and temperamental differences between the sexes are but slight, and last for no longer than a few years of life. as with other faculties, sex-differentiations become ever further intensified and more complexly defined as development rises in the scale. man becomes more man. woman, more woman. most notable during the period over which the human organisation sustains its maximum of condition, these sex-characteristics take longer to arrive at their perfection, and are longer and more fully sustained in the higher races and organisms than is the case with the lower. then, with that degeneration of tissue which sets in with on-coming age, the old man becomes womanish, the old woman mannish. it cannot be doubted that human perfection reaches its climax in the accentuation of the differences between the sex-characteristics, physical and mental, of the one sex from those of the other. the best types of men differ far more from the best types of women than inferior men and women differ from one another. in body and in attribute, the sexes are complementary and supplementary. and their dissimilarities are the measure of their complementary and supplementary values. their attraction to one another, their interest and happiness in one anothers' company, are proportional to the degree in which members of one sex supply for members of the other, sentiment and qualities lacking in their own. mannish women and womanish men are alike incapable of experiencing and inspiring the love-passion, which charms and transfigures life for true man and true woman. these unfortunate, imperfect neuter-persons, because of the deficiency in them of normal sex attributes and impulse, are shut out from the richest and sweetest, most sacred emotions of humanity--precisely as persons of defective brain are debarred from the richer and fuller appreciations and joys of consciousness. and yet, apart and distinct from, although at the root of this abnormal neuterdom, wherein the traits of one sex are so antagonised by those of the other that the finest powers of both are nullified--normally, all men possess latent in them the qualities of woman; all women have latent in them the qualities of man. otherwise, this third neuter-gender--mannish women and womanish men--could not have come into being. in crises of life and under other abnormal conditions, the dormant characteristics of the one sex are seen to emerge in members of the other, and to become dominant. a woman, in the face of danger, develops the strength, the courage and the material resource of a man. a man, when put to it, reveals the gentleness, patience and psychical resource of a woman. and in neither is this substitution of alien traits imitative, merely. that it is vital and intrinsic is shown by the fact that not only mental characteristics, but the body itself becomes transformed. if the circumstances--exposure to danger, to hard and rough physical labours or to mental exactions which are the normal of the male--continue for long, woman's physique, equally with her attributes, becomes increasingly virile of mode. a kindred metamorphosis occurs in men. when called upon to exercise for any length of time the functions of a woman, beside a sick bed, for example--or, to state it otherwise, when the male in him no longer receives the stimulus of the natural male rôle and activities--man's virile qualities decline. he becomes emasculate. so too in disease. with the vital powers at low ebb, man's virility ebbs low. he grows soft and sensitive, uncontrolled and emotional, loses energy and initiative; lapses in outlook and temperament from the masculine normal. in abnormal states of physical development, men are puerile or womanish. women, as result of like abnormal undevelopment, or after operative removal of reproductive organs (_propter quos est mulier_) become mannish of type. in extreme cases the figure changes to a strong and sturdy maleness, the voice drops to gruffness; manners and speech become terse and abrupt, the jaw squares; even moustache or beard may develop. such women lose, perhaps, every womanly characteristic; refinement of form, mental delicacy and sensitiveness, emotion, subtlety. they lapse to the biological grade, not of cultured, but of rough working men. in lesser degrees of sex-extinction, such as are seen in many of our modern girls, de-sexed by masculine training, the subjects are boyish merely; lean, active, restless, hipless, breastless, lacking all those fair, delicate artistries of face and form, as likewise the complex sensibility and emotionalism which are the higher characteristics of their sex. iii these and other singularities of the phenomenon indicate that man has, so to speak, a woman concealed in him; woman has a man submerged in her. the case suggests the little noah and his wife of the toy weatherglass. under some conditions the man in woman emerges temporarily. under some conditions the woman in man reveals herself. but the emergence in the one sex of the characteristics of the other, when appreciable and permanent, is abnormal and unpleasing, and is obviously degenerative. man is at his best when the woman in him is dominated by his natural virile traits. woman is at her best when the man in her is sheathed within her native womanliness. this way, each is a highly evolved and a finely-specialised creation. nevertheless, such possession, in latency, of the qualities of the other, not only enhances for members of both sexes the potence of their own, inspiring and enriching these, but it engenders more perfect sympathy and understanding between them. the woman in man endues him with intuitive apprehension of the woman-nature; of its needs and modes, its disabilities, its sufferings and aspirations. the man in woman informs her of the intrinsic values of his sterner calibre, and thus lends her patience with his impatiences, moves her tenderness and care for him in his rougher, more arduous lot, wins her admiration of his enterprises and ambitions. moreover, the man in her strengthens and intelligises her mental fibre, stiffens and renders more stable and effective her more pliant will and softer, more delicate aptitudes. while she, in her turn, endows him with her intrinsic mentalities. masculine intellection, pure and simple, is initiative, vigorous, enterprising; analytical, logical, critical; its outlook rational and concrete, its disposition just and honest. capable in the degree of its virility, of strenuous and sustained endeavour, of keen concentration and close application; taking nothing for granted, but questioning and demanding proof of all things, it is an admirable executive agent of mind. _per se_, however, it is rational and deductive, judicial and judicious, rather than inspirational and creative. the blending with it of the woman-faculty in him quickens his male brain by contributing the emotional element; endues it with intuitive sensibility, fructifies it with female creativeness. thus it blossoms in imagination--a new talent, which his natural intellectual energy and executive ability enable him to raise to highest issues in inductive science and the creative arts. sex, with its phenomena of the characteristics of both sexes blended but, nevertheless, distinctive in the totally dissimilar constitution of members of both, presents an enigma which all the thinkers of all the ages have left unsolved. what is its significance--what its explanation? how has it been possible--without miracle, but by way of biological sequences of form and process, of function and faculty--for the divergent characteristics, physical and mental, of the two sexes to have developed in both, not only without either order of characteristics (normally) neutralising those of the other, but, on the contrary, with both orders ever further intensifying their differences in the sex to which they belong? by hereditary transmission. true! but by what precise means? because nature achieves her results always by the continuous operation of unerring law and intensifying processes, not by eccentricities or deviations. when she seems to us to skip at random, it means that we have missed some intermediate footprints linking her progressive sequences in a long unbroken train. this problem of human duality, physical and psychical, has baffled not biologists only, but philosophers, religionists and seers. it fills both life and literature with puzzles, paradoxes, incongruities. it has been the source of perpetual misapprehension, misconception, maladministration, personal and ethical. it lies at the root of the whole woman question. it has supplied the motive--and has made the mischief of the feminist propaganda and practice. because, in view of the masculine qualities latent in women, allied with the circumstance that masculine powers are those most profitable and effective on the plane alike of physics and of economics, it has seemed an inevitable conclusion that these dormant male potentialities were _powers lying idle_; virgin soil which, tilled and cultivated, would yield fruitful harvest. and this for the benefit not of woman solely, but of humanity at large. strangely enough, the converse proposition has not presented itself. a pity! for it might have brought enlightenment. because it presents itself outright in the form of a patent absurdity. suppose a man's movement which should have had for aim the cult in males of their potential woman-qualities! not for an instant could the project have found footing as being rational, its ends desirable, or as improving upon nature. everywhere is pity or contempt for the effeminate man. he is regarded as a poor creature, neither one thing nor the other; as little the peer of true man as he is notably an unworthy counterfeit of woman. yet how is this? is it that we admit the male-sex to be so vastly and intrinsically superior to the female that we are not satisfied for half only, but demand that the whole human species shall be male? nevertheless, since masculine qualities, although undeniably present, are normally latent in women, they must be inferior in power and calibre to these same qualities in men. otherwise, in place of remaining in latency, they would assert themselves like men. woman's inferior masculine powers, even when developed to the full, can equip her, therefore, to be no more than inferior male; "lesser man" merely, in place of being "diverse"--the highly-differentiated, finely-specialised being for which nature would seem to have been shaping in her, during untold æons of progressive differentiation. iv the prevailing notion is that these masculine potentialities dormant in women are powers common to both sexes, which have been blighted in the one by long generations of educational and vocational disabilities precluding exercise and outlet for them. or that they are powers which have been dwarfed by long "subjection" of the sex in maternal and domestic functions mainly. consulting biology, we find that such artificial repression of faculty in the mother (even were artificially-repressed faculty transmissible as such) could in no way have limited itself, in succeeding generations, to inheritance by daughters. on the contrary, the more we learn of the laws of heredity, the more it is seen that faculty descends from mother to son, rather than from mother to daughter. and yet, despite the sex-disabilities, personal and social, which are now condemned as having precluded the mothers of earlier eras from developing their masculine abilities, such mothers transmitted masculine characteristics in ever-increasing degree to successive generations of male offspring. whereupon another seeming paradox confronts us. namely, that the sons of those earlier women, in whom masculine inherences were permitted to remain dormant, were notably more virile of body and mind than are the sons of latter-day emancipated mothers who have sedulously cultivated and have fully exercised their male proclivities. and now upsprings a further momentous consideration: is this cause and effect? were the sons of women in whom the potential male had remained abeyant, more virile of body and brain than are the sons of women who have cultivated masculine characteristics, solely and absolutely because the mothers in the latter case had misappropriated to their own uses powers that belonged by right of heredity to sons? while those other mothers, by retaining such in latency, preserved them as a rich inheritance for male heirs. is it similar, indeed, to the cases of a mother who realises and expends for her own purposes her sons' financial patrimony, and of a mother who, expending the interest alone thereof, retains the capital intact; and is enabled thus to pass it on as heritage? is the power held latent in one generation the potential of the generation following? it may be asked: why should woman forgo possession and exercise of faculties available to her, in order to transmit these to sons? one might answer as in respect of that other patrimony. if it be true that she holds these powers in trust merely, they are not hers to spend. to expend them is to despoil her sons; to make paupers and bankrupts of them, humanly speaking. further, since daughters inherit from the father, the male entail woman forbears to realise and to exploit for her own uses returns to her sex in the person of her grand-daughter--by paternal inheritance. for the able father is the parent of the able daughter. thus nature works with the eternal justice of eternal reciprocity between the sexes; making them all the while more complexly diverse, but nevertheless more closely interdependent. so that one sex can neither progress nor can it regress by itself; but draws the other onward with it, or drags it back. thus, the bread of human heritage consigned to the stream of posterity by one sex, for equipment and furtherance of the other, returns to the hand of the sex that consigned it. if this be so--and i hope to prove it so--the woman who develops the potential male in her defrauds of its lawful racial and personal entail not only the opposite sex, in the person of her son, but she defrauds of its dower her own sex too, in the person of her grand-daughter. of the interesting and important biological processes underlying the mystery of the dual-sex constitution and its manifold phenomena, i am about to present a wholly new and--i venture to believe--a wholly true and convincing elucidation. _natura simplex est_, said newton, _et sibi semper consonans_. (nature is simple and always agrees with herself.) bewilderingly multiple in her phenomena, she is superbly simple in her principles. by the operation of her one great law of gravitation, she sustains the mighty solar systems--and brings the apple to the ground. by the extension, counterpoise and co-operation of one primal cosmic energy--with its dual impulses, centripetal and centrifugal--she has generated all the diverse marvels of a universe. and in view of her simplicity of principle, it is conceivable that the duality of sex may be an extension into life of that same principle of duality which characterises the vaster cosmic phenomena. if this be true, man and woman are the complex resultant of infinitely many and varied evolutionary differentiations and associations of the two modes of primal energy. if so, the principle of sex must have existed before matter; must have been inherent in creation before creation began to evolve. and if so, evolution would seem to have had for its purpose the ever further and fuller manifestation of these dual and contrary inherences in terms of life and sex. while, to judge by effects, it has had for its means such ever more intimate and intricate co-operations of these as have resulted in the progressively diverse and complex developments found to-day in human life and human sex-characteristics. chapter iii the mystery of sex and sex-transmission "the idea that the female is naturally and really the superior sex seems incredible, and only the most liberal and emancipated minds, possessed of a large store of biological information, are capable of realising it."--_professor lester ward._ i those happy persons who do not perplex themselves concerning the intrinsic causes behind all physical phenomena see it as only "natural" that two parents of opposite sex should produce offspring of both sexes. and yet it is not only a great mystery, but, on the face of it, it is an anomaly that a child who may possess an admixture of all the physical and mental characteristics of its two parents, bears, nevertheless, the sex and the sex-characteristics of one only. sex, male or female, breeds true in nearly every case; the rare exceptions merely emphasising the rule. the mystery deepens when we realise that every individual is a product of countless such admixtures of the qualities, throughout countless generations, of countless forefathers and foremothers. and although such a man or woman may hark back to any one, or more, of the traits of his or her innumerable forbears, he or she, nevertheless, "breeds true" in the factors of sex and sex-characteristics. long and closely biologists have pondered these many and involved problems. how is it, they inquire, that an embryo bred of two parents of opposite sex develops the sex of one only of these? how is it that the mother, who belongs to one sex only, produces--and produces in about equal number--offspring of both? the phenomenon is expressed, biologically, in the term, "sex-limited factor"--an incalculable something in the embryo which limits its sex to the sex of one only of its parents. but the "something," and the method of this sex-limitation have remained enigmas. sex is regarded by the new mendelian school of biologists as that which is known as a "mendelian factor." and to follow the argument to its conclusions, a few simple words about the mendelian theory of heredity are essential to those unacquainted therewith. * * * * * about forty years ago, a german monk, mendel by name, was struck by the facts that in his bed of edible peas certain plants grew tall, while others remained dwarf; that the blossoms of certain plants were white always, while those of others were always coloured. he made a number of experiments in crossing the plants, with a view to discovering the law of inheritance by way of its operation in hybrid varieties. briefly, the results of his experiments--which have since been repeated and confirmed by many later observers--were as follows: there are plants that are tall and can transmit only tallness to offspring. there are plants that are dwarf and can transmit only dwarfness to offspring. so too, there are plants of white blossom or of coloured blossom that can transmit, respectively, only white or coloured blossoming to offspring. when a tall is crossed with a dwarf plant, however, or a coloured with a white plant, strange to say, the hybrid offspring of this cross shows _one_ only of these opposite traits, to the exclusion of the other. no intermediate, or mixed, forms are produced. thus, a tall crossed with a dwarf produces only talls. plants of coloured flower crossed with those of white flower give only coloured flowering varieties. a yellow and a green-seeded cross produce only yellow-seeded plants. in the cross between plants of opposite traits, _one_ set of traits appears thus, exclusively, in the hybrid offspring. these traits--because they _dominate_ growth and development--mendel styled "dominant." while those traits which are dominated by the other and opposite traits and do not appear in offspring, he styled "recessive." on further breeding, a new and stranger thing happens, however. because when such hybrids--plants bred of parents that had borne, respectively, "dominant" and "recessive" characteristics, but with the parental dominant traits so overpowering the recessive traits of the other parent that these latter are submerged and concealed--when these hybrids are crossed with other hybrids like themselves, both the dominant and the recessive traits of the original parents reappear in offspring. the tall hybrids resulting from the cross between tall and dwarf plants, when crossed with other tall hybrids of similar origin, produce both tall and dwarf plants. so with colour, and with the other so-called "contrasted traits." it becomes evident, therefore, that although the dominant traits of tallness and colour overpower in the growth and development of the second generation of plants, the recessive traits of dwarfness and whiteness, these latter traits are _submerged_ only, and are neither impaired in their values, nor destroyed. in the third generation, under different conditions of mating, the original recessive, and submerged, traits re-appear, and reveal themselves in offspring-plants as the dwarfness or the whiteness that had characterised their grandparents. mendel assumed that such hybrid plants--offspring of a dominant and of a recessive parent--produce two varieties of sex-cells, or gametes, and that one order of cells contain the dominant traits of the dominant parent, while the other order contain the recessive traits of the recessive parent. but any individual sex-cell, or gamete, cannot (according to his view) bear both dominant and recessive traits. the dominant traits and the recessive traits of the respective parents he regarded as being segregated, absolutely, in one or in the other set of sex-cells produced by hybrid varieties. and of these, the cells bearing dominant traits are able to transmit dominant traits only to offspring; while the cells bearing recessive traits transmit recessive traits only to offspring. ii now, biology shows that plants and living creatures develop from a single microscopic cell, formed by the union of two half-cells, of which each half was contributed by one of the two parents. clearly then, a hybrid plant is one that has sprung from the union of two half-cells, one of which bore the dominant traits of one parent, while the other bore the recessive traits of the other parent. but because dominant traits overpower recessive traits in development, the cross between a tall plant and a dwarf plant produces tall offspring only--tallness being a dominant trait which overpowers the recessive trait of dwarfness. so too, the cross between a plant bearing coloured and a plant bearing white flowers produces offspring bearing coloured flowers only--colour being dominant over the recessive trait of whiteness. but because the recessive traits of dwarfness and of whiteness were only _overpowered_ in the plant-development, by the dominant traits of tallness and colour, but were neither lost nor impaired in stock, hybrid plants that had shown only dominant traits in growth and constitution, produce, nevertheless, two sorts of sex-cells for plant-reproduction: cells that bear the recessive traits of the one parent, and cells that bear the dominant traits of the other parent. so that in the fertilisation of one another by such hybrids, cells bearing dominant traits mate with other cells bearing dominant traits, and produce plants of pure dominant type--tall or coloured, like one of the grandparents. while cells bearing recessive traits mate with other cells bearing recessive traits, and produce plants of pure recessive type--dwarf or white, like the other grandparent. it is seen, therefore, that in plants, when a cell bearing dominant traits mates with one bearing recessive traits, the dominant characteristics so overpower the recessive that these latter lie latent, and concealed, in the resulting plant. but when a cell bearing recessive traits mates with another cell bearing recessive traits, the resulting plant (its growth and development not over-ridden now by the more assertive dominant traits) is able to develop its recessive characteristics. * * * * * these interesting and significant laws of plant-heredity and constitution, discovered by mendel in peas, have since been found by many expert observers to hold true as regards other species of plants; as too in poultry, in mice, and in rabbits, and moreover, in the hereditary transmission of human characteristics. in _heredity and variation_, dr. saleeby points out that in the mating of a black with a white rabbit, some of the offspring will be black like one parent, some white like the other, and some grey--a blend of the colours of both parents. in the last case, the _dominant_ trait of blackness, derived from one rabbit-parent, blends in the fur of the rabbit-offspring with the _recessive_ trait of whiteness, derived from the other rabbit-parent; a grey rabbit resulting. but that the contrasted traits come to no more than a temporary and partial compromise during the life of such a rabbit-individual, without either of the traits losing its intrinsic characteristic--blackness and whiteness, respectively--is proved by the fact that these grey rabbit-offspring, on further breeding, produce not _grey_ rabbits, but black rabbits and white rabbits; proving that the black trait and the white trait in them remained distinct and segregated, neither altering its character in the least degree. it is as though one should take a spoonful of black pepper and a spoonful of white salt, and thoroughly mix them. a drab "pepper-and-salt" mixture will result. but neither pepper nor salt will have changed its colour or its properties one iota. could they be separated out again, each would be precisely as it had been before mixing. so it is with the dominant and the recessive traits in living organisms. they commingle intimately, but each retains its original and intrinsic quality. all the diverse and beautiful varieties of vegetation and the loveliness of flowers, in form and colour, result from multiple associations in hybrid-plants, of those which are known as the "contrasted traits" of parent-stock. iii the lay reader need not perplex himself with the problems and phenomena of mendelism. all he requires to remember are its three leading principles. firstly, that in the world of life, plant and animal, living attributes are divided into two contrasting orders. secondly, that of these two orders of so-called "contrasted traits" ("contrasting traits" would be a fitter phrase), the two groups are as absolute and opposite in character and in significance as are the _plus_ and the _minus_ signs of algebra, the positive and the negative potentials of electricity, the conditions of light and darkness, of blackness and whiteness, of heat and cold. thirdly, that the dominant order of traits are paramount over and extinguish the recessive order of traits. to sustain her equilibrium by a counterpoise of dual and contrary factors, physical and vital, nature must preserve these factors absolute and unchangeable as the constitution and the opposite attraction of the poles. but in order to produce her countless progressive variations of form and attribute, physical and vital, she assembles these contrary factors in countless progressively complex combinations, co-operations and correlations. it is conceivable, therefore, that the infinite gradations and variations of form and attribute found in the world of living creatures are, as in the world of plants, phenomena of the ever further differentiation and more complex combination, in the hybrid offspring of two parents, of two orders of contrasting traits, transmitted by the respective parents. in all their multiple associations and diverse developments, however, the two sets of traits remain unchanged, precisely as do the individual elements of chemical combinations. variations in species result, accordingly, not from change in the essential traits, but from changes in the modes and the degrees of the commingling of these in organisms; and in the modes and degrees of their ever more complex associations in such. tallness, being an impulse toward extension, can never be dwarfness, which is an impulse toward contraction. black can never be white. square can never be round. yet two opposite traits, both influencing development, may come to a mean, or poise, in an individual organism; as is seen in the grey offspring of a black rabbit mated with a white rabbit. but it is a _counterpoise_ merely of contrary factors. the traits of blackness and whiteness remain absolute and unalterable. if now, the reader has grasped these leading principles of plant-biology, he is in a position to follow the new application of them to human biology which i now venture to present. without going into details of physiology, it may be stated that the principles of reproduction are so identical in plants and living creatures as wholly to justify argument from one to the other. the only differences are in degrees of structural complexity as organisms rise higher in the scale of development, and demand, accordingly, more complex organs and functions for the more perfect manifestation of their characteristics; as also for the transmission of these to offspring. it may be repeated, however, that mendelian law is found to hold good in humans, both in the hereditary transmission of normal characteristics and in the hereditary transmission of the abnormal traits of disease and degeneracy. increasing complexities, structural and functional, are indispensable to the presentment of the attributes of the higher species, man. but such complexities are, nevertheless, continuous with and have sprung out of the simplicities of lower and rudimentary organisms, precisely as the branches and leaves and flowers of a plant are continuous with and have sprung out of its roots. a vital and important biological detail (to be considered later) is that plants are not, as living creatures are, differentiated into a right and a left-side, identical in construction. another is that plants are self-fertilising. with the lower animals, plural births are the rule. and in these, the still crude and imperfect differentiations of the contrasting traits allow of piebald and other modes of chequered colour and amorphous construction. the higher the organism, the more complex are the biological requirements for its pre-natal development, as for its post-natal nurture. the functions of parenthood, both physiological and psychological, are always evolving to higher and more complex issues, therefore, as the species to be reproduced and nurtured becomes more complex. in human births, single offspring is the normal. twin births are comparatively rare. and that these are abnormal is shown by twins being below the average always in health or in faculty; usually in both. iv as already mentioned, sex is regarded by the large and ever-increasing order of the adherents of mendel as a "mendelian factor." but in applying mendelian truth to humans, i venture to think the applications have not been carried to their ultimate and most momentous conclusions. because, given the keynote to the principle of duality in the phenomenon of the contrasting traits found manifesting in plant-heredity and constitution, the duality of the human sexes, with their respective orders of contrasting characteristics, suggests itself as being analogous. human attributes, physical and mental, are seen, like those of plants, to group themselves into two distinct categories, the male and the female sex-characteristics, primary and secondary. and these, though wholly contrary in nature and in trend, are found--precisely as occurs in plants--linked together in the hybrid offspring of the two parents from whom they were, respectively, derived; blending in a temporal unity, but remaining, nevertheless, unchanged in their essential differences; coming to means and counterpoises in individual organisations, yet nevertheless preserved distinct and unalloyed in these, as is shown by their emergence, unaltered, in offspring of opposite sexes. as a hybrid plant is the product of two parents characterised by opposite traits--tallness and dwarfness, for example--so, i submit, a human creature is the hybrid offspring of two parents characterised by opposite traits--maleness and femaleness, with the sex-traits differentiating one sex from the other. and at once a solution of the many baffling presentments and problems of sex presents itself--of the enigma of man with woman potential in him, of woman with man potential in her; a key to the mysterious duality of human biology and psychology, with its conflict of battling impulses, its harmonies of blending attributes, its innumerable and diverse developments in proportions, in means, in extremes; in normalities, eccentricities, deviations and reversions. and the analogy between the two orders of traits--in plant-life at the lower end of the scale of species, and in human life and psychology at the higher end--suggests that the ever-increasing complexity of organisation and faculty which has characterised evolutionary progress, has had for aim, as it has had for method, the ever further differentiation and more perfect segregation, but, nevertheless, the ever closer and more intricate association of the contrary factors of maleness and femaleness. in the lower organisms--plant and animal--the two groups of traits are but crudely differentiated as characteristics distinguishing one sex from the other. in such lower organisms, sex-development is merely rudimentary; the first foreshadowings in life of two intrinsic orders of essential attribute, the progressive evolution whereof reveals two contrary trends in physiological and psychical inherences. like light and darkness, heat and cold, sex is a phenomenon of dual states which manifest by way of relativity. without maleness, femaleness has no significance--no existence, in fact. and the converse. and in the lower and rudimentary forms of existence, in proportion to their degrees of undevelopment, the dual states of sex are but faintly defined. the very lowly forms are bi-sexual and self-fertilising. while the first and simplest mode of reproduction is by cell-division merely; the principle of sex, with its dual factors, functioning, but not yet differentiated into dual forms. the evolution of species and the evolution of sex have been so absolutely co-incident in biological progress, indeed, that we are forced to perceive them as cause and effect; or, rather, as one and the same thing. and the evolution of sex has meant, of course, the ever further divergence and the more complex specialisation, in form and in function, of the characteristics of the one sex from those of the other. v on still closer consideration, it appears, moreover, that the evolution of sex has meant pre-eminently the evolution of the _female_ sex--the slow and gradual emergence and development, in species, of female characteristics, as, in course of evolution, these have freed themselves and have risen ever further into evidence from long subjection by the stronger, fiercer, more assertive--in a word, the dominant--traits of the male. (a conclusion as singularly interesting, i think, as it is instructive, in view of modern feminist doctrine and aims, which make, not for the culture and the ever further evolutionary development of the woman-traits in woman, but, on the contrary, for a reversion to earlier cruder states of the subjection in her of her woman-traits by those male dominant ones, which, as the hybrid offspring of a male and of a female parent, every female creature inherits from her father, together with the woman-traits she inherits from her mother. there is seen here the irony that woman has, by long ages of biological development, released herself from sociological subjection by the male, only voluntarily to set the woman in herself in far worse psychological subjection to the male in herself.) in the new and profoundly interesting light thrown by mendel on some previously unsolved problems of heredity, the reason for the long subjection of woman, biological and sociological, becomes clear. because, given the key-notes of tallness and colour as dominant traits, one identifies these, at once, as traits of maleness; the greater stature of male creatures and the richer colour of their fur and plumage in the lower species pointing unmistakably thereto. dwarfness (or lesser stature) and whiteness (or lesser colour) are recessive, and are obviously female traits. the plant of dominant type, though still bi-sexual, is making for a male _genus_; the recessive type is making for a female _genus_. white creatures are so feminine in general effect that it seems an anomaly when they are males. the converse is true of black creatures. the black horse is stubborn and restive; the white, gentle and submissive. white poultry are prolific in egg-production; white cattle are good milkers--a female characteristic. jersey cows are both small in size and pale of colour. the male sex stands presumably for dominance. and his positive, or objective, traits overpowering the negative, or subjective, traits of recessiveness, prevail accordingly in early biological development. the female sex stands for recessiveness. her less assertive traits yield and recede into the background before those of the dominant male. in stature, in strength, and in colour, and in the allied mental attributes, he holds the foreground in form and in function. the reason being that his rôle in life is adaptation to environment. the male, therefore, in his masculine rôle of adaptation, with his dominant traits making fiercely for the survival and for the ever further development of physical fitness--until physical fitness, or adaptation, had attained due degrees of ascendancy--was long lord of creation; the female, his vassal. and this not only in life and in action, but too in the personal characteristics of both sexes. during æons before the recessive female-traits were able to come into evidence as definite traits, they functioned as negations, merely; submerged and over-ridden in all female creatures by the dominant male-traits they had inherited from their sires. primal physical development may be said, thus, to have derived its first impulse from those fierce and fighting male-proclivities which characterised it in the epoch of that early savage struggle with environment whence species emerged. only with further evolutionary progress, do the female traits manifest as personal characteristics, secure survival, and find increasing exercise and sway. the tigress is only less fierce, less strong, and less savage than the tiger. primal woman was only less fierce, less strong, and less savage than the male. it is only, indeed, in the maternal function and relation that the female traits of both tigress and primal woman awake, and find justification, impulse, and scope for development. and while the material progress which has led to modern civilisation resulted from adaptation to, and of, environment, and derived its impulse from the male proclivities of strength, assertiveness and intelligence, the moral progress thereof may be said to have derived its impulse from the evolution of the female sex-characteristics. because the evolution of woman-traits has meant the ever further tempering and counterpoising of the fiercely active and aggressive male propensities, by the more passive and self-surrendering qualities of the female. judging the respective characteristics of the sexes by their widely-differing rôles in the most important of their co-operative living functions, the parental one--the sole function wherein the sexes of lower organisation co-operate, indeed--the respective attributes of dominance and recessiveness manifest clearly in these. the province of the male being to fight for mate and young, providing food, defending life--in order to fit him for this struggle for racial survival, his traits of strength and stature remain long paramount, alike in development and function, over those of the female, as regards his own organisation and that of his offspring, both male and female. the province of the female being to surrender her powers to the nurture of offspring before birth, and, after birth, mildly to suckle and to tend its helplessness, nature equips her to these ends; inhibiting, or negativing, strength and fierceness in her by the traits of recessiveness. tigress or savage woman, her struggle with the rough conditions of primal existence is only less fierce and less strenuous than her mate's. it demands the positive male-qualities (which manifest first in stature, strength and pugnacity) only less in degree than does his, therefore. the negative female qualities which, manifesting first in passivity and surrender, detract from her fierceness and activity, would have made for extinction of species had they not been defended by those of her fighting mate, as too by the male-traits she herself had inherited from her fighting father. they could only evolve, accordingly, precisely in proportion as they were sheltered behind the male dominant powers. the tiger shelters his tigress only during her maternal phases, however. her cubs brought forth, suckled, reared, and thrust into the jungle to fend for themselves, she must fight her own battles for food and existence. and her brief maternal phases being all too short for more than the scantest development of female traits--which derive their fullest impulse in their exercise as mother-traits--she remains a tigress merely, and produces tiger offspring merely, because only tigerishness secures survival in her domain of life and attribute. with the further advance of progressing species, savage woman has evolved from savage brute to savage woman by way of such increasing shelter and protection by her dominant mate as have permitted the slow and gradual evolution of the recessive woman-traits in her; and thereby the evolution of the woman-sex. her maternal phases and the unfitnesses of these become ever more prolonged and incapacitating; her offspring demands ever longer periods of suckling, devotion and care, as both she and it rise higher in the scale of organisation. thus, sex has evolved in the male by response to the ever-increasing claims upon him, by the female and by offspring, of his traits of protective chivalry and intelligent effort. and sex has evolved in the female by response to the ever-increasing claims by offspring upon her, of her traits of devotion and ministry. the evolution of the woman-attributes has been rendered possible only by that protection accorded by the male to the female as the due of her maternal unfitnesses; securing thus for her and for offspring a more privileged and kindlier environment. environment which, evoking less of fight and physical stress, enabled her inherent milder, self-surrendering recessive traits to emerge, to unfold, and to function increasingly in life and heredity. and in the degree of her advancing evolution, the male evolved. because, just as in her earlier hybrid constitution, the dominant male-traits she had inherited from her father, submerging the recessive female-traits she had inherited from her mother, made her, for long æons, more male than she was female, so now, with their progressive evolution, the recessive female-traits not only made _her_ ever more woman, but, transmitted in ever fuller measure to her sons, increasingly tempered, modified and humanised, the masculine fierceness and combativeness of these. whereby were substituted arts of peace and civilisation for those of war. thus, with advancing evolution, the female sex-characteristics have engendered, in both sexes, qualities of quietism and subordination, to temper those of force and aggression; amenities of gentleness, forbearance and affection, to soften assertiveness, turn the edge of strife, and fructify intelligence. thus, human civilisation has been fostered and furthered. in the hybrid creature that every man and woman is, are grouped two sets of contrasting traits, or sex-characteristics: traits dominant, or male, and traits recessive, or female. and in the complex human hybrid, these traits, ever increasing in complexity of constitution and further diverging in trend, are associated in ever more close and complex poise and counterpoise as both become more intensified and intelligised. man is a hybrid in whom the male dominant traits derived from his father prevail in impulse and development over the female recessive traits derived from his mother. woman is a hybrid in whom the maternal recessive traits prevail in impulse and development over the male dominant traits she has inherited from her father. the woman-traits (which, as said, reach their highest culmination in _mother_-traits), become in man _paternal_ traits; modified mother-instincts which move him not only to love, in addition to providing for and protecting offspring, but, transfiguring all his other characteristics, move him to philanthropy, amity, tolerance and altruism in his dealings with his fellow-creatures. chapter iv one side of body is male, the other side is female "oh, i must feel your brain prompt mine, your heart anticipate my heart, you must be just before, in fine, see and make me see, for your part, new depths of the divine!" _robert browning._ i on further applying the principle of duality, as operating in organisation and heredity, strangely interesting and significant developments appear. because, with the ever further evolution of form and faculty as organisms have risen higher in the scale of life, the bodies of living creatures are seen to have become further differentiated into two sides; a right and a left. anatomically, these two sides appear identical in structure and in function, although contrary in incidence to one another. each is incomplete and impotent without the other. nevertheless, paralysis and other diseases show that each is, as it were, an entity totally distinct from the other. one side may be wholly helpless and insensitive while its fellow remains sound and efficient. complementary and supplementary each to the other, both are, in a sense, complete. further and closer comparison of function shows, however, that although they co-operate in action, they are by no means identical in power or aptitude. the right half of the body is, for both sexes, the active and executive half; quicker and stronger, and in all ways more efficient on the plane of physics. the left half is, relatively, passive and inert, is _responsive_, mainly, to the initiative and requirements of the right half, by which its powers are overshadowed in every form of direct activity. as with the two sides of the body, so it is with the two halves of the brain, which are at the same time the agencies of mentality and the centres for recording the sensations and for directing the movements of the two sides of the body. the brain-half which controls the right side is known as "the leading half." it is the agent in concrete intellection, as in physical activity. while, so far as biologists and psychologists have been able to discover, the other half of the brain is negative in function--a blank, as regards concrete intelligence and nervous or muscular initiative. in disease, it has sometimes been found to undertake, and to perform feebly and imperfectly, sundry of the duties of its active "leading" partner. but inert and inadequate in muscular action, it is negative in intellection. it has been observed, however, that patients in whom this brain-half is diseased show signs of moral deterioration. yet whatsoever its functions--and the fact that it does not atrophy nor degenerate in the marvellous structure and complexity which characterise brain-constitution shows that it functions duly--its operations are totally dissimilar to, and are, moreover, wholly overshadowed by those of its active, intelligent partner. here again, as in the two sides of the body, appear, surely, the factors of dominance and recessiveness--in other words of maleness and femaleness; of strength and activity upon material planes, and of inhibition upon these. developments which, being in full agreement with one another and with others, suggest that the two orders of sex-characteristics (derived from parents of opposite sex) are centred, respectively, in the two sides of the body, and in the two brain-hemispheres allied, respectively, with these. one side of the body, with its allied brain-half, represents the paternal inherences of the individual; the other, the maternal. if so, the right side of the body, with its allied leading, or dominant, brain-half is, clearly, of male inherence. while the left side, with its allied recessive, or dormant, brain-half is of female inherence. the inference is further supported by the fact that the stronger right side is rather larger and more masculine in form; while left-side limbs are in normal right-handed persons, more slender and shapely and delicate--in a word more womanly--than are those of the right. as regards the face, from one aspect both sides are complete, from another aspect both are incomplete, without the other. and in configuration and expression, the two sides of the face differ appreciably; the left side being more psychical, emotional and subtle--in a word again more womanly. in most persons, the hands and ears and eyes of one side differ from those of the other, both in form and in function. in some persons the differences are considerable. it happens occasionally, indeed, that the eye of one side resembles in colour the eyes of one parent, while the opposite eye bears the colour of those of the other parent. strange to say, there are, moreover, in the human male, organs concerned with the strictly female function of lactation. indication of primæval human hermaphrodites formed one of darwin's greatest puzzles, indeed. in his _descent of man_, the following passage occurs: "it has been known that in the vertebrate kingdom one sex bears rudiments of various accessory parts appertaining to the reproductive system, which properly belong to the other sex.... some remote progenitor of the whole vertebrate kingdom appears to have been hermaphrodite, or androgynous." it escaped him as it has escaped later biologists that man, the highest of the vertebrates, _is still androgynous_. and this inevitably so, since, being of bi-sexual parentage, the sex-characteristics of both parents must be present in him. in _the evolution of sex_, professors geddes and thomson state: "sometimes a fish is male on one side, female on the other, or male anteriorly and female posteriorly.... among invertebrates the same has been occasionally observed, especially among butterflies, where striking differences in the colouring of the wings on the two sides have in some cases been found to correspond to an internal co-existence of ovary and testes.... the prettiest cases of superficial hermaphrodism occur among insects, especially among moths and butterflies, where it often happens that the wings on one side are those of the male, on the other, those of the female." ii despite the fact that nature has evolved the complex human races from the single-celled microscopic _amoeba_ ("protoplasmic father of man," as science has styled this), there are those who regard it as another of numerous blunders on the part of the great mother that the left side of the body is a more or less passive and powerless member. accordingly, the doctrine of ambidextry has arisen. with the result that its wiser exponents have abandoned it. because it has been found that children trained on ambidextrous lines develop neurotic symptoms. this occurs even in cases in which children naturally left-handed are taught to use the right hand, as is normal. in a lecture given before the child-study society in london, mr. p. b. ballard, london county-council inspector of schools, stated that left-handed bowlers send down the ugliest balls, left-handed boxers deal the most unexpected blows--blows that hurt terribly. to be left-handed, it seemed, was to be not merely awkward, but to be wicked, moreover. yet any attempt to interfere with a child's natural habit is liable to make him stammer. (the evil bent of left-handed persons has a special significance in view of my hypothesis of the dissimilar mental functions of the two brain-hemispheres. the term "sinister" expresses this bent. the inference is that in such transposition of the normal functions of the brain-halves, the tempering and humanising influence of the woman-half is counteracted.) of a group of left-handed children, per cent. of pure left-handers stammered, against · per cent, of , in course of being taught to use the right hand, mr. ballard further stated. in another group of , the figures were · per cent, and · per cent. respectively. six out of ten left-handed children who had been taught to use the right hand were practically cured of stammering after having been allowed to use the left hand exclusively for eighteen months. there are twice as many left-handed boys as left-handed girls; and stammering is twice as prevalent among boys. all of which indicates normal differences in function of the two sides of the body--differences suggesting that, as i have surmised, each is the site and the agency of a principle totally unlike that of the other. iii upon referring to biology--on the processes whereof every development, both physical and psychical, of living creatures rests--this curious dual constitution of the body, together with the problems of dual sex-transmission and inherency, become explicable. and the solutions are at the same time so simple and inevitable as to be the strongest possible confirmation of my thesis. as already stated, living organisms, offspring of two parents, derive half the source of their structure from one parent, half from the other. all plants and living creatures evolve their organisation from a single microscopic cell, precisely as life itself evolved primarily, and has developed out of the single-celled, microscopic _amoeba_. the microscopic cell which develops into a living creature is composed thus of two halves, or "gametes," to employ the scientific term. one half was contributed by the father: the other, by the mother. the two have united to form a whole cell. from such a cell (zygote), half male, half female, the body of every living organism has sprung. now, although these two half-cells unite to form a whole cell, exchange constituents, and appear to lose their identity each in the other, it is, in the face of the strange dual constitution of the body, difficult to doubt that each half actually retains its identity and sex-inherences, and develops along its own lines (albeit in close correlation with the other), throughout all the marvellous, intricate, and complex processes of embryological existence, during which the zygote is evolving into a living creature, capable of separate and individual life. and the inherences of these two halves are represented, at birth, in the respective sides of the body; each being, as it were, a complete and perfect entity, although inseparably knit in one flesh to its twin. and throughout all the further intricate and complex processes whereby the creature comes to maturity, lives, reproduces its species, and dies, each half preserves its individual inherence alike in constitution and in function. and yet in the mystical unity of their commingling duality, they are one flesh. each of the parental half-cells contained, marvellously, the potential moiety of a living personality. but either, alone, would have been but an incomplete and valueless thing, had it not become united with the complementary half-cell required to complete it structurally, and to engender and energise its potentialities. nevertheless, throughout all the immature and the mature phases of life, from conception to birth, and from birth onward to death, the opposite sides of the body represent normally the opposite sex-inherences of their respective parents. they are, in humans, the man and the woman--two in one--that exist in every living man and woman. they represent contrary principles; they perform different functions; they engender and energise dissimilar processes. one is the centre of the male characteristics, dominant upon the material plane; the other, of the female characteristics, recessive thereon. normality and health are the mean and balance, in the individual, of the complementary and supplementary functions and processes of the opposite sex-inherences of his, or her, body. precisely as in the social economy the complementary and supplementary rôles of men and women counterpoise the aptitudes and determine the effectiveness of human life and action. the left, female-half of the body, with its allied half-brain,[ ] is inhibitive, and engenders the evolution and the preservation, physical and mental, of the type; sustaining health and vital power by way of the female attributes of rest and conservation. the right, male half, with its allied half-brain, is executive, and energises the development (adaptation) of the type in its relation to environment, and, disbursing and applying the vital resources, generates and differentiates potential faculty in terms of living function. iv this hypothesis of the dual constitution and of dual functions of the two-sided body supplies an explanation, equally simple and inevitable, of the parental transmission of sex. _natura simplex est_, said newton. and du prel, "nature is much more simple than we have any conception of." because, as biology shows, not only does each of the two parents contribute to offspring, but there being both a right and a left reproductive gland in members of both sexes, the contribution either parent supplies must have been derived from one or other of these glands in them. and if the two sides of the body are of different sex-inherence, it is only logical to conclude that the contribution the gland of one side makes will be of different sex-inherence from that of the other. since all forms of energy have two modes, potential (or latent) and kinetic (or active), on the plane of physics, this must be true, of course, of vital energy. life-energy must be present in all living bodies in the forms, respectively, of _latent_ vital energy and _functioning_ vital energy--energy conserved and available for functioning, and energy expending itself in the living processes of mentality and action. an individual is able to move his limbs by power of the _potential_ motion stored, or latent, in the muscle-cells of his limbs. just as a locomotive-engine is enabled to travel by power of the _potential_ motion stored in the steam generated in its boiler. and as in the living organism, so in the engine, the mechanism and the processes that engender in it the _potential motion_ of steam are wholly distinct from those which convert this potential motion into _actual motion_. one is able to think, by power of the _potential_ mentality stored, or latent, in his brain-cells. for not only the vital processes which sustain the life of the organism, as those too which enable it to function in terms of living personality and action, but brain-power also must exist in the dual forms, respectively, of _potential_ faculty and _functioning_ faculty. so too, reproductive power. in all of these appear again the modes of dominance and recessiveness, of powers _positive_ and _manifesting_, and of powers _negative_ and _latent_. and since the female sex is characterised by traits of repose and conservation, and the male sex by traits of action, the dual modes of vital, muscular, cerebral and reproductive energy _in potential_, and of vital, muscular, cerebral and reproductive energy _in course of generating function_, range themselves inevitably on the two sides of the living equation as sex-characteristics differentiating the male organisation from that of the female. thus ranged, they characterise the two sides of the body as representing, respectively, a right, male side which is the central agency in function, and a left, female side, which is the reservoir of the _potential_ of function. if then the female mode of functioning is the potential, or recessive, a mode of latency, it is to be inferred that the male traits every female creature inherits from her father will, when incorporated in a body of female prepotence, pass into the potential, or recessive, mode; and will thus become inhibited from developing as male-characteristics. nevertheless, this male potential will be preserved in that reproductive gland which represents the paternal inherences in her, and will be transmitted, as her contribution to male offspring, in the sex-cells generated by this gland. while the female inherences every male derives from his mother will, in the presence of the dominant male-characteristics he derives from his father, retain their latent, or recessive, mode; and will thus not emerge as female characteristics. the female inherences will be preserved, however, in that reproductive gland which represents the maternal inherences in him; and will be transmitted as his contribution to female offspring. it will be seen thus that, as in hybrid plants, so in hybrid creatures of both sexes, cells of two sexes are generated: in the male, cells dominant for maleness and cells recessive for maleness--female that is; in the female, recessive cells, prepotent for femaleness, and dominant, or male, cells. and of these, the dominant male sex-cells contributed by the male parent, mating with the dominant, or male, sex-cells contributed by the female parent, male offspring results. while the recessive female sex-cells contributed by the female parent, mating with the recessive, or female, sex-cells contributed by the male parent, female offspring results. furthermore, dominance being paramount in development, it must be from the dominant inherence imparted by residence in a male organisation to the potential, or recessive, female germ-plasm that the latter derives the new developmental impulse it transmits to sex-cells. while recessiveness being life and faculty in the potential mode, it must be from the recessive inherence engendered in the dominant male germ-plasm, by residence in a female organisation, that its dominance, passing into latency, derives a new potential of further evolutionary impetus. the differentiation of living creatures into two sexes, therefore, of bodies into two sides, of brains into two halves, and of germ-plasm into two reproductive glands, would seem to have had for object the ever further specialisation and segregation in the individual, for purposes alike of constitutional organisation and of the evolution of faculty and reproduction, of the two orders of contrasting traits, which i have assumed to be maleness and femaleness, respectively. from this view-point, the female sex and sex-traits are recessive, or potential, always, on the material plane, and manifest increasingly thereon only by way of ever more complex alliances with male-traits; which, being positive on the concrete plane, equip the female inherences for function thereon. femaleness, or recessiveness, on its side, however--being life-energy in the potential--is all the while engendering new potence for dominance to transform into active, or functioning, power. while although negative, it is equally potent, on _its_ side of the equation, to alter the values and manifestations of dominance. just as negative electricity inhibits the positive and destructive forces of positive electricity, although it does not, of itself, _manifest directly_. the dominant traits of tallness and strength, for example, are direct and _positive_ factors in physical development. dwarfness and weakness are indirect and _negative_ factors therein. nevertheless, degrees of dwarfness or of weakness must proportionally reduce and modify the tallness of tallness or the power of strength. but that recessiveness is not a _minus_ sign merely, as algebraically understood--but is an essential potence on another, and a psychical plane, is shown by the lesser height of woman rendering itself as a grace; her lesser strength appearing in the new virtue of gentleness. that the female provides, for fertilisation, only a single sex-cell, from the reproductive gland of one or other side, while the male provides multiple and commingled cells from both sides, supports the view that sex-cells derived from one side are of opposite sex-inherence to those from the other side. otherwise, why two reproductive glands? the author of _the causation of sex_ adduces evidence showing not only that the two glands are of opposite sex-inherence, but, moreover, that normally they function alternately; so that now a cell of one, now, of the other sex, is produced. it is likely, however, that function is seldom so mechanical, but that personal constitution or nurture modifies its operations. that the male cells are multiple in number points to such a struggle of survival-fitness as ever characterises the more strenuous male destiny. not, perhaps, the fittest as regards intrinsic superiority, but that most compatible with the requirements of the queen-cell is selected for mate. should the queen-cell be of inferior standard, therefore, then (as happens in life) not the noblest of type, but that most adapted to environment secures racial survival. so that here again, evolutionary racial advance may derive its impulse from the female factor. a singular phenomenon, recorded by the biologist, rörig, and one which materially supports my argument, is that disease of the ovaries of a female deer will cause _male_ antlers to develop in her. proving a male organism concealed, or held recessive, in her, by power of her female sex-organs normally to inhibit the development of her inherited male-traits. a strange feature of this abnormal occurrence is that disease of _one_ ovary only causes antlers to develop on _one_ side only--and this on the side opposite to that of the diseased gland. on the other hand, castration of male sheep of the merino breed (only the males of which are horned) occasions hornlessness. v male traits being paramount on the plane of concrete function, although they exist (normally) in recessive form in the female, it is from the male inherence of her active right side and its allied brain-half that she derives her concrete powers alike of body and of brain. it is obvious, therefore, that when abnormally stimulated by undue exercise, such male-traits may develop into abnormal dominance. the left arm of woman is essentially the woman-member. in its half-passive action of supporting her infant for hours together, it is stronger for this maternal ministration than is the more active and doughty right arm of the male. her left hand is more delicate of form, gentler and more soothing of motion than her right hand is. it is the hand she caresses with. while for direct, strong action--masculine action, that is--the paternal right half of her is dominant, as in the male. and although in our present-day stages of evolution, the recessive woman-traits have emerged as definite characteristics, emancipating themselves from subjection by the dominant male-traits, it must be remembered that their impulse and their powers are yet but rudimentary. woman is still more male than she is female; her methods being more masculine still than they are womanly. and this in the degree of her cruder racial stock, or of the harder conditions (natural or artificial) of the environment in which she finds herself, demanding more of masculine proclivity in her--of physical activity and mental assertiveness--than of her intrinsic woman-qualities of emotion and ministry. civilisation, foreshadowing evolutionary ideals, discountenances, the fighting female. nevertheless, the cruder female _fights_ still with her male right arm, and the more cultured female, with tongue and tactics. the intrinsic woman-qualities, whereof christianity is the gospel, are yet in their infancy of development; are yet more ideals for which we are shaping and waiting than they are realised and abiding facts. even their own babes are not secure from the instinct of blows inherent in the male-muscles of their mothers' right arms, when these are restrained neither by a woman's tenderness nor by a man's chivalry. girl-babies, save those of the rarer higher types, beat their mothers and nurses only rather less frequently and less fiercely than boy-babies do. later in their life-history, that new impulse to the evolution of the woman-traits which characterises their development to womanhood, normally negatives and further tempers in girls the male instincts of fight and of sport. but many of our modern amazons, brought up like boys, are more male than are their brothers. the male fighting-instinct which moved man to invent a club (destructive) has become so tempered by the increasingly potent woman-traits in him that, save when angry or at war, he is content to turn his club into a golf-stick, a cricket bat, or tennis racquet; his sword into a plough-share. whereas, on the contrary, the woman-traits which moved woman to invent the needle (constructive) are becoming so over-ridden by the male in her that modern woman, artificially masculinised, abhors the needle, and is almost as much dominated as the other sex is by the male instinct for a weapon in the hand. the class, vertebrates, would seem to represent an adaptation to environment typically male; earlier than and contrary in trend to that of the mammalia, whereof the impulse was obviously female. increasing vertebration was characterised by such a progressive differentiation of male from female traits as progressively segregated these in opposite sides of the body; with spinal column and spinal cord for, respectively, physical and nervous central lines of demarcation. thus the male traits were enabled more and more to detach themselves at will from female inhibition, and thereby increasingly to specialise and exercise those powers of force and fierceness and activity by way of which species became ever more individuated; aggressive, intelligent, efficient, in terms of _fitness_ for the struggle for survival. until that later evolution of female adaptation to _unfitness_, in the sacrificial function of lactation, inhibiting and tempering the earlier male trend, engendered the yet higher order of mammalia. (with that intuitive illumination inspiring speech, men and races lacking in virility are contemptuously described as being "invertebrate.") according to this hypothesis, the paternal (and male) inherences of any mother may be said to be transmitted to the grandson in the direct male line of her heredity--an unbroken line of maleness reaching back to its amoebic origin. while the maternal (and female) inherences of any father are transmitted, in the direct female line, to the grand-daughter--a similar line of continuity. the woman-sex and traits of the grandmother remain thus for a generation dormant, or recessive, in the father; "skipping a generation," as the phrase is. then, in the third generation, they re-appear in the grand-daughter; by power of a maternal contribution in which the female inherence is prepotent. while the male-sex and traits of the grandfather remain dormant, or potential, in the mother; likewise "skipping a generation." then they emerge in the grandson, by power of a male gamete evoking the inherent male in them. vi the attributes of the one sex invested thus in the other, although normally submerged, form nevertheless a valuable endowment; supplying supplementary and complementary factors to counterpoise, to energise, and fructify the powers proper to the sex of the individual. man bears throughout life the woman-potential his mother transmitted to him. but it is not his to realise. he bears it in trust for his daughters. he transmits it to his daughters, and in them this potential, recovering its woman-impulse, evolves to a further degree of woman-power. the like with mothers and sons. all of which is supported by the mendelian doctrine that the mother transmits "femaleness" as a dominant factor to her daughters and as a recessive factor to her sons. but the method whereby this is achieved has remained a mystery. professor punnett says with regard to the phenomenon: "the mother transmits to her daughter the dominant faculty of femaleness, but to balance this, as it were, she transmits to her sons another quality which her daughters do not receive ... among human families, in respect to particular qualities, the sons tend to resemble their mothers more than their daughters do." a striking illustration of such transmission by mother to son of a paternally-derived abnormal inherence _which she herself does not develop_, is found in so-called "bleeders"; persons who suffer from the disease, hæmophilia. the daughters of a "bleeder" father show no symptom at all of the affliction, but they, nevertheless, pass on to their sons this male heritage of the grandfather. there are numerous other examples of traits and diseases thus "skipping a generation"--in other words, of lying dormant, or potential, merely; overshadowed in the constitution and psychology of the sex to which they do not rightly belong, but developing in a succeeding generation in offspring of that sex whereof they are a natural trait, or (so to speak) a natural defect. since the woman-half she contributes to their hybrid constitution engenders the potential of their living processes, the mother may be regarded as still mothering her children throughout development and maturity, and to the end of their natural term. accounting for that mystical sympathy between mother and child which intuitively informs her of fatalities occurring to absent sons and daughters--but to sons pre-eminently. marvellously, they remain one living flesh so long as life persists. during the war, mothers at a distance have known by an intuitive flash, and have told of the death of sons cut down in battle. one mother described the sensation she experienced as being precisely _as though one side of her body had been suddenly torn away_. so too, mothers whose infants have died during childbirth or shortly after, describe as persisting for months subsequently a sense as though part of them were dead. the father too must function in the hybrid living constitution. with the immense difference, however, that his part therein is a factor of the development of traits, not of the mystical functioning of life. a notable feature of this paternal heritage is that in women at middle-age (when the wane of reproductive power releases vital potential from maternal investments) not only may masculine physical traits emerge, but there may develop in them notable brain-capacities inherited from the father. capacities inherent in them previously, but long inhibited in action by the normal female brain-recessiveness. vii every higher evolutionary differentiation results inevitably not only in progressive mutations in the traits of species, but, as well, in variations of the reproductive processes of such. when _defects_, physical or mental, are not reproduced in later generations true to mendelian law, however, this is not abnormal, but is beautifully normal. normality requires that defect--which is a deviation from the normal--shall not be transmitted in any ratio whatsoever, but shall be corrected in a succeeding generation. moreover, when we realise the number and the complexities of human traits, all struggling to keep the law, it is only to be expected that any single characteristic owing to its sex-inherence, may pass into the potential or recessive, mode, and may thus vanish for a generation. further, by the law of compensation, any trait or determinant, although itself dominant, may be dwarfed and submerged by some other dominant trait more assertive than itself. suppose a father normally larger and stronger than the normally shorter and weaker mother: stature and strength being both dominant and masculine traits, the traits of such a father, dominating the development of his sons, should so over-ride the traits of lesser strength and stature of the mother (in whom strength and stature are normally recessive) that his sons will be tall and broad and strong, and mentally virile. on the other hand, the mother's traits, prepotent in the development of daughters, will inhibit in these and diminish the strength and stature of their paternal inherences. thus, the woman of pure recessive (the essential woman) type is smaller, more delicately organised, and weaker than the male. by such means, the normal of the relative strength, stature, and mental qualifications of the sexes is preserved; the specialised characteristics of both ever further diverging in trend, while at the same time intensifying their intrinsic attributes. suppose, however, a mother who deviates from the normal in having developed along masculine lines, and who is, accordingly, tall or strong or mentally virile: far from supplementing, in her sons, the father's traits of strength and stature, her sons will be more or less emasculate in mind or body, or in both. strength and stature and virile mentality not being normal to her, these can only have emerged in her and can only have been exercised by her at cost of the masculine potential she bore in trust for male offspring. a woman who wins golf or hockey-matches may be said therefore to energise her muscles with the potential manhood of possible sons. with their potential existence indeed, since over-strenuous pursuits may sterilise women absolutely as regards male offspring. thus it is that muscular and otherwise masculine women produce weakling males. (giant women--female-dominants--are incapable of reproduction.) tall mothers may produce tall sons, by transmitting to them the single trait of tallness of the maternal grandfather. but since tallness in woman is development along masculine lines, and detracts from her maternal power, the tall son in such case is likely to be defective in other manly traits. men are of greater height than women, mainly in consequence of greater length of leg. the power expended in the male in length of limb is absorbed in the female into complex pelvic developments, wherein it is stored as reproductive potential. the power thus stored in latency reveals itself in the amazing evolution, as regards capacity and muscular equipment, by way of which the maternal _uterus_ so develops during pregnancy as to enable it to cradle an infant of or lbs. weight, and to deliver this by output of immense energy--a marvel of biological function and mechanism. since the male trait of tallness may be transmitted by woman from her father to her son, without manifesting in herself, it is obviously waste of power for her to develop a characteristic she needs neither for personal nor for hereditary purposes. whereas, by further evolving her own woman-traits of suppleness and grace, she contributes new factors to those of the male. and so with all the other sex-characteristics. mr. horace g. regnart, m.a., the well-known breeder of pedigree stock, states that a bull of marked _masculine_ characteristics sires daughters of marked _feminine_ characteristics. while the _feminine_ cow bears sons of strongly _masculine_ type. on the other hand, the daughters of a "steery" bull (a bull of de-sexed type) are themselves defective in female characteristics, and bear sons defective in male characteristics. viii clearly and fully defined, accordingly, as sex-characteristics are in proportion as the individual is of high and normal organisation, obtrusions in the one sex of the traits of the other are as much stigmata of abnormality as are cleft-palate, webbed feet, or other deviations from the normal. because they are reversions to lower types of organisation in which sex was less highly differentiated than is the normal of to-day. although, with progressive evolution, the sex-traits are spun ever finer and finer, and are ever more subtly and inextricably interwoven with those of the other, normally the threads run true and distinct as do the threads of warp and woof in textile fabric. the ever finer spinning of the threads secures an ever closer, subtler interweaving. whereby the fabric of human organisation, of character and faculty, becomes ever firmer yet more supple, ever stronger yet more delicate, ever more intense and rich of colour, but nevertheless more beautifully harmonised and subtilised by half-tones and complex gradations. this is the reason why the strongest and most virile men are the most humane; the sternest are most tender; the greatest are most subtle. so inextricably interwoven with their virile characteristics are the finer spun woman-potencies, as strangely and exquisitely to temper and sensitise their manhood's powers. and it is why the tenderest, most womanly women are the noblest; the gentlest are the most enduring; the wisest are the sweetest. but no more than black can be white, acid, alkaline, or the straight line a circle, can repose be action, sternness be sweetness, firmness be softness, fierceness be gentleness; assertiveness, selflessness; boldness, modesty. nevertheless, in the hybrid unfoldment of contrasting traits, softness tempering fierceness transforms it to strength; sweetness tempering sternness melts it to mercy; assertiveness reinforcing selflessness nerves it to devotion; firmness preserves softness from lapsing to weakness; altruism, inspiring chivalry, transfigures it to heroism. but that fierceness and strength, sweetness and selflessness, have only intensified as, with further evolution, they have extended further into life and consciousness, is shown when they tear themselves asunder from their counterpoising attributes. fierceness is seen then to be more fierce in complex man--because fierce in so many more and deeper issues of life and consciousness--than is the fierceness of the gorilla, which manifests largely in muscular savagery; champing of jaws, and beating on its breast as on a drum. so too, the emotion of complex woman is more deeply rooted in her, and is more intense, than is the instinctive emotionalism of the savage woman which expresses itself mainly in reflex movements and hysterical outcries. * * * * * thus down the ages, man, by way of fatherhood, has endowed woman ever further with his developing traits of strength and intelligence. woman, by way of motherhood, has endowed man with an ever fuller heritage of her attributes of selflessness and intuition. so these poor souls--the man and the woman in all men and women--have climbed the steep ascent together, hand in hand, toward the light. without the other, neither could have come. so tragically drear and solitary would have been the pilgrimage, save for the spiritual converse of that mystical comrade. only by way of this psychical comradeship, which solaces the one sex by the inspiration of the other, do men and women win through the terrestrial travail of the human destiny. the mystical man (who is her father in her) when woman would falter and fail in the fight, whispers, "courage, dear girl, go on!" the mystical woman (who is his mother in him) goes with her son into the murk and struggle of temptation, holding her lamp of the good and the true and the beautiful before his blinding eyes. footnote: [ ] owing to an interchange of nervous strands, the right half of the brain controls the left half of the body; and the converse. structural details which need not be considered here, but which have clearly for purpose the closer and more complex association and co-ordination of the contrasting traits of the two sides of the body. chapter v masculine mothers produce emasculate sons by misappropriating the life-potential of male offspring "_the truth, when it is discovered, is what every one has known._" i mendel found that the hybrid plants resulting from his cross-breedings of dominants with recessives produced, when mated with similar hybrids, sex-cells of pure dominant and sex-cells of pure recessive types, and, moreover, a proportion of sex-cells of mixed type, corresponding to the grey rabbit-offspring of a black rabbit that has mated with a white. so too, are found among humans, four types of men and women such as might be expected under my application of mendelian doctrine: _homozygotes_ for traits, or pure typical men and women--dominant males and recessive females, respectively; and _heterozygotes_ for traits, or mixed types--dominant females and recessive males. of the pure masculine type, are men who are wholly male in body, mind and bent; active, energetic, enterprising; pioneers of material progress; state-builders, city-builders, trade-builders, financiers, explorers, soldiers, men of affairs. of the mixed type, are men who, while being virile of body and mind, possess nevertheless a greater admixture of womanly quality than is strictly normal. these are the artists, poets, writers, doctors, priests, philanthropists. among women also, are two kindred orders; the wholly womanly--pure unalloyed types of natural woman, wife and mother, sister, friend; and women who, while being wholly womanly too in attribute and trend, possess, nevertheless, underlying manly faculties which give broader scope and effectiveness to abstract and impersonal issues of their own sex-characteristics. these are the artists and poets and writers who present the woman point of view. they are the florence nightingales, the charlotte brontës, mary somervilles; the philanthropists, reformers, born physicians, teachers, nurses, and so forth; whose part it is to mother, befriend and inspire humanity at large rather than to minister to individuals. whose part it is, as well, to extend the tender, purifying ethics of woman and the home ever further and more deeply into public life, public work, and public administration. such men and women possess the characteristics of their own sex fully differentiated, but tinctured and fructified by more than a normal quotum of the characteristics of the other. they are quite normal, however, and are wholly invaluable in their contribution to the world's affairs. admirably manly or womanly, they bear but little likeness to the hereditarily-defective or to the artificially-manufactured species--mannish women and womanish men. they deviate from the essential man and woman types by degrees of overlapping in the higher mental attributes. in all the main characteristics of sex, physical, mental and functional, they are completely men and women. the abnormal mixed types are, on the contrary, more or less degenerate, structurally, functionally and mentally. these persons of natural mixed types are nature's workers rather than the parents of her races. the daily round is too restricted for them. their abilities and bent claim wider fields. the home cannot contain them. it is too round to fit their angles. they are hampered by its reciprocities, stifled by its personal atmosphere, restive beneath its obligations. and not seldom they succeed in making homes as uncomfortable for others as they themselves find such. these heterodox--of which mould genius is--are indispensable to spur and quicken human progress, while adding nothing to the personal evolution of the human type. they advance the standards and the ethics of humanity by creating ideals in art, in literature, in politics, in reform and philanthropy. but only too often they fall short, in their own lives, of the standards and ideals they establish for the world at large. the advance-guard of faculty, they break new ground of mind and morale for others to cultivate. although they themselves frequently quarrel with life, they make life in general greater and happier for their fellows. if women, they possess much of the initiative and energy, the intellect and chivalry of men. but they apply these to womanly ends. if men, they possess much of the insight and sympathy, the altruism and creativeness of women. but they devote these to manly achievements. herbert spencer held that genesis (or reproductive power) and individuation (or self-development) exist in inverse ratio. which is because individuation _beyond the normal_ can only be achieved by drawing upon the vital potential of offspring. hence, these strong individualities of mixed type--because reproductive power is diminished in them--but seldom transmit their abilities to offspring. genius is frequently sterile. otherwise, its children are of inferior calibre. it is in imitation, doubtless, of the natural mixed types--which may be described as a normal deviation from the normal--that the cult of the mannish woman is being cruelly and disastrously forced upon our latter-day girls and women; resulting in wholly deplorable developments. the woman of natural mixed-type is essentially womanly in aim and bent. she does womanly work with virile energy and masculine mental grip. but she never (or seldom) assumes male proclivities or adopts male habits; crazes to wear trousers, to ride astraddle, to smoke, spit, swear, stride, talk slang, or shoot living sentient creatures. nor does she otherwise exchange the more highly-evolved and delicate morale and manners of woman for those of the male. in art, in literature, in science; in industry and reform, her aims and work preserve the womanly mode and outlook. ii in consequence of doctrine which, for several generations, has trained women to develop for their own uses the masculine potential belonging to sons, many of our present-day boys and girls are seen actually to have exchanged their natural sex-characteristics. boys are born now, puny, neurotic, and effeminate; while girls are strong and male and masterful. and it is precisely in the families whereof the girls are strong and male and masterful, that the boys are weakly and effeminate; the degenerative lapse from the normal expressing itself, in both sexes, in terms of abnormal characteristics of the other sex. that at thirteen, girls now-a-days are taller and heavier than boys of the same age has been established by the anthropometrical committee of the british association. dr. j. j. heslop, after carefully observing the health and the physical growth of children in fourteen elementary schools belonging to the stretford (lancashire) education authority, has published a striking return of his investigations. the following table shows the average height and weight at this age: +--------------------------------------------------------------------+ | | height. | weight. | +-----------------------+--------------------------+-----------------+ |st. matthew's | boys ft. - / in. | st. - / lb. | | | girls ft. in. | st. - / lb. | |cornbrook park | boys ft. - / in. | st. lb. | | | girls ft. - / in. | st. - / lb. | |st. anne's | boys ft. in. | st. - / lb. | | | girls ft. in. | st. - / lb. | |trafford park | boys ft. - / in. | st. lb. | | | girls ft. - / in. | st. - / lb. | |gorse hill | boys ft. - / in. | st. lb. | | | girls ft. in. | st. lb. | |seymour park | boys ft. - / in. | st. lb. | | | girls ft. in. | st. lb. | +-----------------------+-------------------------+------------------+ the most notable development among girls takes place between the eleventh and thirteenth years. the opposite bias in this abnormal substitution of alien sex-traits is due presumably, in both sexes, to an antagonising and neutralising of the qualities normal to the one sex by emergence of those of the other. thus, the boy is puny and emasculate because his impoverished maleness is too feeble to dominate the female traits inherent in him, as is normal to males. the girl is big and crude and masterful because her impoverished womanliness is inadequate to inhibit and refine her inherent male traits. the aims of feminism are being realised in unforeseen developments. because in addition to extinguishing the most beautiful and inspiring order of human qualities, this masculinising of women is burdening the race and deteriorating type by producing an ever-increasing number of neurotic, emasculate men and boys. iii the present-day mortality-rate of boy-babies has become increasingly and alarmingly high. the mortality-rate of males is higher always than is that of females, because of the greater hardships and dangers of men's pursuits. this is one of the reasons why, although, normally, boys are born in greater number (about to every girls) the female (pre-war) population of england and wales exceeded the male population by the huge majority of , , . but the excess of male over female infant-mortality has greatly increased of late years. in it was only per cent. in it had leapt to the high figure of per cent. and this diminishing vital power of males begins before birth even, boys being born prematurely as compared with girls. of boys born, die from inborn physical defects, as compared with girls. while, before the age of three months, boys die to every girls. among infants dying before they are a year old, only are girls, as compared with boys. recent statistics show that in rural westmoreland, boys under a year old died, while only girls of the same age succumbed. in wiltshire, the ratio was _ boys to girls_. to quote from a writer on these startling statistics of the registrar-general:-- "tuberculous diseases, convulsions, intestinal troubles, bronchitis and pneumonia, and other maladies, all kill more boy than girl-infants in their first year. the figures are surprising. omitting fractions, we find that among infants of each sex boys die of intestinal troubles to girls; boys die of convulsions to girls; boys die from bronchitis and pneumonia to girls; and boys from other causes to girls. whooping-cough stands alone, carrying off · girls to · boys. even when chloroform or ether is given for the purposes of an operation it kills more boys than girls." it may be objected that, according to my view, the mortality of girls, bred of constitutionally impoverished males, should likewise have increased. but this high mortality among boy-infants and children must so weed out the weakliest males that many of these do not live to become fathers. moreover, by developing into abnormal dominance the _male_ potential in her, the mother de-vitalises sons more than she de-vitalises daughters. further, these crude hoyden-sisters of the weakly boys fail rather in the higher attributes of sex than in mere survival-power. they survive, but they are marred in type by the stigmata of sex-immaturity or abnormality. increasing sex-impoverishment is bringing into vogue--almost as a matter of routine--the performance on male infants of an unnatural (and a degenerative) jewish rite. iv of the many theories advanced to explain the determination of sex in offspring, the true one is, undoubtedly, the relative parental power of the respective parents. normally, this being well-balanced, the ratio of the sexes is about equal; the preponderance being on the male side, however, owing to the maternal parental potential being normally greater, because conserved by reason of her less onerous rôle in life. when parental potential is relatively greater in the father, female offspring is born. when greater in the mother, male offspring results. in the families of men notably virile, daughters preponderate. in those of women notably womanly, sons are in the majority. (presuming in such case the parent of the other sex to be of average potence.) the preponderance of male-births during war-conditions is due to the fact that by far the greater stress of these conditions, with consequent depletion of vital reserves, falls upon the males. hence the women--who although depleted likewise by the increased demands upon them, are less vitally exhausted than the men are--become relatively prepotent in parental potential. the more virile men being absent on military duty, moreover, the less virile members of the sex it is who preponderate in the paternal rôle. other parental factors, as of age, health and circumstance, which affect the sex of offspring, do so _indirectly_ by their effects upon the relative vital and parental potential of mother and father. in corroboration of the view that power conserved in the mother engenders maleness and masculine vigour in offspring, i have received the following letter from the head-mistress of the village-school of corley: "i was much interested in your article _re boy-babies_. i think my school here is unique, there being children on the roll, of whom are boys and , girls. and of the children in the village who will be of age for admission this year, are boys and , girls. "in the village there are several families composed of boys only. one family has boys and girls. " " " " " " two families have " " girl each. " " " " " " " "of one family reckoning boys ( dead; making in all) the mother has but one leg--the other having been amputated when she was fourteen.[ ] _none of the mothers here (so for as i can learn) do work outside their homes_; except in odd cases, an odd day's washing or cleaning. "_none do regular work on farms, or otherwise._ "all the children are well-fed, clean and well clothed. our medical nurse says she finds the finest babies here--of the whole of her district. for years the yearly returns in school have shown a great preponderance of boys over girls." the writer contrasts this utopian order of things with her experience of the rickety and otherwise diseased and defective states of school-children whose mothers were employed in factories. v it would seem that the embryological development of the male brain and nervous system, it is which demands more of vital expenditure on the part of the mother than does that of the female brain; less elaborately differentiated as is this in respect of concrete intellection and physical adaptation. for this reason, not only is more constitutional vitality on the mother's part required for the production of sons--and more particularly of virile sons--but the production of male offspring entails more stress, and exacts a greater toll, physical and psychical, than does the ante-natal nurture of the female embryo. mothers who have borne female children with but little constitutional strain or suffering may be greatly debilitated, even invalided, during pregnancy with male offspring. one finds women permanently weakened in constitution and function, indeed, from the strain of producing a male. in such cases, the male may be exceptional of type. or the mother may be of exceptionally low vitality. it has been argued that defect and degeneracy, as hare-lip, cleft-palate, clubbed or webbed-foot, are more common in the male because he is normally less highly-developed than the female is. the contrary is obviously the case. in creating a difficult and a simpler thing, there will necessarily be more failures in the difficult than in the simpler product. being nearer to nature, the female is usually more true to the normal type of species. but the type is not so fully differentiated, or specialised in relation to environment, as is the male. it is significant that the female _aphis_, when its vital potential is stimulated by summer heat, is able to breed without co-operation of the male, but breeds _females_ only. supporting not only the view that the female is the rootstock of species, while the male is, so to speak, an alien grafted upon it, but indicating too, that the production of females represents less output of reproductive energy, since one sex alone is able to accomplish this. vi absence both of womanly emotion and of spiritual attribute disqualifies the faces of the greater number of our modern "beauties" from being truly beautiful. they lack those last exquisite touches which psychical qualities bestow; sweetness, tenderness, gaiety, pensiveness, mystery, mockery, witchery, wistfulness, surrender, resistance, maidenhood, motherhood--the celestial and the terrestrial melting into one another like the colours of the rainbow. since evolution is advancing in some stock, modern beauty is, no doubt, of higher calibre than has been attained in any previous epoch. but for the most part, the faces of our handsome women are pre-eminently pagan--bold, sophisticated, clever; without sweetness, softness, imagination, sensitiveness--in a word, without soul. the outlines, howsoever fine, are hard and antipathetic in their uncompromising firmness. the eyes are cold and critical and challenging, so that their relentless gaze is sometimes rather of the nature of a blow than it is a sympathy. owing to that setting of the jaw which attends strong muscular action, the shaping bones of the faces of developing girls thicken and coarsen, and the naturally delicate, beautiful contours of chin and of cheek deteriorate to the crude and heavy lower jaws characteristic of a very large order of the sex to-day. the weak receding, or the sharply-pointed chin of the over-feminised type--both early-victorian and modern--errs in the other direction. to give fine balance to the face and form--as to the mind--the male traits must be duly represented. these broaden and strengthen the curves, and preserve them from lapsing to narrowness and feebleness; lending touches of straightness and firmness which nobly enhance the graces. in excess, they mar and deface, however; as is exemplified in the strong and slovenly features, without drawing or delicacy, which characterise the new type of girl being turned out by our schools and colleges, most of which make now-a-days a speciality of sports. similar heavy jaws and blunt, amorphous features are replacing in our working-girls, de-sexed by masculine employments, the classic, nobly-modelled lineaments which made our anglo-saxon race once the most beautiful, as it was the most vigorous and enterprising, of the nations. such faces may be deplorably senseless for the sense--and lack of sensibility--in them. the facial type of the opposite extreme is ultra-feminine--a cameo-like reversion to an earlier victorian physiognomy, to which several generations of mothers have failed to add any new quality. but, unlike its victorian prototype, the modern ultra-feminine face lacks blood and emotion, and shows like a faded attenuation thereof. the cold, delicate features, with the pinched nostrils which, owing to adenoid obstruction, have never expanded to a full, inspiring breath of life, suggest further cameo-comparison; as being the daintily-carven shell of an extinct creature. so devitalised and neurasthenic are many of our pretty young girls, that their flowerlike faces, topping over-tall and undeveloped bodies, suggest delicate blossoms crowning long attenuated, sapless stems. neither faces nor bodies are vitalised and athrill with powers rooted in healthful organs; vivified by healthful functions, and instinct with warm, iron-rich, magnetic blood. they show that making for beauty which is inherent in the woman-traits, but which, in latter-day girls, owing to defective constitutional vigour or to educational, social or industrial exhaustion, has been able to realise itself only in sickly and weed-like development. life manifests in these neurotics in the form of vivacities merely; not as vitalities. severed from their natural roots in life and vital function, they resemble nothing more than charming cut-blossoms gracefully fading on drawing-room shelves. the truth is that girls brought up on modern strenuous methods skip the years between and . if young and fresh at , all at once we find them in constitution and in temperament--a little lean, a little lined, a little wan, a little shrill, a little chill, and only too often more than a little disillusioned and cynical--in a word already _passées_. some are, of course, an interesting and attractive , but the fresh, warm, vital and beautiful years from to , the years of a natural woman's most charming bloom of mind and body, have dropped from their lives, like petals from roses. so that our girls in their 'teens require to hide the ravages of time by every sort of artifice. and at in years, they are approaching the forties in constitution and temperament; are even keen on politics, cards, finance--resorts, pre-eminently, of materialistic middle-age. this blighting of young womanhood, with loss of youthful bloom and responsiveness, it is that has led to the decadent and demoralising vogue of the flapper. since, beyond all things, men seek vital youth and freshness in the other sex, to find it now-a-days, they must seek it in children. vii deplorable are the degenerative processes by way of which those noble natural characteristics of the woman-sex which nature has achieved by ages of evolutionary advance may be observed to lapse, and are presently all but obliterated from the woman form and face. increasingly the curves straighten; the conflict between straight lines and curves occasioning wrinkles. the jaw squares. the lips lose womanly fullness, sweetness, and their natural colour and texture of rose-leaves; becoming thin and pale and stern. shadows gather round them, foreshadowing, it may be, a masculine growth of hair. hair loses lustre and grows sparse, particularly above the brows. the chin loses its feminine softness; rigidity and grimness being substituted. eyes lose fullness, tenderness, brilliance, and woman's normal melting expression. the glance grows chill, hard, shrewd, direct. crowsfeet mar the modelled lids. the serene, inspiring woman-brows are furrowed by the permanent frown of eye-strain or of nervous tension. the voice falls flat and metallic, or drops into gruffness and harshness; losing its delicate tuneful inflections, its sympathetic timbre, its joyous quality. the cheeks hollow; the white temples are wrecked. in the faces of women whose systems are functioning healthfully, a number of exquisite artistries in cellular texture of skin and in tinting appear; the skin beneath the eyes differing from that of the cheeks, that of the brows differing from that of the chin, that above the mouth from that below, and so forth. in women subjected to constitutional strain, all these exquisite artistic differentiations--product of incalculable evolutionary developments--are obliterated; the skin over the whole face becoming of the same grain and hue, as is normal to the male. the body becomes spare and sinewy, or set and spread; its movements heavy and abrupt. and more and more the hidden male emerges from the wreckage. the male right arm, swinging like a pendulum, suggests itself as being the motive-power of the ungraceful mechanism. with the increasing maleness of physique, male mental proclivities develop; obsessions to wear trousers, to smoke, to stride, to kill, and otherwise to indulge the masculine bent. * * * * * it may be objected that beauty takes too high a place in the counsels of this book. _beauty is normality_, however. nature, in her every aim and handiwork, makes beyond every other thing for grace. weed and moth, shell and beetle, humming-bird and dragon-fly--all are lovely in technique and artistry. plainness and uncouthness in humans only too often belie noble mind or disposition. this results, however, from such failure of vital resources that the individual had fine material only to equip his mind, and none left over to adorn his body. one sees the converse too, where all the available potential of beauty has been lavished on handsome exteriors. plainness is a mark of abnormality. the victim may be normal in other respects. but in this, he or she is abnormal. and more particularly _she_--since woman is both medium and creatrix of living harmony and grace. so is comeliness declining, however, that one of the specifications of a recent baby-competition was that beauty would not be a necessary qualification. yet beauty is the natural birthright and the normal of all babes and children. viii the male cult is impressed now at the earliest age. some of our hapless little girls, in consequence of having been subjected early to strain of masculine drill, hockey, cricket and other rough and strenuous exertions, are more like colts or smaller-sized bullocks in their crude conformation and ungainly movements, as also in their crude mentality and manners, than they are like charming human maids. few developments in life are prettier or more engaging than is a natural little girl. the sex of her, with its fair woman-attributes, reveals itself early in children of high organisation. crowned by her curls, in her simple white frock, she is as fresh and dainty, as winsome and elusive as a fairy. her little woman-soul begins to make for beauty ere ever she can walk. ere ever she can walk, she moves her limbs in rhythm of the dance. she tries to sing. she stretches out a tiny finger and reverently touches a bright colour--a blue ribbon, a gold button, a pink flower on a chintz. set her in a field, she runs to cram her hands with daisies. she fills, within the house of life, an exquisite small niche that nothing else can fill. yet now they are cropping her fair curls, are exchanging her white frock for masculine knickers. they are training her soft limbs and exquisite elastic movements to the hard and rigid action of the soldiers' drill and march; are teaching her to stride her pony that once she sat as prettily and lightly as a bird; are making a hard, boisterous tom-boy of her, with lusty, hairy limbs and uncouth manners; perverting all her natural highly-differentiated delicate attributes and graces to clumsy lower-grade form and activities. they have robbed her of her doll, whose helplessness and wax perfection fostered sentiments of worship, tenderness and ministry in her. they have given her a whipping-top, which--unlike the boy, who pleasures in the skill and mechanism of its handling--she lashes with contorted features and neurotic spitefulness. with characteristic scorn of physical disability, feminism contemns old age as disease or degeneracy--a weakness to be combated with latter-day strenuousness, cloaked by a counterfeit youthfulness, forced exertions (even games!) simulated youthful zests and gaieties. beyond all things, women are exhorted not to allow themselves to "grow old" as their grandmothers did, sitting, comely and tranquil and wise, at their quiet firesides. yet the truth is, age is a natural beautiful phase; in its way, as natural, as healthful and as beautiful as are any of the younger seasons. calm and stately as the snows of nature's winter, as nature's winter shows us, old age does not presage death--because there is no death. that we call death is but a temporary recession from the outer and terrestrial to the inner and celestial zone of being. and with the vital quietude and longer-sightedness of eyes, come spiritual quickening and longer-sightedness of mental view. so that both eyes and mind perceive the outer more and more obscurely, focusing more and more on the remote. the stream of life runs stilly for the reason that it runs more deep; centring again to that within and spiritual, whence it issued in birth, and will issue again in re-birth. compare such serene-faced, dignified age, cause to all of reverence and tenderness, for the mystery and pathos of its wise and tranquil resignation--compare such with the restless, harried, malcontent old age of modern counsels! ix before the advent of that admirable institution, the eugenics education society, for the establishment of a new science of heredity, as, too, of a new propaganda of race-culture, vital and illuminating data, not only of supreme scientific interest but, moreover, of the greatest practical significance, passed, for the most part, unnoted. i venture to believe, however, that eugenic propaganda has been too much in the direction of eliminating defect from the race by prohibiting marriage to the so-called "unfit." whereas the true way of racial health, of normality and excellence, is, surely, to eliminate from life the many conditions, material, economic, and personal, which make for unfitness--which preclude, indeed, the survival of little save unfitness. for since we are not in the secret of nature's aims, and are wholly in the dark as to the human type for which she is aiming, to prohibit parenthood to any but the flagrantly abnormal, the insane and imbecile, the epileptic and the hopelessly-diseased, might be to quench the evolution of such higher fitness as we are not qualified to foresee. that which shows like disability in one age may be the incipient ability of a later. in cruder, primitive days, when standards of fitness were physical strength, rapacity and cunning, honesty and mercy, and more delicate organisation of body--the starting-points of new routes of evolutionary development--would have been condemned as worthy only of extermination. in sickly and declining stock there may exist, moreover, an ebbing vein of rare faculty, which, re-vitalised by a due potential of maternal re-creative power, might come to throb with genius. realising all the factors--the innumerable lives, the incalculable personal traits, endeavours and experiences, that have gone to make the individualism of any strain of stock, and realising that just these factors of individualism can have occurred in one line only of human ascent and can never be repeated, it becomes clear that summarily to extinguish any human strain, by arbitrary prohibition, would be to exterminate a unique branch of the great life-tree, and thereby to deprive the race of a specialised route of further ascent; a route which no other stock could supply. the fact that great families, with great histories and talents behind them, fall into decadence shows that even in decadent stock are inherences of greatness which might be recruited to greatness again. while apart from all this, the right of parenthood, with the evolutionary impulse to character and faculty consequent upon the exercise of parental functions, is the birthright of every individual capable of fulfilling such. the counsel of selective parenthood is dangerous doctrine, indeed. given life, nature by her methods of disease is able to eliminate stock too deteriorate for, or beside her purpose. but she alone knows her purpose. and she alone can judge as to what is intrinsic fitness for survival. selective parenthood makes, moreover, for the elimination of those valuable object-lessons of inherited defect and disease, whereby nature points her inestimable morals of healthy and disciplined living. for evasion, too, of those penalties and burdens in the care and maintenance of the unfit, which a nation justly incurs by such social wrongs and maladministrations as are largely responsible for disease and defect. the doctrine of operative sterilisation is not only humanly repugnant but, in view of the psychological import of every physical function, it is essentially evil. x some momentous morals of the feminist trend are pointed by the insect-world, which may be regarded as a devolutionary back-water, wherein life is slowly ebbing toward extinction by fluctuating out in ever smaller, meaner, drabber, ineffective, pulseless and spectral existences--chill and teeming myriads unwarmed by the throb of emotion, unillumined by the light of mind. dust which, raised from dust by power of life, has caught the trick of living, and goes on living and perpetuating, without cause or impulse other than age-old, time-worn mechanistic habit imparted by the state of living. and in this phantom under-world of decadence, cast by the shadow of life and peopled with distorted images thereof, the females are dominant--larger in size, stronger, more active, more enterprising and ferocious than the males. as in the world of vegetation, by way whereof matter first quickened into life, so in this realm of _insectivoræ_ by way of which life is gravitating back to the inertia of inorganic matter, in ever shallower, denser and more sluggish strata, the male is seen as appanage and victim of the female. in the beehive, he appears as ineffective drone amid a throng of strenuous neuter female-workers. and a female is his queen. significant again is it that insect-females are seen increasingly to have emancipated themselves from mother-instincts and maternal functions, as regards nurture or affection for their young. the single process wherein the warring males and snarling females of finer fierce, evolving species sheathe their claws and mute their hates in a co-operative, self-effacing instinct--reproduction, here in this disintegrating world of devolution, functions without welding spark, or lighting gleam of parent-altruism. at best, it is as chill, as colourless and meticulously mechanical as the interminable tickings of a world of clockwork. at worst, it is a repulsive rapacity on the part of females to secure perpetuation. and this secured, they straightway sting the craven male to death, or tear him limb from limb and ghoulishly devour him. queen bee leads her vassal suitors so strenuous and dizzying an ante-nuptial dance, for privilege of mating with her, that only one survives to claim the prize; the others dropping, dead and dying, in the wake of her murderous supremacy. and, as with other masculine and muscular females, her progeny are neuter working-females (sterile) and emasculate males (drones). as feminists demand for human babes, the bee-mother hands over her offspring to be brought up by the state. while some other insect-mothers, having reposited their eggs (to serve as bombs that explode and devastate their living hosts) straightway abandon them, and return to the more strenuous and repulsive female-pursuits of this phantasmagoria-world--a clockwork kingdom fabricated of life's debris, and drably mimicking the throb and motion of its mechanism in ghoulish mockeries and vacuous reiterations; the while it runs down slowly, ticking back to the molecular vibration of mineral inertia. end of book i note.--_mendelian and other readers interested in the more scientific aspects of the subject are referred to an appendix at the end of this volume, in which these issues are further considered and some important evidences adduced._ footnote: [ ] i have observed that lameness in women, by restricting physical activities and thus conserving vital energy, conduces to male offspring. the fact may well have been the origin of the chinese custom of crippling the feet of female children. in my own professional practice, by prohibiting all strenuous and exhausting pursuits, intellectual, social or athletic, before and after marriage, i have succeeded in securing male offspring in patients whose stock had for generations given birth to girls only. in those _organically_ de-sexed by male pursuits, rest will not avail, of course.--_author._ book ii woman's part in human decadence chapter i decline and fall of ancient civilisations due to feminism "this is the function of our and every age, to grasp the knowledge already existing, to make it our own, and in so doing to develop it further and raise it to a higher level. in thus taking it to ourselves we make it different from what it was."--_hegel._ i ancient history is depressing study. it shows us peoples rising slowly and laboriously out of states of barbarism to high degrees of culture and enlightenment, and then, more or less suddenly, falling upon decline; lapsing to total extinction, even. one after another, we may watch them climb the evolutionary hill, then slacken pace and struggle on spasmodically. till presently we find them steadily losing ground; slowly at first, but, gathering momentum, regressing more and more rapidly, until finally they are seen racing headlong to destruction. of some among the proudest and the greatest civilisations, so absolute has been their ultimate extinction that nothing more than ruined temples and some statuary remain to mark their quondam glory. biologists tell us this is natural. races, they say--like individuals--have only a certain life-tenure. they are born, develop, attain maturity, lapse to old age and then die; just as men do. the analogy is not sound, however. because although individual men die, the stock they leave behind, if duly preserved and replenished by fresh blood, may live indefinitely. moreover, such records as remain show that these past civilisations died, obviously, not of natural old age--but of disease. natural old age is sane and wise, and self-controlled; healthful in mind and in body. whereas the main features characterising the decline of these great powers, were viciousness and licentiousness; physical, mental and moral corruption. theirs was no passing in gradual waning of strength and quiet dissolution; not even in senility. they may be described, on the contrary, as having rushed helter-skelter upon death in full vigour of their prime. we see in them, indeed, all the vehemence and self-destructive forces of "sthenic" disease--disease as it occurs in strong men struck down in full health. they died in riot, venality, and lust, and every other form of vice and evil. clearly, they died unnaturally--of disease, not naturally of old age. how and why then did this happen? how and why should disease thus have stricken these in mid-career? since history shows the political institutions, the laws and the administration of many of such mighty decadents to have reached high levels of excellence, in respect of justice and intelligence, while culture, art and industry were likewise notable among them, the causes of their downfall must be looked for elsewhere than in their sociology. and since all human processes, sociological as well as natural, have their roots in biology, we are led to examine such records as remain, for evidences of biological failure. healthy and vigorous races do not decline in consequence of unjust laws or maladministration. if they are healthy and vigorous, they reform these. ii investigation shows one striking feature as having been common to most of these great decadences. in nearly every case, the dominance and licence of their women were conspicuous. and realising woman's portentous rôle in racial advance, it is difficult to believe anything but that her rôle must be equally potent in racial decline. a nation becomes decadent because the individuals composing it have become decadent. the individuals composing it can only have become progressively decadent by progressive hereditary decadences. and since woman is the racial reservoir and the agency of evolution, hereditary decline of individuals and nations must have its source in a decline of mother-power. history confirms this view. it shows the progress and waxing supremacy of these great powers to have been concurrent with rising levels of womanly character and virtue, with high regard for woman by man, with high estimation and observance by woman of the functions of motherhood and of the home. while neglect of the home, contempt for and evasion of the duties of motherhood, immorality and general licence among their women characterised their downfall. and comparing some modern developments with these records of ruin, one can but be struck by notable resemblances between these latter and the present-day trend of all our greater civilisations. in the decline of rome, the roman women went to two extremes. a tendency that shows increasingly among our modern womanhood. they separated into two main orders. "blue-stocking" and "rake," they were then designated. "mannish" and "womanish," or "feminist" and "ultra-feminine," better characterise their latter-day presentments. in america, these two orders of women are known as the "college" and the "society" types, respectively. the "college" type makes a cult of masculinity of body and of brain. the "society" type makes a cult of feminine graces and social accomplishments. in the poorer, as in the superior classes of all nations, similar extremes are found. one order is virile and hard-working; and for the most part plain and moral. the other is womanish and pretty; and for the most part frail. with us--as with those earlier peoples--the demand for liberty and unrestricted economic opportunities for women is occasioning contempt for and evasion of the functions of wife and of mother, emancipation from the home, increasing absorption in public affairs, fever for pleasure, lapse of womanly traditions and morale. all of which developments passed rapidly, in those others, into general laxity, licence and corruption; culminating finally in total ruin. with them, the claims of home and of the family became, as they are becoming more and more with us, secondary merely and subsidiary to other pursuits; to personal ambitions, public careers, to pleasures, excitements, crazes for notoriety. woman's inherent erraticism--defect of her intrinsic spontaneity, her bent for novelty and strong sensation--degenerated, under the licence accorded her in ancient rome, into the appalling orgies of the bacchanalia; which were instituted by the sex. women attended the displays of gladiators. they watched the wild beasts tear their victims. they themselves dressed as gladiators, and held mimic combats. by cult of muscle, they grew taller than the men. sallust writes thus of a notorious roman matron: "sempronia had committed many crimes of a boldness _worthy of a man_. blest alike in family and beauty, in husband and children, she was well-read in greek and roman literature; could sing, play and dance more gracefully than any honest woman need; had many of the other accomplishments of a riotous life. she cared for nothing less than for decency and modesty." fifty years later, seneca takes up the story of a rapid decadence: "the ladies do not reckon the years by the number of the consuls, but by the number of their husbands." much the same licence, extravagance and viciousness of the sex characterised the greater number of those other old-world wreckages. the higher woman-attributes ceased to evolve; ceased to be exercised; ceased to inspire. women cultivated solely, or pre-eminently, the male-side of their natures; muscle, intellect, ambition, concrete activities, indulgence of sex-instincts. by power of which masculine and alien proclivities, they increasingly dominated the men, in whom the virile traits had proportionally declined. thus, more and more, the purifying, uplifting and inspiring potence of true womanhood, together with the softening refinements of the home, became ever further withdrawn from the national life. thus corruption undermined; and chaos finally engulfed. iii things were different in ancient greece. it has been said that greece fell because she did not give her women liberty. for a time comes, in the development of every nation, when its women must be freed. or decadence sets in inevitably. and some of those old civilisations declined, undoubtedly, from lack of progress in this respect. it would seem that the first sips of liberty require to be administered to the sex with caution, however; the effects observed carefully, the doses increased warily. otherwise, impulsive and impressionable as they are, women lose their heads; become intoxicated, and get out of hand. and once women get out of hand, it is next to impossible to bring them again under control (as was seen in the outbreaks of feminist militancy). civilisation forbids that men shall deal with them as with masculine rebels. and fenced thus behind the privileges of their own sex, when armed with the prerogatives of the other, they may prove dangerously difficult customers. in ancient greece, the wives and mothers and the other reputable women had but little or no freedom. they lived, for the most part, in seclusion; dull and unintelligent and uneventful lives. there was no pure, wholesome, and inspiring social life. the only women who were free were the _hetairai_, those famous ladies who shed a lurid brilliance over the corruption and decline of this great state--a decline wherewith they had, most certainly, much to do. a faction apart from the wives and mothers--although many among them were courtesans, they stood apart too from the courtesan class. women who had found in the unfreed state of the wife and mother of their epoch, inadequate scope for their impulses and talents, they broke away from domestic conditions, to form a coterie of free lances--a cultured, brilliant and alluring band of renegades, sought and esteemed for their beauty and intelligence by all men; aristocrat, philosopher, and pleasure-seeker. more likely than that greece fell because she did not emancipate her women, it is that she fell because the women who emancipated themselves abandoned the rôles of wife, of mother, and other reputable functions. for these grecian _hetairai_ comprised, in the main, the flower of their generation. one sees them, indeed, as brilliant racial poison-blossoms, greedily appropriating and exploiting to their own purposes the nation's beauty and the nation's talent, its aspirations, potence, passion--without transmitting any of these racial attainments to a later generation. in place of endowing their kind with such nobler light and faculty, inspiration and sweetness, as supply a people's evolutionary impulse, they abandoned the home and the sacred and spiritualising functions of true wifehood, and of the motherhood of such higher living types as are indispensable to lead a nation's progress. a kindred movement--modified, for the present, by the more enlightened traditions of our century--is foreshadowing itself across the higher civilisations of our day. more and more, our better types of women (the misinterpretations of the feminist movement having imparted a distorted bias and direction to their powers) are similarly abandoning the home, or are withdrawing their best interests and talents from it; are evading wholly, or are gravely restricting their maternal obligations to the race; regarding children as bye-products, merely, of life--vastly less important than some hobby or career. in place of realising the new generation as the vanguard of life and evolution; that which beyond every other human achievement counts in the universe. worse than this even, more and more, everywhere, women are failing in the maternal power of transmitting to offspring the health, the beauty, the abilities and aspirations which are the model and ideals of our age. iv a menace to the race more alarming than that of the hard and mannish woman (who, because of her lack of womanly attractiveness, is debarred, in considerable degree, from marriage) is another and less ungraciously obvious deviation from the normal--an order of the sex, modern and artificial, and rapidly increasing in number, over-civilised and highly-feminised both of physique and of temperament, which may be described as an ultra-feminine, or, in contradistinction to the feminist, as a feminist order. their womanhood but lightly rooted in neurotic systems, the women of this sect are unstable and erratic, seeking distraction for their restless, ill-balanced forces, in cards, crazes, drugs; fads and freaks. unfitted for wifehood and motherhood--some by faulty heredity, but a far greater number by educational strain and consequent warp--some of these ultra-feminised and frequently interesting creatures absorb themselves feverishly in public movements; religious, social or political. some are persons of irreproachable morale and ideals; devoted, gifted, wholly admirable. and being wives not seldom of men as talented, it is deplorable that warp of culture, unfitting them for motherhood, should have left such to waste their powers and aspirations in beating the thin air merely of utopian propaganda. when, otherwise, they might have led the true and only way of progress by endowing the race with living presentments and evolving treasuries of the parental ideals and endowments. the greater her charm, the nobler her character and talent, the more the pity is when woman is defective in the power to transmit her high qualities, or has power to transmit these in inferior degree only; thus sealing up for ever, or gravely impoverishing a vital spring of living faculty and individualism--a unique line of human ascent which no other stock can supply, and one which may have been leading up to the production of genius such as the world has not yet known. another--and quite different--sub-order of this neurotic (and partially-sterilised) type, in losing its higher potential of motherhood has lost the racial instinct wherein personal virtue is rooted. the lives of these are free and irregular. not measures, but men, are their vogue; to serve as admirers of their charm and talents, as spectators of their temperamental extravagances. incapable of the emotions of love, they seek, are discontented, and seek further when they do not find in its excitements, the joys and contentment that reside alone in deep and abiding emotions. the poise and repose, the charm, the refreshment and the inspiration of true womanhood are lacking in them. they demand increasing novelty and change of venue for their ill-ballasted powers and capricious sensibilities. and this precisely in proportion as they are deficient in those womanly emotions and illusions which endue the least and simplest things with glamour and with beauty. this type, which can scarcely be said to _live_, but merely to frolic through life, is pre-eminently dangerous to progress. because, while possessing the psychology, the appeal and influence of women, some of these have cast off, utterly, the traditions, the nobler aspirations and the functions of the best womanhood. v it is universally admitted that a bad woman is far more wicked than a bad man is. she is more callous, ruthless, wanton and debased. the irresponsibility regarding concrete affairs (innate in a sex whereof the concrete is only secondarily the province) makes her a dangerous and a demoralising factor when her acquired male brain and activities (for the clever, bad woman is always of masculine bent) over-ride her own natural aptitudes. because the powers she has artificially acquired--in substitution for her native ones--do not alter her inherent constitution of a creature builded upon instincts; instincts which her native higher qualities are alone adequate to guide and inspire. one may acquire some of the characteristics of an opposite sex, _but never the morale_; which is inborn and inherent to the natural sex-characteristics. faculty declines in the inverse order of its development. the bloom and beauty of the peach and of the flower are the last things to come--and the first to go. so, in forfeiting her womanly qualities, woman forfeits earliest the best of these. love and purity and spiritual aspiration perish first; with the result that the lower-grade female subconscious emotionalism, instinct and palpitant with animal impulse, comes into play. man requires to degenerate to far inferior levels than is the case with woman, before he so loses his normal rationalism as to forfeit his sense of proportion and of his responsibility with regard to material affairs, and that stern obligation to conform to environmental conditions which has been the impelling force of male development. irresponsibility is in him an acquired--and a feminine--defect; not an inherent failing of his sex. the very basis of the manly character is a recognition of the male responsibility in life's affairs. it was the impulse of man's primal struggle. it is the mark of his civilised manhood. irresponsibility is, on the contrary, innate in woman. it is part of that spontaneity, plasticity, and versatility which have engendered the racial evolutionary mutations; and by way of these have engendered the progressive transitions to ever higher forms. and indispensable as her native mutability is in making her the agency of evolutionary change, it is an insecure and a dangerous basis for too heavy a super-structure of male characteristics, physical or mental; as also for too heavy a burden of male responsibilities. it disqualifies her for liberty and scope of action identical with man's, in material affairs. the further we fit her, moreover (beyond her normal capacity), for such affairs, by artificially equipping her with masculine aptitudes, the more we unfit her for her evolutionary rôle of spontaneous advance. her chiefest values lie in the spring and the plasticity which enable her to adapt her nature to the evolutionary impulses of life inherent in her; and thereby to engender further human evolution. for this, it is important that she shall not be moulded on those firmer and more definitely prescribed lines of masculine development which are indispensable to the pioneering of material progress. nor should her powers be equally differentiated, or similarly expended. they must be left, in far greater degree, conserved, unformulate and unadapted. normally, she is the child of nature, in whom (because she is the mother of the human child, who shapes to the maternal model) nature is unfolding the type of our perfecting humanity. she should remain, therefore, more or less in the native and spontaneously fructifying state conducive to evolutionary unfoldment. when she adapts as closely to concrete conditions as it is imperative for man to do, not only does she exhaust the potential fertility indispensable to the further evolution and growth of racial faculty, but her powers lose that mode of flux which enables them to tide to higher levels. while man stands for civilisation, woman stands for nature. generatrix of life, she is instinct with vital impulses. and when these are not expended, as is normal, in the creation of and ministration to living and beloved beings, they generate warped, erratic and chaotic aberrations. because, no matter to what degree she may acquire masculine characteristics and aptitudes, she remains, at core, a creature of instinct; not of reason. as a creature of instinct she is invaluable to life--because life is moulded upon instinct. but instinct and rationalism function on different planes of mentality. to over-develop rationalism in her is to quench emotionalism in her, and the higher illumination of her supra-conscious faculties; thus rendering her the prey of smouldering subconscious impulses which burst fitfully and mischievously into flame. for progress, man must be always the leading half and controller in politics and civic affairs. these are his province. his sex stands for permanence and conformity--and, accordingly, for uniformity. and uniformity is the model for civilisation, making as it does for justice and the common good. woman's non-conformability adapts her admirably to the personal relations of life, but not to the political. man builds institutions and administers them by more or less rigid impersonal rule. woman transforms them into homes, and humanises them by individual concessions and exceptions. so the two are supplement and complement in the public as in the natural sphere. but their respective rôles are contrary in every mode and issue. man's conformity, political and civic, is continually leavened by the element of non-conformity and change he inherits from his mother, with her other woman-traits. but in him, her spontaneity and impulse are so intelligised and stabilised by his masculine rationalism and bent for order that, in place of operating emotionally and spasmodically, they become tempered and restrained. under his administration, material advance proceeds slowly, but surely and securely. his masculine intelligence and sense of responsibility cause him to adjust the maternal evolutionary impulses,--which he inherits as reformatory and revolutionary impulses--to the exigencies of practicability, and the requirements of circumstance. vi there is no more difficult, or possibly mischievous, person than a strong and clever woman whose over-developed masculine energies and abilities are controlled neither by a man's reason and sense of responsibility, nor by a woman's natural disabilities, affections and restraints. she is sometimes prodigiously clever; adding to her male talents a woman's fertility, versatility, adaptability, complexity and intuitiveness. and yet with all their gifts, such women accomplish little but harm--alike to themselves and others. erratic, fickle, irrepressible, they are perpetually flying off at tangents. now they are one thing too much. now they are the opposite--in an equal extreme. medleys of contradictions and perversities, they are no sooner repressed in one direction, or become fatigued by the monotony of any single line of action, than they burst forth in some other. their abnormal mentality and energy, allied to their innate impulsiveness and craving for change, impel them to break loose from those bonds of affection, of tradition and of aspiration, which are woman's safeguards. there is in the nature of most women, this dangerous quicksand of irresponsibility, which may, in crises, topple and submerge the soundest structure of education and of habit builded over it. this is seen in the abandon and anarchy of the sex in riots and in revolutions. such women rebels become increasingly a law unto themselves, and see no reason why all others should not do likewise. they lack the masculine grip of concrete principles to recognise that general lawlessness and individual liberty cannot co-exist. because where every man is free to do as he pleases, no man is free to do as he pleases, owing to some other man's abuse of his liberty encroaching on that of his neighbours. women of this order are the cleopatras, agrippinas, messalinas and the catharines of russia; the de pompadours, de staëls, georges sands, and the innumerable other self-centred, unconscionable female-egotists whose extravagances shriek discordant down the ages. lacking both a woman's morals and a man's ethics, they are freaks of nature; or are frankensteins of abnormal culture. when they are not empresses, to indulge in shameful licence--their male abilities exaggerating their woman-instincts to the dimensions of megalomanias--their inordinate ambitions make them mistresses of crowned heads, or of others whose rank or wealth supplies their mistresses with means and scope for their unbridled prodigalities. privileged by their sex and by masculine favour, their lawlessness protected from its merited penalties by the law-abiding of their fellows, they become intoxicated--frequently insane--as result of their successes and excesses. the famous courtesans have been (and are still) for the most part women of this ilk; persons of steel brain and will, without a woman's aspirations or emotions to soften their self-centredness; nor a man's code to discipline their wantonness. they make men the instruments and the victims of their feminine defects, which are all--or nearly all--of woman they possess; self-consciousness distorted to a monstrous vanity, emotions dwarfed to greeds and lusts. one after another, they exploit their victims, by exercise, precisely, of the same masculine business-abilities and ruthlessness which make men fraudulent company-promoters, profiteers, or sweaters of the poor. when one has served their purpose, they cast him off for another. cold-blooded, clever, and emotionless, although sometimes sensual in a fashion purely male (in keeping with their other male proclivities) they are adventuresses, spies, poisoners, adultresses, monsters; abiding reproach to a noble sex; terrible example of the fate awaiting that sex, as penalty for abnormal development of masculine characteristics beyond the capacity of its woman-traits to counterpoise and guide. power, which strengthens and steadies all but weak men, only too often drives women to destruction. a factor in this is that those privileges of their sex which have become, more or less, their civilised prerogative, preserve them from the salutary harsh and stern rebuffs which men in like circumstance inevitably encounter. if women are to have scope and authority identical with men's, then they must forgo all privileges; must come out from their fence behind strong arms and chivalry to meet masculine blows in the face, economic and ethical--if not actual, indeed, as prévost has predicted. and then, heaven help them--and men--and the race! chapter ii the evolution of sex in adolescence "i am for you and you are for me, not only for your own sake, but for others' sakes, envelop'd in you, sleep great heroes and bards, they refuse to awake at the touch of any man but me." _walt whitman._ i a french biologist has discovered that when a female oyster is starved, and its constitution thus deteriorated, it becomes transformed into a male. the male oyster must be inferior, therefore, in organisation to the female. its constitutional potential is less, since the constitutional potential of the female contains both its own, and the potential of the male. and the lesser, it is admitted, cannot contain the greater; although higher evolutionary forms, when subjected to conditions which preclude them from sustaining these their higher forms, may lapse to modes less complex. further and more striking examples of such sex-transformation are afforded by so-called "mules," or "neuters," which occur in other species. a well-known case is that of a pea-hen belonging to lady tynte. having laid eggs from which chicks were raised, this pea-hen, after moulting, developed feathers proper to the other sex; appearing like a pied peacock. in the third year the same phenomenon occurred in her; she developed spurs, moreover, resembling those of the cock. _she never bred after this change in her plumage._ as already mentioned, kindred phenomena of sex-metamorphosis are observed in women after operations involving removal of reproductive glands. that the female is, indeed, a more complex order of organisation than the male, is not to be doubted, since masculine characteristics emerge from it when it lapses from its normal of condition. adolescence as it occurs in the boy and in the girl emphasises this conclusion. to the age of twelve or thereabouts, the normal boy- and girl-child are like enough to one another; smooth-skinned, active, simple creatures. the boy is, normally, larger, sturdier, stronger and rougher than the girl. but, save for the cut of their hair and of their clothes, the two are very similar. with the transition to manhood and womanhood, respectively, notable differences accrue, however. from having been a strong, young, active, boy-like creature, now--provided her development be allowed to take the normal course--the girl loses physical activity and strength. a phase of invalidation sets in. instinctively, she no longer runs and romps. new languors invest her in mind and in body. she is indisposed to brain-work or to much exertion. she lounges and muses. her mind is clouded with the mists of awakening sensibilities. she suffers from lassitudes. she becomes a complex of disabilities, indeed; disabilities which in delicate, sickly or over-taxed girls, show in chlorosis, anæmia, hysteria and other ills. obviously, profound changes, with re-adjustments of her constitutional resources, are taking place in her. and most significant of these is that which shows like an _arrest_ of development, physical and intellectual. because, normally, she develops but little further along direct lines of intellect and muscle. yet that she is still developing, and this upon wholly new--subtler, higher and more complex lines, is manifest at the end of this transition-period whence she emerges, a woman. her developmental arrest and her disabilities (resulting from an intensification of recessive processes in her) are seen now to have subserved a phase of higher evolution. nature suddenly locked the door upon her differentiating and escaping energies, in order that these might be conserved and knit into organisation. the active muscularity she has lost reappears in the new factors of symmetry and delicate modelling of limb; in repose and grace of movement. the straight, slim, boy-like lines of the hoyden girl have evolved into the curves and rounded suppleness and beauties of a woman. the girlish, agile and abrupt movements have passed into a woman's poise and grace. the unformed features of the child have become now delicately modelled; the curveless, emotionless lips have bloomed into the flower-like, rosy fullness of a woman's mouth; passionate and tender. new mystery and brilliance light her eyes. eyes and brows are charged with potencies; with seriousness, with modesty, serenity, elusiveness. hair and hands, voice and expression, have become transfigured by the magic of a re-creative impulse which has regenerated her whole being. so too her brain development, arrested along lines of concrete intellection, is seen to have evolved to higher, subtler forms of mentality; to be instinct with delicacy, sympathy, tact, and with that incalculable mode of supra-conscious cerebration which is intuition. in so far as she is of high, womanly type, she is now warm and emotional, sympathetic, intuitive; consciously pure, yet delicately passionate. from a crude and sexless hoyden, she has evolved into an exquisite complexity; invested all round with higher values, human and psychical. as in their earliest beginnings, however, so now again the woman-traits manifest as unfitnesses. her new departure has actually undone in her much that had been achieved in physical adaptation. biologists, observing this arrest of development in the female, have interpreted it as sign of an organisation inferior to that of the male. in point of fact, the contrary is the case. her arrest of development along lines of masculine inherence no more proves her inferior to the male than does the human developmental arrest along lines of that tail our ape-progenitor possessed, prove the human inferior to the ape-species. this arrest of tail-development occurred first in the female, doubtless; being one of those evolutionary mutations in the direction of advance of type which are engendered in her sex; and which are characterised by a conversion to higher potential, of differentiations in respect of adaptation to environment that have been achieved in the male. conversion of male fitness to female unfitness, therefore. seeing that the ape is vastly more adapted than is man to natural environment, it is obvious that the trend of adaptation to environment, far from having been along lines of evolving ape to man, must have been always, on the contrary, impelling reversion of the human to the ape-type. darwin relates how he and huxley, watching some boys bathing, "marvelled over the fact, seeming especially strange when they are no longer disguised by clothes, that human beings should dominate over all other creatures and play the wonderful part they do on earth." hugo de vries says: "natural selection (whereof adaptation is _modus operandi_) ... does not single out the best variations, but simply destroys the larger number of those which are, from some cause or other, unfit for their present environment. in this way it keeps the strains up to the required standard." while hoffding states explicitly: "adaptation and progress are not the same." clearly there are dual principles operating in progressive development; one adapting the organism to environment, the other adapting it to the typal model inherent in species. ii in the male of stock impoverished by artificial conditions of civilisation, the transition to manhood is attended likewise by some languors, physical and mental. new powers are being developed and occasion more or less strain upon the constitution--a strain wherewith our present-day masters and pastors, in their zeal of intensive culture, reckon far too little. in healthy boys this is in no way comparable, however, with the constitutional stress which adolescence causes in healthy girls. the youth continues to wax in strength of brain and body. the arrest, or involution, normal to the girl, does not occur in him. while she becomes gentler and more tranquil, by reason of a new poise in her of mind and body, he becomes forceful and restless by reason of a new release in him of energy. yet though he gains in strength of brain and body by this further differentiation of his resources into concrete faculty and virile energy, he lapses notably in organisation. from the supple, fine-skinned boy--clear-eyed, sweet-voiced, womanly almost in refinement and comeliness--he grows large and hard and muscular; more or less sinewy and rough-hewn, according as he is, or is not, manly of type. his skin loses its fine grain and smoothness, becoming coarser and hirsute; thus reverting, in degree, to the inferior, animal grade of skin. his voice falls nearly an octave, lapsing from sweetness and purity to gruffness and volume. obviously--although all this being normal, the male has a virile charm and handsomeness of his own--man's is notably a less highly and subtly-evolved organisation than is woman's. in the boy, is seen a progressive adaptation of body and brain to environment, in order to fit him for his man's task of coping with and advancing the conditions of life, material and ethical. and for this, the more delicate and sensitive woman-physique, demanding more of vital conservation for its upkeep, would be a handicap. biological adaptation for his part in reproduction occurs too. but the male development at this epoch is pre-eminently one of adaptation to environment; equipping him with bone and muscle, brain and enterprise, aggressiveness, initiative and energy. racially indispensable as the reproductive function is in him, it is obviously incidental and subordinate to his general development. the girl's transition to womanhood is seen, on the contrary, to be one almost entirely of adaptation, physiological and psychical, to the functions of wifehood and child-bearing. her growth ceases. she loses, in place of gaining, nerve and muscle-power. while, in becoming emotional, her changed mentality unfits far more than it fits her to cope with life at first hand; with life unadapted, that is, and herself unshielded by the male. her intelligence at eighteen is normally less keen and active--although of higher and more subtle quality and trend--than it had been at twelve. indications of nature which point unmistakably to diametrically different modes of culture and of training for the sexes, and, in consequence, to wholly different applications of their respective powers and aptitudes in every department of life. in the boy, the male-traits receive, with adolescence, a great influx of energy; wholly dominating the woman-traits which had made him more or less a feminine creature. more and more each day, the potential virile in his every cell asserts itself in structure and in function; dominating the woman-traits inherent in him. he waxes big and strong of body; restless and active of mentality. and the less, within normal limits, virility has been prematurely forced in him by too hard strain of mind or body, the better for the evolution of his manhood. unless the woman-traits have been unduly drilled and hardened out of him, they will now refine, inspire and fructify his awakening masculine powers. the too hard struggle for existence put, by necessity, on boys of the poorer classes, and, in the higher classes, forced on sensitive boys called upon, too young, to fight for survival in the semi-savage communities that public schools are, hardens them too soon and too summarily, and thus frustrates their best development. it is said that there is no atrocity a boy-community will not commit. in this stage of development, the moral consciousness of the _genus_ is at low ebb. the accentuation of male-traits now occurring occasions a recrudescence of primal instincts. and the collective atmosphere such recrudescence engenders in a boy-community, marooned in school-life apart from the refining, softening influences of home and womenkind, is only too often an evil and a demoralising one. boarding-schools should be abolished; good day-schools substituted. more than at any other phase of his existence, the masculine needs now the woman-influences from _without_; because the woman-traits _within_ are, for a period, submerged beneath a surge of maleness. notwithstanding these obvious truths, however, during the years when body and mind should be adapting gradually, consciously and subconsciously, to the social environment wherein their lives are to be passed; when the mental horizon should be expanding simultaneously with the expanding intelligence, when the moral should be rising to the new demands upon it, boys are imprisoned in scholastic institutions, where they are hemmed in by routine and restrictions, in an atmosphere of puerile conceptions, puerile traditions, puerile conventions and associations; their chief outlet and respite the narrow rules and the narrowing absorptions of so-called "games," supervised by martinet games-masters. and then, when we bring them to the field of life, we are surprised to find many of them unintelligent, unadapted, unadaptable; resourceless, inept and incompetent. cooped during those impressionable years in a wholly artificial environment, when confronted by the world of living actualities, which is not ruled by similar narrow restrictions, nor shaped upon the artificial forms and puerile misconceptions in which their young ductile natures have been run and have set--they show themselves wholly unfitted for life, with its varied, difficult and complex conditions and adjustments. they have become, in point of fact, mentally and temperamentally "provincial." the good form which some of them acquire is derived less from school-ethics or training than from an aristocratic strain of boys with whom they have been associated. and being acquired, when it is not the form of their own social order, it appears only too frequently as a counterfeit; engendering insincerity and snobbishness, and marring individuality. it has seemed to me that, in both sexes, the first seven years of life--during which native faculty and attribute are evolving at great pace--are a phase in which the recessive, or anabolic, mode, conservative of the resources and vitalising of the tissues, is in the ascendant. the true child of both sexes is normally, during these years, a typification of the woman-traits; receptive, plastic, gentle, affectionate, trustful, intuitive, emotional; quickly fatigued, quickly recuperative; more or less lovely and angelic. in this phase, native intuitive faculty makes children sometimes phenomenal; lightning calculators, musical prodigies, precocious poets, artists. so too, their marvellously rapid apprehension of the complex meanings and implications of life betokens supra-conscious mentality. at seven years old and thence onward to fourteen, a male, and katabolic, phase sets in. phenomenal faculty vanishes. concrete development of body, brain and energy proceeds apace. the child becomes active, intelligent, enterprising, inquiring. the boy becomes appreciably male; the girl more or less of a hoyden, more male, indeed, than she is normally at any other period of her existence. unless, that is, this hoyden phase is rendered permanent in her by masculine training. at fourteen, with the evolution of sex, the sex of boy and girl, with its respective opposite modes of constitution and of function, makes for marked development, each along its characteristic lines. iii the french have a saying: _la femme est une malade_. woman is not, of course, an invalid. nature does not fashion invalids. woman's organisation is normally delicate and sensitive and highly strung, because of its special and complex sex-differentiation. she resembles the child, in that howsoever healthful (in proportion, indeed, as she is normal and healthfully organised) her cells of brain and body re-act resiliently and vitally to all the agencies, physical and psychical, about her. this sensitive re-activity is not only a sign, it is, as well, a _source_ of health. because the greater delicacy and sensitiveness of organisation which characterise women and children, resulting in their quick re-activity to deleterious conditions, secure a permanently more highly-vitalised condition of body than is the case with man, whose cells are less sensitive, more tolerant of fatigue, of cold, and of other injurious agents. immunity against injurious factors is the parent of degeneracy. life being re-activity, in terms of living processes, to the factors of environment, such immunity entails loss of vital re-activity to _vivifying_ as much as against deteriorative factors. we complain that nature, in place of making our bodies of cast iron, so to speak, makes them, on the contrary, vulnerable at every point. the reason is, surely, that the less we are constituted like cast iron--the more vital and complex, intelligent and responsive, our tissues are, accordingly--the more conducive to change and advance (because the more sensitively re-active to subtler and psychical stimuli) they are likewise. we cannot be, at the same time, hardy and obtuse, yet exquisitely sensitive. living tissue-cells are characterised, beyond all other developments, by a range of contrasting abilities. an arm serves as softest cushion for a child's head, or, by stiffening of its muscles, becomes rigid as steel. an eye that sees for miles will focus to a pin-point. but being, as we are, still in the making, our tissues necessarily have limitations--and the defects, accordingly, of both their sets of qualities. high sensitiveness of function is necessarily attended by corresponding complexity and delicacy of structure. such structural delicacy obliges us to adapt environment to its complexities. it is thus an incentive to progress. it obliges us, as well, to moderate our activities, and, by thus restricting the output of our cruder powers, our resources are husbanded and directed into higher channels. the purpose of the complex differentiations which handicap the adolescent girl is obvious. the curving bones, the expanding pelvis, the rounded contours, the inhibited muscles, the languors and recurring disabilities, are designed to restrict activity, physical and mental. physicists tell us that the conservation of motion and the conservation of energy are one and the same thing. this must be true, as well, of _vital_ energy. the conservation of vital activity subtends the conservation of vital resources. the new developments are by no means incidental merely to the new processes; they are an integral part of the plan. in half-closing the doors on avenues of active output, nature conserves the woman-powers for more intrinsic use. every brain and body-cell is raised thereby to higher levels both of constitution and of function. as stored _mechanical_ energy becomes transformed into the higher form of _electrical_ energy, so the power stored in woman's anabolic cells is raised to higher evolutionary forms. thus she becomes fitted to be mother of the child--the blossom of the race. her part in the child will contain the inherence of these new higher evolutionary values, as the father's part in it will contain the inherence of the concrete powers he has developed. and while her body spontaneously raises all its issues in order to fit her to be a mother, so it develops powers and functions adapting her to serve as soft environment, physical and attributal, for the rearing of her child. all this complex differentiation and evolution are designed, as well, to adapt woman for the love-passion, and to draw and bind her mate to her. and nature has so cunningly interwoven the two plans and the two developments that, for the most part, those physical traits and emotional attributes which best qualify for motherhood most potently attract and closely attach the woman's mate to her. woman is "_une malade_," because, throughout the more than thirty years of her potential maternity, she suffers periodically those which, biologically speaking, are _minor childbirths_; each entailing a cycle of complex physiological processes, with more or less considerable constitutional and nervous stress, debility and incapacitation. nature exacts from her this recurring toll to life and to the race, not only to preserve in her, in healthful and efficient function, the power and mechanism of actual child-bearing, but (only second in importance) perpetually to recruit her emotional womanhood and wifehood. when girls in course of developing the maternal function, with all its attendant psychical implications, are strained by athletics, by over-culture or industrial exhaustion, the vital resources are so diverted from the evolution of this function as to cause incapacitation in them, partial or complete, for wifehood, and for the bearing of sound and fine offspring. sterilisation, absolute or partial, is induced; with dwarfed structure, blighted emotions and warped instincts. even in women who have developed normally, disease or atrophy of reproductive organs may follow constitutional strain or undue effort. toll to life, in genesis of potential lives, is exacted likewise from the male. it is a reflex in him of the vital maternal function, inherent in his woman-side. and this perpetual life-tax upon his energies so reduces these as to temper his physical and nervous activities and his bent for individuation, and thus inhibits him from squandering his whole potential of life-power in volitional output. thus is preserved in him that normal proportion between individuation and perpetuation which herbert spencer describes as existing in inverse ratio to one another. thus also is preserved in him the normal mental balance between the male and the female departments of his dual brain. men muscularly or intellectually overactive become lopsided and ineffective; restless and wasteful of their forces, chill and sterile of temperament; having lost that fine fructifying calm wherein creative potential is engendered for concrete achievement; having lost also that equipoise of faculty whereon mental and moral stability depend. * * * * * the life-tax levied on the male is incomparably less, however, than that exacted of the female. iv it is because of their _anabolic_ mode of tissue-cells, less wasteful upon the material plane, that girls and women normally require less food than boys and men do. notwithstanding that their bodies are more highly nourished than are those of males. healthy young women continue to be plump and pretty, healthful and active on bread-and-butter, fruits and sweetmeats. while mannish women, whose physiology has deteriorated to the _katabolic_, disruptive and forceful, male mode, possess frequently the hungry appetites of men; not only for food but for drink. and yet withal, they are lean and for the most part plain, and poorly nourished. with the wane in her of the _anabolic_ mode of cellular conservation, and the release thereby of vital resources which, sealed up in her tissue-cells at adolescence, remain invested in organisation during her years of possible motherhood, woman in whom sex is not highly developed reverts more or less (as does the constitutionally-deteriorated oyster) to the masculine type. she lapses to a _katabolic_ metabolism. at middle-age, accordingly, provided she be still healthy, she derives a considerable accession of energy, physical and intellectual. now for the first time relieved of the life-tax upon her resources, her powers are released from bond, and become more fully available for individuation and personal activity. at the same time, with this conversion of constitutional investment to the form of current and available energy, there occurs a proportional--sometimes a very signal--impoverishment of organisation; and, after a phase of recrudescent emotionalism, a cooling and thinning of passional feeling. because such realisation of invested vital capital is inevitably the precursor of decline. thenceforward her cells, no longer sustaining their high evolutionary states, generate more of concrete energy, and endow her with increased powers of action. but their conditional deterioration is manifest in general deterioration of physique, of looks, and frequently of health. not seldom, indeed, when her constitutional reserves had been previously depleted by over-expenditure, physical or mental, the cell-deterioration of this epoch lapses to serious disease or disability; to rheumatism, gout, cancer or other perverted forms. with the constitutional and biological changes come psychical changes too. in women in whom sex is not highly-specialised, middle-age entails, with its quasi-masculine physical phase, quasi-masculine mental traits. they may become strenuous and combative, sometimes difficult and domineering. perhaps they attach themselves to political and ethical "anti"-movements, as arena for their new combativeness, their augmented intellection, and increased physical activity. in the most womanly of women also (as in men at a later epoch) there occurs at this period a natural transposition of the parental traits of altruism and chivalry to the impersonal plane; moving them to mother and father the world in general, by way of charity, philanthropy, reform. v is it not waste of power and faculty, is asked, for able and cultured women to permit their development, physical and mental, to adapt to the simple requirements of a nursery? uncultured and more or less brainless women of an inferior class, it is said, should be adequate, surely, to cope with the minds and the needs of these immature beings. immature they are, in truth. but they are nevertheless strangely complex; exquisitely sensitive. and they are men and women in the making--or the marring. behind the eyes of any child that looks at you in dumb and wistful impotence to express itself, to defend itself, to provide and to care for itself, may lie the mind, in bud, of a shakespeare, of a newton, of a shelley; of a florence nightingale, a mrs. somerville, a charlotte brontë. how the most ordinary child, indeed, of cultured parents suffers acutely in feeling, and deteriorates in mind and character under the regime of blundering rebuffs, scoldings and misapprehensions, he meets at every turn in the nursery ruled by a crude, hard woman of the labouring classes! how, when they have grown older in years but are still only young in understanding, all youth suffers from the shallow motherhood that was kind, maybe, and helpful to it in its childhood, but fails it utterly in the stress and difficulties of its teens! true motherhood is the greatest of the creative arts; mother-craft, the most vital and complex of the sciences. life has never received more than a tithe of that which nature destined for it, owing to lack of mother-nurture. genius has never fruited to full bloom and potence, because the mothers have so seldom realised the greatness of their task. nearly all the records of childhood that writers have given us are annals of bewildered mental suffering and of moral torture, which have left their evil mark in injured health or warped mentality--not seldom in both. the home, with all the intuitive wisdoms, the powers and sympathies and the maternal ministry of a true mother, is indispensable to the nurture of individualism, and thereby to the evolution of human character and faculty. the true home is the temple of the soul. souls are exquisitely sensitive, infinitely shy. and only in the warm and fostering atmosphere of kindred beings do they find courage to unfold in living attribute. every home should be a unique environment, pre-eminently specialised and adapted to the evolution of the young and tender nursling-individualities shaping in it. to uproot these prematurely from their native soil and transplant them in an alien one, is to blight nascent talent and to warp character. for the reason that it necessitates too early individuation, with precocious development of self-protective and other qualities of worldly expedience. to plant out the shivering, exquisitely sensitive seedling, the human babe, in the chill, communal atmosphere of a crèche or other institution, is as inhuman a social crime as it is an inhuman social crime to defraud its mother of her highest evolutionary impulse and function in the nurture of her little one--a responsibility she has incurred, a privilege she has earned by right of her maternity. in her nursery, the mind of woman opens new windows of illumination, glimpses new vistas of thought and emotion, higher and lovelier apprehensions of the profounder meanings of life. in her nursery, her eyes learn tenderness, her voice sweet modulation, her speech new purity and fondness. in good and happy homes where young persons, in place of being banished to schools, grow up in the natural bracing and inspiring atmosphere of parental influence and affection, sex evolves new issues, in those attractions and sympathies of its contrasting traits which are evoked by the relations of mother and son, of father and daughter, of brother and sister. under modern conditions, in which children and young persons renew intermittent acquaintance merely with parents and brothers and sisters during brief holiday visits--returning home, with every added term of absence, more and more strangers to their kin, their personalities and interests increasingly detached from those of the home circle--such potent and inspiring developments of sex are vanishing. a wide gulf, truly, separates from their fathers these modern self-centred, self-opinionated young sportswomen and over-academised girls. the charming filial relation, engendering new and tender sex-amenities in the daughter's hero-worship and reliance on the manhood of her sire, in the father's protective chivalry and recruital of his youth in the company and interests of his young daughter, is waning toward extinction. the vast majority of fathers feel dismally constrained, indeed, and out of countenance in the presence of their girls--so smart and sophisticated, so superior, critical and self-sufficing are our latter-day school and college-maidens. for the most part, their own daughters are the last among womenkind to whom men turn, to reap something of the freshness and fairness of the younger generation they have sown and laboured for. while the up-to-date mother aspires to no higher or more beautiful place in her boy's life and affections than that of "good chum!" chapter iii the extinction of sex in adolescence "we may outrun, by violent swiftness, that which we run at, and lose by over-running." _shakespeare._ i how now, in detail, does the feminist creed lend itself to the biological developments and indications of nature described in the last chapter? unfortunately, as already intimated, it ignores, violently combats at every turn, and only too frequently wholly frustrates them. feminist leaders have shown themselves deplorably indifferent alike to biological and to sociological law. losing sight of the truth that the intrinsic and eternal function of humanity is parenthood--and more particularly motherhood--they have made, all along the line, not for the true emancipation of woman but for her commercialisation, merely. the economic viewpoint has obsessed them wholly. not to free woman from disabilities under which her womanhood, her wifehood, and her motherhood were suffering, but to convert her powers into industrial and marketable commodities has been the aim. that higher ideals are bound up with economics, is true. the rights of honest self-support and adequate wage, leading to kindlier, healthier and happier life-conditions, are, by improving constitution and character, important assets on the side of evolution. but by far the most urgent and important consideration in economics, as these affect women, is the fundamental biological principle that, because their greatest of all values lie in their evolutionary and racial endowments, rather than in their concrete and commercial efficiencies, the sex requires and is entitled to such more lenient and privileged social and industrial adjustments as admit of due quota of its vital resources, physical and mental, remaining conserved in the potential. in place of these being differentiated and expended to the degree natural to man, and exacted of him by his prescribed rôle in progress. in direct and violent opposition to nature, the feminist system does everything possible, however, to frustrate that normal phase of arrest along lines of concrete development whereon the higher evolution of woman--and in woman, of the race--depends. just at the age when nature locks the door upon her constitutional resources, for the purpose of evolving these to higher organisation, the schools and industries do a strenuous best to keep the door forcibly open, and to wrest the resources from the storehouse of potential. with a view to fitting woman to compete with the male, in whom such arrest of individuation, in the racial interests, is occurring to vastly less degree. in all ways, the natural languors and disabilities of the girl's adolescent phase are vigorously combated. the unfortunate young developing creature is exhorted, spurred--compelled by rigid rule, indeed (whatsoever her physiological disabilities), to take her part in strenuous exertions; hard drill, cricket, hockey, football; with the aim of developing masculine muscles where feminine muscles should be. at the same time, her brain is forced, crammed and exploited by perpetual mental tasks; by competitive examinations, or by some or another strain of specialism, intellectual or industrial. the result is that she is forcibly precluded from evolving to those higher, subtler modes of body and of mind, which are the essence, the charm and the inspiration of the sex; and the model of the race to be. our school-girls and work-girls, in whose already impoverished, or degenerate, bodies this battle for their resources between nature and culture (or industrialism) is waged--the one to make them normal, the other to make them abnormal--are all more or less in states of disease; are chlorotic, anæmic, neurotic, dyspeptic, hysterical; or suffer from ailments special to their sex. while some are sturdy and florid and buxom (prematurely middle-aged), more are neurasthenic and attenuated, ill-nourished, spectacled, breastless, hipless, pale or pimply; are restless, emotionless, joyless, cynical, discontented. in but few are found the thrill and joy, the pulse and spring and natural enthusiasms of healthy, happy young creatures in the dawn and grace of maidenhood. such as are charming and pretty possess these natural woman-characteristics only too often in fragile and weed-like form. the constitutional degeneracy of some shows in precocious sex-development--all precocity being degeneracy, development too rapid and exhaustive, and entailing therefore flimsy and unstable tissue-cells, faulty functioning and premature decline. a proportion, one is thankful to say, are normal and healthful and charming, endowed with the attributes and graces, personal and mental, for which nature is shaping in the sex. others are, biologically speaking, mere lamentable "spoiled copies"; amazons of the hockey, football, tennis or hunting-fields, only just distinguishable in general characteristics from the male, and lacking more or less wholly in womanly psychology and aptitude, and in all the fairer and nobler attributes of their sex. still others, although handsome and finely female of physique, are "splendidly null" in respect of the emotions, and of the other subtler and psychical developments of natural womanhood. the greeks, with their intuitive apprehension, pourtrayed both athene, goddess of intellect, and artemis, goddess of sports, as sexless, passionless, unwedded and childless; scorners of men, devoid of all womanly impulse and sentiment. (strangely enough, as though anticipating the argument of this book, athene is described as having sprung, in full life, from her father's brain. while scripture tells of eve derived from adam's side.) in _the new system of gynæcology_, the latest and most authoritative treatise by eminent specialists in women's diseases, the following passage occurs, under heading, "derangement of the sex-characteristics": "it is our belief that the more truly feminine a woman is, psychically and physically, in instinct and in performance, so much the more complete and normal will be the functions of her mind and body. we have already alluded to inverted instincts. and in the perversion of functions and characteristics (physical phenomena) we may observe all grades from almost complete masculinity in appearance, _with the disappearance of the feminine functions_, to the lesser degrees of disordered function and characteristics." ii nature is so complex, yet so subtly consistent in her workings, that the neuter-state shows in the faces of many of our women as the typical look of the mule--cross between horse and ass, a creature incapable of reproduction. in the eyes of young women of strenuous pursuits--academic, industrial, or athletic, this characteristic sterile glint, part boldness, part antagonism, is common. the normal condition of woman is attended by the normal expression of woman. the womanly biology entails the womanly psychology. and modesty is one of the natural female secondary sex-characteristics, attendant upon healthy structural development and function. the hard, bold glance--the "mule"-look--of some masculine girls and women by no means necessarily implies conscious immodesty. it is mainly biological and subconscious; sign of an attribute missing, as result of deterioration of the function in which the attribute is normally rooted. with reduced values of that reproductive function it is modesty's province to defend, the attribute of modesty declines. the girls and women of old sparta, as ignorant of biology as women are to-day, made a cult of athletics--good and zealous, but mistaken patriots!--for the express purpose of mothering a fine, athletic race. these high and praiseworthy aims failed signally. for sparta, with all her zeal of racial improvement (so drastic in its methods that she killed her weakly girl-infants) fell upon decline and degeneracy. noble civilisation that she had been, she died in decadent corruption. and showing the relation between athletic pursuits and extinction of womanly qualities, the spartan cult of maleness led to such decay of modesty that it became the custom for women to run with the men in the games, naked as they. a custom that sprang less from actual immodesty than from lapse of that normal sex-specialisation, whence arises the normal sex-consciousness which engenders wholesome reserve between the sexes. modern developments of a similar extinction of womanly modesty are seen in the conduct of latter-day girls and women in public parks and elsewhere; in the unseemly familiarities of mixed bathing; in the decadent, unduly-familiar or frankly indecent dances, and the frankly indecent modes of dress just now in vogue. as too in that so-called "candour" which permits women of culture to talk openly of the most intimate physiological functions, and, without sense of shame, to discuss across the dinner-table prurient scandals and other unsavoury topics. the mystery of the creative powers of life occulted in her has ever invested woman, for man, with glamour and reverence, enhancing a thousandfold her charm and appeal to his chivalry and tenderness. in stripping herself of womanly reserve and dignity, alike in demeanour and dress, she shatters her mystery for him and forfeits her supremest claim upon his manhood; while robbing him of his fairest illusions and most inspiring incentives. iii in cases of sex-transformation in the lower creatures, the lapse to a masculine type is found to be accompanied by atrophy of reproductive glands. as recorded in a previous chapter, investigations by rörig show that when the ovaries of female deer atrophy from any cause, male antlers develop. mannish sex-characteristics in women are as abnormal and as unnatural, and arise from a similar cause as do male antlers in female deer. with the wane of parental power, normal to middle-age, there occurs a like--but in such case a natural--atrophy of glands. and this it is that causes some women to acquire masculine traits at this epoch. degrees, greater or less, of such a decline (natural to middle-aged women) are being artificially, and prematurely, induced in our girls and young women. some of them become actually sterilised, and are wholly incapable of reproduction. the greater number are only partially sterilised. they are capable still of being mothers. but the function, in place of being the crown and the fulfilment of their natures, is a disability; is more or less of a morbid process, indeed. and their offspring are more or less deteriorate. not a few, after marriage--called upon to fulfil functions the resources whereof have been sapped by other and abnormal activities--become invalids; a number require surgical treatment. non-development, similar atrophy, or other deterioration of the mammary glands precludes the vast majority of our young mothers from nourishing their babes--a deplorable injury to these as well as to the mothers themselves; physical and psychical function being closely and subtly allied. women who fence or play hockey and other rough games during girlhood, become, owing to such degenerative atrophy, incapacitated for lactation. the following is an interesting example of the manner in which cruder and lower-grade power may be increased at the cost of higher faculties. a patient told me that, having been naturally a poor walker--two miles having been her limit--she had determined to train herself out of this which she regarded as an infirmity. accordingly, by persistent practice, she succeeded in raising her walking-power to ten miles daily. she mentioned incidentally--seeing no relation of cause and effect--that, for several years (the years during which her walking-powers had been increasing) _she had become progressively deaf_. that she had been, in point of fact, sapping the potential of the complex, invaluable faculty of hearing, in order to equip her leg-muscles, was confirmed for me a few weeks later, when i read of a number of cyclists, who, after one of those deplorable pacing-exhibitions common to-day, came in, one and all, stone deaf: a consequence of nervous strain. the deafness in these cases passed off with rest. but it is easy to understand that from such temporary functional depletions frequently recurring, permanent structural deterioration must result inevitably. thus it is that over-use, in sports and games, of the muscles of shoulder and chest, occasions atrophy of mammary glands. by no other way than by artificially inducing in them a premature (partial) climacteric, by perverting their young organisations to the quasi-masculine type of the middle-aged woman, and thereby releasing, for available output, power which should have remained conserved for many years in organisation, can women be fitted for masculine pursuits. and such sterilisation, where it is not producing actually diseased and degenerate offspring, is producing a pitiful race of pallid and enfeebled babes and children; dyspeptic and spectacled, adenoid-afflicted, unchildlike and generally deteriorate. that other factors contribute to the wave of racial decline now menacing our modern civilisations, great and small, is true. yet mothers of fine vital potential are able to counteract and to minimise the effects of constitutional disease in the other parent to degrees but little realised. because such mothers are so lamentably rare. iv it is the natural release of vital forces, consequent upon the normal wane of mother-power at middle-age, that has been mainly responsible for the errors of the woman's movement. in all its aims and methods it has been essentially a middle-aged woman's movement. there are no young ideals in it; no concessions to youth, to love, to graciousness or sentiment; none to wifehood or to motherhood. it has been, for the most part, a grim, dour striving after neuter standards, neuter models, neuter efficiencies, neuter lives and neuter recompenses. identity of brain and muscle, of aims and claims, of games and avocations; equal rights and equal work and equal pay have been the watchwords of its propaganda. "fair play and no privileges!" its promoters rigorously demand for these poor weedy girl-neurotics who, beyond all else, require industrial concessions and the human clemency of adequate rest and leisure, to allow of normal and healthful development of their growing brains and bodies. pioneered by strenuous, middle-aged women--with the best intentions, be it said--feminists have adopted the fatal policy of sternly impressing the model of their own quasi-masculine middle-age as the standard of youthful development. without, for a moment, suspecting that such wresting of male energies and efficiencies from its young women-victims has inevitably entailed upon them degrees of that climacteric of womanhood which is the herald of decline. on the contrary, this middle-aged, quasi-masculine state, because of its release of power for sterner purposes, has been hailed as a triumph of emancipation and of higher education; proof positive that woman is not man--only because she has lacked opportunity to become so. in point of fact, these unfortunate young creatures have been, and are being all the while ever further despoiled of their youth, of their sex, and their fair heritage of life and happiness, of function and of faculty. and the race has been robbed of priceless living wealth in human health and capability. the breasts of these despoiled have shrunk, in place of blossoming. there are no founts of altruistic life in them. never will they be capable of nurturing babes, or of contributing their mysterious due to psychical attribute. the pelvis remains narrow and puerile. never can it serve as hostel for a babe of normal, healthful type. in the vast majority of modern girls and women, the reproductive organs are structurally immature or functionally defective. dr. gaillard thomas, an eminent american gynæcologist, estimated, some years since, that only about per cent. of american women proper were physiologically fitted to become wives and mothers. the united states have been and are all the while deriving fresh influx of vigour and vitality in stock, from the continuous immigration of simpler and more vitalised peoples. but american women proper have never recovered from the strain and hardships of adaptation to a new environment, which settlers in alien and undeveloped countries necessarily encounter; the deteriorative influences whereof are shown in constitutional impoverishment of the parent-stock. this is true, as well, of our colonial kin. not only the strain of acclimatisation, but too the hard and rough life-conditions women have to cope with in undeveloped lands are responsible for the constitutionally-debilitated, or, on the other hand, for the rawer and less highly-organised racial types found in new settlements. in the united states, moreover, the standards of culture and of training are pre-eminently artificial. democratic sentiment and material prosperity induce persons of working-class biological organisation to over-tax their children's brains and constitutions by forcing these to the educational standards and culture of stock that has evolved, by generations of higher nurture, to higher evolutionary grades. the "newly-rich," eager for their families to profit (as they regard it) by opportunities denied themselves, invariably commit this radical error of over-estimating academic education and social accomplishment. they fail to realise that one can no more attain culture than one can acquire breeding in a single generation. it takes _three_ generations of culture--of comparative ease and freedom from the strain of industrial labour and living--to evolve the crude muscular arm of a working woman into the shapely, refined arm of a gentlewoman. and so it must be with brains. in nineteen cases out of twenty, a 'varsity education serves as irreparable injury rather than as benefit to a working-class youth, depleting health or warping character as it inevitably does. the strain of living above the evolutionary level is exhaustive and harmful, physically and mentally, both to individuals and to stock. the prudence of apportioning education to the grade of evolutionary development is strikingly shown in the cases of negroes, who, when over-taxed by the education normal to white races, not seldom become blind or consumptive. and always the morale deteriorates. the forcing upon our own labouring-classes of an education above that suited to their natural powers has contributed largely to the constitutional deterioration and the neurasthenia common among them to-day. one of the factors of modern labour-unrest, indeed, is the physical unfitness of debilitated and neurotic working-men to cope capably and cheerfully with the tasks of earlier and sturdier generations. the urgent need of all our over-civilised races is not more education but more _native faculty_. every form of disease and degeneracy, physical and mental, is rampant. a well-known authority on brain-diseases warns us that if mental defectiveness continues to increase at its present rapid pace, soon we shall be unable to support the asylums required to accommodate and segregate the unfortunate victims thereof. they must remain at large--to perpetuate and multiply indefinitely their terrible afflictions. yet how is it possible that such weedy, half-sterilised creatures as are so many of our modern mothers, should bear sound and sane and vigorous offspring? inherited debilitation and defect are further aggravated by present-day educational methods. our modern rendering of the training of the young is the _straining_ of the young. developing creatures should never be allowed to over-use function or faculty. because to over-tire an immature faculty is to deplete its vital resources of development. nor should young developing creatures be permitted to do anything too strenuously or for too long a time. narrowness and mental warp result inevitably from too early and too long periods of concentration in one direction, of the ductile shaping brain. in defiance, nevertheless, of this first principle of rearing, boys and girls, after the morning's brain-work, are kept at strenuous games for hours in succession. body and mind, after having been cramped between the covers of text-books, now are cramped within the narrow rules and rigid form of such miscalled "games," supervised by over-keen experts--the whole business exacting sustained muscular tension, temperamental excitement and competitive nervous strain. the powers are stretched to win some goal, in place of being unbent in leisure and in pleasure. true play is spontaneous enjoyment of the moment, not fierce concentration upon goals. this latter induces excitement, which may be pleasurable, but it entails its tax in reactionary exhaustion. because of the spur of competition in them, sports and games, as now rendered, act as powerful nerve-stimulants that deplete and waste the vital powers. school-boys and school-girls live, for the most part, in alternating states of high tension in sports and reactionary languors from the heart and nervous strain resulting therefrom. since sports and athletics became a cult, heart-diseases have increased by _per cent._ we complain that our young men are limp and unintelligent, lacking in initiative and enterprise. apart from the serious circumstance that, mentally, they have been trained for cricket, not for life, most of them (to employ their own phrase) have "gone stale" in heart and brain, in consequence of forced athletics, long before they come to the momentous business of living. even their muscles have wasted, in place of developing. with the result that instead of being finely-built and graceful, numbers of our youths are stiff, stoop-shouldered and abnormally attenuated. education should aim at keeping young persons fresh and unstrained; charged with vital energies for growth of mind and body, filled with zest and enthusiasm for the career before them. everywhere, mothers deplore bitterly that they can obtain neither duty, obedience, nor affection from their girls. many will not mend their clothes even; refuse so slight a domestic concession as to arrange flowers for the home. lacking the morbid excitement of competitive rough games, an abnormal craving for which has been artificially created, and home-tastes extinguished, at school, modern girls are bored and disaffected save when indulging in sports or in other excitements. the more delicate, sympathetic, and humanising amenities have no appeal for them. all the subtler, vital and inspiring impulses of natural womanhood have been rudely smothered in tussles of big muscles, in sensational crazes for making hockey-goals, and similar crude aims, quite alien to natural girlhood. the recurring stimulus of such, in addition to over-developing male muscles and proclivities in them, creates both the habit and the craving for excitement; effects pernicious and demoralising as are those of all habitual strong nerve-excitants. it is impossible to exaggerate the cumulative effect of habit upon disposition--and this particularly upon the plastic, shaping dispositions of young girls. youth is at the mercy of its pastors and its masters, to spoil or to foster its best growth. we feed the bodies and cram the brains of our young people, while, in sending them away from the home which is their natural environment, we starve and dwarf their emotions and affections; giving these nothing to evoke, nothing to nurture them. the abnormal cold-heartedness and self-absorption latter-day mothers bewail in their girls are the inevitable outcome of their unnatural upbringing. the spectacle of young women, with set jaws, eyes strained tensely on a ball, a fierce battle-look gripping their features, their hands clutching some or other implement, their arms engaged in striking and beating, their legs disposed in coarse ungainly attitudes, is an object-lesson in all that is ugly in action and unwomanly in mode. the so-called "tennis-grin," which on many women's faces does duty for smile, shows how the muscular tension of forceful effort permanently mars higher attribute. so too, the proverbial quarrelsomeness of tennis-playing women results from the combative habit of mind. light and exhilarating, in place of strenuous competitive exercises, enable girls to develop their womanhood in healthy structure, efficient function, and beauty of body and mind. dancing--the poetry of motion--particularly conduces to health and to grace. true dancing, that is, not the acrobatics of the professional dancer, which result in coarsened ugly limbs and stilted action. there is a well-known girls college which makes pre-eminently for the cult of mannishness. and here are seen, absorbed in fierce contest during the exhausting heat of summer afternoons, grim-visaged maidens of sinewy build, hard and tough and set as working-women in the forties; some with brawny throats, square shoulders and stern loins that would do credit to a prize-ring. all of which masculine developments are stigmata of abnormal sex-transformation precisely similar in origin to male antlers in female-deer; namely, deterioration of important sex-glands, with consequent obliteration of the secondary sex-characteristics arising normally out of the functional efficiency of these. it has been said that the "hardening" process for children succeeds in rearing sturdy families, by killing off those of more delicate (and higher) organisation. and this and other such latter-day schools earn a reputation for rearing amazons, by so breaking the health and constitution of their more delicately-constituted members that these are compelled to withdraw. following the rule that healthy bodies rebel in terms of illness against deteriorative conditions, it is the normal and healthfully-constituted girls who fail beneath such injurious strain. while organisations less sound of constitutional morale, in place of sustaining their typal ideals, conform to these deteriorative methods, and degenerate from higher to lower-grade standards of structure and function. precisely as happens to minds when exposed to demoralising influences. and to what end is it all? the training of modern young persons should fit them for twentieth-century existence in all its varied, complex and psychical developments. yet now-a-days we train our girls as though their destiny were carpet-beating or the forge, rather than the higher human amenities. it is not surprising, therefore, that they frequently play hockey with the higher amenities. so impressionable and mimetic the sex is, and such its bent toward extremes, that women trained to sports comport themselves in after-life as though playing a competitive game. a mental warp which has been one of the sources of latter-day strenuousness, as too of that fierce social rivalry which is wrecking older and fairer ideals and methods of friendship and hospitality. over-development of the large and cruder muscles dwarfs those smaller and more delicate ones which adapt to the softer and subtler departments of faculty. and while despoiling these smaller muscles which subtend gentle and delicate artistries, the crude larger ones, hypertrophied by athletic activities, become alike a burden and a curse to their possessor. because not only is their upkeep a continual and a superfluous tax upon her vital powers, but their hunger for continued function in further such crude activities afflicts her with turbulent impulses, for which the more civilised vocations supply no scope. the militant feminist movement was as much an explosion of suppressed muscularity in young women deprived of other outlet for accumulated muscle-steam, as it was an ebullition of masculine mentality on the part of its leaders. hysteria and other neuroses, obsessing hobbies and crazes, are, more often than not, morbid and distressing consequences of habits acquired at school and college, of developing abnormal high-pressures of muscular and nervous energy. masculine war-occupations have similarly evoked male muscularity and mentality in women. so that--war over--they find it well-nigh unendurable to return to the more refined and humanising womanly employments of their pre-war days. while on the other hand, employers are bewailing the rough and coarsened manners, personality and speech, as too the clumsy movements and ineptitudes of domestic servants, nurses and others, de-sexed by war-work in respect of the higher qualities and efficiencies of their sex. many of these sturdy motor-drivers, lusty w.a.a.cs. and strapping land-girls have lost all taste as well as aptitude for the finer arts of life and of the home. efficient in the handling of plough or gun or lorry, woe to the hapless babe or invalid subjected to their hard, forceful touch! v language is scarcely emphatic enough to characterise the painful (and insane) exhibitions of public-school and college "sports," in which boys and young men, whose vital forces are needed beyond all things for development, may be seen with faces whereon is neither joy of action nor pride of achievement, but only the pained rigidity of supreme heart and nervous strain, as they strive for goals that are no test of true physical fitness, but, on the contrary, prove physical lopsidedness. in confirmation whereof is the fact that many such athletes die young, and die suddenly. or they live the years when men should be still in their prime--valetudinarian and hypochondriac. the secret of health and nervous power is the constitutional capacity to _store reserves_ of vital energy, for expenditure as required. exhausting sports in youth engender habits of _over-expenditure_ thereof. trials of skill and of strength are admirable spurs to development and self-discipline. but these should make for excellence in that fine poise of mind and muscle which is the hall-mark of human achievement, not for extremes of crude brute-force (muscle being the lowest grade of human powers) which strain the living mechanism; and, straining, leave inevitably weak and warped links, when not actually snapped ones therein. the human body is a marvellous and delicate psychological instrument, not a mere muscular implement. when the hearts of boys are "sounded" after competitive sports, "murmurs" are heard; showing valvular incompetency. temporary in the majority of cases, but none the less indicative of gravely-weakened states which can but permanently injure the fine-spun valvular apparatus. "dilated hearts" caused numbers of our "fine young athletes" to be rejected as unfit for military duty. young men "in training" suffer from albuminuria, showing serious derangement of the kidney-function; derangement which inevitably entails such permanent structural deterioration as lapses readily, in after years, to grave disease. the fallacy that the excitement of games distracts the attention of youth from the processes of sex-development has been disproved. while all athletic boys are not vicious, it is now recognised that the most vicious are the athletic. the languors of body and mind reactionary upon the exciting strain of games are unwholesome languors; and breed unwholesome self-absorptions. a fresh and active imagination, to keep the mind interested at every turn, is the best of all safeguards. it is in the imagination, moreover, that higher moral and ideals arise. it has been said that "the battle of waterloo was won on the playing-fields of eton." it was far more likely won in the pages of _jack the giant killer_! because in war, as in most other things, moral is more potent than muscle. there is, it is true, a moral of games. but its outlook and its application are both contracted of range and artificial of form. games are useful in forming habits and in exercising faculties of co-operation in concerted action. but being played in company with others, and played in obedience to rule and regulation, they allow no scope for the development of individualism in mind or character, initiative or resource--outside the narrow boundaries of cricket-pitch or football field. by perpetual absorption of the powers in the movements of a ball, the mind becomes contracted and set in puerile mould, during years when it should be germinating and expanding in response to the countless varied and inspiring stimuli and factors of natural environment. over-keenness in sports destroys the sense of beauty, love of art and love of nature. the grey matter of the brain--the medium of mind--wherein arise imagination, inspiration and those noble talents and the noble dreams of enterprise which make for noble lives--this highest and most complex of the human tissue-cells becomes starved and atrophied from continued waste of brain-resources by those lower-grade cerebral motor-tracts which control and energise the muscles. the popular impression, both lay and medical, that muscular exertion supplies rest to the brain and recuperation to the nervous system, is a sad delusion. one cannot raise a finger without expending brain and nervous force, the muscles being implements by way of which the brain transforms purpose into action--being _brain_-implements therefore. so that brains--and particularly young brains--unduly taxed by muscular activities are robbed of power to develop or to function in their intellectual and other higher departments. if my hypothesis be true, and the right side of the body with its allied brain-hemisphere is the executive and expenditure side, while the left is the life and asset side, it is obvious that excessive brain-work, or sports, for which the executive power is supplied by this right side and its allied brain half, must necessarily deplete and exhaust the left side, which is the power-house and reservoir of life and mind whence the executive half derives its mental, nervous and vital potential. it goes without saying that such careful economy of the powers is superfluous in truly healthful and normally vigorous males. but latter-day stock has been, for the most part, so far depleted by generations of neglect of natural law as to require the strictest husbandry of its vital expenditure, in order to apportion its means to the best all-round advantage. object-lessons in such extremes of athleticism as destroy the normal balance of the counter-poising sex-traits have been supplied by war. the faces--as the natures--of some of our soldiers have become crude, coarse and deteriorate in intelligence, others abnormally harsh and fierce; the softer human qualities having been trampled out of them by stress of militarism, some to degrees of brutalisation and criminality, even. while a very great number show lined and haggard from heart or nervous strain. chapter iv the woman brain: its powers and disabilities "_my state is like the lightning's light-- now it shines forth, and now 'tis gone from sight. at times, amid the heavens i find my seat; at others, i am lower than my feet._" sa'di (persian poet). i of what order is this woman-half of mind which feminism seeks to extinguish? * * * * * the cerebral processes appreciable upon the outer plane, and calculable by science, represent no more than a tithe of brain-activities. they are but a single highly-specialised focus of brain-functioning. behind concrete volition, intellection, and action, are the silent, ceaseless, inner and incalculable workings of innumerable brain-cells concerned with the mysterious constitution and metabolism of life, and its strange, potent relation and correlation with mind and with environment; concerned with character and attribute and impulse; with ancestral vestiges and personal experience; with memories and instincts; with an infinitude of occulted and imperishable records of previous terrestrial existences, perhaps; concerned, in a word, with all the secret springs and complex potences of individuality; which differentiates every thought, emotion and action of any human person from those of every other. and in these recondite mysteries fructifying in a hundred million bi-sexual brain-cells, it may be that the subtle counter and inter-operations of the man and woman-traits find their highest activities, and make for their supremest issues. every man and woman is to every other a sealed book, whereof no more than a few pages have been glimpsed--even by those nearest and dearest. we are sealed books to ourselves, indeed, because we do not know the language we are written in. for of all the muted mysteries spinning ceaselessly within the silent-functioning cells of twin brain-hemispheres, science affords us but the scantest and most sketchy information. that the grey matter coating the brain-convolutions is the site of mentality; that the higher the intelligence, the deeper and more intricate these convolutions are; that disease of a certain area destroys the power of speech; while disease of some other occasions paralysis of this or that group of muscles, loss of sensation in this or that tract of skin. baldly it states that a portion of a certain convolution controls a certain movement of a hand. but the thousand and one emotions and incentives prompting such movement, and differentiating the resulting action across the extensive range between the noblest benefaction and the blackest murder, baffle every scientific method. the processes of mind and impulse occur on planes we have no means of penetrating, possess no appliances whereby to estimate the ethereal undulations thereof. what are we? who are we? whence are we? whither do we go? all is locked within the occulted silence of our hundred million brain-cells; each of which holds and keeps its own intrinsic secret; each the mysterious record, it may be, of one of those countless experiences, forms and phases, ancestral or individual, whereof every living person is the last resultant. but the twin-hemispheres, face to face within the skull, like opposite pages of a book, are key to one another; one page written in the mystical language of the past and future, the other in the concrete language of the present. ii is that which i surmise to be the _woman_--and emotional half of brain, the site of the mysterious province known as the subconsciousness, into the strange powers and phenomena whereof scientists are now beginning to inquire? is it the seat of that which myers designated "the subliminal consciousness," but which might well be called the supra-consciousness, because, in the regions of its higher functioning, it cognises things beyond power of concrete consciousness to apprehend; intuitions, premonitions, apparitions, telepathic messages? is it medium of those inherences and that sub-intelligent emotionalism known as _instinct_; which may be regarded as the implanted religion of rudimentary organisms, leading them upward in blind subconscious obedience, at sacrifice of their self-interests and disposition? respecting the regeneration of the crystalline lens of the eye of a triton, bergson says: "_whether we will or no, we must appeal to some inner directing principle in order to account for this convergence of effects._" may it not be that this brain-half--seemingly functionless, albeit as marvellously constructed and constituted as its fellow-half--is, in its merely organic departments, the agency of such an "inner principle," engendering the vital potentials of life and evolution, of health, of nervous recuperation and of biological repair? while in its departments of mind, it functions as instinct, as intuition, as inspiration, aspiration; serves as the subtly receptive medium by way of which the divine influx wells in human attribute; whereby divine revelation is communicated to the concrete brain-half, for interpretation in speech and in writing. bergson says also: "the consciousness of a living being may be defined as an arithmetical difference between _potential_ and _realised_ activity. it measures the interval between representation and action." (duality is indicated.) the trait essentially distinguishing the human from the brute-mind, is intelligent purpose. and purpose is the product of impulse (or instinct) and reason, (or concrete intelligence). (duality again.) impulse is an emotion and is feminine. reason is masculine. intelligent purpose may well be, therefore, a resultant of the co-operation of the feminine half of the brain, which supplies impulse, with the masculine half, which supplies reason. instinct, professor james, the american psychologist, has pointed out, exists independently of any recognition of its purpose. while reason exists apart from instinct--apart therefore from the emotional impulse which gives it the personal motive-power to become purpose. thus, either mode of brain without the other to supplement it would be incapable of function. _self_-consciousness requires two departments of consciousness--each of which is aware of the other. so that a man may judge and restrain impulses in himself that are contrary to reason and expedience, or, on the other hand, may choose to sacrifice both reason and self-interest to emotional impulse, noble and uplifting, or ignoble and debasing. describing intellect as characterised by a natural inability to comprehend life, professor bergson further says: "instinct, on the contrary, is moulded on the very form of life.... if the consciousness that slumbers in it should awake, if it were wound up into knowledge instead of being wound off into action, if we could ask and it could reply, it would give up to us the most intimate secrets of life." again duality of mental processes is inferred. as too in the following passage: "instinct is sympathy. if this sympathy could extend its object and also reflect upon itself, it would give us the key to vital operations--just as intelligence, developed and disciplined, guides us into matter.... intelligence, by means of science ... brings us, and moreover only claims to bring us, a translation of life in terms of inertia.... but it is to the very inwardness of life that intuition leads us--by intuition i mean instinct that has become disinterested, self-conscious, capable of reflecting upon its object and of enlarging it indefinitely." iii the phenomena of hypnotism seem to set the duality of cerebral processes beyond dispute. dr. george h. savage, consulting physician and late lecturer on mental diseases at guy's hospital, in his harveian oration, october , testified as follows to the strangeness and authenticity of hypnotic evidences: "wishing to follow our great master in not accepting anything without personal investigation, i took advantage of the opportunity offered by dr. wright, to test some of the points of most importance to which i have referred. "a gentleman, an engineer, who had been relieved by treatment by dr. wright, was willing to allow him to demonstrate the various stages of hypnotism and their effects.... he was asked to sit down and talk quietly about his relationship to hypnotism. then he was told to go to sleep. a few passes being made over his head, he slowly closed his eyes, and in less than a minute he was sleeping placidly. by the gentle stroking of his left arm this was rendered inflexible. the pulse was in no way affected; pupils were equal, but rather larger than before he slept, and were sluggish. he was slowly aroused (it being well always to recall the subject slowly). after a talk on general matters he stated that he had no sense of fatigue in the arm, nor any recollection of anything said and done during the period of hypnosis. "he was again, in a similar way, sent to sleep. it was then suggested that at the end of seven minutes he should lose all power and sensibility in his right side. he was roused, given a cigarette, which he smoked while he talked, having no knowledge of the suggestion which had been made. about five minutes after he had been roused, _his right arm fell useless by his side, he passing at the same time into a partial stage of hypnosis_. _this is common when a post-hypnotic suggestion is being carried out. the whole of the right side, including the face, was insensitive_; the pupils were smaller and inactive. he was again slowly aroused, and resumed smoking, having no feeling of oppression, or recollection of anything which had been said or done. he was later again hypnotised, and in that condition he was asked what had been done formerly. after some hesitation, he, in part, recalled the facts. "it is interesting to note that though constantly the acts performed during hypnosis are not recalled when awake, they are fully remembered on a second hypnosis. we tested his emotional side by getting him to recall scenes in a comic opera, at which he heartily laughed but had no knowledge of on waking. while unconscious, it was suggested that when he woke he should remark upon a strong odour of violets. he was awakened and offered a cigarette; but, looking about the room, he asked whence the strong smell of violets came. "i inquired as to the revival of long-past impressions, and it seems that occurrences which took place before his present memory existed, had been revived and verified. but still more interesting was his experience in reference to a mathematical formula which he had forgotten. being hypnotised, he dictated it, and though when once more awake he did not remember it, when shown what he had just dictated he recognised it as the lost formula. this, of course, is in a way parallel to the solution of difficult problems during sleep." be it observed that when at the end of seven minutes (as had been "suggested" to him should happen) the subject lost all power and sensibility in his right side and "_his right arm fell useless by his side_," he passed "_at the same time into a partial state of hypnosis_. _this is common_," dr. savage adds, "_when a post-hypnotic suggestion is being carried out_." here is strong corroboration of my argument that the right side of the body, with its allied half-brain, is the agent of material consciousness, of muscular action and of physical sensation, and that it operates normally in fencing in the higher faculties of mind from the outer plane of concrete happenings, as also of interpreting them upon this plane. hypnosis is induced by devices occasioning muscular exhaustion, and thus temporarily paralysing "voluntary muscles"--muscles, that is, which are under conscious control. it is induced as well (as in the case cited) by stroking, and thus putting to sleep the sensory nerves--nerves which define the patient's consciousness of his material personality. it would seem that by such inhibition, or paralysis, of the perceptions of the outer consciousness, faculties of subconsciousness--even of supra-consciousness--are exposed, so that mind itself may be dealt with direct. every form of insensibility is closely allied with muscular relaxation or paralysis. iv examples of the operation of the supra-conscious faculties upon the concrete plane are supplied by the marvellous feats of "lightning calculators." the most intricate mathematical problems--calculations that would call for lengthy and complicated intellectual processes on the part of expert mathematicians to work out by ordinary methods--are solved instantaneously by the genius of such natural "calculators." you cannot puzzle them; you cannot baffle them. scarcely have you stated your problem than they have calmly presented you with the solution. as maeterlinck records in his interesting book, _the unknown guest_, this genius for figures developed in colbourn and safford at the age of six, in mangiamele at ten, in gauss and whateley at three. all that and more than expert mathematicians laboriously acquire by decades of study and practice, these boy-prodigies achieved by way of native faculty. such have not the slightest notion how they arrive at their results. these are obtained automatically--are products of unconscious cerebration. maeterlinck observes of this, that the resultant "appears to rise, infallible and ready-done, from a sort of eternal and cosmic reservoir wherein the answer to every question lies dormant." what is this "eternal and cosmic reservoir" if it be not mind, or supra-consciousness, as distinguished from conscious intellection--a native intuitive, but undifferentiate, or potential, consciousness which holds the answer, "infallible and ready-done," to every question. truth _is_. there is but one solution--the true one--of a mathematical or any other problem of exact science. a significant fact is that such prodigy boys generally lose their mysterious faculty "_at the moment when the possessor begins to go to school_." so soon, that is, as he develops the power of conscious brain-processes--the power to work out his problems by concrete methods--his native supra-conscious gift of solving them spontaneously fails. intuition, the woman-mode of arriving at conclusions, lightning quick and true without reason or reflection, is a kindred potency of mind. "when a man," says a french writer, "has laboriously climbed a staircase, he is sure to find a woman at the top--although she will be unable to say how she came there!" he did not add the further truth, that--as with the prodigy boys--the more you educate her to come at her conclusions by processes of intellection, the more you rob her of her native woman-gift of divination. with the rising level of faculty engendered by progressive evolution, woman's powers of intellection have developed too. while her own mental attributes are themselves of a very high order, and give to her mentality an inductive subtlety and illumination lacking in that of the male. and this high quality of brain it is that is now being extinguished in her by straining her to masculine standards. progress awaits, indeed, the new and quickening impulse life and faculty should derive from the woman-mind fostered along its own inherent lines--to supplement the mind of man. for as bergson says, "it is to the very inwardness of life that intuition leads us." and intuition is the woman-mode of mind. * * * * * the women intellectuals who have done great work have been women who inherited talents so far above the average, as spontaneously to have reached high mental levels, without need to have sacrificed those womanly traits which gave the noblest values to such work. the woman of average brain, however, attains the intellectual standards of the man of average brain only at cost of her health, of her emotions, or of her morale. v herbert spencer said profoundly, "_mind is as deep as the viscera_." indicating it as being vital and intrinsic, at one with the occulted sources of life. mind is of an order of mentality wholly different from that of intelligence or intellect. mind is of the nature of emotion. it is personal, is sympathy, is divination. it is the cerebration of the soul. the soul, or essential individuality, must abide amid infinitely delicate and delicately infinite brain-cells attuned to those spiritual vibrations whereof mind is the reflex. and if mind is emotion, the woman brain-half, which is the department of human emotion, must be the mainspring of the human mind. great intellect, pure and simple, may exist in man or woman without or with only a fractional leaven of mind. this is seen in the abstractions of scientists, mathematicians, statisticians, physicists, astronomers, financiers, and others. such brains are special organs of a high order of intellection, clear, calculating and precise of observation and reflection; rational, deductive; admirable in their unswerving rectitude, pitiless in their impregnable emotionlessness; rejecting all but incontestable evidences, scrupulously aggregating and faithfully interpreting their dry bones of numbers and data and vestiges--skeletons of life long since extinct, or scaffoldings of life that lives and moves and laughs and weeps, and bears no more semblance to their bloodless tabulations of its modes and processes than warm, creative mother-earth resembles the geological strata they describe in her; or than a beautiful flower-garden blooms in botanical treatises; or than living men and women are pourtrayed in text-books of anatomy and physiology. many men of science--and all the great ones--have been men of mind as well as of intellect. but the intellectual processes of abstract science are no more operations of mind than the paths by which we climb to sun-illumined peaks are the light upon those peaks. mind is spiritual illumination--a glimmering of the infinite, reflected in the highest and most subtle order of the brain-cells. rays from it are deflected toward the concrete, to function as intellection. but these rays enter the brain at a different angle from that of mind-rays. like woman its medium, mind is inspirational, wayward and elusive. it comes we know not whence. it goes we know not whither. receptive, intuitive, creative, colourful, it may be unwitting of astronomy, yet it roams amid the stars. ignorant of geology, in it immortal, the dry-bones of the past become immortal--arise eternally in everlasting re-creation. its biology is in the lives and loves, the hopes and fears, the throes and tears of human souls and stories. it inspires the poet, priest, historian, romancist, artist; the seer and statesman; the philosopher and wondering child. it exalts the humble and meek. it may be lacking in the cleverest and most learned of men. it is found in the most ignorant and simple women; in whom it is dumb, however, failing the intellectual talent of expression. vi the woman brain-half being medium, in its higher region, of that _supra_-conscious emotionalism which engenders mind, and in its lower region, of that _sub_conscious emotionalism which engenders vital impulse in the body, woman's range of mentality is wider than is that of man; extending both higher and lower in its opposite reaches. but because her intelligent consciousness is not inherent in her own brain-half, but is supplied by her borrowed masculine brain-half, her intelligence is more superficial, is weaker and less deep and strong of grip than is his. and when the gap between her upper and her lower registers is not duly bridged and stabilised by an efficient middle-register of male-intelligence, she tends toward two extremes of mentality, both of which are emotional. thus she lives on the plane of her highest emotional impulses. or she lives on the plane of her senses. some women act and re-act perpetually between these two extremes. in her highest _supra_-reaches, she is athrill with supra-faculties. in her lowest _sub_-register, she is instinct and palpitant with the colour, the magnetic vibrations and the blind forces of matter, which her vital processes are evolving into life. extremes which are shown, at the one end, in the reasonless animal emotionalism of hysteria, with its abandon of control, its inco-ordinated muscular movements, its senseless weepings, cries and laughter; at the other end, in catalepsy, in which she exists detached from earth and its material needs and consciousness, subsisting, it may be for weeks together, without food or drink, withdrawn into the inner, and potential, zones of life and mind. so that, no longer subject to limitations of matter, she perceives without aid of the senses, apprehends without aid of intelligence, discerns without help of the eyes, hears without instrumentality of ears. and time and space no longer circumscribing her essential faculties, she visions happenings at the antipodes, overhears whispers across a continent, recalls the past, foretells the future. it is because of the potence of the subconscious medium in her, instinct with the magnetic forces of evolving matter, that, in her intelligence, she shows as more materialistic than man is, although warmer and more quickened in her feelings. living personalities and issues mean to her more than intellectual abstractions do. she is more materialistic because she cares more for the things that matter! the puddings which in her children's young bodies will be transmuted into living flesh and function, are to her of more significance than the isosceles triangle is. (all that is true of the woman brain-half must be true of the woman brain-half in man. in him, however, his own hemisphere dominates the bent and faculty of its female counterpart.) it is in the emotional impressionability of the subconsciousness that habit, good and bad, is formed. hence woman's native susceptibility to her environment--a susceptibility which renders indispensable due protection of her mind and nature during years when habits of thought and of conduct are shaping in her. normal man, whose emotionalism is (like woman's intelligence) a borrowed faculty, differs essentially from her in this. his intelligence is inherent and more stably rooted. he is far less mimetic, far less a creature of circumstance. his firmer will and stronger intellect enable him to rise superior to environmental conditions, to shake himself free alike of habit and of circumstance; his pioneering spirit disposing him to new departures. vii dual personality, catalepsy, epilepsy, shock, insanity, chorea are explicable as effects of abnormal dissociations or inherent discrepant relations between the two brain-hemispheres, which represent, respectively, conscious (or objective) intelligence, and subconsciousness (which is subjective). such discrepancy occasioning confusion between the two planes of mentality, perception becomes so blurred that, as in insanity, _subjective_ impressions are perceived as _objective fact_. and some idea or spectre of his own mind becoming thus objective, and being seen out of all perspective with the facts and conditions of everyday life, the patient may be so haunted and dominated thereby that not only his mentality, but his actions too may take distorted shape. while the conscious brain-half is a lens that focuses the concrete, the _sub_conscious brain-half is a highly-sensitised mirror (or retina) that reflects and retains, in terms of potential memory, all impressions and experiences. it becomes charged thus with a medley of strange and incongruous imprints, which, so long as the lens keeps these submerged and subconscious--because unfocused on the plane of consciousness--do not obtrude upon mentality. flaws or failures in the lens of reason allowing certain imprints to emerge, these become fixed ideas and obsessions. it is by way of the subconsciousness, that the hypnotist impresses "suggestion." clairvoyants and other "mediums" employ crystal-gazing and other devices in order to fatigue, and thus to paralyse or inhibit the visual function on the outer plane of sight. by such means, the subconscious visual faculty comes into operation, and sets them _en rapport_ with their client's subconscious mentality. this becoming _objective_ to them, those endowed with the gift of "second-sight" (a faculty not to be denied) are able to visualise in it misty impressions of the subjects' character, thoughts and circumstances. those rare clairvoyants who are able to establish rapport with their client's supra-consciousness may catch glimmerings of future events, even. because supra-conscious mind, being supra-natural, is not bounded by the limitations of the natural, in respect of time and space. in it, that which was still is, and that which is-to-be already has been. "spiritists" who see or hear phenomena they attribute to "spirits" are (when such are genuine) for the most part visualising or overhearing phenomena of their own (or of some other's) subconsciousness, which, owing to errors of refraction in the lens of consciousness, have become _objective_ to them. it may well be by way of magnetic vibrations communicated to ether by the _supra_ or the _sub_consciousness, that apparitions and telepathic impressions are transmitted from the brain of one person to that of another. so too, apparitions seen of persons lately dead, and so-called spiritist "communications" with these, may be (when genuine) phenomena of such etheric vibrations communicated to the supra or the subconsciousness of a living person, and apprehended by him in the objective forms of "ghosts" or "voices." kindred vital and powerful electric vibrations emanating, at the moment of death, from the subconsciousness of victims murdered, may so charge the etheric element of houses and localities as to be communicable, for long periods afterwards, to the subconscious mentality of "sensitives," which serves thus as "wireless receiver." such sensitives derive the impression that the scene of the tragedy is haunted by the actual "spirit" of the murdered. it is as incredible, of course, that an immortal soul should be chained to the scene of the violent death of a mortal body as it is incredible that a "spirit" should be at the call of a "medium," who--perhaps, for a fee--should be able, at will, to summon it back to the plane of concrete conditions, in order that it might talk (for the most part) irrelevant nonsense. on the other hand it is to be believed that, for a brief period after death, a spiritual entity may remain sufficiently in touch with the material plane as to be able, by way of those etheric undulations continuous through all the planes of being, to manifest its existence to one in close sympathy with it. viii in an article by me, "_is man an electrical organism?_" which appeared in _the nineteenth century_, july, , i showed--on the evidence of careful and delicate experiments by an electrical expert--that the two sides of the body (and presumably of the brain) are of different electrical potential. the active, right side is _positively_ electrified, while the passive, left side is _negatively_ electrified. mental telepathy and telæsthesia prove, surely, that brain and nerve-currents are electrical--one brain-hemisphere operating as transmitter, the other as receiver. since nature employs _one_ law only to suspend the mighty solar systems of the universe and to bring an apple to the ground, is it credible that she should employ _two_ laws for "wireless" and for human telegraphy, respectively? the hibernation both of animal and vegetative organisms shows two poles of vital function; life and consciousness passing into the recessive, or potential, mode during such winter-sleep. plants sleep by night. is sleep a recession merely from the state of consciousness to the potential states of sub- and supra-consciousness? and do these two states alternate normally in the opposite halves of the brain, concurrently with the alternation of day and night? night-blindness suggests such an alternation in the dual factors of vision--which comprises the intrinsic _faculty_ of vision and the concrete _function_ of visualising the external. every concrete function normally wanes with the waning of day. hence increasing drowsiness, passing into sleep. morning and evening mentality differ greatly. intellect, reason and physical activity are paramount during the day. emotion and imagination intensify with the approach of night. is this an alternation in function of the male and female brain-hemispheres, coincident with the alternation of the dual luminaries of our earth--the positive, unchanging dominant sun; the changeful moon, with her recessive phases and her mystical influences upon life and mind? the ante-natal life of the embryo is set in terms of lunar months. the word "lunatic" expresses the effects of lunar phases on persons of unstable mentality. whence do we derive our daily influx of life? though we have sunk to rest with dissolution in our bones, we awake re-charged with powers of living--a phenomenon for which science has no explanation. life does not originate in vital processes; vital processes originate in life. do we, in sleep, when processes have exhausted our daily influx of life-power, recruit this again from a psychical source? are living processes the wick of a lamp which is filled with the spirit of life at each recurring dawn, spent by the day's endeavour, and re-filled again with the following dawn? failure of sleep kills more swiftly than starvation. and drug-insensibility will not preserve life unless natural sleep supervene. if nervous energy is a complex form of electrical energy, then the brain in which this is stored is an electrical dynamo. is this dynamo re-charged during sleep from some occult power-station? since, in every equation of science, an unknown factor reveals itself, why not candidly confess this to be a spiritual factor? spirit is no more a hypothetical medium than ether is. and science has been forced to assume the existence of ether, as a basis for its calculations. ether and spirit are conceivably the same medium manifesting on different planes--the one of physics, the other of mind. ix according to professor clarapède: "the intellect appears only as a makeshift, an instrument which betrays that the organism is not adapted to its environment, a mode of expression which reveals a state of impotence." a saying which supports three clauses of my hypothesis: first, that the brain, with its tributary spinal-nervous system, is an instrument of consciousness wholly differentiated from, and supplementary to the organism of life. secondly, that it is an instrument designed for the adaptation of the organism to environment (the rôle i have assigned, throughout, to the male). thirdly, that the organism of life is not itself adapted to its environment, and that, accordingly, adaptation to environment cannot be regarded as the impulse of evolutionary development, since the living organism has so far failed to adapt itself to environment that it requires a highly specialised instrument to serve as medium between itself and its surroundings. that intellect--being an instrument by way of which life is adapted to environment, as also, on the other hand, by way of which environment is adapted to life--is a makeshift that "reveals a state of impotence" is not to be admitted, however, in view of the fact that it is an instrument which preserves life from developing along the lines of its environment; an adaptation which would necessarily involve lapse from typal ideals. intelligence taught man, in place of so adapting to environment as to have developed the fist of a gorilla (which at a blow can crack a human skull), to arm himself with a club. and by thus adapting environment to his evolutionary requirements, he conserved his resources and applied them to development along higher lines. such impotence as may be, arises out of the undevelopment of a rudimentary organism. of an organism in course of development, however. in the meanwhile, both man and woman are provided, in their hybrid constitution, with the "makeshift" of an instrument of opposite sex, which supplies both with the powers neither has yet developed in himself or herself; but without which neither is able to exist or to function. hybrid humanity is still amphibious; a creature living between two planes, the without and the within, the material and the spiritual. and like all amphibious creatures, the human species is, in a measure, clumsy and imperfect. because while fitted still with organs and faculties that have adapted to a lower plane, it possesses likewise organs and faculties that are adapting to a higher. its powers thus handicapped by requiring to engender the vital potential and the developmental power to equip it with two orders of implement, neither order has attained perfection of construction or of function. and both ministering to the requirements of the other, necessarily hamper the operations and mask the characteristics of the other. the two sexes are making all the while for higher development, each along routes of its contrary trend. man develops human faculty in the direction of the outer and material plane of being. woman develops it in the direction of the inner and psychical plane. man transmits to woman a brain-hemisphere and powers ever further increased and intensified in their relation to the concrete. woman transmits to man a brain-hemisphere ever further indrawn and illumined in respect of the emotional and intrinsic. woman's brain-hemisphere, adapting to its concrete fellow, becomes increasingly empowered to manifest, upon the outer plane, its own essential woman-traits in life and consciousness. man's brain-hemisphere, adapting to its diviner fellow, becomes increasingly illumined and inspired thereby to leaven and exalt its concrete outlook and activities. man's brain, by way of its responsive adaptation to the brain of woman interior to it in the zone of mind, becomes thus ever more sympathetically intelligent, or intuitive, in respect of human life and conditions, of science and the arts; while losing nothing of its dominance and concrete power, but interpreting its operations in terms of a profounder and a nobler chivalry. woman's brain becomes ever more intelligently sympathetic and practically helpful; losing nothing of its recessiveness, or emotional impulse, but, on the contrary, intensifying all its woman-attributes by extending the range and the operations of these in terms of a profounder and a nobler altruism. * * * * * because of their hybrid constitution, there is necessarily a borderland, alike of faculty and function, wherein the organisation and the characteristics of the sexes merge and approximate one another's trend and traits. this borderland represents, however, the crudest and least differentiated department of the personal and mental powers of both. it is a zone of neuterdom, and marks a grade of rudimentary organisation in which the sex-characteristics have not yet sufficiently diverged in development, as clearly and finely to differentiate themselves as traits of pure and unalloyed type. the cruder the species or the evolutionary stage of species, the less sex is specialised in it. chapter v male and female sex-instincts and morale diametrically different "_in conjunction with any other beings but men, women would have been angels; but with men they are just women, which when all is said and done, is much the same thing._"--de livry. i among many other misconceptions with regard to sex-characteristics, is the modern teaching that the sex-instinct is identical in men and women. ignoring the truth that a higher moral code is the mark of psychical superiority, and moreover that the exaction of it from women, under social penalty, has done more than any other thing to purify and to exalt the woman-character, impassioned fallacy now sees this higher standard demanded of the sex as a stigma of inferiority, and as an injustice. accordingly it preaches equal liberty in this as in other respects. the trend toward equalisation is unfortunately (but inevitably) in the direction of lowering the woman-code rather than of raising man's. no falser or more disastrous doctrine could be promulgated. as in all its other attributes and functions, so in this, the woman-nature differs wholly from that of the male. the primal male sex-instinct was one of tyranny and subjugation. there was no element of affection in it, and its bent was toward promiscuity. in the primal female, the instinct as an initiative impulse was non-existent. the surrender was to fear, and to habit engendered by fear. fondness for her mate came to woman by way of her love for his child, a source essentially monogamous in trend. physical passion in woman is derived from the male-traits in her. it is, accordingly, a borrowed, not an inherent instinct. and in all natural women, passion is secondary to love; love belonging to her own intrinsic nature. because of its heritage, there is, in a true woman's love, always a maternal altruistic element: unselfish, ministering, devoted. love has come to be intensified in her by fire of passion and by force of personal attraction. it is no longer a mere meek surrender, with fear for spur and maternity for solace. in proportion as she is of high organisation, it has become a complex of mind and emotion and sense; intense and vital. but always, in proportion as she is womanly, her own way of loving--the way of devotion and tenderness--is ascendant over passion. in man, howsoever it be leavened by the higher love, passion dominates. when in woman passion dominates love, she is loving with the male-traits in her--not as woman. and in the measure wherein she falls short of the womanly monogamous ideal, she is less woman than she is male. mr. justice hannen, for long president of the divorce court--and a subtle expert in women--observed that it was not the passionate, warm-eyed women who figured most before him, but, in far greater number, the cold-blooded, greedy and emotionless. because for one woman who succumbs to love or passion, twenty transgress from motives of vanity or gain; or from mere frivolous craving for excitement. it is the sexless women who are most immoral, for the same reason that some dyspeptics are always hungry. persons of healthy digestion eat, and are satisfied. the healthfully-sexed love, and are content. the emotionless woman is for ever seeking in novelty, emotions she lacks the emotion to feel. such women exploit passion for vanity, for distraction, or for the primal male-instinct of subjugation. their desire for a lover is less a sentiment than it is of the nature of that craving for drink, or for drugs, or for dress, which many of this order also indulge. all are megalomanias--natural instincts distorted to vices by warp of abnormal self-centredness. with its foundations laid in instinct, its organic emotionalism, its streak of mental irresponsibility, and its hunger for approbation, the woman-nature, when lacking in the higher woman-traits of affection and selflessness, or when these are not duly absorbed in the natural interests and functions of the sex, may degenerate to a very ugly thing. some of our latter-day "smart" young married women, childless or with one or two children consigned to hirelings, their passions excited by marriage and not duly assuaged by maternity, their impulses unchastened and their powers unexpended in affection and care for the family, seek outlet and distraction in promiscuous philanderings, in intrigue or in vice. human faculty and impulse diverted from their normal channels readily find crooked and dangerous courses. in the fourth year of war, the prussian protestant state-church declared that "immorality among german women has attained such a degree that the very foundations of society are threatened." this and kindred developments in other war-ridden countries are not due to women having changed their natures, but are the outcome of conditions so altered as to have released them from the wholesome disciplinary exercise of their accustomed duties, relaxing thus the salutary curbs of habit and convention. child of nature that she is, woman is a born rebel; for ever in revolt against the law and order and restraints which man has imposed as indispensable to progress. whereas men abhor, women exult in crises and upheavals. because these serve for outlet to their restive emotionalism and supply scope for exotic sensation, while at the same time giving them temporary mastery over the male--who is always at a disadvantage in exhibitions of feeling. and this temperamental erraticism is valuably disciplined by the masculine bent for rule and method, and normally finds admirable safety-valves in wifely, housewifely, and motherly functions. ii to advocate a moral standard higher for women than for men is regarded now as reactionary and regressive. nevertheless, it is certain that beyond all the other virtues, personal purity is essentially the highest, and is racially the most valuable of all the woman-qualities. lapses in the other sex are in no way comparable, as regards moral, biological, or sociological significance, with kindred lapses in woman. because of her native non-conformability, once she has deviated from the monogamous code, she is dangerously likely never after to conform to it. (it is a truism that _the woman who has one, has many lovers_.) her non-conformity requires, accordingly, to be protected by a social ordinance more rigid than is that of man. man being less complex of psychology, moreover, that which in him is merely biological is vice in woman. the fact alone that the male is able to employ the sex-function as a weapon of brutality (as in violation) proves him totally dissimilar to woman in this relation. man disperses; woman absorbs. and the consistency of nature is such that these two diametrically-opposite biological modes in reproduction are reflected on the planes of mind and impulse. the diametrical difference of the modes disposes outright of the feminist demand for identical moral codes for the sexes; the sex-functions of the two being so intrinsically contrary in method and inherence, with correspondingly signal differences in moral impulse and significance. biologically, the masculine function concludes with its fulfilment. whereas the feminine function _begins_ mainly therewith, and continues thence onward to operate in an ever-deepening, broadening, and intensifying tide of issues; biological and psychological. and so potent and subtle is nature's consistency with regard to this primary and vital function of woman in life, that whether or not biological issue results, psychological issues do inevitably. woman's mode and mood of _receptiveness_ in this mysterious union so operate that, in her surrender, she admits to the inmost sanctuary of her being an alien presence--which remains with her till death. fade as it may from her consciousness, it remains, nevertheless, impressed for ever after on the vibrant records of her sensitive subconsciousness, as vitally as in the hour of her surrender. and underlying mind and character and conduct ever after, it for ever after contributes its quota to these. because of the vivifying potence of her creative womanhood--the function whereof is to engender life--the stranger admitted to her citadel becomes endued with life, and takes up his abode with her to the end of her natural term. for this reason, the adulterous woman is adulterous in a sense impossible to man--adulterous in both a vital and an intrinsic psychical sense that is revolting. with the increasing intensification in the male, with advancing evolution, of his inherited woman-traits, he has become ever further endowed with woman's sub- and supra-conscious faculties. so that the function which was, in its primal moral, but brief and cursory, ending summarily with its biological fulfilment, has become increasingly endued in him with the vital emotionalism, and accordingly with the moral significance inherent to the woman-nature. if his experiences fade more quickly from his consciousness than hers do, they remain nevertheless (in the degree of his psychical development) potent still in his subconsciousness--as possibly adulterating and debasing factors. but since his subconscious emotionalism is an acquired and not an inherent part of his male mentality, it is a medium vastly less sensitised and operative in him than it is in her; of whom it is the very basis of her being. this is no apology, of course, for masculine aberration, but a counsel of feminine virtue--a counsel making indirectly, therefore, but none the less surely for masculine virtue also. the reasons for chastity in the one sex differ diametrically from those which should be the motive thereof in the other, however. chivalry and prostitution are incompatible. it must be confessed, however, that deterioration of the woman-organisation and temperament conduces greatly to masculine promiscuity. not only because this entails loss of power to charm and bind the mate, but because with the sex-immaturity, on the one hand of the over-feminised type, on the other, of the mannish woman, women lose, in greater or less degree, the natural power of one sex to assuage passion in the other. man is deteriorated, moreover, by moral and psychical deterioration in that sex whence moral impulse springs, because, in such case, the appeal of woman ceases to be, as is normal, to the emotional and chivalrous in him, but evokes, on the contrary, biological instinct mainly, or merely. it is well-established truth that her first lover (or her husband, supposing she had loved him) retains a unique hold upon a woman's mind throughout her after-life--his personality or memory dominating her imagination as no later-comer is able to do. this is because that first enters into possession of both consciousness and subconsciousness while the tablets of these are still virgin and unblotted. this first impresses himself, therefore, clearly and strongly defined upon her exquisitely-sensitised tablets of remembrance. latter-day young girls, permitted the injurious licence of free and unchaperoned association with the other sex, even when they come to marriage, inviolate, have, many of them, passed through experiences which so have blurred and sullied their young highly-impressionable temperament and senses as to have despoiled these of that fair purity and freshness indispensable alike to potent impressions and to deep attachments. in natural woman who has arrived at womanhood without premature arousing of the senses, soul and sense are at fine poise, and respond in vital unison to love. in girls whose innocence and conduct have not been duly safeguarded, the prematurely-excited senses have become detached from the soul--from the higher emotions, that is. with the result that this fine poise of mind and body, which is the hall-mark of woman-development, and whence romantic passion issues, has been irretrievably lost. the same is true, in degree, of young men. they too deteriorate when biological instinct is dissociated in them from the higher impulses of passion. but in men, the poise, being less delicate, is not only less readily lost, but it is more readily recovered. in this, as in other things, the normal male makes for means; while woman's bent is toward extremes. further, physical passion being normally far stronger in him, and _initiative_ in impulse--whereas in her it is mainly _responsive_--the senses assert sway over him spontaneously. while in natural girls these lie more or less dormant, unless artificially roused, or until aroused in natural response to love. early philanderings (more serious than boy-and-girl comradeship and innocent flirtation) prevent women not only from ever attaining their highest levels of organisation and temperament, but they destroy effectually their power to love profoundly and whole-heartedly. they rob them, accordingly, of the greatest transfiguring potence and happiness of life. iii odious and startling evidence that because of woman's vital emotionalism and sensitive psychology, her nature retains ineffaceable vestiges of all that has happened to her, is the fact that a woman's children by a second husband may resemble her first husband far more than they resemble their father. a significant and repulsive adulteration of type, and one so intrinsic that a woman who had been previously wife to a negro or a chinaman will present her second husband, typically european, with offspring of negroid or of mongolian type. that husbands and wives come to resemble one another in physiognomy and characteristics, is further indication of the subtle and potent temperamental fusion and implications of the mysterious sex-union. the adulteration of type which may thus repulsively mar the offspring of women twice-mated is seen, at first hand, in that adulteration of personality which results from sex-promiscuity. not only is the individuality both of mind and character obliterated, but the individuality both of form and feature is obliterated too. the features of persons of irregular life become blurred and more or less mongrel; character and expression so degenerating as to produce eventually that which has been styled a "composite face"--the face resulting when a number of portraits of different persons are printed one over another on the same photographic plate. the degree to which in the sex-union--howsoever lightly entered on--they twain become intrinsically and remain irrevocably one, in the vital records of individualism and character, is wholly unsuspected. but in this--which is a complex phenomenon of hypnosis--indelible undying images, such as are impressed upon the subconscious mind in every other form of hypnosis, remain impressed thereon; to inspire and fructify, or to weaken and vitiate nature and faculty. that vigilant supervision of her young daughters for which the early victorian mother is now decried, secured a purity of racial type, in fine physique and constitution, in notable talent and enterprise, in rare womanly beauty and virile handsomeness, which proves the unique potentialities inherent in our anglo-saxon stock. no merely material service a woman can render to the state approaches in value the all-potent one of safeguarding the virtue of its young daughters. each sex has its own morale to sustain. and personal virtue is woman's. the desire for equal liberty in this respect is added proof of the ascendancy, in modern women, of male over their own natural woman-traits. it springs not from an intensification of passion, but, on the contrary, from a waning of that power to love which holds a woman true to one mate. last and most cogent of reasons: in view of those long centuries of suffering and aspiration, by way of which the evolution of the woman-traits of love and purity has been achieved in blood and tears--albeit the monogamous ideal is far yet from attainment--beyond all else, the sex should strive toward this, both personally and socially. it is the soul of love and life, the impulse of human advance. with decline of this ideal, the emotions cease to centre in the home and family, and civilisation relapses to barbarism. iv ellen key, in _love and marriage_, observes: "few propositions are so lacking in proof as that monogamy is the form of sexual life which is indispensable to the vitality and culture of nations." and further: "all the progress that is ascribed to christian civilisation has taken place while monogamy was indeed the law, but polygamy the custom." she overlooks the portentous truth that a law is the expression of a general aspiration toward an ideal for which a people is striving. that a law is broken proves that the higher in man moves him to set a standard beyond his power--or beside his inclination--to sustain undeviatingly. yet although he may not act up to it undeviatingly, it stands, nevertheless, for the ideal he realises that he should reach. abolition of a good and elevating law proves, therefore, not only the serious lapse of a community from an established standard of conduct, but it inevitably lowers the level of conduct by removing barriers--self-respect and self-restraint, public opinion and so forth--standing in the way of laxity. despite the death-penalty, murders are committed. but were the death-penalty to be abolished, murder would increase by leaps and bounds. the human mind is strangely susceptible. and the power of habits acquired under fear of penalties is an invaluable force for good. the higher minds of a community evolve and establish codes for lesser minds to shape by. and undoubtedly the subconscious as well as the conscious shaping toward such standards furthers development in the directions thereof. to make honesty a matter of personal choice, with no penalties attaching to theft, would be in itself an incentive to theft. comparison with polygamous countries, of countries in which monogamy is the law, refutes straightway miss key's discredit of monogamy; showing the polygamous uncivilised, unenlightened, unprogressive, subject to monogamous races, and in every sense, both materially and morally decadent. and if, with a notion of establishing equality in all things between the sexes by emancipating woman from the higher moral code, leasehold marriage or other forms of wedded laxity should be substituted--not only would national purity, but personal character and happiness too would suffer grievously. if men have not kept the monogamous law, the instinct of jealousy, reinforced by repugnance to supporting alien offspring, has seen to it that wives should trespass as seldom, at all events, as was possible to be guarded against. custom and public opinion, furthered by personal fear and fear of divorce, have all contributed toward advancing ideals of womanly honour and conduct. and from monogamous mothers--whether voluntarily or involuntarily so--progress has derived immense impulse. apart from biological considerations, the benefit to the family of the mother's influence centred in her home and kept from straying thence, either by her own aspirations, by public opinion, or by fear of the husband, has been incalculable. during and since the war, crime among children has increased by per cent., largely owing to absence of mothers from their homes, working or drinking, or otherwise dissipating, while their children have been left to run wild in the streets. our reformatories are full to overflowing with these neglected unfortunates; deprived thus of the haven of homes and maternal control. as a man is responsible to the state for the support of his family, so a woman should be held responsible to the state for the proper care and supervision of its future citizens, who, without due care and disciplinary influence, become a burden and scourge to the community. in all these vitally-momentous issues, let us free our minds alike of sex-bias and false sentiment, in order that we may see clearly, and may act honestly and wisely in the interests not only of women themselves, but in those of the race. v the sex-instinct in woman having had its origin in surrender, retains much still of this primal element. and both middle-class men of lower evolutionary grade, and men of the working classes, exercise still, to considerable degree, the brute-trait of terrorism over women--moral rather than physical terrorism. in rescuing young girls from molestation in the streets, one may see in them the panic of such intimidation. they are pale and trembling, with pupils widely dilated. in full daylight, it may be in a crowded thoroughfare, with police at hand, primal instinctive emotionalism paralyses reason, resource and will-power. weak-minded women, who lack their due share of masculine combativeness to stiffen resistance in them, frequently marry, or otherwise yield to such men, far more because they are afraid than because they are fond of them. and the terrorism husbands have exercised over wives has nerved wives against the terrorism exercised over them by other men; and has thus served to protect them from their own weaknesses. the woman-traits, always at a disadvantage in concrete affairs against superior strength, have been buttressed thus and coerced--often cruelly and tyrannously, 'tis true. but they have nevertheless been greatly furthered in development by a mate who, if he did not recognise the higher calibre of woman's nature, nor himself aspired to the code he exacted from her, recognised, at all events, that this higher code he exacted of her was that best adapted to progress. thus has poor mortality been beaten and shapen on the anvils of compulsion and exigency. and always the woman has most suffered--to be beautiful of nature. were it not that an advance-guard of higher and chivalrous men stand, by force of the laws they have made, between women and the lower and coarser masculine orders, no woman's life would be worth the living because of perpetual affront. with existing laws, indeed, which protect even the most degraded of the sex, the women of the poorer classes are everywhere subject to insult and unseemly jest, open or covert. because to many men of crude order, the eternal mystery of sex shows mainly as subject for levity. the crass and unimaginative frequently deride thus things too high for their dense understanding. women have come to take their chivalrous protection by law as mere matter-of-course, precisely as they take it as matter-of-course that men should labour, and should endow them with the benefits of their industry. these things are by no means matter-of-course, however, but are matter of chivalry--chivalry so innate as to have become convention. it would be occasion for laughter, were it not cause for profoundest regret, that the hypertrophy of male-traits in woman has engendered to-day a sex-antagonism which has set her in open revolt against man, from whom, if she has suffered and suffers, and will continue to suffer at the hands of his defects, she nevertheless derives, and has always derived from his chivalries her most gracious human privileges. that the obligations and the recompenses of the sexes are reciprocal, is true. it is equally true, however, that the choice has lain with men to have ignored the nobler issues of the compact. as the seraglio-imprisoned women of the less manly and progressive peoples prove. all our civilisation, with its complex sociological, intellectual, and moral developments, rests on a basis of force. men must still prove their right to each and all of their laboriously-won achievements by arms and the valours of war. in peace, the laws--which alone make life tolerable--rest equally upon the powers of masculine will and strength to inflict due punishment for violation thereof. and laws having been made by men, it was clearly optional with them to have left women unprotected, or far less protected than the other sex; in place of having extended special protection to their more delicate attributes. in safeguarding women in general, men safeguard their own individual women, of course. human motive is involved; is the product of a number of factors. that this is so is reason for eliminating no single one of these factors, lest the resultant undergo a wholly unexpected and disastrous transformation. the plan sets most women at the mercy of most men, by reason of the greater physical strength of males, and by temptation of their more urgent sex-instinct. in view of her inherent disabilities, it would have seemed, _a priori_, that no woman could in ruder days have attained to womanhood, inviolate. and yet that her very disabilities have served for her increasing protection is shown by the fact of her increasing protection as, with the evolution of her higher organisation, her disabilities have intensified. civilised woman, with her more delicate organisation, is far more defenceless than was savage woman. but in response to the claims of her increasing defencelessness, the instinctive chivalry of the stronger male, her natural protector, has become progressively the intelligent and moral chivalry of higher man. no strength or capability of woman's own to defend herself could so have served her; nor could so have served the other sex for fine incentive. to free woman of her highly specialised and inspiring disabilities by substituting in her, powers, muscular and mental, that would fit her to meet the male on equal terms, would be to frustrate the method of the male evolutionary ascent, by eliminating the humanising and uplifting appeal to his manhood of these her inspiring unfitnesses. the deplorable decadence in masculine regard for and bearing toward women, which has resulted in direct proportion as the sex has substituted male efficiencies for womanly ineptitudes, serves for one of many other valuable object-lessons of the war. vi among other feminist fallacies, the _demi-mondaine_ has come to be regarded as victim merely, on the one hand, of an unjust, man-administered economic system, on the other, of masculine libertinism. the truth is that the vast majority of immoral women are under no compulsion, but voluntarily adopt this mode of life either to escape work, or because of a natural vicious proclivity. a number are mental defectives; some actually feeble-minded, others only morally deficient. it must always be remembered, moreover, that, biologically speaking, the separation of the _genus_ woman into the folds, respectively, of sheep and goats is of signal racial and social service. that some goats are in the sheep-fold, some lambs among the goats, is not to be denied. fatalities, injustices, and incongruities are inevitable to all broad human classifications. in the main, however, the women who resist temptation and remain virtuous are obviously better fitted to be the wives and mothers of the race than are they who fall. and although this is not, of course, the calculated purpose of this lamentable under-world, the rough division of the sex thereby into two main classes has been of service, by supplying a sociological backwater wherein the worst of our racial derelicts--mental and moral defectives--are segregated; and are precluded, for the most part, from perpetuating their mental and moral defectiveness. women, like men, must uphold and battle for their standards in the teeth of circumstance. the most notable types of parasite-women, selfish, slothful, worthless, venal, vicious, whose standards are jewels and clothes, their goals luxury and pleasure and the evasion of all that is difficult and distasteful in life, are found among the aristocratic and the plutocratic orders; safely secured against economic necessity or lack of scope and outlet for their powers. the feminist fallacy that prostitution is almost entirely a product of male economics has been strikingly refuted, too, by war-conditions, which opened numerous well-remunerated employments for the sex. yet, coincident with a sad deficit of women to fill these, prostitution has waxed rampant. wise and discreet were those early victorians, with their uncompromising ostracism of loose women. apart altogether from such salutary expression of their condemnation of impure living, they were vastly too clever and far-seeing to admit persons of notoriously evil habit, peeress or actress, to association with their clean young girls, as modern mothers do; to meet and to mix freely with them socially or at charity bazaars, on flag-days, and so forth. with the result that girls all the world over have become increasingly lax and decadent in tone and manner, in dress and morale, from confusion of their young standards by social tolerance and recognition of such persons, as also from corruption by demoralising contact with and observation of such. intolerance? pharisaism? by no means! the strong and straight, uncompromising moral standards of its women serve as landmarks of, and impulse to a nation's progress. clear and definite lines of demarcation between good and evil, between possible and impossible modes of conduct, point the moral of advance, and turn the scale in the upward direction for the weak, the hesitating, and the imitative. dread of consequences went far, in less sophisticated days, to safeguard and foster womanly virtue. modern expedients have, unfortunately, removed all cause for fear in this relation; permitting an impunity of action demoralising to the weak in will or principle, who require every possible aid and check to guide them aright. in simpler days, girls who had lapsed were steadied and strengthened in character and self-restraint by the compulsion to support, as too by their natural fondness for the unwanted child. now the first step--having cost them nothing--predisposes to further backslidings. and both character and self-control degenerate increasingly. vii to weaken the marriage-bond by setting it for a term of years only, or by making it terminable by consent, would virtually destroy marriage and family-life. the fact that the bond would not be binding would make persons more careless even than they are at present in selection of the mate, and would thus multiply the number of mis-matings. which would be still further to deteriorate species, since the finer types of children are born only of well-mated parents. the finality of the bond, if it does not always prevent one or both from meeting some other they prefer, prevents the scrupulous, at all events, from seeking such. or having found, it keeps many from fostering and from yielding to temptation. were marriage terminable, or, as is sometimes proposed, were it abolished wholly, and love the only bond between the sexes, there would be no confidence, no sense of security between the partners, no stability of family life; no centring of interests in this, and but small endeavour to retain affections which for the many could be easily replaced--and replaced, moreover, with the zest of novelty. on the contrary, a curse of unrest would afflict the vast majority of married folk with the unsettling--mayhap with the alluring--prospect of meeting their further "fate"; perhaps their second, possibly their third, it might be, their seventh "fate." only the few are strong enough of heart or stable enough of character to remain steadfast for a lifetime in any undertaking, unless bound stringently thereto by authorised obligations, incentives, and penalties. only the few are deep enough of nature to love for a lifetime; or are deep enough of nature to love so intensely as to justify altering the marriage-code in order to spare these few suffering. the wane of nine out of ten honeymoons impresses the value of an inflexible decree that declines to reckon with disillusion, but sternly bids the disillusioned take up their burden and make the best of it. and having no choice, many do this and make a success of it--on new, and, it may be, on far higher lines than those they had set out upon. that but few love so deeply as to love for life by no means implies that marriage for less than a lifetime should be substituted. it shows, on the contrary, that the majority of persons would prove as incapable of loving no. two for long as they had been incapable of loving no. one; or as they would be incapable of loving no. three, or no. ten. a bond that rivets them for life to no. one therefore, and entails loss or suffering when they fail to abide by it, is safeguard for them against such a succession of loves as would be as demoralising to the individual as it must be destructive of society. examples of this tendency to amorous licence have been furnished by the complications of war-"widows," who, on report of the death of soldier-husbands, remarried in unseemly haste--only to find the husband return. so too, by the widespread infidelity of wives to absent soldier-husbands. if the grave and moving circumstance of a husband facing death or mutilation in the trenches, for his country's defence, was not grave nor moving enough to keep his wife faithful to him, then we should congratulate ourselves upon a marriage-law which, by exacting penalties whereby such a wife suffers material damage, supplies the only argument likely to stiffen the morale of so light-minded and callous a creature. nothing less binding than a lifelong contract is coercive enough or is sufficiently chastening to bridle woman's native changefulness and curb her instinctive emotionalism. the realisation that there is no way out of a situation is her finest incentive to nobility. she bruises her impulses against the iron of circumstance, and the essences of her intrinsic woman-soul distil in patience and in sweetness. under the harrow of sacrifice, she feels herself martyred. and yet without the sense of martyrdom, as may be also without the conditions thereof, no true woman is ever wholly content that she is fulfilling her destiny. ellen key writes of "_all the impurity that the sexual life shuts up within the whited sepulchre of legal marriage_." she falls here into the common error of assuming such evil to be restricted solely to the state of marriage. whereas the higher interests, the duties and affections of the family life--purifying and inspiring influences lacking in unsanctioned unions--make inevitably for the uplifting of the relation. that some husbands and wives fall short of the pure intensity of passion possible to some others between whom love is the sole bond, is true, of course. but as are most other human developments, this is a matter of the character of individuals rather than of the terms of the bond uniting them. certainly, high and tender passion is scarcely to be expected in a union for no better reason than that this is illicit. viii were life designed for happiness and pleasure merely, the case would be different. were one life our sole portion, it might be different too. having one life only, we might be justified in claiming for it the joy of the best love available. an unhappy or a less than happy marriage is only one, however, of the many expedients for the evolution of faculty. if the evolution of the individual progresses by way of countless earth-existences strung upon a thread of spiritual continuity, one life is but a brief and single page of everybody's great life-serial. that is, doubtless, why all feel their lot to be an episode merely--unexplained, and incomplete, rather than a finished story. and in our innumerable pages and innumerable episodes, we must resign ourselves to sundry matrimonial vicissitudes. says the author of _the world-soul_, "the more function is specialised in either sex the less able either is to stand alone." this is argument for further and fuller specialisation of their respective functions, in both sexes, because so great is the happiness of fulfilling for that other his or her great need of us, and of being blessed by that other in our own need. but too, it raises the voluntary surrender of such happiness for honour's sake, for holiness' sake, for god's sake, or for children's sake, to the height of a renunciation which transfigures human life and character, and proportionally ennobles both. that both man and woman should be entitled to divorce for infidelity, for incorrigible drunkenness, criminality or insanity on the part of the mate, would be just and reasonable clauses in the marriage-code. because, apart from the unmerited cruelty and shame of such bondages, is the risk of entailing degenerate offspring. otherwise, it appears that relaxation of the divorce-law would result in evils far worse than any it would remedy. and these evils would re-act inevitably far more cruelly--both temperamentally and materially--upon women and children than upon men. the conjugal and the paternal instincts being traits the sex has acquired by long ages of developmental progress, for men to lose these would be as easy as the loss would be degenerative to themselves and to those others. folly to suppose that having reached a certain stage of human character-building, we can, with impunity, kick away the foundations whereon our house of evolution has been raised; and on which it must rest for all time. the irrevocability of the marriage-contract is woman's greatest security. realisation of that sex-lawlessness which is an innate male-trait--relic of the promiscuous and cursory nature of the primal male-instinct--should set us on guard against weakening, in the least degree, this covenant, which is the best among those privileges whereby man, in the teeth of his inherent instincts, has chivalrously protected woman and the family. in the teeth of these, he has applied his natural intelligent bent for conformity in concrete affairs to the repression and regulation of his impulses by the institution of marriage. and this--the apotheosis of masculine conformity to the exactions of progress--is now menaced by the native non-conformity of woman, exploited by feminism. it is notable that men are but seldom truly fond of, nor are they faithful to the wife who works outside the home. in france, where the clever, industrious wife of the middle and lower classes is more a business-partner than she is a wife, conjugal fidelity is not expected. not only is a house without a woman in it to devote her best interests and powers to the arts of home-making, not a home, but the bond of that fraction of interest and affection left over to her from her work outside it is a thing too slight to bind her husband to her. he finds no difficulty in substituting--should he seek this--a haven with more atmosphere of home and sentiment in it, companionship with more of temperament in it, more resiliency and freshness, than that of the industrious and wage-earning, but fatigued and jaded working-wife. the children of such a union--if such there be--supply no bond either to draw together and unite their parents. children reared by servants, without understanding or affection, are but seldom affectionate or charming. moreover, the children of hard-working mothers are but seldom true children. they bring to the home nothing of the freshness, the vitality or charm of natural childhood. if father and mother possess æsthetic sensibilities, these are offended probably by the plainness and the lack of graces in their offspring--bye-products merely of their economic assiduities. perhaps the big spectacles through which the young eyes gaze forth like doleful prisoners from behind bars, make them feel strangely uncomfortable; as in the presence of weird and reproachful intelligences. neither derives interest or joy enough from the family circle to repay them for their parental obligations and responsibilities. ix love between the sexes, being a need alike of souls and biogenesis, is regarded by some as reason enough in itself for relaxing the marriage-law--even for the abolition of marriage; making affection the sole bond between the lovers. we cannot, logically, abolish the legal contract uniting two persons in marriage, however, without at the same time abolishing every other form of legal contract, and the legal liabilities thereof. logically, we cannot make conjugal duty and family responsibility mere matters of personal conscience, unless we are assured that the human species has reached such a phase of moral integrity as to need no other incentive than its own integrity to secure fulfilment of its obligations, moral and material. if we abolish the legal factor in marriage, to be consistent we must abolish the legal factor in business partnerships and in all other sociological compacts. we must make the payment of rent, of rates and taxes, of tradesmen's bills and so forth, debts of conscience and of honour merely; for the discharge whereof conscience and honour must alone suffice. it may be objected that these are purely material obligations, while the bond between the sexes is an emotional one. and yet--have we reached such a stage of development that emotional considerations are more binding on us than material ones are? moreover, if we are to make love the sole bond--clearly the waning of love must release from the bondage. further, when we sift out the purely emotional element in the vast majority of unions, we shall find it but a very slender factor among other more binding reciprocities. certainly a far more slender thread to trust to in the safeguarding of a contract than is, for example, the factor of commercial honesty. commercial honesty is not, perhaps, a conspicuous virtue of the times. nevertheless, the sense of honesty in business is a good deal stronger in most men than is their sense of honour with regard to love. and their sense of honour in love has developed mainly as a direct consequence of those legal compulsions and responsibilities of love which have been exacted and fostered by the legality of marriage. how many men are there, for example, who, having come to care for some other, hold themselves bound in the least by an illicit tie; howsoever much they may have cared at one time for the woman in the case? lightly come--lightly go! and if the terms, marriage and love, are by no means necessarily synonymous, it has been, nevertheless, greatly by way of the obstacles and compulsions and the social penalties attaching to violation of the marriage vows that the love-passion has been purified and uplifted out of the barbarism of mere instinct and promiscuity, into the graces of emotion and the virtues of monogamy. had any man and woman, reciprocally attracted at their first meeting, been free always to have carried this attraction straightway to its biological conclusion, the sex-relation would be still the merely physiological incident it was in primal forests. the circumstance that such attraction has been debarred from ready consummation by the obligations and the obstacles engendered by a recognised and legalised bond between the sexes, has been debarred, moreover, in innumerable cases, by one of the attracted couple being subject to this bond--all of this has preserved the nascent emotion from straightway relapsing to the basic level whence it sprang, and has fostered the evolution of love in the higher reaches of emotion; of imagination, of controlled and chastened passion. it may be said that modern men and women, loving one another with the more highly-evolved passion of our enlightened epoch, would love as devotedly and would remain as constant in an illicit as in a legalised union. if so, such constancy would be an echo mainly of the long-dignified state of wedded constancy; and the greatest of all tributes to the values of this. nevertheless--for how long after the clarion-note of aspiration sounded by marriage should have ceased to vibrate, would the echo of it last? should woman, in her short-sighted efforts to "emancipate" herself still further, release herself wholly (as she now inclines to do) from the marriage-bond, she will have thrown back in man's face the very tenderest guerdon of his worth and of his high regard for her. and she will have destroyed, at a blow, his most vital incentive to further advance, her own and her children's most powerful safeguard, and the main buttress not alone of national but, as well, of natural human progress. chapter vi feminist doctrine and practice disastrous to infant-life and human faculty "_a hundred men may make an encampment, but it takes a woman to make a home._"--chinese proverb. i the paths alike of progress and of happiness lie, obviously, in the ever further dignifying and enhancement of the functions of home and of wifehood, by way of every further interest and charm that higher, fairer womanhood confers. the chief cause of latter-day conjugal unrest and disaffection is to be found--not in the natural state of marriage, but in a decline of those personal traits which make for happiness therein. girls brought up as now, without home-interests or training, but, on the contrary, with mainly self-realising and self-absorbing aims and pursuits, are deficient not only in domestic aptitudes but lamentably also in emotional qualities. and the home-life without the emotions to give values to it, is like a fine air played on the keyboard of a piano from which have been removed the strings that transform the movements of the fingers into melody. so keenly self-centred the majority of women have become, so bent upon their hobbies and careers, as to have lost nearly all of that sympathetic adaptiveness natural to woman, which enables her to forget--and to forget with pleasure--her own in the personality and interests of others. how eagerly latter-day girls seek refuge from their boredom in the tennis-court, the bridge-table, the dance, or in some other mode of direct action which entails but little temperamental tax or output! to such degree the sexes are now drilled to the same standards, interests, and points-of-view, that neither brings to the other any new thing, of freshness, of colour, or of inspiration. the interchange is only too often a competitive struggle, indeed, as to which shall know (or shall appear to know) more than the other knows (or appears to know) of topics equally trite to both. there is little or nothing of the zest and glamour of a delightful picnic of two; whereat each keeps producing some new and unexpected thing to supplement the new and unexpected of the other. modern woman has no novelty in language even for her mate, but deals him back his own slang--a vernacular which among women of the working-classes not seldom takes the forms of blasphemy and obscenity, wholly disqualifying for the rearing of children. as, indeed, do the coarse and vulgar phrases in vogue now among the cultured of the sex. in view of woman's native faculty of music and her subtle aptitude for naming (as for nick-naming), one cannot doubt that she it was who mothered language. yet now-a-days, adopting virile lingo, her "rotten," "stick-it," and the like are murdering the infant of her quondam genius. and what genius it was, that gave birth to our surpassing mother-tongue! in case of engagement between a young man and his bored one--whom, by the way, although he may suspect that the relation is not all that it might be, he never suspects of being bored--manlike, he trusts to marriage "to put everything right." yet although the newly-wedded more and more relieve themselves of the strain of a honeymoon, with its unmitigated (or inimitable) company of two, a month or six weeks of wedlock find most young modern couples wofully at cross-purposes. possession has freed the man of the obligation to woo. and when the wooing--which had engendered for the woman a flattering and intoxicating sense of being a coveted prize--comes to a more or less abrupt ending, she feels herself defrauded. he too! because while courtship is man's affair, marriage is woman's. and where love is not, to recruit and quicken passion and to take the place of novelty, the wane of honeymoons is sad indeed. (there are faults and failings on the bridegroom's part, 'tis true. that belongs to another story, however. sufficient for these pages is the unpleasing task of holding a mirror to the faults of a single sex.) it should be remembered that men, for the most part, are not eager to marry. considering the nature of the bond, with its lifelong obligations, responsibilities and sacrifices, this is little to be wondered at. a week after marriage a wife may be crippled by an accident, may become insane; or may otherwise be thrown, more or less a burden, on her husband's hands. or she may develop disagreeable and wholly uncongenial traits. in spite of which, even though they wreck his happiness, he will have bound himself to her--and will have bound himself to maintain her--till death them parts. he too, of course, may turn out wholly unsatisfactory. that belongs likewise to the other story. but from the material standpoint, the onus of support which falls on him, and which, in the case of an invalided or of an obnoxious wife, may prove nothing but a carking care, makes the liabilities unequal. it is, doubtless, because of these his greater material obligations and responsibilities, that passion has been planned to beset man more urgently than woman. and had church and state not taken advantage of his inherent, chivalrous instinct, and so turned it to account, both for his own moral uplifting and for the founding and maintenance of the family, woman and society--and man, accordingly--would have remained at very low grades of development. ii among other "wrongs" resented by women is that his obligation and his economic means to support a wife have endowed the male, in the majority of cases, with the lordly prerogative of selecting his mate. on her side, while having much to gain materially by marriage, unless she is unusually attractive she has but little range of choice. and yet this masculine prerogative of selection has served as the strongest incentive to the culture both of higher attribute and charm in woman. failing that economic struggle which has been man's spur to development, this incentive has operated vastly to her benefit; inducing her parents to educate and to enhance her gifts, and influencing her to do the like for herself. a proportion of women have always been self-supporting, of course. but their work has been mainly in fields of unskilled labour, and has lacked, accordingly, the stimulus of competition. the goal of marriage has not only supplied thus the element of emulation, but it has turned woman-culture in the direction of developing personal traits and morale, rather than industrial or professional specialisations. and this has been the right direction, seeing that the rôle of the sex is one demanding personal qualities and virtues rather than economic technicalities. as regards human values, it is a higher privilege to be a charming personality than to be a successful stockbroker. so that in this, as in other things, woman has been privileged by her disabilities. iii an ever-increasing number of working-class girls, on leaving school, enter a work-shop, a factory, or an office, and spend their time and powers in minor mechanical tasks; gumming labels on jam-pots, making match-boxes or tags for boot-laces, addressing envelopes, and other such employments, deadening to female intelligence, impulse and temperament. their minds and natures become too warped and narrowed to adapt later, with ease and interest, to the many and varied intelligent functions of the home. they escape thence, accordingly, after a few months or years of marriage (supposing them to have given up their industrial tasks for a space even), and abandoning home and children, return to the old narrow, mechanical routine, to which alone their poor stultified brains have been shaped. in the education of girls, the subconscious mimetic element in their impressionable natures should be borne in mind. it may be turned to excellent, as to disastrous account. m. vologotsky, head of the omsk government, has called attention to a significant phenomenon of modern russian life--namely, that the women take no interest in their homes. this he attributes to their low states of culture. could they but be persuaded to become "house-proud"--with all that this means and entails--he considers that the task of the regeneration of this vast unhappy, although singularly gifted, people would be greatly furthered. constitutional deterioration, inherited or acquired, entailing defective sex-development, causes many young working-women to be deficient in the maternal instinct, whence spring fondness for and interest in children. the same defective sex-development, disqualifying them for wifehood, results in the vast majority of working-class wives lapsing, after a few years of marriage with normal, virile young men, into haggard, neurasthenic wrecks. the whole of this vital and important department of the woman-organisation is not only ignored in so far as scope for normal development is concerned, but, despised as subserving inferior and "merely physical" functions, every other capacity and aptitude is fostered or forced at the expense of constitutional reserves and resources which belong, by rights of life and love, to this. with the result that the vast majority of modern women are physically unfitted for, as an increasing number are temperamentally averse to the sex-relation--_fons et origo_ of life. iv to such degree the doctrine of expedience and self-for-self-solely has spread that there are women who seek now to escape wholly the natural pangs of childbirth. such persuade their doctors to induce labour a month or more before term; in order that the smaller-sized infant may be born with less discomfort to themselves. others restrict their diet or abstain from certain foods, in order that the babe, starved thus and ill-nourished before birth, shall be soft and frail and easier of delivery. dread of pain at whatsoever cost to the future of a human being--and that being their own child--actuates these unnatural and pusillanimous practices. it is becoming a vogue for expectant mothers of the wealthier classes to enter maternity-homes, where, in luxurious surroundings, they are enabled, under spinal anæsthesia (twilight sleep), to conclude their mother-function without suffering or inconvenience; lying in a torpor of crass insensibility while the greatest of human events is taking place in them. meantime, the sensitive infant-body is dosed with the powerful drug circulating in the maternal blood. but--whither is all this trending? can we believe that true intelligence and progress consist in grasping greedily all the pleasures and the privileges to be had from life, and basely shirking all the hardships? can we believe that--suffering and effort being the laws alike of life and progress, and the rungs whereby we have climbed the evolutionary ladder--we can continue to climb when, with short-sighted selfishness, we shall have stripped the ladder of its rungs? the humane use of chloroform duly assuages the worst pangs. while the fine courage, fortitude and sweetness wherewith the soul of woman fares forth naturally upon her great adventure, to meet this the apotheosis of human pain, prove and still further enhance her nobility. even weak and flimsy women rise to greatness at this crisis. powers they had never glimmered in themselves emerge and armour them, and--be it remembered--leave eternal records upon mind and character; striking spiritual roots still deeper into living function. v with characteristic feminist materialism, olive schreiner lightly dismisses maternity as a merely "passive" form of labour. heaven save the mark! is it passive so to equip a microscopic cell with living human powers and aspirations that, within the space of months, it makes that miraculous pilgrimage of the pre-natal evolutionary ascent whereby it becomes man? passive--so to serve for living environment to this developing organism as to supply it with the multiple, complex and diverse elements, material and vital, biological and psychical, required for the manifold needs and adjustments of its evolving life and faculties? during the ante-natal months of this miraculous ascent, the embryo "climbs its genealogical tree," as biologists style it. that is to say, it passes, in turn, through all the countless evolutionary phases of all the countless evolutionary ages whereof humanity is the culminating product. fashioning out of formlessness, slowly it attains to form. shaping, shaping, ever marvellously shaping, it evolves, in succession, through fish, amphibian and other rudimentary life-grades. climbing, climbing, ever marvellously climbing, day by day, to nobler heights, it is transformed at last to human shape; lower human first, then higher human, and finally to the highest human possible to its stock, its parentage, and the resources, physical and psychical, available to it. it is the most stupendous miracle in nature; a miracle so sacred and so tender that every man in passing an expectant mother should mentally bow the knee. individually, socially, morally--she may be a person of but small significance. but because of the mystery of life enshrined within her, she is a living testament of evolution. the pregnant woman is, moreover, pregnant with the destiny of races. during those ten lunar months there is enacted in the tender darkness of the mother's womb the whole wonderful drama of the human transfiguration. with lightning swiftness, the evolving babe climbs in the footsteps that its countless ancestors had trod, in forms innumerable, along the route interminable of the human advent. in flashes of progressive, infinitesimal transitions, through incalculable phases and mutations, the single cell of double parentage unfolds the marvel occulted in it. until at last, the living product stands triumphant on the topmost branch of its genealogical tree, a perfect human babe awaiting birth; the last achievement of its race, the latest and most perfect bud of its hereditary stock. in so far as all this occurs subconsciously within the mother, the materialist may lightly dismiss the evolutionary marvel as a "passive" form of labour. but although subconscious, these unceasing processes demand inevitably such proportional vital potential and activities on her part from whom the powers energising it are derived, as to be a continued tax and strain upon her strength and health. there are women who feel this strain but little. a rare few of these because they are so richly endowed with maternal potence that the subconscious processes have remained, as nature doubtless intended, for the most part subconscious and painless. far more often, however, when maternity exacts but little from the mother, _it is because she is contributing but little to the child_. i have observed that the finer a child in physique and in brain, the greater the stress and disability the mother had suffered prior to its birth. vi indifferent, notwithstanding, to all the vital activities and psychical evolutions taking place within the mysterious laboratory of the mother's body; reckless of the circumstance that any interference with, or hampering of the least of these must inevitably jar, and warp, the delicate complexes of infantine development, we scruple not to strain and burden, to harass and deplete, the prospective mother even further by strenuous breadwinning. her whole physiology and psychology are profoundly altered by her momentous condition; by the new adjustments to the needs of the developing babe, of the maternal circulation and digestion, assimilation and elimination, mentality and intricate nervous constitution and processes. fatigue, noise, turmoil, effort, shock--any one or all of these which are inseparable from industrial employment--cannot but injuriously re-act upon the delicate evolutions mysteriously occurring in her. the infant brain is complete at birth. from its lowest to its highest departments, all the marvel of exquisitely-delicate construction and association of its complex cells is achieved pre-natally. and according or not as her vital powers have been rich and otherwise unexpended, and according or not as the embryological processes of development have occurred in quietude and freedom from strain upon the mother's part, will be the quality for life, in vigour and in sanity, of her child's intelligence and character. vii in view of those lower biological grades through which the embryo passes before arriving at the human stage, it is inevitable that maternal over-fatigue, shock or undue effort may arrest its physical development temporarily upon any of these lower levels. and such arrest must inevitably entail some warp or bias of a lower animal phase; which may so impress itself permanently on embryonic development as to detract more or less gravely from the final transition. it is, doubtless, for this reason that many modern humans show in their configuration, degrees of reversion to ape, sheep, fish and other lower species. shock or nervous perturbation in the expectant mother may occasion, in the babe, appalling monstrosity, or such minor defects as cleft-palate, hare-lip, and other deformities. showing the vital and--inevitably--the psychological effects on offspring, for good or for evil, of maternal conditions and impressions. the germans record that of infants born during the war, a number are gravely degenerate of type, an infant-degeneracy attributed by some to the creed of hate obsessing german mothers. the same phenomenon is seen however in the offspring of mothers exhausted by religious preachings and marchings, in furtherance of their creed of christian love. for biology recognises no theology except its own--that of evolution. at a representative meeting of london doctors, it was stated recently that the number of imbecile infants now coming into existence with us is no less than appalling. a medical wiseacre has adventured the amazing dictum that _every infant is born healthy_! he might, with equal truth, have said that every infant is born wealthy, or is born a chinaman. some infants are born alive, a great number are born dead. and between those born alive and healthy and the still-born, lie all the infinite gradations of constitutional condition between life and health, between disease and death. one child inherits from its parents a tuberculous tendency; another a neurotic, another a strain of alcoholism or other taint. one is born blind or a hopeless idiot; another with hare-lip or clubbed-foot; another with congenital heart-disease. one babe is born with a beautiful head; all its brain-faculties nobly developed and splendidly balanced. another is born headless, or with a skull which, from crown to brows, is a rapid descent--showing lack of all the brain-powers involved in higher mentality; is born, in short, of criminal inherency. the degrees in which individuals strive against inherited tendencies differ greatly, as do the life-conditions wherein their will and moral power are tested--to make or to break them. man is not, of course, _the creature_ merely of his heredity or of his environment. but he whose mother has equipped him with physical defects instead of with qualities, even though he fight against his disabilities, is obviously handicapped for the life-struggle. a great musician may charm fine music from a poor fiddle, but in no degree so fine as he will bring out of a more perfect instrument. viii a phenomenon which has baffled vital statisticians is a curious relation between the birth-rate and infant-mortality. a high birth-rate is found to be associated with a high rate of infant-mortality; while with a lower birth-rate, the death-rate among infants and children decreases. long and careful observation has left me in no doubt as to the cause of this phenomenon. which is, that under strain of disease, of industrial exhaustion or strenuous activities of any sort, but particularly as result of _the constitutional drain entailed by pregnancy_, mothers may so draw upon the vital powers of their children in order to recruit their own, as to occasion fatal illness in their families. the evil is so great in its effects, not only upon the health and constitution of the rising generation, but, as well, upon the physical and mental development thereof, that such maternal depletion is, i am assured, a cause of widespread disease among children; of infantile paralysis, degeneracy and mortality. it is reason enough, in all conscience, to call for the legalised prohibition of all mothers with young families from engaging in professional or industrial employment. because although such depletion of her children's health is graver in degree during a mother's pregnancy, at all times over-worked, sickly, or strenuous women recruit their powers from the constitutional resources of others. only, indeed, by such depletion of their neighbours can many of our present-day neurotic, overactive women (some of them with ill-nourished bodies and feeble assimilation, but with, nevertheless, indefatigable energies) contrive to keep going. strong-willed, self-centred women, keen in pursuit of business, athletics or pleasure, will, by sapping the nervous forces of these, keep all the members of their households--husband, children, servants--more or less de-vitalised, neurasthenic and characterless; one or more actually invalided, perhaps. if nervous energy is, indeed, a complex form of electrical energy, this nervous interchange is intelligible; obeying the law that bodies under-charged with electricity charge themselves from bodies more highly charged, until equilibrium is established. who among doctors does not know the wan and listless, semi-paralytic babes that working-mothers--and most particularly _pregnant_ working-mothers--bring to the consulting-room? the hapless victims lie limply, or sit hunched upon the woman's lap, nerveless, wasted, apathetic; faces white and hopeless, abdomen lax and tumid; the blenched limbs soft as butter, weak and dangling. they are suffering, perhaps, from some specific ailment, bronchitis, paralysis, gastric or intestinal troubles; perhaps only from mysterious wasting and inanition. not seldom there is an elder child too, white and weak and fretful, and the subject of "infantilism"; growth stunted, development arrested. such children, in their mental hebetude and physical degeneracy, suggest a degree of cretinism. and in the suggestion, a possible cause appears for the cretinous offspring of the hard-living, over-worked mothers of swiss cantons. ix drummond says of motherhood: "_even on its physical side ... this was the most stupendous task evolution ever undertook._" while on the physical side, we see that nature has made infancy and childhood increasingly helpless as species advances in evolutionary values, in order to call forth increasingly intelligent, and sympathetic response and resource in the mother. feminism in _un_making the mother, is undoing the labours of countless ages of evolutionary advance. the intensifying mentality of woman, destined for the more subtly intelligent and sympathetic nurture of the race's increasingly valuable and complex offspring, is being diverted, more and more, by feminist counsel and practice from human and vital into merely economic channels. life is so constituted that its most cruel disabilities and evils are borne inevitably by the children in the van of the great march. these hapless ones it is--soft buds pushing from the human tree--that bear the brunt of the evolutionary impulse. in the main, the very finest children of the poor succumb. because the higher the organism, the more complex and delicately-fitted to its vital needs its life-conditions require to be. briars flourish where rose-trees die. degenerate children struggle through where better types go under. we are not ready, it is true, for exotic humans. but we need urgently, indeed, all the healthy, intelligent, well-balanced stock we can produce. a certain uniformity of type is secured by the expedients of natural selection; by that continual correction of premature evolutionary unfoldment which results from the checks and prunings of developmental exigencies--in the necessary acclimatisation and adaptation of the young and tender organism to environment. and nature herself provides all the checks and prunings required, in her tests of teething, of measles, and the other diseases and trials of infancy and childhood. the respiration-curves and the brain pulse-waves of young infants show serious disturbance as result of sudden loud noises. the consequent nervous jar perturbs both breathing and circulation. the whole organisation of an infant is so delicate and is so subtly balanced as to require the gentlest possible treatment. one sees on the faces of infants and young children a chronic look of painful expectancy. their brows are knitted as though to brace their hyper-sensitive systems for the next distressing shock. women accustomed to hard, laborious work (or sports) lose power to adjust their movements to these delicate needs. and when, unkind and impatient, they fly at the unfortunates and shake or beat or scold them violently, they have no suspicion that for hours afterwards, perhaps for days, the children's nervous systems may be so shattered and disorganised, digestion and assimilative powers so impaired, as to interfere gravely with growth and development. degrees of "shock," akin to shell-shock, result from such maternal violence and chronic terrorism; occasioning feeble-mindedness, morbid timidity, mental hebetude and, moreover, subconscious impressions, which, later in life, may emerge as obsessions, or as other forms of insanity. fear is the most shattering and paralysing of the emotions. yet not only brought up by hand, the majority of our little ones are brought up by _violent_ hand. all day long and during every moment of it, a thousand delicate processes of growth and unfoldment and of intricate adjustments are going on mysteriously within the shaping brain and body of a child. subconsciously, these are a continued tax and strain; making him hyper-sensitive, irritable, cross, perhaps, for causes that appear inadequate. a child is like a convalescent, in that he uses up rapidly for growth and development all the nutritive material and vital energy at his disposal. this is true of healthy, well-nurtured children. what then of these child-martyrs of the poor, who in addition to the strain of growth, are ill-fed, poisoned by unsuitable foods; are sickly, rickety, bronchitic, dyspeptic, syphilitic, phthisical? nevertheless, all the maternal care these miserables receive are such rough dregs of kindness and of patience as may be left over from the toil of their working-mothers' hard, exhausting days. it is no less than monstrous that our laws allow the nation's babes and children--to whom are due all the best resources of maternal care and tenderness and duly-trained maternal powers--to be thus martyred. as substitute for the home and for their mothers--which are every child's birthright--more and more, infants and young children are consigned now to crèches; chill institutions of alien atmosphere, alien surroundings, alien nurses, where, unmothered, they are ciphers among other unmothered alien ciphers. yet babies and young children are so pathetically constituted that they prefer blows from their mothers to caresses from strangers. x the life-story written in the faces of the great majority of our twentieth-century babes and children is a terrible one, in its revelation of tortured helplessness, hopeless resignation, unnatural fortitude, blank despair. see them sunk, limp and dejected, in their prams or go-carts, eyes staring forward on the dreary waste their lives are; limbs dangling, like those of toys with broken springs. in cities, mothers, ignorant of the shock and injury which noise and turmoil inflict upon these sensitive brains and nerves, wheel them amid jostling crowds--in order that they themselves may enjoy the excitements of the shops. at the low level of their prams, they breathe air vitiated by the passers-by; are in the exhausting whirl and press of swirling nerve-currents. in their poor ill-made carriages, they are jerked abruptly, now up, now down, at every kerb; with no more care or tenderness than though they were baskets of clothes. they sit patient, leaden, apathetic; cruelly strapped for hours together in one position; neither pulse of health nor spirit in them. in cold weather, their heads but thinly thatched with hair are bare. so too their limbs; though warmth is life to young, developing creatures. in hot weather, the sun beats mercilessly down upon their hatlessness, their exquisitely-sensitive brains but slightly shielded by their thin un-ossified skulls. degrees of sunstroke, with lifelong injury to health and faculty, occur. they knit their pale brows in fruitless attempt to defend their weak eyes from the glare. many keep their lids close shut, to protect both eyes and brain from the nerve-shattering solar rays, which are far too powerful to be allowed to fall, untempered, upon an infant's highly-sensitive body. with closed eyes, the poor things miss all the joys of their ride; the colour and movement about them, and the spurs to intelligence these should supply. their unobservant mothers and nurses suppose them to be sleeping! children old enough to walk are walked to stages--sometimes to extremes of exhaustion. you may see them dragging heavily along, with wan, exhausted faces; peevish and cross, and scolded and shaken and slapped for being peevish and cross. exhaustion from such over-fatigue will keep a child below par for days; checking its growth and development--to say nothing of its happiness. children derive but little benefit from their holiday changes to sea or country, because of the exertions forced upon them, or the too strenuous play to which they are exhorted. children who go bare-headed suffer, in large number, from eye-strain, with resulting permanent frown. as too, from ear-ache and from ear-diseases; from headache and toothache. in as many as per cent. of school-children, vision is defective. the obsessing aim of many mothers is to "harden" their children. yet no more than a clay model in the shaping may be hardened and set, should the process be applied to children in the shaping. healthy children are inevitably _delicate_ children, because of that highly-sensitive re-activity to surroundings which not only characterises but _conduces_ to the developmental state. (such delicacy must not be confused with _sickliness_.) the finer the organisation the longer it takes (within normal limits) to come to full growth. our greatest men and women were delicate in youth. hardy children are always of inferior type--for the most part, plain and shrewd and unimaginative, insensitive, unlovable. they have matured (have adapted to environment, that is) precociously. evolution of higher faculty has been prematurely arrested in them. modern children are described as "super-children," for their abnormal sharpness and worldly perspicacity. they are merely precocious, which is to say, they have missed their childhood. and too early development entails inevitably early decline. not only america, but england now has produced a grey-haired boy of ten! no less amazing than it is lamentable is the light neglect by the majority of cultured mothers, of their grave maternal obligations. from earliest infancy, they hand over their children, body and soul, to the ignorance, the carelessness, the cruelty (not seldom to the viciousness even), of stranger-women of the uncultured classes; women of whose character and disposition they know nothing, and who are only too often unfitted by nature, by upbringing, and by habit for this most delicate, difficult and important of all human tasks. it is by no means uncommon to find prostitutes, grown too old for a trade that has vitiated every cell and secretion of their bodies (to say nothing of mental vitiation), officiating in the capacity of nursemaid to children of culture. every child is a new creation, with a highly specialised organisation of mind and of body. for the nurture and best development of these, are required high degrees of intelligence, of understanding and of sympathy in treatment. to realise its idiosyncrasies, constitutional and temperamental, and to adapt to these in its rearing and surroundings, with respect to diet, exercise, play, sleep, moral supervision and discipline, demand intuitive perceptiveness, intelligent discrimination, and practical resource such as no other department of life demands--or is worth. notwithstanding all this, mothers who can afford to shelve their duty upon paid substitutes abandon the most complex and sensitive, the most beautiful and valuable, and moreover, the most helpless thing in nature--the mind of a child--to be shaped and coloured, during all the most impressionable years of its development, by persons with neither aptitude nor faculty for this supremely complex and difficult function. in place of so adapting its environment to the child-organism as to enable it, fenced within the tender mother-fold, to enjoy to the full and to develop to the full the lovely, inspiring beliefs and illusions of natural childhood, latter-day mothers now cruelly rob their little ones of this fructifying phase, by prematurely forcing worldly knowledge and distrusts upon them, in precocious adjustment to mature view-points and conditions from which they should be carefully secluded. in that mysterious mind-department, the subconsciousness, with its highly sensitised brain-tablets, every smallest happening of a lifetime--scenes, experiences, mental impressions--are photographed, to be stored for ever after as ineffaceable records. and though, perhaps, wholly forgotten, these subconscious records nevertheless colour and influence for ever after every thought and impulse and action. sometimes they flash up as memories. they can be recalled under hypnotism. the young mind is like an unfurnished house. the rooms are empty. there are no pictures on the walls. but its unblotted, exquisitely-sensitised spaces are ceaselessly filming indelible records of everything seen and felt and apprehended. one impression may correct, or may distort, others. or that right point-of-view which is judgment may focus all impressions in the true perspective which reveals their true values and proportions. but until such judgment has been formed by mental development, it is vitally important that all the impressions absorbed by young minds, whether of their life-conditions and associates, of books or of plays, shall be fair and simple and wholesome. thus, the foundations of mind and of character are laid in clean, intelligising and uplifting influences. xi while we deplore, as appalling, that during the first fifteen months of war, , of our fighting men were killed or died, the returns of the registrar-general show that during the twelve months of the peace preceding war, _there died , of the nation's children_, at less than five years old; , of these at less than a year old. consider it! war, with its destructive engines of bomb and shell, more or less swiftly and painlessly kills just over a hundred thousand men, in the course of fifteen months. peace, with its destructive transgressions against nature, kills in less time a far greater number of defenceless babes and children, by slow and more or less torturing forms of disease. babies, even when unhealthy, come into existence endowed with a certain life-potential. and they struggle hard and painfully to live. it is amazing to see the odds against which the poor things battle; and battle successfully. it is only the fearfulness of the odds to which most of them are subjected that succeeds in killing them. pain and suffering are spurs to adult development. in children they are as needlessly cruel as they are permanently injurious. far from fitting, they _unfit_ them for life. the ratio of mortality is no guide, of course, to the immeasurable injuries wrought to mind and body by these same fearful odds upon the children who survive; and who survive, maimed, diseased, degenerate, to live out lives of disability, of joylessness and ineffectiveness. it will be said--and said truly--that much of this high infant-mortality results, not from maternal omissions, but from paternal commissions. well, that alas! is another of the terrible wrongs against children which lie at the door of the sex. were there not women whose lives are passed in engendering and transmitting the direst of all the diseases human evil has bred, the hapless imbecile and paralytic, the blind, the deaf, the ulcerous, the slowly-wasting, tortured little ones who fill our asylums and hospitals would not be. at every turn the truth is more and more impressed, that the fate of humanity rests, in some or other form, with its women. woman is redeemer; or she is destroyer. because, while man's province is the material, with its roots in temporal things, woman's province is the vital, with its roots and stem and blossom in functioning life. the burning wrongs of women? alas! what are they beside the burning wrongs of helpless babes and children? * * * * * xii an anomaly of feminism is the admission, on the one hand, that motherhood was woman's most valuable function, and her greatest claim on the community in days of barbarism, and the denial, on the other, that it is her most important function in civilisation. the illogic of the position is patent. that the production of savages should be primitive woman's chiefest claim to honour; while the production of highly-evolved and complex human beings should be civilised woman's least. the potence and the values of fine motherhood are proven by the fact that every great, or good, or clever man or woman has been the child of a great, or good, or clever mother. not of one who has made her mark in the world of affairs. such, for the most part, have not reproduced at all. and when they have been mothers their children have been notably of inferior calibre. on the other hand, bad men and bad women have in nearly every instance been sons or daughters of bad women. examples innumerable might be cited to show that both genius and moral greatness are variations (mutations) of the human species which have their origin in mother-genius and greatness. great scientists, it has been noted, have been sons of women characterised by intense love of truth. the love of truth in the mother--for truth's sake--became in the executive, concrete mentality of the son an intuitive apprehension of the truths of science, and an eager and indomitable aspiration to render these in terms of intellection. * * * * * shall woman leave to man no field at all of natural supremacy? shall she not be content with her beautiful part as generatrix of faculty, but must seek to be exponent too? that all women do not marry--cannot marry, indeed, because of their preponderance in number over the other sex--is no reason for dissembling the truth that in wifehood and motherhood lie woman's most vital and valuable rôles. nor is it warrant for training the whole sex as though none were destined to fulfil this, their natural and noblest--if not always, their happiest vocation. xiii feminism repudiates, from time to time, the charge against it of belittling motherhood. yet how can it profess to credit the maternal function with due values or significance when it denies the obligations and responsibilities thereof, asks no economic concessions for it? and when, in place of demanding privileges indispensable to its exercise and complete fulfilment, it makes no distinction, in respect of work and the worker, between childless and unmarried women and mothers and expectant mothers? and this despite the fact that, for a period of eighteen months at very least, the mother's best vital resources belong by rights, biological and moral, to each babe she produces--nine for the pre-natal building of its body and brain, and nine for lactation. her moral obligation to nurse, and the criminality of her omission when able to do so, have been emphasised as follows by sir j. crichton-browne: "dr. robertson, medical officer of health for birmingham has shown that while the infant-mortality of breast-fed infants is · _per births_, that of infants receiving no breast-milk is _per_ . and sir arthur newsholme, medical adviser to the local government board, has shown that the probability of death from epidemic diarrhoea is _times greater among infants fed on cow's milk_ than among those fed on breast-milk, and _times greater_ amongst infants fed on condensed milk. "but it is not merely in a high infant death-rate that the evil effects of the want of breast-milk stand confessed. where it does not kill it often maims, and is responsible for malnutrition, rickets, tuberculosis, and a multiplicity of ailments. every doctor is familiar with the alabaster babies, flabby, limp, languid, and painfully pallid, who have never tasted their natural nutriment." dr. truby king records the interesting fact that the finest calf-skin, known as paris calf, is obtained from calves reared by their mothers, in order to provide the finest veal for paris. so supple and smooth-haired and superior is the skin of these mother-suckled creatures that dealers are able to distinguish it at once from the skin of calves that have been artificially fed. about this, mr. horace g. regnart kindly supplies me with the following significant data: "if we feed a calf, 'on the bucket,' the calf's coat loses its shine and becomes dull. we say it is 'dead.' a couple of days is sufficient to deaden the coat. and it takes three weeks or a month 'on a cow' to get the gloss back. _a quart of milk direct from the cow is as good as a gallon of milk out of a bucket._ "we do not attempt to feed our female calves so well as we feed the bulls. it is too costly. our heifers are put on 'the bucket' when three days old. i buy a cow to rear my bull-calves on. i once reared a bull on 'the bucket' satisfactorily. but i gave him twelve gallons of new milk every day after he was five months old, and kept it up till he was fourteen months. _one cow that gives three gallons does a calf just as well as twelve gallons_ viâ _the bucket, and is much cheaper._ some crack bulls have three and four five-gallon cows at once, and go to shows with all their nurses in attendance. "once i reared a bull as we rear the heifers. but he was a failure. his daughters are only half the size they ought to be." (an example of direct developmental inheritance--in terms of deterioration--from father to daughter.) xiv comparing a calf with a human baby, it becomes self-evident that the diet suited for the large, crude creature which trots about on four legs shortly after birth must be wholly unsuited to the delicate digestion and the subtle psychological needs of the small and complex, highly-organised human infant, which remains so long a helpless infant. the all-important _proteid_ of every order of creature differs from that of every other. before any form of alien _proteid_ can be built into the body of a living organism, the digestion and assimilation of this creature must first have laboriously disintegrated and reconstructed it to the form of its own individual _proteid_. the irish tradition that persons not nursed during infancy by their mothers are beings without souls has much to justify it. even the ill-nourished, sickly babes of working-mothers have an essentially _human_ look in eyes and features, possess far more of nervous power, and are of appreciably higher and more intelligent psychology than are the bottle-fed infants of the cultured. the bottle-fed start handicapped for life, both in constitution and mentality. it is safe to say that all great men and women have been suckled by their mothers or have come of stock thus humanly nurtured. that they were thus humanly nurtured during their momentous first nine months of life, is the reason, doubtless, why so many of our greatest men have sprung from humble origin. the incapacity of a mother to nourish the babe she has borne should be known for a mark of degeneracy--sign, too, that she was unfitted to have borne a child, because deficient in the vital reserve requisite to carry her maternal function to its normal biological and psychological conclusion. just as a statesman or a general would be held unfitted for _his_ function, if he should lack the physical and mental enterprise to complete his national undertakings. that for the nine months preceding its birth the infant obtains its nourishment directly from its mother's blood, and for nine months after birth it obtains this, normally, from her milk--_her_ digestive processes having so assimilated the originally brute and vegetable proteids of her food that these are now _human_ proteids, and are ready, therefore, to be built into the infant's body with the least possible tax upon its own assimilative powers--proves a number of important facts. first: that an infant's digestive powers remain, normally, for nine months after birth, in a more or less embryonic state; slowly and gradually developing capacity to convert the products of the brute and vegetable kingdoms into forms suitable for building into its human organisation. (just as we see the digestive organs of the child progressively developing power to assimilate an adult dietary.) secondly: that the infant's digestion remains thus undeveloped obviously in order that as little as possible of its vital power may be expended in the complex processes of assimilation, all available vital-power being urgently required for its exhaustingly rapid brain- and body-building. thirdly: that where an artificial diet forces precocious development upon the infant-digestion--since all precocity is degeneracy, all the organs concerned in digestion will be, necessarily, more or less structurally defective and functionally inefficient; as a consequence of not having been permitted time and rest to develop slowly and stably over the normal allotted period. (proof is supplied by the premature development of teeth, which occurs in artificially-fed babies some months before dentition is normally due. and these teeth and those that succeed them are of such perishable structure that present-day children need perpetual dental repairs.) fourthly: that such misapplication of vital resources for the premature development and abnormal functions of precocious digestive organs entails inevitably corresponding loss of vital power for general development. fifthly--and by no means lastly, but perhaps most important of all: that since the infant-digestion is quite incapable of properly converting brute and vegetable-proteids into human proteid, infants artificially fed must necessarily _build into their brains and bodies lower-grade proteids_--and proteids so imperfectly assimilated as to be something less than human, and, accordingly, more or less brute or vegetable still in their inherences. and since all living cells and tissues reproduce upon the plan of the parent-cells and tissues they were derived from, it is clear that the abnormal cells and tissues constructed of these half-brute, or half-vegetable proteids must be abnormal; unstable and degenerate, and prone to lapse readily to still further degrees of deterioration and disease. hence a source of our neurotic, neurasthenic, adenoid-afflicted, mentally-defective and otherwise diseased children. hence too the increasing criminality--which is _animality_, of course--that characterises a considerable proportion of the rising generation. each further generation artificially fed in infancy can but deviate still further from the human normal, becoming ever less human; brain and body-cells reproducing themselves, throughout life, on the plan of their infant-construction of half-brute or half-vegetable proteids. one sees the ox in the dull, soulless eyes, in the bovine flesh, the stolid faces, and in the crude animal natures of many modern little ones, to whom calf-diet was fed before they had developed the digestive power of transforming this into substance highly vitalised enough for human brain and body-building. and the less their systems have rebelled against and have rejected, but, on the contrary, have conformed to and have thriven upon such brute-diet, the cruder are their organisations. of this order are the insensate child-monsters who win prizes at baby-shows. to one who realises that, of all the powers of woman, the ability to nurse her babe is second in importance only to her first and vital function of producing it, the cry and clamour and impassioned fallacy that have swirled around the trivial detail of her suffrage-disabilities show grotesque beside the human tragedy of her increasing biological disability and her increasing psychical aversion to fulfil this indispensable and sacred mother-office. to despise which, as being a function woman possesses in common with the humbler creatures, is as narrow-sighted as it would be to scorn the genius of shakespeare because both dog and pig, poor things! possess brains. moreover, in forfeiting this maternal faculty, woman reverts to the mode of those crude rudimentary species _below_ the mammalia. "... _each mother's breast_ _feeds a flower of blue, beyond all blessing blest._" notwithstanding all this, feminism, in its grim materialism, blind to the mystical beauty of life and the sacredness of individuality, regards women mainly as parts of an economic machinery. and to serve as such, it standardises all in body, mind and aptitude, to economic ends; the young and tender girls whose shaping frames are shaping to become the mystical looms of evolving humanity; the young wives in whom love and marriage have set mysterious processes in motion; the young pregnant mothers in whom the shuttle of life is already marvellously flying, interweaving the luminous threads of a soul with a body of flesh. nature made women ministrants of love and life, for the creation of an ever more healthful and efficient, a nobler and more joyous humanity. feminism degrades them to the status of industrial mechanisms, whereof the commercial products are the chiefest values, and children no more than bye-products. * * * * * and what bye-products they are! god help them!--who alone can help them--this pathetic rubble of pallid, sickly, suffering, and dejected infant- and child-life; the violet-hued babies, with their dull eyes glazed by misery, their leaden, half-paralysed limbs; the blind and crippled, halt and deaf, the imbecile and feeble-minded children, apathetic, neurasthenic, joyless; as too, on the other hand, the low-browed, sturdy and soulless, or the debased and evil--all the generation of degeneracy which our deteriorate and enfeebled looms of womanhood are grinding out to-day. though shut from sight and thought, in the prisons, hospitals and other institutions of our modern civilisations is an ever-swelling, ever-rising, further-menacing tide of diseased, defective, insane and criminal mankind, product of ours and of those others' violations of natural law; clogging the river of life, choking the springs of evolution, damming the current of progress. chapter vii feminist doctrine and practice destructive of womanly attributes, morale and progress "a woman versed in that finest of all fine arts, the beautifying of daily life." i in _woman and labour_, miss schreiner laments as follows, picturesquely but speciously: "our spinning-wheels are all broken; in a thousand huge buildings steam-driven looms, guided by a few hundred thousands of hands (often those of men) produce the clothings of half the world; and we dare no longer say, proudly, as of old, that we and we alone clothe our peoples!" a scene is conjured of brute-men with clubs savagely attacking and destroying hapless women's innocent spinning-wheels, as mrs. arkwright ruthlessly destroyed her husband's cherished models. yet who, regarding the subject dispassionately, sees cause for anything but gladness that modern woman has not still to spin the linen of her household and the garments of its members--for anything but thankfulness for that intelligent male-brain which carried the woman-invention of the needle to its higher adaptations in the weaving and the sewing-machine? who can justly regret that the taking over by men, in factories, of wholesale brewings and bakings, jam-makings, and so forth, has relieved the other sex of ceaseless drudgeries; and in so relieving it of drudgeries of house-keeping has left it free to develop the higher and the more intellectual arts of home-making? "_slowly but determinedly, as the old fields of labour close up and are submerged behind us, we demand entrance into the new_," miss schreiner affirms. and to emphasise our determination, the demand is printed in her book, as i have reproduced it, in italics. losing sight altogether of the inestimable benefits to woman secured by the intervention of men between her and the hardest and the most debasing employments, she further protests, "any attempt to divide the occupations in which male and female intellects and wills should be employed, must be to attempt a purely artificial and arbitrary division." "our cry is, _we take all labour for our province!_" nevertheless, clever and intuitive woman as she is, she confesses (now the italics are mine), "_it may be with sexes as with races, the subtlest physical differences between them may have their fine mental correlatives_." and yet, oh why, having come upon so promising a vein of truth, did she not follow it to its logical conclusions, and find in it all the answers to her extremist demands, and, with these, the refutations of her feminist plea and claims? men and women are unlike not only in "_the subtlest physical differences_" which "_may have their fine mental correlatives_." they are unlike in the most obvious and basic facts of physical constitution and of biological function. and these must inevitably entail mental and temperamental correlatives more intrinsic and farther reaching even than the subtler physical differences she recognises as being possibly modifying factors in psychical aptitude. advocating soldiering even for the sex, miss schreiner says: " ... undoubtedly, it has not been only the peasant-girl of france, who has carried latent and hid within her person the gifts that make the supreme general." here is fallacy again. joan of arc was, beyond all things, woman. not the man in her, but the woman in her, and her supra-conscious womanly attributes it was which (inspiring her by way of mystical voices and visions) impelled her so to transcend her woman-nature that without knowledge of arts military or of strategic science, as, too, without experience, she was able, by intuitive prescience, to lead her compatriots to victory. for the soldiers, perceiving the light in her face, followed in awed confidence whithersoever she led. in earlier days of civilisation, this intuitive and visionary faculty of woman was recognised and honoured. ii in _the human woman_, lady grove presents a wholly contrary view to miss schreiner's. with her, woman suffers less in being shut out from the labour-market than in having been driven from the home. "the woman has been driven from her home into the labour-market. the fact of per cent. of the women of this country working for their living is an ugly rebuff to the pretty platitudes about the home," she says. " ... the stupendous mistake that has been made up to now is in supposing that it is men's judgment only that should decide questions, and hence the hopeless state of unravelled misery existing in the world, side by side with all the wealth and wonders of the age. "if we examine the conditions of the working-classes, after years and years of male legislation, what a hideous set of conditions we find. intemperance, bad-housing and the cruel struggle for existence among the poorer classes. and yet we spend over £ , , annually on the education of these people. surely there is something wrong somewhere. what is it that we, seeing this condition of things at our very door, have, as women, to be so grateful for in male legislation?" the writer fails wholly to perceive that these factors she deplores as due to defective masculine legislation are effects less of faulty measures than of faulty humanity. measures are the gauge of the men who frame them. and men are very much the measure of the mothers who bore them. those which she properly characterises as the "hideous" conditions of the working-classes, "intemperance, bad-housing and the cruel struggle for existence" are circumstances legislation cannot remedy unless the hearts of legislators are moved to do this, and their hands are empowered, moreover, to do it, by the collective will of those they represent. except all are content to subordinate their personal interests to the general welfare, and to improve their personal morale for their own and for the common good, acts of parliament can do but little. drunkenness can be penalised by legislation, difficulties put in the way of obtaining drink. but intemperance can be effectually stamped out only by individual men and women so rising to higher levels of thought and self-control as voluntarily to become sober; or by men and women so improving in brain and constitution that the craving for drink--now recognised as a disease--no longer obsesses them. acts of parliament may condemn insanitary and defective dwellings, may compel landlords to repair them to degrees of decency and comfort; may pull them down and build others in their stead. but none of these measures will eradicate the bad housing of dirty and comfortless, or of demoralised and demoralising homes. the best house possible becomes bad housing for its occupants when the woman at the head of it fails to do her duty therein, in consequence of industrial labour which leaves her neither time nor energy to make a clean, well-ordered, cosy and inspiring home of it; or because her own idleness or ignorance, her drunkenness or worthlessness, results in her neglect of it. human conditions, like human measures, result from the personalities, good or bad, capable or incapable, of those who create them. iii the feminist's faith in the masculine prerogative of legislation, as being a possible panacea--had _she_ but part in it--for every ill beneath the sun, is one of her gravest disqualifications for taking part therein. legislators who are over-confident in the efficacy of the law express their over-confidence in terms of premature and unduly-coercive legislation. procedure which, more often than not, frustrates the ends to which it was designed by the methods taken to secure these. progress is personal, moreover. it is the sum of the advance of individuals. legislation is the statutory _formulation_ of public opinion; it is not the _source_ of this. it merely crystallises public opinion. but before crystallisation of thought (as of chemical) sets in, saturation-point must first have been reached throughout the medium wherein it occurs. were any other development required to show the utter inadequacy of legislation to attain its ends--when not reinforced by personal co-operation and initiative--this has been supplied in that latter-day demoralisation of young girls, the consequences whereof will be vastly more baneful and farther-reaching in contributing to national decline than even that other dire factor of the flower of our virile youth struck down before its prime. girls are fully protected by law to the age of sixteen. yet many of the demoralised girls seen consorting freely with tommy or reggie, according to their class, are well below that age. legislation is powerless, however, failing parental vigilance and co-operation to invoke its aid. nevertheless, with its characteristic blind confidence in the male prerogative of law, feminism now advocates raising "the age of consent" to eighteen. but to do this would no more protect the girl under eighteen than the existing law protects the girl under sixteen--or, for that matter, protects the girl of twelve. law can do little or nothing unless, as happens so seldom and happens too late, parents requisition its assistance for menace or for punishment. mothers themselves should see to it that their little daughters have neither temptation nor opportunity to consent to their own ruin. iv we saw lately a militant rising of women against men and their laws; the object being to compel concessions from the male by way of violence. and so short-sighted were the leaders of this movement that not only did they seek to prove their right to make laws, by breaking them, but they showed themselves ignorant of the first rudiments of combat by electing to fight the enemy with his own weapon--that weapon of force which is man's especial fitness and woman's unfitness. woman's unfitnesses have prevailed, it is true, in the counsels of progress, but, obviously, they have not prevailed, nor can they ever prevail by being pitted directly against masculine strengths. her way of supremacy is one by far more subtle and sublime. the leaders of militancy seem never to have suspected, moreover, that while they were demanding to be liberated from all womanly privileges, they were, nevertheless, waging their deplorable skirmishes from behind a strong wall of such privileges. men who should have adopted such tactics would have received but short and scant shrift. were the sex to be confronted, indeed, with that "fair field and no favour!" for which some members of it are so clamorous, these would find it a grievously different thing from the privilege they paint it. marcel prévost has said that when men find women competing with them in fields of labour, to degrees injurious to masculine interests, they will turn and strike them in the face. there are indications to the contrary, however. among decadent races and savages, the emasculate sons of deteriorate mothers assert their masculine authority otherwise. far from combating their women's right to work, they force them to work--and to work in support of the males! more and more every day, civilised men, indeed, released by working-wives from their natural obligation to maintain the family, are seen so to have lapsed from their sense of virile responsibility as to be coming further and further to shelve upon such working-wives the burden of the family support. among the labouring and artisan classes, the wife's contribution to the exchequer leaves the husband more money to spend on drink or on gambling; or on both. in superior classes, too, it leaves husbands with more money to spend on amusement--of one sort or another. responsibility and effort are natural spurs to masculine development. relieve the male of these and he degenerates. as woman released from child-bearing and the duties entailed by the family, degenerates rapidly. we can no more improve on the plan than we can improve without each and every appointed factor of it. v another disastrous blunder of feminism is to make for equal wage for men and women. the higher wage of men springs, economically, from the fact that the industrial output of women is, normally, less than that of men. but there is a deeper, and a biological significance involved. which is, that men's greater output of work results from more of their energy of brain and body being available to them for work, because far less of their vital power is locked-up in them for race-perpetuation and nurture. there is the implication also that man being the natural breadwinner of the family, his wage should suffice for its support. a system of equal wages for the sexes would press as cruelly upon women as it would be disastrous to the race. because it would compel woman, despite the biological disabilities that handicap her economically, to force her powers to masculine standards of work and output. it would, moreover, by qualifying her to support the family, serve as cogent excuse for her husband to shirk his bounden duty. the crux of the demand for equal pay for equal work is that, because of her natural lesser strength and endurance, when a woman is doing work identical in nature and equal in quantum to that of a man, it means that _she_ is doing _more_ than a woman's work, and is overtaxing and injuring her constitution, therefore; or it means that _he_ is doing _less_ than a man's work, and is "slacking," therefore. a further important issue is that when rendered too easy by both husband and wife earning wage, marriage is entered upon far too lightly, and at too early and irresponsible ages, than happens when the whole burden of support rests with the man. moreover, in such case masculine selection makes only too often for economic rather than for human values in the wife. a man upon whom is to fall the whole tax of supporting the home and the family regards marriage more seriously, and delays it until he is more mature of years and of settled position. moreover, he chooses more carefully. and the race benefits proportionally. in manufacturing towns, with opportunity for both husband and wife earning wage, boy-and-girl marriages, feckless, discordant homes, and sickly degenerate, neglected children are the rule. that women should be paid for work they do, a salary enabling them to live honestly and in comfort, goes without saying. economics should be adjusted on a far higher basis than that mainly of a competitive struggle which allows the employer to fix wages less according to the value of work done, than by the number of persons at his mercy, who, in their eagerness to live, will undersell their values and thus cheapen labour. nevertheless economics have, in a degree, adapted to the evolutionary trend. because, in the main, the more skilled and difficult tasks are more highly remunerated than the less skilled, and are performed by the more fit. and not only are these better qualified to expend such higher remuneration intelligently, and with benefit to themselves and to the community, but they are able to secure thereby those better conditions which are the due and the need of families higher in the scale of humanity, and requiring, therefore, higher conditions of nurture. the cases of colliers and of other rough-grade humans who earn wage beyond their mental calibre to expend intelligently, show how an income too large for its possessor leads to coarse and demoralising extravagances, rather than to personal happiness or elevation. (the like is true of many plutocrats.) war has shown us boys' lives wrecked by the same factor. no greater fallacy exists than that of supposing progress to lie in freeing persons from all disabilities--poverty, and other restrictive conditions. wives should be legally entitled to a just proportion of their husband's income, as a _right_, not merely as dole. this, in recognition of their invaluable work in home-making, and of their invaluable service to the state in producing and rearing worthy citizens for it. vi masculine legislation, making all the while, in the face of economic difficulties, for the ever further release of women and children from the more laborious and debasing tasks, has made compulsory, in their own and in the interests of their unborn infants, a month of respite for expectant mothers, and a further month for mothers after delivery. extending thus to these poor victims--beasts of the burden of toil, and beasts of the burden of sex--a mercy and consideration wholly lacking in the feminist propaganda. for this latter repudiates indignantly all need for concession or privilege to wifehood or to motherhood, equally with womanhood. to justify the claim for equality in all things, women must be forced, at all cost, to identical standards of work and production. to ask privileges and concessions would be to confess, in the sex, weaknesses and disabilities that must disqualify it from economic identity with the other. far, indeed, from such vain-glorious and disastrous straining for equality, the leaders of the woman's movement should, before all else, have demanded insistently still further industrial concessions and privileges for a sex handicapped for industry, by nature. first and foremost, they should come into the open and boldly proclaim--what it is useless to deny, indeed--that in the function of parenthood, at all events, men and women are wholly dissimilar. they should reject outright all tinkerings and half-measures for relief of this great human disability, whereof one sex only bears the stress and burden for the benefit of both, and for survival of nations and races. not only for the pitiful respite of a month before and a month after the birth of her child, should the mother be prohibited from industrial labour. by that time all the damage will have been done. the power that should have been put into the evolution of her infant will have been put into the revolutions of a lathe. the life-potential that should have gone to build its living bone and brain and muscle will have gone to feed the life of a machine. the breath she will have drawn for it will have been contaminated by the dust and fumes of toil. its poor nascent brain and faculties will have been dulled and depleted, stupefied and vitiated by the stress and turmoil of its mother's labours. only the dregs of the maternal powers will have been invested in the race. the finest and most valuable will have gone to swell the balance-sheets of capital. the trumpet-cry of the woman's movement should be, indeed, _the absolute prohibition of young wives and mothers from all industrial and professional employment!_ such a prohibition, by lessening the competition of the labour-market, and by thus increasing the value of labour (which the flood of female industry inevitably cheapens) would automatically so increase the wage of men as to make of these true living wage, sufficient for the maintenance of home and family. such a prohibition would, moreover, so diminish the competitive pressure among women as to make it possible for unmarried women, the future wives and mothers, as well as for the older spinsters and widows, to select in every fitting trade and industry, work suited to the lesser strength and endurance of the female brain and body. vii nothing has characterised the feminist movement throughout so much as lack of knowledge of human nature (both masculine and feminine), lack of prevision to foresee the trend of new developments, lack of intuitive apprehension to gauge the issues of such trend. its leaders have never suspected, accordingly, that, in propaganda and in practice, they have been tampering with a great biological ordinance; and that, in obliterating women's sex-characteristics, they have been destroying that counterpoise of human powers and faculties whereon progress and permanence rest, and that morale which is the inspiration of advance. regarding their own masculine rationalism as the ideal and standard for all women, they have believed it possible to shape all women successfully thereto. nature is not to be thwarted, however. and when we destroy the balance of the normal, abnormal developments--gravely mischievous and singularly difficult to deal with--crop up and require to be dealt with. one may raise the familiar cry that some modern developments are due to our being in "a transition stage." but from that remote day when nature first evolved us as a race of _amoebæ_, further to evolve into the human species, we have been always in "transition stages." normal transition upwards is so slow an impulse as to be well-nigh imperceptible, however. rapid change invariably betokens regression--descent being vastly easier and swifter in movement than ascent is. deplorably mistaken has been a doctrine of emancipation which, by disparaging the arts domestic, has sent out young girls and women, indiscriminately, from the sphere domestic, to de-sexing and demoralising work in factories and businesses; and has engendered the race of stunted, precocious, bold-eyed, cigarette-smoking, free-living working-girls who fill our streets; many tricked out like cocottes, eyes roving after men, impudence upon their tongues, their poor brains vitiated by vulgar rag-times and cinema-scenes of vice and suggestiveness. some of our working-girls are charming-looking, pretty-mannered, pure of thought and life, of course. a small minority--alas, how small!--are normal of development and sound of constitution. but these are not the average. and it is the average with which a nation has to reckon. emphatically, men are not as women. in body and in mind they are by nature rougher, tougher, and vastly less impressionable. a regime that _makes_ a boy will wreck a girl. of more sensitive calibre, she requires more kindly, protective conditions, moral and industrial, than does he. notwithstanding which, little girls now run the streets and take their chances as they may--in capacities of over-burdened errand-girl, telegraph-messenger, and otherwise--at ages when their developing womanhood requires due care of nurture, moral supervision, and freedom from physical strain. sedentary occupations are a natural need of their sex, moreover, as is indicated by the breadth and weight of the female pelvis and hips, as too by the delicate adjustments of those important reproductive organs, the future products whereof are of inestimably higher national values than are the industrial assets of these poor children's labour. as girl-guides and so forth, young girls parade our towns in meretricious (albeit hideous) uniform; developing thereby that love of publicity and of unwholesome excitement to which the sex is prone. small girls just fresh from school are even now employed in barbers' shops to shave men; destroying thus in them, at the outset of life, that natural diffidence and reserve toward the other sex which are the first defences of womanly honour. in demanding absolute emancipation, industrial and personal, feminists had no other thought but that such new liberty would have widened woman's scope for usefulness, for happiness, for self-development. yet what has been the outcome of it all? for one who has used her new freedom for the ends designed, very many more have used it to their serious injury; only too many to their moral downfall. already everywhere such liberty has fast degenerated into licence. our girls were no sooner emancipated by their mothers from the usually wholesome--if sometimes too severe--control of their fathers, than straightway they have emancipated themselves from the indispensable maternal rule. strict supervision and guidance in a world they are ignorant of--or if sophisticated are in far worse case--are essential to the well-being, physical and moral, of the young and immature. young girls, on first discovering their attraction for the other sex, become intoxicated by the sense of their new dangerously-alluring power, and lose their heads. beyond all things, they require at this phase a mother's strict and careful supervision, with sympathy and firm control; to tide them over their perilous phase, and thus to preserve them from consequences of their ignorance or folly, or from those of a pernicious bent. nevertheless, young girls of every class are granted now disastrous latitudes of thought and action. the vigilant chaperonage indispensable to protect them from the biological impulses--which they mistake for "love"--of the careless or vicious young men to whom (equally with the chivalrous and honourable) modern mothers abandon their daughters, has become a dead-letter. the girl only just in her teens is free to play fast-and-loose with boys and men--as too with life, before she has learned the merest rudiments of living. all too soon she learns her lesson. and becoming precociously sophisticated--only too often precociously vicious--her nature and future are wrecked at the outset. because nothing wrecks a woman's disposition so effectually as sex-precocity does. sex is the very pivot of her nature. on this she swings up--or down. and early habit decides her bent. that many of these cigarette-smoking, decadent young creatures are no worse than impudent, feather-brained and misguided, does not save the licence allowed them from being as harmful to physical as it is perilous to moral health; nor from the experiences resulting from such licence wholly unfitting the majority for later wholesome restraint, and for purer and fairer ideals of womanly conduct and living. for much of this feminism is gravely to blame. not only because it has led to the absorption of the mothers in outside pursuits, as being of greater importance than the fulfilment of their maternal duties and responsibilities to their young daughters, but because, too, the partial sterilisation of girls, by masculine training and habits, in robbing them of womanly qualities, robs them of natural reserve and modesty, and of the other more delicate instincts and aspirations of their sex. significant, truly, of latter-day maternal neglect of young daughters was the disclosure by a doctor, in a recent _british medical journal_, that of a hundred men infected with venereal diseases, more than _seventy had contracted disease_ from "_amateur flappers_." yet as with a child badly burned by playing with fire, we blame the mother or guardian who exposed it to danger of thus injuring itself for life, so the mothers of these unfortunate girls were to blame for gross neglect of their duty to safeguard these young lives. nature avenges her betrayed girls, however. for medical authority shows that these youthful unfortunates transmit disease in its most virulent and destructive forms. it is as though all the vital potential of their developing womanhood is perverted to a malign poison, charged with the forces of their blasted youth. * * * * * the victorian, who brought up her daughters to marry in ignorance of biological fact, went to the other extreme. but it was a far less harmful one than that in vogue to-day. like that of the child, the immature, susceptible mind of a girl, incapable of apprehending the sex-factor in its true perspective with the other factors of life, becomes unduly dominated by consideration thereof when too early instructed. she is far better left, for so long as is practicable, ignorant or hazy concerning this vital phenomenon, in place of being fully informed, as girls are now-a-days. so that they know all that there is to be known about sex--except its seriousness and sacredness. and divorced from the seriousness and sacredness of love and birth--which mere knowledge of biological fact is wholly inadequate to impart--such knowledge of fact presents a crude and bald distortion of the truth; only too often imparting an ugly and demoralising warp to mind and conduct. ignorance is not innocence, 'tis true, but it serves the same purpose in safeguarding innocence that clothes do in safeguarding modesty. and for one girl who falls in consequence of innocence, twenty fall from sophistication. unless masculine traits have been over-developed in her by abnormal training, in which case (as occurs sometimes in the quasi-masculine woman of middle-age) sex-instinct may acquire an unnatural and quasi-masculine insistence, this instinct is, in the normal girl, _responsive_ rather than _initiative_. (wherein she differs diametrically from the male.) and such natural dormancy may be advantageously preserved by haziness of knowledge, and by the careful surveillance required for protection of immature minds and powers. the bald, matter-of-course view-point of many modern girls with regard to sex, their knowledge of vice, and their cynical acceptance and discussion thereof, as too of the vulgar intrigues of notorious dancers and peeresses, to say nothing of the ugly and debasing personal experiences only too many of them have incurred, are among the evils of the injurious licence at present accorded to young persons. feminism, having thrust such disastrous liberty on creatures as eager to grasp as they are unfitted to cope with the dangers thereof, is striving now, by way of women-patrols and police-women, to stem the evil with one hand--while with the other, it continues to open the flood-gates still wider. the only way to stem the evil is to stem it at its source. the home, with the vigilant supervision and guidance of a mother whose duty is publicly recognised and her authority strengthened thereby, whose time and faculties are devoted mainly to the making of home and to the safeguarding and disciplining of the young creatures she has brought into existence, is environment and shelter as indispensable to the impressionable youth of both sexes--but more particularly to the impressionable youth of one--as it is for the rearing of infancy and childhood. such home-influences, reinforced by the strong hand of a father who likewise recognises his parental responsibilities, are the first of all the rights that matter for young womanhood. later, should come a term of domestic service. mistresses of households should realise not only their human but likewise their national responsibility to these young humbler members thereof. no other public service possible to them would equally conduce to national progress. as fathers are legally responsible for debts of sons under age, mothers should be responsible to the state for the virtue of daughters under sixteen. in the _personal_, vastly more than in any other field of operation, woman's chiefest value lies. when she exchanges it for public functions, and seeks to further progress by officialdom and politics, by institution of women-patrols, police-women, mayoresses, and so forth, the supreme importance of the personal factor becomes impressed by the discovery of the utter inadequacy of any substitute to take its place. "if mothers did their duty, there would be no need for us," a woman-patrol stated recently. by the time young women have reached such phases of demoralisation that their conduct in public demands the intervention of police-women, it is too late to reform them, moreover. they will have lost the best promise and hope of their womanhood. and so it is and must be ever all along the line. the home and the family are the nursery of civic as they are of racial progress. we regard it as proof of civilisation that law-courts for children have been instituted. yet what a blot it is, in truth, upon both parentage and parenthood that, in our day of enlightenment, such should have become necessary. so have mother influences and maternal sense of responsibility declined, however, that mothers on all sides openly confess their utter lack of power to control boys and girls just in their 'teens. viii the fashion is to pity and deride the "poor" early victorian because she lacked the manifold and nerve-wracking outlets for that restlessness and boredom from which modern women suffer. the "poor" victorian was a more harmonious, better-balanced and more tranquil being, however. and she was far less cursed with "nerves," with feverish unrest and carking discontent, than women are to-day. mrs. craigie observed that the victorian, with her backboard and gentle accomplishments, produced (without the pusillanimous expedient of "twilight sleep") notably stronger, finer, and more clever children than do present-day over-educated or athletic women--athletic women, whose muscles of arms and of legs have so sapped the powers of important internal muscles that most of them are incapable of bringing their infants into life without instrumental aid. one does not, for a moment, counsel reversion to the type or to the methods of an earlier generation. evolution and development must advance, and are, of course, advancing satisfactorily in some stock. but the victorian served her generation nobly, producing splendid specimens of men and women, and handing on a generous racial constitution--now being squandered recklessly, alas! by her descendants. the tide of greater freedom, of broader outlook, and fuller effectiveness for woman has set in, however. albeit, owing to feminist misapprehensions, it is not only moving too rapidly but it is moving in a wrong direction; because in direct opposition to biological law. _by their fruits ye shall know them._ and the victorian so preserved her woman-powers and attributes that she was an excellent and a contented wife, and could bring into existence--without instrumental aid--a family of comely, clever boys and girls; nurse them all from eldest to youngest; rear and discipline and put such stuff of health and sanity and enterprise into them as shames some flimsy, feeble-minded, characterless modern stock. we have far to look to-day, indeed, for statesmen and soldiers, poets and artists, business and craftsmen, and other such virile and talented personages as those early and pre-victorian mothers endowed their epoch with. and were further evidence needed that our great-grandmothers equalled our own women in the qualities we pride ourselves upon as triumphs of feminism, the strength and courage, the resource and fortitude those others showed throughout the stress and horrors of the indian mutiny are proof sufficient that, beneath their gentler virtues, lay the sterner fibre of nobility. ix to prove to what a third-grade power woman, once so potent an inspiration of life, has lapsed, we need but go to the drama--reflex ever of its period. consider shakespeare's women--subtly wise, profoundly clever, beautiful and gracious, true and charming, strong and tender, chaste and gay; warm with temperament, crystal-sparkling with wit and parry! and comparing these adorable beings with the posturing, tricky, intriguing, slangy, spotty creatures--neurotic unfaithful wives and erratic "bachelor"-daughters--of the modern stage, the deplorable deterioration of our womanly ideals becomes patent. women have sinned in every age, but they have sinned in some ages picturesquely and pathetically, because nature led them. while the morbids and neurotics of our modern plays are for ever noisily turning out the dusty corners of their warped psychologies, in order to discover some loose end of nature in them to condone their erotic eccentricities. strange, that twentieth-century woman tolerates the mirror held to her in these abnormal and distasteful creatures! the modern dramatist is handicapped in his art, it is true, by lack, in our latter-day actresses, of that personal charm and magnetism, and the vital power to render the higher and subtler emotions and passions, whereby the actresses of earlier days held audiences spell-bound. politics and sports destroy alike the muses and the graces. one who attempts to combine them with the delicate psychological arts and artistries of the drama is bound to failure--in her art, at all events. time was when the best men reverenced women as beings of more delicate calibre, to be shielded from the rougher and grosser contacts of life. chivalry forbade that they should have taken these to coarse exhibitions, prize-fights and the like. and to such restriction woman's purer instinct and her finer taste assented. the male being practical and rational, however, since women themselves are changing all that, he too is coming to believe that any and every thing is good enough for a sex which more and more repudiates its subtler quality. that native delicacy which preserved her once from masculine habits of thought and indulgence, taught man to realise woman as belonging, by nature, to a purer and daintier order. (howsoever inferior to himself in some other respects he may have held her.) it won his reverence and worship that these frailer and more exquisitely-constituted creatures should possess, despite their exquisiteness, such fine mettle of resistance in their softness as withstood the fire and urgence of the masculine siege; that within their (possibly) ignorant little brains was light that flashed straight to intrinsic truths and right courses of action; such intuitive apprehension of the good and the beautiful, without experience of the base and ugly, as taught them to distinguish clearly, to select, and to hold fast to the fairer in thought and in conduct. to encounter in woman his own traits touched to higher, subtler issues, and transformed to novel and alluring quality by the charm and graces of another sex, has made always an enchanting, an inspiring, and a baffling enigma of her--to endue woman for man with eternal values and impenetrable mystery. for he has visioned in her--without formulating--the mystery of the human duality. trembling in the delicate poise of her twofold being, between the soft impressionable, variable woman in her and the man of steel æsthetically sheathed within the velvet of her womanhood, the play of her swift supple transitions, the kaleidoscopic changes of her perpetual new combinations--giving ever fresh bewildering effects of colour, light and mode--have made her infinite variety for him. while her soft, immediate adjustments to his own moods and needs have been his wonder and delight; presenting to him all that there is in himself, yet in modes impossible to himself. all that he knows by acquaintance she knows by intuition--and in a fresh and fairer way. all that he sees, her eyes make him see again in new and more exquisite lights. all that he thinks had been already in her woman-heart ere ever man began to think. all that he loves she shows him a reason for loving--yet not by way of reason. all that he craves with his soul, her soul can confer. all that his body and sense have desired, her body and sense can bestow--but with all the immeasurable differences and enhancements of her unlike sex. "_away, away!_" cried jean paul richter, apostrophising music, "_thou speakest to me of things that in all my endless life i have not found, and shall not find!_" wagner said, "music is a woman." dr. havelock ellis, himself a zealous feminist, has said, that, in their ardour for emancipation, women sometimes seem anxious to be emancipated from their sex. while ellen key, most impartial of critics, observes: "but full of insight as they are into the _ars amandi_, have modern women, indeed, learned how with all their soul, all their strength, and all their mind to love? their mothers and grandmothers--on a much lower plane of woman's erotic idealism--knew of only one object; that of making their husbands happy.... but what watchful tenderness, what dignified desire to please, what fair gladness could not the finest of these spiritually-ignored women develop! the new man lives in a dream of the new woman, and she in a dream of the new man. but when they actually find one another, it frequently results that two highly-developed brains together analyse love; or that two worn-out nervous systems fight out a disintegrating battle over love.... of love's double heart-beat--the finding one's self, and the forgetting one's self in another--the first is now considerably more advanced than the second." the reason why the new man and the new woman, having found one another, find no more inspiration or sweetness each in the other than to "fight out a disintegrating battle" is because both are male of brain and bent--one normally so, the other abnormally. and when two males meet, their nature is--to fight! * * * * * into every clause of this book must be read the many inspiring exceptions to be found among those modern men and women and children who are advancing normally along evolutionary lines. such are so fine of type, in body and in mind, that they blind not a few to facts of racial deterioration. we point to these and say: one cannot speak with truth of the degeneracy of nations which produce such noble specimens! these exceptions prove the principle i am endeavouring to impress, however. that were we to apply ourselves to correction of our biological and social errors, we have with us stock of the noblest race conceivable, and the noblest possible future for that race. chapter viii dangerous separation of women into two orders: feminists and femininists "_every child comes with the message that god is not yet discouraged of man._" i since women possess native gifts of highly-differentiated faculties and aptitudes, not only their greatest effectiveness, but, too, their well-being and happiness lie in finding highly-specialised and selective application for these, in life, in art, in science, and in industry. their rôle in every field of operation should be recognised as being wholly different from that of man, however; and their own natural view-points and special abilities should be fostered, accordingly, by suitable training; in order to fit them for the special departments for which they are essentially suited. the charming artistry and fancies, spontaneous and full of delicate insight, feeling, and sense of line, which a woman puts into her illustrations of a child's fairy-story, are art as true, for example, and if less great of achievement, are nevertheless as intrinsically valuable in the scheme of things as are the virile masterpieces of a michael angelo or turner. few men attain the exquisite artistry in colour that even indifferent women-painters show. it is an expression, in mentality, of the biological fact that the colour-sense is naturally so highly developed in woman that colour-blindness--comparatively common among men--is rare indeed in her. on the other hand, woman is inherently weak in drawing. when she is trained, however, to draw with masculine strength and precision, she loses her natural freedom and delicacy of touch, her sensitive feeling for line, her exquisite colour-sense, her fertile fancy. rosa bonheur's horses are as strong in drawing as they are baldly deficient in sentiment. men have painted horses bolder still in line, but nevertheless noble and beautiful in feeling. the same is true of literature. mrs. browning would have been a great poet had she not taken her husband for model. some of her delicate woman-fancies, tricked out in robert browning's over-virile style, are like charming women masquerading in fustian trousers. george eliot, too, affected the masculine both in viewpoint and method--a bad habit which so grew upon her that her later novels are ponderous as political treatises, and devoid of human interest. far different, charlotte brontë. true to herself and to her sex, she wrote and has written for all time--as those others did not--as a woman, and as only a woman could have written. jane austen, likewise. the woman point-of-view and method are regarded, for the most part, however, as mark of the amateur--the model aimed at being the eternal masculine in mode and trend. if the demand, "_we take all labour for our province!_" be safeguarded by recognising and differentiating the province into two distinct and separate--supplementary and complementary--departments, for the respective labours of the two widely differing sexes, the claim comes first within the range of reason and discretion. as woman was the first doctor, so she was the first artist. man inherits from her not only his artistic faculty, but he derives from her his faculty of creative inspiration. applying his native intelligence, his executive ability and power of sustained effort, to this end, he has so developed the arts as to have carried these to their modern realisations. and though woman, in her turn, may learn of him, it by no means follows that his standards or technique are best adapted to her modes of inspiration, to her ideals or attainments. trained along the lines of natural inherences, and trained, accordingly, without injury or warp to health or faculty by straining after standards not their own, women would not be disqualified, as so many are now by avocational specialisation, for wife and motherhood. they would, on the contrary, be the better adapted. and health and charm and emotion not having been sacrificed in them by de-sexing pursuits, such would be eagerly sought. thus racial advance would be secured by its wives and mothers having been drawn from the best orders of women; the women naturally endowed with faculty and character; self-reliant, but unspoiled by abnormal training. a number of latter-day women being unfitted, alike by nature and by inclination, for marriage, two orders of the sex should be clearly distinguished and administered for; as being wholly different types, for whom wholly different creeds and employments are indicated. those whose aims and talents incline them to public careers should be content with the lot to which they are best suited; and content to accept the privileges thereof, and the disabilities thereof. they should not be greedy, and demand, at the same time, the liberty of the free-lance and the privileges of the wife and the mother. so with the wife and mother. she, for her part, must forgo the liberty of the free-lance. because, with her privileges, she has undertaken functions and duties which, for their complete fulfilment, demand her best powers and activities. men who marry are similarly restricted. the bachelor lacks the interests and happiness of the husband and father. the husband and father lacks the personal liberty and the freedom from responsibility enjoyed by the bachelor. it is women, mainly, who demand both the prerogatives of the married and of the unmarried states. notwithstanding that it is wholly impossible for them to fulfil the functions of both, because it is impossible for them to possess either the aptitudes or the energies for both. in view of all that men have attained by devotion of their lives to the civilised achievements which now dignify existence and ennoble faculty, when one sees women more clamorously confident in their bounden right to inherit lightly all that the other sex has so laboriously won than they are reverently grateful for the inestimable human privileges and the treasuries of art and mind-wealth available to them by way of these surrendered masculine lives, it seems cause for indignation equal to that aroused by the phlegmatic calm wherewith most men accept as matter-of-course--instead of as matter for reverent gratitude--the gifts of life and faculty, to evolve and to transmit which to them, their mothers and all the generations of mothers before them surrendered their lives and their powers. recognition of the intrinsic differences, in trend and in function, between the sexes, should go far to dispel misconceptions and points of variance between them. the prevailing notion that the one sex is a sort of muddled version of the other--and not a highly-specialised presentment of an invaluable order of qualities, with inevitable shortcomings in the complementary order of qualities--is greatly to blame for sex-misapprehensions and antagonisms. ii feminists anticipate that war-experiences will further and finally eliminate all economic sex-distinctions, by having supplied convincing object-lessons that their sex is able to do, and to do efficiently, all that the other sex can do. far from object-lessons in the suitabilities, however, the experience has furnished terrible examples pointing the contrary way. because although women have shown themselves both willing and efficient in these new capacities, results have proved at what cost to themselves and to life they have done men's work. apart from a deplorable deterioration in morale, showing both in coarseness and in viciousness, the blight of age which has swooped upon both young and old, as direct consequence of the hardship and strain of masculine employments, robbing them of youth and health and joy and beauty, of repose and higher appeal, and transforming them into the grim, drab, harassed spectres many have become, should be warning enough, in all conscience, of whither feminism is leading us. many of our young women have become so de-sexed and masculinised, indeed, and the neuter state so patent in them, that the individual is described (unkindly) no longer as "she" but as "it." dire have been the disillusionment and bitterness among our fighting men, upon returning to the homes and wives or loves they had long dreamed of--to find the wife or love a shattered wreck, or a strenuous, graceless, half-male creature; the home a place of nerve-racking unrest. it is consoling to know that a number of those who have been de-sexed merely, and not disabled, will continue to find useful and contented outlet for their masculine developments in filling still the places of our fallen heroes. cruelty lies in the fact, however, that the womanhood of many will have been wrecked quite needlessly; by strain of superfluously strenuous drill and marchings, scoutings, signallings, and other such vain and fruitless imitations of the male. the greatest care should have been exercised to have selected the strong and able-bodied, the older women and the women of the characteristic worker-type (corresponding to the sterile female-worker of the bee-hive), for the rougher and the more exhausting tasks. the young wives and mothers and the young girls should have been rigorously excluded from such. of all human prerogatives, the greatest is that of being preserved, by class, by ability, by means, or by privilege, from gravitating to levels of work that coarsen and debase; or that, at all events, do not exercise and foster the development of higher tastes and faculty. and this human privilege is, in proportion to their degrees of civilisation, accorded to women by all civilised peoples. as men have stood between them and the perils of battle and shipwreck, the slaying of wild beasts, pioneering, exploring, and the like, so they have stood between them and the coarsest, ugliest, and most debasing industrial functions. nevertheless, feminist anger at restriction whatsoever in the matter of employment ignores all cause for gratitude on the part of the sex, that, being at man's mercy as she is, civilised woman is no longer (as the woman of inferior civilisations is still) a beast of heavy burden. far otherwise, indeed, feminism aims at nothing so much as to repudiate her established privileges, abolish all distinctions, and to make woman once again that beast of burden the chivalry of man--at first instinctive, later magnanimous--has progressively rescued her from being. and yet the degree to which sex is defined in labour (as in life) is at the same time the gauge and the cause of human development. wheresoever are found low intelligence, crude morale and lack of progress, there the women are employed in men's work. wheresoever women are employed in men's work, there are low intelligence, crude morale and lack of progress. "thank heaven for the war!" feminists have said, however, "because it has enabled our sex to prove its worth--by enabling us to quit ourselves like men. the world knows now that women can conduct omnibuses, drive ploughs, clean stables, kill chickens, ring and slaughter pigs, quite as well as men can." it is as painful as it is amazing to find intelligent and cultured persons so blinded by the obsessions of their creed as to suppose that in ploughing and hoeing and making munitions, women are doing finer and more valuable work than they had been doing previously; that the woman bus-conductor is a more important person than the children's nurse; that to drive a cab or clean a boiler is a nobler occupation than the teaching of music or the cleansing of clothes; that to spread manure is more dignifying than to make beds; to amputate the limbs of wounded soldiers is superior to the subtler, far more difficult art of medically treating the complex ills of women and children. that these other employments have been demanded by the times, is undeniable; as, too, that honour and credit are due to those who well and capably responded to the exigencies of the hour. but this does not, in the least degree, lessen the illogic of the claim that such response to the cruder and less-civilised demands of war proved woman's value more than did the devotion and efficiency she was previously showing in the far more complex and progressive arts of peace. the main value of her war-work was that it fitted the times. but the times have been woefully out of joint! iii at a recent feminist meeting, one of the leaders of militancy detailed to an audience of fierce-eyed, sombre-visaged members of her own sex, and sundry meek-browed persons of the other, her latest exploits in the matters of arranging labour disputes and averting strikes of working-men; of sending governmental male officials to the right-about, and of disposing, in general, of masculine concerns. the main issue of her story was lost sight of, alike by herself and by her audience. this was--or so it seemed to one among the latter: what manner of men were these who required or tolerated it that a woman should take them thus in hand, and, as though they had been whipped children, dispose of them and their men's affairs--between worker and employer, between man and man? what order of creature will be the sons and the grandsons of men ever further emasculated by every further generation of subjection by such masterful persons; female-dominants who arrogate the virile rights and prerogatives of their menkind; their initiative and enterprise; their capacity to think, to speak, to plan and to act for themselves? the subjection of woman by man--what was that evil compared with this other enormity: the subjection of man by woman, which is fast replacing it? men who--saving under stress of war--permit women to usurp the functions and prerogatives of their natural domain, in capacities of mayor, of chairman of companies and so forth, are, frankly speaking--muffs! not of such sires were our great anglo-saxon races gotten. not such was it who have made england what she is! and the england we look to will never be the england we look to--until such effeminate blood shall have been bred out of her sons. the male becomes emasculate when women invade his domain. and with the increasing hugger-mugger of the sexes, it grows, every day, more and more difficult for men to escape into the bracing, invigorating environment and moral of their own sex--a moral untempered by amenities due to the other, and one indispensable to string them to the pitch of virile thought and action. our sailors and soldiers and aviators are still _men_, because woman has not so far invaded the navy, the army, or the air. feminine invasion everywhere else--in schools and colleges, in the arts, in politics, in commerce and in sports--is undoubtedly enfeebling the fibre of our manhood and the quality of masculine achievements. man is a pioneer; aggressive, progressive, ever breaking new ground; conquering new territory and new forces of nature. and this alike in politics, in commerce, and in other material affairs. when he fails to pioneer, reaching out to new horizons of thought and activity, engineering new enterprises, while at the same time strengthening and consolidating all he had already acquired--then the world, in place of progressing, regresses. and for pioneering, whether in political or in geographical regions, woman's presence hampers him. the less men are in a position to escape from the other sex, the more they lose the impetus and characteristics of their own. the like applies to women. women who mix too much and too freely with men deteriorate signally in womanly values and quality. both sexes benefit by segregation from the other, in order to adapt--each to its own characteristic morale and moral. neither sex is wholly unconstrained and candid when in company of the other--unless both are demoralised. sex operates as a stimulant. and to be always under influence of a stimulant is enervating. on the other hand, when, from over-indulgence, sex or any other stimulant ceases to release new inspiration and forces, it is sign of a permanently enervated state. or sex operates as a hypnotic. and to be always under hypnotic influence is as destructive of individuality as it is fatal to achievement. the sexes require to separate, accordingly, in order to derive fresh impulse on coming together again. both work more seriously and sincerely, more efficiently and more effectively, apart; taking counsel, when need be, one of the other. the dilettante spirit and amenities of mixed companies, destructive of "thoroughness," are greatly to blame for that decline of british commerce which has followed on the feminist invasion of business-houses. significant of the trend is the fact that young and pretty and inefficient girls are selected for business positions, as clerks and so forth, while older women of experience and accredited ability are rejected summarily. it is, doubtless, amusing and flattering to masculine employers to be surrounded by attractive youth of the opposite sex. but it is conducive neither to commercial enterprise nor to achievement. iv because of the intrinsic variability underlying her duality of constitution, the happy mean and balance (difficult to all humans) are especially difficult to woman. man, like herself, is of dual constitution. but he is more firmly, because less finely, poised between his two orders of traits. she, on the contrary, tends to oscillate between the opposite extremes of her two-sided nature. a bent which may be traced, throughout history, in the excesses, in one or the other direction, that have characterised the careers of many famous women-personages. the ultra-feminine extreme, which results from lack of due balance of her woman-side by the masculine side of her, and the mannish extreme, occasioned by over-development of her masculine inherences, may be regarded as, respectively, the scylla and charybdis--the rocks of the male-traits, or the vortex of the female-traits--whereon, equally, may be wrecked the noblest characteristics and the highest values of the sex, when it fails to steer clear, _in medias res_, of either. in a number of women, the feminist and the femininist (ultra-feminine) types alternate in the same person. in place of being stably and permanently centred in the woman-side of them, with the masculine to steady and intelligise, such persons act and re-act, in more or less violent pendulum-swing, between their two orders of impulse. thus we get women, intellectual, progressive, strenuous, engrossed for part of their time in serious, perhaps in public avocations--and then plunging, in violent recoil, into social frivolities; vanities, dissipations, pranks, intrigues, excesses. men, too, act between extremes. in far less degree, however. life demands from most of them over-accentuation and concentration of their male-abilities, in physical and mental specialisations. and in reaction, they plunge into follies and vices. but the more virile keep their heads, and preserve a certain stability and conformity in their aberrations. while effeminate men, it is mainly who lapse into vicious excess. since woman supplies the inspiration and the morale of life, however, and since her momentous function of motherhood empowers her to make or to mar the race whereof she is creatrix, a nation has a greater claim upon its women, and has, at the same time, more reason and more right to restrict their liberty of action, and to direct their bent, than it has in the case of its men. its survival and its downfall tremble in the scales of life which woman holds. to compensate her for such restriction and limitation of her scope, obviously it owes her privileges, personal and economic. and a subconscious recognition of this fact has been, doubtless, the source of such privileges as she now enjoys. there have always been, as history shows, women in whom, from faulty heredity or culture, or from stress of circumstance, the male-traits have been abnormally developed; virile-brained, stout-hearted, muscular chieftainesses, chatelaines, abbesses, matrons; or (in less agreeable guise) amazons, shrews and viragoes. but always such were recognised as being abnormal, and for the most part as being repellant. it was not sought to manufacture them. it is only of late years that mannishness has become a serious cult. and now a dangerous thing has happened. because where formerly symptoms of feminism attacked individuals only--and these mainly the mature and eccentric--now the young and the normal are being indoctrinated wholesale. young girls taken during the malleable phases of growth and development, and forcibly shaped to masculine modes, become more or less irretrievably male of trait and bent; losing all power to recover the womanly normal. while on the other hand, there are assembling to-day, in an opposite ever-increasing and menacing camp, those others for whom feminism, with its extremist, exacting, self-reliant codes and modes, has no appeal; the pretty mindless, the idle frivolous, the pleasure-seeker, the freakish and the conscienceless--in a word, the ultra-feminines; in whom the woman-failings are unfortunately more conspicuous than are the woman-virtues. between these two extremes stand (and stand so far in gratifying number) the natural, admirably-balanced, noble and invaluable moderates--normal women content to be normal women, and to fulfil the destined rôle of such. and these are the saving grace of nations. apart from these, the sex is ever further and more dangerously separating into the two extremist camps; the mannish and strenuous, and the over-feminised and purposeless, more or less idle and frivolous, selfishly absorbed in clothes, in luxury and pleasures; exacting masculine tribute in mind and kind, with but little return in affection or ministry. in place, accordingly, of that fine normal poise of the contrasting man and woman-traits--which is the way of evolution and of progress--there is being substituted in the sex this degenerative segregation of its traits in two wholly opposite, and equally lopsided types. and of these, the purposeful and strenuous, all the while making for masculine standards, are all the while further discarding the beauty, the emotions, the delicacy and morale of true woman; while the mindless and vain, the attractive and charming, are more and more divorcing themselves from purpose, from seriousness, from noble endeavour and usefulness. and since rights accorded to women are shared by all, every new privilege feminists win for the sex in the sweat of their assiduous brows--liberty, latchkeys and general latitude--the ultra-feminines snatch, and apply to frivolous and profitless, or to demoralising ends; licence, extravagances, vices. the ultra-feminine, for the most part shallow and mindless (although many clever women belong to this order), absorbed in complacent culture of her oftentimes alluring personality, enhancing it, attiring it, developing its charm and graces, eager of homage and of tribute, is example of that parasitism miss schreiner condemns in the sex; example of qualities normally making for beauty, but from loss of balance, owing to warp, hereditary or of misdirection, morbidly feeding upon themselves. this parasitism is seen in its worst guise in the vast armies of prostitutes, who in every clime and epoch ravage the fair fruits of human life and achievement. against this parasitism in herself, self-absorbing, self-indulgent, enervating--defect of her reposefulness, of her æstheticism and vital self-consciousness--every woman needs to be upon her guard; to repress with firmness the smooth easy lapse it prompts toward sloth and pleasure; to exorcise the soft dry-rot of it, by power of aspiration and by prayer of ministry. (for noble truth it is that _laborare est orare_.) the woman's movement did good service for the sex in the early chapters of its history, when it made for due education of woman's higher masculine inherences; intelligence, application, self-reliance; as also in finding further fields of usefulness and self-expression for her. but unfortunately in the later chapters, over-cultivation of these traits has increasingly annulled and extinguished her own. and this with the unforeseen, disquieting resultant that a compensatory movement has set in apace among that other faction of the sex. so that the more mannish the feminists become in mode and aim, the more womanish become the effeminates. thus, albeit sincerely despising and decrying this, feminism has nevertheless indirectly fostered the growth of effeminacy. while, by supplying it with ever further liberty and scope for the indulgence of its freaks and failings, feminist propaganda has directly played into its hands. motherhood strikes deeper roots of attribute even in the ultra-feminine; brings thin streams of altruism to her neurasthenic breasts. in her children she forgets clothes, grows less greedy of masculine tribute, forgoes pleasures and excitements that had been the breath of life to her. the increasing emancipation of the sex from home-functions and from womanly and mother-duties, however--claimed and obtained with a view to further economic scope and application of its powers--has been exultantly hailed and exploited by the ultra-feminines for ever further indulgence of and wider range of action for their dangerous defects. and feminism will find--and this soon to its dismay--that the battle it has waged against the other sex has been as nothing to the battle it has yet to wage against its own, in the person of the eternal effeminate; idle, luxurious, parasitic and effete, who, with her brood, engenders the dry-rot which crumbles mighty civilisations, or topples them in revolution. v of the two camps, the vast majority of masculines will always seek their loves and wives among the ultra-feminines; frail and erratic, but attractive and more or less womanly. so long as men are men, the feminine graces, even in their spurious forms of effeminacy, will possess more vital appeal for them than do the intelligences and utilities. the feminist camp, further and further commandeering the intelligent and self-reliant, the worthy and purposeful of the sex, while more and more discarding the charms and the softness thereof, will be further and further deserted by men. and of the happy mean--the well-balanced woman, at once tender and intelligent, devoted and charming--there will be ever fewer available. what then is the future, biological and sociological, of races whose wives and mothers will have been drawn mainly from the shallow-brained and shallow-hearted, from the less dutiful, the less high and right-minded? to say nothing of the less constitutionally-sound, the ultra-feminine being, for the most part, a neurotic? the great majority of such will decline part, indeed, in functions so dull and distasteful as the mothering and rearing of children. the feminist wife, with her intelligent grip of economics and her stern sense of citizen-duty, would fulfil her racial function (in accordance with malthusius) during intervals of more absorbing and strenuous activities. but when once the novelty--which gives a certain piquancy for some men to a mannishness some women are able to wear quite prettily and attractively in early youth--shall have worn away, the poor feminist's chances of marriage will be few, indeed; save with men-weaklings, requiring the virile support of a strong-minded, muscular wife. the feminist makes a far more honest and reliable, sincere and helpful, mate than does the ultra-feminine. but men prefer the latter. male characteristics are to be found among their male acquaintance. and it is not a normal, nor is it a wholesome instinct in a man, to seek in sex the traits of his own. in the cult of mannishness, woman loses her strongest, her noblest and tenderest appeal for true men--the appeal of her womanhood. and losing it, she abandons the male to the toils of the enemy camp; to those whose womanishness partakes, at all events, of the attributes of a sex complementary and supplementary to his own. * * * * * unhappy wights! how nature has handicapped them--in order to spur them to their virile part of founding and providing for the family! vi as innocent of misappropriating that which is cæsar's as they are ignorant of the biological verities, some women-leaders and prime-movers in feminism exact and exult in the warm young, zealous adulation and hero-worship of their followers; never suspecting that such tribute is rendered, in fact, to the _male_ in them. both they and their votaries believe themselves loyal and thrall to their finger-tips to woman and the woman-cause. whereas they are, in reality, hero-worshipping, on the one hand, the male in their cult, and on the other, the masculine traits of its female exponents. against man himself and the maleness that is his by natural right, many are filled with hottest distrust and aversion. yet while sex-antagonism is thus strong in them in fealty to their creed, nature is strong in them too. and with gentle irony she exacts their homage for the traits of the foe--masquerading in guise of a female! heroes to worship, every naturally-constituted woman craves. and it is the hero--far less than it is the heroine--in the feminist leaders, their qualities of fight and masterfulness, of virile brain and concrete enterprise, which evoke their adherents' devotion and tribute. some feminist leaders bid, indeed, as strenuously for and claim as jealously the undivided loyalty and subjection of their flock as ever tyrant-man demanded of the sex. in schools and colleges too, the girls make gods and heroes of those of their sex who excel in manly sports. they have never a suspicion that their gods and heroes are not goddesses and heroines. similars being unattractive to one another, the exposition of woman-traits leaves woman more or less unmoved. as nature destined, the woman-heart goes out to those virtues and valours which are the natural complement of her own. this latter-day vogue is not a normal, nor a pretty development. but it is another of the inevitable consequences of disturbing nature's balances. nature's plan and her methods of administration are so perfect that when left to herself she preserves her equilibrium and secures her aims by the safest and, at the same time, by the simplest expedients. when man destroys the hawks which, normally, reduce the smaller fry of birds to their allotted quotum in the scheme of things, however, the smaller fry multiply inordinately and devour his cherries and his corn. and when he destroys the smaller fry, the slugs and grubs and _aphides_ multiply and devour his lettuces and roses. so it is with human traits and faculties. the balance of the normal is the way alone of health and happiness and progress. there is great boast now-a-days of friendship and comradeship between the sexes. yet though friendship and comradeship are good allies of love, they are but sterile, uninspiring substitutes for the profounder, higher, vital and undying emotions of the true love-passion. on the other hand, attachments between men and men, and between women and women, are strengthening and intensifying; absorbing the emotion and devotion formerly and normally bestowed on members of the opposite sex. while attraction between persons of opposite sex becomes ever lighter and triter in sentiment; serving more and more for brief distraction and provocative pastime rather than for a living and abiding bond. this misplaced affection for members of the same sex arises from the attraction of traits of the opposite sex unduly developed in them. while indifference to members of the opposite sex results from lack in these of the characteristics of their sex, normally accentuated. thus a woman is more drawn to one of her own sex possessing virile characteristics, physical or mental, than she is drawn to a weak-brained, emasculate man. masculine women are attracted likewise by the womanly graces and quality of feminine women. while men find in some members of their own sex, feminine traits of sympathy and sentiment absent in women of male-proclivity. all is an expression of the law of the attraction of opposites, which (normally) causes persons of opposite sex to be strongly drawn to one another. on the other hand, the development in himself, or in herself, of the characteristics of the opposite sex makes members of either sex independent of and indifferent to members of the other, by supplying them with a spurious counterfeit of qualities it is natural to seek in those others. vii professor drummond, from whom i quote frequently, as being one of those biologists on the side of the angels, writes thus beautifully: "sex is a paradox; it is that which separates in order to unite.... there is no instance in nature of division of labour being brought to such extreme specialisation. the two sexes were not only set apart to perform different halves of the same function, but each so entirely lost the power of performing the whole function that even with so great a thing at stake as the continuance of the species _one_ could not discharge it. "it is important to notice this absence of necessity for sex having been created--the absence of any known necessity, from the merely physiological standpoint. "is it inconceivable that nature should sometimes do things with an ulterior object, an ethical one, for instance? to no one with any acquaintance with nature's ways, will it be possible to conceive of such a purpose as the sole purpose. "had sex done nothing more than make an interesting world, the debt of evolution to reproduction had been incalculable.... what exactly maleness is, and what femaleness, has been one of the problems of the world. at least five hundred theories of their origin are already in the field, but the solution seems to have baffled every approach. sex has remained almost to the present hour an ultimate mystery of creation.... "the contribution of each to the evolution of the human race is special and unique. to the man has been mainly assigned the fulfilment of the first great function--the struggle for life. woman, whose higher contribution has not yet been named, is the chosen instrument for carrying on the struggle for the life of others. "that task, translated into one great word is maternity--which is nothing but the struggle for the life of others transfigured, transferred to the moral sphere. focused in a single human being, this function, as we rise in history, slowly begins to be accompanied by those heaven-born psychical states which transform the femaleness of the older order into the motherhood of the new." out of the misconception of sex as having no other purpose or significance than that of reproduction merely, there has arisen the further misconception that, lacking other purpose or significance, the sex-characteristics of woman may be obliterated in her not only without injury, but with benefit to her; as being superfluous and hampering impedimenta merely, when reproductive issues are beside the question. yet since faculty lapses first in its latest and highest developments, sex-deterioration manifests most in the higher mental and moral sex-characteristics. one result, therefore, of not fostering, by culture and by avocation, sex-specialisations upon planes of mind and aptitude, is that, while lapsing in its higher functions, sex remains operative still upon the physical plane, and functions crudely--perhaps viciously thereon. just as intelligence becomes dense and degraded when its finer qualities are not exercised, and their development thus raised to finer issues. moreover, by denying to sex and to the rites of love any but parental issues, the individual, emotional and spiritual issues of the human union are ignored; a limitation all the more dishonouring, because of the present-day misconception of parenthood as being a purely "physical," and, accordingly, an inferior function. there is not, of course, in all the complex marvel of human metabolism, such an anomaly as a purely physical function. digestion even is far, indeed, from being such, since by way of this a slice of bread is transformed into living personality, living thought and impulse, living action. sex is manifestly a spiritual and an eternal principle. because, by way of its essential dual differentiations and intensifying operations, matter becomes endued not only with life and faculty, but, having become living matter, it becomes endued, by power of reproduction, with the potential of eternal life and faculty. even more, it becomes endued with the potential of the eternal unfoldment of ever-further intensifying life and faculty. sex is, in truth, for both genders, such a convergence of every characteristic--physical, mental and emotional--in a highly specialised focus, that the whole outlook upon life becomes highly specialised and intensified thereby; every impression and experience becoming instinct and charged with intrinsic meanings, vividness and colour. and this apart wholly from relation to the other sex. although, of course, the focus and intensity of the traits of the one sex are _accentuated_ in vividness and richness, in response to the complementary traits of the other. it is sex that energises men to be great; great leaders of men, great writers, great statesmen, great soldiers, great sailors, explorers--great sinners and great saints. sex it is makes women great also; great mates for great men, great mothers, writers, ministers to poor humanity--great saints. the mystery of sex is, surely, master-key to all the other mysteries of the cosmos. * * * * * viii in aiming at hermaphrodism, feminism is contriving not only at frustration of all that evolution has achieved in life and faculty, but it is making for the extinction of life itself. the hermaphrodite is incapable of parenthood. and in the degree to which members of either sex lapse toward neuterdom, in body or in mind, they become incapable of transmitting to offspring all those higher developments of form and faculty which are, essentially, sex-differentiations. the present-day decline in parental impulse and affection, which shows, among other signs, in ever-decreasing birth-rates, is a symptom of temperamental neuterdom; evidence alike of sex-decline, and, in this, of decline of that vital energy and spiritual impulse whereof sex is the manifestation. such trend toward race-suicide denotes, in the race, that same neurasthenia and pusillanimity, which, in the individual, impel him to personal suicide. latter-day marriage, greedily grasping all that life and love bestow while grudging any due to life and love, is not true marriage--but is sacrilege. between this and the mating of true men and women, who, in gratitude for love, pay tribute joyfully to life in lives to follow after them, is all the vital difference, in impulse and emotion, between the ship of love--with its mysterious freight--immured within a narrow lock whereof the gate to the beyond is sealed, and the ship of love launched free upon the open sea of human destiny--a shining sea of faith and hope, which tides beyond the narrow mortal gateway toward a great unknown; remote, illimitable, veiled in everlasting silence. _this_ ship fares forth upon its voyage of mystery, beatified by full surrender of all lesser issues to that sacred one of the eternal human--a surrender which endues true marriage with tenderness and awe and beauty. * * * * * _do we not pitch our songs too low, o sweet--my singers?_ chapter ix the impending subjection of man "the earth never tires.... nature is rude and incomprehensible at first; be not discouraged, keep on, there are divine things well envelop'd; i swear to you there are divine things more beautiful than words can tell." _walt whitman._ i in the long and painful history of man's more or less total failure to value and to honour woman for her greatest, her most vital and self-sacrificing part in human affairs, none has approached in obliquity his recent deplorable blunder of awarding her the suffrage and the right to sit in parliament, as recognition of her war-services. all the long ages of mother-surrender, of quiet heroism and attainment, all the best, beautiful years of women's lives which the burden and sickness, the weariness, danger and anguish have devoured down the centuries, while the mothers were giving themselves to be the nation's bone and blood and brain, to nourish, cherish, and upbring it--all were passed over without word or sign. not for her long ages of devoted duty to the nation's sick and helpless, for rearing and safeguarding its priceless infant and child-life, for administering its homes--fashioning, cleansing, beautifying, contriving, making the utmost of its means and ends--not for her inestimable services as man's good comrade and wise counseller, his love and friend and faithful help, in sorrow, evil and adversity; not even for her age-long, arduous labours and achievements in religion, charity, reform. for none of these, her great intrinsic and eternal ministries to life and to humanity, has man now set her by him in the van of things. but for filling shells and felling trees, for turning lathes and driving motors, ploughing fields and lighting street-lamps--all valuable duties, it is true, in the crisis we have passed through, and indispensable to carrying on the nation's business. yet what a drop from the supreme and tender to the trite and banal, from the vital and essential to the merely incidental, is seen in this belated recompense. not woman, generatrix of humanity and inspiration of all that is fairest in humanity, has been now honoured--but woman the bus-conductor, ticket-clipper, clerk and agricultural labourer, woman in breeches and workman's overall, woman whom german frightfulness had dislocated for a space from her high lot and labours; twisting her powers awry to fit a hideous revulsion of barbarism. how, if the gods ever laugh at the fantastic tricks of poor mankind, they must now have laughed (or wept) over the opportunity that one sex had--and forfeited--to requite the other's finest merit. how deeply-moving and far-reaching in its impulse and its inspiration would have been the tribute, had it been made in reverent gratitude to the mothers-of-men who had saved the world by mothering the men who saved the empire--for achievement stamped with the high and unique quality of service that woman alone could have rendered. and not because, when tested by men's standards, she proved herself a worthy second-best in doing things that men have always done. the gods must long have wept, i think, that men had thought so lightly of the women living every day beside them, surrendering their lives and powers, their interests, desires and individuation; toiling over cooking-pans and wash-tubs, tied for years to children's cots, for life to some or another person's sick-bed; smothering talents, impulse, hopes, impatiences, to find the soft and simple word; solacing, inspiring, making-believe above an aching spirit and a breaking heart that all was fair and well with the world. and, moreover, in every generation making these beautiful fictions ever a fraction more truth and less fiction. for the gods alone know how that kindlier, purer and more tender home-environment which women have created in men's stony-hearted cities involves the most laborious, heart-wearing, complex and widest exercise of faculty of any human task. women themselves had long been tiring of it; stung to the soul and mortified by centuries of man's ingratitude--when not contempt. nevertheless, where love and duty did not, chains of custom and tradition bound them faithful to their oars. till german frightfulness releasing them, the cry is now: since you can do something better and more profitable than merely to row the old galley of life--since you can do men's work, forsooth, come out into the market-place and help us pay our big war-bill! and yet--whither will drift the galley of life when its rowers put their strength elsewhere? ii in the haze of false sentiment exaggerating--not the value of masculine work done by the sex during war, because this was, of course, invaluable and indispensable, but exaggerating, absolutely, the values of this work as compared with the woman's work it had been doing previously, the decision to admit women to parliament was a precipitate and an ill-considered measure, by no means innocent of party motive. threatening, as it does, a drastic sweep of all political, economic and every other difference between the standards, training, and employment of the sexes, it was pressed forward, nevertheless, not only with characteristic masculine failure to recognise the vital significance of the other sex in human things, but in utter blindness to social and racial consequences, immediate and remote, which make it possibly the most momentous decision ever arrived at in the history of human progress. showing how little it was known for the turning-point in our great destiny, the question was debated with unseemly levity, while less than half the parliamentary members troubled (or had hardihood) to record their votes; the abstention of the others proving which way blew the straws of their faint wills. and of those voting in favour, half, perhaps, did so (as some confessed) under intimidation of otherwise losing their seats. (what would be said of the soldier who should turn his back upon the enemy for fear of losing life even?) no more than twenty-five found courage to say their "no's" like honest gentleman. yet far from enfranchisement having been a burning need blazing in the hearts of women, their newly-awarded vote required to be spurred and whipped out of all but a small minority. or coaxed from them by abandoning appeal on all the wider issues of imperial and national policy, and, in so far as their interest was sought, by reducing the programme to personal and domestic issues--electric lighting in their parlours, hot-water taps in their kitchens, and so forth. and here was seen, at once, the threat of a grave and an increasing diversion from that purely political outlook of men, which should be impersonal in issue, broad in enterprise. not that the human and domestic side is a whit less momentous than the more abstract and national. but appealing to a different order of mind, it demands that different order of mind which characterises the woman-sex, to deal with it effectively. the plea that women will acquire in time the masculine political view-point threatens, on the other hand, the loss in them of their own highly-specialised and invaluable interests, morale and qualities; which, being womanly of impulse and of trend, make for the individual welfare, happiness and elevation of the nation's members. iii as with every other human function, there are two departments of politics. and the house of commons represents man's. it stands for all that is best accomplished politically by his highly-specialised order of brain; by his concrete energy and initiative, his justice and rationalism, his power of administration, and his uncompromising sternness--pitilessness, if need be--to deal with and to punish crime and aggression, national and international. it stands, in a word, for that virile outlook and the virile grip in statesmanship which are indispensable to materialise a people's prosperity and to pioneer its progress. these are the functions of _men_. just as the army and navy, science and commerce, are the functions of men. because the male bent and intellect are those best fitted to raise these developments to their highest and most effective issues, just as the male physique and energy are best fitted to achieve these issues in material results. had anything been needed to emphasise the values of such virile characteristics in the administration of a nation's policy, the war furnished it. and the many blunders and vacillations marring the conduct of the war emphasised the lack of these invaluable masculine qualities in the concurrent house of commons. army, navy, and air-services proved their manhood doughtily in their respective provinces. had they been supplemented by an equally virile statesmanship, the war, having begun, would have been brought to a speedy termination. in point of fact, it would never have begun. if now, our british politics are already so lacking in the manly ability and grip indispensable to national permanence and progress, the presence of women in parliament can but further emasculate these. it may be said that some women outside the house are more male of mind and mode (not to speak of muscle) than are some men inside. but this is reason, surely, for replacing these weak males by stronger ones, rather than for adulterating british statesmanship with femaleness. the presence of a masculine woman in a house--whether this be writ with a small or a capital letter--far from stiffening the manly calibre of weak men in it, only further enervates and paralyses them. to serve on a committee of mixed sex is to realise this. women should be represented in the counsels of the nation--but not in the councils of men. they should have a house of their own, wherein to foster the interests of women and children mainly, as well as to further the humanities and the moralities; which are, at the same time, woman's true political sphere and her chiefest concern--because she and the child most suffer from failures thereof. thus, the house of men would be relieved of problems their sex is unqualified to deal with. while more time and energy would be left them to dispose of affairs they are best fitted to administer. as already pointed out, the all-potent factor of sex intervening, members of neither sex are capable of doing their best work while in association with the other. sex-rivalries are stirred, or sex-antagonisms. either of which range the sexes on opposite sides; thus precluding amicable co-operation. or they engender sex-ascendancy. which, making one sex dominate or defer to the other, precludes intelligent co-operation. through all, moreover, only too often run threads of intrigue, to entangle and hamper the powers of both. british politics have notably declined since woman's incursion therein. british commerce, once supreme among the nations, has notably declined since women entered business-houses. good and thorough work demands, beyond all things, undivided concentration of the powers upon it. and for nine persons out of ten, this concentration is impossible while in the presence of members of the opposite sex. and emphatically this is true of the male, since woman exercises a hypnotic, and, accordingly, an enervating influence upon him. worse still, he poses for her: becoming meretricious and insincere. it is held by some that women in parliament might elevate the codes and modes of latter-day politics, many of our best men withholding themselves therefrom because of bad odour imparted by self-seeking and unscrupulous politicians. but let us keep our house of commons a house of men, and make it representative of the nation's finest manhood. it is the first and foremost function of the sex, the way of national success and progress. and just as the presence of women would blunt the pioneering spirit and cripple the action of a party of arctic explorers, so women in the house must blunt the enterprise and hamper the exploits of statesmanship. so far, the good sense alike of women as of men has declared against the innovation; rejecting, by large majorities, all but one of women parliamentary candidates. it remains to be seen, however, whether men outside the house will later endorse the new departure, by electing members of the other sex to represent them. a thing impossible for one sex to do for the other, of course, seeing that not only do men and women arrive at their different conclusions by wholly different routes, but all questions bear wholly different values for them. it may be argued that the existence of dual departments of politics, and dual points-of-view is argument for electing representatives of both sexes to the commons. not so, however. each sex is specialist in its own domain. and an aurist wastes time, and most likely blunders, when he applies himself to treat eye-diseases. an oculist wastes time, and probably blunders, when delicate ear-operations are required of him. since by his dual constitution, moreover, man possesses, by inheritance from his mother, the quotum of woman-apprehension, foresight, and altruism required to present the woman-bent and view-point in his outlook and conduct of political and civic affairs, woman's personal intervention in these is as superfluous as it would be harmful. further, there are two orders of men: an order strictly male in trend and talent, and an order whose mentality is tinctured with a higher than average proportion of womanly conservatism, sympathy and intuition. and these two orders of male--typified, respectively, by the conservative and the radical parties--perpetually struggling to secure the measures prompted by their respective orders of mind, and intermittently gaining ascendancy, sustain a poise, or mean, between the unduly conservative and traditional, and the unduly radical and transitional in our political administration. these two orders of mentality are found again in youth and age. all healthy and vigorous-minded young men are radical of bias; hot-headed, precipitate and intolerant of crusted orthodoxy, keen to demolish old institutions and established methods. while maturity makes for conservatism. it _knows_. and having learned by experience the values of institutions which have become institutions because of their values, it is prudent in its counsels of slow and stable reform, in its distrust of drastic, precipitate change, and, beyond all, in its wise misdoubtings of the world in general as being better than it is, and ripe, accordingly, for the best things. for the present, there are numberless problems and questions of women's industrial employment, of children's employment, of the industrial supervision of young girls and their moral protection; problems of female drunkenness and prostitution, crimes of children, crimes against infants and children; questions of health, of the education and upbringing of the young, of dress and conduct, and of the general moral purification and the mental elevation of the race--with all of which women are essentially qualified to deal; and the vital national importance whereof men have proved themselves as incapable of apprehending as they have shown themselves powerless to administer them. the two classes of national problems, or the two departments into which most of these problems might be advantageously sub-classed, should be recognised as being the functions, respectively, of the one or of the other sex, and should be deputed for consideration to the house of men or to the house of women. with the result that in both, every problem of reform would be dealt with by the sex specialised by nature, by sympathy, and by training, best to understand and best to legislate for it. as with the lords, either house should have power to question or to reject the conclusions of the other. we need urgently, indeed, such a house of women to employ its native wisdom, its intuitive apprehension, and its moral and emotional impulse, and, moreover, to bring its experience and tact to bear upon a hundred-and-one tangled and neglected issues of moral and social reform. in order to remedy evils that have come, from long neglect, to be a cancer, slowly and surely sapping and vitiating our national life and endangering our racial supremacy. iv that women may do useful work in male departments of politics and economics is quite beside the question. far more valuable work is needed and is possible from them in their own especial fields of aptitude. in these latter, moreover, they would be fostering, in place of sacrificing, that morale and those distinctive talents nature has specialised in them. while their withdrawal _in toto_ from male political and economic functions would put men on their mettle, and stimulate their efforts and achievement therein. woman's influence, like that of religion, is most potent when it is indirect and inspirational. like the church, when she exchanges her indirect and devotional ministrations for direct and material ones, temporal or militant, she destroys herself or the peoples she dominates. or she destroys both. it is common fallacy that so long as the world's work is done and its affairs tolerably well conducted, it is of no significance whatsoever by which sex these ends are attained. sight is lost of the intrinsic truth that life exists for man--not man for life; its purpose being the evolution of the human species by way of the evolution of human faculty. the world's work has no slightest value save as spur and instrument of human education. and the evolution of the dual orders of human faculty having differentiated the human species into two sexes, each representing a wholly different order of faculty--obviously the perfection of both orders of faculty and, accordingly, the further evolution of both sexes wherein these orders are respectively specialised, can be attained only by the exercise, by each order, of the rôle and the functions that best evoke its powers. if, therefore, the male sex repudiates its allotted rôle and functions, and forfeits, in consequence, the education of its distinctive talents and moral, by shelving its responsibilities upon the other sex, howsoever capable a substitute this other sex may prove itself, man acts as foolishly and fatuously as the schoolboy who shirks his schooling and the discipline thereof, by enlisting his capable sister to do his lessons for him. it is, at the same time, man's duty and his privilege manfully to shoulder and ably to perform his own allotted part in life's affairs. evading this, or from a false conception of chivalry allowing woman to usurp a share therein, he degenerates inevitably; in default of his natural spur to development. moreover he obliges--or connives at woman doing likewise, in respect of her allotted part. that he has already grown so slack, his virile pride and enterprise have so far lapsed, as to reconcile him to woman's usurpation of his masculine functions and prerogatives should warn him of incipient dry-rot in him. as too, the portentous fact that had he not declined in physical and mental calibre, she could never so readily and efficiently have taken his place as we have seen her doing. so efficiently, indeed, that he will be hard put to it to regain and to retain his lost professional and industrial footing, by proving himself appreciably the better man. as dr. havelock ellis says, if they are to cope with the new feminism, men must needs look to their laurels and produce a new masculinism. for truly these weak-chinned, neurotic young men of the rising generation are no match at all for the heavy-jawed, sinewy, resolute young women feminist aims and methods are giving us. on every side, in politics, literature, journalism, oratory, commerce, even in scientific invention, women are swiftly coming up abreast of men, and threaten shortly to out-distance them.--and this upon their own ground. on the other hand, the finer and more exquisite womanly qualities and aptitudes, the emotions and devotions; purity, sweetness, patience, forbearance, tenderness, lovingness and lovableness, together with the courtesies and graces, have fallen out of culture and are fast declining toward extinction. and this, in the measure of the mushroom-growth of masculine abilities and aims and bent, now substituted for them in the sex. with which decline of womanly characteristics, the religion and nobility, virility and chivalry, manly reverence and regard for women, wherewith the true mother illumines the souls of her sons, and which are man's response to the appeal of true woman, are waning rapidly also. there is, in all men worth the name, an instinctive recognition that the world's most strenuous labours and the world's administration are their natural functions, and that upon their sex, accordingly, rests the responsibility alike of progress or decline in these directions. this sense of responsibility is both stimulating and uplifting, in the degrees of its realisation and fulfilment. the yielding, by man, to the other sex, of masculine essential rights and obligations is, at the same time, a symptom in him of declining virility, physical and mental, and a cause inevitable of his further speedy decadence. the position yielded, and equality in all things ceded to woman, that pride in his sex, in himself, and in his work, which were his strongest incentives to progress, drop to ever lower grades. until he comes at last to the state of the decadent savage, who keeps as many wives to work for him as their work for him enables him to keep. the spirit and pride of sex are normal and inspiring, and are the expression of that impulse which has directed, in both sexes, the contrary trend of both. no man of mettle feels ever again the same zest or spur to achievement in a rôle that has become equally woman's. arrogance? possibly. but wholesome and energising. defect of that pride in his man's mission which inspired drake, columbus, nelson, cæsar, shakespeare, newton, to great conquest. without it, man ceases to be man. that it is a factor to be reckoned with, was proved by the recent election, which was signalised by being woman's first authorised entry into the political arena--and was characterised by nothing so much as by man's indifference, even his neglect to record his vote. and that it is a factor to be reckoned with, is further and seriously proved by the slackness and diminished zest and output of masculine labour, since the other sex has invaded the field. woman, for her part, is characterised by a similar spirit and pride of her sex. equally she loses it when men intrude upon her province. and this sex-pride and spirit in her would be nobly intensified and uplifted to ever higher levels of expression and attainment, were she but assured of the fine quality and issues of those woman-faculties and functions, by way of which it is her privilege first to create life, and afterwards to minister to it. a potent factor in man's impotence to hold his own either in moral or achievement, when pitted directly against the other sex, is that power many women exercise of recruiting their vital forces from those of persons--and of men, particularly--in association with them. the highest levels of work and inspiration are the product of _reserve_ and surplus forces. when these are depleted, only languid and lower-grade aims and capacities are possible. the extent to which over-worked women may impair the health and constitutional vigour of men associated with them in work was strikingly shown during the changed conditions of war. surrounded by over-wrought girls and women, who kept themselves going by stimulus of nervous excitement, of strong tea or more dangerous drugs, many men, co-workers or heads of departments, became neurasthenic wrecks. others lapsed to the condition of infirm old men. the like was seen in fathers and husbands of such over-wrought war-workers. and nervous depletion occasioned by working-wives has doubtless much to do with the inanition and depression now crippling our industrial output. i may be charged with holding a brief for the enemy-sex. if so, it is not only because man's cause is woman's, but, moreover, because his present disposition to surrender his prerogatives all round shows him dangerously blind to the truth of woman's power; misdirection whereof from its natural channels menaces not only him, but woman herself, and the race. _find the woman!_ said the french cynic. jestingly: because he no more than other men had gauged the profundity of the saying, in all its deep and vast biological phenomena and implications. our national survival stands in jeopardy already, indeed, from the lower-grade males--narrow-brained neurotics or feeble-brained neurasthenics--whom latter-day women are producing yearly in tens of thousands. and the deplorable truth of this degeneracy is overlooked, because no more than a fractional number of our doctors distinguish between the normal and the average. with the result, that comparing an abnormal with others more abnormal, they declare the less abnormal satisfactory. of the fine physique, the vital health and faculty, the zest and joy of living which characterise true normality--and which are the birthright of every human being--only the few have any conception. it is significant that the sole ancient civilisations now surviving, india and china, have never hazarded their chances of survival by emancipating their women. on the other hand, because their women are in bondage, personally and psychologically, and because their women's vital powers are exhausted by laborious and de-sexing occupations, the moral and material progress of these peoples is at low ebb. v recruiting statistics have shown us the damocles-sword of decadence suspended by a hair above our heads; have shown us our great people so riddled with disease, defect and abnormality, that nearly _half our manhood was declared_ unfitted for man's elementary duty of fighting for his country ( · per cent. only being classed in grade i.). all that our centuries of evolutionary progress have achieved for us, all that the race has achieved for itself by faculty and enterprise, integrity and industry, threatens now to be sacrificed to a feminist fanaticism, which, denying to woman any more vital or tender human faculties or offices than those of man, has increasingly repudiated all else for her than rights to pit her wits and muscles against his. england has long been, and has once again proved herself supreme among the nations. because england, more than any other land, had freed her women from the more laborious industrial employments; leaving them, in consequence, more vital power to put into the making of a splendid race, fine of body, stable of character; the men of it charged with virile energy and enterprise, the women house-proud, home-abiding; faithful wives and admirable mothers. recruiting statistics have valuably emphasised the truth that in those localities where women are most employed in labour, there disease and degeneracy are most rampant. significantly it was shown that colliery-districts and the universities (the latter with about per cent. of grade i. men), were conspicuous in providing the greatest number of men qualified for military service. why? because neither the mothers of men enrolled in universities, nor, for the most part, those of colliery-districts, are employed industrially. while, on the other hand, the health and physique of cotton-mill operatives proved so "alarmingly low" that of weavers and spinners only could even be passed for army-training. of examined, only men of one cotton-spinning town were graded i.; only were graded ii., while were graded iii. and iv. again, _why_? because, unlike colliery-districts where the standard of health was notably good, in cotton-towns where physique and health were "alarmingly low" the vast majority of wives and mothers are employed in factories. it is important, moreover, to note that in such gradings of men for military service, even those classed first were by no means necessarily normal or vigorous. on the contrary, many passed were later shown defective, by breakdown under stress of military discipline. further, that so many as _per cent._ of the young manhood of our highest culture were disqualified for grade i. is a serious circumstance. mr. lloyd george has said regarding this most vital question: "the next great lesson of the war is that if britain has to be thoroughly equipped to meet any emergencies, the state must take a more constant and a more intelligent interest in the health and fitness of the people. if the empire is to be equal to its task, the men and women who make up the empire must be equal to it. the number of b and c men is prodigious. i asked the minister of national service how many more men could we have put into the fighting ranks if the health of the country had been properly looked after. i staggered at the reply: '_at least a million_.' a virile race has been wasted by neglect and want of forethought, and it is a danger to the state and to the empire. i solemnly warn my fellow countrymen that you cannot maintain an a empire with a c population." this estimate of abnormality, by reason of a million of the nation's young manhood disqualified by definite disease, defect or degeneracy, is far below the mark. because owing to the urgent need for fighting men, the standard of fitness was compulsorily low. and the estimate takes no account of the huge number of such low-grade "fit," who succumbed in death or incapacitation to the strain of military training, or to the vicissitudes of active service. the _british medical journal_ has published figures showing that of , , men examined by medical boards--the men constituting "a fair sample of the male population between the ages of and , and a smaller proportion of the more fit between and "--_only in could be classed in grade i_. that is, out of every members of our british manhood in its best years of life, _only were up to the mark in health and normality_. the _journal_ comments on "this mass of physical inefficiency, with all its concomitant human misery, and direct loss to the country." sir auckland geddes, addressing the federation of british industries, stated that "_appalling facts about the health of the nation have been disclosed in reports of medical examinations carried out by recruiting authorities_." one of the most startling and disquieting of these disclosures was that of hundreds of thousands of our men, between the ages of and , dying of tuberculosis. despite all this, however, because our authorities fear to face the truth and the drastic economic upheaval involved in the prohibition of all young wives and mothers from the stress of breadwinning, attempt is being made to shelve the whole blame of this appalling state of national health upon faulty industrial and hygienic conditions; too long hours of work, imperfect ventilation, bad housing, inferior cooking, poor wages, and so forth. all factors, of course, but only contributory to the great vital one. and in order to placate the public conscience, reforms in these directions are promised. excellent and sadly needed reforms, it is true--in so far as they go; but bound to failure because they will not go to the root of things. they will be tried, no doubt, in our promised reconstruction-scheme. but being palliative merely, further holocausts of human life and faculty and happiness will be sacrificed in the experiment. sooner or later--and heaven send it be sooner lest it come too late!--the truth must be confronted, and the crisis met. the further the feminism now threatening our downfall secures footing, however, and more and more diverts the nation's life-resources into merely economic channels, more and more squanders them in abnormal ambitions and output, the more deeply-rooted and more desperate will have become the cancer of our national decadence. and incalculably the more difficult and dangerous will be the task of its eradication. the reform should have come while _man_ still held the reins securely in his grasp--ere feminism had entrenched itself and its deforming aims and powers behind an enfranchised woman-sex; to intimidate and out-number his own. because women in general, misled by these false standards, and, moreover, deteriorated by de-sexing training, become every year less and less disposed toward home and family-life; less and less willing to burden themselves with the duties and sacrifices indispensable to the proper fulfilment of wife and motherhood. and now, more than ever, when they are still further to be pitted against men in the industrial struggle, woman-instincts and aptitudes will become ever more warped and enfeebled in them. the danger menacing us is the graver because, while disease is the expression of a healthy vital conscience protesting, in terms of pain and disability, against conditions, environmental or personal, adverse to normal states of health and development (and to which the healthy living organism declines therefore to conform), degeneracy is characterised by a vital conscience of so low an order that it conforms and adapts the type, without pain or protest, to conditions perversive of healthy normality and of further evolutionary advance. there comes a stage, accordingly, in racial decline, when the racial vital conscience no longer rebels, in terms of disease, but conforms, in terms of degeneracy, to artificial, abnormal and evil conditions of living, environmental and personal. and then as happened to those mighty civilisations snuffed out before us--the major portion of the community having lapsed from health and normality into decadent states of mind and body, vice and corruption become its normal both of mind and body. evil and chaos run riot. till nature, defied and transgressed at every turn, opens the vials of her wrath, and pours forth her microbic myriads to sow death and destruction wholesale. thus she sweeps from the board of life another great race--that had failed. vi already, there are disquieting signs that the physical disease and abnormality among us have engendered such degrees of mental and of moral aberration as may lead at any hour to grave disruption. below the quiet order of our british constitution are heard, from time to time, the rumble of chaotic and disintegrating forces. with growing frequency, the shriek of anarchy shrills. red flags break. we shall be truly fortunate if we succeed in bridging over, without more or less serious upheaval, the critical gap between war and peace. woman is nature's peacemaker and welder. she it is who, in the home, knits the loose ends of the multiple incongruous and turbulent human elements into social unities--families, friendly communities, townships and peoples--by her annealing powers of affection and sympathy, of charity and intuitive understanding. "_keep the home-fires burning!_" sang our soldiers. no considerations of the british constitution, the london stock exchange, or worshipful civic company, fired them to heroism, spurred them to victory. but for the home-fires burning in suburban villas, in four-roomed cottages or two-room lodgings--as equally in hereditary mansions--it was, our gallants dared and died, and reaped their glorious triumph. my father, an early and an earnest advocate of female enfranchisement, used to counsel lord beaconsfield that to enfranchise women would be to establish the conservative party for a century, at least. because nine out of ten women were, in those days, conservative. since then, feminism has been active, however. less by way of direct propaganda of anarchy or bolshevism, be it said, than by fostering that masculine bent and spirit of material unrest and discontent which destroy in women all the finer, fairer ideals and attributes of their intrinsic womanhood, and those self-denying ordinances which so sweeten and dignify the humblest tasks as to content the doers of them with the inspiring sense that they are worth the while. with the result that nothing so characterises the great mass of latter-day working women as a smouldering irrational and intemperate socialism. and the socialism of working-women (as, too, of the majority of working-men) is based on total ignorance of the impracticability and evil of making for universal equality in a vast scheme of things, the values and the ultimate successes whereof depend absolutely on preserving those highly-specialised diversities and inequalities, alike of faculty and bent, into which life, with its countless degrees of evolutionary development, has progressively graded living creatures, brute and human. the innumerable orders and classes of our sociology are as inevitable as they are invaluable. because they serve for stages of faculty and avocation upon that biological gradient of ascent by which we climb. as was pointed out earlier in this book, woman, although passive and reposeful of inherence, is variable and unstable of temperament; her powers being eternally at ebb and flux, in order that she may be the medium of those evolutionary mutations which engender human progress. a nature truly perilous when too great dominance is permitted the sex in affairs so momentous as those of state-administration, upon the firm stability and permanence whereof depend so many destinies. because this evolutionary impulsiveness of hers is dangerously liable to express itself in irresponsible, chaotic and anarchical outbreaks. as history shows, wreckage of many once mighty, but now extinct, civilisations set in when the males thereof weakly, or basely, surrendered their manhood's rights of rule to a sex disqualified by its native non-conformability to rule in national and international policies. should women ever come to exercise political power identical with man's, they would be liable to subvert the whole national and international administration of their country on an impulse. not solely from craving for novelty, but, too, as result of their inherent bent toward forward and precipitate movement, and their implicit faith in change as being necessarily _reform_. nations in which the feminine element is strong betray the native fickleness thereof in perpetual change of ministry--even in frequent revolution. this element of instability is ireland's curse, the flaw in her people's splendid celtic faculty. in view of the stern and strenuous and narrowly-rationalistic creed and claims of feminism, as too of the steel-brained, steel-willed fighting women leading it, men may scoff, with sense of false security, at odds of danger from feminine weakness and fickleness in feminist ranks. they scoffed just so at the menace of prussianism--whereof feminism is the female rendering. it must always be remembered, moreover, that the civic and political privileges ceded to woman, the feminist, are ceded alike to that freakish, irresponsible creature woman, the femininist, who, to counterbalance the decline of woman-quality in those others of her sex, adds to her number and her freakishness as those others wax in number and in stern determination. and in a house of commons of mixed sex, feminists would find, to their undoing, that here as elsewhere the ultra-feminines would speedily outnumber and out-power themselves. the movement, inaugurated in all the stern and sterile sex-insensibility of the feminist code, would soon be dry-rotten and corrupt with the weaknesses bred of effeminacy. nor should it be forgotten that the present feminist leaders it was who, by their dangerous bolshevist tactics of militant suffragism, proclaimed the anarchy seething in themselves and their adherents. so long as there survives within the breast of man a spark of that chivalry which has been both the inspiring and impelling power of his virile development, he can neither meet, nor can he treat with woman upon equal terms. always the aspects of her in capacities of mother, wife or love (or mistress) must intervene to disarm, and to incapacitate him from exerting his full strength against her. whether her appeal to him be sacred or profane, accordingly--that of woman at her best or at her worst--always so long as he is man, her highest and most tender (as her basest) appeal will be by way of those woman-unfitnesses which in every age have served as highest incentive of his fitnesses; that he might win, safeguard and cherish her. this chivalrous instinct it was, in part--for behind it lurked the recognition of more than half a nation suffering from the wrong of unenfranchisement--which disarmed and paralysed his action in respect of those same suffragist outbreaks. and so long as he is man, will he be similarly disarmed and dangerously inhibited from meeting and from battling successfully with woman. history repeats itself. and if men suppose that they have seen the last of female militancy, and overlook the menacing truth that their own incapacity to cope with this must increase inevitably in direct proportion to woman's waxing power, they are blind, indeed, to dangerous breakers ahead. having sown the fickle wind of woman's variability, they are like to reap the whirlwind in her inherent non-conformability; a difficult and parlous factor such as they have never previously encountered in political and industrial administration. such non-conformability as is seen at an extreme in the anarchy of revolutions; in which women, having lost control and balance, plunge deeper and deeper into excesses, without power, it would seem, of recoil. while men reach a maximum, recover poise, and then setting about to re-constitute order out of chaos, more often than not evolve a higher form of order than had previously obtained. vii secure in their traditional superior strength, however, and with characteristic complacency in this relation, men have no suspicion of the sex-antagonism--hatred even--seething against them in feminism. and this far from having been annealed or softened, has been, on the contrary, greatly aggravated by the concessions and new privileges lately accorded the sex. strange to say, the chief talk of extremist women in their new war-capacities was bitterest grievance and hostility against the male, because, although installed in masculine positions, they were denied rights identical with his; of rank and recognition, of responsibility and pay. that they held these capacities temporarily merely, and as novices and amateurs, while men held theirs as experts, for long service or for superior values by right of masculine abilities, had no weight whatsoever. never in all her days of so-called subjection has woman been so loud and denunciatory of the injustices of the oppressor, of his conspiracies and crimes against her, as since she has been yielded a number of those rights which feminism claims. feminists will say this is because complete equality in all things has not yet been granted--has yet to be fought for. the truth is, however, that the interests and functions of men fail wholly to satisfy the wholly dissimilar natures of women. but until they have realised this--the true reason of their discontent--an ever-increasing number of women will continue to make these their coveted goal, and to chafe with anger and bitterest resentment against the other sex for denying them full measure of things--without intrinsic value for them. * * * * * it needs no saying by me, that, apart from the feminist extremist faction, the woman's movement includes a number of the sex characterised by the noblest ideals and impulse, as by the finest achievements; their creed and aims being pure of self-seeking or materialist ambitions for themselves or for their kin. and these it is to whom we owe it, that, amid the clamour and the combat of those others, the spirit of true womanhood, devoted, wise and altruistic, is making itself felt everywhere in modern thought and modern progress. such women for the most part discredit feminism, in many cases directly oppose both its doctrine and practice. viii the huge numerical preponderance of women must, of itself, presently swamp all masculine power and initiative in state affairs unless the political functions of the sexes be separated. thenceforward, _vox populi_ must be the voice of woman--man's having ceased to be heard. and man's chiefest menace lies, be it reiterated to the point of tedium, in that momentous fact of the biological investment in woman, of the racial trustfund. for this is, at the same time, his sole heritage and that of the nation. and not only does it constitute her the custodian of human life and faculty but it makes her arbitress as well of man's and of the nation's destiny. in yielding his house of parliament, man has surrendered not only his highest and most characteristic prerogative, but he has yielded the last exclusive stronghold of his manhood. an entrenchment indispensable to his difficult task of holding his own against a sex overwhelmingly superior in number, and chartered, by right of womanhood, with time-honoured baffling privileges which handicap and defeat him at all turns. a sex nature has armoured with charms, moreover, and with weaknesses for his disarming; by appeal, on the one hand, to his chivalry, on the other, to his senses. entrenched in his last stronghold, he stood some chance of exerting his allotted dominance in life's affairs. all his strongholds invaded, he stands none. for the rest, it can only be said that men who should reject their own, and elect members of the opposite sex to represent them in parliament, would by that vote alone of non-confidence in the ability or the good faith of their kind, proclaim the human male a pitiful failure in species; an order without specialisation of brain, of character, or of moral, to give it essential values in human concerns. woman, on the other hand, would stand acclaimed a super-being. one not only highly-specialised by god and nature, as creatrix of the race, and endowed with gifts to be the racial nurse and guide and teacher, but, added to these most vital of human capacities, she would stand accredited by man with such superior qualifications also for the administration of the state as to lead him to adjudge her his superior in this capacity likewise. while her still further pre-eminence is now to be emphasised by pitting her on equal terms against the male, in all the arts and crafts, the professions and the businesses. truly--poor super-being that she is to be--burdened and spent by her super-tax of faculties and functions, she will need, indeed, to break into the racial trust-fund, in order to equip herself for these her multifarious exactions. because not only will it be her affliction to produce the race and mother it, but she must provide for it too; moreover, must doctor it, play lawyer, parson and accountant to it; paint its pictures, mould its statuary, plan its architecture, build its houses, compose its music, blow its trumpets, beat its drums; and, over and beyond all these, must administer its politics, and serve it presently, no doubt, as premier, primate and chancellor. while it must be merely a matter of brief time, when, to her other tasks, will be added the manning of its army, its navy and air-services, and the serving of its guns. should feminist aims be realised--and already they are more than half-won--it will be a case, truly, of _exit man!_ rejected on all counts, as possessing no intrinsic sex-values, to offset woman's vital and pre-eminent one of the creation of life (for his biological part in this is so slight and brief as to be unworthy of note were it not indispensable, and will be insignificant, indeed, when he no longer serves as highly-specialised agent and artificer of the racial faculty); possessing no distinctive qualities and no obligations of fatherhood, to protect and to provide for offspring, and thereby to offset woman's vital and important one of nurturing and rearing this; no more than woman's equal (if that) in the sciences and arts, in politics and commerce--truly no alternative will be left him save to retire, abased, into the dim background of the human pageant; a self-admitted failure, without place or standing, by virile and exclusive right and power of body, brain and office. ix a more inspiring picture presents itself, however. of a manhood, worthy of its racial and national traditions, waking timely to a recognition of its manhood's powers and duties, and, having emancipated itself from woman's rule in all beside her natural province, reinstating its supremacy in every virile field and function; and thus re-shouldering bravely its allotted burdens in labour, faculty and administration. of a womanhood re-finding itself also, and finding itself and its natural lot upon a fairer and a nobler plane--the plane of life, as ever, but illumined now by broader outlook, and instinct with higher understanding. and these two working for the common good, of our anglo-saxon race, recruited by their sympathetic impulse and reciprocal achievement, having been set, in course of a few generations, upon routes of such a human renaissance as should carry it forward to fulfilment of its splendid destiny. in this new human dispensation would be a house of women to serve as a second--a balancing and an uplifting--wing to the house of men. thus in the national as in the natural life, the sexes would be most effectively operating and co-operating; travelling each along its own inherent and allotted lines, employing each its own intrinsic powers and fulfilling its intrinsic functions, apart from, but abreast of and in continual touch with the other; inspiring, fortifying, supplementing and complementing the attributes, the trend and the achievements, each of each. * * * * * said mazzini, "_man and woman are the two human wings that lift the soul toward the ideal we are destined to attain_." and the value and the effectiveness of these two human, as of other wings, lie in the degree to which, although they work in unison, _they move in different areas_; apart from and independent, each of the other; balancing and correlating, but, nevertheless, each sustaining its own side of the body, vital and social. appendix further evidences in support of the biological and mendelian propositions advanced in book i. i _the male is the impelling force in physical development, or adaptation to environment_ scientific stock-breeding supplies valuable practical examples of applied genetics, or the science of heredity. although artificial, in the sense that the creatures of the stock-yard are not mated by law of natural selection, nor are they bred or reared under normal environmental conditions, the circumstance that breeders are breeding for special characteristics, and mate the parents with a view to the transmission and the accentuation of such, provides important indications regarding hereditary influence and its determinant factors. mr. horace g. regnart, who has done much to establish stock-breeding on a scientific basis, kindly furnishes me with the following interesting and suggestive data: "we breeders pay more attention to the bull because he can sire fifty calves yearly; while the cow can produce only one. one can afford to pay a thousand guineas for a bull, whereas one cannot afford fifty cows at the same price. and the purchase of a first-class bull is the cheapest way of getting a good herd. the history of practically every great herd is the history of some particular bull. as we say, '_a bull is half the herd_.' it is equally true to say that every great bull is the son of a great cow. with one highly-prepotent bull we can raise a high-class herd, even if we start with second-rate females; while a bad bull will ruin the best herd in the county. it is for this reason that we 'put all our money' on the bull." all of which supports my theory that the male is the impelling agency in adaptation to environment, or evolutionary development on the plane of physics, and that such progressive development is achieved by way of the male traits being dominant upon this plane, and manifesting, accordingly, in the physical terms of stature and muscle and force-production. the male being the determinant agent in the physical characteristics of size and flesh and nervous energy--for which breeders of live-stock are making--the bull is "half the herd." "with one highly-prepotent bull," a high-class herd may be raised, even though inaugurated with second-rate females. whilst "a bad bull will ruin the best herd in the county." akin to which is the circumstance that, in two generations, the improvement which occurs in the offspring of a new forest pony-mare when mated with a horse, lapses; the descendants reverting to the type of the new forest pony. if, however, the male, being the agent of adaptation, determines progressive development in the direction of such physical traits as further fit species to its material environment, the female it is, that, being the agency of the evolution of life (and of the equipment of species in terms of life, accordingly) supplies offspring with the vital potential of living cells and vital organs--heart, lungs, digestive and assimilative organs and functions--which, by engendering the multiple functions and vital processes of life, _sustain_ the existence and the powers of the organism in relation to environment. the female, moreover, provides it with the vital potential of reproductive organs for the transmission of types ever further evolved and adapted, in terms both of life and adaptation. the male thus broadly sketches out the lines and supplies the initiative of structural development. the female supplements the sketch with the structural potential of living cells, whereby structural development is achieved; as too with the vital potential of organs whereby living organisation is sustained and transmitted. the great sire, bull or man, generates the great daughter. but since life is earlier in origin and precedes development, the great mother it must be who first _engenders_ the great son. because, as i have already pointed out, life and reproductive-energy must exist in the potential before they can evolve upon the plane of personal development. in other words, function precedes structure. the potential of both function and structure must precede the _development_ of either on the plane of life. woman, accordingly, is creatrix of the race, because in her the race becomes potential. man is artificer of the race, however, because from him the race receives its powers of concrete development. for progressive evolutionary advance, therefore, every new generation of females must contribute a new complement of vital potential, equal in potence to the new complement of developmental initiative which the new generation of males contribute, and by way of which the female vital potential is differentiated into further concrete powers. fruitless for one parent to supply a finer complement than the other is able to render in terms, respectively, of life or development. the female potential must be adequate to energise the male powers of differentiation. the male powers must be adequate to differentiate the female potential. ii _the female supplies the typal and vital potentials of adaptation_ to mr. regnart, i am indebted for the following further data, which seem further to support my view: "ursula raglan was a beef-cow that milked heavily. to a beef-bull, she produced gainford champion--a great bull. while to a dairy-bull, she produced the dam of priceless princess--about the best dairy-cow that ever looked through a halter." here we find the vital-potential indispensable to the equipment of great offspring, proved great in the mother, by her female vital-function of lactation. while her respective bull-mates appear as the determinant factors which differentiate this vital potential in offspring, respectively, into the beef-traits (stature and muscle, that is) or the milking-traits (vital function, that is). the very term "dairy-bull," signifying a male with power to transmit to female descendants the purely female trait of milking, is evidence, in itself, of a female trait, derived by a male from his mother, passing into the potential, and lying dormant, or recessive, for a generation, in his male organisation, and then emerging again in his daughter. the great bull is sire of a great cow--_because he was son of a great cow_. and he is a great bull because he received from his dam a great female vital-potential, for differentiation into greatness of the male traits that characterise great males. and in his turn, he may sire a cow greater than his mother, because in passing on to his daughter the great female vital-potential of his mother, he passes on a female potential of greatness to which his own male inherence of greatness has added a further power of differentiation. this increased _male_ power of differentiation, descending in the female line, however, manifests in traits of increased _female_ functioning--the function of milking, that is. the daughter inherits thus from her father the female potential of her paternal grandmother, with new power of male differentiation acquired by its residence during a generation (so to speak) in a male organisation. which new power, when reawakened to function in a female organism, manifests in a further degree of femaleness. male development having progressed along lines of increasing brain- and nervous power, which the female has ever further inherited, female development has progressed along lines of such increasing brain-power as has enabled her to transform her native simple and undifferentiated femaleness into ever further developed and more complex female _traits_, or functional and nervous characteristics. while, on the other hand, since female evolution has proceeded along lines of increasing life, or vital power, which the male has ever further inherited this increasing vital power it has been that has served as _potential_ for the evolution of his maleness in terms of higher brain- and nervous power. the great cow is mother of a great bull _because she was daughter of a great sire_. and she was a great cow because she received from her sire a great male complement of developmental power, which imparted to her recessive, and undifferentiated femaleness, further power of functioning as female characteristics. and she may mother a son greater even than her sire because the great male developmental impetus of her father becomes in her a greater vital potential; which, descending in the male line, engenders further power for the further differentiation of male characteristics. iii _evolution of species and evolution of the individual occur on different planes_ the evolution of species progresses in every generation by way of each sex having derived from the other sex a new and opposite potential to engender, in every alternate generation, the further evolution of its sex-traits along its own (and contrary) lines. it may be considered therefore that type, or species, evolves to higher inherences by way of progressive divergences of sex-characteristics. while the evolution of the individual progresses in every generation in proportion as parents of both sexes had mated, in the previous generation, with such members of the opposite sex as were best fitted to supply, in the gametes contributed to offspring, complements which, by union with their own, so matched and supplemented their own as to have quickened and energised the development of offspring to the fullest and the most efficient issues. in any line, however, a strain of greatness or of other inherence descends in alternating succession, now in the female, now in the male line; receding now into the potential, and then evolving in development. so that while the individual normally evolves in every generation, the type evolves only in alternate generations. the evolution of type, or species, is the intrinsic function of the spontaneous evolution of life into two orders of sex. it occurs on a wholly different plane from that of the evolution of the individual. but by way of his, or her, complement to the biological constitution of offspring, members of both sexes contribute alike to the evolution of _species_ and to that of the _individual_--according as such complement enhances the power of the traits of the opposite sex to manifest, and further to evolve in offspring. the intensification in the one sex of its own inherences stimulates a proportional intensification of the opposite inherences in the other sex, both as regards the evolution of the type and of the individual. the phenomenon would seem to be akin to that increase of one electrical potential evoking a proportional increase of the other electrical potential, to complement it. when one sex fails to supply its due potential, or complement, to the other, the evolution both of type and individual receives a check. and because the evolution of type is achieved by the germ-plasm derived from a parent of one sex obtaining new increment from being invested in the organisation of offspring of the opposite sex, it is not until the new typal-inherence of this germ-plasm is revivified again in the organisation of a member of the sex from which the plasm was derived, that such new impulse manifests. hence the phenomenon of characteristics being transmitted from parents to offspring of opposite sex. so that daughters of normal womanly organisation reproduce the typal characteristics of their fathers' maternal line; while in sons of normal male organisation those of their mothers' paternal line emerge. hence too, the reversion of offspring of hybrid plants to the types,--pure dominant and pure recessive--of their grandparents. iv _progressive segregation of male and female traits in opposite sides of body ever further intensifies and differentiates their intrinsic qualities_ the biological constitution of humans and of the other higher organisms differentiating them into two opposite symmetrical sides, in which, as development rises higher in the scale, the dominance, or maleness, in them is ever further and more perfectly segregated from the recessiveness, or femaleness, in them, secures the progressive intensification, respectively, of maleness or of femaleness in them, by ever further ranging the factors, or traits, of these on opposite sides of the biological equation; and by thus more effectively centralising the powers, according to sex, in one or the other side thereof. mendel's peas, not thus differentiated into two sides, are bi-sexual and self-fertilising. of the original stock, that order in which dominant traits are prepotent is differentiating toward a male _genus_, however. while the recessives are differentiating toward a female _genus_. although regarded as "pure" dominants and "pure" recessives, they are nevertheless hybrids in respect of sex. being self-fertilising, both dominants and recessives are of low power, alike for reproduction and development. because the dominance, or male developmental power, of the recessives being inhibited by the recessiveness, or femaleness, in them, is of low vigour. while the recessiveness, or female vital power in the dominants being unduly expended by the dominance, or maleness, in them, is of low vitality. the male sex-cells of the self-fertilising dominants thus fertilise female sex-cells of low vitality. while the female sex-cells of the self-fertilising recessives are fertilised by male sex-cells of low vigour. in cross-breeding, the conditions cease not only to be those of self-fertilising, but they cease, moreover, to be those of the close inbreeding of self-fertilisation. in the "hybrids" obtained by crossing the higher-vigoured male sex-cells of the "pure" dominants with the higher-vitalised female sex-cells of the "pure" recessives, the dominants--because dominance is prepotent for exterior characteristics--submerge the external traits of the recessives, which are prepotent for vital and internal functioning. such dominants are a bi-sexual species in which the male is prepotent. and to be male, means that they have expended, in terms of structural development, a great proportion of the female vital power inherent in them; thus masking the recessive female traits in them, as regards exterior characteristics. but since reproductive power inheres in these recessive traits, these traits are preserved in the sex-cells, equally with the dominant traits. the plants being not only bi-sexual, but self-fertilising also, the sex-cells must obviously be bi-sexual too; in order to provide the organism with factors both of life and development. every sex-cell is a hybrid cell, therefore; bearing both dominant and recessive traits. but, like their parents, in some, the dominant, in others, the recessive traits are prepotent. and the dominant sex-cells mating with dominants, the recessives with recessives, the original types of so-called "pure" dominants and "pure" recessives reappear in the third generation. v _self-fertilising organism is a female organism with a male organism differentiated in it_ because the female represents the life-potential of species and the vital potential of organisms, a self-fertilising plant or creature must be regarded as a female organism, with a male organism of adaptation, or differentiation, developed in it. this male organism energises both its developmental and its functioning power, and fertilises it; although the _potential_ of structure, of growth, of function and of reproduction are engendered in the female organism. the female is the root-stock or parent-stem of all species, therefore. if dominance is maleness, and recessiveness is femaleness, and if dominance energises structural development while recessiveness engenders reproduction, a dominant self-fertilising plant is a female plant, with a male plant of superior dominance differentiated in it. while a recessive self-fertilising plant is a female plant of superior recessiveness, with a male plant of inferior dominance differentiated in it. in crossing stock of superior dominance with stock of superior recessiveness, the dominant prevails over the recessive in the general structural traits of the resulting "hybrid," but not in its reproductive inherence. the new hybrids being male in inherence, nothing is added to the female reproductive, or vital, potential in them. the root-stock transmits to its sex-cells therefore just as its grandmother did--recessives of her type, and dominants of the type of the dominant male engrafted on her, of the male grandfather of this third generation, that is. hence reversion. vi _sterility of offspring of alien species proves evolution of species and of individual are independent phenomena_ the fact that dog and wolf, when mated, breed fertile species, proves them sprung from the same root-stock. while the hybrid offspring of different species are sterile. showing such an intrinsic incompatability of the alien complements in the zygote as, while operating as no bar to their immediate union and their development into a complete hybrid individual, nevertheless bars the incorporation of the alien breed in the vital potential of stock. such sterility in the offspring of creatures of different species is weighty evidence that the evolution of type, or species, and the evolution of the individual are wholly independent phenomena; occurring upon wholly different planes, and involving wholly different principles and sets of processes. in the mating of alien species, the two sex-cells, although of dissimilar species-inherence, unite nevertheless and develop in the maternal environment into a living entity of mongrel order. but the germ-plasm contained in the gamete of one species will not germinate in the alien environment of an organism of alien species. no potential, either vital or of differentiation, is engendered, therefore, for production of offspring. hence sterility results. the potential of a living individual is seen thus to belong to a wholly different plane of phenomena from the potential of stock. conditions which do not annul the powers of life and of function in the one, quench life and function in the other with the seal of sterility. vii _possible explanation of "sports"_ mr. regnart says: "we often meet with sports. second- and third-rate parents may produce an exceptionally fine individual, but such animals are always failures to breed from. the law of filial regression comes into operation. our aim is to find families that have produced a large number of fine animals--we know then that we are on safe ground." in these cases, it would seem that the "fine individual" results from so singularly harmonious and successful a complementing and fructifying of the parental halves in offspring as conduce to develop the best points of both; doubtless, too, to eliminate or to annul weak or faulty factors of either parental strain. neither of such inferior-grade parents transmitting a fine _lineal_ potential, however, the exceptional fineness of the individual is not inherent in the germ-plasm he or she transmits to offspring. the fine characteristics of such "sports" are not transmissible, therefore, to descendants. proof again of two planes of life and evolution, that of species and that of the individual. moral, too, of the importance of fine selection in mating, since the harmonious mating of second- or third-rate parents may produce finer offspring than are born of ill-assorted matings of two finer breeds of parent. the case is recorded of a pony about the size of a shetland pony, which was the offspring of pedigree shire-parents on both sides, _both parents being over hands_. the most striking feature about the animal was that there was nothing of the _horse_-type about him--he was a perfect example of _pony_. shire horses are typical examples of vigour, or developmental power, expressed in terms of stature, muscle and nervous energy. and for so long as the breeding for these characteristics was supplemented in terms of vital organs and vital functioning, by an equivalent maternal complement of vital potential, to sustain the constitutional expenditure involved in stature, muscular equipment, and nervous energy, the breed improved in these particulars. pushed beyond this limit, by introducing into stock further strains of vigour, or developmental initiative, without simultaneously providing the indispensable equivalents of these in increasing vital potentials, all at once the balance toppled, and reversion to inferior type resulted. an excessive proportion of the vital power of these two pedigree shires of great stature and great strength had been expended in the achievement of such great stature and great strength, and in the equipment of digestive and assimilative organs required to sustain these. but little had remained, accordingly, for reproductive investments. hence reversion in the de-vitalised stock. one conceives of the counterpoise in stock, of male and female complements, as being akin to that of the opposite and complementary curves of an arch. so long as equipoise is sustained by the perfect balance of the contrary curves, so long each re-inforces the other to support a heavy superstructure of development. lopsidedness of either curve leads to collapse. viii _vigour is male. vitability is female_ "vigour," which breeders regard as a potent factor in heredity, is commonly confounded with vital power, or vitability; although the two would seem to be diametrically opposite in cause, in nature and effect. an athlete, in so-called "condition," is in the prime of vigour; his muscular and nervous powers being at high levels of structure and of functioning. his vital powers are proportionally at low ebb, however; as is proved by his notable lack of recuperative power in illness. he is bad subject, indeed, in respect of progress and recovery from disease. feeble-minded persons possess but little vigour of brain or of body, yet their vital power, as shown in healthy organic functioning and vitativeness, is often extraordinary. vigour is an expression of nervous energy, and is generated by the brain. vitability is life-power, and results from vital organs efficient both in structure and in processes. it is engendered in the reproductive system; which may be regarded as the power-house of life and vital function. _vigour_ is the power of differentiation, or individuation, of an organism, structural and functional, physical and mental, in terms of its relation to environment. _vitability_ is the intensification of the individualism and of the functioning of an organism in terms of life-power. vigour, being katabolic, a male and a dominant trait, manifests in man (as in plants) as tallness, or the expenditure of vital energy upon the material plane, in growth and stature; as too in functional initiative and activity, both physical and mental, on the material plane. vitability, being anabolic, a female and a recessive trait, manifests as dwarfness, or the conservation of vital energy upon the material plane, in respect of growth and stature; as too in weakness, or inhibition of vigour and activity, both physical and mental. the male trait of vigour makes men larger, stronger, hardier, and more resistant to disease than women are. the female trait of vitability makes women healthier, more charged with vital power and temperament, more recuperative from disease, and longer-lived than men. the complementary inherences of vigour and vitability, derived respectively from the two parents, and supplementing one another in offspring, endow him or her with fine form and structure, healthy vital organs and efficient function, power of life and nervous energy. in the normal male, vigour dominates vitability; the maternal potential of vitability being differentiated in him into its male equivalent. while in the normal female, vigour recedes within the female traits of vital power and healthy functioning, endurance and womanly faculty. the opposite modes of vigour and vitality are well shown in disease. in vigorous men, disease may assume the type known as "sthenic"; occasioning such violent re-activity, or rebellion, of the system, and such consequent severity of symptoms as speedily exhaust the resources, and tend to fatal ending. while vital power, being anabolic and conservative, meets the foe passively, and instead of wasting, economises the forces by moderation of symptoms; bending to the course and processes of sickness, and making thereby for recovery. because of the lesser vitability of their cells, disease in men tends toward structural, or organic deteriorations. while disease in normal women is more often functional, merely. in masculine women, disease is prone, as in men, to structural degenerations. masculine women are very liable to cancer; a liability they transmit as heritage to offspring of both sexes. hence the increasing masculinity of latter-day women has entailed upon the race an increased liability to cancer and to other structural degeneration. this liability has assumed such grave proportions as to occur in children even, showing in the abnormal growths, "adenoids" now so prevalent as to have become "the normal" of modern childhood. ix _the living body is a highly-vitalised vegetative organism with a highly-specialised cerebro-nervous organism differentiated in it_ professor cuvier said, "the nervous system is, at bottom, the whole animal; the other systems are there only to serve it." professor bergson amplifies the statement: "a higher organism is essentially a sensori-motor system installed on systems of digestion, respiration, circulation, secretion, etc., whose function it is to repair, cleanse and protect it, to create an unvarying, internal environment for it, and above all to produce its potential energy for conversion into locomotive movement." in both statements, is recognition of the dual differentiation of the body into an organism of life which functions in relation to its own intrinsic being, and an organism of consciousness which functions in relation to exterior environment. that in death from starvation, the brain and the nerves remain almost unimpaired, while all the other organs and tissues lose weight, their cells undergoing profound degenerative changes, is further indication of two distinct and separate departments of development and processes in every animal existence. as in its mendelian phenomena of the segregation of its contrasting traits, and the dominance and recessiveness of these in constitution and heredity, so, in its living organisation, the human body is extraordinarily and in a number of ways essentially plant-like. the brain and the nervous system may be regarded, indeed, as a highly-differentiated cerebro-nervous organism grafted upon a simpler vital, and vegetative body, from which, as from a soil, it draws its life and energy: and from which, as age advances, it gradually withdraws the power of further sustaining its existence. this cerebro-nervous graft perishes only because the vegetative body on which it is installed has come to the end of its power to sustain the life of the nervous organism picketed upon it. the close resemblances in structure and in processes between the cells of vegetable and animal organisms, when taken in conjunction with a number of other biological indications, justify the conclusion that living bodies are actually vegetative organisms to which have been super-added, by progressive evolutionary differentiations, faculties of motion and of consciousness. (plants are recognised as possessing rudimentary consciousness. while growth is a mode of motion.) the trunk, which contains the respiratory, circulatory, nutritive and reproductive organs represents the vitative, or vegetative, system. the brain with its tributary spinal cord and spinal-nervous system represents the sensori-motor organism. while the limbs are highly-differentiated implements which the cerebro-nervous organism has developed in the vitative organism; to serve it with means of locomotion and of action, for the achievement of intelligent purpose. the lungs, with their ramifications of tubes and their air-cells, closely resemble the branches and leaves of a tree, which spread into and absorb from the atmosphere the oxygen whereby it lives. while the convoluted intestines are like the roots of a tree, absorbing nurture for it from environment. the vegetative organism, being the agency of life, is female in origin and inherence. the cerebro-spinal organism, being the agency of adaptation, is male in origin and inherence. in both, however, the inherences of the other sex are represented. the body resembles thus a bi-sexual plant, its root-stock being female and recessive, with a male dominant and differentiating organism incorporated in it. x _vegetative body has its own brain and nervous system and its (involuntary) muscles_ this vegetative body has its own separate (organic) brain, in the solar plexus--or "abdominal brain"--and its nervous system, in the intricate "sympathetic" system of nerves; which, in addition to administering the nutrition of the body, is intimately and closely associated, in psychology, with the brain and with the spinal-nervous system of the psychical organism. itself subconscious, this organic brain nevertheless contributes vital impulse and colour to consciousness. it possesses also its own specialised system of muscles, the "involuntary muscles"; which are not under control of the conscious brain and will, but operate automatically--by so-called reflex action. the motions they subtend are concerned with vital functions; nutrition, respiration, circulation, assimilation, elimination, reproduction. the vitative organism, being vegetative of growth and passive of mode, needs rest and sun and wind and air and water for its nurture and development. with that rising of the sap in the world of vegetation which occurs in spring, kindred processes occur within the human vegetative body. it responds to the re-creative forces of its mother-earth. with every recurring spring-tide, youth turns again to thoughts of love, because of this natural renaissance of its vitative resources, for purposes of re-creation--both of cells and individuals. old age is a permanent winter of this plant-body. summer suns revive but little more than flickerings of its vegetative pulsings. although the psychical life, intellectual and nervous, may be still vigorous, the sap of the plant-body no longer rises, quick and warm and fructifying, to earth's perennial call. this plant-like body with its plant-like fruiting cells, it is, that when charged with the graces and magnetic potences of health and high nurture, supplies the pleasing personality found not seldom in sinners, while often conspicuously lacking in saints--a seeming anomaly which has gone far to discredit the virtues. by way of it, human personality resembles a mystical flowering plant that breathes and feels and moves; and a fruiting plant that reproduces. the cerebro-nervous system animates and intelligises this beautiful vessel of flesh wherein it subsists. the vigour of its vegetative stock, supplementing brain and nervous system by fine structure, fine stature, organic vigour, native faculty, and reproductive power, has given the anglo-saxon race its world-wide rule. it is to this that its women have owed their shapely frames, their healthful constitutions and their loveliness; the warm tints of hair and skin, the fresh and flower-like complexions, and the fruit-like form and bloom of cheek for which they once were famed. rich personal charm and sweetness of healthful condition which are all too swiftly passing from our modern women, hag-ridden by a strenuousness that is wrecking the flower-body, with its vital joy and warmth, its grace of being and its bliss of sense, its temperamental thrill and colour. * * * * * the doctrine of evolution is signally incomplete unless we realise it as a sequence of progressive developments, direct and without intermission, from the simplest forms of elemental matter to the highest, living orders of creation--mineral, vegetable, brute and human being progressive stages in the evolution of life and of consciousness; graded by links so subtly and infinitesimally constituted as to belong equally to the kingdom below and to that above them. the subject appears full of interest and suggestion, showing all the planes of nature, from mineral to man, linked in an unbroken line by way of this half-vegetable body of flesh, with its roots in earth and its branches in consciousness. no more than this briefest of mentions can be given here, however. xi _mysterious "internal secretions"_ biologists tell of dual planes of operation in the processes of every organ of the body. because some of these function on the external plane, in visible secretions or in other ways calculable by scientific methods, and they function, too, upon an inner and occulted, plane; in the form of mysterious "internal secretions," the mode and nature whereof have long baffled and eluded the most intricate scientific appliances and intellections. what is indicated if not an inner, and potential, plane of life and vital processes--a _plane of involution_, or recession (centripetal)--whereon factors of environment, air, food, water and so forth are transformed by vital involutionary processes, into _potentials_ of living form and function? which potentials remain latent, or recessive, in the cells and glands secreting them, and available for transformation by evolutionary processes, into actualities of physical form and function on the outer (centrifugal) plane of life--the _plane of evolution_. and life and health, together with normality of faculty and function, depend upon the perfect balance and co-ordination of these two contrary orders of factors and processes, which, i assume, are engendered, respectively, in the male and the female departments of living organisms of both sexes. all the vital functions--respiration, circulation, digestion, reproduction--may be classed as recessive functions, because they are characterised by a recession, or withdrawal, from the without to the within. this is a phenomenon of the _involution_ of environment, for transformation thereof into potential life, and potential evolutionary output. _death_ is a centripetal withdrawal of the soul from the material without to an inner zone of spiritual, or potential, being. and in due time, analogy assures us, having assimilated and transformed the resultant of a terrestrial existence into a new potential of life, life issues forth again, by the centrifugal impulse of re-birth, to differentiate itself once more in living form upon the outer plane. (_re-incarnation_ is, obviously, the true interpretation of _resurrection of the body_, which otherwise is scientifically impossible.) winter withdrawal, or involution, of the sap of vegetation from the outer plane of functioning to the inner plane of potential life, whereby it derives such new increment of vital potential as, with the outgoing of sap again in the renaissance of spring, evolves in increased growth and new foliage, is further example of the principle and processes of dominance and recessiveness--of the female vital impulse and the male developmental impetus, operating in an eternal tidal rhythm of ebb and flow. xii _dual planes of mentality: outer and material, inner and occult_ as in the domain of life and vital processes, so in the domain of consciousness and nervous processes, there are two planes of function; an inner and occulted plane of mind, or potential consciousness, and an outer plane of material consciousness; representing respectively afferent (or centripetal) and efferent (or outgoing) nervous currents. faculty and sense may be regarded as having developed in one direction along lines of the telescope, with increasing capability to horizon the without; while they have developed simultaneously along lines of the microscope, to reveal an invisible within. the senses, which adapt man's consciousness to environment by the functions of sight, hearing, touch, taste, smell, have become, with evolutionary development, so increasingly sensitised in response to the without as ever further to have set him in rapport with the world exterior. while, at the same time, so have they become sensitised in response to the within, as ever further to have deepened and quickened his apprehension of an occulted interior plane. faculty has acquired thus, simultaneously with its increasing power of focusing the outer and objective, an increasing power so to invert its focus as to penetrate ever more deeply into the inner and subjective, alike of man's own constitution and that of environment. these two contrary, but co-operative, modes of mentality are, respectively, intellection and intuition--male and female modes of mind. xiii _differentiation of the zygote, or mated sex-cell_ i have described, throughout, the right side of the human body as the male-side--that in which the male-traits of humanity are specialised in the individual; the left as the woman-side, that in which the woman-traits of humanity are centred. but the modes of constitution, as of inheritance, are more complex, of course, than that one parent supplies the potential of one side, the other parent that of the other side. as regards inheritance, the maternal ovum comprises, i believe, the potential of the whole body, with the exception of the brain, the spinal-cord and the spinal nerves. but because the mother is descended from parents of both sex, and possesses, therefore, both male and female elements, the ovum must contain (as must every other cell) both male and female factors. these, it is conceivable, are grouped, by contrary polarities, into two areas, or hemispheres; an upper and a lower. of these the upper is male in inherency. it comprises the potentials of shoulders and spinal column which are fulcra of action, and of lungs and heart which are the _energising_ organs of life. the lower hemisphere of the ovum is female in inherency. it comprises the potentials of the pelvis, which is the cradle of maternity, of the reproductive organs, which engender life and the emotions, and of the digestive and assimilative organs, which engender vital processes. so too, because the male parent is likewise descended from parents of opposite sex, his contribution to offspring must also contain both male and female factors. but while the mother supplies, in the ovum, the potential of the whole body--face and head, trunk, limbs and vital organs, the father contributes the potential of the brain, the spinal cord and the spinal nerves only, which adapt the organism, by way of form and consciousness, to environment. the limbs, which adapt it, by way of motion, to environment, may be regarded as differentiations primarily of the brain and nervous system. the ovum is spheroidal; the sperm-cell rectilinear (following the rule that the line of maleness is a straight one; that of femaleness, a curve). and as in the spheroidal ovum, the factors of the opposite sexes, grouped into two areas, separate it into hemispheres of opposite sex-inherency, so in the rectilinear sperm-cell, we may surmise the factors of the two sexes to be grouped lengthwise, and to separate it thus into a male side and a female side. such a sperm-cell penetrating the ovum, and developing laterally, further differentiates this into anterior, posterior and lateral areas. the two lateral developments of this potential brain and spinal cord and nerves eventually constitute the right and the left brain-hemispheres, and differentiate the body into right and left sides. the left brain-hemisphere, with its half of the spinal cord and nerves, is derived from the _male_ side of the sperm-cell; while the right brain-hemisphere, with its half of the spinal cord and spinal nerves, is derived from the _female_ side (by inheritance) of the sperm cell. weismann describes the germ-plasm as being transmitted in the female line solely, from ovum of mother to that of daughter. this supports the above view; namely, that the germ-plasm proper is inherent in the ovum, in which it exists in potential, or undifferentiated, form, and that it becomes differentiated (in both sexes) into a right and a left-reproductive gland of contrary sex-inherence, by differentiative power of the dual-sexed sperm-cell. the re-polarisation of the fertilised ovum, which is visible beneath the microscope, would seem to represent this differentiative process. since the microcosm is as the macrocosm, the dual constitution must be repeated in every living cell of the body; the cell-plasma representing the vegetative system, the cell-nucleus representing the cerebro-nervous system. possibly the nucleolus is the supra- and subconscious element. xiv _inorganic matter is dual and hermaphrodite. life breaks up this neuter counterpoise, and progressively unlocks and segregates, and thus reveals and specialises the inherent attributes of sex_ phenomena of duality characterise not living matter only, but inorganic matter too. the elemental atom is never found manifesting singly, but always as two atoms coupled together, in the form of "the molecule"; these mated atoms being of opposite electrical potential. and since living matter has evolved out of inorganic matter--what is to be inferred but that the duality of the living cell is the evolution, on the plane of life, of the duality of the chemical molecule? further, that the duality of living forms in terms of sex-characteristics is the evolution, on the plane of living faculty, of the duality alike of the living cell and of the chemical molecule; the two sexes representing, respectively, the contrary inherences of all these dualities, specialised and ever further intensifying in the contrary trends of the opposite sex-traits of male and female. the elemental molecule is seen thus to be hybrid, or hermaphrodite, in constitution, precisely as the living cell and the living body are. while that both living cells and inorganic crystals reproduce, proves factors of sex differentiated and functioning in them. the inertia of matter is due to the hermaphrodite state; its contrary sex-impulses interlocking and nullifying one another. life breaks up this neuter state of equipoise, by increasingly segregating the dual-sex-inherences and evolving each along its own intrinsic trend; thereby engendering between their dual factors fructifying interoperations which result in the motions of growth and other vital processes. growth is a phenomenon of reproduction. living cells increase their substance by germination of their bi-sexual elements. attaining maturity, a cell divides into two cells, each of which by way of similar processes develops into a mature cell. and since for all change, two (or more) contrary impulses are necessary, and since reproduction is a function of sex, what is to be inferred but that evolution and growth and all other phenomena of living cells result from oppositions, co-operations and correlations of the contrary impetus and processes of two orders of sex-factors present therein? by way alone of their bi-sexuality, are cells, both animal and vegetable, able to reproduce the cell-offspring required by living organisms for processes of growth, of function and repair. printed in great britain by richard clay & sons, limited, brunswick st., stamford st., s.e. and bungay, suffolk. * * * * * woman and labour by olive schreiner demy vo, cloth, s. d. net _seventh impression_ "at last there has come the book which is destined to be the prophecy and the gospel of the whole awakening.... remarkable as this book of olive schreiner's is, merely as an intellectual achievement, its greatness and its life are in the emotional power which has found its stimulus and its inspiration in a vision of the future.... a book which will be read and discussed for many years to come."--_the nation._ "it is a fascinating mingling of keen argument, scientific knowledge, historical pageantry, rushing emotion, written (need it be said) in that adorned prose which is olive schreiner's characteristic style.... the book ... is an epic."--mr. j. ramsay macdonald in _the daily chronicle_. "all the qualities which long ago won for olive schreiner the gratitude and admiration of readers all over the globe are here in their old strength. there is fierce satire; there is deep-souled eloquence. there is the same quick reasoning, the same tenderness, the same poetic insight into the puzzle of life.... the feelings which are behind the various women's movements could not find clearer or more eloquent expression than they do in this remarkable book."--_the daily mail._ "it is one of those books which are sunrises, and give us spacious and natural horizons. like mazzini's essays, it is logic touched with emotion, politics on fire. one may begin to doubt the cause of woman's rights when the opponents of sex equality produce an equally glowing earnest and prophetic book."--_the daily news._ t. fisher unwin, ltd., adelphi terrace, london, w.c. baby welfare a guide to its acquisition and maintenance by w. e. robinson, m.d. _assistant physician and pathologist to the infants' hospital, london_ demy vo, cloth, s. d. net "we congratulate the author on his careful study of the healthy infant, about whom it has too long been difficult to obtain exact information."--_the lancet._ "a valuable addition to the literature dealing with the scientific knowledge of infancy and early childhood.... the book starts with a brief and easily comprehended exposition of physical characteristics, a groundwork of great value to intelligent women who desire, from one reason or another, to be self-reliant as far as possible where their babies are concerned. a chapter devoted to 'the healthy infant' gives in pleasingly lucid fashion a picture of what a baby should be doing at each point of its development."--_the queen._ "this book deals fully and clearly with the physiology of the infant; with dietetics, based on a study of human and cow's milk, as supplied to it; with the effects of faulty upbringing, more especially of faulty feeding; the signs, causes and treatment of diseased conditions, and so on. it should be a valuable aid to the intelligent mother or nurse."--_nursing notes._ t. fisher unwin, ltd., adelphi terrace london, w.c. woman and marriage a handbook by margaret stephens with a preface by dr. mary scharlieb, and an introduction by mrs. s. a. barnett large crown vo, cloth, s. net _sixth impression_ the direct purpose of this book is to explain very simply something of the structure and the use of parenthood, and to show the possibilities which arise from it--in short, to help women, and men too--in the understanding of themselves. it endeavours to increase intelligence on the subject of child-life by letting a clear light shine on those everyday matters of birth and life which are so often furtively wrapped in a mysterious and wholly distorting gloom. "'woman and marriage' is an outspoken book which should be carefully read by those for whom it is written. it is not a book for boys and girls; it is a physiological handbook, thoroughly well written, orderly, wholesome and practical.... we commend this work to all who want a full account in simple words of the physical facts of married life. all the difficulties of the subject are handled fearlessly, gravely and reverently in this book, and as it must be kept out of the reach of mere curiosity, so it deserves thoughtful study by those of us whose lives it touches."--_the spectator._ "if more such books were written, and more such knowledge disseminated, it would be a good thing for the wives and mothers of the present day."--_the times._ t. fisher unwin, ltd., adelphi terrace, london, w.c. * * * * * important notice. all the works mentioned in this list may be purchased through any bookseller. they are also obtainable at all libraries. any book-buyer wishing to see any of the books mentioned before purchasing them may, on sending to mr. unwin the name of his local bookseller, have the opportunity of so doing. t. fisher unwin, ltd., , adelphi terrace, london, w.c. . contents history and biography pages to travel & description " " politics, sociology & economics " " belles lettres " " poetry and drama " miscellaneous " fiction " to new editions and impressions " " life and letters of silvanus phillips thompson, f.r.s. by jane s. thompson and helen g. thompson. illustrated. demy vo, cloth. (spring, ). s. d. net inland postage, d. this is a straightforward and somewhat intimate account of the career of a man of great and varied gifts. born into the family of a simple quaker schoolmaster of york his extraordinary energy and devotion to science carried him into the foremost ranks of physicists, an acknowledged leader in electro-technology and optics. both as popular lecturer and as trainer of technical college students his skill was unrivalled, and wheresoever he went his enthusiasm for men and things won him friendships, alike in his own country and abroad. many of the letters describe experiences on his journeys, others adventures of the antiquarian in the pursuit of sixteenth and seventeenth century scientific literature, and yet others tell of battles for truth in some field or other. the book contains appreciations of his works as original investigator, teacher, writer, artist, and "prophet," and indirectly testifies to the warmth of personal regard which the frank geniality of his nature won for him in many spheres. all and sundry: more uncensored celebrities. by e. t. raymond, author of "uncensored celebrities." demy vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage, d. few books this year have attracted more attention or been more widely read than mr. e. t. raymond's "uncensored celebrities," a work as caustic as it was impartial. in his new work mr. raymond does not limit himself to political personalities only, but includes figures in the church, such as the bishop of london and dean inge; in literature, mr. g. k. chesterton, mr. hilaire belloc, and mr. rudyard kipling; in journalism, mr. harold begbie, mr. t. p. o'connor, and mr. leo maxse; in art and music, mr. frank brangwyn and sir thomas beecham. mr. raymond includes also character sketches of president wilson, m. georges clemenceau, the duke of somerset, viscount chaplin, viscount esher, sir arthur conan doyle, lord ernle, mr. speaker, and many other prominent people. wider in range than "uncensored celebrities" and equally brilliant, this work may be expected to appeal to even a larger public than its remarkable predecessor. the life of john payne. by thomas wright, author of "the life of william cowper," etc. with illustrations. demy vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage, d. few great authors appeal more to the imagination than john payne, the hero of "the john payne society," who shrank from the lime-light of "interviewing." recognised as a true poet by swinburne, he was probably the most skilful translator of the nineteenth century, for we owe to him a version of villon's poems which is itself a poetic work of consummate art, the first complete translation of the "arabian nights," the first complete verse rendering of omar khayyam's quatrains, to say nothing of translations of "the decameron," etc. among his friends were swinburne, sir richard burton, dante gabriel rossetti, arthur o'shaughnessy, french authors such as victor hugo, banville, and mallarmé, and the artist who ventured to depict "god with eyes turned inward upon his own glory." mr. wright by an extraordinary exercise of tact and sympathy was able to pass the barrier which shut payne off from anybody who sought to know the man behind the books. for twelve years before payne's death in he was his most intimate friend, and as, during all that time, he had in view the writing of payne's life he lost next to none of his opportunities for obtaining at first hand the facts and opinions needed for his work. moreover, payne made him a present of a ms. autobiography and supplied him with valuable material from his letter-files. mr. wright was, in fact, payne's boswell, and no life which may be written hereafter can have the weight and interest of this vivid book, much of which gives us the sound of payne's own voice. a history of modern colloquial english. by henry cecil wyld, b. litt. (oxon.), baines professor of english language and philology at the university of liverpool. demy vo, cloth. (spring, .) s. d. net. inland postage d. the book deals more particularly with the changes that have taken place during the last five hundred years in the spoken forms of english. the development of english pronunciation and the changes in grammatical usage are dealt with in considerable detail, and there is a chapter on idiomatic colloquialisms, modes of greeting, forms of address in society, conventional and individual methods of beginning and ending private letters, expletives, etc. the main part of the book is based almost entirely upon new material collected from the prose and poetical literature, and also from letters, diaries and wills written during the five centuries following the death of chaucer. a sketch is given of the chief peculiarities of the english dialects from about , to the end of the th century, and special chapters are devoted to a general account of the languages of the th, th, and th and th centuries respectively. many questions of general interest are dealt with, such as the rise of a common literary form of english, and its relation to the various spoken dialects; the recognition of a standard form of spoken english, and its variations from age to age, and among different social classes. the various types of english are illustrated by copious examples from the writings of all the periods under consideration. this will be a work of much interest for the intelligent general reader as well as for the scholar. professor wyld is the author of many well-known and widely read books of which this ought to prove not the least popular. zanzibar: past and present. by major francis b. pearce, c.m.g. (british resident in zanzibar), with a map and pages illustrations. super royal vo, cloth. (spring, .) s. d. net. inland postage d. this important work deals with the past and present history of zanzibar. from the earliest times this island, owing to its commanding position off the coast of africa, controlled the great trade-routes which traversed the continent from the indian to the atlantic oceans, and it has remained to the present day the metropolis of the east african region. it has known many over-lords, and the author, who is his majesty's representative in zanzibar, traces the story of this romantic island-kingdom down the centuries. the close association of this african island with ancient and mediæval arabia is demonstrated, and the advent of the old persian colonists to its shores explained. coming to later times such names as vasco da gama and sir james lancaster, that famous elizabethan sea-captain, are met with; until leaving beaten tracks, the author introduces the reader to the hoary kingdom of oman, whence came those princes of the arabian desert, who subdued to their sway the rich spice-island of zanzibar, and the adjacent territories of central africa. modern zanzibar is fully dealt with, and the enlightened prince who occupies the throne of zanzibar to-day is introduced to the reader in a personal interview. the latter portion of the work is devoted to descriptions of the ruined arab and persian stone-built towns--the very names of which are now forgotten--which until cleared by the author, lay mouldering in the forests of zanzibar and pemba. the text is elucidated by a series of beautiful photographs and by specially prepared maps. this volume must be regarded as the standard work on the sultanate of zanzibar. the canadians in france, - by capt. harwood steele, m.c., late headquarters staff, nd canadian division. with maps. demy vo. (spring, .) s. d. net. captain steele, who is already favourably known as the author of the spirited volume of poems entitled "cleared for action," here recounts the deeds of the famous force sent by canada to take part in the great war. what st. julien, ypres, st. eloi, the somme, passchaendaele, lens, vimy, amiens, cambrai and mons, mean in the glorious record of the allies will be fully understood by the reader of this book. this is the first complete record of the achievements of the canadian divisions to be published. captain steele served three years in france, and participated in most of the important engagements in which the canadians took part. drake, nelson and napoleon: studies. by sir walter runciman, bart., author of "the tragedy of st. helena," etc. illustrated. demy vo, cloth. s. d. net inland postage d. in this work sir walter runciman deals first with drake and what he calls the fleet tradition, of which he regards drake, the greatest elizabethan sailor, as the indubitable founder; next the author deals at considerable length with nelson, his relations with lady hamilton, and the various heroic achievements which have immortalised his name. from nelson the author passes on to napoleon, and shows how his career and policy have had a vital relation to the world war. as himself a sailor of the old wooden-ships period, sir walter is able to handle with special knowledge and intimacy the technique of the seafaring exploits of nelson; and sir walter's analysis of the character of nelson, a combination of vanity, childishness, statesmanlike ability, and incomparable seamanship and courage, is singularly well conceived. bolingbroke and walpole. by the rt. hon. j. m. robertson, author of "shakespeare and chapman," "the economics of progress," etc., etc. demy vo, cloth. s. d. net inland postage d. many years ago, in his "introduction to english politics" (recast as "the evolution of states"), mr. robertson proposed to continue that survey in a series of studies of the leading english politicians, from bolingbroke to gladstone. taking up the long suspended plan, he has now produced a volume on the two leading statesmen of an important period, approaching its problems through their respective actions. the aim is to present political history at once in its national and its personal aspects, treating the personalities of politicians as important forces, but studying at the same time the whole intellectual environment. a special feature of the volume intended to be developed in those which may follow is a long chapter in "the social evolution," setting forth the nation's progress, from generation to generation, in commerce, industry, morals, education, literature, art, science, and well-being. seen from a railway platform. by william vincent. crown vo, cloth. (spring, .) s. d. net. inland postage d. mr. vincent must from his early years have cultivated his faculty of observation, and he has a marvellous memory for what he has seen or heard. his recollections start from the early 'sixties, when, as a boy, he got a situation as bookstall clerk, from which position he rose to be bookstall manager in various parts of the country. his experiences as bookstall manager on a railway platform, with its continuously shifting crowds and contacts with various idiosyncracies, are highly interesting, but he recalls many events that have happened in his time away from the bookstall, the notorious heenan fight, the remarkable exhibition of the "great eastern" and others. he gives curious accounts of the early railway carriages, the treatment of the third-class passenger and much other lore concerning railway travel in the now distant days. altogether, mr. vincent has produced a valuable volume of reminiscences. life of liza lehmann. by herself. with a coloured frontispiece and pp. illustrations. large crown vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage d. shortly before her death, madame liza lehmann completed a volume of reminiscences. a charming and gifted woman her life was spent in artistic and literary surroundings. she was the daughter of an artist, rudolf lehmann, the wife of another, herbert bedford, one of her sisters being mrs. barry pain, and her cousins including muriel ménie dowie ("the girl in the carpathians") and mr. r. c. lehmann, of "punch." her memories include a dinner with verdi, conversations with jenny lind, anecdotes of edward vii, brahms, mme. clara butt, and other celebrities. as the composer of "a persian garden," she became world-renowned, and her self-revelation is not less interesting than her tit-bits about other artists. men and manner in parliament. by sir henry lucy. with a biographical note and about illustrations. large crown vo. s. d. net inland postage, d. as "member for the chiltern hundreds" sir henry lucy published an interesting volume on the parliament of . the book has been long out of print, but it again came "on the tapis" as it seemed to the publisher so thoroughly worth bringing to life again. it is recorded in the authorised life of president wilson that study of the articles on their original publication in the "gentleman's magazine" directed his career into the field of politics. he wrote to the author apropos this book: "i shall always think of you as one of my instructors." the book is essentially a connected series of character-sketches written in the well-known witty manner of the famous _punch_ diarist. gladstone, "dizzy," dilke, bright, auberon herbert, roebuck, sir stafford northcote, etc., are some of the leading figures, and lesser-known m.p.'s resume a vigorous vitality, thanks to sir henry's magic pen. anglo-american relations, - . by brougham villiers & w. h. chesson. large crown vo, cloth. s. d. net inland postage d. this book deals with the causes of friction and misunderstandings between great britain and the united states during the trying years of the civil war. the reasons which, for a time, gave prominence to the southern sympathies of the british ruling classes, while rendering almost inarticulate the far deeper feeling for the cause of union and emancipation among the masses of our people, are examined and explained. such dramatic incidents as the trent affair, the launching of the "alabama," and lincoln's emancipation proclamation are dealt with from the point of view of their effect upon opinion in this country as illustrated by contemporary correspondence and literature. interesting facts, now almost forgotten, of the movements inaugurated by the english friends of the north to explain to our people the true issues at stake in the conflict are reproduced, and an attempt is made to estimate the influence of the controversies of the time on the subsequent relations of the english-speaking peoples. mr. w. h. chesson, grandson of george thompson, the anti-slavery orator, who was william lloyd garrison's bosom friend, contributes a chapter which attempts to convey an impression of the influence of transatlantic problems upon english oratory and the writings of public men. woodrow wilson: an interpretation. by a. maurice low, author of "the american people: a study in national psychology," with a portrait. crown vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage, d. mr. a. maurice low has long been recognised as, next to lord bryce, the most acute, discriminating, and well-informed of the english critics of america. his long residence in that country and his exhaustive study of certain phases of american life have given him a background for the interpretation of their political life. mr. low has written this interpretation of president wilson "because the man to-day who occupies the largest place in the world's thought is almost as little understood by his own people as he is by the peoples of other countries, and still remains an enigma," but his point of view as an interpreter is that of a contemporary foreign observer who, while having the benefit of long residence in the united states and an intimate knowledge of its people and politics, may justly claim a detached point of view and to be uninfluenced by personal or political considerations. peace-making at paris. by sisley huddleston. large crown vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage d. mr. huddleston has been one of the most independent commentators of the proceedings at the paris conference, with a keen sense of the realities, and his despatches have, in the phrase of one of our best-known authors, made him "easily the best" of the paris correspondents. this book aims at giving a broad account of the seven months which followed the armistice; but the writer has a point of view and has not told the story of these memorable days objectively, such as might have been done by any compiler with the aid of the newspapers. a resident in paris, he has lived close to the heart of the conference, and throws a vivid light on certain events which it is of the utmost importance to understand. thus the famous "moderation interview," which was followed by the telegram of protest from m.p.'s and the return to westminster of the prime minister, who made the most sensational speech of his career, came from his pen. the attitude of mr. wilson is specially studied; his apotheosis and the waning of his star and his apparent lapse from "wilsonianism" is explained. there is shown the dramatic clash of ideas. special attention is devoted to the strange and changing policy in russia, and some extremely curious episodes are revealed. this is not merely a timely publication, but the volume is likely to preserve for many years its place as the most illuminating piece of work about the two hundred odd days in paris. it is certain to raise many controversies, and it is one of those books which it is indispensable to read. letters of anne gilchrist and walt whitman. edited with an introduction by thomas b. harned (one of walt whitman's literary executors). cloth. s. d. net. inland postage d. anne gilchrist, a charming woman of rare literary culture and intelligence, who was born in and died in , was whitman's first notable female eulogist in england, her essay on him being a valuable piece of pioneer-criticism. admiration in her case became identified with love; in the 'seventies she wrote whitman ardent love letters, the contents of which would have surprised any literary man less acquainted than he was to heroic candour. whitman was not insensible to the affectionate feelings of mrs. gilchrist (her husband died in ), and his share of their correspondence is of considerable interest to students of "leaves of grass." breaking the hindenburg line: the story of the th (north midland) division. by raymond e. priestley, author of "antarctic adventure." illustrated. large crown vo, cloth. (second impression.) s. d. net. inland postage, d. written by a member of the division for his comrades and their relatives and friends, the book is first of all intended to place on record for the north midland people the deeds of their men during the weeks which crowned four years of steadfast endeavour during the great war. it has, however, a wider significance, and thus deserves a wider circulation. the north midland county regiments were composed mainly of miners, machinists, operatives and agriculturists: men without military traditions or militant desires. the last men to take to war without an all-compelling reason. the transvaal surrounded. by w. j. leyds, litt.d., author of "the first annexation of the transvaal." with maps. demy vo, cloth. (spring, .) s. d. inland postage, d. this work is a continuation of "the first annexation of the transvaal" by the same author, and like the previous volume is based chiefly on british documents, blue books, and other official records. references are given to these, and the reader can form his own opinion from them. to find his way through the overwhelming mass of documents is only possible for the man who for long years drew up and signed most of the papers issued by his government. for the official records accessible to the historian are incomplete; they must be supplemented by the archives of the republic. only when this has been done--as it has now by one who knows--will the history of the relations between england and the boers be freed from falsehood and slander. modern japan: its political, military and industrial development. by william montgomery mcgovern, ph.d., m.r.a.d., f.r.a.i., m.j.s., etc. lecturer on japanese, school of oriental studies (unv. of lond.), priest of the nishi, hongwaryi, kyoto, japan, (spring, .) s. d. inland postage, d. unlike the book of casual impressions by the tourist or globe-trotter or a tedious work of reference for the library, mr. mcgovern's book on "modern japan," gives for the average educated man an interesting description of the evolution of japan as a modern world power, and describes the gradual triumphs over innumerable obstacles which she accomplished. the book relates how the restoration of was carried out by a small coterie of ex-samurai, in whose hands, or in that of their successors, political power has ever since remained. we see portrayed the perfecting of the bureaucratic machine, the general, political and institutional history, the stimulation of militarism and imperialism, and centralised industry. it is a vivid account of the real japan of to-day, and of the process by which it has become so. though comprehensible to the non-technical reader, yet the most careful student of far eastern affairs will find much of value in the acute analysis of the japanese nation. the author is one who has resided for years in japan, was largely educated there, who was in the japanese government service, and who, by his fluent knowledge of the language, was in intimate contact with all the leading statesmen of to-day. furthermore his position as priest of the great buddhist temple of kyoto brought him in touch with phases of japanese life most unusual for a european. while neither pro nor anti-japanese, he has delineated the extraordinary efficiency of the machine of state (so largely modelled on germany), while, at the same time, he has pointed out certain dangers inherent in its autocratic bureaucracy. _travel and description_ byways in southern tuscany. by katherine hooker. with full-page illustrations, besides sketches in the text and a removable frontispiece, the end papers being a coloured map of southern tuscany by porter garnett. demy vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage, d. in addition to its absorbing historic interest this book has the claim of recording the impressions of a vivacious and observant lady who describes what she has seen in modern tuscany from san galgano to sorano. those who like books which conjure up beautiful historic places and fascinating romances of real life will be sure to enjoy this handsome volume. among the stories related by the author is the harrowing one of nello pannocchieschi told by dante, the scene of which is the ill-famed maremma, mentioned in a proverb as a district where "you grow rich in a year, but die in six months." the romantic roussillon: in the french pyrenees. by isabel savory. with illustrations by m. landseer mackenzie. super royal vo. s. d. net inland postage d. this book is written for a double purpose: to reveal to lovers of sculpture the beauties of certain romanesque work hitherto hidden in remote corners of the pyrenees, and to suggest to travellers the attractions of a little country formerly known as the roussillon, which now forms part of the pyrénées orientales. well off the beaten track, though within easy reach of london, it should appeal to lovers of fine scenery and to students of romanesque and mediæval architecture. miss isabel savory, author of "the tail of the peacock" and "a sportswoman in india," has explored every inch of it. each chapter is a witness to the writer's research in the library at perpignan, coupled with a graphic description of the country from an artistic point of view, and lively portraits of the catalam as he exists to-day. miss muriel landseer mackenzie, sculptor and great-niece of sir edwin landseer, gives a series of pencil drawings of which the collotype process makes faithful reproductions. apart from their own merit, they represent subjects of which apparently no records exist, details of byzantine and romanesque architecture discovered in neglected abbeys, old churches, and ruins in the hills. at the end of the book there is a map and a few practical notes for travellers which indicate that prices are moderate, and that there are good roads for motorists, though the country is pre-eminently adapted for those who like the informality of the knapsack and the mountain path. in the wilds of south america: six years of exploration in colombia, venezuela, british guiana, peru, bolivia, argentina, paraguay, and brazil. by leo e. miller, of the american museum of natural history. first lieutenant in the united states aviation corps. with full-page illustrations and with maps. demy vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage d. this volume represents a series of almost continuous explorations hardly ever paralleled in the huge areas traversed. the author is a distinguished field naturalist--one of those who accompanied colonel roosevelt on his famous south american expedition--and his first object in his wanderings over , miles of territory was the observation of wild life; but hardly second was that of exploration. the result is a wonderfully informative, impressive, and often thrilling narrative in which savage peoples and all but unknown animals largely figure, which forms an infinitely readable book and one of rare value for geographers, naturalists, and other scientific men. millions from waste. by frederick a. talbot, author of "the oil conquest of the world," "all about inventions and discoveries," "moving pictures; how they are made and worked," "practical cinematography," "the building of a great canadian railway," etc., etc., etc. demy vo, cloth. s. d. net inland postage, d. in this book, mr. frederick a. talbot, whose many volumes dealing with invention, science, and industry in a popular manner have achieved such a successful vogue, introduces us to what may very appropriately be described as a fairyland of successful endeavour in a little known field. the present work does not aim at being a treatise upon the whole subject, because it is far too vast to be covered within the covers of a single volume. he takes us, as it were, into the less frequented, yet more readily accessible by-ways, where exceptional opportunities occur for one and all sections of the community to contribute to one of the greatest economic issues of the day. every industry, every home, contributes to the waste problem; each incurs a certain proportion of residue which it cannot use. this circumstance, combined with the knowledge that it is our duty to discover a commercial use for such by-products, has been responsible for many happy stories of success achieved during voyages of discovery which the author duly records. mr. talbot does not confine himself to a mere recital of the so-called waste products. he describes how their recovery and exploitations may be profitably conducted, so that the present volume is of decided practical value. he treats of the fertility of thought displayed by the inventor, chemist, and engineer in the evolution of simple ways and means to turn despised materials into indispensable articles of commerce. many of the appliances are of a striking and highly ingenious character and cannot fail to excite interest. the nations and the league. by various writers. with an introductory chapter by sir george paish. crown vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage d. this important work presents the views of eminent men of different nationalities upon one of the most burning questions of the day. french views are supplied by m. léon bourgeois, president of the association française pour la société des nations, and the famous french barrister, m. andré mater, whose historical account of experiments already made in international leagues, is of high interest. the president of columbia university, dr. nicholas murray butler, supplies an essay on patriotism in which this noble quality is rightly adjusted to a larger idea of human brotherhood than has formerly been connected with it. sir sidney low presents a british view, and messrs. louis strauss and a. heringa contribute dutch and belgian views respectively. mr. johan castberg, president of the norwegian odelsting, and the celebrated explorer, dr. nansen, write for norway, and the germans have a spokesman in professor lujo brentano, of munich. sir george paish brings his long experience and expert knowledge to bear on the economic questions that confront the league. local development law: a survey of the powers of local authorities in regard to housing, roads, buildings, lands and town planning. by h. c. dowdall, barrister-at-law, lecturer on town planning law in the university of liverpool and legal member of the town planning institute. demy vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage d. this book, which incorporates the important legislation just passed on the subject, has been written at the request of architects and surveyors as well as lawyers, council clerks, and councillors, who have complained that they have been unable to find the kind of information which it supplies in a brief, comprehensive, and intelligible form. for the law of housing, roads, parks, open spaces, allotments, public buildings, town planning, private bill procedure, compensation, and kindred matters bearing on the public control of land and the use of land for public purposes is contained in many large volumes through which even a skilled lawyer finds his way with difficulty. mr. dowdall's work deals with all these subjects systematically and fully, almost in the form of a code, but it is held together and enlivened by a certain measure of historical and illustrative matter, and avoids unnecessary detail by giving references through which the fullest information is made readily accessible to those who desire it, but perhaps do not know where to look for it. the author is of opinion that local authorities are often imperfectly aware of the full range and scope of the powers which they enjoy, or of the manner in which they might be co-ordinated and brought to bear upon what is, after all, the single and indivisible problem of town planning and town improvement. my italian year. observations and reflections in italy, - . by joseph collins. demy vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage. d. in the latter part of the author was assigned to military duty in italy. the nature of his duties brought him in close contact with italians in every walk of life and every part of the kingdom. italy was not previously unknown to him, as he had made already frequent visits. he presents a study of the italian temperament, describes the different social classes, gives a study of the governmental machine, describes various sights and monuments (not at all in the tourist manner), and altogether writes a very original book. the author has been trained by a life of observation, examination and deduction, as the work itself clearly shows. he writes with lucidity and charm, and though, as he says, he has been since childhood a lover of italy, he writes with great impartiality of certain features of the italian people. despite the fact that the war enters the book to a certain extent, its main interest is by no means the war, but the fascinating study it presents of the italian character, ways and manners, and of italy generally. instincts of the herd in peace and war. by w. trotter. new library edition. revised and enlarged. large crown vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage, d. press opinions of the first edition. "an exceedingly original essay on individual and social psychology."--the new statesman. "it is a balanced and inspiring study of one of the prime factors of human advance."--the times. "the main purpose of mr. trotter's book, which may be commended both for its logic and its circumspection, is to suggest that the science of psychology is not a mass of dreary and indefinite generalities, but if studied in relation to other branches of biology, a guide in the actual affairs of life, enabling the human mind to foretell the course of human action."--daily telegraph. boy-work: exploitation or training? by the rev. spencer j. gibb, author of "the problem of boy-work," etc. large crown vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage d. mr. spencer gibb is well known as a writer on the social and economic problems which arise from the employment of boys. his new book, is a systematic consideration of these problems, as the conclusion of the war has left them, and of the remedies which are being proposed. it seeks to co-ordinate these reforms so as to lead to a solution of the problem. but the book is of wider than merely economic and industrial interest. the problem as mr. gibb sees it is not only one of boy-work, but of the _boy at work_. he therefore examines, with close analysis and sympathetic knowledge, the psychology and physiology of the boy at the age of entering upon work and in the succeeding years, and traces the reaction of working conditions, not only upon his economic future, but upon his character. the land and the soldier. by frederick c. howe, author of "the only possible peace," etc. demy vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage d. the author believes that this is the moment for extensive social and agricultural reconstruction: the large bodies of returning soldiers on the outlook for work gives an unparalleled opportunity for experiment toward this; and the war experience of the government gained in financing and organising war industries and communities could be applied with great advantage and effect. the plan is based on the organisation of farm colonies somewhat after the danish models, not on reclaimed or distant land, but upon land never properly cultivated, often near the large cities, and aims to connect with the communities thus formed the social advantages of, for instance, the garden villages of england. in fact, the author advances a broad and thoughtful programme, looking toward an extensive agricultural and social organisation, and based upon a long and careful study of experiments in this line in other times and countries as well as here. it is a book that no one concerned with reconstruction can afford to neglect. the only possible peace. by frederick c. howe, author of "privilege and democracy," "the city," "the hope of democracy," etc. large crown vo, cloth. s. d. net inland postage d. under modern industrial conditions it is conflicts springing from economic forces that are mainly responsible for war forces that seek for control of other people's lands, territories, trade resources, or the land and water ways which control such economic opportunities. mr. howe's work, keeping these essential points in view, is an attempt to show how to anticipate and avoid war rather than how to provide means for the arbitration of disputes after they have arisen. mr. howe, a widely known student of economics and international questions, has here produced a book of the highest importance. nationalities in hungary. by andrÉ de hevesy. crown vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage d. this is a study of the many and various nationalities of which hungary is composed, of their respective characters, and of the problems which confront these nationalities. the author advocates a sort of united states of hungary, giving each nationality the fullest liberty of internal self-determination. included in the work is an ethnographical map of hungary which is of great assistance to the reader. the new america. by frank dilnot, author of "lloyd george: the man and his story," etc. crown vo, cloth. s. d. net inland postage d. this volume presents in a series of short, vivacious sketches the impressions made on a trained observer from england of life in the united states during and . manners, outlook and temperament are dealt with appreciatively, and there is a good-humored analysis of how americans eat, drink and amuse themselves. the chapters include "the women of america," "american hustle and humour," "president wilson at close quarters." there is an intimate character-sketch at first-hand of general rush c. hawkins, who raised and commanded the new york zouaves in the civil war, with a narrative of some of his conversations with lincoln. home rule through federal devolution. by frederick w. pim. with an introduction by frederic harrison. paper covers. s. d. net. inland postage d. the author assumes that there is a general consensus that extensive modifications of our existing legislative and administrative systems are urgently required, and that all indications seem to show that the present time offers an exceptional opportunity for dealing with them. he offers federal devolution as the solution of the irish question. mr. frederic harrison makes a valuable contribution to the pamphlet. bye paths in curio collecting. by arthur hayden, author of "chats on old clocks," "chats on old silver," etc. with a frontispiece and full page illustrations. demy vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage d. the broad way of collecting is crowded with bargain-hunters. competitors are keen and prices are high. all real collectors love peregrinations into the unknown, and have often stumbled upon quaint and long-forgotten objects which were once in everyday use, but are now relegated to the attic or the lumber-room. in furniture there are many objects not deemed desirable by the fashionable collector; in porcelain and earthenware there is still much that has not reached the noisy mart to be chaffered over as being rare. there are precious and beautiful things comparatively unsought and unconsidered. modernity has forgotten many by-gone necessities. the tinder-box with its endless varieties has not escaped studious attention but it has not come into the forefront of collecting as has the ornate and bejewelled snuff-box with its more highly attractive appearance. old playing-cards, old fans, silhouettes, patch-boxes, snuffers, old keys, old chests and coffers, earrings, brass table-bells, carved watch-stands, curious teapots, tea-caddies and caddy-spoons, tobacco-boxes, tobacco-stoppers, have their appeal to collectors who have specialised and have become experts--that is, have left the highway of collecting and pursued a delightful search in the bye-paths. this volume deals with these, among other subjects. the author has drawn upon his notebooks for twenty-five years, and has opened to the reader a wonderful storehouse of miscellaneous information illuminated with a gallery of photographic reproductions. as a pleasant guide in the bye-paths of collecting, mr. hayden will fascinate those real collectors who love collecting for its own sake. shakespeare and the welsh. by frederick j. harries. demy vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage d. the author has dealt with his highly interesting subject in a manner both critical and attractive. not only has he examined shakespeare's knowledge of welsh characteristics through a study of his welsh characters, but he has also collected much valuable information regarding the celtic sources from which shakespeare drew his materials. the opportunities which probably presented themselves to the poet for studying welshmen at first hand are suggested, and an endeavour is made to arrive at an explanation of shakespeare's singularly sympathetic attitude toward the welsh nation. what will strike the general reader most, perhaps, is the variety of topics which arise around shakespeare's celtic allusions, and a subject of great interest to the welsh reader will be the claim that shakespeare was descended through his paternal grandmother from the old welsh kings. the claim is not a mere speculative one, for a pedigree is given. the work is unique in many respects, and should find a welcome not merely among welshmen, but among all shakespeare students. my commonplace book. j.t. hackett. dem vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage, d. the title of this bock, it is needless to say, does not mean that the contents are commonplace. it is a very rich collection of choice extracts from the verse and prose of famous writers, and writers who deserve to be famous. swinburne is particularly well represented, as is seldom the case in anthologies. the arrangement of the book and the accuracy of the matter have been the subject of careful consideration. some greek masterpieces in dramatic and bucolic poetry thought into english verse. by william stebbing, m.a., hon. fellow of worcester college, oxford, and fellow of king's college, london. s. d. net. inland postage, d. the author, who is a scholar, presents in this volume an english verse anthology of two departments in greek poetry. among the passages and poems which he has rendered are the charge against olympus by prometheus, the "hymn of the furies," iphigenia's appeals to her father and mother, "hue and cry after cupid," etc. to convey the poet's thought has been the translator's purpose, and his versions are particularly intended for the reader who has classical tastes without having had a thorough classical education. the legend of roncevaux. adapted from "la chanson de roland," by susanna h. uloth. with four illustrations by john littlejohns, r.b.a. small to, cloth. s. d. net inland postage, d. of all the legends circulating round the name of charlemagne none is more famous and popular than that of the paladins roland and oliver. the poem known as "la chanson de roland" is the earliest epic in the french language, dating in all probability from a period not long after the conquest of england by william of normandy and before the first crusade. mrs. uloth has written a metrical and rhymed version of the most important part of the "chanson," namely, the story of the treachery which led to the battle of roncevaux, and the thrilling series of encounters which terminated in the heroic death of oliver and the lonely and mystical death of roland. there are not many rivals in the field, and her work should, therefore, command a good deal of interest. it may be added that mr. john littlejohns, who illustrates the work, has won a considerable reputation for originality and charm in drawing and painting. the collected stories of standish o'grady. with an introduction by Æ. first volumes now issued. crown vo, cloth. s. d. net each inland postage d. the cuculain cycle. ( ) the coming of cuculain. ( ) in the gates of the north. ( ) the triumph and passing of cuculain. these three books contain the essential and most beautiful portions of mr. standish o'grady's "bardic history of ireland," the work which proved to be the starting-point of ireland's literary renaissance. that work has long been unobtainable, and is now offered for the first time in a convenient and popular form, which will enable every reader to make the acquaintance of the most striking figure in contemporary anglo-irish literature. the debt which a generation of brilliant poets and dramatists owe to the author of these cuculain stories has well been described by one of his disciples, who wrote:-- "in the 'bardic history of ireland' he opened, with a heroic gesture, the doors which revealed to us in ireland the giant lord of the red branch knights and the fianna. though a prose writer, he may be called the last of the bards--a true comrade of homer." a new volume of the talbot literary studies. irish books and irish people. by stephen gwynn, m.a. crown vo, cloth s. d. net. inland postage d. whatever captain gwynn writes is worth reading. he has a knowledge of the literary value of irish books, and the complex personality of irish possessed by few present-day writers, and he imparts his knowledge with that peculiar detached conviction of the hurler on the ditch. whether one accepts or rejects the opinions expressed, they are always worthy of consideration, while the fine choice of language and beautiful literary style will well repay a second reading. capt. gwynn deals with such subjects as novels of irish life, a century of irish humour, literature among the illiterates, irish education and irish character, yesterday in ireland, etc., etc. to book lovers. if you would like to receive future issues of this catalogue you are invited to send a post card to that effect to t. fisher unwin, ltd. , adelphi terrace, london, w.c. . _please write your name and full address clearly._ swords and flutes. poems. by william kean seymour. crown vo, cloth. s. net. s. d. net. inland postage, d. what the critics say of mr. seymour's work. "we recognise not so much audacity of experiment as a sound loyalty to the best standards of the past, and an almost acute appreciation of beauty both of vision and form.... mr. seymour's poetry is full of rich and multi-coloured pageantry, a sheer delight to the eye and imagination."--the bookman. "mr. seymour's verse is full of a haunting, fugitive sense of beauty, and owes allegiance to a school of lyric craftsmanship which is rapidly falling out of date. but it is something more than this. mr. seymour believes that poetry should not only beautify, but interpret life."--daily telegraph. "the measure" and "down stream." two plays. by graham rawson, author of "stroke of marbot," etc. crown vo. paper cover. s. d. net. inland postage d. "the measure" is an amusing comedy of contemporary life, in a prologue and two acts, dealing with the adventures of two bachelors who become entangled in a family containing three daughters. "down stream" is a one-act play whose action takes place in a supposititious country in south-eastern europe, where the king traps one of his ministers neatly, and then deals with him in an unexpected fashion. of mr. rawson's previous volume ("the stroke of marbot," fisher unwin, ) the _times_ said: "they are effective plays which should act well, and the stage directions are so given as to make them quite good reading for the study." latest addition to the talbot press booklets the spoiled buddha. an eastern play in two acts. by helen waddell. paper covers. s. d. net inland postage d. the play is about the buddha, in the days before he became a god; and about binzuru, who was his favourite disciple, and who might have become even as the buddha, only that he saw a woman passing by, and desired her beauty and so fell from grace. songs of the island queen. by peadar mactomais. paper covers. s. d. net. inland postage d. "those are songs of a dreamer of eire, a scion of a race that is old --of a race that is strong, a people begotten of freemen, rocked on the cradle of song." west african forests and forestry. by a. harold unwin, d.oec., m.can.s.f.e. author of "future forest trees." with upwards of illustrations. cloth. (spring, .) £ s. net. inland postage, d. the author, late senior conservator of forestry in nigeria, having spent eleven years in west africa in forestry work, has had exceptional experience. he starts by dealing in general with west african forests, then successively in geographical order, with the trees and forests of gambia, sierra leone, liberia, the ivory and gold coasts, togo, nigeria, and the british sphere of the cameroons. he supplies notes on timber trees both for export and local use, and gives throughout the botanical and vernacular names of indigenous trees. dr. unwin has also chapters on the oil beans, seeds and nuts of the west african forests; on the oil palm and palm kernel industry, and the question of the forest in relation to agriculture. the work is an elaborate one, marked by singular thoroughness in its execution. collected fruits of occult teaching. by a. p. sinnett. demy vo, cloth. (spring, .) s. d. net. inland postage. d. mr. sinnett, who is one of the leading lights of theosophy and one of the ablest exponents of reincarnation and the science of the evolution of races, embodies in this work the deeply interesting information which, as an occultist, he states he has derived about the human soul, its hereafter and other matters. much of the work is due to the teaching of the occult master with whom mr. sinnett claims to be in touch. it cannot be doubted that even the most sceptical reader will be thrilled and impressed by more than one of the chapters of this remarkable and fascinating book. the religion of a doctor. by thomas bodley scott, m.d., author of "the road to a healthy old age." crown vo, cloth. s. d. net inland postage d. dr. scott, who is well known for his skill as a physician, offers here a sort of modern companion to the famous "religio medici." the essays in this interesting volume enable the reader to view the spiritual side of a contemplative man of science of our day. revelations of monte carlo roulette. by j. cousins lawrence. crown vo, cloth. (spring, .) s. d. net. inland postage, d. mr. lawrence has had an extensive experience in studying roulette playing at monte carlo, and the result is an accumulation of evidence supporting his accusation of unfair control on the part of the bank in the notorious casino. the book is a full and descriptive account of the methods of croupiers in dealing with players, of the observation maintained by the officials over both croupiers and the players. the work is full of typical incidents, tragic and amusing, observed on the spot. blind alley. by w. l. george. author of "the second blooming," etc. crown vo. (second impression.) s. d. net inland postage d. "a powerful piece of work, and is at once a protest against the exploitation of youth by age and an attempted demonstration that war and all its activities are spiritual blind alleys from which we merely have to grope back to the position from which we started."--pall mall gazette. "it is an indictment in detail, a display of follies and festivities, a protest against the past stifling the future, a stirring of muddy depths."--manchester guardian. "it strikes us being so far its author's high watermark."--daily chronicle. "we ate tempted to say that 'blind alley' is the greatest character study of the influence of the war we have read."--ladies' field. pink roses. by gilbert cannan. author of "mendel," "the stucco house," etc. crown vo, cloth. (second impression.) s. d. net. inland postage d. "character and atmosphere are the qualities of mr. gilbert cannan's new novel, and they revel through its pages like a riot of pink roses.... ruth hobday symbolises the new generation, who have learnt in suffering what they will realise in joy. mr. cannan has done nothing better than the portrait of this splendid type of young womanhood. indeed, we are inclined to doubt if he has ever done anything as good."--daily telegraph. the candidate's progress. by j. a. farrer. crown vo, cloth, with a picture wrapper. s. d. net. inland postage d. this is a jeu d'esprit, a political skit which pokes fun pretty evenly at all parties, especially at so-called democratic representation as exemplified by a parliamentary election conducted largely by the cynical wiles of the election agent. the candidate (a conservative), who tells the story in the first person, meets all the local elite and has patiently to listen to crusted toryism; he gets heavy orthodox support from the bishop and the church, and is involved in expensive experiences in competing in philanthropy with the liberal candidate. he finds it necessary to take elocution lessons; eventually, after incredible exertions, he gets in by five votes--but this is only part of an extravaganza which has the great merit of being founded largely on fact and the observation of a political expert who is also a master of irony. pirates of the spring: a novel. by forrest reid. crown vo, cloth. s. d. net inland postage, d. mr. forrest reid is one of those careful craftsmen who are not convinced of the absolute necessity of producing one or two full-length novels every year. mr. reid has always an interesting story to tell, and he is a master of style, tender and sensitive, yet powerfully effective. "pirates of the spring" is a fine example of mr. reid's work which will certainly enhance his literary reputation amongst discriminating readers who appreciate a good story well told. by strange paths: a novel. by annie m. p. smithson. crown vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage, d. miss smithson's former novel, "her irish heritage," achieved a success seldom accorded to first ventures, and "by strange paths" is certain to be equally popular. miss smithson is a nurse by profession, and her pictures of the unseen side of hospital life are drawn with the sure touch of knowledge and experience. her characters are familiar because they are real, and the human notes of gladness and sadness run through the story as "a melody in tune." tales that were told. by seumas macmanus. crown vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage d. these are stories that are truly different real irish folk tales, with the scent of the turf smoke still on them, and qualities of humanness, fancy and humour which make them of irresistible appeal. a delightful book for young and old, written with that touch of genius which brought a poor donegal schoolmaster into the front rank of irish authors. the whale and the grasshopper. by seumas j. o'brien. with frontispiece and cover design by john keatings, a.r.h.a. crown vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage d. a curious title of a curious book of curious stories that a curious reader will simply revel in. mr. seumas o'brien is one of the younger school of irish writers who has taken american readers by storm, and this unique collection of short stories comes to us by way of boston and dublin. regarding the stories, the "boston transcript" says:-- "one new short stories writer has appeared this year whose published stories open a new field to fiction and have a human richness of feeling and imagination rare in our sophisticated literature. in seumas o'brien i believe that america has found a new humorist of popular sympathies, a rare observer and philosopher whose very absurdities have a persuasive philosophy of their own." _first popular edition._ greatheart by ethel m. dell. crown vo, cloth. with a striking picture wrapper, printed in three colours. (fifth impression.) s. d. net. inland postage d. "we think miss dell's many admirers will consider her present novel the best she has written."--pall mall gazette. "miss dell's huge circle of admirers will revel in this latest example of her skill in incident and plot. it goes with an unfaltering swing from start to finish."--sheffield telegraph. "the novel is full of tense situations and highly wrought emotions. whoever begins it will not put it down until it is finished."--the scotsman. a new popular edition of the sequel to "the shulamite." the woman deborah by alice and claude askew. new impression, re-set. crown vo, cloth, with a striking picture wrapper, printed in three colours. s. d. net inland postage d. alice and claude askew's south african novel, "the shulamite," is one of the most popular of successful novels. the sequel, "the woman deborah"--an equally striking piece of work--has long been unobtainable. this new impression will find many new readers for both books. town planning in practice: an introduction to the art of designing cities and suburbs. by raymond unwin. with many illustrations, maps and plans. crown to, cloth. (sixth impression.) s. d. net. inland postage, d. "few men in england have had so much experience of town-planning as mr. unwin has had.... his is the first english handbook on the subject.... it is not too technical for the general reader, and it deserves a wide public."--manchester guardian. the evolution of modern germany. new and revised edition. by w. harbutt dawson. demy vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage d. "a book so well known needs no recommendation, and those who have the earlier edition will assuredly desire to get the new one. it is essential as a work of reference."--the new world. richard cobden: the international man. by j. a. hobson. with a photogravure frontispiece, and other illustrations. demy vo, cloth. (second impression.) s. d. net inland postage, d. "mr. hobson has produced one of those rare books which it is difficult to read through, because they are too interesting. it continually lures one into reflection; one puts it down on one's knees and wanders away straight out of the text down some pleasant (and sometimes unpleasant) path of speculation.... almost every page testifies to cobden's soundness of judgment in the sphere of international policy."--new statesman. tropic days. by e. j. banfield, author of "the confessions of a beachcombe," etc. with illustrations. demy vo, cloth. (second impression.) s. d. net inland postage, d. "the plant and bird life of a tiny pacific island are described with care and charm, and in a number of revealing chapters the characters and habits of the very primitive natives who are mr. banfield's neighbours are explained. to the naturalist the abundant illustrations of rare growths will be a treasure."--the manchester guardian. shakespeare's workmanship. by sir arthur quiller-couch, m.a., litt.d., king edward vii. professor of english literature in the university of cambridge. demy vo, cloth. (third impression.) s. d. net. inland postage d. "sir arthur quiller-couch's analysis of shakespeare's craftsmanship goes direct to the principles of dramatic construction; and if ever the poetic drama seriously revives in england it is more than likely that this book will be found to have had a hand in the revival."--westminster gazette. the soul of denmark, by shaw desmond. demy vo, cloth. (third impression.) s. d. net inland postage d. "this book is the result of nearly four years' residence in denmark; and conveys a full and intimate picture of the dane and his life as he impressed the author."--the times. old and new masters. by robert lynd. demy vo, cloth. (second impression.) s. d. net. inland postage d. "a book of essays full of charm, insight and sympathy, and of the transmitted enthusiasm that is the basis of all good criticism."--daily news. "this is a fascinating volume, and has the right quality of literary criticism."--sunday times. through lapland with skis and reindeer. by frank hedges butler, f.r.g.s. with maps and illustrations demy vo, cloth. (third impression, re-set.) s. d. net. each. inland postage d. "it is at once a fascinating story of travel, a practical guide book, and a storehouse of interesting information on the manners, customs, and folklore of a little-known people."--world's work. uncensored celebrities. by e.t. raymond large crown vo, cloth, (fourth impression.) s. d. net. inland postage d. "some exceedingly frank portraits of public men are contained in a book with the curious title of 'uncensored celebrities,' which messrs. fisher unwin publish. the author, mr. e. t. raymond, is mercilessly careful to explain in his preface that the work is 'not meant for the hero-worshipper."--evening standard. "no book of personal studies of recent years has given so much food for thought, and in spite of its frankness it is always fair. mr. raymond has succeeded in revealing men without taking sides.... here we have clear vision, sane opinion, and a very useful sense of humour, not always free from acid."--national news. a short history of france. by mary duclaux. with maps. demy vo, cloth. (fourth impression.) s. d. net inland postage d. "mme. duclaux is a true literary artist; and no one, we venture to say, even among the writers of her adopted nation, the home of brilliant literature, was better fitted for the exact task she has here set herself and so charmingly fulfilled.... one of the chief merits of the book, which makes it valuable for all persons, and they are legion in these days, who wish really to understand france, is mme. duclaux's penetrating knowledge of the french character."--the spectator. the wonders of instinct: chapters in the psychology of insects. by j. h. fabre. translated by alexander teixera de mattos and bernard miall. with illustrations. demy vo, cloth. (third impression.) s. d. net. inland postage. d. "nothing has ever been written in the literature of natural history more fascinating than the essays of j. h. fabre."--daily news. six centuries of work and wages: the history of english labour. by james e. thorold rogers. demy vo, cloth. s. d. net. inland postage d. "professor thorold rogers' works on political economy possess a permanent value as a storehouse of data on that branch of the science in which he specialised, and it may almost be said, made his own."--westminster review. poems. by w. b. yeats. with a photogravure frontispiece. demy vo, cloth. (eighth impression.) s. d. net. inland postage d. "mr. yeats is the only one among the younger english poets who has the whole poetical temperament.... it is this continuously poetical quality of mind that seems to me to distinguish mr. yeats from the many men of talent, and to place him among the few men of genius."--mr. arthur symons in the saturday review. the economic interpretation of history. by james e. thorold rogers. special library edition. large crown vo, cloth. (eighth impression.) s. d. net. inland postage d. "professor thorold rogers clothed the bare bones of political economy with the living tissue of life when he fascinated his generation with the 'economic interpretation of history' ... an unrivalled survey of the inter-action of economic motive, social growth and political history."--christian world. how france is governed. by raymond poincare. large crown vo, cloth. (fifth impression.) s. d. net. inland postage d. "a most interesting and valuable account of the whole framework of french administration ... packed with information not easily obtained elsewhere, and conveyed in language of remarkable and attractive simplicity."--the spectator. the life of girolamo savonarola. by professor pasquale villari. special library edition. illustrated. large crown vo, cloth. (eleventh impression.) s. d. net. inland postage d. "the most interesting religious biography that we know of in modern times."--spectator. 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"yet malice never was his aim, he lashed the vice but spared the name. no individual could resent where thousands equally were meant." a book of genuine wit and humour which is sure to be as much appreciated as "the book of artemas." presentation edition of the novels of ethel m. dell _seven volumes, crown vo, bound uniform in cloth gilt, complete in a handsome box._ s. d. net. the set. _note._--the volumes are also included in the adelphi library of standard novels, and sold separately, bound in cloth at / net each. _list of novels included in this presentation edition._ the way of an eagle. the knave of diamonds. the rocks of valpré the swindler, and other stories. the keeper of the door. the safety curtain, and other stories. greatheart. _important._--it is advisable to place your order for this presentation edition without delay, otherwise delivery cannot be guaranteed. t. fisher unwin, ltd., , adelphi terrace, london. unwin's pocket novels. _neatly bound_ /- _net_ _picture wrapper_ the way of an eagle by ethel m. dell the knave of diamonds by ethel m. dell my lady of the chimney corner by alexander irvine ricroft of withens by halliwell sutcliffe the vulture's prey by h. de vere stacpoole arundel by e. f. benson exile by dolf wyllarde carnival (abridged edition) by compton mackenzie guy and pauline by compton mackenzie the passionate elopement by compton mackenzie through sorrows gates by halliwell sutcliffe shameless wayne by halliwell sutcliffe / _net_ m'glusky the reformer by a. g. hales the trail of ' by robert w. service ann veronica by h. g. wells the beetle by richard marsh almayer's folly by joseph conrad the shulamite by alice & claude askew new chronicles of don q. by k. & hesketh prichard the camera fiend by e. w. hornung monte carlo by mrs. de vere stacpoole called back by hugh conway the stickit minister by s. r. crockett the crimson azaleas by h. de vere stacpoole patsy by h. de vere stacpoole by reef and palm by louis becke uncanny tales 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rico_, and _alaska_. by j. f. muirhead. with maps and plans. fourth revised edition. . net s. women as world builders women as world builders studies in modern feminism by floyd dell [illustration] chicago forbes and company copyright, , by forbes and company contents chapter page i the feminist movement ii charlotte perkins gilman iii emmeline pankhurst and jane addams iv olive schreiner and isadora duncan v beatrice webb and emma goldman vi margaret dreier robins vii ellen key viii freewomen and dora marsden women as world builders chapter i the feminist movement the feminist movement can be dealt with in two ways: it can be treated as a sociological abstraction, and discussed at length in heavy monographs; or it can be taken as the sum of the action of a lot of women, and taken account of in the lives of individual women. the latter way would be called "journalistic," had not the late william james used it in his "varieties of religious experience." it is a method which preserves the individual flavor, the personal tone and color, which, after all, are the life of any movement. it is, therefore, the method i have chosen for this book. the ten women whom i have chosen are representative: they give the quality of the woman's movement of today. charlotte perkins gilman--jane addams--emmeline pankhurst--olive schreiner--isadora duncan--beatrice webb--emma goldman--margaret dreier robins--ellen key: surely in these women,[see also the chapter "freewomen and dora marsden."] if anywhere, is to be found the soul of modern feminism! one may inquire why certain other names are not included. there is maria montessori, for instance. her ideas on the education of children are of the utmost importance, and their difference from those of froebel is another illustration of the difference between the practical minds of women and the idealistic minds of men. but madame montessori's relation to the feminist movement is, after all, ancillary. a tremendous lot remains to be done in the way of cooperation for the management of households and the education of children before women who are wives and mothers will be set free to take their part in the work of the outside world. but it is the setting of mothers free, and not the specific kind of education which their children are to receive, which is of interest to us here. again, one may inquire why, since i have not blinked the fact that the feminist movement is making for a revolution of values in sex--why i have not included any woman who has distinguished herself by defying antiquated conventions which are supposed to rule the relations of the sexes. this requires a serious answer. the adjustment of one's social and personal relations, so far as may be, to accord with one's own convictions--that is not feminism, in my opinion: it is only common sense. the attempt to discover how far social laws and traditions must be changed to accord with the new position of women in society--that is a different thing, and i have dealt with it in the paper on ellen key. another reason is my belief that it is with woman as producer that we are concerned in a study of feminism, rather than with woman as lover. the woman who finds her work will find her love--and i do not doubt will cherish it bravely. but the woman who sets her love above everything else i would gently dismiss from our present consideration as belonging to the courtesan type. it is not very well understood what the courtesan really is, and so i pause to describe her briefly. it is not necessary to transgress certain moral customs to be a courtesan; on the other hand, the term may accurately be applied to women of irreproachable morals. there are some women who find their destiny in the bearing and rearing of children, others who demand independent work like men, and still others who make a career of charming, stimulating, and comforting men. these types, of course, merge and combine; and then there is that vast class of women who belong to none of these types--who are not good for anything! the first of these types may be called the mother type, the second the worker type, and the third--the kind of women which is not drawn either to motherhood or to work, but which is greatly attracted to men and which possesses special qualities of sympathy, stimulus, and charm, and is content with the more or less disinterested exercise of these qualities--this may without prejudice be called the courtesan type. it will be seen that the courtesan qualities may find play as well within legal marriage as without, and that the transgression of certain moral customs is only incidental to the type. where circumstances encourage it, and where the moral tradition is weakened by experience or temperament, the moral customs will be transgressed: but it is the human qualities of companionship, and not the economic basis of that companionship, which is the essential thing. when a girl with such qualities marries, and she usually marries, much depends upon the character of her husband. if her husband appreciates her, if he does not expect her to give up her career of charming straightway, and restrict herself to cooking, sewing, and the incubating of babies; and, furthermore, if he does not baffle those qualities in his wife by sheer failure in his own career, then there is a happy and virtuous marriage. otherwise, there is separation or divorce, and the woman sometimes becomes the companion of another man without the sanction of law. but she has been, it will be perceived, a courtesan all along. and while i do not wish to seem to deprecate her comfortable qualities, she does not come in the scope of this inquiry. but there is another figure which i wish i had been able to include. not wishing to involve my publisher in a libel suit, i refrain. she is the young woman of the leisure class, whose actions, as represented to us in the yellow journals, shock or divert us, according to our temperaments. i confess to having the greatest sympathy for her, and in her endeavor to create a livelier, a more hilarious and human morale, she is doing, i feel, a real service to the cause of women. our american pseudo-aristocracy is capable to teach us, despite its fantastic excesses, how to play. and emancipation from middle-class standards of taste, morality, and intellect is, so far as it goes, a good thing. "too many cocktails," a lady averred to me the other day, "is better than smugness; risque conversation far better than none at all." and that celebrated "public-be-damned" attitude of the pseudo-aristocracy is a great moral improvement over the cowardly, hysterical fear of the neighbors which prevails in the middle class. but, if i sympathize with the "hell raising" tendency--no other phrase describes it--of the young woman of the leisure class, i have more pity than sympathy for the one who is trying to realize the ideal of the "salon." for she must, after sad experience and bitter disillusionment, be content with the tawdry activities which, relieved by the orgiastic outbreaks alluded to above, constitute social life in america. the establishment of a salon is, in itself, a healthful ideal. if civilization were destroyed, and rebuilt on any plan, the tradition of the salon would be a good starting point for the creation of a medium of satisfying social intercourse. social intercourse we must have, or the best of us lapse into boorishness. the ego only properly functions in contact with other and various egos. so that, in any case, we should have to have something in the nature of our contemporary "society." all the more do we need "society" at present, since those ancient institutions, the church and the café, have almost entirely lost the character of real social centers. recognizing this need, and supposing the best intentions in the world, what can people do at present in the creation of a "society" which shall be useful to the community instead of a laughing stock for the intelligent? that is a fair question. many an ambitious and idealistic young american matron has tried to solve it. she has found that the materials were a little scarce--the people who could talk brilliantly are very rare. but brilliancy is always a miracle, and it can be dispensed with. the real trouble lies elsewhere. the fact is that in our present industrial system the need for social life is in inverse ratio to the opportunity for it. the people who need social intercourse are those who do hard work. the people who have most money and leisure, the most opportunity for social life, are those who have too much of it, anyway. moreover--and this is an important point--no one profits less by leisure and money than those who have a great deal of it. consequently, the basis of "society" today is a class of people naturally and inevitably inferior. it is this class which dominates "society," which gives the tone, and which sets the standard. so long, then, as "society" is dominated by inferiors, intelligent men and women will not be inclined to waste what time they have for social intercourse in such stupid activities as those that "society" can furnish. they will flock by themselves, and if they become undemocratic and unsocial as a result, that will appear to them the lesser evil. so that, however catholic our standards, the saloniere, as a bounden failure, has no place in this transcript of feminism. one thing will be observed with regard to these following papers--though they are imbued with an intense interest in women, they are devoid of the spirit of romance. i mean that attitude toward woman which accepts her sex as a miraculous justification for her existence, the belief that being a woman is a virtue in itself, apart from the possession of other qualities: in short, woman-worship. the reverence for woman as virgin, or wife, or mother, irrespective of her capacities as friend or leader or servant--that is romance. it is an attitude which, discovered in the middle ages, has added a new glamour to existence. to woman as a superior being, a divinity, one may look for inspiration--and receive it. for those who cannot be fired by an abstract idea, she gives to imagination "some pure light in human form to fix it." she is the sustenance of hungry souls. believe in her and you shall be saved--so runs the gospel of petrarch, of dante, of browning, of george meredith. so runs not mine. i have hearkened to the voice of modern science, which tells me that woman is an inferior being, with a weak body, a stunted mind, poor in creative power, poor in imagination, poor in critical capacity--a being who does not know how to work, nor how to talk, nor how to play! i hope no one will imagine that i am making these charges up maliciously out of my own head: such a notion would indicate that a century of pamphleteering on the woman question had made no impression on a mind saturated in the ideology of popular fiction. but--i have hearkened even more eagerly to the voice of sociology, which tells me of woman's wonderful possibilities. it is with these possibilities that this book is, in the main, concerned. but first the explanation of why i, a man, write these articles on feminism. it involves the betrayal of a secret: the secret, that is, of the apparent indifference or even hostility of men toward the woman's movement. the fact is, as has been bitterly recited by the rebellious leaders of their sex, that women have always been what man wanted them to be--have changed to suit his changing ideals. the fact is, furthermore, that the woman's movement of today is but another example of that readiness of women to adapt themselves to a masculine demand. men are tired of subservient women; or, to speak more exactly, of the seemingly subservient woman who effects her will by stealth--the pretty slave with all the slave's subtlety and cleverness. so long as it was possible for men to imagine themselves masters, they were satisfied. but when they found out that they were dupes, they wanted a change. if only for self-protection, they desired to find in woman a comrade and an equal. in reality they desired it because it promised to be more fun. so that we have as the motive behind the rebellion of women an obscure rebellion of men. why, then, have men appeared hostile to the woman's rebellion? because what men desire are real individuals who have achieved their own freedom. it will not do to pluck freedom like a flower and give it to the lady with a polite bow. she must fight for it. we are, to tell the truth, a little afraid that unless the struggle is one which will call upon all her powers, which will try her to the utmost, she will fall short of becoming that self-sufficient, able, broadly imaginative and healthy-minded creature upon whom we have set our masculine desire. it is, then, as a phase of the great human renaissance inaugurated by men that the woman's movement deserves to be considered. and what more fitting than that a man should sit in judgment upon the contemporary aspects of that movement, weighing out approval or disapproval! such criticism is not a masculine impertinence but a masculine right, a right properly pertaining to those who are responsible for the movement, and whose demands it must ultimately fulfill. chapter ii charlotte perkins gilman of the women who represent and carry on this many-sided movement today, the first to be considered from this masculine viewpoint should, i think, be charlotte perkins gilman. for she is, to a superficial view, the most intransigent feminist of them all, the one most exclusively concerned with the improvement of the lot of woman, the least likely to compromise at the instance of man, child, church, state, or devil. mrs. gilman is the author of "women and economics" and several other books of theory, "what diantha did" and several other books of fiction; she is the editor and publisher of a remarkable journal, the forerunner, the whole varied contents of which is written by herself; she has a couple of plays to her credit, and she has published a book of poems. if in spite of all this publicity it is still possible to misunderstand the attitude of mrs. gilman, i can only suppose it to be because her poetry is less well known than her prose. for in this book of verse, "in this our world," mrs. gilman has so completely justified herself that no man need ever be afraid of her--nor any woman who, having a lingering tenderness for the other sex, would object to living in a beehive world, full of raging efficient females, with the males relegated to the position of drones. of course, i do but jest when i speak of this fear; but there is, to the ordinary male, something curiously objectionable at the first glance in mrs. gilman's arguments, whether they are for coöperative kitchens or for the labor of women outside the home. and the reason for that objection lies precisely in the fact that her plans seem to be made in a complete forgetfulness of him and his interests. it all has the air of a feminine plot. the coöperative kitchens, and the labor by which women's economic independence is to be achieved, seem the means to an end. and so they are. but the end, as revealed in mrs. gilman's poems, is that one which all intelligent men must desire. i do not know whether or not the more elaborate coöperative schemes of mrs. gilman are practical; and i fancy that she rather exaggerates the possibilities of independent work for women who have or intend to have children. but the spirit behind these plans is one which cannot but be in the greatest degree stimulating and beneficent in its effect upon her sex. for mrs. gilman is, first of all, a poet, an idealist. she is a lover of life. she rejoices in beauty and daring and achievement, in all the fine and splendid things of the world. she does not merely disapprove of the contemporary "home" as wasteful and inefficient--she hates it because it vulgarizes life. in this "home," this private food-preparing and baby-rearing establishment, she sees a machine which breaks down all that is good and noble in women, which degrades and pettifies them. the contrast between the instinctive ideals of young women and the sordid realities into which housekeeping plunges them is to her intolerable. and in the best satirical verses of modern times she ridicules these unnecessary shames. in one spirited piece she points out that the soap-vat, the pickle-tub, even the loom and wheel, have lost their sanctity, have been banished to shops and factories: but bow ye down to the holy stove, the altar of the home! the real feeling of mrs. gilman is revealed in these lines, which voice, indeed, the angry mood of many an outraged housewife who finds herself the serf of a contraption of cast-iron: ... we toil to keep the altar crowned with dishes new and nice, and art and love, and time and truth, we offer up, with health and youth in daily sacrifice. mrs. gilman is not under the illusion that the conditions of work outside the home are perfect; she is, indeed, a socialist, and as such is engaged in the great task of revolutionizing the basis of modern industry. but she has looked into women's souls, and turned away in disgust at the likeness of a dirty kitchen which those souls present. into these lives corrupted by the influences of the "home" nothing can come unspoiled--nothing can enter in its original stature and beauty. she says: birth comes. birth-- the breathing re-creation of the earth! all earth, all sky, all god, life's sweet deep whole, newborn again to each new soul! "oh, are you? what a shame! too bad, my dear! how well you stand it, too! it's very queer the dreadful trials women have to carry; but you can't always help it when you marry. oh, what a sweet layette! what lovely socks! what an exquisite puff and powder box! who is your doctor? yes, his skill's immense-- but it's a dreadful danger and expense!" and so with love, and death, and work--all are smutted and debased. and her revolt is a revolt against that which smuts and debases them--against those artificial channels which break up the strong, pure stream of woman's energy into a thousand little stagnant canals, covered with spiritual pond-scum. it is a part of her idealism to conceive life in terms of war. so it is that she scorns compromise, for in war compromise is treason. and so it is that she has heart for the long, slow marshaling of forces, and the dingy details of the commissariat--for these things are necessary if the cry of victory is ever to ring out over the battlefield. some of her phrases have so militant an air that they seem to have been born among the captains and the shouting. they make us ashamed of our vicious civilian comfort. mrs. gilman's attitude toward the bearing and rearing of children is easy to misapprehend. she does seem to relegate these things to the background of women's lives. she does deny to these things a tremendous importance. why, she asks, is it so important that women should bear and rear children to live lives as empty and poor as their own? surely, she says, it is more important to make life something worth giving to children! no, she insists, it is not sufficient to be a mother: an oyster can be a mother. it is necessary that a woman should be a person as well as a mother. she must know and do. and as for the ideal of love which is founded on masculine privilege, she satirizes it very effectively in some verses entitled "wedded bliss": "o come and be my mate!" said the eagle to the hen; "i love to soar, but then i want my mate to rest forever in the nest!" said the hen, "i cannot fly i have no wish to try, but i joy to see my mate careering through the sky!" they wed, and cried, "ah, this is love, my own!" and the hen sat, the eagle soared, alone. woman, in mrs. gilman's view, must not be content with hendom: the sky is her province, too. of all base domesticity, all degrading love, she is the enemy. she gives her approval only to that work which has in it something high and free, and that love which is the dalliance of the eagles. chapter iii emmeline pankhurst and jane addams a few months ago it was rather the fashion to reply to some political verses by mr. kipling which assumed to show that women should not be given the ballot, and which had as their refrain: the female of the species is more deadly than the male! but it seems that no one pointed out that this fact, even in the limited sense in which it is a fact in the human species, is an argument for giving women the vote. for if women are, as mr. kipling says, lacking in a sense of abstract justice, in patience, in the spirit of compromise; if they are violent and unscrupulous in gaining an end upon which they have set their hearts, then by all means they should be rendered comparatively harmless by being given the ballot. for it is characteristic of a republic that its political machinery, created in order to carry out the will of the people, comes to respond with difficulty to that will, while being perfectly susceptible to other influences. republican government, when not modified by drastic democratic devices, is an expensive, cumbrous, and highly inefficient method of carrying out the popular will; and casting a vote is like nothing so much as casting bread upon the waters. it shall return--after many days. by voting, by exercising an infinitesimal pressure on our complex, slow-moving political mechanism, one cannot--it is a sad fact--do much good; but one cannot--and it should encourage the pessimistic mr. kipling--one cannot, even though a woman, do much harm. this is not, however, a disquisition on woman suffrage. there is only one argument for woman suffrage: women want it; there are no arguments against it. but one may profitably inquire, what will be the effect of the emergence of women into politics upon politics itself? and one may hope to find an answer in the temperament and career of certain representative leaders of the woman's movement. let us accordingly turn to the accredited leader of the english "votes for women" movement, and to the woman in the american movement who is best known to the public. that miss jane addams has become known chiefly through other activities does not matter here. it is temperament and career in which we are immediately interested. what is perhaps the most outstanding fact in the temperament of miss addams is revealed only indirectly in her autobiography: it may be called the passion of conciliation. mrs. emmeline pankhurst has by her actions written herself down for a fighter. she has but recently been released from holloway jail, where she was serving a term of imprisonment for "conspiracy and violence." in a book by h. g. wells, which contains a very bitter attack on the woman's suffrage movement (i refer to "ann veronica"), she is described as "implacable"; and i believe that it is she to whom mr. wells refers as being "as incapable of argument as a steam roller broken loose." the same things might have been said of sherman on his dreadful march to the sea. these phrases, malicious as they are, contain what i am inclined to accept as an accurate description of mrs. pankhurst's temperament. no one would call mrs. pankhurst a conciliator. and no one would call miss addams "implacable." it is not intended to suggest that miss addams is one of those inveterate compromisers who prefer a bad peace to a good war. but she has the gift of imaginative sympathy; and it is impossible for her to have toward either party in a conflict the cold hostility which each party has for the other. she sees both sides; and even though one side is the wrong side, she cannot help seeing why its partisans believe in it. "if the under dog were always right," miss addams has said, "one might quite easily try to defend him. the trouble is that very often he is but obscurely right, sometimes only partially right, and often quite wrong, but perhaps he is never so altogether wrong and pig-headed and utterly reprehensible as he is represented to be by those who add the possession of prejudice to the other almost insuperable difficulties in understanding him." miss addams has taken in good faith the social settlement ideal--"to span the gulf between the rich and the poor, or between those who have had cultural opportunities and those who have not, by the process of neighborliness." in her writings, as in her work, there is never sounded the note of defiance. even in defense of the social settlement and its methods of conciliation (which have been venomously assailed by the newspapers during chicago's fits of temporary insanity, as in the averbuch case), miss addams has not become militant. she has never ceased to be serenely reasonable. but when one comes to ask how powerful miss addams' example has been, one is forced to admit that it has been limited. there are two other settlement houses in chicago which are managed in the spirit of hull house. but all the others--and there are about forty settlement houses in the city--have discarded almost openly the principle of conciliation. they are efficient, or religious, or something else, but they are afraid of being too sympathetic with the working class. they do not, for instance, permit labor unions to meet in their halls. the splendid social idealism of the ' s, of which miss addams is representative, has disappeared, leaving two sides angry and hostile and with none but miss addams believing in the possibility of finding any common ground for action. one event after another from the pullman strike to the averbuch case has brought this hostility out into the open, with miss addams occupying neutral ground, and left high and dry upon it. it is the fact that miss addams has not been able to imbue the movement in which she is a leader with her own spirit. her career has been successful only so far as individual genius could make it successful. if one compares her achievement to that of mrs. pankhurst, one sees that the latter is startingly social in its nature. for mrs. pankhurst has called upon women to be like herself, to display her own amazonian qualities. she called upon shop girls and college students and wives and old women to make physical assaults on cabinet ministers, to raid parliament and fight with policemen, to destroy property and go to prison, to endure almost every indignity from the mobs and from their jailers, to suffer in health and perhaps to die, exactly as soldiers suffer and die in a campaign. and they did. they answered her call by the thousands. they have fought and suffered, and some of them have died. if this had been the result of individual genius in mrs. pankhurst, transforming peaceful girls into fighters out of hand, she would be the most extraordinary person of the age. but it is impossible to believe that all this militancy was created out of the void. it was simply awakened where it lay sleeping in these women's hearts. mrs. pankhurst has performed no miracle. she has only shown to us the truth which we have blindly refused to see. she has had the insight to recognize in women generally the same fighting spirit which she found in herself, and the courage to draw upon it. she has enabled us to see what women really are like, just as miss addams has by her magnificent anomalies shown us what women are not like. can anyone doubt this? can anyone, seeing the lone eminence of miss addams, assert that imaginative sympathy, patience, and the spirit of conciliation are the ordinary traits of women? can anyone, seeing the battle frenzy which mrs. pankhurst has evoked with a signal in thousands of ordinary englishwomen, deny that women have a fighting soul? and can anyone doubt the effect which the emergence of women into politics will have, eventually, on politics? eventually, for in spite of their boasted independence the decorous example of men will rule them at first. but when they have become used to politics--well, we shall find that we have harnessed an unruly niagara! in women as voters we shall have an element impatient of restraint, straining at the rules of procedure, cynical of excuses for inaction; not always by any means on the side of progress; making every mistake possible to ignorance and self-conceit; but transforming our politics from a vicious end to an efficient means--from a cancer into an organ. this, with but little doubt, is the historic mission of women. they will not escape a certain taming by politics. but that they should be permanently tamed i find impossible to believe. rather they will subdue it to their purposes, remold it nearer to their hearts' desire, change it as men would never dream of changing it, wreck it savagely in the face of our masculine protest and merrily rebuild it anew in the face of our despair. with their aid we may at last achieve what we seem to be unable to achieve unaided--a democracy. meanwhile let us understand this suffrage movement. let us understand that we have in militancy rather than in conciliation, in action rather than in wisdom, the keynote of woman in politics. and we males, who have so long played in our politics at innocent games of war, we shall have an opportunity to fight in earnest at the side of the valkyrs. chapter iv olive schreiner and isadora duncan i hope that no one will see in the conjuncture of these names a mere wanton fantasy, or a mere sensational contrast. to me there is something extraordinarily appropriate in that conjuncture, inasmuch as the work of olive schreiner and the work of isadora duncan supplement each other. it is the drawback of the woman's movement that in any one of its aspects (heightened and colored as such an aspect often is by the violence of propaganda) it may appear too fiercely narrow. that women should make so much fuss about getting the vote, or that they should so excite themselves over the prospect of working for wages, will appear incomprehensible to many people who have a proper regard for art, for literature, and for the graces of social intercourse. it is only when the woman's movement is seen broadly, in a variety of its aspects, that there comes the realization that here is a cause in which every fine aspiration has a place, a cause from which sincere lovers of truth and beauty have nothing really to fear. mrs. olive schreiner stands, by virtue of her latest book, "women and labor," as an exponent of the doctrine that would send women into every field of economic activity; or, rather, the doctrine that finds in the forces which are driving them there a savior of her sex from the degradation of parasitism. in behalf of this doctrine she has expended all that eloquence and passion which have made her one of the figures in modern literature and a spokesman for all women who have not learned to speak that hieratic language which is heard, as the inexpressive speech of daily life is not heard, across space and time. miss isadora duncan stands as representative of the renaissance in dancing. she has brought back to us the antique beauty of an art of which we have had only relics and memento in classic sculpture and decoration. she has made us despise the frigid artifice of the ballet, and taught us that in the natural movements of the body are contained the highest possibilities of choregraphic beauty. it has been to many of us one of the finest experiences of our lives to see, for the first time, the marble maiden of the grecian urn come to life in her, and all the leaf-fringed legends of arcady drift before our enamored eyes. she has touched our lives with the magic of immemorial loveliness. but to class olive schreiner as a sociologist and isadora duncan as a dancer, to divorce them by any such categories, is to do them both an injustice. for they are sister workers in the woman's movement. they have each shown the way to a new freedom of the body and the soul. the woman's movement is a product of the evolutionary science of the nineteenth century. women's rebellions there have been before, utopian visions there have been, which have contributed no little to the modern movement by the force of their tradition and ever-living spirit. no joan of arc has led men to victory, no lady godiva has sacrificed her modesty--nay, even, no courtesan has taught a feeble king how to rule his country--without feeding the flame of feminine aspiration. but it is modern science which, by giving us a new view of the body, its functions, its needs, its claim upon the world, has laid the basis for a successful feminist movement. when the true history of this movement is written it will contain more about herbert spencer and walt whitman, perhaps, than about victoria woodhull and tennessee claflin. in any case, it is to the body that one looks for the magna charta of feminism. the eye--that is to say--is guarantor for the safety of art in a future régime under the dominance of women; and the ear for poetry. these have their functions and their needs, and the woman of the future will not deny them. it is the hand that olive schreiner would emancipate from idleness. she knows the significance of the hand in human history. it was by virtue of the hand that we, and not some other creature, gained lordship over the earth. it was the hand (marvelous instrument, coaxing out of the directing will an ever-increasing subtlety) that made possible the human brain, and all the vistas of reason and imagination by which our little lives gain their peculiar grandeur. and this hand, if it be a woman's in the present day, is doomed to the smallest activities. "our spinning wheels are all broken ...our hoes and grindstones passed from us long ago.... year by year, day by day, there is a silently working but determined tendency for the sphere of women's domestic labors to contract itself." even the training of her child is taken away from the mother by the "mighty and inexorable demands of modern civilization." that condition is to her intolerable; and it is on behalf of women's empty hands that she makes her demand: "that, in that strange new world that is arising alike upon the man and the woman, where nothing is as it was, and all things are assuming new shapes and relations, that in this new world we also shall have our share of honored and socially useful human toil, our full half of the labor of the children of woman." and what of miss duncan--what is her part in the woman's movement? in her book on "the dance" she tells a story: "a woman once asked me why i dance with bare feet, and i replied, 'madam, i believe in the religion of the beauty of the human foot'; and the lady replied, 'but i do not,' and i said: 'yet you must, madam, for the expression and intelligence of the human foot is one of the greatest triumphs of the evolution of man.' 'but,' said the lady, 'i do not believe in the evolution of man.' at this said i, 'my task is at an end. i refer you to my most revered teachers, mr. charles darwin and mr. ernst haeckel--' 'but,' said the lady, 'i do not believe in darwin and haeckel--' at this point i could think of nothing more to say. so you see that, to convince people, i am of little value and ought not to speak." but rather to dance! yet it is good to find so explicit a statement of the idea which she nobly expresses in her dancing. for, as the hand is the symbol of that constructive exertion of the body which we call work, so is the foot the symbol of that diffusive exertion of the body which we call play. isadora duncan would emancipate the one as olive schreiner would emancipate the other--to new activities and new delights. and if such work is not a thing for itself only, but a gateway to a new world, so is such play not a thing for itself only. "it is not only a question of true art," writes miss duncan, "it is a question of race, of the development of the female sex to beauty and health, of the return to the original strength and the natural movements of woman's body. it is a question of the development of perfect mothers and the birth of healthy and beautiful children." here we have an inspiriting expression of the idea which through the poems of walt whitman and the writings of various moderns, has renovated the modern soul and made us see, without any obscene blurring by puritan spectacles, the goodness of the whole body. this is as much a part of the woman's movement as the demand for a vote (or, rather, it is more central and essential a part); and only by realizing this is it possible to understand that movement. the body is no longer to be separated in the thought of women from the soul: "the dancer of the future will be one whose body and soul have grown so harmoniously together that the natural language of that soul will have become the movement of the body. the dancer will not belong to a nation, but to all humanity. she will dance, not in the form of nymph, nor fairy, nor coquette, but in the form of woman in its greatest and purest expression. she will realize the mission of woman's body and the holiness of all its parts. she will dance the changing life of nature, showing how each part is transformed into the other. from all parts of her body shall shine radiant intelligence, bringing to the world the message of the thoughts and aspirations of thousands of women. she shall dance the freedom of woman. "she will help womankind to a new knowledge of the possible strength and beauty of their bodies, and the relation of their bodies to the earth nature and to the children of the future. she will dance, the body emerging again from centuries of civilized forgetfulness, emerging not in the nudity of primitive man, but in a new nakedness, no longer at war with spirituality and intelligence, but joining itself forever with this intelligence in a glorious harmony. "oh, she is coming, the dancer of the future; the free spirit, who will inhabit the body of new women; more glorious than any woman that has yet been; more beautiful than the egyptian, than the greek, the early italian, than all women of past centuries--the highest intelligence in the freest body!" if the woman's movement means anything, it means that women are demanding everything. they will not exchange one place for another, nor give up one right to pay for another, but they will achieve all rights to which their bodies and brains give them an implicit title. they will have a larger political life, a larger motherhood, a larger social service, a larger love, and they will reconstruct or destroy institutions to that end as it becomes necessary. they will not be content with any concession or any triumph until they have conquered all experience. chapter v beatrice webb and emma goldman the careers of these two women serve admirably to exhibit the woman's movement in still another aspect, and to throw light upon the essential nature of woman's character. these careers stand in plain contrast. beatrice webb has compiled statistics, and emma goldman has preached the gospel of freedom. it remains to be shown which is the better and the more characteristically feminine gift to the world. beatrice potter was the daughter of a canadian railway president. born in , she grew up in a time when revolutionary movements were in the making. she was a pupil of herbert spencer, and it was perhaps from him that she learned so to respect her natural interest in facts that the brilliancy of no generalization could lure her into forgetting them. at all events, she was captured permanently by the magic of facts. she studied working-class life in lancashire and east london at first hand, and in joined charles booth in his investigations of english social conditions. these investigations (which in my amateur ignorance i always confused with those of general booth of the salvation army!) were published in four large volumes entitled "life and labor of the people." miss potter's special contributions were articles on the docks, the tailoring trade, and the jewish community. later she published a book on "the coöperative movement in great britain." then, in , she married sidney webb, a man extraordinarily of her own sort, and became confirmed, if such a thing were necessary, in her statistical habit of mind. meanwhile, in , the fabian society had been founded. but first a word about statistics. "statistics" does not mean a long list of figures. it means the spreading of knowledge of facts. statistics may be called the dogma that knowledge is dynamic--that it is somehow operative in bringing about that great change which all intelligent people desire (and which the fabians conceived as socialism). the fabian society was founded on the dogma of statistics as on a rock. the fabians did not start a newspaper, nor create a new political party, nor organize public meetings; but they wrote to the newspapers already in existence, ran for office on party tickets already in the field, and made speeches to other organizations. that is to say, they went about like the cuckoo, laying their statistical eggs in other people's nests and expecting to see them hatch into enlightened public opinion and progressive legislation. some of them hatched and some of them didn't. the point is that we have in this section of beatrice webb's career something typical of herself. she has gone on, serving on government commissions, writing (with her husband) the history of trades unionism, patiently collecting statistics and getting them printed in black ink on white paper, making detailed plans for the abolition of poverty, and always concerning herself with the homely fact. at the time that beatrice potter joined mr. booth in his social investigations there was a -year-old jewish girl living in the german-russian province of kurland. a year later, in , this girl, emma goldman by name, came to america, to escape the inevitable persecutions attending on any lover of liberty in russia. she had been one of those who had gone "to the people"; and it was as a working girl that she came to america. she had, that is to say, the heightened sensibilities, the keen sympathies, of the middle class idealist, and the direct contact with the harsh realities of our social and industrial conditions which is the lot of the worker. her first experiences in america disabused her of the traditional belief that america was a refuge where the oppressed of all lands were welcome. the treatment of immigrants aboard ship, the humiliating brutalities of the officials at castle garden, and the insolent tyranny of the new york police convinced her that she had simply come from one oppressed land to another. she went to work in a clothing factory, her wages being $ . a week. she had ample opportunities to see the degradations of our economic system, especially as it affects women. so it was not strange that she should be drawn into the american labor movement, which was then, with the knights of labor, the eight-hour agitation, and the propaganda of the socialists and the anarchists, at its height. she became acquainted with various radicals, read pamphlets and books, and heard speeches. she was especially influenced by the eloquent writings of johann most in his journal freiheit. so little is known, and so much absurd nonsense is believed, about the anarchists, that it is necessary to state dogmatically a few facts. if these facts seem odd, the reader is respectfully urged to verify them. one fact is that secret organizations of anarchists plotting a violent overthrow of the government do not exist, and never have existed, save in the writings of johann most and in the imagination of the police: the whole spirit of anarchism is opposed to such organizations. another fact is that anarchists do not believe in violence of any kind, or in any exercise of force; when they commit violence it is not as anarchists, but as outraged human beings. they believe that violent reprisals are bound to be provoked among workingmen by the tyrannies to which they are subjected; but they abjure alike the bomb and the policeman's club. there was a brief period in which anarchists, under the influence of johann most, believed in (even if they did not practice) the use of dynamite. but this period was ended, in america, by the hanging of several innocent men in chicago in ; which at least served the useful purpose of showing radicals that it was a bad plan even to talk of dynamite. and this hanging, which was the end of what may be called the anarchist "boom" in this country, was the beginning of emma goldman's career as a publicist. since the anarchists have lost influence among workingmen until they are today negligible--unless one credits them with syndicalism--as a factor in the labor movement. the anarchists have, in fact, left the industrial field more and more and have entered into other kinds of propaganda. they have especially "gone in for kissing games." and emma goldman reflects, in her career, the change in anarchism. she has become simply an advocate of freedom--freedom of every sort. she does not advocate violence any more than ralph waldo emerson advocated violence. it is, in fact, as an essayist and speaker of the kind, if not the quality, of emerson, thoreau, or george francis train, that she is to be considered. aside from these activities (and the evading of our overzealous police in times of stress) she has worked as a trained nurse and midwife; she conducted a kind of radical salon in new york, frequented by such people as john swinton and benjamin tucker; she traveled abroad to study social conditions; she has become conversant with such modern writings as those of hauptmann, nietzsche, ibsen, zola, and thomas hardy. it is stated that the "rev. mr. parkhurst, during the lexow investigation, did his utmost to induce her to join the vigilance committee in order to fight tammany hall." she was the manager of paul orlenoff and mme. nazimova. she was a friend of ernest crosby. her library, it is said, would be taken for that of a university extension lecturer on literature. it will thus be seen that emma goldman is of a type familiar enough in america, and conceded a popular respect. she has a legitimate social function--that of holding before our eyes the ideal of freedom. she is licensed to taunt us with our moral cowardice, to plant in our souls the nettles of remorse at having acquiesced so tamely in the brutal artifice of present day society. i submit the following passage from her writings ("anarchism and other essays") as at once showing her difference from other radicals and exhibiting the nature of her appeal to her public: "the misfortune of woman is not that she is unable to do the work of a man, but that she is wasting her life force to outdo him, with a tradition of centuries which has left her physically incapable of keeping pace with him. oh, i know some have succeeded, but at what cost, at what terrific cost! the import is not the kind of work woman does, but rather the quality of the work she furnishes. she can give suffrage or the ballot no new quality, nor can she receive anything from it that will enhance her own quality. her development, her freedom, her independence, must come from and through herself. first, by asserting herself as a personality, and not as a sex commodity. second, by refusing the right to anyone over her body; by refusing to bear children unless she wants them; by refusing to be a servant to god, the state, society, the husband, the family, etc.; by making her life simpler, but deeper and richer. that is, by trying to learn the meaning and substance of life in all its complexities, by freeing herself from the fear of public opinion and public condemnation. only that, and not the ballot, will set woman free, will make her a force hitherto unknown in the world; a force for real love, for peace, for harmony; a force of divine fire, of life giving; a creator of free men and women." there is little in this that ibsen would not have said amen to. but--and this is the conclusion to which my chapter draws--ibsen has said it already, and said it more powerfully. emma goldman--who (if among women anyone) should have for us a message of her own, striking to the heart--repeats, in a less effective cadence, what she has learned from him. the work of beatrice webb is the prose of revolution. the work of ibsen is its poetry. beatrice webb has performed her work--one comes to feel--as well as ibsen has his. and one wonders if, after all, the prose is not that which women are best endowed to succeed in. a book review (written by a woman) which i have at hand contains some generalizations which bear on the subject. "this is a woman's book [says the reviewer], and a book which could only have been written by a woman, though it is singularly devoid of most of the qualities which are usually recognized as feminine. for romance and sentiment do not properly lie in the woman's domain. she deals, when she is herself, with the material facts of the life she knows. her talent is to exhibit them in the remorseless light of reality and shorn of all the glamour of idealism. great and poetical imagination rarely informs her art, but within the strictness of its limits it lives by an intense and scrupulous sincerity of observation and an uncompromising recognition of the logic of existence." if that is true, shall we not then expect a future more largely influenced by women to have more of the hard, matter-of-fact quality, the splendid realism characteristic of woman "when she is herself"? chapter vi margaret dreier robins the work of margaret dreier robins has been done in the national women's trade union league. it might be supposed that the aim of such an organization is sufficiently explicit in its title: to get higher wages and shorter hours. but i fancy that it would be a truer thing to say that its aim is to bring into being that ideal of american womanhood which walt whitman described: they are not one jot less than i am, they are tann'd in the face by shining suns and blowing winds, their flesh has the old divine suppleness and strength, they know how to swim, row, ride, wrestle, shoot, run, strike, retreat, advance, resist, defend themselves, they are ultimate in their own right--they are calm, clear, well-possessed of themselves. when whitman made this magnificent prophecy for american womanhood the civil war had not been fought and its economic consequences were unguessed at. the factory system, which had come into england in the last century, bringing with it the most unspeakable exploitation of women and children, had hardly gained a foothold in this country. in , of the seven employments open to women (teaching, needlework, keeping boarders, working in cotton mills, in bookbinderies, typesetting and household service) only one was representative of the new industrial condition which today affects so profoundly the feminine physique. and to the daughters of a nation that was still imbued with the pioneer spirit, work in cotton mills appealed so little that they undertook it only for unusually high pay. anyone of that period seeing the red-cheeked, robust, intelligent, happy girl operatives of lowell might have dismissed his fears of the factory as a sinister influence in the development of american womanhood and gone on to dream, with walt whitman, of a race of "fierce, athletic girls." but two things happened. with the growing flood of immigration, the factories were abandoned more and more to the "foreigners," the native-born citizens losing their pride in the excellence of working conditions and the character of the operatives. and all the while the factory was becoming more and more an integral part of our civilization, demanding larger and larger multitudes of girls and women to attend its machinery. so that, with the enormous development of industry since the civil war, the factory has become the chief field of feminine endeavor in america. in spite of the great opening up of all sorts of work to women, in spite of the store, the office, the studio, the professions, still the factory remains most important in any consideration of the health and strength of women. if the greatest part of our womankind spends its life in factories, and if it further appears that this is no temporary situation, but (practically speaking) a permanent one, then it becomes necessary to inquire how far the factory is hindering the creation of that ideal womanhood which walt whitman predicted for us. as opposed to the old-fashioned method of manufacture in the home (or the sweatshop, which is the modern equivalent), the factory often shows a gain in light and air, a decrease of effort, an added leisure; while, on the other hand, there is a considerable loss of individual freedom and an increase in monotony. but child labor, a too long working day, bad working conditions, lack of protection from fire, personal exploitation by foremen, inhumanly low wages, and all sorts of petty injustice, though not essential to the system, are prominent features of factory work as it generally exists. people who consider every factory an inferno, however, and have only pity for its workers, are far from understanding the situation. here is a field of work which is capable of competing successfully with domestic service, and even of attracting girls from homes where there exists no absolute necessity for women's wages. yet at its contemporary best, with a ten-hour law in operation, efficient factory inspection, decent working conditions and a just and humane management, the factory remains an institution extremely perilous to the whitmanic ideal of womanhood. but there are women who, undaunted by the new conditions brought about by a changing economic system, seize upon those very conditions to use them as the means to their end: such a woman is mrs. robins. has a new world, bounded by factory walls and noisy with the roar of machinery, grown up about us, to keep women from their heritage? she will help them to use those very walls and that very machinery to achieve their destiny, a destiny of which a physical well-being is, as walt whitman knew it to be, the most certain symbol. the factory already gives women a certain independence. it may yet give them pleasure, the joy of creation. indeed, it must, when the workers require it; and those who are most likely to require it are the women workers. it is well known that with the ultra-development of the machine, the subdivision of labor, the régime of piecework, it has become practically impossible for the worker to take any artistic pleasure in his product. it is not so well known how necessary such pleasure in the product is to the physical well-being of women--how utterly disastrous to their nervous organization is the monotony and irresponsibility of piecework. this method--which men workers have grumbled at, but to which they seem to have adjusted themselves--bears its fruits among women in neurasthenia, headaches, and the derangement of the organs which are the basis of their different nervous constitution. it is sufficiently clear to those who have seen the personal reactions of working girls to the piecework system, that when women attain, as men in various industries have attained, the practical management of the factory, piecework will get a setback. but not merely good conditions, not merely a living wage, not merely a ten or an eight hour day--all that self-government in the shop can bring is the object of the women's trade union league. "the chief social gain of the union shop," says mrs. robins, "is not its generally better wages and shorter hours, but rather the incentive it offers for initiative and social leadership, the call it makes, through the common industrial relationship and the common hope, upon the moral and reasoning faculties, and the sense of fellowship, independence and group strength it develops. in every workshop of say thirty girls there is undreamed of initiative and capacity for social leadership and control--unknown wealth of intellectual and moral resources." it is, in fact, this form of activity which to many thousands of factory girls makes the difference between living and existing, between a painful, necessary drudgery and a happy exertion of all their faculties. it can give them a more useful education than any school, a more vital faith than any church, a more invigorating sense of power than any other career open to them. to do all these things it must be indigenous to working-class soil. no benefaction originating in the philanthropic motives of middle-class people, no enterprise of patronage, will ever have any such meaning. a movement, to have such meaning, must be of the working class, and by the working class, as well as for the working class. it must be imbued with working-class feeling, and it must subserve working-class ideals. it is the distinction of mrs. robins that she has seen this. she has gone to the workers to learn rather than to teach--she has sought to unfold the ideals and capacities latent in working girls rather than impress upon them the alien ideals and capacities of another class. "just"--it is mrs. robins that speaks--"as under a despotic church and a feudal state the possible power and beauty of the common people was denied expression, so under industrial feudalism the intellectual and moral powers of the workers are slowly choked to death, with incalculable loss to the individual and the race. it is easy to kill; it requires a great spirit as well as a great mind to arouse the dormant energies, to vitalize them and to make them creative forces for good." one is reminded of the words of john galsworthy, addressed to workingwomen: "there is beginning to be a little light in the sky; whether the sun is ever to break through depends on your constancy, and courage, and wisdom. the future is in your hands more than in the hands of men; it rests on your virtues and well-being, rather than on the virtues and the welfare of men, for it is you who produce and mold the future." there are , , working women in the united states, and half of them are girls under . one may go out any day in the city streets, at morning or noon or evening, and look at a representative hundred of them. the factories have not been able to rob them of beauty and strength and the charm of femininity, and in that beauty and strength and charm there is a world of promise. and that promise already begins to be unfolded when to them comes mrs. robins with a gospel germane to their natures, saying, "long enough have you dreamed contemptible dreams." chapter vii ellen key in these chapters a sincere attempt has been made not so much to show what a few exceptional women have accomplished as to exhibit through a few prominent figures the essential nature of women, and to show what may be expected from a future in which women will have a larger freedom and a larger influence. it has been pointed out that the peculiar idealism of women is one that works itself out through the materials of workaday life, and which seeks to break or remake those materials by way of fulfilling that idealism; it has been shown that this idealism, as contrasted with the more abstract and creative idealism of men, deserves to be called practicalism, a practicalism of a noble and beautiful sort which we are far from appreciating; and as complementing these forms of activity, the play instinct, the instinct of recreation, has been pointed out as the parallel to the creative or poetic instinct of men. woman as reconstructor of domestic economics, woman as a destructive political agent of enormous potency, woman as worker, woman as dancer, woman as statistician, woman as organizer of the forces of labor--in these it has been the intent to show the real woman of today and of tomorrow. there have been other aspects of her deserving of attention in such a series, notably her aspect as mother and as educator. if she has not been shown as poet, as artist, as scientist, as talker (for talk is a thing quite as important as poetry or science or art), it has not been so much because of an actual lack of specific examples of women distinguished in these fields as because of the unrepresentative character of such examples. here, then, is a man's view of modern woman. to complete that view, to round off that conception, i now speak of ellen key. her writings have had a peculiar career in america, one which perhaps prevents a clear understanding of their character. on the one hand, they have seemed to many to be radically "advanced"; to thousands of middle-class women, who have heard vaguely of these new ideas, and who have secretly and strongly desired to know more of them, her "love and marriage" has come as a revolutionary document, the first outspoken word of scorn for conventional morality, the first call to them to take their part in the breaking of new paths. on the other hand, it must be remembered that america is the home of mormonism, of the oneida community, of the woodhull and claflin "free-love" movement of the ' s, of "dianism" and a hundred other obscure but pervasive sexual cults--in short, of movements of greater or less respectability, capable of giving considerable currency to their beliefs. and they have given considerable currency to their beliefs. in spite of the dominant tone of puritanism in american thought, our social life has been affected to an appreciable extent by these beliefs. and these beliefs may be summed up hastily, but, on the whole, justly, as materialistic--in the common and unfavorable sense. they have converged, from one direction or another, upon the opinion that sex is an animal function, no more sacred than any other animal function, which, by a ridiculous over-estimation, is made to give rise to jealousy, unhappiness, madness, vice, and crime. it is a fact that the puritan temperament readily finds this opinion, if not the program which accompanies it, acceptable, as one may discover in private conversation with respectable puritans of both sexes. and it is more unfortunately true that the present-day rebellion against conventional morality in america has found, in hardy and shaw and other anti-romanticists, a seeming support of this opinion. so that one finds in america today (though some people may not know about it) an undercurrent of impatient materialism in matters of sex. to become freed from the inadequate morality of puritanism is, for thousands of young people, to adopt another morality which is, if more sound in many ways, certainly as inadequate as the other. so that ellen key comes into the lives of many in this country as a conservative force, holding up a spiritual ideal, the ideal of monogamy, and defending it with a breadth of view, a sanity, and a fervor that make it something different from the cold institution which these readers have come to despise. she makes every allowance for human nature, every concession to the necessities of temperament, every recognition of the human need for freedom, and yet makes the love of one man and one woman seem the highest ideal, a thing worth striving and waiting and suffering for. she cherishes the spiritual magic of sex as the finest achievement of the race, and sees it as the central and guiding principle in our social and economic evolution. she seeks to construct a new morality which will do what the present one only pretends, and with the shallowest and most desperately pitiful of pretenses, to do. she would help our struggling generation to form a new code of ethics, and one of subtle stringency, in this most important and difficult of relations. thus her writings, of which "love and marriage" will here be taken as representative, have a twofold aspect--the radical and the conservative. but of the two, the conservative is by far the truer. it is as a conservator, with too firm a grip on reality to be lured into the desertion of any real values so far achieved by the race, that she may be best considered. and germane to her conservatism, which is the true conservatism of her sex, is her intellectual habit, her literary method. she is not a logician, it is true. she lacks logic, and with it order and clearness and precision, because of the very fact of her firm hold on realities. the realities are too complex to be brought into any completely logical and orderly relation, too elusive to be stated with utter precision. there is a whole universe in "love and marriage"; and it resembles the universe in its wildness, its tumultuousness, its contradictory quality. her book, like the universe, is in a state of flux--it refuses to remain one fixed and dead thing. it is a book which in spite of some attempt at arrangement may be begun at any point and read in any order. it is a mixture of science, sociology, and mysticism; it has a wider range than an orderly book could possibly have; it touches more points, includes more facts, and is more convincing, in its queer way, than any other. "love and marriage" is the talmud of sexual morality. it contains history, wisdom, poetry, psychological analysis, shrewd judgments, generous sympathies, ... and it all bears upon the creation of that new sexual morality for which in a thousand ways--economic, artistic, and spiritual--we are so astonishing a mixture of readiness and unreadiness. ellen key is fundamentally a conservator. but she is careful about what she conservates. it is the right to love which she would have us cherish, rather than the right to own another person--the beauty of singleness of devotion rather than the cruel habit of trying to force people to carry out rash promises made in moments of exaltation. she conserves the greatest things and lets the others go: motherhood, as against the exclusive right of married women to bear children; and that personal passion which is at once physical and spiritual rather than any of the legally standardized relations. nor does she hesitate to speak out for the conservation of that old custom which persists among peasant and primitive peoples all over the world and which has been reintroduced to the public by a recent sociologist under the term of "trial marriage"; it must be held, she says, as the bulwark against the corruption of prostitution and made a part of the new morality. it is perhaps in this very matter that her attitude is capable of being most bitterly resented. for we have lost our sense of what is old and good, and we give the sanction of ages to parvenu virtues that are as degraded as the rococo ornaments which were born in the same year. we have (or the puritans among us have) lost all moral sense in the true meaning of the word, in that we are unable to tell good from bad if it be not among the things that were socially respectable in the year . ellen key writes: "the most delicate test of a person's sense of morality is his power in interpreting ambiguous signs in the ethical sphere; for only the profoundly moral can discover the dividing line, sharp as the edge of a sword, between new morality and old immorality. in our time, ethical obtuseness betrays itself first and foremost by the condemnation of those young couples who freely unite their destinies. the majority does not perceive the advance in morality which this implies in comparison with the code of so many men who, without responsibility--and without apparent risk--purchase the repose of their senses. the free union of love, on the other hand, gives them an enhancement of life which they consider that they gain without injuring anyone. it answers to their idea of love's chastity, an idea which is justly offended by the incompleteness of the period of engagement, with all its losses in the freshness and frankness of emotion. when their soul has found another soul, when the senses of both have met in a common longing, then they consider that they have a right to full unity of love, although compelled to secrecy, since the conditions of society render early marriage impossible. they are thus freed from a wasteful struggle which would give them neither peace nor inner purity, and which would be doubly hard for them, since they have attained the end--love--for the sake of which self-control would have been imposed." it is almost impossible to quote any passage from "love and marriage" which is not subject to further practical modification, or which does not present an incomplete idea of which the complement may be found somewhere else. even this passage is one which states a brief for the younger generation rather than the author's whole opinion. still, with all these limitations, her view is one which is so different from that commonly held by women that it may seem merely fantastic to hold it up as an example of the conservative instinct of women. nevertheless, it is so. it must be remembered that the view which holds that the chastity of unmarried women is well purchased at the price of prostitution, is a masculine view. it is a piece of the sinister and cruel idealism of the male mind, divorced (as the male mind is so capable of being) from realities. no woman would ever have created prostitution to preserve the chastity of part of her sex; and the more familiar one becomes with the specific character of the feminine mind, the more impossible does it seem that women will, when they have come to think and act for themselves, permanently maintain it. nor will they--one is forced to believe--hesitate long at the implications of that demolition. no, i think that with the advent of women into a larger life our jerry-built virtues will have to go, to make room for mansions and gardens fit to be inhabited by the human soul. it will be like the pulling down of a rotten tenement. first (with a great shocked outcry from some persons of my own sex) the façade goes, looking nice enough, but showing up for painted tin what pretended to be marble; then the dark, cavelike rooms exposed, with their blood-stained floors and their walls ineffectually papered over the accumulated filth and disease; and so on, lath by lath, down to the cellars, with their hints of unspeakable horrors in the dark. it is to this conclusion that these chapters draw: that women have a surer instinct than men for the preservation of the truest human values, but that their very acts of conservation will seem to the timid minds among us like the shattering of all virtues, the debacle of civilization, the götterdämmerung! chapter viii freewomen and dora marsden this is by way of a postscript. dora marsden is a new figure in the feminist movement. just how she evolved is rather hard to say. her family were radicals, it seems, smug british radicals; and she broke away, first of all, into a sort of middle class socialism. she went into settlement work. here, it seems, she discovered what sort of person she really was. she was a lover of freedom. so of course she rebelled against the interference of the middle class with the affairs of the poor, and threw overboard her settlement work and her socialism together. she was a believer in woman suffrage, but the autocratic government of the organization irked her. and, besides, she felt constrained to point out that feminism meant worlds more than a mere vote. the position of woman, not indeed as the slave of man, but as the enslaver of man, but with the other end of the chain fastened to her own wrist, and depriving her quite effectually of her liberties--this irritated her. independence to her meant achievement, and when she heard the talk about "motherhood" by which the women she knew excused their lack of achievement, she was annoyed. finally, the taboo upon the important subject of sex exasperated her. so she started a journal to express her discontent with all these things, and to change them. naturally, she called her journal the freewoman. "independent" expresses much of dora marsden's feeling, but that word has been of late dragged in a mire of pettiness and needs dry cleaning. it has come to signify a woman who isn't afraid to go out at night alone or who holds a position downtown. a word had to be chosen which had in it some suggestion of the heroic. hence the freewoman. the freewoman was a weekly. it lived several months and then suspended publication, and now all the women i know are poring over the back numbers while waiting for it to start again as a fortnightly. it was a remarkable paper. for one thing, it threw open its columns to such a discussion of sex that dear mrs. humphry ward wrote a shocked letter to the times about it. of course, a good many of the ideas put forth in this correspondence were erroneous or trivial, but it must have done the writers no end of good to express themselves freely. for once sex was on a plane with other subjects, a fact making tremendously for sanity. in this miss marsden not only achieved a creditable journalistic feat, but performed a valuable public service. her editorials were another distinctive thing. in the first issue was an editorial on "bondwomen," from which it would appear that perhaps even such advanced persons as you, my dear lady, are still far from free. "bondwomen are distinguished from freewomen by a spiritual distinction. bondwomen are the women who are not separate spiritual entities--who are not individuals. they are complements merely. by habit of thought, by form of activity, and largely by preference, they round off the personality of some other individual, rather than create or cultivate their own. most women, as far back as we have any record, have fitted into this conception, and it has borne itself out in instinctive working practice. "and in the midst of all this there comes a cry that woman is an individual, and that because she is an individual she must be set free. it would be nearer the truth to say that if she is an individual she _is_ free, and will act like those who are free. the doubtful aspect in the situation is as to whether women are or can be individuals--that is, free--and whether there is not danger, under the circumstances, in labelling them free, thus giving them the liberty of action which is allowed to the free. it is this doubt and fear which is behind the opposition which is being offered the vanguard of those who are 'asking for' freedom. it is the kind of fear which an engineer would have in guaranteeing an arch equal to a strain above its strength. the opponents of the freewomen are not actuated by spleen or by stupidity, but by dread. this dread is founded upon ages of experience with a being who, however well loved, has been known to be an inferior, and who has accepted all the conditions of inferiors. women, women's intelligence, and women's judgments have always been regarded with more or less secret contempt, and when woman now speaks of 'equality,' all the natural contempt which a higher order feels for a lower order when it presumes bursts out into the open. this contempt rests upon quite honest and sound instinct, so honest, indeed, that it must provide all the charm of an unaccustomed sensation for fine gentlemen like the curzons and cromers and asquiths to feel anything quite so instinctive and primitive. "with the women opponents it is another matter. these latter apart, however, it is for would-be freewomen to realize that for them this contempt is the healthiest thing in the world, and that those who express it honestly feel it; that these opponents have argued quite soundly that women have allowed themselves to be used, ever since there has been any record of them; and that if women had had higher uses of their own they would not have foregone them. they have never known women to formulate imperious wants, this in itself implying lack of wants, and this in turn implying lack of ideals. women as a whole have shown nothing save 'servant' attributes. all those activities which presuppose the master qualities, the standard-making, the law-giving, the moral-framing, belong to men. religions, philosophies, legal codes, standards in morals, canons in art, have all issued from men, while women have been the 'followers,' 'believers,' the 'law-abiding,' the 'moral,' the conventionally admiring. they have been the administrators, the servants, living by borrowed precept, receiving orders, doing hodmen's work. for note, though some men must be servants, all women are servants, and all the masters are men. that is the difference and distinction. the servile condition is common to all women." this was only the beginning of such a campaign of radical propaganda as feminism never knew before. miss marsden went on to attack all the things which bind women and keep them unfree. as such she denounced what she considered the cant of "motherhood." "considering, therefore, that children, from both physiological and psychological points of view, belong more to the woman than to the man; considering, too, that not only does she need them more, but, as a rule, wants them more than the man, the parental situation begins to present elements of humor when the woman proceeds to fasten upon the man, in return for the children she has borne him, the obligation from that time to the end of her days, not only for the children's existence, but for her own, also!" when asked under what conditions, then, women should have children, she replied that women who wanted them should save for them as for a trip to europe. this is frankly a gospel for a minority--a fact which does not invalidate it in the eyes of its promulgator--but she does believe that if women are to become the equals of men they must find some way to have children without giving up the rest of life. it has been done! then, having been rebuked for her critical attitude toward the woman suffrage organization, she showed herself in no mood to take orders from even that source. she subjected the attitude of the members of the organization to an examination, and found it tainted with sentimentalism. "of all the corruptions to which the woman's movement is now open," she wrote, "the most poisonous and permeating is that which flows from sentimentalism, and it is in the w. s. p. u. [women's social and political union] that sentimentalism is now rampant.... it is this sentimentalism that is abhorrent to us. we fight it as we would fight prostitution, or any other social disease." she called upon women to be individuals, and sought to demolish in their minds any lingering desire for authority. "there is," she wrote, "a genuine pathos in our reliance upon the law in regard to the affairs of our own souls. our belief in ourselves and in our impulses is so frail that we prefer to see it buttressed up. we are surer of our beliefs when we see their lawfulness symbolized in the respectable blue cloth of the policeman's uniform, and the sturdy good quality of the prison's walls. the law gives them their passport. well, perhaps in this generation, for all save pioneers, the law will continue to give its protecting shelter, but with the younger generations we believe we shall see a stronger, prouder, and more insistent people, surer of themselves and of the pureness of their own desires." she did not stick at the task of formulating for women a new moral attitude to replace the old. "we are seeking," she said, "a morality which shall be able to point the way out of the social trap we find we are in. we are conscious that we are concerned in the dissolution of one social order, which is giving way to another. men and women are both involved, but women differently from men, because women themselves are very different from men. the difference between men and women is the whole difference between a religion and a moral code. men are pagan. they have never been christian. women are wholly christian, and have assimilated the entire genius of christianity. "the ideal of conduct which men have followed has been one of self-realization, tempered by a broad principle of equity which has been translated into practice by means of a code of laws. a man's desire and ideal has been to satisfy the wants which a consciousness of his several senses gives rise to. his vision of attainment has therefore been a sensuous one, and if in his desire for attainment he has transgressed the law, his transgression has sat but lightly upon him. a law is an objective thing, laid upon a man's will from outside. it does not enter the inner recesses of consciousness, as does a religion. it is nothing more than a body of prohibitions and commands, which can be obeyed, transgressed or evaded with little injury to the soul. with women moral matters have been wholly different. resting for support upon a religion, their moral code has received its sanction and force from within. it has thus laid hold on consciousness with a far more tenacious grip. their code being subjective, transgression has meant a darkening of the spirit, a sullying of the soul. thus the doctrine of self-renunciation, which is the outstanding feature of christian ethics, has had the most favorable circumstances to insure its realization, and with women it has won completely--so completely that it now exerts its influence unconsciously. seeking the realization of the will of others, and not their own, ever waiting upon the minds of others, women have almost lost the instinct for self-realization, the instinct for achievement in their own persons." whether she is right is a moot question. certainly in such matters as testimony in court, the customs-tariff, and the minor city ordinances, women show no particular respect for the law. ibsen sought in "the doll's house" to show that her morality had no connection with the laws of the world of men. even in matters of human relationship it is doubtful if women give any more of an "inner assent" to law than do men. woman's failure to achieve that domination of the world which constitutes individuality and freedom--this dora marsden would explain on the ground of a dulling of the senses. it may be more easily explained as a result of a dulling of the imagination. the trouble is that they are content with petty conquests. there you have it! inevitably one argues with dora marsden. that is her value. she provokes thought. and she welcomes it. she wants everybody to think--not to think her thoughts necessarily, nor the right thoughts always, but that which they can and must. she is a propagandist, it is true. but she does not create a silence, and call it conversion. she stimulates her readers to cast out the devils that inhabit their souls--fear, prejudice, sensitiveness. she helps them to build up their lives on a basis of will--the exercise, not the suppression, of will. she indurates them to the world. she liberates them to life. she is the max stirner of feminism. freedom! that is the first word and the last with dora marsden. she makes women understand for the first time what freedom means. she makes them want to be free. she nerves them to the effort of emancipation. she sows in a fertile soil the dragon's teeth which shall spring up as a band of capable females, knowing what they want and taking it, asking no leave from anybody, doing things and enjoying life--freewomen! * * * * * transcriber's notes obvious punctuation errors have been repaired. on p. sucessful changed to successful (has been successful). nequa or the problem of the ages by jack adams vol. i. equity publishing company topeka, kansas dedication. to all lovers of humanity, wherever found who believe that the application of the golden rule in human affairs would remove all the burdens that ignorance and greed have imposed upon the masses of mankind, this volume is respectfully dedicated by the author. copyrighted , by a.o. grigsby and mary p. lowe. contents. chapter i. beneath the midnight sun--a strange visitor comes down from above--an old acquaintance recognized--strange story by an old physician chapter ii. in san francisco--"where shall i go next?"--a startling item of news answers the question and ends the search--in male attire--enlists as scientist on the ice king--off to the north pole--an unexpected blow--the danger signal--the race for life--the earthquake--"the channel is closing!"--"the ship is lost!" chapter iii. in the dark--all is still--imprisoned in the ice--distressing situation--how to preserve the health and efficiency of the crew--a new danger--the ice is moving--the common sailor to the rescue--lief and eric save the ship--the tunnel to the surface--exploring the ice-field chapter iv. a singular discovery--battell crossing a sand ridge on the ice-field--captain ganoe leads a party to his assistance--lief and eric--battell's theory--a second expedition--battell's long absence--is discovered returning alone, scarcely able to walk--relief party finds him unconscious--captain ganoe as physician--battell relates how he was abandoned by his men--preparing for the break chapter v. the break--a race for life--the island--strange tower--a safe harbor--crossing the open polar sea--strange phenomena--sailing south--horizon obscures familiar constellations--return to the tower--no explanation--off for the pole again--a wonderful discovery chapter vi. sailing south--the wind ceases--our coal exhausted--drifting on an unknown ocean--in the grasp of southbound currents--desponding--visited by an airship--then a whole fleet--among friends--a most highly cultivated people--we embark for altruria--an air voyage chapter vii. caring for the sick--new methods of treatment--not physicians but nurses--a voyage through the air--wonderful optical instruments which reveal a panorama of the world--arrival in altruria--marvelous improvements--drudgery and poverty both abolished chapter viii. a colossal communal home--district , range --under the pacific ocean--battell at the telephone--startling apparition in a mirror--enrolled in school--study of the language--phonographic enunciator--a communal agricultural district--the first revolt against landlordism--freedom the rule--a new world--strikingly similar to america chapter ix. a happy scene--two civilizations compared--arrival of oqua--disguise penetrated--human rights--"glittering generalities" reduced to practice--a strange custom--numbered, labeled and registered as citizens--exit jack adams--a new name--nequa--bitter memories--oqua's sympathy chapter x. oqua's visit--the revelation--a story of perfidy and wrong--cassie vanness--raphael ganoe--richard sage--a designing guardian--false charges against ganoe--a fraudulent marriage--home abandoned--on the high seas--jack adams--ganoe found--effects of a false education--legal wrongs vs. natural justice--oqua hopeful chapter xi. an air voyage--change of scenery--homes for mothers--evolution from competitive individualism--the mountains--battell joins us--orbitello--a perpetual world's fair--department of exchange--the business of a continent--norrena--public printing--the council--all matters submitted to the people--library of universal knowledge chapter xii. the institute of school superintendents--norrena's address on the transition period--from competition to co-operation--the closing decades of money supremacy--the power of gold--its conquest of the world--political governments its tools--the people helpless--a hint at the way out chapter xiii. bona dea--matrons' home--pre-natal influences--improving the airships--battell explains--plans for the future--museum of universal history--relics of the past--building toward our ideals--law of human progress--presaging the future--profit causes poverty--equitable exchange the remedy chapter xiv. through the air to lake byblis--on the ice king once more--captain ganoe in command--met by the viking, silver king and sea rover--a wedding--huston and dione the principals--ganoe objects--norrena investigates--objection over-ruled--excursion beneath the waters of the lake--down the cocytas--the ruins of kroy--abandoned gold--the last relic of barbarism chapter xv. home again--letter from bona dea--electric garments--reporter's phonograph--testing the new airship--a world's council--wallaroo on evolution--the ideals planted by missionaries--the eolus--preparing for return to america--excursion to the far north--the watch tower--symbolic representations--the farewell--the revelation to ganoe--"cassie! cassie! come back! come back!" explanatory. the undersigned claims no credit for the concept of an "inner world" in which the great economic problems which now confront the people had been solved in the interest of humanity and ideal conditions established for all. this was the leading thought in a work by dr. t.a.h. lowe, deceased, which was placed in the hands of the writer by his widow, mrs. mary p. lowe. it contains a glowing description of the ideal conditions which would prevail under the practical application of the principles of freedom, equality and fraternity in human affairs but the author died before he had an opportunity to work out a practical system by which the masses of the people, situated as they now are, without even a clear understanding as to just what is the matter, could commence with existing conditions, and peacefully, effectually and speedily establish the much to be desired system of absolute justice in distribution which he described. hence it was determined to prepare a series of volumes, illustrating the operation of practical working methods by which this result could be secured, and then, publish dr. lowe's original volume, just as it was written as a fitting conclusion; and we now take pleasure in presenting to the reader the first volume of the series and respectfully ask a candid consideration of the principles which it is designed to elucidate. jack adams. nequa. chapter i. beneath the midnight sun--a strange visitor comes down from above--an old acquaintance recognized--strange story by an old physician. [illustration] my private office was on the second floor of the sanitarium which i had fitted up in kansas city to meet the demands of my large practice in the treatment of chronic diseases. the furniture consisted of a large book case, containing my library of standard works, and other publications useful in my practice; a writing desk, a few chairs, sofa and other conveniences usually found in such places. one door opened into the hall, and another connected with my bed chamber, bath room and laboratory in the rear. in the front was a large bay window where i often sat, in a meditative mood, concealed by the heavy lace curtains, looking out upon the throngs of people and numerous vehicles passing to and fro on the street below. on the opposite side of the main hall, and separated from it by the wide stairway, was the parlor where i received visitors. in the rear of this were the consultation and operating rooms. i usually lunched in my private office, my meals being sent up to me on an elevator, from a restaurant connecting directly with the sanitarium. as a rule, no one but the office boy, who occupied a small room over the stairway, was ever admitted to my private office. the boy attended the door, conducted visitors to the parlor, and then reported who was in waiting. if i cared to see them, i went around the head of the stairs to the parlor; otherwise i was "not in." many of my patients came from a distance and had lodgings and board in the sanitarium. others called at my reception rooms during my regular office hours, which were from to a.m. at other hours i was ordinarily occupied in my private office, reading, thinking and writing, or in my laboratory compounding medicines, etc. but it was generally understood that i frequently drove out, and hence people calling to see me, except during office hours, were not surprised to learn that i could not be seen. this arrangement was an absolute necessity in order that i might have time to attend to my large correspondence and make my usual study of the diseases of patients who had placed themselves under my treatment as their last hope of regaining health. my success in treating these cases which had been given up as incurable, was such, that the sanitarium was always full, and it was a rare thing indeed, that i called upon patients at their homes. one bright and unusually pleasant day in june --, after i had attended to my patients, i retired to my private office, feeling that a call, even from my most intimate friends, would be very undesirable. i wanted to be alone. i had many letters to write, and other work that i could not well neglect, but i seemed in spite of myself to have lost my usual active interest in my business. i felt oppressed and dissatisfied with its restraints, and after worrying through with my most important correspondence, i got up and paced the floor to and fro. what could it mean? why was it i felt this restless longing for something that seemed just beyond my reach? my business was flourishing, my health was never better, my friends were numerous and all my surroundings pleasant. then why was it that i could not compose myself to read or write? whenever i tried to do anything, my mind involuntarily reverted to the past, and especially to a voyage i had taken some years before in the capacity of ship surgeon. at last i despaired of being able to complete my work to my satisfaction, and determined to indulge this irresistible tendency to retrospection. all the afternoon, whatever i did or attempted to do, my mind turned to jack adams, a beardless young man who shipped on the same vessel with me as super-cargo. turn which way i would, his image loomed up before my memory with a vividness that was startling. why should i be continually thinking of him? true, we had been the closest of friends, and often spent hours together in the most enjoyable conversations. however, notwithstanding our intimacy, there had ever hung around jack an air of fathomless mystery. his character was faultless, his modesty, refinement and culture unexcelled. his perceptions were keen, his reasoning powers deep and comprehensive, and his innate truthfulness inspired every one with unlimited confidence who came in contact with him. in times of peril he was courageous as a lion and yet he was gentle as a woman. he was of medium size and perfectly rounded form, too refined in his appearance to be masculine, but none the less active and efficient; and i must say that his face was the most handsome, and the most expressive of the finer emotions of the soul, i had ever met with in man. we were the most congenial of associates, and i was more attached to his personality than i had ever before been to one of my own sex. though young and beardless, his intellect was mature beyond his years, and by common consent the old and experienced soon came to honor his unusually remarkable judgment. to me, he was a phenomenon that i was utterly unable to fathom. while he was not shy, he was always reserved and retiring. he never intruded where he had no business except in my cabin, where he often came to while away an hour discussing themes of lofty and far reaching import. he seemed not to live on the common plane of ordinary life, but soared far above it. still he attended to all his duties in a prompt and energetic manner, often lending a helping hand to others when there was no necessity for him to move a muscle. he seemed to take real pleasure in lightening the burdens of others even at a sacrifice of his own comfort. such was jack adams, who had worked himself up from the most menial employments on shipboard to a position of responsibility. such was my most valued friend, always reserved and reticent with others, but genial, sociable and confidential with me, notwithstanding the disparity in our ages. but why should he now be intruding upon my memory, and holding my thoughts to himself by a mystic chord which i had no power to break, much as i had striven to do so? i had left the sea at the close of this voyage, the memory of which had haunted me all day. i had scarcely thought of jack adams for years, and now i found it impossible to keep from thinking of him all the time. i became almost superstitious, and began to speculate that perhaps he had just passed from earth, and that his spirit was now with me trying to force a recognition. as i was thus ruminating, my office boy announced that a gentleman wanted to see me. i was just about to send back the word "not in," when behind the boy, through the half open door, i beheld a tall, handsome and elegantly dressed man, of commanding personal appearance. my rule had been never to permit anyone to enter my private apartments except on my personal invitation, and as the boy seemed entirely unconscious of his presence, i knew that some mistake had been made, and instinctively felt that the man was not an intruder; so all that remained for me was to recognize the requirements of common politeness and invite him in. as he entered the room i mentally took his photograph. he was tall, symmetrical, powerful, with a high intellectual forehead, dark, deep-set eyes, dark hair and whiskers, and dark complexion. his countenance was very impressive, inspiring the beholder with a feeling of respect and confidence. as the door closed behind him he fixed his large, penetrating eyes upon me as if he were reading my inmost thoughts, and after a moment's scrutiny said: "have i the honor of addressing dr. thomas h. day, who was a surgeon some years ago on a vessel engaged in the east india trade?" "yes," i replied, "that is my name, and i was surgeon on an east indiaman." "then," he continued, "may i further ask if you remember a young man on the vessel in the capacity of super-cargo, who greatly trusted and confided in you?" his words penetrated my inmost being like a shock and i exclaimed impulsively: "you mean jack adams! i feel it! i know it! is he still living?" "he is alive and well," he said, "and your prompt recognition demonstrates that you are the man i am looking for. i bring you word from jack adams. he was also a trusted friend of mine, in whom i felt deeply interested, when he occupied the humble position of cabin boy on a steamer between new york and liverpool." his words came to me like a flash of sunlight, dispelling at once the clouds which had seemed to paralyze all my energies. i felt that any word from jack adams would be an inexpressible relief to my present agitated state of mind. i grasped my visitor's hand with a warmth i could not restrain, and with an enthusiasm that must have appeared to him effusive, i said: "thank god! your words thrill me with delight. i will esteem any message from jack adams a blessing, and the messenger a benefactor. you are indeed a welcome visitor, and you have placed me under bonds of gratitude by removing a most oppressive burden from my mind." he returned the pressure of my hand in a manner i had hardly expected, and handed me a card on which was traced a significant inscription in jack's well known handwriting which, if any confirmation was necessary, would have removed every possible doubt. shaking his hand again i asked: "will we ever have a world of truth such as has been the dream of every altruist?" "jack has found it," said my visitor, "and we must make it. that is the mission he sends me on. he has made it his life work to discover just how this may be accomplished with the greatest ease, and to convey the information to us." "then you are doubly welcome," i said. "be seated and make yourself at home. i hail you as a brother in a common cause, even if, as yet, i have no name by which to call you." "excuse me," he said, "i should have introduced myself before, but i was so overjoyed at finding dr. day that i forgot he knew nothing about me. my name is leo vincennes. i have been in the public service in some capacity, ever since i came to years of maturity; as soldier, sailor, scout, and later, as civil engineer and explorer. i come now from alaska, and my special business here is to see you and deliver a message, committed to my care by our esteemed brother and co-worker, jack adams." i had moved my chair as near to him as decorum would permit, and said in reply: "i am indeed happy to meet you, mr. vincennes. i have been thinking of jack all day, and i want you to tell me all about him." "i saw him last at cape lisburne, on the northwestern coast of alaska, where i was on the lookout for a vessel that was to take me and my party to san francisco. we were employed on the coast survey, and our allotted portion of the work included the cape, where we went into camp about the last of june. our lookout was on top of the bluff, which at this point rises to a height of about eight hundred feet above the level of the sea. the other members of our party were out on a hunt while i remained at the lookout. through my glass i had a clear view of the sea for leagues away, and i continued to sweep the horizon with my glass, as the unusually early breaking up of the ice led me to expect the appearance of a ship at any time. i casually turned my glass and espied a speck on the horizon, a little to the east of north, that at first gave me the impression of a distant sail. not thinking of a vessel from that direction, i observed it more closely, and soon saw that it was not on the surface of the water, but evidently in the air and coming directly toward me. it looked like some monstrous bird, of a magnitude such as i had never conceived. "in my long experience as a soldier, sailor, scout and explorer of the polar regions, i had been accustomed to remarkable adventures, and had come to take pride in the fact that i could face danger of any kind without a tremor; but i do not hesitate to confess that as this gigantic, winged phenomenon of the heavens bore down toward me, i quivered in every vein and fiber of my being. it came with a rapidity that was startling, and ere i could recover my equanimity sufficiently to determine whether i should try to get out of the way or take my chances with the monster, it came to a halt directly over my head, and i could see that it was some kind of a mechanical contrivance for navigating the air, and that its movements were controlled by human intelligence. it remained stationary for a moment, as if the occupant were taking observations, and then dropped slowly down and alighted on the highest point of the cape, within twenty feet of where i was standing. as this strange vessel came to a rest, a door opened and out stepped a young man who said in the clearest of english: "'well, well, i declare! here is the same leo vincennes who gave me my first lessons in navigation. how glad i am to see you so far north. i was heading due south for the mouth of the yukon, when i discovered you scanning the horizon with your glass. i then changed my course a little to the west and came directly to you.' i recognized his features, but was dazed and stood rooted to the ground. seeing my embarrassment, he advanced, extending his hand as he said: 'surely you have not forgotten jack adams, the cabin-boy, who sailed on the same ship with you from new york to liverpool, and asked you so many questions about ships and a seafaring life.' "i grasped his hand, but for a moment my brain seemed benumbed, and my tongue, to use an oft quoted phrase, 'clave to the roof of my mouth.' i could only look at him in open eyed wonder--the same smooth-faced lad that i had known and admired--nay loved, fifteen years ago. my temporary paralysis gave way to a flood of feeling such as i had never experienced before, and i convulsively shook his hand as i exclaimed: "'yes! yes! my dear old jack, i remember you, but never again did i expect to meet you--and least of all on this barren rock, in the regions of eternal ice, beneath the midnight sun, and dropping from the heavens to this mundane sphere. where did you come from and whither are you going? have you put off this mortality with all its weakness and put on immortality in some far off clime of perpetual youth, beyond the utmost limit of our earthly vision?' "'hold on leo,' he exclaimed, with that mischievous twinkle in his eye that i remember so well, 'don't for heaven's sake get superstitious. remember that if the kingdom of heaven can be established in us, there evidently must be more in this mundane sphere than has ever been dreamed of in our philosophy. i am no visitant from another world, but i do come from another country, where man is master of his environments, instead of being their servile victim, just as you and i and all of the brothers and sisters on our plane of thought, believe that all of this glorious old world ought to be. we must continue to spread the light, and inspire our common humanity, in every stage of development, wherever found, with higher aspirations and brighter ideas of what is in store for them. we must give them hope and courage. the good time coming, so oft foretold, is almost here, and it will be realized just as soon as a respectable minority can be brought to fully comprehend the way out of all their miseries, as well as they now understand the crushing effects of their present environments. it is for us to speak the word that will save them from all their miseries, pains, and woes, here and now, without waiting for some far off time, and wonderful change to be brought about in some mysterious and incomprehensible manner. no! no! leo, this is no time for us to stop and simply wonder at something that is merely the birth-right of every human being, while by a little well devised, intelligent and earnest effort on the part of the very few reformers who are not yet entirely submerged, we can secure to every human being every blessing he or she is capable of appreciating. there is nothing impossible about this, and if the world is not redeemed from its present low estate, it will be because the few altruists in the world do not make the necessary effort;--and they will surely make that effort when they comprehend how easy it is to quietly and peacefully remove the burdens that ignorance and greed have imposed, and thus rescue the toiler from the grasp of the selfish. how much are you willing to do toward this work of saving the world? could you be persuaded to forget self for awhile and lend your services to the cause of humanity, by spreading the light that will save it, and save it too before even the older people of this generation shall have passed off the stage?' "i was carried away by his earnest appeal, and promptly responded: "'i am indeed willing to make any conceivable sacrifice in such a cause, my dear old jack, but you must tell me what to do and how to do it.' "'then can you go into the interior of the united states--to the great missouri valley, and deliver a message from me to a dearly loved friend, which will secure his assistance?' "'i certainly will,' i said. 'personal matters require my presence in new york. i shall go from here to san francisco, and thence across the continent by rail, and can stop off at any point you desire. i have been notified that, in the private papers of richard sage, who died some years ago, a document was found, clearly proving that i am one of the heirs to a large property, which was held in trust for minors, whose whereabouts were unknown to the testator, my grandfather. i am the representative of those heirs.' "as i spoke, jack's countenance became ashen pale and the expression hard and stony, and as i concluded he asked in tones that struck me with a chill like a polar wave: "'and is richard sage dead?' "'he died nearly fifteen years ago,' i said. 'committed suicide, i believe. did you know him?' "'i think so,' he said. 'he was a friend of my father--but,' he added after a short pause, his face regaining its usual winning and kindly expression, 'we have no time to give to the discussion of the dead past. come with me and take a look at our earth from the cosy cabin of the eolus, while i tell you something of my adventures in the way of polar exploration, and explain what it is that i want you to do.' "we stepped into a small but luxuriantly furnished car, which i shall not attempt to describe, and seated ourselves upon a soft cushioned divan. the walls were paneled on all sides with large transparent sections, through which we obtained a clear and seemingly magnified view of the surrounding scenery. there we were, poised on the highest point of this towering rock, overlooking the sea, the rolling waves of which dashed themselves into foam on the rocks below. jack manipulated a delicately arranged keyboard at his side, and in a minute more we were flitting to and fro far above the earth at an almost inconceivable speed, and then loitering along or standing still to get a better view of objects of especial interest. "jack handed me what looked like a peculiarly constructed opera glass, and requested me to take a peep at cape lisburne through the transparent section at the bow. though we were miles away, i felt that i could reach out and pick up a pebble anywhere along this rock-bound shore. this explained a mystery, and i turned to jack and said: 'i can now understand how it was that you discovered me at such a great distance, for when i first saw you, your ship was but a speck, and several points to the east of north.' "'yes,' he said, 'i discovered you on the lookout when several leagues away. i had not expected to find civilized people so far north. as soon as i saw you, i put the eolus to her greatest speed directly toward you, lest you should leave the lookout. as i came nearer i felt sure that i recognized your features, and i at once made up my mind that i had found one whom i could trust to assist me in the work i had undertaken to perform. this fortunate meeting enables me to return immediately, and relieve the painful anxiety of many loving hearts concerning my safety. they had a most exaggerated conception of the perils i would be compelled to encounter in attempting to traverse these frozen regions.' "he told me a wonderful story of his trials, perils and adventures in getting past the great ice barriers, and his discovery of a world of truth beyond. "when we had circumnavigated the country for miles around, we slowly descended to earth and alighted at the same spot from which we started, and as we separated, he to return to his new home beyond the ice barriers, i to come to you, he placed his portmanteau in my hands and said: "'go to dr. thomas k. day, at kansas city, and if he will agree to publish the manuscript contained in this portmanteau and scatter it broadcast over the world, place it in his hands and tell him to use the gold contained also therein, which was contributed by the crew of the ice king for that purpose; for nothing but gold, the fetich of this benighted and money enslaved external world, can command labor; and yet it is labor and not gold, that is the sole producer of everything essential to the sustenance and comfort of humanity. if dr. day cannot be found, or is so situated that he cannot attend to this matter, use the gold yourself to find a publisher, and have eight printed volumes for me when i return with another manuscript of even more value, from the same fruitful field of discovery.' "and now dr. day," continued my visitor, "will you undertake to discharge the trust committed to you by jack adams?" "i will gladly do so" i replied, "for anything from jack will surely be a blessing to humanity." he placed the portmanteau in my hands and said: "i must bid you adieu. send the eight volumes for jack to my address at fort yukon, alaska, and as many more for myself, unless i should send you other directions. i shall be anxious to read the book as soon as it is published. jack must have passed through some trying ordeals, and from what i saw, his discoveries have been wonderful. but i must go." i tried to detain him, but with a cordial grasp of the hand he was gone. i turned and opened the portmanteau with the key that was attached. it contained a package, securely enclosed in a wrapper of some water-proof material, and marked "ms," and below was a glittering array of gold eagles. i examined the package of manuscript more closely. on either side it was addressed to dr. thomas h. day, kansas city, and below was written: "in the name of civilization i ask that whoever may find this package shall place it in the hands of those who will publish the ms. contained therein and have it scattered broadcast over the world, so that the discoveries recorded shall not be lost to humanity. nequa." this was repeated in french, german, norwegian, russian and spanish. and now dear reader, i shall give you the contents of this remarkable manuscript, from the pen of my sailor comrade of years ago, jack adams, but known in his new home as nequa, the teacher. ponder well the lessons taught in these wonderful discoveries. yours truly, thomas h. day. chapter ii in san francisco--where shall i go next?--a startling item of news answers the question and ends the search--in male attire--enlists as scientist on the ice king--off to the north pole--an unexpected blow--the danger signal--the race for life--the earthquake--"the channel is closing!"--"the ship is lost!" [illustration] i was in the parlor of the palace hotel in san francisco. since my last visit to the city, i had circumnavigated the globe. during the last three years, i had not only again visited the leading points of interest for tourists in asia, africa, europe and australia, but had extended my travels into the frozen regions of the far south, on a whaling voyage. yet i had not found that for which i was searching. my failure had brought a feeling of intense sadness and depression which i shall not attempt to describe. for fifteen years i had been a wanderer on the high seas. i had traversed every latitude from greenland to the south frigid zone and was now mentally asking "where shall i go next?" i had determined that i would not give up this long continued search until it was crowned with success, or death had intervened, as long as there was one spot on earth unexplored. thus pondering in my own mind what to do next, i picked up an evening paper and abstractedly glanced over its pages in the attempt to form an idea of its contents by reading the headlines. in the editorial columns my eye rested on the caption: "off to the north pole." this was travel into a region i had not penetrated. i was at once interested and glancing down the column i read the comments of the editor. "the discovery of america," he said, "was the attempt to discover a more direct and consequently a nearer route to india by sailing westward. the object sought for was not found, but the search gave to the overcrowded and oppressed millions of christendom a new world, where they might work out their destiny in conformity with the ideal of the founder of their religion, beyond the reach of the political and religious despotisms of the old world; and why may not this venture, even though it fails to reach the pole, ultimate in discoveries of inestimable value to mankind? we hope so, and hence we wish the most abundant success to the expedition now being organized in this city, by an experienced traveler and navigator, capt. raphael ganoe." the paper dropped from my hand; i was overcome; my senses were paralysed; my heart almost ceased to beat; my brain for a moment was deprived of the power of thought. as the full import of this unexpected revelation dawned upon me, i arose and paced the floor. "my god," i exclaimed, "this cannot be, it must not be, but how can i prevent it? all the arrangements are perfected. i cannot, i dare not, under the circumstances, speak the word that possibly might prevent this perilous undertaking." i was powerless. but i soliloquized, "if i cannot prevent it, i must join the expedition, for never again will i permit him to leave me." my mind was made up. i was in the prime of life, about thirty-five years of age, and had traveled extensively. i was familiar with ocean navigation and versed in all the sciences taught in our higher institutions of learning. i would make application for the position of scientist, and failing in that would enlist before the mast as a common sailor, if nothing better offered. i turned to the mirror and surveyed myself long and earnestly. i raised myself to my full height and critically viewed the womanly face and figure revealed to my vision. though not masculine, my form was strong and muscular for one of my sex, and with the proper disguise it would do. for the first time in years i had donned the habiliments of woman. in masculine attire i had traveled without being discovered. protected by this disguise, i had filled almost every position on shipboard and had succeeded in earning a competency, something i never could have accomplished as a woman. it was not an experiment. i had tried it successfully for years and would try it again. i took up the paper and read the account of the expedition with more care. the ship was one of the staunchest that had ever been built and had been provided with all the modern appliances for the comfort and protection of the crew, during a cruise that was intended to be indefinitely extended. none but bold and experienced seamen had been enlisted. as time was no object it was intended to use the sails instead of steam whenever it was practicable. hence the large space usually given to coal was mainly reserved for an unusual supply of carefully prepared provisions for a long sojourn in the arctic regions. every thing that human foresight could devise for the success of this expedition had been provided. the daring commander had determined to take all the time that was needed for making careful surveys of the shore lines of the frozen north, and sounding its seas. my mind was made up. i retired at once to my rooms. the male attire that i had used so successfully, was in my trunks. i need not worry the reader at this time with the details of my hasty yet thorough preparation for concealing my identity from the keen observation of one who knew me so much better than the many with whom i had been associated in my wanderings. suffice it to say that every arrangement was completed in my private apartments, without exciting the suspicion of any person. i dressed myself in a neat sailor suit, which was concealed from view beneath the ample folds of a fashionable wrapper. i packed my trunks, summoned a porter and ordered my goods removed to furnished rooms that i had previously engaged. when there, i removed every article that would indicate that i was a woman, and with valise in hand took my way to the dock, where the ice king was being fitted up with the greatest care by the experienced navigator in whose services it was my intention to enlist. it was in the early twilight of a glorious evening in may --. i lingered a few moments on the wharf to enjoy the scene and to collect my faculties for the trial that was to come. i was tall and slender and my appearance was youthful and refined. yet i flattered myself that with my long experience in this disguise, i would be able to successfully act the part i had determined upon. as i stepped on board, i met an officer who accosted me with the familiar salutation: "hello jack, what will you have?" "i want to see captain ganoe," i said. "where can i find him?" "he is in his cabin," he replied, and passed on. i gained the deck. the calm waters of the bay reflected the full rounded moon and her stellar attendants. the harbor was almost deserted. vessels here and there dotted the placid surface of the water. music low, sweet and plaintive reached my ears. its melancholy strains drew me forward. the soul of the performer seemed to float out upon the air through the tender caresses of the magic bow. the very waves, as they sparkled in the mellow moonbeams, seemed to dance to the sweet melody. it came from the captain's quarters. i passed in so quietly that i was not observed. as i suspected, the musician was captain ganoe. he was so absorbed in the plaintive notes of the violin, through which his soul was speaking, that he did not notice my intrusion. he was in thought, far away and oblivious to his surroundings. i stood and carefully scanned the form before me. it was that of a man of mature years, broad shoulders and medium height, firmly knit, compactly built and fair complexion. his eyes were blue, his nose a combination of grecian and roman, his mouth firm, and his entire bearing indicative of courage and strength of character. his brow was broad and thoughtful; his expression kind and firm. everything left the impression that, though comparatively young, he had drained the cup of bitter disappointment to its dregs. while i sympathized, his sadness brought a feeling of sweet relief. oh, how my heart bounded, and for the moment i felt impelled to fall upon his bosom and sob out the story of my wrongs. but no, this would not do. i must be patient and first ascertain from his own lips, in just what light he would regard me when he learned the whole truth. i aroused him from his reverie with the inquiry: "is this captain ganoe?" he looked up quickly, surprised to see a stranger in his cabin, and responded: "yes, young man, i am captain ganoe, and let me ask to what i am indebted for the honor of this visit. did you not meet an officer who could attend to your wants?" "i did," i replied, "but i wanted to see and talk with captain ganoe." the severity left his countenance, and he bade me be seated. "now young man," said he, "please state fully but briefly, what you want, for my time is entirely occupied." i answered promptly, and without preliminary explanations i said: "i have just learned from the papers that you are about to sail for the most thorough exploration of the arctic regions that has yet been attempted, and i want to go with you." he turned up the lamp which had been burning low, and looked me full in the face. i felt his searching gaze but withstood it, with no exhibition of the fears i felt for the success of my plans. but with inward tremor, i awaited his reply. after hesitating a moment, he said deliberately: "you do not know what you ask. you are young and refined. this expedition must encounter dangers, known and unknown, and none but the strong and experienced should be permitted to make the venture. it would be wrong in me to take a young man like you from the bosom of his family, from society, and all the opportunities for a successful and useful life, to go with me on this perilous expedition. the fact is, you ought to return home and leave such hazardous adventures as this for those who have no hopes to be blasted, and who wish for reasons of their own, to hide themselves away from the world. please tell me your name and where you come from." "my name sir," i replied, "is jack adams, and i have just returned from a three years cruise, during which time i visited the leading seaports of the world. i have become familiar with a life on the high seas in all the medial latitudes, and now propose to explore the frozen north. as to family, i have none. i am an orphan, and all alone in the world. i graduated from school at the head of my class and then shipped as cabin boy and worked my way up to a position of super-cargo. i have been a practical student of navigation--never sailing twice on the same line of travel when i could avoid it. i now offer my services to you because i want to go with you into the unexplored regions of the north. i have had enough of the tropic and temperate zones. if i never return i leave no one to mourn my loss." he looked his astonishment and was visibly softened as he responded: "we have no need of a super-cargo and we have all the seamen we want. i have just formed a co-partnership with captain samuel battell, who is not only an officer of ability and long experience in the arctics, but an expert scientist and mathematician. every place seems to be full." "i am not," i replied, "seeking a position as super-cargo, nor am i asking any position that requires pay or even board, if you can find room in your commissary for the supplies i stand ready to furnish. i can and will do any work that may be assigned me. all i want is to be permitted to go with this expedition, take my own chances and pay my own way." "you seem very much in earnest mr. adams, and i am frank to admit that i admire your courage even if i doubt your judgment in this matter. but what can you do, and what evidence have you to offer that you can render valuable service in an expedition of this character? as to pay, i would not have you infer that i regarded it as any object to one of your adventurous disposition. no one enlisted in this expedition is promised a salary but the common sailors, and that is paid by captain battell and myself." "as to what i can do," i responded, "i am by education and experience, qualified to navigate the vessel and make every necessary scientific observation and calculation. i am familiar with all that has been published on arctic exploration and discovery. as to my ability, you can best ascertain that by inquiring into what i know. that is the best evidence of my training and experience on the high seas. i do not shrink from the necessary examination." "you are right," said he, "and i will consult my partner. if it is agreeable to him, you may take charge of our library and scientific instruments, assist in our observations and keep a record of the expedition. i will summon captain battell." he touched an electric button and in a moment a bell sounded at his side. he said to me: "captain battell will be here in a moment, and i will leave this matter to him." a moment later, the same officer i had met when i first came aboard the ship, entered and i was formally introduced. he cordially shook my hand and captain ganoe told him what i wanted, and, quite unexpectedly to me, said: "mr. adams is admirably qualified, and i think we had better place him in charge of the scientific work of the expedition. we can assist him as occasion requires. this will enable us to give our entire attention to the exigencies of the situation in the dangerous waters of the arctic regions, while mr. adams will keep a record of everything discovered that may be of value, and send out duplicates of the same by the balloons, as we intended, so that if the expedition should be lost, the winds may carry some account of our discoveries to the civilized portions of the globe." evidently in the mind of captain ganoe, i had already been appointed to the position which of all others i would have preferred, and one that would always keep me near his own quarters. and to this, captain battell assented, saying: "i met mr. adams on his arrival, and was favorably impressed with his appearance and evident determination to see the senior officer of the ice king." and turning to me he continued, "i will now take pleasure in showing you through the library, which will be your quarters during the voyage." captain battell was the opposite of captain ganoe in his personal appearance. he was powerfully built, of medium height, dark complexion, dark hair, and steel grey eyes set beneath a broad and beetling brow. the general contour of his features indicated courage, firmness, and strength of character. he was just that type of a man who might be expected to appear to the best advantage in some great emergency that demanded qualities of a high order. all the appointments for the scientific work were of the first quality. the library contained the leading scientific publications, together with encyclopedias, and historic and general literature, carefully catalogued for easy reference. every kind of scientific instruments, charts, maps, globes, cameras, etc., had been selected with the greatest care. among the special supplies were the balloons to which captain ganoe had referred. these were small and could be inflated at short notice. they were designed to be sent up from time to time with accounts of the expedition, its progress, discoveries etc., hermetically sealed. it is well known that at the equinoxes, the heated air from the tropics ascends to the higher altitudes and flows toward the poles, while the cold air flows toward the equator to fill the vacuum, producing the equinoctial storms. these little balloons were expected to be carried south by the winds, and find a resting place on the land surface where they might be picked up by civilized people; or if they fell into the water, the bottles would preserve the dispatches and the ocean currents might carry them into civilized countries. thus every precaution was taken to secure to the world the benefit of any discovery that might be made, even though the expedition should be lost. i was well pleased with my quarters. all the surroundings would be, to me, most satisfactory, no matter what the trials and dangers that we might encounter. i was enlisted for the expedition, and in the position i preferred above all others, as it brought me into frequent consultation with the commander, and i should be able to acquaint myself with his present views and feelings and note what changes had taken place since i saw him last. i lost no time in having my trunks brought on board and made ready for the voyage. the ice king was soon at sea. we stopped at one of the aleutian islands where we took on our dog teams, which were to be used for explorations on the ice. the sledges were so constructed that they might readily be converted into boats that would accommodate the whole crew and a good supply of provisions, in case we should be compelled to abandon the ship. we expected to be locked up in the ice during the winter, but with our sledges and dog teams, we could continue our explorations for long distances in every direction, with the ship for headquarters. captain battell was a whaler and familiar with all the methods of arctic travel. his long experience on these northern waters enabled him to forsee many of the dangers we were likely to meet, and to make the needful preparations to overcome them. from this point our voyage northward through behring strait and into the arctic ocean, was without any incident worth recording. our course after passing the strait, was a little east of north to avoid the ice, until we reached longitude degrees west of greenwich, and then north. captain ganoe often came into my cabin to while away an hour in conversation. his marked friendship seemed to increase with each visit. he always addressed me familiarly as jack, and in these conversations he became more and more confidential, and revealed to me more and more of his inner life, his early hopes and subsequent disappointments. one evening after we had been at sea about four months, he came into my cabin looking unusually gloomy. after the customary salutation he lighted a cigar and fell into a brown study, not speaking to me for several minutes, when suddenly he said: "jack, did you ever think what mere trifles sometimes change the whole course of a life-time? i often wonder at myself for being out here on this wild goose chase, with the certainty of loss of property, business, comfort and possibly life itself, searching for something i have no use for, and which at best if discovered, will only gratify an idle curiosity. and yet, this has been brought about by what was only a trifling incident. have you ever thought of these strange effects which flow from trivial causes?" he spoke bitterly and i determined to take advantage of the opportunity to draw him out. i wanted to penetrate the inmost recesses of his being, and with this object in view i replied: "yes, captain, i have often thought of it and have realized it in my own experience. it sometimes seems little short of a miracle, that after years of wandering, i am now here with you. in my case i was not influenced by a mere trifle, but a stern necessity. i had absolutely nothing to lose, and i thought i might find something which, under the circumstances, would amply repay me for all the hardships and dangers i might have to encounter. but you were differently situated. you were independent. you had wealth, business and influential friends, while i had been robbed of my patrimony, and was thrown upon the world with nothing but my hands and brain to work with. my course was a necessity, but it is a mystery why you should abandon a profitable business and organize this expedition at such an enormous expenditure of labor and money, while you regard its avowed objects as matters of such little importance. your course seems to involve a self-contradiction that i cannot comprehend." "and thereby hangs a tale," said the captain. "as a matter of fact, i never did attach any great importance to arctic exploration. from my point of view, the discovery of the pole would be of no especial value to mankind, as no practical use could be made of it. even the discovery of a productive country, which may be possible, could not greatly benefit the world, as it would be inaccessible to the masses of humanity whose condition would be improved by the discovery of a new country and cheap homes. while such a successful culmination would be of small benefit to the world, it would be of still less interest to myself. i really care but little about what we may find at the end of this voyage." "then," i said, "if such be the estimate that you place upon the objects of this expedition, i am more than ever curious to learn what could have impelled you to undertake it. you must have had a reason of some kind. i cannot understand how men can act without a motive." "yes," said he, "i was impelled to organize this expedition by a power stronger than myself, but when i ask myself what i expect to accomplish by it, truth compels me to answer: 'nothing.' as to the motive, i suppose that i have been actuated by an all-absorbing desire to forget the miseries of the past in the activities of the present." "but this is not the tale that unlocks the mystery." i responded. "you have aroused my curiosity to a fever heat, and yet you fail to gratify it. it might be that i could pour oil on the troubled waters and possibly enable you to discover that you have been actuated by a mistaken conception, and that really there is nothing in the past that you should desire to forget. it would certainly do no harm to review the case, and it might reveal the fact that it was a source of misery, simply because all the circumstances were not fully understood." "i have no desire," said the captain, "to conceal the story of my life from you, if you care to hear it. but i fully understand it and it is of such a nature as to admit of no remedy." "do not be too sure of that," i said. "but until the story is told, of course i will not be able to form an intelligent opinion of the case. yet, observation and experience have convinced me that there are always two sides to every question and that to get at the facts in all their bearings, we must closely examine both sides." "well," said the captain, "i see that you were cut out for a lawyer and the wonder is how you came to be a sailor. you certainly have a judicial cast of mind and to while away the monotony of the hour, i will submit the matter to you, reserving the right, however, to decide for myself. i have always exercised my natural right to examine every question from my own standpoint and decide it according to my own sense of right and wrong. "it is the same old story of an all-absorbing love and a cruel disappointment, followed by long years of suppressed anguish, from which i am still striving to escape. i was an orphan, living with my bachelor uncle, richard sage, in one of the suburbs of new york city. he was my guardian and the executor of the estate left me by my father. my uncle was kind and indulgent, and my widowed aunt who presided over his home, was to me a loving mother, and so my childhood days were passed in happy contentment. "one misty, dreary morning, my uncle announced at the breakfast table that he had been called to the bedside of his old friend, james vanness, who was supposed to be dying. he said he would not return until his friend was much better or dead, and not to be disappointed if he was absent for several days, or possibly weeks. "a week later i saw my uncle drive up to the gate and assist a very beautiful young girl from the carriage. he beckoned me to him, and introduced me, saying: "'raphael, i have brought you a little sister. this is miss cassie vanness, whose father i was called to see. i have been made her guardian and this will be her future home. both mother and father are dead and she has no near relatives. remember this, and do everything in your power to make her home with us as happy as possible.' "we at once became great friends. cassie was at that time about fourteen or fifteen years of age and i was eighteen. she proved to be the gayest, brightest, most winsome little lady i had ever seen. i must have fallen in love with her at first sight. i have often thought since," he added slowly, "that even his satanic majesty might look entrancingly beautiful, for to my intense sorrow, cassie proved herself, it seems to me, a tenfold greater hypocrite than judas of old who betrayed with a kiss. "but enough of this. our school days, lasting some five years, were to me one ceaseless round of delightful experiences, which seemed to fill every vein and fiber of my being with unalloyed happiness. during our vacations cassie and i were always together, either at home or traveling, and many were the excursions, romps and drives we enjoyed. "i graduated at twenty-three and we laid our plans for the future. i had inherited an interest in a line of steamers running between liverpool and new york, which enabled us to frequently cross the atlantic during our vacations, and visit the leading points of interest in great britain and on the continent. i had acquired a taste for travel, and it was determined that i should visit the orient, while cassie returned to college to complete her study of the higher branches. i was to be gone about three years, during which time i would circumnavigate the globe, and on my return we were to be married. "with these objects in view i secured, through the influence of my uncle, a lucrative position in the employ of a firm of importers, whose trade extended to all parts of the eastern continent and australia. on the evening before my departure, i placed a brilliant diamond engagement ring on cassie's finger and a gold chain and locket of peculiar workmanship around her neck. "these presents were made from special designs for this purpose and the patterns destroyed. i shall never forget the last night we spent together. the appearance of my affianced bride in her splendid evening dress, her diamond engagement ring sparkling on her lovely hand, the gold chain and diamond set locket and her luxuriant suit of golden hair handsomely ornamented, formed a picture of beauty indelibly imprinted upon my memory. "my ship sailed from one of the piers on the hudson near the battery. we contemplated the circumnavigation of the globe by way of cape horn, the sandwich islands, japan, china, australia, africa, europe, and thence returning to america, stopping at all the principal seaport cities and points of interest on our voyage. this would enable cassie and me to keep up our correspondence with no very long interruptions. "for the first year of my absence, at every port i received a package of letters from home, and this always contained letters from cassie. we had agreed to write to each other at least once a week without waiting for replies, and it often occurred that i got a whole package of letters from her at one time, and the perusal of these affectionate missives was the one all-absorbing pleasure to which i looked forward when we came into port. whatever else might be lacking, cassie's loving letters never failed. "at last, however, they ceased all at once. letters from my uncle came regularly, and through them i heard of cassie, but i could get no word from her. i wrote to her every week, but my letters brought no response. i was miserable, and urged my uncle to find out what was the matter and let me know if my letters came safely. "my uncle's replies were at first evasive, but at last with an expression of the most cordial sympathy for me, he informed me that my letters came regularly, but that cassie had changed her mind and they remained unopened. he enclosed a draft on london for the balance due on my estate, together with a complete statement of the account from the date of his taking charge, and the findings of the court as to all the property and investments that came to me from my father. everything was complete and duly certified, so there was nothing that demanded my presence in new york. he advised me not to return home, but continue in my present position, as cassie was to be married in a short time and my presence would be painful to her as well as to myself, and embarrassing to everyone concerned. "i was thunderstruck. i did not, could not, would not believe that cassie was false to our mutual and oft repeated pledges of love and fidelity to each other. i could get no satisfaction from my uncle. my aunt had been dead several years. i wrote to my lawyer to learn if possible, the truth of the reported engagement and approaching marriage. his reply was prompt, stating that it was not only true, but that the marriage had already taken place. he wrote that he had been called in by my uncle, who was in feeble health, to make out the papers in regard to the estate of cassie vanness, which she was anxious to have settled satisfactorily to herself before her marriage. 'these financial matters being arranged,' wrote my lawyer, 'what was my surprise to be called upon to witness her marriage to richard sage. financially she did well, but it is hard for me to believe that it was a love match. your uncle, however, is certainly much infatuated with her, and she is indeed beautiful.' "this same letter contained a flattering offer from a firm of new york importers, for my interest in the steamship line, and i advised my attorney to close the deal at once and forward the proceeds to london and also to dispose of all my property in and about new york, lists of which were in his possession. i had made up my mind never to return home, as it would be distressing to me and certainly embarrassing to my uncle. after that my only new york correspondence was with my attorney. "when i reached london, i found a letter from my attorney with drafts on the bank of england for all my interests in america. this letter also contained the information that my uncle was in great trouble, his marriage with cassie having resulted in much unhappiness. she had suddenly deserted him without giving any reason for her strange conduct. she merely left a note, stating that she would not live with him. this was the last that had been heard from her. 'of course,' added my attorney, 'it would be next to impossible to find her in this large city if she desires to keep herself concealed.' "since that time i have been a wanderer, caring little whither i went, so that my mind was fully occupied. i purchased a staunch ship in which i cruised for years, avoiding as far as practicable the regular lines of trade and often sailing without a cargo, searching for a contentment never to be found. at last i conceived the idea of getting away from civilization altogether, joining in the work of arctic exploration, and, if possible reaching the pole. with this end in view, i had the ice king built according to special designs, and adapted, so far as human foresight and ingenuity could devise, for a long sojourn in the frozen north. and now here we are, in the arctic ocean, liable at any moment to be caught between the ice fields which appear on either side, and possibly crushed. what is to come next? god only knows. "such is a brief statement of the perfidy of the woman i loved, and its consequences. and this is why i am out here on this perilous expedition, searching for something that i care very little about. i think you will agree with me that it admits of no remedy." "it does not look that way to me," i responded. "i would be unwilling to condemn your affianced bride until i had heard her side of the story. it may be that her marriage to your uncle was secured by unfair means, and that when she discovered the fraud, in her desperation she started out to find you. in that case, the remedy would be for you to find her and renew your plighted faith." "never!" said captain ganoe. "even if your supposed case is correct, it could not set aside the facts. she knew that, in marrying my uncle, she was false to me, and when she deserted him with no legal cause for separation, she was false to her husband to whom she was bound in the holy bonds of matrimony. she acted from her own choice. she was not compelled to engage herself to me, and no law could have forced her to marry my uncle. her conduct in both cases reveals her innate perfidy of character, and under no circumstances could i, as an honorable man, accept such a woman as my wife. her tarnished reputation, if nothing else, would place an insurmountable barrier between us even if she were not legally the wife of another man." i was paralyzed. i had indeed succeeded in getting from him an emphatic expression of sentiment covering my own case. i had penetrated the innermost recesses of his being, but had fanned to a flame the slumbering fires of a volcano, only to be submerged in the eruption of molten lava. the blow was so unexpected and so sudden, that i was stupefied, and my astonishment left no room for grief, which gave me a moment for reflection. here i was, in the ship with him, far within the arctic circle, at the beginning of the arctic winter, and with the certainty of being locked up in the ice for months if not for years. i could not get away from him if i would, and from his own lips i had heard my conduct denounced as the acme of perfidy, and my love spurned as something treacherous and vile. bitterly and in the most emphatic manner, had he declared that as an honorable man, he could never associate himself in the tender relations of marital love, with one of my tarnished reputation. in his own estimate, he had already assigned me a place among the most debased and abandoned characters, and all there was left for me to do was to preserve my disguise, in order to secure even respectful treatment from the man i loved. as the full sense of the situation dawned upon me in all its crushing weight of humiliation and anguish, i must have fallen at his feet in a dead faint, but for the clangor of the great bell which had been agreed upon as the signal of immediate peril, to summon each one to the post that had been assigned him in case of sudden emergencies. the alarm came to me as a sweet relief from an agony tenfold more difficult to endure than any possible hardships or dangers from an arctic storm, amid towering mountains of ice. there was no time for grief. the emergency demanding prompt action was upon us, and we hurried out upon deck. according to previous arrangements, captain ganoe seized the wheel and captain battell, as an experienced arctic navigator, took command, while i, with glass and note book, stood by the wheel to make observations and to render any assistance to captain ganoe that might be required. the cause of alarm at once became apparent. the stiff breeze that had been blowing all day from the southwest, had now increased to a gale, and the icebergs which for days were becoming more numerous on our starboard quarter, had formed a solid pack, which was evidently land-locked, as it remained stationary, while on the larboard, a solid field of ice of vast extent was approaching. it was only a question of a few hours at the utmost, when these two great ice walls must come together and it would be destruction for us to be caught in their deadly embrace. retreat was impossible. the only open channel was the one we were pursuing. the walls on either side were continuous, and with my glass i could see the channel behind us blocked with icebergs, urged on in our wake by wind and waves as if determined not to let us escape. our only safety seemed to be in our being able to sail beyond these two continuous walls of ice before they came together. captain battell, with his glass kept up a rapid survey of the horizon, and gave orders through his trumpet as calmly as if scenes like this were matters of every day occurrence, and captain ganoe, at the wheel, responded as if he was part of the machinery, which he handled with rapidity and precision. it was a scene never to be forgotten. the midnight sun hung just above the horizon. off to our larboard, an unbroken wall of ice extending as far as the eye, assisted by a powerful glass could reach, was bearing down upon us. on our starboard another wall of ice against which the waves were dashing in all their fury, stood apparently as firm as the granite shores against which it rested. behind us, the channel was filled with detached masses of ice, which if caught between these ice walls might hasten the closing of the channel before us. could we escape? was the all pervading question that propounded itself to us. every sail was set and under the pressure of every pound of steam our boilers could carry, the ice king leaped forward like a frightened deer, as if conscious of the doom that was impending. for hours we kept up this reckless speed. the foam flew in blinding spray from the ship's quarters, fretted along her sides and left a broad white line in her wake. the whistling of the wind in her rigging and the regular plunging of her engines, made pandemonium on board. it was indeed a race for life, and in my perturbed state of mind i actually enjoyed the excitement, almost hoping that it might culminate in the destruction threatened. with the courage of despair i calmly surveyed the scene and took my notes, occasionally assisting captain ganoe at the wheel. this was the first real danger that we had encountered, and my interview with the captain had given me a reckless daring to meet it without a tremor, that seems almost miraculous. we still kept up this rapid flight, and as far as the eye could reach the two great ice walls still confronted each other and the channel of open water continued to grow more narrow. soon we had to veer from side to side to avoid collisions with the jagged shore-lines of ice, but nowhere was there any indication that when they came together an open space would be formed sufficient to protect the ship. we were compelled to reduce our speed, and still the ice-fields were coming closer together and at last we were forced to creep along a narrow, crooked channel between two great packs of ice-mountains which often towered far above the mainmast of the ice king. the outlook was desperate, but the ice on our larboard ceased to approach, and for a moment it seemed as if we might escape into open water. but not so. our way was blocked. an ice-mountain loomed up before us, and we came to a full stop. it was this that had probably checked the advance of the moving ice-pack, and saved us from the cruel "nip" which has crushed so many hapless vessels in these dangerous waters. the ice king lay between two vast overhanging ice-mountains, which towered high above us. in the front was the huge iceberg, which had prevented the nearer approach of the wall of ice. the channel in which we lay could only be closed by the breaking up of the fields of ice behind us, and we could see no reason why this should occur. if the ice-fields remained intact until the freezing of the channel there would be no collision and we would be safe for the time being. the weather had become intensely cold and we began to feel that the danger had passed by, when an ominous roar and the sharp reports of breaking ice, gave warning of the only thing we had to dread. a violent earthquake was lashing the ocean into fury, and the ice pack was broken into innumerable fragments, which were crashing against each other in the most violent commotion. captain battell shouted from the lookout where he had posted himself: "save yourselves if you can. the channel is closing and the ship is lost." i looked up, and as i did so, the lofty ice-mountains between which we lay, seemed to be falling directly down upon us, and at the same time a violent shock threw me upon the deck with a force that must have rendered me unconscious for a few seconds. chapter iii. in the dark--all is still--captain ganoe's narrow escape--imprisoned in the ice--distressing situation--how to preserve the health and efficiency of the crew--a new danger--the ice is moving--the common sailor to the rescue--lief and eric save the ship--the tunnel to the surface--exploring the ice-field. [illustration] the first thing i remember after being thrown to the deck, was the profound quiet, and the consciousness that some mighty change had taken place in our surroundings. i opened my eyes. the deck was wrapped in semi-darkness, and instead of the thundering reverberations of the breaking ice and the waves dashing into foam upon their icy barriers, there was a gentle, swish, swish, of the sea as it lashed the sides of the ship. i felt dazed, and the memory of the awful scenes through which we had passed impressed me like the vivid imagery and fantastic pictures of some horrible dream. at the moment of the shock, fully impressed with the conviction that all was lost, i was turning to grasp raphael in my arms, so that we might die together, and on recovering consciousness, my first thought was of him. i sprang to my feet and in the dim light i saw something gliding away from me towards the edge of the deck, and i instinctively grasped it, as it was about to drop overboard. it was captain ganoe. he was living but unconscious. with my insecure footing, i feared for a moment that we should both go overboard together, when there was a flash of light and battell seized my arm, exclaiming: "thank god, you are both alive! i called to you and as you did not reply, i feared that you were both killed by the falling ice. it was lucky that you were able to grasp the captain just when you did, or he would surely have been lost." i was holding captain ganoe in my arms, while battell was briskly chafing his hands. in a moment he aroused, as if suddenly awaking out of a deep sleep, and straightening himself up in a dazed sort of way, he exclaimed: "good god, jack, what is the matter? where are we? have i been asleep?" "oh, we are only imprisoned in the ice," said battell. "i feared that you were crushed by that huge block of ice which came so near carrying away the part of the deck where you were standing. if jack had not caught you and drawn you back at the imminent risk of his own life, you would now be at the bottom of the sea." captain ganoe, now fully aroused, took in the situation at a glance, and exclaimed as he grasped me by the hand: "jack, my savior! the last i remember was that you were turning as if to grasp me in your arms. it was indeed a close call. but why did you risk your life to save mine?" i had scarcely spoken since the alarm had ended our conversation in my cabin, and i felt that to do so now, in answer to such a question, would betray my weakness and possibly my secret, which i had resolved to guard more closely than ever. fortunately, however, he did not wait for a reply, but with his usual thoughtfulness for the crew and safety of the ship, he started below, saying: "come on, my bruises are not severe, and we must look out for the sailors and make a tour of inspection around the ship and ascertain as nearly as possible, in just what kind of a place we are." just as we reached the deck below, we met paul huston, the engineer; pat o'brien, second mate; and mike gallagher, the cabin boy. they understood what had happened and feared we had been injured or killed by the shower of ice that had fallen upon the upper deck. they reported everything all right with the crew and that the vessel was apparently uninjured. we passed entirely around the ship, narrowly scanning the walls of our ice prison, with a powerful reflector, which revealed every crevice. we lay in an inclosure which gave the vessel more than room enough to turn around if carefully handled. we ascertained that the great overhanging ice-mountains between which we lay, and that had threatened us with instant destruction, had actually been our salvation. when the earthquake shattered the two great ice-fields, these towering mountains had started to tumble over on the ship at the same time, and meeting far above had formed a massive arch which had prevented the closing of the channel at that point. here and there were openings in the icy roof, but in the main, the colliding masses were closely joined together. the only injury to the ship was from the block of ice that had fallen so near to captain ganoe. from the number of fragments of from one to several pounds in weight, which were scattered over the upper deck, it seemed a marvel that we had escaped without serious injury. when our tour of inspection was completed we repaired to the library to talk over the situation. addressing battell, captain ganoe asked: "what do you think of the situation?" "i apprehend no immediate danger," replied captain battell. "in a few hours with the present intense cold, this ice-pack will be frozen into one solid block. but if we are not crushed by the ice, god only knows when we will get out. as for the present, we are most fortunately situated. we could not find better winter quarters in the frigid zone. we are well protected from the cold, and the fishing will be good, as this will be a good breathing place where the fish will gather for air. we can lay in an ample supply of dog feed and i am inclined to believe that we might capture a whale and lay in a supply of oil for fuel." "but how long do you think it will be," asked the captain, "before we will have an opportunity to get the ship clear of the ice?" "i would not venture a prediction," replied battell. "one thing is certain. we are sealed up for the winter, and it may be that the entire summer will not be sufficient to produce a break up of the ice-field in which we are caught. so it may be that we will be cooped up for a year or two. there is no telling how long we will be prisoners." "well, i suppose then," said the captain, "that all there is for us to do is to wait." "yes," said battell, "that is all we can do, and," he added, smiling, "it will not take much effort. but," after a pause, "it will take some effort on our part to provide sufficient exercise and amusement to preserve the health and discipline of the crew, so that we will have a reasonable prospect of getting clear of the ice when the break up does take place." "that is well thought of," said captain ganoe, "and i think it would be well to muster the crew and organize a regular system of employment and amusement. and," turning to me, he continued, "what do you have to say, jack? i never knew you to be so silent. what is the matter? have you no opinions to offer, and nothing to suggest?" "i certainly have opinions and i might offer some suggestions," i remarked, "but before doing so, i want to familiarize myself with existing conditions. only one thing seems certain, just at present, and that is, that we are locked up in the ice for several months and perhaps for years to come. this will give us ample time for careful reflection. there is no reason that we should be in a hurry to inaugurate a rigid system of any kind just now in order to preserve the discipline of the crew. there is no danger of their deserting the ship and we can well afford to wait until the novelty of our present surroundings has worn away." "you are right," said the captain. "there is certainly a novelty in our present surroundings, that will attract the attention of all and prevent ennui for the time being, but this will soon wear away, and the monotony of our imprisonment will become unbearable, except to the best disciplined minds. this will be particularly severe on our common sailors, who are uneducated, and thus deprived of the numberless sources of recreation and amusement to which we have ready access. when this time comes, what would you do?" "so far as i am concerned," i said, "i have access to the library, and will really enjoy the association that it affords with the brightest intellects and noblest characters of earth, past and present. now, if i should suggest anything for the relief of the common sailors, outside of such exercise and amusements as are essential to health, i would organize them into a school, and seek to bring these more exalted pleasures within their reach by increasing their knowledge, and giving them broader views of life and higher aspirations. this will also furnish us with needful and elevating employment and will certainly afford us a splendid opportunity to do good to others, and at the same time increase our own knowledge of human nature, and to trace the effects produced by environments, on the masses who have not enjoyed the advantages of a liberal education." "your suggestion," said the captain, "is all right as far as the better educated are concerned, but it would be useless and probably hurtful to the common sailors. remember the old adage that 'a little learning is a dangerous thing.' to the extent that we could succeed in giving them broader views of life and higher aspirations, we would only succeed in making them dissatisfied with their lot, and thus weaken the discipline on which the safety of all depends. all that we can do for the common sailors is to provide such healthful exercise of the muscles as will give them good appetites and enable them to enjoy rest and sleep. they would not appreciate the mental feast which you in your kindness of heart would set before them. their training has been physical, and, hence, their enjoyments must be of the same nature. the same rules that apply to trained intellects will not apply to them." "if that is your opinion," i said, "there is no use for any suggestions from me. you are the owner and senior officer of the ice king, and, of course, good discipline demands that your will shall be law. you ought to understand the material of which your crew is composed, better than i. my duties have not brought me in contact with your sailors and, of course, i know practically nothing about them, except that i see they are courageous and efficient. but, nevertheless, on general principles, i believe that nature has planted the germs of all that is good and noble in every human soul, and if this is true, all that is good and noble can be developed in them by the proper influences, without detracting in any way from their usefulness as mere workers; besides, the effort to elevate them draws them nearer to us, and it seems to me, would tend to engender feelings of mutual love and confidence, that strengthen instead of weaken that perfect discipline which is of such inestimable importance to an expedition like this, when the safety and well-being of every individual member is of vital importance to the safety and well being of the entire crew." "i have always had the respect and confidence of my sailors," said the captain, "not because i tried to lift them up to the same plane that i occupied, but because i provided them with good food, good quarters, never overtaxed their strength, and gave them ample time for rest and such amusements as they could appreciate. i have always had the good-will and cheerful obedience of the common sailors, because i looked out for their physical needs and treated them kindly." "i have no doubt of that," i said. "but your voyages in the past have been between civilized ports and all your sailors wanted was their pay, and in addition to this, you gave them better treatment than they could get elsewhere. hence, their selfish impulses held them to you. the relation between you and them was purely physical, and all that was needed to make them loyal to you, was to look out for their physical wants and treat them kindly. from their standpoint, this was an addition to their wages that they could not secure under more heartless employers. but you are now differently situated. you are not expected to come into a civilized port where sailors can spend their wages as sailors usually do. they have nothing to look forward to, and as mere workers they have no interests in common with you. but with the broader views of life to which association with the best intellects and the noblest characters gives access, they would take a more exalted view of the work in which they are engaged, and be true to you from a higher motive than their wages, which they cannot use in the supply of their physical wants. this is why i suggested the school." "i recognize the force of your reasoning," said the captain, "and if i regarded your premises as correct, i would come to the same conclusion that you do. but you make the mistake of overlooking the fact that a liberal education can only be secured by years of training in school, from the kindergarten to the college, and should be accompanied by the elevating influences of the home and cultured society, and followed by a life of study and experience in the higher walks of life, before the average man can be reasonably expected to rise above the plane of mere physical existence, and act from the high intellectual and moral impulses which impel the most cultivated and elevated characters. and, you must still further take into consideration the fact, that even if we were imprisoned in the ice for a year or more, we would have time enough to give our sailors only a smattering of what they ought to know, in order to develop the high type of character that you propose, even if we could overcome the influence of their home lives and the low social status of the society in which they have always mingled. you do not realize, my dear jack, the utter impossibility of the task you would have us undertake. they must still be sailors and perform the hard labor for which they were engaged, and we should be careful not to engender in their minds hopes and aspirations that would make them dissatisfied with their lot." "i certainly would not do anything," i replied, "that would tend to make them discontented. this is something that should be most carefully avoided. but, nevertheless, i still think my suggestion, if carried out, would have just the opposite tendency. from my own experience, i regard my premises as stronger than my reasoning. i enjoyed all the advantages of a liberal education and the elevating influence of home and cultured society, and still, i have engaged in the most menial employments. yet, i did not find that my education rendered me dissatisfied with my lot. on the contrary, it did much to enable me to adapt myself to the situation, and to find sources of enjoyment which were inaccessible to my uneducated associates. but, more than this, my experience among the lowly, convinces me that a collegiate education is not essential to the development of the noblest characteristics. i have met sailors before the mast, who had accumulated a vast fund of useful knowledge, and had the broadest and most comprehensive views of life, and its duties. the premises from which i reason, are the results of actual experience with the lowly." "i fear," returned the captain, "that in your enthusiastic love for humanity, you have made the very natural mistake of judging the uneducated by yourself. i do not desire to flatter, but you have certainly inherited qualities of a high order, and a temperament so well poised, that you could acquit yourself with credit in any capacity in which you might be placed. your employers could not fail to discover your worth, and according to your own statement, you were rapidly promoted. this is the ordinary reward of those who have inherited exalted qualities. real ability never remains very long in a menial position. the simple fact that our sailors, who are much above the average of their class, have, after years of experience, still remained in the same humble position, is a very good evidence that they are not qualified for anything higher. there are lief and eric, for instance. they have been with me for several years, and they have not even tried to master the language. as mere sailors, you could not find better men, but you would never select them for an emergency that required extraordinary quickness of perception, and the ability to lead." i was about to reply, feeling myself master of the situation, so far as the argument was concerned, when a crashing sound from above, and a careening motion of the ship brought us to our feet. on gaining the deck the cause of the commotion was immediately apparent. the ship was moving toward the starboard, and was being forced under the shelving ice. the crashing sound had been caused by the masts coming in contact with the sloping, icy roof. the masts were closely wedged under the roof and could go no farther, while the hull was still being carried forward by what seemed to be a strong ocean current. the situation was one of imminent peril, for if this motion continued, we were in immediate danger of being capsized. the ship was already careening toward the larboard. the top could go no farther, while the hull was too far from the solid ice to admit of the use of pikes and spars to prop it back. battell was calling for axes to cut away the masts, when a shout from the larboard wall of our prison, attracted our attention. by the light of the reflectors we saw lief, on a low lying bench of ice making a cable fast around an ice hummock, and at the same time we heard the voice of eric calling for aid at the capstan on the lower deck. we saw instantly that this was the thing to do, and captain ganoe, battell, huston and myself were the first to take hold of the lever. eric immediately motioned for the men who were coming forward with axes to man another capstan, while he seized a coil of small rope attached to a cable, sprang into the sea and swam rapidly to join lief on the ice bench. the axmen hesitated for a moment and captain ganoe shouted: "man the capstan! the norwegians know what they are doing." with remarkable celerity, the new cable was made fast and the men began turning the capstan. this was not a moment too soon, as the first cable, unable to stand the strain, showed unmistakable signs of breaking. the motion of the vessel toward the starboard and under the ice was stopped. but the norwegians now called for a boat and more cables. their orders were promptly obeyed. captain ganoe, battell and myself were the first to respond. for the moment, our norwegian sailors were in command, and all obeyed their orders with alacrity. the boat was manned and the ice king was lashed to the larboard wall of our prison at a number of different points. the ship was saved from the impending disaster, but still was slightly careened and the masts were bent almost to the point of breaking. returning to the ship, captain ganoe and battell began figuring on getting the masts clear of the ice and the ship righted. the pressure of the water on the larboard side was immense, but the cables held her fast and there was no especial need of haste. the first thought suggested was to remove the upper splice of the mainmast, which would relieve the pressure, but the norwegians had evolved a more simple plan. they motioned the engineer to set the screws in motion, slowly. as soon as the ship began to move forward the masts began to bend toward the stern, and the cables which held the ship firmly on the larboard, being relatively shortened by the forward motion, the vessel was drawn in that direction and righted herself. we now moved the vessel to the center of the enclosure in which she floated, and cables were made fast to the ice on every quarter, and thus secured from contact with it, the ice king had the appearance of a huge spider with its web spread out in every direction. the danger was past, the ship was safe, and we had time to inquire into the particulars concerning the important part that had been enacted by our two norwegian sailors. we now learned that while the entire crew, except themselves, were resting from their recent fatigue in a feeling of security, lief and eric were far from believing that our winter quarters were entirely safe until the ship was securely tied up to the walls of our prison. their especial charge was to keep the cables, capstans and anchors ready for use at a moment's notice, and they were satisfied that this was a time when they were needed. hence, instead of retiring to their hammocks to sleep, they determined to carefully examine our surroundings for themselves. they observed that the larboard wall was nearly perpendicular to a point several feet above the top of the masts, while on the starboard, the sloping roof extended far out to the water's edge. they further observed that along the larboard was a low lying bench upon which the falling ice had formed a number of hummocks. this was a safe place to tie to. just as they had satisfied themselves on this point, they noticed that the ship was drifting toward the starboard, and that the masts were coming dangerously near the roof, and that in a few minutes we might be capsized. there was not a moment to be lost. this motion toward the starboard must be arrested, and lief, with one end of a coil of small rope, sprang into the water and swam to the bench along the larboard wall while eric attached the other end to a cable. but before it could be made fast to the larboard wall the masts came in contact with the sloping roof on the starboard which gave the alarm that aroused the crew and brought the officers on deck with the results already mentioned. captain ganoe was visibly affected when he learned how the ship and the lives of the crew had been saved by the quick perception and prompt action of the two sailors. he shook their hands and thanked them over and over again, declaring that such all-important service should not go unrewarded. they understood his allusion and declared in their very limited supply of english that they could not be induced to take pay from the captain for saving the ship and at the same time saving themselves. that we must all stand together or we would all perish. as soon as they had succeeded in making themselves understood, they withdrew. as a rule they kept to themselves, except when their services were needed. yet they were not unsociable and often conversed with the engineer, paul huston, who understood their language. when they had an important communication to make, they secured his services as an interpreter. they seemed averse to the use of english. when they were gone captain ganoe said: "i little thought that lief and eric possessed ability of such a high order, and since i have discovered their true nobility of character, i am more than ever anxious that they should study english, as it would enable me to do so much more for them." "you little understand the material of which these norwegians are made," said huston, who was standing by. "they do not want you to do anything for them. they feel more than able to take care of themselves. they have not always been sailors, but that occupation suits their purpose best for the present. they are looking forward to great results that may be accomplished by this expedition, and they care more for its success than for anything you could do for them. as to the language, they already understand more than they care to use. they are proud of their native norse." "you astonish me!" exclaimed the captain. "i must get better acquainted with them." "then," said huston, "you must learn their language, and even then they may repel any familiarity. they preferred working for you because you did not understand their language. they do not care to be on confidential terms with anyone. when they found that i understood them, they became somewhat communicative but not confidential. yet, i have learned enough to make me believe they have a history, and some well defined purpose in life. i would not think, however, of trying to draw from them anything that they did not care to give of their own accord. one thing is certain. you can place implicit confidence in their courage, ability, nobility of character and fidelity to the purposes of this expedition." "well, thanks to their watchfulness, quick perception and prompt action," said captain ganoe, "we can now have the much needed rest we tried to enjoy before we had taken the precautions essential to our safety. i am surprised that we did not think of the possible dangers that might beset us from ocean currents. my only fear was that some disturbing cause might sunder the walls of our prison before they were frozen solid. and, even now, i have some fears on that score." "no danger of that kind," replied battell. "several hours have already elapsed, and the weather was intensely cold before the channel closed. just listen how the storm still rages." through the rifts in our ice roof, we had been enabled to catch glimpses of the sky, but now it was all inky blackness. the gale that had brought the two great ice-fields together, had now grown to a terrific storm, and had changed its direction. the winds roared and raged like demons in mortal combat, and ever and anon the snow was driven in upon us like fine dust, indicating the intense cold. we, now that the ship was safe, had the best of reasons for congratulating ourselves on our snug winter quarters. our icy prison was both our safety from the violence of the storm, and our protection from the intense cold. we partook of a hearty lunch and retired to our rest with feelings of perfect security. when i awoke everything was astir on board. the carpenters were busily engaged in repairing the broken deck, while the sailors were removing the ice and snow. everything was being put in order as if we were preparing for a voyage. the storm had ceased to howl and we were in the grasp of an arctic winter. even in our secluded retreat, it was necessary for us to wrap up in furs and woolens when we went on the upper deck. but our cabins were warm and we had an abundance of everything to eat and wear to make us comfortable. the ice-field was frozen into a solid block, and there was no question as to our safety, but we had no means of making observations that would indicate our location. this to me, was the loss of an occupation that i really enjoyed and i felt the need of something that would take its place. we were imprisoned in the ice on september d, and from my last observations i inferred that our location was about latitude ° north and longitude ° west. the sun made his appearance for a brief interval each day, and i calculated that the long arctic night would be fully set in by the last of october. the rifts in the roof of our prison afforded us no opportunity for determining our location. our recent danger had revealed the fact that we were moving. we tried the sounding line and found that we were in deep water, and that our motion was evidently due to the motion of the ice-field. we were floating at the mercy of the winds and ocean currents. but whither would they carry us? none could tell. assuming, however, that the currents were north-bound, and reasoning from the fact that the motion of the earth was from west to east, the tendency being, as it were, to slip from under us, we concluded that as long as the ice was floating freely, our general motion would be toward the west and north. for the present we were safe and comfortable with the ship securely fastened to the solid walls of our prison. but we knew summer would come, and the warm rays of the sun would beam down on us for months, melting and breaking up the frozen surface of the ocean which was now our security, but might then become the cause of our destruction. our future safety, and the success of the expedition, demanded that we should have easy access to the surface, so that we could make the necessary observations, and, if possible, find some means of providing for the safety of the ship and crew when the ice went to pieces. this was the task before us, but we had no means of calculating the time it would take. all we knew was, that the two ice mountains by coming together had formed a roof over our heads, and towered many feet above the ship's masts, and if their other dimensions were in proportion, it might take a long time for us to tunnel through to the surface. we felt that there was no time to lose. all needful arrangements were soon perfected under the direction of battell, who took charge as engineer and manager. the ice-bench on our larboard was selected as the point of starting. the crew was divided into three reliefs, each with a foreman, and the work of excavation went on without intermission. this arrangement gave eight hours for work in the tunnel, and sixteen for rest and recreation. i again suggested my "pet hobby" as it was called, of organizing the crew into a school and devoting a few hours each day to educational purposes. but i was alone in the recommendation, and it was not acted on, but the library was free to all who cared to read. i noticed, however, that paul huston, pat o'brien and mike gallagher, were the only ones who ever called for books, and huston was the only one who seemed to know just what he wanted. lief and eric had some norwegian books and writings which they often consulted, but all the others, when not at work, spent their time in playing games, spinning yarns and fishing. as predicted by battell, the enclosure in which the ship floated, seemed to attract the finny denizens of the deep, supplying fresh food for the crew and our dog teams, as well as oil which we used for fuel. the library was the favorite resort of those who cared to read and discuss topics of general interest. here we spent our leisure hours, reading, conversing upon subjects of every description and devising amusements that would enable us to pass the time pleasantly. when tired of these things we joined the working force in the tunnel and exercised our muscles. this was a work of necessity, as well as a healthful recreation, and we went into it with the utmost enthusiasm. we managed to get comfortably tired every day, and enjoyed excellent appetites and most refreshing sleep, in consequence. altogether the winter passed very agreeably. it was well on toward spring before the tunnel was completed. we now had access to the surface, up an easy incline, and beheld the uninterrupted beauties of an arctic night. the scene which greeted us defies description. the sky was cloudless, and the northern lights, with their brilliant corruscations, nature's compensation for the long polar night, presented a pyrotechnic display, the grandeur and beauty of which are indelibly impressed on my memory. we took our bearings and found we were in latitude ° n. longitude ° w. we were seven degrees farther north than when we were caught in the ice, and ten degrees farther west. we were plainly in the grasp of north-bound currents, while our motion toward the west was uncertain. subsequent observations revealed the fact that at times our longitude was stationary, or drifting somewhat toward the east. on the whole, our westerly motion exceeded any opposite tendency, but our progress northward was considerable though not regular, as if we were retarded by obstructions which were being overcome at intervals by the force of northerly currents. it was now the th of feb., and it was determined that the work of exploration should commence. the dog-teams and sledges were brought out and provisioned for a journey to the eastward under the direction of captain battell. captain ganoe, pat o'brien, mike gallagher, paul huston, the two norwegian sailors and myself remained on the ship. the sledge party was to be absent a month and possibly longer. captain battell wanted to make some thorough observations on the eastern borders of the ice-field, and take soundings if he could reach open water. we still had some weeks of arctic night before us, but the full, round moon and the brilliant aurora, made every object visible for a long distance. the weather was intensely cold, but the scenery was so attractive that i spent much of my time exploring the ice-field in the immediate vicinity of the ship. many were the weird and fantastic scenes that i sketched, and many the strolls i took in a vain effort to find some prominent point from which with my glass i could get an unobstructed view of the horizon. but like our prison in the ice, all nature seemed cramped. the starry vault was contracted by the obscuration of stars which i thought should have been visible above the horizon. i kept searching for an elevated point of view, but this seemed always just a little ahead. these rambles often extended for miles and occupied hours. returning from one of them, i was met by lief and eric who pointed to the crest of the mountain of ice that formed the roof of our prison, and beckoned me to follow them. i did so and found that they had cut an inclined road around the icy mountain to the apex, where they had erected an observatory out of ice blocks. it was built over a rift in the roof of our prison that was directly above the ice bench on the larboard near the mouth of the tunnel. the wall at this point was almost perpendicular, and with but little labor they were able to put in an elevator, consisting simply of a platform secured by ropes, and attached to a pulley inside the observatory. they showed me what they had done, and to convince me that it was entirely safe, they let themselves down on the elevator and raised themselves up again, much as a painter handles his swinging scaffold, but more rapidly. i was pleased with the contrivance, and more with the interest taken by lief and eric in making arrangements to facilitate my observations. i did not hesitate to take my place on the platform with them and return to the ship by this direct route. i now learned that as soon as the tunnel was completed, lief and eric had found their way to the top of our prison, and seeing the advantages that this elevation offered as an outlook, they conceived the idea of an observatory on the top, to be connected with the ship by an elevator. they took no one into their confidence but huston, and set to work immediately. in a little over two weeks they were ready to put in the elevator which connected directly with the ship, and saved a long walk by way of the tunnel. this work had just been completed and they were enabled to give me a very unexpected but agreeable surprise on my return from one of my usual rambles. but it was no more of a surprise to me than it was to captain ganoe, who was just starting out to the surface through the tunnel, when lief, eric and myself came swinging down from the observatory on the platform which constituted the cage. lief who was handling the rope stopped our descent just in time to prevent the platform from swinging against the captain, who looking up exclaimed: "hello, jack! where did you come from, and what is all this rigging for?" "just ask lief and eric," i replied. "they have been looking out for a more direct route to the surface than by way of the tunnel. they have erected an observatory on the roof, and if you are going out for a walk, you had better take the elevator." "all right," said the captain stepping on the platform, "but i would suggest that you ought to have a light on board, to give warning in this gloom to all whom it may concern, to get out of the way of the engine." "that can be provided for in the future," i said. "this is the first trial and we find that it works all right. now we are ready for such improvements as you have to suggest. while the invention belongs to our norwegian friends, we have no patent laws in this country and hence there can be no infringement. there is no restrictive legislation here to stand in the way of progress." "i think in view of all the facts," said the captain, "that this matter had better be left in the hands of the inventors. i have no doubt that they are fully equal to the task, and they have free access to the ship's stores for that purpose. it seems to me that the improvement most needed is some contrivance that will counteract the swinging motion, and no doubt lief and eric have a plan already that will accomplish that." we were now in the observatory and the view in every direction was most satisfactory. this was by far the most elevated location anywhere in the region, and captain ganoe cordially concurred in my suggestion to fit it up in good shape for all the purposes of an observatory as well as a resting place when the weather became warm. we carefully explored the immediate vicinity and found that this towering mountain of ice could be made accessible from both the east and west. towards the north and south it was easy to trace the seam where the ice walls had come together, and along this line were numerous depressions of great depth. when we were ready to return to the ship we found that lief and eric had stretched ropes from the top to the bottom which passing through the platform held it steady while passing up and down. they had also devised a contrivance by which the elevator could be operated either from above or below as occasion might require; also a telephone connection between the observatory and the ship. with this easy means of access to the surface, we seldom used the tunnel except for the sledges, or the transportation of some heavy burden. from this elevated point i watched with continually increasing interest, the roseate hues on the horizon which indicated the location of the rising sun. these grew brighter and brighter until the king of day made his appearance. this was the signal for inflating the balloons and sending up dispatches in the hope that they might be carried south into civilized portions of the globe by the equinoctial storms. it was also the time fixed for the return of battell from his exploring expedition on the eastern portion of the ice field. his observations, in connection with my own, constituted our only means of accumulating that fund of information concerning these unknown regions which would make this expedition valuable to the world. besides, our own safety depended to a very great extent upon the accuracy of the knowledge we could acquire concerning the forces which controlled the movements of this vast island of ice. my relation to the scientific work of the expedition, made me anxious to make the best possible use of our present favorable opportunity for investigation. during our long incarceration in our ice prison i had kept such notes and made such observations as our environments would permit. the movement of the ice field towards the west which at first had threatened to draw us under the ice and capsize the ship, had lost much of its force, and now that we were on the surface, and able to trace the seam which marked the channel in which we had been moving, we discovered that its general direction was from southeast to northwest, while at the time we had been caught between the colliding ice fields, we had according to my notes, been running northeast. this demonstrated, that the entire body of ice had turned one quarter around, while its general movement had been toward the west and north. and now my daily observations indicated that it was continually changing its position, and that while its motions were generally toward the west, they were by no means uniform. it seemed to have been at the mercy of contending forces ever since we had been held within its grasp, and it was one of the prime objects of the expedition to make a close study of just this kind of influences. as soon as the sun began to show itself above the horizon, i kept a constant lookout for the return of captain battell and his sledge party. we knew that he had gone east, and that it was his intention to commence the exploration of the western portion of the ice-field before the sun was remaining above the horizon for the full twenty-four hours. but the weather during the early spring was unfavorable and i discovered nothing worthy of note. when the days became longer and with the sun in the west, i expected to make some important discoveries with my glass. and when i did get a clear view i was startled to observe what seemed to be a barren waste of sand and sand mountains. i called captain ganoe's attention to this appearance, and after a careful scrutiny with his glass he said: "that looks very much like land. the surface is certainly neither snow nor ice. but where in the world did all that sand come from? i will telephone huston to bring a larger telescope and we will make a closer examination." in a few minutes huston made his appearance and we placed the instrument in position. with the stronger glass, our first impressions as to the nature of the surface were confirmed but we discovered nothing that offered any explanation of the phenomenon. here was a mystery and we were now more anxious than ever for the return of captain battell, who we felt assured had made some very interesting discoveries. i continued to scan the horizon with the large telescope and my search was soon rewarded by the discovery of a man who seemed to have just reached the crest of what appeared to be a long sandy ridge running north and south, but a few miles distant. he seemed to be assisting others to reach the same position. raising the instrument to its highest powers i was enabled to recognize captain battell and several sailors. they were hauling others up from the opposite side by means of a rope, who as soon as they reached the top, took hold and helped to raise others. i described the scene and asked captain ganoe to look for himself. he took in the situation at a glance and said; "we must go to their assistance. the sledges and dog teams are evidently on the opposite side and they must be lifted up as well as the men," and turning to huston he said: "return to the ship. summon the entire crew. explain the situation to the norwegians, tell them to get out the sledges immediately and take such appliances as they deem necessary, and jack and i will meet you at the foot of the mountain on the east side. make all haste possible as we must hurry to the assistance of our comrades who are evidently nearly exhausted." chapter iv. a singular discovery--battell crossing a sand ridge on the ice-field--captain ganoe leads a party to his assistance--lief and eric--battell's theory--a second expedition--battell's long absence--is discovered returning alone, scarcely able to walk--relief party finds him unconscious--captain ganoe as physician--battell relates how he was abandoned by his men--preparing for the break. [illustration] huston stepped upon the elevator and descended to the ship to carry out the instructions he had received, while captain ganoe and myself remained in the observatory to scan the surface more critically, and map out the route we must travel. so far as we could discover there seemed to be no serious obstacle in the way. the surface between us and the sand ridge which battell must cross had the appearance of a level plain of snow or ice, with numerous hummocks scattered here and there. beyond this, the ridge, with some lofty elevations, filled the outlines of the picture. the point which battell had selected for crossing was a gap in this ridge. directly below the gap the ridge was very steep but the top could be reached from this point by an easy incline towards the south. i made a hasty sketch of every prominent object on a direct line from the observatory to the gap which was the point we desired to reach as soon as possible, as we felt that our assistance was sorely needed. this work was completed to our satisfaction when we noticed the crew with the sledge coming around the north side, and we hastened down to meet them at the foot of the mountain on the east. we found everything in good shape for a rapid march: the sledge was lightly loaded with such appliances, ropes, pulleys, etc., as had been deemed necessary to enable us to render the most effectual assistance. the dogs were pulling on their harness as if anxious for a run, and the men were fresh, and feeling the need of exercise. the thaw had scarcely commenced and the traveling was good. every condition seemed favorable. captain ganoe and myself led off along the route which our observations had indicated as the most practicable. in less than two hours we had reached the foot of the ridge just below the gap where we had discovered captain battell. we found the surface covered with volcanic ashes and scoria, and our minds instantly reverted to the earthquake which broke up the ice-field, and our narrow escape from destruction. however, this was no time for speculation. our business was to reach the top as soon as possible. we found that a direct ascent would be exceedingly difficult, but that the inclining shelf along the face of the ridge would enable us to reach the top at a point about a half mile south of the gap. this shelf, or bench, was several yards in width and its appearance, covered as it was with ashes, gave the impression that it had been a level shore line that in some great convulsion of nature had been tilted up from the south at an angle of about twenty-five degrees, and that the general surface had been leveled up by a subsequent deposit over the lower part. we at once began our ascent along this comparatively easy route. yet it was a tedious and toilsome effort to get the sledge with its load of necessary appliances to the top. however, within less than an hour, notwithstanding numerous resting spells, we reached the top and found ourselves on a level plateau, several hundred feet wide, and about one half mile south of where we expected to find captain battell and his comrades. while our party halted in order to give the dog-team a rest, captain ganoe and myself hurried on to the gap. on reaching the edge we discovered that the men were taking a rest, after having lifted most of the contents of the sledge to the top. we could see that they had been compelled to cut a road through some hundreds of feet of frozen ashes, in order to reach their present position, and we did not need to be told that they had been having a very hard time. most of the party were asleep and no one observed our approach until we had descended into the gap, and captain ganoe had called out in regular sailor style the familiar: "ship ahoy!" this unexpected greeting brought captain battell to his feet, but for a moment he was too much surprised to make any response. recovering himself, he advanced and grasped captain ganoe by the hand exclaiming: "how did you get here? i was just thinking how fortunate it would be if you knew the predicament we are in and would come to our relief with a capstan and some more ropes and pulleys." "that is just what we have done," said captain ganoe. "jack was on the lookout for you from his observatory on top of the mountain of ice that covers the resting place of the ice king. as soon as we discovered you, we started to your relief with a sledge load of such appliances as it seemed you most needed." "this is indeed fortunate," said battell. "we are almost exhausted with the efforts we have been compelled to make in order to reach this gap, and now that we are here, we find that our difficulties are by no means ended, and it is most important that we should get well over the ridge and commence our exploration of the western portion of this vast island of ashes and ice." as he was speaking, our sledge appeared at the top of the gap and the men joined us at once. huston acting as spokesman for our norwegian sailors, said: "lief and eric request that they be permitted to complete the work of transferring the sledges and their loads to the west side." "tell them," said the captain, "to go ahead in their own way and accept our thanks for their most welcome services." in a few minutes they had their ropes, pulleys and capstan in place and gave us to understand that the dogs would furnish all the power that was needed. they soon had one of the sledges slowly but surely gliding up the steep incline to the top. we watched them a few minutes, when captain ganoe said: "i think we can safely leave this matter to the norwegians and we may start on our return to the ship." "i am willing to trust them," said battell, "and it is important that we begin at once to compare notes and lay our plans for the future. i feel that there is no time to be lost." and giving some instructions to brown who had been selected as foreman in the work of road making, to give such assistance as might be needed, we started on foot for the ship, a distance of between five and six miles. on our way back, battell gave us a concise account of his observations and the conclusions at which he had arrived. "when we left the ship," he said, "we took a southeasterly direction. the cold was intense, but with our ample preparations we did not suffer so much as might have been expected. we reached open water within three days, but the shore line was so precipitous that we could not launch our sledge boats and sail around as i had intended. so, we continued our journey around the ice-field toward the north, as we had begun it. the general direction of the shore line at this point was from the southwest toward the northeast. the traveling was fairly good and we made good time for about a week, and then our trouble commenced. the entire surface was covered to an unknown depth with volcanic ashes. "the surface formation was evidently new, but careful examination revealed the fact, that this covered an older formation of very considerable thickness. our soundings, owing to the precipitous character of the coast line, were not satisfactory, but taken in connection with my observations as to the motions of the ice-field, i came to the conclusion that it was frequently grounding on the tops of submarine mountains. if this is true, it will probably hasten the breaking up when the ice becomes rotten under the influence of continuous sunshine. "having satisfied myself on these points we started on our return trip, and but for the difficult nature of the surface, and the frequent necessity for road making, we would have been with you by the time the sun made his appearance." before we reached the ship, it had been definitely settled that after a short rest, battell should continue his explorations toward the western borders of the ice-field, and time the expedition, so as to return to the ship before there was any immediate danger from the thaw. we had come to the conclusion that we were floating in an open sea, and it was our intention to press on for the north when the ice went to pieces; and some phenomena, that we, in common with other explorers had observed, led to the opinion that we would find land and not unlikely a habitable country around the pole. since the sun had made his appearance, flocks of ducks, brants and geese, coming from the north were quite numerous. when killed we found them fat and juicy and their crops were often filled with a species of grain resembling rice, which seemed to indicate that they came from a temperate climate. we now began to confidently expect that when the ice-field went to pieces we would find the country which produced this grain--the northern home of these flocks of birds. we argued that the six months and more of continued sunshine at the pole, would necessarily produce a mild, if not a warm climate, for the greater portion of the year. we held that refraction would secure perhaps as much as seven months of sunshine at the pole, and add to this the long twilights and the aurora, preventing absolute darkness, the immediate vicinity of the pole might be in many respects, a most desirable climate. of one thing we felt sure, and that was, that those flocks of ducks and geese that came from the north had been well fed with grain that must have grown in a productive country. when we came to the ice mountain that covered the ship, captain battell turned to the north, saying: "i believe that this is the route to the mouth of the tunnel." "yes, that is true," replied captain ganoe, "but let us go by the way of jack's observatory, which is directly over the ship." "all right," said battell. "lead on. i want to see the observatory any way, and it is probably no further over the mountain than it is around it, even if the traveling may be a little more laborious." we offered no explanation as to our elevator, and in a few minutes we were in the observatory, under the canopy of sail cloth which protected it from the rays of the sun. "well, this is a cosy place," said battell, as he seated himself upon one of the extemporized cushioned seats with which it was furnished. "it is," said i, "but i am more interested in seeing how lief and eric are getting along in their coveted task of transferring the sledges to this side of the ridge." so saying, i went directly to the large telescope which we had left bearing upon the gap battell had chosen for a crossing place. a glance was enough, and in reply to a questioning look from battell i said: "both sledges are on top and they are preparing to let them down on this side. come and see for yourself. i believe that our norwegian sailors are equal to anything they are willing to undertake." "i believe you are right," said battell, as he took his place at the telescope. "there," he continued, "they are letting the sledges down the steep incline fully loaded. from the progress they are making, they will be here in a few hours, with everything in ship shape for the expedition toward the west. that rests me so, that i will not mind clambering down to the mouth of the tunnel." "why go by way of the tunnel?" asked captain ganoe. "just take your seat on that divan and there need be no clambering down." "yes," i said, "and just let me share the seat with you, and let the captain act as chief of transportation and take command of the expedition, down to the ship." he did as he was directed with a puzzled look. captain ganoe took hold of the rope while i turned on the light and we began to drop down toward the ship. "well you have got things fixed up in grand style," said battell. "who would have expected a few weeks ago, that we would now be descending into the interior of an iceberg on a grandly upholstered elevator, with the stern captain of the ice king as our elevator boy? is not this putting on a little too much style for these regions of eternal ice?" "not at all," i responded. "i hold, you know, that every human being is justly entitled to the very best that his own labor can produce. but this arrangement for facilitating our access to the outer world is the product of the labor and skill of our norwegian sailors. they had the observatory almost completed before they revealed their designs to any one but huston." "then," said battell "if that is the sort of men they are, i think they had better remain with the ship. i had thought of proposing to take them out with me on our western expedition and leave some of the other men to take their place here." "i could hardly consent to part with our norwegians even for a few days," said captain ganoe. "since i have discovered their ability, i want them on the ship in case of emergencies. i would not hesitate, if it was necessary, to place them in command. the quickness of perception and general reliability they have shown, almost persuade me that jack is right and that under some circumstances the highest qualities may be developed among the most lowly." "and it may be," said battell, "that as huston intimated, lief and eric have some great purpose in life, and under such influences as jack would like to place around the common sailors, many of them might develop qualities of a high order. i have thought much of jack's 'pet hobby.' on this last expedition, i have realized more than ever, the importance of having men of lofty characters in the capacity of common sailors, if such a thing is possible." "and it is possible," i added. "and whether it is possible or not, it is our duty to ourselves and to humanity to do everything in our power to inspire all with whom we come in contact, with broader views of life, and nobler aspirations for the future." "well," said captain ganoe, "it is certainly not my intention to antagonize your exalted idea of our duty toward our fellow beings. it is an ennobling thought to dwell upon, but whether it will ever be possible for us to do much for our sailors in this way or not, it is clearly impossible to do anything immediately, and surely captain battell wants one good sleep in his own bed before he starts on another expedition. so i propose that we now retire to our quarters for rest. we certainly need it, and there is no duty pressing upon us to prevent it." we acted upon the captain's suggestion as soon as we could reach our cabins. in a few minutes i was sleeping soundly, and did not awake until the gong gave notice that breakfast was ready. the crew had returned with the sledges, and after a nap were now ready for the first meal on shipboard that they had taken for over a month. captain battell had completed preparations for his expedition toward the west, and once more the officer's mess was complete, and while we enjoyed our repast we discussed plans for the future. as we arose from the table, battell took me by the hand and said: "you may keep a sharp lookout for me after the first of july. by that time we ought to be able to reach open water on the west and return. if we can launch the sledges, it is my intention to sail around the ice to the north and if possible return along the seam which marks the channel through which we were moving when we were entombed beneath these 'bergs.' i have already made use of your observatory to make a sketch of the most prominent objects toward the west and north. i apprehend no trouble. of course we will have channels of water to contend with before we return, but as our sledges make excellent boats, they are as likely to expedite as to obstruct our movements. i need not caution you to keep up your observations, and note everything that has a bearing on our situation. i will do the same and together we cannot fail to secure a fund of valuable information." he bade us good-bye, and at once departed. i repaired to the observatory, and through my glass watched the sledges until they disappeared from view in the distance. it was now the th of april, and it would be two months and a half before we expected the return of the exploring party, and if it met with no mishap, there was ample time for an extended tour around the ice-field. i anticipated great results from the observations that might be made. captain battell had left with us three of his party who seemed the least able to bear the fatigue of the long journey over the ice which he contemplated. this was a valuable addition to the force left with the ship, and at the same time relatively strengthened the exploring party, as it relieved them of the prospective danger of being compelled to take care of disabled comrades. the weather was favorable, and soon the rays of the sun began to slowly but surely change the surface of the ice. i watched the process with constantly increasing interest. if we were ever to escape from our imprisonment, our release must come as a result of the thaw. hence, i came to regard the little rivulets that were forming in every direction, and usually disappearing in a short distance through some crevice, as our saviors. if the process kept on with sufficient vigor, the ice-field was sure to break up before we were again locked in the embrace of an arctic winter, and we would have an opportunity to escape. at last the sun had reached his highest altitude, and the time had come when we might expect the return of battell. the thaw had progressed rapidly and the ice was becoming rotten, and with the first storm would probably go to pieces. but the weather was serene and there was no immediate danger. the st of july had come and gone and battell was still absent. the thaw, under the continuous rays of the sun was accelerated, and i began to fear the break up would come before his return with the larger part of the crew. this might prove to be fatal to all our hopes. i felt that we sorely needed captain battell with his experience in the navigation of these frozen seas. i now began to dread the thaw as much as i had been inclined to welcome it two months before. i continued my observations with more interest, if possible, than ever. the motions of the ice-field puzzled me. we seemed to be slightly oscillating from one side to the other of longitude °, but with a frequent motion toward the north. i spent most of my time in the observatory, more on the lookout for some indication of the return of captain battell than for any other purpose. this interest was shared by every member of the crew, and we established regular watches for this one purpose, so that there was always some one at the telescope. captain ganoe and myself took the first watch, pat o'brien and huston, the second, and lief and eric the third. so the entire twenty-four hours were occupied in the lookout for battell. in addition to this, we made several expeditions to the north and west for many miles. while we learned that the traveling was very toilsome, we discovered no reason why the exploring party should not be able to return as long as the ice-field remained unbroken. it was true that the expedition might have reached a section where the thaw had destroyed the solidity of the ice, but it was well equipped for such a contingency, as the sledges could readily be converted into boats. we tried in vain to figure out the cause of captain battell's delay. the ice was becoming more rotten every day and our suspense became more and more painful. we had almost despaired of his return, when through my glass, i observed what seemed to be a human being, directly west of us, slowly struggling along over the rotten, slushy surface of the ice. i called the attention of captain ganoe to my discovery and after a careful scrutiny of the object he exclaimed: "that is certainly a man. it must be battell or one of his men returning alone. and," he paused, and then added hastily: "he is scarcely able to walk and falls down from sheer exhaustion. we must go to his relief at once." and turning to mike gallagher, who was present, he said: "hurry down to the ship and tell o'brien to summon a relief party with a stretcher. bring my medicine case with restoratives for an exhausted man. tell huston to explain the situation to lief and eric. make all the haste possible and meet us at the mouth of the tunnel." mike started down on the elevator at once to deliver these orders, while captain ganoe and myself went down the winding way on the west side. at the mouth of the tunnel we were joined by the relief party. lief and eric carried the stretcher, while pat o'brien, paul huston and mike gallagher, each had a parcel containing something intended for the relief of an exhausted man. the medicine case and some warm blankets were on the stretcher. the ice-field in this direction spread out before us into a vast plain, but the exact spot where we had observed the approaching man was hidden from view by a number of hummocks and we took these for our guide. as soon as we reached the nearest and highest of these elevations, i climbed to the top and carefully scanned the plain beyond. several minutes elapsed without discovering any indication of the object of our search, when not more than a mile away, i saw through my glass the head and shoulders of a man, arise above the surface. for a moment he seemed to support himself on his hands and then dropped back out of sight. i carefully noted the location and we then hurried on. in a few minutes we came to a channel in the ice that had been worn out by a stream of water. a little to one side a man was lying on the bottom as if dead. we called to him, but he did not move. lief and eric sprang into the channel and lifted him out. it was captain battell and he was entirely unconscious. we could now see that he had been trying with all his strength to lift himself out of the channel which was not over four and a half feet in depth by six or seven in width. when i saw him from the summit of the ice hummock he was doubtless making the last effort to climb out, that his exhausted energies would permit. we had arrived just in time to rescue him from certain death. as he lay upon the stretcher unconscious and scarcely breathing, in fancy, i pictured the trials through which he must have passed. his worn out boots and tattered clothing; his sunken eyes and pinched features, all indicated more than words could express his terrible struggle for life against the combined forces of cold and hunger. true, it was not freezing weather, but the water through which he had been compelled to wade was ice cold, and the bed upon which he rested, must have been a melting ice hummock. all these things were evident from the environments and did not need to be stated in words in order to be understood and appreciated. while he alone could give us the particulars, we were already familiar in a general way with his experiences, traveling on foot over the fast melting ice and almost without food for weeks and possibly months. while no physician had been engaged for this expedition, it was because captain ganoe was well qualified by education and experience to fill the place as occasion might require, and among the stores of the ice king, there was an ample supply of medicines, surgical instruments and appliances of all kinds. the captain was very averse to being classed as a physician, and yet his knowledge of medicine, surgery and practice would have enabled him to aspire to the highest rank in the profession. hence he at once took charge of the patient with the readiness and skill of an experienced practitioner, and soon he had him as comfortable as dry clothing, a warm bed and appropriate restoratives could make him. the patient did not regain consciousness, but he was soon breathing naturally and apparently enjoying a sound and refreshing sleep. when all was ready for us to start on our return to the ship, captain ganoe said: "as it is evident that i must turn doctor for a few days i will place jack adams in command. that will leave just six of us to carry captain battell to his cabin in the ice king. for this purpose we will divide into three reliefs. huston and i will take the first; pat and mike the second, and lief and eric the third. this seems to be about the proper order, as our norwegian comrades carried the camp bed and medicine case all the way from the ship." "but what if i object to the arrangement?" i asked. "while i am willing," i continued; "to render any service in my power, i am not disposed to usurp your place as commander. you lead the way and i will take my place at the handles of the stretcher. i enlisted to obey orders and take any place assigned me, but not to usurp the prerogatives of commander." "then i have only to insist upon the terms of the contract as you understand it," said the captain. "you say that you enlisted to obey orders and take any place assigned you, and hence as the captain of the ice king, i order you to take the place of commander until i choose to resume the duties of that position. this is just as it should be. it was you who discovered captain battell and then led us to the spot where we found him, and now you are appointed to lead us back to the ship by the most direct and practicable route. it is fortunate for us that you have spent so much of your time in the study of the topography of this country, if that is the proper word to apply to a dreary waste of ice. it is your first duty as commander to divide the distance to the ship into easy stages and see that each relief does its part of the work with all possible care for the comfort of our comrade. this is 'orders,' if you prefer to look at it in that light. i shall certainly take my place at the stretcher until in your judgment, the second relief, pat and mike, ought to take hold." "all right," i said. "if i am to be commander-in-chief, whether i will or not, my first order is, 'follow me.'" we returned to the ship without any particular haste, frequently stopping to rest and to administer restoratives to the lips of our exhausted comrade. he was conveyed to his own quarters and everything was, by the direction of captain ganoe, placed as nearly as possible, in the same shape that he left it. he was still sleeping, and the captain assured us that he was doing well, and that if fever could be avoided, he would soon recover. he cautioned us to keep quiet and not ask him any questions in case he should awake to consciousness. captain ganoe took his place at the side of the patient and from time to time touched his lips with water. after several hours he partially aroused from his lethargy, and the captain administered a few spoonfuls of broth, which were swallowed with avidity, and he again relapsed into a profound slumber. the captain now directed us to leave him entirely alone with the patient but to hold ourselves in readiness to come at a moment's notice. he told us that all the patient now needed was profound silence, and a little nourishment whenever he was sufficiently aroused to partake of it. "i want mike" he said, "to remain with me so as to be ready at any moment to execute my orders. captain battell's restoration to health and vigor is of more importance to us now than any other consideration. i need mike more than you do, and you must get along with cold lunches, or, do your own cooking. if i need any of you, mike will let you know." through mike, we heard from the sick room from time to time, but the word was always the same; that the patient was doing well, but still sleeping. mike said that whenever battell showed signs of awaking, the captain would administer a spoonful of soup and he would drop off to sleep again without ever being fully aroused to consciousness. i was keenly alive to the fact that the death, or even the great disability of captain battell would be an irreparable loss to all of us. he was the only experienced arctic navigator and explorer among us, and notwithstanding the cheering news from the sick room, i felt the most intense anxiety, and remained in the library all the time, so as to be ready to respond at once to any call from captain ganoe. after forty-eight hours of this anxious waiting had gone by, i was surprised at a personal call from captain ganoe, who greeted me in his usual cordial manner, while his face fairly glowed with happiness. without waiting for me to ply him with questions, he exclaimed: "well, jack, the danger has passed. captain battell has come to himself. he is still very weak, but there are no signs of fever. i admonished him not to talk until he had taken another nap, to which he consented on the condition that i would call you. he wants a conference at once." "i am delighted to hear such good news!" i exclaimed. "but what did he say when he realized that he was in his own cabin, and you sitting by his side in the capacity of attendant. i have all of a woman's curiosity in regard to this matter, and insist upon your giving me all the particulars." "certainly," he replied. "your interest is but natural, and shall be gratified as nearly as my memory will permit. in his treatment, i sought to keep him asleep until he had gained strength for mental and physical effort. when he showed signs of waking up, i knew that it was from the gnawings of hunger, and would administer a small quantity of beef tea or some strengthening cordial, and then he would again relapse into a profound slumber. these spells of semi-consciousness became more and more frequent as he gained strength, and at last he opened his eyes and looked me full in the face. he closed them again, and seemed to reflect and then looking at me, he said in his usual calm and deliberate manner: "'the last thing i remember, is, that i was trying to climb out of a channel that had been worn in the ice by a small stream of water. the bank only came up to my chin, but i was so weak that i could not succeed. after that, i seem to have dream-memories of delicious feasting, and reclining on luxurious couches. i want you to tell me at once how i got here, into my own quarters.' "i told him to be careful and not permit himself to become the least excited until he had gained more strength, but to content himself with the simple statement that jack had noticed his approach from his observatory; and that we went immediately to his relief. 'now,' said i, 'drink this cup of beef tea and turn over and take another nap.' "he drank the tea and said, 'i will do as you say, if you will agree to have jack here when i wake up. it is a matter of the greatest importance that we have a conference immediately. we must be ready for the break up and i have much to tell you.' "so saying he turned over and was soon sleeping soundly, and i am here to request you to come to his quarters. as he is not likely to sleep very long we had better go at once. nature will soon be demanding exercise for mind and body as strenuously as she has demanded rest. let us go." some ten or fifteen minutes after we entered captain battell's cabin he awoke, and immediately got up and shook hands with me most cordially. he was naturally a man of few words, and never very demonstrative of either joy or grief, affection or anger, and usually preserved the most perfect equilibrium, but he was visibly affected when he said: "my dear jack! how fortunate it has been for captain ganoe and myself that you joined this expedition. but for your watchful care we would both have been dead, and in all probability, the ice king and the entire crew would have been lost. you have certainly been our guardian angel, and must ever hold the very highest place in our esteem and affection." "i deserve no especial thanks for anything i have done," i responded. "we are out here all alone, imprisoned in the ice and our only hope of escape depends upon our standing together and helping each other, at all times and under all circumstances. the safety of every individual depends upon the safety of every other individual. common sense and our common interests, dictate that we should be a unit and realize that 'an injury to one is the concern of all.' our rule of action toward each other should be, 'each for all and all for each.' this is the only principle that a truly intelligent people anywhere would ever adopt, but here on this waste of floating ice, situated as we are, the most stupid ought to be able to comprehend the necessity for its application. so, i repeat that i deserve no especial credit, for in looking out for the safety of others i do the only thing that can be done for my own safety. this thing of caring for self, regardless of the interests of others, indicates a deficiency in intellectual development as much as it does hardness of heart; and a careful regard for the comfort and interest of others, is indicative of intellectual development as much as it is of kindness of heart and love for our fellow creatures." "your philosophy," said captain battell, "is always right; but what is still better you practice what you preach. would to god that our misguided crew had understood the self evident truths to which you so frequently give expression. they might have saved themselves from a terrible fate, and we would not have been short handed, now that the ice is liable to go to pieces at any time. and as this matter is referred to, i suppose i had better tell you at once what became of them and why i was stranded on the ice in such a woebegone plight." "and that is just what we are most anxious to hear," said captain ganoe, "but i have resolutely suppressed this anxiety because i feared fever and a possible fatal culmination, as the result of your exposure and privations. we certainly do want to hear all about your expedition, your crew and what you discovered. but do not relate it even now, if it is going to excite you in the least. the fact is, that you must be very careful for several days until your strength is fully restored." "do not be alarmed about me," said battell. "it is not the first time that i have been stranded on the ice and so i was to some extent prepared for this by past experience; besides you know that i am much inclined to be a stoic and never permit my feelings to very seriously disturb my equilibrium." "then go ahead," said the captain. "we want to hear what is uppermost in your own mind, and we will listen. if we have any questions to ask, or other matters to discuss, we will do that when you are through." "just speak when the spirit moves," said battell. "it will not disturb me. as you doubtless remember, when we started on this last expedition, i was anxious to reach open water on the west and if possible launch the boats and circumnavigate this island of ice around toward the north as far as practicable, so as to be able to return early in july, keeping a close watch of the movements and condition of the ice, and noting any signs of its breaking up. we found the traveling exceedingly difficult, and it was late in june before we reached open water, about one hundred and fifty miles west of this. we found the ice sloughing off in great sections and floating away from the main body, demonstrating that the ice-field was comparatively stationary so far as any westerly motion was concerned. by careful observation i satisfied myself that it had grounded somewhere to the north, probably against an island and was oscillating on that point. "this made me more anxious than ever to launch our boats and make observations along the shore of the ice-field which sloped off towards the northeast. we would therefore during the exploration of its shore-line be getting nearer to the ship, and i thought that we would be able to reach the obstruction against which it had grounded, which i found reasons for believing was not so very far north of the ship, and probably near the seam where the two original ice-fields had come together. i reasoned that it was held against an island under the influence of north bound currents, and that the entire field might be expected to part along this line as soon as the ice became sufficiently rotten, which would give us a chance to keep on our way. if such a break came along the line of this seam, the ice-field urged forward by the northerly currents, would spread apart and we would only have to follow the fissure as it formed, to come either to land, or out into an open polar sea. in either case we would be safe for the coming winter. our greatest danger will be from the falling of the ice when these 'bergs' part company, and that, to a great extent, can be provided for. "after careful investigation we selected a spot where by cutting a short road down to the water's edge we could easily launch our boats. when i gave the word, the men sprang to their work with the greatest alacrity and in good time we had an inclined way admirably cut out and arranged for launching the boats. we first unloaded everything of importance, as our stores were too precious to run any risk of loss or damage. our boats were very soon riding the waves without any mishap, and the dogs and baggage placed on board. while all this was going on, i noticed frequent consultations among the men, but it seemed that it was because they were taking unusual care in their work. as soon as the last of our baggage was on board, the men took their places at the oars with a promptitude which i regarded as highly commendable. then came the climax that i had least of all things expected. tom brown halted me at the plank and asked a word with me. he said that the men had determined to return to civilization and that they would prefer i should go with them and retain the command. "i was astounded at such an unreasonable, as well as infamous, proposition to abandon the ship, and i told him i did not believe that any body of sane men would contemplate such a suicidal undertaking. he replied very emphatically: "'then, if you do not take my word for it, you may speak to the men. i have only spoken at their request.' "and so saying, he stepped quickly into the boat and drew the plank in after him. the men in the boats pushed out into the water and halted as if to listen to what i had to say. "i expostulated with them, and explained how it would be utterly impossible for them to reach civilization in such frail boats, and that their provisions, at the farthest, would not last them more than four or five weeks, and then, they must look starvation in the face. brown, who acted as spokesman, replied: "'we have decided upon this thing deliberately, and we have closely calculated how long the provisions will last. besides, we have plenty of ammunition and can certainly kill some game, and if the game is not abundant, we will kill the dogs and salt them down.' "i then tried them on another tack, and called their attention to the comrades whom we had left behind, and the imminent danger of their being lost, as well as ourselves, if we did not all stand together, and make good use of the observations we had made. "'they have the ship and must take their own chances,' said brown. 'we know that there is no hope of the ship being able to get out of the ice, and we propose to save ourselves while we have an opportunity, and you had better go with us. let captain ganoe and his shipmates take care of themselves. we cannot afford to take any chances, in a case like this, to save them. we are determined to look out for ourselves, and let them do the same.' "i was so exasperated at this cold-blooded speech, revealing, as it did, such a depth of perfidy, that i felt that i could scarcely refrain from opening fire on them, and evidently they feared something of the kind, for as i turned to take hold of my gun, which was leaning against a block of ice, brown gave the order, 'ready!' and instantly twenty rifles were aimed at me, and he said: "'we do not want to hurt you, but if you do not let your gun remain where it is until we are out of range, i will give the order to fire and you will be filled with bullets, and you will not have even the poor satisfaction of dying with your friends at the ship, whom you seem to think are worth more to you than the entire crew.' "'have your own way,' i said. 'i certainly shall not stain my hands with your blood, neither will i be responsible for the miserable fate that awaits you as the result of this infamous and rash undertaking. i have given you fair warning.' "i watched them until they were out of range, and then started on my return to the ship. all the food i had, was the hardtack and bacon which i always carry in my haversack, for emergencies. i had, however, my cartridge-box with some ammunition, and i could kill game, but considering the long journey before me, and the slow progress i could make, the supply was indeed very small. "the traveling was terrible, through water and slushy ice, often for miles at a stretch. i often had to make long detours around chasms and inaccessible elevations. when i slept it was on a melting hummock of ice. i could have killed a large number of brants for food, but i felt that it would be suicidal for me to waste my ammunition on such small game. hence, i took my chances of finding something larger. i killed a goose occasionally, but was compelled to eat it raw, as i had no means of making a fire. but i did not fear starvation as long as my ammunition lasted. "i had reason, however, to fear that the ice would break between me and the ship, and this came near being the case when i first started on my return. when i was only a few hundred yards from the place where the boats were launched, a large strip of the shore-line broke away behind me. but, i now think this rapid breaking up on the western border was due to a strong ocean current, that did not extend very far east. however, i was very apprehensive that i might be sent adrift into an unknown ocean on a cake of ice, and probably, for this reason, i exerted myself more than i should have done for the first few days. "i got along tolerably well until my boots gave out, and then the ice-cold water seemed to paralyze my limbs, and my progress was correspondingly impeded. "i often felt that i must drop in my tracks, and never make another effort to move. but i was buoyed up by the thought that every step brought me nearer the ship. at last i could catch glimpses of this ice mountain, and the sight gave me renewed strength and courage. but my ammunition had given out, and i was famishing for food. i would often fall from sheer exhaustion, but would rally again, and stagger on toward the goal of my hopes. when i came to the channel where you found me, i made an effort to spring across, but landed on the bottom. i repeatedly attempted to climb out on this side, but failed. you know the rest." "i thank god," said captain ganoe, "that jack discovered your approach so that we could come to your assistance. the loss of so many of our crew is much to be regretted, but your loss would have been much worse, as your experience is indispensable to the safety of all. and now you must take some refreshments and another nap and then i think you will be all right." "i will take the refreshments," said battell, "but we have no time to waste on sleep until work has commenced in earnest on the necessary preparations for our escape. how long have i been here?" "a little over forty-eight hours." "then we cannot afford to delay another two days before we commence work." "do you think the danger so pressing as that?" asked the captain. "i do," said battell emphatically. "we are at the close of an arctic summer and we may look for storms and a breaking up at any time. the ice is very rotten, and the ocean currents, which are holding this ice-field against some point of land or submarine mountain, may part it in twain at any time, and then we will be compelled to run for our lives." "and what preparation do you advise?" asked the captain. "tell us just what to do and i will see that work is commenced at once and pushed to completion as rapidly as our small force will permit. "the first thing to be done," said battell, "is to see that the boilers are free from all sediment, and that the furnaces are filled with the most combustible material we have, so the application of a match will produce a fierce heat and get up steam in the shortest time possible. if we had plenty of coal, i would get up steam at once and keep up a moderate pressure until the ice had gone to pieces, or we were securely frozen up for the winter. but with our small supply of coal we cannot afford to do this, and i am quite sure that we cannot afford to wait for the break to commence, or the coming of a storm. in either case we will have a few minute's warning. of course in such an emergency we must use steam, as with our small force the sails might be a positive detriment. "secondly, when the break comes, there will be a fall of ice from over head that might prove fatal to those who must remain on the upper deck. this must be provided for by the erection of substantial structures to protect those who direct the course of the ship. "thirdly, cut all the cables that hold the ship but four, so that our diminutive force can cut us loose with one blow of their axes. "this is all the work that our small force can possibly get through with before the breaking up of the ice, if that is to occur at all, this season." "then," said the captain, "i will go at once and commence work, and if the necessity is as pressing as you think, you had better take all the rest you can, so that you can lend a hand when the emergency comes." "i will rest and eat," said battell, "but i will not be idle. to gain strength, i must take exercise, so jack and i will make some observations along the seam in the ice which marks the old channel, as the break will in all probability be along that line." captain ganoe, commenced the work of preparation immediately, and battell and myself engaged in the work that he had proposed. our observations, made with the greatest care, seemed to confirm, more decidedly than ever, the theory that the ice-field had lodged against some obstruction, not very far north of us. since we had reached longitude °, we had been oscillating from one side to the other but had made considerable progress toward the north, indicating that the ice was sloughing away in that direction while the main body was held against some obstruction, by the force of the currents. my own observations all the time had shown that we were oscillating, and these compared with observations made by battell, one-hundred and fifty miles west, where this movement was much more apparent, gave us reliable data on which to make calculations. at the present time, the sloughing off of the ice was evidently much more rapid on the west and hence our position was tending more than ever toward the east of the longitudinal line on which we lay. from the observations we had made we calculated that the obstruction against which the ice-field had lodged, was about one degree due north of our present position. we closely examined the seam in which we lay and found numerous indications of its weakness. in many places, where the walls of the closing channel had not come into close contact, we found open water for considerable distances, where the fish were making their appearance. on the theory which captain battell had evolved, it did not seem difficult to prognosticate just where the break would first make its appearance, and some of the contingencies which would confront us when that time came. within a few days, notwithstanding our very small force, everything was ready for the emergency we anticipated and now we anxiously awaited the storm that would sunder the ice-field and release us from our long imprisonment. but the weather remained calm while it was steadily growing colder and we began to fear that we would be locked in the ice for another winter. at last, however, a stiff breeze set in from the southwest and the barometer began to fall, indicating an approaching storm. immediately every man was at his post, but hours passed away and the wind did not increase. the order was given for every man to remain at his post and be ready to act as soon as the alarm should be sounded. as no special duty had been assigned to me, i retired to my quarters in the library to take a much needed rest and was soon asleep. chapter v. the break--a race for life--the island--strange tower--a safe harbor--crossing the open polar sea--strange phenomena--sailing south--horizon obscures familiar constellations--return to the tower--no explanation--off for the pole again--a wonderful discovery. [illustration] i was startled from my slumbers by the alarm and sprang to my feet. the strong breeze that had been blowing from the southwest had increased to a gale and the hissing of the steam revealed the fact that sufficient warning had been given to enable the engineer to be ready to start the machinery as soon as the parting of the ice gave us an opening through which we could move. the time for action had come and i heard battell give the order to cut the cables. as i hastened on deck, the two great ice mountains between which we lay were lifted by the waves, and a moment later parted, and a shower of ice fragments from the sundered roof fell upon the upper deck with an awful crash; but thanks to the wise precautions that had been taken, no one was hurt, and the injuries to the vessel were but slight. the ice-field had parted along the line that had been predicted by captain battell, and the ice king was at once subjected to the full force of the winds and waves which urged us forward with an irresistible force. but under the influence of the same power the ice continued to part before us, and all we had to do was to keep in the channel that was forming. while the waves behind us were driving the ship to seeming destruction, they were at the same time rending the ice-field asunder in the direction we were moving, creating a narrow, but constantly widening channel between the walls of ice on either side. captain battell, as usual in cases of emergency, was in command. captain ganoe was at the wheel, while i took my place at his side to take notes and render assistance as occasion might require. captain battell was right when he said we might be compelled to run for our lives. the gale continued to increase in its fury, and as we followed the channel that was forming before us, the wind was closing up the channel behind, by huge masses of ice in wild commotion. a halt would have invited destruction, and if we missed the channel that was being opened before us, we might be dashed to pieces against the ice. while the general direction of the channel being formed was toward the north, the ice did not break along a straight line, but was often zigzag, and it took the closest kind of attention to keep the ship from dashing against one side or the other and being disabled. the ice pack that was always forming behind us, urged forward by the wind and probably a strong ocean current made retreat impossible, even if we had so desired. there was but one thing that could be done, which was to move forward regardless of the continual danger of a collision that might prove fatal. this strain was kept up for several hours, when to our great delight we could discern what seemed to be a small island toward the northeast and an open sea beyond. a minute later; what appeared to be a mighty watch tower, at least two hundred feet in height, loomed up before our astonished vision just a little off from our starboard quarter. it stood at the edge of the water and the waves were dashing against its base. this island was evidently the obstruction against which the ice-field had been lodged. the tower was built of dressed stones accurately piled upon each other; and at one time had apparently been surrounded by a spiral staircase which led to an observatory on top. this conclusion was the logical deduction from the existence of a spiral ledge from the base to the summit, plainly indicating that it had been used as a support for an external structure. we were now running under a full head of steam through a channel that had been formed between the ice and the island, which led into an open sea beyond. this channel brought us close to the strange tower, and as we came even with it, captain battell gave the word: "starboard your helm! hard up!" "aye, aye, sir," came the response, and the wheel fairly spun in captain ganoe's hands. the ice king lurched, trembled, and in the next instant shot around the tower, and into comparatively still water, under the cover of the island, which we now discovered, extended from west to east, about two miles, in the form of a crescent, constituting a safe harbor from all storms except from the north. we determined to cast anchor until the wind had subsided and give our small crew a much needed rest. this gave me an opportunity to make sketches of the tower and island at my leisure. the rest was most welcome to officers and men after the unusual fatigues of the last few days, culminating in the excitement and extraordinary efforts of the last few hours. while we slept, the winds ceased to howl, the skies became clear, and i sketched the tower and the island while they were bathed in the glorious hues of an arctic sunset. i applied the camera to every prominent object in sight. the island had the appearance of a segment of the top of a circular mountain which might have been, in geologic ages, the crater of a vast volcano, since which time the land had been depressed, or the water level elevated, perhaps several hundred feet. the shore-line was a granite precipice, rising to the height of about one hundred feet. over this was a lofty covering of ice, cut into the most fantastic shapes by streams of water which come with summer and depart with winter. in places where the surface had been laid bare i could discover traces of man's handiwork, which for the present i had no opportunity to investigate, owing to the precipitous nature of the shore-line. but the object of the greatest interest was the tower. as i made my sketch, the last rays of the sun illuminated this strange guardian of these unexplored waters with a luster which impressed the beholder with a feeling of awe. we examined it closely with our glasses and speculated as to its origin. it had evidently been erected to serve some important purpose, by a people who were skilled in architecture. from its location, it might have served the purpose of a light-house in some far off time, before these regions were covered with their present mantle of ice. as this mighty column loomed up above its icy background, its presence was thought-provoking as well as awe-inspiring. it seemed like some sentinel placed here to guard the gateway to this unknown northern sea. but when was it built? and for what purpose? were questions that were continually forced upon our minds. as to the time: it must have been before the great ice age, when tropical plants as well as animals, flourished in the far north, and a tropical, or semi-tropical climate extended from the equator to the poles. but this did not indicate the purpose for which it was erected. was it an observatory for astronomical purposes, or a light-house for the guidance of the pre-historic navigators of these waters, now locked in the embrace of almost impassable ice barriers? who could tell? all we could do for the present was to record our observations. the tower was there, two hundred feet in height, and its latitude was ° north, and longitude ° west. this was all that we could learn for the present. as had been the experience of all other navigators in high northern latitudes, the dipping of the needle rendered the compass useless, and we had to depend on the sun, moon and stars for our guidance. but the skies were clear and the sea open, so that we apprehended no further trouble, notwithstanding this was the beginning of winter. accounts of the expedition were sealed in bottles and sent up in balloons, as was our custom, and as there was no ice in sight, we determined to sail due north from the tower. after holding our course for a few days, we found that the needle had again assumed the horizontal position and that we were sailing due south. we knew we had started north and had not consciously changed our course. here was a mystery we could not fathom. but this was not all. the horizon seemed to be rising up and obscuring stars that ought to have been in full view. the pole star, which had been near the zenith was sinking toward the horizon behind us. the whole face of the celestial vault was changing. as the northern lights, which were dropping to the rear grew less brilliant, the southern horizon beamed with a halo of light, which continued to grow brighter. without having changed our course we were now sailing away from the constellations by which we had so long been guided in our progress toward the pole. what could it mean? these strange phenomena upset all of our calculations. everything seemed weird and unnatural. the engines were stopped and we lay to, in order to make observations and study the situation. accounts of these strange phenomena were securely sealed in bottles and committed to the care of the winds. captains ganoe and battell held a council in the library and made a careful study of the best authorities, but could find no solution to the problem, as to why we should be going south. it was determined to change our course to the northeast. continuing in this direction, we found the cold increasing, while the northern lights grew brighter, and stars that had been obscured, again made their appearance above the horizon. at the end of this run, the ice-pack, now frozen solid, made its appearance. we changed our course toward the east, keeping the ice on our starboard quarter until we were again at the great tower from which we had started. we had discovered no opening in the ice-barriers and no solution to the problem we had started out to investigate. we found ourselves in an open sea, but encompassed by an impassable barrier of ice. we again determined to sail directly north, and, if possible, cross this wide expanse of ocean around which we had been sailing. in a few days we again found ourselves running south and leaving the pole star behind us. star after star began to disappear behind the horizon. again the light in the south appeared and began to grow brighter. again, captains ganoe and battell held a conference. after carefully comparing notes and going over all the facts revealed by our observations, captain ganoe asked me to hand him a magazine which he selected from the catalogue. i complied, and he looked through it for a minute and handed it to me saying: "there is the solution of the problem." i found the article which he had marked, to be a review of the "theory of concentric spheres," by captain john cleves symms. "according to this theory," says the reviewer, "the earth is a hollow globe and open at the poles. the diameter of the northern opening, is about , miles, or , miles from outside to outside. the south opening is somewhat larger. the planes of these openings are parallel with each other, and form an angle of twelve degrees with the equator. the shell of the earth is about , miles thick, and the edges of the shell at the openings are called verges, and measure from the regular convexity without to the regular concavity within, about , miles." i turned and read the passage again, which he had marked for my careful perusal. i had never heard of this "theory of concentric spheres." could this earth be a hollow shell with an outer and inner surface? at first thought i felt like rejecting the idea as utterly absurd, but in view of the strange and inexplicable phenomena which we had encountered, and my confidence in the judgment of captain ganoe, i only requested him to tell me just what he thought about this "hollow globe theory." "i believe," he said, "that this theory offers the only logical solution of the phenomena which have upset all of our calculations. we found the open polar sea, just as we expected, but when we tried to sail across it, we found ourselves sailing away from it. we also found that constellations which ought, according to the popular astronomy, to have been seen above the horizon were entirely obscured. you will remember that you remarked the cramped appearance, as you expressed it, of the celestial vault, when we were imprisoned in the ice. "this 'theory of concentric spheres' offers a ready and complete explanation of all these phenomena by which we have been so much puzzled. it now begins to look as if this theory had been rejected by scientists with the same unreasoning haste that every other new idea has encountered. many things that explorers have met with in the polar regions, seem inexplicable, unless we admit the truth of this theory." the last remark aroused the interest of captain battell, who was ordinarily more inclined to listen, than to join in conversation. taking up the subject where captain ganoe seemed disposed to drop it, he continued: "in my long experience as a whaler and explorer, i have often found tropical vegetation, and evidences of man's handiwork, on the northern shores of iceland, spitzbergen and the borders of siberia; trees, vines and flowers. the position where these were found, on the northern shores, precludes the idea of their having been brought by ocean currents, from our own temperate and tropical countries. besides this, we find that after we pass ° north latitude, the cold never increases. we further observe flocks of birds coming from, and returning to, the north. when we kill them for food, we often find their crops filled with grain and seeds which must be the product of a mild climate. all these things have come under my personal observation, and this 'theory of concentric spheres' offers the most complete explanation that i have met with." "then, do you believe this theory?" i asked, somewhat surprised at the unusual interest taken by captain battell. "why not?" he responded. "i have always been among the few who treated every new thought with fairness and consideration, no matter what might be my own preconceived opinions. while not accepting every new fangled theory that comes along, i do not condemn, but investigate, with a view to ascertaining the exact truth. i will not knowingly twist and misrepresent facts and logical deductions therefrom, for the purpose of proving a pre-adopted creed. hence i have given this theory an impartial hearing and justice compels me to admit that the arguments in its favor are well worthy of careful consideration. scientists have all agreed that the earth is not a cold, solid body, and to account for its lack of density they assume that the center is expanded and diffused by heat. they further assume that it was originally a nebulous body entirely destitute of a solid surface. if this is true, then the centrifugal force generated by its rapid revolution on its axis would certainly throw its constituent elements outward toward the surface, thus tending to produce a hollow shell, the very thing claimed in this 'theory of concentric spheres.' the operation of this mechanical law, which governs revolving matter, can be readily illustrated by placing a quantity of oil in alcohol of the same density. the oil at once assumes the globular form by virtue of the law of molecular attraction. then insert a disk through the center of the globule and begin to turn it around. the oil at once begins to rotate on its axis and becomes depressed at the poles and bulged at the equator, just the form which the earth is conceived to be. increase the rapidity of the revolution up to a certain point and the oil separates from the disk and becomes a revolving ring. reasoning from these well-known mechanical laws, we are forced to the conclusion, that if the earth was ever a soft revolving body it must be hollow at the center, and it is not at all unlikely that there may be openings at the poles into this hollow space. so, we see that there is some logical foundation for this hollow globe theory." "it is true," i replied, "that the motion of a soft revolving body, such as the earth is supposed to have been, may be so accelerated, that the mass will separate from the line of its axis, but in such a case it would become a revolving ring, and not a hollow shell, as required by this theory of concentric spheres. have you any theory as to how a revolving ring could under the operation of known mechanical laws, be converted into a hollow shell, with convex and concave surfaces?" "yes," responded battell, "i can very easily formulate such a theory. i can assume that the earth was at one time a revolving ring of meteors, or minute planetary bodies, which by the mutual attraction of its parts became solid. this ring, besides the motion on its own axis, was revolving around the sun, or common center of the solar nebula, through space filled with meteors, and by its attraction it gathered other rings of meteors exterior to itself, thus forming a series of concentric rings revolving around the first, or present ring. the materials composing these external rings could not reach the parent ring at its equator because of the centrifugal force generated by its revolution around its axis, but under the operation of well-known mechanical laws, they might be drawn toward the pole where the attraction was the greatest and the centrifugal force the least. under the influence of these contending forces, these external rings, thus acted upon, would one by one spread out and form, first a canopy over the central ring, and then it would part at the equator, and be drawn to the poles where it would ultimately find a resting place upon its polar edges. such a process kept up long enough would convert the original revolving ring, or infant earth, into a hollow shell. of course all this is mere speculation, but the same thing may be said of the nebular hypothesis, the supposed igneous condition of the earth's center, and in fact of nearly all the teachings of science when it attempts to go beyond the domain of undisputed facts." "i am much interested in your reasoning," i said. "this is a new thought to me and i would like to follow it a little further. how does this hollow globe theory account for volcanoes and other evidences of internal heat, that have led scientists to the conclusion that the center of the earth is an igneous mass?" "to my mind," said battell, "these evidences of intense internal heat do not conflict with the hollow globe theory. assuming that the shell is one thousand miles thick; at the center, between the outer and inner crust, there would be a pressure of five hundred miles of solid matter, more than sufficient to generate a heat that would melt every known rock, and this of itself will account for every evidence of internal heat. scientists have taught us that heat is a form of motion, or rather that it is the result of motion when arrested. now pressure is only arrested motion, or in other words heat. hence it has been estimated that the weight of a column of steel blocks, sixty-five thousand feet in height, would generate sufficient heat to melt the lower tier of blocks. these well-known laws, to my mind, offer a more plausible explanation of the existence of intense heat at great depths, than the assumption that this heat is the residue, that was left over from the heat of an original planetary nebula. well known laws of physics, force us to the conclusion that this earth can never become a cold body and that the igneous condition at great depths, will continue as long as the centripetal and centrifugal forces continue to press the outer and inner surfaces toward each other. or in other words, as long as the surface continues to press down upon the materials below, as they do now, there will be intense heat at great depths." "your theory," i replied, "if true, will force scientists to abandon the wonderful history of creation which they have evolved from long and persistent research." "nothing but their opinions will need to be revised," said battell. "every fact they have discovered will continue to be a fact. we are here on this expedition to discover facts of scientific importance, and it now looks as if we are making a most wonderful discovery that will force scientists to abandon some of their long cherished opinions and revise others. if we find that this earth is actually a hollow shell, it will be a fact, that must in the very nature of things harmonize with every other fact that has been, or will be discovered. facts are facts, and while they may not be understood, they cannot be set aside. it was to discover facts that might benefit the entire human race by increasing their knowledge that i sacrificed a whaling business that was paying a handsome profit, to join captain ganoe on this expedition, in which i might lose the accumulations of years, and possibly life itself. i certainly did not join this expedition in order to either confirm, or disprove, any of the theories which scientists have given to the world." "then it seems," i responded, "that you joined the expedition with a view to making discoveries by which mankind would be benefited, by adding to the sum total of human knowledge, rather than from any hope of personal advantage." "possibly," he said. "but i cannot draw the line that your remark would seem to suggest. i cannot see how i could help mankind, without helping myself, at least so far as it would give me satisfaction, and that after all is the one great object that makes life worth the living. as to just what i expected to discover, i have only to say that i am not surprised at present appearances. there now seem to be as many indications of the existence of a habitable country on an inner surface of the globe, as there were of a western hemisphere, before the discovery of america. columbus gave to mankind a new world, and should we be the means of discovering an inner world, and of opening a line of communication between that and the outer world, it would not be so much a matter of astonishment as it would be of actual advantage." then turning to captain ganoe he asked: "what do you think of our prospect of success?" "the present indications," replied the captain, "are certainly most encouraging. from the observations which we have already made, i believe that we have passed over the verge into the gateway of an inner world. you remember," he continued, turning to me, "that when we made our escape from the ice, we sailed directly north and soon made the discovery that some thing interposed between us and certain stars that ought to have been visible just above the horizon." "yes," i replied, "i remember. but what do you infer from that?" "i infer," he said, "that it was the opposite side of the verge that interposed between us and the stars which we calculated ought to have been visible. and now, i propose to sail south until we find land, or failing in that, run out at the south opening, if we find one. we have circumnavigated the north pole and yet when we tried to sail across the open polar sea we found ourselves sailing away from it, assisted by a powerful ocean current. now, the water which comes from this impassable polar sea, is going somewhere, and it is our business to follow it up and find out all we can about its destination." as he spoke, a large flock of birds passed over our heads. "there," said the captain, "go our oracles that will lead us to land, and as they are going in our direction i propose to follow them," and going to the wheel, he placed the ship directly in their track. "how is it," i asked, "that you now take the birds for our guide, something you have never done before?" "because," said the captain, "we want to find land and these birds are evidently on their way to find feeding grounds. i wonder that it did not occur to me sooner to follow them." the light we had observed in the southern horizon grew brighter, and soon we saw the sun emerge as if from behind a cloud and disappear again near the same point, when we saw the full moon and a few stars shining through the northern verge. it was indeed a strange sight to visitors from the outer world. it never became actually dark, as light from the sun either direct or reflected reached us at all times. we had therefore reached a country of which it might be truly said: "there is no night there." some two days after the first appearance of the sun shining through the opening at the southern pole, we sighted a small island with a high, rocky shore-line, and a deep inlet, which formed a natural harbor, well protected from storms if any ever came to these placid waters. we steamed into the inlet, cast anchor and went ashore. this was the first time in over eighteen months that we had the opportunity to set our feet upon land. as there seemed to be an abundance of game birds, captain ganoe gave orders that all who desired might take their guns and enjoy a day's shooting. notwithstanding the general desolation of the island it was a most welcome diversion for our small and overworked crew. the first thing that attracted our notice, was the stump of a tree that had been cut down with an axe. though the stump was much decayed, the marks of the axe were plainly visible. on examination, we found plenty of evidence that the island had been inhabited at no very distant day, as everything in the shape of timber had been cut down. this we regretted, as we would gladly have availed ourselves of an opportunity to take on a supply of wood, our coal being well nigh exhausted. on one side of the narrow inlet in which the ship was anchored, was a wall of stone which was covered with figures of men, animals and hieroglyphics. captain ganoe said that he had seen similar sculptured stones in new mexico, and from this, he inferred that the time had been when the same people had visited both localities, and that time had been before the great ice caps had enveloped the poles. on the other side of the inlet was found a rude hut constructed of rough stones, and from the inscriptions on the walls we learned that it had been occupied by an english speaking people, whose vessel had been wrecked on this lonely island. the powerful current which had been the chief factor in liberating us from the ice, and sweeping us out into the open polar sea, touched at this lonely island; and it was not unlikely that it was this current, which had stranded some disabled whaler and its crew, the vestiges of which were now attracting our attention. this would also account for the destruction of the few trees which had grown upon this stony waste. so near the icy verge, fire was a necessity. the scant growth of timber had been needed for fuel, by these ship-wrecked mariners. but what had become of the crew? they had evidently burned up all the fuel, but they had not been frozen, as their skeletons would have revealed their fate. the supply of ducks, geese and fish seemed inexhaustible, and hence they had not starved. we searched diligently, but could find no indications of death in their ranks, except one lone grave, on the most elevated point in the island, marked by a rough stone on which was inscribed the one word: "father." with my camera i took views of the most prominent objects. we spent two days on this island to the great relief of all. the sailors enjoyed the hunt, and a goodly supply of ducks, geese, etc., rewarded their efforts. [illustration] chapter vi. sailing south--the wind ceases--our coal exhausted--drifting on an unknown ocean--in the grasp of southbound currents--desponding--visited by an airship--then a whole fleet--among friends--a most highly cultivated people--we embark for altruria--an air voyage. as we again proceeded south, the weather became more and more spring-like and the air more invigorating. the climate seemed to have opposite effects on different temperaments. the more delicate and refined were stimulated to greater vigor and endurance, while the most powerful physically were stricken with a fever, attended by acute pains. this reduced our small crew to a point where we were helpless. our coal was also exhausted. the light breezes which had enabled us to utilize the sails, now ceased entirely and we lay becalmed. for weeks the ice king lay idly on the bosom of this most placid ocean. so monotonous it became that even an arctic gale would have been a most agreeable diversion, by enabling us to move. with a supply of fuel our chances of finding land would have been increased manifold. we could have made some headway, notwithstanding the fact that we had at this time only five persons able to render any efficient service. these were captain ganoe, battell, huston, mike gallagher and myself. pat o'brien and the two norwegians, lief and eric, were scarcely able to move around and the three sailors that had been left with us by battell while exploring the ice-field because they were not able to stand the exposure, were now utterly helpless, and not expected to live from hour to hour. we had plenty of provisions for an indefinite period, and when these were exhausted, the sea would furnish an unlimited supply of fish. our vessel was seaworthy and there was seemingly no possible danger of a storm. and yet our condition was most depressing. the ocean currents were drifting us slowly along towards the south and might eventually bring us to land. but this hope, at best, was only a bare possibility. these same currents might carry us into the ice-fields at the south pole which in our present disabled condition, meant almost certain destruction. we dropped bottles into the sea containing dispatches, stating our condition, and describing our location as nearly as possible. but the chances were that these would never reach a people who would understand their purport, and be able and willing to offer us any assistance. all these considerations, added to the sickness of our most sturdy seamen, had a most depressing effect, and every hour the outlook became more hopeless. with these gloomy forebodings, i had become discouraged indeed. i am naturally hopeful, but now all hope seemed to be gone. as i look back to this period i regard it as certainly the darkest of my life. early one morning i had gone upon the upper deck, hoping that the fresh air might brace me up and revive my drooping energies. in my mind, with my note book before me, i mentally reviewed the leading incidents of our voyage on this unknown ocean. according to my reckoning we had escaped from the ice on the d of september, sketched the island and tower on the th, and on the th set sail as we supposed for the north pole. without having consciously changed our course, five days later we found ourselves sailing south. we then under a full head of steam changed our course to the northeast, and circumnavigated a large expanse of sea surrounding the pole. when we again attempted to cross this open sea we again found ourselves sailing south. we landed on a barren island on the first of november. in a few days we were becalmed, but in the grasp of a powerful current which carried us steadily southward, and now on the th of december, when christmas festivities were the order of the day throughout the christian world, here we were on a broad ocean, drifting we knew not whither. i never felt so utterly devoid of hope, but i was determined to keep up courage. we were in a most agreeable climate. the air was sweet and refreshing and i thought if we could only find land, what a glorious discovery we had made, and if we could convey the news to our own country, how it would stimulate the latent energies of the whole people to find some ready means of access to this inner world, and thus our perils and privations might ultimately prove a blessing to mankind. but why speculate? we were lost on an unknown ocean which seemed to be boundless, and utterly unable to direct our movements. the thought struck me with a chill. suddenly in the midst of my cogitations i was startled by a loud, "halloo!" it was certainly near at hand. i sprang to my feet and looked around over the placid surface of the ocean. i could see for leagues away in every direction, yet could not discover any living thing. i then started to go below, thinking that perhaps captain ganoe had called me. as i disappeared, the "halloo!" was repeated in a somewhat louder tone. i met the captain coming in search of me, and i told him what i had heard. with an incredulous look on his face, he placed his hand on my head and said: "i fear my dear jack that your brain has played a trick on you." "that may be so," i said, "but let us go above and investigate before we jump to conclusions." he assented, and as we reached the deck, the "halloo!" was repeated in a much louder tone than before and this time, apparently directly over our heads. we looked up and about one hundred feet above our starboard quarter we beheld what, at first sight, appeared to be some monster bird, with outspread wings slowly moving as if to maintain its position. but a second glance revealed it to be some kind of an aerial conveyance, with transparent sides, through which we could plainly see two persons on board, who were watching us with intense interest. "well jack, what do you think of it?" asked the captain. "i hardly know," i replied, "but this seeming monster bird is some kind of a contrivance for navigating the air, and it has passengers on board who evidently want to communicate with us." our colloquy was brought to a summary conclusion by one of our aerial visitors addressing us in a strangely musical but unknown tongue. we were astonished at the salutation, but we had had so many strange experiences lately, that we did not lose our self possession, and captain ganoe responded at once by inviting them to "come on board." they did not seem to understand, and after a moment's pause he beckoned to them. they understood the gesture and after a short consultation, their strange vessel began to circle around in a spiral and came to a rest on deck, when a side door opened, and two of the finest looking people i had ever seen stepped out and shook hands with us. they were large, very fair and looked almost exactly alike. one of them who seemed to be the leader, presented a paper which i recognized as one of the dispatches which we had committed to the care of the winds a few days after our escape from the ice. i was surprised to see written below it, in strange characters, what seemed to be a translation, and this was signed, "mac," in a plain round hand. we examined it closely, and handing it back, captain ganoe turned to me and exclaimed: "thank god! english is understood by some people in this inner world. this removes our greatest difficulty. we can get acquainted." our visitors seemed pleased when they saw that we recognized the dispatch and the leader at once stepped to the larboard side of the ship and waved a handkerchief. i now noticed for the first time that two other airships hovered near, and one of them immediately responded to the signal and came alongside. after a brief consultation with the occupants, it began to circle around and ascend until it had attained a great height, when it darted off at an amazing speed toward the west. i had noticed that these aerial conveyances both ascended and descended, by circling around in a spiral. while this was going on, i took especial notice of our visitors. they wore soft felt hats, slightly turned up at the side, with broad silver bands. their hair was parted in the middle and hung in ringlets to their shoulders. they wore embroidered slippers, with silk stockings, and pants that fastened just below the knee, attached to a loose waist with a short skirt. around the waist was a broad silken girdle, fastened in front by a silver buckle, and tied behind in a bow, the ends deeply fringed and hanging even with the bottom of the skirt. their necks were bare but encircled by a golden chain to which was attached what seemed to be diamond set lockets, and at their girdles they wore watches of magnificent workmanship. while they were conferring with the occupants of the other airship, captain ganoe said to me: "these persons are surely women." "and," added battell, who had just come on deck, "what beauties! where did they come from?" "they came through the air in yonder little vessel," said the captain, "and they seem to have been looking for us, as they have one of the dispatches we sent out after we escaped from the ice; and more than that, it has been translated into an unknown tongue, by some one who signs the name of 'mac.'" "then they are our saviors," said battell. "i certainly feel so," said the captain, "and they have evidently made up their minds to stay awhile, for some purpose." "no doubt," replied battell. "see! they are sending that other bird off for help. they understand what they are about." as the airship disappeared from view, our strange visitors returned to where we were standing, and seeing captain battell, the leader advanced and gracefully extended her hand. her unaffected and cordial manner at once placed us at ease. they now manifested a disposition to examine the ship, and seemed by their motions to confer with each other about it, pointing to the smoke stacks, the sails and steering apparatus as if they were discussing the motor power. observing their evident interest in these things, captain ganoe suggested that battell and myself should conduct them over the ship, while he would attend to having a breakfast prepared that would be a credit to the ice king. thus prompted, we motioned our visitors to accompany us below, which they seemed pleased to do. we took them through the engine room and pointed out such portions of the machinery as we felt would interest them the most. we showed them our liberal supply of scientific instruments, maps, charts, etc. i was astonished at the keen interest they manifested in our large library. we then led them into the presence of our sick sailors. sympathy was plainly depicted on their countenances as they passed from one to another and cordially grasped their hands, frequently conferring with each other in low tones, as if planning for their relief. in the meantime, mike gallagher, who in our disabled condition was nurse, cook and general factotum, had prepared an ample repast, in which our guests participated with evident relish. while we were enjoying our meal, i noticed that our visitors were observing me closely, and then looking at the others, as if making a comparison and mentally taking notes. when we had arisen from the table the one who had presented the dispatch came up and pointed to the signature as if to ask if it was mine. i nodded assent, and she took me by the hand and drawing it through her arm, led off toward the deck and conducted me directly to her airship. i noticed now, for the first time, that the entrance was about thirty inches above the deck, where it rested, and was approached by steps so constructed that they dropped to their place when the door was opened. we entered, and i found it to be a splendidly upholstered car, about six feet wide by sixteen in length, coming to a sharp point at the bow, while the stern was oval. i could see by a glance at its proportions, that it was designed to dart through the air at a great speed. but i had no time to take many notes of this small, but elaborately finished vessel. the proprietor, so to speak, at once opened a little bookcase, and handed me a small volume with a knowing smile on her face. to my surprise, i found it to be a school history of the united states in english, with a translation, presumably into her own language, printed in parallel columns. she handed me several other volumes printed in the same manner in both languages. among these i noticed a grammar, dictionary, small geography, a new testament, hymn book and several introductory works on the natural sciences. she showed me a card on which was printed the english alphabet, that had evidently never been used, and opposite each letter, a varying number of characters, corresponding with the number of sounds which we assign to each. i understood from this, that the people of this country used phonetic characters. i at once realized that she had the means of acquiring a knowledge of our language, history, geography and science as taught in our common schools. i surmised that this collection of school books, had been brought to this country on the vessel that was lost near the barren island on which we had stopped. it was just such a collection as might be expected among sailors who were trying to obtain the rudiments of an education, while employed on a whaler. she had doubtless shown me these books as a means of letting me know that our country and its language were not entirely unknown in her country, and that she had contemplated making a study of these things. we were soon joined by her comrade, battell and huston, and this unique library of outer world school books was again exhibited, and while we could not exchange a word, we soon felt that we were old acquaintances. our visitors were evidently highly cultured people, and while not speaking our language, they certainly knew considerable about our country, while we knew nothing about theirs. i was a little surprised at the active interest taken in our guests by captain battell, who was usually so reticent and retiring, and this interest was plainly mutual. although they were not able to converse, they could understand each other, and spent their time strolling about the ship and peering out over the calm waters of the ocean. after the airship had been gone about eight hours, our guests began to consult their watches and look intently toward the west. soon a whole fleet of airships came into view. in a few minutes the foremost one separated from the others, circled around, and alighted upon our deck, and one of the occupants stepped out, and as he did so exclaimed in good english: "thank god, you are safe! how happy i am to welcome so many of my countrymen into this world of truth, justice and fraternity." "and how happy are we," said captain ganoe, "to be welcomed by a fellow countryman after our long voyage in these unknown waters. we have not looked in the face of a fellow being for nearly two years, and we welcome you to the deck of the ice king, as the saviors of all that is left of its once numerous crew." the new comer threw his arms around the captain's neck, and embraced him as a mother would her long lost child, sobbing with sudden emotion until we were all shedding tears in sympathy. then leaving captain ganoe he embraced each of us in turn. "i never was so happy in my life," he exclaimed. "i hope you will excuse me for thus giving way to my feelings. i had thought i would never again look into the face of a single human being from my own native land, and this meeting with so many overcomes me." "no apologies are necessary," said captain ganoe. "we appreciate the man who has feelings and is not ashamed to show them, while we could not have any respect for the man who is destitute of feeling." "thank you," said the newcomer, "and now permit me to introduce myself. my name is, or rather was, james macnair, an american born scotchman." captain ganoe then introduced himself, battell, huston and myself. macnair in turn introduced our visitors as the twin sisters, polaris and dione, of the life saving service, and then continued: "ever since they discovered me, almost starved, on a desolate island far to the north, these self devoted saviors of humanity, have kept an especial lookout for stranded mariners from the frozen north. and since they captured your little balloon with the dispatch i translated for them, they have known that an entire crew had passed the ice barriers, and they have been more than ever on the alert for an opportunity to render assistance, and conduct you into a safe harbor. they feared that you would be disabled by the almost perpetual calms on these waters, and be carried to the southern verge by these ocean currents which seem to carefully avoid the land. you see with all their watchfulness you have been carried nearly to the equator without being discovered, and you are now fully one thousand miles from land." "it was indeed fortunate," said captain ganoe "that we continued to commit dispatches to the care of the winds." "that is true," said macnair, "but it is more fortunate that you sent up dispatches just when you did, for at that time, the sun begins to heat the air at the southern verge and it rises to higher altitudes and the air in the vicinity flows in to fill the vacuum. this produces a current of air that flows south from the northern verge. it was this breeze which occurs but once a year that brought your balloons south. had they been sent up at the beginning of the northern summer they would have been carried south on the outside by your equinoctial storms. this is my theory. it may not be a correct one but it satisfies me." "whether correct or not," said captain ganoe, "we know by experience that we had a northerly breeze for several days, which enabled us to use our sails to some advantage. but this breeze soon ceased and as we had no coal we were at the mercy of the ocean currents." "yes," said macnair, "there is but little use for sails in this inner world. but with plenty of coal you would have had no difficulty in finding a safe harbor among a highly civilized people, in a country where extremes of heat and cold, and violent storms are unknown." macnair's remarks were cut short by the appearance on the scene of another magnificent woman who had evidently remained on the airship which had brought him to our deck, and he added: "and now permit me to introduce to you my wife, iola, who wished to be among the first to welcome you to this inner world." "glad to meet you," said captain ganoe, extending his hand, "and i hope that you will have no reason to regret this addition to your circle of so many of your husband's fellow countrymen." "thank you," said iola, in good english, but with a peculiar accent. "on behalf of our people, i take pleasure in extending to you a cordial welcome to our home in altruria, where we are making a special study of everything we can get concerning the outer world." "and happy are we," rejoined the captain, "to be welcomed by a people where our language is not entirely unknown. it will be so much easier for us to get acquainted, and adapt ourselves to our new surroundings." "in our district," said iola, "you will find quite a number of people who can converse in english. we are teaching it in our schools." while this conversation was going on, polaris had stepped to the side of the ship and commenced signaling with a yellow silken flag to the fleet of airships which hovered over us. soon one of the largest, and seemingly the most elaborately furnished, swerved around and alighted upon the deck of the ice king. seeing that our attention was attracted to this new movement started by polaris, macnair said: "that is our hospital or relief ship. polaris has called them to the assistance of your sick sailors." "thank god!" ejaculated captain ganoe, "for indeed the poor fellows need the most careful attention. she and her comrades have placed us under obligations for their kindness, that can never be repaid. i am indeed most thankful to our new found friends." "why feel under such obligations to anyone?" asked iola. "polaris is only doing her duty and so are her comrades. this is a duty which we owe to each other, and you and your sailors will only receive that which justly belongs to you." "but are we not under obligations to those who assist us when in trouble?" asked captain ganoe, "and should we not repay them for the burdens we impose on them?" "i do not quite understand you," said iola. "you certainly are under obligations to yourself to entertain feelings of grateful appreciation toward those who assist you in getting out of a difficult and distressing situation, as this feeling tends to make us all better men and women, and hence more desirable members of the community. but as to repaying others for their assistance, i cannot see how we could do so unless we were to place them under similar environments, and we certainly would not do that, simply for the purpose of securing an opportunity to do for them what they did for us." "and i do not understand you at all," said the captain. "when people help us, we are certainly under obligations to compensate them for their assistance, with something more substantial than mere thanks." "then i will try to make my meaning clear," she said. "we all seek happiness, but a well ordered mind cannot enjoy real happiness while others are miserable. so in helping others into a condition where they may be happy, we are working to establish and perpetuate conditions that are essential to our own happiness. the act itself brings its own reward. in order for a people to be happy, it is necessary for them to do to others as they would have others do to them. this is one of the most simple and obvious laws that govern our relations to each other. it cannot be ignored without establishing conditions, under the operations of which, misery would become the normal condition of mankind, ourselves included." "i begin to get a glimpse of your meaning," replied the captain. "the founder of our religion, inculcated the same principles in his teachings which we call the 'golden rule,' but i have never before met with such a practical, matter-of-fact application of it to all the relations existing between the individual members of the human family. it may be that among our people a few small circles, to some extent, apply this rule of action to a chosen few, but it is never applied to the people in general, except by some cranky individual, who in popular esteem, is regarded as a fit subject for a lunatic asylum." "it seems strange to us," said iola, "that your people do not universally apply this fundamental law, upon which human happiness depends, in all their relations with each other. they must certainly desire happiness and the most ordinary intelligence ought to incline them to use the means by which they could secure happiness. but i know from history that this law was entirely ignored by our ancestors thousands of years ago. it was first taught as a religious tenet, but for ages it has been accepted as a fundamental principle in our civilization, and as a teacher of moral philosophy in our schools it becomes my duty to inculcate these principles into the minds of the children. the civilization which we have now, carries out in practice, the fundamental, humanitarian principles to which the founders of our old religious system gave expression. these teachings were in many respects identical, even in language, with the teachings of jesus and the apostles as i find them recorded, in the copy of the new testament which was among the books that my husband, then a small boy, saved from his father's ship which went to the bottom near the barren island where he was discovered." "this is indeed remarkable," said the captain. "i had thought from the tenor of your remarks that the apostles must have penetrated this inner world and taught these doctrines, and that they had taken a better hold on the minds of the people than they have in the outer world. i see, however, that you claim an independent origin for your religious system, yet you have the same fundamental doctrines. how is this?" "nothing strange about it," said iola. "truth is truth no matter where it is found. all people, no matter where they live, have the same faculties, and the same sources of knowledge are open to all alike. all the religions of the world have had their origin in some form of inspiration, and these religions have, in turn, left their impress upon the civilizations of the world. jesus, of the outer world, and krystus of the inner world, both inculcated the same fundamental truths, which we have incorporated into our civilization, and now teach in our schools as the fundamental natural laws which must regulate human relations, before the race can attain to the one great object of existence,--happiness." while this most interesting conversation was going on, polaris, dione and macnair were busy fitting up the hospital ship and giving directions by signals, to the fleet which hovered above us. ropes were attached to the bow of the ice king, which connected with a number of the largest airships. the design was apparent, by the preparations. they intended to tow us to shore. but this was not all. electrical apparatus was placed on board and they evidently intended to use electric motor power to set the machinery in motion. as soon as the preparations were well on the way, macnair broke in upon the discussion by saying: "captain ganoe, we are now ready to look after your afflicted sailors. we want to attend to them, just as we would like to be attended to, if, unfortunately, we were compelled to change places with them, and with your permission we will take charge of them at once." "you not only have my permission, but my heart felt thanks for the interest you take in them. so now let us go below," and suiting the action to the word, captain ganoe led the way and we all followed. we found the ever active mike, busy ministering to the wants of the sick and keeping up the spirits of all by his inimitable irish wit, in which pat o'brien, notwithstanding his acute rheumatic pains joined with a hearty good will. this buoyant irish lad and the herculean irish sailor, had been the life of the expedition, when we were imprisoned in the ice, and but for these typical sons of erin, our environments would have been much more gloomy. no matter how serious the outlook might be, they brought out the comic and laughable side of the picture by their mirth-provoking comments. a half dozen persons from the relief ship at once began their examination into the condition of the sick, and captain ganoe, turning to macnair, asked: "are these persons all physicians?" "well, yes, and no," replied he. "in the outer world you would call them doctors but here they are nurses. these skilled hospital attendants, understand all that has been discovered in regard to the treatment of both mind and body." "but what do they use?" asked the captain. "i see no sign of medicines and the usual hospital appliances." "they need none," replied macnair. "but this is something that must be learned further on." "yes," interposed iola. "you will doubtless find a very different system of treating human weakness from that which i understand is adopted in the outer world by the medical practitioners. in their system of healing they depend exclusively upon external appliances and ingredients, while we depend mainly upon arousing the internal powers of mind and spirit, which alone can exercise any absolute control over the human organism. your system of treating the body is from without, while ours is from within, directly opposite to it." i did not at that time comprehend her meaning, neither did any of our crew. its depth was beyond our grasp and we found that indeed this was something to be learned further on. but as she ceased speaking, polaris called her to one side, and after a brief consultation with the nurses she said to captain ganoe: "the nurses report that it will require an hour or more to get the patients in proper condition for removal and that they want to be left alone with them, and will let us know when they are ready." with this, we all returned to the upper deck to await the pleasure of the nurses. captain battell, who had been an intensely interested listener, notwithstanding his retiring disposition, now moved to renew the conversation by turning to macnair and saying: "my dear sir, did i understand you to say that the special business of polaris and dione is to look out for those who may be lost at sea and render assistance as occasion may require, and especially for such as may drift in from the outer world? where are your men, that women are permitted to engage in these hazardous enterprises?" "nothing strange about that," said macnair. "as you well know, the women of the outer world take the lead in all humanitarian work, because they are naturally more sensitive and sympathetic than men. the women of this inner world are even more inclined to extend a helping hand to the distressed, and they are not handicapped by usages which restrict the influence of the woman of the outer world. here, both sexes are placed upon terms of absolute equality, and every individual has an opportunity to find the place that is best suited to his or her inclinations. men are also engaged in this work, but the women here, as in the outer world, are more sympathetic, and as there is nothing to prevent it, they have carried their humanitarian work to such perfection, that all the oppressive conditions which afflict humanity have been wellnigh removed. to this, more than to all other causes combined, do we attribute the existence of the ideal conditions which you will find throughout this inner world. you certainly cannot think that women are out of place when they are protecting their own offspring?" "not that," said battell. "i certainly esteem it most fortunate that we have fallen into the hands of these humanity loving women, but it all seems so strange. you have women commanding fleets in the air, and if so, why not have them navigating the ocean and commanding your armies and navies?" "we have no armies and navies to destroy our offspring," interrupted iola. "we know nothing of these things except from our ancient histories. when woman secured her true position in the world she put an end to war by removing the vicious commercial, financial and governmental systems that enabled one class of people to oppress another. when greedy and domineering classes could no longer have soldiers to do their bidding, poverty was abolished by securing to the whole people equal access to the unlimited productive power of the earth. the women demanded peace because it prevented the slaughter of their offspring in useless wars, and in order to have peace it was necessary to secure to all an equal opportunity to create wealth by their labor." "but i do not see," said battell, "how equal rights to women would prevent governmental injustice, with its consequent wars and bloodshed. in the outer world, some of the most bloodthirsty rulers in the annals of history have been women." "and the same thing was true in the inner world," said iola, "until all women had secured their personal freedom from the domination of man-made laws and prerogatives. when that time came, mother-love completed the work of human redemption. in time the women became a unit for peace, and this thought was impressed upon their offspring and these grew into maturity without any inclination to rule by violence, and war was abolished. and the same love of offspring which put an end to war and all its horrors, demanded the removal of the discriminations which enabled the offspring of one woman to defraud and oppress the offspring of another woman. it was the inspiration of mother-love which set the women to investigating the systems which enriched the few at the expense of the many; and in defense of their children, they united their efforts along peaceful lines to establish equitable relations in all the affairs of life. the women of that day, were not more intelligent than the men, but love for their offspring gave them a deeper and more abiding sympathy for the oppressed, and this feeling, if not crushed out by the iron heel of military power, will ultimately save the people of any country from the consequences of inequitable conditions." "i believe you are right," said battell, "but this does not explain to me why women should lead in such a hazardous business as this in which polaris and dione are engaged." "it is because they desire to do so," said macnair. "polaris is a sincere lover of humanity. she is a true womanly woman, and as such takes pleasure in rendering assistance to all who are afflicted or distressed. besides, she is by education, inclination and long experience, an expert in aerial navigation, and holds her position as head of the life saving service by virtue of her superior qualities." "but," said battell, "as head of a department, she might send her subordinates and not take the hardest work on herself. it seems to me, that she personally superintends everything, doing as much work as a half dozen others ought to do." "polaris always leads," said macnair. "besides, in your case there were especial reasons why she should personally lead the search. you were exposed to peculiar dangers, and it was uncertain whether you had been carried into the oscan or umbrian oceans, by the ocean currents. so, to guard against possible failure, she did not trust entirely to the patrols, but continued to circumnavigate the concave herself. "but few persons could have kept up the incessant activity and watchfulness that she and dione have done ever since they captured your dispatches. they were determined that you should not be carried into the stormy waters of the south if persistent vigilance could prevent it." "well, thank god, they were successful!" said battell. "if we should live a thousand years we could not pay them for their efforts in our behalf." "no thanks are required," again interrupted iola. "polaris has only done her duty, and as to pay, she could hardly comprehend what you mean by it. she doubtless felt that she was amply rewarded for all her efforts when she succeeded in finding you. success, in a praiseworthy undertaking, is the only reward that any man or woman can afford to work for. she has found you and therefore has her reward, while we can enjoy the pleasure of providing you with the comforts of a home and freedom from anxiety, toil and danger. you will only get what our common mother nature has prepared alike for all her children, while we have been especially benefited by the opportunity it has given us of helping a brother in distress. if there is any difference, we have more reasons to be thankful than you have, as we take pleasure in contributing to the happiness of others. it is in very truth 'more blessed to give than to receive.'" "i am not an enthusiast," responded battell, "but i am frank to admit that i am carried away by the transcendent character of the sentiments you express, in regard to our duties toward each other. but it seems to me, that your grand ideal as to what human character ought to be, is so far above our fallen human nature, that it can never be realized in this life. such a character was jesus, the savior of mankind as painted by our religious teachers. but this character is so very much above the human plane of development, that it would be regarded as sacrilegious for anyone to attempt to be as pure, as noble and as holy as he is said to have been." "the great mass of our people," said iola, "would not understand your allusion to fallen human nature, and the savior of mankind, but i have read a number of your religious books, and from comparisons with our own ancient history, have concluded that the fall of man and his redemption through the cross are allegories which were intended to teach a wonderful truth. but, be this as it may, the character of jesus, i regard as the only truly human character that i have met with in the few outer world books that we have. the wonder is, that this magnificent character has not been incorporated into all of his professed followers. after two thousand years of preaching and discipline, it is strange that you have not developed many of these characters; even surpassing his exalted standard, especially as he told his disciples that they might do greater things than he did." "but," said battell, "we are told that he was more than man. he was the son of god, sent upon earth from his father's home in heaven, to save fallen man." "i am willing," was iola's reply, "to admit all this, as i understand it. we had similar characters in the olden time, who tried to save their fellow beings from the low estate in which they lived. but a time came when the effect of their teachings was to produce a multitude of such characters, and then the entire people made one great bound upward, and now we are all saviors whenever and wherever we find a demand for our services in that capacity." battell looked his astonishment as he asked: "is this heaven? am i to be brought into the presence of not one, but a world full of these god-like characters?" iola smiled as she said in response: "yes, this is heaven provided you have heaven in you, the only place where you will ever find it. and this god-like character whom you call a savior, is also in you, as it is in every other human being, just as soon as you permit it to be developed. this spark of divinity--this son of god--is latent in the human soul, and its efforts to make itself felt, is the source of every noble, pure and holy impulse to elevate our common humanity. give the god that is in you a chance to develop, and you will become like unto jesus, a 'god manifest in the flesh.'" "but how am i to develop this god-like character?" asked battell. "by becoming a savior of the race to the best of your ability," answered iola. "you were taught that it was the mission of jesus to save the world. it is also your mission. he did his duty in his age and generation, to elevate humanity, and it is your duty to make just as much of an effort in your age and generation, to make the world better for your having lived in it. "you cannot afford to sit down as if you had nothing to do and 'cast all your cares on jesus.' you have no right to impose, even if it were possible, any more burdens upon the 'meek and lowly carpenter of judea.' he did his duty, well and truly, and you ought to do yours. you, in common with every other human being owe a debt to humanity, and you must pay it by your efforts to save humanity-- from all its sins, its aches and pains from all its multitude of woes, you cannot be released from your share of the obligation to save the world, by singing: 'jesus paid it all, all the debt i owe.'" "i acknowledge," said battell, "the justice of your criticism as applied to the churches of the outer world, but i am, or rather, i was, a whaler, and they do not fit me. as a sailor, and as a whaler, i never shirked any duty or danger, and i expected every other man to do his duty. i think if i had been called upon to do the work of every other man on shipboard, i would have objected to it most strenuously. on the same principle, jesus certainly has a clear case against every one of his followers for neglect of duty." "i did not expect you to take my criticism to yourself," said iola, "notwithstanding the fact that you referred to the religious system of your country, as if it was your standard of faith and practice. i only sought to impress upon your mind, the truths that, it seems to me, the founder of your religion intended to teach. those who took up the work after him, seem to have entirely lost sight of the purpose and spirit of his teachings. but here comes polaris. she has something to communicate." polaris came forward, and after a brief conference with iola and macnair, she signaled the fleet, which began to maneuver, as if aligning itself under orders, according to some well-defined plan, while macnair, addressing himself to captain ganoe, said: "polaris reports that the nurses are ready, and to guard against any excitement that might disturb the patients, they want everyone to embark on the airships except mike, who will stay with the patients on the relief ship. polaris will take battell and huston in the ship with herself and sister, while jack and yourself will take passage with iola and your humble servant. the rest of the fleet will tow the ice king into port, where you can remove your baggage at your leisure. she will be taken up the cocytas to lake byblis, where all will be safe and under the charge of pat o'brien and mike gallagher. it will be a convenient distance from the home we have prepared for you until you have become familiar with the language, customs of the country, and so forth." "how far will it be?" asked the captain. "only about miles," replied macnair, "which can easily be reached by airship or electric car in half an hour." "so quickly as that!" exclaimed ganoe. "certainly. miles an hour is nothing extraordinary." chapter vii. caring for the sick--new methods of treatment--not physicians but nurses--no medicines--a rapid recovery--a voyage through the air--wonderful optical instruments which reveal a panorama of the world--arrival in altruria--marvelous improvements--drudgery and poverty both abolished. [illustration] captain ganoe and myself took passage with macnair and iola. for the first time, we had embarked upon an airship. i had witnessed many balloon ascensions and had read much in regard to various contrivances for navigating the air, all of which had been failures. but here was a success, and i was on the alert to learn everything possible, in regard to the mechanical principles involved. we found ourselves in an elegantly furnished cabin, but we saw no signs of machinery. everything in sight seemed to be arranged for the especial comfort and convenience of the passengers. the view in all directions, through transparent sections, was unobstructed, but the sections could be readily shaded, or the light shut out entirely as the occupants might desire. in the center was a table of exquisite design and workmanship, on which were various optical instruments for the use of the occupants, and also an electric keyboard connected with the hull which was elevated about thirty inches above the floor upon which it rested. the shape of the hull in which i concluded that the motor power was placed seemed to be adapted to the navigation of the water as well as the air and in answer to our inquiries macnair informed us that it could readily be converted into either a water craft or land carriage. the ordinary propelling power consisted of an ingenious combination of wings shaped like those of an insect, but when extraordinary speed was required there was a rudder-like appendage, similar to the tail of a fish, that was shot out from the hull. these were operated by electricity and appropriate mechanical contrivances. he further explained that the power of levitation, or rising in the air, did not depend entirely upon the wings, but, that by a discovery in magnetism, the vessel was rendered positive to the earth so that they mutually repelled each other. when all was ready, macnair touched a button on the keyboard, and at once our aerial conveyance became instinct with life. its broad wings that had been neatly folded, as it alighted upon the deck, now extended out like the pinions of some mighty bird, there was a slight whirring noise beneath our feet, and we began to ascend, moving as it were forward, around a spiral incline. as we circled around and arose to a place among the fleet which had hovered over us, we had a full view of the ample preparations which our deliverers had made for our rescue. on some of the ships we noticed cables and powerful dynamos. these vessels were as unlike the light and airy passenger boat on which we were embarked, as the ponderous freight train is unlike the lightning express. they had evidently come prepared to take charge of the ice king as well as the crew. polaris, dione, battell and huston had embarked, and ascended a short distance, as if to be in a good position to give directions. the hospital attendants were carrying the afflicted sailors on board the relief ship, on stretchers, with the exception of pat o'brien, who was getting around as lively as if there never had been anything the matter with him, and mike seemed to be trying to keep him still. we were surprised at what seemed to be such a wonderful recovery, and macnair, noticing the intense interest we were taking in what was transpiring on the ice king, asked: "what is the matter? anything going wrong?" "nothing wrong," replied captain ganoe, "but something strange. do you see that herculean sailor rushing around down there and evidently making himself useful in caring for his comrades?" "well, what of that?" asked macnair. "only this," said the captain, "a few hours ago he was confined to his bed with a severe attack of rheumatism and now he seems the personification of health and vigor. can you explain the change in his case while the others are still helpless?" "perhaps his rheumatic attack had actually run its course, but still remained to trouble him as the result of the impression that had been made upon his mind. if that is the case, then he only needed a mental suggestion, to remove the rheumatic impression which had fastened itself upon him." "that is a queer view to take of the matter," said the captain, "yet there may be something in it. but why are the others still helpless? why would not mental suggestion have the same effect on them?" "i do not understand the particulars in regard to their condition, and hence, am not qualified to offer an opinion. it may be that the disease in them had worked some organic change that was not so easy to overcome, or, it may be that the suggestion that removed the pain put them to sleep. i see they are apparently sleeping soundly." "i hope their sleep may be a favorable indication," said the captain. "i do not," he continued, "understand this strange disease which seems to single out the most robust and powerful. can you explain it to me?" "the atmosphere of this inner world," interposed iola, "is highly stimulating, and it requires much active exercise to provide an outlet for the surplus energy that is generated. you were becalmed. your sailors had nothing to do but to rest when they were not tired. the energy was created and it must be expended. mental activity would have accomplished this, and their health would have been improved. but failing in this, it took the form of fever and acute pains. the best, in fact, the only efficient safeguard from disease, situated as you were, is to be found in mental activity." "you certainly do not mean to say that mentally active people are not liable to get sick in this inner world?" remarked the captain. "nothing of the kind," said iola. "but i will say this, that all other conditions being equal, mentally active people are not in as much danger, provided they think healthy thoughts. if they think disease and fear the worst, they will be even more liable than others to get just what they think. but if the active mind is trained to exercise its power to preserve the health of the body, there is no danger from disease." "this is a strange doctrine," said the captain, "and one that i am anxious to know more about, but that must be learned further on, i suppose, as macnair says." we had been rising slowly until we had now attained a great height and macnair interrupted the discussion of mental suggestion by saying: "we have designedly ascended to a greater height than usual, so as to be above the more humid atmosphere. this will give you a better opportunity to make observations." "but what observations can we make," i asked, "that could not be made from the surface? when i became satisfied from seeing the sun shining through the southern verge, that we had passed into an inner world, i expected with the telescope, to be able to scan every part of the surface, but i found that i was seemingly as far from being able to do so, as when i was in the outer world. can you explain to me why i cannot turn my glass to the zenith and see the opposite side of the concave?" "there can be but one reason," said macnair, with a merry twinkle in his eyes. "the gaseous contents of the concave must be opaque to your vision." "well, well," i said laughing, "i found that out without your assistance, and i am not going to let you dodge the question by a play on words. what i want to know is, why these gaseous contents at the center, are opaque while the air at the surface is not?" "well i see," said macnair, "that you are determined to compel me to reveal how little i know. the scientists of the early ages evolved the theory that the center of the concave is a gaseous globe composed of the very lightest materials which they knew by actual experience to be opaque to their vision." "but why," i asked, "is it that this concave sphere does not shut off the light from the sun?" "because," said macnair, "this opaque sphere is above our line of vision,--our position on the surface, being twelve degrees below the verges. besides this, the central opaque sphere is conceived to be flattened at the poles and bulged at the equator, and some have contended that it is also hollow like the earth. but for this opaque sphere our nights would be as light as day by the reflection from the hemisphere above." "i have thought of that," i replied, "and still i have so much wished that the opposite hemisphere could be seen with the telescope." "well, that is precisely what you will be able to do from this airship," said macnair. "how so?" i asked. "we certainly cannot rise above the opaque sphere, and if we could, and got a clear view of the opposite hemisphere, that would not be seeing from one side of the concave to the other." "not that surely," said macnair, "but scientists knowing that magnetic currents often pass more readily through opaque than transparent substances, began to search for rays of this kind that would pass through dark bodies and be reflected by substances beyond. at last they succeeded in securing a photograph through wood and metal, and then, all that was required in order to enable us to see through opaque matter, was an optical instrument that would cast the reflection on the retina of the eye. this, in the course of time, was accomplished. and now, these wonderful discoveries are used by the medical profession, in order to enable them to look into the bodies of their patients and examine the internal organs. and, these electro-magnetic optical instruments have been so improved that they are in general use, in observations where opaque bodies obstruct the view." "and do you tell me this as sober truth?" i asked. "certainly," responded macnair, "i propose to give you a practical demonstration. you discovered that the space between us and the zenith was opaque to your vision. now, take these glasses and adjust them to your eyes and look through those semi-transparent sections, which are like a lace-work of tubes. the penetrating power of these glasses, you see, can be increased or decreased by moving this slide. they enable you to use the magnetic rays which pass through all substances for the purpose of vision." we followed his directions and the first glance gave us an ocular demonstration that the surface was concave. "now," continued macnair, "in order to get the best idea of the leading geographical outlines of this inner world, i want you to examine with your glasses a zone from the horizon in front of us, through the zenith to the horizon behind us. we are now moving on an airline for your future home in altruria. our course is a little south of west and the distance about one thousand miles. we are now very near the center of the oscan ocean. east of us is the continent of atlan. so, a zone, extending through the zenith along the line on which we are moving will pass through the equatorial belt, and give you a clear concept of the great centers of population and material improvement. this is the most important part of the world for you to study for the present, and until you learn the language and mingle with the people, you must depend upon your eyes as the chief source of information." we were now moving at great speed and the sensations were most exhilarating. looking out over the bow we beheld the horizon of water and raising our glasses as we had been directed, at an elevation of about twenty degrees, the coast line of a continent came into view. and still elevating our glasses, we rapidly passed in review a wonderful panorama of flowing rivers, cultivated fields, tangled wildwood, and lofty mountain chains until at an elevation of about forty-five degrees, we beheld the western coast line of the altrurian continent. at the zenith, we saw the umbrian ocean, and further down, and directly opposite to altruria, the continent of atlan, suspended, as it were, in the eastern sky like a map. looking toward the north, and some ten or twelve degrees above the horizon, was the barren island on which we had landed. we were so engrossed with our observations in a world where we could take a bird's eye view of any part of it, that we did not care to continue the conversation in which we had become so intensely interested. the continent which we were approaching, looked through our glasses like a vast concave picture of a most lovely country suspended above the horizon, and covering almost the entire western sky. but when we looked through our ordinary glasses, the general appearance was not materially different from what it would have been in the outer world. i could but wonder at this marvelous discovery, which had enabled the inventor to construct instruments that converted opaque rays into rays of light, and i could not help thinking, what a restraint the general use of such wonderful optical instruments would be upon evil doers. nothing could be hidden from those who cared to investigate. while my thoughts wandered into other channels, my gaze was riveted upon the wonderful panorama presented to our view. i noted that the divisions between land and water were strikingly similar to the physical geography of the outer world, except in this, that the land surface of the inner world on the line of the equator seemed to correspond very closely with the water surface of the outer world, though on a much smaller scale. the clear weather prevailing in the western hemisphere gave us a splendid view of the continent of altruria. in a few localities dense masses of clouds obscured, but did not entirely shut out the view; and on the whole we got a clear concept of the topography of the country. a lofty mountain chain extended from the north to the south, and many long rivers flowed from the mountains into the ocean on either side. large areas of the surface seemed to be highly cultivated, and even in the mountains, palatial buildings were brought into view by the higher powers of our telescopes. boats plowed along the rivers and on the lakes, and the entire country seemed to be a network of railroads, while airships appeared like specks in the field of our vision, flitting here and there and speeding in every direction. but the most singular feature which attracted our attention, was, that notwithstanding all the evidences of a highly cultivated country and the most active traffic and trade between the different sections, we nowhere discovered any indications of great cities; and while what appeared to be extensive manufacturing establishments existed in numerous localities, and the harbors along the shore lines were filled with shipping, nowhere did we see vast clouds of smoke such as vitiate the atmosphere in the large cities and manufacturing districts of the outer world. we were so taken up with what we could see, that we had no inclination to withdraw our attention from this wonderful panorama, to ask for many explanations of minor details. we now had a view of an entire continent and were disposed to make the most of the opportunity. it was doubtless highly civilized, and had its libraries filled with historical, scientific, sociological and ethical works that would, in time, reveal to us all that was worth knowing. as macnair had said, we must use our eyes as our chief source of information, until we had acquired the language and familiarized ourselves with the daily life and usages of the people. we were now nearing the continent and macnair reduced our speed so as to give us time to make our observations more in detail. the general direction of the coast was north and south for some hundreds of miles. along the mainland, capes and promontories were numerous, while running parallel therewith was a chain of islands, forming a continuous series of bays which in the outer world would have been of inestimable value as harbors. one long island, lying parallel with the coast immediately before us, particularly attracted our attention. it seemed to be some twenty-five or thirty miles in length, and lay like an elevated ridge, between two promontories which extended out from the mainland at either extremity, from which it was separated by narrow channels. this formed a magnificent bay which contained a number of smaller islands that divided the bay into a series of land-locked harbors. the cocytas river, to which our attention had been called, flowing from the mountains in the northwest, entered this bay at its northern extremity, through two outlets about five miles apart. between these outlets was a triangular island about fifteen miles in length. the north bank of the northern outlet was a promontory which extended out from the mainland, to within a few hundred feet of the northern extremity of the island which separated the waters of the bay from the ocean. as we neared the coast, what had seemed to be a huge smokestack on the point of the promontory that constituted the southern shore-line of the bay, was revealed to our vision as a colossal tower, that in its general appearance, was an exact duplicate of the strange tower we had passed at the northern verge, at the point where we had escaped from the ice. the material used, the style of architecture, and everything about it indicated that it was erected by the same people and for the same purpose. we had now been speeding forward in a straight line for five hours. we had covered fully , miles, and macnair assured us that we had been traveling slowly, in order to give us an opportunity to study the topography of the country, as a whole, from an advantageous position, at an average height of about four miles, though at times we had ascended to higher altitudes, as iola suggested, to so train our lungs to an attenuated atmosphere, that we would experience less discomfort from the lofty aerial flights we were destined to make. macnair now called our especial attention to the region of country we were approaching. it was an agricultural district, and, evidently, in a high state of cultivation. it looked like a vast prairie farm, regularly laid out, in the shape of a parallelogram, extending from east to west about thirty miles, and from south to north about fifteen miles. magnificent buildings appeared at regular intervals, surrounded by beautiful grounds, and connected by broad boulevards, reaching from one end to the other, and crossed by elevated roads at regular intervals. on these magnificent highways, splendid carriages were rolling, but no horses were in sight. electric cars were continuously moving both ways between these houses, the north and south lines being elevated. airships of all sizes and designs, seemed to be ubiquitous, and were moving in every direction. children amused themselves on the shaded lawns that bordered the boulevards, and in the flower gardens of the highly ornamented grounds around the palatial buildings which appeared in every direction. while this district seemed to be distinctively agricultural, much of the surface was given up to parks, shaded driveways, miniature rivers, artificial lakes, fountains, ornamental gardens and orchards. the lands devoted to cultivation, were laid off into rectilinear fields running the entire length of the district, thus securing a saving of labor that could not have been accomplished in any other manner. from one end to the other of these long fields, monster machines were moving, operated by electricity, and completing their work as they went. one machine to which macnair directed our especial attention, was a combined breaking plow, seeder and roller. it was moving at a rapid rate, and leaving behind it a strip, fifty feet in width, thoroughly pulverized, seeded and rolled. the operator occupied a comfortably furnished cab, and directed the progress of the machine by what we were told was a delicately arranged electric keyboard on a table before him. everywhere within the range of our vision was presented a scene of industrial activity, and yet comparatively few appeared to be engaged in actual labor. the major portion of the population seemed to be out enjoying a holiday. so impressed was captain ganoe with this appearance, that he asked if it was some special festival occasion. "not at all," said macnair. "this scene of recreation and enjoyment is of every day occurrence. the people of this inner world have learned that it takes very little physical labor to provide an abundance of every article of necessity, comfort and luxury for the whole people. they have discovered how to control the great forces of nature and the machine has taken the place of human muscle." "but," said the captain, "does not that throw the great masses of the people out of employment, and place them at the mercy of the people who own the machines and the land?" "it certainly does," answered macnair. "it deprives all persons of toilsome drudgery, and places them absolutely at the mercy of the people who own the machines and the land. but this is just what they want, because these same people who are deprived of employment, own both the land and the machinery of production and distribution. hence, they are enabled to enjoy a perpetual holiday. the amount of work to be done, is a much coveted task, as it provides necessary exercise, and from the fact that it is useful and contributes to the commonweal, it is ennobling. the people of this country are too wise to permit the private ownership of land and the means of production, and thus deprive themselves of the abundance, that can be provided for all by the intelligent application of human labor to those natural resources which exceed in productiveness all the demand that can be made upon them. "but here we are," continued macnair, "over the land, and now we will loiter along, so you can study the immediate neighborhood in which you will have your home until you want to make a change. these magnificent buildings are communal homes, and this is a communal agricultural district. i am engaged here as a teacher of english, and it has been thought best to bring you here, because quite a number of people are learning to speak our language. it will therefore be more agreeable to you until you have learned to speak the language of altruria, which has long been universal throughout the inner world. but this will not take you long, and then your services will be in demand as a teacher. the people are anxious to learn all that can be discovered concerning the outer world." this country is divided into numerous districts which are numbered from north to south. this is district no. , range no. , west. this range line corresponds with longitude °. these longitudinal lines are numbered east and west just as they are in the outer world, but as the circle is smaller, the distance between the lines is proportionally less. "the tower which you were examining so closely as we came to land, is the point from which longitude is calculated. it stands on the equator, and the north and south verges are said to have been marked on the same longitude by similar towers, in ancient times, before communication between the inner and outer worlds was closed by the great ice age, and floods which are said to have submerged all the lower lands. some regard these traditions as mythical, but many of the ablest scholars accept them as the fragments of authentic history which were saved from some great cataclysm." "then," said captain ganoe, "it will doubtless be interesting to these people to learn, that our log book confirms the truth of these traditions. at the point where we escaped from the ice was a stupendous tower situated on a point of land, and it was in latitude ° north, longitude ° west. so from this it seems that we are now situated directly under the pacific ocean." "this indeed will be welcome news to the people of the inner world," said macnair. "numerous expeditions have been sent to discover these towers, but thus far, they have either perished, or have been driven back by the cold and storms of the icy verges. our ancient histories record, that, from the top of these towers, the philosophers made note of some wonderful appearances in the heavens which threatened the race with destruction. oqua, who is at the head of our district schools will indeed be glad to converse with you on this subject. she has been an enthusiastic patron of polar expeditions, believing that the discovery of these towers would confirm much in the history of the world that has been regarded as mythical. it was the first of these expeditions to use the airship, that rescued me. the only important discovery made was that while the airships are all the most enthusiastic expected in these medial latitudes where storms are unknown, they are not equal to the task of penetrating the icy verges." chapter viii. arrival in altruria--a colossal communal home--district , range --under the pacific ocean--battell at the telephone--startling apparition in a mirror--enrolled in school--study of the language--phonographic enunciator--a communal agricultural district--the first revolt against landlordism--freedom the rule--a new world--strikingly similar to america. [illustration] while macnair was speaking our airship had alighted upon the top of one of the monster houses. we found that a portion of the roof constituted the boat yard for the airships which were kept for the use of the community. in the center of this roof and elevated far above it, was a circular structure which was slowly revolving, and we could see that it was occupied by people who seemed to be enjoying a siesta. macnair informed us that this was the reclining room where the members of the community retired to rest and enjoy the scenery in every direction, as well as a place for conferences in its many private apartments. from this roof, elevators connected at various points with the floors below. this was by far the largest residence building i had ever seen. it consisted of one main building, twelve stories in height and feet in length by wide. on either side were three wings, of the same height, feet long by feet in width. the building was constructed of semi-transparent material which admitted a mellowed light. at the points occupied by the elevator cages were awnings of the same material as that which constituted the roof. we took our seats in one of these elevators, macnair touched a button and the cage descended, leaving its covering as part of the main roof. we landed in an extensive dining hall where a magnificent repast had been provided for us. the tables were loaded with the finest soups, bread, vegetables, honey, fruits and nuts in the greatest variety. macnair informed us that any person had the right to eat at any communal home or public dining hall in the world provided that he had performed his share of productive labor in any part of the world. no matter where the labor is applied, the product is added to the world's supply and it does not signify where its equivalent is consumed. the evidences of useful service rendered to society, which are issued by the proper authorities in every part of the world, entitle the holder to food, shelter and raiment in any other part of the world. these evidences of labor performed, procure the right of way upon any public conveyance on land or water, or through the air. to us, this had indeed been a most eventful day. we had been discovered in our forlorn condition early in the morning and at o'clock in the afternoon we had embarked for a voyage of miles through the air, during which time we had been permitted to enjoy a bird's eye view of the mighty oceans and vast continents of the world. by the time we were through with our suppers it was p.m., and macnair's announcement that we would now be conducted to our rooms, was indeed most welcome. he explained that they were in the visitor's department which we would occupy until our own apartments were ready. i was introduced into a magnificent bed chamber but was so sleepy that i scarcely noticed its contents. it was late next morning when i awoke, and when i went out into the hall, i found it full of people passing to and fro, and wondered how it was that i could sleep so soundly. but the mystery was soon explained. i met macnair in the dining hall and in his usual cheerful manner he asked: "well, jack, how did you rest?" "all right," i said, "but i seem to have lost my ability to waken up. i am usually aroused by the least noise, but all the passing to and fro in the hall had no effect on me." "of course not," said he. "we wanted you to sleep all you could, and so cut off the sounds from your rooms. these walls are all upholstered so that no sound can enter when the sound conductors are disconnected. "now," he continued, "just make yourself at home and look around for a day or two. go wherever your inclinations seem to direct, and make good use of your eyes. remember that transportation is free. i am now going to register your arrival. your other comrades have gone to lake byblis. polaris will take care of them and the ice king." i took him at his word, and roamed at will over the grounds and through the public offices, library, museum, lecture room, music hall, etc. i found that the heads of the departments and many others understood some english, and all treated me with the utmost courtesy. the second morning iola informed us that battell wanted to communicate with us and conducted us to the telephone room. on entering i was surprised to see battell standing before me, and he greeted me in his usual cordial manner: "well, good morning, jack. how do you like this enchanted land?" "i am delighted to meet you," i replied, and extended my hand. imagine my surprise when it touched the smooth surface of a mirror, and battell broke into a hearty laugh, saying: "i would indeed like to shake, but we are not yet able to reach miles." i was astonished. indeed i was so taken aback by the unexpected and life-like apparition, that for once i was completely dumbfounded. iola, seeing my confusion came to my rescue, saying: "i ought to have prepared you for this by some explanation of our system of inter-communication, but i thought that the use of our electro-magnetic optical instruments, by which we are enabled to see through opaque substances had prepared you for this. the reflection of captain battell on the mirror, is only another method of applying the same principle. the rays from him, converted into rays of light, are reflected upon the mirror, on the same principle that the rays from the eastern hemisphere are reflected on the retina of the eye." "i ought to have anticipated such an application of this wonderful discovery," i replied, "but it was nevertheless so unexpected, that i was entirely unprepared for it." "well jack," came from the phonograph, "you are not alone in your astonishment. i would have been quite as much surprised to see you, had i not been apprised of what i might expect. i called you up in order to let you know that we have just arrived at lake byblis. the ice king is coming. the hospital boat is here. pat and mike are well. lief and eric have gone on to the hospital and the other three sailors are dead. we are all well pleased with the possible exception of mike, who thinks we are bewitched. pat got well so soon that mike thinks he must be crazy. but what shall be done with your baggage when it arrives?" after consulting with captain ganoe, who was present, i replied: "send our trunks to headquarters, district no. , range , continent of altruria." "well, well, jack," responded battell, "i am glad you know where you are. i am not so sure about myself. we are treated royally. this is a lovely lake with the most magnificent surroundings i ever beheld. i take it, that this is a great pleasure resort, for a people who seem to have nothing to do but to enjoy themselves. we are taking lessons in the language, and find it very easy. i have taken the liberty to authorize the department of education to translate our library, and they were so anxious about it, that they went out on airships to meet the ice king, and commence the work." "that is right," said captain ganoe, who now came forward and took up the conversation. "tell them the ice king, and all we have so far as i am concerned, is at their service." "they have no use for the ship," responded battell, "but would highly appreciate it, as a specimen of american ship building. they will place pat and mike in charge as soon as the ship comes in. polaris informs me that the whole world will give us a reception at lake byblis when some great council meets here. by that time she thinks we will have become masters of the language and learned in all the wisdom of the altrurians." we frequently conferred with battell, and he kept us advised in regard to everything of interest relating to the ice king, and other matters in which we felt especially interested. acting upon macnair's suggestion, i gave my entire time to the study of our immediate surroundings. i found that this magnificent home contained over people, men, women, and children, and still there was no crowding. the main building contained all the offices and store rooms, public halls, school rooms, library, museum, dining hall, kitchen and laundry. powerful storage batteries furnished electricity for heating and lighting, and motor power for manufacturing, which formed a part of the educational system in every home. the wings were given up entirely to apartments, so that the members of this immense family could be just as secluded and exclusive as they desired. each one had a private apartment furnished to his or her taste. each room was numbered and connected by telephone with the library, storerooms and business offices, and could be placed in communication with the occupants of any other apartment, or with the district exchange which could place them in communication with any part of the world. if a book was wanted from the library or any article from the storeroom, it was ordered by telephone, and delivered at once, by pneumatic tube. every apartment could be connected by phonograph with the lecture room or music hall, and the occupant could listen to the lecture or music, without leaving his or her room. there was also a universal distribution of news by the same means to any person who desired such service. in each of these communal homes was a publishing department, and all the facilities for manufacturing furniture, clothing and almost any utensil needed, equal to the supply of the community, if it was found to be necessary. while the district was devoted mostly to agriculture, in its educational system, every member was trained in the mechanic arts and general business methods. this training began with the children and continued for life as occasion might require. people never imagined that they would become too old to learn. they were taught that the most important service they could render to themselves and to society was to educate themselves, physically, mentally and morally, and that for this kind of service society could well afford to give them access to all that was required for their sustenance and comfort. hence all facilities for improvement, books, papers, scientific instruments and instruction were not only free, but the use of them was regarded as a valuable service to society. the pupil attended school, got his or her evidence of labor performed, which entitled the holder to food, shelter, clothing, etc., the same as the teacher,--as both were alike serving society. the pupils, in training themselves for lives of usefulness, were regarded as benefiting the community as well as themselves, and hence the community was in duty bound to provide them with all the essentials for their highest development of body and mind, in harmony with the demands of an advanced or advancing civilization. these lessons concerning this inner world civilization, derived from conversations with macnair, iola and others who could converse in english, and confirmed by our own observations as far as they had gone were intensely interesting, and we never tired of asking questions, which were always answered courteously and in a satisfactory manner. but i soon reached the point where i began to feel the need of more comprehensive sources of information. i wanted to be able to speak the language of the country, converse with all the people, attend lectures and make the fullest use practicable of the extensive libraries and numerous publications which contained the current literature of the times, so that i could enter into the spirit and purpose of this wonderful civilisation, which seemed to be far more attractive than the most entrancing picture of utopia. feeling thus, i was prepared for what was to follow. one morning after we had somewhat familiarized ourselves with our new surroundings, and we felt inclined to rest and think, rather than to roam around, macnair asked: "how do you like your new home since you have had time to look around and get acquainted?" "so far as i am concerned," i replied, "i am delighted with the country and the treatment i receive wherever i go. but there is so much to learn, that i feel overwhelmed. if i were able to converse with the people, and enter into the spirit of their daily life, i would be more at home. i want to be able to utilize all the sources of learning which are contained in your literature and i think that the time has come when the best thing we can do is to settle down in earnest to the study of the language." "i knew that you would soon come to that conclusion," said macnair, "but what you have seen is a necessary step in your education. we must soon go to our classes and you can go with us and take your first lesson. in order to facilitate your studies, you have been assigned apartments adjoining the library and lecture room." we assented and were at once conducted to our apartments. iola presented each of us with just such a bookcase and library as polaris had shown us, on her airship. as she opened one of these cases and displayed the contents, she said: "you will find here everything needed in order to acquire an accurate understanding of our language. it has been prepared under the direction of macnair and myself by the publishing department, particularly for the use of english speaking people who might succeed in getting through the ice barriers. these cards contain the english alphabet with our corresponding characters printed on the right. the only difference is that we have a character for each sound while you have a number of sounds to one character. when you have learned our alphabet you will be able to read our language. if there should be any difficulty with the pronunciation all you have to do is to formulate the word by pressing the characters on this keyboard and you will hear every sound clearly enunciated. every word thus formed is inscribed on a cylinder and after the sounds have been recorded all you have to do is to increase the speed of the clock work in order to have the word pronounced just as it is spoken in ordinary conversation. this instrument is called a phonographic enunciator and it records the sound of every character by means of a simple but most delicately constructed mechanical contrivance which has been carefully adjusted to the tones of the human voice. the sounds thus recorded by the use of the sound characters on the keyboard are then pronounced audibly on the principle of our old fashioned phonograph. "you will find that the definition of the words and the grammatical structure of our language are very easy to learn. this small dictionary of root words, defined in english, contains the key to the definition of every word in our language. when you have committed these definitions to memory you will not find it difficult, even without a teacher, or lexicon, to define every word compounded from them. the grammar, as you will see, is not essentially different from your own, except that we have simplified its treatment. we recognize but four parts of speech; nouns, verbs, modifiers and connectives. the study of our language is further facilitated from the fact, that when its fundamental principles are fully understood, you will naturally have a word for every meaning, instead of a variety of meanings for one word. our altrurian language has been repeatedly revised by carefully selected committees of eminent scholars, with a view to making it so easy to learn that it would become universal, a result that was accomplished several hundred years ago." "polaris showed me a school library something like this," said i, "but it was adapted to pupils who wanted to study english." "yes," remarked iola, "we have been urging her for a long time to study english, but we never could induce her to make the effort. but," she added, smiling, "no doubt she now regrets it. i predict that it will not be long before she is speaking english as glibly as she does her mother tongue. but i must go now. if you need any help, just touch that button and i will come at once." she bade us adieu, and we went to work to master the language. as iola and macnair had informed us, we found it remarkably easy. we had been well trained from childhood in distinguishing all these sounds, and our eyes soon became familiar with the characters by which they were represented, and before we retired to rest after our first day's study, we were practicing the pronunciation of words, and committing definitions to memory. we soon had quite a vocabulary of words at our command, which we introduced into our ordinary conversation. this could be the more readily done, because of the grammatical construction of the language being so similar to the english. associated as we were, with a number of highly educated people, who understood both languages, our progress was very rapid, and in a short time we could express all of our wants in the language of the country, and when we did not have the right word we substituted english, knowing it would be understood, and also, that some one would supply the right word. we determined from the beginning, to use no language but the altrurian, just as rapidly as we could acquire it. we used it in reading, writing and conversation, and soon we scarcely thought of our mother tongue, except when we heard it spoken. macnair and iola were engaged with their classes an average of two hours a day, and we ordinarily spent our leisure and recreation time together. our home was also district headquarters, and here we were continually meeting with representatives from every home in the district, and our acquaintance was rapidly extended. we often visited other homes, sometimes by electric carriage or airship, and sometimes we would walk for miles. when tired, we could always hail a car or carriage. thus, we were by our associations continually improving in the use of the language, while we were adding to our fund of knowledge concerning the country, by observation and conversation with the people. i carefully studied the economy of the home in which we lived, being assured that this was a sample of a multitude of others. the same thing was true of the district. so in a general way, we were making a study of the entire concave by having a sample submitted to our inspection. at least, i could get a very clear idea of agriculture, the great basic industry that sustains the race, and hence, i am condensing into this chapter the results of a long and careful investigation under exceptionally favorable conditions. during our attendance at school iola and macnair frequently took us for a sail in their airship. this gave us an opportunity to study its mechanism, and at the same time obtain a bird's eye view of the country, and if anything especially attracted our attention, all we had to do was to ask for an explanation. as we had first approached the continent we were struck by the large residences, storage buildings, and the long rectilinear fields, but now that we examined the scene at leisure we began to take in the details, and were impressed by the general sameness of the picture. these magnificent buildings were strikingly similar to each other and the same thing was true of the long rectilinear fields and the arrangement of the crops. the residence buildings were apparently situated at alternate section corners and hence about two miles apart each way. midway between these were large warehouses, elevators, mills, factories, etc. to the east and west these long rows of buildings were connected by surface, electric roads, and north and south by elevated roads. these roads, both passenger and freight, all passed through these buildings. this general arrangement of everything into squares, gave the entire district, from the cabin of the airships, the appearance of an immense checkerboard. this district which may be taken as a sample of many others, had a complete system of waterworks, a continuous pressure being secured by a series of stand-pipes, from three to five hundred feet in height, which forced the water to every point where it was needed. this system also provided water for irrigation purposes as the season seemed to require. this with a complete system of drainage, constituted a method of keeping the most perfect condition for producing the greatest abundance. in addition to this, all the waste products were converted into fertilizer and returned to the soil. these wise, economic, scientific methods and intense cultivation, explain how this small district, sustained a population of , and yet gave up fully one-half of its lands to boulevards, lawns, parks, driveways and ornamented grounds. electricity was the universal motor power, as well as a stimulant to the growth of crops. the soil was pulverized, seeded and rolled by vast machines. the grain was harvested, threshed and placed in sacks by huge combined reapers and threshers, and dried by passing through evaporators on an endless belt which conveyed it to elevators, from which it reached the mills by force of gravity, if that is the right word to apply to the centrifugal force which in this moral world held everything to the surface. the standard day's labor was but two hours; and yet with the aid of machinery, ten persons harvested a strip of grain one hundred feet wide and thirty miles in length, delivering the same at the elevators in sacks, while another ten prepared the soil and put in another crop. all the other work was carried on in the same labor saving manner, and this two hours of labor was deprived of every feature of drudgery and became only agreeable exercise. one thing i noticed particularly; domestic animals seemed to be raised more as pets than for use. the only animal diet ordinarily used consisted of eggs, milk, butter and cheese. sheep and goats were raised for the fleece which was manufactured into the finest fabrics. fruits and nuts were produced in the greatest abundance and constituted a very large part of the diet of the people. the district was in fact a stupendous farm and in its original design the prime object had evidently been utility rather than ornament. the work of the landscape gardener had been utilized to the largest extent, but it had not been permitted to encroach upon the useful. the economy in the uniformity in which the lands were laid out, the houses constructed and the work of production carried on, gave to the whole country such an artificial appearance, especially from the airships which we need most generally in our observations, that captain ganoe could no longer refrain from commenting upon it. one day as we were soaring above this magnificent farming district, he asked macnair if the entire inner world had been cut out according to the same pattern. "not at all," replied macnair. "you will find plenty of variety. every person has an opportunity to gratify his or her tastes, provided that by so doing they do not deprive others of the same privilege. there is nothing compulsory about it. people who do not desire to dwell together can find plenty of opportunities to be by themselves. the rule here is freedom. people live together in communities because it secures so many advantages, but they often take an outing and find variety, and solitude if they want it, in comparatively wild and uninhabited parts of the country." "but," i said, "i am curious to learn how it was that the communal system came to be established. in the outer world i am inclined to believe that it would be impossible to find so many people who would live together in harmony." "that is doubtless true," said macnair. "but as i now understand it, influences are at work, which will ultimately compel the producing masses to come together as one family, in order to enable them to preserve any semblance of personal liberty and economic independence." "and was it," i asked, "necessity that compelled the founders of this district to organize this system of community life?" "it certainly was," interrupted iola. "this district was founded by a few of the more intelligent laborers in the great city which at that time existed at the mouth of the cocytas. a time had come when the laboring masses were forced to get together in colonies and co-operate with each other in order to live. this represents the first organized revolt of the masses against landlordism and the spirit of commercial and financial cannibalism, which had reached its apex in the large cities existing in the olden time along this eastern coast. the few owned all the land, all the machinery and all the facilities for distribution while the many were often famishing for food, and always begging for an opportunity to serve some master who would feed them." "if they were indeed so poor," i asked, "how was it possible for them to break the chains by which they were bound?" "that is a long story," said iola, "and cannot be recorded in a word. volumes are filled with the futile efforts of the working classes to protect themselves by organization, and their education had to come through their repeated failures. but all these futile efforts at organization were on the competitive plan, and actually placed one class of workers in competition with another class. at first the skilled artisans, seemingly secured some advantages by the trade unions, but it was only a question of time when the improvement in machinery and a division of labor, placed the skilled workman, to a very large extent, in competition with the common laborer for the privilege of running the machines, which did the work better than the most skillful mechanic, and with a speed that had never before been dreamed of. from that time on to the end, the employed in every branch of production were placed in a bitter and destructive contest with the unemployed for the privilege of working for a master. "it was not until they had reached this condition by bitter experience that they began to learn just what was the matter. among the first things that occurred to them, was, that they were at the mercy of the landlord until they had access to the soil, but how could they obtain access to the soil in their penniless condition? this was the question that racked their brains. "but conditions, which neither they, nor their oppressors could control, were forcing a solution. it had been recognized in the civilization of that time, that the poor and the physically infirm, had a just claim on society for food, shelter and raiment which must not be disregarded. all that they needed, was the fruits of their labor applied to the soil, and the money kings had to a very great extent monopolized the soil. it was worthless to them unless it was cultivated. its possession still gave them power to oppress the landless, but not the opportunity to speculate, as no one was able to buy. so to save the expense of feeding their victims they were willing that the land should be used, by these objects of charity, to produce their food by their labor. "thus was provided the opportunity that enabled far sighted reformers to introduce a new system of organization among the poor, which placed all their relations to each other on an ethical, instead of a selfish basis. they began by organizing exchanges among themselves, and what they saved to themselves in this way was invested in land for which there were no other purchasers. for a time this enabled the land owners to sell the lands which were useless to themselves, as a source of profit. the colonists continued to cultivate the land, sell the surplus in the cities, and buy more land, but they never sold an acre. in the course of time, the lands of this district were socialized and rent abolished. "thus, by using the profit, which under the old competitive system left the hands of the producers, never to return, they were able to abolish landlordism, as far as they were concerned, and their wealthy oppressors congratulated themselves that they had gotten rid of a dangerous class. but the same causes continued to impoverish others, and thus create other dangerous classes, and the only way to get rid of them, was to give them an opportunity to dig their living out of the soil. it became a common thing for cities to organize movements which enabled the poor to secure subsistence by cultivating vacant lots. indeed, this was one of the first signs that marked the decline, and presaged the early abolition of the then existing system of commercial and financial cannibalism that impoverished the people. "this community demonstrated that labor could, even under the most adverse circumstances, by co-operating in production and distribution, get control of land and the means of production, and abolish tribute to non-producers in all its forms. you will find the history of these movements most intensely interesting, and i should think from what i have learned, of inestimable value in your native land. "since macnair gave us the benefit of his knowledge of the economic system which exists in the outer world, our scholars have studied our own ancient histories as they never did before. situated as we are, it is hard to believe that any people, no matter how ignorant they may be, would permit a few to take possession of the earth and starve the many, but such was the situation here in the olden times; hence, it is not strange that these conditions exist in the outer world." "well," i remarked, "since i think of it, i am not surprised that you can hardly believe such conditions could exist in any country claiming to be civilized. but why is it that the people of this inner world, understood the nature of this evil and removed it so long ago, while the masses of the people of the outer world seem to be utterly oblivious to the fact that there is anything wrong?" "on this question i can only theorize," said iola. "i have thought that it may have been the long continued ice age, that with its rigors, held the people of the outer world back and retarded their development until long after the inner world had made a very considerable progress toward civilization. but macnair has a theory that may have something in it. he believes that the psychic conditions in a concave world, tend directly toward concentrated effort and co-operation, because the heads of the people all point toward each other and converge at a common center, while in the outer world they point outward, each in a direction of its own, tending directly toward individualism and the development of every selfish instinct." "well," said captain ganoe, who had been an attentive listener, "i am glad, for the honor of my own country, that a fellow countryman of mine has evolved a theory that has not been previously thought out and demonstrated by this most progressive people. i think, jack, that we had better go to work and evolve an improvement on these airships that will enable us to carry the news of these wonderful discoveries to our own people." "i have been thinking of the same thing," i replied, "and that is why i have always been insisting that we should use these airships for our short journeys that did not require speed. it is when we go slowly that i can study them best, and in my mind i have partially solved the problem of constructing a ship that would be proof against both cold and storms." "just like my luck," said the captain. "i always succeed in getting an idea in my head after someone else has worked it out. but still i think that i am something of a mechanic and you can depend upon me to do my best to assist you." "thank you," i replied, "i shall certainly call upon you for assistance." "i have reason," said macnair, "for believing that battell and polaris contemplate something of the same kind, and i am sure that they will call upon both of you for your co-operation." "why," i asked, "have you had any intimation of the kind?" "not directly from them," said macnair, "but i have heard this, that battell and polaris spend much of their time in the airship factory at lake byblis and that they are experimenting with their private airship every day, and that they have succeeded in making some changes in the gearing that enable them to reverse the wings and run backward; also in moving the steering apparatus so they can ascend or descend without the usual spiral motion." "that is good news," i said, "but i thought that captain battell was giving most of his time to the study of the language and customs of the country." "so he is," said macnair. "polaris told me so by telephone, and what is more, she spoke in good clear english. she further said that the work of translating the library was progressing rapidly and that several volumes had been completed and furnished to norrena, the continental commissioner of education at orbitello, for distribution to the commissioners of all the grand divisions of the concave." "orbitello! what is orbitello? a country or a city?" asked captain ganoe. "we have no cities," said macnair, "but orbitello is what you would probably call the seat of government. it is the center of business for this continent, the headquarters of all the departments of the public service. the altrurian council meets at orbitello every year, and the world's parliament every four years. here the continental executive committee meets every day to transact business in which the whole people are interested. it is located on the cocytas at the foot of the mountains." "i would indeed be pleased to visit this center of business and learning," said the captain. "we have thought of that," said macnair, "and as soon as oqua returns, i think that we had better go. she is our district commissioner of education and i am deputy and must officiate in her absence. she is attending the quadrennial congress of educators in the mountains of atlan at lake minerva. the sessions seldom last more than thirty days and that time has passed, so we may expect her return from the old world almost any day." "what's that? the old world!" ejaculated captain ganoe. "am i to understand that you have an old world here, and is this the new, just as we have it in the outer world?" "yes, very much the same," said macnair. "altruria is often spoken of as the new world because it was originally settled by colonists from the other side of the ocean. the early history of this country is in a general way very similar to the early history of america. this similarity holds good even to the almost total destruction of a warlike race of red men. the original colonies achieved their independence of kingly rule and established a republican form of government, just as was done by our thirteen original colonies. but here the similarity ends. altruria now extends all over the continent, and has carried out to their logical sequence, the principles set forth in our own declaration of independence; and more than this, these principles have extended over all parts of the inner world. this is why i often speak of the concave as the world of truth." as macnair ceased speaking, our airship alighted on the roof of our home, and we were informed that battell wanted to meet us at the telephone. we went at once to the telephone room and again met battell, but i was not dumbfounded at the sight. he addressed me in his usual familiar style, saying: "well, jack, we have a boat factory here and i have conceived the idea of becoming an inventor of airship attachments and i want you and captain ganoe to join me. i want the captain for his mechanical skill and i want you to test our inventions, make observations and report such changes in the mechanism as you deem advisable. polaris cannot stand the cold at the verges and i will not have time. can you undertake the work?" "certainly," i replied. "just notify me whenever you are ready. i have been contemplating the same thing myself, and captain ganoe has offered his services as a skilled mechanic." chapter ix. a happy scene--two civilizations compared--arrival of oqua--disguise penetrated--human rights--"glittering generalities" reduced to practice--a strange custom--numbered, labeled and registered as citizens--exit jack adams--a new name--nequa--bitter memories--oqua's sympathy. [illustration] the proposed improvement of the airship, so that it could withstand the storms of the polar regions, and macnair's report of the progress that battell had made in that direction inspired me with the determination to prosecute my studies with more energy than ever. i saw at a glance, that if we should be able to open up a channel of communication with the outer world, the knowledge that could be acquired here would be of incalculable value to the people on the outside of the sphere, and especially to my own native america, on whose virgin soil the new and improved thought was the most likely to germinate and grow to perfection. before this trip to the outer world was made, i felt that it was my imperative duty to glean the wisdom of the ages from these vast libraries, and from the oral lessons of these ripe scholars. my one, all-absorbing thought, was to trace the progressive evolution of these people and discover the fundamental principles and practical business methods that had enabled them to reach their present ideal civilization. hence i determined to apply myself to study, with an earnestness of application that i had never before attempted. when i needed rest or desired to be alone, my favorite resort was the large observatory or reclining room on the top of the building. this room is octagonal in form and is detached from the roof on which it rests, and is placed upon small wheels which run around on a circular track whenever the occupants turn on the electric power. in order to enjoy a most beautiful panorama, all i had to do was to seat myself at one of the windows, with or without my glass, and set the room to revolving slowly. i never tired of the scenes thus presented to my view from this elevated position. this room is furnished in the most superb style. its elaborate upholstery is of the finest and softest materials of the most exquisite designs. it is large and airy. the walls are adorned with many magnificent paintings and ornamented with festoons of trailing vines and flowers, while the windows are garlanded with green and fragrant foliage. around the circumference of this luxurious retreat, are small, well furnished alcoves at each window, which can be cut off from observation by sliding doors which are upholstered with some soft material that excludes every sound that might disturb the occupant. one day, about a week after the interview with battell in regard to the improvement of the airships, macnair, iola, captain ganoe and myself had descended to the observatory for our usual after dinner rest. i was in a meditative mood, and not caring to take part in the conversation, i had retired to one of the little alcoves, closed the doors, set the room in motion and brought my window around to a point overlooking the great boulevard, with the pleasure grounds, shrubbery, flower gardens and giant forest trees just beyond. from my lofty perch i looked down upon the scene before me. bright, happy faces, and kind, cheerful voices, greeted eye and ear through the open window. i felt entranced by the wonderful scenes around me. i could not help but compare this great communal home, where all was abundance, elegant leisure, fascinating social enjoyment, health and happiness, with the crowded, filthy and ill-ventilated tenement houses of new york, london and other large cities of the outer world, which are pre-eminently the abodes of destitution, misery and woe. how often has my heart ached when i have found families of ten and twelve persons, huddled into one or two diminutive rooms, poorly lighted, ill-ventilated and disgustingly filthy. in the living hells of the outer world, i had witnessed every manner of deformity, degradation and filth. children in rags, just from the arms of their mothers, creeping like cowardly wharf rats about the slums and alley ways, picking up pieces of mouldy bread or fishing in slop barrels and sewers for bits of meat, were scenes of human misery that often made my heart bleed. then, add to this picture of the conditions into which the children are born, the abject misery of their decrepit grandsires and grandmothers. how often have i seen them, dressed in tatters and exposed to the wintry winds as they tottered off to some alley, or some rich man's ash heap, to scratch out with naked and almost freezing fingers, the little bite of unconsumed coal, so that they might have a little fire to warm their half-famished bodies, while they dined upon the garbage gathered up by the children. such were the scenes that i had often witnessed in the poverty stricken districts of the large cities of the outer world, and with them i compared the happy scene before me. not one deaf, dumb, blind, lame, deformed or disfigured individual among the multitudes which often gathered upon the grounds i was now contemplating. not one ragged, bare-footed and bare-headed urchin, nor one snowy-haired, tottering and infirm old man or woman among them. what a contrast! a heaven was opening up before me, in comparison with the living hells that had been so indelibly impressed upon my memory. why such a contrast between humanity here in this great communal home, and humanity in the tenement houses in the large cities of the outer world? there must be some cause for this extraordinary difference in the physical makeup and personal appearance of the people. why were the people in this communal home more robust, more beautiful and more kind and cheerful than the people of the outer world? and why had the usual decrepit appearance of age disappeared from view? here was the evidence that a physical regeneration of the race had taken place. i did not doubt that this was the logical result of improved social and economic conditions and i was determined to find if possible the scientific explanation. but here my meditations were broken in upon by the sight of an airship crossing my line of vision, in the direction of that portion of the roof used as a boat yard. i opened the sliding doors and looking out toward the landing, i saw the vessel alight and a splendid looking person step out, just as macnair opened the door upon that side, saying: "there is oqua!" and motioned for her to come into the reclining room. macnair and iola had so often spoken of this person in such eulogistic terms as a ripe scholar and experienced educator, prominent throughout the world, that i had pictured her as aged, sedate and probably careworn from the discharge of her onerous duties, showing the wear of years of careful study and attention to public affairs. but what was my surprise, as she came up to the observatory, to see a most beautiful woman, showing no signs of age or care. i could but stand spell-bound, and admire her form and features which were simply perfect. any attempt at description would be presumptuous and i will not attempt it. as she came in and was introduced by macnair, i noticed that she understood our language and customs, for stepping forward and extending her hand to captain ganoe she said in a most musical voice: "i am indeed most happy to make your acquaintance and offer you a most cordial welcome to our country and a place in our esteem. your arrival has been heralded all over the world, and it is regarded as an event that may be pregnant with the most important results to the entire human race. the congress of educators at lake minerva passed a resolution requesting that the next meeting of the world's parliament, shall be held at the auditorium of the transportation pavilion at lake byblis, and that this shall be the occasion of giving a world's reception to the crew of the ice king. but captain, how many do you have with you?" "only one," said the captain. "the others are at lake byblis. but here is jack adams, the scholarly artist and scientist of the expedition, and as such i have no doubt that you and he will become fast friends." she turned to me and placing one hand on my shoulder grasped my extended hand with the other. she scanned me from head to foot with an expression of amazement and inquiry playing over her smiling countenance; then with a light, musical laugh she bent forward and kissed me on the forehead, saying: "yes, i am sure that we will become fast friends." the action was so sudden and unexpected, that i blushed, stepped back and stammered. i instinctively knew that her keen eye had penetrated my disguise, and the recognition tested my nerves. yet it was so cordial, that i felt that my secret was safe, and my reply was a laugh, a lifting of the eyebrows and a closer pressure of her soft, warm palm as i merely responded, "yes, i am quite sure," and from that moment i knew that she was indeed a friend. a chord of sympathy and affection had been touched, that enraptured while it bound me in bonds of friendship to this grand woman, a relationship of the most enjoyable character, as well as of incalculable value, in opening up for me a life work, as agreeable to myself as i hope to make it profitable to others. for some time we joined in general conversation when oqua asked macnair if we had yet been registered and enrolled as citizens. "in part," said macnair. "they have been given numbers on the schedule of the school, but have not yet been called upon to select the names by which they desire to be known. in fact i have not yet explained this matter to them. iola has been giving them language lessons in their room, and instructions concerning such matters as they desired to understand more fully in regard to the country, its history, customs, etc. but as they can now read and speak the language understandingly, their selection of names and registration as citizens ought not to be put off any longer, as at present their numbers only rank them as minors." we were more than a little mystified at the turn the conversation had taken and as it related to us captain ganoe asked: "what does this mean? it seems from your remarks that we have been numbered and that we are now to be labeled. i would be pleased to have an explanation. we highly appreciate the interest you have taken in our welfare, and anticipate much pleasure and profit to be derived from a knowledge of your language, as it will give us access to the boundless stores of wisdom which are contained in your literature. but is it really necessary for us to be numbered and labeled? i take it for granted that it is all right, but i do not understand it." "perhaps," said macnair, "this should have been explained to you sooner; but i was guided by my own experience when i found myself among these people. there was so much to be learned and it could not all be acquired at once. i deemed it best to give you as nearly as possible just what you asked for, and let you get somewhat acquainted with the customs of the country before asking you to take the steps necessary to become citizens of altruria, which also makes you citizens of the inner world, entitled to all the rights of citizenship, no matter where you go. in america, you require a foreigner to declare his intentions to become a citizen, and then, after five years you permit him to be sworn in as a full-fledged citizen. we have no regulations but such as apply to all alike. the child has no choice of birthplace, but it has a natural right to food, shelter, clothing, education, etc. hence, children are numbered, so we may know how many are to be provided for. when they reach maturity and graduate from school, they are requested to select the names by which they desire to be known. this entitles them to a voice in public affairs and makes them eligible to any public trust. when i gave you a number, the right to food, clothing and education was conferred upon you. when you select names you will be registered as citizens and will be entitled to a voice in public affairs and eligible to any public trust for which you may be selected." "then," said the captain, "it seems that we have no reason to be dissatisfied with either the number or the label, as the first gives us free access to wealth that we did not create, and the second confers upon us the sovereign right to be consulted as to how our benefactors should conduct their business. we seem to be the beneficiaries in all these regulations, 'reaping where we have not sown.' what right have we to the fruits of the labor of others to whom, as yet, we have been of no benefit whatever?" "the same right," said oqua, "that you have to live. your right to life cannot be questioned, and you cannot live unless you have access to the fruits of the earth, which are garnered by the labor of the people. the primary object of human society is to secure to each individual member the right to live and be happy, and to this end, each must be secure in the possession of the means of subsistence and the liberty to enjoy the healthy exercise of every function of mind and body. this, being the primary object for which our social organism was created, our first duty is to humanity, and all of our rules and regulations have this one object in view." "but does not this endanger the perpetuity of the social organism," asked the captain, "by opening the door to those who would take advantage of this broad definition of rights to impose grievous burdens upon those who confer these rights?" "not at all," responded oqua. "when all the people enter into an organization of society, the primary object of which is to provide the best possible conditions for each of its members, the personal interests of each, will, to say nothing of the moral obligations, impel them to perpetuate such organization, by doing everything in their power to promote the best interests of all. hence, just as soon as all have been made secure in their natural rights to life, liberty and those equitable conditions which place happiness within the reach of all, sound policy, as well as equal liberty and even-handed justice demands that all should have an equal voice in the conduct of public affairs in which all are equally interested. it would be manifestly unjust and oppressive, to ask the people to submit to regulations to which they never consented." "i admit the force of your reasoning," said the captain. "the same ideas, expressed in different language, were adopted in my own country and have served to embellish platform utterances and sensational newspaper appeals, but in practice, they have been treated as mere 'glittering generalities.' here, you seem to regard them in a far different light, as something to be reduced to practice in every day life; and with a people as well educated as yours this seems to be easy, but, with an ignorant and brutal populace the case would be very different." "not so," said oqua. "there is more good than evil in the human soul. the populace might be made ignorant and brutal by the violation of these principles, and if so, the application of these principles in all the transactions of life would inevitably produce an intellectual and refined populace. this is no 'glittering generality,' but a sober truth, and this is the lesson that your people must learn before they can ever reach their ideal of what they ought to be. when the leading minds among any people realize that there is absolutely but one way by which the masses of mankind can ever be elevated to higher and better conditions mentally and morally, and that way is, by placing them under better conditions physically, it will be found that the whole people can be lifted up to a higher plane of being as if by magic. it is on this line that the people of this country have been moving for centuries and it is to this that we desire to call your attention. we give you a number, which signifies that because you have an existence, you are entitled to the blessings of our civilization. but now we want you to register your name, as a co-worker. when you take this step, you will have given us your permission to ask your co-operation whenever it is needed. are you willing to register and assume the duties incumbent upon citizenship?" "certainly," said the captain. "you have a right to command our services and all we want is to know what is required of us." "then you will register," said oqua. "this will make you one of us and equally responsible with us for the exalted trust which is committed to our hands of preserving intact the blessings of a humane civilization. so if you are ready we will attend to this preliminary work at once." we assented, and stepping on the elevator passed down to the lower story and into the registry office which was made a part of the department of education. for school purposes it was of course necessary to register the children and as all adults were supposed to be graduates of the schools, the same department kept a registry of the entire people, so that at any time, the population of any community, district or continent could be ascertained at short notice. oqua opened an immense volume and turning to the proper letter said: "you see here the name of your countryman, james macnair. just opposite, on the left, is a number. of course his introduction to our schools was that of a child, as he had everything to learn concerning the language and people of our country while we knew nothing of his language or his country. as a pupil he was known by a number; as a citizen he is known by a name; and according to our customs that name must be one of his own choosing. there could be no objection to his taking the same name by which he was known in the outer world, and you can of course suit yourselves in the selection of names, but it must be your own signature and when recorded it becomes permanent. all that we care for is, that it shall be your own choice." "as to that," said the captain, "i prefer to retain my original name. however, i rather like this custom of permitting people to select names to suit themselves. in the outer world, the name is selected for you, and you are not permitted to change it, except by application to the courts or the law-making power. but as i have no reason to change my name you may record it as raphael ganoe." "but let me suggest," interposed macnair, "that you retain the prefix of captain as it is familiar to your crew and also designates your relation to what i doubt not is destined to take its place in the minds of the people of the world as the only polar expedition that brought blessings to humanity. of course the title signifies nothing here, but it does in the outer world which is to receive the greatest benefits from it, and there is no reason here that you should not retain it as part of your name." "then so be it; captain raphael ganoe will give me the regulation three names of the outer world, for the edification of a people who seem to be, as a rule, contented with only one." my turn to select a name came next, and oqua toying with her fan between her fingers, and with a smile she could not suppress, said to me: "well, jack, why is it that you take no part in this discussion? you seem to have no interest in the matter of selecting names. is it because you deem it of no importance, or do you disapprove of our custom of requiring every person to select a name in order to become a citizen?" "oh, as for that," i replied, "i approve your custom, but as yet i have not given any thought to the name i should select for myself. but as i have always been rather indifferent in regard to names, i hardly know how to give myself a cognomen which seems to be so much more important than i have been accustomed to think it." "oh then," interposed macnair, "there is no hurry. you have an unquestioned right to take all the time for reflection that you require, provided that you are willing to remain a minor." "i am not trying to evade the responsibility," i replied. "this matter may just as well be attended to now as at some future time." oqua then raising her eyes with a mischievous twinkle, asked with a comical expression of countenance: "shall it be jack adams?" i pressed my finger on my lips and with a side glance at captain ganoe, replied: "no, not jack adams, if you please." macnair caught the silent message but could not interpret its purport, and looking first at me and then at oqua, said: "what kind of a sideshow is this being exhibited under our very eyes and we left in the dark? what have you against jack adams, that you should thus take the very first opportunity to put an end to his existence, so that he will not have even the poor tribute to his memory of an inscription on a marble slab?" "no mystery at all," i replied. "jack adams is all right for a sailor but too commonplace for this land of romance and sublimity. i intend to exercise my right to select a more euphonious title, more in harmony with the part i hope to play," and turning to oqua i asked: "will you please to suggest some appropriate name? something short and significant." after a moment's reflection she said: "i have a name for you, jack, that i think will be most appropriate. i have been told that you are a student, and our people greatly desire to obtain all the knowledge that is within reach of the outer world, its geography, history, manners and customs, and as you are inclined to be studious, we will doubtless want you as an instructor in our schools; and for that reason i select for you the name, nequa, which signifies teacher." i was much pleased with the name and even captain ganoe who was quite a stickler for established usages intimated that he regarded it as much more appropriate than commonplace jack adams. of course i assented and nequa became the name by which i am known in the inner world. i was now a citizen of altruria and had been assigned a position in the public service as a teacher which gave me the opportunities i so much coveted, to gather gems of wisdom for the benefit of my own country, which was grappling with great problems that had here been solved. i retired to my apartments to think. it had been just two months since we arrived at this great communal home, and i had recovered from the long strain to which i had been subjected for two years on the ice king. i now discovered that it was this strain brought on by the dangers which continually beset us, that had held me up. but now that all the dangers were past and the future bright with hope, a flood of bitter memories swept in upon me like a mighty avalanche. for the first time in years i gave way to uncontrollable emotions, as i buried my face in the soft silk cushioned sofa on which i reclined and wept as seldom mortals are doomed to weep. how long i had remained thus i do not know, when i felt a gentle hand tenderly stroking my head and a voice i could not mistake said, in the most soothing tones: "nequa, nequa child, what troubles you? listen to me dear. it did not take me long to discover that under the smiling exterior of jack adams, you carried the aching heart of a stricken woman. do not start. i am your friend. confide in me. i know that there is some deep secret gnawing at your heartstrings, and that it relates to captain ganoe, and of which he is entirely unconscious. and i know that there must have been some great wrong in days gone by from which you suffer." i could stand no more and throwing both arms around oqua's neck and drawing her down to me as the suffering child would its affectionate, sympathetic mother, i kissed her repeatedly between my sobs as i replied: "yes, my dear oqua, you read me aright. but the crushing wrongs of the hideous past are irreparable and the future promises no healing balm for the wounds that have been inflicted. i must meet my fate alone. it would be wrong for me to burden you with my troubles. no! let me bear them alone, on, on, to the bitter end. i must drain the cup of misery to its dregs absolutely alone." here i again broke down and gave way to another flood of tears. i wept until my brain seemed a livid flame and my heart bursting with despair while oqua sat silently by my side stroking my head until the storm of contending emotions had time to subside when she said: "nequa, i am glad to find you in tears. they will give you relief as nothing else can. i knew you needed a friend, and i have come to constitute myself that friend. now listen to me. i knew from the first that you were a woman and that captain ganoe did not suspect anything of the kind. i further discerned that there was a hidden chord which drew you to him and yet for some reason you dare not reveal yourself to him. this secret is wearing your life away. you must tell me all about it and i can, and i will, help you to bear it. when we look at things philosophically and see them on all sides, just as they are, there is no wound of body, mind or spirit that may not be healed. there is no wrong that is not too limited in its scope to effect any permanent injury. our bounteous mother, nature, has provided a healing balm for every wound if we will but search for it with the right spirit." i could not be mistaken as to the spirit and purposes of this noble woman, nor resist her entreaties. she had penetrated my disguise and read my secret and i had every reason to respect her judgment. for years i had carried my burdens alone. under the weight of the wrongs imposed upon me i had sought relief from the burden of grief in the exercise of an indomitable will, in a vain effort to force my heart to become, if need be, as cold as ice, and as hard as adamant. but it could not be. i was forced to realize that "there can be no philosophy which steels the heart 'gainst ev'ry bitter woe; 'tis not in nature, and it cannot be; we cannot rend the heart, and not a throe of agony, tell how it feels a blow." and now this agony, which i had carried so long, concealed under the smiling countenance of an assumed character, had forced a recognition. this was nature's demand for human sympathy and the kind and loving heart of oqua was here to respond. much as i had desired to keep my sorrow deep buried in my own bosom. i could not repel this noble woman whose keen intuition had already divined my secret. i felt the need of just such sympathy as hers, and why should i spurn it from me? my soul went out to her and i felt impelled by some irresistible impulse to clasp her to my bosom and tell her all. my heart was breaking with the silent misery that it had carried for years, unshared by a single human being, and which i resolved should be carried unobserved to the grave. again i resolved anew that i would not even share it with this noble, sympathizing woman, but nature's floodgates, once opened for the outpouring of long suppressed sorrow, close no more to force it back upon the surcharged heart, and before i knew what i was doing i was folded to her bosom and weeping out the long pent up load of grief that had been gnawing at my heartstrings. as i looked up into her face, i could see the cordial, heartfelt sympathy reflected from her beautiful countenance as she whispered: "go on, dear nequa, and tell me all about it. do not distrust a friend who is able to help you as i can. remember what i told you that our bounteous mother nature, has provided a balm for every wound. this is no fanciful exaggeration, but a well ascertained truth." "i do not distrust you," i replied, "and when i am more composed i will tell you all. i have done nothing to be ashamed of, but i cannot talk now. i am too much agitated. call this evening and i will tell you all." "so be it," said oqua, "and i will be here early this evening. do not be discouraged. compose yourself and be of good cheer and all will be well." and imprinting a kiss on my forehead, she left me to my meditations, which now began to assume a more roseate hue. some of the blackness of despair which had overwhelmed me had begun to depart, and i felt more hopeful and became more composed. [illustration] chapter x. oqua's visit--the revelation--a story of perfidy and wrong--cassie vanness--raphael ganoe--richard sage--a designing guardian--false charges against ganoe--a fraudulent marriage--home abandoned--on the high seas--jack adams--ganoe found--effects of a false education--legal wrongs vs. natural justice--oqua hopeful. [illustration] as the sun disappeared behind the western edge of the verge, i was reclining upon my sofa awaiting the promised visit to oqua. i was now as anxious to tell the story of my sorrows to a sympathising friend as i had formerly been to conceal it from all the world. since my conversation with oqua, a longing sensation had come over me to confide to her the story of my life. the hour had arrived for my meeting with her, and a minute later she was by my side. laying her hand on my head, she said: "nequa, i have come at the time designated, and in order to be able to assist you, i must not be left to surmise what is the matter. by the very act of telling me your troubles, you will to a certain extent obtain control over your own feelings, and thus take the first step toward finding a remedy." "then you shall know all, from my earliest recollection," said i. "my name is cassie vanness. i was born and raised near new york city. my mother died when i was an infant, and i was cared for by my devoted old father, james vanness, and a kind motherly colored woman who had been a servant in the family. my father died when i was fifteen years old, and i went to live with my guardian, richard sage, who was also the uncle and guardian of raphael ganoe, whom he had taken to raise when an infant. at this time raphael was eighteen years of age. our school days, of about five years, were the happiest, nay, i may say the only really happy days of my life. when i was twenty and raphael twenty-three years of age, he was offered a lucrative position on a ship engaged in the chinese trade. during our vacations we had crossed the ocean together, and he desired to travel in the orient. while on this voyage he expected to circumnavigate the globe, stopping at all the leading ports. on his return we were to be married. "he promised to write to me at every available opportunity, and for the first few months his letters came regularly, always couched in the most affectionate terms and often referring to our coming marriage as the beacon light of all his fondest hopes. then his letters ceased altogether, and though i wrote repeatedly to him, i never heard from him again. "as the months rolled by, often at noontime, when the music of birds filled the air, and all was life and light, or at eventide, when the mellow twilight was over hill and dale, and the activities and light of day were giving place to the stillness and shadows of night; when the perfume of the flowers filled the air, or the yellow leaves of autumn fell about my feet, i, the forsaken, and perhaps forgotten, could have been seen seated beneath some broad-spreading tree, where we used to read and converse together. i would sit thus for hours in silent meditation, recalling the tender words and caresses of my absent lover. then arising sad and disconsolate, i would leave the lonely spot and try to bravely wait and hope for the word that never came. "my guardian professed great sympathy, and with seemingly the most poignant grief informed me that his nephew had committed some desperate crime in foreign lands for which he had been tried, convicted and sent to prison for a long term of years. yet, with this black shadow resting upon him, the truth of which was vouched for by his uncle, i continued to write as it had been agreed between us and many were the tear stained missives i addressed to him, hoping that comrades on the ship would see that they reached him. though he might be a criminal and an out-cast from his kind, my affection for him never wavered for a single moment. "my guardian, in order to make his deception more complete, pretended to deplore the actions of his nephew, and even his own unthoughtfulness, in telling me of them, and thus causing me so much suffering. he seemed to be aging very fast, and i feared that he, the only friend to whom i had never looked in vain for kindly counsel and advice, was falling into a decline from the crushing weight of what i believed to be our common sorrow, and consequently, my woman's sympathy and pity went out to him in what i regarded his disconsolate lot. "he fully realized the sincere and all pervading character of my sympathy for him, and took advantage of every opportunity to impress me with the dangerous state of his health. he intimated that the chief cause of his suffering, aside from the grief caused by the wayward and criminal course of his nephew, was the agony that it gave him to leave me all alone in the world, with no one to guard and protect me from the manifold dangers that threatened an inexperienced girl when thrown upon her own resources in this cold and unfeeling world. he did not ask my affection, except as a daughter, but suggested that under the circumstances, i had better become his wife, and then my position in the world, as his widow, would be secure. i would be protected against the intrusion of society and would be alone, as he felt sure i so much desired. "'you are already in mourning,' he said, 'and yet, your grief is so indefinable that no one will be disposed to respect it as i do. besides, situated as you now are, with no female companion, you are in some sense at the mercy of the evil-minded who never lose an opportunity to asperse the character of the good and pure, while as my wife, you would be safe, and your position honorable in the eyes of the world. i could then, even more than now, console you, and sympathize with you in your affliction.' "i told him that i had never thought of my position as being in the least compromising, in the home of my lawful guardian, and if it was so, i would go away at once, but i could not be his wife. he besought me again and again, and i continued to give him the same answer. in the meantime, i was greatly troubled by what he had intimated regarding my compromising position in his house without a female companion. i had all faith and confidence in his unselfish and paternal regard for my welfare. for years, he had treated me with marked kindness and consideration, such as a loved daughter might expect from a kind and loving father. for this, i regarded him with the filial affection of a devoted and trusting nature. to leave him now, when stricken with sorrow and apparently with one foot in the grave, was repugnant to my feelings, as it seemed to me that it would be an act of base ingratitude, and yet, it was brought to my ears that people were beginning to make flippant and disrespectful remarks concerning my position. yet i felt that i could not be so cruel as to forsake him now. the situation was a most trying one to me, as i never for a moment suspicioned that it had been made up for the occasion to influence my feelings. "he continued his importunities under the guise of paternal counsel for my own good as a loved daughter. one day he brought me a newspaper clipping which stated that raphael ganoe had died in prison. he seemed to be so grief stricken and depressed, that for many days i feared that he would drop off at any moment, and he seemed so entirely dependent upon me that i dared not leave him for a moment, and yet my position was such that i must necessarily often give place to others, who had no such regard for him as i had. if i were his wife in the eyes of the world, i might do much more for him, and believing that my affianced husband was dead, i at last consented to become his legal wife and the ceremony was performed while he lay as i believed, on his dying bed. "two hours later, feeling lonely and disconsolate, i had gone into the library and taken a seat in one of the deep windows behind the curtains, where i was hidden from view. "he seemed to have fallen asleep and my long watch was wearing upon me. i was exhausted and took this opportunity for rest and communion with my own thoughts. i soon fell into a reverie, in which the past came up before me like a panorama, and again the fancy i was with my handsome, happy lover--when suddenly i heard voices in the adjoining room where i had left my guardian asleep. a strange voice asked: "'where is your young wife?' "'gone to her room to rest,' said my guardian. 'she thinks i am very sick and she has watched by my side, to minister to my pains until she is worn out. i got easy and told her that she might go and rest herself, as i would, now that the pains had ceased for the time, be able to take a long nap. she remained until i was seemingly fast asleep and then she tiptoed out of the room as softly as a cat for fear she would awaken me.' "'you worked it well,' said the stranger, 'but what shall i write to ganoe? he has written me a long letter engaging my services as his attorney to find out all about cassie. what shall i say to him?' "'here,' said my guardian, 'are the letters i have written to him in regard to cassie's change of mind. you can take your cue from these and be governed accordingly.' "'but,' asked the attorney, 'what if she should suspicion something, and drop a letter to ganoe into some street box? it might prove to be a serious matter for us if she should learn the truth.' "'i have provided for that,' said my guardian. 'there is a round million in the deal for us, after all the expenses are paid, and no mail can reach him on the ship, without being inspected by a man who has as much interest as we have in preventing him from hearing from cassie. if a letter should not be intercepted by my agent in the postoffice, which is not likely, it would be intercepted at the ship. so rest easy in regard to this matter. there is no danger; besides she is now my wife, and i have all the legal rights of a husband. but as we want to avoid everything like friction, it is best to prevent ganoe from returning to america, which will not be difficult if it is managed well.' "'all right,' said the lawyer, 'provided you deal squarely with me. i am the only one who could defeat the plan and of course i will not lose a million to do that.' "'of course not,' said my guardian, 'and you know that i have even more to lose than you have--a life long reputation for integrity and purity of character, which to a man in my position is worth more than money. it would cut off my income as a favorite administrator on large estates.' "'well, we are both in the same boat,' laughed the lawyer, 'and we can well afford to trust each other. i guess that now you have recovered from your very serious illness we may expect to hold our conferences at the proper place.' "'oh certainly,' laughed my guardian, 'and my lovely bride will not object to my being away, as she is in widow's weeds, mourning the untimely death of her first and only love. so, good day. i must rest and take a long and very refreshing nap to account for my unexpected recovery.' "'just so,' laughed the lawyer, and i heard the door close behind him. "the conversation that i had overheard froze the very blood in my veins. i learned that i had been deliberately deceived and not only robbed of a large fortune, but had been robbed of my affianced husband. worse than this, i had been induced to take a step that made me false to him and at the same time precluded the possibility of our ever consummating our plighted faith without violating the marriage laws, as under the law i was his aunt and marriage with him would have been a crime, for which under the law i could be imprisoned for a long term of years. "my whole nature arose in revolt against the iniquity that had been perpetrated against me. i determined to find raphael and explain the whole matter to him. i hastily wrote a note to my guardian and left it where he would be sure to find it, denouncing his treachery and informing him that under no circumstances would i ever enter his door again. "i made my way into the city and disguising myself in male attire i succeeded in finding a position as cabin boy on a steamer bound for liverpool. i was determined to find raphael. i kept up the search for nearly fifteen long years, visiting almost every part of the known world, and at last found him at san francisco, on the eve of starting on an expedition to the north polar regions. before revealing myself to him i wanted to ascertain beyond any doubt whatever, from his own lips, in just what light he would regard my marriage to his uncle and my subsequent long career on the high seas in male attire. so i applied for a place on the ice king and succeeded in getting the position of scientist. i cultivated the acquaintance of the captain, secured his confidence so far that he related to me the story of his life, which gave the opportunity i wanted to draw him out, and soon learned, what i had come to dread, that the prejudices engendered by social usages were stronger than his sense of natural justice, and i heard my own conduct denounced as perfidious and vile. but for the sudden sounding of the alarm i must have fallen at his feet and thus have in all probability revealed my identity. "but i was saved that bitter humiliation and now, after a long and perilous voyage, locked up with him on the same ship, i am at last permitted to pour my tale of woe into sympathetic ears, far away from the land where legal wrongs are honored while natural rights are regarded as disreputable." oqua had listened to my story without a single interruption, and with a sympathetic interest which drew me closer to her than ever. when i ceased speaking, she looked at me with a puzzled curiosity, which i shall never forget as she remarked: "your guardian certainly committed a great wrong against you, and under the operation of an awakened conscience, i can well understand that his remorse would be most excruciatingly painful, but you have not committed any wrong, and i do not understand what it is that you are feeling so badly about. the blame all rested with your guardian and the fact that you discovered his perfidy so soon, and at the same time discovered that the man to whom you were the betrothed wife, only awaiting the time set for the consummation, was still living, ought, it seems to me, to have been a source of rejoicing. while the deception practiced upon you was painful to contemplate, it brought with it a certain measure of compensation. had you failed to make this discovery, you might have unwittingly violated the most sacred obligation, that to your betrothed husband. the wrong might have been much worse." "you have mistaken my meaning," i said. "i was not under that obligation to raphael that you seem to think. i had only promised to become his wife but i was actually married to another man. under the circumstances i do not see how the wrong could have been worse, and i, as its innocent victim, was certainly excusable for feeling badly about it. the wonder is how i could bear it at all." "if i was mistaken," said oqua, "in regard to your relations to raphael ganoe, i fear that your explanation of the situation only makes the matter more difficult to understand. i certainly understood you to say that you loved ganoe and that he loved you, and that you had both agreed to go through life as husband and wife. this you had a perfect right to do, and this agreement constitutes a marriage bond that cannot be set aside without sufficient cause, as long as you both live, and hence you could not become the wife of another man, without violating the most sacred of all obligations. and if by misrepresentation you were induced to enter into any such relation while ganoe was living and true to you, such relation would be on the face of it, null and void." "but i was married to my guardian," i said. "actually married. the clerk of the court had issued the license which was a legal permit for us to marry, and the minister pronounced us man and wife according to the solemn rites of the church. my guardian took an obligation to love, cherish and protect and i, an obligation to love, honor and obey; and then the minister invoked the blessing of heaven upon our union and pronounced the solemn warning to all who might object: 'whom god hath joined together, let no man put asunder.' yes, i was actually married to richard sage, according to law and the sacred rites of the church." "the more you explain, my dear nequa, the more incomprehensible your ideas of marriage become. you say that you were actually married to richard sage. that god joined you together, but before he could do so, a permit had to be granted by the clerk of the court. yet, in your own soul you repudiated this fraudulent marriage, and for nearly fifteen years you searched for your betrothed husband, to whom you felt bound by the laws which god had implanted in your own soul. to me it seems that this first engagement to raphael ganoe was the only true marriage, in which god had joined you together and that the court and the minister united to put you asunder. your own inner consciousness, the spark of divinity that is in you, forced you to take this view of the transaction. from all the facts, just as you relate them, i must still insist that you were not married to richard sage. that the ceremony was a fraud and could not annul your obligations to raphael ganoe. your actions demonstrate, that your own true self, took the same view of the matter, and that when you found your betrothed husband you loyally stood by his side in the hazardous effort to reach the pole, and now you are here with him in this inner world where we regard it as our first duty to accept the true and discard the false in all of our relations to each other, and to the universal system of which we form a part." "i agree with you," i replied, "that my marriage to richard sage was false, and that in order to be true to myself and my higher convictions of duty to my absent lover, when i learned that he was still living, i was forced to rend these legal bonds regardless of the consequences; but still, in the eyes of the law, of society and the church, i was the wife of my guardian, the uncle of raphael ganoe, and hence his aunt, and as such could never become his wife. yet i realized that i was united to raphael in bonds of affection that never could and never should be broken. but all the powers of law, religion, and society were united to hold me to a union secured by deception, which i loathed and abhorred. it was the environments established by this world wide power that held me incarcerated, as it were, in a prison, from which there was no escape but the grave." "thank you," said oqua, "for the light which you have thrown on the present state of your outer world civilization. it seems almost incomprehensible that the laws and usages of any people would seek to make right wrong and wrong right, but i can readily turn to a corresponding period in our own history and trace the evolutionary forces which must now be at work among your people. the old institutional life is ever striving to preserve its forms and ceremonies while the advancing spirit of freedom is continually protesting. at first the advocates of the old order, persecute all who protest against its dictum, and this protest in the name of liberty, often only means license. both extremes are essentially wrong. but the friction between these two elements, in the end will lead to the discovery of the truth upon which both extremes can unite, and this truth will make them indeed free. the manifest progress of the race is in the direction of the truth, and its logical culmination must be the establishment of altruistic conditions in all the relations which exist between individual members of the human family." "well, i am glad that you have at last penetrated my meaning," i said. "the misunderstanding grew out of my inability to formulate my own thought, so as to adapt it to your altruistic conceptions. i like the word altruism, but the thought that it expresses is so little understood in the outer world, that the word is, as far as i know, generally excluded from our common school dictionaries, while in this country i find that it forms a necessary part of your every day vocabulary. i realize that all of my troubles grew out of environments which were the legitimate product of the false premises from which we drew our conclusions. in speaking of myself as actually the wife of my guardian i only used the popular phraseology to express the conceptions of the people among whom i was raised. they regarded the license and the ceremony as the actual marriage without reference to the plighted troth of devoted lovers. i only used their language to express their conceptions, while my own were expressed by my actions." "thank you," said oqua. "i surmised that you spoke the language of your environments rather than your honest convictions, but i wanted you to say it yourself. you know that i insisted that you should say just what you mean and leave nothing for me to surmise. in all that you have to say, i want you to draw the line clearly between the true and the false, in thought and action, just as you understand the terms, and then we can ascertain where the trouble is and take steps to remove it. you are now in a country where truth alone is recognized as a standard for the regulation of human conduct, and it seems that there ought to be much in the way of mutual explanations between you and captain ganoe, and then all will be well." "i dare not risk it," i said. "i thought just as you do when i secured a position on the ice king, but i deemed it advisable to conceal my identity until i had ascertained in just what light he would regard the course i had taken. the opportunity came as i have already told you and as yet i have discovered no indications that he has in any way modified his views in regard to such matters. i have ascertained beyond a doubt from two years' association with him, that in him all the prejudices of the popular education of the outer world, its laws, usages and religious notions have crystallized. if he knew that i had spent years, associated with men, in the character of jack adams, the sailor, his sense of propriety would be shocked, and i should forfeit his respect, which would be something that i could not bear." "i cannot see," said oqua, "how he could cease to respect you. i know that as the scientist of the ice king, he entertains the most exalted opinion of your ability, courage and refinement of character." "yes, oqua, i doubt not that he respects me as jack adams, the sailor. he has given me numerous proofs of that. but as cassie vanness in that garb he would regard me as unwomanly and immodest, much below the standard of propriety and respectability of the women of the outer world, with whom he would be willing to associate on terms of equality. remember that his education, like my own was as far removed as possible from the spirit of altruism. when i left my guardian's home i was penniless, except for an allowance known as 'pin money.' by the marriage ceremony, my fortune had been transferred to richard sage. as a woman, i stood no show of being able to acquire a competency, besides i was liable to pursuit and arrest. i had no legal grounds for divorce, and if i had been discovered as the absconding wife of richard sage, the multi-millionaire, the courts would have declared me insane, and i would have been incarcerated, most likely for life, in some lunatic asylum. hence it was from necessity, rather than choice, that i donned male attire and sought employment as a cabin boy. my education, tact and close attention to business led to more lucrative positions which required ability as well as a strict integrity and close application. by rigid economy, i succeeded in accumulating a moderate competence. as a woman i could not have even procured a comfortable subsistence; but i was in male attire, associated with men in all my relations to society, and hence in the eyes of the world my womanly character was under a cloud. for this reason i did not care to reveal my identity to captain ganoe until i knew that he would approve the course i had taken. as for myself i was prepared for altruistic principles. my association with the working classes gave me a knowledge of their condition, and i familiarized myself with the best thought of their leaders. but captain ganoe had been differently situated. he had continued to move in the narrow circle in which he was born. i had hoped that experience with the world had broadened his views. but i found that i was mistaken. i have studied his feelings and hence have resolved never to give him the opportunity to reproach me for my unwomanly disguise and associations." "how could he reproach you, nequa, when he realized that it was all for love of him?" "you cannot, my dear oqua, educated as you were in the most advanced thought of this altruistic civilization, realize the almost irresistible power of prejudices when they have been incorporated into the education of a people for thousands of years. they constitute a race belief, the correctness of which the people seldom, if ever, heard questioned. when i assumed male attire and associated myself with men in the ranks of labor, i knew that i invited not only social ostracism, but laid myself liable to arrest and imprisonment, if my disguise was discovered. and captain ganoe as a high spirited gentleman of the old school, could not unite his destinies with such a social out-cast." "but surely," said oqua, "he will not entertain such mistaken conceptions of honor when he learns that the people of this inner world without an exception, would honor you for your heroic devotion to your bridal troth and regard captain ganoe as the most fortunate of men in having such a companion." "that may indeed be true, sometime," i said, "but before i reveal myself to him, i must hear from his own lips such expressions of opinion as will demonstrate that he would not regard the career of jack adams, under the circumstances, as unworthy, immodest and unwomanly. there is a deep seated prejudice in the outer world against 'mannish women,' and the donning of male attire is prohibited by law, and what is even worse, it is regarded as positively disgraceful. hence i must know that he of his own option has abandoned all these prejudices, before i will consent to be known to him as cassie vanness." "i believe," said oqua, "that his association with altrurians will certainly give him a higher regard for truth and correspondingly weaken the influence of time honored errors. we can very easily ascertain his views and if we should find them adverse, do not be discouraged, for the atmosphere of truth which surrounds him is creative in its influence and will surely establish itself in his mind. an error is powerless to hold anyone in thrall very long where truth is cultivated and free to express itself in thought and action. truth is eternal and cannot be destroyed, while error is transitory and disappears with the ignorance on which it is based." "i will leave this matter to you," i said, "with this understanding, that to captain ganoe i must remain simply jack adams, or nequa, until i know that he approves and appreciates the sacrifices made by cassie vanness. i love him too well to be willing to face his disapproval, but knowing the purity of my own purposes, i will never put myself in a position that will imply even in the remotest degree that i was wrong. my self respect forbids this. my heart tells me that i was right and i will never apologize to any human being for the course i have taken, and least of all to captain ganoe, for love of whom i have braved the danger of social ostracism as well as the dangers incident to the life of a sailor, from the blistering heat of the tropics to the intense cold of the frigid zones. i certainly could never ask him to forgive me for loving him so well." oqua threw her arms around my neck and kissed me most affectionately, saying: "my dear nequa, i knew that i was not mistaken in the estimate that i had placed on your mental and spiritual character. you have a great work to do, not only in the education of our people, but a work for your own people. intercourse between the inner and outer worlds must be re-opened. in this work much depends upon the crew of the ice king, as you are the only people among us from the educated classes who have ever penetrated the frozen regions which surround the verges. our people will of course assist in every way possible. but my dear nequa, a still greater work depends upon you, more than upon any of the others, in which we can be of but little assistance." "and what is that greater work?" i asked. "and how could i get along without assistance? no matter what i undertake i want you as a tutor. to me it seems, that in this inner world, i have everything to learn, and i must have a teacher at every step." "and i, too," said oqua, "have much to learn from you. all that i have learned of the outer world came from macnair and the few books which he saved from the sinking ship. with the ice king comes a well selected library of standard works and three scholarly, well read people, and from this, i anticipate a most valuable addition to our knowledge, especially of a scientific, geographical and historical character, which has been hidden from the people of the inner world. we have, it seems, made more progress along lines of a social, economic and ethical nature and in mechanical inventions. so while we need that knowledge which can be more readily acquired in the outer world, your people need the lessons taught by our progress along other lines. our libraries are filled with these lessons and the work evidently marked out for you is to gather this knowledge for the benefit of your own people. in this you will have the cordial co-operation of the scholars of the inner world." "this," i said, "is certainly a work in which i am most anxious to engage, just as soon as i can qualify myself for the task, and i shall certainly need all the help i can get. i do indeed want the people of america, the great republic of the outer world, to learn that the highest ideals of their revolutionary sires, are not mere 'glittering generalities,' but realities, and have been carried out to their logical culmination in this country with the most beneficent results to humanity. to this end, that they should not only learn this most significant fact, but that they should have laid before them a clear and concise statement of the methods that have been used so successfully to produce these results and evolve this wonderful altrurian civilization. i most keenly realize that it is my duty to accomplish this work for humanity, but when i think of the vast libraries, written in a strange tongue, that must not only be read but studied, in order to trace the operation of the evolutionary forces which have produced these grand results, i am overwhelmed at the contemplation of the magnitude of the task set before me." "do not be alarmed," said oqua, "at the multitudinous array of ponderous volumes. these records are only preserved for reference. the scholars of every age have been over them, with the special object in view of condensing and simplifying their lessons, for the benefit of students who could not afford to neglect other studies of the most pressing importance, in order to familiarize themselves with the details of so many thousands of years of history. hence the lessons of permanent value, such for instance as relate to the social, economic and ethical progress of the people, have been carefully arranged in the form of attractive condensations, with marginal references to the authorities. with these lessons from history, designed for the use of the pupils in our schools, the students can rapidly trace every step in our progress, from the original half-civilized condition down to the present time, and if there is any matter which they wish to examine more closely, the marginal references will direct them to volume and page. so, my dear nequa, you will find that the greater part of your work which looks so overwhelming, is ready made for you, in our school concordances. another thing will help you; these lessons of progress have all been treated in the shape of allegories and historical romances, in order to make them attractive. perhaps you could not transmit them to your own people in a better shape, than by translating some of the works that bear directly upon what they need to understand. these works trace in a most attractive form the operation of every evolutionary force which has contributed to our altrurian civilization as you find it to-day." "this, indeed, my dear oqua, relieves my mind of a load of doubt and apprehension, which amounted almost to a dread, whenever i thought of reading so many ponderous volumes in order to get a clear idea of the forces which have contributed to your present ideal conditions. it also explains to me how it is, that your entire people have such a clear understanding of every economic, social and ethical problem. these things are taught to the children in your primary schools." "yes," said oqua, "the blessings of a high state of civilization can only be preserved by educating the children of a country into a comprehensive understanding of the laws of progress, by which these blessings are secured. while a very few can set the machinery in motion by which the masses may be relieved of any burdens that can be imposed upon them, yet unless the children are universally educated in regard to these matters, a few will be able to re-enslave them. these so-called 'great problems' which you inform me are puzzling the brains of your statesmen, ought to be thoroughly understood by the children. hence we teach these things to children while the mind is the most receptive and the most capable of acquiring knowledge rapidly." "but," i remarked, "it sounds so strange to hear you speak of children thoroughly understanding these questions of world-wide importance, with which the great statesmen of the outer world have grappled for ages, without finding a solution." "nothing strange about it," said oqua. "the mind of the child is plastic and is remarkable for the facility with which it receives and retains impressions. when it reaches the adult stage these impressions become crystallized and are hard to change. hence the importance of starting the child rightly, with correct habits of thought on these vital matters, upon which its future weal, and that of every other human being depends. if the impressions on the mind of the child are erroneous, they are liable to crystallize and be retained through life, no matter how absurd they may be. as an apt illustration of this tendency, i have only to refer to some of the notions which were popular in this country at the time when the old economic system had run its course and was producing widespread poverty and suffering among the people. at that period all of the exchanges among the people were on a money basis, and the few had control of the money while the many were not able to utilize their labor to produce the wealth they needed because they could not get the money to effect the necessary exchanges. the reformers of that time were loud in the demand for more money, while the controlling minds among the majority insisted that the one thing needed was less money so that the money they had would purchase more; and others were equally sure that more tax on products of foreign countries was just the thing to relieve the industrial depression by holding the home market for the products of our own labor. keep foreign products out by a high tariff and protect home industry, was the doctrine. but we cannot help smiling as we read that these same people who wanted to exclude foreign products from our markets in order to protect our own labor, expected to get revenues from a tax on foreign goods to run the government. it is difficult to imagine at this time that any sane people ever entertained such absurd and self contradictory opinions, but it is nevertheless a fact, as demonstrated by the history of that time. these absurd notions could not have found lodgement in the human mind, if as children, the people had been trained to correct habits of reasoning." "and such," i said, "are the notions which predominate at this time in my own country and the result is, that a few are very rich while the many are hard pressed and poor. the few who protest against this system are denounced as cranks, agitators and dangerous characters." "this is just what might be expected," said oqua. "like causes produce like effects. the masses of mankind are always prone to deride and persecute isolated individuals who know more than the mass, which is physically so much more powerful. this is the protest of brute force against mental, moral and spiritual superiority. this was why your jesus was crucified and this is why your reformers of the present day are denounced as cranks, agitators and dangerous characters. it is an invariable trait of human nature in a certain stage of development." "i have long entertained these same views," i replied, "but the object lessons which can be drawn from your history will cover all these questions and they ought to reach our people with the first announcement of the discovery of this inner world where all the great problems of human development have been solved. i have found your language remarkably easy to learn and from what you say, i expect to find lessons from your history equally easy, but still i need your assistance. i want to make the very best possible use of my opportunities, and to that end, i want the benefit of your experience, observation and knowledge of altrurian civilization as it is to-day." "then, to begin," said oqua, "my work as counsellor, i would advise you to complete your account of the expedition which brought you into this inner world; a brief description of your reception; the civilization you found as it appeared to you at first sight, and the information that you gathered from intercourse with the people in regard to the progressive development of the country from the semi-barbarous conditions which existed in early times. this ought to be sent to the people of the outer world just as soon as possible. it will make an excellent introduction to a series of works consisting of your own observations in regard to the existing educational system, customs of the people and business methods, together with translations from our literature that will be of use to your people. in the preparation of the account of your expedition and your discoveries, you will need no assistance and when it comes to translations from our libraries and travel over the five grand divisions, you will have the help of ripe scholars wherever you go." "concerning the work here in this inner world," i said, "among such a people, i have no doubt that it will be well done, but how are we to transmit the information across the ice barriers at the verge? i at first had great hopes from your airships, but i find that while they are all right in this serene climate, they would be worse than useless in the stormy atmosphere of the outer world and as at present constructed the occupants could not live an hour in the intense cold of the frigid zones." "i do not," said oqua, "apprehend any insurmountable difficulty from this source. the inventors of the airship know nothing about storms and cold and hence made no provisions for guarding against them. the case is different with arctic explorers. our inventors have learned how to navigate the atmosphere, with ease and safety. this is the main point. now you people of the outer world can take up the work where our inventors left off, and construct ships which can ride the storm. i have learned since my return from the minerva congress, that captain battell is working on this problem with good prospects of success. i do not believe that there is anything impossible to the human mind when it acts in harmony with nature's laws. the airship factory at lake byblis is at your service, with every facility of material, machinery and mechanical skill. all that is needed is a comprehensive understanding of outer world atmospheric conditions, and you brought that knowledge with you. this is all that our inventors needed in order to enable them to construct an airship that would be equal to every emergency." "you give me great encouragement," i said. "captain battell has asked me to assist in this work by making experimental voyages to the verges, in order to test the proposed improvements and make observations." "then all seems to be going well," said oqua, "but there is no time to lose. you must be gathering materials for your first volume as rapidly as possible for i feel that it will soon be needed. to this end, i want you and captain ganoe to go with me to-morrow to orbitello, to see how business is carried on. what do you think of it?" "think of it!" i said. "i have been very anxious to take this trip and have only been awaiting your return so that we might have company, who could assist us in our observations." "then," said oqua, "we will start early, and i will telephone polaris and dione to meet us and bring battell and huston. i know that norrena will be most happy to meet you. he is a walking encyclopedia of knowledge and i know that you will enjoy his acquaintance. but," she added after a moment's hesitation, "you need rest and i will go. be of good cheer. all is well, and do not forget that there is a wonderful power in truth when it is left free, to remove errors from the pathway of human progress,"--and kissing me good-night, she was gone. chapter xi. an air voyage--change of scenery--homes for mothers--evolution from competitive individualism--the mountains--battell joins us--orbitello--a perpetual world's fair--department of exchange--the business of a continent--norrena--public printing--the council--all matters submitted to the people--library of universal knowledge. [illustration] every preparation had been made for our proposed voyage into the interior and as the sun appeared from behind the eastern edge of the southern verge we were embarking on the airship. our party consisted of macnair, iola, oqua, captain ganoe and myself. i took my place at the helm with macnair and told him that i wanted to take lessons in aerial navigation. he kindly explained the use of the electric keyboard which controlled the machinery, and i found it so simple that i felt no need of an instructor. in this placid atmosphere all i had to do was to set the ship in the direction we wanted to go and turn on the power until we reached the speed at which we desired to travel. all the motions of the vessel were under absolute control. i found that the steering apparatus could be readily adjusted to overcome a light wind, and reasoned that the same principles would enable us to ride the storm. this first practical experience in aerial navigation gave me confidence. our course was a little north of west, and we were soon leaving the great communal agricultural district which we now regarded as our home. according to our reckoning it was now the st of february and i had begun to figure whether it would be possible for us to be ready to attempt the proposed journey to the outer world during the northern summer. if we did, it would certainly require intense application. these thoughts were continually running through my mind, and they spurred me up to gather all the information possible for the book that i was preparing. the country over which we were passing was still agricultural, but the surface was more broken and the general arrangements were changed accordingly, presenting to our vision an agreeable variety. we still saw the magnificent communal homes with correspondingly large areas of cultivated lands, but we also saw cottages gathered into groups, with large public buildings which macnair informed us were schools, public halls, homes for the aged, hospitals, and especially homes for prospective mothers who felt that the ideal conditions which these homes afforded would secure the best possible development of their offspring. i was forcibly struck by the number and grandeur of these homes for mothers. i had noticed that every communal home had its department for the care of mothers, and now i found that the grandest structures that i had ever seen were devoted exclusively to this purpose. in reply to my inquiries i was informed that this care for motherhood was a universal feature throughout the inner world. but in this, as in everything else, liberty prevails. the mother is always free to select her own conditions. many prefer these large public homes which are exclusively under the control of women, while others, with different temperaments, prefer greater exclusiveness in their own apartments, but all alike make this period of prospective motherhood, one in which all the environments are calculated to produce the best possible pre-natal influences upon the unborn child. for this purpose, different temperaments require different surroundings. the impressions produced by beautiful scenery and social enjoyments on one, may be more readily produced by reading, lectures, music and intellectual entertainments on another. the unperverted taste of the mother is always accepted as a sure guide to what is best in each case, and the best is always provided. while the country over which we were passing did not have the same artificial appearance as if laid out by one uniform pattern, like that where we had been located since our arrival in altruria, i still noticed the general tendency of the people to get together in large communities. we passed over large districts of wild lands which afforded ample opportunities for isolated homes but nowhere did we see anything of the kind. this induced captain ganoe to ask if there was any law against people getting out by themselves and cultivating these wild lands. "nothing but the natural law," said oqua, "which impels people to do that which is the most conducive to their happiness. the people of this country do not like drudgery and they have learned by experience that in order to avoid drudgery, they must work together on a large scale, as one family, each for all and all for each. in the olden time, people in their ignorance scattered into single families consisting of a man and wife and their children. they wasted their energies in their isolated efforts, and were at the mercy of the few who had the intelligence to work together. when the masses became more intelligent they gathered into communities and co-operated with each other to make the most out of their labor and to avoid the payment of tribute to speculators who did not work at all. they soon found that they could not possibly consume all that they were able to produce and they began to work less and enjoy more." "but," asked the captain, "have you no arrangement by which a man and his wife could get out on these wild lands and make a home for themselves?" "we certainly have no arrangement," said oqua, "that would prevent their doing so. but if they should try such an experiment it would not last long. as soon as they found themselves toiling incessantly to procure a bare subsistence, while the great masses in the communities were spending eleven-twelfths of their time in the enjoyment of rest and pleasurable recreations, they would seek admission into a large communal home, where all who are willing to perform their share of the labor are welcome." "but," said the captain, "you say that the people of this country once lived in isolated homes. the people in the outer world do so now, and they feel that to be the best possible condition for the development of the highest qualities. how were the individualists of this country persuaded to give up their individual holdings and accept in lieu thereof a community interest in the products of their own labor?" "they outgrew their preconceived opinions," said oqua. "among the reformers of the olden time none were more earnest than a large and very intelligent class of individualists, who believed that the people ought to own the land, and that the individual holder ought to pay the community for its use, in proportion to its value as land, not counting the value of the improvements. these reformers agreed to the abolition of land titles, and in accordance with the doctrines which they had promulgated long and earnestly, they took their lands in severalty and paid the community a tax for its use. as individualists, they could not object to other people forming communities and having all things in common. but when they discovered how much more they had to work than their neighbors, they were true to their own interests and joined the communities where their labor became so much more effective. they found that instead of sacrificing any of their individual rights by so doing, they actually made those rights more valuable by being relieved of drudgery. the land tax to the community was abolished in the course of time, and then any individual might take a homestead and cultivate it in his own way without being taxed for the privilege of doing so, but this right is never exercised, as it would deprive the individuals thus setting up for themselves, of free access to the common wealth of the community, and the common advantages which belong to community life. they could only enter the communal homes as guests and strangers, and while free entertainment is never refused, proud spirited individualists would never think of securing a subsistence by visiting around. they would naturally prefer doing their share of the work to create the common stock. and hence our individualists are all in our communal homes and have no desire for individual holdings of any kind. their community interest in the common wealth is worth vastly more to them than all the wealth that they could create by individual effort." "but," asked the captain, "do you permit no private ownership of property at all in these communities?" "yes, we do," said oqua. "all persons may accumulate property which they create by personal labor, if they wish to burden themselves with the care of it. but as there is an abundance in the common stores to supply every want, there is no motive for the private ownership of anything but personal belongings which are ordinarily of no value to anyone else. members of the community may have anything they need out of the common stock and intelligent people would not encumber themselves with the care of more than they have a use for. the greed for the accumulation of property which i am informed is so prevalent in the outer world, if manifested here would be taken as an evidence of insanity and would be treated accordingly. it is very difficult for the average altrurian to realize that people should ever desire to hoard up wealth which it is impossible for them to consume. but when we scan the pages of our early history at the time when legal money was the medium of exchange and the standard of value, the people made a mad scramble for money, in which they disregarded every interest of humanity." we were now approaching a region where art and nature seemed to have united in one mighty and persistent effort to excel each other in the entrancing beauty and rugged grandeur that could be added to the picture. on either side was a broad expanse of cultivated lands, interspersed with parks, lawns and ornamented grounds, which revealed the work of the most artistic landscape gardeners. beneath us the cocytas meandered its way toward the distant ocean, between its wooded shores, like a shining pathway of silver, while before us the great continental divide with its towering mountain peaks piercing the clouds, closed our view towards the west. at one moment we were admiring the rugged grandeur of this lovely mountain chain and at another entranced by the beauty of the highly ornamented landscape, where art had improved upon nature. take it all in all, the scenery presented to our view from the cabin of our airship, sailing at a height of several thousand feet, was sublime, beyond the power of words to describe. as we neared the mountains, macnair took charge of the ship and made a detour toward the south, which brought into view the mighty canon through which the cocytas reaches the plain. on either side were mountain torrents dashing over the rocks on their way to join the waters of the deep flowing river. here, nature in all her majesty revealed her titanic powers. but suddenly another scene opened upon our vision, in which art revealed itself as master of all the forces of nature. it was more like a city than anything we had seen since leaving san francisco. and yet it was very much unlike any city i have ever seen. i was bewildered by its sudden appearance upon this wonderful panorama of nature and art which seemed to hold us spell bound. palatial buildings in white and silver appeared in every direction, surrounded by highly ornamented grounds. no smoke, no dust and no miserable shanties to remind us of the poverty and misery which characterized the cities of the outer world. in the distance, it presented a panorama of beauty and grandeur, more like the paintings of a gorgeous midsummer dream, than any real achievement of human skill and human taste. it was more like the fancied abode of the gods than the dwelling place of men. this was orbitello, and as it lay spread out before us, it presented a scene beyond my powers of description. it was located on an elevated plateau and almost enclosed within a bend of the river, which flows around it on three sides, the west, south and east, like a silver highway, over which electric yachts of almost every size and description were gliding. it was a dream of beauty that once seen, could never be erased from the memory. "this," said macnair, "is our continental headquarters. here, was at one time a large city, but every remnant of the old structures was removed long ago. the location, however, is so central that it was selected as our chief center of business for all the departments of the public service. it is a favorite gathering place for large numbers of people from all parts of the world. hence the number of buildings for the accommodation of visitors. it is in fact a perpetual world's fair, a miniature picture of the world as it is to-day. there is no better place to study the civilization of the inner world in all its phases." macnair was interrupted by a familiar voice with the well remembered "ship ahoy!" and as we turned around to see from whence it came, another airship came alongside, and we exchanged greetings with our old shipmates, battell and huston, and our saviors, as we called them, polaris and dione, who both addressed us in english. "please speak altrurian," i said. "i have abandoned english except in cases of emergency, as i am anxious to perfect myself in the use of your native tongue. remember that i have become a citizen of altruria, and have no desire to perpetuate the use of a foreign language." "and we," replied polaris, "want to perfect ourselves in the use of english, as we want to visit america and talk like natives, just as soon as a ship can be constructed that will enable us to navigate the frozen regions without being frozen ourselves." "and one," i responded, "that can hold to its course with a side wind of a velocity from fifty to one hundred miles an hour." "have no fears on that score," interposed battell. "we have the principal parts of the machinery completed, and all that remains to be done, is for you to take a trial trip to the southern verge and see how it will work in a storm, and in the meantime we will try our hands at constructing one that will be proof against the cold of a polar winter. better go to the southern verge now, while it is comparatively temperate and test our improvements in a gale." "all right," i said. "i am willing. but who will go with me? i ought to have the assistance of someone who could not only stand the exposure, but be able to make observations. it will keep one person busy to manage the ship during a storm, no matter how perfect your machinery may be." "i suggest," said battell, "that you take lief and eric, who are first-class mechanics as well as scientists. this is their request, and it ought to be granted. we need both huston and captain ganoe, to assist in the construction of a cold proof vessel. this is the plan of work that i suggest. how will it suit you?" "anything suits me that looks toward success," i said. "since you have already completed the inventions that i had contemplated, it is but fair that you dictate how they should be used until we can improve on your improvements, which, by the way i hope may not be necessary." "oh yes, it will," said battell. "just as soon as there is no room for improvement, everything will be perfect, and with nothing to do, nothing to live for and no improvements to make, constituted as we are now, we would very likely be just as unhappy, as we are now anxious to improve the airship or to accomplish any other object that is dear to us. this is a working world and we are workers, and when there is no work to do, there will be no use for us on our present plane of development." "you talk like a philosopher," i said. "one would think you had graduated from an altrurian university." "so i have," said battell. "were you not talking altrurian philosophy all the time we were together on the ice king? so i was to some extent prepared for what we have found in this highly developed country." "but what's the matter?" i asked, as battell's airship came to a full halt, and seemingly began to fall. before i recovered from my surprise, it had settled lightly on the top of a stupendous structure, and macnair was evidently aiming for the same place, as he set our ship to circling around in the way i have often described. i had seen the practical workings of one of battell's improvements, and could not help seeing that it was an undoubted success. the mechanism that would control the vessel while dropping toward the earth, seemed to me, more difficult of construction than that which would hold it on its course against contrary side winds. a minute later and we had reached the surface. polaris, and her crew, so to speak, had disembarked and we had a cordial handshaking, and then took a stroll around the roof of this immense building. everything about it seemed to indicate that it was especially designed for the accommodation of business on a gigantic scale. it was built of the semi-transparent material which we had found so common in the district where we had made our homes. the cornice, windows and doors were trimmed with aluminum, which gave it a peculiar grandeur of appearance. macnair, who was ever ready to make explanations, informed us that this was the continental department of exchange through which all the commercial transactions between the various districts throughout the continent were carried on. this was the chief center of distribution, and bore the same relation to the continent, that the district exchange bore to the several communities of which it was composed. the community stores made the actual distribution of products to the people. these larger exchanges, district and continental, did not really handle the products at all, but collected the orders from the consumers and sent them direct to the communities where the goods were wanted, in this way saving very much unnecessary labor in handling and transportation. the actual exchange of commodities was always direct between the producers and the consumers. i did not quite comprehend all this, but it prepared me for the object lesson which was to come. i was keenly alert to everything that was to be seen and heard, as it was valuable material for the book which i now felt sure i would be able to lay before the people of the outer world. it was now noon, and macnair suggested that it was about time for dinner. "no doubt," he said, "your fifteen hundred miles of travel has given you an appetite." and suiting the action to the suggestion, we all stepped upon an elevator, and descended to the largest dining hall i had ever seen. it seemed that thousands of people were seated at the tables, quietly conversing and enjoying their midday meal. we seated ourselves at a vacant table and oqua said: "i shall order for all, as our american visitors are not yet perfectly familiar with our customs." and manipulating a button at her side, i was surprised to see the center of the table disappear, but it reappeared before i had sufficiently recovered my equilibrium to ask questions, and it was loaded with the most tempting viands. oqua explained that these central tables which carried the food stood on the top of an elevator that connected with the kitchen below. that when an order was received, a table was already prepared to take the place of the one which the elevator brought down. everything moved with quiet celerity; no bustling waiters, and no waiting for orders to be filled. after dinner we passed into a large sitting room, elegantly furnished with chairs, divans, sofas, etc., splendidly upholstered. i noticed chairs and divans on wheels and asked macnair for an explanation, and he replied: "these chairs are moved by electricity, supplied by storage batteries just under the seats. you apply the power by pressing a button on the arm by your side, and guide them with your feet. you will often find them in use, particularly in large places like orbitello, where travelers coming in fatigued, and people on business with the various departments, having many places to go, need some easy means of locomotion. in the olden time, waiters used to push these chairs around by hand, but with the advent of electricity, electric motors were substituted, and now the people who use these chairs need no such assistance, and all the chair-men have to do is to see that the chairs are returned to their proper place." after a little instruction we found no difficulty in going where we pleased in our chairs, and regulating their direction and speed with perfect ease. this novel experience was so agreeable that we decided to visit the leading points of interest in these electric chairs. the first place to visit was the business offices of this great continental exchange. we took our places in a large elevator room and passed down to the office of the commissioner of exchange. on either side of the great hall were shelves containing large books in which we were informed, were statistics of production that are sent in from every district twice a year, at the close of each crop season. these records show just how much surplus each district has for exchange, and of what it consists. this information is for the order and supply department which is on the same floor, toward which we were directing our chairs. here we entered a long hall, on either side of which were arranged desks and electrical instruments. the clerks in attendance, each represented a district, and were selected by the districts to fill these positions because of their intimate knowledge of the wants of their several localities and of the surplus they had for exchange. the district commissioners sent their orders to their own clerk which was written out by telautograph on his own desk. the order was at once transmitted by the same method, to the district having the surplus, through its own clerk, and a duplicate of these orders to the record department. these orders when received from the district commissioners were transmitted to the communities having the surplus. the community department of exchange then shipped it directly to the place where it was needed. under this system of distribution, products passed directly from the producer to the consumer and were never handled but once. the producers held their surplus in their own possession until they had orders from consumers by whom it was needed. the commissioner of exchange at orbitello had a tabulated report of the surplus held by each district, and each district had its clerks in the order and supply department of the continental exchange. when an agricultural district wanted machinery, musical instruments, furniture, clothing, etc., the order for the same was transmitted to its own clerk in the department of exchange and it was at once sent to the district, or districts, having a surplus of the products needed. and when a manufacturing district needed food supplies the orders were sent to the clerk in the continental exchange and the order was transmitted to the nearest agricultural district that had a surplus for exchange. under this system of organized exchange, if any district found that it had a surplus accumulating in its warehouses for which there was no demand, this was all the notice required that a time had come to curtail production in that particular line. from what we could see of the workings of this system, by going through this department, we could readily see how the law of supply and demand, if permitted to act freely with no artificial restrictions, would be a perfect regulator in the world of commerce. neither would there ever be, under this altrurian system of exchange, a glut in the market at one place while there was a scarcity at another. "you see here," said macnair, "a business house which handles the trade of a continent, containing over two hundred millions of people. all the products of the soil, the shop, the factory and the mine, are practically bought and sold in this establishment, and yet without any of the excitement and bustle, hard work and worry, which characterize the comparatively diminutive business houses of new york and london." "i see evidences," i remarked, "of a most admirable business system on a stupendous scale. but the question that will be asked in the outer world will be, how are these goods paid for and how are the prices fixed and the accounts adjusted without money? this is what the people of the outer world will want to understand. i am asking more for them than for myself." "nothing difficult about it," said macnair. "product pays for product here just as it actually does in the outer world, but under co-operation, the elements of interest, profit and rent have been eliminated. the price of an article is fixed by the amount of labor expended in its production and distribution. this of course only applies to such commodities as are in demand. a great deal of labor might be expended in the production of something that no one wanted. such labor would be wasted here as it would be anywhere else." "i had thought of this contingency," i replied, "but was not seeking a difficulty. i referred only to such articles of necessity, comfort and luxury as the consumers wish to secure. how are the prices fixed, what is the standard and how are balances settled?" "these questions," said macnair, "are well put, to draw out a concise, as well as a comprehensive statement of our business methods. we readily ascertain by statistics, the average number of minutes, hours and days of labor invested in the production of every commodity which enters into common use. this includes the labor invested in the necessary transportation, superintendence and distribution. hence in our accounts, the value of products of all kinds are credited and debited as given amounts of labor. this is what in the outer world would be called the price. a given number of hours of labor in one branch of useful service to society is worth just the same number of hours of labor in some other branch, and the exchange is made on that basis. the one primary object of this system of exchange is to secure equal and exact justice to all." "but how are all these numerous employes on your railroads, in your stores and the various departments of industry paid?" asked captain ganoe. "very easily," said macnair. "the people produce all the supplies and render all the service, and the people enjoy all the benefits. this is about all there is of it. we produce what we consume, and consume what we produce, without paying tribute to anyone else for the privilege of exercising these natural rights, as the people in the outer world are forced to do." "but," said the captain, "would you have me infer that all these expert clerks and accountants, and the commissioner who superintends all this business do not receive any more than the laborers on the farms and in the shops, factories and mines?" "why should they get more than people who are engaged in laborious occupations?" asked iola. "they get all they can consume. if they should use a little more or less no one cares. they can have all they want without working any more hours than other people and i cannot understand how they could use any more food or clothing without ruining their health or making themselves very uncomfortable. i cannot conceive of any person wanting to eat more food or wear more clothes, because he or she is employed in some position of trust. can you, captain ganoe?" "i admit," replied the captain, "that your question is a poser. and this is not the first time that i have been puzzled by your remarks. i do not say that you are wrong; but i never heard questions handled in this way until i drifted into this inner world. i can only say that i am bewildered and while i do not comprehend your philosophy i do admire your civilization." "and," responded iola, "i cannot comprehend how anyone can admire our civilization without accepting our philosophy. the civilization of a people is only reducing to practice, the mental and moral concepts of the people. our civilization is the logical outcome of our philosophy. people always think first and act afterward. our philosophy is what we think, and our civilization is the result of what it induces us to do." "well," said the captain, "it has certainly induced your people to do many things that would look very strange in the outer world, but which seem to work rightly here." oqua, who had quietly dropped out of our party without being observed, now joined us, accompanied by a man of commanding appearance. he was about six feet, four inches in height, brown hair, full beard, blue eyes, fair complexion and a high intellectual forehead. oqua introduced him as norrena, chief of the continental department of education. his address was most gentle, pleasing and kind, but firm and decided. turning to me he said: "i had hoped to have an opportunity to make the acquaintance of jack adams, the scientist of the ice king, but oqua tells me that i must be content with nequa, the teacher. she informs me that you are preparing a book to be published in your own country, and to that end you are making a close study of our civilization." "that is true," i said, "and she has spoken to me of you as one who could render me great assistance, in gathering the lessons that would be of the most value, in our transition from competition to co-operation." "i shall gladly render you any assistance in my power," he said, "but what you can see here of our completed system of co-operation in every department of human endeavor, will be indispensable to a clear comprehension of the lessons to be drawn from the history of our own transition period." "thank you," i said. "and i would be pleased to have you show me through the departments, and call my attention to such features as will be of the greatest advantage for me to understand just at this time." "that is the same request that was made by oqua, as it would take a long time for you to find just what you want without the assistance of someone who is familiar with all the departments and who also understands the nature of the work in which you are engaged. to begin, we will now visit the department of public printing and news distribution." we now dispensed with our electric chairs, as we felt the need of exercise. as we emerged from the exchange building, norrena took the lead, and conducted us into another stupendous structure, devoted to the public printing and the distribution of news to all parts of the world. the upper story was an immense auditorium, where public meetings of unusual proportions could meet and have ample room, and where the acoustic properties were so scientifically adjusted, that all could hear the speaker in ordinary tones of voice. norrena conducted us first into the press room, where printed sheets were being turned out with a rapidity i had never before witnessed. these passed on an endless belt into the binding department and from thence in completed form to the mailing rooms for distribution. everything seemed to move with the same quiet celerity that we had noticed in the exchange department. from the press rooms we ascended in an elevator to the composing department, where we found a number of machines turning out stereotype plates, but no operators were anywhere in sight. norrena informed me that the machines were operated on the same principle as the telautograph, or writing telegraph, and with the multiplex system of transmission, an expert could operate a number of these machines in different parts of the world at the same time. the matter for publication, was thus delivered in the composing room in the shape of plates ready for the presses. but the most interesting and important feature of this great publishing house is the manner of collecting and distributing news. the news department is connected by telegraph with news offices throughout the world and is continually receiving items of general interest, which are classified and distributed by the same means to the people in every home throughout the continent. the printed pages are of matter of a more permanent character, which is regarded as worthy of preservation. copies of new books are sent to similar establishments in the other grand divisions and by them reproduced and placed in their local libraries where all have access to them. this free distribution of intelligence to the whole people is under the direct control of the department of education. during the meetings of the altrurian council, this department has another important duty to perform. the council, through this department, is practically, at all times, in communication with the majority of the people. when a matter of public interest has been carefully discussed pro and con, it is formulated and transmitted to every community where the people are interested, a vote is then taken at once, and the result transmitted to the council. by this means, a majority of the people can be heard from in regard to any matter of importance in a few hours. the people are at all times familiar with the matters which are being considered by the council, and are prepared to respond promptly. the communities ordinarily have decided any important question in their minds before it is submitted to them and reply at once. i could readily see how, under an advanced state of civilisation, direct government by the people is not only practicable, but remarkable for its simplicity and promptness of execution. the council acts upon all matters in which two or more districts are interested and the matter is formulated and submitted at once to the people of such districts for their approval or disapproval. but in any matter of great importance the people are not compelled to wait for the regular meeting of the council, but may by the action of the communities place the matter before the executive committee which meets every day, and it becomes their duty to submit the question to a vote of the people. in this way, under this system, the people can always secure prompt action, as it is the duty of their officials to serve, but not to govern, as they do in the outer world. if a public improvement is agreed upon, the districts and communities interested, make an appropriation of necessary material and labor, and the work is pushed forward. in all things this great council is advisory in its character and the executive committee only takes such action as the people have agreed upon, and when any matter has been agreed upon the executive power acts at once without question. the will of the people is the law which no one ever assumes to question. we passed rapidly through a large number of magnificent structures, filled with exhibits of all kinds. in machinery hall were samples of every conceivable mechanical device. another vast building was devoted to textile fabrics of all kinds. every industry had its exhibit. all the great grand divisions had similar buildings. everywhere, accommodating attendants were ready to show us anything and give us any information we wished. and one remarkable thing was, that while every one seemed anxious to display the goods on exhibition, no one ever tried to sell us anything, as would have been the case in the outer world. here, as macnair said, was indeed a miniature picture of a world. i could write a volume on each one of these great buildings without exhausting the subject. but for the present i had seen enough and requested norrena to conduct us next to the library of universal knowledge which was the most highly finished and imposing of all these palatial structures. it was built of the usual semi-transparent material which shut out the direct rays of the sun while it admitted a mellow radiance rendering artificial light as a rule unnecessary. we took an elevator to the top where we began our survey of the contents. elevators at frequent intervals connected every story. a description of one story would in a general way apply to all the others. each floor is divided longitudinally into three halls or suites of rooms. the central division is ordinarily a single hall fifty feet in width by six hundred in length, and in these central halls are stored all the books, papers and relics of the past. also specimens of ores, metals, alloys and compounds of everything that goes to make a complete museum of natural history, and scientific methods in chemistry and the mechanic arts. different stories are given to archeology, ethnology, geology, chemistry, electricity, etc., and constitute a most instructive feature of this library of universal knowledge. the divisions on either side are given up to reading rooms, lecture halls and schools for culture in technical branches that can be studied to better advantage here in this vast library than elsewhere. in the reading rooms, which are always open to the public, full catalogues are always kept for visitors, and courteous attendants are ever ready to give any information and procure any book that may be needed. books are all numbered and catalogued, so the visitor has but to press the number on an electric keyboard, and it is delivered at once by a pneumatic tube. the attendants return the books to their proper places in the same rapid and quiet manner. no noise, bluster, or confusion anywhere. everything is reduced to system, and moves along like clock work. instruction is free in any of the technical schools, to all who apply and submit to the rules. these schools embrace every specific branch of study, and are usually patronised by graduates from the public schools who desire to perfect their knowledge of some specific branch in order to be better qualified for a special calling. here, can be studied under the most favorable conditions, the progressive development of a world, illustrated at every step by the relics indicative of its status which are carefully preserved in the museums, thus tracing in the most instructive and satisfactory manner, the progress of the people from their primitive condition of barbarians to their present high state of culture. i saw at a glance that this was the place where my contemplated work of investigation, into the practical methods which had enabled the people of this country to develop such ideals, could be prosecuted under the most favorable conditions. i determined to make good use of these facilities for gathering the ripened sheaves of human thought in every age and condition of life, for the benefit of the people of my own native land. in the lower story, we passed into the department where new publications are received and catalogued. the first thing that attracted my attention was the translations from the library of the ice king, which seemed to have the right of way over everything else. among these translations, i noticed the american cyclopedia, ridpath's history of the world, the decline and fall of the roman empire, histories of the united states and the leading countries of the world, together with a selection of works on polar exploration, and a number of scientific works. i was astonished at the progress that had been made, but norrena informed me that, under their system, a work could be translated almost as fast as it could be read, and that the work had been divided between the scholars of all the grand divisions. i asked norrena if there was much demand for these translations of outer world literature, and he replied: "yes, the orders from each grand division, amount to millions, and they can be translated in all parts of the concave as rapidly as the presses can turn them out. this is especially true of everything pertaining to america, whose history up to date is so similar to the early stages of our own." "but," i said, "with the usual large attendance at the reading rooms, one volume will do for a number of persons, and i should think that would greatly decrease the demand." "that is true," said norrena, "but all have an equal right to be served, and this addition to our knowledge of the outer world is in such great demand, that all want to be supplied at the same time." "of course that is impossible," i said, "and so i suppose that with all your improved methods many will be compelled to wait." "not so very many," said norrena. "all may not be able to get books, but all who desire to do so can hear them read." "how," i asked, "can that be, when millions are asking to hear them read all at once?" "not so very difficult," he replied, "when we use the multiplex phonograph. one reader can be heard all over the concave. a vast number would rather listen to a good reader, than to read themselves, and as the voice of this reader can be connected with a large number of phonograph reading rooms at the same time, in each such room, as many can listen as can be seated." "you astonish me," i said. "will you please explain how this is done?" "i will do more than that," he said. "i will show you how it is done. come with me." i followed him into a large room, where i found, i should think, from two to three hundred people, composedly sitting in chairs, or reclining on sofas and divans, with phonographic attachments in their ears. "these," said norrena, "are all listening to readers at lake byblis who are assisting in the translation of these works. they are using these attachments in the ears because they are not all listening to the same matter. this is a fair sample of what is going on in every room of this character, throughout the concave. a large number of professional readers are employed who are connected by telephone and phonograph with every home and reading room in all parts of the country. by such means you see that we can disseminate knowledge almost simultaneously, to all who are most anxious for it. the demand for printed books is mainly from libraries and reading rooms, public and private. the masses of the people at this time are spending much of their ample leisure, in listening to the reading of this new addition to our literature. it will not be long, before the most industrious, intellectually, have absorbed, to a considerable extent this most valuable addition to our knowledge, and then a very large number will apply themselves to the study of the english language, so that they may be able to judge for themselves as to the accuracy of the translations." "i see from your admirable system of distributing knowledge that there must be an extraordinary demand to be supplied." "nothing extraordinary for us," said norrena. "the demand is steady with a tendency to increase. our people are all workers who have enough physical exercise to keep their bodies in good condition, and this stimulates the mind to demand food, which it is our duty to provide." "do you not often find this difficult?" i asked. "not at all," he replied. "in this, as in the supply of food for the body, the quantity is always ample where the operations of natural law are not antagonized in the administration of public business. we have ample facilities for gathering news, and everyone who has a thought to express finds an opportunity to do so. there is a steady supply which we distribute alike to all. this demand for mental food is even more pressing than the demand for physical nourishment. the real man and the real woman are not their physical bodies, but the living souls which occupy these bodies, and it is the duty of this department of the public service to provide these souls with the staff of life, which is knowledge." before leaving the library, norrena requested us to record our names on the visitor's book. we complied, and then continued our rambles until i, for one, was utterly exhausted, and asked to be excused from further exercise. "then," said norrena, "we will retire to the department of public comfort, where i have my private rooms, and while you are resting, we can talk over plans for the future, or other matters that may demand attention. i am much interested in this move to improve the airships with a view to opening up a line of communication with the outer world." "and," i remarked, "i am, if possible, more interested in the completion of my book in time for it to go to the united states by the first airship, for publication. and i want it to contain every lesson of importance to our people that can be gleaned from the present condition and the past history of the people of this country." as we were speaking, norrena hailed a passing electric carriage, and in a few minutes we were landed at the grandest hotel i had ever entered in my life. i could see at a glance why it was called the department of public comfort. every facility for the comfort and enjoyment of guests was provided. but the dimensions assigned to this volume will not permit a description. i need only say that all its appointments were complete, for the accommodation of thousands of guests. while each of the department buildings had its own arrangements for accommodating its own force of employes and its own guests, this department of public comfort was designed more especially for guests from other grand divisions. here, the heads of departments of all the grand divisions held their conferences; and here the continental heads of departments very appropriately had their headquarters. after supper, norrena informed me that on the morrow, he would devote an hour to oral lessons at the institute of district school superintendents and that his subject would be the history of the transition period. "this," he explained, "covers that period in the history of altruria which marks the decline and fall of the old system of competition and the introduction of co-operative methods. it may be just what you want in the way of lessons from history. if you think that you do not yet understand our language well enough to fully comprehend all the points, i will provide you with a translation into english." i thanked him for his interest in my work and assured him that while i wanted to hear him in his own tongue, if he could provide me with the same matter in english, it would help me to a better understanding of the language of the country, and that certainly i did not want to miss any point of real value in the subject matter. chapter xii. the institute of school superintendents--norrena's address on the transition period--from competition to co-operation--the closing decades of money supremacy--the power of gold--its conquest of the world--political governments its tools--the people helpless--a hint at the way out. at an early hour we were up and had our breakfast. i felt that my journey to orbitello and the hasty glance through the leading departments had been the most instructive day i had ever experienced. but i was not surfeited, and looked forward with interest to the meeting of the institute of school superintendents and especially to norrena's oral lessons from the transition period of the great industrial commonwealth of altruria. we met in the auditorium over the department of public printing. many had already arrived and were gathered into groups in various portions of the vast hall conversing with each other. i took a seat on one side by myself to contemplate the scene before me. i was by nature a student, and here i was among, as it were, a nation of competent instructors, and in a country where everything demonstrated the power to control the great potent forces which govern the external world, and the innate force of our higher moral and spiritual concepts of what should be our relations toward each other in order to convert this earth into a heaven of blissful, happy contentment. i was among a people who universally regarded "an injury to one as the concern of all," and hence health, happiness and abundance for all was their normal condition. i could hardly realize that this country had once been the abode of poverty and all of its consequences of ignorance, vice and crime; that here where equal rights, equal opportunities and an equal share in the unlimited abundance which nature places within the easy reach of intelligent labor were the universal and unquestioned law of being, there had once been a grasping and cruel financial and commercial power that condemned the wealth-producing millions to lives of unrequited toil. but such, i was repeatedly told, had been the fact, and norrena, at this meeting was to give an oral lesson from that period and describe the power that had oppressed and degraded the people in those early ages. but a short time had gone by since my first meeting with these people and yet i had become thoroughly absorbed in their mental, moral and spiritual life. i felt myself to be to all intents and purposes one of them. what was it that had so entirely taken possession of my consciousness? in all my life i had never felt so completely at home, and at peace with myself and all the world. i was fully satisfied. norrena broke in upon my reverie by asking: "what is it nequa, that so absorbs your attention that you seem to be utterly oblivious of the presence of this large assemblage of teachers from all parts of the country to talk over the history of the olden time when 'wealth accumulated and men decayed?' have you forgotten what i told you last evening? oqua will report the lesson from the transition period in english for you and you can afford to give some attention to your old friends, iola, macnair, polaris, dione and your comrades of the ice king." i looked around and found that while i had been musing, our party had all gathered near me without attracting my attention and i said apologetically: "i must have been dreaming." "then you were dreaming with your eyes wide open," said oqua. "i noticed that you seemed to be unusually absorbed. what were you thinking about?" "i was pondering," i replied, "how it was possible that this country could ever have been cursed with poverty as the normal condition of the masses of the people while the few were rich beyond the dreams of avarice, and held those masses bound by fetters that they could not break." "it is now time for the exercises to commence," said norrena. "i will explain the mystery in my address, at least so far as the leading factors are concerned, for in its entirety it is indeed a long and ghastly picture of human ignorance on one side and human greed directed by a morally perverted human intelligence on the other." the chairman called the meeting to order and stated that the first thing on the program would be an address on the transition period, by norrena, the continental commissioner of education. without extended preliminary remarks, the speaker opened the discussion of the question under consideration from which i condense the following from oqua's report in english. yet notwithstanding my short residence in the country i believe that i could have given the gist of the address myself without any assistance. "i need not," said the speaker, "enter into any lengthy explanation before an institute of teachers, as to how our ancestors under the old civilisation exchanged the products created by their labor for products created by the labor of others, by the use of a law-created medium of exchange called money. neither need we trace the history of many kinds of products and devices which were used in different ages as a medium of exchange, such as cattle, slaves, shells, tobacco, the skins of animals and certain stones and metals. these things are only of interest to the antiquarian. it is enough to know for our present purpose that money had originally been devised as a substitute for barter, and marked the first step towards the establishment of a system of exchanging products which required the exercise of a higher order of mental faculties. during the early part of the transition period, gold and silver were the exclusive materials from which money was coined, except for sums of only a few cents, when the so-called baser metals were used. as the supply of gold and silver was not equal to the demands of business, banks were established to issue notes to circulate as money with the consent of both parties to the exchange. these notes were made redeemable in gold and silver on the demand of the holders, and at frequent intervals the banks failed and the people lost the wealth which they had exchanged for the notes. this was a transfer without compensation, of the actual values created by the labor of the people, to the note issuing power, and this process, oft-repeated, laid the foundations for many colossal fortunes. "in this connection, it may be well to note that in times of great public danger when the metal coins disappeared from circulation, the government exercised the right to issue a legal tender paper money to meet the deficiency. it served all the purposes of gold, and often in the midst of adversity and disaster brought great industrial prosperity to the people. but when the danger had gone by, strange as it may appear, the government funded this legal tender paper into government bonds, payable, interest and principal, in coin. this process of converting the debt paying medium of the country into an interest bearing debt that must be paid in another kind of money which had been hidden away by the more wealthy in times of danger, was the foundation of the great bonded debt of this country which was established during the transition period. this bonded debt was made the basis of a national bank currency for the redemption of which, at first in legal tender paper and coin, and later in gold, the people as debtors to the banks were in the last analysis responsible. in other words the national bank currency derived its sole value as a reliable medium of exchange from the fact that it was based on the public credit, and this public credit belonged to the people, but the private banking associations got the benefit for the private gain of their stockholders, and the service rendered, cost the people many times its worth. "during the transition period in this country the people had three kinds of legal tender money, gold, silver, and paper, together with the national bank notes which were a legal tender as between the people and the government. at the close of this period, silver coin, and legal tender paper were made redeemable by the government in gold, on the demand of the holder; and all deferred payments were made payable in gold on the demand of the creditor. the great bulk of the business of the country among the people was transacted by the use of silver, paper and bank notes but the holders of these forms of currency could demand gold in exchange, and if for any cause the government failed to collect enough gold from the people to meet the demand it became the duty of the secretary of the treasury to sell interest bearing gold bonds to meet the deficiency. "such in brief, was the complicated, cumbersome and unscientific system of exchanging, or distributing wealth, which existed under the old civilization. the means of production being fixed by natural law were the same then as now. wealth always was and must always continue to be, the product of human labor and skill applied to natural resources, facilitated by such mechanical contrivances and business methods as human skill may devise. but the system of distribution being entirely under human control is continually changing as affected by human impulses, whether they be selfish, as in the olden time, or altruistic as they are now. "we now exchange a product for a product of equal value, for the convenience and benefit of all, without any charge except for the necessary labor expended in the production and distribution. but under the old civilization the product was first exchanged for money and the money was then exchanged with some one else for the product that was wanted in return. as a method of exchanging one value for another, this was a very awkward and unscientific process, but in and of itself it was not necessarily unjust and oppressive; yet the system such as it was, could be used by the greedy few who controlled the financial and commercial affairs of the country, for the purpose of exacting such exorbitant tribute from the many as would, and did, condemn the millions to poverty. the few, with their superior business sagacity took advantage of this semi-barbarous idea of a perpetual money token which was supposed to contain within itself an actual value, equal to the values which it was used to exchange, and they organized banking as the chief factor in the mechanism of exchange among themselves, which in its operations also gave them control of the perpetual money tokens which the people must have to carry on their ordinary business transactions with each other. "these shrewd financiers had no use for money except to pay balances, and at the time of the end, ninety-seven per cent. of the great business transactions of the country were carried on by means of organised credit through banks and clearing houses. this system of minimising the use of legal money through banking methods, as a matter of course left a large surplus in the hands of the great operators, which was loaned to the people, who in their unorganised condition were compelled to pay cash. these loans bore various rates of interest, but always much above the average increase of wealth, and very often so exorbitant that the states for very shame's sake were compelled to establish certain arbitrary rates beyond which the money lender dare not go. "it will be seen at a glance that this system of transacting the business of the country on a cash basis by the people and by organized credit through banks by large operators who controlled finance and commerce could not fail to give to the latter an enormous advantage in the aggregate business of the country. the great masses of wealth producers naturally became a debtor class. as all wealth was the product of their labor, they must necessarily create the means of paying all indebtedness, interest and principal. hence they constituted the interest paying masses while the comparatively small number of large operators constituted a powerful creditor class who were continually receiving interest, and hence always had money to loan or invest in such a manner as to be able to receive more interest. and the larger the interest-charge against the people, the more they needed money and the more inclined they were to borrow. cities and towns often voted a bonded debt upon themselves for improvements, for the express purpose of providing employment for the workers, so that business might derive some temporary advantage by having the wages expended in their midst. the great masses of the people did not realize that a part of the same dollars they borrowed most go back to the lender to pay interest, and that the consequent deficiency in the means of payment could only be met by transferring to the creditor a portion of the wealth created by their labor equal to the interest. and the larger the aggregate indebtedness in proportion to the volume of money available for debt paying purposes, the larger must be the deficiency to be met out of their savings, or what should have been their net income from the exercise of their producing power. "but the interest on loans, public and private was only a small fraction of the burden of usury imposed upon the wealth producing masses. all the large industrial, financial and commercial enterprises of the country were on a debt-creating basis. stock companies owned the railroads of the country; the streetcars, waterworks, gasworks and electric light and power plants of the cities; all the great manufacturing, mining and commercial enterprises; the steamship lines, and even vast bonanza farms and stock ranches. all these interests were operated with a view to paying dividends on the stock in addition to the operating expenses, and were therefore equivalent to a perpetual interest bearing debt, the principal of which never could be paid. "this constructive indebtedness was intended to be perpetual, and its volume was not limited to the actual cost of the various enterprises that were incorporated. the railroads, for instance, sold stock to many times the cost of the roads, or as it was called, 'watered their stock,' and then they ordinarily bonded the roads for vast sums besides. these bonded debts however, were very often created for the purpose of bankrupting the companies for the enrichment of an 'inside ring.' this process was known as 'freezing out the stockholders,' and by thus reducing capitalization it was not necessary for the roads to exact so much tribute from their patrons in order to pay dividends. other corporate enterprises also 'watered' their stock, and some of them got such a hold upon the people that they continued to pay exorbitant dividends on their fictitious valuation until they were absorbed into the larger combination of the whole people. "at the close of the transition period the volume of interest bearing indebtedness and dividend earning investments was estimated at fifty thousand millions, and the average cost to the people six per cent. per annum, or an aggregate of three thousand millions every year to be taken out of the wealth produced by the people. the bulk of these obligations, public, corporate and private was held by the great banking institutions which had been established by the corporation and trust magnates, who practically owned the lands and all the machinery of production and distribution. they owned not only the indebtedness against the people but they controlled the medium by which it must be paid, and on their demand under the law, this medium of final payment was gold. "as this great creditor class was the principal employer of labor and controlled both the buying and selling of products which the people must have for the purposes of consumption, thus fixing both the income and the expenses of the producer, it was not difficult to collect their tribute. a pro rata of the great annual charge of interest, dividends and profits against the people was collected from the producer in the shape of a discount on what he had to sell, whether it was his labor or its products. the remainder was charged up to consumption and constituted a part of the price that was paid for every article that was purchased. the cost to the consumer of every commodity purchased, consisted of five distinct elements: first, interest on the money supposed to be invested in its production and distribution; second, rent upon all the buildings in which it had been stored, which would include cars or vessels used in transportation; third, profit to all who had handled the product; fourth, its pro rata of taxation and fifth, the wages paid to the labor expended in its production, transportation, superintendence and distribution. this fifth element in the cost was all that went to useful labor, while the other elements went to the great financial, industrial and commercial combines which held the masses of the people in their grasp. "of course under the operation of this system, where both the income and the expenses of the producer were determined by this great creditor class for its own selfish purposes, it is not strange that the condition of the average toiler was one of poverty, nor is it strange that a widespread spirit of unrest, and often of angry and violent discontent threatened the peace of society and the perpetuity of established institutions and a stable government. but to us, it does indeed look strange that the brawny millions whose strong arms and undaunted courage had conquered the untamed forces of nature and made the wilderness a fit dwelling place for a refined and cultured people, could have been bound, hand and foot, by such a gossamer thread as the puny power of a few owners of gold. but when we take into consideration the fundamental truth that mind controls matter, and that the few who were at the top had cultivated brains while the many who were at the bottom had only cultivated muscles, the mystery is solved. the toiling masses had no conception of their power, and on their plane of intelligence were utterly unable to hold their own against the wily schemes of the more intelligent few. "at the time of which we speak, four-fifths of the aggregate wealth of the country had passed into the hands of a small fraction of the people, and millions were landless, homeless and dependent for subsistence upon the crumbs, so to speak, that fell from the tables of their lordly masters who controlled every avenue to employment and dictated the terms upon which they were permitted to live. being few in numbers, they could and did co-operate with each other for their mutual advantage. all they had to do in order to keep wages at a minimum was to leave a large number of applicants unemployed, and hence very poor, who at all times, would be ready to take the place of workmen who demanded more liberal wages. the self-employed farmers were but little better off than the wage workers, as they were forced to sell their products and purchase their supplies at prices fixed by the great financial, industrial and commercial combines which controlled the business of the country. under the inequitable methods of exchange which existed at that time, the masses of the people were powerless to help themselves. the fortunate few who controlled money, dictated how much they might receive for their labor or its products and how much of the products created by the labor of others they could purchase with the proceeds. "to us the natural remedy for discriminations of this kind, so unjust and oppressive to the masses of the people seems so self-evident and easy of application that it is not strange that many have been inclined to doubt the correctness of much that is recorded in the history of the economic conditions which existed under the old civilisation, when human selfishness ruled supreme in business affairs. but when we take into consideration the fact, that at that time, the world had never had a single object lesson large enough to be seen by the great of mankind, as to what would constitute an equitable system of distribution, we are forced to the conclusion that the adverse conditions existing during the transition period were just what might have been expected under the circumstances. the few who had the ability to conduct the business of the world did not understand that the productive power of the earth is practically unlimited so that under an equitable system of exchange there is absolutely no possibility of any person being reduced to poverty. then, too, the great masses were but a few generations removed from a condition of absolute serfdom, and were just what ages of drudgery had made them, and could not be expected to take broad and comprehensive views of the great economic problems by which they were confronted. the world had never known anything but the private ownership of all the means of production and distribution and the desire to lay up treasures was universally regarded as laudable and praiseworthy. under these circumstances neither the few who had monopolized the earth nor the many who were disinherited could have been reasonably expected to be other than they were. both alike were the product of long ages of growth. the wheat and the tares must necessarily grow up together, nurtured by the same soil, until the harvest is ready, and then the separation takes place strictly in accordance with natural law. "the gold power which established itself in this country during the transition period was an exotic that had been imported from the old world. its object was to control every nation on earth, for its own gain, without being the loyal supporter of any. it had secured absolute control over the nations of the old world before it succeeded in financially conquering the new. whenever it succeeded in establishing the gold standard in any country, it established its local branch for controlling that country's finances. its first object was to promote the creation of national bonded debts, payable, principal and interest, in gold. for this purpose, it was always ready to loan money to carry on wars, and each country could negotiate its loans through its own local branch, but the creditor in every case, as a matter of fact, was the international gold power of the world, which had no preferences between nations but sought to impose a bonded debt alike upon all. there was absolutely nothing patriotic about it. all it wanted, was a lien upon the industries of the world, that would produce a steady income in the shape of interest. "in this country, we had a republican form of government and with our vast area of public lands the people were more independent by far than the people of any other country ever had been, notwithstanding the fact that they were robbed unmercifully by the private banks which issued notes and then suspended so that the notes which the people had accepted for their property became worthless. at frequent intervals, these bank panics reduced thousands of people to bankruptcy. but the country was new and land could be had for the asking, so when pressed to the wall, as it were, in the more populous districts along the eastern border, they came west on the public lands, made new homes and soon accumulated another competency. it is not strange that this international gold power of the world cast longing eyes upon a country that was so productive, and could recover so rapidly from industrial depressions and financial disasters. "for nearly one hundred years after the establishment of our republic, notwithstanding the prevalent 'wild cat' banking system as it was called and the absurd reverence for the so-called precious metals, the people of this country were practically independent of the great gold power which had its headquarters in atlan. while the founders of the republic had made gold and silver coin the standard money of the country, they reserved the right to issue treasury notes and also to make them a legal tender, and as there was no great debt, and land could be had for the asking, the economic independence of the people could not be entirely crushed out, and therefore altruria offered an effectual barrier to the encroachments of the gold power. before the people could be actually subjugated financially, a vast bonded debt must be created, and in order to induce the people to agree to such a debt, the life of the republic must be placed in jeopardy. a foreign war was not to be thought of, as it would arouse to fever heat all of the innate democratic hatred against aristocratic rule of every name and description, but a war between the states would serve the same purpose. "the conditions that made such an interstate struggle possible, had unintentionally been provided for by the founders of the republic. at the time when the republic was established the colored people were held as slaves in nearly all of the original colonies. this institution was regarded by the founders of the republic, as inconsistent with the spirit of its institutions, and it was unsparingly denounced as the 'sum of all villainies' by a large number; and one state after another emancipated its slaves, and new free states were admitted, until the country was practically half slave and half free. "in the manufacturing states uncultured slave labor was not profitable and hence there was but little objection to its abolition. but in the agricultural states such labor was valuable, as the old world furnished an unfailing market for all the surplus products. the gold power of atlan took advantage of the situation to sow the seeds of discord between the two sections. "missionaries were sent into the manufacturing states, papers established and literature distributed appealing to the sympathies of the people in behalf of the slaves and creating a public sentiment against the slaveholding states. these anti-slavery missionaries came in the name of religion and humanity and it cannot be denied that ample grounds existed for all that could be said against chattel slavery, but the purposes for which the anti-slavery agitation was used by the gold power were, if possible, to destroy the republic, or failing in this, involve the country in an interstate war and induce the patriotic lovers of liberty to consent to the establishment of a vast bonded debt. "another class of missionaries were sent into the slaveholding states and another class of literature circulated, proclaiming that 'cotton is king' and that if free trade with all the world was established, the planters would be the wealthiest and happiest people on earth. that all that stood in the way was the union with the anti-slavery states, which sought to abolish the 'peculiar institution' that enabled the planters to produce such a magnificent surplus, which the old world stood ready to take in unlimited quantities, at high prices in gold, just as soon as free trade could be established. to secure this grand victory for agriculture, all that was needed was to dissolve the union with the anti-slavery states and their pet hobby of tariff duties on imported goods. "both sections of the country were flooded with literature, all of which contained enough of truth to make it attractive to honest people, and enough of misrepresentation to engender the most bitter and antagonistic feelings between them. the institution of slavery was wrong, in and of itself, but the anti-slavery agitators ignored the fact that the masses of the slaves were not qualified for self-government, and that the perpetuity of free institutions depended upon the intelligence of the voters. they did not try to convert the slaveholding states to the policy of educating their slaves and preparing them for freedom, but they went to the non-slaveholding states and demanded the immediate and unconditional abolition of slavery in the other section. this was, as a matter of course, most exasperating to the people of the slave states who in their capacity as independent states felt themselves amply competent to attend to their own affairs. "in the political discussions of that time, half truths served all the purposes of full grown falsehoods as a means of deluding the people. the free trade agitators of the slave states were unqualifiedly right when they called attention to the fact that all import duties were a tax upon the people in proportion to their expenses instead of their incomes and were therefore unjust and oppressive to the great masses of the people; but they ignored the fact that the absolute free trade that did exist between all sections of the country was of vastly more importance to the slaveholding states, than free trade with any foreign country could possibly be. the manufacturing states of their own country were over two thousand miles nearer to them than the manufacturing countries of the old world, and that fact, with a fair compensation to labor would have given them an assured market for their surplus products without paying transportation charges both ways across the ocean. "but the leading object of these free trade agitators, was to appeal to the selfish impulses of the few who owned slaves, and to the race prejudices of the masses of non-slaveholders, by telling them that the abolitionists proposed to place them on terms of political and social equality with the slaves. they were taught to believe that under the prevailing tariff regulations, they were taxed for the special benefit of the 'mudsills' of the manufacturing states, who being low down in the social scale themselves wanted to bring the proud, chivalrous people of the slave states down to the level of their chattel slaves. "as a matter of fact, neither the producing masses of the free states or the non-slaveholders of the slave states had the remotest conception that the international gold power of atlan was taking advantage of the discussion of slavery and free trade through its paid agents, to sow the seeds of discord between the two sections of the great republic of the new world. and they permitted their resentments for fancied wrongs to be fanned into a flame of fierce indignation, which, as was intended, culminated in a bloody strife and the creation of a vast bonded debt. "this fratricidal struggle lasted nearly five years, and when it ended, the people found themselves in debt, billions of dollars, to a class of people who had speculated on their necessities. the unsuspecting masses on both sides had bared their breasts to the storm of battle, endured all the privations and suffered all the losses, and were in debt for all the expenses of the war including their own services, to an international money power which ruled the world. "in order to carry on the war, paper money was issued and paid out to the soldiers, sailors and citizens for their services. this money performed all the functions of gold and notwithstanding the fact that the people were engaged in a most destructive war, it stimulated all branches of business and brought on an era of great industrial prosperity. but after the war was over this same paper money which had been paid to the people as the original creditors of the government, and for which they had signed receipts in full for their services, was converted into interest bearing bonds, and these same soldiers, sailors and citizens were taxed to pay to those who speculated on their necessities in the hour of danger, the same debt that had originally been due to themselves, and for which they had received legal tender paper money. "but had the process of funding the legal tender debt paying medium of the country into bonds ceased at this point, the international gold power of the world would never have been able to financially subjugate the people of this country, as under the law creating the bonds, the debt was payable in legal tender paper money. so another step must be taken. the debt had been created and a large portion of the money had been burned, but the bonds did not call for gold, except for interest. hence a law was enacted resuming specie payments, and the bonds were made payable in coin, and now the people who had taken paper dollars for their services in saving the union, were taxed to pay gold dollars to the money kings for the paper dollars they had received. "we can scarcely conceive at this distant day, how it was possible for our ancestors to have been so stupid, as not to see through this outrage that was perpetrated upon them, but nevertheless, history records the fact that for thirty odd years after this bare faced legalised robbery had been committed, a vast majority of men were voting their approval, which was proclaimed throughout the world as the triumph of patriotic statesmanship. "as the direct result of this kind of financial legerdemain, which converted the debt-paying medium of the country into an interest-bearing debt, the wages of labor and the prices of products steadily declined, business enterprises were wound up in bankruptcy at the rate of more than one thousand per month and millions of workmen were forced into idleness and thronged the highways in all parts of the country, demoralized, degraded and becoming a sure menace to civilization. "as a result of the war between the states, chattel slavery had been abolished, but another form of industrial servitude, the wage system, had fallen heir to all of its worst features. the owners of the chattel slaves had the power to be oppressive and cruel, but personal interest demanded that the slave should always be provided with food, shelter and raiment, while the wage slave could be turned out to starve when from sickness, age of any other cause it was more profitable to dispense with his services. the wage slave, who must work or starve was serving a much more exacting and cruel master than the most heartless owner of chattel slaves ever could have been. in the great sphere of human servitude the tables had been completely turned. while the slave owner had always been very careful not to give his chattel slaves an opportunity to run away, the wage slave very often lived in a perpetual dread that his master would pay him off and tell him to go. "conditions such as these could not fail to arouse a widespread feeling of dissatisfaction and as every man had a vote, political agitation was the logical result of the situation and politicians were kept busy in defending old policies and proposing new ones, all for the professed purpose of securing better conditions for the great masses of the people. a slight glance at a few of the popular economic and political ideas of that time indicates the average status of popular intelligence, and is therefore useful in tracing the evolutionary forces which were operating at that time for the elimination of selfishness and the establishment of equity in human affairs. "as the times grew harder, the politicians of the old school told the people that the over production of wealth was the cause of all their poverty and distress, and for a time the great masses seemed to be satisfied with this explanation. they did not pause to inquire how it was possible for them to produce so much food and clothing and build so many houses, and for that reason be compelled to go hungry, dress in rags and be without shelter. "further on, this same class of politicians told the people that what they needed was to make their silver and paper money redeemable in gold and then they would have a dollar that would purchase more, and a majority of the people decided in favor of the gold standard. they did not reflect, that the larger the purchasing power of the dollar might be, the more of their labor it would require in order to get the dollar, and so without understanding what they were doing, the laboring masses of the country actually voted to decrease the money earning power of their own labor. but had they decided in favor of more money, while their wages would have gone up, their cost of living would have increased and they would not have been materially benefited except incidentally, as a part of the great debtor class, which was required to pay interest as part of the price of everything purchased for consumption. and we may add, that but for the fact that the great masses who produced wealth by their labor, constituted a debtor class, the advantages and disadvantages between a larger or smaller volume of money, would have formed a perfect equation, and the condition of the masses would neither have been better nor worse, as in either case, the banks would have determined the amount that was permitted to circulate among the people, by making or withholding loans as might at the time, best promote their own interests. "while the gold power was international in its character, and not loyal to any country, it always took an active interest in moulding the opinions of the dominant political parties of all countries. it was necessary for it to have at least two favorites among the dominant parties, so that by turns they might spring reforms, so-called, based on half truths, to attract the constantly increasing number of dissatisfied voters. the demand for an increased volume of money in order to raise the wages of labor and the price of farm products was a question of this character, and it was sufficient to sidetrack and head off a more searching investigation as to the real causes of poverty. this was met by the demand for a better quality of money that would purchase more goods. the arguments in favor of both, contained half truths which were dwelt upon with great force, but the success of either, still left the gold power, directly or indirectly, in a position to control the situation. "the same thing was true in regard to the tariff question which the gold power made a dominant issue between its favorite parties. the question itself could be used to call attention away from the question of finance, which had a more direct bearing upon the vital matter of exchange and was therefore more likely to educate the people to a point where they could no longer be deluded by an ingenious discussion of half truths. this question, in order to be made available for the purposes of the gold power, must necessarily have two seemingly antagonistic political parties to go before the people. one party advocated a tariff-for-revenue, with free trade arguments, while the other advocated a tariff-for-protection, and appealed to the laboring classes to maintain liberal wages for themselves by voting for a high tariff that would exclude foreign goods. "the positions taken by these parties were about equally delusive and neither would have in the least delayed the dangerous encroachments of the gold power. a tariff-for-revenue could in no sense be a free trade party, but it did propose to raise revenue by duties on imports. this duty would of course be paid by the people as part of the price of the goods which they consumed, and hence the tax would be in proportion to their expenses without any reference to their incomes. those who expended their entire incomes in consumption would be taxed upon the whole, while those who expended only a small fraction, would be taxed only on the fraction so expended. as a system of taxation it is difficult to conceive of one that would be more unequal in its bearings, and more oppressive to people of small incomes. "on the other hand the tariff-for-protection party, proposed to make the duties on imports so high that foreign productions would be kept out, and the home market secured to the employers of home labor. this, it was claimed, would enable the employers of labor to pay higher wages, which was true; but the selfishness of the heartless employer, was always in favor of keeping wages at a minimum and the noble, generous, employer could not afford to pay any more. if he did, his heartless competitor would undersell him in the market and destroy his business. hence we are not surprised that statistics proved the tendency of wages to be toward a minimum under both parties--that is, a sum barely sufficient to provide food, clothing and shelter, and to enable the workman to raise other toilers to take his place when he was no longer able to work. "under this tariff-for-protection policy, the revenues raised were just as oppressive and unjust to people of small incomes as under the policy of 'a tariff for revenue only,' but with this additional burden, that the increased price of home products was assessed upon the people in the same unequal manner. but on the other side, more home labor could be employed, which benefited the workmen in protected industries at the expense of the classes which were not protected. of course, even the tariff-for-protection party which had so much to say in favor of holding the home market for home products, never seriously intended to exclude foreign products, as that would have put an end to all revenue. "these delusive theories of a tariff for revenue and a tariff for protection, served the purposes of the gold power, by calling the attention of the people away from the real difficulty which stood in the way of wealth producers. all that the people needed was an opportunity to apply their labor to natural resources, and be able to exchange their products for products of equal value, produced by the labor of others. the foreign trade of the country was a matter of small importance compared with the home trade. if at almost any time during the latter part of the transition period, the people of this country had been guaranteed just such rations as were provided for soldiers, or even convicts, there would have been no surplus for exportation; and had the whole people been provided with all the clothing that was needed to keep them well clad, it would have taken the entire product of wool, flax, cotton and leather. but the press of that day, religious as well as secular, was to such a large extent under the control of the gold power, that facts such as these were kept away from the masses of the people. and it may be added in this connection, that the educational system of the country was controlled by this same power to suppress the truth on economic questions, and many eminent scholars were removed from professorships in the higher institutions of learning, because they refused to teach such sophistries as suited the purposes of the gold power. "in our very brief mention of the political agitations of that time we have only referred to the leading measures advocated by the dominant political parties. it is due however to even that benighted age to state, that at every step taken by the international gold power to financially conquer the world, a few of the more enlightened and self-sacrificing spirits, boldly exposed the financial wrongs which were being perpetrated against the people for the still further enrichment of the money kings of the old world and their agents and co-workers in the great centers of wealth in this country. but these courageous, clear headed and humanity loving pioneers of a higher civilization were frowned down as dangerous agitators and enemies of law and order, and every foul epithet was applied to them. if in business, they were boycotted, and if belonging to the ranks of labor, they were blacklisted and in many cases imprisoned on false charges, and some were even executed for crimes which they did not commit. and yet the measures of reform they advocated along political lines were usually of such a nature that had they been enacted into law they would only have prolonged, for a few decades perhaps, the false system which pauperized and degraded the toiling millions. "so much for the political agitations which had for their ostensible object the improvement of the economic condition of the great masses of the people. yet they did much good as a means of educating the more intelligent into a better understanding of the situation, and revealed the apparently utter hopelessness of ever being able to secure necessary reforms by political action, as no matter how pure at first might be the objects of a political party, just as soon as it was successful, and offices were in sight, the work of corruption set in and its principles became subordinate in the minds of its leaders, to the more profitable occupation of office seeking. "but other more potent factors than political agitation, were at work among the masses in the shape of great industrial organizations of farmers and wage-workers. these organizations as a rule were strictly non-political. the farmers sought to secure higher prices for the products of the farm without any regard for the interests of the millions of wage-workers and others upon whom they depended for a market. another object of the farmers was to reduce their cost of living by securing lower prices on their implements and other supplies. by concentrating their trade and taking advantage of the competition between dealers they often succeeded in securing very much reduced prices on goods, and this furnished what was regarded as a legitimate excuse for reducing the wages of the employes engaged in their manufacture. this reduction of wages crippled the market for farm products and offended both the employer and the workmen, so in the end the farmers defeated themselves and succeeded in arraying all other classes of people against them. "but it was the wage-workers who suffered the most from the great oligarchy of wealth which had been established in the name of the people for the express purpose of exacting profits from the industrial classes. they organized trade unions which ultimately federated into one great national organization with a view to securing higher wages and fewer hours of labor without any regard to the interests of the consumers of their products. the number of workmen in these trade unions were at all times but a small fraction of the multitude which depended upon wages. as a rule the purposes and methods of these labor organizations were in practice, if not in theory, based upon the same false principles that characterized the industrial despotism against which they were protesting. selfishness was a distinguishing characteristic and a fatal defect. the skilled workman who had employment, cared but little for the non-union workman of his own craft except as a possible competitor for his job, and nothing whatever for the great masses of common laborers who were so numerous and so poor that organization could do them no good as a means of maintaining wages. the union workman recognized no interest in common with the unemployed outside of his own fraternity. "instead of banding together to devise ways and means by which all could find employment, the trade unions sought only to secure work and maintain wages for the comparatively small number who were members in good standing. hence in case of strikes and lockouts the unemployed workmen were actuated by the same selfish motives and did not hesitate to take their places whenever they could be protected from violence. and whenever they did so, the union workmen made war upon them. while they recognized the relation of master and servant as one that was to be perpetuated, they denied the right of the 'scabs' as they were called, to accept employment from their masters, no matter how destitute they might be. "neither did they question the right of employers, who in the days of the old civilization were principally powerful corporations, to control the enactment and the enforcement of the laws. as a rule, the workmen divided their voting power between the political parties which were controlled by their masters. with such evident inability to grasp the situation in which they were placed, it is not strange that the employers were enabled to obtain absolute control of every branch of government, state and national, legislative, executive and judicial, notwithstanding the fact that every laborer had a vote which counted just as much as that of the most wealthy corporation magnate. conspiracy laws were enacted which could be used for their suppression as occasion required. the right of trial by jury was denied by the courts, and the champions of labor were imprisoned for long terms for disobeying the mandates of the courts. finally the supreme court, in the case of a sailor who had refused to serve for the period for which he had hired, decided that his employer had a right to hold him in bondage until the expiration of the contract; that the ownership over himself had ceased for the time specified, and that the constitutional provision which prohibited involuntary servitude did not apply to such as him. one of the labor papers of that time characterized this opinion of the court as the 'fugitive sailor decision,' a name by which it is known in the history of those dark days of the transition period. "but unfriendly legislation and one-sided court decisions, were not the only factors in crushing the hopes of labor. this was a period of wonderful scientific discoveries of natural forces and mechanical inventions by which they could be utilized in saving labor. the grandmothers who boasted that they could spin three miles of thread in one day, from sunrise to sunset, lived to see their little granddaughters spin three thousand miles in ten hours with the aid of machinery. similar improvements were introduced into every branch of industry. the machinery belonged to the employer and he added the saving to his profit. he did not need so many workmen to produce all that the people were able to purchase, and the workmen were dismissed to join the mighty army of the unemployed. for a time certain skilled workmen were enabled to maintain living wages by means of organization, but continued improvements in machinery ultimately enabled common laborers to take their places, and reduced the number of experts required, to such a degree, that their condition was but little better than that of the unskilled. among the best paid organizations of the olden time was the locomotive engineers, but ultimately, electricity took the place of steam, and a motor-man from the ranks of common labor took the places of both an engineer and a fireman. the machine displaced three-fourths of the printers at first, and later a still larger number of what remained, by introducing the principles of multiplex telegraphy, which enabled one expert to operate machines at the same time in a number of separate offices in different parts of the world whenever the copy was the same. "labor economists called attention to this displacement of labor by machinery, but the press and the politicians in the service of the corporations claimed, that this cheapening of production was of great benefit to the people by securing a corresponding reduction in prices. finally, after a persistent agitation for years, the national commissioner of labor was required to make a careful examination, and in his report, among a multitude of similar items, we find that the labor cost of a five-dollar hat was only thirty-four cents; a ten-dollar plow, seventy-nine cents and so on to the end of a long catalogue of commodities which the people always needed. the question was, who got the difference between the amount received by the actual producer and the price paid by the consumer? the answer was self-evident; outside of clerk hire, it must have gone to pay profits in some form to non-producers. but after this official demonstration that the 'lion's share' of the wealth created by productive labor went to nonproducing speculators, the great masses of the people still continued to use their influence to perpetuate this inequitable system which practically confiscated the wealth created by their labor to pay profits on speculative investments. "the mass of the small dealers of that time were no better off, in many respects, than the wealth producing laborers, but being in some sense a part of the profit-exacting system, they held to it longer, in the vain hope that a time might come when by some fortuitous turn in business, or lucky speculation, they could amass millions. as a class they had never devoted themselves to an earnest and careful study of economic questions, but as long as the people came and purchased goods and left a profit in their hands, they were satisfied, and paid no attention to the far reaching influences which were surely paving the way to their ultimate failure in business. hence it was not until just before the end of the old civilization that they began to realize that something was the matter. sharp competition among the large number of small dealers reduced the average profits below a fair compensation for the labor expended, and large combines with unlimited money capital, were able to meet the universal demand for cheap goods. the dealers were finding themselves crowded out of business. they blamed their customers for not giving them the preference, even if the large department stores could afford to sell for less. they demanded legislation against the large stores and took an active interest in the anti-trust agitation of the time. "this opposition to trusts and department stores, like the farmer's organizations and trade unions, took a very narrow view of the situation. they saw their profits decreasing and their sole object was to prevent this, without any reference to the interests of the people who as purchasers of goods must pay all the profits. the masses of the people understood their motives and did not hesitate to patronize department stores and purchase trust products, provided they could get them for less. they might have been able to protect themselves from the inordinate greed of the trusts and combines, by taking their customers into partnership and with their assistance organizing consumption and thus controlling distribution for the equal benefit of all. this would have been in exact accordance with the ideal that had been handed down in their system of religion, that we should always do unto others as we would have them do unto us. "the entire history of altruria as an independent republic belongs to the transition period in the progress of the world and in a larger, but not so well defined a sense it extends to the discovery of the continent, and even to an earlier period, distinguished by the breaking up of the ancient religious hierarchy and the introduction of a constantly increasing number of warring sects. these were the evolutionary forces developed under the operations of natural law, in strict accordance with the constitution of the human mind, which always tends towards the utmost possible development of the race, physically, mentally and morally. these forces in the early stages of human development, work so slowly, that even the best trained intellects do not discover their existence and hence have no power to intelligently co-operate with them, with a view to accelerating their own progress upward toward the highest possible planes of development. but, it was during the last fifty years of this transition period, that all these forces became more apparent to the careful historian, and it is these to which i have more particularly directed your attention. "human selfishness on the lower planes of development constitutes the first step in the development of that higher selfhood, which is the predominating characteristic on the higher planes. during the last fifty years of the transition period, human selfishness, in the baser sense, was making its last struggle for existence as the controlling factor in human affairs. all classes of people were inspired to action by selfish interests, and these interests could not fail to clash. out of this clashing between forces they ultimately learned that the best and highest interest of every individual could always be secured by carefully guarding the interest of every other individual. out of this was evolved our present universal rule, which governs our relations towards each other, of 'each for all and all for each,' and hence all are equally secure in the exercise of every natural right and in the possession of absolute economic independence. "the gold power sought for and secured universal dominion over all the nations of the earth and there being no other nations to conquer, in its inordinate greed, it continued to impose additional burdens upon the people. this met opposition, first from one class and then from another, but all these movements were animated by the same element of selfishness which characterized the gold power. the farmers organized to secure better conditions for themselves without any regard to the interests of the millions of wage workers and others upon whom they depended for a market. the workmen organized to secure better wages for the members of their unions with no regard for any other class of people, or even for other workmen who did not belong to their fraternity. at the close of the old system the small dealers and manufacturers were unanimous against the encroachments of the vast combines who could undersell them, but they ignored the interests of the great mass of consumers upon whom they depended for a market. selfishness, in the baser sense, guaranteed the failure of all these movements. no one class of people, seeking to promote its own selfish interests was able to hold its own against the superior intelligence of the great financiers who had planned to financially conquer the world by controlling the world's supply of gold through an organized system of creating debts both actual, for borrowed money, and constructive as investments which exacted tribute from the wealth producing classes. this process of debt creating continued until in this country the entire volume of sixteen hundred millions of money of all kinds would have paid but a fraction of the annual charge for interest, dividends, etc., upon investments and all the gold in the world, about $ , , , would have paid but a fraction of the principal. "but another, and in the end the most potent evolutionary force which was destined to emancipate the people, was the arousing of the moral sense of large numbers who had never turned their attention to the study of economic science but whose souls revolted at the conditions imposed upon vast multitudes of people. the gold power while still a mighty factor in the control of the religious press and a large number of the leading religious teachers of the country, was not able to still the voice of the truest disciples of krystus, and these demanded that the spirit of the founder of their religion should be exemplified in the practical every day affairs of life. they well understood that if the people were doing to each other as they would have others do to them, there could be no such thing as poverty, with all its tendencies towards vice and crime. these pioneers of a diviner civilization, with nothing but a theological training, were perhaps not clear in their own minds, as to just how this golden rule could be applied in business under the prevailing financial and commercial systems of the country, but they did believe that the ideal in every human relation could be realized, and they insisted that the effort should be made by every true follower of krystus, to establish the dominion of good upon earth to the end that righteousness might prevail in human affairs. "for this grand culmination, the operation of the evolutionary forces for the last fifty years had been a post-graduate course for the workers who were to set the machinery in motion, on the material plane, by which all the crushing burdens imposed by greed could be easily and speedily removed. and in this course, the mistakes made by the people had been the most potent educators. the producing classes had been induced to organize because they felt that they were not getting their just share in the distribution of wealth; but to save that which was lost in the distribution, they made the strange mistake of organizing as producers. the farmer had no need of an organization, to enable him to produce more wealth. the soil would produce just as much without such organization as with it. the same thing was true of mechanics, miners and other wage-workers, who organized in their capacity of wealth producers. but as consumers they could all stand on one platform, and being the market upon which all producers must depend, they would be masters of the situation. with an equal distribution of the benefits of such organization of consumption, it would be just as easy to pay dividends to labor, and thus increase their share in the distribution, as it was to pay dividends on capitalistic investments. "so it was, that at a time when every thing seemed hopeless, the few who never yield to disappointments, and who had made an exhaustive study of existing economic conditions reinforced the earnest followers of krystus who were demanding the application of the golden rule in business by formulating methods by which this much desired result could be attained. they had studied the moral problem that confronted the religionists, from the objective side, and understood just how it must be solved along business lines. inasmuch as all material wealth was created by labor, and distributed by being bought and sold, it followed as a logical sequence, that there was but one way by which every useful worker could secure a just share in the distribution, and that was to take charge of the business of exchange (buying and selling) and divide the benefits equally among all who united their efforts to establish the largest possible round of exchange between producers and consumers. this was simply the organization of the market for the express purpose of establishing equity in distribution, by paying dividends to labor. the people had at last discovered the vital truth upon which the application of the golden rule depends, that organized consumption controls distribution. "organizations of consumers were effected with a view to concentrating their purchasing power through channels of their own, not to reduce prices, but to pool the net profits into a common fund for the equal benefit of all the members. a portion of this was set aside as an educational fund to extend the work, and the remainder was used to pay dividends to the members who, as customers, had paid the profits into the common treasury. this was known as the "dividend to labor," and it was always distributed equally, as it had been secured by the united purchasing power of all the members. and, in order to secure this fund, which belonged alike to all, no member had added one cent to his or her cost of living. it was all a saving, as between the new equitable system of exchange and the old and wasteful profit system. this was a profit-saving business machine of which the producers who constituted, in the main, the great markets of the world, could not be deprived, and with this, it became a matter of indifference as to who had immediate control of the labor-saving machinery of production. "this movement had its origin in the west where the people were more inclined to think for themselves, but the benefits were so decided and so easily secured, that it spread rapidly. the first exchanges demonstrated that the use of money could be very largely minimized, and banks were established as depositories for all the money that came into their hands, and to facilitate their financial relations with unorganized communities where money was still a necessity. these savings of money, were held as a sacred trust, to enable the members to pay taxes, and debts, in cases where the creditor could not be induced to take products at a fair price. among themselves they used exchange certificates which were issued on the deposit of products or money, and for necessary labor. these certificates being issued on values which were seeking a market and redeemed in products needed for consumption and cancelled, constituted an ideal currency that was always just equal to the demand,--neither more nor less. "the people learned by experience how easy it was to minimize the use of money, and the tendency of this decrease in the demand for money, was to relatively increase the amount in circulation. it was easy now, for the most unfamiliar with business methods, to understand how the large operators, under the old system, had enriched themselves by making their settlements through great clearing houses where one obligation cancelled another and only two or three per cent. of money had been used to pay balances; and they could see how even this balance among wealth producers, could take the shape of a check against future production and money be entirely eliminated as a medium in the exchange of wealth. "all the people who were doing their buying and selling through these exchanges were regularly supplied with carefully prepared literature on economic questions and business methods, and of general information as to the trend of current events, the progress of the new order which placed business on an ethical basis and all matters of advantage for an independent, cultured citizenship to understand. then for the first time, the multitudes began to realize the weakness of the fragile thread by which they had been bound to the triumphal car of capitalism. their experience gave them confidence. they used the same business methods for the benefit of the many that had enabled the few to concentrate in their own hands four-fifths of the wealth of the country. it was therefore no untried experiment. they were only exercising the same kind of business sagacity that had been used by the money kings to financially conquer the world. just in proportion as they decreased the demand for money, it flowed in upon them in exchange for their products at a steadily increasing price. they had established a debt-paying instead of a debt-creating system of business, and in the course of time their debts were all paid, the necessity for legal money had disappeared, the people were free from its exactions, and all they had to do was to produce what they consumed and consume what they produced, exchanging equivalent for equivalent for the equal benefit of all. and thus the world had been saved from its thralldom to greed by the establishment of the 'kingdom of god and his righteousness' as had been enjoined by krystus at the beginning of the old religious system two thousand years before. this which was enjoined at the beginning of the dispensation was realized at its close and hence the first became the last, because the last was the first reduced to practice in human affairs." chapter xiii. bona dea--matron's home--pre-natal influences--improving the airships--battell explains--plans for the future--museum of universal history--relics of the past--building toward our ideals--law of human progress--presaging the future--profit causes poverty--equitable exchange the remedy. [illustration] as i listened to norrena's description of the financial and commercial system which had once existed in altruria, i could not help but notice its close similarity to the system which prevailed in the outer world. as he elucidated the international and seemingly unlimited power that had been exercised by the owners of gold, and how it would take all the gold in the world to pay a small fraction of the annual interest on the obligations held against the people, my heart sank within me at the utter hopelessness of their condition. i was expecting to hear that the people in their desperation had blotted this power from the earth with fire and sword, but the speaker finished with merely a description of a more equitable system of transacting business. just as he had come to this most interesting place in the discussion, the institute closed and took a recess for dinner, and macnair began to introduce us to the superintendents of many of the large educational institutions of the country who were members. as we were leaving the hall oqua joined us, accompanied by a magnificent looking woman whom she introduced to me as bona dea, the superintendent of the matron's home at lake byblis, saying: "my dear nequa, i want you to learn that in altruria we commence the education of children before they are born. this is what these matron's homes are established for, and bona dea is superintendent of one of the oldest, largest and most thoroughly equipped institutions of this kind in the world. i want you to make her acquaintance, and i doubt not that you will become fast friends." "i am indeed glad to meet you," i said, "as i want to learn all that i can about these, to me, strange educational institutions." "and i," said bona dea, "shall be happy to give you any information in my power. oqua informs me that you are preparing a book descriptive of our civilization, and i am much interested as an altrurian in what it may present to the people of the outer world." "yes," i said. "and by all means, i want it to contain a review of these matron's homes, and all that can be learned in regard to their origin, and the good they are designed to accomplish for humanity." "that, indeed," said bona dea, "would constitute a most important volume in a series, but it should not be the first one in a thorough treatment of the evolutionary forces which work for the development of the race toward higher and better conditions." "then," i said, "would you have me ignore this, to me, most singular system of commencing the education of children before they are born?" "there is nothing singular about the system," said bona dea. "even the savages of the olden time did the same thing, but they did not know it. the mothers were surrounded by the conditions of savagery, and their children were born predisposed to become savages. these pre-natal influences are in fact the commencing point in the education of every child that is born, as they pre-dispose the child to a life of usefulness, or the reverse, according to the character of the influences. the object which our matron's homes are designed to accomplish is to provide the best possible conditions, to start the child with a strong, healthy body and mind, with a kindly disposition and elevated aspirations toward the highest possible intellectual and moral development." "if such results," i said, "can be secured by the establishment of these homes, you certainly would not dissuade me from an exhaustive review of the entire question?" "certainly not," she said, "but as a teacher of your people i would have you follow the natural law and begin your work at the beginning. from what i can learn, your own country is now passing through its transition period, similar to that described in norrena's lecture, and hence the first great duty of your people is to abolish poverty. when the fear of want is removed from every household the first effect will be to place better pre-natal conditions around the mothers, and the next generation will be placed on a higher plane physically, intellectually and morally. this is the first step that your people must take and then the home may be introduced for the scientific adaptation of pre-natal influences to specific purposes. then you will begin to determine in advance whether the child shall be an inventor, scientist, philosopher, poet, musician, teacher or explorer. the homes are scientifically adapted to specific purposes, while economic independence and general education lift the entire people to a higher plane of being along every line of human effort. what your people need now, is the general, mental and moral uplifting of the victims of your present system, and to this end, my advice to you would be, to confine your first work to the solution of the problem, 'how to abolish poverty.'" "but would you," i asked, "discourage these specific measures at this time because the masses are poor?" "of course not," said bona dea, "for those who are able to apply them, but i would first place these advanced scientific methods within the reach of the entire people by establishing economic independence for all. this is simply following the natural law of human development." "will you," i asked, "please explain just what you regard as the natural law of human development?" "it is the law of growth," said bona dea, "and always begins at the base and works its way upward. the plant germinates in the earth and then pushes its way upward towards the light. the growth of the animal organism from conception to maturity is along the same line of progression, from the bottom of the scale, toward the top. in the growth of human civilization and the mental, moral and spiritual elevation of the race, the same general law of evolution holds good. the elevating influence must reach the people through their environments. the real man and the real woman, is the ego or spirit. the physical body is the outermost environment of the individual being. by improving the physical conditions we stimulate the mental organism into a healthy activity, and the result is intellectual growth, and spiritual unfoldment. such is the natural law of human progress from the physical through the mental to its culmination in the spiritual or divine, which is the very highest type to which we aspire." "this," i said, "looks like a concise and logical statement of the natural law, but how do you apply it to the present conditions which exist in my own country? we have a civilization and many very intelligent, well meaning and well to do people who might be greatly benefited by a better understanding of the influences of pre-natal conditions." "doubtless that is true," she replied, "but your duty as a teacher is to take the whole people into consideration and not a part, and in your work for their enlightenment begin at the bottom of the scale. your present civilization was developed along the lines of unconscious growth, jest as the child grows from birth to maturity. but your work as a teacher and civilizer is to work along conscious lines and lay your plans with due deliberation. having, as it were, reached the top, you are able to give instruction to those who are lower down and help them to climb higher. the place of the teacher is one which demands that you should understand the natural law of growth, so that you may work to the best advantage. hence your work is to begin with the outer environment, the physical, and that which pertains to the higher will take care of itself. it is not the whole, but the sick, who need the physician, so it is not the wise, but the ignorant who need the teacher. for these reasons i advise you to confine your present work more to the economic, as that would prepare the field for the higher, and that, just where it is most needed, among the poor." "i think i comprehend your meaning," i said, "and shall act accordingly in the preparation of my first volume on altrurian civilization. oqua's advice was very similar, but situated as i am here, these numerous lines of thought press in upon me all at once, and there is so much to learn, that i often find it difficult to make a selection. i am sure that the people of my own native land are passing through their transition period, and i am anxious to give them that which will do them the most good." "then," interposed norrena, who had joined us, "show them how to get rid of poverty. without economic independence, political independence and personal liberty, under the law, are a hollow mockery. there can be no progress without freedom, and there can be no freedom as long as a people are driven to their work by the stern lash of necessity." "but how is it," i asked, "that you have such a realizing sense of the horrors of poverty, when you have always had an abundance?" "because it is the one great object," said norrena, "of our educational training and of our altrurian civilization to provide against want, and to relieve distress wherever found. every student in our schools is required to make a careful study of our transition period, the helpless, hopeless condition of the poverty stricken masses, and the methods by which they got out, and which must be continued in order to stay out." "but why," i asked, "do you now, after centuries of abundance, still make these lessons so prominent in your educational system?" "because," said norrena, "we are still on the physical plane, and if we do not guard against them by every means in our power, these physical evils may again overtake us. we know for a fact that eternal vigilance is the price that we must pay for the preservation of our present blessings." "but constituted as your people are," i said, "with their readiness to relieve distress under all circumstances, i should think that you have no cause to fear a return of the old systems of oppression." "certainly not," said norrena, "so far as this generation is concerned, but should we neglect the education of the rising generation in regard to these matters, we would begin to go back toward those conditions. there is no danger so long as we do our duty as educators, and keep alive the finer sensibilities of the soul. we did not reach our present condition at one bound, and if we were to go back it would not be all at once; but it is the duty of our teachers, to see that we do not take a single step backwards. hence, we educate." we had now reached the department of public comfort where we were making our home during our stay in orbitello. after dinner, battell informed us that he intended to start within an hour to lake byblis, and that before he left, he desired to have some definite understanding as to our plans for future work. "then," said norrena, "you had better join me in my rooms and talk the matter over. i feel deeply interested in your plans for opening communication with the outer world. so if it is agreeable, come with me." we accepted the invitation, and were soon discussing what was now the leading thought in our minds--the improvement of the airships with a view to forming a connection between the inner and the outer worlds. battell explained his plans for constructing a ship that could be moved in any direction, the power to be applied instantaneously, so as to be able to meet all the contingencies of a storm and contending currents of air. then plans were discussed for protecting the occupants from intense cold. for this purpose, i had plans of my own which i did not divulge. several ways were proposed for making the vessel proof against cold, but i saw at a glance, that with all of them, the freezing moisture on the inside, would so obstruct the vision as to very materially interfere with the proper guidance of the vessel. "before i left," said battell, "i gave plans and specifications for an entirely new ship, that i want you to test in a storm, if you can find one, and report as soon as possible. captain ganoe has agreed to go with me and assist in its completion. as soon as it is ready i will let you know. will you come to lake byblis and start from there? or shall i send it to some other point? what will be your address?" "i have made no arrangements for the future," i said, "that will in the least interfere with the proposed trial trip to the southern verge. i think, however, i had better remain here a few days, as there are some questions that i want to study, and to that end, i shall take a look through the museum of universal history." "well, get your book ready," said battell, "and we will find the means to send it where it will do the most good." "i have sufficient material ready," i said, "for a number of books, but the question now is, how much out of the great abundance, shall i select to go with an account of our discoveries?" "well, i should think," said battell, "that you could not send a very large proportion of what you can find in a single one of these exhibits, to say nothing of the libraries; but do your best. i have work that must be completed, in order to make yours available, so good-bye, and may success attend you." captain ganoe, macnair and iola accompanied battell to lake byblis, and norrena, oqua and myself went to the museum. this was a most magnificent structure, situated on the river, on a point of land where the river leaves orbitello and makes a sharp turn toward the east. the building was a hexagon, about feet in diameter, and the foundation had been excavated down to the level of the water, which gave one-half the building the appearance of extending out into the river. in the center of the building was an inlet for boats for which there was a spacious landing, enclosed by broad, marble steps on three sides. at the center, and each of the six corners, was an elevator which connected with each floor. around what may be regarded as the main building, was a broad extension in the form of an inclined floor, that communicated at frequent intervals with the several stories, either on the level of the floors or by easy flights of steps. on the periphery of this inclined spiral floor, was a railing. the whole of the external structure was supported by massive and highly ornamented columns of aluminum which reflected the light like burnished silver. in the center, and supported from above, was a double track electric tramway, with cars moving each way at short intervals. this arrangement gave the entire floor space to pedestrians and those using electric chairs and other small vehicles. the lower stories of this immense building, up to the level of the bluff, contained supplies of all kinds, required by those engaged in river transportation. the upper stories of the building were devoted to the preservation of relics and records commemorative of past civilizations and taken altogether, presented to the eye a complete history of man's progressive development along every line from the earliest period of recorded history. this wonderful exhibit, enabled the student to trace, by means of practical illustrations, the progress of the mechanical arts, from the original crude contrivances to the present high state of development under which drudgery was unknown, and the people were in the full enjoyment of all the comforts of life with a minimum of labor. it is no part of my intention to attempt to give more than the most cursory mention of this wonderful exhibition of industrial progress. one feature, however, impressed me most and that was the striking similarity in these exhibits, to the much smaller ones, which i had visited in the outer world. the methods which had prevailed in the different stages of civilization, were almost identical with those prevailing in the corresponding stage of outer world development. in water craft for instance, the raft of logs bound together with thongs and propelled by poles came first, followed by canoes hollowed out of logs. then smaller boats with oars, and growing in dimensions until they assumed the shape of roman galleys and the ships of the northmen. then sails were introduced and later, steam became the motor power. so, of the methods of land transportation. the sledge and ox-cart were followed in time by the stage coach, this by the electric car, and last came the airship. i asked norrena to explain this remarkable similarity. "this," said he, "only indicates that human development along every line of progress is determined by the constitution of the human mind. knowing this, we have the key which explains all the mysteries connected with the progress of the race from lower to higher conditions. at every step it has been met by similar difficulties and hence the methods for overcoming these difficulties have been similar, because all have alike possessed the same mental constitution. this progress up to a certain point, has been along unconscious lines, and the average man and woman had no clear understanding of the influences which were impelling them forward. in every age, and in every condition of life, man has been building in the direction of his ideals, but never reaching them. in his primitive state, he felt the need of some means for crossing streams, and having observed that wood floated upon the water, he constructed a raft. from this he formed the plan of a boat, and constructed a canoe. as he improved in the direction of his ideals, these ideals became more exalted, and to-day we have the magnificent electric yacht. so it has been in every department of human effort. the higher the ideals which have been formed in the mind of man, the higher he has climbed in the scale of development. this is the fundamental law of human progress. every one of these relics of past ages was at first an ideal that had been formed in the human mind before it was realized." "a thought strikes me," i exclaimed. "if all these ideals have been realized, is it not a promise, or a prophecy, that our ideals of to-day, will be realized in the future? and if from the constitution of the human mind we could presage the ideals of the future, we could in a general way predict what the civilization of distant ages will develop." "certainly," said norrena. "your thought is strictly philosophical and applied to our immediate future it gives an infallible rule for presaging events where we are familiar with the forces impelling in a certain direction. if we can ascertain where we are to-day on any given line of progress, we can safely predict what the next step will be on the same line, for all things are possible to the human mind in its ultimate state of development. there is no such thing as actually turning back in the path of progress, much as man may seem to retrograde at times. the lessons taught by these seeming failures are essential elements in his still greater development further on. nothing that is useful can be permanently lost to the race. what we are inclined to call evil, is fleeting and fades away, while the good, the true and the really valuable is immortal. hence, human progress towards higher and better conditions, as applied to the race, and long periods of time, must ever be onward and upward toward the infinite good." "i have always," i said, "been deeply interested in everything pertaining to the progress of the race, but i have been inclined to regard it as somewhat a matter of chance. you seem to have reduced it to an exact science. i can understand how certain influences are necessarily toward improvement, but how is it that our elevation is assured when so many are unconscious of such a tendency, and in the outer world at least, multitudes seem to be bent upon getting lower instead of higher in the scale? i feel quite sure that the masses of our ancestors in the past, were no better than the masses now, and did not consciously co-operate with nature for their own improvement. it seems, however, that by some kind of a blind chance they may have contributed something, but it certainly was not intentional. i see a different influence working here and the people are evidently co-operating with nature for the good of all, but i fear that it will be a long time before the people of my own country will reach that stage of development." "do not be discouraged," said norrena. "the constitution of the human mind is a guarantee of human elevation. the history of human development presents two distinct stages, the unconscious and the conscious. all progress from the simple cell to the human being, is of course unconscious and is governed by fixed and immutable laws. these same laws control human development up to the point where knowledge enables the race to consciously participate in the work of its own elevation. as soon as the people are sufficiently developed to understand the operation of the laws which control their own unfoldment, they will enter upon an epoch of conscious progress by careful and well concerted measures. when at the close of the transition period our people reached that stage, the change for the better in every direction came suddenly upon the world, because the masses of mankind felt the need of something better. unconscious development had prepared them for the wonderful change. the blind forces which had been slowly urging man upward toward a higher plane of existence, now had the aid of careful and well devised methods, and the long ages of darkness disappeared in the blaze of light which was let in upon the world." "and from this," i said, "am i to infer that you think america is about ready for such an uplifting of the masses? your description this forenoon of the transition period of this country, would pass as an accurate delineation of the present condition in my own. the belief is widespread among thoughtful people in the united states that our country is on the eve of some great change. persons of an optimistic turn of mind believe that we are near the beginning of a higher, nobler and purer civilization than the people have ever enjoyed before, while the pessimistic are equally sure that we are destined to go back toward barbarism. i want so very much to be able to disseminate the light that will dispel this darkness from our future." "i think," said norrena, "that you have no cause for alarm. from what i can learn the optimists of your country are largely in the majority, and a general expectation of something better for humanity, is a powerful psychic force, to produce something better. if your people earnestly desire better things for the masses and at the same time believe that better things are in store for them, your future is most hopeful, as the people cannot fail to find out how to attain the object they are seeking." "thank you," i said. "but where is the light, and what can i do to shed it broadcast among them?" "the light," said norrena, "is latent in every human soul and is manifested in the readiness with which all classes of people render assistance to those who are placed in peril or are suffering from some great affliction. this is the light that is manifested in your charitable institutions and public hospitals for the relief of the poor and the physically infirm. when those who provide these institutions for the relief of suffering humanity learn how the sufferings which now appeal to their sympathies can be avoided, this latent light will be developed into a flame that will enlighten the whole earth and the darkness will disappear as if by magic." "but this," i said, "does not tell me how that latent light can be developed into such a flame. human sympathy has always existed, but as yet in the outer world it has not succeeded in removing the suffering which appeals to our sympathies. by what means can this be accomplished?" "by the discovery and application of the principles of equity in all of our relations toward each other," said norrena. "to assist you in this, i suggested that we take a look through this museum. in the relics of past ages which you find here, you can trace the operation of the fundamental laws of human progress. on this floor you have the works of man in his lowest condition. on the floor above, you find relics of a higher civilization. these have been classified as nearly as possible in their natural order, from the lowest to the highest, with a view to teaching the progressive development of the race in the most effective manner." "i realize the importance," i said, "of such a collection to every student. but all this comes before your transition period and i do not see its bearings upon the great problem of the present day in my own country--how to secure the same conditions which i find prevailing here." "as yet," said norrena, "you have only seen the relics of barbarism. this museum is twenty stories high above the level of the bluff on which it stands, and each story bears its record of the onward and upward progress of the race. the first were erected soon after the transition period, but others have been added since that time, to make room for the evidences of our progress. we will now ascend to the one devoted to the transition period." we stepped upon the elevator and in a moment more were ushered into one of the upper stories, and i found myself confronted by a display, such as would characterize a first-class exposition of the present day in the united states; with this difference, however; it represented the poverty and misery of the hovel as faithfully as it did the grandeur of the palace. everything seemed familiar and i felt as if i had been suddenly transported to new york or london. every feature of the competitive system of production and distribution was appropriately illustrated, together with the inevitable consequences to the people; wealth beyond the dreams of avarice for a favored few and hopeless poverty and degradation for the many. the clothing of the workmen in contrast with the gorgeous apparel of the fashionable bon ton; the furnishings of the hovels of the poor and the mansions of the rich placed side by side; the coarse and homely fare of the wealth producer compared with the dainty viands of the non-producer; all told more plainly than words the story of undeserved poverty, and in millions of cases, the abject want and misery of the most useful classes of society, in striking contrast with the unearned abundance of the idle, and for all practical purposes, the useless rich. the manner in which the wealth created by the toiling millions, passed through the channels of trade, into the possession of a few wealthy speculators, was illustrated by pictures and printed explanations, in almost endless variety, so that even the most obtuse observers, could not fail to get a clear idea of the practical workings of a system of commercial exchange, under the operation of which, interest, profit and rent were always added to the market price of the product, every time it changed hands. one of these illustrations was entitled, "thirteen usuries on one hog." it represented a hog passing from the farmer at one end of a long bridge to the workman at the other. from the time the hog starts from the producer on the farm until it reaches its destination in the workshop of the consumer, its size (price) has become colossal. in exchange for the hog a plow starts from the shop to the farm, and the size (price) increases in the same proportion. every time any commodity passed one of the commercial toll gates established between the producer and the consumer, the price was increased for the benefit of speculators who contributed nothing to its value. all this was of course to the manifest loss of the producers. the long bridge was labeled, the profit system. in contrast with this was a short bridge labeled equity, over which products were passing both ways from the producer to the consumer, without changing size. over this equity bridge the product passed directly from the producer to the consumer by the shortest practicable route, and was only handled one time. over the profit bridge, goods became shelf-worn and deteriorated in value, by the frequent changing of hands. these two bridges, profit and equity, were given as symbolical representations of the cause and cure of poverty. there was no mistaking the lessons taught by them; neither could there be a doubt of their truth. under the profit system of exchange the managers are self-employed and it is legitimate that they should have a profit for the service rendered, and the larger the profit, the larger the number who can make a living out of it. under equity, the managers are employed by their customers and it is to their interest to see that the business of exchange is carried on with the smallest possible amount of work in handling the product. hence the profit system necessarily entails poverty upon the masses who have no interest in the exchange, while equity secures abundance, because the exchange is effected by their own agents at the least possible expense. hence, under equity, the product passes from the producer to the consumer without changing size, and the cost is fixed by the amount of labor expended in its production, superintendence and transportation; and all parties to the transaction, get the exact value of their services; but under this system there is nothing for the money king, the profit-monger and the landlord. "you see," said oqua, who had been unusually silent and pre-occupied, "that this symbol of the two bridges, tells the whole story of the difference between the profit system of exchange and the equitable; between the old system with its widespread poverty and the new with its abundance." "i see the difference," i said, "but it is not so clear to my mind just how the people can pass from one bridge to the other; from profit to equity." "that is very easy," said oqua. "change the purpose for which business is transacted. instead of exacting profit from the producer and the consumer, conduct business for the purpose of establishing equitable relations between the producers and the consumers. when this is done the profit system will have been removed and equity will bring abundance to the household of every producer, and poverty will be abolished." "i can well understand," i said, "what the effect of a change of systems would be, and it is equally clear to my mind that the money kings, trust barons and landlords could, if they would, easily introduce the change, but how could the poverty stricken people make such a change in the business system of the world? if it is done at all, it must be done by the very poor, and under the profit system the very poor are helpless." "that, 'under the profit system,' is well put in," said norrena, laughing. "it is undoubtedly true, that 'under the profit system,' the producers are helpless; and it is equally true that as long as they remain under this system, they will continue to be helpless. it is also true that the selfishness of the wealthy managers will never consent to the change so long as they can prevent it." "then, indeed," i said, "to my mind the condition of the laboring millions is hopeless. they cannot establish equity and the rich will not." "why hopeless?" asked norrena. "do you think they would refuse to make the change from profit to equity, if they had the opportunity to do so?" "not that," i said. "but the question is, how can they make the change while bound hand and foot under the profit system?" "whatever has been done," said norrena, "can be done, and you have only to look around you to see that the change from profit to equity has been made in this country and can be made in yours, notwithstanding the fact that the people are bound hand and foot and will continue to be so bound as long as the profit system continues." "please do not mock me," i said with some spirit. "how can a people who are bound hand and foot, save themselves?" "by using their heads," said norrena. "the hands and feet may be bound while the head is left free to think. let this freedom to think be exercised in the right direction and their physical bonds will disappear." "i am sure they do think," i responded, "and what is more, they have been thinking for a long time." "then," said norrena, "let them continue to think and they cannot fail in due time to find out just what is the matter." "oh, many of them have found that out," i said, "and realize that they are impoverished by the exorbitant profits on investments which go to the wealthy classes." "then, indeed," said norrena, "the day of their deliverance is drawing near. they have already learned that it is the profit system that is pauperizing them. if they continue to think, they cannot fail to learn that the profit system could not continue without their constant support. that when they withdraw their patronage from profit-mongers, the profit system will disappear. if i read your literature correctly, your people are very near the hour of their deliverance." "they may," i said, "be driven to the violent overthrow of the present system, but i do not see how they can speedily break their bonds in any other manner." "they can do it," said norrena, "by the exercise of the same spirit of manly independence, intelligently directed, that they now exercise in their worse than useless strikes. you have the competitive system which is self-destructive and hence weak. your producing classes can organize as consumers and take advantage of the sharp competition between dealers to sell goods, and by a wise use of their combined power to purchase, introduce an equitable system of exchange." "what is that?" i asked. "would they expect any such sweeping results from selling their trade to the firm that would give them the largest rebate on prices? would not the tendency of such a movement be, to still further curtail the demand for labor, by depressing the the price of products?" "yes," said norrena, "such a system of selling their custom for a rebate, would have just such an effect. but you lose sight of the fact, that wholesale dealers are competing with each other for an opportunity to sell goods. they sell to retail dealers who can find customers for their goods. organize your ability to purchase, select a competent business agent, and go into business for yourselves, and be sure not to undersell other dealers. your exchange will have a decided advantage over every other dealer, because your trade will be organized and your sales will be certain. the wholesaler will be quick to see this, and will be anxious to get your trade, as his pay will be certain." "but," i said, "where would be the inducement for the people to organize their trade, with the certainty that they would pay just as much for the goods as they did before?" "the same inducement," said norrena, "that people under the money system have for depositing their earnings in savings banks. every time they purchase an article in their own exchange they are making a deposit to their own credit, where it will do them the most good in times of disaster. the profits will belong to the organized customers, and by leaving them in the exchange they will accumulate a sample stock of goods already paid for, from which any order can be filled. after such a stock of goods is secured, they might at regular intervals declare a dividend to the organized customers, leaving a percentage on deposit with the exchange to be used to educate the people into a comprehensive understanding of business methods and for the creation of a fund to purchase land and give employment to their members, in order to eliminate rent on land and save the profits on production." "but," i said, "i do not clearly see how starting stores and saving retail profits would enable the people to escape the demands of interest and rent." "the store by itself," said norrena, "could not do this, but the financial power that can always be secured by wise business methods could. to the extent that the use of money can be minimized and debts paid, of course interest will be saved. and to the extent that consumption can be organized and concentrated, a smaller number of business houses will also be needed and thus rent saved to the customers who in the last analysis pay all the expenses. and just in proportion as business houses are not needed, they will be for sale to people who can use them, as landlords could not afford to pay taxes on property for which tenants could not be found. this property would all be needed by the organized consumers who, with their continually accumulating fund from pooling the savings of profit, interest and rent, even on a comparatively small scale, would always be able to buy. the profits on distribution will constitute an ample fund for socializing the land and furnishing employment for a continually increasing number of people." "but," i said, "to be able to hold our own against the world-wide profit system, would require a world-wide organization." "do not be too sure of that," said norrena. "the benefits of equitable exchange in a single locality, would be most decided. of course it would be more effective if extended over a wider field. but the distribution of literature, such as the accumulating profits would enable you to make, added to the far-reaching effects of a successful object lesson, could not fail to make the organization world wide. all that is necessary for this purpose is a practical demonstration, that by this system, the productive laborer and not the money king is master of the situation." "is this the same plan that you outlined in your address?" i asked. "just the same," he said. "all that is required is such a business organization as will cover the entire ground demanded by absolute justice. it must look to the elimination, as rapidly as possible, of the elements of interest, profit and rent. to avoid the payment of interest it is necessary to minimize the use of money, and as soon as debts are paid, refuse to use it at all. to avoid profits, you must purchase your supplies and sell your products through your own exchanges. to get rid of rent, use the profits to socialize the land." "this is certainly sweeping enough," i said, "but it seems to me, that it would be an almost endless task to induce the masses of the people to unite their trade to such an extent as would be necessary to secure the full measure of relief demanded by absolute justice." "it certainly would be," said norrena, "if you did not prosecute a vigorous educational work, and at the same time offer inducements that the profit system cannot afford." "i fear that this would be impossible," i said. "the dealers with millions of money could beat us in offering inducements to catch the trade of the unthinking." "do not fear that," said norrena. "they could not do that without abandoning the profit system, which is all that you would ask. as soon as you have organized trade and have a sufficient stock accumulated to meet its demands, you will be saving interest to the extent that you can transact business without money, and to this will be added all of the net retail profits. this will enable you to pay a little more for farm products than dealers can who are on the profit basis. you can safely continue this rise in prices until you pay as much as you can sell for. this will give you the entire trade of the farmers, and the usual profits on all they purchase will be a net gain to your exchange, less the slight advance on the price of products, equal to the profits of the speculators. the price you receive for farm products, will be exchanged for goods on which you will make a profit, and if you can always make one profit on the exchange you will be on the high road to success." "but this inducement," i said, "would only reach the farmers. it would be necessary to offer some other kind of inducement to secure the trade of the city workmen." "that is easily provided for," said norrena. "your farmer's trade, notwithstanding the fact that you pay as much for the product as you can sell it for, will net one profit on the goods for which you exchange it. with all this farm trade secure, you can begin to furnish employment to city workmen in various ways, converting the raw material into finished products to supply your increasing trade. this will enable you to make valuable customers out of all the workmen for whom you can find employment. another inducement will be, to return one-half of the net profits on their trade in the shape of a check which will be good at the exchange for products. this will still leave one-half as a contribution to the educational and land purchase fund. i believe, however, that with a vigorous and comprehensive educational work, but few would ever draw anything in the shape of a dividend out of the business, but leave it as a permanent investment to enable them to secure homes, or as an insurance fund to support them in sickness and for the benefit of their families in case of death." "you seem to have unlimited faith in this plan of organizing business," i said. "and why should i not have?" asked norrena. "these principles have been tried in this country and we know by experience that they cannot fail, wherever they are intelligently and honestly applied, on a scale large enough to constitute one good object lesson as to what can be accomplished. the system, in practice, will demonstrate that money is not a necessity. money however, will still come into your hands, even more freely, and as long as you have debts that must be paid in money, you will have use for it. but when the debts are all paid, money might cease to circulate, as you would then have learned by actual experience, that you would get along better without it than with it." "that puts me in mind," i said, "that in your lecture you stated that the people in this country, in their movement to establish equity in business, established banks to manage their money account. if the movement here was started by the very poor, how did they get money for the necessary cash capital?" "by the accumulation from cash purchases made in their exchanges," said norrena. "their exchanges were a system of banking products, but they issued checks on the deposit of money as well as products. as these exchanges offered superior inducements, they received their full share of cash trade from the beginning, and nearly all of it when their exchange was complete. hence they found no difficulty in establishing their own banks under the law, and as they never loaned their deposits, their banks could not break, and people who had money to deposit, brought it to them for safe keeping. as the tendency of this locking up of deposits was to curtail the circulation of money, the exchanges provided against any oppressive stringency, by loaning on good security, without interest, checks which were redeemable in products at the exchanges. it was estimated by the statisticians of that time, that every dollar locked up in the exchange banks, brought six dollars of trade per annum to the exchange stores on which the regular customers at these exchanges made an average of ten per cent., or sixty per cent. upon deposits." "were these exchanges incorporated as joint stock companies?" i asked. "they were," said norrena, "but not always. the real object of the order was to ultimately eliminate the stock corporation and substitute the equal co-partnership. hence when incorporated, every regular customer was a stockholder to the same amount, and the stock might be paid for by turning their dividends back into the business as a permanent investment. in other words, they might pay for their stock out of what they were able to save in their cost of living by their abandonment of the profit system. and further, in order to protect themselves from the danger of a constructive indebtedness in the shape of dividend exacting stock, no certificates were issued, and the stock paid for was always redeemable in exchange certificates payable in goods at the option of the shareholders, or by order of the directors of the corporation, for failure to patronize the exchange whenever practicable. as governments were especially friendly to corporations, it was deemed best by many, to incorporate and secure these advantages." "this," i said, "was certainly the full measure of justice to be secured by a stock corporation, but how were others which were not incorporated, organized in order to secure the full measure of justice to members?" "there was," said norrena, "no patent on the application of the golden rule in business, and among business men there was a large number who really wanted to see equity established in human affairs. hence there was nothing to hinder a merchant from entering into contracts with organized consumers, to sell his business to them, and retain the management at an agreed salary, under such rules and regulations for the conduct of the business as they might adopt. by this means many were enabled to exchange a precarious profit for a permanent income. in cases of this kind, the merchant was benefited by securing a guarantee against bankruptcy and the organized consumers by securing the services of the necessary business talent to establish equity in distribution, by paying equal dividends out of the net income to all regular customers. as contracts for a lawful purpose were held sacred by the courts a very large number held that the contract between the customers and the manager secured greater advantages than the stock corporation in obtaining equality of dividends." "but," i asked, "why this equality of dividends? was it fair to those who purchased large quantities of goods, to require them to share equally with those who purchased on a small scale?" "it certainly was," said norrena, "as it took the united purchasing power of all to establish a business that enabled them to effect any saving at all, so that there would be something to divide. the large purchaser through these exchanges got something back, while under the profit system he would have made nothing at all. to him this equal dividend was a comparatively small item, while it was a most important increase of purchasing power to one who was barely able to procure the necessaries of life. persons in affluent circumstances were thus enabled to help their poorer neighbors, and at the same time secure a dividend themselves. this system of organized consumption with an equal distribution of the net profits, was the first introduction of the fraternal features of our altruistic civilization. it was, in its application, a system of universal insurance against poverty for all, who, as consumers, withdrew their support from the profit system. in a peaceful, just and orderly manner, it enabled the poorest to take a seat at the table which our bounteous mother nature has prepared alike for all, and from which they had been excluded by human greed, which the founders of the old religious system had characterized as the 'mammon of unrighteousness.'" "then it seems," i said, "that this was something of a religious as well as a business organization?" "yes," said norrena, "it may indeed be regarded in that light as it was the practical application of the teachings of krystus. this equality of interest in the distribution of that which had hitherto been lost to the producers of wealth under the profit system was the first recognition, on a broad scale, of the brotherhood of man in the business relations which existed among the people. this great business organisation appealed to the enlightened self-interest of all classes of people, and drew them into closer relations with each other as one family, and cultivated feelings of fraternal regard for each other that will be imperishable. with an abundance for all, the inordinate thirst for gain had been eliminated and the application of the golden rule in business had at last been established to bless mankind." "i am deeply interested in learning more about this organization," i said. "from your explanations i think that i have a tolerably clear idea of its general principles, and now i would be pleased to know more of its origin, history and experiences. as an organization it must have passed through many trying ordeals before it had accomplished its work of freeing the people from their thralldom to triumphant greed." "it did have a history," said norrena, "but it was a history of signal and sweeping victories. its difficulties and trying ordeals were all in its efforts to get started right. even the leaders of the great reform movements of that time, many of whom had given years to the study and discussion of economic questions, did not comprehend its scope. the people had been so thoroughly blinded by the universal system of doing business on money basis, that they had never even tried to formulate plans for changing to the labor basis unless they could get money enough to purchase everything necessary to start up the work of production and distribution. this class of co-operators frequently put their means together, purchased lands and established colonies. many of these proved quite successful, but they did not bring the benefits of co-operation to the millions who could not pay the necessary initiation fee to say nothing of the other millions who were forced into idleness." "this reminds me," i said, "that iola told me the district where i had been making my home, was a community or colony of this kind, but she said that the colonists were from among the very poor." "that is true," said norrena. "district number one, was originally composed of that class of people in the great city kroy, which the money kings regarded as dangerous, and hence they were permitted to go upon lands for which there was no market. the leaders were people of high culture and knew how to use their opportunities. but the colonies of which i speak were not founded by the submerged. these colonies demonstrated that co-operation contained elements of vital power that was irresistible, whenever it was fairly tested. the able literature sent out from these colonies, backed up by their experience, was a powerful educational influence which prepared the way for universal co-operation." "but this organisation of equitable exchange, as i understand it," i said, "was a business organization adapted to the general public, which enabled the people to get possession of the machinery of production and distribution. we have successful colonies in the outer world and i am familiar with their methods, but how to bring these benefits of united action to the whole people, is the question in which i am especially interested." "i have described its workings," said norrena, "as clearly as my knowledge of your language will permit, and if there is any matter concerning which you are in doubt i will try to make it plain." "i have no doubt of the principles," i said, "and from what i have seen, i am persuaded that the methods could be successfully applied wherever a nucleus of earnest reformers could be found who would make a careful study of the situation, and adopt the same business methods which were used so successfully in this country. i want some of the particulars concerning the history of this organization and a concise statement of its purposes and business methods that would serve as a model for a similar organization in the united states." "the first organization," said norrena, "was effected at this place which was then the site of one of the larger interior cities of that day. this was the center of business for a large population of farmers on one side and miners on the other. it started with the guaranteed trade of one hundred families and was a success from the start, as the result of the ample provision for educational work along the lines indicated. every member was supplied with a paper which was devoted to the education of the people into a comprehensive understanding of business methods and commercial equation, as promulgated in theory and illustrated in practice by the patrons of equity. this paper contained the official reports of the business exchanges established under the auspices of the order. the educational work had been carried on for a long time by a few devoted workers, before it materialized into a self-supporting business. after that, the order spread rapidly. a percentage of the profits was used to employ organizers and every organization added to the trade and increased profits without any corresponding increase of expenses. when this movement was inaugurated, the number of commercial travelers in the country was estimated at about , . these were persons of energy and business talent. they were quick to see the advantages which this system of commercial equity offered to men of ability, to establish themselves in business for which they were especially qualified, and they started out to find locations where they could organise business on these principles." "but was there not some danger that designing people might get control and defeat the purposes of the organization?" i asked. "designing persons did get into positions," said norrena, "but there could be no danger to the cause from this source, as in order to secure positions they had to adopt methods of business that could not fail to overthrow the profit system, and as fast as business was organized, the official paper of the order was sent regularly to every member. if at first they did not understand the principles well enough to protect themselves from knaves, they soon learned; and if anything was going wrong it was soon understood by the customers. as the business extended, the oppressive power of money decreased, and the power of labor increased. the enthusiasm of the people was aroused to the highest pitch, and the magnates of the old system were correspondingly depressed. the old system was essentially weak, while the new was peculiarly strong, and as the hosts of wealth producers came together, and utilised the actual values created by their labor as the medium by which exchanges were effected, prices went up as the result of the increase in the currency, and there was no use for money except to pay debts. under this system, the purchasing power of labor and products was steadily increasing, while the purchasing power of money was decreasing. as long as money was needed to pay debts, products were exchanged for money at the increased price fixed under the labor standard, but when the debts were all paid, the purchasing power of money was gone and poverty had disappeared with it. every debt had been paid according to contract, and in the payment of these debts the debtors had transferred their poverty to their creditors." "we have gone over this ground," i said, "until, as i understand it, the great potency of this organization, was in the fact that all its methods were especially designed to ultimately eliminate the use of money in the transaction of business, but it occurs to me, that much could be done in this direction, without the organization of business exchanges, which issue certificates on the deposit of money and products to serve the purposes of a currency." "you are right," said norrena. "and much was done along other lines when the people came to understand that the prime factor in the overthrow of the profit system was to avoid the use of money in the transaction of business, in every manner possible. in some localities, farther east, the use of what was known as new occasion notes was introduced to facilitate exchange without money. the shoemaker, for instance, would give his note, payable in shoes, for groceries. the physician would give his note for groceries payable in professional services. the grocery man had no personal use for either shoes or the services of a physician, but he needed coal, and the coal dealer needed both a shoemaker and a physician, and exchanged coal for the notes. the exchange enabled the shoemaker and the physician to get groceries, the grocery man to get coal, and the coal dealer to get shoes and the services of a physician, and all without the use of a cent of money. the use of these notes became so common, that to still further facilitate exchanges, clearing houses were established where persons who held notes payable in something they did not need, could exchange them for notes that were payable in something they did need. this system of exchanging new occasion notes grew into a general collecting agency, and it was found that among the large number of collections placed in its hands, a great percentage cancelled each other, and balances could ordinarily be put in the shape of new occasion notes redeemable in some kind of products or services. as a means of enabling people to get out of debt, and at the same time facilitating exchange and decreasing the demand for money, these agencies proved to be most effective. the patrons of equity contemplated the persistent use of every method that could be devised to minimize the demand for money with a view to its ultimate elimination as a medium of exchange, by the establishment of equity between producers and consumers. they had learned that money of any kind could be inflated and contracted for selfish purposes, and therefore it was a false measure and could not be depended upon to mete out even handed justice to the people who used it as a medium of exchange." "i can plainly see," i said, "that the field of labor for such an organisation in the outer world is practically unlimited, and i want you to furnish me with the details of its plan of organization, as a model for a similar one for use in my book." "i have," said norrena, "provided a translation of the constitution and by laws of the order, together with the rules and regulations for the government of its exchange department for your own use. i would advise you, however, not to publish these in your book. only present the general principles, and let your people work out the details in their own way. start the idea to working and i doubt not that they will discover how easy it is for them to escape from their thralldom to greed, and when they do, it will not be long until they sever the bonds that hold them." "and how," i asked, "would you state these purposes so as to include all you have given me, in the fewest possible number of words?" "for this purpose," said he, "i cannot do better than to quote the declaration of purposes from the preliminary constitution formulated by the founders of the patrons of equity, as follows: "'section . the primary object of this order shall be to organize exchange on the largest scale that may be practicable, with a view to the establishment of equitable relations between producers and consumers, by eliminating as rapidly as possible, every element of cost that does not go to the producers of the wealth exchanged, less an equitable compensation to the labor, physical and mental, that is necessary to an economical management of the business. "'sec. . and further, as opportunity offers, to effect such an organization of our financial relations as will enable us, as far as practicable, to hold all the money that comes into our hands, as a sacred trust, to be used only in the payment of taxes, and of debts in all cases where the creditor cannot be induced to take some other form of payment. "'sec. . to accomplish these objects, the first and leading work of the patrons of equity shall be to educate the people into a more comprehensive understanding of business methods, that will enable them to minimize the use of money in their business relations with each other, by an organized effort to make the largest possible number of exchanges with the smallest possible amount of money. "'sec. . the general policy of this order, in the conduct of all the business enterprises established under its auspices, shall be to utilize the net profits on distribution to procure lands and establish production, in order to provide the largest possible amount of employment to members in good standing.' "this declaration," continued norrena, "when fully understood, is seen to contain every element of a speedy uplifting of any people who are oppressed by the power of wealth. any person with a fair understanding of business methods can work out the details for the application of these principles in actual business, and any fifty families who are able to purchase and pay for supplies to the extent of five dollars per week, would provide an aggregate sale of over two thousand dollars' worth of goods per month, which would be ample to start business, pay necessary expenses and have something left. such a business properly managed, could, by a comprehensive educational movement, be made to absorb the trade of any community for the benefit of the customers, and thus create an object lesson that would be speedily adopted by other communities, and become general. the people would be masters of the situation, and the power of money to dictate terms would have passed away forever." "i should think," i said, "that everything pertaining to the organization which won such a victory for humanity would be carefully preserved in this museum of universal history." "it is," said norrena, "but it will be found in the story above and we will hardly have time to extend this visit any further to-day." "nor to-morrow, either," interposed oqua. "we have important work at byblis to-morrow, or at least there may be. huston and dione, want to register as man and wife, and for some reason, huston thinks that captain ganoe will have objections, and if so, they must be taken into account. besides, we propose to have an excursion around the lake on the ice king. so we had better return to our rooms, take a rest and be prepared to start early to-morrow morning." "and i propose," said norrena, "that we extend our excursion to kroy and complete the object lesson that records the victory of equity over greed." chapter xiv. through the air to lake byblis--on the ice king once more--captain ganoe in command--met by the viking, silver king and sea rover--a wedding--huston and dione the principals--ganoe objects--norrena investigates--objection over-ruled--excursion beneath the waters of the lake--down the cocytas--the ruins of kroy--abandoned gold--the last relic of barbarism. [illustration] the journey by airship from orbitello to lake byblis was as usual most interesting. i never tired of these aerial flights. my first was from the deck of the ice king in the middle of the oscan ocean to the continent, and now i was returning to the ice king from the middle of the continent. our course was an airline, several points south of east, over the fertile valley of the cocytas. for a distance of twelve hundred miles, we were first on one side of the river and then on the other, with a bird's eye view of this highly improved valley. we traveled at a speed of about three hundred miles an hour which brought us to the vicinity of lake byblis about o'clock, a.m. from our elevated position of several thousand feet we had a full view of the surroundings. the lake is an expansion of the river, from five to ten miles in width and thirty in length surrounded by a magnificent boulevard, on which we could see numerous vehicles moving. the surface of the lake was dotted over with water craft of various sizes and descriptions. on the north side, oqua pointed out the hospital to which our sailors had been sent, the matron's home where bona dea presided, the home for the aged, and the crematory. on the south side, and situated back on the bluff, was the airship factory where battell was employed superintending the completion of his improvements on the airship, and the transportation headquarters, in the auditorium of which it had been announced that the world's parliament was to meet the following december, and give us a welcome to the inner world, as citizens-at-large. anchored in front of the transportation building i recognized the ice king with the stars and stripes floating from the masthead. the valley of the cocytas had the appearance of having originally been a vast inland sea extending about twelve hundred miles from the coast range on the east to the great continental divide on the west, and from five to six hundred in width, bounded by high lands north and south. at the east end of the lake the cocytas flows through a deep gorge on its way to the ocean, carrying the surplus waters of a vast valley of rich alluvial lands. such is the geographical location of this favorite gathering place for pleasure seekers. as we approached the famous lake we reduced our speed and took a little time to contemplate the magnificent scene presented to our view. but we have neither time nor space for an adequate description. as we reached a point directly above the ice king we began the usual spiral descent and in a few minutes were once more upon the familiar decks of the old ship, and exchanging cordial greetings with our old shipmates and many of our new found friends and associates. it was a happy reunion. pat and mike gave us a most warm hearted irish welcome. they informed us that they had been installed as custodians of the ice king and were faring sumptuously. i asked mike how he liked the people and he replied laconically: "better than i did but i don't know how much." i pressed him for an explanation of his doubtful compliment, and he replied that he could not understand their queer ways. at first he thought that they had bewitched pat, as he got right up from his sick bed and declared that there was nothing the matter with him any more. as pat had stayed well, it was perhaps all right, but it was queer. then ever since they had been at lake byblis they had got everything they wanted but when they offered to pay for it, the shopmen would look at the money, turn it over as if they did not know what it was and hand it back. "in fact," continued mike, "i don't understand them at all. they never work to amount to anything, and yet they have an abundance, and that of the very best. they never pay for anything and they never charge for anything. ever since we have been here, it has been one continual coming and going and merry-making. but this free spread cannot last all the time or i miss my guess." "well mike," i replied, "you seem to be doing well enough, for the present at least, and ought to be satisfied. and i can safely assure you that you need have no fears for the future. these people have learned that it only takes about two hour's labor per day to produce an abundance of everything they need. in taking care of this ship, so that they can come and see what kind of vessels we have in the outer world, you are doing all that will ever be required of you, and when you want to take a furlough, you can travel wherever you please and it will not cost you anything but the evidence that you have been serving the people by taking care of this ship." "may be so," said mike, "but i don't see how they can afford it." i had no time to explain the situation to mike, as it had been arranged that captain ganoe should again take his old position on the ice king and give its visitors an excursion on this, to them, strange craft. the steam age with these people had long since given place to electricity and compressed air, as motor powers, and so a steamship in actual use was something they had never seen. captain ganoe entered into the spirit of the occasion and summoned all the surviving members of the ice king crew to take their accustomed places. when this understanding was agreed upon, polaris and dione came forward and invited us below for an early dinner. we found that on the same table where they had taken breakfast with us, on our first acquaintance, they had spread such a repast for us as had never before been attempted on the ice king. a goodly number joined us in doing ample justice to the delicious viands. after dinner, captain ganoe invited the company present to go with him and have a look over the ice king while she was being made ready for the excursion. the first place to which he conducted us was the engine room, but it was so neat and clean that he did not recognise it, and turning to huston, he said: "what does this mean? i thought that you told me every thing was ready to get up steam on short notice. there is not an ounce of coal in sight and the bunkers are as neat as a lady's bandbox. how do you expect to get up steam without fuel?" "we shall burn water," said huston. "burn water!" exclaimed the captain. "have your new surroundings led you to believe that we can set aside the laws of nature?" "nothing of the kind," said huston, "but i am learning much concerning the laws of nature that i never before suspected. you see this little metallic cube. i drop it into this jar of water. see it effervesce. i apply this match. see how it burns! this little cube dissolving in the water, converts it into its original gases. you see now how we can burn water. this tank, connected by these pipes with the furnace under the boiler, contains water that has been charged with these metallic cubes, the constituent elements of which have been found in coal and lime. i now turn on this prepared water and apply an electric spark. see the fierce flame! we shall soon have steam without having vitiated the atmosphere with smoke, which in this country is regarded as a nuisance not to be tolerated. dione superintended this part of the arrangements." "wonderful! wonderful!" was all that captain ganoe had to say, and he passed out leaving huston at his post as engineer. i remained behind as i wanted to have a talk with huston, concerning what oqua had told us, that he and dione intended to be registered as man and wife and that he expected captain ganoe would object. i asked him why he expected any opposition from the captain. "because," said he, "captain ganoe, with all his good qualities, is a living personification of every popular error which forms a part of the outer world education, law and custom." "but," i asked, "on what grounds do you expect him to object?" "he will," said huston, "unless i have misjudged the man, raise the question that i have a living wife, from whom i have no legal grounds for divorce. this is true so far as the law goes, but false in every feature that constitutes a true marriage. captain ganoe is familiar with all the particulars, and still he entirely disapproves of the course i took, in taking the law into my own hands and severing the bonds, just as soon as i discovered the fraud that had been perpetrated on me." "won't you give me the particulars?" i asked. "i am especially interested in learning all about it." "i have no objections," said huston. "it is no secret. but steam will soon be up and our time is limited." "but please give me a brief outline," i persisted. "i am indeed vitally interested in learning the principal facts in this case." huston regarded me for a moment with a puzzled expression of countenance and then said: "i will for your sake, jack, try to make a long story short. my father was a planter and supposed to be wealthy. our family was proud and aristocratic. my father had a ward in a distant state who lived with his sister. she was heir to an immense estate. though i had never seen her i had been encouraged to correspond with her, and we had exchanged photographs. her letters indicated remarkable talent and the highest culture, while her photograph proclaimed to my imagination, that she was a beauty. i was but a boy and i confess that i was fascinated by her letters, and the affectionate interest by which she led me to the most ardent declaration of my admiration. "such was the relation that had been established between us when my father took me into his confidence and declared that he was a ruined man and our family irretrievably disgraced, unless i could prevent it by a marriage with his ward, zeta wild. the time was at hand when he must account for her estate, which had been lost through unfortunate speculations, and that the settlement would reveal a state of affairs that would send him to prison for a long term of years. "i objected to the idea of marriage with a girl i had never met, no matter how favorably i had been impressed by her photograph and her letters. but my father's special pleading and the pressing nature of the danger to the family name, overcame my objections, and the day was set for the marriage. "everything was artfully arranged. we arrived in the evening and met the bridal party at the church. i was charmed with the appearance of my bride. we were married at once, and took carriages for the home of my aunt where a splendid wedding supper awaited us. "within an hour, i found that i had married a beautiful idiot. i was shocked, and stole away from the guests into an upper room. i wanted to think. a lamp was burning on the table. my eyes fell upon a letter written to my father by my aunt. i recognized the handwriting. it was my aunt who had written the letters that had charmed me so much. in this one, she deplored the deception that was being practiced upon me, but justified it on the ground that it was necessary in order to save the honor of the family. "my mind was made up. i passed out into the darkness of the night, started for the nearest seaport and found employment as a sailor. i have never returned home since. i learned that my father got his ward's fortune in my name. captain ganoe is personally acquainted with my father and has seen his ward at his house, who was introduced as his son's wife. i explained the situation to the captain, but he disapproved my conduct in very emphatic terms, and i should have left the ship but for the fact that i had engaged to go with battell on the expedition. "i have also explained the situation to dione and my part in this transaction meets her approval. we shall register as man and wife, and if the captain objects, so much the better, as it will place my conduct in the correct light. the marriage was a fraud and no one ought to be bound by a fraud." "i can most cordially sympathize with you," i said. "it is certainly a terrible wrong to compel people to associate in such an intimate relation when their entire natures are in rebellion against it. it cannot be wrong to sever such bonds regardless of the claims of church or state. a relation that is wrong, in and of itself, cannot be made right by lawmaker or priest." "thank you," said huston. "i am glad that i am not alone among the crew of the ice king. indeed i believe that ultimately even the captain will see this question just as i do. our intention was to register while we were in orbitello, but oqua requested that we should wait until this excursion, and to please her we consented. i do not know her reasons for advising delay but i suppose it is all right." "i think i understand it," i said, "and you may rest assured that her reasons are good, and good will come out of it." "i hope so," said huston. "but the steam gauge points to one hundred and here goes to all whom it may concern," and suiting the action to the word he pulled the rope and the steam whistle resounded far and wide, something entirely new to these people, in a country which had abandoned steam as a motor power so long ago. i hurried upon deck and joined captain ganoe. captain battell was at the wheel, and all was ready. the decks were crowded with excursionists who had never been on board a steamship, and knew nothing of steam as a motor power, except as a matter of history. all were anxious to see the vessel move and captain ganoe did not keep them waiting. he signalled the engineer and immediately the ponderous engines began to move and the ice king was backing out into the water and swinging around with her bow toward the head of the lake. she obeyed her helm beautifully and started off with a speed of which we were proud. the route determined upon kept us near the larboard shore, while some miles to the starboard we could see a magnificent craft that reflected the light of the sun like burnished silver. i asked oqua what it was. "that," said she, "is the silver king, an electric yacht, built of aluminum. she brings a load of excursionists and expects to take us down the river. she is remarkable for her speed and her splendid accommodations. she will meet us at the head of the lake." i found too much to look at to take up much time in conversation, but cannot at this time indulge in descriptions. suffice it to say that the scenes presented on the boulevard surrounding the lake, on the surface of the water and in the air were most animated, and all were moving as if to meet us at the head of the lake. as we approached the mouth of the upper cocytas, we met the silver king and while the excursionists were exchanging greetings, a strange little craft with a dragon's head and propelled by oars, shot out from under the cover of the river bank. at the bow were our norwegian sailors, lief and eric plying their oars most sturdily and singing a weird song, in which i distinguished the mythological names of odin and thor. the oarsmen were dressed in a strange, fantastic style, and were armed with spears, crossbows, swords, and long hunting knives. this strange craft came out of the river and both the ice king and the silver king, as if by common impulse stopped short in their career while the viking, for such it was, took its place between them. to say that i was astonished at the appearance of a style of vessel that had been obsolete for centuries, but feebly expresses my surprise, and i asked norrena where it came from. "it came from the outer world," he said, "about , years ago, and brought a warlike crew, the general appearance of which, the superintendent of festivities, has tried to imitate. the historians of that period could gather very little information from them concerning the country from which they came. they said that the people had to leave because it was so cold. this gave rise to the false impression that the outer world had become uninhabitable and that these were the last remnants of the people." "these people," i said, "were known as northmen, and their ships were called vikings. they were the most daring of navigators, and penetrated every portion of the outer world, and it is not at all surprising that some of them found their way to the inside. this will probably explain why so many of your names are identical with those of the scandinavian countries. "that is correct," he said. "many of our people are descended from this stock and still perpetuate the names. our records preserve the language they brought with them as carefully as our chemists have preserved this little boat." "do you intend to say," i asked, "that this is the original boat that found its way into the inner world a thousand years ago? i thought that it was a reproduction. how was it possible to preserve it so long?" "yes," he said, "this is the original boat, and it has been preserved by forcing a chemical solution into the wood which makes it as durable as granite." as we were speaking, two powerful metallic arms operated by machinery reached down from the deck of the silver king and lifted this little viking and its passengers into stocks that had been prepared for it, with the seeming tenderness of a mother lifting her babe to her bosom. so suggestive was the manner in which it was done that i turned to norrena to ask the meaning, which he anticipated by saying: "this represents the tender care that vigorous youth ought to bestow upon age. this little boat is highly prized, as in the process of evolution, it may be regarded as the progenitor of the silver king. if there had never been such boats as the viking, there never would have been an ice king or a silver king. all things must develop from small beginnings." the ice king and silver king now headed toward the mouth of the lake, were lashed together, and the excursionists on both vessels passed freely from one to the other. the ice king attracted much the largest number, but i was more anxious to inspect the silver king. norrena introduced us to captain thorfin, as visitors and seamen from the outer world. he conducted us first to the motor room and explained the workings of the machinery, and showed us a system of airtight compartments, which would, he claimed, absolutely keep the vessel from sinking, no matter how badly the hull might be injured. he stated that even the decks would float like cork. when we reached the upper deck of the silver king we found that the oarsmen on the viking had exchanged their warlike equipments for musical instruments and as we came up they opened with strains of the most thrilling music that i had ever heard. as if in response, both the ice king and the silver king seemed lifted up on the crest of some mighty wave, and what appeared to be some monster marine animal arose out of the water behind us and moved to the starboard side of the ice king. it had a resemblance to a gigantic turtle, but was fully three times as long as it was wide. as soon as the water ceased to flow from its sides, a hatchway opened in the center and macnair and iola made their appearance, and began to wave their handkerchiefs to us. i was too much astonished at this strange apparition to even ask what it was. norrena relieved my embarrassment by saying: "this is the sea rover, a submarine boat, that came up the middle of the lake near the bottom. the three boats will be lashed together and thus proceed down the lake while the excursionists will have the freedom of the entire flotilla, and may amuse themselves in any way they choose. see there! the sea rovers have brought up their dancing floor. it is plain that they propose to have a ball. but i have some business that i must attend to while the crowds enjoy themselves. as this is to be a private party of invited guests, of which you are one, i shall expect you to join us in the cabin of the silver king." i intuitively knew what was coming. we found the cabin as exclusive as could have been desired for a private party. battell and polaris, huston and dione, norrena and oqua, macnair and iola, and captain ganoe and myself constituted the party on this occasion. when we were all comfortably seated, norrena said: "i have invited you in here because we want our esteemed guests from the outer world to understand all of our usages. we are going to have what in their world is called a wedding. ordinarily these events attract no especial attention in this country as there are but two persons interested. but there may be circumstances under which marriage is not permitted. in such cases we investigate. in this country, it is the duty of the educational department to keep a record of everything pertaining to birth, marriage and death, as all are supposed to be either pupils in school or graduates from school. hence the school record is the record of the birth, educational attainments, name, occupation, marriage and death of every person. "we have no such marriage ceremonies as i find described in the literature of the outer world, but we keep a most perfect system of records. all persons who are allowed to marry at all, are free to make their choice. no interference on the part of others is permitted. as a notice of their intentions, they send or bring the nativity cards which they receive on leaving school, to the proper office where they are registered as citizens. if there is nothing in the record which prevents, each couple so united receives an acknowledgment and a copy of the record, enclosed in two silver lockets, which are usually worn around the neck. this is all there is of it unless some one objects. in that case, there is an inquiry and the commissioner decides according to the facts. "i have here two nativity cards. one is that of dione of the life saving service, and the other bears the name of paul huston, and the date of his registration on the books of the sailor's union of citizens-at-large of altruria. at the request of the applicants for registration as man and wife, i have invited you as witnesses and will ask if any one objects to their union?" "i object," said captain ganoe. "state your grounds of objection," said norrena. "because of my certain knowledge and his own admission, he has a living wife to whom he was lawfully married." "is this true?" asked norrena, addressing huston. "it is," responded huston. "i was married according to the usages of the country where i was born and i do not believe that i have any legal grounds for divorce, but as a matter of fact, the entire transaction was fraudulent." "state the facts in full," said norrena. "i will," said huston, and he narrated the story of his marriage, substantially in the same language that he had related it to me. norrena turned to captain ganoe and asked: "have you any reason to offer why this statement just made by paul huston, before these witnesses, should not be accepted as true?" "i have not," said the captain. "he admits that he was married to zeta wild. that he left her without any offense on her part for which a divorce could be obtained. hence, he is to-day a married man. married according to law, and he has no right to marry another woman, and dione has no right to take him as a husband." "that is your view of the matter," said norrena. "but under our usages, the girl to whom he was married was an imbecile and had no right to be married, and on this ground the marriage was null and void. besides, he was deceived, and hence the marriage being fraudulent, could not be binding." "a legal marriage, voluntarily entered into cannot be fraudulent, and is always binding upon the conscience of all well meaning people." "but," said norrena, "if she was a person he could not love and respect as a wife, was it not better that he should refuse to consummate the relation?" "certainly not," said the captain. "when he was married to her, that ended it. i have no doubt that he could have lived agreeably enough with her if he had wanted to." "i see," said norrena, "that you are not likely to withdraw your objection, so we will not continue the discussion. it is my duty to decide in favor of the true and against the false, and hence i must over-rule your objection to the registration of paul huston and dione as husband and wife." "do as you please," said captain ganoe. "it does not change the facts in the case. it is strange to me that any woman would accept a man as a husband under such circumstances. so far as i am concerned with my present light on the subject, i could not as a conscientious man, consent to marry a woman, no matter how much i loved her, who according to law, was the wife of another man. as an honorable man i would advise her to return to her husband." i had been listening intently to this inquiry. here was a case almost identical with my own. i had married my guardian of my own free will, and like huston, when i discovered the fraud by which my consent was secured, i had taken to the sea, and now the one whom i had loved more than life itself, and for whom i had searched for years, and with whom i had braved all the dangers of the frozen north in order to be near his person, had for the second time deliberately declared that he would not marry such a woman no matter how much he loved her. my entire being was aroused in revolt against such injustice and i arose and said: "for the second time, captain ganoe, i have heard you express this atrocious sentiment, which ignores love, the only thing which can sanctify the union of the sexes in the marriage relation, and place above that the debasing doctrine that man made laws are superior to the laws of god, which are implanted in the human soul. without love, marriage is a curse, unholy and impure. love is an inspiration and cannot be transferred by the state or the church. if you have never realized what true love signifies, of course you are excusable, but those who have felt it, will never agree with you. huston was right, to take the law into his own hands and separate from his imbecile wife. to have consummated the union, would have been a crime against her, against himself and against humanity. and now, so far as i am concerned, i shall drop this question. no good can come of the discussion, and other questions of far-reaching import to the toiling millions of the outer world, demand my undivided attention. let us do what we can to abolish poverty by removing time honored wrongs, and when women are economically free, they will be able to select companions who will not trample love under the heel of antiquated wrong." so saying i walked out of the cabin without waiting for reply. oqua followed me and as she came up by my side, said: "do not be disturbed. your victory is won. captain ganoe cannot long withstand the force of truth. and he has now placed his position so plainly before our people that the truth will reach him from all sides in a way of which he never dreamed before." "yes," i said, "i have won a victory, but it is over myself. he may come to me, when he has removed the clouds from his mind and the bitterness from his heart. i will never make any overtures. i can love humanity and work for it, and even if my work is not understood, i know that it will exercise an elevating influence on myself. my motto for the future will be, 'plenty of room at the top where true love and a sterling devotion to the right, will be understood and appreciated.'" "you talk like a philosopher," said oqua, "and i have no doubt that your heroism of character will come out triumphant, but do not permit your resentment of a wrong to engender a feeling of bitterness toward captain ganoe." "i shall not stoop to that," i said. "i cannot afford it. my love in the future shall go out to every human being and i still regard captain ganoe, with all of his prejudices, as one of the best. i have forgiven his weakness and want to forget. what i need now is something better to think about." "well," said oqua, "the excursion beneath the waters of the lake in the sea rover this afternoon and the one on the silver king down the cocytas to-morrow will give you a great many things that will doubtless, very thoroughly engage your attention." "that," i said, "is just what i need. something to arouse my interest and exclude disquieting reflections. but what of this excursion beneath the waters of the lake? i had not heard of that." "oh yes," said oqua, "the superintendent of festivities would not think of slighting the sea rovers who make the navigation of our shallow lakes, bays and rivers safe for such vessels as the silver king and their numerous passengers. they wanted to entertain our visitors from the outer world on their own vessel and of course the excursion beneath the water was made a part of the program." "well, the arrangement," i said, "is better than i anticipated and it surely will be, to me, a novel experience to be able to see the world of marine life as the fishes see it." "and as the sea rovers see and improve it," said oqua. "but see! they are signaling for us to come on board." in a few minutes we had passed out upon the dancing floor of the rovers and descended into an elegantly furnished cabin. i was the only one present who had not become acquainted with the crew, and oqua introduced me as the scientist of the ice king, to captain doris of the sea rover who gave me a cordial greeting and introduced me to a number of his comrades. in answer to my inquiries, he gave me an entertaining and instructive description of the duties of the submarine service. "our work," he said, "is to keep a careful lookout for obstructions that might impede navigation and endanger life. this is especially necessary in rivers like the cocytas, where huge stones are sometimes loosened from the rocky shores and fall into the channel, and sand-bars form rapidly. these are discovered and removed by the submarine patrols." "but how," i asked, "can you get at them?" "nothing easier," said doris, "as i will show you." at once i heard the water pouring into the hold and the sea rover sank to the bottom. the captain and two of the crew passed into a little room at the rear of the cabin and immediately i noticed that the sides of the vessel were transparent and brilliantly lighted from the outside. looking out i saw the men in diving suits leisurely walking around on the bottom, which looked like a smooth floor. oqua explained that by means of powerful arc lights and reflectors, these submarine navigators were able to see for long distances even at great depths, and that the work of removing obstructions was carried on by means of machinery, and that the stones which fell into the channel were reduced to powder by powerful explosives, and the surface smoothed down like a well cultivated field. the air was continually renewed from stores of condensed air, while the poisonous exhalations from the lungs were absorbed by sponges having a peculiar affinity for carbon. in a few minutes captain doris returned and the vessel began to move rapidly through the water. i was much interested in the view of marine life which was revealed through the transparent sides, and especially in the level bottom of the lake, which, as oqua had remarked, really looked something like a broad, smooth, cultivated field. but soon we turned toward the south and began to move slowly along the side of a brilliantly lighted boulevard on which all kinds of vehicles were passing and repassing. i was so much astonished at this unexpected scene, so realistic and seemingly uncanny, that i was utterly at a loss for words to express my feelings. oqua seeing my embarrassment came to my relief by saying: "this is the tunnel across the lower portion of the lake and constitutes a part of the boulevard you noticed along the shores." "how is this?" i asked. "it is certainly not a tunnel excavated under the lake. if anything, we are a little below the roadway and well above the bottom of the lake with the water all around us." "we do not," said oqua, "excavate tunnels as we did in ancient times. they are constructed in our machine shops. this is a metallic tube with supports which rest on the bottom, and has many advantages over the old fashioned, dark and dismal excavations. the material used is a compound somewhat like common glass but as strong as steel. with our submarine fleets it is not difficult to put the sections in place and when completed the water is pumped out of the cavity and the roadway is ready for use. even across small streams, where the banks are not too high, they are frequently preferred to bridges as more safe and durable, but for long distances and in very deep water they are indispensable, and in the case of deep water tunnels, they are frequently made to span submarine gorges." "how fortunate," i exclaimed, "that this submarine excursion was on the program! i now see a most wonderful exhibition of the power of mind to overcome material difficulties, that it would have been hard for me to realize if i had received the information in some other manner." "all things," responded oqua, "are possible to the human mind in its ultimate state of development--but we are now heading for the landing at the transportation headquarters and we will spend the night on the silver king which takes us down to the ruins of kroy in the morning." "and," i asked, "what is to hinder you from telling me something about these ruins now, and what they have to do with norrena's economic lessons?" "they are," said oqua, "only the relics of the great money center which held the people in bondage during the transition period. when kroy was deserted by the money kings, the people determined to preserve it, subject only to the ravages of time, as a warning and a lesson to future generations." as oqua ceased speaking, the sea rover arose to the surface by the side of the silver king, the hatches were opened, and in a few minutes we were welcomed on board the electric yacht by captain thorfin, and invited to an elegant supper. the day had certainly been most agreeably spent but its lessons were too suggestive and far-reaching in their character to be adequately presented in this small volume. i was fatigued by the incessant activity since early morning and was glad of an opportunity to retire to my state-room and rest. i was awake early next morning and after a hearty breakfast, we were soon speeding down the cocytas between two lofty walls of granite. there was nothing to be seen but these towering cliffs for the first few miles and captain thorfin gave us a specimen of the speed of the silver king. the cliffs seemed to dart past us as if we were on board of a lightning express train, and yet we could scarcely feel the motion of the vessel. i confess that i felt a little nervous at such astonishing speed, but captain thorfin assured us that there was no danger, as the submarine patrols removed every obstruction and preserved a uniform depth of water. i asked the captain what was the greatest speed of his vessel and he replied that he had never tested it. he had made one hundred miles an hour but the excursionists generally preferred to travel slowly. on this trip we would average fifty, and so reach kroy in about three hours. during the last two hours of our journey we were passing through a densely populated country. great communal homes appeared on either side and large manufacturing plants at frequent intervals. but our interest was centered at the mouth of the river and our attention was chiefly directed over the bow. soon a point of land appeared where the river seemed to part in twain. this i recognized as the island i had seen from the airship which had brought us to the continent, and here is where the city of kroy had been situated. my interest had been aroused and as the silver king turned into the northern channel, the island became the center of attraction. on the larboard side the same scenes of sylvan beauty, palatial buildings and groups of happy, joyous people continued, but it was now the uninhabited island that absorbed my attention. i could see, in places, through the tangled brushwood and tall trees which lined the shore, glimpses of shattered walls and tumuli, over-run by vines and briers, such as in many parts of the outer world are so attractive to archeologists, as the ruins of some ancient civilization. at one point i noticed what appeared to have been costly monuments to the dead and i said to norrena: "surely that must have been a cemetery." "and so it was," he responded. "in those days, millions were expended in decorating the graves of the rich, while the masses of their fellow beings who had toiled to create what the few had absorbed, lived in poverty, and large numbers died in alms houses or by the wayside, and found their last resting place in a potter's field. more was often expended on a single tomb than could possibly have been earned in any useful service to society, in a life-time. they sought to secure a sort of immortality by polished granite columns and laudatory inscriptions. this has all been changed for centuries. we cremate the dead body in the most speedy and economical manner possible, and seek to secure longevity and happiness for all, by creating the best possible conditions for the living." at another place i caught glimpses of monuments of another description, mingled with what had evidently been palatial structures adorned with the artistic work of the sculptor in great profusion. obelisks of polished stone towered above the surrounding trees, giving the forest a peculiar appearance not easily forgotten, but difficult to describe. noticing my interest in the scene norrena remarked: "this was once a magnificent park, and was ornamented by works of art from foreign lands representing the most ancient civilizations, as well as the most artistic products of their own sculptors and painters. one of those obelisks dated back to pre-historic ages. it was transported from its original site in the old world, at great expense as a monument to the wealth and munificence of the money kings. they had conquered the world then existing and held the people in subjection. to commemorate their success they sought to compel the past to proclaim their greatness and gratify their vanity. but they had no future. they passed away. and now the descendants of the millions whom they oppressed, visit these ruins and gather lessons of wisdom from their contemplation." we were now opposite a portion of the island where the ruins assumed something of the appearance of a city. an open roadway between buildings indicated that this had been one of the principal streets in the olden time. the silver king rounded to and made fast to a well preserved dock which forcibly called to my mind the great docks of new york, liverpool and other seaport cities of the outer world. we disembarked and found the first restrictions on our movements that we had met in altruria except the entrances to private apartments. those who desired to visit the ruins on the island were required to register their names and accept an escort to see that nothing was displaced or carried away from the chief points of interest. these preliminaries arranged, the gates were opened and accompanied by our escort, we proceeded up the well-worn roadway towards what had doubtless been the chief center of wealth and power. on either side were huge masses of debris, and falling walls of what had once marked the site of lofty structures. briers and brambles grew in the accumulated dust of ages which now covered the well-paved streets and marble sidewalks. wild vines clambered over the shattered walls and not unfrequently tall trees grew through the tops of buildings where the walls still stood firm. we were in the midst of a deep tangled wildwood, where on every side could be seen indisputable evidence that this had once been a great center of population, wealth and luxury. ruined churches and marble halls where once had gathered the elite of a city, the opulence of which had been the wonder of the world, now afforded a nesting place for wild fowl. my heart grew faint and my head dizzy as i pondered upon the wonderful lesson spread out before me. here had been a city, no less magnificent in its prime than new york, the great metropolis of america, and i asked myself the question, could this ever be the fate of my native city? captain battell, who was walking by my side, broke in upon my meditations by asking: "what do you think of it, jack? i never saw you so absorbed." and yankee like i said: "i reply by asking, what do you think, captain? surely you cannot be indifferent to scenes like this when you reflect that we are natives of new york city!" "i am not indifferent," said battell, "but i have had the advantage of former visits and hence am better prepared for it. the part of the city we are now approaching has been kept in a tolerable state of repair, to make the lessons taught by these ruins more impressive. this visit has been arranged for your especial benefit, as you are the recognized historian of the ice king. polaris and dione showed huston and myself through these ruins as soon as we reached the continent, which led me to infer that they had learned enough of our money system from macnair to understand that we needed the lesson." "then you are not a total stranger to these scenes?" i said. "no, i have been here several times and every time i come i get some new light which applies to our own country. these ruins teach a wonderful lesson. it does seem, as norrena claims, that human progress always leads up through similar channels of development. here we are in what was once a city, every feature of which indicates very clearly the existence of the same conditions which now prevail in the great cities of the outer world. it had its day and passed away because it had served its purpose, and so must all great centers of pride and fashion in which a few absorb the wealth created by the people and expend it for their own pleasure without regard for others." we now entered a locality where all the buildings, pavements, etc., had been kept in a state of repair that had in a great measure withstood the ravages of time. everywhere else the island had been left without care and was a mass of ruins which were largely concealed from view by a deep soil, composed of accumulated dust and vegetable humus from ages of luxuriant growth. here, however, were the sub-treasury, stock exchange and a number of great banking houses, still preserved, to some extent, as the money kings had left them. "these buildings," said norrena, "were occupied by the taskmasters of the people. here was the headquarters of the gold power in this country, and having a monopoly of money, it bore to the people the relation of a universal creditor and absorbed the entire surplus created by their labor to meet its demand for interest, etc. here was practically determined the amount allowed to producers on one hand, and the price charged to consumers on the other. this power was the unquestioned dictator in every sphere of human activity. but we will visit the vaults of the great money kings of that time, which were the actual head-center of this oppressive oligarchy of wealth." we entered a massive building. its heavy bronze doors and polished granite walls gave the impression, that notwithstanding its artistic finish, the chief object in its erection had been strength and durability. the thick plate glass windows could be at once protected by heavily barred steel shutters. at a moment's notice this massive structure could have been converted into a fortress that would enable a small number to hold it against a multitude. the front room was perfectly equipped as a bank, but with a strange, and seemingly reckless display of gold coins, giving one the impression that a time had come when the owners were utterly indifferent as to what became of their accumulated hoard. large safes were standing open literally crammed with stacks of glittering coins. tables and shelves were crowded with the yellow metal, which the custodian informed us, was kept just as it had been left, as a relic of the ages of mental darkness, when the wealth producing millions foolishly believed that they were dependent upon this golden hoard for the privilege of converting their labor into the means of subsistence. from the public office of the bank we descended a flight of marble steps into the basement which we found brilliantly lighted by electricity. huge steel vaults were standing open, piles of gold bricks rested upon the floors and packages of gold coins met our sight in every direction. "you see," said norrena, "how the gold flowed in upon the creditors when the people were making their exchanges without its use. among the people, it was only used to pay debts, and as the money kings owned, to such a large extent, the indebtedness, the gold supply of the country flowed in upon them until it was difficult to find storage for it. additional vaults were built and these were soon filled. at first they sought to turn this glut of gold to profit by making improvements which gave employment to labor. great trunk lines of railroad were built and the government borrowed vast sums which were expended on country roads, waterways, harbors and so forth. but the people, now fully established in business for themselves, continued, by their system of paying dividends to consumption, to increase the price of labor and its products. when these millions were paid out as wages and entered into circulation they speedily found their way into the people's banks and were returned to these vaults to pay debts. all this time the price of labor and its products was increasing, and the purchasing power of gold was decreasing, until in time all the debts were paid and the people ceased to exchange their products for money altogether. the purchasing power of gold was gone, and the money kings, who held on to the system to the last, were poor indeed. they found starvation staring them in the face. then, they abandoned these useless hoards, went out among the people and found plenty of employment for their really valuable talents." from the gold vaults we passed into others where bonds, mortgages, stocks etc., had been kept. "here," continued norrena, "at regular intervals, clerks were locked in and kept close prisoners while they clipped coupons for their masters. you see by the labels, the kind of securities which each compartment contained. these vaults held a legal lien upon the great bulk of the wealth of the country, the interest, dividends, etc., on which, if paid in cash, would require each year a sum equal to, at least, one and one-half times the entire circulating medium of the country, and the principal if converted into cash would have required ten times the entire volume of gold in the world. here, in potency, was held a lien sufficient to take every acre of land and personal property in the country." "that," i said, "calls to my mind a phase of the question which i would like to have you explain. how did the multitudes, especially in this city and on this coast, escape the grasp of these money-kings who also owned the real estate? the people had no land to go upon, and hence could not procure a subsistence by cultivating the soil without paying tribute in the shape of rent." "your question," said norrena, "is far-reaching and i can only hint at the reply which it naturally calls forth. the money kings over-reached themselves by encouraging people to secure loans and pledge their real estate for interest and principal, and then by contracting the circulation in order to increase the purchasing power of the money which they received as interest. as long as only a minor fraction of the land was mortgaged the interest was promptly paid, but a time came when nearly all of the lands were mortgaged and the people were compelled to force their products on the markets all at once to get money to pay interest. more and more of the debtors gave up the struggle and abandoned their farms. these lands were useless to the money-kings when no longer cultivated by a sturdy yeomanry. all along this eastern seaboard, where agriculture ought to have been most profitable, farms were abandoned because they would not pay interest on the investment. the money value of lands for actual use to producers, declined to zero, and the people crowded into the city and were regarded, in their impoverished condition, as a dangerous class. under these circumstances the tendency of the ruling class was to encourage the homeless poor to go upon the lands and dig a subsistence out of the soil, for which there was no market." "iola explained this to me," i said, "but i have never quite understood why it was that these colonists were not charged a rental that would keep them in perpetual poverty." "that," said norrena, "would certainly have been the result, if there had been no great central west, with a widespread tendency to agitate the money question and its relation to the economic condition of the wealth-producing millions. when the people began to organize as consumers with a view to minimizing the demand for money, and to equalize distribution by paying dividends to labor, the money kings were forced to change their policy in regard to labor, and many producers got a firm hold on enough land to furnish a subsistence. the unused lands had no value and the equitists continued to increase the price of products in the west. the money kings who were not able to sell their lands could avail themselves of opportunities to exchange them for products. the leaders of the co-operative movement here in the east knew how to take advantage of these changing conditions, and by their communal system of co-operation, were able to keep the movement on peaceful lines, and thus avoid violent collisions which might have, locally, at least, set the work of industrial emancipation back for years." "then it appears," i said, "that it was not the western organization of equitable exchange, singly and alone, that compelled the gold power to relax its grasp; but this eastern co-operative movement was also a factor in securing better conditions for labor." "that is true," said norrena. "in the west, the people had one great advantage over the east, plenty of land. but it was the organization of equity in the west that flooded this eastern financial center with money, not as interest, but because the western people were using less money and paying debts. this made times better for the eastern workmen. both the western and eastern co-operators were working on the same principles. they were all accumulating funds to purchase land, and just in proportion as the people acquired control over business they had more influence on legislation, and the power of money was correspondingly decreased." "so it seems," i said, "that your business organization did at last get into politics!" "yes," said norrena, "it did get into politics as a business influence and what may seem strange to you, its object was to prevent the repeal of laws which had been enacted in the interest of the money monopolists. these shrewd financiers, raised a great outcry against combinations among producers to increase the price of products by using interchangeable certificates of deposit instead of money, in the transaction of business. the people were using the same methods for the improvement of their own financial condition that had been used so successfully by monopolists for their impoverishment, and the patrons demanded that all the laws that had been enacted in favor of monopoly should remain on the statute books. they further demanded that all debts should be payable in legal tender money at the option of the debtor." "i should have thought," i said, "that the people would be glad to welcome the repeal of laws from which they had suffered so much." "there was a time when they would," said norrena, "but not after they had adjusted their business relations to the operation of monopoly laws. their debts were legally payable in money, and as the purchasing power of money was continually decreasing, it was to their interest to pay in money, and when all their debts were paid and the people refused any longer to take money for their products, the money kings who owned these vaults and their hoards of gold had to go in search of food. many found homes in the co-operative communities and became valuable citizens, while a larger number had taken the alarm and emigrated to the old world, only to meet a worse fate a little later on, for in the less enlightened parts of the world, the reign of gold wound up in a reign of terror." the lesson taught by these ruins would fill volumes. norrena's accurate historical knowledge and ever ready explanations, with the not less forcible comments of oqua and others, covered every phase of this wonderful, speedy and peaceful evolution from the era of money despotism to the era of man and universal freedom, equality and fraternity. no wonder, i thought, that these people had preserved the ruins of kroy as a relic of their dark ages and a warning to humanity for all time to come. here, human selfishness reigned supreme and the people of an entire continent had suffered in order to pour into this greedy maw the wealth which it had no power to consume. and now, this once great center of wealth, pride and fashion, was a solitude. its aristocratic "four hundred" had actually been starved out by the refusal of the "clodhoppers," "greasy mechanics" and "mudsills," whom they had held in such contempt, to feed and clothe them any longer. surely this was an object lesson well worthy of the care that had been taken to preserve it from the refining and civilizing hand of labor. time was slowly obliterating these foot prints of a tyranny from which the people had been emancipated for ages, but it was still important that it should not be entirely forgotten, and there could be no better reminder of the evil that had impoverished and degraded the millions, as well as of the means by which it had been removed, than these ruins and the abandoned heaps of useless gold. after a day among the ruins, and full of serious reflections, we returned to the silver king and were soon speeding down the bay. we landed at the tower, and from this point the electric cars soon transported us to our great communal home. i was fatigued and retired to my own apartment at once, to think and rest. [illustration] chapter xv. home again--letter from bona dea--electric garments--reporter's phonograph--testing the new airship--a world's council--wallaroo on evolution--the ideals planted by missionaries--the eolus--preparations for return to america--excursion to the far north--the watch tower--symbolic representation--the farewell--the revelation to ganoe--"cassie! cassie! come back! come back!" [illustration] next morning at the breakfast table oqua informed me that a package and letter from bona dea to my address, had arrived at an early hour but that it had not been delivered, as they did not wish to disturb my rest. it had been retained in the office subject to my order when i was ready to receive it. this recalled to my mind a private conversation i had with bona dea at orbitello, and i surmised that her communication might have reference to that; but i was at a loss to form any opinion in regard to the package. she had told me that one of the inmates of the home at lake byblis was paying especial attention to the formation of an ideal mental picture of life and its conditions in the frozen regions. and to that end her apartments had been fitted up to represent winter scenery, and to make the impression more realistic she was provided with a refrigerator room where she subjected herself to low temperatures and was testing the heat conserving powers of various qualities of clothing. when breakfast was over i called at the office and received a large bundle, neatly wrapped and securely sealed. the address was "jack adams, no. , care nequa." this was a poser. the communication was in the official envelope of the home and i hastened to my room, so that if need be i could have the aid of a lexicon in the translation. but when i opened it, somewhat to my surprise, i found it was written in english. being appropriate as a part of this narrative, i insert it in full. matrons' home, lake byblis, march , , a.m. my dear nequa:--on returning to the home, i related to meidra, the "arctic pupil" of whom i told you, the substance of our conversation, and explained to her what you suggested in regard to electric garments as a means of conserving the natural heat of the body when exposed to severe cold. she informed me that she had been experimenting on that line and had succeeded in making a suit that proved to be an ample protection from the greatest cold that her refrigerator is capable of producing. she sends you this electric suit, with the request that you test it in your proposed voyage to the southern verge. she further requests me to tell you that she does not intend to permit you to deprive this inner world of the honor of having a jack adams among its great navigators and explorers by your simply taking advantage of one of our customs to change your name to such a feminine cognomen as nequa. both she and tanqua are anxious to make your acquaintance. meidra says that your image is indelibly impressed on her mind by your photograph. she has an enlarged reproduction of your picture as a prominent feature in her room, and from this she reads a most admirable character. the people of the entire concave are aroused to the importance of your efforts to open up a channel of communication with the outer world. all the grand divisions want to participate in the honor and to that end each one has appointed a member to act with a representative from altruria, and constitute an inner-world council to assist in every way possible. it has been agreed that norrena shall represent this country and i am authorized to request you to make a date for the first meeting of the council, as soon as possible after your trial voyage "in search of a storm," as battell expressed it. please advise me as soon as you return, when it will suit you best to have these inner-world representatives call upon you, and oblige your many friends, bona dea. i opened the bundle and found a beautifully quilted silk suit, soft and pliable, but of firm texture, with sandals, gloves, head-dress and visor to match. it also contained a small inlaid jewel case with a key in the lock. i opened this and found, as i supposed a beautiful locket in which i expected to see a picture of the donor, but it proved to be a delicate piece of machinery with printed instructions, which informed me that it was a phonograph for the especial use of reporters. when wound up it recorded on silver foil every word spoken. this was something new and i recalled to mind that i had frequently talked to people who wore similar lockets. now i had found put that they probably preserved a record of every word i said, and i wondered if i had said anything that i would not like to have repeated. with people wearing lockets of this description, i realized how important it was for all to be very careful what they said; and certainly the people of this country are the most circumspect and exact in their statements, of any people with whom i have ever met. just as i had finished the examination of the phonograph, the bell called my attention to my private telephone, and i was requested to meet battell at the boatyard on the roof, prepared for a flight through the air on his new airship and to take some lessons in its management. this was just what i wanted, and in a minute the elevator had landed me on the roof. i found battell, huston, polaris and dione, together with iola, macnair and oqua, ready for a ride in the new airship. it was beautifully finished but much more substantial than the light airy vessels to which i had become accustomed. i complimented battell upon its appearance, but he was too matter-of-fact to appreciate anything that might look like flattery and said with his usual honest bluntness: "it is not the appearance that we care anything about, but the sailing qualities. and so far as this climate is concerned we have made decided improvements in this particular. the sailing qualities are such, that everyone wants an improved airship, all at the same time. the demand is so pressing that captain ganoe and myself are in honor bound to these people, to give our entire attention to supplying the world with these improvements for at least a year to come. so we have concluded to turn the whole matter over to you, of constructing a vessel that will meet the requirements of an arctic storm." "but," i asked, "why should you give up this work, now that you have it so far completed, into my inexperienced hands? i should think that your improvements could be duplicated by native mechanics." "so they might," said battell, "but they want all their factories readjusted, and the same improved methods of manufacture which have been introduced at lake byblis. besides we could not have completed the work without your assistance. it was just as important that you should test our improvements in the conditions existing at the verges, as it was for us to manufacture them. these external world methods of testing everything by actual experiment are absolutely necessary when we come to deal with external world conditions. a department of the factory at byblis has been set apart for you, where your plans and specifications will be speedily worked out." "but," i asked, "how can they be worked out as they should be by mechanics who know absolutely nothing about external world conditions, such as polar waves, arctic storms, hurricanes and cyclones which are produced by external influences not existing in this internal world? will captain ganoe and yourself, with your external world experience and observation be there to superintend the work?" "yes, i will be there," said battell, "but i want to thank you now for so forcibly presenting the reasons why the people of the inner world are anxious to avail themselves of our outer world experience in adapting their airships to outer world conditions. you certainly would not deprive them of this when they have given us so much that is indispensable to the physical, mental and moral uplifting of the people who live in the external world? it is these considerations which have influenced our decision to yield to their wishes. whenever these people who live in this internal world of truth, as macnair calls it, where an altruistic love for humanity is the controlling impulse, see an improvement, they all want it immediately because it will enable them to do more good to others and of course we could not honorably refuse to assist them to the fullest extent of our ability." "certainly not," i said. "that puts the matter in an entirely new light; but it also leaves to me, with my comparative inexperience, the whole responsibility of constructing a storm and cold proof ship. for this, i have no experience as a mechanic, and am but poorly qualified. my duties on shipboard have always been in some capacity that did not stimulate my mechanical faculties, if i have any. as an assistant to captain ganoe and yourself i thought there might be a place for me, but as to my ability to take the lead, i have my doubts. i do not see how i am to get along without your co-operation and counsel." "you will certainly have that," said battell "this is a country of rapid transit and we shall get together at regular intervals to compare notes. besides, we will have the assistance of an inner-world association, whose representatives will constitute an inner-world council of the most earnest spirits, who are anxious to unite the internal and external worlds by opening a channel of inter-communication and cultivating a mutual spirit of fraternal regard and co-operation between the two. i have thought much along these lines and realize how necessary these two great worlds are to each other and how important that the leading spirits of both should come together and work with one accord for the highest possible development of both." "and that is just what they must do," said oqua. "but let us test your new ship at once and confer in regard to the work we have in hand at the same time." thus prompted, we embarked, battell applied the power and we began to ascend. every required motion of the vessel had its appropriate propelling power which was under perfect control. no turning around was necessary. the new ship could dart in any given direction, at the will of the operator. i took my place at the helm with battell and after a little practice found that i could handle it without difficulty. to me its management was much more simple than the old style which could only move in one direction. this facility with which the direction could be changed was the essential feature in order to be able to ride the storms and nullify the influence of the contending air currents which would be a constant source of danger in the outer world. in fancy, i pictured myself in a storm with sudden changes in the direction of the wind, and suiting the action to the thought i set the vessel to dodging and gyrating in every direction to the no little alarm of our altrurian friends who had no conception of the conditions of an external world bluster. "hold on jack!" exclaimed battell. "don't shake the life out of us. wait until you get into an actual storm and then dodge as rapidly as may be necessary, but there is no need of it here." "i was just thinking," i said, "what motions might be necessary in a regular bluster, to hold the ship steady on her course. i really feel anxious to try it, and believe that i can literally ride the storm like the petrel in such a ship as i fully believe can be made." "well, you can try as soon as you like," said battell. "i see you understand the management and i leave you to test it to your heart's content. find all the deficiencies you can and let us know what changes may be needed, and they will be made to the best of our ability. we will now return to your home, borrow one of your old fashioned ships and return to our work at byblis." "well, do not send it back," said oqua, "until it is remodeled according to the latest improvements." "your department of exchange," said battell, "has already sent in a general order for improved airships to replace those of the old style, which in effect means, that they shall all be remodeled on application. so we will send you an improved ship as soon as it can be made." it was now the second day of march and i had set my heart on getting ready to start for the outer world by the latter part of may or the first of june, so there was no time to be wasted. i determined to leave at once on my experimental voyage to the southern verge and announced my intentions to oqua, requesting her to represent me during my absence and any arrangements that she made in my name would be satisfactory. "what!" she exclaimed. "do you propose to go alone? i thought battell intended that two of your sailors should go with you?" "so he did," i replied, "and at that time i thought i would need them, but since i have tried the vessel, i have come to the conclusion that i had better go alone. as battell left without referring to the matter, i shall act upon the presumption that he had changed his mind, just as he did in regard to completing a storm and cold proof airship." "but," said oqua, "your journey will take a week or ten day's travel at the least, and how can you stand the constant attention to the helm without rest?" "no fears on that score," i said. "very much of the time will be spent in this serene atmosphere. i need only set the helm in the right direction and i can rest until i find stormy conditions. then i will surely be able to experiment with the ship for a few hours." oqua, seeing that i was determined, helped me to get ready. i took sufficient supplies for three weeks, although i did not expect to be gone half of that time. the trip was most interesting but i have no room to describe the voyage. sufficient to say that i found storm conditions and intense cold much sooner than i expected. my electric garments proved to be a perfect success, but i discovered a number of deficiencies in the ship. i returned in just eight days and presented a written report, and specifications for necessary changes. battell assured me that the new vessel should be ready for another trial journey as soon as possible. i had notified norrena, that i would be pleased to meet the world council at my own apartments on the fifteenth, and i was back from the southern verge on the tenth, ready to place my discoveries before them. promptly at the time indicated, captains ganoe and battell with our usual circle of altrurian friends were present in the council chamber of the home, ready to receive our guests, and in a few minutes norrena arrived with the representatives from the other grand divisions. he introduced them as hylas of atlan, lal roy of budistan, wallaroo of noxuania and lefroy of the austral isles. coming as they did from all the grand divisions of the world, i expected to see people of widely different physical appearance and mental characteristics, but in this i was mistaken. while they showed marked differences, there were no such contrasts as we find between different races in the outer world. in complexion they ranged from blonde to a dark brunette, all spoke the same language, expressed similar sentiments and in features and general deportment seemed to be building toward a common type. i made a report of my trial trip to the southern verge and also of our plans and specifications for the further improvement of the airship, that we believed would make it storm and cold proof. as these people knew practically nothing of the conditions of the frigid zones they accepted what we had to offer without criticism. they expressed themselves as highly gratified that they had with them experienced navigators who were familiar with the frozen regions and who knew what was needed in order to open up a channel of communication. at this meeting it was definitely determined that we should meet again on april th, which interval battell assured us would give me an opportunity to report on another trial trip, to test the additional improvements which had been found desirable. that i should go ahead with the work of preparation in my own way, and when i was satisfied that the time had come to cross the ice barriers i should fix the date, so that the council could arrange for an excursion to the most northern point of the continent of altruria where the life saving service had a signal station at an ancient watch tower that had been erected in pre-historic times. after our business meeting had closed, the representatives from the old world plied us with questions concerning the outer world which we answered to the best of our ability. finding that they were not a bit backward about questioning i was emboldened to ask, how it was that all the representatives from the different countries seemed to have been selected from the same race of people, while i had learned from altrurian history that the same races of men had existed here that existed in the outer world. "that was the case in ancient times," said wallaroo of noxuania, "but at this time we have practically only one race of people in the inner world." "here is a mystery," i said, "that i would like very much to have explained. how is it that they have all merged into one type, ranging in complexion from blonde to brunette?" "my own explanation," said wallaroo, "is, that identity of ideals and similarity of conditions naturally lead to similarity of development, as in accordance with natural law the race is always building in the direction of its ideals." "that is certainly," i said, "a scientific proposition, but it does not explain why blonde, for instance, should ever become an ideal complexion among the dark races. how do you account for it?" "your question," said wallaroo, "is one that should be carefully studied in the light of science and history, in order to be understood. one thing is certain, that the early inhabitants of my own country, noxuania, were very dark, ranging from brown to black, while at present, brunette is the rule and blonde is not uncommon." "but how," i asked, "do you account for the change?" "my opinion," said wallaroo, "is that the influence of the white missionaries created a new ideal in the minds of the people and especially in the minds of the mothers, who almost worshiped them." "but how is this?" i asked. "in the outer world, the dark races very often persecute and destroy the white missionaries." "and so they did here," said wallaroo, "before equity was established in altruria among white people, and another class of white missionaries were sent to the dark races. these came not to promulgate metaphysical creeds, but to bring material blessings, and establish freedom, equality and fraternity. they practiced just what they preached and wherever they went, they bestowed blessings. the people, especially the women, soon came to worship them as saviors because they sought only to do them good on the material plane which they could appreciate, and left them to free their minds from superstition in the natural way by increasing their knowledge. it is not strange, under these circumstances, that with these children of nature, white became the ideal color. improved material conditions, together with a scientific education, higher ideals and ample time for development have produced all the changes which have been wrought out." i found the members of the council from the other grand divisions to be highly cultured people and i looked forward to meeting them in the future with pleasure. i was especially, interested in wallaroo and lefroy because they represented peoples which at the introduction of the present altruistic civilization would correspond to the people now occupying central africa and the south sea islands. wallaroo had attributed their remarkable development as physical, mental and moral beings to the higher civilization derived from the religion of humanity regardless of creeds, that had been brought to them by the altrurian missionaries. the more i thought of these things the more i was impressed that i must visit these countries, mingle with the people and make a close study of their history. lefroy told me that their written history commenced with the work of the missionaries of the new civilization, but much additional knowledge had been gained from archeological and ethnological researches in the light of such pre-historic traditions as had been preserved. these missionaries did not come to promulgate doctrines of a future life but to establish conditions which would confer blessings in this life, such as could be appreciated on the animal plane. for this reason they were welcomed as superior beings to lead them morally and spiritually. by these glimpses of a new field of discovery that was opening up before me, i was more than ever stimulated to complete the work i had in hand which was directly applicable to the solution of the great economic problem confronting the people of the outer world. as had been promised by battell, at the council which met on april th, i was able to report the deficiencies that had been discovered in the airship by my second trial trip to the southern verge during its winter season. at this meeting it was determined to name the new vessel the eolus, though i preferred to call it the petrel because i had demonstrated that it could ride the storm. the time for the excursion to the watch tower at the northern extremity of the continent and my departure for the outer world was fixed for the twentieth of may and the next meeting of the council on board the silver king on the fifteenth, while enroute. this gave me really less than one month to complete my manuscript and get everything in readiness for what i regarded as the most momentous voyage of my life. while i was enrolled as a teacher of english, and the geography, history and institutions of the outer world, i had really given all of my attention to the study of the altrurian language, and of the manner in which the great problems now confronting my own country had been solved. every day revealed something new or presented the old in a new light. the arts and sciences had been developed to a degree that had scarcely been dreamed of in the outer world. psychic powers such as clairvoyance, clairaudience and telepathy, which in the outer world were classed as occult by believers, and as baseless assumptions by the multitudes, were here well understood by the many, as revealed in the fact that my disguise had been so readily penetrated by native altrurians. but at the same time they respected my right to conceal my identity. this was a marked peculiarity of these people. the right of persons to keep a secret in their own bosoms was never questioned, and when it was discovered, as i take it for granted was usually the case, it was never alluded to. here, my assumed character of jack adams, the sailor, was held in the highest esteem by the few to whom i had explained the reason for it, because it had been necessary, in order to enable me to be true to my own higher sense of right. in the outer world this would have branded me as disreputable and i would have been ostracized as something vile by the so called better classes of society. after years of wandering, exposed to the perils and hardships of a sailor's life, i had found my lost lover, only to learn from his oft expressed sentiments, that he regarded such a course of life as i had pursued as so grossly disreputable that no honorable man could afford to contract a matrimonial alliance with such a woman. for this reason i had not revealed myself to him, and now that i was soon to leave him, the question often presented itself to my mind as to whether i ought to let him remain any longer in ignorance of the fact that cassie vanness had stood by his side in so many dangers. the time was at hand when this question must be decided and i determined to confer with my most intimate altrurian friends of my own sex. bona dea had arrived at our home at my invitation and oqua and iola were present to assist in making out a program for the excursion and my departure for the outer world. my proposed journey was of course the subject of conversation, but i wanted to draw them out in regard to the personal matter that was uppermost in my mind. i wanted their advice but did not want to be too abrupt in raising a question that was calculated to call the attention of these public spirited people away from an important public question in which they were deeply interested, to the consideration of my own private affairs. oqua, however, soon gave me the opportunity i wanted by asking: "what does captain ganoe think of the decision of the council and the general consensus of the opinions of those most interested, that you should have your own way about the journey and go alone if you thought best? while he did not object, i felt quite sure that he did not approve." "his heart," i said, "was very much set on going himself and he expresses grave fears as to my safety, notwithstanding my excursions into the stormy regions in the vicinity of the southern verge. he knows however that it was with his consent and advice that the entire matter of opening communication with the outer world was placed in my hands and i accepted the responsibility under protest. the council regarded my proposed expedition as too perilous to risk more than one life in the attempt. but this you know is just what i wanted for reasons of my own. as a matter of fact there is less danger than in my excursions to the southern verge. i wonder sometimes what the captain would think if he knew that it was the little girl playmate of his boyhood days and the affianced bride of his early manhood who was bidding him adieu!" "and do you not intend," asked oqua, "to reveal your identity to him in some way so that when you return, no concealments will be necessary? you know that we penetrated your disguise at once but we respected your natural right to conceal your identity, and we shall continue to do so until you are willing for us to do otherwise. but i would suggest, as an act of justice to captain ganoe as well as to yourself, that you ought to let him know who you are. it will doubtless awaken in his mind a train of thought that will be very beneficial to him, while it will protect you from the deteriorating effects of leading a double life." "but," i said, "this double life was forced upon me by causes over which i had no control and hence i do not see how it can have any deteriorating effects." "that was no doubt true," interrupted bona dea, "in the present stage of your outer world civilization, but there is no necessity for it here. and the necessity being past, the continuance of the deception might be interpreted to mean that deep down in your soul you doubted the propriety of your conduct. disguise is perfectly legitimate as a means of self protection, but when it is unnecessary, its tendency is to cultivate duplicity, a characteristic to be carefully avoided. hence i would advise you to adopt some method of revealing your identity to captain ganoe at the moment of your departure; and the more open and frank you are about it, the better will be the effect on him as well as your self. better not wait until he penetrates your disguise for himself, something he would have done long ago, but for the fact that from his education, he is guided by external appearances instead of those more subtle impressions from which there can be no concealments." i saw the force of this kind of reasoning and determined to act accordingly, and the more i thought of it, the more determined i became to be frank, honest and kind, but strong, independent and inflexible in the assertion of my natural right to think and act for myself without having my integrity and purity of character called in question, because i preferred truth to falsehood. at first i dreaded the denouement; but the more i reflected upon it, the more necessary it appeared, and the better i was prepared for the ordeal. the hour of my departure was near. it had been arranged that the silver king with the delegations from the other grand divisions should meet the altrurian delegation at the ruins of kroy, and i had agreed to give pat and mike a ride on the eolus, from the ice king on lake byblis, and land them on the silver king while enroute for the northern extremity of the continent. i started to the lake early on the morning of may th and within an hour from my departure i was on the deck of the ice king. i found lief and eric, as well as pat and mike, ready for the journey. as soon as i had secured some scientific instruments i wanted from the equipment of the ice king and some personal belongings which i regarded as important, i invited the sailors on board the eolus, and in a moment more we were mounting into the air. we sailed around the lake and gave the people an opportunity of seeing the airship that was destined for the outer world. the eolus was not built with a view to securing greater speed but for holding its course regardless of contrary winds. in speed, however, it was capable of making considerable progress against a head wind of two hundred miles an hour. i put the ship through the various movements that it was capable of making, such as stopping suddenly, moving backward, moving sidewise and suddenly rising and falling, for the benefit of the sailors and of the numerous spectators. mike was quick to see the advantage that the eolus had over other airships and he remarked with enthusiasm: "well jack, it will take a lively hurricane to drive you much from your course, but how in the world will you keep from freezing?" "nothing easier," i said, as i touched a button and lighted the electric burners that were placed between the inner and outer walls. in a minute the walls were hot to the touch and the air inside became sultry. "gracious!" exclaimed mike. "you can never stand this. it will roast you." "then we will cool it," i said, as i shut off part of the burners, "or if this is not enough, i will shut them all off." "but," said mike, "you have it so hot now that it will take an hour to cool off." "not so," i replied. "i will open the doors and start the electric fans," and suiting the action to the word, a cool breeze took the place of the sultry air. "but if you want it cooler," i continued, "i will bring the temperature down a point or two more," and closing the doors, i opened the refrigerator compartment and in a moment we were shivering with the cold. "well!" exclaimed mike, "i never knew climate to change so rapidly. i think you have not been dodging up to the pole and back for nothing. you seem to have provided for every emergency but one, and that is the freezing of the moisture which is already obscuring your lookouts by this manufactured dose of winter." "that is provided for," i said, as i started the circular lookout glasses into motion under a specially prepared brush which absorbed the moisture. mike noticed the disappearance of the clouds on the lookouts but did not observe the cause and looked at me inquiringly. "put your hand on the glass," i said, "and it will explain itself." "well i should think it would!" he exclaimed as he jerked back his hand. "the whole window is just a whizzing; and now i see that the cross bar is a brush that seems to have drank up the moisture." "i have tried to provide for every contingency," i said, as i turned the prow of the eolus down the valley of the cocytas, and put her at full speed. "i regard it as a matter of the first importance that a full account of our discoveries shall be transmitted to our own country. we must join the excursion on board the silver king as soon as we can. i want to interview as many of the representatives from other countries as possible. i must gather all the useful knowledge i can for the benefit of the external world." "that is right," said mike, "and i would be far from stopping you, but i want you to be after going slow a bit." "why what is the matter?" i asked, as i checked our speed. "just this," said mike, producing a box, "it will take money in the outer world to secure the publication of your book and here is our wages from the ice king. it is of no use to us in this country, and we want it to be used to send your book broadcast. you will see that it is divided into two parcels, one belongs to lief and eric and the other to pat and myself." here lief broke into our conversation, speaking the altrurian language like a native, saying: "we want your book to be translated into all languages,--and it will be, just as soon as our wonderful discoveries are known in any civilised country. we particularly want our own people to hear about this country, and that we are not the first norsemen who came here. tell them about the old viking, and also of the norwegian names which are found everywhere." "i have noted these things," i said, "as well as the part you have taken in the expedition. how you saved the ice king by your prompt action when we were caught in the ice, and how your ability as seamen enabled us to get through after the larger part of the crew had deserted." "oh! we ask no credit for that," said eric. "we shipped for a purpose, and have in a measure found what we were looking for. when the right time comes our people will hear from us, and when they do, we may be able to add something of value to the great work for humanity which you have undertaken. all we ask for now is, that your account of our discoveries shall be given to the outside world." "and i promise you," i said, "that your money shall be used for that purpose, and i fully believe that what we have learned, will be the greatest boon that could be conferred upon the people of the outer world. in the name of humanity i accept the trust you place in my hands and i shall see that your gold shall be used to emancipate your fellow workmen from the tyranny now imposed upon them by human greed." as we sped down the valley a glass of small magnifying power brought the silver king into view gliding northward on the bay like a thing of life. i timed the eolus so as to join the excursion on this floating crystal palace when it passed out upon the ocean. as we slowly settled in the place that had been set apart for us, the crowds gathered around and i was kept busy answering questions and explaining the use of the various attachments which experience had demonstrated to be essential to the successful navigation of the air in the external world. this was an excursion long to be remembered. the crowds of elegantly dressed people who thronged the decks of the silver king had gathered from every part of the concave to accompany us to the northern extremity of altruria, a distance of about , miles from the mouth of the cocytas. it was intended that we should cover this distance in seven days, which would make the actual time of my departure on my aerial voyage, the morning of the twenty-third of may. as the excursion was to last one full week a series of entertainments was provided to make the time pass pleasantly and profitably. music, dancing and theatrical performances were interspersed with lectures and social converse touching upon leading subjects of thought and action. the program made this journey one ceaseless round of enjoyment. the records of the conversations preserved by my locket phonograph, i regard as the most instructive and valuable historical, scientific and ethical lessons i have ever listened to, and which i hope to be able to give to the world when the occasion requires. on the evening of the twenty-second, oqua called my attention to the kaleidoscopic lights on the watch tower which was to be the point where i would bid farewell to my altrurian friends as well as my comrades of the ice king. in the pitch dark nights of the outer world such an exhibition would have been beautiful and grand beyond description but even here, with the reflected light which made the darkest nights comparatively light, the scene through our glasses, of the ever changing views was such, that i never tired of observing them. these lights presented all the prismatic hues of the rainbow with the intermediate shades, continually changing from one geometrical figure to another, but always coming around to a five pointed star which is the symbol and sign manual of the material civilization of this inner world; the changing colors kept pace with the changing geometrical figures, always returning to the five pointed star, until it had been reproduced in each of the seven prismatic colors. this seemed to be the regular order, but suddenly it was broken, by giving only the stars in the seven different colors in a rapid succession, until they resolved themselves into a circle, revolving swiftly on its axis. seeing my interest in this change, oqua said: "the keeper has just noticed our approach and is operating the keys to send us a welcome in the name of the entire concave. this welcome will be repeated by every signal station on this parallel around the world. the principal use of these lights is to send messages by means of the changing figures, which are well understood by the people of this country, and especially those who navigate these northern waters. the one great drawback to their use, is, that they must be observed through glasses which are especially adapted to this purpose. here in this inner world where it is never absolutely dark we cannot take the full advantage of these light signals, without the use of external appliances." as she spoke she set the great telescope through which i was looking to revolving so as to take in a zone all around the concave, and i observed other signal lights responding in regular order along this zone. "these signal stations," continued oqua, "are under the control of the life saving service, and the keepers with these glasses are always on the lookout for mariners who may be in danger, and their signal messages notify any patrols that may observe them of the nature of the danger as well as the locality of the endangered. had the ice king come within the radius of any of these signal stations at almost any other time, you would certainly have been discovered and rescued. but at the time you came into these waters the fog had effectually checkmated our observations. for this reason we are agitating for the extension of this system to medial and equatorial latitudes, as a time has come when it seems likely that other ships like the ice king, may drift into these placid waters where sails are useless, and hence be powerless to save themselves from certain destruction by being carried into the southern verge on ocean currents which never touch the land." on the morning of the twenty-third when i awoke, the silver king was lying at the wharf and i had a close view of the watch tower and its ever changing signal lights. it was more like a lofty building than a mere tower. it was a hexagon in shape, two hundred and fifty feet in height with a large platform on top, in the center of which was a huge column like the body of a tall tree branching out into numerous arms, each supporting a series of electric lights. the mechanical contrivance by which these lights were controlled was automatic, but as occasion required could be changed by the watchman in the observatory to signal any message required to all whom it might concern. this building from outside to outside was one hundred feet at the base and fifty feet at the top, while the inside diameter was the same from top to bottom. on the outside was a spiral stairway reaching from the ground to the platform at the top and in the center was an electric elevator, connected with each of the twenty stories. the hour of my departure had come. according to the program i was to bid farewell to the members of the inner world council and my old comrades of the ice king and some personal friends at the top of the tower where they had already assembled. the crew of the silver king and her throngs of excursionists had gathered on the deck and the wharf to see me take my flight. when all was ready, i took my place on the eolus and rising a few feet sailed slowly around this magnificent ship, coming to a halt on the starboard quarter where captain thorfin, acting as spokesman, said: "in the name of the people here assembled from all parts of the world who have accompanied you thus far on your daring expedition, i am requested to express to you our exalted opinion of your courage, your ability and worth, and to thank you for the inestimable service which you have undertaken to render to our people, by extending their sphere of knowledge in regard to the external world. you are now engaged in a work for which our people are powerless. we realize that we are to profit by your perils. you will ever occupy a warm place in our affections. accept our thanks for your heroic efforts to open a channel of communication with our fellow beings of the external world. hoping for your speedy return we bid you a loving farewell." "and through you," i responded, "i desire to extend my heartfelt thanks to those who are beyond the reach of my voice, for this demonstration of their interest, and may the channel of communication, which we hope to establish between the internal and the external worlds never again be closed. but as yet i have not accomplished anything to merit your thanks. i am the one who ought to be grateful to your people. i came among you a stranger and you received me as a brother. everywhere i have met the kindest consideration and all my wants have been supplied without even the formality of asking. i have here found the living soul of humanity developed as it has never been believed to be possible in the external world. i carry with me to my own native land the pearl of great price, the knowledge that humanity can be redeemed from selfishness and all of its consequences. in the external world, from whence i came, we have only cultivated the external, and hence have developed physical hardihood while you have developed the finer attributes of the soul which we have neglected. my ambition is to bring these two worlds together. you need our physical hardihood while we need your higher development of soul. when the leading characteristics of both are united into one common brotherhood, both worlds will have a perfected humanity. if i can help humanity to reach this grand culmination, where both soul and body shall be developed to their utmost capacity, i shall be happy. to me, with my training, it does not seem like a daring undertaking now that i am enabled to utilize your grand discovery of the means by which the air can be navigated. thanking you for this mark of your consideration, and promising to return as soon as possible, i bid you adieu." as i ceased speaking, i set the eolus to moving directly to the top of the tower. this demonstrated at once to the multitudes, its superiority over the old style of airship and they gave a cheer, which was the more expressive and significant as these people are not given to anything like loud demonstrations of applause. at the platform i received cordial words of cheer from the committee, my old comrades of the ice king and my most intimate altrurian friends. speaking for the committee, lal roy, of budistan said: "on behalf of the members of this committee, and especially of the members from the eastern hemisphere, i congratulate you upon the marked improvements you have made in our methods of aerial navigation. the construction of the eolus marks an era in our progress that will be a monument to your memory. you will be honored and appreciated for generations to come." "excuse me," i responded. "i am not entitled to the honor you would bestow upon me. captain battell made the first move toward the improvements that were consummated in the eolus, and captain ganoe and huston have both contributed their mechanical skill. without them there would have been no eolus." "hold on jack," said battell. "in the consummation, we only carried out your suggestions. the improvements i started, were completed in accordance with your plans." "yes," said captain ganoe, as he clasped my hand. "you were the first person i ever heard suggest the construction of an airship that could ride the storm, and but for your suggestions every one of which was tested in your experimental journeys to the verges, we never could have succeeded. and but for your intimate knowledge of the difficulties to be overcome, i never would have consented for you to go alone. even as it is, notwithstanding the unanimous decision of the committee, i find it very hard to reconcile myself to the thought that you are to be exposed all alone, to the cold and the storms of the polar regions. such dangers ought to be reserved for those who have nothing to live for, and not for the young, the refined and the educated who have a bright future before them." "have no fears for me," i said. "you must not forget that it is now warm weather in the north frigid zone and i will not be exposed to intense cold, and the probability is that i will have no severe storms to contend with. but i will promise this: to be careful, and if i discover any defect in the eolus that would make the journey too hazardous, i will return at once, rather than take any chances of defeating our purpose of communicating with the outer world when we have mastered the problem of riding the storm. no doubt my observations on this voyage, will open the way for other improvements. keep up your courage. this is but the beginning of our work. we must have airships that will enable the most sensitive, to visit the outer world, and teach our countrymen the importance of cultivating the higher attributes of the soul, which can only be developed in their fullness under the benign influence of an altruistic civilization." oqua here stepped forward and took me by the hand, saying: "nequa, my more than friend, go, and the blessings of our people go with you. may you reach your native land in safety and accomplish your mission. by so doing you will leave footprints on the sands of time that can never be effaced. as soon as your work is placed in the proper hands return with all speed to the many loving hearts which await you." scarcely had she ceased speaking when polaris, as if to continue her remarks, raising her hand and pointing to the north, said: "yes, loving hearts will await you. and when your form has faded from our vision, in yonder deep cerulean blue, the mystic symbol of purity and truth, remember that in spirit we are with you. and i will continue to keep watch over these waters, patiently awaiting your return, as in the past i have kept watch for any of your people that might drift in here, and be left to the mercy of the currents which never touch the land. i hope to be the first to greet you on your return, but if perchance you should be lost in your perilous undertaking, i will still be flitting, to and fro, over these northern seas, awaiting the coming of your people, to assist and welcome them in the true spirit of our civilization." macnair gave a new turn and spirit to this closing interview, by saying in his usual cheery manner: "in the name of humanity i protest against preparing for the funeral before the corpse is ready. neither am i willing to contemplate the possibility of jack adams ever requiring any such a service at our hands. you do not understand the kind of material of which he is composed. i know that jack is going to make the round trip, no matter what we may be doing, and so far as i am concerned, i do not intend to give myself any uneasiness about him; and instead of bobbing around up here in this chilly atmosphere, i will go home and be ready to give jack the cordial greeting of a fellow countryman, when he returns from this last polar expedition." "macnair is right," i said. "i am not starting out to fall by the wayside, and do not forget that the eolus will sail far above the ice-fields, and that during the high-noon of the long arctic day of six months duration. i apprehend no danger, but anticipate a pleasant excursion to my native land. but i will not go any further this time, than is absolutely necessary. i hope to meet the right persons at some of the many stations in alaska, and if so i will return several days earlier than i have promised. i shall return as soon as possible. my life work is here, for it will take a life-time to complete the work that i have laid out for myself to do for the benefit of my countrymen who live in the external world." as i was speaking, captain ganoe stood with his hand on the door of the eolus, at if it was by right his place to have the last parting word. captain battell and the other comrades of the ice king drew near. upon their faces, i read the affectionate regard they had for me. it was a trying moment. i wanted a last word with captain ganoe. i wanted it impressive, kind but inflexible. i shook hands with all who stood near, and then as i held captain ganoe's hand i said to oqua: "step on board, i want you to assist me a moment," and to the captain, "wait here a moment, i have something to say to you." oqua did as directed, and we ascended and made the circuit of the lights, while i prepared myself for the revelation i intended. oqua handled the ship while i hastily donned the attire which characterised my sex in the outer world. i arrayed myself in the same rich satin dress that i had worn on the last evening i had spent with raphael, at his uncle's home in new york. my golden locks made into a neat fitting wig, and put up in the game style which he had so much admired, now covered my short cropped hair. around my neck i had the same gold chain and locket of peculiar workmanship, and the same ring on my hand, which had been his parting presents to his affianced bride. over all i wore a cloak that came down to my feet. my toilet complete, we dropped to the level of the platform, but just outside, and oqua with a parting pressure of the hand, and with a last injunction: "nequa, be strong, be true, but do not forget to be kind and considerate," passed from the eolus to the platform, and moving back a few feet, i stepped to the door and throwing aside my cloak, stood arrayed before captain ganoe, just as i had been when i bade him adieu at our guardian's home just fifteen years before. the crowd stood spell-bound. none but oqua, macnair, and the crew of the ice king had ever seen any one dressed in the costume which is peculiar to women in the outer world. captain ganoe stood rooted to the spot, and gazed at me with a look of consternation, as if i was one who had just arisen from the grave, as i said: "captain ganoe, you doubtless recognize me and i ask your attention for a moment. you will probably remember, that on the ice king you confidently related to your scientist, jack adams, the story of your engagement to cassie vanness, and asked him if he had ever loved. he made an evasive reply. if you care to have an explicit answer to that question, ask my trusted friend oqua. i do not wish to have that story again pass my lips. i have done with it forever. i have now taken up a new life and henceforth i am wedded to a new lover, and the wealth of my affections shall be bestowed upon humanity. "the memory of the old life, and the old love, carries with it the martyrdom of all that is noblest, purest and most sacred in the soul of woman, her devotion to the chosen idol of her girlhood days. these outer world conditions so foreign to all that is good and true, make me wonder that i should ever have been so weak as to be victimized by them. but such are the consequences of a false education, which belongs to a benighted past and cannot be helped. for many long years, in my assumed character of jack adams, the sailor, i roamed over the high seas to find you, and during all of our perils in the ice, i stood by your side. i worshiped you with an idolatrous devotion. and all this, only to hear again and again from your lips, the expression of sentiments, that condemned all that i had done, as disreputable, unworthy and immoral. you have repeatedly declared that as an honorable man, you could never unite yourself with such a woman in the holy bonds of matrimony, no matter how much you loved her. "it was for this reason, that my own self respect forbade that i should reveal my identity to you. the case of huston was almost identical with my own, and in condemning the course which he had taken you condemned me. i took it for granted, that as an honorable man, you expressed your honest sentiments, and there was nothing for me to do but to submit to your verdict--" the captain raised his hand as if to speak, but i checked him, saying: "hear me through. it is in no spirit of unkindness that i speak. i have waited patiently for you to so modify your views, that i could make myself known to you in the full assurance of your approval of my fidelity to our plighted troth. but you gave me no such opportunity. oqua penetrated my disguise at first sight and many others of my inner world friends with whom i have been associated, intuitively understood that jack adams, the sailor, was an assumed character and why it had been adopted; but you, blinded by the crystallized errors of a false education, were ignorant of my identity. "i now reveal myself to you, because i do not wish to continue this assumed character, even to escape the pain that would be inflicted by your disapproval. i do not regret the course i have taken. under the same circumstances i would be compelled to do the same thing again, rather than be false to the higher laws of my own nature. it is true that i have repudiated, and still repudiate, any legal obligation that may be secured by fraud, misrepresentation or coercion. i now know that human laws, human customs and legal ceremonies may be the cover for the violation of god's laws which are implanted in the human soul. i have been true to these higher, god made laws of my own being, and disregard all man made laws and customs which violate the most sacred rights of the human soul. "if i cannot meet you as an equal, free to think and act for myself, regardless of the arbitrary rulings of either church or state, then it will be far better for both of us, that we remain apart. i will never be bound by any ceremony that does not meet my own approval. when it comes to matters of this kind, i, cassie vanness, am the lawmaker. "you have repeatedly expressed sentiments, which could have no other meaning, than that you regarded legal and popular ceremonies, as of more worth in your estimation, than the 'unpurchased, and unpurchasable devotion of a loving woman.' if you prefer a companion who cares more for what mother grundy might say, than she does for captain ganoe, then i could not possibly be that companion. when i return, let all this be forgotten. let us meet as friends, forget if we can, the past, and let each of us live our own life, true to our own convictions of what is noble, good and true. i have had one lover and lost him because i loved him too devotedly. i shall never make that mistake again. but as the widow of such a lover, i shall henceforth continue to labor for the upbuilding of all humanity, as i would gladly have lived for him, and him only. "and now, farewell raphael. i regret, not that i loved you so devotedly, but that i did not learn sooner, that it was only love with certain restrictions, and within certain specific bounds, that you wanted. excuse my mistake and farewell." while i maintained my equilibrium, i felt that my heart would break. with my hand i waved a farewell to all, and set the eolus in motion. as i closed the door, captain ganoe sprang forward and would have dashed himself from the tower but for those who stood by him. his last words have been ringing in my ears ever since as they were wafted to me on the balmy air. in a voice of agonizing entreaty, he cried out: "oh cassie! cassie! for god's sake, come back! come back!" the end. book was produced from images made available by the hathitrust digital library.) josiah allen on the woman question [illustration: "she made me think that minute of them big rocks when i was tryin' to plough 'round 'em" (see p. )] josiah allen on the woman question by marietta holley _author of "samantha on the woman question", "samantha at saratoga", "my opinions and betsy bobbett's", etc._ _illustrated._ [illustration] new york chicago toronto fleming h. revell company london and edinburgh copyright, , by fleming h. revell company new york: fifth avenue chicago: north wabash ave. toronto: richmond street, w. london: paternoster square edinburgh: princes street contents i. in which i resolve to write a book ii. in which betsy bobbett butts in iii. i talk on wimmen's duty to marry iv. i talk on man's protectin' love for wimmen v. wherein i prove man's courtesy towards wimmen vi. i talk on females infringin' vii. about wimmen's foolish love for petickulars viii. i talk on wimmen's extravagance ix. the danger from wimmen's exaggeration x. the modern wimmen condemned illustrations opposite page i. "she made me think that minute of them big rocks when i was tryin' to plough round 'em" title ii. "and she looked as if she would sink down in her tracts" iii. "till she gets 'em all rousted up, and just boy cote that man till he has to keep hullsome food" iv. "josiah", sez she, "a hen don't cackle till she lays her egg" i in which i resolve to write a book for years and years i've been deeply wownded in my most sacred feelin's and my reason has been outraged by my pardner, samantha's, writin' agin the righteous cause of man's superiority to wimmen. but though my feelin's have been rasped and almost bleedin' from the unjust wownds i've kep' still and let her go on with other headstrong and blinded females, and argey and deny man's sole and indefrangible right to oversee and order the affairs of the universe, and specially the weak helpless female sect, the justice of which, it seems to me, a infant babe might see without spectacles. i have curbed in my wownded sperit and my mighty inteleck with almost giant strength, and never let 'em have free play in public print to dispute and overthrow them uroneous doctrines. and my reason for this course has been twofold. first, as any male filosifer and female researcher knows, that owin' to her weakness of inteleck and soft nater, a woman's mind gits ruffled up easy, and that rufflin' up affects her cookin'. and under a too severe strain a female has sometimes forgot to be promp with her meals, and not notice seemin'ly that her pies wuz runnin' out, and the cookie jar gittin' empty. such things, no matter how strong a man's inteleck is, has a deleterious effeck on his internal systern, which reacts on his branial cranium. and i've been afraid of the consequences if i onleashed the lion in me, and answered and crushed her onholy arguments in cold type. and my second reason wuz that in spite of her almost blasphemous doctrine that wimmen are equal to men, i knowed that under them mistook idees it wuz a lackage of good horse sense and not inherient depravity that ailed her. i knowed that if samantha wuz only willin' to settle down peacefully in the shelter and shade of man's powerful strength and personality, there never wuz a better woman or a neater, equinomicler housekeeper on earth than samantha smith allen, and as a maker of cream biscuit and apple dumplin's, and a frier and briler of spring chickens never outdone and seldom equalled. i've argued in private life with her till my jaws ached and my lungs wheezed with incessant labor. have experimented in various ways and appeared before her daily for years as a shinin' sample of man's superiority. but never, never have i been able to make her own up how inferior her sect is to the more opposite one. but as i say, as long as i've suffered, i have never before took my rightful place in literatoor, never took the high peak waitin' for me to set down on, while i hurled the thunderbolts of convincin' eloquence down upon the female wimmen squirmin' beneath me. but i dassent wait a minute longer. i have got to put a stop to the awful doin's goin' on around me. and if my worst forebodin's are realized, and i've got to starve it out, i will offer myself a hungry victim to duty, and die with my manly principles enfoldin' my gant form like a halo of glory. but mebby i've waited too long. i tremble to think on't. i ort to made the move sooner. for things are growin' worse and worse all the time, female wimmen are risin' up on every side claimin' to be equal to men, talkin', preachin', hikin', paradin' with lyin' banners, vowin' with brazen impudence that since they bear the financial and legal burdens of citizenship, they ort to be citizens of the u.s., and since they bear children they want to protect 'em in the house and outdoors, and so on to the end of their windy arguments. want to be citizens! how can they be? hain't the eagle a male bird? and what duz e pluribus unum mean? why, we men translated it years ago--eminent people us--us males. and every fool knows that wimmen hain't a people, hain't a citizen and never has been. jest think on't, weak wimmen, underlin's, as they've always been legally and politically considered, dashin' and hikin' about, bilin' up like foamin' billers of froth and folly threatenin' to engulf our noble ship of state. i've knowed how a strong minded man wuz needed to grasp holt of the hellum and try to steer that poor staggerin' wobblin' wimmen tosted craft into a haven of safety, into some place where men can agin enjoy their heaven born rights to rule the world and boss round the female sect, and to turn that frothy turbulent feminist tide sweepin' out into broad paths never meant for it to sweep in, into the shaller narrer safe channels it is fitted for. i had decided not to tell samantha about my great book aginst female suffrage till it wuz writ and published and the crash come. but the very day i begun my immortal work she wuz cookin' a young duck with dressin', and the delicious uroma come like incense to my nostrils, and insensibly it softened my feelin's. and i thought mebby i ort to prepare her for what would be the effect of my book on her sect, and the world at large. we'd lived together for years and outside of her uroneous beliefs she'd been a kind and agreeable companion, a fur better cook and housekeeper than any aunty suffragist i ever see or hearn on, and had been a help and comfort to me; she wuz bakin' a plum puddin' too, and some hubbard squash. and as i inhaled the delicious odors i felt more and more soft and meller towards her, most as soft as the squash. and so i broached the subject to her. sez i, "what do you think, samantha, about my great projeck of destroyin' female suffrage? what do you think of my writin' the book?" i said the words and paused for a reply. the kitchen wuz clean and cozy, the cheerful fire blazed; samantha sot with smooth hair and serene face in a new gingham dress and white apron, choppin' some cabbage and celery for a salad; all wuz peace and happiness. as i spoke the fateful words it seemed as if old nater herself wuz listenin' and peakin' in through the kitchen door to see what would happen. what would be the effect on samantha? i dreaded, yet waited for the result. would she overwhelm me with reproaches and entreaties to stop and not ruin her sect? would she be overcome and swoon away? and the appaulin' thought come to me onbid, if she did who would finish up the dinner? as i asked the question she paused with the choppin' knife in her hand and sez: "when i wuz a girl we had a debatin' school, and there wuz one feller that we always tried to git on the side opposite to us, his talk and arguments wuz such a help to us. i hain't no objections to your writin' the book, josiah." and then she resoomed her work with her linement cam as ever. i felt relieved, but couldn't see what sot her off to tellin' that old story at this juncter, and can't to this day, but set it down to female's inability to grasp holt of important questions, and answer 'em in a straightforward way as males do. i knowed when i begun my great work of stompin' out woman's suffrage that i must proceed careful; wimmen had clogged up the road to truth and reason so with their fool arguments, lectures, parades, etc., i must plough through 'em and make my way clear every step i took so no clackin' arguin' female could rise up and dispute 'em. i laid out to chase females back to the very beginin', and there in the dim light of the dawnin' day of time to grasp holt of the unanswerable argument that proves to every reasonable mind wimmen's inferiority and man's greatness. and then chase 'em back agin through the centuries up to the present time, and there corner 'em and break down their flimsy arguments of equality, and crush 'em forever. and make an end to this male disturbin', world opsettin' bizness of wimmen's rights. and in divin' back into history as fur as i've doven i want to give suitable credit to my chumb, uncle simon bentley. bein' a bacheldor without no hamperin' female ties drawin' on him and holdin' him back, he's had more time than i have to devote to arjous study and research on the subject, and has been a help to me. not but what i could have equalled him or gone ahead on him if i'd been foot-loose. but samantha and the barn stock wuz on my back, and fambly cares kep' me down. but after he mentioned to me certain things he had studied out, i told him i had thought of them very things more than one hundred times, but hadn't had time to write 'em down. why, in the very first beginin' of time, we find the great fact that smashes female equality down into the dirt where it belongs. we find that wimmen wuz made and manufactured jest because men wuz kinder lonesome. as uncle sime well sez, "it wuz jest a happen that wimmen wuz made at all. adam happened to feel kinder lonesome alone on that big farm, and probable needed wimmen's help. and he happened to have a extra rib he could spare as well as not, and so wimmen wuz made out of that spare rib. but," sez uncle sime, "adam would have been as well agin off if eve hadn't been made, and i should have told him so if i had been there." sez he bitterly, "men hain't been lonesome since wimmen wuz made. oh, no! she has kep' her clack goin', and kep' men's noses down on the grindstun ever sence." "well," sez i, "simon, it wuz noble in adam to be willin' to lose one of his ribs to make her, for who knows to what hites men might have riz up if he hadn't parted with it. if us men have riz up to such a hite with one rib lackin' who knows how fur we should have gone up with the hull on 'em." "that hain't the pint," sez uncle sime. "the pint is, how dast wimmen feel so big and claim to be equal to us men, when they think how, and why, and what out of they wuz created. wimmen ort to feel thankful and grateful to men that she wuz made at all. how would she felt if she hadn't been made? i guess she would feel pretty cheap and not put on so many airs, and be hikein' round preachin' to her superiors." in his excitement uncle sime had enunciated that crushin' argument in a ruther loud tone. we wuz settin' on the back stoop and samantha comin' out to shake the table-cloth must have hearn it. but instead of actin' humiliated and crushed by that masterly argument she looked at us kinder queer over her specs, folded her table-cloth camly and said nothin'. and after she went in uncle sime resoomed his unanswerable arguments. "why, beside bible proofs i can prove it in a scientific way. weigh up a man's bones in the stillyards and they'll weigh one hundred pounds more or less, jest the bones. and now jest think on the preposterous idee of that one little rib bone a risin' up right in the face of science and reason, and pretendin' to be equal to the hull carcass. and worse yet tryin' to stomp on him and bring him down to her level by votin'. why, if adam had hearn to me and kep' that rib bone where it wuz, jest think what the world would have escaped, think of the jealousies, angers, revenges, weariness, expenses, wars, ruin and bloodshed caused through the centuries by changin' that rib bone into a female!" i wuz astounded to see how deep uncle sime had doven into the great mysteries of human existence, not but what i'd have thought it out myself, if i'd had time from fambly cares. but uncle sime went on, "jest think, josiah, of wimmen's wild and turbulent doin's and the commotions and troubles and sufferin's wimmen has caused males, and then think how quiet and peaceable that rib wuz before it had been meddled with, and brought into the woman question. a layin' there in adam's side onquestionin' and cam. never startin' up and argyin' with the liver or diafram, never sassin' the spinal collar, or disputin' the knee jints, that one small bone risin' up, and demandin' the rights that justly belong to the hull carcass. oh, what lessons to female suffragists can be drawed from that scientific fact, and how fur they can be drawed." as long as i'd knowed uncle sime i never had realized before he wuz such a deep thinker, and had such a fund of scientific knowledge to back up his arguments. of course i had 'em too, all on 'em, layin' dormer inside on me. * * * * * of course it made a tremendous stir in jonesville when the startlin' news got out that i wuz writin' a book agin female suffrage with the settled intention and firm determination of puttin' an end to it forever. it lifted me up to such a tottlin' hite in the estimation of the male jonesvillians that it would have gin a weaker man the big head and made 'em liable to fall off. but such is my strength of mind that i kep' cool on the outside, talked in a friendly and patronizin' way to samantha and the neighborin' wimmen, associated with the folks that had the honor to live round me, and wore the same hat. the creation searchin' society of jonesville called a special meetin' to congratulate me and themselves on havin' their views on the inferiority of wimmen disseminated in my book through the entire habitable globe. i knowed my beliefs regardin' wimmen wuz the same as theirn, for we had often laid them views out side by side and compared 'em together. and uncle sime bentley when i first told him on't shed tears of joy and sez he: "at _last_, at _last_ the men of jonesville, the male men, are goin' to be hearn from, and did justice to." and he grip holt of my hand in one of hisen, and with the other he wep' onto his bandanna handkerchief tears of pure joy and thankfulness. deacon henzy, solomon sypher, deacon bobbett and a lot of other bretheren in the meetin' house, talked to me about the forthcomin' book with a solemn joy and triump in their linements and told me to consider and weigh well every word i writ, up to the very ounce, "for," sez they, "the broad onwinkin' eye of the world is on you and in that eye we male jonesvillians have been demeaned and lowered and looked down on by the abominable things that wuz writ by----" but i riz up my right hand and arm in a noble jester of warn, and sez i, "not one word agin samantha, bretheren, not a word!" they see the stern wild glare in my eye, and turned it off by sayin', "things have been writ by a female who shall be nameless, that has had a tendency to make us male jonesvillians objects of contemp. and the uroneous and blasphemous idee has been disseminted in them writin's that females are equal to males, and want rights that we know they don't need or deserve, rights that will bring 'em to the brink of ruin if not held back by a manly arm. now it is in the power of a male jonesvillian to lift his sect up on the hite he's been partially knocked off of, by them writin's, and put the weaker inferior sect down into the holler place where they belong. it is your honor and your privelige, josiah allen, to let the hull world see how superior to females, how noble, how grand is the male manhood of jonesville u.s.a." it wuz a solemn occasion, but i riz up to it and told 'em i laid out in my book to make such a change in public opinion that it would shake the very pillows of society, but sez i, "after the shake and the quake is over, things will settle down in their proper place agin. and then as of old, men will take their position as master and females their proper place as the tenderly governed class, lookin' up agin meekly to male men as their nateral gardeens and protectors." ii in which betsy bobbett butts in owing to the inclemency of the inclement weather, and the hardness of the wood (slippery ellum) i would had to split for extra fires, i did the writin' of my great work of destroyin' female suffrage in the common settin' room. i didn't feel above it. as i told samantha, many a immortal work had been writ in a garret, and even in a prison (namely by mr. keats and mr. j. bunyan and others). she didn't dispute me, she kep' right on with her usual housework, bakin', etc., and i almost thought the delicious uroma of her vittles which come in from the contagious kitchen wuz a inspiration to me. so dificult it is to tell what tiny springs feeds the great spoutin' fountain of genius. on the mornin' i made this memorable remark jest quoted, i hadn't more'n got started on my masterly work and wuz settin' almost drownded in the bottomless sea of thought while samantha wuz parin' some apples for pies, havin' fetched her pan into the settin' room, when the magestic onward and upward flow of my thought wuz arrested or dammed up, as you may say figuratively speakin', by the tall awkward obstacle of a onwelcome female figger. it wuz betsy bobbett slimpsey who came in with a red and green plaid shawl wropped round her gant form, and a yeller fascinator on her humbly head. fascinator! who wuz fascinated by it? i wuzn't, no indeed! and so lightnin' quick is my mind to ketch holt of any argument illustratin' wimmen's weakness of inteleck to transcribe in my volume, that i methought instantly how that one article of betsy's attire showed plain the inferiority of her sect that i wuz tryin' to prove to the world. as i glanced at it, my eager soul questioned my active mind, "did you ever ketch a man wearin' anything on his head with such vain silly names," and my mind thundered back to my listenin' soul, "no! no sir!" the strong brain within the manly head would spurn such a coverin', and tread it into the dust. a man's fascination consists of sunthin' inside his skull, his powerful brain, his invincible will, not in a flimsy woosted affair knit with a tattin' hook. with what hauty coldness would a man spurn it, if his wife tried to put it onto his noble head to wear to meetin' or to a neighbors. but to resoom. betsy passed a few triflin' onimportant remarks about the weather, her hens, her husband, etc., but my keen eye pierced through her outward demeanor, which she tried to make nateral, and i see she had a ulterior object in comin' out so early in the mornin'. and soon it broke forth in speech, and she uttered the bold presumptious request that i would let her insert some of her poetry writ before, and after her marriage, in my great forthcomin' volume. for a minute i wuz almost stunted and stumped by the brazen impudence of the idee, that i would let a female have any part however small in that grand work proclaimin' and provin' the superiority of my sect. and havin' a mind so powerful and many sided it can see both sides to once, i methought how onbecomin' it would be in me and how meachin' to let females take part in a work designed to be the ruination of 'em, or that is the ruination of their claims to be equal to the sect i wuz nobly representin'. how could i grant her request without sinkin' down to the low female level? no, i answered her promp in the negative. but she clung to the idee as clost as she ever clung to the various men she had paid attention to until her doom wuz sealed and she had with herculeanium efforts won simon to be her pardner. sez she pleadin'ly, "josiah allen, do let me insert some of my poetry on woman's spear in your noble volume. i feel that my poems deserve immortality, but they won't never git there if a man don't help me to lift 'em up." that idee wuz indeed grateful to me, it naterally would be to any man, but agin i answered her coldly in the negative, samantha lookin' on, but sayin' nothin'. anon betsy turned to her and sez, "josiah allen's wife, will you not help plead with him in the name of a strugglin' sister woman?" samantha kep' on parin' and slicin' her greenin's but sez coldly, "i hain't no objections to it. i guess the verses will correspond pretty well with the rest of the book." "yes, indeed!" sez betsy eagerly. "our two idees about the loftier, superior sect, and the overpowerin' need of wimmen to be protected by 'em, are perfect twins, you couldn't hardly reconize 'em apart." and agin she sez in a still more hungry axent: "do grant my request, josiah allen; poetry makes a book so interestin'. mebby it hain't necessary, but some like the tail feathers of a rooster, though they may not add to the weight of the fowl; without 'em he has a bare lonesome look. poetry may not add to the strength and matchless power of your arguments, probably nothin' could; but somehow a book looks sort o' bare and lonely without these feathery gushin's of the soul." sez i in a cold austere axent, "i have laid out to enrich the prose pages of my great work with my own poetry, some as lovely flowers might appear on the smooth side of a volcano, softenin' and amelioratin' the comin' roar and rush of the destroyin' fire and flames, that is to bust out and burn up error and mistook idees in females." "oh, what eloquence! what grand thoughts!" sez betsy claspin' her yeller cotton gloves together, and lookin' up to me in almost worship. "what a inteleck has been burnin' under that bald head for years. no wonder it is bald, no hair could live in such a fiery atmosphere." as she said this my feelin's softened towards her and i felt different than i did feel. i had never liked betsy bobbett slimpsey; she wuz always too sentimental and persistent to suit me. when i wuz a widow man she paid me a lot of attention oninvited and onrecipercated. i never responded to her ardent overtoors. i spurned her poetry from me. and she wuz a slack housekeeper, and mizuble cook, which always riles men, and i felt relieved and glad when she got round simon slimpsey and won him to be her husband. but i do like her idees on man's supremacy and her clingin' idees on marriage. such voylent and persistent efforts in that direction, by elderly onmarried females are esteemed worthy of every man's admiration, when directed in another direction than himself. i own i suffered from them clingin' idees of hern durin' my widowerhood till samantha rendered me immune. but under all them sufferin's of mine and my almost hopeless efforts to shy off from her, and avoid her, yet i felt that her adorin' love and her warm clingin' attentions to males wuz eminently becomin' to a female if only turned off from me onto some more willin' man. all these thoughts chased each other through my brain, but still i kep' the cool superiority of my sect and sez coldly: "i want no female thought to cumber and weigh down the sails of my skyward bound volume." but sez she in a humble pleadin' manner, so becomin' in a female and agreeable to males, "my poetry all breathes the weakness and inferiority of my sect, and the overwhelmin' need we have to be protected by the nobler uplifteder sect. and though simon has been bedrid for years and his brain had softened even when we wuz wed, and he and his numerous children have been hard for my emmanuel strength to support and take care on, yet i found in my union to a male man a dignity and rest i had never known in my more single state." here betsy sithed hard a few times, for she wuz indeed weary, she works hard and fares hard and shows it, but she continued: "is it not possible that in a humble way my verses may give a tiny puff of wind, that added to your mighty roarin' gusts will waft your grand craft upward and onward on its heaving sent mission of elevatin' men up, and helpin' 'em in this turrible epock of time they're passin' through. and rebukin' and lowerin' females down for their bold doin's, in opposin' and badgerin' their natural gardeens and protectors, their brazen efforts to be equal to 'em which is a crime agin nater. "for though as i said, simon can't lift his head from the piller, and his language to me is awful at times, and extremely profane, and boot-jacks have been throwed at me, and teacups and sassers smashed agin my form, and milk porridge and catnip tea have deluged me from them flyin' cups and bowls, yet, as i said, i felt through all, even when i wuz bruised and wet as sop, that when he gin me his name at the altar, he gin with it a dignity and uplifted feelin', that nothin' else could give or take away. and i would fain have them womanly idees of mine made immortal by appearin' in your noble volume as a pattern for bolder onwomanly wimmen to foller." as betsy paused i once more waded out bare legged into the sea of thought. thinkses i even a tiny drop of water helps to make the mighty ocean, and the ocean he never repels the humble drop. though a female, betsy wuz a human bein' like myself. wuz it right for me to deny her the boon of immortality in the pages of my great work? what wuz my duty in the matter? i rubbed my forward, behind which my brain wuz revolvin' with lightnin' speed, with my forefinger, gittin' considerable ink on the outside of my brain (namely my forward) which samantha reminded me of afterwards and finally i sez: "i will give this triflin' matter due consideration, betsy slimpsey, and let you know the result of my cogitations. and now," sez i, wavin' my hand towards the outside door in a noble lordly wave, "woman depart! leave me to my thoughts." she went, samantha accompanyin' her to the doorstep on which i hearn her dickerin' with betsy for some rhode island hen's eggs to set, so irresponsive and oncongenial is a female pardner ofttimes and onmindful of the great historical event happenin' so near her, and the great man she is throwed amongst. alas! how often is genius bound down and trammeled in its own environment. when samantha come in lookin' cheerful, for she could git the eggs on a even swop for our brown leghorns, i asked her agin about it, for every married man will testify that you can't depend on what a pardner will say before other wimmen on such a occasion. sez i, "would you honor betsy by lettin' her put some of her verses in my great volume? do you think," sez i anxiously, "that it will clog and weigh it down too much?" sez she, "it may be a good thing to have some weight hitched to it." i didn't really know what she meant, but as she immegiately retired into the buttery to make and roll out her pie crust, i didn't want to interrupt her, for every man knows that a woman needs the hull of what little mind she's got at such a time. such apple pies as samantha makes with tender flaky crust and delicious interior are a work of art, and requires ondivided attention. so i wuz throwed back onto my own resources and judgment, and didn't try to argy no more. duty and pity for her and her sect conquerored in the end, and the next day i gin my consent and betsy sent down by one of her various stepchildren a bran sack full of her poetry, which i emptied for convenience into a huge dish pan which wuz exempt from work by age. how tickled and full of triump betsy wuz, and it wuz enough to tickle any female to have her poetry appear in the pages of my gigantic effort. the follerin' verses of hern writ before her marriage i culled at random from the dish pan and subjoin: wimmen's spear _or whisperin's of nature to betsy bobbett_ last night as i meandered out to meditate apart, secluded in my parasol, deep subjects shook my heart. the earth, the skies, the prattling brooks all thundered in my ear-- it is matrimony, it is matrimony, that is a woman's spear. day, with a red shirred bunnet on had down for china started, its yellow ribbons fluttered o'er her head as she departed-- she seemed to wink her eyes on me as she did disappear-- and say it is matrimony, betsy that is a woman's spear. a rustic had broke down his team, i mused almost in tears, how can a yoke be borne along by half a pair of steers? even thus in wrath did nature speak hear, betsy bobbett, hear; it is matrimony, it is matrimony, that is a woman's spear. i saw a pair of roses like wedded pardners grow, sharp thorns did pave their mortal path, yet sweetly did they blow. they seemed to blow these glorious words into my willing ear, it is matrimony, it is matrimony that is a woman's spear. two gentle sheep upon the hills, how sweet the twain did run, as i meandered gently on and sot down on a stun; they seemed to murmur sheepishly oh betsy bobbett, dear-- it is matrimony, it is matrimony, that is a woman's spear. sweet wuz the honeysuckle's breath upon the ambient air, sweet wuz the tender coo of doves, yet sweeter husbands are; all nature's voices poured these words into my willing ear, b. bobbett, it is matrimony, that is a woman's spear. iii i talk on wimmen's duty to marry cephas slinker stopped yesterday mornin' and had a little talk with me over the barnyard fence. i pitied cephas; he don't live happy with his wife, she's hard on him, and they have frequent spells. they had one last night, and he got up and started for jonesville quick as he'd had his breakfast. he said he never stopped to git a stick of wood or a pail of water (they bring their water from a spring under the hill) but he hurried away he said for fear she'd begin on him agin, and aggravate him. he wanted sympathy, and i see he needed it, so he told me about it. he's been out of a job for some time, and his wife has took in washin' and worked round for the neighbors to keep 'em goin'. he said he wuz to jonesville all day yesterday lookin' for a job. he said he thought the best way to find one wuz to set right still in some place where men wuz comin' and goin' all the time, so they could see him handy if they wanted to hire him. but he said he never got a job, or no hopes of one, and he went home completely discouraged and deprested, and he said that if he ever felt the need of tender words from a comfortin' companion it wuz then; he said he felt so bad that he went in and busted these words right out to his wife, "i want to be soothed and comforted." and if you'll believe it she told him, "if he wanted to be soothed to soothe himself." jest so hash and onfeelin' she spoke. he said she wuz splittin' kindlin' wood at the time to git supper, and she struck at that wood as if she would bring the woodhouse down. and i guess from his tell that he gin it to her hot and heavy. but 'tennyrate she refused outright to soothe and comfort him, and if that hain't a wife's duty what is? it has always been called so, as i told samantha. she asked what cephas and i wuz talkin' so long about, and i had to tell her. and she said she see miss slinker go home from deacon gowdey's where she'd done a two weeks washin'. she wuz pushin' the baby carriage in front of her with her twins in it, and a bag of potatoes, and little cephas draggin' at her skirts and cryin' to be carried, and she looked as if she would sink down in her tracts. and it seemed, sez samantha, "as tired as she wuz she had to split wood to git supper. and how could she soothe and comfort anybody droudgin' round as she had all day and all wore out? under the circumstances it wuzn't reasonable in cephas to ask it." that's jest the way on't, wimmen will argy and argy and try to have the last word. i wouldn't say no more for i knowed it wuz no use. but i must say that when samantha has the time she's always ready to soothe and comfort me if i'm in trouble. she sez it is a woman's nater to want to help and comfort the man she loves, but he ort to be reasonable and not ask it of her as cephas did. under such circumstances she said it wouldn't hurt him to soothe her a spell. i see i couldn't make no headway arguin' with her, so i kep' demute and went to writin' on the subject i'd laid out to hold forth on which is as follers. when the first thought of writin' this great work bust onto my soul like the blazin' sun risin' up and pourin' down his dazzlin' beams onto jonesville and the surroundin' world, there wuz one idee that stood towerin' up like a light house. one fundamental truth i laid out to lift up so high and make so plain that even a female's feeble comprehension could grasp it, and see its first and primary importance. and that wuz that wimmen should not try to have rights, but at all hazards and under all circumstances not fail to marry a man, and secondly i laid out to prove that them two things matrimony and rights could never by any possibility be combined and run together. [illustration: "and she looked as if she would sink down in her tracts"] for truly these two great truths are what we male men have considered the very ground work and underpinnin' of our strongest and most unanswerable arguments agin wimmen's suffrage, marriage--home--clean children--housework--good vittles--oh, how sweet them words have always sounded in men's ears and are still a soundin', and how eminently fitted to wimmen's weak tender minds and patient confidin' naters. and how obnoxious and loathsome to every male ear have been and are now, the words justice--freedom--equality. oh, how continuously and loudly have my male bretheren, we and us, twanged upon them two strings on life's lyre, and tried to make females jine in the melogious song, tried to make 'em comprehend the beauty and full meanin' on 'em. and right here before i go any furder mebby i ort to stop and make it plain to the modern female who is always tryin' to pick flaws and argy, that i said l-y-r-e and not liar, which they might out of clear aggravation try to make out i meant when i made the hullsale insertion that marriage is woman's duty, and a perfect heaven on earth, and woman's suffragin' is ruination and come straight from hadees. i had writ a hull chapter full of the most beautiful and high flown eloquence on this most congenial subject, and proved i thought to every right minded person that it wuz the duty and delightful privelige of every female to stop immegiately seekin' for rights, and marry to a man to once. it wuz a lovely chapter, and very affectin' in spots, so much so i shed several tears over it, as i told samantha, when she glanced over it at my request. i longed for her appreciation of my genius, if she didn't share my idees, but she only made this remark: "no wonder you shed tears! it is enough to make a graven image weep." she didn't explain what she meant by this remark. but i most knew by the looks on her linement that she wuz makin' light on't. but i wuzn't goin' to pay no attention to slurs comin' from them that want rights. her remark only goaded me on to amplify on the beautiful subject, and i had spent i presoom to say most a teaspunful of ink, and pretty nigh half a pad of paper, besides a soul full of emotion on it, when my dear friend and literary adviser, uncle sime bentley come in, and samantha bein' then out in the buttery makin' sugar cookies and spice cake, i had a clear field and read the chapter over to him, longin' for sympathy and admiration, and feelin' sure i'd tapped the right tree to git the sweet sap of true understandin' and appreciation flow out and heal my wownded sperit, when to my great surprise (and it wouldn't been any more shock to me if i'd tapped a butnut tree and see it run blue ink) uncle sime jined in with samantha's idees, and objected to my hullsale insertion that it wuz the bounden duty of every human bein' to marry. as i read it over to him, expectin' to be interrupted by a warm hand grasp of sympathy and lovin' praise of my idees, i see a dark shadder pass over his linement and he wiggled round oneasy in his chair and finally he said: "that won't do, josiah! you've got to change that or you'll git lots of the jonesvillians down on you," sez he. "there are a good many bacheldors round here, and their feelin's will feel hurt." sez i in a sombry dissapinted axent, "i guess i can handle the subject so's not to hurt their feelin's." "id'no," sez he, "lots on 'em might have married if they'd wanted to, and there are three or four grass widowers too, or mebby i should say hay widowers, for they're pretty old for grass." and simon continued feelin'ly: "this book of yourn, josiah, is as dear to me as if it sprung like a sharp simeter from my own brain, and i can't bear to see you make any statement in it that will be called a slur on our sect." strange as it wuz i hadn't thought on that side of the subject till simon pinted it out to me, my barn chores and fambly cares are so wearin' on me that it had slipped my mind, though probable i should thought on't of my own accord when i had time. but i see the minute my attention wuz drawed to it that i must meller the chapter down for the good of my own sect. and after simon went home (he had come to borry a auger) i meditated on the other side, what you might call the off side of the argument and i see different from what i had seen. and i brung up convincin' incidents and let 'em run through my mind. firstly, i see i wuz hittin' my dear friend simon, hittin' him hard, for he wuz a bacheldor, though he thought too much on me to mention his own wownded feelin's. but when i realized what i had done it fairly stunted me, for it wuz like kickin' my own shins with a hard cowhide boot to hit simon. and i see that take it with all the grass and hay widowers, and what you might call plain bacheldors, there wuz a good many male jonesvillians who would had reason to feel riled up, and i wuzn't one to cast no slurs onto my own sect. id'no why a number of them bacheldors hadn't married, for they wuz well off and might have married if they'd wanted to. i guess it wuz jest because they didn't feel like it. and my mind is so strong and keen i see immegiately how that would spile my argument that females must turn their backs on rights, and marry at all hazards and under all circumstances. for it stands to reason that a woman can't marry if a man is not forthcomin', and hadn't ort to be blamed for it. and i could see every time a man hung back it left a female in the lurch. i see i must wiggle out on't the best i could for i'll be hanged when it come down to brass tacks and i figgered it out, i dassent print a word of what i'd writ; as beautious and eloquent as it wuz i had got to drop it onwillin'ly into the waist basket. for i see that besides a lackage of men caused by hangin' back which wuz of itself a overwhelmin' argument, i see how lots of the females wuz situated that had turned their backs on matrimony. susan jane adsit stayed to home to take care of her old father, and by the time he died she'd got off the notion of marryin'. huldah pendergrast wuz humbly as the old harry, and samantha sez that a man always puts a pretty face before reason or religion, 'tennyrate no man had ever asked her to marry i knowed, so how could she help her single state. amelia burpee wuz left a orphan with five younger children that she promised her dyin' ma to take care on, and when she got them all rared up and settled down in life, she wuz too tuckered out to think of matrimony. and serepta corkins wuz a born man hater, would git over the fence ruther than meet one in the road. she didn't want a man, and heaven knows a man didn't want her. luella pitkin's bo died durin' engagement, and she never wanted to look at a man after that. and her sister, drusilla, wuz all took up with music, and no man could ever take the place with her of b flat, or high g. and abigail mooney's feller she wuz engaged to got led off and married another girl, and abigail went into a incline and the doctor had hard work to raise her up, besides all her own folks did with spignut and wild cherry bark and other strengthenin' and soothin' herbs. and almina hagadone's feller left her because she fell and broke her hip durin' engagement. and id'no but it wuz for the best, for how could she bring up a fambly with only one hip. and so it went on, the hull train of single wimmen swep' through my brain, follered by a crowd of widders, grass, and hay, and sod. and as i mentally stared at 'em i see what i'd done on insistin' that they should every one on 'em marry a man and stay to home, when they hadn't no man and no home to stay in. why, i wuz fairly browbeat and stumped to see what a ticklish place i would stood in with the jonesvillians, if i had writ my chapter as i laid out to, that wimmen _must_ marry and must _not_ vote. i see i had got to turn round and take a new tact. but it wuz like tearin' a bulldog from a good shank bone to uproot a man from that inborn belief. and i thought it over pro and con, con and pro, till my head got fairly dizzy and in one of the dizziest spells this thought come to me that mebby simon's bein' a bacheldor had hampered him and colored his advice, and thinkses i before i lay down in the dust my old beloved belief for good and all, it won't do any hurt to jest mention the subject casually to samantha agin, which i did. i sez in a meachiner axent than i ginerally use, for i felt fur more meachin' than i had felt, sez i, "samantha, wimmen ort to marry instead of votin'." and she sez, "why can't they do both? men marry and vote." "but," sez i, recoverin' with a herculaneum effort a little of my usual feelin' of male superiority, "that is very different, samantha. men have bigger, roomier minds, wimmen and politics can sort o' run side by side through 'em without crowdin' each other. but female minds bein' more narrer and contracted they naterally can't, and hadn't ort to try to hold more'n one on 'em. "but," sez i with a last effort to put forth the beautious arguments that my sect has clung to for ages, i sez in a deep protectin' axent, "marriage is the holiest, the most beautifulest state on this earth." "yes," sez samantha reasonably, "a happy marriage is, i guess, about as nigh heaven as folks ever git on earth, but how many do you find, josiah?" "oceans on 'em," sez i, "oceans on 'em," for i wuzn't goin' to spile my argument entirely till i had to. "yes," sez samantha, "there is once in a while one that looks so from the outside, and mebby it looks so from the inside. but," sez she, "the hands of divorce lawyers are pretty busy nowadays. marriage," sez samantha, "is a divine institution, but its beauty has been dimmed by the rust of unjust and foolish idees and practices. always when time honored customs change from the old to the new, from bad to better, there is a period of upheaval and unrest, until the new becomes natural and common. "wimmen," sez samantha, "are beginin' to look upon marriage differently than they used to. they look now on both sides of the question. instead of settin' with folded hands in a shadowy bower, waitin' and listenin' for the prancin' steed that is to bring the prince to her feet to ask for her lily white hand, which she gives him with grateful, rapturous tears of joy, wimmen are now standin' up on their feet in broad daylight, lookin' on every side of the marriage question and lettin' the full light of day shine on it, the same light they've got to live under after the hazy days of the honeymoon are over." them forward practical idees of hern riled me, and i sez, "i guess men have sunthin' to complain on in the marriage question." "yes indeed they have," sez samantha (with a justice no doubt ketched from me). "lots of silly simperin' girls look upon marriage as a means to be supported without labor, an unlimited carnival of picture shows, circuses and candy. but in the good times comin' when men have learned not to look exclusively for a pretty face and kittenish ways, and seek the sterling qualities of common sense, thrift, and industry, qualities that will keep the domestic hearth bright when the honeymoon has waned, girls will begin to prize and practice these traits which men find admirable. "and another thing, josiah, thoughtful inteligent wimmen are getting so they don't admire the crop of wild oats that used to be considered inevitable, and in a way dashing and admirable. instead of blindly accepting what the prince danes to bestow upon her and asking nothing in return, she demands the same things of him he asks of her, the same purity he demands of her, and why not the same moral and legal rights, since they are both human bein's, made as all mortals are of god and clay?" i gin a deep groan here, showin' plain how distasteful them forward onwomanly idees wuz to me. but she went right on onheedin' my sithes, or the dark frown gatherin' on my eyebrows. sez she, "so many avenues of pleasant lucrative employment are open now to wimmen, and the epithet, old maid, is not as of old a badge of contumely, that wimmen won't take a ticket for the lottery of marriage, for but one reason, the only reason that ever made marriage honorable and respectable, and that is true love, not a light mental fancy, nor a short lived physical attraction, but the love that in spite of earthly shadows illuminates hovel and palace, and makes both on 'em the ante-room of paradise. the love that upholds, inspires, overlooks faults, is constant in sun and shade, and lasts down to the dark valley, and throws its light acrost it into the very land of light." them words sounded good to me, they sounded some like what i had writ more formerly on the subject, and i jined in fervently. "yes, indeed, and why can't females settle down in matrimony and stay to home with their famblys, and take care of their children?" and i quoted a few words from the dear chapter i had writ first. "there woman is a queen, the poorest female in the slummiest slum is a monark in that sacred place." "yes," sez samantha, "sometimes a good man makes a wife supremely happy. but too often nowdays a bright healthy young woman finds in the life she has pictured as the dooryard of eden a worse serpent than eve found there, a loathsome souvenir of her husband's old gay life which destroys her own health and happiness, and which she has to hand down to her children's children, makin' 'em invalids and idiots. "the poor workin' mother you speak on if she is well enough can stay at home if she has a home to stay in, and doesn't have to labor outside to sustain it. she can breathe the filthy tenement air, be frozen by its winter, choked by its summer atmosphere, she can guide and guard the youthful steps of her children as far as the doorstep and then she must drop the helpless hand, and if she is inteligent and loving hearted she can wet her pillow with vain tears thinking how her pretty innocent young girl has got to pass vile saloons full of evil men on her way to and from store and factory. the factory filled with gant childish forms, with all the care-free happiness of childhood ground from their faces by the brutal hand of incessant toil. unguarded machinery on every side that one false careless move of her girl may maim or kill. her pretty girl alone strugglin' with ontold dangers. youth's wild blood urging her to indiscreet acts, wolves of prey on one side, grim want on the other. if the mother has a mother's heart, her body may be at home where she is so eloquently urged to be, but her heart will be abroad, in the greater home wimmen want to make safer; the home where her children spend their days. it will be hantin' the factory, the grog shop, the vile picture show, the white slaver's abode, watchin', waitin', for what may happen, what has happened so often to other mothers' children." samantha goes too fur when she gits to goin', and i told her so plain and square, she aggravates me. and to let her see how much i disapproved of her talk i never dained a reply to her in verbal words. but i riz up with a hauty mean on my eyebrow, and went to pokin' the kitchen fire. i poked it with all the strength of a strong man whose arguments have been spilte and whose feelin's have been wownded by his own pardner. but i believe my soul that she thought that i did it as a hint that it wuz about dinner time, for she went out to once and hung on the teakettle. and as she did so she mentioned incidentally that she laid out to have lamb chops and green peas and mashed potatoes for dinner, with peach pie and coffee to foller. as she said this my angry emotions settled down and grew more clear and composed, some like samantha's delicious coffee, when she drops the powdered eggshells into it. iv i talk on man's protectin' love for wimmen it wuz a beautiful mornin'. i felt boyed up by the invigoration of the invigoratin' atmosphere, the boyness helped along mebby by three cups of samantha's delicious coffee with rich cream in it, three veal cutlets brown and tender, four hot rolls light as day, several flaky baked potatoes and some biled eggs. i felt well and i devoted my muse on this auspicious occasion to writin' specially on the protectin' love and care that men had always shown and delighted to show to females. it wuz a subject that i loved and my mind and tongue had often reverted to, follerin' the example of all the other good and great statesmen who have talked and writ on the feminist question. and i felt that i wuz abundantly qualified to do justice to it, havin' protected samantha and lovin'ly guarded her weak footsteps for goin' on forty years. i set with my steeled pen in hand and got so lost and wropped up in contemplation of the beautiful and inspirin' subject, and plannin' how i would handle it to the best advantage, that time passed onheeded and first i knowed i hearn by the sound of dishes rattlin' in the near and adjacent kitchen that samantha wuz beginin' to make preparations for dinner. the kitchen as i said wuz contagious to the settin' room and the door wuz open. i had laid out and intended to begin the chapter on this important and most congenial subject with some strong stern language calculated to shame wimmen for the unbelievin' remarks they had made on this beautiful and universal trait of my sect, and their seemin' teetotle inability to appreciate the constant onvaryin' and lovin' protection that men had always gin to the weaker and more inferior sect. i remembered well how in a former talk with samantha on this subject, though she had admitted willin'ly enough that there wuz lots of good generous men runnin' loose in the world. yet she tried to dispute my insertion that _all_ men _always_ cared for and tenderly protected wimmen, by bringin' up instances where she claimed men had balked and kicked over the traces, and instead of protectin' wimmen had run 'em away into ruination and destruction. she brung up white slavery, political, social and industrial dependence, and the average man's inherient objection to regard wimmen as a citizen and plain human bein', bein' inclined to regard 'em either as angels or underlin's. and a lot of other trashy arguments calculated to rile a man up, yes mad a man to the very quick, who knowed what he wuz talkin' about. one who had spent the heft of his life in protectin' and guidin' her that now turned agin him and disputed him. a man who knowed as well as he knowed the looks of his linement in the shavin' glass, that man's protectin' love and care wuz all that had held wimmen up, and wuz still a proppin' her. i spoze in my righteous indignation i may have said kinder hash things about the low down ornary traits of the inferior sect to which samantha belonged, for she begun to bring up traits that she said some of my sect had, and throw 'em at me, traits that i know no man ever had or skursley ever had hearn on. but i must say that all the while riled up as she wuz inside of her, she kep' knittin' away on my indigo blue sock, and kep' makin' honorable exceptions of good men and smart men. but she brung up vanity, said i and my sect wuz vain. sez she, "if a woman tries to talk sense and reason to a man about her needs and her rights, he will generally pay her a compliment about her eyes or her nose. 'tennyrate he will turn the subject some way and won't listen to her. but if she makes eyes at him, and talks soft nonsense, and flatters him, he will purr like a pussy cat." 'tain't so. who ever hearn a man purr? purrin' is sunthin a man's nater would rebel at and scorn with perfect contemp. but i smashed that argument about vanity to once and forever. sez i so scathin'ly that it seemed as if she must show signs of scorchin', "did you ever see a man wear a cosset? or carry a vanity bag?" and then still a knittin' and still makin' exceptions of some good and generous men, she throwed the trait of selfishness in my face, said my sect had passed along down the fields of time, gatherin' up the ripe wheat and leavin' wimmen to rake up the leavin's. 'tain't so, and even if it wuz, i presoom to say ruth got quite a good bundle of grain out of boazes' wheat field. and then she took pomposity and throwed at me (still a knittin', and still makin' exceptions of some men) said lots of men stood up on a self-made pedestal lookin' down mentally on them who in many cases wuz their superiors, but she added that wimmen wuz more to blame for this trait in men than they wuz, for they had been educated to look up to men instead of lookin' sideways where they ort to find him on a level at her side. it is needless to say to any one who knows my keenness of inteleck that i took immegiate advantage of this slip of her tongue and sez, "i am glad that you admit, samantha, that wimmen are always in the wrong. i and my sect have always knowed it, and we've always laid the blame on 'em from eve down to miss pankhurst." and that seemed to set her off agin, and she brung up my blindness. blind as a bat! them wuz her words she throwed at me, at _me_! who has got eyes as keen as a eagle's. that injustice did rankle and make me hash and say hash things. but she kep' cam on the outside, kep' on with her knittin' and intimidated agin that though there wuz lots of good generous men in the world, yet it had always been a trait of the average man from solomon to harry thaw to look upon woman as a plaything or a convenience. and then she brung up inconsistency and how men showed it in the laws they made, _criminal inconsistency_, she called it. sez she, "a girl must be twenty-one when she is considered by men lawmakers wise enough to sell them a hen, or buy a cat. but yet at the age of ten in one state, twelve in another, she is considered by them wise and prudent enough to sell them the crowning jewel of her life with the payment of lifelong shame, agony, and despair, and mebby a little candy. men make such laws," sez she, "not for their own sweet young girls, but for some other men's daughters, just like the infamous white slave traffic that sells every year thousands and thousands of young girls into a livin' death. and i think," sez she, "when men make such shameful barbarous laws it is high time for 'em to have help from angels or wimmen or sunthin' or ruther." "that hain't religious, samantha," sez i, "to speak of angels makin' laws, tendin' corkuses and such. as a deacon i object to it." sez she, "as a deacon you better object to the laws i'm talkin' about, and if clergymen, deacons and church members generally, would all rise agin 'em, they'd be stamped out pretty sudden." sez she, "when the young girls of our country are considered of equal importance with cows and clover to oversee and protect, there will be different laws, and i believe wimmen's votin' will hasten that day." there is always a time for a man if he wants to keep his dignity intack before females, to stop arguin' with 'em. that time had come to me at that juncture, and i knowed that it would be more dignified to show a manly superiority to such hullsale calumnity of my sect so i looked hautily at her, and didn't dain to reply to her in verbal words though i grated my teeth some, as i walked out of the settin' room with head erect into the kitchen, and brought in a armful of wood from the contagious woodshed with my head still held high, and hung on the teakettle with a hauty mean. for i felt that some of samantha's good vittles would soothe my wownded and perturbed sperit if anything could and they did cam me. i thought of that former interview with my pardner as i sot there preparin' my mind for the masterful effort i wuz about to make. as i said more formerly i had intended to begin the chapter at this epock of time with a few witherin' remarks calculatin' to rebuke wimmen and wither 'em. i laid out to stun 'em and skair 'em with the artillery of my brilliant eloquence, my protectin' love for the weaker sect riz up so powerful, and my anger wuz so hot agin them that had dasted to deny it. i felt that they _did_ believe in men's constant and tender protection, but held out and denied it jest to be mean, jest to carry out their sect's well known desire to argy and aggravate us. and as i meditated on these things and thought of my former talk with samantha i have jest related, i held my steeled pen in almost a iron grip, and my linement i knowed growed fearful to look upon, charged as it wuz with the awakened powers of a strong man. when jest as i wuz beginin' the turrible rebukin' words samantha opened the oven door in the contagious kitchen and the fragrant breath of a lemon custard pie floated out, accompanied with the delicious uroma of a roast chicken with dressin'. and as on so many former occasions, the delicious odor seemed to enter into and permenate my hull mental and physical systern and soften 'em and quiet my wild and dangerous emotions, i felt mellerer towards her and her sect, and i held my steeled pen in a gentler, softer grip. and instead of the thunderbolt of convincin' argument i had even begun to transcribe, i sez to samantha, who had come in with a pan of potatoes to peel, and my voice wuz as sweet as the lemon custard. "you do know, don't you, dear samantha, that it has always been men's chief aim and desire to protect the weaker inferior sect?" sez i tenderly. "any man that has the sperit of manhood within him will agree with me." agin i inhaled into my nostrils the sweet uroma comin' from the contagious kitchen, and sez i in a still tenderer axent, "men love to protect wimmen, don't you think so?" sez samantha in a cam reasonable voice peelin' away at her potatoes, "a man loves to protect and warn a woman agin every man only himself." sez she, "amanda peedick wuz protected by men and warned." and i sez kinder short, my tenderer emotions driv back into myself, "what of it, what if she wuz!" and then she had to go on and recall to my mind that triflin' incident that had occurred and took place in jonesville the fall before. sez she, "you remember, josiah, old man peedick who wuz rich as a jew, left all his money to his boys, a handsome propputy to each one on 'em, and almina who had stayed to home and took care on him, and lifted him, and rubbed him, and soaked him, and swet him, and dressed and fed him, he only left the house and apple orchard. "the boys all had splendid homes in the city, but their houses wuz either too big or too small, or too hot or too cold, to have almina live with 'em, and she wuz expected to git her livin' out of the apples. they wuz first class grafts, none so good anywhere round, and brought the very highest price, and she would got a good livin' and laid up money, if she had been left alone, if she hadn't been protected and warned. "but every single one of them brothers would come out from the city and warn her agin the other brothers, and tell her how easy it wuz for a weak innocent woman to be deceived and cheated by designin' men, her nearest relation mebby. and that a gentle female's mind wuzn't strong enough to grapple with depravity, and she must lean on him for protection, and he would see her through, so every single one on 'em told her, and warned her agin the other six brothers. "and amanda would feel real affectionate and grateful to each one on 'em in turn, and be glad she had such a strong protector and warner to take care of her. and every single time they come to protect and warn her they would take home a few bushels of them delicious apples, and when they got through protectin' and warnin' her, she didn't have apples enough left to make a mess of sass." but what of it, what had that got to do with my great work that wuz seethin' through my brain? that shows how triflin' and how ornary a woman's mind is, to bring up that old story whilst my brain wuz workin' to a almost dangerous degree inside of my forward tryin' to prove to the female masses at large the great fact of men's protectin' love and the needecessity for it, to prove to 'em as i laid out to prove to the listenin' world that wimmen wuz naterally inferior to men, their brains smaller and lighter, when weighed up in the stillyards. their emmanuel strength less, their idees more whifflin' and onstabled, and that therefore and accordin'ly wimmen needed and had got to have man's masterful mind and emmanuel strength to protect her from the evils and wickedness of the world, and specially from the awful tuckerin' and dangerous job of votin'. at this juncter i paused for a minute to collect my thoughts together and then i brought forth from my brain this convincin' argument. if wimmen don't need a man to protect her and take care on her, why is she so much more ignorant of sin and depravity? why is there five times more men in prisons and penitentiaries than there is wimmen, if they knowed as much about crime as men do? "no," sez i, soarin' up in eloquence, "what a man has been through and been educated up to in business and political life, he knows how to protect tender females from. why," sez i, fairly carried away on the wings of my own eloquence, "men can teach wimmen more in one day about criminal wickedness, graft, false witnessing, drunkenness, bribery, political corruption of all kinds, than she can learn from her own sect in months. not but what," sez i reasonably, "she can learn some from some on 'em, but not nigh so much nor nigh so fast." i didn't know but samantha would take lumbago from my cuttin' remarks, but she didn't seem to. she took up her pan of peeled potates and prepared to leave the room. but as she went out she said sunthin' agin about that old debatin' school, and the feller she always tried to git on the other side of the argument, so's to help her out. showin' as plain as the nose on your face jest how queer wimmen are, how their minds will wander, and how impossible it is to keep 'em down to the subject under discussion. v wherein i prove man's courtesy towards wimmen in my tremenjous efforts to succor my sufferin' and women-hounded sect at this awful epock of time, i have already held forth on the beautiful and congenial subject of the love and protectin' care males have always loved to show towards females. but agin i take up my steeled pen to write upon this most important subject. for i agin warn my sect solemnly that this beautiful trait in me and us, is what we should enlarge upon, and insist on makin' the female sect admit at this epock of danger and revolt. yes, my sufferin' sect, we should make 'em own up to it, peacefully if we can, but if necessary let us insert it into their obstinate craniums with a crowbar and hammer. for though a weaker inteleck may not grasp its importance and extreme needecessity, it is plain to the eagle eye of a researcher and reformer of females that if they admit this, they have got to admit all that follers, the perfect peace and rest they feel surrounded by these noble traits as by a shinin' mantilly. with this worthy end in view i've tried to warn samantha time and agin that if females insisted on risin' up and demandin' their rights they would become so obnoxious to the stronger and opposite sects that men would lose that tender courtesy they have always loved to show towards wimmen. but i've never been able to skair her, and i don't know as i ever shall. mebby this great work of mine when it is finished and lanched onto a waitin' world may dant her, but, i don't know, i feel dubersome about it. sez she when i brung it up to her agin, "men and wimmen are born with different traits; wimmen have love and tenderness and sympathy towards the helpless, babies, husbands, etc.; you insist that votin' hain't changed nor harmed men's courtesy and chivalry you talk so much about, so why should votin' break down these inborn traits in wimmen that men admire?" "but you will see that it will," sez i, "and methought i had proved it to you on a former occasion that it is a scientific fact proved by such scientific men as myself, simon bentley esq., and other deep thinkers, that the very minute a woman goes to the pole that very minute a man's courtesy and chivalry towards her is utterly destroyed." but if you'll believe it even this turrible idee didn't seem to skair her. she sez, "if i can't have but one i'd ruther have justice than courtesy, but i'd like both, and don't see why i can't have 'em." but i sez agin firmly and decisively, "you can't have both on 'em, for if a woman votes, by that brazen and onbecomin' move of hern, wimmen lose that winnin' weakness and appealin' charm for men, their helplessness before the law, and their clingin' dependence upon them to take care of them and their propputy that is so endearin' to my sect. and if they spile this by their obnoxious act of votin' they must take the awful consequences." sez samantha, "it has worked well in other states; it has helped men, wimmen and children mentally, socially and legally. if it wuz such a dangerous thing as you say it is, why have men granted suffrage to wimmen after it has been tried for twenty years or more in a neighborin' state, right in their own dooryard as you may say? would they venter if they hadn't found that it wuz a good thing?" sez i hautily, "i am not talkin' about other states or other countries, or other males or other females. i am working and writing in the interests of jonesville and its environin' environs. i am tryin' to ward off with my right hand, and my steeled pen the waves of error that i see in my own mind sweepin' down nigher and nigher onto us." and i went on with a soarin' eloquence enough to melt the heart of a salamander, "i stand at the gate of jonesville as the boy stood on the burnin' deck when all but him had flowed, and i will stand there protectin' that gate, and us male jonesvillians from infringin' and encroachin' females till i'm sot fire to." i waved out my hand in a noble jester as i spoke, and spozed mebby it would touch samantha's heart. but she looked at me over her specs from head to foot in the cool aggravatin' way wimmen have sometimes, and i read in her eyes the remark she didn't utter: "you hain't big enough to make much of a bonfire." but i didn't reply to that unuttered tant, i felt above it, and went on, "i am not the only man who takes that firm onchangeable position. england has a high official who occupies the same noble poster. he don't heed or care what females want or don't want, nor what other statesmen want or don't want. nor he don't care what is goin' on in other parts of the world, or not goin' on. his proud position is to shield england from the encroachin' army of female suffragists. to do what he's made up his mind to do, and nothin' can't stop him, not threats, nor reason, nor argument, nor broken winders, nor torn coat tails. a good hard shakin' from a female can't change him, nor shake his resolve out of him, nor hunger strikes, nor fleein' wimmen, nor pursuin' ones. he stands side by side with me. and even if it brought the towers of jonesville and england in ruins at our four feet we would not then change our two great minds. "his bizness is to not look to see what is done in other places or not done, but to protect his own green isle from what he's made up his mind is dangerous and infringin'. "oh," sez i with a deep heart felt sithe, "would that we two congenial souls might meet and sympathize with each other. but though sea and land divides our bodies, our sperits meet and flow together." i wuz almost lost in the rapped idee of the sweet conference meetin' we two could enjoy together. but anon i gin my attention to the subject momentarily broke in upon (for my mind is so large and roomy it is big enough for several trains of thought to run through it at one time). and i sez as i remarked prior and heretofore, "samantha, that courtesy in males is a most beautiful trait; you see it everywhere, to mill and to meetin', as the old sayin' is. now last week when i wuz to the conference, uncle sime and i wuz in a crowded street car and a dretful fat woman come in, heftier than you are, samantha." "is it possible?" sez she coldly (she thinks i make light of her heft but i don't; it hain't nothin' to make light of, specially when you lift her in and out the democrat). "yes," sez i, "she wuz even fatter than you are, and she come in red-faced and pantin' from the exertion. and a young chap who had been settin' with two or three other young fellers carryin' on and laughin', the very minute she come wheezin' in, he riz up and sez to her: "'i will be one of three men to give you a seat, madam.' "you see, samantha," sez i, "how that inborn courtesy in males inserted itself even in a street car." "yes, i see," sez samantha in a still colder axent, but i could tell by her linement that she wuzn't a mite convinced. and i went on a praisin' up that noble trait of my sect, and tryin' to convince her how universal it wuz, and how turrible it would be for females to lose it, but she kep' on a knittin' on my blue sock, and sez in quite a reasonable axent for a female to use: "yes, to see a great hearted noble man guard and protect a woman is a beautiful sight, but," sez she, "that trait, though sometimes seen, is not universal." sez i, "it is; it is jest as universal as--as--any universalist ever wuz." but she kep' right on in the persistent, irritatin' way wimmen have; as i've said prior and before, they can't seem to be willin' to give up to man's superior judgment, they're bound to talk and argy. and her voice wuz as firm as any rock in our medder, and if there is anything more firmer and aggravatin' than them i'd like to see 'em. she made me think that minute of them big rocks when i wuz tryin' to plough round 'em. i see i could jest as easy make a furrer through them as through her sot obstinate old mind as she said agin: "men don't always use courtesy towards wimmen." as she made that damagin' insertion agin, is it any wonder that the plough of my manly judgment struck fire from her rocky obstinacy? i acted fearful wrathy and disputed her right up and down. sez i, "that is sunthin' that no man will stand for; they will not brook bein' accused of a lack of courtesy towards wimmen." i acted dretful indignant, for in this turrible time us men have got to lay holt of every little nub of argument and hang onto it like a dog to a bone, or the lord only knows what will become on us, or how low a hole we will be ground down into by the high heels of females. sez samantha, "i admit there are beautiful instances of men protectin' and guardin' wimmen, but how wuz it with fez lanfear? he wuz always boastin' about men's courtesy and chivalry, and how did it come out?" i sot silent and scratched my head for a minute or so, not as samantha intimidated to try to dig out a favorable idee, no, it itched. and i sez, "id'no as i blame fez for always talkin' about this trait in his sect, and id'no as i blame him for what it led to." he see how necessary it wuz to insist on men's havin' these traits, and his wife would argy agin him, and he'd git riled up. he always had to be real sharp with her and boss her, for if he hadn't he would lost the upper hand of her, which every man ort to have, and she would took the advantage on him and run on him. for the propputy all belonged to her and it made fez discouraged, and took his ambition away, and he couldn't seem to set himself to work, and all the comfort he had wuz in arguin' on them traits of men and playin' on the fiddle and base drum, so she rented her place and they lived on what she got for it. but knowin' it wuz her ruff that covered him, and her chairs he sot in, and her vittles he et, and clothes he wore, made him irritated and fraxious, and he knowed he'd got to sass her and act uppish towards her or he wouldn't be nothin' nor nobody. and she would act real disagreeable and tell him she'd love to see some of the courtesy of his sect he talked so much about showed out by him to home, and she doubted he had any, and knowin' that he had oceans of it, for every man has, it naterally madded him. and one washin' day they got to arguin' and he brung up them noble traits of men, and their onvaryin' courtesy and generosity towards wimmen. and right in the midst on't she asked him to bring in two pails of water to finish her washin' on account of her havin' a lame back. he wuz practicin' a new piece entitled "woman, lovely woman," and bein' so interested in it and bein' broke off so sudden from melody and men's noble traits to act as a chore boy (he'd argyed so much he could argy and fiddle) and a smartin' i spoze from the dispute they wuz havin', he wouldn't git her the water and told her real short to git it herself. and as she started with two pails for the water--they brung it up from the creek by hand, for fez had never had time to make a cistern--she twitted him agin about that courtesy of men towards wimmen, and bein' so high strung and independent sperited, he up and hit her and knocked her down, and stood over her a hollerin': "now will you dispute me agin, and say that men don't show any courtesy towards wimmen?" and bein' browbeat and skairt (for he wuz a great strong man and she a little mite of a woman and tired out) she had to knuckle down and admit that men _did_ have courtesy, oceans of it. but he wouldn't git the water, he showed his independence there and she better kep' still and not aggravated him. lots of folks blamed him, samantha did, them that see shaller, and didn't see deep into first causes. he told uncle sime and me jest how it wuz; he said that mad and aggravated as he wuz he didn't forgit that his wife belonged to the weaker and tenderer sect, and it wuz a husband's duty and privelige to take care on her and shield her from harm. and he said he didn't hit her hard at all, only gin her a little tunk to let her know who wuz master there and that he wouldn't brook female arguin', and he said that if she hadn't been so tuckered out it wouldn't have hurt her much of any, and he wuz as surprised as she wuz when she tumbled over. but he said seein' she laid there on the floor he see it wuz his duty to his own sect to make her own up how truly superior men wuz, and how much courtesy they had, for he thought mebby he should never git so good a chance agin to make her own up to them noble traits of men. uncle sime and i both see how fez felt and what driv him to do what he did. i tell you agin it is a perilous and agonizin' epock of time for the male sect at home and abroad. men in america havin' to set curled up on a bench by the side of the road, and see weak wimmen, underlin's, a marchin' by 'em in the center of the street with brass bands and banners a flyin'. and in england the highest official of the empire held by the collar and shook by a weak female jest like a spitball thrower of a schoolboy, and couldn't resent it in court owin' to his havin' so much dignity at the stake. oh, my downtrod sect! what are we a comin' to? i do git so wrought up a meditatin' on the dretful things that are a happenin' to us men nowdays, and how browbeat and how humiliated we are by our inferiors, i git so cast down and deprested that my melancholy sperit has to bust out in poetry. for some time i've had them feelin's. now last christmas night i had such a spell, and i had to git out of bed and put samantha's crazy quilt round me (and it seemed as if that insane quilt made me feel more high strung and wild) and go out in the settin' room and ease my strugglin' sperit in verse. why, sometimes it seems if i didn't have this safety valve to my bustin', swellin' emotions it seems almost as if i should have to be hooped to keep myself together. but poetry kinder easies me a little. now last saturday night i writ the follerin' verses as late as leven p.m. we'd been to meetin' as usual, and had a splendid christmas dinner. samantha, as i have mentioned prior and before this, with all the weaknesses and shortcomin's of her inferior sect, is a masterly cook. but it is all nonsense her thinkin' i et too much; i didn't eat more'n four pieces of mince pie, and three helpin's of plum puddin', besides the turkey and vegetables and salad and such. if a strong man belongin' to a strong and superior sect can't stand that, it is a pity. she insisted that it wuz a nightmair that sot on my chist and rid me out of bed into the settin' room that time o' night. but it wuzn't no such thing, it wuz my melancholy and deprested sperit that overcome me a thinkin' of my sect and what wuzn't to be. it seems as if everything melancholy and cast down appeared right in front on me. seems as if i could see old fate a encouragin' and pompeyin' the more opposite sect, and turnin' her back and lookin' down onto me and my sect, and refusin' me and us things she might have gin us if she'd a mind to. but bein' a female we might know she'd be contrary and love to tromple on us, and on me in petickular. as i sot there in them solemn night hours, with samantha sleepin' peacefully in the next room and the old clock tickin' away as if onmindful of the sufferin' sperit near it, it seemed as if every mean jab old fate had ever gin me from her sharp elbows and hard knuckles riz right up before me, and i seemed to see all the agreable things she might have did for the benefit of me and my sect if she hadn't been so contrary, but as i said, what could you expect of a female? my feelin's wuz turrible; the verses i gin vent to relieved me a little some like prickin' a bile and after writin' 'em i went back to bed and slep' so sound that i never hearn samantha buildin' a fire and gittin' breakfast till the sweet uroma of the coffee and briled chops stole on my wakened senses and i forgot for the moment the trials of me and my sect and felt better than i did feel. the verses wuz entitled: a christmas owed _by josiah allen, esq., p.m.s.j.c.f._ yes christmas has come, it got here at last, a bringin' me memories out of the past, and a pair of galluses, a necktie sad-- a gray night-shirt and a paper pad; useful presents, but nothin' gay, _useful presents_, dum 'em! i say! i wanted some jew'lry for the brethren to see, but it wuzn't to be, it wuzn't to be. ministers preach 'tis a blessed day, and so it is in a meetin' house way; but to me it has been a day of gloom, samantha i see didn't like the broom, and mop-stick, and pair of cowhide shues, it took me the heft of a hour to chuse; it made me deprested, and mournfulee i've mused on the things that wuzn't to be. weak females risin' on every hand pertendin' that they're equal to man-- wantin' to stand right up by his side, instead of the place where they ort to abide down in the safety and peace at his feet; oh the dear old times, so happy so sweet, will never come back to my sect, nor to me, no, it wuzn't to be, it wuzn't to be. yes, i guess old fate made a slip of her pen, when fixin' the lot of the children of men, 'twas bad for the world and for me i ween that i wuzn't born a king or a queen; my bald head shines out bare and cold, or wears a hat, oh a crown of gold would set it off fur agreabler to me, but it wuzn't to be, it wuzn't to be. fate sets a writin' in darkness and night, 'tain't spozeable she always gits things right; to the poor she sends ten children or more crowdin' in through famine wolves round the door, while for one kid the rich may vainly sigh, but she flirts her skirts and passes 'em by; why hain't villains shot while the good go free? it wuzn't to be, it wuzn't to be. a poet comes with his dreamy way right into a nest of common clay; and in pious home a soul gits in the size of the hole in the head of a pin; so 'tain't so strange some feller and i should git mixed up on our way through the sky; if i had to be born why not been he. it wuzn't to be, it wuzn't to be. fate sort o' yanked me and throwed me down on a yankee hillside bare and brown; and gin me a chance to die or live accordin' to labor i had to give; i couldn't eat stuns or a burdock burr, so i had to hustle and make things purr, no bread-fruit round, nor no custard-tree; no, it wuzn't to be, it wuzn't to be. now that other feller that might have been me by a turn of fate's pen, oh in luxury he lays and counts up his millions in bed, with his crown on the bed-post over his head; i wonder by snum! if he thinks it straight-- for me to be small and him to be great; when i might have been him and he might have been me, but it wuzn't to be, it wuzn't to be. i'd ask how he'd like it to take off his crown and to good hard hoein' knuckle down. or plantin', or hayin', or a weed pullin' bee in onion beds, (dum 'em from a to z!) i bet i could work on his feelin's so deep he'd up and divide a part of his heap, jest a thinkin' of how he might have been me-- but it wuzn't to be, it wuzn't to be. now that feller's wife, i presoom to say that some of the time he has his way; he's so tarnal lucky and happy and fat, it would be jest like him to git even that. oh i'd dearly love to have it to say that _once_, jest _once_ i'd had my way when samantha and i didn't chance to agree, but it wuzn't to be, it wuzn't to be. samantha of course had to find fault with these sad but beautiful verses. and she asked me what them letters meant i had strung along after my name, showin' plain the inherient weakness of a female's brain. of course a man would see to once that they stood for path master and salesman in the jonesville cheese factory. i had talked it over with uncle sime and we both agreed that at this time, when the hull race of men wuz facin' complete insignificance, if not teetotal anhiliation, it behooved us to lay holt of every speck of dignity we could lay our hands on, and we both thought them letters made my name look more noble and riz up. but samantha didn't like the verses at all, and agin advanced the uroneous idee that it wuz my liver that ailed me instead of genius. sez she, "if folks will gorge themselves 'till their eyes stand out with fatness,' as the good book sez, how can they see plain to gratefully count over the blessin's the past year has brought 'em, and lay plans to pass on some of their good cheer to them that set in the shadders of grief and poverty?" she said i'd be all right in a day or two, and if i wuzn't she should soak my head, and doctor me, for, sez she, "i hain't goin' to have anybody round writin' such deprestin' and ongrateful verses. "lots of times," sez she, "if sentimental and melancholy poets would git their livers to workin' better they wouldn't harrer up their readers so. catnip would help 'em to look on the brighter side of life, or thoroughwort." and she didn't like the last pathetic and interestin' stanza; she said i'd had my way, or _thought_ i'd had it time and agin. and agin she said it wuz my liver that ailed me, and she even approached me with some catnip tea. good heavens! _catnip!_ to curb my soarin' sperit, and soothe the ardent emotions of my soul. a regular fool idee. you might know it sprung from a female's brain, or ruther the holler spot where brains should be--gracious heaven! _catnip!_ vi i talk on females infringin' as i've repeated time and agin it is a apaulin' epock of time us males are a passin' through. more and more, day by day and year by year the female sect is a infringin' on us. right after right, privelige after privelige, dear to our manly souls as the very apples in our eyes, are grasped holt on by encroachin' female hands and torn away from us weak and helpless men. from birth to death the infringin' goes on, you can't take up a newspaper now but you see signs on't. in the good old times when a man had a child born to him to carry on his name and his propputy to future generations, he took the credit on't. how is it told on now? instead of puttin' it in as it used to be, and ort to be, "john smith has got a son, john smith jr."--it is writ down now in this fool way: "a son is born to john and mary smith." what's the use on't? john's name is enough any fool would know there wuz a female somewhere connected with the event in a womanly onobstrusive way, but why do they have to bring her name forward to set her up, and spile her, and mention all these little petickulars? why, how wuz it in bible times, as i asked samantha, sez i, "from the very first it wuz set down as it ort to be and a sample to foller, noah begot ham, and ham begot cush, and cush begot nimrod, and they kep' on begettin' and begettin', chapter after chapter, and no female's name connected with it in any way, shape or manner." sez i, "hain't that a solemn proof, samantha, that females are inferior and wuzn't considered worth writin' about?" sez i, "you nor no other female suffragist can squirm out of that." sez samantha, "men translated the bible, but i can tell you," sez she, "that when miss ham, racked with agonizin' pain, went down to death's door for little cush, whilst mr. ham wuz santerin' round canean smart as a cricket, and probable flirtin' with some good lookin' four-mother, if miss ham had writ it up for the daily paper her name would been mentioned in the transaction." that's jest the way it is, even bible proof can't stop wimmen's clack and argyin'. yes, jest as i said, infringin' follers a man from the cradle to the grave. for i'll be hanged if you don't see it writ nowdays, "james brown, beloved husband of sarah brown." how bold, how forward! _husband of!_ it seems as if it is enough to make his grampa, old jotham brown, turn over in his grave and try to git up, to stop such doin's. he lived in a time when females knowed their place and kep' in it. he had twenty-one children by his seven different wives, and every one on 'em wuz put in the paper and the old fambly bible credited to him; ketch him havin' any female's name mixed up with it, oh no! they couldn't infringe on him, not whilst he wuz alive, they couldn't. he worked his wives hard, and when one died off, he married another. he said as long as the lord kep' takin' 'em, he should. as i said no female couldn't git the better of him whilst he wuz alive, but they played a nasty mean trick on him after he wuz dead. his last wife wuz a high headed creeter, or would have been if he hadn't broke her in, and held her head down with such a tight rain. but owin' to his disagreein' with all his children and bloody relatives she got the propputy all in her hands, and after he died she got tall noble gravestuns for every one of his different wives, almost monuments, with a long verse of poetry on each one on 'em, and their names writ down in full. "mahala eliza--mehitable jane--amanda mandana--drusilly charity--priscilla charlotte--alzina trypheena--diantha cordelia--all carved in big deep letters, and their names before they wuz married. these seven high stuns stood in a sort of a half circle with a little low stun in the center and on it printed in little letters wuz: "our husband." it looked dretful; but his children all hatin' him as they did they didn't interfere. but it wuz a mean trick and she couldn't have done it if he'd been alive, no indeed. but seein' he wuzn't there to rain her in and hold her down, she took the advantage on him as wimmen will if you give 'em the chance. folks all thought she done it to come up with him for bein' so hard on his different wives, and keepin' 'em down so, and i presoom she did. i presoom she wuz a regular female infringer and suffrager. now in the marriage notices, instead of bein' put in the newspaper in the modest becomin' way it used to be, "john smith's son married to mary brown," it has to be put in mr. and mrs. smith's son or daughter is married. where is the good horse sense on't? everybody would know that young smith had a mother somewhere in the background, but what's the use of bringin' her forward so and makin' on her? it is jest to infringe on men, that's what it is for. and when luke dingman married nancy whittle she had the money to start a store bizness, but luke bein' a man, his wuz the name that ort to been spoke on, and he went and got a handsome sign all painted "luke dingman's store." and if you'll believe it nancy made him git it painted all over agin "l. and n. dingman's store." what wuz the use of draggin' a female's initional into it? jest to infringe on us men. but lots of men made fun on't and told luke he'd ort to been man enough to stand his ground and kep' the first sign. they say it makes luke real huffy, and he takes it out on nancy, is dretful mean to her, but she's only got herself to blame, she hadn't ort to infringed on him. and last week samantha and i went to philena peedick's weddin'. and when the minister asked, "who giveth this woman to this man?" the widder peedick walked up bold as brass, and gin philena away, _she_, a _female woman_! never, as i told uncle sime, never did i see a plainer or more flagrant case of infringin' on men's rights. why, philena had a male uncle there, and ruther than see such things go on i would have gin her away myself. but thank heaven, there is one thing they hain't changed yet, females have got to knuckle down and be gin away to a man, in marriage, that's a little comfort. "who giveth this woman!" they have got to hear that, much as it may gald 'em. but as i told uncle sime, it would be jest like 'em to try to change that. and i told him the first we knew a female would snake a man up to the altar, and the minister would be made to say, who giveth this man to this woman? and the woman who walked him up there would say, "i give him." and then she'll hand him over to the bride. oh, my soul! have i ever got to see that day? uncle sime and i both said that we hoped and trusted that we would be dead and buried under our tombs before that humiliation come onto our sect. uncle sime and i sympathize a lot together and talk of the good old times and forebode about the future. and one day when my sperit seemed crushed down and deprested more than common, and the future for us men looked dark and gloomy indeed, i sez to him: "simon, i see ahead on us the time when i shall be called mr. samantha smith." uncle sime, though very smart, hain't got my mind, sort o' forebodin' and prophetic, and much as he'd worried about wimmen's infringin', he hadn't foreboded to that extent, and he trembled like a popple leaf at them dretful words and sez: "oh, gracious heavens, josiah! how can we men ever stand up under that!" but i went on, turnin' the knife in the wownd, "mr. kittie brown, mr. nellie jones! what do you think of that, simon?" he groaned and sithed but didn't say nothin'; it seemed as if the very idee had fairly stunted him, and i kep' still and meditated and my mind roamed back to the humiliatin' time when i laid my onwillin' nose on the grindstun, or ruther it wuz laid on for me and held there, and i signed a piece of poetry i had writ "samantha allen's husband." it hain't no use to go into the petickulars and tell all about the means employed to git me under such mortifyin' subjugation. vittles had sunthin' to do with it, and i hain't goin' to tell no furder. but never, never shall i forgit my meachin' and downtrod linement as i surveyed it in the glass when i wuz shavin' jest afterwards. shavin' a beard! that very act riz up and asserted the supremacy of my sect and mocked the move i had made. oh, the sufferin's of that occasion and my vain efforts to git out of it. but samantha never sympathized with me a mite. she said, "you've seen me doin' the same thing for years and enjoyed it, and what is sass for the gander ort to be sass for the goose." there is another proof of wimmen's infringin'; she turned that familiar old sayin' right round to carry her pint, and put the goose where the gander always had been, and ort to be. i tell you there hain't no length a female won't go to to carry the day and infringe on men's rights. and you might as well git blood from a white turnip as to git any pity and sympathy from 'em for my downtrod sect. for when i mentioned to samantha my turrible forebodin' about my sect havin' to take wimmen's names at the altar, and asked her if she could begin to realize what men's humiliated and despairin' feelin's would be at such a time, she up and sez: "do you realize what wimmen's feelin's are at the altar? she's had to stand it. no matter how romantic and beautiful her name wuz, miss victoria angela chesterfield has had to change it for miss ichabod tubbs, or miss peleg hogg. "and," sez she, "if she has a big propputy and married a man so poor he had to borry his weddin' shirt, she had to hear him say, 'with all my worldly goods i thee endow,' when all them goods wuz a pile of debts she had to pay for him, but she had to stand it and couldn't snicker, for it wuzn't a snickerin' time. "and a great able bodied business woman had to promise to obey a little snip of a boy, when they both knew she wuz lyin', with a priest hearin' the lie and givin' it his blessin'. my sect has had to stand considerable from yourn," sez samantha. no, i didn't git a mite of sympathy from her, and might have knowed it, and i'd better not said a word to her about my forebodin's. but uncle simon bentley always hears my prognostics with respectful sympathy, and he said after i come out of my meditations, and asked him agin how he would feel to take a woman's name, he sez: "thanks to a kind and protectin' providence, i hain't married. but never! whilst i have the sperit of manhood in me would i, simon bentley, ever be called miss polly brown. no, i would cover that alter with my goar, before i would submit to it." and to comfort me he sez, "josiah, mebby it won't take place in our day." but i sez, "simon, i see it jest ahead on us if this infringin' can't be stopped, and i don't see no way to stop it." but sez simon in his comfortin' way, "your book, josiah, that great work, you forgit that. i believe it will work wonders for our poor strugglin' sect." "no, simon," sez i, "i don't forgit that great work for a moment of time; it is the anchor throwed out into the heavin' water of woman's revolt that is a risin' all round us. sometimes i hope the anchor will touch the solid bottom of man's supremacy, and hold, and then i feel boyed up. but my feelin's ebbs and flows like the mighty ocean to which i have before fittin'ly compared my emotions. we both on us heave up, and heave down. to-day i am a heavin' down. oh, how deprested and dubersome i do feel," but i went on in tremblin' axents, "i am bound to make this tremenjous effort, and if you and i, uncle sime, and the rest of our sect have got to lay down in the dust to be trod on by the feet of underlin's, whilst layin' there under them high heels, i will have the conscientiousness that i have did what i could for my downtrod sect." my feelin's overcome me so here that i took out my bandanna and wiped my eyes, and uncle sime hisen. he looked as cast down as i did, as we both realized our danger from the turrible doin's round us, and instinctively we took holt of hands and sot there sympathizin' for quite a spell. but anon uncle sime had to go home. he lives with his niece and she sez, "if she has to support him, he has got to be promp to his meals, or go without," so he hastened off. and i summoned up the brave dantless sperit of manhood and walked upright through the kitchen (we'd been settin' on the back stoop). i trod with a firm bold step and braved samantha's onsympathizin' demeanor as she stood fryin' nut cakes, and retired into the welcome seclusion of the corner sacred to my literary pursuits. mekanically i run my hands through the dish-pan heaped with betsy's poetry. oh, how sad, when a man has to turn to another female (and one he has always detested) for the sympathy and understandin' denied him on his own hearthstun. and though i despise betsy bobbett slimpsey as a human bein' and a female, yet when torn and wownded from infringin' and cold remarks from my own pardner, i do draw a little mite of comfort from that granny iron dish-pan, and runnin' my hand through the poetry heaped up in it, and read how she looks up to my sect, and the becomin' and reverent views she takes on us, and me in petickular. and how it has always been the goal of her life and should be to every womanly female to be united by hook or by crook to one on us, it soothed me, it brought back the dear old days when man's supremacy wuz onquestioned and he wuzn't infringed on. and i read how she despises and looks down on the encroachments of the inferior sect to which she belongs, and how she loathes the great tide of the feminist movement that is risin' up all over the world, threatenin' to sweep us strong males away, as frothy water, if there is enough on't will uproot giant oaks. i read over piece after piece to cam my sperit, hurt and wownded by infringin', and my pardner's onsympathizin' words, and i picked out the follerin' one as bein' comparitively worthy a place in my great work. this poem, writ before her marriage, i consider the most touchin'ly pathetic one of all the enormous pile on 'em i had perused. what to a feelin' mind and tender heart is more pitiful than to see a patridge hidin' his head under a maple leaf, and thinkin' his hull body is hid from the hunter? what is more affectin' than to see how betsy tried to hide her lifelong pursuit of man, and matrimony, under the cold word, _duty_? "unless she see her duty plain." oh, what a soul of meanin' there is hid under that word, _unless_. a keen eye, and a tender heart can read between the lines her real meanin', her dantless resolve, as plain as the hunter sees the plump body and gray tail feathers of the patridge. but i will not keep the reader longer from the sad but beautiful poem. stanzas on duty _by betsy bobbett_ unless they do their duty see oh who would spread their sail on matrimony's cruel sea and face its angry gale? oh betsy bobbett i'll remain _unless_ i see my duty plain. shall horses calmly brook a halter who over fenceless pastures stray? shall females be dragged to the altar, and down their freedom lay? no, no, b. bobbett i'll remain, _unless_ i see my duty plain. beware! beware, oh rabid lover who pines for intellect and beauty, my heart is ice to all your overtures unless i see my duty, for betsy bobbett i'll remain _unless_ i see my duty plain. come not with keys of rank and splendor my heart's cold portals to unlock, 'tis vain to search for feelin's tender too late you'll find you've struck a rock; for betsy bobbett i'll remain _unless_ i see my duty plain. 'tis vain for you to pine and languish, i cannot soothe your bosom's pain, in vain are all your groans, your blandishments i warn you are in vain; for betsy bobbett i'll remain _unless_ i see my duty plain. you needn't lay no underhanded plots to ketch me, men desist or in the dust you will be landed for to the last i will resist. for betsy bobbett i'll remain _unless_ i see my duty plain. vii about wimmen's foolish love for petickulars how folkses emotions will sometimes rise up entirely onexpected and onbeknown to them, and git the better on 'em. of course we male americans have always foreboded and felt dretful about a certain subject. but this mornin' it come over me like a black flood, the realizin' sense of the enormous labor that votin' would bring onto weak delicate females, and how impossible it wuz for their fraguile constitution and puny strength to stand up under it. why, how many many times we statesmen have said and preached and lectured that wimmen wuzn't much more nor less than angels, and ort to be treated as such. tender delicate flowers, to be kep' from every chillin' breeze of life that tried to blow onto 'em. such talk has been one of the greatest comforts of us men, and has been very affectin' and effective with lots of females. as i say i've knowed it and held forth on it for years and years, ever since this loathsome doctrine of wimmen's rights become so prominent in jonesville. but as many different emotions as i've had about it, never wuz my feelin's so wrought up as upon this occasion i speak of. my steeled pen fairly trembled in my hands, shook by my devotion to samantha, and my determination if possible to keep her beloved and delicate form from sinkin' down under the awful fateeg of votin', and havin' rights. i wuz so excited and strung up by my feelin's, that i felt that i must warn her agin about it that very minute, and i hollered to her to come to me to once. i spoze my voice wuz skairful, my feelin's wuz such, and she come a hurryin' in wipin' her hands on her apron, and sez she, "for the land's sake! what is the matter, josiah? have you got a crick?" "no," sez i, "i've fell into fur deeper waters than any crick. it come over me like a overwhelmin' flood, the thought of the weakness of wimmen, and the arjous and tuckerin' job of votin', and how impossible it wuz for weak wimmen to not sink down under it, and i felt i had to warn you about it this very minute, and entreat you agin to shun it as you would a pizen serpent." "well," sez she, "you better forebode to yourself another time. i wuz jest rensin' out my last biler of clothes, and i've got to whitewash the summer kitchen, and paint the buttery floor, and scrape the paper off overhead in the settin' room, so's to paper it to-morrow. and i guess that whitewashin' and scrapin' off that paper with a case knife overhead is as hefty a job as liftin' up a paper ballot, to say nothin' of the biler full of clothes i'm liftin' on and off, and sweatin' over the wash-tub. and i'll thank you to keep your forebodin's and warnin's to yourself in the future, and not call me offen my work." and she went out and shet the door hard. and that's all the thanks i got for my tender feelin's and overpowerin' desire to keep hardships from her. but i knowed she wuz expectin' company, and fixin' up and preparin' for 'em, so i overlooked it in her, and i presoom to say the thought of that company and the extra good meals we wuz sure to have, had a amelioratin' effect on me. but her hashness won't stop me nor other noble tender hearted males from worryin' about the turrible hardship and labor of votin', and tryin' our best to keep the gentle delicate females we are protectin' and guardin' from plungin' into it. but i'm so sensitive and my feelin's so easy hurt, that it must have been a minute and a half before my mind settled down agin and i could hold my steeled pen in as firm a grip as heretofore, and resoom my powerful argumentative strain. another reason i've argued why wimmen should not vote wuz she would act so awkward in politics she would put in so many petickulars, wimmen's minds hain't stabled, they hain't got horse sense. and they don't nor won't appreciate that good old doctrine that has always been such a comfort to me and uncle sime and other statesmen, that what has been always will be, and to let well enough alone. no they have got to be tinkerin' and tryin' to make things better, and interfere, and talk and tell petickulars. now if a merchant sells 'em cloth for their fambly, instead of buyin' and payin' for it and keepin' their mouth shet as a man would, they'll feel of it and pull it to and fro, fro and to. and if it hain't what he claims it is, if it is shoddy and poor, they'll talk and talk till he has to hustle round and buy good stuff, or they won't trade with him, takin' off his profits jest by petickulars. and if a grocer lets his eatin' stuff lay round outdoors for the flies to roost on, do you spoze they'll buy that stuff? no, their minds not bein' bigger than them fly specks, they'll hound that man till they make him cover up that stuff or bring it into the house, and every one that has got horse sense knows it makes that man extra work, but what do they care? and if he tries to make a little more money by sellin' things that hain't jest what you might call hullsome--and of course every business man understands that he wants to make all the money he can--why, the woman that buys that stuff once, and thinks it hain't what she wants to feed her fambly on, she begins to tell petickulars; she'll call it rotten, and tell how long it has been in cold storage, she'll say "to lessen population and increase some millionaire's revenue." and she'll call his canned vegetables mouldy, and tell how his canned meat smells, and how it made her children sick, and how eben purdy's little girl died after eatin' it, and how it took off old miss lanfear. all these little petickulars she has to dwell on with other wimmen till she gits 'em all rousted up and there will be a dozen talkin' at one time, sez i, and sez he, and sez she, and sez they. and they'll keep it up and jest boycote that man till he has to keep hullsome goods that cost him most as much agin, and of course cuts down his profits, but they don't think of that. and how them wimmen found fault with the decision of the supreme court, that pizen could be used to bleach flour, when they knew the supreme court is composed of the very smartest men in the nation. and they knowed them supreme men didn't approve of usin' enough pizen in it to kill the aged and infants. but they had to argy and boast that if they wuz supreme wimmen, they wouldn't had a mite of pizen put into bread, jest as if grown folks can't stand a little pizen now and then. but you can see plain that they claim that wimmen can manage the home and food bizness better than men, and want to find fault with men and git the upper hands on 'em. and it is jest so with milk. a fool ort to know that it makes a man as much agin work to fuss and clean off his cows and his stables every day, and keep his milk absolutely clean. but what do they care if a man breaks his back cleanin' his stables and washin' off his cows' tits. they'll talk and put in every little petickular about how many babies wuz killed by his bad milk, and how many folks got tomain from it, till they carry the day and git the milk they want. another man made to toe the mark by petickulars. and it is jest so with stuff throwed into the street--why, a man can't call his soul his own, and throw a old cabbage or rotten potato into the street without their interferin' with him, and makin' him clean up his primises and keep a covered garbage can. [illustration: "till she gets 'em all rousted up, and just boycote that man till he has to keep hullsome food"] now jest imagine what that meddlin' interferin' sperit would be if carried into politics, if public officials wuz a prey to woman's petickulars. now spozin' a man wuz nominated for some high office that hain't mebby jest exactly square. for as uncle sime sez, "what man is square in public life? no," he sez, "you'll find 'em every shape and size, except by ." but wimmen can't accept that scientific statement, made by folks that know, that men are made in such a way that public life and politics wears and rubs on their square corners, and digs into and destroys their shape, so as uncle sime sez, "they can't help bein' crooked." but wimmen's brains hain't strong enough, and their naters and consciences hain't elastic enough to comprehend such matters. they always have and always will pay more attention to them little petickulars of right and wrong than men have time to. as i've said before, they can't see big, they see little. they'll talk it over together how many million dollars is made by the white slave trade every year, ketchin' sweet young girls, they'll say by the net of their love, by drink, by pizened needles, flattery, lies, treachery, takin' 'em from health, home and happiness, and throwin' 'em to the lions of lust and greed, into livin' deaths. oh, yes, they'll put in all the petickulars. and they'll ask how many millions wuz made by highway graft, tax-payers wadin' through mud, whilst high officials, contractors and public grabbers stuff the tax-payer's money in their pockets. and they'll bring up stories about all the other big corporations and money grabbers. and how much blood money is made yearly by whiskey sellin'? that is the main fountain their petickulars gush from. now if a smart hustlin' saloon keeper is nominated for some high office and wimmen could vote, what would be the consequence? why, they would jest onloose them petickulars onto him and he would be washed completely away on 'em. they wouldn't know any better than to peek and pry into his bizness, and run it down to the lowest notch. jest as if a bizness that is good enough for the u.s. govermunt isn't good enough for them. no, their naters bein' such, and they've got such itchin' ears, they'll pry round into every crook and turn of that man's bizness, and talk about it till they git the hull community riled up. the hull wimmen crew will pin on their white ribbings, and git their heads together, tellin' some story agin him, and the bizness he represents, and go into all the petickulars, sez i, and sez he, and sez she, and sez they. "le'me see," sez they, "when wuz it he got hen daggett so drunk that he went home and whipped his wife, and most killed her and her next baby wuz born a fool. "and what time o' night wuz it, wuz it ten or twelve, that he got old chawgo's boy crazy drunk and wantin' to git rid on him, histed him up on his motorcycle and started him for home, and he didn't go half a mile before he fell off and wuz killed. "and what time of year wuz it, wuz it late in the spring or early in the summer, that them two wizzel girls wuz took from his saloon drugged and unconscious, and not a hide or hair on 'em seen sence. "and le'me see, wuz it on a monday or a tuesday, that them two men got into a drunken fight in his saloon and both on 'em got killed. no, it wuz on a wednesday, for i remember i cut my bib apron wrong, i cut it ketrin ways, and jest as i wuz cuttin' it over, i hearn of that big railroad smash-up where two hundred got killed and maimed by a drunken engineer." them wimmen would bring up all them little petickulars agin that man, and his bizness lection day, jest to be mean, and to beat him. every man and woman whiskey had destroyed, all the crime and agony and poverty it has caused, every fambly wrecked by it, every young man ruined, every young girl who went through the saloon into destruction, and the one hundred thousand deaths caused by it every year. they wouldn't know enough to keep their mouths shet at this time when it wuz so important to have 'em shet up; they'd jest clutter up the road to the pole with petickulars. and no matter how flourishin' a bizness that man wuz doin', and how much money he wuz makin', and how much he wuz willin' to pay for votes, helpin' the male community in this way, they'd carry the day agin him. they can't seem to realize what a loss in propputy it is to the man they're a houndin'. and if you twit 'em of it they'll twit back and ask, what of the one billion, four hundred million dollars loss to the country every year, caused by strong drink, and ask you if you know that as many americans are killed every year by it as has been killed in all the battles of the world since time begun. havin' to ask all these little leadin' questions at jest that onconvenient time and take the advantage on him. and then when they git him turned down and some favorite religious man elected in his place, oh, how their tongues would run agin, tellin' of all the good things he'd done and would do; agin it would be sez i, and sez he, and sez she, and sez they. wimmen can't seem to learn to set still to home, and knit, no, they have got to meddle and interfere with men's bizness, as fur as they can, and woe be to us if they ever cut loose and run furder. why the hullsale liquor dealers' association will agree with every word i've said. they know what females are, and what they can do when they git their white ribbings on, and are banded together agin 'em, and they begin to tell petickulars. that's what makes 'em fight so agin woman's suffrage. they know where they and their bizness would be after a few years of wimmen's petickulars and votin', and they're willin' to pay well them that help 'em. as i've intimidated before, to a smart hustlin' bizness man who looks out for his own interest, it is absolutely appallin' to see how woman suffragists stand in their own light. but in my talk about the shiftless ways of these wimmen, and their tetotle inability to see where their interests lays, i want to make a honorable exception of the modest retirin' she auntys. them wimmen, though females, have got some good horse sense; they know which side their bread is buttered and they lay out to keep it right side up. they know who helps butter that bread. they know it is better to ride round in palace cars to their lectures agin female suffrage, helped by them who hate that cause like pizen, than it is to walk afoot. and they know enough to grasp special priveliges, and enjoy 'em, and they lay out to help the ones that help them. liquor dealers have got oceans of horse sense, and oceans of money, and they let that money flow along where it will do the most good, into female channels if necessary. anything to dam up the big waters of reform from risin' up and washin' 'em away, and stop woman suffragists from ruinin' their bizness, and tellin' petickulars and votin'. and i'll ask this question of any man or woman with the brains of a angleworm or caterpillar--hain't it easier to float along with the current, than to fight agin it and go in the other direction? why a fool ort to know it is. you won't ketch them she auntys a peekin' round huntin' for every little petickular about what the liquor dealers' association stands for, and talk and tattle about the effects of liquor sellin', no indeed. and i want to say and own up that when i find a spark of horse sense in a female, i'm willin' to own up to seein' that spark shinin' out agin the background of females' nateral ignorance and folly. we jonesvillians reconize smartness and horse sense, and i want to encourage and happify them she auntys by sayin', that the creation searchin' society of jonesville will never be found throwin' out no slurs agin them. neither will i as a male man, and a celebrated author, ever be found mockin' and sneerin' at 'em. of course they are females, but considerin' the limited amount of brains that females have and their scurcity of horse sense, they have done and are doin' the best they can. the creation searchin' society of jonesville and the liquor dealers' association stand up hand in hand, with me in the midst, and publicly reconize their humble helpfulness, and what more in the way of honor can any human female ask for? i always despised petickulars, every male man duz. it's nateral when our minds are took up with big things, big thoughts, petickulars jar on us; we hain't got the time for 'em in our busy lives. but i believe few of my bretheren can say what i can, that petickulars come within one of bein' the death on 'em. the way on't wuz samantha wuz to tirzah ann's visitin' and wuz took bed sick there, and right while i wuz stark livin' alone, i wuz took down with voylent pains runnin' up and down my spinal collar, and hull body. but the neighborin' wimmen, friends of samantha, i will say done all they could for me, they flocked in and filled me up with milk porridge, chicken broth, etc., and sot up with me nights and waited on me, helped by their various husbands. and i should got along all right if it hadn't been for the endless swarm of petickulars they driv into my room. talk, talk, talk, and tellin' petickulars, some on 'em smaller than the end of a nat's toe nail. and one day when i'd been made almost delerious by 'em, i made out to open the stand draw at the head of my bed and git out a pad and pencil, and writ the follerin' verses which come from the very bottom of my soul, heaven knows! owed to petickulars _by josiah allen, esq._ i've been bed-sick and very bad, and pains and chills and cramps i've had; and at tirzah's samantha come suddenly down with pleuresy pains from heel to crown, she couldn't git home with her plaguey crick-- so they never let her know i wuz sick. but the neighbors turned out good and true and stood by me to help me through, they come alone, and they come in pairs, they come with mules, and they come with mares; and i felt the goodness that in 'em lay and treated 'em well both night and day, till they brung in them petickulars. they come from fur, and they come from near, with new wild remedies strange and queer-- my mouth wuz a open and burnin' road down which the streams of their medicines flowed; streams of worm-wood and oil of tar, and onions, and warnuts, and goose, and bar; but my mean wuz a christian's all the while-- i sithed and swallered and tried to smile-- till they brung in them petickulars. they blistered my back, and they blistered my breast; they iled my nose, and they iled my chest, they gin me sweats of various sorts, hemlock and whiskey and corn and oats-- i drinked their gruel weaker'n a cat, i drinked their whey, didn't wink at that; i stood their faith cures, and their mind, i took 'em all and acted resigned-- till they brung in them petickulars. but they tried their cures to the very last, and i grew no better very fast; and i spoze they thought it would brighten my gloom, to bring some petickulars into my room. so they drove 'em in and they talked of flies-- and of chicken's teeth, and muskeeter's eyes, and they talked of pins, and stalks of hay, and lettice seed, and there i lay-- a victim of small petickulars. and one recounted a lengthy tale about the best way to drive a nail, and one old woman talked a hour on a pinch of salt and a spunful of flour; and jane she boasted two hours the deed she did when she pizened a pusley weed, and there i'd sweat, and there i'd groan, and pull my gray locks onbeknown-- a victim to small petickulars. and a female sot with anxious frown disputin' herself right up and down-- as to whether the hour wuz one or two, when their old white mare lost off its shoe-- sometimes 'twas two, and then 'twas one, and so through the hours that mare wuz run, and it trompled my brain till i cried, "whoa! do shue the old mair and let her go!" but under its heels i had to lay, and sweat, and rithe, and cuss the day-- they driv in them petickulars. and they wondered if jane had cloth enough for her calico apron with bib and ruff, and they mentally rent their robes and tore, for fear that sunthin' wuz wrong with the gore, till i wished that gore wuz over it rolled, and on martha's boots that had been new soled, and they almost mistrusted wuz too thin, by pretty nigh the wedth of a pin. and i vowed i could put their souls all in, and rattle 'em round in the head of a pin. and there i groaned, and turned, and lay, and sweat and sithed from day to day, a victim to small petickulars. till one day i riz and cried with might, "bring on a earthquake into my sight, fetch me a cyclone good and strong, a hurrycain, pestilence, bring 'em along, let me see 'em before i am dead; let 'em roar and romp around my bed, but ketch 'em, kill 'em, drive 'em away, this very minute of this very day every one of your dum petickulars. "let me be killed out square and rough, by a good hard kick from a elephant's huff, or let a volcano rise and bust this mortal frame, if bust it must. but i swan to man that i won't die by a kick from the off leg of a fly; and agin i swan, that i won't give in and go to my grave on the pint of a pin, killed by your dum petickulars." my eyes wuz wild, my goery meen skairt 'em almost to death, i ween the females all fled out of my sight, the two old women mad with fright, jostled each other and fell over chairs; and all on 'em said "i wuz crazier'n bears." but i settled back on my peaceful bed and most mistrusted i wuz dead and had got through the gate to beuler land, and i smiled some smiles, serene and bland, for i never had felt such peace before, as when i drove 'em out of the door, every one of them dum petickulars. viii i talk on wimmen's extravagance it wuz a cam beautiful mornin'; old mom nater seemed agreeable and serene, goin' about her mornin's work of lightin' up and warmin' the world. and samantha seemed as busy as old nater herself, and as cam, as she went about her work of makin' the house comfortable and clean. as i've mentioned prior and before this a better, cleaner housekeeper than samantha allen never trod on no shoe leather whatsoever, or went barefoot. equinomical, industrious, and as a cook beyond any compare. if these words wuz the last i should ever write i'd die solemnly declarin' as a housekeeper and home maker samantha allen can't never be beat. oh, if her principles about female suffragin', and the inferiority of her sect, and the superiority of my sect, wuz only equal to her housekeepin', what a treasure i would have in a earthen vessel (that is bible; i don't really understand what it means, but i think it looks well for a deacon to patronize the bible all he can conveniently, and bring into his literary work passages out on't). i feelt meller and agreeable in my mind, as i sot there in my favorite corner almost immersed in the parfenalia of my perfession, two paper pads, a bottle of ink, a steeled pen, two lead pencils, a pen knife and the immense granny iron dish-pan containin' betsy b.'s poetry. and as i sot there with my steeled pen in my hand ready to begin work on my remarkable book, my mind become so impressed by the inestimable value it wuz goin' to be to the world and the male and female sect, that almost onbeknown to myself i uttered the words aloud that wuz seethin' through my large active brain. sez i, "samantha, don't you believe this forthcomin' book of mine is goin' to be the greatest work of this age, or any age?" she wuz pickin' the pin feathers offen a plump spring chicken for dinner, and she looked up at me over her specs in the cool deliberate way she has sometimes, and sez, "josiah, a hen don't cackle till she lays her egg." and then she resoomed her work agin, sayin' no more. naterally my feelin's immediately hardened more hard than they had been, for i would ask any human bein' did not that one speech show what i've sot out to prove in my book, what wifflin' onstabled minds females have got, and how onfit for votin', onjinted, tottlin', wanderin' way off from the subject spoke on, flyin' down at one jump from literatoor onto poultry. for what connection, i ask, is there between the finest fruit in literature, and hens? hens which are known to be the awkwardes and stupidest of any liven critters. what jinin' link is there between the most scathin' and convincin' arguments ever writ by mortal man, and eggs? mute, onfeelin', onseein', eggs. but i only gin a moment of my valuable time to contemplate this prominent phase of wimmen's folly. and bein' driv back as i have often been by a lack of congenial sympathy into my own interior (my mind), my inteleck seemed to flow freer than ever, and i devoted this propishous time to enlargin' on a important subject i had not had time to enlarge on before, and that wuz the well known extravagance of females and how fatally fatal that trait which is exclusively confined to her own sect would be if let loose on the political world. and so harrered up my mind got in contemplatin' that gigantic danger to my sect, and my country, that before i knowed it i wuz speakin' my thoughts and forebodin's aloud. sez i, "another insurmountable objection agin female suffragin', another fearful danger facin' the country if females should have a free run in the political field, is their well known extravagance." [illustration: "josiah," sez she, "a hen don't cackle till she lays her egg."] sez i, "to a female researcher of the prudent, equinomical male sect, it is absolutely appallin' to witness the blind reckless extravagance of wimmen and their well known habits of follerin' each other's fashions blindly, like a flock of sheep jumpin' over the fence. if one woman gits a new dress the neighborin' wimmen have got to git one like it, or better, not a mite of independent sperit about 'em. why can't they take pattern of us men who always wear jest what we please, and pay no attention to what any other male wears, pay no attention whatsumever to fashion or extravagance. in fact men would hardly know there wuz any such words as them, if it wuzn't for female doin's and the dictionary." i knowed i had got samantha in a corner then that she couldn't git out on and i waited with a dignified stately look on my linement to hear her say, "i gin up, josiah; you're in the right on't." but did i hear her say this? oh, no! she lifted up the plump yeller skinned chicken in one hand, whilst she peered under its wings for a stray pin feather. and then she laid it down gently on the pages of the _world_ that wuz spread for its benefit over the table, i spoze to keep her dress clean, and as she looked down on the smooth crisp folds of gingham she sez: "yes, lots of wimmen are extravagant. but as the fashion is now, josiah, five or six yards will make a woman a dress, and have enough left to make her husband a vest, if he would wear anything so cheap. i've got enough left of this very dress, good green and white plaid gingham, costin' ten cents per yard to make you a good cool summer vest; it would wear like iron, and i stand ready to make it, and will you wear it, josiah?" she thought she had me in a corner then, but my mind works so quick i answered her almost instantaneously, "id'no as a green and white plaid vest would be becomin' to my complexion, but i will wear it if the other bretheren will." sez she, "i thought you didn't care what any one else wore." is there any limit to a female's aggravatin'? i wouldn't dane a reply. but i took up ayer's albernack with a stern cold linement, and went to readin' the advertisements, and of course she didn't see the danger ahead on her, of irritatin' too fur a strong nater. she kep' right on, "no doubt wimmen are sometimes extravagant, josiah, no doubt they spend lots of money foolishly and worse than foolishly, but before we decide that it ort to deprive her of political rights, let us compare it with men's extravagance for a few minutes." i felt above replyin' to her, but kep' my eye on the bottle of medicine, and the woman raised from the tomb by a smell of the cork, and she went on: "which party is it in a workman's home that usually wants to buy an automobile before the little home is paid for? mebby in some rare cases the woman eggs the man on, but i believe that it is safe to say that in seven cases out of ten, it is not the housekeeper and house mother that is willin' to risk losin' the ruff that covers her baby's pretty head, and councils waitin' a while before takin' on the extravagance of the added expense. and which party is it, josiah, that turns and twists every way to save money so her boy and girl can present a decent appearance before her mates? how many millions a year duz the horse races, yot races and polo games and other manly amusements amount to? how many billions a year duz the useless extravagance of tobacco cost? of course you can substract sunthin' for some wimmen's foolish habit of cigarette smoking, but in the great total it would hardly count. and in how many poor homes duz a woman toil into the night hours to mend and make so that her family may look respectable, while her husband is spendin' his spare hours and spare change in the corner saloon?" sez i, lookin' up from the albernack with a scathin' irony that must have scathed her, whether she owned up to it or not, "i thought it wuz about time for you to drag in that saloon bizness." "yes," sez she, "it is time. how many billion dollars a year is spent mostly by men, in the ruinous extravagance of strong drink, and how many billions more in payin' for the effects on't, loss of labor, jails, prisons, hospitals, police force, pauper burials, etc., etc., and i might string out them etc.'s, josiah, clear from here to grout hozleton's and then not begin to git in the perfectly useless and ruinous extravagance of the liquor bizness. and i guess that take all the wimmen's extravagance, it will count up so small in comparison as to be lost sight on. and unlike the liquor bizness if a woman dresses extravagantly, which no doubt she often duz, the dressmakers and merchants and jewelers reaps a profit, if she gives extravagant fashionable parties, the grocer, the florist, the laboring class gits some benefit from it; it is not a danger to human life, like the heart breakin', soul destroyin' extravagance and danger to the hull community of the liquor traffic." i felt above arguin' with her agin on this subject i had so often wasted my finest eloquence on. she knowed how i felt, and i wouldn't demean myself by repeatin' my crushin' arguments in that direction, for i knowed as well as i sot there that she wouldn't act crushed, no matter if she felt flat as a pan-cake. so i passed on to another faze of woman's extravagance. sez i, "it hain't enough for her to spend money like water on her bridge parties, and maskerades, and theatre and tango parties, but she has to rack what little brain she's got, tryin' to git up new follies that other wimmen hain't thought on; she has to have her dog parties, and monkey parties, when them animals come dressed like human bein's with human folks to wait on 'em. thank heaven! you can't say but what male men would look down with abhorrence on such fool doin's." but samantha sez, "id'no, take a stag party sometimes--mebby in the beginin' them stags might be able to look down on the monkeys, but after high-balls and cock-tails and gallons of shampain has been consumed, id'no whether them stags could look down on sober temperate monkeys, or the monkeys look down on them, though no doubt some of the stags behave and can see straight." i scorned to notice this slur onto my sect, brung up i knowed to make me swurve from my subject, but it didn't make me swurve a inch. i went right on and brung up wimmen's extravagance in their houses. sez i, "look at her gorgeous brussels carpets, her draperies hangin' from elegant brass poles, her superb black walnut furniture, her glossy black hair-cloth sofias and easy chairs, a perfect riot of extravagance, samantha. who can blame a man from kickin' agin it, kickin'," sez i, "with the hull strength of a outraged nater and a number nine shue." "no doubt," sez samantha, "wimmen are sometimes extravagant in makin' their homes beautiful, but their families and admirin' friends benefit by it. and how duz her velvet carpets and persian rugs, her rose-wood furniture, statuary, and costly pictures and silken draperies compare with men's outlay and extravagance in public buildings; for instance, the capitol at albany; wimmen have had nothing to do with that, and i guess her most extravagant doin's in her house will compare favorably with the millions men have spent in that house for years, and no sign of there ever bein' an end to it." i knowed by the look on her linement that she meant to intimidate that there had been shiftlessnes and stealin' goin' on in that direction, and in other public works through the country, but i refused to notice the slur on my sect. that slur that females love to sling at us and which we'd better treat with silent contemp, jest as i did now, for no knowin' if we'd stoop to argy with 'em about it, what figgers and statistics they may bring up, to prove their slurs, so as i say i passed it over with silent disdain, but i sez in a safe general way, fur removed from probable figgers she would be apt to throw at me to prove her reckless insertions, i sez, puttin' a sad look onto my linement: "wimmen's extravagance makes the heart of man to ache and often drives him to a ontimely tomb, strivin' for fashionable display, strivin' for rights she don't need." and bein' anxious to change the subject at that juncter (i always think it is best to change the flow of my thought occasionally) i put on a sort of a solemn, fraid look on my linement, "such talk as you wimmen talk is revolutionary, samantha, and is liable to lead to war." and then, if you'll believe it, so contrary and hard to conquer is females, she took advantage of that speech of mine to invay on the expenditure of war. she asked me then and there how many billions wuz spent every year by male men on the extravagance of man-made war, its preperation and consequences. i told her coldly and with a irony as iron as our old cook stove, that as much as she expected of me, she couldn't expect me to figger up to a cent what war had cost the nation. sez i, "with the barn chores on my hands, and my great work of destroyin' woman's suffrage do you expect me to keep track of every cent the nation has spent on war?" "no," sez she, "one man couldn't reckon it up if he spent his hull lifetime at it, but jest the money spent on it yearly is two billion five hundred million. but," sez she, "it seems that the enormous extravagance of man in this direction and others don't unfit him for the franchise. and if you should spend a few years tryin' to reckon up the gigantic expenditure in money and misery, the horrors and extravagance of war and its effects, you might feel like talkin' less about wimmen's extravagance and how it makes her onfit to be a citizen of the country she's born into, and helps to support with her labor and taxes." oh, how aggravatin' a woman can be when she sets out to be. much as i think of samantha and the tendrils of my great heart are wropped completely round her, as big as she is round her waist--yet sometimes on occasions like this i almost wish i wuz a bacheldor, a fur off lonely man in some distant cave, or on some lonesome mountain peak, encumbered not by a female who thinks she has a right to argy with me and irritate me. but these feelin's always come over me in the middle of the forenoon, or the middle of the afternoon. when it comes nigh meal time, my wild seethin' emotions gradually simmers down and as the appetizin' meals progress so duz my feelin's change and grow less dangerous; if they didn't i don't know what the effect would be to the world of females. i spoze it is the way the overrulin' power has fixed it as a means of safety to females, for with my strong nater and massive inteleck, if it wuzn't for them three daily safety valves to let off the steam of my indignation at female doin's, and sayin's, heaven only knows what would be the consequences. things and folks would be tore to pieces for all that i knew and utterly destroyed. for how can you curb in a outraged and high sperited nature when it is fully rousted up, and aggravation has gone too fur? it is well that good vittles stand guard between me and them. but as a man who loves peace and quiet, and despises female arguin' i wuz glad at this juncter to see the welcome form of uncle sime wendin' his way towards the barn. and i throwed down the albernack with a hauty movement of my right hand, and strode off barnward with my head erect. and then we two valiant warriors in a noble cause held a meetin' of sweet sympathy and full understandin' in the horse barn. ix the danger from wimmen's exaggeration i told samantha one day that another strong reason why wimmen hadn't ort to vote, and why they would be such a dangerous element in politics wuz that they prevaricated and exaggerated to such a alarmin' extent. sez i, "a woman can't tell a story straight to save her life--but has to put in so many exaggerations and stretch out facts so you couldn't reconize 'em when she gits 'em pulled out to the length she pulls 'em. they don't seem to have any idee of plain straightforward truthfulness such as my sect has. as long as they've seen men appearin' before 'em, tellin' the exact truth from day to day, and from year to year, they can't or won't foller his example. "that trait of theirn," sez i, "is bad enough in the home and social circle, for there their men folks can head 'em off, and cover things up and make excuses for 'em, and tell the story straight. but if it wuz carried into public life where their men folks couldn't reach 'em, and quell 'em down, and ameliorate the effects on it, where would this nation be? it would be looked down on and shawed at by foreign powers as a nation of exaggerators and false witnessors, and it ort to be. "wimmen can't seem to learn to tell the truth and 'nothin' but the truth,' and that is the reason, samantha," sez i, "that that clause wuz put in the law books; it wuz designed to try to skair female witnesses, and drive 'em into tellin' the truth. but it hain't done it." i wuz gittin' real eloquent and riz up, for nothin' pleases a man more than to teach his wimmen folks great truths and enlighten 'em about laws. but samantha had to bring me down from the hite i wuz on, in the aggravatin' way females have. and as it turned out i wuz kinder sorry i had dwelt on that trait of females that particular time, for she said in the irritatin' way wimmen have of bringin' up facts at times when there hain't no use of bringin' 'em up and when it is inconvenient for 'em to be brung. sez she, "i would talk about exaggeration in females, and men's love for exact truth, after what took place in this settin' room only last evenin'." i didn't reply to her for there are times when silent disapproval is better than argument. i knowed what she meant, and i knowed she wanted to spile my argument, in the ornary way females have, so, as i say, i treated them words with silent contemp and went out to the barn. but i spoze i may as well tell you how it wuz, for if i don't she may tell it and make it out worse than it wuz. condelick henzy come over here last night after supper to borry my neck-yoke and dr. meezik from zoar, where he used to live, went to see condelick on bizness, and his wife told him he wuz here so he stopped here on his way home (i mistrust condelick owes him though he didn't dun him before us). they're both on 'em good natered easy-goin' men, and love to talk and tell stories. and i brung up a basin of good sick-no-furder apples, and they set and et apples and talked and talked. they both on 'em love to brag about what they've seen and hearn and naterally both on 'em want to tell the biggest story about it. onfortinately samantha wuz in the room to work on a new insane bed-quilt. and of course she has to find fault and cricketcise what they said and won't make allowances for high sperits. sez dr. meezik, "when i wuz a young man my folks lived on a farm that run along one side on a creek. and one day i wuz down on the creek lot hoein' corn and a bear come down on the ice from the big woods, and i rushed right out on the ice and killed that bear with my hoe." sez condelick, "that's nothin' to what i did at about the same time. i lived on that same creek though furder south; it wuz dretful rich land. and i raised a cabbage there that wuz so big i hollered out the stem on't and made a boat of it, and used it to ferry me acrost that very stream of water." "and it wuz jest about that time," sez dr. meezik, "le'me see, it wuz on my birthday about nine minutes past four o'clock in the afternoon, or it may have been nine and a half minutes past, i always want to be perfectly exact in my statements, but we will let it go at nine minutes. "i wuz a great hunter in them days and fearless as a lion as you may know by my goin' out on the ice to meet that bear who had come to eat green corn, and killed him with my hoe handle. "i had gone a little further north than i had ever gone before, and i come out to a big clearin' that i had never seen. i should say it wuz half a degree north of where we're settin' now, or it might have been half a pint further, a man can't be too exact and particular in telling such things, for some folks if they wanted to pick flaws and find fault might doubt his statement. but i didn't have my pocket compass with me and i wuz so surprised at what i see there that i don't know that i should thought to use it if i had had it. "i must say that as many strange things as i've seen and heard i never wuz so surprised as i wuz at what i see there. "right there in that big clearin' there wuz a perfect army of tinkers makin' a immense brass kettle. there wuz jest one hundred of 'em, for i counted 'em over twice so's to be sure of gittin' the exact number. i am always so perfectly reliable in my statements, and am bound to git the smallest petickulars jest right. i spoze i got the habit partly from weighin' out my medicines so exact. "and them tinkers wuz hammerin' away for all they wuz worth on that kettle, and you may judge of the size of it when i tell you them workmen wuz so fur apart they couldn't hear each other a hammerin'." even condelick henzy wuz took back and browbeat and sez mekanically, "what do you spoze they wuz goin' to do with the kettle?" "well," sez dr. meezik, "they didn't tell me, for i didn't want to act forward and ask, but i always spozed they wuz goin' to use it to bile your cabbage in." just at this epock of time samantha gathered up her insane piece work and left the room. she didn't say nothin', but i knowed by the looks of her linement jest as well as i know now, that she'd throw that kettle and that cabbage in my face some time the most inconvenient for me, and you can see plain she's done it and now i hope she's satisfied. as i said i went out to the barn and kinder fussed round cleanin' up some, and i never see samantha agin till dinner time. i wuzn't afraid to go in and meet her and have her resoom her argument agin. no, i skorn the importation. i belong to a fearless sect, and am almost unacquainted with the word fear, though i know there is such a word in the dictionary. no, i had considerable putterin' round to do in the barn, and hen house, and so i stayed out there till i hearn the welcome sound of the dinner bell and smelt even from the barn door the agreable odors risin' from a first class dinner. the smell and taste of the tender roast lamb and lushious vegetables softened my feelin's considerable, or would have if it hadn't been for the look on samantha's face. it wuzn't a cross look nor a mean one, would that it wuz, for i could handle them looks better. no, it wuz a kind of a superior look, as if she had conquored me in the argument about exaggeration and prevarication, and wuz gloatin' over the _contrary temps_ that had occurred in the settin' room only the evenin' before, the little incident that broke down my excelent argument. and of all the looks that mankind ever read on a woman's linement, the one a man can't stand is a superior look, a look that says as plain as words, "i like you and pity you, but i can't help lookin' down on you, poor thing!" that look from a inferior sect always aggravates a man so that he hain't skursly answerable for what he sez and duz. and almost onbeknown to me i broke forth in a crushin' argument designed to crush her and change that look on her linement to one of humbleness becomin' to a female. sez i, "our sect has been the makin' of yourn, and it seems that when a female considers and thinks on all that men have done for wimmen and are willin' to do for 'em, they would have some feelin's of gratitude towards 'em, but they don't; they delight in argyin' with 'em and tryin' to git the better on 'em." instead of my smart reasonable words affectin' her favorably it seemed as if the look i despised deepened on her linement; not a sign did i see of meach, nor a sign of humble gratitude, and i wuz so irritated by it that i lanched right out in the crushin' argument that i had on my mind and that ort to bring female feathers droopin' down in the very dust. sez i, "do you ever pause to think, samantha, of the inestimable boon wimmen owe to men? why," sez i, "if it hadn't been for a man, wimmen wouldn't had no souls to-day." "how do you make that out?" sez samantha, helpin' herself camly to some more dressin'. "why, it is a matter of history that way back in the centuries the preachers of that time had a meetin' to settle the question, and when they took a vote on't, the majority on 'em stood out on the popular side and cast their votes agin 'em, and vowed and declared that females hadn't no souls. and it wuz only by the vote of one single solitary man that it wuz carried in their favor and decided that they had souls. "and i should think females would be so grateful to that noble man for what he done for 'em, for his bein' willin' to admit that they had souls, that they would honor the hull sect to which he belonged, and look up to 'em in humble and grateful gratitude, and never try to argy with 'em and aggravate 'em. for let me ask you, samantha," sez i, in a solemn axent, "where would wimmen have been if that man had held out and jined in with the rest, and decided that wimmen hadn't got any soul? where would they been then, and where would they be to-day?" "jest where they always wuz and are now," sez samantha camly helpin' herself to a apple dumplin'. "it seems that it wuz men that started the question in the first place, and i spoze that if wimmen hadn't been so wore out and hampered by her hard work of takin' care of men, cookin', mendin', and cleanin' for 'em and bringin' up their children, etc., they might have had a jury of wimmen set on men to find out if _they_ had souls. but i don't spoze they had a minute's time to spare from their hard work no more than i have, and i don't spoze it would make any difference either way. the main thing is whether men and wimmen have got souls to-day, and use them souls for the good of mankind, instead of lettin' 'em grow hard, or wither away in indifference to the woes and wants of the world, and the cause of eternal justice for every one, male and female." that is jest the way with wimmen, they've got to talk and argy and try to have the last word. you can't seem to make 'em act meachin' and beholdin' to men anyway you can work it, and it seems to me i've tried every way there is from first to last. but i wouldn't argy no more, i felt above it. i helped myself to my fourth apple dumplin' with a look of silent contemp on my linement, also i had the same look when i poured the lemon sass over it and took my third cup of coffee. and my linement still showed to a clost observer the marks of a tried though hauty sperit, as i riz up from the table and retired with a high step to my sacred corner to resoom my literary efforts. sometimes pardners are real aggravatin' to each other and a trial to be borne with. and though i don't know what i'd do if i should ever lose samantha, it don't seem as if i could ever eat another woman's vittles after livin' on the fat of the land as you may say for forty years. yet there are times when you set smartin' under wownds your pardner has gin your sperit and from arguments she no need to have brung up, and you see a widow man a passin' by, you have feelin's that can skursly be told on. you can see by the looks of his face and hands that he don't wash any oftener than he wants to, and never combs his hair and don't change his clothes till the board of health gits after him. and you know he never goes to meetin', and throws off girl blinders boldly, and stays out nights till as late as ten p.m. onquestioned and onscolded. and don't have to clean his shues when he goes in, and never curbs his appetite, but eats like a hog and enjoys himself. why, much as you love the dear pardner of your bosom, and prize the excelent food she cooks, and the clean comfortable home she makes for you--the air of freedom that seems to blow from that widow man (kinder stale air too) yet it fans your clean head and clean stiff shirt bosom like a breath from the isle of freedom. and so after samantha had hurt my feelin's and wownded my self respect by remindin' me of the incident mentioned, when if she had kep' still i should have come off victorious in my argument, i retired into the solitude of my corner in the settin' room where betsy bobbett's poetry lay heaped up in the dish-pan and i read with feelin' that i couldn't skursly describe the follerin' verses which i spoze betsy writ after her husband had wownded her feelin's. and in readin' it i dedicate it silently to my brother men who have been aggravated by their pardners. longin's of the sole _by betsy bobbett slimpsey_ oh gimlet! back again i float, with broken wings, a weary bard; i cannot write as once i wrote, i have to work so very hard; so hard my lot, so tossed about, my muse is fairly tuckered out. my muse aforesaid once hath flown, but now her back is broke, and breast; and yet she fain would crumple down; on gimlet's pages she would rest, and sing plain words as there she's sot-- haply they'll rhyme, and haply not i spake plain words in former days, no guile i showed, clear was my plan; my gole it matrimony was; my earthly aim it was a man. i gained my man, i won my gole; alas! i feel not as i fole. yes, ringing through my maiden thought this clear voice rose: "oh come up higher." to speak plain truth with candor fraught, to married be was my desire-- now, sweeter still this lot doth seem, to be a widder is my theme. for toil hath claimed me for her own, in wedlock i have found no ease; i've cleaned and washed for neighbors round, and took my pay in beans and pease; in boiling sap no rest i took, or husking corn in barn and stook. or picking wool from house to house, white-washing, painting, papering, in stretching carpets, boiling souse; e'en picking hops it hath a sting, for spiders there assembled be, mosquitoes, bugs and etc. i have to work oh! very hard; old toil i know your breadth and length; i'm tired to death, and in one word, i have to work beyend my strength. and mortal men are very tough to get along with, nasty, rough. yes, tribulations doomed to her who weds a man, without no doubt, in peace a man is singuler; his ways they are past findin' out, and oh! the wrath of mortal males-- to paint their ire, earth's language fails. and thirteen children in our home their buttons rent their clothes they burst, much bread and such did they consume; of children they did seem the worst. and simon and i do disagree; he's prone to sin continualee. he horrors has, he oft doth kick, he prances, yells--he will not work. sometimes i think he is too sick; sometimes i think he tries to shirk; but 'tis hard for her in either case, who b. bobbett was in happier days. happier? away! such thoughts i spurn. i count it true from spring to fall, 'tis better to be wed, and groan, than never to be wed at all. i'd work my hands down to the bone rather than rest a maiden lone. this truth i cannot, will not shirk, i feel it when i sorrow most: i'd rather break _my_ back with work, and haggard look as any ghost,-- rather than lonely vigils keep, i'd wed and sigh and groan and weep. yes, i can say though tears fall quick can say, while briny tear-drops start, i'd rather wed a crooked stick, than never wed no stick at all. sooner than laughed at be, as of yore i'd ruther laugh myself no more. i'd ruther go half clad and starved, and mops and dish-cloths madly wave than have the name, b. bobbett, carved on head-stun rising o'er my grave. proud thought! now, when that stun is risen 'twill bear two names--my name and hisen. methinks 'twould colder make the stun if but one name, the name of she, should linger there alone--alone. how different when the name of he does also deck the funeral urn; two wedded names, his name and hurn. and sweeter yet, oh blessed lot! oh state most dignified and blest! to be a widder calmly sot, and have both dignity and rest. oh simon, strangely sweet 'twould be to be a widder unto thee. the warfare past, the horrors done, with maiden's ease and pride of wife, the dignity of wedded one, the calm and peace of single life,-- oh, strangely sweet this lot doth seem; a female widder is my theme. i would not hurt a hair of he, yet did he from earth's toil escape, i could most reconciléd be, could sweetly mourn e'en without crape. could say without a pang of pain that simon's loss was betsy's gain. i've told the plain tale of my woes, with no deceit or language vain, have told whereon my hopes are rose, have sung my mournful song of pain. and now i e'en will end my tale, i've sung my song, and wailed my wail. x the modern wimmen condemned the vice president of the creation searchin' society of jonesville wuz here yesterday mornin', and as soon as he'd gone through the usual neighborly talk about the weather, the hens, his wife, and the neighbors, etc., he tipped back in his chair and pushed back his hat a little furder on his head. he never took off his hat in my sight; samantha asked me once "if i spozed he took it off nights, or slep in it." but i explained it to her as a kind man is always willin' to do if a female asks him properly for information. sez i, "i hearn him say once, samantha, that the way he got in the habit of not takin' off his hat before wimmen wuz to impress 'em with the fact of male superiority, and to let 'em know that he wuzn't goin' to bow down before 'em and act meachin'. he wuz always a big feelin' feller and after he got to be such a high official in the c.s.s. he naterally is hautier actin'." well, almost to once he begun to samantha about wimmen's votin', runnin' the idee down to the very lowest notch it could go on the masculine stillyards. you see my forthcomin' great work agin wimmen rights has excited the male jonesvillians dretfully, and emboldened 'em, till they act as fierce and bold as lions when they're talkin' to females. they realize that when that immortal work is lanched onto the waitin' world the cause of woman's suffrage will collapse like the bladders we used to blow up in childhood, jest as sharp and sudden and jest as windy. they know that them that uphold such uroneous beliefs won't be nothin' nor nobody then, and so they begin beforehand to act more hauty and uppish towards suffragists, and browbeat 'em. and he poked fun at the cause and slurred at it, and sneered at it till i didn't know but samantha would take lumbago from his remarks, but she didn't seem to. she had got her mornin's work all did up slick, her gingham apron hung up behind the kitchen door, and she'd resoomed her white one trimmed with tattin'. and she sot knittin' on a pair of blue woosted socks for me, her linement as smooth and onrumpled as her hair, which wuz combed smooth round her forward. and she kep' on with her knittin', only once in a while she would look up at him over her specs in the queer way she has at times, but still kep' lookin' cam, and sayin' nothin'. and her camness and her silence seemed to spur him on and make him bolder and more aggressiver. he thought she wuz afraid on him, but i knowed she wuzn't. at last he flung out the remark to her that if wimmen could vote it would be the bad wimmen who would flock to the poles; samantha wuz jest turnin' the heel in my sock and after she made the turn she said that that wuzn't so, and she brought up statisticks and throwed at him (still a knittin' and seamin' two and two) provin' that it is the educated conscientious wimmen who want to help the good men of the country to make the laws to try to make the world a safer place for their children, a better, cleaner place for every one, and she threw some statements at him from states that had woman's suffrage for years and years to prove her insertion, but the statisticks, the figgers and the proofs piled about him onheeded, for he had got hot and excited by this time and it seemed as if samantha's very camness madded him, and her knittin', and her seamin' two and two, and her countin' "one--two," to herself once in a while. and sez he agin in a overbearin' skairful voice, intended to intimidate females, "i tell you it is the bad wimmen who will rush to the poles, and i can prove what i say." sez he, "the meaner anybody is the more and the oftener they want to vote; my father is one of the best of men and you can't hardly git him to stir his stumps 'lection day. and my wife's father is the meanest man in the country and he will vote from mornin' till night for either party and sell his vote where he can git the highest figger--(he don't live happy with his wife, and he went on) and so will her uncle josh sell his vote to anybody for a glass of whiskey, and most all the men on her side will sell their vote and make money by it. and i know more'n a dozen men right round here who do the same thing. i don't spoze you wimmen read much of any, but if you did you'd see how common graft and fraud is in politics, all the way from jonesville to washington. so you see," sez he, "i can prove right out what i said that it is the bad wimmen who would vote." samantha counted "two and two" to herself, and then said in a mild axent, "why would a bad woman's vote be worse than a bad man's?" the vice president see in a minute into what a deep hole his excitement and voylent desire to prove his argument had led him, and he acted sheepish as a sheep. but anon he revived and ketched holt of the first argument he could lay his hand on, to prop up his side of the question. it wuz a argument he had read about, he didn't believe it himself, but ketched at it in his hurry. sez he, "we expect more from wimmen than we do from men; they're naterally better than men and we want to keep 'em so, keep 'em out of the dirt of public affairs." sez samantha still a knittin' and still a lookin' cam, "you must use clean water to cleanse dirty things. i don't believe as you do. i think the good qualities of men and wimmen would heft jest about equal, and need equal treatment. but accordin' to your tell if men are so much worse than wimmen they need her help to clean up things." agin the vice president see where his hasty talk and anxiety to prove his pint had led him. he wiggled round in his chair till i trembled for the legs on it, for he wuz still leanin' back in it too fur for safety. he kinder run his hand up under his hat and scratched his head, but didn't seem to root any new idees out of his hair, and he finally give up, settled his hat back more firmly on his head agin, let his chair down sudden and got up and sez: "i come over this mornin' to borry josiah's sheep shears." and after he went out with 'em i asked samantha, "what do you spoze the vice president wanted of sheep shears this time of year?" and she sez: "he looked sheepish enough to use 'em on himself." well, it wuz gittin' along towards noon, as i reminded samantha, and she riz up and put her knittin' work on the mantelry piece, resoomed her gingham apron and went out into the kitchen and soon i hearn the welcome sounds so sweet to a man's ear whether literary or profane, that preperations wuz goin' on for a good square meal. and as i sot there peaceful and happy in my mind who should come in but my dear and congenial friend, uncle sime bentley. he had been on a visit to illenoy. and after his first words of greetin' and his anxious inquiries as to how my great work wuz progressin' and gittin' along, he went on and gin me the petickulars about his journey. he'd been on a visit to the city to see his nephew, bill bentley. bill is well off and smart, and his father-in-law is rich and sent his only child, bill's wife, to college; "jest like a fool," uncle sime said. "for what duz a female want with such a eddication." sez he, "the three r's, readin', ritin' and rithmetic are enough for her and would be for any woman if they worked and tended to things as my ma, bill's grandma did. "up at four every mornin' summer and winter, milkin' five or six cows and then gittin' breakfast for her big fambly, hired men and all, and doin' every mite of the housework, and spinnin', weavin', makin' and mendin', and takin' sole care of her eight children, in sickness and health, and takin' care of her mother who had been as big a worker and stay-at-home as she wuz, and who wuz now melancholy crazy in a little room done off the woodshed. "how ma did work," sez uncle sime in a reminescin' axent, "stiddy at it from mornin' till night, never stirrin' out of the house from year to year. oh! if she could only have lived to set a sample for bill's wife, and instruct her in a wife's duty. "i told bill so," sez uncle sime. "and if you please," sez he, "bill resented it, and said, ketch him a killin' his wife with work hard enough for four wimmen, and not stirrin' out of the house from year to year, he thought too much of her; sez he, 'if i wanted a slave i'd buy one and pay cash for her.' "he didn't seem to appreciate ma's doin's no more than nothin', though as i told him, _there_ wuz a woman whose price wuz above rubies, so different from the slack forward wimmen of to-day. so retirin', so modest and womanly, willin' to work her fingers to the bone and not complain. never puttin' forward her opinion about anything, always lookin' up to pa and knowin' he wuz always right. and if she ever did seem curious about anything outside her housework and fambly, pa would shet her up and bring her back to her duty pretty quick. yes indeed! pa wuz the head of the house, and laid out to be. but bill didn't seem to have no gumption and self respect at all, and wuz perfectly willin' to be on equal terms with his wife. and bill told him she had a household allowance and a private bank account. private bank account! i told bill it wuz enough to make his grandma rise from her grave to see such bold onwomanly doin's. "and bill said 'it would be a good thing for her to rise, if she could stay up, for mebby she would take a little comfort and rest her mind and her bones a little, at this epock of time.'" i sez, "i spoze, simon, you didn't have nothin' fit to eat there and everything goin' to rack and ruin about the house." "no," uncle sime said, "i must own up that things run pretty smooth, and bill's wife sot a good table. they had a stout woman who helped about the work and takin' care of the children, leavin' bill's wife free to go round with bill to meetin's and clubs and a fishin' and motor ridin', and picknickin' with him and the kids." "i spoze she wuz high headed and disagreable," sez i. "no," sez uncle sime, "she wuz always good natered and dressed pretty, and why shouldn't she?" sez he bitterly, "havin' her own way and runnin' things to suit herself. and why shouldn't she dress pretty? lanchin' out and buyin' everything she wanted. not curbed down by bill, nor askin' a man's advice at all about her clothes or housen stuff so fur as i could see." sez i, "mebby bill didn't like it so well as you thought, simon; mebby he wuz chafin' inside on him." "no, he wuzn't, he liked it, there's one of the pints i'm comin' at, how these modern wimmen will pull the wool over men's eyes, no matter how smart he is naterally. they did seem to have good times together, laughin' and talkin' together, settin' to the table a hour or so, a visitin' away as if they hadn't seen each other for a month. but merciful heavens! the subjects they talked on and discussed over! it seemed that she knew every crook and turn on subjects that bill's grandma never had heard on by name. hygeen, books, street cleanin', hospital work, charities, political affairs from pole to pole and scientific subjects--radium, electricity, spiritualism, woman's suffrage, which they both believed in. there seemed to be no end to the subjects they talked about. so different from pa and ma's talk. they eat their meals in perfect and solemn silence most all the time, ma always waitin' on him. and if she did venter any remarks to him they usually didn't fly no higher than hen's eggs or neighborhood doin's. do you spoze that pa would stood it havin' a wife that acted as if she knew as much as he did? not much. "but bill's wife wuz right up to snuff as well informed as bill wuz, and bill didn't seem to know enough to be jealous and mad about a wife actin' as if she wuz on a equality with him. it made me ashamed to think a male relation on my own side should act so meachin'. and in one thing she even went ahead of bill, owin' to the money men had spent on her. she sung like a bird, and evenin's bill would lay back in his chair before the open fireplace and listen to her singin' and playin' them old songs and look at her as if he worshipped her. he didn't seem to want to stir out of the house evenin's unless she went too, lost all his ambition to go out and have a good man time, seemed perfectly happy where he wuz. and he used to be a great case to be out nights and act like a man amongst men. "but," sez uncle sime, "i believe that one of the things that galded me most amongst all the galdin' things i see and hearn there, wuz bill's wife's independence in money matters. economic independence! that wuz one of her fool idees. oh, how often i thought of you, josiah, and wished you wuz there to put down what i see and hearn in the beautiful language you know so well how to use." my feelin's wuz touched and i sez solemnly, "simon, i would loved to been there, and if i couldn't help you i could have sot and sympathized with you." sez simon, "never once durin' them six weeks i wuz there did i see her ask bill for a cent, and how well i remember," sez simon, "when if ma wanted the money for a pair of shues, or a gingham dress for herself, how she would have to coax pa and git him extra vittles and pompey him and beg for the money in such a womanly and becomin' way. and sometimes pa wuz real short with her and would deny her. not but what he meant to git 'em in the end, for he wuz a noble man. but he held off, wantin' her to realize he wuz the head of the fambly, and to be looked up to." sez simon, "ma would have to manage every way for days and days to git them shues and that dress and when he did git any clothes for her pa picked 'em out himself, for ma had been brought up to think his taste wuz better'n hern." sez i, "probable it wuz better, probable he got things that wore like iron." "yes, he did," sez simon, "he did. he never cared so much for looks as he did the solid wear of anything." and for a few minutes uncle sime seemed lost in a silent contemplation of his pa's oncommon good qualities, and then he resoomed agin. "the news come right whilst i wuz there, about the leven hundred saloons closed durin' the few months since wimmen voted in that state. and bill never resented it and even jined in with the idee that it wuz owin' to wimmen's votes largely that that and the other big temperance victories of late wuz accomplished. he didn't seem to have no more self respect than a snipe. and if you'll believe it, josiah, bill's wife made a public speech right whilst i wuz there, sunthin' about school matters she thought wuz wrong and ort to be set right." "how did bill like that, simon?" sez i. "i guess that kinder opened his eyes." "like it!" sez uncle sime in a indignant axent. "why, instead of actin' ashamed and resentin' it as a man of sperit would, he went with her and made a speech too, and they carried the day and beat the side they said wuz usin' the school to make money. and i hearn 'em with my own ears comin' in at ten p.m. laughin' and jokin' together like two kids. makin' a speech before men! oh, what would bill's great-grandma thought on't? she'd say she had reason for her melancholy madness, and his grandma would say she wuz glad she wuz dead." "most probable that is so, simon," sez i, sympathizin' with him. "as i've intimidated to you before, simon, time and agin, this is a turrible epock of time us male men are a passin' through, jest like a see-saw gone crazy, wimmen up and stayin' up, and men down and held down. but wait till my great work agin female suffrage is lanched onto the world and then see what will happen, and jest as soon as i git a little ahead with my outdoor work i'm a goin' to lanch it. then will come the upheaval and the crash, follered by peace and happiness. men will resoom their heaven-born station as rulers and protectors of the weaker sect, and females will sink down agin into hern, lookin' up to man as their nateral gardeens and masters." "ma knowed it in her day and practiced it," sez simon. "and pa knowed it and acted his part nobly. ma wuz so retirin' and so womanly. why, if once in a great while she took it in her head to ask about such things as bill's wife boldly lectured about, do you spoze she'd go before any strange man to talk out about it? no, she would always ask pa to explain it to her. and i remember well how kinder wishful and wonderin' her eyes looked and yet timid and becomin'. and pa actin' his part in life as a man of sperit should, would most always tell her to tend to her housework and let men run them things. but if he did feel good natered and explain 'em to her she took his word for law and gospel and acted meek and grateful to him. "yes, pa wuz to the head of his house and kep' females down where they belonged, and her actions wuz a pattern for wimmen to foller. and it wuz such a pity and a wonder that she had to die so early, only thirty years old when the lord took her before her virtues wuz known to the world at large. "i remember well the night she passed away," sez simon, in a softer reminescener axent. "she wanted her bed drawed up to the open winder. and she lay lookin' up to the full moon and stars a shinin' in the great clear sky. she looked up and up and kinder smiled and sez in a sort of a wishful, wonderin' axents: "'oh, how big! and how free!' "and i always spozed she meant sunthin' about how big pa wuz, and how free to understand things she didn't, and hadn't ort to." sez i, "i hain't a doubt, simon, but that wuz what she meant, not a doubt on't!" printed in the united states of america by marietta holley _josiah allen on the woman question_ illustrated, mo, cloth net $ . . a new volume from the pen of miss holley, marked by such quaint thoughtfulness and timely reflection as ran through "samantha". all who read it will be bound to feel better, as indeed they should, for they will have done some hearty laughing, and have been "up against" some bits of striking philosophy delivered with point, vigor, and chuckling humor. _samantha on the woman question_ illustrated, mo, cloth net $ . . 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history of the bible in italy, the founding of the waldensian mission among the alps, the religious revival of , the exile period; up to the present movement, termed "modernism," an attempt to bring the roman catholic church back to the simplicity of christ. +-------------------------------------------------+ |transcriber's note: | | | |obvious typographic errors have been corrected. | | | +-------------------------------------------------+ mary wollstonecraft and the beginnings of female emancipation in france and england [illustration: logo] j. bouten mary wollstonecraft and the beginnings of female emancipation in france and england academisch proefschrift ter verkrijging van den graad van doctor in de letteren en wijsbegeerte aan de universiteit van amsterdam op gezag van den rector-magnificus dr p. zeeman, hoogleeraar in de faculteit der wis- en natuurkunde, in het openbaar te verdedigen in de aula der universiteit op vrijdag nov. des namiddags te uur door jacob bouten, geboren te dordrecht h. j. paris v h firma a. h. kruyt amsterdam to my wife preface. there is something particularly fascinating about the study of the literature and philosophy of the eighteenth century, with its gradual evolution of lofty social ideals which the revolution failed to realise. when the altered circumstances brought promotion within my reach, it completely brought me under its sway, and ultimately came to determine my choice of a subject for an inaugural dissertation. it was while engaged upon tracing the influence of rousseau's hopebringing theories on his english disciple william godwin, that the less boldly assertive, but all the more humanly attractive personality of the latter's first wife, mary wollstonecraft, attracted my attention. my admiration of her husband's intellect paled before my sympathy for her more modest, but at the same time more emotional character. where the indebtedness of godwin to rousseau and the encyclopedians has been manifested so clearly in different works, the absence of any direct attempt to prove and determine the extent of the relations between mary wollstonecraft and the early french philosophers struck me as an omission for which i found it difficult to account, and made me turn to a subject to which i am fully aware that a book of the size of the present little volume does but scant justice. i wish to avail myself of this opportunity to thankfully acknowledge the valuable help and friendly encouragement received from _professor dr. a. e. h. swaen_, of the university of amsterdam, whose unceasing kindness and ever-ready interest in the preparation of this treatise i shall never forget. _mr. k. r. gallas_, lecturer on french literature in the same university, has likewise a claim to my heartfelt gratitude for giving me the benefit of his extensive knowledge in making various suggestions with regard to the chapters dealing with the literature of france. my best thanks are also due to _mr. m. g. van neck_ and _dr. p. fijn van draat_ for guiding my reading for the b.-examination, and particularly to my first teacher of english, _mr. l. p. h. eijkman_, for giving me that interest in england and her language and literature which has determined my subsequent career. _amsterdam_, november . contents chap. page i. the main theories regarding the position of women ii. the beginnings of a feminist movement in france iii. the position of french women in eighteenth century society iv. feminist and anti-feminist tendencies among the english augustans v. qualified feminism: the bluestockings vi. radical feminism: mary wollstonecraft bibliography introductory chapter. _the main theories regarding the position of women._ the history of the emancipation of women is the long and varied record of their slow and gradual liberation from that utter subjection to man in which various circumstances beyond their control--among which the physical superiority of the latter, a form of male supremacy which has seldom been called into question, was probably the most prominent--had combined to place them. it relates how in the course of centuries--either with the support of a certain portion of the opposite sex or relying upon their own resources--they strove to cast off the shackles which bound and degraded them, and to acquire that degree of physical, intellectual and moral freedom to which they felt themselves entitled. that the movement towards complete enfranchisement met with a varied reception and was hampered and retarded by men and often by women themselves was due chiefly to the fact that in the question of female possibilities there was much diversity of opinions at different times and among different nations. the worst enemies to evolution of this kind were those women who, holding the empire of love and gallantry to be their exclusive domain, in which their sway was not likely to be ever disputed, turned deliberately against those of their own sex who in trying to wrench from the hands of men the sceptre of social power, were willing to forego the privileges of sex. that women were thus divided among themselves from the first, was the natural outcome of those differences in personal attractions and in personal intelligence which have always constituted the great danger of too sweeping conclusions with regard to the inclinations and capabilities of the female sex. individual members of the same sex may yet be radically different, and he who would prescribe for all will always find himself confronted by the bewildering problem of the disparity of individuals. the champions of the cause of woman have had to overcome a great deal of stubborn opposition, nor can it be said that even at the present moment the emancipation of women is complete. even now that the ideal of perfect equality in everything seems almost within reach, and the domestic woman has largely given way to the social worker and political agitator, it may be a matter of speculation whether the full realisation of the long wished-for end, throwing open to women all those occupations from which centuries of injustice rigorously excluded them, would mean a blessing to society and to women in particular, or a mixture of gain and loss. those who regard women from the all-human standpoint, holding the functions of sex to be only a passing incident in the great scheme of life, will be inclined to take the former view; those, on the other hand, who believe that a woman's life derives its colour from considerations of sex which refuse to be ignored, may well wonder where a rigorous application of perfect equality will land us in the end. in one respect however, there has been great and undeniable progress. the modern tendency to overlook sexual differences ensures to individual women the necessary freedom to judge for themselves whether a life of domestic or one of social duties will be more compatible with their personal inclinations; and no woman whose hopes of domestic bliss are rudely blunted, need--as was the case in former times--despair of succeeding in life; any talents she may happen to possess, will find full scope. if we contrast with this the truly pitiable condition of unmarried women in earlier ages, who were too often treated contemptuously for failing to perform what was considered the only duty of womanhood--the propagation of the species--we cannot but feel grateful to the champions of emancipation, whose restless ardour and unceasing devotion has entailed such glorious results. the feminist programme includes a number of points, on some of which something will have to be said. there is, in the first place, that physical enfranchisement which makes the woman cease to be the willess, and therefore irresponsible and soulless, slave to the caprices of a brutal master. there is, in the second place, the intellectual emancipation of women, admitting the female sex to the participation of reason and granting them that education of the mind which is to place them on a par with the other half of humanity; and there is that moral emancipation which recognises woman as a being endowed with a soul, equal to that of man, with consequent moral duties and responsibilities, partly dictated by considerations of sex. as a direct consequence of these, there is finally, social emancipation, constituting principles of perfect equality between the sexes, also in matters of social and political interest. they are all of them largely dependent on the growth of civilisation. it has even been said that the degree of civilisation in a nation is determined by the position of its women in the life of the community. in the early stages of history--in that savage state which some authors persist in preferring to the social state of an imperfect civilisation--only the physical condition of women was considered, and, where even some of the most fervent advocates of the female excellence are forced to acknowledge the physical inferiority of the sex, it is but natural that the women of prehistoric times were kept in utter subjection, being regarded exclusively as a means of gratifying the animal instincts. but with the growth of civilisation came the development of the mind, and it has always been one of the bitterest grievances of feminists against man, that he, taking advantage of his usurped authority, deliberately withheld from woman the means of proving that the supposed inferiority only concerned her physical capacities, and not those of the mind. even as late as the th century the complaint is repeatedly uttered (and this is one of the points where two women of such widely different views as mary wollstonecraft and hannah more fully agree) that men keep from women all opportunities of that cultivation of the understanding which infallibly leads to virtue, and by a singular want of logic hold them responsible for the moral deficiency which is the inevitable consequence. in the introduction to her "_strictures on the modern system of female education_" hannah more calls it "a singular injustice which is often exercised towards women, first to give them a very defective education and then to expect from them the most undeviating purity of conduct; to train them in such a manner as shall lay them open to the most dangerous faults and then to censure them for not proving faultless"[ ], and the argument seems indeed unanswerable. hence the cry for female education which plato was among the first to raise. the physical inequality between the sexes was apparent and therefore remained, upon the whole, uncontested, but the problem of the possibilities of the female understanding was less easy to solve and admitted of different opinions; hence it was in the first stage of the growth of the human mind that the great question was first broached the solution of which was to occupy so many minds in so many successive centuries. while making every possible allowance for deviations due to individual opinion, which mostly had its roots either in a particular form of creed or in some special system of philosophy, it may be stated that there were throughout the centuries two directly opposing lines of thought, each leading to certain clearly marked conclusions. of these, the first and oldest is based upon considerations of practice rather than theory, which makes it less rigid and more adaptable to the exigencies of practical life. it was adopted on the whole by churchmen and religious moralists rather than by abstract philosophers, and had the full support of the unquestioned doctrines of christianity, of which support its adherents never failed to make the best use. it determined the attitude of the early christian church towards women in taking for granted the existence of a sexual character, from which it draws inferences. the difference between the sexes is essential and not restricted to physical differentiations. they were intended for different functions and have widely different duties to fulfil. man's chief duty is the support of the family he has reared--for which obviously his strength of muscle was intended,--his is the struggle for life against a hostile society in which egoism reigns supreme and the interests of individuals constantly clash. woman's special province is the home; hers is the difficult and important task of regulating the domestic life and bringing up the children she has borne. so far this theory receives support from observations of the animal world. but that faculty which marks the essential difference between the human and the animal kingdom became the apple of discord among many later generations. for reason was held to be the prerogative of man only, in which woman had no share. his world is the world of the intellect, the world of action, in which sex is only an episode; hers is the world of sentiment and of contemplation, in which sex is the dominant factor. to think is the prerogative of man, to feel that of woman. that there is also an intellectual side to the quiet undisturbed contemplation of confinement at home was demonstrated by shakespeare when creating the character of lady macbeth, nor was the monopoly of thought greatly abused by the mediaeval lords of creation, the only scholars of that period being those who had resigned their sex. but apart from those who lived in convents and whose reading was exclusively religious, women were self-taught or rather taught by experience, and the use of books was confined to some monasteries. starting from the above principle, any claim to intellectual equality would have seemed an encroachment upon the male kingdom. love and maternity, and the daily routine of the household ought to be the only considerations in a woman's existence and whatever is outside these is the domain of man. to woman was allotted the task of managing the home, to man the more comprehensive one of managing society. that in reality the former is quite as important as the latter, which must always largely depend on it, since woman is the mother of man, and the guide of his first steps, did not find full recognition until the th century, when fénelon and some of his contemporaries made this consideration a basis on which to build their demands for a female education. early christianity, drawing the necessary conclusions from certain biblical allusions to the position of woman and guided by st. paul's teachings, adopted the hebraic notions of female inferiority and dependence, which long met with no resistance whatever. the early churchmen, in strict obedience to the teaching of their faith, tacitly accepted the inferiority of women and their subjection to men. about these little need be said here. they were partly responsible for the misery of women in the early middle ages, the time of their greatest debasement and degradation, and will be remembered only among the adversaries of feminism. however, the fact must here be emphasized, that even the full acceptance of a sexual character does not necessitate, and in practice did not always lead to, insistence upon the female inferiority. there are those who, while assigning to woman a place in society differing essentially from that held by man, do not infer that woman is necessarily inferior to man. they purposely refrain from comparing that which by its very nature defies comparison: "for woman is not undeveloped man, but diverse." they insist instead on the division of functions which makes the sexes supplement each other. the majority are moralists, churchmen of a later age, and to them the problem is that of sexual duties, with the promise of eternity in the background, which is intended for both sexes, female as well as male. the pursuit of christian virtue, which to them is the essential thing, is regardless of sex and leads to self-abnegation which renders the sexual problem of secondary importance. the very orthodoxy of her faith prevented hannah more from becoming a feminist in the full sense of the word, and as mary wollstonecraft's feminism came to absorb her mind more fully, her religious convictions retired into the background. to the christian moralist the place of woman in the social structure must of necessity be an important one; but it is made so only by the domestic duties which devolve upon her. she is expected to bring up her children to be good christians, good citizens, and good fathers and mothers, in the moral interest of society, and this duty obviously involves the necessity for women to receive the benefit of a moral education. in this lies the gist of the moralist's arguments in favour of a partial female emancipation. to be a good educator of the young it is indispensable that the mother herself should be liberally instructed, for what is to become of her influence, should her male offspring come to regard her as intellectually inferior? in this argument the feminist and the moralist join hands. fénelon and his contemporaries were philosophers and for the rigid, inflexible interpretation of scripture by the early churchmen they substituted the structure of moral philosophy, which thus indirectly promoted the growth of feminist ideas. in their eyes an education is the very first requisite to enable a woman to discharge the duties imposed by motherhood. the second line of thought, in direct opposition to the assumption of a sexual character, takes for its starting-point the theory of _equality_ in everything except what is physical, arriving at the conclusion that there is nothing which woman--if given the benefit of the same education--is not capable of performing equally well as man. in view of the impossibility of furnishing conclusive rational evidence--women are not educated and therefore no opportunity is given them to vindicate their powers--the adherents of this theory, who mostly belong to the rational school of philosophy, point to the example of some individual women, who in spite of a defective education obtained great results, thereby laying themselves open to the criticism that what may apply to certain individuals, need not hold good for the entire sex, which argument they try to refute by insisting on the experiment being made. this ultra-feminist way of thinking equally originated in france, where mlle de gournay and françois poullain de la barre built up their theories more than a century before mary wollstonecraft voiced their claims in the english language. apart from certain physical differences which even she could not deny, although she held with truth that they were often exaggerated, nay, purposely augmented, woman possesses the same capabilities as man and the existing difference in intellectual development may be entirely removed by means of an education which does not regard sex. this process of reasoning naturally leads to a denial of sexual character. the mental inferiority of women is merely the consequence of ages of neglect which urgently demands reparation. the soul, they agreed with the moralists, has no sex--an assertion which some of the early christian leaders might have felt inclined to call into question--and since the development of the moral sense depends largely upon the condition of the mind, it is the _right_ of women to be educated. the claim for education as a natural right was first made in its full purport by mary wollstonecraft, to whom belongs the undivided honour of having been the first woman in europe to apply rousseau's famous theory of the rights of man to her own sex by taking her stand upon the principle of equality of the sexes. the extreme adherents of equality among the philosophers of the french revolution founded their claims upon an absolute denial of all innate character, holding the character of every individual to be the resultant of different influences to which it has been exposed. among french philosophers helvétius had been the first to profess this theory in his "_traité de l'homme_." diderot had written an energetic reply, vindicating the theory of innateness and heredity, and the topic had remained a theme of frequent dispute. the partisans of helvétius, among whom were both godwin and mary wollstonecraft, continuing his line of argument, were naturally led to the most optimistic forecasts for a happy future. it only remained to find a way to perfect education and to extend it from a few privileged ones to the multitude, and all evil would of necessity disappear, and society would be rebuilt upon a more solid foundation. the consequence was an overwhelming number of educational treatises, mainly in the french language, most of which, however, sadly overlooked the pressing needs of woman. it was again mary wollstonecraft who extended this implicit faith in the perfectibility of humanity to the case of woman. all that women needed was to be given a good education, and the rest would follow. so convinced were these idealists of the incontestability of their arguments that they refused to make any concessions, however slight, to those who held different views. this very inflexibility became the means of ruining their best intentions. they did not stop at intellectual and moral enfranchisement, their daring schemes comprised complete social and political emancipation. in the period with which we shall be chiefly concerned, their efforts were doomed to failure by the circumstance that their aims were physically incapable of realisation while society remained in the state in which it found itself at the time of the outbreak of the french revolution. those more or less unconscious feminists, the bluestockings, were responsible for far more direct improvement through the very moderation of their suggestions than mary wollstonecraft, whose lonely voice in the wilderness of british conventionality heralded the great and successful movement of a later century. when the inevitable reaction set in, the entire feminist movement, which mary had identified with the cause of liberty, as advocated by the french, was regarded as anti-national and seditious, and first ridiculed and reviled, to be soon after consigned to a temporary oblivion. when called upon to decide which of the two lines of argument referred to above deserves most sympathy, the unbiased onlooker may find himself sadly perplexed. in choosing between the advocates of dignified domesticity and those of perfect equality, one might be inclined to decide in favour of the former; yet the fact remains that, if especially the last decades have brought considerable progress, it is chiefly the latter we have to thank for it. for the pathway of the pioneer is rough and beset with difficulties, and she may seem "no painful inch to gain", and yet the amount of progress, when measured after the lapse of ages may be found to be considerable. but the fatal tendencies to generalise and to exaggerate are everywhere, and invariably spoil the best arguments. to the advocates of equality _à outrance_ might be held up the warning example of the "masculine woman", who has succeeded in getting herself abominated both by man and by the wise members of her own sex; who has voluntarily, for the prospect of mostly imaginary gains, unsexed herself, forgetful alike of her task of propagation and education and of the fact that even outside the home-circle there are the sick to be ministered to, and the suffering to be comforted, occupations that demand the loving gentleness and unselfish devotion of which the womanly woman is made more capable by nature than her brother man. she scornfully resigns the chivalrous worship of the opposite sex, mixing in political and other debates with a want of moderation and often with a narrowness of views which prove all too clearly that the average woman's qualities fit her for the domestic rather than the social task. on the other hand, those moralists who exhort women to be content to take their place in society as "wives and mothers", not inferior to man, but different, forget to provide for those women, whom circumstances beyond their control have destined for celibacy, debarring them from the privileges of their own sex, while not allowing them to share those of the male. for such women it was indeed a blessed day when the word that was to deliver them from bondage and to open to them paths of public usefulness was first spoken by the pioneers of feminism, throwing open to the female sex the many professions for which they are as fit, or even fitter--in spite of the equality theory--than men! whatever may be the absolute truth,--which probably no moralist or feminist has ever held, although some may have held a considerable portion of it,--both may be credited with a firm and unshakable belief in the creative force of a good education for women, of whatever description their chief duties in life may be. and, after all, the question of perfect equality and of rivalry between the sexes leading to a struggle for pre-eminence will chiefly attract women who, being more gifted than their sisters, and filled with a laudable desire to devote their talents to their cause, make the error of identifying their own individual plight with that of their sex, imagining women in general to be thwarted in their aims and ambitions, and ascribing to them aspirations which the majority of women never cherished and probably never will cherish. they turn their weapons against "man, the usurper", goading him to opposition and forgetting hannah more's wise remark that "cooperation, and not competition is indeed the clear principle we wish to see reciprocally adopted by those higher minds in each sex which really approximate the nearest to each other"[ ]. this remark, however much it may hold good for the times in which we live, would have elicited from mary wollstonecraft the reply that between master and slave there can be no cooperation until the latter's individuality has been fully recognised by emancipation. if, moreover, we consider how she was always thinking of duties before considering the question of female rights, claiming the latter only that with their help women might be better enabled to perform the former, it is difficult to withhold from either woman that sympathy to which the purity of her motives and the extreme earnestness of her endeavour justly entitles her. the history of female emancipation, therefore, is so closely bound up with that of female education that it often becomes impossible to separate them. education, to follow the feminist line of rational thought, forms the mind; and a well-formed mind shows a natural inclination towards that perfect virtue which ought to be the ruling power in the universe and the attainment of which is the sole aim of humanity. the feminist problem will not be fully settled until all men and women are equal partakers of the best education which it is in our power to bestow. it is impossible to record the earliest beginnings of feminism in england without first glancing at that country whence came the powerful wave of philosophical thought which, stimulated by the fathers of british philosophy, in its turn stung the latent feminist energy of a mary wollstonecraft to life and was also--although in a less degree--indirectly responsible for the more qualified feminism in the tendencies of the bluestocking circles and their literature, which it will be our business to describe. after one or two abortive attempts of a directly feminist nature a movement of indirect feminism, which was fostered and nursed by the french _salons_ of the th century began at a time when in england the condition of women was rapidly sinking to the lowest ebb since the dark ages of mediaevalism. all through the th and the greater portion of the th century female influence and importance grew and intensified without calling forth anything like a parallel movement in the great rival nation beyond the channel. those who, like mary astell and daniel defoe, caught the spirit of emancipation were indeed pioneers, and to them all english women owe a never-to-be-forgotten debt. from the beginning of the religious revival in england in the early part of the th century to the outbreak of the french revolution a strong and determined reaction against french manners was noticeable in england. this reaction found its root in national prejudices, which held whatever came from france to be tainted with the utter corruption and depravity of french society and as a natural consequence disqualified public opinion from appreciating the glorious edifice of philosophical thought which was being erected at the same time. it derived greater emphasis from the vicious excesses of the french aristocracy and afterwards from the unparalleled horrors of the revolution. the english nation has never been remarkable for any special love of imitation, and the menace of french revolutionism turned great britain into the very bulwark of the most rigid conservatism. so general did the feeling of hatred of the french revolutionary spirit become, that even mary wollstonecraft's determined attempt remained unsupported and was predoomed to failure merely because it was identified with the hated principles of the french revolution. footnotes: [ ] edition t. cadell, strand, ; p. ix. [ ] _strictures on the modern system of female education_, p. . chapter ii. _the beginnings of a feminist movement in france._ the two main feminist tendencies of the preceding chapter may be found illustrated among the ancients by the respective theories of plato and plutarch regarding women. the history of ancient greece records the earliest traces of what might be termed a feminist movement. there was a period when the position of the women of greece, who had long been kept in submission, excluded from political influence and treated contemptuously in literature, began to awaken some interest. the views of plato were of an advancedly feminist tendency. his _republic_, of which the fifth book deals with the position of women in the ideal state, ascribed their inferior power of reasoning to an education which was based upon the assumption of a sexual character. plato was the first to assert the moral and intellectual equality of women and to claim for them an equal share in the public duties. his writings foreshadow the constant alternative of later centuries. the woman who is regarded as essentially a citizen will find the consequent responsibilities crowding upon her, which she will be expected to share with her male partners, a bar to the exclusively feminine duties of motherhood and the education of her own progeny. no theories and social movements of the past or of any future time have altered or will alter the axiom that every individual woman will sooner or later find herself at a parting of roads, one of which will lead her to devote her energies to the progress of human society at large, the other to the more exclusive happiness and welfare of the domestic circle. so completely does plato disregard the feminine instinct, that the children in his commonwealth were to be entrusted to professional nurses, and that the mothers were to be allowed only to suckle the infants promiscuously and without even recognising them, out of bare necessity. the maternal instinct in plato's state was ignored, and the existence of a sexual character emphatically denied. another feminist among the ancients, although his views differed widely from plato's, was plutarch, whose ideas represent the opposite extreme of the ideal set up for women. woman's chief duty he held to be, not to the state, but to her own family. she should try to be her husband's associate not merely in material things, but also in the fulfilment of more delicate tasks, prominent among which is that of educating the young, for which purpose she herself requires to be instructed. in direct opposition to plato, plutarch insists on the essentially feminine qualities of tenderness, gentleness, grace and sensibility. in preference to a national education, he wishes for a home-education, based upon the natural affections between parent and child. the theories of plato and plutarch contain the germ of one of the main points of dispute among later feminists and anti-feminists: that of a sexual character. on the attitude taken by later writers on the woman question towards this all-important problem depends the course into which they are directed. those who, like plato, either deny or ignore the existence of a specially feminine character and specially feminine proclivities, are naturally driven to assert the equality of the sexes, and to claim for the female sex an equal share in both the rights and the responsibilities of social life. on the other hand, those who, like plutarch, lay stress on the domestic and educational duties of womanhood, counterbalancing the public duties of man, duties which take their origin in the innate propensities of the female character, may yet become defenders of the cause of woman, but their demands will be more qualified, and while including in their programme a liberal female education to make women fitting companions to their husbands and wise mothers to their children, will regard the political emancipation of the sex as a hindrance to the discharge of more important duties, and therefore as undesirable. although the problem regarding the social status of women was a matter of some speculation and discussion in the early days of antiquity, no female writers arose to take part in them, and the position of the female sex was exclusively determined by male opinion. this circumstance in itself proves conclusively that the prevailing opinion was that woman in her then state was an inferior creature. women were not even appealed to to make known their own wishes on a subject so vitally concerning them. their participation in the movement belongs to later times. upon the whole, the educationalists of rome took little notice of the problem of female education and instruction. quintilian, the chief among them, completely ignores the point, and roman literature affords no contribution of any real importance. the first statements of the cause thus remained without any direct results. such traces as had been left were completely swept up in the years of turmoil that followed, causing early civilisation to fall back into barbarism. the centuries that elapsed between the fall of the latin empire and the renaissance may be called the dark age of feminism. mr. mc. cabe in his "_woman in political evolution_" states that the decline of the comparative esteem in which women were held among the romans set in even before the great empire began to totter on its foundations, and was largely due to the judaic spirit which prevailed in the early days of christianity, demanding the implicit obedience of women to the stronger sex, a point of view which was found endorsed in many places in both the old and the new testament. the earliest christian leaders had been taught to regard woman as the agent of man's downfall, and readily observed the law that rendered her dependent. they were for the most part zealots, who did not believe in any literature that was not devotional. even the most enlightened among them, st. jerome, who had to answer the charge of occupying himself preferably with the instruction of women--which accusation he met with the complaint that the men were displaying an absolute indifference to instruction of any kind--wanted to make narrow religious asceticism the basis of his education of women. being exempt from social and political duties, they seemed naturally fitted for a life of devotion and contempt of the world, directing their energies and hopes towards a life to come. in the strict retirement of the cloisters they filled their time with prayer and sacred literature. thus, in the dark age, the ideal of womanhood became the virgin, who lived her life of devotion far from the temptations of a wicked world with which she had nothing in common. those women--and they were the majority--who did not pursue so lofty an ideal, sank lower and lower, and came to be regarded as mere sexual instruments, without any claim to consideration, by men whose only interest was war, and among whom learning was regarded with contempt. before the great renaissance came with its revival of learning in which some women had a share, bringing improvement to some privileged ones, but leaving the bulk of them in the pool of ignorance and slavery into which they had sunk, two minor renaissances call for mention. the first, of the late eighth and early ninth century, centres round the names of charlemagne, emperor of the franks, and alcuin. they saw, indeed, the necessity for better instruction and founded a great many schools, but in their scheme women as a class were unfortunately overlooked. the second revival, that of abélard, which took place in the twelfth century, marks the beginning of a more rational education, subjecting various theological problems to the test of reason and logic. unfortunately, this second revival soon degenerated, and gave rise to a class of pedants who neither understood the aims, nor even the principles of education and against whose severity and arrogance the great reformers of the renaissance as rabelais, montaigne and roger ascham directed their shafts. neither of these revivals, therefore, exercised any considerable influence on the position of women. it was also in the twelfth century that the influence of the conquest of england by the normans began to make itself felt in latin europe. the early traditions of england regarding women offer a striking contrast to those which lived on the continent. when in the days of julius caesar the romans first set foot on british soil, they found a well-balanced society, in which prevailed a state of comparative equality between the sexes, and a correspondingly high code of morality. the british women were consulted whenever an important resolution had to be taken, and tacitus, and in later days selden, were lavish in their praise of the dignity and bravery of boadicea, whose history has furnished even modern authors with a fitting subject. about the middle of the fifth century there began those invasions of anglo-saxons which led to a partial blending of the two races. the newcomers also reverenced their women; history even records the names of some "queens regnant" among them, and ladies of birth and quality sat in their witenagemot. the church boasted among its abbesses some fine specimens of intellectual womanhood (st. hilda, st. modivenna), and in general the position of women among the anglo-saxons points to a spirit of generous chivalry. william the conqueror and his men, who overran and subjected the country in the eleventh century, came from a land where the principles of the salic law were recognised. seen from a feminist point of view, this invasion was a most fatal occurrence. under norman influence a rapid decline set in. but if the normans latinised the manners and customs of the nations subjected to their rule, the latter influenced their conquerors in a more subtle way through their literature. it was especially the literature of celtic england that hit the taste of mediaeval france. the arthurian cycle found its way to the continent. it breathes a spirit of chivalry, and depicts a blending of the sexes on terms of homage to the fair and weaker which came like a revelation. and although the chivalrous element soon degenerated--mr. mc. cabe deliberately leaves early romanticism out of account, calling it "a cult of pretty faces and rounded limbs, leading to a general laxity in morals"--yet it opened the eyes of the stronger sex to the possibility of women playing some slight part in society. in this connection it is rather amusing--and also enlightening as illustrating the general estimate of women--to read about a proposal made by one pierre du bois to king edward the first to make christian women marry saracen husbands, that they might have a chance of converting them. the first social mission of women, if du bois had been given his way, would thus have been that of utilising their charms to make religious converts. at the same time, he deemed it advisable to fit them for this task by giving them a rather liberal education and instruction. there was, however, one important result of the new tendencies. the education of girls in the early middle ages,--such as it was--was a monastic one, practised within the walls of a convent. but in feudal society it became more and more customary to have the daughters of aristocratic families brought up at home, either by a tutor, or by some member of the family whose parts fitted him for the task. this first secularisation of female education among the higher classes was mainly responsible for the awakening interest of some women in literature of a secular kind. the traditions of the church had demanded the teaching of latin long after it had fallen into disuse in the outside world. the secular education, which comprised little actual instruction, next to music and dancing, came to include a good deal of physical exercise. religion was not neglected, but relegated to a less commanding position, and secular literature in the vernacular became a favourite pastime, so much so, that (about ) gerson thought it necessary to protest against the reading of the _roman de la rose_ by young ladies, from motives of delicacy. in spite of many backslidings, the position of women was now very slowly beginning to improve, and in the argument between the partisans and the opponents of female instruction the latter were beginning to have the worst of it. in the fifteenth century one or two forerunners of the renaissance-women swelled the ranks of the advocates of the cause. there was in france christine de pisan, who in her "_cité des dames_" protested against the conventional statement, that the spreading of learning among women had had a disastrous influence upon their morals. in illustration of her plea she quoted the example of jehan andry, "solennel canoniste à boulogne", who, when prevented by circumstances from giving his lessons of divine wisdom, sent his daughter novelle in his place. in order that the beauty of her appearance might not awaken illicit thoughts among her male scholars "elle avait une petite courtine devant son visage." christine de pisan was one of the first women who made a living by their pen, and is said to have lived a life of irreproachable virtue, besides being possessed of great erudition. the country where the most considerable gain was recorded was italy. not only did many italian women share in the enthusiasm aroused by the renaissance, but their doings were no longer regarded as unworthy of interest. in boccaccio's writings, for instance, women occupy a very prominent place, and chaucer was among those who followed his example. although a great many writers of the period make the failings of women the object of their satirical remarks, yet there is in their very criticism the wish for something better and nobler, and better still, the conviction that women are capable of improvement. the renaissance, with its revival of ancient culture, contained a strong educational element, which, although like the earlier revivals it busied itself only very indirectly with the female half of society, was not without importance to the movement of female emancipation. for in the first place man was the usurper of all authority, and it was only by educating him and widening his horizon that he could be made to recognise the absurdity of the relations between the sexes; and in the second place it was the philosophical spirit of the renaissance that built its educational speculations upon a solid foundation of thought and method. the educationalists of the renaissance were not churchmen, but philosophers. the tendency among them--when at all interested in women--is to condemn both the monastic education, which forms devotees instead of mothers, and that secular education which creates literary ladies instead of housewives, and to return to the ancient ideal of womanhood in making them essentially wives and mothers, assuming without discussion the female inferiority. the most striking exception to this rule was the german cornelius agrippa, of nettesheim, who was the first to state the cause and pronounce upon it in a sense so favourable to female instruction that it entitles him to the name of "father of feminism". his treatise "_de nobilitate et praecellentia feminini sexus_" (first published in ), though naturally crude and immature, and hesitatingly put forward, has that enthusiasm of firm convictions which touches the reader's heart. the rudiments of later contentions are to be found in his plea. the tyranny of men, he says, has deprived woman of her birthright of liberty. iniquitous laws have prevented her from enjoying it, usage and custom have neglected it, and finally an exclusively sexual education has quite extinguished it. in her youth she is kept a close prisoner at home, as though she were utterly incapable of any more dignified occupation than the performance of domestic duties like a kind of superior servant, and using the needle. thus she is prepared for the matrimonial yoke which is laid upon her the moment she has attained maturity, that she may quickly serve her chief purpose of propagating the species. she is then delivered up to the oppression of a husband whose inordinate jealousy and fits of temper reduce her to a deplorable condition. or she is kept all her life in the even more rigorous confinement of a convent, a retreat of so-called virgins and vestals, where she is left to a thousand agonies, the worst among which is a gnawing regret for lost happiness which finishes her. in a supplementary treatise agrippa exhorts the husband to regard and to treat his wife as a companion, and not as a servant. he seems almost afraid of the consequences of his audacity when he tries to weaken its effects by acknowledging the natural dominion of the male sex. "however", he adds, "let their rule be all grace and reverence. although woman be inferior, let her be given a place by the husband's side, that she may be his faithful helpmate and counsellor. not a slave, but the mistress of the house; not the first among the servants, but the mother of the fine children who are to inherit her husband's property, succeed to his business, and transmit his name to posterity." erasmus in his _dialogues_ depicts women as eager to rise out of their conditions of servitude. however much he tempers the force of his argument by continual jokes and pleasantries, yet he seems to sympathise with the female complaint that woman herself has abandoned her cause, leaving the husband to decide all matters of importance and voluntarily resigning all liberty, consigning herself to a life of religious devotion and household duties. the consequence is that men regard them as mere playthings and even deny them the name of human beings. the woman who voices this complaint enumerates the various occupations for which her sex would be fit, and winds up by saying that "there is nothing in what she has said which does not deserve serious and mature consideration." in "_abbates et eruditiae_" erasmus anticipates the problem of female education as it would present itself in later ages. he foresees that there will come a time when women, dissatisfied with the state of bondage, will seek improvement by demanding an education. the innate masculine egoism, however, will realise that learning will make women less submissive to male authority, and they will resist any innovations by which their supremacy may be endangered. the coming struggle is thus foreshadowed by one of the most prominent among the philosophers of the renaissance, and his sympathies are, upon the whole, with the female sex. he is the first to see the close connexion between the moral worthlessness of females and their need of an education. to remedy the frivolity of women he demanded that girls should be taught some useful occupation, so as to keep them from idleness and its concomitant vices. he also wished for a more liberal intellectual education to be supplied in the family, and, should that be impossible, by the husband. in full accordance with the above is the main drift of the third of the great humanist's works which show a tendency favourable to women: his "_christian marriage_", which made its appearance in . it resolutely prefers the state of matrimony to that of religious celibacy and makes the possibilities of conjugal happiness dependent on the cultivation of the female soul. works like the above could not fail to draw to the problem the attention of the reading public, and to make it a favourite topic of controversy. france especially proved an extremely fruitful soil, and the french nation became interested in a regular "querelle des femmes" which inspired a great many pens, and culminated in the third book of rabelais' _pantagruel_. the habit of reviling the female character and satirising the female weaknesses was of mediaeval growth, and may be found illustrated among many other examples in that portion of the "_roman de la rose_" which is the work of jean de meung, in the "_lamentations de matheolus_", of which the late professor van hamel issued a new edition in , and in a great many "_fabliaux_". it also prevailed in england with great persistence for several centuries.[ ] but the somewhat puerile invective became a controversy in france when about the middle of the th century the female sex found some staunch defenders among the male french authors. martin le franc's "_champion des dames_", composed between and , aroused a great deal of hostile criticism, mostly in the prevailing satirical form and culminating in the "_grand blason des faulces amours_" by guillaume-alexis, and some sympathy, as in the "_chevalier aux dames_", an allegorical poem; while some authors, like robert de herlin in his "_acort des mesdisans et biendisans_" tried to reconcile the two parties. after the growth of the renaissance spirit soon caused the controversy to enter into a new phase. the interest it commanded remained undiminished and towards the middle of the century it even increased to immense proportions, without, however, leading to any pronounced tangible results. the progress of learning caused the argument to become intensified into a more serious, philosophical cast. one of the champions of the female sex, at the time when the "quarrel" had reached its acute stage, françois du billon, who also made use of the allegorical device to level his threats at the heads of the revilers of women in his "_fort inexpugnable de l'honneur fëminin_", narrates how three of the worst sinners are taken prisoner by the gallant defenders of the fortress. they are boccaccio, gratien dupont, seigneur de drusac, whose "_controverses_", written in , are full of the fiercest invective against women, and jean nevizan, author of a latin treatise, published in , of which the very lengthy title may be advantageously condensed into "_sylva nuptialis_". nevizan's work shows the renaissance spirit of enquiry into the stores of antiquity in its mention of a great many sources from christ to plato and itself became a source of inspiration to rabelais. in the years that followed the champions of feminism became identified with the platonic idealists who were bent upon spiritualising love[ ], whilst its adversaries tried to uphold the ancient "gaulois" traditions with their lower estimate of womanhood. the publication (in ) of antoine héroët's "_parfaicte amye_", with its platonic notions, heralded a new phase in the history of the "querelle des femmes". in its metaphysical tendencies this brief treatise contains a delicate analysis of the emotions attendant upon the pure passion, the chief inspirer of virtue which brings us nearer to god. it ushered in the acute stage, during which not one of the great authors remained silent on a question which occupied so many minds. the different contributions to the problem under discussion were soon combined in one volume under the name of "_opuscules d'amour_". the poets and poetesses of the "école lyonnaise", maurice scève, pernette du guillet, louise labé, and others, ranged themselves among those who tried to introduce a purified love-ideal and also marguerite, queen of navarre[ ] joined the controversialists in her poetry. so general did the interest taken in the issue become, that rabelais interrupted the narrative of his _pantagruel_ to contribute his reflections on the subject in the third book (about ). he took his cue from nevizan's "_sylva nuptialis_" in introducing the problem as a consequence of speculations regarding the marriage of panurge. rabelais proved himself on the whole an anti-feminist, and we have du billon's authority for the fact that the name "pantagruéliste" was considered equivalent to that of enemy to the cause of woman.[ ] if we except christine de pisan, marie de jars de gournay, and "la belle cordière," the lyons poetess louise labé, the number of french female authors was not greatly increased by the renaissance movement. but the number of women of the higher classes who took part in the great intellectual movement grew all over europe, particularly in france, england and spain. one of the most erudite frenchwomen of the time was marguerite de valois, queen of navarre, ( - ), sister to francis the first, who welcomed to her court the greatest scholars of the day, and who was herself no mean poetess. it would not be difficult to extend this list with more names of high-placed women who owed their intellectual development to the instruction of special preceptors. education of this kind became the privilege of the female aristocracy. the schools for the most part refused to admit women; in the convent learning was discouraged because a spirit of free inquiry mostly led to heresy, and for the women of the lower classes nothing at all was done. their more fortunate sisters learned to speak and write latin, greek and italian, and after also spanish, and the abuse by women of italian words while pretending to speak their own language called forth a strong reaction in , the year which saw euphues, and the beginning of its influence at the elizabethan court. the tendencies of the reformation pointed in the same direction; they encouraged a spirit of free inquiry and were directly opposed to those of the monastic education. under luther's influence a number of lay-schools for girls arose in germany and the early reformation thus tried to fill up the gap in female education which the renaissance had left. unfortunately the political condition of france in the late th century was most unfavourable to educational reform owing to the violence of the religious wars, and it was not until after the edict of nantes that a number of huguenot schools arose. the outlook in the opening years of the th century was far from bright; great misery prevailed everywhere, in addition to which the internal wars had brought about a general decay of morals which threatened to become the country's ruin. it was at this critical stage in the history of france that woman had become sufficiently confident of her powers to claim a beneficial share in all matters of social importance.[ ] for the first time in history the woman question reached an acute stage. the seventeenth century, which witnessed the deepest abasement of english women, will always be remembered in the history of france as the time of the first self-conscious vindication of female rights. this vindication--except in one or two isolated instances--did not take the form of a direct appeal; it adopted the persuasive method of furnishing convincing evidence of woman's capacity to hold her own both intellectually and morally and even to supply certain elements which were lacking among the opposite sex, for the benefit of french society. we have seen that in the late sixteenth century the problem came to be a much-discussed one in french literature, which it remained all through the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. m. ascoli, in the "_revue de synthèse historique_" (tome xiii) has published an extensive bibliography of no fewer than ninety-seven works of a feminist or anti-feminist tendency written between and , which proves conclusively that the intellectual condition of women remained a subject of contemplation. the thirst for knowledge, as we have seen, had imparted itself to a small category of women whose circumstances enabled them to share the literary pursuits of their menfolks. but even the boldest of these earliest champions in their wildest dreams did not go beyond that enfranchisement of the mind which--however important in itself--is only the indispensable first step in female emancipation. until quite late in the th century no women had entered the field as the avowed champions of their sex against the arrogant assertions of male supremacy. the alleged inferiority of women was a theme of frequent discussion only in the works of male authors, who further degraded the sex by the bantering, often insolently satirical tone of their contentions. but no woman had come forward to test the evidence on both sides, far less to enter into competition with men on behalf of her sex. the growing taste for literature had done little or nothing to improve the social position of women; it unfortunately limited itself to a few privileged women, leaving the rest of womanhood in the obscurity of hopeless ignorance. thus matters stood when in the first quarter of the seventeenth century two events of great importance in the history of feminism took place, of which the first, abortive though it was, and therefore predoomed to barrenness, represents a deliberate attempt by a woman to constitute herself the champion of her sex; the second being something in the nature of a social experiment, which, without aiming definitely at the attainment of an exclusively feminist ideal, did more to improve the condition of women than any more direct endeavour. i refer to the work of marie de jars de gournay, and to the establishment of the first _salon_ by catherine de rambouillet. the former struck a bold and defiant note, resolutely claiming for her sex equality with men. this audacious assertion stamps her as the pioneer of modern feminism. the remarkable thing about her theories is that without the help of anything like a clearly defined philosophy she strikes the keynote of whatever claim was put forward on behalf of women in later times as a consequence of more than a century of philosophical speculation, the practice of which entailed the all-absorbing consequences of the great revolution of . when the cause of woman was taken up in england by mary wollstonecraft, and grafted upon the larger cause of humanity as its logical consequence, the arguments of her plea were directly derived from that philosophy of liberty, equality and fraternity which may be traced to its origin in locke, descartes and bacon. yet here was a lady, at a time when descartes was a mere boy, boldly asserting that nature is opposed to all inequality. "la pluspart de ceux qui prennent la cause des femmes contre cette orgueilleuse preferance que les hommes s'attribuent, leur rendent le change entier: r'envoyans la preferance vers elles. moy qui fuys toutes extremitez, je me contente de les esgaler aux hommes: la nature s'opposant pour ce regard autant à la supériorité qu'à l'infériorité." she thus sets about vindicating the equality of her sex in everything except physical strength, going beyond the most daring speculation of any previous author, with the exception of those who, blinded by hate, had put forth theories of female pre-eminence in which in sober moments they themselves hardly believed. marie de gournay ascribed the state of inequality to the circumstance that woman is purposely denied an education by man, who owes his usurped authority to abuse of physical force, which she holds in utter contempt. "les forces corporelles sont vertus si basses, que la beste en tient plus pardessus l'homme, que l'homme pardessus la femme." woman is man's inferior in bodily strength only "par la nécessité de port et la nourriture des enfants", compensating her lack of brute force by her delicate mission of propagation. but mlle de gournay emphatically asserts the perfectibility of the female mind. to understand and partly justify the extreme vehemence of the lady's attack upon the opposite sex, whose unmerited contempt of the feminine intellect had deeply injured her feelings, it is necessary to take into account the circumstances of her life, which explain her acerbity. she was a studious woman,--a forerunner of the hannah mores and elizabeth carters as well as of the mary astells and mary wollstonecrafts of a later period--whom her exceptional intellectual gifts betrayed into that error so common among the extreme female champions--that of substituting herself for her sex and claiming for all what no one with any discernment would think of refusing her personally. her mother's attempts to turn her away from literature only irritated her. she had no personal beauty and her entire life was a protracted struggle against indifference, opposition and ridicule, which embittered her beyond measure against that sex which valued the gift of a pleasing appearance above that of a comprehensive mind. born in or about , she must have been a mere girl when first brought into contact with montaigne's _essays_. she expressed her admiration of them in a letter to the author, couched in terms so enthusiastic that the philosopher came to see her, thus laying the foundation of a friendship which was only disturbed by his death in . she became his spiritual daughter,--his "fille d'alliance"--and took an active part in the publication of the later editions of the _essays_. she rather conceitedly accounted for the close affection which bound them together as "the sympathy from genius to genius". when montaigne died, his "fille d'alliance" was in a fair way to become a prominent figure in the literary world, having under his influence written some pedagogical essays, which were favourably received. with the philosopher her chief guide passed away, and subsequent experience seems to have soured her and made her spiteful and old-maidish before her time. those whose object was to ridicule her represent her with three cats, following her about wherever she went. she met with little sympathy beyond that expressed from chiefly intellectual motives in the correspondence of the learned dutchwoman anna maria schuurman, and of the renowned louvain professor juste lipse--whose praise of montaigne's _essays_ had won her instant recognition. but she deserves respect for the courage of her opinions, regardless of the prejudices of her contemporaries, and for standing her ground firmly, often turning ridicule into esteem. such was the pioneer whose ideas regarding the position of women are embodied chiefly in a treatise entitled: "_de l'egalité des hommes et des femmes_" and in the "_grief des dames_", and further alluded to in her preface to the edition of montaigne's _essays_ and in a prose "_apology_", intended to disarm her ridiculers, in which she protests against being disregarded merely on account of her womanhood. here, indeed, we are confronted by a sense of personal injury. concerning "_de l'egalité_" she says in one of her later writings: "il faut le soubmettre à la touche par ce que peuvent valoir ses raisons et ses pensées, fortes ou feibles qu'elles soient, et puis apres, par la consideration de son dessein. sçavoir si ce nouveau biais qu'elle prend, et qui la rend originale, est bon pour relever le lustre et pour verifier les privileges des dames, opprimez par la tyrannie des hommes." the treatise "_de l'egalité_" consists of two parts. in the first, the right of women to equal consideration with men is vindicated by means of evidence derived from the writings of men; in the second the authority of god himself as contained in the bible is referred to and expounded in a manner wholly favourable to the doctrine of equality. regarding the first point, the author derives comfort from the reflexion that the chief revilers of women are to be found among the worst specimens of the male sex, who merely repeat the opinions of others, "n'ayans pas appris que la première qualité d'un mal habill' homme, c'est de cautionner les choses soubs la foy populaire et par ouyr dire," in doing which, "d'une seule parolle ils desfont la moitié du monde." their sole aim is to rise at the expense of the female sex. but fortunately there is the testimony of truly great men to prove the mental and moral capacity of women. here follows a list of the male partisans of some degree of feminism among the philosophers of antiquity and of the renaissance: plato, socrates, plutarch, seneca, aristotle, erasmus, politian, agrippa. montaigne is introduced as "le tiers chef du triumvirat de la sagesse humaine et morale" (with plutarch and seneca), for having written that "il se trouve rarement des femmes dignes de commander aux hommes," which she twists into an implication that he holds woman to be the equal of man. to counterbalance the principles of the salic law, constructed entirely upon considerations of war, tacitus' account of the position of women among the germanic tribes is quoted, together with the example of the spartans, who in the discussion of their public affairs consulted female opinion. marie de gournay held that the two sexes have equal souls given them; the institution of a sexual difference having been made exclusively with regard to the propagation of the species. to illustrate which, the author, whom nobody would dream of accusing of levity, bashfully craves permission to quote a popular saying. "et s'il est permis de rire en passant, le quolibet ne sera pas hors de saison, nous apprenant: qu'il n'est rien plus semblable au chat sur une fenestre, que la chatte." after passing in review the principal secular authorities with feminist tendencies, mlle de gournay tries the more difficult task of reconciling her feminist views to those of the early christians, taking what she calls "la route des tesmoignages saincts", quoting st. basil and st. jerome, and finding herself for the first time somewhat perplexed at the teachings of st. paul, who forbids preaching by women and enjoins silence, "not because he despises the female sex, but merely lest their beauty and grace, displayed to advantage in a public office, should become a source of temptation to men." that women have always excelled in religious devotion is demonstrated by means of a reference to the championship of judith and the martyrdom of joan of arc. the mention of the former brings us to direct scriptural evidence, which the author finds an even harder subject to tackle. here, indeed she is sometimes led by her zeal into the most palpable absurdities: "et si les hommes se vantent, que jesus-christ soit nay de leur sexe, on respond qu'il le falloit par nécessaire biensceance, ne se pouvant pas sans scandale, mesler jeune et à toutes les heures du jour et de la nuict parmy les presses, aux fins de convertir, secourir et sauver le genre humain, s'il eust esté du sexe des femmes: notamment en face de la malignité des juifs." the entire treatise is mere theorising, and being produced at a time when the public mind on the subject was one mass of inveterate prejudice, brushing aside any speculations of the kind it contained as ridiculous and "paradoxical", it is not astonishing that marie de gournay spoke to the winds, and that the practical results of her labour were nihil. one gets the impression that the author herself was fully convinced of the hopelessness of even obtaining a hearing, and wrote chiefly to relieve herself of the burden of her glowing indignation. to this circumstance it may be attributed that she refrains from formulating any practical claims, or drawing up a scheme of an ideal society in which women were given their due. but her zeal and devotion to the cause she believed to be just were above suspicion, and she has a claim to the gratitude of her sex for having asserted the female equivalence. if mlle de gournay combined in her person some of the elements of the social reformer, there certainly is nothing sensational about her personality and way of expressing her views, and she must be described as revolutionary in a limited sense. apart from her extreme feminism, her social and political views were quite conventional, and in her preface to "_de l'egalité_" she even seeks the patronage of queen anne, as the most prominent and influential member of her sex. françois poullain de la barre, however, who half a century later became heir to her spiritual legacy, was an out-and-out revolutionist, whose theories of female equality proceeded from generally revolutionary tendencies. like mlle de gournay, he was a theorist, but he differed from her in being above all a philosopher of the school of descartes, and the first to apply the doctrine of cartesianism to social problems. this consideration renders him important not merely as the direct advocate of the cause of woman, in which capacity his efforts met with no success whatever, but as the forerunner of j. j. rousseau in his theory of human rights, which in its turn became the basis of the feminist movement in england in the last years of the next century, inaugurated by mary wollstonecraft. as m. piéron puts it, "le chemin réel ira de descartes au féminisme par la révolution, et non de descartes à la révolution par le féminisme." m. rousselot, in drawing attention to poullain de la barre, refers to his works as "now almost forgotten."[ ] the utter obscurity in which this author remained buried for two centuries is probably due to his life of retirement,--as m. henri grappin has pointed out in opposition to m. piéron's opinion, who, basing himself upon evidence of style and language, adjudged him to be a frequent visitor to salons--to his complete indifference to worldly fame, and to this freedom from worldly ambitions. his work, like that of mlle de gournay, was received with a mixture of scorn and ridicule, and soon forgotten. a century later, some of the works of the encyclopedians, which developed the same social ideas--with a striking difference in the matter of female education,--were burnt by the common hangman by order of the authorities, who could not, however, prevent the new ideas from taking root and bearing fruit. in striking contrast, poullain, whose revolutionism found few sympathisers and was consequently adjudged harmless, was left at peace, and brought out his revolutionary treatises "avec privilege du roy", and "avec permission signée de la reynie", for which he paid with disregard and oblivion. both mary wollstonecraft and poullain should have been born in the nineteenth century, but whereas the former was the embodiment of that indomitable spirit of rebellion which had taken almost a century to mature, poullain stands revealed to the modern reader, a living anachronism. there is something in his "fanaticism of ideas" which anticipates the intellectual "tours de force" of william godwin, whose eccentric genius, however, was made subservient to the larger cause of mankind. born at paris in , it seems that poullain chiefly studied theology at the university of his native city, until the discontent which was roused in him by the system of education followed there, made him yield to the intellectual allurements of cartesianism. descartes had been dead some dozen years when the great vogue of his philosophy began. poullain became a fervent cartesian and after some years turned protestant, which religion he felt to be better suited to his philosophical ideas. he lived mostly at paris and at geneva, and died at the latter place in . although poullain seems to shrink from openly confessing himself influenced by descartes, his works show the rationalist tendencies of pronounced cartesianism, to which we shall often have occasion to refer in coming chapters. he may be called one of the forerunners of the encyclopedians, anticipating their imperturbable rationalism, their contempt of tradition and custom,--which, by a somewhat sophistic turn of reasoning, they call superstition and prejudice,--their habit of referring to original principles, and above all their absolute faith in the perfectibility of mankind through the education of the mind and in the certainty of unlimited human progress. no theory had ever been put forward which contained brighter promises for the future of the human race, and the enthusiasm which it awakened was not damped by the fatal experience of the failure of former experiments. to this circumstance must be ascribed the boundless optimism of the partisans of the new philosophy and their radicalism. the three feminist treatises, in the order of their publication, were: . "_de l'egalité des deux sexes, discours physique et moral ou l'on voit l'importance de se défaire des préjugés._" ( ); . "_de l'education des dames, pour la conduite de l'esprit dans les sciences et dans les moeurs._" ( ); . "_de l'excellence des hommes, contre l'egalité des sexes, avec une dissertation qui sert de réponse aux objections tirées de l'ecriture sainte contre le sentiment de l'egalité._" ( ). of these, the second may be dismissed in a few words, as containing nothing very striking beyond the author's dissatisfaction with the spirit prevailing at the universities. the first, on the other hand, contains the gist of poullain's contentions. we are exhorted to judge only from evidence, without regarding the opinions of others, and are brought face to face with what the author holds to be the unvarnished truth, unaffected by that spirit of misplaced gallantry which he feels to be particularly offensive. if, therefore, anybody is shocked at the crudeness of some statements, he expects him to blame truth, and not poullain de la barre. conventionalism is what the author holds to be the chief source of the prevailing inequality. in conformity with the tenets of the christian faith, people are taught to regard the submission of women as the will of god, whereas reason shows it to be merely the consequence of inferior strength. to maintain this usurped supremacy men have purposely kept women from being instructed. in many respects the capabilities of women are superior to those of men: it is their special province to study medecine and by its aid to restore health to the sick and ailing. there is, in fact, nothing for which he pronounces women to be unfit: "il faut reconnaître que les femmes sont propres à tout." he would make them judges, preachers and even generals. the faults of women, which even this fanaticist of reason cannot overlook in the face of the distressing state of female manners and morals, are due to the defective education which is given them. they are taught to feel an interest only in balls, theatres and the fashions, with the result that vanity is their predominant characteristic. so far we might be listening to some english moralist of the eighteenth century. their only literature is of a devotional kind, "avec ce qui est dans la cassette," poullain meaningly adds. for a girl to display any knowledge she may have acquired is thought a shame, and makes her a "précieuse" in the eyes of everybody. the only state of dependence which finds favour in poullain's eyes is that of children on their parents. here again, we have the purely rational view which was also mary wollstonecraft's. the reason of a child is undeveloped, and therefore requires the support of full-grown reason. but this dependence naturally comes to an end as soon as that age is reached when the faculty is sufficiently developed to enable the child to judge for himself, when advice may take the place of command. pierre bayle informs us that poullain fully expected to be taken to task for this daring vindication of the right of woman to be educated. however, as two years passed without bringing the looked-for refutation of his arguments, he himself anticipated his opponents by writing the third treatise. its title is rather misleading. as a matter of fact, the pamphlet itself presents the usual arguments in favour of the theory of male excellence with which the arsenal of anti-feminists was stocked, whilst the "remarques nécessaires" by which it is followed, demonstrating the author's opinions, contain the entire feminist theory. the spirit that was to conduct straight to the revolution breaks out when the author confidently states that as yet feminism is only a matter of theoretical speculation, and not ripe for social or political action. he next enters upon a diatribe against civilisation, which has failed to bring humanity any nearer to absolute truth, and extols the never-failing power of reason. however interesting treatises like the above may be in the evidence they contain of what was secretly going on, of the mental processes which occupied individuals when conventionalism was at its height, processes which contained in them the germs of the great upheaval of a later century, yet it cannot be sufficiently insisted on that they were only abortive eruptions, showing that the social volcano was very far from being extinct; mere puffs of smoke which the slightest breath of wind dispersed. of far greater direct importance to the growth of opinions was that social movement which began in the early seventeenth century, of which woman was herself the originator, and by means of which she almost leapt into the seat of social influence: the movement of the _salons_. we have seen that it was in the sixteenth century that woman made her triumphal entry into society and began to dominate the world of conversation and of literature. the chivalrous worship of earlier centuries had degenerated without doing anything permanent to increase the esteem in which women stood. but in the sixteenth century a new form of courtship was introduced from italy and spain, which was utilised by clever women as a means of gaining the ascendancy over men. the love theory evolved by plato, with its metaphysical conception of the passion, which in the greek philosopher's days had fallen on deaf ears, was carried into practice two thousand years later under the auspices of the great renaissance. in accordance with the views of plato's circle, love came to be recognised as the chief inspirer of virtue and of noble deeds. the platonic ideal thus was from the beginning a refining influence, a corrective to coarseness and materialism, and an incentive to the purest idealism. the theory of spiritualised love recognised the love of physical beauty only as the first step on the ladder of beauty connecting earth with heaven; at each new step, however, the ideal becomes transfigured and purified, until everything earthly sinks into nothingness, the soul becomes paramount and everything else falls away. this view was adopted by the intellectual leaders of the italian renaissance, dante and petrarch, and also by the leading churchmen, in whose speculations the highest and purest form of passion became the love of god. the spirit of platonism thus became mingled with that of religious mysticism, which even surpassed plato in its condemnation of that earthly love which the latter had recognised. the florentine academy, however, adopted the platonic view, making human love one of the steps leading to the ideal of eternal beauty; and refining upon it until it became the chaste passion of the sacrifice of self to the loved object, of which the passion of michel angelo and vittoria colonna furnishes an example. the italian wars of the late fifteenth century had brought lewis the twelfth and his retinue to genoa. one of the highly-cultured ladies of that city, tommassina spinola, made a deep impression upon the king. she was married and virtuous, and so the royal lover had to control his passion and to be content with that platonic friendship which made of the lady "la dame de ses pensées", and entitled him to nothing beyond the purest and most disinterested friendship. a great many parallel cases occurred among the king's followers, and the women found their influence upon their platonic lovers far greater and more lasting than that exercised over the husband in matrimony. there was in this new form of courtship,--which in literature often took a pastoral form,--an element of idealism which placed the weaker sex on a pedestal in putting the adored one far beyond the reach of the lover, who only aspired the more faithfully for not having his passion gratified. in this lay the dormant power of womanhood, which might be successfully turned into a means of improving their position in society; and as soon as women came to realise this they made the most of their opportunity. the "platonic friendship craze" spread to france, where the sentimental passion of these "jansenists of love" found a fruitful soil. before this new form of worship all class-distinctions fell away; not unfrequently the lady was so high above the lover's reach as to exclude all possibility of gratification, which only added an additional zest to the adventure. unfortunately the morals of the french court were not such as to encourage the hope of a permanent improvement in the relations between the sexes. the antithesis between the platonic ideals and the brutal coarseness of sexual desire, ill-concealed under a varnish of hypocritical gallantry, was indeed very marked. at the court of francis physical beauty was considered far above virtue. the years following the introduction of the female element and the rise of female influence at court witnessed a long and bitter struggle between the coarse manners which the long years of warfare had engendered, regarding women as the playthings of men, to be trifled with and to be lightly thrown away when used, and the newly-introduced "galanterie" which implied patient and disinterested worship of an object, superior in the possession of that beauty of feature which was regarded as the reflection of a beautiful soul. women had become conscious of their growing influence, and of the means of increasing it. this struggle for recognition found expression in literature in the "_contes de la reine de navarre_", written by marguerite after her marriage, and modelled upon boccacio's _decamerone_, the evident purpose of which was to correct french manners and morals, and to glorify that form of love which is a mixture of the worship of chivalry and the platonic passion. the _contes_ themselves show a certain looseness of morals which is rather a concession to the general taste of the times, but the prologues and epilogues are of a far more refined character, and breathe a spirit of platonic idealism. in their celebration of virtue and the pure, idealistic passion it inspires, the _contes_ are a precursor of mlle de scudéry's later romances. instead of the deceitful, hypocritical homage of feudal times, the demand was for women to be respected and to be recognised as the social equals of men. the first serious attempt made by the ladies of the french court to better their position ended disastrously. their influence was more than discounted by the demoralising effects of the wars and by the gross libertinism of the male leaders of society. the more determined among the women, finding the task of reforming the morals of a dissolute court beyond their strength, resolved to cultivate in their own private circles that refinement of manners and higher civilisation which the court refused to adopt. thus arose the famous _salons_ of the seventeenth century, in which the struggle for the emancipation of the female mind was combined with that for the improvement of contemporary morals, the refinement of contemporary taste, and the purification of the french language and literature. "depuis le salon de madame de rambouillet jusqu'au salon de madame récamier", says m. ferdinand brunetière, "l'histoire de la littérature française pourrait se faire par l'histoire des salons." this statement by an eminent critic implies a magnificent eulogy of women and testifies to the magnitude of their literary influence during the whole of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, for the history of the _salons_ is the history of indirect feminism. nor was their influence restricted to literature; in nearly every department of social life french women rose to ascendancy; and this, too, at a time when the subjugation of their sex in the other countries of europe, and notably in england, was most complete. after the great triumphs of the first half-century of their existence, the _salons_ shared in the general decline, to be revived with a fair amount of success,--although of a somewhat different kind--in the eighteenth century. woman thus became a social influence to be reckoned with. the question may be put whether upon the whole this remarkable event was favourable to the cause of feminism? for, however much the movement of "preciosity" did to make women realise their independence, and assert their individuality, its original tendencies were not towards any appreciable increase of female instruction. the leaders of the movement: mme de rambouillet and her daughters, and afterwards mme de sévigné and mme de la fayette, detested the "femme savante" quite as much as they hated ignorance. the only aim of the education they recommended was to make women fit for the society in which they were expected to move; manners, taste and wit were cultivated at the expense of those qualities which are indispensable to rouse a spirit of pure feminism. the "précieuses" were bent upon cultivating sentiment rather than intellect, and--apart from the fact that sentiment is rather apt to run riot and that many women have a natural surplus which does not require cultivation--it is by a well-regulated intellect that the cause of feminism will be best served. as it was, the essentially feminine qualities were cultivated by the _salons_, and the sexual difference emphasized. it must therefore be admitted that the _salons_ only very indirectly furthered the feminist movement and that the interest evinced by the "précieuses" in the equality problem and its levelling tendencies was naturally slight. but it stands to their credit that they compelled men to recognise the importance of sex in other matters than those which are purely sexual. if the cause of feminism in the days of the _salons_ had been in a more advanced state, the ladies who frequented them might have turned anti-feminist in their horror of social changes which threatened to rob them of the empire which their essentially feminine qualities had so easily secured over men. the better "précieuse" was not an intellectual; she was expected to conceal such knowledge as she might possess and to cherish that "pudeur sur la science" which makes mme de lambert refer to her secret "débauches d'esprit", and which became the prevailing sentiment also among her bluestocking sisters of the eighteenth century. the history of the french _salons_ and of the "précieuses" who peopled them begins in the year , when catherine, marquise de rambouillet invited to her town residence all those who, like herself, felt disgusted at the camp-manners prevailing at the court and at the licentiousness of the language and literature practised there. the rambouillet-assemblies, in their original intention a reaction against the "esprit gaulois", accomplished far more than they aimed at in securing for women a prominent place in french society. they became a powerful factor in that thorough reform of manners and of language which became the glory of the century and which, whatever excesses may have followed in its train, did away for good and all with coarseness and brutality. of the very questionable society at court it might be said that "force prevailed, while grace was wanting"; the latter essentially feminine quality was abundantly supplied at the hôtel de rambouillet, where the feminine element found its way into literature; and conversation, which hitherto had been masculine, became the means of introducing a new language for new manners. in opposition to the scant respect with which women were treated in court-circles, an ideal of love was set up which was more in accordance with the platonic sentiment. once again the virginal state became an object of glorification. the state of matrimony, on account of its coarser foundation, was relegated to an inferior position. to the crude, almost offensive lovemaking of the courtier was opposed the modest, unselfish worship of platonic love of a pastoral kind; and the representative poetry of the period, some of which was the work of women, exalted the platonic passion which was to revolutionize the relations of the sexes. the warrior-lover of the feudal past, who was only a tyrant under the mask of chivalrous adulation, gave way to the "honnête homme", or knight without an armour, of whom it could be said that he possessed "la justesse de l'esprit et l'équité du coeur", safe-guarding him against error of judgment and excess of passion, and making him the devoted and constant lover of his mistress. the following enumeration is given of his duties: "aimer le monde, aimer les lettres sans affectations; mais surtout être amoureux et rechercher la conversation des femmes". anybody wishing to be admitted to polite society had to conform to these rules. the tone of conversation was characterised by a spirit of "galanterie", a kind of chivalry of words and actions, which was to inspire men to noble feelings and to corresponding deeds. mme de rambouillet attracted to her salon not only men and women of the aristocracy, but also a great many men-of-letters, who were valued according to their literary merit, regardless of fortune and importance. this close alliance between the female sex and the men of culture was in some respects the best education the former could have chosen. they were bent on proving once for all, as fléchier puts it, that "l'esprit est de tout sexe" and that nothing was wanting to make women the intellectual equals of men, but the habit of being instructed and the liberty of acquiring useful knowledge. women became the unchallenged arbitresses of morals, taste, language, literature and wit, in all of which they themselves set the example. in a contemporary work we find the earliest salon described as "l'école de madame de rambouillet, qui a renouvelé en partie les moeurs, où l'on mettait sa gloire dans une conduite irréprochable." not only was the language purified by removing its overgrowth of obscenity and indelicacy, but it was divested of a number of superfluous and affected foreign words. the female influence upon the literary taste was equally all-embracing. a number of new words owed their existence to feminine initiative, and although the writers of the very first class were on the whole unfavourably disposed towards what came to be called "préciosité", and were consequently inclined to satirise its excesses, a great deal of respectable second class talent was lavished upon the frequenters of the salons. the literature produced by the "habitués" of mme de rambouillet's salon was mostly of an occasional nature, and composed in homage to the female sex, comprising sonnets, madrigals, epistolary prose, and plays. the literature of the scudéry circle, besides the products of a growing pedantry, also included many occasional pieces of a lighter kind, among which were so-called sonnets-énigmes, vers-échos and the like, which, if contributing to the enjoyment of an idle moment, had no permanence whatever as literature. to this kind of poetry the ladies themselves were important contributors. in m. victor du bled's "_la société française_" we read about a "journée des madrigaux" at mlle de scudéry's, occasioned by a present of a "cachet de cristal" made to the hostess on one of her famous saturdays, calling forth poetical ebullitions from the most widely different authors. there were the famous "portrait" series, composed by the ladies of the duchess of montpensier's circle; the written "conversations",--those by mlle de scudéry herself were judged by mme de maintenon to contain "useful hints to young females" and therefore introduced at st. cyr--and a very extensive literature in the epistolary style, which was to become the current form of the richardsonian novel. the topics of the day also formed a subject of animated discussion at the assemblies. among them the social position of women and their treatment by the male sex occasionally found a place. dissertations on literary subjects alternated with discussions of intellectual problems, one of the themes at mlle de scudéry's being: "de quelle liberté les femmes doivent-elles jouir dans la société?" although the salons of the seventeenth century were not so revolutionary in their tendencies as some of the next, inasmuch as they were strictly private and did not either directly or indirectly aim at subverting the existing government or promoting seditious theories, yet political subjects were not shunned, and even philosophy and science--the craze of the salons of the early eighteenth century--found a number of devotees and sympathisers. about the middle of the seventeenth century, cartesianism became the fashionable philosophy in spite of the opposition of the universities. mme de sévigné's letters prove that many women were interested in its propagation. the "précieuses" felt attracted by the speculations of descartes, to follow which the cultivation of a sound sense of logic is more indispensable than any great erudition. the consequence of the philosophical movement was a widening interest in knowledge, an awakening curiosity about science, and a corresponding contempt of tradition, resulting from that self-reliance which is the natural outcome of the theory of human perfectibility. the two principal salons, those of the marquise de rambouillet and of mlle de scudéry, although of the same general tendencies, differed somewhat in their particulars. the glory of the former and earlier was never equalled by any subsequent one. the marquise herself was in every respect an ornament of her sex. born and bred in italy, she married the marquis de rambouillet before she had reached the age of thirteen. after some turbulent years at court she retired to the privacy of her residence in the rue saint-thomas-du-louvre and became the centre of a brilliant circle of aristocratic people and celebrated men-of-letters. although some of the greatest wits of the age frequented her salon--malherbe, and afterwards corneille and balzac were among her occasional visitors--there never was question of a domination of literary men: the hostess remained enthroned in full and undisputed authority, receiving the verbal and written homage which they paid to her virtues. the entire house was reconstructed after her own ideas, so as to afford more room for the reception of guests. in one of the apartments which opened into each other, the marquise was in the habit of keeping her state, receiving her visitors while reclining upon a luxurious couch. the blue room, which, by the way, changed its aspect with each succeeding fashion, was a marvel of refined taste. nor did the marquise confine her receptions to her town-residence; assemblies were held at rambouillet in summer and garden-parties introduced plenty of variety. great praise has been lavished on her kindness of character, and rising authors in particular found in her a warm-hearted patroness, always ready to applaud and encourage. one of her daughters, julie d'angennes, equalled her in popularity and had her beauty and virtue celebrated in a collection of laudatory verse entitled "_la guirlande de julie_", to which different poets made contributions, the principal being the young marquis de montausier, who afterwards became her husband. among her closest intimates were two men of a very much inferior social station: voiture, the chief poet and chronicler, and chapelain, the chief oracle and critic of the hôtel de rambouillet. she had made these two her own; they basked in the serenity of her smile, shared in her joys as in her troubles, and were the most perfect male satellites to female beauty and brilliance. the years between and were the crowning years of glory in the history of the hôtel de rambouillet. after julie's marriage, however, there came a decline. there were some sudden deaths, including that of the marquise's only son, and the fronde began, in which some of the marquise's intimates followed the fortunes of the rebels, entailing fresh partings. in she sustained a further loss through the death of her husband. bowed down with sorrow, she retired to rambouillet to seek comfort in the intimacy of julie's family. the influence of the hôtel de rambouillet passed on to the circle presided over by madeleine de scudéry, whose "saturdays" were much sought after. her visitors were rather more given to affectations of manners and speech than those of her aristocratic predecessor and the transfer therefore marks the first step in the decadence which set in. in her "ruelle" the third estate was largely represented; in fact, as the "bourgeois" element gained in strength, the decadence became more marked, for its representatives were more easily led into excesses than the female members of the aristocracy. this explains how the name of mlle de scudéry--rather unjustly--came to be identified with that false preciosity which did the female cause such harm. and yet she was herself an ardent feminist, not only in the qualified sense of her predecessor, but in the full sense of the word. her two principal romances: "_artamène, ou le grand cyrus_" and "_clélie_", derive an interest--which their longwindedness greatly endangers--from their marked feminist tendencies. in the former, mlle de scudéry, whose views are expressed by sapho, pleads for mental occupation as the only means of promoting female virtue. she rebukes the vanity of ignorance so common among those of her sex who imagine that "elles ne doivent jamais rien savoir, si ce n'est qu'elles sont belles, et ne doivent jamais rien apprendre qu'à se bien coiffer". she is also one of the first to accuse the male sex of inconsistency, refusing their womenfolk an education, yet finding fault with them for lacking those qualities which are the fruit of education only. "sérieusement, y a-t-il rien de plus bizarre que de voir comment on agit pour l'ordinaire en l'éducation des femmes? on ne veut pas qu'elles soient coquettes ni galantes, et on leur permet pourtant d'apprendre soigneusement tout ce qui est propre à la galanterie, sans leur permettre de savoir rien qui puisse fortifier leur vertu, ni occuper leur esprit". but the "femme savante" equally inspires her with profound disgust, and this some of her critics have failed to recognize. the damophile of the _grand cyrus_ is an exact reproduction of the philaminte of molière's "_femmes savantes_", pretending to an erudition which is only imaginary and prevents her from attending to her household duties. there is nothing more objectionable in mlle de scudéry's opinion than for a woman to make parade of her knowledge, which may be useful chiefly in enabling her to listen with appreciation when men were talking. the theory of perfect equality, proposed about the same time by poullain de la barre, did not find an adherent in mlle de scudéry. the "honnête homme" of her dreams has more power of diverting and amusing than the most erudite of her own sex. of all the leading ladies of seventeenth century french society there were none whose qualifications would have fitted them so perfectly to be the rivals of mrs. montagu in presiding over bluestocking assemblies as mlle de scudéry! her second great romance, "_clélie_", marks the culminating point of the usual seventeenth century feminism in expressing the rather one-sided ideal to which the ladies of the salons aspired, that of commanding the love of gallantry and of ruling the world through it. the entire romance is nothing but an elaborate code of gallantry by which all love is to be regulated. in some passages, however, the social position of women becomes the theme, regardless of the rather too obtrusive love-theories. after protesting indignantly against female bondage, mlle de scudéry proves that the doctrine of gallantry has not impaired her judgment. she demands that man shall be "neither the tyrant nor the slave of woman", and that the rights and duties of matrimony shall be equally shared between the two partners. nor has the glitter of the platonic love-arsenal blinded her to the blessings of the virginal state. far superior to matrimony she holds the condition of the wise and (of course!) beautiful woman who, although much courted, remains indifferent; who has many friends, but no lovers; who lives and moves in a world which to her is without peril, unswayed by the passions which rule others, always free and always virtuous--and, we may add, always sublimely conscious of her own superiority--an ideal embodied in the person of plotine. the attempt at "regulating the passions", i. e. keeping the affections under perfect control, no doubt led to a great deal of absurdity which supplied the many antagonists with weapons against "la préciosité." some of the worst sinners in this respect were ladies of the scudéry circle. there was a certain mlle dupré, given to philosophy, and surnamed "la cartésienne" whose glory was to consider herself incapable of tenderness; and, worse still, there was the example of her friend mlle de la vigne, whose infatuation went so far as to make her reject even the comforts of platonic worship. mlle de scudéry herself was more moderate in her ideas, and proved capable of cherishing some "tendresse" for the poet pellisson whom she rescued from the bastille. her verdict that "la vraie mesure du mérite doit se prendre sur la capacité qu'on a d'aimer" even suggests that she was capable of undergoing the real passion. gradually, however, the excesses in false "préciosité" began to multiply. the original signification of the term had been a taste for whatever is refined and delicate; noble, grand and sublime. the affectation and pedantry which came to be substituted for this, gave rise to the worst excesses of language. in their admiration of the fine phrasing of the literary masterpieces the "précieuses" took to substituting their periphrases and metaphors for the simple mode of expression which daily conversation requires[ ], making themselves ridiculous and objectionable in the eyes of soberminded people and calling forth some malignant attacks even by people who could not be accused of misogynist leanings. to make matters worse, some very inferior imitations of the aristocratic salons had sprung up among the "bourgeoisie" both at paris and in the provinces, where prudery was substituted for purity, affectation for elegance and pedantry for charm and taste. the moral tone prevailing at these meetings also compared very unfavourably with the atmosphere of culture and good breeding which had reigned at the hôtel de rambouillet. scandal became a favourite topic of conversation, and literary men of a usurped reputation, to whom the better circles remained closed, laid down the law and constituted themselves the arbiters of literary taste. the decline, which had been slow and partial in the salons of mlle de scudéry and afterwards of mme deshoulières, became rapid and complete in those of the so-called "bourgeoisie de qualité". m. brunetière has pointed out that the "esprit précieux" of the salons, aiming at polish and refinement--for which in later years it came to substitute narrowness and affectation--was directly opposed to the "esprit gaulois" which had the upper hand in court circles and whose satire of the salons often degenerated into cynicism and coarseness. the great authors found themselves occupying an intermediate position, trying to reconcile what was recommendable in either and ridiculing what was objectionable. the fact that they drew their inspiration from nature and from the lessons taught by antiquity brought them into conflict with the précieuses who lived in an artificial present, and eagerly welcomed whatever was new. in the ancient and modern controversy, which was started in the seventeenth century and revived in the early eighteenth, the female element, with a very few exceptions, unhesitatingly took the side of the moderns. how powerful a factor they had become in determining what was to be the public opinion appears from the share they had in the ultimate victory of the moderns, and more still from the utter futility of the repeated efforts made by men of the first genius to crush their power by means of ridicule. molière opened the campaign in his "_précieuses ridicules_" ( ). although very successful as a play, and warmly applauded by the rambouillet-circle, it missed its aim in utterly failing to crush false "préciosité". when after molière's death boileau continued the campaign, he met with no better success. no sooner had he retired from the field than the monster he had set out to kill reared its head again, enjoying undisputed possession until mme de lambert and her friends made an endeavour to return to the old ideals; in doing which, however, they did not forget to march with the times and to observe the signs of impending change which were beginning to manifest themselves. while the "précieuse" society of the salons in its anxiety to strengthen the female element was occupying itself with the cultivation of polished manners, taste and wit in the members of the sex, and came to neglect female morals and instruction, the problem of a moral education was introduced and discussed by a philosopher among churchmen, the great fénelon. the civil wars in france were followed by a religious renaissance, representing a supreme effort made by catholicism to recover the ground which had been lost to the combined classical renaissance and reformation. the religious order of the jesuits, founded in the middle of the sixteenth century, saw in a strictly religious education the means of strengthening the position of the roman catholic church. before the end of the century they had their colleges in different parts of france and became the educators of the roman catholic youth of that country. from the first their aim was the attainment of political influence for the church by means of religious propaganda. to this end they tried to suppress all spontaneity and individuality in their pupils, a system which in that age of awakening individualism and philosophical enquiry could not long remain without protest. a reaction set in which aimed at combining a certain amount of personal freedom and patriotic sense with religious sentiment, and at reconciling the tenets of catholicism with the theories of the new philosophy. such was the general character of the first great rival of jesuitism, the "oratoire". neither society, however, took any notice of female education. the omission was repaired by the jansenists, the implacable enemies of the jesuits, be it in a manner in which some sound common sense was mingled with a good deal of narrow dogmatism. for a number of years they maintained a somewhat precarious footing in france, during which time they proved themselves zealous educators, to whom the moral interests of their pupils, and not the worldly ones of their society, were paramount. their chief educational establishment at port royal, founded in , was in many ways superior to contemporary institutions, and some of their methods have found imitation in france to this very day. it is true that the jansenist system of education was, upon the whole, a monastic one, and as such could not be a very great improvement. but its practice was distinguished by a few characteristics which made it superior to all parallel schemes of education. nowhere do we find that perfect purity of motives, that eagerness on the part of the educator to keep his charges from temptation and evil. this circumstance found its origin in the tenets of jansenism, asserting that a tendency to sin and evil is inherent in the infant soul. to the jansenists, education meant the unrelaxing struggle of the educator, aided by divine grace, against this natural bias, for the purpose of saving the soul. that this constant watchfulness on the teacher's part involved the total disappearance of the last frail spark of liberty left to the child, is only natural. on the other hand, it strengthened the affections. the jansenist "religieuses" were filled with a most laudable sense of responsibility and loved their charges with the most unselfish tenderness and devotion. their individual kindness tempered the severity of the rules laid down in jacqueline pascal's "_règlement pour les enfants_". ( ). the discipline was of the strictest, and the entire system directed towards forming pious christian women and docile wives, rich in virtue rather than in knowledge. the final decision was left to the girls themselves; they either became nuns or re-entered the world after some years of close sequestration, "selon qu'il plaisait à dieu d'en disposer", but it is to be feared that some moral pressure was often brought to bear upon them. the rules for daily observance implied early rising, strict silence, very limited ablutions and the greatest simplicity in dress; the hours of daylight being divided among prayers, devotional literature, manual labour and the elements of practical knowledge. the above will be sufficient to show that port royal was a convent rather than a school and that its spirit was directly opposed to both the renaissance spirit and the philosophical spirit of the later generations. in the annals of female education the "petites ecoles" of port royal will therefore not be remembered as a milestone in the march of woman towards the ideal of perfect enfranchisement. they derive their importance from the fact that they were among the very first institutions in which great stress was laid on a moral education and in which some attention was paid to psychology. the convents of other religious orders also participated in the educational movement and tried to recover lost influence. the seclusion of convent-life in those days was not nearly so strict as it had been in the days of early christianity, and this concession gained for them many pupils who had no intention of taking the veil, but were merely obeying the increasing call for female instruction. some of these religious orders, as for instance the ursulines, did good service, although they aimed at the pursuit of the moral virtues rather than intellectual accomplishments. what constitutes their chief merit, however, is the fact that by the side of the existing boarding-schools for paying resident pupils they established dayschools for the benefit of the poorer classes, in which all instruction was gratuitous. the number of secular schools for girls was so small, that we may safely regard the above as a first attempt to bring education within the reach of the untaught female multitude. unfortunately, the convent-schools became involved in the general decline which marks the latter half of the century. all sorts of abuses found their way into them. a great deal too much regard was paid to the social standing of pupils, the nuns were often unfit for their educational task, for which they lacked preparation, and many convents became havens of refuge to worldly ladies with a damaged reputation, who paid well, but in return introduced lazy morals and a loose conversational tone. add to this the intense and general misery which both the fronde and the later foreign wars had engendered, and it need not astonish anybody that the efforts of the religious orders were of too partial and desultory a nature to bring about a lasting improvement in female education. although the actual progress recorded was slight, yet something had been gained. the necessity for some degree of female instruction--thanks largely to the indirect influence of the salons--was now universally granted, although opinions varied regarding the extent and the means to be employed. it had to a certain extent become a topic in france, and as such began to attract a good deal of notice among moral philosophers. there arose the philosophy of education, making the subject a basis for philosophical speculation and applying to the systems then in vogue the severe test of reason. in this way some glaring abuses were revealed which urgently demanded correction. the entire monastic system, based upon conventional grounds, was full of faults and the reverse of practical, showing an utter disregard of the demands of life. thus began the gradual emancipation of education from the shackles of monasticism, the urgent necessity of which was recognised even by some of the leading churchmen, whose works breathe the more liberal spirit of the new philosophy. the theorisings of fénelon mark a new departure in moral education, and his ideas became the prevailing ones of the eighteenth century which he heralded. he did not fall into the error made by his predecessors of overlooking the female half of society, but placed himself on the standpoint that the education of women is as important a social problem as that of men. at the time of the composition of his treatise "_de l'education des filles_" (published in ) he was director of the "nouvelles catholiques", a parisian institution in which female converts from protestantism were educated. its direct claims on behalf of woman--apart from absolute insistence on the right of a moral education--are rather modest, but its originality consists in the introduction of the problems of feminine psychology, lifting the subject into the sphere of moral philosophy. unmoved by the passion which swayed some of the later feminists--there is a wide gulf between his ideal of morality and theirs of equality--the moderation of his views and the soundness of his logic gained him a hearing and procured him some staunch supporters among the better précieuses, who justly admired his insight into the female character. madame de maintenon was very much taken with his ideas and even procured him an appointment to the archbishopric of cambrai. while insisting on the fundamental difference between the male and the female character, fénelon never hesitates to put woman on the same level as man, without troubling to decide the theoretical question of superiority. the all-important promise of eternity he believed to apply with perfect equality to both sexes, and as regards earthly life he held that man and woman are too fundamentally different to allow of comparison in the sense of competition. however, he recognised that while the chief duties of man were concerned with social life, those of woman lay within a smaller circle: that of the home, upon the management of which depend both the happiness of every individual and the prosperity of the state; thus granting to woman a sphere of interest and activity in no wise inferior to, though different from, that of man, and exhorting her to fulfil those sacred duties to the very best of her ability. the domestic duties of womanhood are first regarded by fénelon as an important social function, for which the monastic education was the worst preparation that could be imagined. there are not only children to be educated, but servants to be managed. the more deeply we enter into the spirit and full purport of fénelon's contentions, the more it strikes us how he anticipates all the points of discussion which were to keep the philosophical moralists of the next century busy. a woman may excel in the art of being served; she may show in her treatment of her inferiors that she realises the great truth that all human beings in their widely different social stations are equal before god, and that any amount of authority involves an equal amount of responsibility. ideas like the above seem to belong to the eighteenth century rather than to the seventeenth. fénelon was in the full sense of the word: a pioneer. we have said that the jansenist educators held that "la composition du coeur de l'homme est mauvaise dès son enfance", directing their efforts towards reclamation from innate evil. fénelon's views are more optimistic. to him, there is no original tendency towards either good or evil. everything depends upon guidance; give a child a good education and all its possibilities for good will be developed and bear fruit. the sole aim of education is not social influence or intellectual culture, but merely what he calls "l'amour de la vertu". and who can be fitter for such a task than the girl's own mother? "a good mother", says fénelon, "is infinitely preferable to the best convent". only she can prepare her daughter for the domestic circle over which it will one day be her task to preside, and only she has enough natural affection for her to impress upon her receptive mind lessons of moral wisdom. boys, who are brought up to be citizens, require a public education, but for girls there is no place of education like the home, watched over by a loving mother. a few of the points introduced may here be passed in rapid review. great stress is laid on tenderness in education. unless the pupil feels real affection for the teacher, unless the task of learning lessons is made a pleasant, and not a wearisome one, the results will be disappointing. gentle reasoning and persuasion ought therefore as a rule to take the place of severity. also in matters of religion an appeal should be made to the child's budding reason. the religious principles should be instilled in a subtle, slightly philosophical manner, and cleverly arranged questions--often in the form of metaphors or similes--should suggest to the pupil the expected replies. here we have an anticipation of that "mise en scène" which becomes a striking feature in rousseau. a close study of the characters of women implies an insight into the essentially feminine failings, which may render them unfit for their task, and therefore ought to be first exposed and then carefully eradicated. fénelon's list of female shortcomings and their remedies proves that there was no great difference in the matter of inclinations between the female youth of france and that of england. their worst vices are said to proceed from the misdirection of two characteristically feminine qualities: imagination and sensibility. want of purpose renders the former over-active and turns it towards dangerous objects. a careful watch should be kept over the literature put into the hands of young females, for of the amorous romances then in vogue which were so eagerly devoured by the sex, the majority were far too stimulating to an imagination which in the close seclusion of home- or convent-life was but too apt to run riot. by living in an imaginary society of "précieux et précieuses" the girls became dissatisfied with everyday life and were made unfit for it. another dangerous consequence of inoccupation is that thirst for amusement which is the leading motive in female society. it creates egoists, bent upon indulging every wanton caprice. this, coupled with physical weakness, makes women resort to cunning and dissimulation as a means of attaining their end, to the detriment of their moral characters. vanity, which is another inherent portion of the female character, is responsible for that inordinate desire to please which in leading to an all-absorbing passion for clothes and fashion threatens to ruin domestic life and to deprave the female morals. fénelon had no patience with the "précieuses" of the decline, who tried to appear "savantes" without being even "instruites". to him, the value of knowledge depends entirely on its practical use as a means of edifying the mind and soul. woman was not meant for science, and what fénelon has seen of the "femme savante" is not calculated to make him enthusiastic. girls should feel "une pudeur sur la science presque aussi délicate que celle qu'inspire l'horreur du vice." his programme of subjects of female study is correspondingly small. reading and writing, spelling, arithmetic and grammar are the principal. in addition, music, painting, history, latin and literature are conditionally recommended, for the individual talents have to be taken into consideration. fénelon's picture of contemporary womanhood is far from alluring. its chief interest lies in the circumstance that it is the first instance in french literature of a systematic estimate of female manners based upon the feminine psychology, anticipating the current opinion among the writers of the next century regarding the foibles of the sex. fénelon was among the first to realise--what mary wollstonecraft a century later stated with that characteristic frankness which almost entirely robbed her of female sympathy--that the worst enemy of female emancipation is, and always has been, woman herself. as long as the majority of women make considerations of sex the foundation of all their actions, it will prove impossible for the champions of equality to accomplish their full aims. although a churchman and a moralist, fénelon was in open revolt against the spirit of monasticism which regarded only eternity and failed to see its relation to everyday life, with its many exigencies. the best preparation for eternity, according to him, is a daily attention to the nearest duties of life. not science, but the domestic circle was the proper domain of woman. more necessary than theoretical knowledge was that practical instruction in the little household ways which turn a young woman into a good housekeeper. what fénelon did not sufficiently realise, was the indispensable connection between a moral and an intellectual education. the theory that perfect virtue arises out of the intellect and derives its chief value from a rational source, was a further step in the same direction which it was left to his successors to take. but he was instrumental in preparing the enfranchisement of the female education from the narrow principles of that church to which he belonged heart and soul. his precepts were almost immediately put in practice. making some allowance for personal inclinations and circumstances which forbade their full application, we may call madame de maintenon the foremost pupil of fénelon's school. this remarkable woman's educational views present two entirely different aspects. she was a pietist of the roman catholic faith, but with certain leanings towards liberalism which smacked of heresy, the origin of which may be found in the influence of the philosophical creeds with which her early career as a précieuse had brought her into contact. on the other hand, her experience of society--after her marriage to the poet scarron she had for some years kept a salon in paris--had given her a taste for literature and made her a believer in "l'art de dire et d'écrire" as one of the necessary elements of female education. she thus combined in her person two of the principal tendencies of the century: a strong religious spirit and an intense interest in literature, and both became important factors in her educational system, in which she aimed at reconciling the exigencies of the world with the demands of piety in forming society women who were devout christians. she was a woman of practical common sense, actuated by the most unselfish motives, and devoted to the exercise of that reason which she held ought to be the constant regulator of piety and the governing motive of all human actions. nothing could be more directly opposed to the monastic spirit. her principles therefore stamped her as a reactionary of fénelon's school, save for the fact that "the world was too much with her", which made her always keep in view that polite society whose morals she had set out to improve, and the allurements of which constantly clashed with the rigidity of her religious devotion. at the same time the charms of domesticity appealed to her as strongly as to fénelon. reason, she argued, forbids the education of women to any station except that for which providence originally intended them, and providence never meant them to pass their lives in a convent, but rather in the domestic circle as devoted wives and loving mothers. she felt the monastic education to be a violation of the destination of womanhood, and her educational writings were a plea for emancipation from the compulsion of conventional religiosity with its disregard of practical life. the equality-claim has no place in her programme. the very spirit of christianity condemns it. "dieu a soumis notre sexe au moment qu'il l'a créé, la faiblesse de notre esprit et de notre corps a besoin d'être conduite, soutenue et protégée; notre ignorance nous rend incapable de décision, et nous ne pouvons dans l'ordre de dieu, gouverner que dépendamment des hommes." no further steps towards intellectual, social or political enfranchisement are to be expected from madame de maintenon. although woman can only "govern dependently", yet her rule of the home--and here again she fully agrees with fénelon--is of the utmost importance, not only to her own small circle, but to society, or rather to that portion of it which alone had her full regard and affection: the kingdom of france. woman was meant for marriage and her education should be relative to her position in society. plutarch's line of thought, which we had almost lost sight of, re-enters the stage with the appearance of fénelon and madame de maintenon. no motives of false delicacy should withhold from young women such information as may be useful to them in their struggle against the temptations of the outside world. the right place to prepare them for their natural place in society is not the convent, but the college, where the educational taste is entrusted to capable teachers, of whom it may be said that "le monde n'est étranger qu'à leur coeur". the optimistic faith in the capability of her sex of being perfected, which links her to helvétius and the other encyclopedians gave her the necessary courage to attempt an experiment which she confidently trusted might lead to a general reform in female morals. the words of racine's _esther_: ici, loin du tumulte, aux devoirs les plus saints tout un peuple naissant est formé par mes mains, are a faithful reflection of her hope for the future. and so madame de maintenon declared war against convention and tradition and went the way she had marked out for herself. her influence with the king enabled her to carry out her scheme to the minutest details and became the means of placing the vast establishment of st. cyr at her disposal. the time had come to realise her dream of education. two hundred and fifty girls of aristocratic families whom the endless wars had ruined, were entrusted to the care of a headmistress, mme de brinon, and her staff, under madame de maintenon's personal superintendance. it was her wish that they should constitute a large family and that the relation between teacher and pupil should be as nearly as possible that of mother to child, so as to make the reality differ as little as possible from what fénelon's theory had considered the ideal form. the secular character of the establishment--on which the king had also insisted, holding that there were already more nuns than was strictly compatible with the interests of his kingdom--appeared from the fact that the teachers--"les dames de saint louis"--were called "madame" instead of "soeur" and wore dresses which, although simple, were different from those worn in the convent. they were not at first expected to take the vow for life, but their patroness expressed a distinct wish that they should always regard their pupils' interests before their own and show the greatest possible devotion to this task. in respect of this insistence upon the most absolute self-abnegation--involving a most unyielding sternness in taking what seemed the right moral course and a most complete subjection on the part of the pupil--mme de maintenon's ideas came dangerously near those of the jansenists against whose severe methods she professed to be in revolt. the rules of discipline at st. cyr were in some respects as strict as those practised at port royal and in both the motive was to shield the pupil against contamination. realising the danger of influence from abroad at an age when the character was not sufficiently formed, and apt to take impressions too easily, mme de maintenon determined that all parental authority should cease. the girls were kept in the establishment until they were well out of their teens, and supposed to be morally strong enough to resist temptation and to exercise influence on their surroundings instead of undergoing it. there were no holidays and the "demoiselles" were allowed to see their parents only four times a year for half an hour or so under the watchful eye of one of the mistresses. even their correspondence with them was limited, and the tone of the letters had to be strictly formal, in fact they were mere exercises of style. apart from these restrictions, the girls were treated with great kindness, if with little outward show of affection. mme de maintenon was too much devoted to reason to approve of such demonstrations, and wished the emotions to be kept under strict control. on the other hand, punishments were few, the teacher took a liberal share in all recreations and amusements, and the necessary instruction was made as attractive and imparted in as unobtrusive a manner as possible, in accordance with fénelon's precepts. the sudden change in mme de maintenon's system of discipline which took place in the third year of st. cyr and which narrowed down the comparative liberty which had been a fundamental principle to the absolute subjection described above, was a frank avowal of the failure of her original methods and at the same time a proof of the sincerity of her endeavour. it was due to a most unexpected development. in the first years of st. cyr--the establishment was opened in --the study of literature had occupied an important place among the subjects of the curriculum. the girls were made to act little domestic scenes written by the headmistress. at the patroness's instigation an experiment was made with racine's "_andromaque_", which, in her opinion, "succeeded too well", for the girls so entered into the spirit of the play, and developed such histrionic talents, that their monitress, realising the danger, asked racine to write another play specially for them. in accordance with this request the great dramatist wrote "_esther_", which was performed several times before the king and a select audience with signal success, and results disastrous to the spirit prevailing among the girls of st. cyr. never before had the discipline of the institution been in greater jeopardy. the girls' heads were turned, and their vanity and conceit knew no bounds. mme de maintenon saw that energetic measures were urgently called for, and did not hesitate to adopt them. with an earnestness and resolution greatly to her credit she undertook the necessary reform with the effect of radically removing whatever was liberal and reactionary in her system, and reducing st. cyr to a slightly modified form of a convent, thus granting to her opponents the satisfaction of a great moral victory, which the latter deserved no more than mme de maintenon deserved her defeat. one of the unfortunate consequences was that the instruction which the girls received, and which had never been abundant, was reduced to almost a minimum. "il n'est point question de leur orner l'esprit", said mme de maintenon. the horrors of exaggerated preciosity were ever since before her eyes. too much learning, she feared, might turn the girls into précieuses, and manual labour was introduced as an effective antidote. fortunately the years tended to soften the severity which had prevailed immediately after the catastrophe, and upon the whole the institution, which enjoyed special protection and undiminished popularity until its suppression by the convention in , could boast excellent results, and turned out some real "ornaments of their sex". it seems a pity that in mme de maintenon's schemes so secondary a place should have been given to that education of the mind which is so essential to lasting improvement. she inevitably suffers by comparison with her contemporary mme de sévigné, whose correspondence with her daughter mme de grignan contains a most enlightened scheme for the education of her granddaughter pauline de simiane. she recognises that it is by literature that the mind is fed, and since to the pure everything is pure, there is little to be feared even of the otherwise pernicious reading of novels, for a sound mind will not easily go astray. an optimistic view of education, taking its root in considerations of philosophy, for mme de sévigné, like her daughter, was a cartesian. in comparing her contribution to the educational problem with that of mme de maintenon, it should be remembered, however, that an individual education within the family circle offers better opportunities for freedom and less danger of contamination than the collective system of st. cyr. mme de sévigné's ideas, contained in private correspondence, intended only for her daughter's use and entirely without the militant spirit, exercised little influence and were of little direct value to the cause of feminism. footnotes: [ ] cf. the two articles in "_a cambridge history of english literature_", by prof. f. m. padelford (vol. p. ) and by prof. h. v. routh (vol. p. ). [ ] cf. p. . [ ] see also page . [ ] a very interesting article on "_le tiers livre du pantagruel et la querelle des femmes_" by m. abel lefranc, containing an extensive list of contributions to the feminist and the anti-feminist literature of the time, may be found in the "revue des etudes rabelaisiennes", (tome ii, ). [ ] heinrich morf, in his "_geschichte der französischen literatur im zeitalter der renaissance_" relates that a number of ladies took to frequenting the _académie de poésie et de musique_ founded by baïf under the auspices of charles ix; especially after his successor henry iii had transferred its seat to an apartment in the louvre, whence it came to be called "_académie du palais_". [ ] p. rousselot. _histoire de l'education des femmes en france._ poullain de la barre owes his revival to an article by m. henri piéron in the "_revue de synthèse historique_" of . the latter's judgment is based upon two works: "_de l'egalité des sexes_" and "_de l'education des dames_", which he found in the bibliothèque nationale. in the "_revue d'histoire littéraire de la france_" contained an article by m. henri grappin, pointing out that some of poullain's works had been overlooked, supplying a full list of his literary productions and fully discussing one, entitled: "_de l'excellence des hommes, contre l'egalité des sexes_." the above-named three are the only treatises by poullain which bear upon the position of women. [ ] cf. livet, _précieux et précieuses_, p. xxv. chapter iii. _the position of french women in eighteenth century society._ in the earlier half of the eighteenth century, at a time when the inferiority of english women was so generally recognised as to leave no room at all for controversy, the woman question was attracting a good deal of notice in france, and scarcely a year passed without some kind of contribution to its literature.[ ] it was by this time an acknowledged problem, and theoretically speaking it may be said that by the middle of the century feminism in france had carried the day, thanks mainly to the influence of modern philosophy, which the salons helped in propagating. the instruction-problem was also settled in theory in a manner satisfactory to feminists, and only that of female occupations remained as yet unbroached. the position of women in society not only became a favourite topic of conversation and controversy, but came to command a number of able pens in periodical literature and in the drama. in the latter branch of literature a number of pieces were written on the subject, some of which were hostile and sought the aid of ridicule, but of which the majority were of a more sympathetic tendency, showing that molière's attack had failed. all the important theatres paid their tribute of attention to the cause of feminism. one of the earliest was montchenay's "_cause des femmes_", a comedy performed at the théâtre italien as early as , while a more elaborate dramatic statement of the cause, entitled "_l'ile des amazones_" was composed in by lesage and d'orneval, and suggested the machinery of the "_amazones modernes_" of legrand ( ), performed at the théâtre français. this brings us to the field of utopian literature _à la_ mrs. manley, whose "_new atlantis_" had appeared a few years previously. the amazons, who had founded their own community in a remote island, having forsworn the society of men, made their return conditional on the acceptance of the following terms: stly, there was to be no subordination of the wife to the husband; ndly, the women were to be allowed to study, and to have their own universities; rdly, they were to be eligible to the highest positions in the army as in jurisdiction and finance; and finally it was to be considered as shameful an act on the part of a man to break the conjugal faith as on that of a woman, so that men might no longer boast of that which in a woman was deemed criminal. that the last was among the most rankling sores will be seen later on, when the "dual standard of morality" aroused the indignation of true "blues" like mrs. chapone, and equally of radical feminists like mary wollstonecraft. but the piece in which the question was best and most conclusively treated was a comedy, entitled "_la colonie_", which marivaux wrote about the middle of the century, and which, possibly owing to lack of success, was not included in the different editions of his works, so that it is at present accessible only in the _mercure de france_ of [ ]. it was on the whole sympathetic to women, in spite of the failure of their effort--described in the play--to establish a feminine republic, and the pleasantries of which men and women alike are the object. both the weak points of the female character, as vanity, coquetry, garrulity and frivolity, and those of the men, as envy and vainglory, are made the object of ridicule. but the feminist tendency of the whole appears from the fact that the speeches of the female leaders are more reasonable than those of the males who are worsted by them. the women of the island-state, bent upon vindicating their rights, and inflamed by the speeches of arthenice and madame sorbin,--whose respective lover and husband occupy responsible positions on the male side--contemplate a final breach between the sexes. they experience their first disappointment when the young and pretty women refuse to give up their empire of coquetry, especially when told to make themselves ugly! an ultimatum is duly sent to the male leaders, demanding the admission of women to different occupations and equality between the sexes in matrimonial affairs, a refusal of which will mean instant dissolution of the social state. when the men, driven to despair, are on the point of surrendering, a philosopher's stratagem brings relief. rumours are spread of a hostile attack upon the island, and the women, by virtue of the proposed compact, are called upon to swell the ranks of the defending army. this proves too much for the majority, who find that they prefer the worries of the daily household routine to the hardships of war, causing peace to be restored. the periodical essay was also made subservient to the propagation of feminist ideas when in , while in london, mme leprince de beaumont started the "_nouveau magasin français_", in which the rights of women were vindicated with great fervour. nine years later, a second, even more pronounced attempt to adapt the periodical to the female interests was made in the "_bibliothèque des femmes_", which after a short run, was continued in the "_journal des dames_". this paper, which enjoyed great success, was continued for twenty years, during which it served the female interests and contained a number of articles written by women. the original intention of having only female contributors proved incapable of realisation. the paper sang the praises of women in different keys, as an antidote to the daily revilings in other periodicals, and the original idea of promoting the female interests by stimulating the female intellect was gradually lost sight of. but the greatest friends of woman and her cause, who fought and won her battles for her, and were willing to recognise her empire, were the philosophers of the encyclopedia, with the emphatic exception of that most inconsistent of all geniuses: j. j. rousseau. the encyclopedian spirit is best reflected by d'alembert's "_lettre à j. j. rousseau_", written in reply to the "_lettre sur les spectacles_" in the famous controversy on the drama. he protests against the latter's cynical views of womanhood. the human race would be indeed in a pitiable condition, he says, if the worthiest object of the male homage were indeed so rare an occurrence as rousseau chooses to intimate. but supposing he should be right, to what cause would such a deplorable state of things be attributable? "l'esclavage et l'espèce d'avilissement où nous avons mis les femmes; les entraves que nous donnons à leur esprit et à leur âme, le jargon futile et humiliant pour elles et nous; auquel nous avons réduit notre commerce avec elles, comme si elles n'avaient pas une raison à cultiver, ou n'en étaient pas dignes; enfin, l'éducation funeste, je dirai presque meurtrière, que nous leur prescrivons, sans leur permettre d'en avoir d'autre; éducation ou elles apprennent presque uniquement à se contrefaire sans cesse, à n'avoir pas un sentiment qu'elles n'étouffent, une opinion qu'elles ne cachent, une pensée qu'elles ne déguisent. nous traitons la nature en elles comme dans nos jardins, nous cherchons à l'orner en l'étouffant." and d'alembert makes an appeal to the philosophers of the age to destroy so pernicious a prejudice, to shake off the barbarous yoke of custom and to set the example by giving their daughters the same education as their sons, that they may be saved from idleness and the evils that follow inevitably in its train. and the cause of woman thus became incorporated in the great scheme of liberty and equality which was slowly maturing in the master minds of the nation. the gulf that yawned between the two opposing parties was widening every instant. on one side were those in possession of power and authority, leaning upon custom and tradition, drawing what inspiration animated them from the source of the ancients and stubbornly opposing any change which might tend to undermine their position. ranged on the other was the intellect of the nation, the devotees of a philosophy which held the promise of the millennium to be almost within immediate reach, firing the mind with their daring schemes for improvement and asserting the coming triumph of modernism. nothing could be more natural than that woman should throw in her lot with the latter and that her cause should become a subdivision of the great problem of humanity. the great sphere of activity, next to the wide field of literature, was the more modest compass of the eighteenth century salon. madame de lambert herself draws a parallel somewhere between the salons of the seventeenth and those of the eighteenth century, more especially with regard to the prevailing codes of morality. her conclusions, like those of m. brunetière nearly two centuries later, are overwhelmingly in favour of mme de rambouillet and her contemporaries. she complains that the delicate intellectual amusements of the seventeenth century assemblies have been largely superseded by the grosser delights of the card-table and of a declining stage. the merest semblance of knowledge is regarded with disapproval,--this in consequence of molière's furious onslaught in his _femmes savantes_--and as a natural consequence of ignorance, the female morals have sadly decayed. being thus deprived of the means of improving the mind, women are naturally driven to a life of pleasure-seeking. and she doubts whether society has derived any benefit from the change. "les femmes ont mis la débauche à la place du savoir, le précieux qu'on leur a tant reproché, elles l'ont changé en indécence." in other words, mme de lambert wanted to return to the earlier preciosity, granting women the right to be instructed, and trying to steer clear of those excesses which had called forth the attacks of molière and boileau. she emphatically protests against the pernicious habit of making a pleasing appearance the sole aim of female education, and claims for her sex the blessings of an education which in cultivating the mind will improve the female morals. it would be impossible to deny that the moral standard was considerably lower than it had been half a century earlier. the consequences entailed by the revocation of the edict of nantes and by the suppression of port royal had been equally disastrous. the chief bulwarks of protestant and catholic orthodox faith had been removed, leaving a free field to both libertinage and disbelief. the coarseness of manners which it had been the aim of the rambouillet societies to suppress reasserted itself on the one hand, while on the other the rising spirit of philosophical inquiry and scientific research had degenerated into a scepticism which was no longer counteracted by that spirit of religious mysticism which had been a weapon of orthodoxy against unbelief. the encyclopedian spirit often spelt deism and atheism, both of which flourished in the salons. the very fact that their society was no longer exclusive, but freely admitted people of all class and opinions, and from different parts of the world, accounts for the enormous influence exercised by these "bureaux d'esprit" upon public opinion in the eighteenth century. moreover, the monarchical power was declining, and the king, in establishing a barrier between himself and the society of the salons, was himself instrumental in raising opinions which more and more became the prevailing ones, and upon which he had no influence whatever. rationalism began to gain ground rapidly and became a basis for speculations which soon came to include politics and economics. m. brunetière, whose judgment on the salons of the eighteenth century is very severe, complains that the lofty artistic and moral ideals of the preceding generation had given way to scepticism and to cynicism of a kind which made madame de tencin refer to her guests as "ses bêtes". this statement, which no doubt is mainly correct, seems strange in consideration of the fact that it was by the new philosophy which the same salons helped in spreading, that the great problems of the future of the human race were put forward, which in broader minds gave rise to much idealism in what m. du bled so finely calls: "le souci de la modernité." but eighteenth century society regarded philosophy as an intellectual pastime rather than as bringing the hope of relief to the oppressed millions, and if it occasionally dabbled in social problems, the misery of the multitude did not touch the majority of those who lived lives of comfort and luxury, and were utterly unacquainted with suffering, very deeply. no direct attempt at improvement, therefore, was to be expected from them, they were talking in theory about things of the practice of which they knew nothing. brunetière calls the eighteenth century salon "le triomphe de l'universelle incompétence", with which its seventeenth century predecessor, with its more limited programme, compares favourably. it became habitual "to talk wittily of serious problems, while seriously discussing trifling subjects". it needed, indeed, the fiery imagination and fervent enthusiasm of a rousseau to inspire the philosophical theories with the life of his genius. and yet, if the social problems of the time were not directly solved by eighteenth century society, they were at least formulated by it in such a manner as to make them the catchword of the period and to draw to them the attention of those who were better able to do them justice. the very fact that the salons were ruled over by women and independent of court-influence made them the place where opinions were most freely uttered and most readily listened to. literature, which had been the chief occupation of the early salons, now found a powerful rival in science. the poetry of the eighteenth century "ruelles" became of an even lighter and more insipid kind. on the other hand, the latter half of the previous century had witnessed a growing interest in anatomy and surgery, and after the introduction (by fontenelle) of astronomy as a fashionable science, newton became the rage, and ladies of quality like the marquise du châtelet were among his worshippers. the domination of the salons thus became extended to philosophy, science, economics and politics. when the ancient and modern controversy was re-introduced in the opening years of the century, nearly all the female philosophers were fervent partisans of the moderns, believing in a future in which all human beings would be guided by the light of reason. of this eighteenth century modernism, feminism is, in fact, only a subdivision. this appears from the work of poullain de la barre, and still more from the great defence of the cause of woman (when threatened by boileau in satire x "_sur les femmes_") by the great champion of modernism perrault in his "_apologie des femmes_." the moderns, indeed, saw in the prejudice against women a remnant of the servility of antiquity which was in flagrant contradiction with the dictates of reason. hence the close connection between feminist literature in the eighteenth century and life in the salons, of which the authors were mostly among the regular frequenters. the marquise de lambert laid down her ideas of feminism in her "_réflexions sur les femmes_", and we have seen that both d'alembert and marivaux were among the staunch defenders of the right of the sex to equal consideration. boileau's death had left the "précieuses" in the undisputed possession of the field of light literature, to which now became added that of science. this new form of preciosity, "la préciosité scientifique", which made its appearance in the salon of mme de lambert, where it found an ardent worshipper in fontenelle, grew so powerful that even voltaire's efforts to crush it with ridicule were unavailing. so strong had the female dictatorship become, that three of the most influential men-of-letters in the kingdom had vainly tried to get the better of it. but unfortunately the platonic ideal to which the women of the preceding century had owed their ascendancy had degenerated, and in consequence of the altered circumstances women often had to buy with physical submission and degradation that worship of their beauty and deference to their opinion which made them at the same time the rulers and the slaves of men, and against which the moralists of the century, with the glaring exception of rousseau, made it their business to protest loudly, but in vain. mme de lambert merely wanted to restore the right sort of preciosity to its throne as an antidote to the evils of ignorance, in which she set herself the ideals of the hôtel de rambouillet, and advocated moderation in everything. her salon thus became as much a protest against exaggeration and affectation as against the prevailing opinion that the education of women should only aim at teaching them how to please the opposite sex. an occasional frequenter calls it "l'hôtel de rambouillet présidé par fontenelle, et où les précieuses corrigées se souvenaient de molière." being left a widow at a comparatively early age, mme de lambert opened her salon in the palais mazarin in the rue colbert about . she was at that time rather more than fifty, and reigned supreme over her circle of visitors for more than thirty years. she set herself to prove that it was possible to have a lively entertainment without the help of the card-table, relying chiefly on conversation and literature. her tuesdays and wednesdays soon became famous, and attracted both the aristocracy and the literati. among her regular visitors were fontenelle, marivaux, mlle de launay (mme de staal) and de la motte, champion of the moderns, whilst mme dacier undertook the defence of the opposite cause. mme de lambert herself was the ruling spirit of the académie, of which the way towards membership lay through her favour, and the chief literary productions previous to being published--if published they were--were read and criticised in her circle. if mme de lambert deserves mention for having kept a salon which formed a link between the seventeenth and the eighteenth century, and exercised a beneficial influence on the tone of conversation, she is even more entitled to attention on account of the part played by her in the development of feminism. she was a moralist rather than educator, and followed in the steps of fénelon. she had the cartesian belief in the infallibility of reason, with two exceptions, which do honour to the qualities of her heart, and saved her from the inevitable conclusions of logic _à outrance_: religion and honour. "il y a deux préjugés auxquels il faut obéir: la religion et l'honneur", and a little further: "en fait de religion, il faut céder aux autorités. sur tout autre sujet, il ne faut recevoir que celle de la raison et de l'évidence", excluding even honour. but her actions show that she realised the danger which lies in obeying the duties of reason while totally excluding the admonitions of the heart. stronger than her love of logic was that exquisite form of sensibility which made her at least a real champion of the less fortunately situated. there is real concern for the welfare of her inferiors in the precept that "servants should be treated as unhappy friends", and a true love of humanity in the statement that "humanity suffers in consequence of the inequality which fortune has introduced among men". words which come from the heart and entitle her to sympathy and admiration. her ideas concerning female education are contained in the "_avis d'une mère à sa fille_". she insists on the importance of cultivating the female mind to render woman an agreeable companion to her husband, who will then honour her and give her her due. and she places herself on the standpoint which mary wollstonecraft took after her, in basing upon this foundation her vindication of women's _right_ to be instructed. she complains of the tyranny of men, who condemn to ignorance the partners of their wedded lives, disregarding the pernicious consequences entailed thereby. for ignorance leads to vice, and the mind should be kept employed, were it only as a means of avoiding mischief. to mme de lambert the muses were "l'asyle des moeurs". her educational scheme contains more instruction than fénelon's, as it includes philosophy, which is to reclaim women to virtue through the medium of reason. of all the french female authors on the woman question it is mme de lambert whose ideas show the nearest approach to mary wollstonecraft. the essential difference between the two--the former's indifference to political emancipation--was due to a difference in social circumstances, which made her a ruler whose influence over men no political enfranchisement could have increased, and also to the condition of things in france, where the first steps towards the political equality of the stronger sex were yet to be taken. she believed the domestic circle to be the proper sphere of women, and her "metaphysics" of love--if less fantastic than the ideals of her th century predecessors, which, however, found some adherents among the regulars of her own circle in de la motte and the duchesse du maine--were certainly more conducive to real happiness in the high moral principles out of which they arose. it was the marquis d'argenson who said of her writings that they were "un résumé complet de la morale du monde et du temps présent la plus parfaite", and there seems no reason to doubt the truth of his judgment. unfortunately the good example set by the marquise de lambert was not followed in other circles, where the increasing influence of the feminine element, instead of purifying the morals of the male sex, depraved them yet further. the great catastrophe of the end of the century was hastened by the vicious excesses of many females. goncourt says that the eighteenth century lady of quality represented the principle that governed society, the reason which directed it and the voice which commanded it; she was, in fact, "la cause universelle et fatale, l'origine des événements, la source des choses," and nothing could be achieved without her concurrence. rousseau, when first arriving in paris, was advised by a jesuit to cultivate the acquaintance of women, "for nothing ever happened in paris except through them". the bulk of female influence upon the morals of the century was disastrous. the gross materialism amongst society-women found expression in a well-known utterance of the marquise du châtelet: "we are here merely to procure ourselves the greatest possible variety of agreeable sensations." the most perverse code of morality came to reign in some of the most-frequented salons. one of the leading hostesses of paris boasted that one of her reception-days was reserved for "gentlemen of a damaged reputation", the so-called "jour des coquins". of the englishmen who frequented these circles of appalling vice, horace walpole--who in a space of forty years paid six successive visits to paris, and who was very far indeed from being a sentimentalist,--refers to the utter absence of any sense of decency among people whose chief occupation was the demolition of all authority, whether temporal or spiritual, including the divine authority itself. one of the worst examples of the epicurian spirit was furnished by the salon of the notorious mme de tencin. she disdained even to keep up the appearance of quasi-platonic courtship and lived in open and shameless debauch. her entire life was made up of political intrigues and adventures of gallantry, in which she turned the latter to account to promote the former. she possessed plenty of literary talent, and her two novels "_le comte de comminges_" and "_le siège_ _de calais_" rank among the best female productions of the century--but even fontenelle thought her heartless. after a childhood spent in the very imperfect seclusion of a convent which was notorious for its nocturnal orgies, "la religieuse tencin" came to paris in to begin her siege of male hearts, directing her first attack against no less a person than the regent himself, and ultimately contenting herself with one of his ministers, which gallant adventure was followed by many more. she gave birth to a child, whom she deposited on the steps of a church, to be found and brought up by strangers. this child afterwards became the famous d'alembert. in order to be able to pursue her political schemes she filled her salon on different days of the week with people of various occupations and interests; keeping philosophers and académiciens, politicians and ecclesiastics carefully separated, making herself their confidante, and possessing herself of their secrets, managing them all so cleverly that they became her tools without being aware of it, secretly despising her "bêtes" while openly flattering them. the visitors to her two weekly dinners were nearly all men, bolingbroke and matthew prior being among her "habitués". apart from mme geoffrin, who became her successor, and of whom she said that "she only came to see if there was anything among her inventory that she might have a use for", there were hardly any women, for mme de tencin would brook no possible rivals. such was her degradation that she wrote a most indecent "_chronique scandaleuse_" for the special delectation of the regent. as mme de lambert's salon represents eighteenth century society at its best, so mme de tencin's foreshadowed some of the worst instances of female intriguing that were to follow. a totally different salon was that kept by mme geoffrin. mme de tencin--whose own birth was not above suspicion--had all the pride of class, and looked down upon the third estate; mme geoffrin on the contrary was the daughter of a court-valet and consequently remained all her life a "bourgeoise", without any pretence to "préciosité" or anything but a kind and warm heart, a most remarkable wit, sound common sense and a natural delicacy which made her an ideal hostess. for mme de tencin's lofty disdain she substituted an almost maternal solicitude for the welfare of her "children", who, with the exception of mlle de lespinasse, were of the male sex. besides d'alembert, diderot, morellet and grimm there were the ubiquitous horace walpole, david hume the philosopher and wraxall; the first-named of whom in his correspondence declared her to be "a most extraordinary woman with more common sense than he had ever encountered in one of her sex." the principles of the salon in the rue st. honoré were much the same as at mme de tencin's, but a milder spirit prevailed, and the demon of intrigue was absent. mme geoffrin kept fixed reception-days, her mondays being devoted to artists, and her wednesdays to men-of-letters and philosophers, while her intimates were made welcome on both days. the hostess presided over the assemblies without in any way obtruding her personal opinions or bringing her private interests into play, exercising an absolute authority which never became tyranny, and keeping peace among the more excitable of her guests[ ]. she was much appreciated by them all, not least by the future king of poland, stanislas augustus, her devoted "son", causing walpole to refer to her as "the queen-mother of poland". her apotheosis came when in her sixty-eighth year she visited warsaw, where she met with a royal reception. after her return her mental powers declined rapidly, and her daughter--fearing the influence of scepticism upon her mother--kept her favourite philosophers at a distance, eliciting from her the remark that she was, like godfrey of bouillon, "protecting her tomb against the infidels." the third of the "muses of the philosophical decameron", whose salon was much in vogue, was julie de lespinasse, whose attractive personality and brilliant conversational and epistolary powers account for her success. she combined the warmth of heart of mme geoffrin with the ardent temperament of mme de tencin, but without the latter's brazen-facedness. she possessed a degree of sensibility which made her succumb to different lovers "for each of whom she cherished a passion which it was beyond her power to resist." her youth had been fed with richardson, "_clarissa harlowe_" being her favourite. she had entered the employ of the famous marquise du deffand, herself a prominent hostess, in the capacity of reader. her wit and the natural buoyancy of her character soon made her more popular than her mistress, whose guests took to visiting her in her room, while her mistress was still asleep. mme du deffand in her jealousy accused her of "skimming off the cream of her visitors' conversation"; a breach followed, and julie was enabled by some supporters to set up a small salon in the rue st. dominique, which flourished from till the year of her death in . she could not afford sumptuous dinners, but her guests were sure of a warm welcome and of some interesting conversation, which she conducted so tactfully, effacing herself completely and making her guests feel at home by always appearing interested, that her lack of personal beauty was quite forgotten in the charm of her manner. politics were a frequent topic, and mlle de lespinasse was among the professed admirers of the british constitution. d'alembert, condorcet, turgot and also mme geoffrin belonged to her circle, and that walpole knew her also, appears from the correspondence between him and mme du deffand, who at julie's death complained that the rupture with her had robbed her of the friendship of d'alembert. while the women of society were celebrating their triumphs in the salons, philosophy was trying to do something for the female multitude. we have seen that it was fénelon who caused education to be included among the subjects of moral philosophy, but it was the diffusive power of rousseau's writings that made it one of the most frequently discussed themes of the century. his "_emile, ou de l'education_", which appeared in --curiously enough, the year of the suppression of jesuitism in france--marked a new era in the history of education, if not in that of feminism. of rousseau it might have been reasonably expected as the champion of liberty and equality to carry to their full extent the philosophical venturings of fénelon and thus to usher in a new era of female emancipation. however, with an inconsistency which is one of his chief characteristics, rousseau not only deliberately left the female half of mankind out of his scheme for political enfranchisement, but ranged himself among the anti-feminists by the great emphasis he laid on the consideration of a sexual character, which he construed into evidence of female inferiority, by arguing that it makes the subjection of woman a natural law, which is to be respected according to the theory that "whatever is in nature, must be right." owing to the contradictory nature of his views, however, while directly opposing the movement, he indirectly furthered it in two ways. in the first place, his social theories were adopted without reserve and without restrictions by some of his followers, who thus repaired the omission which had left woman out of the scheme; and secondly it was rousseau who once for all broke the back of the monastic system of education by continuing the campaign which fénelon in theory, and mme de maintenon in practice, had entered upon before him, and bringing it to a happy conclusion. the reduction and ultimate abolition of the education of religion, which was one of the great victories of the philosophical school, became manifest in the latter half of the century. it was a signal success, achieved over an unwilling government and crowned by the expulsion of the jesuits, who had formed one of the chief bulwarks against the growing revolutionary spirit. the cartesian principles, which had been a beacon-light to seventeenth century philosophy, were supplemented in the next by a new element: that of _utility_. in john locke's "_treatises of government_" and also in "_some thoughts concerning education_", he let himself be guided chiefly by considerations of usefulness, thus becoming the founder of that doctrine of utilitarianism which, after influencing the french encyclopedians, was to return to england a century later and to find a fervent champion in william godwin. in deciding upon a course of action, the inevitable question was: "what is the use?" and this guiding principle became paramount also in matters of education. to locke, who was a man of practical sense and not a mere theorist, the problem was how to make people understand their real interests, and to make them act in accordance with them, which must necessarily lead to happiness. his educational system, therefore, is based upon the communication of such useful knowledge as will most contribute to the total amount of happiness to be found on this globe[ ]. locke insisted on the necessity for a physical education which increases the mental and moral capacity by rendering the body less subject to fatigue. simplicity and effectiveness in dress and food, and plenty of outdoor exercise are recommended, and in this important matter, as indeed in a great many others, locke may be said to have struck the keynote of the philosophical tendencies of the eighteenth century, anticipating the famous nature-theory of rousseau. many important questions were mooted by him. he introduced the ethical problem of reward and punishment, and discussed the advisability of reasoning with a child and of making him learn a trade, which became a part of the educational programme of the next generations. the french philosophers became locke's immediate heirs, and afterwards repaid their debt to england with interest. where locke gave his "young gentleman" a tutor, his views were adopted by the opponents of the monastic education. it could hardly be expected of locke, who lived in a time when the female fortunes in his own country were at a very low ebb, to have paid much attention to the possibility of making women share in the obvious advantages of the new system. however, if he did little or nothing for british women, his theories were turned to account for the benefit of their french sisters, whose position in the lower walks of life was not very much better than theirs. his french disciples, carrying the theory of utility to its fullest extent, included the female sex in their reflections. the first in point of time was the abbé de st. pierre, of whom rousseau contemptuously said that he was "a man of great schemes and narrow views". seen from a feminist standpoint this judgment is cruelly unjust. for, even granting that the abbé's schemes were too utopian to be capable of full realisation--a circumstance he himself sadly recognised--the fact remains that he was responsible for the first project of female education _on a national basis_, making wholesale education a state-concern and thus wanting to extend the benefit of instruction to many who would otherwise be deprived of it. he stands at the beginning of the lane that leads via bernardin de st. pierre and talleyrand to the great condorcet. the abbé de st. pierre was willing to grant women _as a class_ that equality which the better-class women had actually attained, and he believed in their instruction, holding that on the instruction given to the young, whether male or female, depended the happiness of the coming race. but he believed still more in the necessity for a moral education, for his utilitarianism is not of this earth, but of eternity. with him the ever recurring question is: "what will it profit the soul?", and the fear of punishment in hell is rather stronger with him than the sense of moral duty. he thus laid himself open to attack from the notorious mme de puysieux, who believed in reputation and the preservation of appearances, informing him that it was silly to let the fear of hell withhold people from seeking happiness by cultivating the good opinion of others, _whether deserved or not_! the final clause sums up what moralists found most objectionable in the inclinations of a depraved age. the real aim of women, according to the abbé, should be to please god, and not men, so as to gain eternal life. he has no ambition for women beyond that of making them devout christians and good housekeepers, and his educational efforts are accordingly directed towards these two accomplishments. girls are to dress simply, to eschew cards--that curse of the age--and to learn useful needlework, the keeping of accounts and in general such things as will be of the greatest use to them in the performance of their domestic duties. but he very unaccountably refuses their youth the advantages and innocent enjoyments of home-life, wishing them to be brought up in colleges, in which they are to be kept immured until such time as their education will be completed, when they will be ready for matrimony! at college girls may learn to be good citizenesses, but they will scarcely gain the necessary experience for managing a home of their own. the comprehensiveness of his scheme, however, and his recognition of the female equality entitles him to a place in the history of feminism above rousseau. the latter's attitude towards the feminist movement is so complicated as to demand careful analysis. where women were concerned the strong individuality of the female genius would not allow him to side fully either with "those who wished to condemn them to a life of household-drudgery, making of them a sort of superior slaves, or those who, not satisfied to vindicate woman's rights, made her usurp those of the stronger sex", for the former have too low a notion of the duties of womanhood, whilst the latter overlook the considerations of a sexual character by which, according to rousseau, the relations between the sexes are exclusively determined. rousseau's opinion of the depth to which women had sunk appears from his "_lettre à d'alembert sur les spectacles_," which contains a fierce onslaught upon their moral perversity, which has caused the drama, too feeble to rise to worthier themes, to fall back upon erotics of a most despicable kind. rousseau judged women capable of becoming something better than what eighteenth century society had made of them, but in his demands for them and in his schemes for perfecting their moral education he was extremely modest. next to the salons he held the education of the convents, "ces véritables écoles de coquetterie", to be chiefly responsible for the degradation of the female character. the young women who, on leaving them, enter society, carry into instant practice the lessons of vanity and coquetry which the convents have supplied. for convent and salon rousseau wanted to substitute the blessings of true domesticity--painted in glowing colours in the pages of the "_nouvelle héloise_." his sympathies went out, not to that college-life of which the abbé de st. pierre had such sanguine expectations, but to the intimacies of the family-circle, presided over by loving parents, an ideal which he reintroduced in the fifth book of his treatise on education, where, circumstances rendering it advisable to provide the finished male product with a suitable partner for life, the principles of sophie's education are elaborately described[ ]. where he recommends making the duties of life as pleasant as possible to the young pupil, protesting against that austere conception which allowed her no other diversion than studies and prayers, rousseau sides with fénelon. in his opinion girls enjoy too little freedom, whilst grown-up women are left too much liberty. let the young girls have an opportunity to enjoy life, he says, or they will take it when they are older. nor does the notion of making them at an early age acquainted with the world inspire him with terror, for he trusts with mme de sévigné that the sight of noisy gatherings will only fill them with disgust instead of tempting them to imitation. so far there is nothing anti-feminist in rousseau's ideas. but unfortunately we have come to the end of what is positive and his further utterances rather advocate woman's subjection than her enfranchisement. the habit of reverting to first principles which is so dominant a characteristic of his nature-theory makes him draw a parallel between the sexes upon the foundation of those innate qualities which constitute the sexual character. men and women are the same in whatever is independent of sex, and radically different, almost diametrically opposed, in all that pertains to it. thus all disputes regarding equality are vain, for "in what the sexes have in common they are naturally equal, and in that in which they differ no comparison is possible". and woman is to be congratulated upon this diversity, for in it lies the great secret of her subtle power. where woman asserts the natural rights which arise from this difference she is superior to man; where she tries to usurp the natural rights of the opposite sex she remains hopelessly below their level. the two sexes have different spheres of activity, and each sex can do well only in its own sharply-defined sphere. reason itself demands this stress laid on the contrast between the sexes. for, says rousseau, once women are brought up to be as like men as possible, their authority and influence, _which are rooted_ _in their being essentially different_, will be lost without a substitute. this remark is one of great wisdom and psychological insight. rousseau saw what many extreme feminists are so apt to forget, that those who wish to develop in women those qualities which naturally belong to man, and to suppress in them what is proper to their own sex, are in reality doing them irreparable harm. there are, according to rousseau, a male empire and a female one. the former rests upon a foundation of superior physical strength and mental superiority; but although the stronger sex are masters in appearance, they in reality depend on the weaker. for the female empire, _established by nature herself_, derives its strength from those delicate feminine charms which command the worship of that gallantry which nature again has instilled into the hearts of men. in giving this interpretation of female power and influence rousseau exposed himself to attack. the platonic worship, we have seen, had sadly degenerated, and what remained was a worthless, hypocritical imitation which was felt by well-meaning women as an insult rather than a compliment. but what called down a storm of feminist indignation upon his head was the sweeping conclusion he drew from the natural law that man, having physical strength on his side, must always play the active part in the intercourse between people of different sexes, while woman has to be always content with the passive rôle. "the sole object of women," says rousseau, "ought consequently to be _to please_ men, on whom their relative weakness has made them dependent", and goes on to assert that all female education should as a natural consequence be "relative to men". there is in the above passage, which shows that on the subject of feminism rousseau, instead of a revolutionary, was rather a conservative, nothing to suggest the bold and daring vindication of female rights that was so soon to resound in the philosophical world like a mighty trumpet-blast. his ideas about the position of woman are characteristic of his want of equilibrium in presenting a bewildering chaos of judicious observations and unaccountable oversights. it is not so much that some of his statements are untrue, as that they are incomplete. in drawing sweeping conclusions from the physical inferiority of the sex he deliberately closes his eyes to their moral and mental possibilities. it is true that he insists upon a moral education for women, but whatever of merit may be contained in this claim is instantly neutralised by its only object: making women more acceptable companions to their husbands, contributing to the happiness of the latter by unwearying devotion and unalterable constancy. there are undoubtedly many women to whom the above would seem the most acceptable task, as there are others whose consciousness of their talents would make them indignantly reject so subordinate a part. as long as women are not cut after the same pattern, allowance will have to be made for individual propensities and any theory, however cleverly put together, will succeed with some types of womanhood and hopelessly fail with others. st. marc girardin indignantly remarks that the condition of the women in rousseau's nature-scheme suggests the oriental seraglio. this is an exaggeration, for the "relative education" is qualified by rousseau to such an extent that the harem-picture which it may at first conjure up is considerably modified. he wished the term "made to please men" to be understood in a far wider meaning than the merely sensual, for no one realised better than he that in the absence of a spiritual element no love based upon the grosser passions can possibly endure. where the female weaknesses and vanities are concerned rousseau's discernment even surpasses that of fénelon. the task of woman being to please, nature has made her regard above all things the opinion of the opposite sex. and the moralist who teaches men to ignore the opinion of others as destructive of individuality, goes so far as to prescribe for women an unlimited deference to opinion and reputation. "opinion, which is the grave of virtue among men, ought to be among women its high throne". the utilitarian question: "a quoi cela est-il bon?", which is to be the guiding principle in emile's case, changes its character where sophie is concerned, and becomes: "quel effet cela fera-t-il?" the question what impression a thing will produce naturally leads to putting the shadow before the substance, and appearance before reality, and as such may have a most disastrous effect. sophie's love of needlework is accounted for not so much by considerations of usefulness as by the reflection that this delicate occupation will make her appear to advantage to her admirer. the same train of thoughts makes her abominate the useful occupation of cooking, by which her hands might become soiled. did rousseau actually imagine that his much-recommended simplicity in dress would hold out against the innate love of finery which was to help in the accomplishment of what he considered the chief aim of womanhood? rousseau certainly did not mean to imply that woman must of necessity be morally inferior to man, but simply that nature had ordained that she shall be subjected to his superior strength, to his cooler judgment and to his superior common sense. he was certainly capable of imagining an ideal female, and of worshipping in her the essentially sexual qualities which make her differ from man. that portion of the fifth book of _emile_ which deals with the first meeting between the lovers leaves little doubt as to how he pictured to himself his ideal of womanhood. the philosophical treatise is more than once in danger of becoming a romance, embodying the slightly sobered ideals of courtship of the author of "_julie_". it cannot be denied that sophie has charm and that her subjection to emile is not oppressive. but to form a correct notion of rousseau's ideas regarding the social position of women we must strip the story of its lyrical element and glance at the purely philosophical portion of the treatise. it is there that we must look for an answer to the question: "did rousseau look upon women as partakers of the faculty of reason?" and he gives his reply in the following words: "l'art de penser n'est pas étranger aux femmes, mais elles ne doivent faire qu'effleurer les sciences de raisonnement." he would not even object to a system by which the functions of women were strictly limited to the performance of sexual duties, if it were not that utter ignorance would make them fall a too easy prey to rascally adventurers! the subsequent statement that, after all, it being the task of woman to get herself esteemed, _so as to justify her husband's choice_, a little knowledge would not come amiss, does not mend matters in its re-introduction of the relativity-principle. here indeed, rousseau "pitches the pipe too low". woman's special domain is that of sentiment. but the very "sensibility" which renders her more alluring by contrast, prevents her from forming a sound judgment. this appreciation of women appears clearly in the passages of _emile_ in which the choice of a religion is discussed. emile is not allowed to decide until he has completed his eighteenth year, when he is made to judge for himself, uninfluenced by his tutor. sophie's religious notions, on the contrary, are carefully instilled by her parents at an early age, it being silently taken for granted that she will never arrive at a degree of understanding which will enable her to form her own convictions. "the female reason is of a practical nature, which renders them very quick to find the means of arriving at a fixed conclusion, but _does not enable them_ _to form that conclusion independently of others_". again that utter dependence, that total lack of individuality which characterises rousseau's female ideal. "my daughter", says sophie's father, "knowledge does not belong to your age; when the time has come, your husband will instruct you." the amount of actual instruction in rousseau's scheme is reduced to a minimum. there is no knowing what damage may be done to the unstable female imagination by the dangerous literature of the time. here we recognise the author of the dijon prize-essay with its crushing conclusion. rousseau frankly hated the "femme bel esprit". sophie's mind is to be formed by observation and reflection, and not by books. but how can sophie be supposed to reflect, one might ask, unless she had certain fundamental truths pointed out to her, the instilment of which is not the work of every parent, however well-intentioned? it is rousseau's fatal mistake that he cannot bring himself to realise that moral culture simply cannot exist without a certain amount of intellectual culture. he wanted to have both granted to men, and his conclusions tended to withhold both from women. the march of humanity finds him in the first rank of those who were pioneers; the feminist movement, while recognising his cleverness, looks upon him as a dangerous, and sometimes does him the injustice of calling him an hypocritical enemy. the charge of insincerity has, indeed, been often brought against him, although he has found some defenders also. however, he is condemned by most women. mrs. fawcett, in her introduction to mary wollstonecraft's _vindication_, opines that a man who made so light of his duties towards his own children, and whose married life was so full of blame has no right to pronounce on problems which require the disinterestedness and self-abnegation of the pure idealist. where rousseau points out the shortcomings of the women, of his time and regrets them, he is with mary wollstonecraft; where he fails to show the way by which improvement may be attained, he remains hopelessly behind one who, with considerably less genius, had a great deal more moral courage and a far wider conception of the ideals of woman. of the disciples and opponents of rousseau, some of whom, like mme de staël, mme de genlis, and mme de necker de saussure were of the female sex, little need be said here, as their writings either did not throw any new light on the problem under consideration, or belong to a period following that of mary wollstonecraft. when the revolution came, bringing with it an increased demand for a public education, some of its theorists, who like condorcet, showed an interest in the female part of the problem, will call for mention. footnotes: [ ] the "_revue d'histoire littéraire de la france_" (tome xxiii, xxiv and xxv) contains a contribution by m. raymond toinet entitled: "les ecrivains moralistes au ième siècle"; being an alphabetical nomenclature of moral writings published during the age of louis the fourteenth ( - ). in this list works of a feminist or an anti-feminist nature figure so largely that little doubt can be entertained as to the interest taken in the topic under discussion. they may be conveniently classified as follows: _ ._ _assertions of female superiority_, including a. o. two french translations of agrippa, three pieces entitled: "_le triomphe des dames_", and one by mlle. jacquette guillaume, entitled: "_les dames illustres_". they were frequently combined with attacks on the male half of humanity, as in the case of regnard's "_satire contre les maris_". _ ._ _apologies for the female sex_, including perrault's "_apologie des femmes_", poullain de la barre's "_egalité des deux sexes_", and a latin translation of anna maria schuurman. some were meant as a refutation of some male attack. to this class belong ninon de l'enclos' "_coquette vengee_" and a number of replies to boileau's satire. _ ._ _attacks on the female sex_, which are gradually diminishing in number, or rather changing from the direct invective to the moral essay with a didactic purpose, busying itself with the female morals and the female character. a collection of pieces dealing with the problem of sexual preference was published in by de vertron under the name of "_la nouvelle pandore, ou les femmes illustres du siècle de louis le grand_". _ ._ _rules of female conduct_, for the use of young ladies "about to enter the world", insisting chiefly on the feminine duty of preserving the reputation. a translation of lord halifax's "_advice_" (see page ), "_etrennes ou conseils d'un homme de qualité à sa fille_" seems to have attracted some notice. _ ._ _pieces dealing with the relations between the sexes in daily intercourse_, including the subjects of love and gallantry, and of marriage. some are directly favourable to the state of matrimony, pointing to the reciprocal duties of the partners in the contract, and instructing them in the readiest way to happiness; others, frequently deriving their inspiration from boileau, arguing about marriage as a social institution and enumerating its advantages and its drawbacks. to the period under discussion belongs a translation of erasmus' "_christian marriage_". _ ._ _treatises of female education_, containing a plea for the development of the female intellect. they are, as yet, remarkably few. beyond the contributions by poullain de la barre and fénelon there are some half-dozen pieces dealing with the education of girls on a religious basis, and a few in which the question of the pursuit of science and philosophy by women is stated and answered favourably. there was an "_apologie de la science des dames, par cléante_", ( ); a treatise entitled: "_avantages que les femmes peuvent recevoir de la philosophie et principalement de la morale_", ( ); another by rené bary bearing the somewhat questionable title of "_la fine philosophie accommodée à l'intelligence des dames_", and, in conclusion, one by guillaume colletet, headed: "_question célèbre, s'il est nécessaire ou non que les filles soient savantes, agitée de part et d'autre par mlle anne marie de schurmann, hollandoise, et andré rivet, poictevin, le tout mis en françois par le sieur colletet_" ( ) [ ] "_la nouvelle colonie, ou la ligue des femmes_", first presented in the théâtre italien on the th of april , a three-act comedy, afterwards reduced to one single act to be performed in the "théâtres de société", and published in this form in the _mercure_. (cf. larroumet; _marivaux, sa vie et ses oeuvres_, paris ). [ ] such, at least, is the description of mme geoffrin's character in m. e. pilon's "_portraits français_". m. g. lanson, in his "_lettres du dix-huitième siècle_", accuses her of vanity and consequent despotic leanings. "elle aimait à conseiller ses amis, et les régentait en mère un peu despotique; elle n'aimait pas les indépendants, les âmes indociles et fières qui ne se laissent pas protéger, et veulent être consultés dans le bien qu'on leur fait". [ ] that a great many of the utilitarian ideas of john locke may be traced to their origin in the works of montaigne has been demonstrated by m. pierre villey in his "_l'influence de montaigne sur les idées pédagogiques de locke et de rousseau_", who thus claims for the literature of his own country an honour which was commonly granted to that of england. [ ] the education recommended for emile is not domestic. he was to be kept carefully isolated from the world, so as to escape its taint, until such time as his character would be fully matured, placing him above the reach of disastrous influences. a similar principle had prevailed at mme de maintenon's establishment of st. cyr. chapter iv. _feminist and anti-feminist tendencies among the english augustans._ in studying the march of feminism among the two rival nations on either side the channel, one cannot help being struck by the remarkable lateness of anything resembling a feminist movement in england. that the women of mediaeval england were looked down upon, not only on account of their inferior muscular strength, but also on the score of their supposed want of mental and moral stability, appears but too plainly from the numerous scornful references to the weaker sex in the literature of those days. the song-collections of the transition period clearly betray the "esprit gaulois" in their brutal estimate of woman and in the tone of undisguised contempt and ridicule which prevails whenever women are the theme. the often-repeated story of the henpecked husband and the shrewish wife contains a warning against marriage which, although couched in the form of banter, evidently has its foundation in the general conviction of female depravity. the early plays with their brawling scenes and stock female characters were also most unfavourable to women. nor did the early renaissance bring any marked improvement either in the female morals or in the male appreciation of them, for the satires against women continued with hardly a refutation. the improvement which resulted in ascham's days from the awakening female interest in learning and in the caroline period from the introduction into poetry of the platonic love ideal, was too partial and too qualified to be permanent, and in later years the puritanic ideal of womanhood was an abomination to feminists of the wollstonecraft type. but the general estimate of women in england had never been lower than in the notorious days that followed the restoration. in the middle ages all influence had been denied them on the score of their supposed inferiority of understanding and inequality of temper; the men of the reign of charles ii regarded them merely as fair dissemblers and utter strangers to the nobler motives, in which opinion the ladies of the age did all they could to confirm them. the higher the society in which they moved, the less likely they were to escape the many vices which prevailed in that age of depravity and libertinism. there were, of course, the puritans, who were forced by circumstances to lead lives of retirement, regarding the vicious excesses of whitehall with disgust and jealously guarding their women against degrading influences. the puritan ideal of womanhood was thus preserved; but there was no promise for the future in the state of close confinement and complete submission which the judaic notions of puritanism demanded. in those days, when night was darkest, a faint glimmer of a coming dawn was seen. it consisted in some women beginning to take a modest share in literary pursuits. when late in the seventeenth and early in the th century the modern novel was passing through its preparatory stage, mrs. aphra behn, mrs. manley, mrs. haywood and some other women realised that here was a new domain of literature in which woman was qualified by her fertile imagination and quick power of observation to excel. even before the restoration, the birth of a new social problem dealing with the relative positions of the sexes was heralded in the works of margaret cavendish, duchess of newcastle[ ]. however, public opinion stamped any such efforts--whether conscious or no--as immature, and therefore doomed to failure. all through the late seventeenth and early eighteenth century women were regarded from a purely sexual point of view; they were, as mr. lyon blease calls it "enveloped in an atmosphere of sex". their being judged exclusively by a sexual standard entailed as a necessary consequence the scornful neglect of those among them who were disqualified by age or lack of physical attractions. if the lot of the married women was often a sad one, considering the habitual inconstancy of husbands, the condition of those who had drawn a blank in the matrimonial lottery was even more pitiable. hence that desperate hunting for husbands which it is among the most creditable performances of modern feminism to have lessened. it is easy to understand that it is among forsaken married women and especially among the more pronounced spinsters that we must look for such elements of female wisdom and virtue as the barren age affords. the middle-aged mother of a family was sometimes possessed of a certain hard-acquired dignity; and to the often bitter experiences of spinsterhood we owe women of the type of mary astell. but contemporary literature, while on the whole inclined to be lenient towards married women who became "stricken in years" was almost uniformly severe in dealing with the "old maid of fiction", and the unmarried female had to await the broader days of humanitarianism to have her troubles understood and her wrongs righted. but even the more privileged among the female sex, those who in their personal attractions possessed some kind of coin, the value of which masculine opinion was not slow to recognise, were not much better off than their plain sisters. the prevailing views regarding the place of women in social life were the direct outcome of the general tendencies of egoism and materialism by which the age was characterised. woman was regarded only in her relations to the male sex, and, what was worse, woman herself had not yet learned to rebel against the shackles of a convention of centuries, unquestioningly adopted the male verdict and tried her hardest to become what the opposite sex wanted her to be. they found it easy to relinquish all individuality, and live up to the ideal set up by a degenerated manhood, and readily assumed the vices which their lack of any sense of moral responsibility prevented them from recognising as such. this total absence of moral purpose is a characteristic of the age which was not restricted to women only. the moral standard had sunk very low indeed, existence among the better situated seemed exclusively devoted to the pursuit of pleasure with all its attendant vices. from the male standpoint this view of life determined the esteem in which the female sex was held. the eighteenth century "beau" regarded woman only as an instrument of animal passion, which hypocrisy tried very successfully to gild over with a varnish of mock gallantry that was a remnant of better times of platonic chivalry, and aroused the indignation of moralists. this gallantry tried to make up in extravagance for what it lacked in sincerity. the pursuit of the object of his passion led the libertine to the most absurd excesses which were very far removed from a devout worship[ ]. love had become a grossly sensual passion, and women were treated with exaggerated ceremony, but with little respect. men held with pope that "every woman is at heart a rake", and treated them accordingly. they laid a mock siege to what was conventionally called "the female heart" and when that fortress in an unguarded moment surrendered or was taken by storm, the conqueror, after enjoying the spoils of his victory, left the poor victim to pay the penalty of social excommunication and flaunted his conquest in the face of a society which maintained a double standard of morality, and in which seduction and adultery on the part of the male were held to be titles of honour. to fully understand the eighteenth century interpretation of the passion of love we have only to scan the pages of that new form of fiction, the novel, which has supplied us with a truthful and lifelike picture of the morals and manners of the time. in many of them the heroine is made the object of libertine attempts which to the twentieth century reader are absolutely revolting. it is true that she does not submit to the outrage, but defends her honour as well as she is able--strange to say, the eighteenth century heroine, apart from a few females of the picaresque kind, is generally represented as virtuous and chaste, rather a picture of womanhood as the author liked to imagine than a faithful one, a circumstance for which the presence of a moral purpose may account--but the secondary female characters are often of a frailty which contrasts strongly with it. the "_memoirs of a lady of quality_" in _peregrine pickle_, for instance, are a frank confession of the most shameless female profligacy, and the outrages upon decorum and good taste described in them are corroborated by numerous descriptions of female indecency and wantonness displayed either in the baths of the fashionable watering-places or at the masquerades which were in great vogue, giving the female sex ample opportunity for displaying their charms with an utter want of delicacy. nor were the "bucks", "beaux" or "maccaronies" at all inclined to be particular with regard to the language they used in the presence of ladies. the obscenity of their conversation aroused the indignation of swift's stella, but upon the whole women were too much accustomed to the coarseness of male conversation to think of protesting, nor did their parents or husbands think it necessary to interfere. besides which, the dialogue of those novels which constituted their daily amusement was of much the same kind, and even the works of an aphra behn or a mrs. manley were read freely in the presence of young girls without being considered in the least offensive to feminine delicacy. the improvement which the latter half of the century witnessed in this respect was, as we shall see, in no small measure due to female influence. the bluestocking circles were largely instrumental in bringing about this purifying of conversational and literary taste. the female novelists of the next generation, while following in the steps of richardson and fielding, and imitating their choice of incidents, do not imitate their revolting coarseness. the stories of libertinage and violence occur in a much modified form, and the treatment is less offensive and not unfrequently humorous, taking the edge off the indelicacy of many a doubtful situation. the chief literary exponents of female depravity, satirising women for what they were and hardly allowing an exception to the general rule, forgetting the part of men in their degraded state, and regarding the prospect of improvement with a degree of scepticism which has made them the abomination of feminists, were alexander pope and lord chesterfield. pope's estimate of the sex, contained in the second of the "_moral essays_", and confirmed by numerous allusions in his other works, ranks him among those who jeer at women in general. their two prevailing passions according to him, are "love of pleasure", and "love of sway": "men, some to bus'ness, some to pleasure take, but every woman is at heart a rake: men, some to quiet, some to public strife, but every lady would be queen for life." the former he is rather inclined to excuse, for "where the lesson taught is but to please, can pleasure be a fault?" but the latter contains in it the germs of unavoidable wretchedness to the woman who outlives the power and influence which beauty grants her and whose punishment consists in finding herself in later years friendless and neglected, and without the redeeming blessing of a cultivated intellect and a sensitive heart, which "... shall grow, while what fatigues the ring flaunts and goes down, an unregarded thing." the many inconsistencies in the female character are passed in review and scourged with the whip of a satirist who does not care to rack his brains for means of improvement, but whose egoism revels in the intellectual delight of scathing ridicule. women make their very changeability a means of attracting suitors, they are "like variegated tulips," showing many colours and attracting chiefly by variety: "yet ne'er so sure our passion to create as when she touched the brink of all we hate." it was no doubt pope's intention to run down the entire female sex, but while uttering the above insinuation, he seems fatally blind to the very questionable light the successful application of certain female devices reflected on the contemporary male character! from a purely feminist point of view, the name of "cold-hearted rascal", by which mary wollstonecraft distinguished the earl of chesterfield, although not altogether deserved--for where his son was concerned he was anything but "cold-hearted"--may be easily accounted for. whenever woman is the subject, his contentions as well as his tone of uttering them betray a callous, contemptuous cynicism which marks the man of fashion who "knows the season, when to take occasion by the hand", and has been taught by the intricacies of diplomacy to regard women from a purely egoistical standpoint as political weathercocks, whose undeniable influence may be turned to account, but upon whom otherwise no judgment can be too severe. there is in his writings no trace of interest whatever in women for their own sake; despising them for their weaknesses, he regards them merely as possible instruments by which his personal ends may be furthered. the morality preached in the famous "_letters to his son_" (written between the years and , representing the dawn of the bluestocking movement) has been severely and deservedly criticised. their worst defect as well as their greatest danger is that while containing a number of maxims which are absolutely repugnant in their cynicism, they were written for an educational purpose and pretended to instil the ways of conscious virtue "which is the only solid foundation of all happiness."[ ] another objection is that he insisted far too much on "the graces" (i. e. deportment), while almost forgetting to recommend the more solid acquirements of the character. mrs. chapone complained that he substituted appearances for the real excellences which she considered more important, and mrs. delany wrote that his letters were generally considered ingenious and useful as to polish of manners, but very hurtful in a moral sense. "les grâces", she added, "are the sum total of his religion." this, and the fact that he made a point of discussing moral questions of the greatest importance with a child not yet ten years old and incapable of grasping their full purport, afterwards made mary wollstonecraft turn upon him with her accustomed vehemence. no doubt she found this education of deliberate cynicism more difficult to forgive than even his cold contempt of the female sex. chesterfield wanted to perfect his son in what he considered the most important of arts, to be recommended to both sexes with equal emphasis: that of pleasing. no man held more by opinion as a means of reaching aims than he. to read his correspondence one might think the chief aim of life to be a perfect mastery of the art of "wriggling oneself into favour", with all its attendant insincerity and duplicity. such was the man whose advice the bishop of waterford asked in respect to the kind of reading to be permitted to his daughters[ ]. when women are the topic, lord chesterfield invariably appears at his worst. nowhere in literature do we find a lower estimate of the sex and a more sneeringly insolent ridicule of their foibles. little is known about the marriage of young philip stanhope, who even forgot to inform his father of the circumstance, and who died too soon after to test the truth of his father's teaching that "husband and wife are commonly clogs upon each other." however, with such a mentor his chances of happiness in the matrimonial state would have been slight in any case. in the first place lord chesterfield regards women as intellectually inferior and beneath notice. they are to him only "children of a larger growth"[ ] who seldom reason or act consistently; their best resolutions being swayed by their inordinate passions, which their reason is to weak to keep under constant control. even the so-called "femme forte",--of which type catherine the second was a prominent representative--was in his eyes only another proof of this statement; for at bottom all women are machiavelians and they cannot do anything with moderation, sentiment always getting the better of reason[ ]. they do not appreciate or even understand the language of common sense, and the proper tone to be adopted in their presence is "the polite jargon of good company"[ ]. his opinion of female morals is not more flattering. women are capable of, and ruled by two passions: vanity and love, of which the latter is made dependent upon the former. "he who flatters them most pleases them best; and they are most in love with him who they think is the most in love with them"[ ]. they value their beauty--real or imaginary--above everything, and in this respect "scarce any flattery is too gross for them to follow". the above, if true, might be a reason for a man to rather avoid female company than court it. however, says chesterfield, low as they are, we cannot afford to ignore them, for it is not to be denied that they are a social power. "as women are a considerable, or at least a pretty numerous part of company; and as their suffrages go a long way towards establishing a man's character in the fashionable part of the world (which is of great importance to the fortune and figure he proposes to make in it), it is necessary _to please_ them". the sole use of women in chesterfield's eyes is that they may be turned into a ladder for social advancement: "here women may be put to some use"; and he who has discovered the right way of humouring them may serve his own interest by cultivating their acquaintance and fooling them to the top of their bent with judicious and cleverly administered flattery. of all chesterfield's insinuations this is certainly the worst. but how is woman to be pleased? the scheme for social promotion involves an effort to please on an even more general scale. women feel a contempt for men who pass their time in "ruelles", making themselves their voluntary slaves; they value those most who are held in the highest esteem among their fellowmen; for this will render their conquest by a woman worth her while. however, to please men, and gain influence among them, the concurrence of women is indispensable, and so forth, ad nauseam. practical hints are not wanting either. the best stepping-stones to fortune are "a sort of veteran women of condition" who, besides having great experience, feel flattered by the least attention from a young fellow and in return render him excellent services by pointing out to him those manners and attentions which pleased and engaged them when they were in the pride of their first youth and beauty, and are therefore the most likely to prove effective. in conclusion, two instances may here be quoted of the excellent father's recommendable advice to his son in regard to the exploitation of female sympathies. the first regards that mme du bocage whose name will be mentioned again in connection with her relations to the bluestocking circles in england. when young stanhope was residing in paris and frequenting some salons, lord chesterfield advised his son to make the french lady his confidante and confess to her his eagerness "to please", asking her in true hypocritical fashion to teach him her secret of pleasing everybody. offered under different circumstances this might have been a pretty compliment, coming as it did from the pen of such a cynic and confirmed womanhater it was about the worst insult that could be offered to a lady of "esprit" and dignity. but the second passage is even worse. the exemplary father here suggests a full scheme for political advancement through the intermediacy of a lady of unsullied reputation, who was to be courted and inveigled into granting her concurrence in a manner so beyond words that we must let the letter speak for itself. "a propos, on m'assure que mme de blot, sans avoir des traits, est joli comme un coeur, et que nonobstant cela, elle s'en est tenu jusqu'ici scrupuleusement à son mari, quoiqu'il ait déja plus qu'un an qu'elle est mariée. elle n'y pense pas; il faut décrotter cette femme-là. décrottez vous done tous les deux réciproquement. force, assiduités, attentions, regards tendres, et déclarations passionnées de votre côté produiront au moins quelque velléité du sien. et quand une fois la velléité y est, les oeuvres ne sont pas loin." social life in the eighteenth century had indeed sunk to the appalling depth which such letters as chesterfield's reveal, through an utter lack of purpose. the time was entirely void of social interest. at a time when the french philosophy which had been so largely stimulated by british example found its way into the assemblies of paris, awakening a vivid intellectual interest in thousands of minds and giving birth to a national thought-life which laid the theoretical foundations not only of the coming changes in the social order, but also of that glorious edifice of science of which the nineteenth century was to witness the rapid growth--english society was content to let things remain as they were and did not at once respond to the call that came from beyond the channel. if england, too, contained a number of social abuses that were rank and appealed to the justice of heaven, they did not heed them. the self-sufficiency thus revealed remained characteristic of the better classes in england, and was in the majority of cases increased rather than lessened by the outbreak of the revolution, when most englishmen felt secure in the conviction that in england there were no great wrongs to be righted. it had its origin in gross selfishness and coarse materialism, which did not leave the bulk of the nation an opportunity to realise the miserable condition of the poorer classes in ireland,--in england itself there was comparatively little pauperism in the beginning--or the gross injustice of the prevailing system of parliamentary representation, or the cruelty of punishments, or the abominable condition of the jails in which thousands of small offenders were abandoned to the horrors of slow and gradual extinction, or the shame of the execrable system of slavery prevailing in the colonies. it was not until the second half of the century that the great humanitarian movement began to make rapid progress; before that great dawn british society remained undisturbed while pursuing their round of pleasure which was interrupted only by death. of the heralds of a better time, who acted according to their lights, and of whom some were doomed to failure, while others were to see their efforts crowned with ultimate success, it is gratifying to think that a fair percentage were women. if the education of men was sadly inadequate, that of women was so hopelessly neglected that ladies of quality could hardly sign their own name. they were, upon the whole, quite content to remain in ignorance. their horror of the "femme savante" was such, that all appearance of even the slightest degree of learning was carefully avoided. the result was disastrous. dean swift can hardly be said to rank among the defenders of the sex, and yet even he recognised the absurdity of this utter ignorance. in a letter, dated october th , occurring in mrs. delany's correspondence, and addressed to her, he says: "i speak for the public good of this country; because a pernicious heresy prevails here among the men, that it is the duty of your sex to be fools in every article except what is merely domestic; and to do the ladies justice, there are very few of them without a good share of that heresy, except upon one article, that they have as little regard for family business as for the improvement of their minds." he proposes to "carry mrs. delany about among his adversaries", and (i will) "dare them to produce one instance where your _want of ignorance_ makes you affected, pretending, conceited, disdainful, endeavouring to speak like a scholar, with twenty more faults objected by themselves, their lovers or their husbands. but i fear your case is desperate, for i know you never laugh at a jest before you understand it, and i must question whether you understand a fan, or have so good a fancy at silks as others; and your way of spelling would not be intelligible." only those qualities were considered worth developing which were calculated to excite desire in the opposite sex. women were skilled in the commonplace conversation of the gaming-table, and were taught to dance and to play the spinet, or the harpsichord, and to say ballads, regardless of talent. household duties and needlework were held in less repute, and the qualities of the mind were utterly disregarded. all feminine education was deliberately discouraged.[ ] in marriage the wife was completely subjected to the husband's authority. if he proved inconstant--which was the rule--and transferred his attentions to other women, it was considered most unwise in the wife to object, the approved course being to pretend ignorance of the fact, lest the husband should be displeased at being taken to task by his inferior. about lord halifax's "_advice to a daughter_" was published; and being the reflections of a man of recognised social abilities, became a standard-work not only in england, but also on the other side the channel, where it was translated into french and repeatedly quoted with great deference. viewed in the light of the conditions then prevailing it must be unreservedly admitted that the advice is absolutely the best that could be given under the circumstances. mr. lyon blease's indignation in quoting it, seems due rather to very natural disgust at the social conditions that necessitated it, than to the nature of the advice in itself. lord halifax exhorts his daughter to consider that she "lives in a time which hath rendered some kind of frailties so habitual that they lay claim to large grains of allowance." this reasoning would seem faulty to a moralist, but there is more. "this being so, remember that next to the danger of committing the fault yourself, _the greatest is that_ _of seeing it in your husband_. do not seem to look or hear that way, if he is a man of sense he will reclaim himself; the folly of it is of itself sufficient to cure him; if he is not so, he will be provoked, but not reformed." in other words he advises her to "eat her half loaf and be happy", rather than disturb her share of happiness by aiming higher than is compatible with the character and morality of the average male. halifax further observes that a benign indulgence on the wife's part for the husband's wanderings will "make him more yielding in other things", i. e. he admonishes his daughter to make a compromise, enabling her to acquire certain advantages by conniving at her husband's faithlessness! this is certainly pretty bad; but there seems no room for any doubt that halifax indeed struck the key-note of eighteenth century opinion. so far we have looked at the purely negative side of the picture, which presents no features that can be called redeeming. before passing to the brighter side to examine the utterances of those who aimed at the moral improvement of the female sex, or at an amelioration of their social position, or both, we shall have to make some mention of the views expressed by swift in his "_letter to a young lady on her marriage_". the general tone is certainly not encouraging. it holds the male sex to be absolutely superior in matters physical, intellectual and moral. while criticising with his habitual sarcasm the errors, fopperies and vices of the female sex, swift does not even trouble to consider what has made them so depraved. the nearest suggestion of possible blame to the male sex in regard to their treatment of women is to be found in a passage in the "_hints towards an essay on conversation_". there are certain signs of a coming dawn in this passage. after complaining of the degeneracy of conversation, "with the pernicious consequences thereof upon our humours and dispositions," swift suggests that it may be partly owing to "the custom arisen for some time past of excluding women from any share in our society, farther than in parties at play, or dancing, or in the pursuit of an amour." in this respect he readily admits the superiority of the more peaceable part of charles the first's reign, "the highest period of politeness in england," when the example set by france, and the love-ideals prevailing among french society found english followers, "and although we are apt to ridicule the sublime platonic notions they had, or personated, in love and friendship; i conceive their refinements were grounded upon reason, and that a little grain of the romance is no ill ingredient to preserve and exalt the dignity of human nature, without which it is apt to degenerate into everything that is sordid, vicious and low." this astonishing avowal on the part of one so inclined to cynicism throws a most unfavourable light upon the relations between the sexes in the early years of the eighteenth century. however, if it could not be denied that manners and morals had decayed, swift never doubted that the female sex were chiefly responsible. in his advice to the young bride their depravity is contrasted with the sound wisdom and the more dignified conduct(!) of their lords and masters. swift satirises the worthlessness of the females who spend their afternoon visiting their neighbours to indulge in talking scandal, and whose evenings are devoted to the gambling-table. his opinion of the sex in general is such as to make him emphatically warn his young _protégée_ against the dangers of female conversation. "your only safe way of conversing with them is, by a firm resolution to proceed in your practice and behaviour directly contrary to whatever they say or do." the fondness of the sex for finery disgusts him to such an extent, that he "cannot conceive them to be human creatures, but a certain sort of species hardly a degree above a monkey." such was the verdict swift passed upon the women of his time, whose moral ideals, he was willing to grant, might be and ought to be the same as those of men, always excepting "a certain reservedness, which however, as they manage it, is nothing but affection and hypocrisy." man being superior to woman in every respect, also morally, it follows that her chief aim should be to render herself more worthy of him. swift here introduces that pernicious theory of "relativity" which in rousseau's "_emile_" was to arouse the indignation of mary wollstonecraft. an effort is to be made to raise women out of that pool of iniquity into which they have sunk, not so much for the sake of their precious souls, as to render them more acceptable companions to men. whatever in swift seems to favour a certain degree of emancipation owes its origin to this consideration. he does not believe in what he calls "the exalted passion of a french romance". by the time his first passion is spent, the husband will want a companion to amuse and cheer his leisure hours. some provision should be made for the years to come when, beauty having disappeared forever, it will be necessary to fall back upon the accomplishments of the mind as a substitute, by means of which the husband's esteem may be gained. thus, by a process differing materially from that of the feminists, swift arrives at the same conclusion; viz. that the first step towards improvement is the institution of some kind of mental education for women. at the same time he has little confidence in the mental capacities of the female sex, so that his claims are in truth modest enough. books of history and travel represent the limit of what he deems them capable of grasping; and he even recommends the making extracts from them, should the fair reader's memory happen to be a little weak! for the rest the task of instructing woman will necessarily devolve upon man; i. e. upon the husband and upon those of his friends whom he judges best calculated to enrich her mind by their advice and conversation, and to set her right should her imagination tend to lead her judgment astray! "learned women," in the full sense of the term, were an abomination to swift, who believed the average female intellect to be so deficient that "they could never arrive in point of learning to the perfection of a schoolboy." there can be no doubt that swift's estimate of female capabilities was the general one, which makes it all the more astonishing to find that as early as a deliberate attempt was made to "raise women to the dignity and usefulness which distinguished their ancestresses", by giving them an education which included a rather considerable amount of knowledge. a school for girls was founded in that year by a certain mrs. makin, who explained her purpose in "_an essay to revive the ancient education of gentlewomen in religion, manners, arts, and tongues; with an answer to the objection against this way of education_", dedicated to mary, daughter of james, duke of york. the author protests against "the barbarous custom to breed women low", which arises from the general belief that women are not endowed with the same reason as man. learning, and even virtue, in a woman are "scorned and neglected as pedantic things, fit only for the vulgar", and the creation of schools seems the only way to restore women to the place they once held. mrs. makin wisely refrains from asking too much, and therefore will not "as some have wittily done, plead for female pre-eminence. to ask too much, is the way to be denied all". a plea, therefore, for female education as a means of improving female morals. curiously enough, one of her pupils, elizabeth drake, was destined to become mrs. robinson, and the mother of that elizabeth robinson who as mrs. montagu became the recognised queen of the bluestockings. to strengthen her argument mrs. makin points to a number of women who were proficient in knowledge among the ancients, after which she refers to some englishwomen of great erudition, as: lady jane grey, queen elizabeth, the duchess of newcastle, "who overtops many grave gownsmen", and the princess elizabeth, daughter of charles the first, whose tutoress mrs. makin had been. her school for gentlewomen was situated at tottenham high cross, then within four miles of london, on the road to ware, "where by the blessing of god, gentlewomen may be instructed in the principles of religion and in all manner of sober and virtuous education: more particularly in alle things ordinarily taught in other schools." half the time available for study, according to the sort of prospectus with which the essay closes, was to be devoted to foreign languages, particularly latin and french, and those who wanted further instruction could be served with "greek, hebrew, italian, and spanish, in all which this gentlewoman hath a competent knowledge." as a linguist, therefore, mrs. makin here constitutes herself the rival of the famous translator of epictetus, mrs. carter. but she realised that the gift of languages is not granted everybody. "those who think one language enough for a woman may forbear the languages and learn only (!) experimental philosophy." that the lady herself regarded the undertaking more or less as an experiment appears from the fact that the terms were made dependent on the success achieved. the minimum was twenty pounds per annum, but in case of very marked improvement "something more would be expected", it being left to the happy parents to judge how much more was due to the preceptress. a discourse on the "practicability of the scheme" was to be delivered by a proxy "every tuesday at mrs. mason's coffee house in cornhill, near the royal exchange; and thursdays at the 'bolt and tun' in fleet street, between the hours of three and six in the afternoon." that in mrs. robinson's case, at least, mrs. makin's efforts had not been wholly in vain, is demonstrated by the fact that her children called their mother "mrs. speaker", probably in connection with her easy flow of language in the miniature contests of wit that used to be held among them, which were no doubt an excellent preparation for the later mrs. montagu's social task. if we consider that both port royal and st. cyr aimed far more at instilling moral principles than imparting useful knowledge and that neither in france nor in england had so sweeping an assertion ever been put forward, it seems only giving mrs. makin her due to allow her a prominent place among the pioneers of female education in europe. the history of feminism is as much that of the indirect influences fostering the movement while slowly and almost imperceptibly leavening the whole of society, as that of the direct and embittered struggle for enfranchisement. the earlier half of the eighteenth century cannot boast any direct champions of the cause beyond that mary astell of whom it will be our business to speak presently, no martyrs out of whose sacrifice arose the hopes of better things to come, but there are some instances of men--and even of women--of letters who, while aiming at a less ambitious or even a different object, indirectly contributed to the growth of new opinions regarding the social status of women. among them must be reckoned the essayists, whose aim was (as the general advertisement of the _tatler_ has it) "to teach the minuter decencies and inferior duties, to regulate the practice of daily conversation, to correct those depravities which are rather ridiculous than criminal, and remove those grievances which, if they produce no lasting calamities, impress hourly vexation." life is chiefly made up of such seeming trifles, and the men who by pointing out the shortcomings of humanity bring about an improvement in the general morals may claim to be mentioned among the benefactors of mankind. where the correction of the slighter errors was avowedly the object in view, the essayists were naturally drawn to consider the relations between the sexes, to criticise women freely, and to point out the ready way towards improvement. that the success they undeniably achieved was not--at least in its direct consequences--in proportion to the talent lavished on the essays, nor to the eagerness with which these literary efforts were devoured by the reading public, was due mainly to two causes. in the first place, considering probably that the times were not ripe for that more direct form of attack upon the stronghold of conventional manners and customs which in arousing opposition and resistance results in war to the knife and ends in the complete overthrow of one of the combatants, they chose to inculcate their moral lessons almost imperceptibly, assuming a light and bantering tone of ridicule which was not likely to give serious offence and might cause the reader to laugh at her own expense and perhaps make her consider how much of truth there lay in a criticism so jovially offered. no doubt this plan was the wisest course under the circumstances then prevailing, but it is not the way in which thorough reforms arise. moreover, the moral lessons were introduced so much at random, and with such utter lack of system; and the improvements suggested were so vague, that in stating that the periodical essay of the days of addison and steele helped in some measure to prepare the way for the more emphatic assertions of the later feminists, we have done the essayists full justice. their feminism is indeed extremely qualified, and stamps them as the forerunners of the moralists among the bluestockings, while leaving a very wide gulf between them and mary wollstonecraft. the thought of making anything like a definite claim never entered their minds; the time for suggesting extensive social and political improvements was yet far off, and addison and steele were content to recommend in a general way the cultivation of the female mind as the readiest way to overcome the prevailing worthlessness and irresponsibility, thus continuing a line of thought which others had held before them, and bringing it under the public notice. this involves the supposition that the female mind is improveable to an eminent degree, and here addison and steele fully agree. in no. of the _guardian_ the latter, in giving an extract from a poem "in praise of the invention of writing, written by a lady", delivers himself of the sentiment that "the fair sex are as capable as men of the liberal sciences; and indeed there is no very good argument against the frequent instruction of females of condition this way, _but that they are too powerful without that advantage_." addison in another number ( ) of the same periodical says that "he has often wondered that learning is not thought a proper ingredient in the education of a woman of quality or fortune. since they have the same improveable minds as the male part of the species, why should they not be cultivated by the same method? why should reason be left to itself in one of the sexes, and be disciplined with so much care in the other?" an assertion, therefore, of the faculty of reason in woman, and a denial of that much-professed sexual character upon which eighteenth century society was almost exclusively founded, and which steele held to be the main cause of contemporary female inferiority. he complained (_tatler_ no. ) that the fact that the eighteenth century woman valued herself only on her beauty, caused her to be regarded by men on no other consideration as "a mere woman" from a purely sexual point of view; it being his opinion that the rule for pleasing long (which, with a want of logic in matters of sex characteristic of his time, he held to be woman's chief consideration) was "to obtain such qualifications as would make them so, were they not women," and therefore without any reference to sex. the superiority of the accomplishments of the mind over mere physical beauty is a favourite theme with steele, and may be found illustrated in the usual way in no. of the _spectator_ in the character of the two sisters laetitia and daphne. the suitor whom the former's charms have captivated is not long in discovering that her pleasing appearance but ill conceals the insipidity of her character, and promptly transfers his affections to the less handsome but more cultured and therefore far more agreeable daphne. and so steele wants it to be realised that we commit a gross blunder when "in our daughters we take care of their persons and neglect their minds", whereas "in our sons we are so intent upon adorning their minds that we wholly neglect their bodies" (_spectator_ no. ). strangely enough in a moralist, the ethical side of the question is here left out of discussion. the conclusions drawn by both steele and addison from this neglect of the education of the mind are characteristic of the difference between the two. steele observes that the unavoidable loss of her beauty through the ravages of time causes a woman in the prime of her years to be out of fashion and neglected, and he pleads earnestly for an education to be given to women, that they may have better chances of happiness in the later years of matrimony; whilst addison with his habitual irony weakens the impression produced by his assertion of the perfectibility of the female mind, by ridiculing the much-discussed "femmes savantes" in his picture of lady lizard and her daughters reading fontenelle's "_pluralité des mondes_" while "busy preserving several fruits of the season, dividing their speculation between jellies and stars, and making a sudden transition from the sun to an apricot, or from the copernican system to the figure of a cheese-cake." his treatment of the question is throughout tinged with sarcasm. "if the female tongue will be in motion", he says, after complaining of their _copia verborum_, "why should it not be set to go right?" thus science might be made into an antidote to scandal and intrigue. the most directly feminist among the authors of the late seventeenth and the early eighteenth century was mary astell, the author of "_a serious proposal to the ladies_", written in . her personality and ideas remind us strongly of mlle de gournay, who lived nearly a century earlier. the conviction that all contact with the world and its wickedness would infallibly end in moral ruin had made mary astell the warm advocate of education in a nunnery, far from the madding crowd, where women might be brought up to lives of christian virtue. the very fact, however, that she was not a worldly woman, made her overlook the circumstance that her scheme, however promising in theory, could never hope to stand the test of practice. it was to be expected that the first practical hint for an educational establishment for women--a hint which, however, was not more regarded than mary astell's had been--would come from one whose close contact with the outside world enabled him to do something more than brood over schemes that were incapable of realisation. mary astell in her religious zeal had entirely forgotten to take into account the innate proclivities of the female character. daniel defoe knew how to reconcile the demands of life and of womanhood with those of a moral educational establishment, and he suggested a scheme which was certainly more capable of being put into practice than mary astell's. but even he was firmly convinced that his proposal would meet with almost universal disapprobation and therefore recommended it to the consideration of a later generation. defoe was a man of great inventiveness and sound common sense, and many undeniable improvements were suggested in his "_essay upon projects_" ( ). he had certainly heard of, and very probably read (although he misquotes the title) mrs. astell's "_serious proposal_", and it redounds to his credit that he is one of the very few contemporaries of that eccentric lady to do justice to her motives in seriously considering her ideal of a nunnery, instead of making it the object of obscene insinuations like those of which dr. swift was guilty in the pages of the _tatler_. his estimate of the possibilities of women was very considerably in advance of his time, and places him among the most advanced of woman's male advocates. unlike the essayists, his tone is serious throughout, and the proposal well worth considering, although even defoe has so far become tainted with the prevailing opinion regarding women as to assume certain sexual propensities which he fears will be in the way of their moral improvement. "i doubt a method proposed by an ingenious lady in a little book called "_advice to the ladies_" would be found practicable," he says. "for, saving my respect for the sex, _the levity which is perhaps a little peculiar to them_, at least in their youth, will not bear the restraint, and i am satisfied nothing but the height of bigotry can keep a nunnery." here we have the voice of worldly experience and psychological insight protesting against utopianism. for in women who for ages have lacked the moulding influence of education nature cannot fail to assert herself, and will ruin the scheme. on the other hand, his confidence in the improvability of the sex is such as to make him claim for them the right to an education which will bring out their dormant qualities. "i have often thought of it as one of the most barbarous customs in the world, considering us as a civilised and a christian country, that we deny the advantage of learning to our women. we reproach the sex every day with folly and impertinence, which i am confident, had they the advantage of education equal to us, _they would be guilty of less than ourselves_." that the pioneer should occasionally somewhat overstep the bounds of moderation is surely pardonable. defoe in his zeal holds the capacities of women to be greater and their senses quicker than those of men. nor does he fail to recognise the advantage that will accrue to the female soul from an education which will "polish the rough diamond", and without which its lustre might never appear. the academy for women which he proposes, therefore, shall be "different from all sort of religious confinements," and above all, there shall be no vows of celibacy. the ascetic view of finding fault with every innocent enjoyment seems to him as objectionable as the perpetual pursuit of pleasure upon which it was a reaction. the academy was to be a sort of public school, supplying women with the advantages of learning "suitable to their genius", without requiring any monastic vows which were sure to be broken. defoe is inclined to try his women "by the principles of honour and strict virtue", being convinced that the measure of keeping the men effectually away from the college will put an end to all intriguing. according to him, temptation comes with the suggestion of opportunity and all modesty takes its root in custom, "for this alone, when inclinations reign, tho' virtue's fled, will act of vice restrain". "if their desires are strong, and nature free, keep from her man and opportunity, else 'twill be vain to curb her by restraint; but keep the question off, you keep the saint." everything should be done to render intriguing dangerous, if not impossible. the building should be of three plain fronts, "that the eye might at a glance see from one coin to the other, the gardens walled in the same triangular figure, with a large moat and but one entrance." but the restraint would be only relative, for only those were to be admitted into the seclusion of the college who were willing to live there, and even they were not to be confined a moment longer than the same voluntary choice inclined them. defoe realised that upon an absolute separation from the opposite sex depended the success of his undertaking. we seem to be listening to lilia in tennyson's _princess_ saying: "but i would make it death for any male thing but to peep at us", when defoe pleads the advisability of an act of parliament making it "felony for any man to enter by force or fraud into the house, or to solicit any woman though it were to marry, while she was in the house." any woman willing to receive the advances of a suitor, might leave the establishment, whilst those anxious to "discharge themselves of impertinent addresses" would be sure at any time to find a refuge in it. the plan of instruction is made relative to the natural inclinations of the sex. an important place is to be given to music and dancing, "because they are their darlings", and to foreign languages, particularly french and italian, "and i would venture the injury of giving a woman more tongues than one." books are recommended, especially on historical subjects, to make them understand the world, nor are "the graces of speech", and "the necessary air of conversation" forgotten, in which the usual education was so defective. in the solution he proposes to the problem of female erudition, defoe was equally effective. he recognises that it will not do to fit all women into a universal harness. allowance must be made for individuality. "to such whose genius would lead them to it" he would deny no sort of learning. he is even roused to an ecstatic pitch of enthusiasm by the contemplation of the ideal female which his imagination conjures up before his mind's eye. "without partiality; a woman of sense and manners is the finest and most delicate part of god's creation, the glory of her maker, and the great instance of his singular regard to man, his darling creature, to whom he gave the best gift either god could bestow or man receive", to which he adds that education may make of any woman "a creature without comparison, whose society is the emblem of sublime enjoyments." god has given to all mankind souls equally capable, and the entire difference between the sexes proceeds "either from accidental differences in the make of their bodies, or from the foolish difference of education." and defoe winds up with the bold assertion that all the world are mistaken in their practice about women, "for i cannot think that god almighty ever made them such delicate and glorious creatures, and furnished them with such charms, so agreeable and so delightful to mankind, with souls capable of the same accomplishments with men, and only to be stewards of our houses, cooks and slaves." in direct opposition to the opinion of the dean of st. patrick's, holding women to be the main cause of their own depravity and endowing them with a very limited share of intelligence rendering them forever inferior to men, stand out the views of at least one individual member of the sex. while fully sharing swift's disapproval of the actual condition of women, she felt more inclined to follow defoe in blaming the other half of mankind for refusing them every opportunity to show their possibilities. the tyranny of the male sex aroused the burning indignation of lady mary wortley montagu, whose feelings found vent both in her voluminous correspondence and in her, mostly occasional, poetry. she was most vehement in her denunciation of the treatment of married women by their husbands, which she made an argument against matrimony, and in favour of the virginal state, which at least ensured to women a certain amount of freedom and leisure. "wife and servant are the same, but only differ in the name", and accordingly women are exhorted to "shun that wretched state, and all the fawning flatt'rers hate."[ ] she did not, like swift, believe in the moral superiority of man, and called marriage "a lottery, where there is (at the lowest computation) ten thousand blanks to a prize." being all her life a furious reader, she had in her earliest years imbibed the romantic notions of d'urfé's _astrée_ and of de scudéry's long-winded romances of _cyrus_ and _clélie_, causing her to deeply regret the utter loss of that platonic ideal of gallantry with its tendency to elevate the mind and to instil honourable sentiments which had so charmed her hours of meditation. in spite of the fact that her passion for literature met with little or no encouragement, and that her own education had been, according to her own statement[ ] "one of the worst in the world"--being an exact parallel to that of which the unfortunate clarissa harlowe became the much-lamented victim--her erudition was such, that pope--previous to their quarrel, when he said some very nasty things about her--playfully wondered what punishment might be in store for one who, not content, like eve, with a single apple, "had robbed the whole tree". her own marriage to mr. edward wortley montagu was hardly a success. his diplomatic career, however, gave his wife the much wished-for opportunity to cultivate her understanding by means of foreign travel. as a result of her experiences at constantinople she was enabled on the one hand to furnish the medical science with the means of successfully combating that most destructive disease: the smallpox, and on the other to enrich literature with a correspondence which bespeaks a profound knowledge of the world, combined with great sagacity and a wonderful discriminating power, and cannot fail to charm even the modern reader with the freshness and variety of its descriptions. both style and descriptive manner show a pronounced resemblance to mary wollstonecraft's "_letters from sweden_", written nearly eighty years later. a preface to lady mary's letters, which were not published until her death, was written in by mrs. astell, who certainly did not deserve the description given of her by the first editor of the letters as "the fair and elegant prefacer", being "a pious, exemplary woman, and a profound scholar, but as far from fair and elegant as any old schoolmaster of her time."[ ] her friendship for lady mary found its origin in the circumstance that she saw in the latter's talents the conclusive evidence of that mental equality of the sexes which she made it her business to demonstrate. "i confess i am malicious enough to desire that the world should see to how much better purpose the ladies travel than their lords; and that, whilst it is surfeited with male travels all in the same tone, and stuffed with the same trifles, a lady has the skill to strike out a new path and to embellish a worn-out subject with variety of fresh and elegant entertainment." that this praise is--at least partly--due to considerations of feminism, appears from the following verses: "let the male authors with an envious eye praise coldly, that they may the more decry; women (at least i speak the sense of some) this little spirit of rivalship o'ercome. i read with transport, and with joy i greet a genius so sublime, and so complete, and gladly lay my laurels at her feet." lady mary on her part wrote an "_ode to friendship_", addressed to mrs. mary astell. she also sympathised with the latter's scheme for the establishment of a convent. she thought that a safe retreat might be preferable to a show of public life. her friend lady stafford once said of her that her true vocation was a monastery, and we have lady mary's own evidence where, approving of a project of an english monastery in "_sir charles grandison_", she confesses that it was one of the favourite schemes of her early youth to get herself elected lady-abbess. this intellectual propensity--for what appealed to her most in the scheme was the indefinite leisure to be devoted to studies--pervades all her writings, and throws further light upon her disinclination to the matrimonial state and her recluse habits. lady mary's social career came to a sudden close when in her declining health made it advisable for her to leave england for the sunny skies of northern italy, where she remained till the year before her death. to this period belong her chief contributions to the woman question, contained in her correspondence with her daughter the countess of bute, and giving her views of the position of women, elicited by certain remarks on the education of her little granddaughter. the circumstances under which this correspondence was carried on bear a close resemblance to mme de sévigné's when writing to her daughter mme de grignan her excellent advice regarding the education of little pauline de simiane. from what has already been said it may be readily concluded that the principal of lady mary's grievances against the existing system was not that women were not allowed their share of political and social power,--for she felt no difficulty in entrusting the male sex with those duties which would have kept her from her favourite pursuit--but rather that they should be purposely and systematically debarred from studies and kept in ignorance. but she was wise in avoiding all generalisation and recommending the consideration of each individual case by itself and for its own sake, since what might suit one woman might prove a source of misery to another. when her own daughter had been young, the fact that she was likely to attract the highest offers had made it necessary that she should learn to live in the world, for which very few intellectual qualifications were then needed. but her granddaughter's chances of a brilliant match were considerably less, and so she ought to be taught how to be perfectly easy out of the world, in that retirement which lady mary herself preferred to the social state. thus, a new element is added to the arguments in favour of liberal instruction, which is to be a pleasure rather than a task, with no more important background than the providing of a substitute for social intercourse to those whose circumstances prevent them from occupying a place in social circles. and it is clearly the mother's task to talk over with her daughter what the latter may have read, that she may not "mistake pert folly for wit and humour, or rhyme for poetry, which are the common errors of young people, and have a train of ill consequences." the moral education which she recommends for her granddaughter is rather slight, and based chiefly on the negative principle--which we have also found in fénelon and other french moralists--of keeping the mind occupied as a means of preventing idleness, which is the mother of mischief. learning,--which modesty would have them carefully conceal, for ignorance is bold, and true knowledge reserved--will tend to make women less deceitful instead of more so, and as the same lessons will form the same characters, there is no reason to "place women in an inferior rank to men." lady mary thus declared her belief in the equality of the sexes, but she has not enough of the social leaven in her to make any definite claim for her sex. she is rather an isolated specimen of womanhood, serving as a proof of the capacities of some exceptional women, than a fighter for female rights. her intellectual and literary powers were of a critical and satirical rather than a creative nature. that she was among the very first women to possess the critical faculty in an eminent degree, appears from the clever criticism of contemporary fiction with which her correspondence abounds, and which makes her the forerunner of her husband's relative of bluestocking fame. she was sufficiently independent in her judgment to disagree with the general opinion of richardson's novels, without being able to remain uninfluenced by his pathos. "i heartily despise him, and eagerly read him, nay, sob over his works in a most scandalous manner." this merely because of the parallel some of the heroine's circumstances afforded to those of her own youth, for neither miss howe nor even clarissa herself found favour in her eyes. she was one of the very few readers of richardson who saw the faultiness of the moral of both _pamela_ and _clarissa harlowe_, considering them "to be two books that will do more general mischief than the works of lord rochester." her sound common sense made her heartily despise any excess of that sensibility which richardson's works fostered. her verdict of _sir charles grandison_ was even more crushing. "his conduct (towards clementina) puts me in mind of some ladies i have known who could never find out a man to be in love with them, let him do or say what he would, till he made a direct attempt, and then they were so surprised, i warrant you! nor do i approve sir charles's offered compromise (as he calls it). there must be a great indifference to religion on both sides, to make so strict a union as marriage tolerable between people of such distinct persuasions. he seems to think women have no souls, by agreeing so easily that his daughters should be educated in bigotry and idolatry." in her love of learning, and more still in her keen literary judgment lady mary foreshadowed the coming of the bluestockings, whom her total lack of sociability would have forever prevented her from joining. footnotes: [ ] "_the world's olio_" ( ) contains an essay on "_the inferiority of woman, morally and physically_". [ ] see forsyth, _novels and novelists of the eighteenth century_, pp. - . [ ] letter . [ ] letter . [ ] letter . [ ] letter . [ ] letter . [ ] letter . [ ] the above statement may at first sight seem rather too sweeping. but it is supported by the authority of mary astell (cf. page ), who in her "_serious proposal to the ladies_" remarks that it was generally considered quite unnecessary to waste money on the education of daughters. most parents, she says, "_took as much pains to beat girls away from knowledge as to beat boys towards it_". she was quite aware that her scheme for the establishment of a nunnery in which the daughters of the aristocracy were to be saved from neglect must be shocking to the parents of her generation, who feared that such an education might in all probability corrupt their morals(!) and would certainly _prevent them from marrying_. in this lies the gist of all deliberate discouragement of female learning. the only object in a girl's life being to make a suitable match,--meaning a wealthy one,--it followed that everything was subordinated to this consideration. and it unfortunately happened that the men of the century preferred their partners in wedlock silly and ignorant, and consequently easy-going and submissive. at one time mary astell's scheme came very near to realisation. the devout, intellectual and wealthy lady elizabeth hastings became interested in it and declared herself willing to supply the necessary funds. but it so happened that bishop burnet heard of the plan and of the promised donation. a scheme for a rational education for girls struck this conservative churchman as so absurd that in his anglican hatred of catholicism he rather irrelevantly referred to it as "a popish project", using all his influence to divert lady elizabeth's charity, in which effort he was completely successful. [ ] _a caveat to the fair sex._ [ ] _letter_ to the countess of bute, march , . [ ] "_introductory anecdotes_" to lord wharncliffe's edition of the letters and works of lady mary wortley montagu (paris, ). chapter v. _qualified feminism: the bluestockings._ "feminism", says m. ascoli, in an article in the "_revue de synthèse historique_", "is the mental attitude of those who refuse to admit a natural and necessary inequality between the faculties of the sexes, and, in consequence of this, between their respective rights; who believe that--within certain limits clearly defined by nature--women are capable of the same occupations as men, in which they will succeed equally well when, prepared for their task by an adequate education, they will be no longer opposed by the ill-will and the hostile jealousy of the opposite sex; of those who, eager for the birth of a more extensive liberty and a more liberal justice, hope for the realisation of an ideal which will bring the greatest boon not only to women, but to all humanity." if the above is a correct and exhaustive definition of feminism, the bluestockings certainly cannot be called feminists, for they none of them believed that the future of the human race was in any way dependent on a recognised equality between the sexes. this, however, should not be understood as implying that they did nothing to promote the march of feminism, or rather to prepare the national mind for the first symptoms of a more directly feminine movement which were to manifest themselves before the more or less artificial conversations of the bluestocking côteries had retired into insignificance before the looming spectre of revolution, filling the mind with speculations of more direct importance, and arousing the hereditary conservatism which slumbers at the bottom of every true british heart in a common effort to uphold the laws of the country against the revolutionary element, sown broadcast at home, and prevailing with most disastrous consequences abroad. but the contribution of the english salons to feminism in its narrower sense, however important in its consequences, must be described as largely unintentional, and extremely qualified. the very mention of mary wollstonecraft's name was enough to arouse indignation and disgust in the bosom of every true "blue" except miss seward, on the joint score of her being considered an extreme feminist, a revolutionary and most of all: an atheist. the charge of atheism is of the many accusations brought against the author of "_a vindication of the rights of women_" beyond any doubt the most absurd, and where there was so little mutual understanding, it is not astonishing that there should be an utter lack of appreciation between such women as hannah more and mary wollstonecraft, both of whom were actuated by the noblest motives and whom a closer acquaintance could not have failed to bring nearer together. of the main contentions in the former's "_strictures_" a very considerable majority, stripped of their dogmatic spirit of orthodox christianity, and worded in such a manner as to make them sound as a vindication of inalienable rights and corresponding duties rather than an exhortation to a life of moral virtue, are an exact repetition of the notions put forward in the "_rights of women_"; with the contents of which hannah more was unacquainted. horace walpole, the tone of whose letters to "saint hannah" is so completely different from his usual scoffing as to suggest a conflict in the writer's mind between irony and genuine admiration, in referring to the paris massacres, expresses his disgust of "the philosophing serpent", and is pleased to find that his friend has not read her works; to which hannah replies that she has been "much pestered" to read the "_rights of women_", which she evidently never did. mary's feminism was of the most comprehensive description. although very far from atheism, her religious notions, shaken by bitter experience, were not sufficiently strong to support her in what was to her the very cruel struggle for life, the facts of which were, from her earliest infancy, so hideous as to leave her no leisure for the gradual development of social ideas under the regulating influence of a riper mind, but put her through the hard school of suffering. the problem with which she found herself confronted was an urgent one, calling for immediate solution. considerations of a future existence certainly did come at different times to comfort her, but they were to her a remnant of convention and called forth in times of pressure rather than an inherent part of her being. in proportion as the more tangible ideals of the revolution came to absorb her interest, the hope of salvation became a secondary consideration, which was not to be allowed to interfere with the necessity for correcting present evils and relieving present wants. to her, the problem of the female cause was stern reality which was well worth the devotion of a lifetime. her energetic mind took in the subject in its entirety and thought it out to the minutest details, suggesting radical changes without stopping to consider their feasibility, and impressing us with the almost masculine width of its range. how insipid and uninteresting compared to her radicalism are the attempts at a partial reform of a hannah more, the very limitations of which bring out more clearly the utter want of breadth, the narrow conventionality which hampered the growth of the ideal! to her and to her associates the woman question had a much narrower range, and remained limited to the problem of moral improvement. hannah more, indeed, had no cause to complain of scornful treatment at the hands of men, and in her circle, next to one or two of the greatest men of the day, women were the ruling influence. of the lower classes and their struggles her early youth had taught her little or nothing, and her sympathy with the poor and humble was awakened in the course of the long and bitter struggle of conventionalism against radicalism, in which, viewing the matter broadly, she ranged herself among the defenders of a doubtful cause. it gave her a better insight into the social conditions of england, and no doubt she grew to realise that the great problem of humanity had reached an acute stage, and that even in her own cherished country there were many wrongs to be righted. from that time she became more and more of a social reformer, but the pressing need of the case was forever mitigated by considerations of eternity. to her, who pinned her faith on the promise of life everlasting, the most glaring pictures of human misery faded before the beacon-light of faith and trust. she never found it difficult to be reconciled to the preponderance of evil, for she looked upon it "as making part of the dispensations of god", who in his supreme wisdom meant this world for a scene of discipline, not of remuneration. hence the utter incompatibility of the orthodox view with the doctrine of perfectibility, and the hostile attitude of the bluestocking ladies towards those of the new faith, by which this world was looked upon as all-in-all, and in which want and misery were considered as evils arising solely from the defects of human governments. "whatever is, is right", was hannah more's guiding principle, and to remove that inequality which in her eyes was a portion of god's great scheme seemed to her rebelling against god's own decree. she relieved human misery where she could, from a sense of christian duty and propriety, and by establishing schools tried to rouse the poor to a sense of moral duty, teaching them to be satisfied in the position in which it had pleased god to place them and to live in the hope of eternity. the practice of that humility which is among the first duties of a christian forbade any attempt at rising in the social scale. likewise, in the case of woman, there was to her only one great and leading circumstance that raised her importance, and might to a certain extent establish her equality: "christianity had exalted them to true and undisputed dignity; in christ jezus, as there is neither rich nor poor, bond nor free, so there is neither male nor female. in the view of that immortality which is brought to light by the gospel, she has no superior. women, to borrow the idea of an excellent prelate, make up one half of the human race, equally with men redeemed by the blood of christ." all other forms of equality do not seen to her worth fighting for. this view of hannah more's was fully shared by those among the bluestockings who took a more direct interest in social questions: mrs. montagu, mrs. chapone and mrs. carter. in their opinions about social inequality they were guided by the conservatism of dogmatic faith, as their views of the position of women derived colour from notions of propriety. they rejoiced with the rest of the nation at the news of the fall of the bastille, which to every true john bull had become the symbol of french slavery and which served as an opportunity to assert his own superiority and praise that perfect liberty which he imagined to be the privilege of every individual briton--and no doubt thought themselves extremely enlightened in doing so. but at the first reports of bloodshed and lawlessness propriety suggested that they had suffered themselves by their all-embracing love of humanity to be betrayed into feelings which might be thought distinctly improper, or be translated into a want of patriotic feeling. they chose to be englishwomen rather than cosmopolitans. this choice was made the easier for them as they had come to regard france as the chief bulwark of irreligion. hannah more complains ( ) that "that cold compound of irony, irreligion, selfishness and sneer, which make up what the french (_from whom we borrow the thing as well as the word_) so well express by the term _persiflage_, has of late years made an incredible progress in blasting the opening buds of piety in young persons of fashion."[ ] when the immediate danger of revolution in england was over, some bluestockings--in particular mrs. montagu, hannah more and mrs. carter--responded to the appeal of suffering humanity, in a narrow compass, to the best of their ability, and in the case of the second with highly creditable zeal and devotion, but they did not, like mary wollstonecraft, rise to the occasion, forego public praise and suffer martyrdom for the cause of humanity. the bluestockings, therefore, cannot be ranked as militant feminists. they were content with the position of dependence which the authority of the bible assigns to women. it is true that even from among their circle an occasional protest was heard against the deliberate subjection of the female sex. the learned mrs. carter once complained to her friend archbishop seeker of the partiality of the male translator of the bible, who in rendering the first epistle of st. paul to the corinthians had translated the same verb in different ways so as to bring out what he thought ought to be the relations between husband and wife, writing that he was not to "put away" his wife, and that she was not to "leave" him; and the archbishop, who began by contradicting her, on referring to the bible was forced to acknowledge that she was right. on the whole, however, the literary remains of the bluestockings demonstrate pretty clearly that their confidence in female equivalence was not great. mrs. chapone, in her letters, mostly adheres to the creed of male superiority. she tries, however, to effect a compromise. man, the appointed ruler and head, is undoubtedly woman's superior, but a woman "should choose for her husband one whom she can heartily and willingly acknowledge her superior, and whose understanding and judgment she can prefer to her own". this sounds most revolutionary at a time when women, as a rule, were not allowed to choose their own husbands. it is interesting to note that miss hester mulso did, and made a love-match with mr. chapone, whom she soon after lost through death. she goes on to say that the husband should have "such an opinion of his wife's understanding, principles and integrity of heart, as will induce him to exalt her to the rank of his first and dearest friend", and concludes: "i believe it necessary that all such inequality and subjection as must check and refrain that unbounded confidence and frankness which are the essence of friendship, be laid aside or suffered to sleep". a qualified superiority, therefore, upon which the lord and master is supposed not to presume. among the correspondence of mrs. montagu, the "queen of the blues", published "by her great-great niece" miss e. j. climenson, is a letter to her devoted friend and admirer the earl of bath on the subject of her archenemy voltaire's tragedy of "_tancred_", in which she finds fault with the character of aménaide for not following virtue as by law established, but despising forms and following sentiment, "a dangerous guide". this is what we should expect from a bluestocking leader. she continues: "_designed by nature to act but a second part_, it is a woman's duty to obey rules; she is not to make or redress them". hannah more also admits the male superiority in a chapter on conversation in her "_strictures_", where she follows swift and mrs. barbauld in suggesting that men shall concur in the education of the female sex by allowing them the humble part of interested listeners to their superior conversation. "it is to be regretted", she says, "that many men, even of distinguished sense and learning, are too apt to consider the society of ladies as a scene in which they are rather to rest their understandings than to exercise them; while ladies, in return, are too much addicted to make their court by lending themselves to this spirit of trifling: they often avoid making use of what abilities they have, and affect to talk below their natural and acquired powers of mind, considering it as a tacit and welcome flattery to the understanding of men to renounce the exercise of their own"[ ]. the last part of this statement strikes a higher note in its denunciation of the pernicious system of "relativity". mrs. carter also refers somewhere in her correspondence to the indignity of ladies and gentlemen at various assemblies being kept separated, as if the former were disqualified by the shortcomings of their sex from listening to the improving conversation of the latter. in conclusion it may be stated that the bluestocking assemblies in all probability arose from an ardent wish on the part of some intellectual ladies to intermingle with the conversation of the members of dr. johnson's club the charms of their own. one of the literary clubbists informs us that a certain lady, whom he does not name, but describes as distinguished by her beauty and taste for literature, used to invite them to dinner and share in the conversation. he may have meant miss reynolds, sir joshua's sister, who wrote a much praised "_essay on taste_", and whose salon was among the first where wits and bluestockings learnt to appreciate each other's society. boswell, in his "_life of johnson_" says: "it was much the fashion for several ladies to have evening assemblies, where the fair sex might participate in conversation with literary and ingenious men, _animated by a desire to please_". although the duty of receiving the guests and so placing them as to ensure animated discussions fell to the share of the women, yet few of them were bold enough to let themselves be heard in the presence of the literary dictator, whose oracular speeches were delivered with pompous assurance and listened to and taken in with becoming deference and humility. dr. johnson made and marred the literary and conversational reputations of his bevy of female admirers; fanny burney owed her success as a bluestocking principally to his praise of "_evelina_", as hannah did hers--next to the kind protection of garrick--to his unstinted eulogy of her "_bas bleu_" poem. johnson had said that "there was no name in poetry that might not be glad to own it." but after johnson's death there came a radical change, and in the absence of a male dictator to occupy the vacant throne, the female element predominated more and more. especially mrs. montagu "queened it" over her satellites, both male and female, and of all the bluestocking hostesses who vied for supremacy she came nearest to justifying the charge of pedantry. the question whether the bluestocking societies were either directly or indirectly an imitation of the older french salons must be answered with some degree of circumspection. that the influence of the latter was considerable may be taken for granted, and the direct points of contact were numerous. horace walpole in particular was an intimate of both, david hume frequented several paris salons and mme du bocage, mme de genlis and mme de staël--the last two in the year of their exile from france--were repeatedly seen in blue society. it is to the pen of the first that we owe one of the most vivid descriptions of mrs. montagu's convivial meetings. if we moreover consider that french interest in england which is a prominent feature of th century society and the close relations between the two countries, we do not wonder that a parallel movement to that of the french salon should have sprung up. and yet the bluestocking assemblies had a distinct individuality of their own; inferior to their french rivals in some respects, they were superior to them in others. most critics of the time agree in asserting their inferiority, which is a natural circumstance in view of the fact that they considered them as a literary and conversational movement, in which the chief aim was literary taste and polished, witty conversation. their estimate never went beyond these limits to consider the influence exercised by these côteries upon society in general. and it is when throwing into the scale the moral improvement, especially among women, which was the result of the efforts of the bluestocking ladies, that we realise that although different, they were not necessarily inferior to their french rivals. wraxall in his "_historical memoirs_" opines that "neither in the period of its duration, nor in the number, merit or intellectual eminence of the principal members, could the english society be held upon any parity with that of france." he might have added with equal truth that the average frenchwoman of the cultivated class is distinguished from her english sister by greater keenness of wit and by a greater brilliance of conversation. the chief talents of the french are of the mind, "de l'esprit", and are shown off to the best advantage, those of the english are rather of the heart and are not flaunted in public. english society, in the matter of outside splendour and brilliance, has always been completely overshadowed by the greater expansiveness of the french. the bluestocking hostesses were upon the whole less brilliant specimens of female magnificence, but they were undoubtedly far better women. for the light-hearted gallantry practised in the french salons they substituted warm and generous friendship, which considerations of envy only very rarely disturbed. the bluestocking atmosphere was purer, allowing one to breathe more comfortably than in some french salon where intrigue ruled the hour. the women were like the men, lacking in that "finesse" in which the french excelled, but kind and considerate, and upon the whole quicker to praise than to find fault. hannah more realised this when singing the praises of the blues in her "_bas bleu_" poem. she describes the members of the french assemblies as brilliant and witty, but lacking common sense and simplicity. her verdict would have been more correct if for the hôtel de rambouillet, against which her disapprobation is directed, she had substituted the later salons of the decline, where indeed a mistaken "préciosité" prevailed and "where point, and turn, and équivoque distorted every word they spoke". for indeed the parallelism with the salon of the th century is far more marked than with that of the th. the evolution of both french and english polite literary society furnishes a strong argument in favour of rousseau's theory that "everything degenerates in the hands of man"--by which he meant "humanity"--for after a short spell of glory both degenerated sadly. in both pedantry supplanted wit, and molière's "_femmes savantes_" might have found its counterpart--though probably not its equivalent--in fanny burney's play of "_the witlings_", which the unfavourable criticism of her friends induced her to destroy. the history of bluestocking pedantry is a repetition of what took place in french society with the exception that to the bluestocking society of england no second blossoming was granted by the chilling blasts of revolution. pedantry, that archenemy of wit, robbed it of all its charm, leaving naked learning, than which nothing can be less sociable. fanny burney signalled its approach, warned against it, and ended by joining in the general homage. there can be no doubt that the french salons occupy the more important place in the history of th century thought. no daring philosophical schemes were hatched under the auspices of the bluestockings, and if their conversation showed the influence of the rationalist spirit, their rationalism was not made subservient to projects of a revolutionary nature, but made to support with its evidence the long-established truth of orthodox religion. mrs. chapone in her "_letters on the improvement of the mind_" warns her niece that reason, which may help us to discover some of the great laws of morality, is yet liable to error. the sending of god's son therefore is to be looked upon as a demonstration or revelation of the evidences of the christian religion, by which we become convinced _on rational grounds_ of its divine authority. here, as in the matter of sexual preeminence, mrs. chapone loved a compromise between the head and the heart. the company at mrs. vesey's is described as a good "rational society" by hannah more, who herself rather affected a "comfortable, rational day". where politics are discussed, the door is opened wide to intrigue, and party-feelings will prevail. politics had been the ruin of many a periodical attempt and their exclusion at the bluestocking assemblies left the field to literary conversation. philanthropy, or active benevolence, was practised instead, and the light moralising tendencies of the _spectator_ enlistened the same sympathy among the bluestockings which the sterner moral code of port royal awakened in the heart of the more serious hannah. upon the whole the bluestockings were not, like their french rivals, recruited from the aristocracy. they belonged to the middle-class, to whom the th century was a time of great financial prosperity. mrs. montagu's wealth was considerable, and she made a liberal use of it not only in philanthropy, but also in encouraging needy authors, which made hannah more refer to her as "the female maecenas of hill street"[ ]. they were mostly the daughters of clergymen and schoolmasters, who in early youth acquired that taste for learning which their fathers or near relations were able to gratify, and that serious cast of mind which never forsook some of them and fitted them to be religious moralists. the tone of their conversation and writings was a distinct improvement upon that of the ladies of the preceding generation, of whom it was said that those who--like mrs. aphra behn and mrs. de la rivière manley--excelled in wit, failed signally in chastity. the love of scandal which had been their chief characteristic, and which sheridan justly satirised, was an object of scorn to the bluestockings, who were as careful to preserve the reputation of others as they were of their own. that some of them occasionally went too far in constituting themselves the mentors of others who were fully able to take care of themselves, is an "amiable weakness" which may be readily forgiven. thus, for instance, mrs. thrale's second marriage with the italian vocalist signor piozzi aroused a good deal of unfavourable comment, brought about an indirect rupture with fanny burney and partly caused her withdrawal from the bluestocking circles. the same exaggerated notions, arising partly from hatred of the encyclopedian spirit of revolutionism embodied in the much-reviled rousseau, occur in mrs. delany's "_essay on propriety_" and in her extremely voluminous correspondence. mrs. chapone's _letters_ insist on a proper regard to reputation as one of the most desirable qualities in a friend. she emphatically distinguished between love of reputation, which is nothing but discretion, and undue regard of opinion, which is only vanity. here her views coincided with mary wollstonecraft's, who had pointed out the error of wanting to make opinion "the high throne of virtue" to women in rousseau's _emile_, but who did not make mrs. chapone's distinction. in the behaviour of young women towards gentlemen, the latter says, great delicacy is required, "yet women oftener err from too great a consciousness of the supposed views of men, than from inattention to those views, or want of caution against them." she therefore agreed that the "desire to please" should be kept under a certain amount of restriction. all the bluestockings' actions arose from a strong sense of duty, which the majority of french hostesses--with the emphatic exception of mme de lambert--sadly lacked. one of their deliberate aims was the substitution of conversation "à la française" for cards. the first determined attack upon the greatest social curse of the age was made by mrs. chapone,--then miss mulso--in collaboration with johnson in no. of the _rambler_ in the year . she wrote to johnson in his capacity of censor of manners, informing him that she, "lady racket", intended to have "cards at her house every sunday". she, of course, intended that johnson should seize the opportunity to attack gambling and thus range himself openly on the side of the intellectual ladies who were in open revolt against the practice. johnson replied that even at the most brilliant of card-tables he had always thought his visit lost, "for i could know nothing of the company but their clothes and their faces." their complete absorption in the vicissitudes of the game, their exulting triumph when successful, and their flush of rage at defeat or at "the unskilful or unlucky play of a partner" so disgusted him that he soon retired. "they were too trifling for me when i was grave, and too dull when i was cheerful". mrs. carter, who did not object to taking an occasional hand at whist or quadrille, was vehement in her condemnation of faro, which she hoped horace walpole on getting into the house would succeed in putting down. hannah more's "_bas bleu_" further endorses the statement that the substitution of conversation for cards was one of the objects of bluestockingism. the introduction states its origin and character. the ladies at mrs. vesey's, mrs. montagu's and mrs. boscawen's, to mention the three hostesses to whom according to their chronicler hannah more "the triple crown divided fell", although in the opinion of others mrs. thrale and mrs. ord were candidates for mrs. boscawen's place--assembled "for the sole purpose of conversation, and were different in no respect from other parties, but that the company did _not_ play at cards." it was there that hannah more found the rambouillet-ideal realised of learning without pedantry, good taste without affectation, and conversation without calumny, levity or any censurable error. the attacks directed against whist, "that desolating hun", and quadrille, "that vandal of colloquial wit", were made not so much on the score of their devastating influence on the moral character as of their exclusion of conversation. it should be remembered, however, that hannah more wrote her "_bas bleu_" in the years before the desire to effect moral reforms got the better of the natural vanity of displaying her considerable intellectual talents. conversation thus became in itself a pursuit, almost a cult, the purpose of which was to "mend the taste and form the mind". the record of what was said by the most prominent male and female wits at the bluestocking gatherings was kept with a minuteness which is characteristic of the time in the endless memoirs and the voluminous correspondence in which every literary lady indulged, and upon which she lavished her talents as an author. immeasurably the best is fanny burney's diary, with its clever and vivid sidelights upon gatherings in which she herself as the successful author of _evelina_, and the protégée of johnson, was lionised, although she never became a bluestocking in the full sense of the word, her temperament being far too sprightly and volatile, and the language of her pen too gushing to suit the notions of propriety of some ladies, whom she further offended by her marriage to a french refugee and by the freedom with which she published details that were not meant for the general ear. the constellation in the bluestocking circles differed somewhat from french society, where the hostess received in her drawing-room a number of prominent men-of-letters, scientists, diplomatists, artists and philosophers, the female element being represented by herself, and only a very few privileged friends. at the english assemblies the majority were ladies, and although some members of the literary club, johnson's satellites, were regular frequenters, the female element predominated. boswell, johnson's biographer, the painter sir joshua reynolds, the politicians fox and burke--before the stirring political events that drew them apart,--the historian gibbon, the poet goldsmith, the actor garrick and the author lyttleton--mrs. montagu's friend and collaborator in the "_dialogues of the_ _dead_"--alike delighted in bluestocking society and by their conversation helped in that diffusion of high principles which to mrs. chapone in her "_essay on conversation_" seemed more important than the french object of sharpening the wit. in her "_letters on the improvement of the mind_" she says that conversation must be cultivated "by the mutual communication of whatever may conduce to the improvement or innocent entertainment of each other." the literature which was the direct outcome of bluestockingism is far slighter in bulk than the poetical effusions called forth by the spirit of gallantry which dominated the early french salons. there was between the ladies and gentlemen of the english circles rather less love-making and rather more mutual esteem. there was hardly any of that complimentary occasional poetry of the lighter kind in which the love-sick french swains of the montausier type had found relief. one of the rare instances of verse-making at an assembly occurred in mrs.--afterwards lady--miller's provincial drawing-room at batheaston, where, in imitation of a french custom, each of the assembled guests deposited his or her poetry in an antique vase, to be read aloud and judged. that this "puppet-show parnassus[ ]" called forth the ridicule of walpole and johnson proves sufficiently that emulation of this kind was not regarded with sympathy among bluestockings and their wellwishers. it is difficult to say whether the bluestockings' contribution to the increase of female importance and influence rivalled that of the french societies, but we undeniably find, that in the latter half of the th century the popular verdict regarding women is undergoing a distinct change. instead of the scornful blame to which pope, swift and chesterfield have made us accustomed we actually find women recognised as an influence in literature by no less a critic than the great doctor himself. madame d'arblay's _diary_ relates how--in --johnson once talked to mrs. thrale and sir philip jennings about "the amazing progress made of late years in literature by the women." he said he himself was astonished at it, and told them he well remembered when a woman who could spell a common letter was regarded as all-accomplished; but now they vied with the men in everything. the same _diary_ makes mention (in ) of the verses published by the author's father--dr. burney--in the _herald_, making women the object of praise instead of blame and ridicule. the composition was entitled "_advice to the herald_", published anonymously, and ascribed to sir w. w. pepys, until in a m. s. copy was found among dr. burney's papers. they exhort the paper not only to proclaim the shame of woman, but to also "record in story such as shine their sex's glory". hannah more's "pathetic pen", mrs. carter's "piety and learning", fanny burney's "quick discerning" are praised; and special places are retained for mrs. chapone, "high-bred, elegant mrs. boscawen"; lady lucan, mrs. leveson gower, mrs. greville, lady crewe and "fertile-minded" mrs. montagu. david garrick, hannah more's faithful friend and supporter, in referring to the success of her ballad entitled "_sir eldred of the bower_", followed by another poem called "_the bleeding rock_", playfully represents the male sex as mortified by female success and makes apollo the author. and in hoole's "_aurelia, or the contest_", likewise referred to in fanny burney's _diary_, the example of "the wiser females" is glanced at to counterbalance female folly. all which examples tend to show that public opinion regarding women was undergoing a slow process of change. now that women themselves had taken their moral improvement in hand, the male authors felt that they could again indulge in some measure of praise. on the other hand, women had become sufficiently conscious of the moral shortcomings of the opposite sex, to take an occasional share in their reclamation and point out the error of their ways. when, after long circulating in manuscript, the "_bas bleu_" poem was at last published, it was accompanied by another entitled "_florio_", describing the fopperies and the utter worthlessness of a typical "maccaroni" or young man of fashion, a criticism which none of us would think of calling undeserved. the department of literature in which women were qualified to shine _par excellence_ was the novel. richardson's novels had succeeded marvellously in awakening interest in the workings of the female heart, and analysis of the female character to its minutest details was what the reading public had grown to expect. this was a field in which women have since abundantly proved themselves in many ways the equals of men, and the story of the universal praise with which "_evelina_" was welcomed, and the author's mingled pride in her achievement and bashfulness, arising out of the fear that she might be thought lacking in modesty, is among the most amusing parts of her diary. unfortunately, for all her keenness of perception and fine sense of humour, there was about her character a certain want of depth, which became more apparent as she grew older. but she certainly paved the way for the later female novelists, and particularly for jane austen. not the least among the bluestockings' merits was the fact that by the example some of them gave they accustomed the british public to seeing females engaged in different occupations which before had been the exclusive work of men. where ladies of such a strong sense of propriety did not shrink from appearing before the public as authors, and even pseudonyms were often thought unnecessary, the domain of literature ceased to be the exclusive property of men. strangely enough, the notion that female knowledge should be carefully concealed, originating in molière's _femmes savantes_ and prevailing all through the th and th centuries in both literatures until mary wollstonecraft openly disregarded it, was implicitly obeyed by the bluestockings. not all the bluestocking ladies were authors; mrs. vesey for instance, probably the most loveable among the hostesses, who understood better than any of her rivals the art of making her guests comfortable, has left us no literary legacy. of the others, mrs. delany and mrs. boscawen concentrated their literary energies chiefly upon their correspondence, while mrs. carter's clever translation of epictetus which elicited the unstinted praise of mr. long, a later translator, who repeatedly, when in doubt, consulted her text, is of no importance to her sex. the principal literary contributions to the subject of feminism were made by three bluestockings: mrs. montagu, mrs. chapone and mrs. hannah more, the nature of whose contributions corresponds closely with their respective characters. the natural bias of elizabeth robinson's character was strengthened by the circumstances of her education. in her early youth she was often at cambridge, where her grandmother's second husband, dr. conyers middleton, took great delight in her keenness of understanding, and often kept her in the room while he was conversing with his visitors, among whom were the greatest philosophers and scholars of the day. her father was also amused at the child's precocity and they used to have frequent "brain cudgellings", until he became painfully aware that he was no longer a match for his clever daughter. she was a furious letter-writer, which occupation, if it sharpened her wit, also developed in her that insatiable intellectual vanity which afterwards became her ruling passion, distinguished her as a bluestocking from her more modest rivals and prevented her from being as universally liked as a mrs. vesey. her biographer mr. huchon says that "she was all mind, if not all soul", and was more respected than loved. sentimentality was not among her weaknesses, her sound practical sense dictated both to herself and to others. she strongly opposed the love-match which her ward miss dorothea gregory--one of the daughters to whom the well-known physician of that name addressed his legacy of advice--asked her permission to make, and the ubiquitous fanny burney writes that mrs. montagu once asked her, "if she should write a play, to let her know of it", which vexed fanny's "second daddy", mr. crisp, as it "implied interference". her own marriage ( ) was purely a "marriage de raison", the husband being considerably older, and a man of great wealth. mrs. chapone afterwards called her with reason "an ignoramus in love", which did not in this case prevent the marriage from being fairly happy. neither was mrs. montagu free from affectation. much-praised simplicity and humility were not among her virtues, and no flattery seems to have been too gross for her to accept. lady louisa stuart--lady mary wortley montagu's granddaughter, to whom we are indebted for some humorous pictures of bluestocking society--describes her as thoroughly satisfied with herself. her speech is described as affected, although ready wit can scarcely be denied her. her reply on being informed that voltaire, shakespeare's translator, had boasted of having been the first frenchman to find "quelques perles dans son fumier": "c'est donc un fumier qui a fertilisé une terre bien ingrate" is a good specimen both of her proficiency in the french language and of her quickness of repartee. however, she often descended from the heights of rhetoric, and her affectation of speech seems to have been a weakness into which she was occasionally betrayed by a momentary lapse of her fine judgment. speaking of mr. gray she once said: "i think he is the first poet of my age; but if he comes to my fireside, i will teach him not only to speak prose, but to talk nonsense, if occasion be." she loved to make a display of her learning, and johnson said of her that "she diffused more knowledge in her conversation than any women he knew." at the same time she criticised others freely, which procured her many enemies. mr. crisp thought her "a vain, empty, conceited pretender, and little else"; wraxall judged that "there was nothing feminine about her"; and an essay by cumberland in the _observer_ of describes the "feast of reason" at mrs. montagu's house in portman square, where the lady herself is satirised under the name of "vanessa". it describes her as stimulated to charity, affability and hospitality exclusively by the dictates of inordinate vanity, and even accuses her of bribing her critics: "authors were fee'd for dedications, and players patronised on benefit nights". her charity was, indeed, of a condescending kind. thus her annual feast to the chimney-sweeps on may day rather smacks of the doctrine of good works pointing the way to salvation, and to the working people in her coal-mines she was a dutiful but immeasurably superior patroness. in a few isolated cases, however, there were flashes of real kindness. she gave unstinted financial support to mrs. williams, the blind poetess whose lot had aroused johnson's compassion, and her letter of condolence to mrs. delany on the occasion of the death of their mutual friend the duchess of portland has the genuine ring of grief and sympathy. it tries to find solace in considerations of eternity. mrs. montagu's religious views were strict, and religious worship was a serious matter with her. however, her strong individuality would not suffer her to bow her intellect before that of any man. beyond the admitted fact that "god is the loving father of all", she has only hope, but no definite knowledge of the certainty of a future state. such was the character of the lady whom johnson called "queen of the blues", and fanny burney "our sex's glory". the incident which had a determining influence on her further life was the death of her only child. grief of that kind may be to some extent drowned in religion or in social intercourse, and mrs. montagu tried both. she emphatically believed in the social state as productive of good through the friction of minds. thus it came about that in the middle of the century--the exact date is nowhere given, which makes it difficult to decide whether mrs. montagu, or mrs. vesey, or miss frances reynolds had the right to consider herself the first bluestocking hostess,--mrs. montagu opened her salon in hill street, where she entertained a great number of guests of the most widely different description, her rooms being often filled from eleven in the morning till eleven at night. the best descriptions of mrs. montagu's parties are to be found in hannah more's correspondence and in mme du bocage's "_letters on england, holland and italy_." the latter visited england at a time when mrs. montagu's breakfasts were all the fashion, served "in a closet lined with painted paper of pekin and furnished with the choicest movables of china", the so-called chinese room, recalling the splendours of the "chambre bleue" of the marquise de rambouillet. it was probably at mrs. montagu's and at mrs. thrale's that dr. johnson chiefly indulged in his tea-orgies, and mme du bocage describes his hostess as pouring out her delicious tea, attired in a white apron and a large straw hat. on the whole the english ladies paid more attention to gastric delights than their french sisters, and in mrs. montagu's case her well-provided table often relieved her from the wearisome duty of keeping up the flow of conversation. in this lay the characteristic difference between mrs. montagu and mrs. vesey. the latter wanted her guests to forget her and to consult their own inclinations in the forming of groups of conversation, contenting herself with listening to her literary lions; mrs. montagu on the other hand, to quote fanny burney, "cared not a fig, as long as she spoke herself". that her intellectual queenship involved the duty of maintaining conversation at a high pitch seems to have considerably worried her upon occasions. the bluestocking hostesses kept a great variety of hours. in the last decades of the century late teas were in vogue, but the usual entertainments were breakfasts and dinners, in which there was a great variety. we read of mrs. garrick's dinner parties to a select company of eight chosen friends, among whom hannah more was proud to find herself, and according to horace walpole mrs. montagu's breakfasts at her house in portman square sometimes included seven hundred guests, from royalty downwards. to this magnificent abode she removed in , six years after the death of her husband. she spared no cost in fitting it up in the most gorgeous fashion, and although walpole thought her decorations in good taste, one cannot help feeling doubts as to the room with the feather hangings of which cowper wrote in that "the birds put off their every hue, to dress a room for montagu." the famous "room of the cupidons" made her a little ridiculous in the eyes of the more sober-minded ladies, one of whom (mrs. delany) in a letter refers somewhat spitefully to "her age". there are no references to any of mrs. montagu's parties taking place out of doors, but some of the minor hostesses would sometimes send out invitations to tea, followed by a walk in the park or fields. this custom was perhaps an imitation of the habits prevailing among rambouillet-circles. neither do we find anywhere mention of stated days, such as were kept by the french hostesses, although sundays were objected to by some of the more orthodox. the greater artificiality of arrangement at the bluestocking assemblies appears from the pains taken by the hostess to so place her guests as to ensure a free flow of wit. in connection with mrs. montagu, reports are contradictory. hannah more's correspondence informs us that the company used to split up into little groups of five or six; fanny burney on the contrary relates how the guests were seated in a semi-circle round the fire. here again, mrs. vesey followed her individual inclinations, for the bas-bleu poem tells us how her "potent ward the circle broke", insisting on an easy informality in the grouping of her guests. mrs. ord seems to have preferred the later method of drawing chairs round a table in the centre. mrs. montagu's early correspondence is full of wit and humour, and displays so much discrimination that we feel surprised the writer did not make her mark later in life as a novelist. the critical faculty she possessed in so eminent a degree fitted her for satire, the object being naturally contemporary society. in a letter, written when she was twenty, she gives a vivid description of fashionable life at bath, ridiculing the emptiness of daily conversation and signalising the general depravity of morals. "how d'ye do?" prevails in the morning, and "what's trumps?" at night; the ladies' only topic is diseases, and the men are all bad. "there is not one good, no not one." she likewise freely vented her ridicule of overdone fashions, and descriptions like the following are by no means rare. "lady p. and her two daughters make a very remarkable figure, and will ruin the poor mad woman of tunbridge by out-doing her in dress. such hats, capuchins, and short sacks as were never seen! one of the ladies looked like a state-bed running upon castors. she had robbed the valance and tester of a bed for a trimming." although her satire is chiefly directed against her own sex, she strongly protested against the opinion that women were morally inferior to men, whose insincere flattery was largely responsible for female frivolity. one of her most constant friends and platonic admirers was mr. (afterwards lord) lyttleton, her vindication of whose memory against dr. johnson in later years led to the most famous of bluestocking quarrels. in , lyttleton published his "_dialogues of the dead_"--referred to rather unkindly by walpole as the "dead dialogues". the preface says that after the dialogues of lucan, fénelon and fontenelle, english literature can boast only the learned dialogues of one mr. hurde, who takes living persons for his characters. the author proposes to take his cue from the history of all times and nations, opposing them to or comparing them with each other, "which is, perhaps, one of the most agreeable methods that can be employed of conveying to the mind any critical, moral or political observations". needless to say, the dead are supposed to know all that has taken place since their decease. mr. lyttelton goes on to say that the last three dialogues are by a different hand. "if the friend who favoured me with them should write any more, i shall think the public owes me a great obligation, for having excited a genius so capable of uniting delight with instruction, and giving to knowledge and virtue those graces which the wit of the age has too often employed all its skill to bestow upon folly and vice." the above sufficiently denotes the character of the dialogues in which mrs. montagu--for the "different hand" was hers--had every opportunity to display her satirical vein. the numbers and , of which the former satirises fashionable conduct and the latter the literature of gallantry, are illustrative of her opinions of contemporary female character. the characters of no. are mercury and a modern fine lady, whose name is mrs. modish. the god comes to fetch her to the nether world, but she begs to be excused: "i am engaged, absolutely engaged". mercury thinks she is referring to her duties to her husband and children, but he is quickly disillusioned. "look on my chimneypiece, and you will see i was engaged to the play on mondays, balls on tuesdays, the opera on saturdays, and to card-assemblies the rest of the week, for two months to come; and it would be the rudest thing in the world not to keep my appointments. if you will stay with me till the summer season, i will wait on you with all my heart. perhaps the elysian fields may be less detestable than the country in our world. pray have you a fine vauxhall and ranelagh? i think i should not dislike drinking the lethe waters when you have a full season." when mercury objects that she has made pleasure the only object in her life, she replies that she has indeed made diversion her chief business, but has got no real pleasure out of it. for late hours and fatigue have given her the vapours and spoiled the natural cheerfulness of her temper. her ambition to be thought "du bon ton" (which mrs. montagu explains in a note is french cant for the fashionable air of conversation and manners) has ruled her conduct. when asked by mercury to define the term, mrs. modish is somewhat perplexed. "it is--i can never tell you what it is; but i will try to tell you what it is not. in conversation it is not wit, in manners it is not politeness, in behaviour it is not address; but it is a little like them all. it can only belong to people of a certain rank; who live in a certain manner, with certain persons, who have not certain virtues, and who have certain vices, and who inhabit a certain part of the town. like a place by courtesy, it gets a higher rank than the person can claim, but which those who have a legal title to precedency dare not dispute for fear of being thought not to understand the rules of politeness." mercury finds fault with her for sacrificing all her real interests and duties to so arbitrary a thing as "bon ton". she asks him what he would have had her do? to which mercury replies that her real business consisted in promoting her husband's happiness and devoting herself to the education of her children. it appears that their religion, sentiments and manners were to be learnt from a dancing-master, a music-master and a french governess. the result will be "wives without conjugal affection and mothers without maternal care." mercury's final advice to the lady is to "remain on this side the styx", and to wander about without end or aim, to look into the elysian fields, but never attempt to enter them, lest minos should push her into tartarus, "for duties neglected may bring on a sentence not much less severe than crimes committed." the characters of the next dialogue are plutarch, charon and a modern bookseller. it contains a pointed satire on literary taste. it appears that the works of plutarch do not command any sale whatever except to "a few pedants," but "_the lives of highwaymen_" have brought our bookseller a competent fortune, and the enormous sale of "the lives of men that never lived" (by which the novel is meant) have set him up for life. this latest modern improvement in writing enables a man to "read all his life and have no knowledge at all." modern books not only dispose to gallantry and coquetry, but give rules for them. caesar's commentaries and the account of xenophon's expedition are not more studied by military commanders than our novels are by the fair; to a different purpose indeed, for their military maxims teach to conquer, ours to yield; those inflame the vain and idle love of glory, these inculcate a noble contempt of reputation. if the women had not the friendly assistance of modern fiction, the bookseller fears they might long remain "in an insipid purity of mind; with a discouraging reserve of behaviour." plutarch is shocked at so much degeneracy of taste and wishes that for the sake of the good example he had expatiated more on the character of lucretia and some other heroines. it grieves him to hear that chastity is no longer valued, and that crime and immorality, far from meeting with the punishment they deserve, are universally applauded. and yet it is not more than a century since a frenchman wrote a much admired life of cyrus under the name of artamenes[ ], in which he ascribed to him far greater actions than those recorded of him by xenophon and herodotus. he goes on to praise the gallant days of chivalry, when authors made it their business to incite men to virtue by holding up as an example the deeds of fabulous heroes, whereas it seems to be the custom of a later age to incite them to vice by the history of fabulous scoundrels. "men of fine imagination have soared into the regions of fancy to bring back astrea: you go thither in search of pandora, oh disgrace to letters! oh shame to the muses!" the bookseller's feeble remonstrance that authors have to comply with the manners and disposition of those who are to read them, is met with the indignant remark that they should first of all correct the vices and follies of their age. to give examples of domestic virtue would surely be more useful to women than to inflame their minds with the deeds of great heroines. "true female praise arises not from the pursuit of public fame, but from an equal progress in the path marked out for them by their great creator." thus we find that even plutarch is pressed into service to inculcate a religious moral. the bluestocking ladies were sufficiently enlightened to recognise the deep wisdom of the ancients, which is of all ages and independent of religious doctrines. mrs. carter, the translator of epictetus, was a woman of profound piety. the bookseller now remarks that some authors have indeed tried to instil virtuous notions. in _clarissa harlowe_ "one finds the dignity of heroism tempered by the meekness and humility of religion, a perfect purity of mind and sanctity of manners", and _sir charles grandison_ is "a noble pattern of every private virtue, with sentiments so exalted as to render him equal to every public duty." next to richardson, fielding and marivaux are remarkable for their fine moral touches, and some comfort is to be derived from the reflection that when there is wit and elegance enough in a book to make it sell, it is not the worse for good morals. here charon appears to conduct our bookseller to his future abode, but deeming him after all "too frivolous an animal to present to wise minos", proposes to constitute him _friseur_ to tisiphone, and make him "curl up her locks with satires and libels". the above pieces derive their chief interest from the fact that they are among the very first instances of female satire of a kind which in being more pointed and more direct than that of the spectator, and less bitter and exaggerated than that of swift, written by a member of the sex who was herself a recognised leader of society, was more calculated than anything else to impress the female mind with the necessity of thorough reform. strange to say, mrs. montagu's claims for female instruction other than moral are very modest. it is a subject she seldom refers to, although there is a letter dated to her sister-in-law mrs. robinson, containing a reference to the education of her little niece, in which she certainly does not aim very high. a boarding-school is recommended in spite of the fact that what girls learn there is most trifling, "but they unlearn what would be of great disservice--a provincial dialect which is extremely ungenteel, and other tricks that they learn in the nursery." french lessons she deems unnecessary, "unless for persons in very high life", and she expects a great deal of benefit from a good air and a good dancing-master. mrs. montagu here presents that curious mixture of good sense and narrow conventionality which proves the extreme difficulty of getting away from influences and forming an independent judgment. in the "_essay on shakespeare_" ( ) mrs. montagu appears as a literary critic. she felt offended at voltaire's disparagement of the great english author and also at the frenchman's haughty arrogance. the essay was favourably criticised in the _critical review_, and cowper praised it in a letter to lady hesketh in the following words: "i no longer wonder that mrs. montagu stands at the head of all that is called learned, and that every critic veils his bonnet to her superior judgment.... the learning, the good sense, the sound judgment, and the wit displayed in it fully justify not only my compliment, but all compliments that either have been already paid to her talents or shall be paid hereafter." but johnson spoke scornfully of it. he said he had "taken up the end of the web, and finding it packthread, had thought it useless to go further in search of embroidery," but had to grant afterwards that it was conclusive against voltaire. it procured mrs. montagu a great many friends in france, where such wit as hers was sure to find full appreciation. when, seven years later, she visited paris, voltaire wrote another furious article against shakespeare, which was read at the académie in her presence. "i think madam," said one of the members when the reading was over, "you must be rather sorry at what you have just heard." mrs. montagu shrugged her shoulders. "i, sir! not at all! i am not one of m. voltaire's friends!" of quite a different cast of character was mrs. chapone, whose "_letters on the improvement of the mind_" were dedicated to mrs. montagu. she was plain and uninteresting, and when the romance of her life had taken an untimely ending, it is to be feared her conversation became too much like sermonizing to suit vivacious young ladies like fanny burney, who thought her assemblies "very dull". but whatever she wrote bears the stamp of sincerity. she was evidently deeply concerned about the moral welfare of the niece she addressed in her letters--the example set by mme de sévigné and imitated by lady mary wortley montagu had found followers--and she honestly tried to reconcile what was noble and proper in her eyes with the demands of convention. above all she tried to inculcate that sense of responsibility for our actions which she held to be the basis of true christianity. all our strivings should have the same purpose; that of bringing us nearer to god. her niece is told to render herself more useful and pleasing to her fellow-creatures (a concession to prevailing opinions), "_and consequently more acceptable to god_". this last addition completely subverts the meaning of what precedes. without it, the sense would be: "please others and you will please your own vanity," which now becomes: "please others and try to make them happy, and you will please god." mrs. chapone thought pride and vanity the worst vices. men were particularly addicted to the former, since to be proud is to admire oneself; and women to the latter, for vain is she who desires to be admired by others. it is the vice of little minds, chiefly conversant with trifling subjects, and brings affectation in its train. the vain woman turns exaggerated weakness to account to ensure her empire over the stronger sex. thus arises that false sensibility which will weep for a fly and leads to a thousand excesses. a well-directed reason will keep the feelings under control and spur us to actions of christian charity. those who relieve the sufferer are of more benefit to him than those who lament over his misfortunes. sensibility is, indeed, one of the catchwords of the century. originally a laudable compassion and sympathy with the sufferings of others and a reaction against "the faithless coldness of the times", richardson's novels show how soon it began to degenerate into sickly sentimentality which, when indulging in the luxury of woe, forgot to relieve the suffering which called forth the tears of sentiment. one of the most serious charges brought against j. j. rousseau was that in his "_nouvelle héloise_" and in his "_confessions_" he makes his lovers wallow to a sickening extent in the ecstasy of grief, inducing others by the magic of his personality to imitate him. this false sensibility was as much the abomination of the bluestocking ladies as a well-regulated fellow-feeling was thought commendable, and here at least mary wollstonecraft heartily agreed with them. the usual reproach that the revolutionary leaders, those "friends of humanity", in fighting for the interest of the human race neglected the immediate wants of the individual--of which argument especially the anti-jacobin made ample use--was, therefore, in her case at least, utterly undeserved. hannah more made "_sensibility_" the subject of a poem dedicated to mrs. boscawen, and in her "_strictures_" devoted an entire chapter to it. in both the conclusion runs that sensibility has received its true direction when it is supremely turned to the love of god: "but if religious bias rule the soul, then sensibility exalts the whole." there is, of course, in mrs. chapone's letters the usual warning against the danger of fiction, especially of the sentimental kind, the chief nurse of false sensibility, and also an element arising from the wish to reconcile christian charity with the "necessary inequality" among individuals: the question of the treatment of inferiors. since the chief duties of woman are of a domestic nature, it follows that the management of servants will be her task, and the christian in mrs. chapone would see them treated with kind civility, while the lady of quality in her warns against the danger of too close intimacy with people of low birth and education. the idea of raising them by slow degrees to a higher social level probably never suggested itself to her. her ideal of female instruction must be likewise described as in the main conventional, with a few useful hints to mark a partial advance. dancing and french are "so universal that they cannot be dispensed with", but music and drawing she wanted to be taught only to those who were qualified by possessing talent. the study of history is recommended as giving a liberal and comprehensive view of human nature, and supplying materials for conversation, and the reading of poetry will improve the female imagination, which only wants regulating to be superior to that of men. shakespeare, milton, and mrs. montagu's _essay_ ought to be the object of diligent study, and even heathen mythology and greek philosophy may be recommended as containing a strong moral element. the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake clearly did not appeal to mrs. chapone at all. the most pronounced character among the bluestockings, as well as the most privileged among them in literary gifts was beyond any doubt mrs. hannah more.[ ] it will be interesting, in continuation of the more general appreciation of respective tendencies in the introduction to this chapter, to contrast her with mary wollstonecraft with a view to establishing the chief causes from which the difference in their ideas arose, and arriving at a vindication of the laudable intentions of both. if mary wollstonecraft was turned into a social reformer chiefly through the influence of the outward circumstances which dominated her youth, hannah more's career was largely the consequence of certain innate qualities, which predestined her to become a moralist. she may have inherited her preaching propensities from her father, who had himself been designed for the church before circumstances interfered to turn him into a schoolmaster. her mother, a farmer's daughter, devoted herself entirely to the children's education. in her earliest youth, little hannah's favourite pastime--as her biographer and admirer mr. w. roberts tells us in his memoirs--was the writing of long exhortative letters "to depraved characters", and when in later years she lived at mrs. garrick's we find her referred to as the latter's "domestic chaplain". and yet she could be witty enough when she chose and was not without a sense of humour. at the time of the writing of her "_bas bleu_" she sent her friend mrs. pepys a pair of stockings for one of her children, accompanied by a letter, "_the bas blanc_", in which she treats the subject as if it were an epic, "so far of a moral cast that its chief end is utility,"--hoping the child will be able "to run through it with pleasure". she goes on to say that "the exordium is the natural introduction by which you are led into the whole work. the middle, i trust, is free from any unnatural humour or inflation, and the end from any disproportionate littleness. i have avoided bringing about the catastrophe too suddenly, as i know that would hurt him at whose feet i lay it", and so on in the same strain. mary wollstonecraft would have been utterly incapable of such playfulness. a further determining factor in the difference in the lives of both was the treatment received at the hands of the influential. mary was first treated with indifference and coldness, and afterwards reviled for her opinions, whereas hannah more was courted and flattered in a way which might have turned the head of any more volatile girl. to the struggle for life of which mary bore the marks till her dying-day, hannah was a total stranger, having had a comfortable annuity settled on her by a mr. turner, who once made her an offer of marriage. thus secured against penury, that constant dread of rising authors, hannah could go to london and give herself up to social amusements and to literature. her meeting with garrick ensured her a hearty welcome in bluestocking circles, and his support smoothed her brief dramatic career and contributed to the warm reception of her first poetic attempts. they represent her contribution to romanticism, and gained the approval of no less a critic than dr. johnson himself. hannah more thus became a universal favourite, and her "vers de société" became very popular. however, her career as a dramatist came to an end with garrick's death, and after the success of "_bas bleu_" and "_sensibility_" she more and more directed her energies towards social and moral reform. the bluestocking assemblies, much as they appealed to her love of witty conversation, afforded no outlet for that pent-up energy which made her long for some worthy object on which to concentrate herself for the benefit of society. it may be said that from the decade which saw the outbreak of the french revolution dates the participation of english women in the discussion of the great social problems by which the times were stirred. it was as natural that hannah more should openly declare herself in favour of a strict maintenance of the existing social order as that mary wollstonecraft should become the champion of radical social and political reform. thus, each of the contending parties numbered among the warmest advocates of their cause a member of the female sex. and yet, previous to the great social upheaval in france, hannah more at one time seemed likely to range herself among the partisans of moderate social reform. her first social object was found in the struggle for the abolition of the slave-trade which in held the attention of parliament. mr. wilberforce became her "red cross knight", and hannah wrote a poem entitled "_the black slave trade_", in which her attitude towards the revolution is foreshadowed. the lines: shall britain, _where the soul of freedom reigns_, forge chains for others she herself disdains? forbid it, heaven! o let the nation know, the liberty she tastes she will bestow; are sufficient to show that she consented to be the champion of liberty in other countries only while they regarded england as the natural home of freedom. burke had no more faithful follower among his conservative friends than the reformer hannah more. after the outbreak of the revolution she soon altered her opinion that, although the capture of the bastille had been undertaken by "lawless rabble" yet "some good" might be expected from it. price's sermon filled her with horror, and burke's _reflections_ had her undivided sympathy. while engaged upon religious tracts and plans for instructing the children of the poor came the news of dupont's speech in the national assembly, attacking all religion and calling nature and reason the gods of men. indignation made hannah take up her pen in reply, and refute the atheistic arguments in a pamphlet. the success of this effort caused her to be solicited from all sides to undertake the refutation of thomas paine's _rights of man_. her humorous treatment of the subject in this second tract, entitled "_village politics, by will chip_", appealed to the class for whom it was chiefly intended and was a distinct success, as were her doggerel ballads on the subject, some of which were to popular tunes, preaching submission to the existing social order, for, as "will chip" puts it in his "true rights of man": that some must be poorer, this truth will i sing, _is the law of my maker_, and not of my king; and the true rights of man, and the life of his cause, is not equal possessions; but equal, just laws. hannah's sympathy went out to patient joe, the newcastle collier, who held that "all things which happened were best", and to the ploughman who felt safe in his cottage with the british laws for his guard: "if the squire should oppress, i get instant redress"; a view which the author of _caleb williams_ emphatically did not share, and which makes the modern reader feel as if hannah more were "laying it on a little too thick." hannah more and mary wollstonecraft--who, as will be seen in the next chapter, ranged herself among the opponents of burke--thus took opposite sides in the great struggle, defending diametrically opposed principles, yet collaborating in gradually weaning the reading public from the conventional notion that the domain of literature was taboo to women and in accustoming them to the unwonted spectacle of women participating in a social struggle. mary wollstonecraft's claims for a complete emancipation impressed hannah more as directed straight against the divine authority. the state of inequality, we have seen, was looked upon by her as god's will, and to rebel against it was to oppose the decrees of the almighty. the right way to benefit her sex seemed to her to insist on a better moral education. on this subject at least the two political adversaries were agreed. "in those countries in which fondness for the mere persons of women is carried to the highest excess, they are slaves; their moral and intellectual degradation increases in direct proportion to the adoration which is paid to their charms" is one of the many statements in hannah more's "_strictures on female education_"[ ] which mary wollstonecraft might have written, and both saw in a liberal moral education the only remedy. at this point, however, the two paths become separated. to mary wollstonecraft female education was merely one of the milestones in the march towards perfection; to hannah more it seemed that women might be made instrumental "to raise the depressed tone of public morals and to awaken the drowsy spirit of religious principle", and also that they might be called upon "to come forward and contribute their full and fair proportion towards the saving of their country." with hannah more, high morality and patriotism necessarily went hand in hand. her ideal was to see all english women join in a thorough reform of manners and morals, that her country might become not only the bulwark of tradition against the mania for innovation, but also that of the religion she held sacred against the onslaughts of atheism coming from across the channel. if she had a less fervent temperament than mary, she compensated for this lack through her practical insight, which told her that sudden radical changes are apt to destroy the edifice of ages, without offering anything solid as a substitute. she felt the guardian of her sex against the attacks of infidelity which in her eyes were principally directed against the female heart. "conscious of the influence of women in civil society, _conscious of the effect which female infidelity produced in france_, they attribute the ill success of their attempts in this country to their having been hitherto chiefly addressed to the male sex. they are now sedulously labouring to destroy the religious principles of women, and in too many instances have fatally succeeded. for this purpose not only novels and romances have been made the vehicles of vice and infidelity, but the same allurement has been held out to the women of our country which was employed in the garden of eden by the first philosophist to the first sinner,--knowledge"[ ]. the above lines determine hannah more's attitude towards female learning, which she regarded as the devil's own bait. as an example of the corrupting tendencies of foreign literature she makes a few remarks on the much-admired german plays of "_the robbers_" and "_the stranger_", the second of which presents the character of an adulteress in the most pleasing and fascinating colours. "to make matters worse, the german example has found a follower in a woman, a professed admirer and imitator of the german suicide werter. the female werter, as she is styled by her biographer, asserts in a work entitled, "_the wrongs of women_" that adultery is justifiable, and that the restrictions placed on it by the laws of england, constitute one of the wrongs of women".[ ] to come to a correct understanding of this passage, it is necessary to remember that the "_strictures_" were written in , when the remembrance of mary wollstonecraft's attempt at suicide was still fresh, and when her unexpected death had drawn attention to godwin's edition of her works, the only one containing "_maria, or the wrongs of woman_". in their ideas of marriage, as indeed in all their applications of religious precepts, the gulf between hannah more and mary wollstonecraft becomes immeasurably wide. but wherever the sense of moral duty, unhampered by convention or by a rigid philosophical harness, was free to assert itself, it is curious to note the close affinity between the ideas of two women who occupied such widely different positions in the social life of their time, yet were both so extremely conscious of the moral responsibility of their sex. it remains for us to consider the interesting--if somewhat eccentric--personality of the woman who had brought down upon herself so many charges of gross immorality. footnotes: [ ] _strictures on the modern system of female education, p. ._ [ ] _strictures on the modern system of female education, p. ._ [ ] see w. roberts, _memoirs of the life and correspondence of mrs. hannah more_, p. . [ ] walpole. [ ] there seems to have been a good deal of uncertainty as to the authorship of the works of the famous brother and sister. contemporary opinion unanimously assigns that of "_le grand cyrus_" to madeleine de scudéry, and not to her brother george. [ ] like mary wollstonecraft, hannah more took brevet-rank as a matron by virtue of her literary publications. [ ] p. . [ ] _strictures_, p. . [ ] _strictures_, p. . chapter vi. _radical feminism: mary wollstonecraft._ around the name of mary wollstonecraft a storm of adverse criticism raged for years after her death, prompting godwin to the publication of his "_memoirs of the author of a vindication of the rights of woman_", and calling forth the somewhat half-hearted defence of her actions and writings by an anonymous author in . both failed to attract any degree of notice. shelley, whose meetings with young mary godwin over her mother's grave in st. pancras cemetery are described in mrs. marshall's biography, offered her the sincere tribute of his verse in "_the revolt of islam_", where the heroine resembles her in her character. the champion of the cause of woman was herself an essentially loveable, thoroughly feminine representative of her sex, whose many troubles arose from an extremely sensitive heart, a pure, refined sensibility, without any of the alloy which she was the first to regret in so many other women, and from the circumstance that, being born a century before her time, her striving was only moderately successful and brought her the ill-will of many who were unable to appreciate the sincerity of her motives. nothing could be more undeserved, or bespeak a more glaring ignorance of the character it reviled than horace walpole's mention of mary wollstonecraft in his letter to miss hannah more--in her rigid respectability the direct opposite of the author of the "_vindication_"--as "a hyena in petticoats, whose books were excommunicated from the pale of his library". few books and their authors have been the object of such unsparing censure as the _rights of women_ and mary wollstonecraft, and it may be added that seldom was the imputation of meddling spitefulness and even of gross immorality more utterly undeserved. there speaks from the entire work a spirit of absolute sincerity, of disinterested eagerness for necessary reforms and of that fervent enthusiasm in the pursuit of aims which will not shrink at martyrdom, which endear the author to the unbiased reader, and which only the narrowest conservatism could overlook. nor would it have met with the bitter antagonism it encountered had not the public mind, harassed by the constant menace of the french revolution, been overmuch inclined to cry down all works of reform. as it was, mary wollstonecraft's reputation passed through three distinctly marked phases; in the first, the work and its author were violently attacked by the many, and enthusiastically defended by the few; in the second, they were consigned to temporary oblivion; in the third, mr. kegan paul in , and after him miss mathilde blind in "_the new quarterly review_", miss h. zimmern in the "_deutsche rundschau_", and e. r. pennell in the "_eminent women series_" tried with a fair amount of success to awaken a new interest in both and to vindicate the author's memory by clearing her personal character from the monstrous imputations of immorality. the fact has now been definitely established that she was prompted by the noblest love of humanity, and is entitled to rank among those champions of the new faith who suffered martyrdom for the cause. she was one of those predestined by that innate character she was so fain to deny to a life of the bitterest anguish, brightened by spells of almost perfect happiness. both the joys and the sorrows of humanity were abundantly hers. with her, character was indeed fate, and the outward circumstances of her life only emphasized the convictions to which a woman of her stamp was bound to come in the world of inequality and cruel injustice in which she moved. she combined in her person the rarest gifts of both head and heart; as a quick perception, enabling her to grasp a situation very rapidly; a never-flinching determination to use the divine gift of reason in the pursuit of useful knowledge, and a boundless devotion to what she considered the obvious task of her life. once she had discovered her vocation she flung herself into her work with indomitable zeal, trying to do herself violence in asserting the superiority of reason over sentiment, and to put a restraint on the passions that threatened to overpower her. in this attempt she did not always succeed, and while it makes her appear to us thoroughly human, yet her imperfect self-control was not without influence on her works of reform, leading her to exaggeration and wearisome reiterations. in the chapter of the _vindication_ which deals with national education she insists that only that man makes a good citizen, who has in his youth "exercised the affections of a son and a brother," for public affections grow out of private, and it is in youth that the fondest friendships are formed. this sounds like a confession, for if mary wollstonecraft had not been in earlier years such a devoted friend to her dear ones as to utterly disregard her own comfort in her desire to befriend them, she could never have loved humanity with such intensity. it is difficult to say what would have become of the wollstonecraft household if mary had not strained every faculty to assist them. when her drunken father beat his wife, the latter used to appeal to mary for protection. when at last the poor soul felt death approach, it was again mary who without a second's hesitation flung up her situation as a lady's companion at bath to return to her mother's sickbed and to ease her last moments. not only her sisters everina and eliza, but also her younger brothers charles and james received from her both moral and financial support, to be able to give which she cramped herself to such an extent that the room in george street in which she wrote was furnished only with the barest necessaries, and her gowns were so extremely shabby that knowles in his "_life of fuseli_" describes her as "a philosophical sloven". in thus reducing her wants, however, she was merely acting in accordance with the view--held by all the friends of reform and derived from rousseau--that only he can be happy whose desires are so few that he can afford to gratify them, an offshoot of the famous nature-theory. nevertheless, the description of mary as a "sloven" seems exaggerated, judging from the two portraits by opie which have been preserved, of which the one may be spurious, but the other, now in the national portrait gallery, is beyond any doubt genuine. it shows the face ("physiognomy" mary wollstonecraft herself would have preferred to call it) of a strikingly pretty, refined-looking woman, with a profusion of auburn hair, a clear complexion and a pleading look in her brown eyes which reminded mr. kegan paul of beatrice cenci. the grim realities of mary's youth left little space for the development of any sense of humour, but they bred in her a fighting spirit which afterwards stood her in good stead. her next championship was that of fanny blood, whom she shielded from domestic misery very much like that she had herself experienced, and whose brother george, who became involved in a nasty scandal[ ], also experienced mary's all-embracing kindness of heart. from her correspondence with him in the years of his forced absence from england it indeed appears that she was not by any means a "fair-weather friend". the extremely serious cast of her character--which circumstances afterwards developed into melancholy--also found expression in a strong sense of duty. unlike those champions of humanity who clamour for the rights of man without reference to the corresponding obligations, mary wollstonecraft in later years always insisted not only that every right of necessity involves a duty, but also that we should insist upon those rights chiefly to be enabled to perform the moral duties which life imposes. add to this an absolute "incapability of disguise", as her friend and publisher johnson expressed it, and a frankness which made her "fling whate'er she felt, not fearing, into words"--often uncovering the worst sores of society in all their hideousness with a determination bordering upon indelicacy--and the portrait of mary's character, as far as elementary traits go, is complete. the strong natural bent of her character was further emphasized by incidents which presented to her mind the problem of the subjugation of women urgently demanding a champion. on three different occasions did she see the lives of women ruined by cruel, dissipated husbands. the third of these was by far the worst. it concerned the marriage of her sister eliza ("poor bess", as mary calls her in her correspondence with everina and fanny), to a mr. bishop, who, although he was probably a clergyman, appears to have been a most hypocritically sensual brute. no doubt the wife also was to blame; indeed, all the wollstonecraft girls were inclined to be suspicious, irritable, and over-ready to take offence. shortly after the birth of a child matters came to a crisis, and mary, having come over to nurse her sister, who after her confinement had had an attack of insanity, proposed that they should leave mr. bishop's house together, a plan actually carried into execution, after which mary, eliza and fanny blood started teaching as a profession. the daily bickerings of the bishop household impressed upon mary's mind the state of utter defencelessness and abject slavery in which many women were kept. it afterwards made her decide to supplement her "_rights of women_" with a novel, dealing with the wrongs of women, in which some of the incidents she had witnessed found a place. the work was unfortunately interrupted by her unexpected death, and in its unfinished state was included by godwin in the posthumous edition of some of mary wollstonecraft's works in . thus death claimed her while making a last effort to succour the oppressed. with the sisters' flight from mr. bishop's house began the long struggle against adverse circumstances in which mary did most of the fighting. one wonders what would have become of eliza and the boys--who had soon left their father's home--but for mary's resourcefulness. everina found a home with edward, the eldest brother, who obviously thought that in sheltering her he had done all that could be expected of him. the girls met with little or no sympathy from friends, the general opinion finding fault with eliza's conduct and judging that "women should accept without a murmur whatever it suits their husbands to give them, whether it be kindness or blows". this represents the general belief of those days with regard to the position of married women. the possibility of girls of the better middle class having at any time of their lives to earn their own living had never been seriously considered, and the sisters were indeed in great distress. again mary had the utter incapacity of even the bravest of her sex to support themselves brought home to her in a way that left no doubt. and yet the two or three years of the little boarding-school at newington green were not wholly devoid of enjoyment. mary made the acquaintance of the famous dr. price, the dissenting preacher who was soon to rouse the fire of burke's indignation, and who strongly influenced her religious views. it seems the right place here to say something of mary's attitude towards religion. in a life like hers, bringing her face to face with the evils of existing society, and with her degree of sensitiveness it is but natural that religious feelings should have played a prominent part. her mother had bred her in the principles of the church of england, but mary was far too independent to allow her mother any real influence. but at least the circumstances of her youth saved her from sophistic teachings, which may form hypocrites or awaken an altogether disproportionate hatred of whatever smacks of christianity, under the impression that christianity and the dogmatism of narrow-minded orthodoxy are at bottom one and the same thing. such was godwin's case, and it proved a deathblow to his faith. mary, however, was a great deal left to herself and, as godwin informs us in the _memoirs_, her religion was mostly of her own creation, and little allied to any system of forms. the many biblical quotations in her works suggest diligent reading of the bible and point to a state of mind very far removed from indifference or antipathy. she rather felt a natural leaning towards religion, a craving for mental peace to be satisfied only by firm religious convictions. as godwin puts it, the tenets of her system were the growth of her own moral taste, and her religion therefore was always a gratification, never a terror to her. the same almost feminine yearning for the moral support of a religion that warms the heart, distinguished rousseau from the robust and self-reliant philosophers of the rational school, and possibly caused mary wollstonecraft to feel attracted towards him and at the same time to pity him, when first reading his "_emile_"[ ]. up to the time of her first meeting with dr. price her attitude had been that of simple faith, with constant appeals to the divine interference. she had been a regular church-goer, and it is quite possible that the public and regular routine of sermons and prayers and the implicit subjection it demands, had already begun to pall upon her, and predisposed her for the adoption of the less dogmatic views of deism. it may also be safely assumed that her experiences in ireland as a governess and the subsequent period of close intimacy with some of the leading revolutionists lessened her interest in religion, which points to the future, and proportionately increased that in man, who is the present. as the years advanced, the rapid growth of her considerable intellectual powers, the tendencies of the times in which she lived, and the society which she frequented made her drift unconsciously towards rationalism. then it was that a conflict arose between sentiment and intellect. she set about "repressing her natural ardour and granting a more considerable influence to the dictates of reason", or, as professor dowden puts it, "she set her brain as a sentinel over her heart, trying to put a curb on her natural impulsiveness"[ ]. this change in her views of life, dating from her intimacy with price, was hastened by circumstances. the death of her friend fanny--who died in her arms at lisbon,--and the want of success of her first educational efforts--due chiefly to mrs. bishop's mismanagement of the school in mary's absence--had made her feel low-spirited and ill. it was only the sale of the manuscript of the "_thoughts on_ _the education of daughters_" to mr. johnson, the publisher of fleet street, for ten guineas--part of which sum she sent to the bloods whose straits were worse than her own--that staved off utter ruin. she relinquished her work as a schoolmistress, and through her friend mr. prior, assistant master at eton, obtained the situation of governess to the children of lord kingsborough at a salary of forty pounds a year. before leaving for mitchelstown in ireland, she spent some time with the priors at eton, where she had an opportunity to study the life in an english public-school. it did not impress her favourably and gave rise to some severe criticism in the _rights of women_ on the subject of false religion and undue attachment to outward things. "i could not live the life they lead at eton", she says in a letter to her sister everina, "nothing but dress and ridicule going forward, and i really believe their fondness for ridicule tends to make them affected, the women in their manners, and the men in their conversation, for witlings abound and puns fly about like crackers, though you would scarcely guess they had any meaning in them, if you did not hear the noise they create". this was her first glimpse of society. in the same letter she finds comfort in the reflection that the time will come when "the god of love will wipe away all tears from our eyes, and neither death nor accidents of any kind will interpose to separate us from those we love". no wonder she was horrified at the boy who only consented to receive the sacrament of the lord's supper to avoid forfeiting half a guinea! she was now, indeed, entering upon a new phase of her life. she had witnessed the horrors of a domestic life in which drunkenness and other moral vices reigned supreme; she was now to behold the utter worthlessness of the pleasure-seeking, irresponsible upper classes, whose religion was all sham, and who tried to make up in dogmatic narrowness what they lacked in true piety. it was the conduct of her own sex that most of all disgusted her. it taught her that the absurd distinctions of rank corrupted not merely the oppressed dependents, but also their tyrants, whose only claim to respectability was in the titles they held. in short, it turned her from a mere educator into a social reformer, and from a devout christian into a deist. what struck her most forcibly about the women of the kingsborough household was their unfitness for their chief task in life: that of educating their own children. they represented a varied catalogue of female errors. lady kingsborough was too much occupied with her dogs to care for her children, whom she left to the care of their governess. when afterwards that governess came to stand first in the children's affections, she promptly dismissed her. mary wollstonecraft's revilers have tried to substantiate the charge of irreligiousness against her by pointing out that her favourite pupil margaret--afterwards lady mount cashel--was not wholly without blame in her later life; thus ignoring the degrading influence of a mother like lady kingsborough, and overlooking the fact that mary's stay in ireland lasted only one year. in her correspondence with mrs. bishop there is a description of lady kingsborough's stepmother and her three daughters, "fine girls, just going to market, as their brother says". this short sentence shows the state of revolt she was in against the frivolity of women in making a wealthy marriage the sole aim of life. if, therefore, her religious principles were of a sternness hardly suited to the practice of those days, it need not necessarily be the former that were at fault. the imputation of insincerity, however, merits absolute contempt. here, indeed, "to doubt her goodness were to want a heart". it is impossible to read any portion of her works without being struck by the earnest tone of sincere piety which pervades them all. it was a great pity that what she saw of christianity prevented her from going to the source of that religion, which might have given her that peace "which passeth understanding" for which her heart yearned and which the vagueness of her deistic views, although better suited to satisfy her reason, could not supply. while at bristol hot wells in the summer of she wrote a little book entitled "_mary, a fiction_", relating the incidents of her friendship with fanny blood. but it is not the incidents that make the charm of this composition. godwin, who could admire in another those qualities which he knew he himself lacked, says that in it "the feelings are of the truest and most exquisite class; every circumstance is adorned with that species of imagination which enlists itself under the banners of delicacy and sentiment"[ ]. mary's dismissal as a governess fortunately did not leave her unprovided for. the generous mr. johnson found her lodgings in george street, near blackfriar's bridge, and made her his reader. she criticised the manuscripts sent to him, and the kindness and sincerity of her criticisms brought her a few real friends, among whom was miss hayes, who afterwards became the means of bringing her and godwin together. mr. johnson had just started the _analytical review_, in which mary took a considerable share. the many translations she did at this period were suggested by johnson, and as such throw no light on her personal taste, but in the case of salzmann's "_moralisches elementarbuch_" he certainly gave her a congenial subject. she had by this time read rousseau's _emile_, with the main tendencies of which she agreed as far as the boy emile was concerned, but whose ideal of womanhood, embodied in sophie, was very far removed from her own, and also thomas day's "_sandford and merton_," in which the influence of rousseau is very marked. the ideas expressed by day, corroborated and added to by her own experience and by salzmann's theories, form the basis of her "_original stories from real life, with conversations calculated to regulate the affections and form the mind to truth and goodness_". ( ). the idea of a private tutor (or preceptor) had been rousseau's, and day makes a kind-hearted clergyman, mr. barlow, who had attained excellent results in the training of young harry sandford, a farmer's son, undertake the instruction of tommy merton, the son of a rich planter of jamaica. day obviously cannot refrain from introducing the theme of class-distinctions, making the farmer's child appear to great advantage by the side of the gentleman's son, who has been utterly spoiled by an over-indulgent mother and has had the whole catalogue of prejudices of birth and station inculcated into him. the story consists of a string of incidents, partly arising from natural causes and partly due to mr. barlow's "coups de théâtre pédagogiques", in which rousseau also was fond of indulging. they all contribute towards the formation of tommy's mind and heart, in conjunction with a number of stories, told at the psychological moment by their preceptor, which it appears do not fail to produce their effect, for tommy is promptly changed from an insufferable little despot into a paragon of virtue. nor is he slow himself to adopt the oracular tone of self-sufficiency which harry exhibits from the first. where day's book differs from rousseau,--which is only in two respects,--the deviation is due to the fact that rousseau was essentially a theorist, whose aim was to provide an educational scheme, whilst day in combination with mr. edgeworth meant to, and did carry his theories into practice, in doing which he had to make a good many concessions to outward circumstances. rousseau seldom indulges in story-telling, in his scheme the work of instructing the child under twelve (tommy and harry are only six) is left to nature, and the preceptor keeps his precepts to himself and merely mounts the most jealous guard over his pupil to ward off undesirable influences and to leave nature undisturbed in accomplishing her task. thus rousseau advises the negative education for young children. in day, however, the preceptor takes a decidedly active part, and both by precept and example directs his pupils' thoughts towards certain conclusions they are meant to draw. a natural consequence of rousseau's radical nature-scheme is that the pleasure of reading books--beyond a few of great practical value to the man of nature, such as defoe's robinson crusoe--is withheld from the young pupil, who is only taught to read at his own request, and at a much later age. instead, he should be content to read the book of nature, which is in a language every human creature can understand. here again the more practical day disagrees, and in _sandford and merton_ books play a prominent part. again, rousseau wants to separate his pupil not only from the family to which he belongs, but from all other children, thus overlooking the important factor of inter-education. day educates the two boys together and occasionally brings them in contact with other children also, mostly of the peasant-class. for the rest, however, there is a close parallelism between the two systems. stress is laid on simplicity being the mother of all virtues, the boys are taught to regard manual labour as an honest occupation of which no so-called "gentleman" need be ashamed, and which may stand him in good stead should circumstances make it necessary for him to earn his own living. they have their physical strength developed by manly exercise, and the advantages accruing from a life in accordance with the dictates of nature are pointed out to them in a most suggestive way. they learn to regard class-privileges with scorn; to them a "man" is a being superior to a "gentleman"; are taught that the only property a man is entitled to is the result of his own labour; and acquire some knowledge of botany, zoology, cosmography, geography and in general of such subjects as may render the child more fit for a life in accordance with nature such as day himself practised. it need hardly be said that mary wollstonecraft's educational ideas did not go the entire length of day's somewhat eccentric radicalism. she sympathised with rousseau's nature-scheme only inasmuch as it asserted the advantages of country-life and did away with conventionality. although accustomed to the most rigid simplicity, she never approached the utter disregard of appearances which day professed to feel. she utterly disagreed with rousseau where he asserted the necessity of giving girls an education "relative to men", it being one of the chief aims of her later works to show that there should be no difference of principles in the education of the two sexes; but she applied a great many of rousseau's suggestions, which he intended for boys, to her own sex. far from wishing to furnish a complete scheme for the education of young girls upon a basis of abstract reasoning, she follows day in attacking the defects most common to childhood and in trying to establish a standard of virtue which may be attained by following reason. she entirely relies upon the force of a moral lesson contained in a well-told story, or, better still, illustrated by personal example. in one point of difference the contrast in character between her and rousseau becomes most obvious. the latter's lack of moral firmness makes him, while shielding his pupil from the evil influence of his surroundings, rather unaccountably overlook the necessity of inculcating a sense of duty. his scheme has no ethical background. in mary wollstonecraft, however, this ethical background is the essential thing. her parting advice to her pupils (voiced by mrs. mason) is: "recollect, that from religion your chief comfort must spring, and never neglect the duty of prayer. learn from experience the comfort that arises from making known your wants and sorrows to the wisest and best of beings not only of this life, but of that which is to come." rousseau's pupil was not likely to become a "striver", mary wollstonecraft's had had high ethical principles instilled into her. the lack of incentives to virtue which characterises rousseau's scheme may be the consequence of his theory of original innocence. he does not believe in the existence of evil in connection with the divine will, but holds that evil is merely the consequence of wrong opinions. here he was godwin's teacher. a radical change in individual opinion will cause evil to disappear. how original sin and evil could find their way into the world, mankind being in a state of perfect innocence, he does not explain. godwin, and with him mary wollstonecraft, were of opinion that there is in mankind no natural bias towards either good or evil, and that everything depends on the forming of the mind, hence the all-importance of education. religion, therefore, is an essential part of mary wollstonecraft's educational plan. it is true that the child cannot grasp the fundamental truths, its power of reasoning being as yet limited, and should not for this reason be permitted to read the bible. but her girls are taught from the first that "religion ought to be the active director of our affections" and that "happiness can only arise from imitating god in a life guided by considerations of virtue. virtue, according to her mouth-piece mrs. mason, is "the exercise of benevolent affections to please god and bring comfort and happiness here, and become angels hereafter." in the "_original stories_" we have some of the theories of the _rights of women_ presented to us in a nutshell. they claim for girls equality of education with boys, and indirectly deny the sexual character theory, based on that of innate principles, which mary wollstonecraft agreed with godwin did not exist. rousseau held that reason was the prerogative of man, and that woman's substitute for it was sensibility. man was made to think, and woman to feel. "whatever is in nature is right", was the axiom he applied to the case of woman. nature meant her to be kept in a state of subjection to man, and to give her an education without regarding the limitations of her sex would have seemed to him flying in the face of providence. mary wollstonecraft's views of society were sufficiently pessimistic to consider the average parent utterly unfit to educate a child. she therefore adhered to rousseau's idea of a preceptor. her two girls, mary and caroline, aged and , far from having been kept in ignorance, and further handicapped by the death of their mother, had already imbibed some false notions and prejudices. mary's judgment was not sufficiently cool to make her realise that appearances are often deceptive, and that bodily defects may be found together with excellent moral qualities. she had an unfortunate turn for ridicule. her sister caroline, by being vain of her person, proved that she did not understand the source of true merit. it was, therefore, the task of their monitress to carefully eradicate these prejudices and to substitute for them correct notions of true virtue. in mrs. mason, mary wollstonecraft enriched english literature with the portrait of the typical british matron with "no nonsense about her", but in making this woman her mouth-piece she scarcely did justice to the qualities of her own heart. it was the struggle of her life to make her heart yield to the dictates of reason, and mrs. mason certainly does not impress the reader as struggling very hard. she is the embodiment of pure, undiluted reason in all its unyielding sternness. any show of tenderness towards her charges would have seemed to her a confession of weakness. when after a long spell of life together she returns them to their father, they have advanced just far enough in her affection to be termed "candidates for her friendship"; which, by the way, is meant to imply that they have made satisfactory progress in the faculty of reason. mary wollstonecraft for the moment does not seem to realise that the essential quality in an educator should be to make her pupils not only respect, but also love her, and mrs. mason is a most unloveable person. her haughty arrogance and insufferable self-sufficiency were not likely to escape her eldest pupil's sense of humour and could not but seriously affect her influence over the girls. thus the children of mary wollstonecraft's fancy are brought up in the midst of reasoning logic, unwarmed by the sunshine of parental love. to make matters worse, this champion of liberty, who found fault with rousseau for failing to see that his schemes of freedom applied with equal justice to women; who was soon herself to protest against the abuse of parental authority, who held with locke that "if the mind be curbed and humbled too much in children, if the spirit be abased and broken much by too strict a hand over them, they lose all their vigour and industry",[ ] herself made the fatal mistake of aiding and abetting the thraldom of the young girl. the education which mary and caroline receive is nothing but a dreary course of constant admonition, in which the word liberty would be utterly misplaced. she has entirely failed to catch the spirit of rousseau's _emile_, in which the instructor only prevents the pupil from hurting himself overmuch through his ignorance, leaving him otherwise free to draw the conclusions of awakening reason, and above all allowing him to live out his life. harry sandford and tommy merton go together for long walks in the woods, get lost and owe their rescue to the lucky accident of meeting a boy who takes them to his home. when mr. barlow is informed that the boys have turned up, he goes to meet them on their way home and merely tells them to be more careful in future, availing himself of the incident to instil certain lessons in geography which smack of rousseau. but their liberty is in no way cramped. with mary wollstonecraft, however, the case is entirely different. one wonders what sort of paragons mrs. mason was going to turn out. the chances would seem pretty even between prim old maids and confirmed young hypocrites, depending on those very innate tendencies she was fain to deny! she held that children should not be left too much freedom, because, the faculty of reason being as yet insufficiently developed in them, they might make the wrong use of it. but the restrictions on their liberty should be such as to remain almost unnoticed by them. they should not have a variety of prohibitions imposed upon them, as was the case with lady kingsborough's children, whom she immediately restored to some degree of liberty. one cannot help thinking that theory and practice often clash, owing to the perpetual conflict between reason and the feelings. granting, however, that mrs. mason had the best and most disinterested intentions, what, we may ask, can be left of liberty to children whom their monitress "never suffers out of her sight?" in her catalogue of living creatures mary puts animals at the bottom on account of their being incapable of reason. they are guided exclusively by instinct, which is a faculty of a coarser growth than reason. the love of their young, for instance, though sweet to behold, and worthy of imitation, is not in their case dictated by reason. next upon the list come children; in them the latent faculty ought to be developed by older and wiser people bringing what godwin would call "the artillery of reason" to bear upon the infant mind. mary wollstonecraft protests against the arrogance of those philosophers who, while granting their own sex the privilege of an education, wilfully exclude the other half of humanity from the blessings of reason, which is the only guide to virtue and moral perfection. when mary wrote the "_original stories_" she was not more than twenty-nine herself, and had known neither the passion of love nor motherhood. her all-embracing love of humanity made the subject of interest to her, but there is upon the whole too much of reason and too little of the heart in the little volume. circumstances over which she had no control were soon to teach her for good and all that the affections will not be suppressed and peremptorily demand their share. when next she touched upon the subject she was a mother and confronted with the task of educating her own child in the long and frequent absences of a faithless and undeserving father. the "_first lessons for an infant_" in volume ii of the posthumous edition of her works are the result of the joint teachings of maternal love and bitter experience. here she is herself, an essentially human, loving woman, overflowing with tenderness and bound up closely with her child not merely by the ties of duty, but by those of an all-absorbing affection. having thus tried to do justice to the author by accounting for what seems contradictory, we may frankly say that mrs. mason is an insufferable pedant. the mr. barlow of _sandford and merton_, while constantly moralising,--in doing which he draws far more sweeping conclusions than even mrs. mason--and arranging incidents to illustrate and anticipate his moral lessons like the best of stage-managers[ ], at least does not obtrude her own personality. but the impeccable mrs. mason in her boundless self-confidence never loses an opportunity to introduce her own personality. her benevolence is unlimited, and she is utterly incapable of doing wrong. if she inflicts bodily pain, it is that reason has whispered to her that in doing so she avoids a greater evil. she puts her foot deliberately on a wounded bird's head, "turning her own the other way". she teaches by example rather than precept, and the example somehow seems to be always herself. never for a moment are the girls allowed a rest from the moral deluge. the first eight chapters of the little book contain the moral food for one single day, carefully divided into a morning, an afternoon and an evening of incessant moralising. yet she is "naive" enough to imagine that she teaches imperceptibly, by rendering the subject amusing! if mary wollstonecraft had possessed the slightest indication of a possible sense of humour, the absurdity of the mrs. mason portrait would have struck her. but she had not, and while relating the most ludicrous incidents, she always remains terribly in earnest! there is something distinctly oppressive, too, about mrs. mason's benevolence. she relieves the distress of the poor, but while doing so her coldly critical eye wanders about the humble cottage and makes the poor wretch feel uncomfortably conscious of its generally unfinished appearance. with her, reason is always enthroned. the passions are not to be mentioned in her presence. and yet, her cupboard, too, has its skeleton. early attachments, we are informed, have been broken, her own husband has died, followed by her only child, "in whom her husband died again". her afflictions have taught her to pin her faith on the hope of eternity, in doing which she has unfortunately forgotten to learn the lesson of earthly suffering and to realise her own imperfections. the virtue of modesty, which she recommends to the girls in contrasting the sweet and graceful rose to the bold and flaunting tulip (!) was not among her many accomplishments. the little book prepares the reader's mind for the "_vindication of the rights of women_," which was soon to follow, in that it contains a long plea for the glorious faculty of reason, leading to virtue. the heart should be carefully regulated by the understanding to prevent its running amuck. all errors are due to a relegation of reason to an inferior position; a systematical application, however, cannot fail to conduct towards perfection. one seems too be listening to the sweeping assertions of _political justice_, which was to appear a few years later and in which the general philosophical tendencies of the revolutionary movement were gathered up and stated with bold radicalism. the main line of thought which godwin followed, and the tendency to resort to "first principles" is everywhere manifest. to call girls "rational creatures" for doing what their monitress expects of them is to give them the most unstinted praise. the absolute subjection of the poor children to their governess is the necessary outcome of the infallibility of the latter's superior reason, which renders implicit obedience the interest of the former. in her discussion of the filial duties in connection with the parental affections in the _vindication_, mary wollstonecraft insists on just such a degree of obedience as is compatible with the child's obvious interest. nor is the respect due to superior reason lost sight of when she opines with respect to marriage that, although after one and twenty a parent has no right to withhold his consent on any account, yet the son ought to promise not to marry for two or three years, should the object of his choice not meet with the approbation of his "first friend". thus the principles of liberty and obedience are made to fit each other. the infallibility of reason is enforced by some "glaring" examples, which bring fresh proof of the author's fatal insensibility to the ludicrous and absurd. the story of the girl who, like caroline, was vain of her good looks, until she had smallpox, when, having to pass many days in a darkened room, she learned to reflect and afterwards took to reading as a means of enlarging the mind, may pass; but the history of charles townley is utterly absurd and distinctly inferior to day's stories, some of which afford pleasant reading and must have amused the boys. its hero is the "man of feeling" so prominent in the sentimental school, who allows his conduct to be governed solely by sentiment. having chosen the wrong guide, he is made miserable for life, and his sorrows culminate when he beholds the daughter of his benefactor, a maniac, "the wreck of a human understanding", merely because he has too long put off assisting her and relieving her distress, as he intended to do. the principal vices against which the book inveighs and which are for the most part illustrated by means of fitting stories, or warned against by means of toward incidents, are: anger and peevishness, by which reason is temporarily dethroned (story of jane fretful), lying, immoderate indulgence of the appetite, procrastination, pride, arrogance to servants[ ], sensitiveness to pain and an excessive regard for the vanities of dress and for the opinions of the world (story of the schoolmistress). thus the ideas which found an outlet in the _vindication_ were anticipated, and the little book marks the first step in the transition from pedagogical to social and political authorship. next to the careful eradication of vices, the cultivation of virtues is attended to. the children are taught to love all living creatures, the love of animals being characteristic of the new movement as a natural offshoot of the greater but more difficult love of mankind. they are instructed in the practice of charity, economy, self-denial, modesty and simplicity. the last-named virtue constitutes the link between the educational and the social instruction. the stories of "the welsh harper" and of "lady sly and mrs. trueman" are intended to convey the great truth that class-distinctions are not by any means dependent on moral character and that often "the lower is the higher." nor can mary wollstonecraft refrain from making herself the advocate of the greater love towards mankind. the sad fate of crazy robin, who languishes in a debtor's prison, after losing his wife and children through death, is described in a little story which has true touches of pathos, and the horrors of the bastille are incidentally thrown in to heighten the impression produced. in the naval story told by "honest jack"--in which, by the way, absurdity reaches its climax when the hero, losing an eye in a storm, thanks god for leaving him the other--we hear that even the french are not so bad as they are often painted, and are capable of mercy, for while jack was pining away in a french prison, some women brought him broth and wine, and one gave him rags to wrap round his wounded leg. the whole story is rather a poor attempt at a sailor's yarn, in which the author visibly though vainly exerts herself to catch the right tone, with a rather too obtrusive moral background. we feel that jack is mrs. mason's ideal of manhood and the excellent lady forgets herself and her constant companion reason to such an extent that tears of benevolence are seen "stealing down her cheeks"! the girls' trials come to an end when at last their father writes for them to return to london. they are described as visibly improved, "an air of intelligence" beginning to animate caroline's fine features. mrs. mason accompanies them to london, and there takes her leave of the two girls, probably to inflict her personality on a pair of fresh victims. in the next few years the problem of the education of children, although remaining a subject of constant speculation, receded before that of the cause of woman. but when mary was herself a happy mother, the old problems presented themselves in a more tangible form. godwin informs us in the "_memoirs_" that shortly before her death she projected a work upon the management of the infant years, "which she had carefully considered, and well understood". it was about the time of the publication of the "_original stories_" that mary made up her mind to definitely adopt writing as a profession. she realised that in doing so she was flying in the face of prejudice. but she had seen enough of the world, and the result of her long and bitter wrestlings with adversity had been a sufficient increase of moral strength to render her independent of the opinion of others. henceforth it was to be her task to form the opinions of her sex, and in doing so she totally disregarded the opinion of others concerning herself. her voluntary martyrdom had begun. at the same time her scope of observation became considerably widened. mr. johnson's house was the resort of a great many of the leading philosophical minds of the day, all of whom had strong revolutionary tendencies, and whose works he brought out with an utter contempt of consequences very much to his credit. nothing could be more natural than that the constant intercourse with people like thomas paine, fuseli the swiss painter, mr. bonnycastle the pedagogue, dr. priestley, dr. geddes, dr. george fordyce, lavater and talleyrand (who in those days paid a visit to england)--to whom was added afterwards the enigmatical personality of william godwin--should tend to inspire her with strong revolutionary ideas. it had the effect of widening her horizon and of causing her to transfer her energies from the work of education to that of social reform. mr. johnson's circle consisted almost entirely of men, the only women, besides mary, being the more easy-going, and less energetic mrs. inchbald and the far less gifted miss hayes and mrs. trimmer. where the men had the rights of men for their watchword, mary wollstonecraft as a natural consequence found her attention directed towards the position of her own sex, a subject which these hot-headed champions were too apt to overlook. it was in those days (nov. , ) that burke made his violent onslaught upon what he termed the "seditious" theories concerning the rights of man voiced by her dear friend dr. price in his epoch-making sermon at the old jewry to his congregation of sympathisers with the revolution. this direct attack had the effect of making mary wollstonecraft seize her pen in defence of her old friend and in support of those principles which had slowly and gradually come to mean a great deal to her. already the correspondence of the kingsborough period is distinctly suggestive of awakening social interests, stress being laid on the prejudices connected with rank and station. (letters to everina, and , and to mrs. bishop, ). in ireland her eyes had been opened to the moral inferiority of men and women of quality and to the distress of those who, like herself, were dependent on them. the picture of eternity receded before that of earthly injustice to be repaired. at mr. johnson's she frequently took part in the discussion of the possibility of reestablishing the governments of europe on primary principles, and the new ideas sounded in her ears like a new gospel of man. the reflections of jean-jacques--she must have read and discussed the _contrat social_ in those days, although there is no correspondence to prove the assumption--couched in prose "made lyrical by faith" could not fail to impress a mind like that of mary, than whom they never made an easier proselyte. add to this the direct stimulus of the revolution, and the prospect of immediate application of the new theories which electrified all revolutionary minds, and it will not be difficult to account for her enthusiasm, which placed her among the first to use her pen in defence of the new creed. when she had almost finished her pamphlet and was about to have it printed, she felt less sanguine about her powers of persuasion, but the work as she wrote it bears the unmistakable evidence of having been struck at a heat, which, together with its obvious sincerity, may account for some of its success. dr. price, in his sermon of , "in commemoration of the revolution of ", had given vent to the feelings of approbation with which he had greeted the outbreak of the french revolution, and among others expressed the view that the king owes his crown to the choice of his people and "may be cashiered for misconduct", thus openly declaring himself a follower of the theories of the social contract, which are based upon the sovereignty of the people. burke in his "_reflections on the revolution in france_", takes his stand upon the british constitution--once the object of the admiration of a montesquieu--to oppose what he regards as nothing less than a direct attempt at sowing the seeds of revolution in great britain. his pamphlet called forth no fewer than thirty-eight replies, of which that written by thomas paine was the most successful amongst the partisans of the new movement in consequence of its radical tendencies. mary wollstonecraft was in the van of the revolutionary army, and shared with dr. priestley the honour of being the first to enter the field. to account for her indignation it should be remembered that burke had until then been regarded as one of the principal whig advocates of reform, in connection with his attitude towards the american problem. no one had anticipated this sudden change of tactics, so welcome, though unlooked-for, to king george and to pitt, and it fairly maddened the champions of reform. buckle, in his "_history of civilisation in england_", deeply regrets burke's conduct, which he calls the consequence of an unfortunate hallucination, due to his feelings having temporarily got the better of his reason. the vehemence of the controversy in question between opponents who were equally sincere and convinced of the soundness of their views, is due to an essential difference in standpoint, leading to opinions which in either case, though containing an element of truth, must be termed one-sided. the thoroughly practical burke, whose political ideas were the fruit of an experience of nearly half a century, placed himself upon the purely empirical standpoint, resting his arguments upon a basis of sound historical experience, and asserting that the legislator's first aim should be expediency, taught by experience, and not abstract, speculative truth. he points to the difference between political and social principles, which are the outcome of reason; and political practice, which is the product of human nature, and of which reason is but a part. the reformers of the opposing camp took their stand upon a basis of abstract, geometrical reasoning, and persistently refused to consider the argument of expediency. they only regarded the theoretical aspect of the social problem. both parties recognised the doctrines of human rights and of the popular sovereignty, which were of british growth, having been put forward long before rousseau by john locke; but they differ in their application of them. with burke, rights are of an hereditary nature. to him, the constitution is the embodiment both of the rights of the free british citizen, and of the duties of the british subject, an inheritance they derived from their ancestors of , together with the duty of keeping the legacy intact in its general tendencies. it was burke's firm conviction that a statesman should steer clear of philosophical principles, which an absolute want of adaptability to the exigencies of a special case renders unfit for practice. it must be granted that this line of argument in burke's case led to a fatal blindness to obvious injustice and to a curious inability to appreciate what was good, noble and disinterested in the leaders of the revolutionary movement. mary wollstonecraft and her friends failed to see that reforms which are to affect the roots of existing conditions--however desirable and even necessary--must of necessity be slow and gradual, lest our gain should prove but a poor substitute for our certain loss. there are none more dangerous to society than the abstract idealist, whose very inexperience confirms him in the belief that he is in possession of absolute truth, for which he is willing to lay down his own life, and, _en passant_, the lives of others. of such a nature was the "amiable defect"--to use her own terminology--developed in mary wollstonecraft's nature by too impulsive a zeal in the cause of mankind. she felt intensely on the subject. the furious onslaught which she makes upon burke in the _rights of man_--without that respect for grey hairs which she would have burke observe in his dealings with dr. price--was prompted by a far deeper feeling for mankind than burke was capable of. the two vulnerable points in burke's pamphlet were his unreasonable vehemence and the personal character of his attacks on the one hand, and his want of real sympathy with the "swinish multitude" on the other. the submerged portions of humanity have little to hope for in a statesman who coolly advises them "by labour to obtain what by labour can be obtained and to be taught their consolation in the final proportions of eternal justice". the hopeless conservatism of this view aroused the indignation of mary wollstonecraft. "it is possible," she exclaims, "to render the poor happier in this world without depriving them of the consolation which you gratuitously grant them in the next!" nor has mr. burke's "immaculate constitution" her undivided sympathy. she agrees with rousseau that property, while one of the pillars of the monarchical system, is a deadly enemy to that equality of men before the law without which there can be no real liberty. the preservation of the intact family-estate for the purpose of perpetuating a time-honoured name and tradition, much as it appeals to burke, was a phrase the force of which did not strike mary wollstonecraft, whose indifference to opinion we have already referred to. it would be far better for society if each large estate were divided into a number of small farms, so that each might have a competent portion and all amassing of property cease. in the same passage she boldly asserts the rights of man, as laid down by rousseau in his famous social compact, which give him a title to as much liberty, both civil and religious, as is compatible with the rights of every other individual. as it is, the first rule of the doctrine of equality, which says that all men are equal before the law, is utterly disregarded, for does not the law shield the rich and oppress the poor? property in england is a great deal more secure than liberty. the views expressed in the above passage to a great extent anticipate those of godwin's "_caleb williams_", published in , which, according to the author's preface, comprehended "a general view of the modes of domestic and unrecorded despotism by which man becomes the destroyer of man", and in which a social system was denounced which enabled the rich man to use the power of a law which seemed to regard only the interests of one single class of society for the most nefarious purposes[ ]. a parallel to this sociological novel is afforded by mary wollstonecraft's unfinished "_maria, or the wrongs of woman_", to which, if we replace the last word by "woman", the sentence just quoted applies literally. it is but fair to state that mary wollstonecraft did not persist in her extreme views as to the necessity of a sudden and radical change which at one time made her overlook the principle of slow evolution. she was willing to recognise this principle in her "_historical and moral view of the origin and progress of the french revolution_", of which the first and only volume was written some three years later. at paris, before her intimacy with imlay and the birth of her daughter fanny brought about a temporary relaxation in her social zeal, her time was spent in watching the development of events with eager and sympathetic interest. her optimistic faith in the perfectibility of mankind helped her--as it did wordsworth--to look beyond the horrors and bloodshed by which her heart was moved to intense pity and indignation. she was convinced that out of the chaotic mass "a fairer government was rising than ever shed the sweets of social life on the world." but, she adds, "things must have time to find their level." the "_vindication of the rights of man_"--although quite overshadowed by paine's pamphlet--met with so much success that very soon after its publication a second edition was called for. there is no doubt that this circumstance gave mary a great deal of encouragement. it became an incentive to further efforts on a larger scale in the direction in which she now realised lay the mission of her life. in spite of her theories she was sufficiently sensitive to praise to feel gratified by it and to derive from it the moral courage necessary to defy public opinion and constitute herself the champion of the cause of woman. we have seen that the cause of woman had met with very little regard in england in the course of the century, except where moral improvement was concerned. in france, however, the progress to be recorded was considerable. it will be remembered that fénelon had been the first to insist on an education which might teach girls the pursuit of some useful ideal instead of leaving them to pass their time in a degrading search for pleasure. there is in fénelon a distinct foreshadowing of the tendencies of educational reform in later years. with mary wollstonecraft also, the chief aim of education is not to prepare the individual for social intercourse, but to accustom the mind to listen to the dictates of reason. fénelon has a more negative way of putting the question. he believes in filling the mind with useful ideas as a means of preventing moral degradation. in the course of the following century, the philosophers of the encyclopédie introduced their theories of rationalism. helvétius (in his _traité de l'homme_, ) insisted on the necessity of an education in connection with his theory that the human mind, which is sovereign, is the exclusive product of education and experience. he may be called a link in the chain of advocates of the cause of woman, although not paying the slightest attention to women in particular; for he indirectly advances their cause a step by defending the view that an education is indispensable to develop the mind and thus attain perfection. he is one of the originators of the theory which says that the mind is in a perfectly neutral state at birth, capable of receiving and guarding any impressions which may be produced by accidental circumstances, which a well-regulated education may to a certain extent make or re-make; the obvious conclusion being that all men are of equal birth. to this scheme diderot in his "_réfutation_" opposed his theory of heredity, or innate character. both godwin and mary wollstonecraft were adherents of helvétius. viewed in the light of original equality, which supposes equal possibilities in individuals who are only physically different, it will be readily seen what a long vista of improvements may be opened by perfecting the education. in the catalogue rousseau must be passed over until mary herself will introduce him, when he will be fighting on the wrong side, although not so completely as mary wollstonecraft would have us believe. although their respective views on the subject of female education and the consequent position of women in society are almost diametrically opposed, yet there is a great deal of sound reasoning in the remarks of both. however, we find in each the same unfortunate tendency to generalisation and exaggeration. a discussion of the social position of women without direct reference to education, criticising them as they then were, and pointing out what they might be, may be found in d'holbach's _social system_ ( ), where an entire chapter is devoted to the subject. mr. brailsford[ ] points out the strange incongruity which lies in the fact that an atheist and a confirmed materialist was among the first to recommend the emancipation of women. for a rationalist philosopher, indeed, to arrive at the conclusion that women should be made the social equals of men, would be nothing very remarkable, but where d'holbach constantly keeps in view the moral side of the problem, he approaches the english moralists rather than the french thinkers of the school of reason. the tone of his plea is sincere, and his hints are wise, moderate and worthy of consideration. he complains that the education of the women of his time, instead of developing in them those qualities which are best calculated to bring happiness to men, merely tends to make them inconstant, capricious and irresponsible. they are being tyrannised over in every country; in europe their position is not more enviable than elsewhere, although a varnish of gallantry seeks to hide the fact. not woman herself is to blame for this, but rather man, who refuses her the benefit of an education which may render her fit to perform the duties of life. there is nothing more inconsistent than the education of girls, which includes instruction in religious matters, teaching them the hope of eternity in conjunction with all the vanities of life, such as dancing and a too great regard for dress and deportment, which are incompatible with true piety. d'holbach was also the first to protest against those marriages in which even mutual esteem is wanting, which is even more important than love, because of its greater permanence. where conjugal infidelity is encouraged on the stage and in society, married life too often becomes one protracted intrigue, and the domestic duties and the education of the children cease to be regarded. women of the lower classes are even worse off; prostitution is their only course, and society, while readily forgiving the seducer, leaves the victim to a life of infamy. the chapter ends with an earnest appeal to women to learn the value of reason and the power of virtue, which alone lead to happiness, and to respect themselves if they wish others to respect them. the parallelism between the passages referred to above and the main drift of mary wollstonecraft's contentions in her "_vindication of the rights of women_" is so particularly striking, that the assumption seems justified that she had read d'holbach. the outbreak of the revolution caused the new philosophical principles to be put to the test of practical experiment. in the national assembly, realising that an important step towards the realisation of that equality they aimed at was the institution of a national education, called upon talleyrand to elaborate a project of an educational scheme on rational principles. talleyrand's report pointed out the desirability of allowing women to share in the universal education and to establish schools to which both sexes were to be admitted. as regards the possibility of their taking part in political discussions, he was of opinion that their domestic duties forbade their entering the arena of politics. the education of children was the principal of these duties, and the report says that "after reaching the age of eight, girls should be restored to their parents to be taught housekeeping at home." the dissolution of the national assembly caused talleyrand's scheme to be consigned to oblivion, and his task was entrusted by the legislative assembly to the philosopher condorcet. this disciple of turgot, who may be called the french godwin, sharing the latter's love of the mathematics of philosophy, blessed with the same boundless confidence in the future of humanity, and actuated by the same unselfish enthusiasm, which he did not, like godwin, take the trouble to hide under a mask of seeming stoicism,--read his report in april . it almost coincided with the publication of the _vindication_, for a letter written by mrs. bishop to everina wollstonecraft in july of the same year refers to mary as the successful author of the _rights of women_. condorcet's views differ from mary's in that he wishes the instruction which is open to all classes to be regulated in accordance with talent and capacity. an education, therefore, regarding innate talents rather than social distinctions, and by which each man is to be rendered independent of others[ ]. women are to receive the same instruction as men. it is not astonishing that the theorist condorcet should be inclined to go beyond what the practical talleyrand considered feasible and to forget the undeniable difference in character and capacities existing between the sexes. in this, mary wollstonecraft felt like condorcet. both make the mistake, when anxious to assert the intellectual equality of women and to have them recognised as "partakers of reason", of trying to strengthen their plea by pointing to one or two exceptional women to prove what woman is capable of. the grounds on which condorcet--continuing the line of thought of his french predecessors--demands instruction for women are the same as those of mary. women are the natural educators of the young, they should guard their husbands' affections by making themselves agreeable companions, capable of taking an interest in their daily occupations. but it is the last argument that clinches matters: the two sexes have equal _rights_ to be instructed. it is condorcet's ideal--as it had been that of bernardin de st. pierre--to give the children of the two sexes a joint education, which may prepare them for the social state, and which he feels confident will remove the atmosphere of unhealthy mystery which an artificial separation is apt to produce. mary heartily concurs with this view. "i should not," she says, "fear any other consequence than that some early attachment might take place, which, whilst it had the best effect on the moral character of the young people, might not perfectly agree with the views of the parents." i have tried to point out that, although the acquaintance of mary wollstonecraft with the works of the french educationalists (rousseau, of course, excepted) is doubtful, yet there is the closest resemblance in the spirit which animates them. the english writers on the subject, as we have seen, were upon the whole much less enlightened. their names are repeatedly mentioned in the _vindication_, and their methods criticised. the principles underlying the theory of the rights of man are adopted with perfect logic as a basis on which to consider the position of the female half of society. "if the abstract rights of man will bear discussion and explanation", says the dedication to talleyrand, in whom she trusted to find a sympathiser, "those of woman, by a parity of reasoning, will not shrink from the same test." mary's methods of investigation are borrowed from rousseau. in his scheme for the improvement of social conditions, the latter had insisted on the necessity of reverting to the original principles which underlie the social structure, and out of the misunderstanding and consequent misapplication of which the great hindrances to human progress, prejudice and prescription arose. a too close regard to expediency--continually contrasted with simple principles--seems to her the cause of the introduction of measures "rotten at the core", from which flow the misery and disorder which pervade society. while adopting rousseau's general lines of thought, however, she cannot bring herself to share his raptures about the state of nature, which in its essence is nothing but a denial of the possibility of a well-organised society. the optimism with which he regards the individual does not extend to society, in respect to which he is far too pessimistic to suit mary's unshakable confidence in human perfectibility. where rousseau asserts that "l'homme est né bon", and holds the social state responsible for the introduction of evil, mary wollstonecraft feels in the presence of evil the will of the almighty that we should make use of the gift of reason as a means of conquering evil and attaining perfection. to return to nature, therefore, would mean evading the chief task which god meant to impose upon his favourite creature, that of cultivating virtue in the social state which he ordained. here again, as in helvétius, d'holbach and so many others, reason is to be the governing power. in reason lies man's pre-eminence over the brute creation, and out of the struggle between reason and the passions arise virtue and knowledge, by which man is conducted towards happiness. mary wollstonecraft, in bringing her reason to bear upon the existing social conditions, had become deeply conscious of the degrading position of her sex, and, having herself risen above her troubles, makes a fervent appeal to rational men to give them a chance of becoming more respectable. her plea, while in the first place for her sex, embraces all humanity, for unless woman be prepared by education to become the companion of man rather than his mistress, she will hamper the progress of knowledge and virtue. there seems, indeed, a great deal of absurdity in a social scheme which in vindicating the rights of the male portion of humanity, in claiming for them equality, liberty and the blessings of education, could leave the other half of mankind out of consideration. was liberty to be the portion of men only; and was woman to continue in her state of bondage? were all men to be partakers of reason, guided by her only, whilst women had the use of that faculty denied them? in a social state where such partiality could prevail, man was himself responsible for the utter depravity of women. the worst despotism is not that of kings, but that of man, and woman is the trampled-upon victim. we are thus led to a natural division of the subject into an examination of the position of woman such as it is, and an investigation of what it ought to be and might be. there is one circumstance which distinguishes mary wollstonecraft from other champions of the new social creed. in their eagerness to champion oppressed humanity against all forms of tyranny and oppression, thomas paine and his followers had been too much inclined to forget that "every right necessarily includes a duty." it is very much to mary's credit that she emphatically pointed out that "they forfeit the right who do not fulfil the duty." in her claims for equality with men, far from being prompted by sordid motives of envy, or by a desire to obtain power or influence for her sex, she aims at enabling women to discharge the duties of womanhood, among which that of educating their own children occupies the first place. she was always ready herself to take more than her share of those duties, and no one at present doubts her sincerity when saying that she pleads for her sex rather than for herself. in considering the actual position of women in society she concludes that the trouble arises from two widely different sources. women have either too much attention paid them, or they have no attention whatever paid them, and the result is equally disastrous, although in a different way. she had had personal experience of the defencelessness and helplessness of a young woman whom fate had cast out upon the cruel world without the means of fighting adverse circumstances, when financial embarrassments forced her to accept a situation as governess in lord kingsborough's home. it had stung her to the quick to realise the contempt in which she was held by those whom she justly considered her intellectual inferiors, merely because no government had ever taken the trouble to provide for women without a natural protector, and the narrow views of society were that any woman who, compelled by circumstances, tried to support herself in an honest profession, degraded herself. that her only alternative was to throw herself upon the protection of some lord of creation and prostitute herself, did not seem to occur to these judges of morality. the only compassion excited by the helplessness of females was the consequence of personal attractions, making pity "the harbinger of lust." it is the duty of a benevolent government to add to the respectability of women by enabling them to earn their own bread, and to save them from inevitable prostitution, or from the degradation of marrying for support. let the professions be thrown open to them, let women study to become physicians and nurses. let there be midwives rather than "accoucheurs", let them study history and politics, all of which will keep them far better employed than the perusal of romances or "chronicling small beer". women are capable of taking a share in the dealings of trade, of regulating a farm, or of managing a shop. the only employments which have hitherto been open to them are of a menial kind. thus the position of a governess, who must be a gentlewoman to be equal to her important task of education, is held in less repute than that of a tutor, who is himself treated as a dependant. this prejudice entirely destroys the aim of tutorship in rendering him contemptible to his pupils. how the personal note appears in the above remarks, the demands of which will certainly not strike the modern reader as exorbitant. however, seen in the light of the prejudices prevailing in mary's days, they make her stand out very clearly from the common herd of those who were willing slaves to man. she seconds condorcet in hinting at the remote possibility of having female representatives in parliament. it may here be argued in favour of her modest proposal--which she fears may excite laughter--that the introduction of women into the parliament of those days could not very well have made matters worse than they were. the mock representation of the "rotten boroughs" was indeed as she calls it "a handle for despotism" of the worst description, and on this subject at least a large portion of the nation held coinciding views. the position of women of the upper classes, who have every attention paid them and pass their lives in search of amusement, although it seems better, is in reality even worse. in connection with his views on this subject mary is reluctantly obliged to recognise in rousseau--whose inconsistency is among his chief characteristics--a champion of despotism. making allowance for a few deviations in details of education, it may be said that here rousseau's views reflect the general opinion of his time. his educational scheme, which upon the whole had mary's sympathy, and from which she borrowed largely in her purely educational works, only regards emile, the boy. the girl, sophie, only interests him as being essential to the happiness of the male. the theory that the education of women should be "relative to men", as rousseau puts it, places him in direct opposition to mary wollstonecraft, as it implies a necessary inferiority on the part of women. his maxims supply her with a target against which to direct the shafts of her disapprobation and indignation. in his "_lettre à d'alembert_" he had made a violent onslaught on women and the passion they inspire. it does not leave them a shred of reputation: modesty, purity and decency are said to have completely forsaken them. the hysterical violence of his sallies was probably due to his hatred of the encyclopedians, those "philosophers of a day" whose rationalism opposed the utter subjection of women to man's desires. i have already pointed out that it was from the french school of rationalism that the first suggestions of emancipation came, and the above-mentioned epistle marks the beginning of hostilities between the rationalist and the emotional school. mary wollstonecraft did not find it difficult to agree with rousseau that many women had sunk to a state of deep degradation, but, she asked: "a qui la faute?" it was man who brought her there, and she expected man to lift her on to a more exalted plane. the julie of rousseau's "_nouvelle héloise_" impresses us as another inconsistency. she displays, it is true, the characteristic submissiveness to a characteristically masterful parent, and the usual notions of virtue consisting chiefly in the preservation of reputation which mary attacks so vigorously in the _rights of women_, but julie has far more individuality than the average young woman of the period. she rather leads her lover than he her. the _nouvelle héloise_, however, displays rousseau's sentimental vein, and is therefore more directly irrational than anything else he wrote. the sophie of _emile_ is partly the creation of his intellect, the julie of the _nouvelle héloise_ almost exclusively that of his sentiment. in the fifth book of _emile_, therefore, sentimentality only plays an occasional part. rousseau's intellect assigns to woman the place which she ought to fill in society. a writer on female education, says lord john morley, may consider woman as destined to be a wife, or a mother, or a human being; as the companion of man, as the rearer of the young, or as an independent personality, endowed with talents and possibilities in less or greater number, and capable as in the case of men of being trained to the best or the worst use, or left to rust unused[ ]. rousseau insists upon the first, makes little of the second, and utterly ignores the third. emile is brought up to be above all a man; sophie, however, is given no chance of attaining the necessary qualifications for womanhood and motherhood and is merely educated to be an obedient and submissive companion to her husband. her opinions are modelled upon emile's, and in no matter of importance, not even in religion, is she allowed to choose for herself. the last is an emphatic denial of the faculty of reason in women. that a woman of this stamp, accustomed to mental and moral dependence, is all unfit to educate her own children, is self-evident, nor did rousseau destine her for this task. as soon as the child has been weaned, the mother passes out of the educational scheme, her place and that of the father being taken by the instructor. mary wollstonecraft regards women in the first place as human beings and asserts their right to be educated. they are in possession of the faculty of reason, which in them is as capable of being perfected as in their lord and master, man. their conduct and manners, however, show that their minds are in no healthy state. having been taught that their chief aim in life is to make a wealthy marriage, they sacrifice everything to beauty and attractiveness of appearance. instead of cherishing nobler ambitions, they are satisfied to remain in that state of perpetual childhood in which the tyranny of man has purposely kept them. the relative education has made them utterly dependent on masculine opinion. rousseau, who calls opinion the tomb of virtue in men, recommends it to women as its "high throne", thus introducing a sexual code of morality. they know that the flattering sense of physical superiority makes man prefer them feeble and clinging for protection, and accordingly they cultivate physical weakness and dependence. a puny appetite is considered by them "the height of human perfection". why did not rousseau extend his excellent advice regarding outdoor sports and games to girls? they would not care for dolls if their involuntary confinement within doors did not incapacitate them from healthier pursuits. thus the physical inferiority of women is partly of man's own creation, and might be to a large extent remedied. once the right of being educated has been granted to women, they must of necessity develop into suitable companions to their husbands and affectionate parents to their children. to assert that woman's only duty consists in catering for the happiness of her lord and master is taking a sordid view of her possibilities. granting that woman has a soul, and that the promise of immortality applies also to her, it follows naturally that the cultivation of that soul is her chief business in life. the prevailing notion of a sexual character, therefore, is subversive of all morality. soldiers, who like women are sent into the world before their minds have been stored with knowledge or fortified by principles, show the same deplorable lack of common sense. scattered through the book are a number of rather desultory remarks from which may be gathered the author's notions regarding the baleful influence of slavery upon the moral aspirations of her sex. nearly all contemporary authors agreed that woman's chief aim ought to be "to please". among their number were mrs. barbauld, mrs. piozzi, mme de genlis and mme de staël. from the first the notion was inculcated that the chief object is to make an advantageous match, "it is acknowledged that they spend many of the first years of their lives in acquiring a smattering of accomplishments, meanwhile strength of mind and body are sacrificed to libertine notions of beauty, to the desire of establishing themselves--the only way women can rise in the world--by marriage." the cardinal virtues of the sex are therefore those qualities which are best calculated to make them acceptable to men, as gentleness, sweetness of temper, docility and a "spaniel-like" affection. men complain, and with reason, of the follies and caprices of women, forgetting that they are the natural outcome of an ignorance which is very far removed from innocence. the education of women, such as it is, consists only in some kind of preparation for social life, instead of being considered the first step to form a rational being, advancing by gradual steps towards perfection. thus a woman is methodically prepared for the bondage that awaits her, and never gets an opportunity of asserting her better possibilities. a sexual character is established by artificial means, and in this circumstance mary sees the chief cause of woman's moral decay, for which she herself is only partly responsible. all her life she remains powerless to get away from the shackles of first impressions. her conduct is regulated by absurd notions of a specially feminine virtue, chastity, modesty and propriety. instead of realising that virtue--which surely ought to be the same for women as for men--is nothing but love of truth and fortitude, she confounds with it reputation. respect for the opinion of the world is considered one of her chief duties, for does not rousseau himself declare that reputation is no less indispensable than chastity? for true modesty--which is only that purity of thought which is characteristic of cultivated minds--she substitutes the coquettish affectations which are to draw the lover on while seemingly rejecting him. the insincerity of these principles of daily conduct tend to develop in the female mind that cunning which rousseau calls natural and accordingly recommends! for a woman to show her actual feelings is to be guilty of the most flagrant breach of modesty. where writers have granted to man the monopoly of reason, they have given to woman as a substitute that which is delicately termed "sensibility", but is in reality nothing but a morbid sort of sensuality, the consequence of devouring novels which have the effect of inflaming the senses, and the only antidote to which is healthy exercise. mary wollstonecraft, like the bluestocking moralists, regarded the quality of sensibility with favour only when regulated by reason. in her enjoyment of the beauty of natural scenery, according to her own analysis, it is her very reason which "obliged her to permit her feelings to be her criterion." (letters from sweden). but it was one of her chief contentions that far too much stress was laid on the cultivation of that kind of sensibility in women which in its very exaggeratedness leads to the worst excesses of sentimentalism. the eighteenth century interpretation of the term "sensibility" with its concomitant absurdities awakened in her feelings of intense disgust. all rousseau's errors in her opinion arose from its source. to indulge his feelings, and not to imbibe moral strength at the fountain of nature, or to satisfy a thirst for scientific investigation, he sought for solitude when meditating the rapturous but dangerous love-scenes of the _nouvelle héloise_. no doubt these scenes were in her mind when she wrote: "love such as the glowing pen of genius has traced, exists not, or only resides in those exalted, fervid imaginations that have sketched such dangerous pictures." she only sees in them "sheer sensuality under a sentimental veil." the sentimentalists who, like richardson and rousseau, laid bare the play of the human passions to a reading public consisting almost entirely of women, whose minds were not sufficiently occupied to keep their imagination within bounds, "set fire to a house for the sake of making the pumps play." morbid sensibility, in its exaggerated tenderness over insignificant trifles and corresponding indifference to real social evils, excludes from the mind all sense of moral duty. two writers of mary wollstonecraft's time had shown a more than usual narrowness of views. they were the rev. dr. james fordyce, author of a number of sermons addressed to women, and dr. gregory, who had written a "_legacy to his daughters_." the former proceeded from the propositions which had formed the basis of rousseau's argument. he is so thoroughly convinced of the all-round superiority of man, that he assumes the natural folly of woman to be the cause of all matrimonial differences. he feels sure that women who behave to their husbands with "respectful observance", studying their humours and overlooking their mistakes, submitting to their opinion, passing by little instances of unevenness, caprice or fashion, and relieving their anxieties will find their homes "the abode of domestic bliss." fordyce held the principal charm of women to be a sickly sort of delicacy which, as it flatters the vanity of the male, is not wholly without effect even in our days, in spite of all mrs. fawcett may say to the contrary. men of sensibility, he says, "desire in every woman soft features and a flowing voice, a form not robust, and demeanour delicate and gentle." this hint could only have the effect of making women more insipid than even rousseau's sophie, who at least after her marriage shared her husband's outdoor exercise. but the worst part of fordyce's argument is that passage in which he advises young women to remember that the devout attitude of pious recollection (in prayer) is most likely to conquer a man's heart. when a clergyman thus by well-meant advice perverts his flock, what are we to expect from the grosser bulk of mankind! as mary wollstonecraft justly points out, there is about these sermons, for all their sentimental posing and bombastic phrasing, a certain sneaking voluptuousness which would strike a modern woman as most insulting; a confident tone of proprietorship which could not fail to stimulate any woman of independent temper into revolt. mrs. rauschenbusch points out that dr. fordyce was acting in accordance with the tendencies of the church in advocating that meekness and bearing of injuries without retaliation which are taught by the gospel. what particularly galled mary was the hypocritical prostration of men before woman's charms, that mock politeness which seemed to her the most cruel proof of the degradation of her sex. the description of women by fordyce as "smiling, fair innocents", and the frequent use of terms like "fair defects", "amiable weakness", etc. where women were concerned, sounded to her as an insult. in gregory's "_legacy to his daughters_" the case was slightly different. the author was an affectionate father, whose anxiety to shield his motherless girls induced him to become an author. that an honest, well-intentioned man like he should be capable of writing such trash makes us realise the hopelessness of mary's task. he openly recommends dissimulation. for a woman to show what she feels must be termed indelicate. a girl should be careful to hide her gaiety of heart, "lest the men who beheld her might either suppose that she was not entirely dependent on their protection for her safety, or else entertain dark suspicions as to her modesty." in the lives of the poor gregory girls mrs. grundy was omnipotent! unreserved praise, on the contrary, is bestowed upon mrs. catherine macaulay's "_letters on education with observations on religion and metaphysical subjects_", which had appeared in , shortly before their author's death. mrs. macaulay had been among the opponents of burke in a vindication of a french government which owed its authority to the will of a majority; and also in matters educational her views coincided with those of mary wollstonecraft. she believed in co-education up to a certain age, which has the obvious advantage of making the daily intercourse between people of different sexes less strained and more natural not only in early youth, but also later in life, when the relations between the sexes ought to be based upon mutual appreciation and esteem. like mary wollstonecraft, she protested against what she called "the absurd notion of a sexual excellence", which not only excluded the female sex from every political right, but left them hardly a civil right to save them from the grossest injuries. it was an unlucky circumstance indeed that the only woman who might have granted mary the full support of her reputation as the author of a very successful work on the "_history of england from the accession of james the first to that of the brunswick line_" should have been removed by death at a time when that support might have been of so much value to one who felt forsaken by the majority of her own sex.[ ] mary wollstonecraft pleads the necessity of giving woman an education like that which is granted to man, that she may learn to take reason for her guide. only then will she be able to perform the specific duties of her sex. but there is a weightier argument for the cultivation of reason in women. their deplorable deficiency in this quality has so far made them consider only earthly interests and disqualified them from looking beyond the affairs of this world to the promise of that eternity for which only the soul can fit them. it is in pointing out the evil consequences to the soul of a life devoted to pleasure that mary's pleadings attain their greatest depth of pathos and intensity. the profound piety of her character makes her protest against this sordid view of life. "surely" she exclaims, "she has not an immortal soul who can loiter life away merely employed to adorn her person that she may amuse the languid hours and soften the cares of a fellow-creature who is willing to be enlivened by her smiles and tricks when the serious business of life is over." once a woman has attained her aim of a profitable marriage, the circumstances of which almost exclude the possibility of love, she turns all her "natural" cunning to account to establish a sort of mock tyranny over her master. she lives in the enjoyment of her present influence, forgetting that adoration will cease with the loss of her charms, and that woman is "quickly scorned when not adored". in later years there will be no sound basis of friendship arising from equality of tastes to take its place, no reflection to be substituted for sensation, and their earthly punishment consists in a miserable old age. even when married to a sensible husband, who thinks for her, what will be the fate of a woman who is left a widow with a large family? "unable to educate her sons, or to impress them with respect, she pines under the anguish of unavailing impotent regret." the passage in which she pictures her ideal of rational womanhood, who, far from being rendered helpless by her husband's death, rises to the occasion and devotes herself with a strong heart to the discharge of her maternal duties, finally reaping the reward of her care when she sees her children attain a strength of character enabling them to endure adversity, is a piece of true eloquence. "the task of life fulfilled, she calmly waits for the sleep of death, and rising from the grave, may say: "behold, thou gavest me a talent, and here are five talents".[ ] there never was a more fervent champion of marriage and domesticity than mary. the sanctity of matrimony needed no enforcement by means of a wedding ceremony, but consisted in the mutual affection and esteem which was felt. hence her violent criticism of loveless marriages contracted from mercenary motives and her severe condemnation of the harshness with which society treated poor ruined girls. the twelfth chapter of the _rights of women_ contains a plea for national education. mary is here seen treading in the steps of talleyrand, and forsaking her old masters locke and rousseau. they both advocate a private education. locke wants to educate the "gentleman", making his scheme practicable in isolated applications, but disregarding the bulk of the nation. rousseau, who did regard the mass of the people in matters of political speculation, entirely loses sight of the public interest in favour of the private in his educational scheme, thus reducing it to mere abstract speculation, incapable of extensive realisation. but mary wollstonecraft adopts the more practical view of the active socialist. the children of the nation are to be educated without the slightest reference to class distinction, and they ought to be brought up together. the exclusive teaching of a child by a tutor will make him acquire a sort of premature manhood, and will not tend to make him a good citizen. he is to be a member of society, and it will not do to regard him as a unit, complete in himself. the same view limits the freedom of the individual to what is compatible with the rights of others. to ignore the duties of the individual towards society would be to build the entire structure of education upon an unsound basis. this plea for co-education will be seen to be a recantation from former opinions expressed in the "_original stories_". the latter had their rise chiefly in the experience gained of boarding-schools during her stay at eton with the priors. they seemed to her absolute hotbeds of vice and folly, where an utter want of modesty introduced the most repulsive habits. the younger boys delighted in mischief, the older in every form of vice. the colleges were full of the relics of popery, the 'mouth-service',which makes all religion but a cold parade of show, and the educators themselves were very poor champions of true religion. what mary saw at eton confirmed her in the belief that dayschools were to be preferred, as the only way of combining the advantages of private and public education. that important part of education which aims at awakening the affections can only be given in the home of loving parents, and only that man can be a good citizen who has first learned to be a good son and brother. a country day-school, affording the best opportunities for unstinted physical exercise, might be expected to be productive of the greatest benefit to young pupils. the division of the educational task between school and home will moreover leave the children the necessary amount of freedom which is denied them when living the cramped lives of boarding-schools. to make women the companions of men, and to remove the unhealthy atmosphere of an artificial separation of the sexes which produces indelicacy in both, she thinks it necessary that boys and girls should be brought up together. all children should be dressed regardless of class and submitted to the same rules of discipline. they should not be made to remain in the schoolroom for longer than an hour, and be taken out into the schoolyard, or better still, for walks. a good deal of outdoor instruction of the kind rousseau described might be given by means of spectacular illustration. at the age of nine comes the first great change in the daily routine. the two sexes will still be together in the morning, engaged in common pursuits, but the afternoon will find the girls bent over their needlework, millinery, etc., while the boys' further instruction will depend on their choice of a trade. special schools ought to be established for those whose superior abilities render them fit to pursue some course of scientific studies. being thus together will take the edge off that unnatural restraint which too often marks the relations between children of a different sex. the position of the teachers--not ushers--should be such as to render them entirely independent of their pupils' parents. the usher's ambiguous position of mixed authority and submission frequently rendered him an object of ridicule to the children. talleyrand, from whom mary in all probability borrowed this suggestion, even wanted to make the children independent of their masters in respect of punishment, by having it inflicted only after the offender had been tried and found guilty by his peers. it will be seen that the "_vindication of the rights of women_" touches upon a great many points which at the present time have become foregone conclusions, but which, nevertheless, were in mary's days daring speculations, which were received with anything but general approval. if it should now appear to us that some of her conclusions were rather too sweeping, that the very physical inferiority of woman which she is willing to grant makes it impossible for her to combine in her person the wife, the mother and the social woman, and that a too ardent application of her theories of the social possibilities of her sex is responsible for some abominations of the public hustings, who, banging their fists on the table, "refuse to be the playthings of men any longer"--it should be remembered that she insisted with equal emphasis upon the cultivation of the female qualities, and that it was not granted her to be taught moderation by the repulsive spectacle of female extremism in later times! moreover, in the introduction to the first edition of the _vindication_, she expresses her disgust of "masculine women". and yet the type of a "masculine woman" in mary's days, with her "ardour in hunting, shooting and gaming", was not nearly so objectionable as her modern sister. it is, indeed, very difficult to find anything to praise in the _vindication_ when viewed as a literary effort. mary wollstonecraft herself clearly did not regard it as such. the importance of the object by which she was animated made her disdain to cull her phrases or polish her style, wishing rather to persuade by the force of her arguments than dazzle by the elegance of her language. unfortunately the former is not inconsiderably weakened by a deplorable tendency to reiteration, and a general desultoriness and lack of system which cannot fail to strike the reader. the "flowery diction" which she professed herself anxious to avoid, but did not succeed in completely banishing, is responsible for a great deal of the turgidity and false rhetoric which disfigure certain passages. godwin, whose unemotional nature enabled him to judge of his wife's work without prejudice and whose _memoirs_ contain a most sincere and therefore valuable criticism, although admiring the courage of her convictions, the disinterestedness of her motives and the originality of her contentions, finds fault with what he calls "the stern and rugged nature" of certain passages which will probably impress the modern reader as coarse and indelicate. her great devotion to the cause may account for the "amazonian" temper which fills some parts of her book, more especially the "animadversions" on the opinions of those of her opponents whose "backs demanded the scourge". her disapproval of lord chesterfield's moral standpoint has already been referred to. mary wollstonecraft was not in the habit of mincing matters, and her sincerity and consequent frankness brought her the ill-will of many. the publication of the _rights of women_ at once brought mary into prominence. unfortunately, the scare of a french invasion and the trial of the reformers were most unfavourable to the spread of any new ideas in england. from her sisters she had little sympathy, and "poor bess" rather spitefully alluded to information she had received to the effect that "mrs. wollstonecraft was grown quite handsome" and intended going to paris. for this trip to france there were several causes. in the first place she felt intensely interested in the march of events there, which were hastening to a crisis, louis xvi being a prisoner in the hands of the convention. the second motive--perhaps the principal--was connected with her friendship for mr. fuseli, the celebrated swiss painter; but whether she hoped to make the trip in company with the fuselis and her friend johnson, as mr. kegan paul supposes[ ], or wanted to get away from the influence of the artist, with whom godwin informs us she was in love, is uncertain. the end was that she went to paris alone in december , and boarded at the house of mme filliettaz, a lady in whose school eliza and everina had been teachers, but who was absent from home, so that mary's french was put to the severe test of conversation with the servants. she now became a close spectator of the progress of that revolution which upon the whole had her sympathy. yet it was with mingled feelings that she saw the chariot pass her house in which the royal prisoner was conveyed to his trial a few days after her arrival. the sight of louis going to meet death with more dignity than she expected from his character, brought before her mind the picture of his ancestor louis xiv, entering his capital after a glorious victory, and pity, her ruling passion, interceded for the poor victim who had to pay for the crimes of his forefathers. economy prescribed her removal from the filliettaz mansion to less pretentious quarters at neuilly, where she was left a great deal to herself, save for an occasional visit to her english friends in paris miss williams and mrs. christie. it was at the latter's house that a meeting took place which decided the next few years of her life. her days at neuilly were thus spent in retirement. she had a devoted old gardener to wait upon her and generally went out for a walk in the evening, the hours of daylight being given up to the composition of a new work, combining history with philosophy and inspired by the stirring events to which she was such a close witness. although not published until some years after, "_an historical and moral view of the origin and progress of the french revolution, and the effect it has produced in europe_" was written in the first months of at neuilly. the advertisement with which it opens declares the author's intention of extending the work to two or three more volumes, a considerable part of which, it informs us, had already been written; but godwin assures us that no part of the proposed continuation was found among her papers after her death. the only existing volume both in style and method shows a very decided advance upon the earlier _vindication_. mary's narrative powers were even greater than her capacity for philosophy, and her imagination had been fired by the thrilling accounts she had received from her parisian friends of the march of events. the greater freedom and fluency of the style, the greater cogency of the reasoning and the dignity of the narrative render the volume very pleasant reading, the more so, as it shows great moderation and impartiality as far as actual facts are concerned. that the delineations of personal character are not always felicitous may be due to the fact that the author obtained all her information from witnesses who were not free from the prejudices which strong party-feelings awaken. on the whole, however, mary succeeded in placing herself above her subject and in proving that time had taught her to modify her extreme views and made her readier to grant certain concessions. the book is a compromise between her former principles of abstract philosophy and those of gradual evolution. although unwilling to abandon her original view that "reason beaming on the grand theatre of political changes, can prove the only sure guide to direct us to a favourable or just conclusion", and that the erroneous inferences of sensibility should be carefully guarded against, yet she felt sufficient appreciation for her old enemy burke's principle of growth to admit that the revolution was the natural consequence of intellectual improvement, gradually proceeding to perfection. never before had her hopes been so sanguine. it seemed to her that the time was at hand for the final overthrow of the tremendous empire of superstition and hypocrisy. what, in comparison with the great end in view, were the inevitable horrors of the revolution, produced by desperate and enraged factions? there is not a single page in the history of man but is tarnished by some foul deed or bloody transaction. that the vices of man in a savage state make him appear an angel compared with the refined villain of artificial life finds its cause in those unjust plans of government which exist in every part of the globe. a simpler and more effective political system would be sure to check those evils, and a faithful adherence to the new principles will lead mankind towards happiness. her feelings for mankind, however strong, were not powerful enough to interfere with the coolness of her judgment, and the light of her reason which was so soon to be temporarily eclipsed by the conflict of passions a thousand times more powerful because proceeding from within, was never obscured by the contemplation of social evils, which could not disturb her optimistic faith. the history of the french revolution is traced down to the king's removal to paris, where he was sent to stand for trial. it is, upon the whole, a successful attempt at impartial narrative not only of the course of events in paris, but also of the causes which produced them, the author indulging in a minute survey of the state of french society and politics previous to and during the catastrophe. the severity of the judgment she passes on the king and more especially on marie antoinette has been commented upon. here especially it should be remembered that she had everything from hearsay. what she heard of the character and actions of the queen struck her as characteristic of the type of womanhood she had so violently attacked in the _rights of women_. she saw in marie antoinette the product of education by a priest, who had instilled into her all those vices which mary held in abhorrence. she was devoted to a life of pleasure, vain of her good looks, but dead to intelligence and benevolence, using the fascination of her cultivated smiles and artificial weakness to exercise the tyranny of sex over a sensual, besotted husband, whose depravity she completed; an artificial dissembler, regarding only decorum, without any reference to moral character, making free with the nation's money to support a worthless brother, and depraving the morals of those around her; in short, mary wollstonecraft regarded her as the babylonian scarlet woman, a sort of "painted jezebel." her judgment is diametrically opposed to that of burke, who went into such raptures over the beauty and dignity of the queen, and gave vent to such a burst of indignation at her sad and ignominious fate that thomas paine saw fit to remind him that "while pitying the plumage, he was forgetting the dying bird." the outer revolution which was to assert the rights of the species was followed by an inner revolution in the individual which came to constitute the tragedy of mary wollstonecraft's life. the father of nature, whom she thanked for having made her so intensely alive to happiness, had also implanted in her breast an overwhelming capacity for sorrow, and after a short taste of the former, the latter became her portion to such an extent that life seemed to her unendurable. the letter to mr. johnson referring to the king's trial was the last news her friends in england received from her for eighteen months. in february war broke out between england and france and mary's nationality made it advisable for her to keep close. among her new acquaintances was an american, captain gilbert imlay, and the tenderness which about this time she began to cherish for him, was no doubt fostered by a sense of loneliness. moreover, that affection for mr. fuseli which she had so resolutely suppressed,--fuseli was happily married--left her more vulnerable than before to cupid's arrows, in addition to which imlay was to her the representative of that nation which embodied her ideals of liberty and virtue. she gave herself up body and soul to the all-devouring passion of love, and reason, seeing another in full possession of the field, "with a sigh retired." mr. imlay had served as a captain in the revolutionary army during the war of independence, and derived some slight literary fame from the publication of a short monograph on the state of america, entitled "_topographical description of the western territory of north america_." he was, therefore, a man of some accomplishments, which makes his subsequent behaviour to mary all the more unpardonable. at the time of mary's first meeting him he appears to have been in business--probably his line was timber--and the dealings of his trade claimed a great deal of his time and nearly all his attention. circumstances putting marriage out of the question,--a wedding-ceremony would have betrayed that nationality she was so anxious to conceal--she consented to live with him as his wife by virtue of their mutual affections. his correspondence shows that he regarded her as his lawful wife, and as mary fully expected the alliance to be of a permanent nature, and believed him capable of that affection which reason causes to subside into friendship after the first flame of passion is spent, she was acting in full accordance with the views she had repeatedly expressed.[ ] the letters which she wrote him in the first stage of their growing intimacy are full of exquisite tenderness. her repeated "god bless you", which sterne says is equal to a kiss, shows the depth of her feelings towards him. seldom was a purer, more unselfish love wasted upon a more unworthy recipient. imlay was a "mere man", of a cheerful disposition and to a certain extent good-natured, but easy-going, self-indulgent, inconstant and incapable of appreciating a noble love which he himself could not cherish. he evidently looked upon his relation to mary as the amusement of a day,--she lavished upon him that which might have made a greater soul happy for life. she tried to draw him up to her level and failed; her efforts to cure him of his sordid love of money which so disgusted her only irritated him, and made him anxious to cast off the bonds of a union of which he soon began to tire. their agreement had been entered upon in a different spirit, and it was mary who paid the full penalty of disillusionment. a letter he wrote to mrs. bishop in november , when the estrangement had already begun, at a time when mary was deeply conscious of the fact that he neglected her for business and perhaps worse, in which he states that he is "in but indifferent spirits occasioned by his long absence from mrs. imlay and their little girl" shows that he cannot even be acquitted from the charge of absolute hypocrisy. such was the individual whom mary had appointed the sole keeper of her possibilities of happiness. love had come to her late in life, but when it did, it took the shape of that complete surrender in which consists woman's greatest bliss and which she had never thought possible. it came as a revelation and brought experience in its train. who shall describe the anguish of her heart when after a short spell of ecstatic bliss, the inevitable truth began to dawn upon her! mary was not an essentially sensual woman; almost from the first she looked for that sympathy of the mind which was not forthcoming. she found him wanting, and the recognition of this probably irritated him, and ultimately made him transfer his easy-going affections to those who were less exacting. he was far too matter-of-fact to sympathise with or even understand her moments of tenderness, and too much occupied with his business to be much of a companion to her. in the month of september, after a few months together, he went to hâvre. then it was that mary's troubles began. in her letters she repeatedly protested against his prolonged absences. she grew to hate commerce, which kept him away from her. his promise "to make a power of money to indemnify her for his absence", failed to produce any impression. perhaps there was already then the vague fear of a possible desertion haunting her. she was in expectations, and the tenderness with which her letters refer to the coming event would stamp a repetition of her hopes and fears as an indelicacy. for the first time in her life, the champion of the rights of women was happy in acknowledging the superiority of a man. "let me indulge the thought that i have thrown out some tendrils to cling to the elm by which i wish to be supported." well might she say that this was talking a new language for her! the feelings, so long pent up and cheated of their birthright by tyrannical reason, were indeed asserting themselves with a vengeance! the undefined dread of coming disaster makes her letters more and more insistent. grief and indignation at imlay's neglect struggle for the mastery. at last he wrote to ask her to join him at hâvre. the irritation he had felt against her--which she humbly ascribed to the querulous tone of her correspondence--had worn away and there was a brief renewal of happiness when in the spring of a little girl was born, to whom the name of fanny was given in commemoration of the friend of mary's youth. in the course of the following august imlay went to paris, where mary joined him in september, at the end of which month he proceeded to london on business. the extensive trade he was carrying on with sweden and norway at this time completely engrossed him. mary's first letters after this fresh separation were cheerful and pleasant, although she was subject to occasional fits of depression. the conviction that imlay was about to forsake her does not appear to have taken root until the closing month of the year. the days of the terror were now over, and people once more breathed freely. mary made an heroic effort to let the future take care of itself and to concentrate her attention upon her little girl, who developed an early fondness for scarlet coats and music, and on one occasion wore the red sash in honour of j. j. rousseau, her mother confessing that "she had always been half in love with him." imlay's letters now became few and far between. his business-schemes were unsuccessful, and mary took the opportunity to point out to him the absurdity of thus wasting life in preparing to live. the tone of her correspondence betrays a growing indignation at his treatment of her, which appeared in spite of herself and which repeated protestations of unalterable affection could not hide. "i do not consent to your taking any other journey," she writes, "or the little woman and i will be off the lord knows where." she wants none of his cold kindness and distant civilities, but wishes to have him about her, enjoying life and love. the picture of sweet domesticity, of parents sharing the sacred duty of education, of pleasant evenings of homely tenderness spent at the fireside, recurred to her mind with a sense of aching regret. she would far sooner struggle with poverty than go on living this unnatural life of separation. too proud to be under pecuniary obligations to a neglectful husband, she began to consider the possibility of having to provide for herself and her child. when at last he allowed her to join him in england, she no longer cherished false hopes, but begged him to tell her frankly whether he had ceased to care. but imlay wanted her support for his business-schemes. he asked her to go to sweden and norway for him to attend to his interests and mary consented with a heavy heart, hoping that a complete change of surroundings might afford distraction, if not amusement, for she was feeling utterly worn out and ill. imlay kept up the melancholy farce a few months longer. mary wrote him a series of long epistles from scandinavia, into which, as a means of keeping her mind concentrated upon other matters, she inserted elaborate descriptions of the voyage, of the countries in which she was travelling, and of their inhabitants. of these letters, the descriptive portions of which were published in , godwin speaks highly. their perusal caused him to change his opinion of the author of the _rights of women_. their first, and so far only, meeting--in november --had not prepossessed him in her favour. she seemed to him to monopolize the conversation, and prevented him from listening to tom paine, who never was a great talker, and whom she reduced to absolute silence. but he now learned to think highly of her literary talent. the passages dealing with personal affairs had of course been omitted, and afterwards found their way into godwin's _posthumous edition of the works of mary wollstonecraft_, and also into mr. kegan paul's collection of _letters to imlay_. the tone of despair has on the whole given way to one of resigned melancholy. in spite of the sadness which prevailed in mary's heart, the change was doing her good, and her health was improving rapidly. before her arrival at tonsberg in sweden, she had felt very ill, a slow fever preyed on her every night. one day she found "a fine rivulet filtered through the rocks and confined in a basin for the cattle." the water was pure, and she determined to turn her morning-walks towards it and seek for health from the nymph of the fountain. she also wished to bathe, and there being no convenience near, took to rowing as a pleasant and at the same time useful exercise. while thus the flush of health was returning to her cheeks, she found it easier to arrive at a conclusion. she made up her mind that there should be an end to all uncertainty. imlay was put before a dilemma. either they must live together after her return, or part forever. still he kept flattering her with the hope that he might join her at hamburg, for a trip to switzerland, the country of her dreams since the days of neuilly. but he did not keep his word, and when mary landed at dover in october , she realised that all was over and that imlay had entered into a new connection with an actress. then it was that mary made up her mind to die. the harrowing details of her fruitless attempt at suicide may be found in godwin's _memoirs_ and also in mr. kegan paul's work. after her rescue she learnt to live for her child's sake, and not to flinch from the sacred duties which tied her to life. imlay passed out of her sphere, and she parted with him in peace. but the sufferings through which he had made her pass had stamped themselves indelibly upon her heart. the "_letters written during a short residence in sweden, norway and denmark_" met with a favourable reception. being the narrative of foreign travel, they mark a new departure in her literary career. she held with rousseau that travelling, as the completion of a liberal education, ought to be adopted on rational grounds.[ ] the writing of a journal was to her a means of keeping the mind employed, and preventing it from dwelling overmuch on painful recollections of disappointed hopes. her works of education and reform had been so full of the militant spirit, and her correspondence with imlay so replete with the anguish of unrequited love, that she had not yet come to recognise the soothing effect upon the mind of a close communion with nature. it is in the scandinavian correspondence that the nature-element is first met with. the contemplation of the grand coast-scenery gave her that peace and quiet for which her heart yearned. it did not bring her forgetfulness of present troubles, but it gave her the necessary strength to meet them without flinching. in her little boat, surrounded by the glorious works of nature, she found herself for the first time capable of grappling with her problem, which the sense of human insignificance reduced to its true proportions. the nature of her worship stamps her as the true spiritual child of jean-jacques. the writers of an earlier period had been able to appreciate only what is congenial in nature. the forbidding austerity of the snow-clad mountains of switzerland had produced no raptures in goldsmith's breast, and cowper's english landscape owed its attractiveness to its suggestion of peaceful harmony. rousseau had been the first to love nature also in her sterner moods and aspects; like wordsworth, "the sounding cataract haunted him like a passion", and the _nouvelle héloise_ contains the faithful record of the impressions produced upon him by the grandeur of the valais mountains. some of mary's nature-descriptions--notably those of the trolhaettan falls, and of the rocky norwegian coast--afford a parallel to these passages. she was deeply impressed by the wonders of nature she witnessed, and by the exquisite loveliness of the short northern summer. "in the evening the western gales which prevail during the day, die away, the aspen leaves tremble into stillness, and reposing nature seems to be warmed by the moon, which here assumes a genial aspect; and if a light shower has chanced to fall with the sun, the juniper, the underwood of forest, exhales a wild perfume, mixed with a thousand nameless sweets, that, soothing the heart, leave images in the memory which the imagination will ever hold dear." there is an anticipation of wordsworth in the last line of the above passage. mary recognises in nature "the nurse of sentiment", producing melancholy as well as rapture, as it touches the different chords of the human soul like the changing wind which agitates the aeolian harp. her worship of nature, like that of wordsworth, contains an element of profound piety. when she wrote her letters from sweden, mary had reached that stage in her religious life which is marked by a complete silence as far as dogma is concerned. yet this silence should not be misconstrued into indifference. her feelings on the subject were not of the nature of a systematic creed, and therefore never took an external organisation. they remained perfectly subjective in their vagueness, like the natural religion of rousseau with which they have so much in common. mary did not care to become an apostle of faith, to her religion was rather a matter of the inner life, which wanted no outlet into the world, but remained locked up in itself. she believed that her rational powers enabled her to discover certain portions of truth, but that the mystery which veiled the presence of god could not be removed by reason, but remained a matter of the heart. there is no touch of rationalism, or anything but pure sentiment, in the passage in which she describes her return from fredericshall in a perfect summer night. "a vague pleasurable sentiment absorbed me, as i opened my bosom to the embraces of nature, and my soul rose to its author, with the chirping of the solitary birds, which began to feel, rather than see, advancing day." a great deal of attention is paid in the letters to the national character of the inhabitants of sweden, norway and denmark, which she holds to be the result chiefly of the climatic conditions. never had she seen the blessings of civilisation more clearly demonstrated than by the utter lack of them among the scandinavians. especially in sweden, civilisation was at that time in its earliest infancy, and what struck mary from the first was the ignorance of the people. what she saw of their manners and customs was not calculated to make her fall in love with rousseau's golden age of simplicity. they were full of vices, and their very virtues had their origin in considerations of a lower order. they were hospitable, but their hospitality, arising from a total want of scientific pursuits, was merely the outcome of their inordinate fondness of social pleasures, "in which, the mind not having its proportion of exercise, the bottle must be pushed about." being ignorant of the advantages of the cultivation of the mind, they were content to remain as they were: ignorant, sluggish and indifferent to social progress. they moved in a narrow sphere, did not care for politics, had no interest whatever in literature and no topics of conversation, and were strangely incapable of appreciating the charms of nature. mary's experience was chiefly gained in the small provincial towns. they necessarily presented to her--so she thought--the worst side of the picture. to her, the ideal condition was "to rub off in a metropolis the rust of thought, and polish the taste which the contemplation of nature had rendered just." but no place seemed to her so disagreeable and unimproving as a small country-town. the refined amusements of a cultivated society being thus inaccessible to the swede, he will choose them of the coarsest kind. meals occupy a prominent place in the daily routine, and a good many hours are wasted at table. a "visiting-day" means a severe strain upon the powers of digestion, and to make matters worse, the brandy-bottle,--the bane of the country--passes round freely. what mary saw of wedded life in sweden did not give her a high opinion of swedish morals. the men were generally inconstant, and also the women lacked chastity--the product of the mind. the statement that in later life "the husband becomes a sot, whilst the wife spends her time in scolding the servants", likewise finds its explanation in the _rights of women_ as the natural result of vacancy of mind where youthful beauty and animal spirits have gone the way of all flesh! neither has the treatment of servants mary's sympathy. "they are not termed slaves; yet a man may strike a man with impunity because he pays him wages." but the lot of female servants is immeasurably harder. their having to eat a different kind of food from their masters strikes mary as a remnant of barbarism. the general appearance of the women is not prepossessing. too much attention to the delights of a well-provided table makes them fat and unwieldy and soon changes the natural pink of their complexions to a sallow hue. they are uncleanly of their persons, and vanity is more inherent in them than taste. their ignorance is even more profound than that of the males, and mary once had the compliment paid her that "she asked men's questions." the peasantry of sweden impressed her as more really polite and obliging than the better-situated classes, whose cold politeness consisted chiefly in tiresome ceremonies. in norway, however, the unmistakable signs of a coming dawn were noticeable. a river forms the boundary between the two countries, and yet, what a difference in the manners of the inhabitants of the two sides! instead of the sluggishness and poverty of the swede, here are industry and consequent prosperity. it is the patient labour of men who are only seeking for a subsistence which affords leisure for the cultivation of the arts and sciences that lift man so far above his first state. the world requires the hand of man to perfect it, and as this task naturally unfolds the faculties he exercises, it is physically impossible that he should remain in rousseau's golden age of stupidity. and although the cultivation of science in norway is as yet in its earliest stages--the time for universities having not yet come--yet a bright future is awaiting her. norway seemed to mary wollstonecraft the country of the greatest individual freedom. the king of denmark, it is true, was an absolute monarch, but the state of imbecility to which illness had reduced him placed the reins of government into the hands of his son the prince royal and of his wise and moderate minister count bernstorff. under their almost patriarchal authority every man was left to enjoy an almost unlimited amount of freedom. the law was mild, and the lot of those it sentenced to hard labour not unnecessarily hard. she found in norway no accumulation of property such as existed in sweden, resulting in the abject poverty of the submerged tenth. rich merchants were made to divide their personal fortunes among their children; and the distribution of all landed property into small farms,--one of the ideals hesitatingly put forward by mary in the _rights of women_--produced a degree of equality which was found nowhere else in europe. the tenants occupied their farms for life, which made them independent. there was every hope that drunkenness, the inherent vice of generations, would before long disappear, giving place to gallantry and refinement of manners; "but the change will not be suddenly produced." the norwegians love their country, but they have not yet arrived at that point where an enlarged understanding extends the love they cherish for the land of their birth to the entire human race. they have not much public spirit. however, the french revolution meets with a great deal of sympathy among the people of norway, who follow with the most lively interest the successes of the french arms. "so determined were they," says mary, "to excuse everything, disgracing the struggle of freedom by admitting the tyrant's plea necessity, that i could hardly persuade them that robespierre was a monster." mary hoped that the french revolution would have the effect of making politics a subject of discussion among them, "enlarging the heart by opening the understanding," and leading to the cultivation of that public spirit the absence of which she regretted. although the women of norway were not much more cultivated than their swedish sisters, regarding custom and opinion to such an extent that mary's educational advice was not listened to lest "the town might talk", and on the plea that "they must do as other people did"--yet they compared favourably with the latter in the matter of personal appearance and cheerfulness of disposition. they had rosy complexions, and were pronouncedly fond of dancing. they were very strict in the performance of their religious duties; yet showed the greatest toleration; nor was the norwegian sunday remarkable for that stupid dulness which characterises the english sabbath, the outcome of that fanatical spirit which mary feared was gaining ground in england. the same lack of public spirit which mary commented upon in her description of the national character of the norwegians, also struck her when observing the manners and customs of the danes in their capital. there had been a huge fire, destroying a considerable portion of the town, and held by some to be the work of pitt. it was the general opinion, that the conflagration might have been smothered in the beginning by pulling down several houses before the flames had reached them, to which, however, the inhabitants would not consent. mary found among the danes a great many vices. the men led dissolute lives, and utterly neglected their wives, who were reduced to the state of mere house-slaves. their only interest was love of gain, which, in rendering them over-cautious, sapped their energy. a visit to a theatre showed mary the state of the dramatic art in denmark and the gross taste of the audience, and the fact that well-dressed women took their children to witness the execution of a criminal as a favourite kind of entertainment, filled her with unutterable disgust. "and to think that these are the people," she exclaims, "who found fault with the late queen matilda's education of her son!" matilda, it appears, had carried some of rousseau's principles into effect, which, however, had found no favour at the court. the ignorance and coarse brutality which she found among the danes were instrumental in changing mary's opinions of the french. the parisian festivals were rendered more interesting by the sobriety of those who took part in them, a danish merry-making, however, generally degenerated into a drunken bacchanal. "i should have been less severe," she says, "in the remarks i have made on the vanity and depravity of the french, had i travelled towards the north before i visited france." the antipathy with which she had always regarded the dealings of business was increased by the experience she gained during her stay in scandinavia. at gotheburg and at hamburg the contrast between opulence and penury which the war had called forth filled her with indignation, and at laurvig, in norway, the lawyers proved to be all great chicaners. it seemed to her that traffic was necessarily allied with cunning. the gulf which now yawned between her and imlay was widened by the circumstance that she was unable to feel anything but contempt for what he had made his chief object in life. she was willing to admit that england and america to a certain extent owed their liberty to commerce, which created a new species of power to undermine the feudal system. but let them beware of the consequence, the tyranny of wealth is still more galling and debasing than that of rank! shortly after the final rupture with imlay mary renewed her acquaintance with godwin in the house of their mutual friend miss hayes. she took a fancy to him, and in the following month of april called upon him in somers town, having herself taken a lodging in pentonville. in godwin's _memoirs_ the description of their friendship, "melting into love" may be found. a temporary separation in july , when godwin made an excursion into norfolk, had its effect on the mind of both parties. as godwin says, it "gave a space for the maturing of inclination," and both realised that each had become indispensable to the other. they did not at once marry. godwin, in his _political justice_, had declared himself against marriage, which compels both parties to go on cherishing a relation long after both have discovered their fatal mistake. moreover, marriage is a contract for life, and binding to both parties; and no rational being can undertake to promise that his opinions will undergo no change in the future. mary's ideas of marriage we have seen to be different, nor did she change her mind under godwin's influence. but she had been much and rudely spoken of in connection with imlay, and she could not resolve to do anything that might revive that painful topic, and therefore agreed to keep their relations a secret from the world. mary's pregnancy, however, became their motive for complying with a ceremony to which godwin in a letter to mr. wedgwood, refers as follows: "nothing but a regard for the happiness of the individual, which i had no right to injure, could have induced me to submit to an institution which i wish to see abolished, and which i would recommend to my fellowmen never to practise but with the greatest caution." the marriage took place at old st. pancras church on march th, , but was not declared till the beginning of april. godwin records with some bitterness that certain of his friends, among whom were mrs. inchbald and mrs. siddons, from this moment treated him with coldness. in accordance with godwin's ideas of cohabitation he engaged an apartment about twenty doors from their house in somers town, where he pursued his literary occupations and sometimes remained for days together. the notes which passed between the two lovers in their five months of married life show that upon the whole they were very happy, although they had one or two slight differences. their most serious trouble in those days were the constant financial embarrassments. in june godwin went on a long excursion with his friend montagu, and the letters of both husband and wife are full of the most affectionate solicitude. the time of mary's confinement was now rapidly approaching, but her health was quite good, and she concentrated a good deal of energy upon a novel which she had begun in the first period of her intimacy with godwin. it engrossed her mind for months, and she wrote and rewrote several chapters of it with the most elaborate care. when she died, the work, to which she gave the name of "_maria, or the wrongs of woman_", was unfinished, in spite of which circumstance godwin decided to include the fragment in his edition of her posthumous works. a long and circumstantial account of mary's last days is given in mr. kegan paul's "_william godwin; his friends and contemporaries_." suffice it to say, that she gave birth to a daughter mary on the th of august, , and in spite of the constant attendance of some of the best doctors in london, died eleven days later. in the year following her death, godwin published his _memoirs_. they are an admirable piece of writing; yet they did not produce the effect he hoped for: that of making the principles and motives by which she was actuated in life better understood and more generally appreciated. the disfavour with which his personality was regarded in many circles on account of his radicalism rendered him all unfit for the task. fortunately, later generations have done justice to the impartiality of his judgments. we, at least, realise what the unstinted praise of a man of godwin's sincerity means, although to us her character and actions require no vindication. perhaps without being aware of it himself, godwin paid his deceased wife the greatest compliment in his power when insisting on the astonishing degree of soundness which pervaded her sentiments, enabling her to supplement her husband's deficiencies. both he and mary carried farther than to their common extent the characteristics of the sexes to which they belonged. godwin, while stimulated by the love of intellectual distinction, was painfully aware of his lack of what he calls "an intuitive sense of the pleasures of the imagination." women, he says, who are more delicate and susceptible of impression than men, in proportion as they receive a less intellectual education, are more unreservedly under the empire of feeling." if this estimate of women is correct, it proves the superiority of mary wollstonecraft over the other members of her sex. for the fact that her great natural gifts, joined to her boundless energy enabled her to attain an intellectual level far beyond the reach of others, did not in any sense detract from the warmth of her heart and the intensity of her feelings, by which she proved herself above all a tender, loving woman, thoroughly capable of constituting the happiness of a husband who was himself a leader of men. when two years after mary's death godwin published "_st. leon_," he gave in his idealised description of the married life of st. leon and margaret what he felt to be a faithful account of their short spell of matrimonial happiness. well might he say of his margaret that the story of her life is the best record of her virtues. it has been the aim of the present study to prove mary wollstonecraft the spiritual child and heir to the french philosophers of her own and of the preceding century--to a poullain de la barre, a fénelon, a mme de lambert, a d'holbach, who ventured to propose a scheme for the improvement of the deplorable conditions of an erring and suffering womanhood. more extreme in her views, and more determined in her claims than her bluestocking sisters, she stands out the one great apostle of female emancipation among the revolutionary leaders who held out the hope of lasting social improvement to all mankind. that she aimed too high and failed to find that recognition among her contemporaries to which her spirit of ready sacrifice entitled her, lends her a certain tragic dignity which adds materially to the interest felt by posterity in her striking personality. and yet her work certainly was not done in vain, although it was left to a later generation to build the huge structure of modern feminism on the ruins of a hope which, together with even more comprehensive ideals, had been blasted by the rude winds of reaction. this structure the present generation beholds with feelings which are not wholly unmixed, for it is as yet full of imperfections, and much remains to be done. but those who feel doubtful of the final issue, may turn to mary wollstonecraft, to borrow from her that unshakable faith in evolution and progress which to her became a kind of religion which never forsook her. footnotes: [ ] c. kegan paul, _william godwin, his friends and contemporaries_. [ ] see letter from mary to everina, dated from dublin, march th. , with which compare the following severe judgment by hannah more in her _strictures_: "it is worthy of remark that 'depart from me, i never knew you', is not the malediction denounced on the sceptic or the scoffer, but on the high professor, on the unfruitful worker of "miracles", on the unsanctified utterer of "prophecies", for even acts of piety, wanting the purifying principle, however they may dazzle men, offend god. cain sacrificed, balaam prophesied, rousseau most sublimely panegyrised the son of mary...." those who lacked true humility did not fall within the range of hannah more's compassion. [ ] e. dowden, _the french revolution and english literature_. [ ] w. godwin, _memoirs of the author of a vindication of the rights of women_. [ ] "a slavish bondage to parents cramps every faculty of the mind." (_a vindication_, chapter on _duty to parents_). [ ] the creation of congenial surroundings, and the bringing about of circumstances which involuntarily lead the pupil to draw certain illuminating inferences, is recommended also in _emile_, where the preceptor relies largely upon them. there seems nothing to be said against them, unless it were that the pupil might sooner or later discover that he was "being sold", which might be attended with awkward consequences! [ ] the position of servants very naturally called for discussion in the great liberty scheme. the treatment of female servants never failed to interest mary. many years later, godwin treated the subject in an essay. [ ] mr. falkland, the "high-spirited and highly cultured" gentleman of the dramatis personae, utilises all the advantages of his superior rank to crush his enemy caleb and finds the law upon his side. [ ] see h. w. brailsford, _shelley, godwin and their circle_. [ ] this rule, which also applies to property, and may be traced to the _contrat social_, strikes the keynote of what was the common view of the social reformers. mary's scheme of enfranchisement advocates the admission of women to the different professions to ensure their social independence. [ ] see morley's _rousseau_. [ ] see lilly bascho, _englische schriftstellerinnen in ihre beziehungen zur französischen revolution_. (_anglia )._ [ ] curiously enough, hannah more,--who refers to the education of the children as "the great object to which those who are, or may be mothers, are especially called"--unwittingly copies mary wollstonecraft where she says: "in the great day of general account, may every christian mother be enabled, through divine grace, to say, with humble confidence, to her maker and redeemer, behold the children whom thou hast given me!" [ ] c. kegan paul, memoir to the "_letters to imlay_". [ ] "we are soon to meet, to try whether we have mind enough to keep our hearts warm". (_letter to imlay_, august ). [ ] when emile's education is almost completed, he is sent abroad for the final touch. in this way he obtains full command of the principal languages of europe. bibliography addison and steele. the tatler; the spectator; the guardian. ascoli, g. les idées féministes en france. (revue de synthèse historique, .) astell, mary. a serious proposal to the ladies. (london, .) bascho, lilly. englische schriftstellerinnen in ihre beziehungen zur französischen revolution. (anglia, .) blease, w. lyon. the emancipation of english women. (national political press, .) bled, v. du. la société française. (libraire académique, paris, .) boulan, e. figures du dix-huitième siècle. (leiden, .) brailsford, h. n. shelley, godwin and their circle. brunetiÈre, f. histoire de la littérature française classique. (vol. ii and iii.) brunetiÈre, f. nouvelles etudes classiques. (la société française au ième siècle.) buckle, h. th. history of civilisation in england. (longman, green and co., london, .) burney, fanny. (mme d'arblay). diary and letters. cabe, joseph mac. woman in political evolution. (watts and co., london, .) a cambridge history of english literature, vol. xi. chabaud, l. les précurseurs du féminisme. chapone, hester. letters on the improvement of the mind. chesterfield, lord. letters. (ed. j. bradshaw.) climenson, e. j. mrs. montagu. compayrÉ, g. histoire critique des doctrines de l'éducation en france. day, thomas. sandford and merton. defoe, daniel. essay upon projects. delany, mrs. (mary granville). correspondence. dodds, m. hope. fulfilment. (an article about mary astell in "the englishwoman".) doran, dr. j. a lady of the last century. (mrs. montagu.) dowden, e. the french revolution and english literature. elwood, mrs. a. k. memoirs of female writers in england. forsyth, w. eighteenth century novels and novelists. godwin, w. political justice. godwin, w. caleb williams. godwin, w. memoirs of the author of a vindication of the rights of women. grappin, h. poullain de la barre. (revue d'histoire littéraire de la france, tome xx.) girardin, st. marc. cours de littérature dramatique. (vol. iii.) hales, j. w. the last decade of the last century. (contemp. review, vol. .) d'holbach. le système social. huchon, r. mrs. montagu and her friends. kegan paul, c. william godwin, his friends and contemporaries. lanson, g. lettres du dix-huitième siècle. larroumet, g. marivaux, sa vie et ses oeuvres. lefranc, abel. le tiers livre du pantagruel et la querelle des femmes. (etudes rabelaisiennes, tome ii, .) livet, ch. l. précieux et précieuses. (paris, .) lyttleton, lord. dialogues of the dead. 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" " a vindication of the rights of women. " " the french revolution. " " letters to imlay. (ed. by c. kegan paul.) " " letters from sweden. yonge, charlotte m. hannah more. (eminent women series.) stellingen . there never was a more fervent champion of marriage and domesticity than mary wollstonecraft, who twice lived with a man to whom she was not married. . the bluestocking assemblies differed in their essential qualities from the french salons both of the seventeenth and of the eighteenth century. . british influence was a potent factor in the intellectual revolt which preceded the french revolution. . those who, like st. marc girardin and lord john morley, observe that in the fifth book of rousseau's "_emile_" we are confronted with the oriental conception of women, do its author an injustice. . the views expressed in paine's "_rights of man_" regarding the attitude of burke towards democracy are open to criticism. . mr. r. h. case's interpretation of the text of shakespeare's "_the tragedy of coriolanus_", act i, scene ix, l. : when steel grows soft as the parasite's silk, let him be made an overture for the wars! is quite plausible. . the popularity of tennyson's poetry is largely due to circumstances which are independent of his greater poetic qualities. . there is a strong element of romance in richardson's so-called "realistic" novels. . behoudens het geven van eene beknopte historische inleiding is het niet wenschelijk het onderwijs in de engelsche letterkunde aan onze middelbare scholen en gymnasia uit te strekken tot die perioden welke vallen vóór shakespeare.