THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 PRESENTED BY 
 
 PROF. CHARLES A. KOFOID AND 
 
 MRS. PRUDENCE W. KOFOID 
 
THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES 
 OF A FREE LANCE 
 
 Being the Observations of 
 
 S. G. W. BENJAMIN 
 
 Late United States Minister to Persia 
 Author, Artist and Journalist 
 
 Burlington, Vt. 
 
 Free Press Company 
 
 1914 
 
^A I^O^SS' 
 
 BOOKS BY S. G. W. BENJAMIN. 
 
 Constantinople, the Isle of Pearls. 
 Ode on the Death of Abraham Lincoln. 
 The Turk and the Greek. 
 Tom Roper. 
 What is Art? 
 
 The Atlantic Islands. Pub. in London. 
 Art in America. 
 Our American Artists. 
 The Multitudinous Seas. 
 The World's Paradise. 
 
 Troy in Legend, Literature and Topography. 
 A Group of Etchers. 
 The Cruise of the Alice May. 
 Sea Spray. 
 
 Persia and the Persians. 
 The Story of Persia. 
 
 {Translated into East Indian Dialects and Published, Neiv York, 
 London, Bombay). 
 
 Copyrighted, 1914, by Free Press Co. 
 

 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Anyone who writes his autobiography must be pre- 
 pared to meet the charge of egotism. But so many, es- 
 pecially in recent years, have written the record of their 
 lives, that the author finds himself in good company 
 and needs to make no apology. 
 
 Aside from the pleasure of going over the scenes of his 
 life, the author had two or three specific objects in view 
 when he began to write these pages. 
 
 One was to indicate some of the characteristics of 
 races in Europe, greatly differing from our own, es- 
 pecially the Oriental, who is so often misjudged. 
 
 In war or peace the personal traits of a people, to- 
 gether with environment, gives a trend to great national 
 movements, and it is only fair to judge such outcome 
 througli that impartial vision which comes only from an 
 all-around knowledge. 
 
 Another subject the author had hoped to have treated 
 more at length was the history and methods of early mis- 
 sionary work in the Levant, with some analysis of char- 
 acters met there, but lack of space crowds out much in- 
 teresting material at hand on this and other matters. 
 
 Another subject was a description of life in one of our 
 country colleges during the fifties. This also it seemed 
 necessary to abbreviate, as also a description of shipping 
 and life at sea, before steam and other modern inventions 
 affected the character of sailing; vessels and sail naviga- 
 
 M3100f76 
 
tion. This subject has been chiefly illustrated by the 
 writer's somewhat varied personal experience and obser- 
 vation from childhood up to recent years. Personal ex- 
 periences in the world of art, are also touched upon, 
 among other topics. The reader who cares not for any 
 or all of these subjects is hereby warned! 
 
 The greatest difficulty encountered in preparing this 
 record has been to keep within the limits attractive to 
 the modern reader, in this country, and in this age of 
 hurry and hustle. For the memory of the authoV serves 
 him so well that he could have quadrupled the length of 
 this work with the utmost ease ; and added episodes which, 
 for various reasons, it was found expedient to omit. 
 
 S. G. W. B. 
 
EDITOR'S PREFACE. 
 
 The author of Lorna Doone writes in his introduction 
 to this charming work, "I call this a Romance, because 
 incidents, scenery, time, and characters, are all romantic." 
 With this definition, from so good an authority, we may 
 properly, I think, call this little book "a romance," and 
 trust that the readers who do not like Memoirs will find 
 unfailing attraction in these memories of a life full of 
 adventure. 
 
 Our author owes to his childhood in Greece (and also 
 perhaps to pre-natal influences in an atmosphere of Hel- 
 lenic culture and beauty) his enthusiastic love of the 
 beautiful. The influence of the scenery, characters and 
 incidents of much of his life, tended to increase this roman- 
 tic spirit within him, which was by Nature, that of the 
 knight, paladin, and poet. 
 
 To paint, to write, or to work solely for fortune or 
 fame, ever stirred him to indignant protest. He loved 
 things noble, free and untrammeled. 
 
 It is expected of most authors and artists that their 
 "experiences" will be confined to literature and art, and 
 it is quite unusual that they should include also those 
 of yachting and diplomacy. 
 
 Having crossed the seas some forty-five times, loving 
 the sea and all sea-craft with the love of a sailor, Mr. 
 Benjamin had learned its multitudinous wave- forms which 
 he so vividly depicted in print and on canvas. 
 
As a boy he spoke several languages, and had amused 
 himself when not at out door sport by sketching charac- 
 teristics of different peoples and customs ; later, while 
 residing more than half his life abroad, he had studied the 
 personal character of different peoples, and the trend of 
 their national life. All this was of service to him in 
 the diplomatic experience which came afterward. Es- 
 pecially did his long sojourn in the Levant give him an 
 acquaintance with the mysterious Oriental, and an appre- 
 hension of that "viewpoint of the East," which we of the 
 West, with all our conceit of wisdom so fail to appreciate. 
 
 In mature years he was called to fill the place of con- 
 sul general to Persia, and later on, was appointed by 
 President Arthur, U. S. minister, to establish a legation 
 there. His mind naturally penetrating and astute had 
 already gained an insight into the true status of the 
 powers, especially in the East_, and all these varied life- 
 influences had given to his soul a strange maturity that 
 led at last toward the deeper perception of the Supreme 
 and all compelling Power that moves nations as well as 
 individuals toward their allotted goal. 
 
 Fannie N. Benjamin, Nov. 16th, 1914. 
 
CONTENTS 
 Chapter Page 
 Poem 9 
 
 I. x\rgos and Athens 11 
 
 II. From Trebizond to America 42 
 
 III. Smyrna and Earthquakes 67 
 
 IV. Constantinople 102 
 
 Poem 133 
 
 V. College Life 135 
 
 VI. College Vacations, Ralph Waldo Emerson and 
 
 Dr. Hopkins 153 
 
 VII. Episodes of Teaching and Life at Albany 169 
 
 VIII. Early Marriage and return to the Levant 193 
 
 Poem, The Agnostic's Creed 213 
 
 IX. Madeira 216 
 
 X. From the \Miite House to the Bahamas 242 
 
 XL Paris and Portugal 267 
 
 XII. Boston and a Trip to Cuba 287 
 
 Poem, The Sailor's Fate 309 
 
 XIII. New York Art Life 311 
 
 XIV. Marriage and a Cruise 333 
 
 XV. Incidents of Life in Persia 353 
 
 XVI. Society and Diplomacy 378 
 
 XVII. Homeward Bound 410 
 
 Poem, A Vision of Eternity 425 
 
 List of Paintings by S. G. W. Benjamin 428 
 
CHILDHOOD 
 
 PART I 
 
 There is a shore 
 
 The sun of morning gilds 
 
 And, hallows, ever more 
 
 Where Hope her castle builds 
 
 And jocund Spring a harvest yields 
 
 Of amarinthine flozcers 
 
 Upon Elysian fields. 
 
 Oh Land of gleams! 
 Where only youth can tread 
 Ensh'ied thou art, rcith dreams. 
 Thine hours, like magic sped; 
 
 Oh Land of song and joyous hells! 
 With thee, we zcalk the Elysian fields. 
 
 And hear no sad farewells! 
 
 S. G. W. B. 
 
 Selection frovi a poem tvrittcn for 
 a "Kappa Alpha" reunion, Williams 
 College, 1S80. 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 ARGOS AND ATHENS. 
 
 The City of Argos, on the southeastern coast of Greece, 
 is reputed to be, after Damascus, the oldest city in the 
 world. My parents were missionaries at that place when I , 
 was born there in the year 1837. They sailed for the Medi- 
 terranean in 1836, taking passage at Boston in the schoon- 
 er Sea Eagle, Captain Drew. The schooner was bound 
 to Smyrna, and being over-sparred, the provisions and 
 water very bad, the captain surly, and the weather tem- 
 pestuous, the voyage was exceedingly unpleasant, even 
 for those days of primitive ocean travel. My parents 
 made their devious way from Smyrna to Athens in a Greek 
 vessel and thence, in a coaster, to Argos. Steam packets 
 were hardly seen or known in those days. 
 
 My father was descended from John Benjamin , Gen- 
 tleman, as he is styled in the old records, who was one 
 of the first settlers of Cambridge, Massachusetts, coming 
 over in 1632. ]\Iy grandfather Benjamin was a paper 
 manufacturer at Catskill, New York, one of the first in 
 the United States, and fought at Bennington. ]My grand- 
 mother Benjamin was the daughter of Captain Charles 
 Seymour of Hartford, Connecticut, who fought in Wash- 
 ington's army. My mother was Mary Gladding Wheeler, 
 
 11 
 
daughter of Samuel Green Wheeler, one of the old mer- 
 chants and manufacturers of New York (mentioned in 
 Barret's work), and elder in the Rutgers Street Church of 
 which the celebrated Dr. Macauley was pastor. 
 
 When I was thirteen months old my father was directed 
 to remove to Athens. Passage was engaged on a Greek 
 brig sailing from Napolidi Romania, but she went on the 
 rocks in a night squall. Escaping these perils we finally 
 reached Athens, safely, where my parents lived six years. 
 That most attractive city had just been made capital of 
 the newly liberated country ; and the court of King Otho, 
 the Bavarian, and his handsome Queen Amalia, though 
 ^yet still crude, attracted characters of every description, 
 chief tans, heroes, and adventurers of the recent war of 
 revolution in search of office, Philhellenes of every Euro- 
 pean nation, who had lent their swords and their purses 
 in aid of the war for freedom ; many of them men of cul- 
 ture, title and distinction, diplomats accredited to Greece, 
 travellers fired by the romantic strophes and the volcanic 
 career of Lord Byron, scholars, artists, poets— all gathered 
 alike to the ancient classic city, now about to renew its 
 youth, and to reenter on a career of glory, as was fondly 
 hoped. In a word, the splendor of a new era seemed burst- 
 ing over all the ruins of the Acropolis, although few real- 
 ized that the results were to ripen but slowly after such 
 ages of oppression. 
 
 I look back to our residence at Athens with unalloyed 
 satisfaction. Owing to the distance of time it is still in- 
 vested with a roseate haze, like that which hangs over a 
 summer landscape when the morning light's tender glow 
 is first breaking over mountain, forest and stream. 
 Through this veil, objects, scenes, faces, are discerned here 
 
 12 
 
and there, some vaguely, others with perfect distinctness, 
 according to the impression they made upon my young 
 mind. ]My memory dates back to an early period, and 
 retains vividly many incidents that would scarcely attract 
 the attention of most children. That was due very large- 
 ly to the fact that at that time I had but few playfellows 
 of my own age, except at rare intervals, as my parents 
 seldom allowed me to associate, until later, with the Greek 
 children, and there were no other American children then 
 living in Athens except two or three little girls, the 
 daughters of Dr. Jonas King and his Greek wife, and Ion 
 Hanford Perdicaris, noted lately as a captive to Moor- 
 ish brigands. Occasionally, I met a few English lads in 
 a formal way. It is true that in my seventh year I at- 
 tended the Missionary school for Greeks in order to learn 
 how to read and write Greek. But I did not remain there 
 long; it was found that as I already spoke Greek more 
 readily than English, I was likely to fall behind in my 
 English studies, which I had begun with my mother the 
 same year. 
 
 Although taught to keep in the background and rarely 
 to speak, yet I could listen, and one can readily perceive 
 how nuich may, in that way be learned by a child of active 
 mind and quick perception. My parents took particular 
 pains to interest me in the people and country of my birth 
 by repeating to me events and legends of Greek history, 
 such as the story of Marathon or the legend of Ulysses 
 and the Odyssey, which I soon knew by heart. Of course 
 they often recited to me incidents of the recent Greek 
 Revolution until I almost came to believe it was the history 
 of my own country and heroes, to which I was listening. 
 
 Another factor in directing the aim of my thought, if 
 
 13 
 
not actually planting the seeds of certain tendencies, were 
 the folktales recited by the Greek servants, and the sea 
 adventures told me by some of the grizzled mariners who 
 had sailed and fought in the fleets of Miaulis, Tombazi, and 
 Saktoori. They often came to our house. One of them I 
 especially remember, his white mustache, weather browned 
 and weather seamed features, and dark flashing eyes 
 fringed with crows feet. He wore a fez with a short blue 
 tassel of the islanders, a half open shirt, vest decorated 
 with embroidery, the worse for wear, and corded buttons, 
 a red band or belt, baggy blue breeches, and scarlet shoes 
 but no stockings. I would listen by the hour, breath- 
 less with interest, seated on his knee or on the steps at 
 his side, to stories of battle, shipwreck and storm. These 
 old sea dogs, who were doubtless much like the men of 
 Ulysses, made for me models of brigs and mysticoes until 
 my inbred love of the sea took fire, and I perpetually 
 thought and dreamed of the briny clement. From that 
 day to this I have had no stronger passion than my love 
 for the sea and ships, and would "swap yarns" with old 
 seamen on a ship's deck or along shore with as much 
 pleasure as to converse with artists, philosophers, poets, 
 and statesmen. 
 
 It was when I was six years old that the celebrated Suli- 
 ote chieftain, Kitzo Tzavellas, visited at our house with 
 his wife. He was one of the famous band who stormed 
 the camp of the Turks on the night when Marko Bozzaris 
 was killed, he who was the hero of Fitz Greene Halleck's 
 immortal ode. After that event Tzavellas commanded the 
 Suliote contingent in the ill-starred but immortal siege of 
 Missolongi, the place where Byron gave up his life for 
 the freedom of Greece. After the most heroic defence, 
 
 14 
 
when the supply of rats and mice began to fail, and Ibra- 
 him Pasha, the Turkish general, was on the point of 
 storming the place, the garrison determined to cut their 
 way out, hoping that some at least might thus escape from 
 the inevitable horrors of a victorious assault. At dead 
 of night the Greeks sallied from their works in two 
 columns, attended by thousands of famishing women and 
 children. On one wing the sortie failed, but about 1,500 
 of the beseiged succeeded in hewing their way through the 
 enemy's line and evaded pursuit in the mountains. At 
 their head was Kitzo Tzavellas ; his heroic wife marched 
 at his side, her infant on one arm and brandishing a sci- 
 mitar with the other. Of such stuff were the women of 
 Suli ! I well remember this illustrious pair, as they sat 
 in my father's study, while we all listened with the keen- 
 est interest to the thrilling story of the escape. 
 
 Study and educational influences were no more indis- 
 pensable for the Greek men of action and affairs than for 
 the barons of feudal times. Learning, and generally not 
 much of that, was for the priests in those days, but the 
 sword, and shriswdness, craft and will-power sufficed for 
 the rulers and the men of war, and genius was as much 
 in evidence with the one as with the other. The celebrated 
 ]Mehmet Alee, who founded the existing dynasty of so- 
 called viceroys or khedives, and held Egypt in his fist, 
 could neither write nor read. But he could do what some 
 bookmen cannot do — he could read and manage men, and 
 had insight and nerve equal to ever}' occasion. 
 
 Opposite our house was the Konak or metropolitan 
 residence of Petro Mavromichaelis, known as the Petro 
 Bey of whom I have spoken, feudatory chief of Southern 
 Greece or Sparta under the Turks, and one of the most 
 
 15 
 
prominent characters of the Hellenic Revolution. A 
 group of palikars or irregular soldiery and retainers 
 always loitered in picturesque listlessness about the en- 
 trance. They wore the brilliant national costume, and 
 most of them were armed with huge flintlock pistols and 
 long silver mounted dirks stuck in broad red belts deco- 
 rated with gold thread, while scimitars were suspended 
 from the waist by red sashes. Long barrelled "tufeks" 
 or flint locks of the old Albanian type were leaned against 
 the wall, and two or three shaggy wolf dogs slumbered on 
 the steps with half an eye open for intruders. These com- 
 bined objects, this romantic eff'ect, daily visible under our 
 eyes against a background of storied mountains melting in- 
 to the cloudless sky of Attica, suggested thoughts in severe 
 contrast with the orthodox puritanism which my parents 
 were trying to instil into my soul. 
 
 I visited the palace several times, but never saw Otho, 
 the King of Greece, except on public occasions. My father 
 met him officially when acting as American charge d'af- 
 faires. Naturally such a striking event as the popular 
 rising against the King in September of 1843, in order to 
 wrest a constitution from the despotic rule of that mon- 
 arch, was exactly to the taste of a man of Griziotis' type 
 who was one of the leaders. His tall figure with that of 
 Makriyni or Long John, was everywhere apparent, and re- 
 ceived due prominence in the rude illustrations of that 
 event, designed by local artists. I well remember many of 
 tlic incidents of this brief and successful uprising which was 
 managed so well that in less than twenty-four hours a 
 complete change in the character of the government was 
 effected without the loss of a single life. This is more 
 than can be said of most of the revolutions Europe has 
 seen for a similar purpose. 
 
 16 
 
No one slept a wink the night before, for the clatter 
 of liorse hoofs on the pavement, and the rush of excited 
 multitudes. Cannon were pointed toward the entrance of 
 the palace and an immense crowd was gathered in the 
 royal square, armed and ready to act, if necessary, but 
 in the meantime quietly chatting and smoking as if watch- 
 ing some ordinary occurrence, while the delegates of the 
 people were arguing with King Otho to grant the con- 
 stitution and legislative chambers demanded. Men had no 
 force to depend upon, but a few companies of Bavarian 
 guards, who would have been slaughtered in the first on- 
 set. The telegraph did not exist then. No appeal could 
 be made to the powers. The diplomatic corps stood 
 aloof, confounded by the suddenness of the coup. The 
 people's delegates were respectful but inflexible, and as 
 his Majesty felt no enthusiasm to re-enact the tragedy 
 played by Louis XVI and the Swiss guards, he yielded 
 every demand before the close of day. Russia, whicli 
 sometimes loses her self-control and drops the disguise 
 by which she conceals her aims and policy, instantly 
 recalled her envoy at Athens and relegated him into per- 
 manent retirement for not asserting Russia's claim to 
 quasi suzerainty, and commanding Otho to remain firm 
 at whatever cost. 
 
 The following night the entire city was illuminated. 
 However disposed, no one would have dared to leave his 
 windows darkened. Our own house, therefore, was lit up 
 with candles and tapers floating on olive oil in tumblers 
 of water, a common method of lighting in those days, 
 before the discovery of petroleum or gas. The crack of 
 flintlock, muskets and pistols rang all over the city — a 
 noisy feu de joie that continued until the local supply of 
 
 17 
 
sakee and rum was about exhausted. For days after 
 that, whenever people met, they would greet each other 
 with the exclamation, ^''Zeto to Syntagna!" "Long live the 
 Constitution !" Everyone wore a bit of red ribbon in his 
 buttonhole, often with an iron or silver cross attached to 
 it. Although a mere lad of six years, I was carried away 
 by the universal enthusiasm and insisted on having a 
 ribbon of genuine scarlet ribbed silk, and an iron cross 
 sewed to my blouse. 
 
 It was one of the proudest days of my life when my 
 mother took me on one of our delightful morning strolls 
 to tlie ruins of the Temple of Jupiter Olympus with that 
 red ribbon and cross glistening on my bosom. On that 
 day, at least, I was more of a Greek than an American. 
 
 While the excitement was still at its height, my father 
 met a crowd of school boys in the street vociferating 
 with unusual glee. "What is the matter now, my boys?" 
 inquired my father. "Oh," replied their leader, "it's 
 just this; our teacher has been flogging us overmuch 
 lately, and carrying on altogether too lively for us. And 
 so we all rose today and just gave him a flogging in re- 
 turn, and kicked him out of the school : ''Zeto to Syn- 
 tagna!'' 'Long live the Constitution!' " 
 
 The Duchess of Plaisance, an eccentric French lady, 
 who died in 1854, had a country place in the mountains 
 near Athens when we were living there to which she some- 
 times invited guests of note, for she effected to patronize 
 intellect and culture. On one occasion Dr. King, the 
 noted American missionary, together with a number of 
 savants, literati, and diplomats, were invited to her villa. 
 The ride up the rough mountain road was long and ex- 
 hausting, and the racy air whetted their appetites until 
 
 18 
 
they looked forward with keen impatience to the hour 
 when they should gather around the smoking board and 
 enjoy a sumptuous dinner by the capable chef of the 
 Duchess. They reached the house at last; it was long 
 after sunset, and they were hungry as wolves. Judge 
 then of their stupefaction and horror w^hen the noble 
 hostess, on reaching the dining salon, announced the 
 menu in these blood-curdling words : "Gentlemen, I can 
 easily understand that when men of scholarship and intel- 
 lect like yourselves meet together it is not with the grosser 
 pleasures of the table that you enjoy each other's society, 
 but by the pure interchange of thought. I have, there- 
 fore, arranged for a light meal that would be in harmony 
 with the character of the occasion." She then invited 
 them to partake of the glass of milk and the slice of 
 sponge cake that were laid by each plate. Language 
 failed to describe the mingled chagrin and wrath of those 
 philosophic souls as the}' partook of the slender re- 
 freshments, which they hastened to supplement, on re- 
 tiring to their rooms, by bribing the servants to snuiggle 
 up to them a supply of eatables. 
 
 Among the distinguished travellers I remember to have 
 seen at Athens were Sir Jolui and Lady Franklin, and 
 Stephens, the noted author of Travels in Central Ameri- 
 ca Chiapas and Yucatan, one of the most entertaining 
 books of travel ever written. I also remember well the 
 Rev. Joseph Wolfe, a guest of Dr. Leaves while at Athens, 
 on his way to the far East on an errand which attracted 
 much attention at that time. He w^as a converted Jew 
 connected with the British Bible Society — florid, red- 
 liaired, corpulent, quick and nervous in his actions, l)ut 
 possessed of some ability which pi'ocured for him a iiiar- 
 
 19 
 
riage with an English lady of quality. He was then en- 
 route on a mission for the British government, having 
 nobly volunteered to go in search of tidings of the ill fated 
 emissaries, Captains Conolly and Stoddart, who had been 
 sent to the Emeer of Bokhara. The East India Company 
 and the British Foreign Office, notwitlistanding the gener- 
 al ability displayed in their dealings with Asiatics, have 
 sometimes committed stupendous blunders in India and 
 Central Asia, that might almost bring their sanity into 
 question, and such as Russian astuteness never would 
 allow. 
 
 As I had been very feeble in infancy, and had had 
 several ill turns in successive years, I was kept back and 
 did not learn to read in any language until my seventh 
 year. Strange to say I could not learn to read in the 
 ordinary way — by beginning with the alphabet — but by 
 the sight of a word in its entirety. For this reason it 
 was many years before I could write English with any 
 certainty that the words would be spelled correctly ; in 
 fact, not until by the study of Latin and French, and 
 general etymology was I able to perceive the logical proc- 
 esses by which a language is built up or evolved from 
 other tongues. 
 
 Owing to the fact that I had so few associates of my 
 own age I was almost constantly in the society of those 
 much older than myself — my parents and their acquaint- 
 ances. I was not only permitted but often encouraged to 
 accompany them when making or receiving visits. 
 
 Two of the most striking figures to be seen at Athens 
 in those days were the daughters of Kitzo Bozzaris, 
 brother of Marko Bozzaris, I recollect seeing them several 
 times, tlieir intense black tresses superbly set off by the 
 
 20 
 
sc-arlct fezzcs they wore. ]Mere child though I was, I 
 was not too young to observe the beauty of scenery, or 
 the beauty of women. I also just remember seeing Bja'on's 
 famous ''^Maid of Athens," who was at that time a portly 
 matron, the wife of an Englishman prosaically named 
 Black. 
 
 In speaking of Byron I am reminded that among the 
 people we met was a Mr. Noel and his bride. He was a 
 nephew of Lady Byron and was travelling in Greece. In 
 our parlor they alluded to the unpleasant story about 
 which Mrs. Stowe, many years later, published a highly 
 sensational article in the Atlantic Monthly. She gave 
 it out as a great secret which she felt it her duty to 
 reveal in order to diminish the pernicious influence of 
 Byron's poetry. When her article came out as a new 
 "find" in literary life, I was amazed as I had heard the 
 story in my boyhood and so openly alluded to, as to leave 
 the impression that it was anything but a secret. It is 
 now known that it was a fiction evolved from an over 
 excited brain, and that Lady Byron, a monomaniac on 
 the subject, confided it as a dead secret to many of her 
 friends. 
 
 My father was well acquainted with Petro Bey, the 
 white-haired hero of Sparta and not infrequently took 
 me Avith him when paying his respects at the Konak. 
 Petro Bey was then quite advanced in years, and his 
 spirit had been broken by the terrible domestic sorrows 
 he had experienced, such as the execution of his two sons, 
 who after bravely fighting through the Revolution, as- 
 sassinated the President, Capodistria, for secretly pro- 
 moting Russia's designs. But outwardly Petro* Bey still 
 presented a very handsome appearance, his ruddy com- 
 
 21 
 
plexion and keen falconlike eyes contrasting with a splen- 
 did mustache white as the driven snow. If I remember 
 rightly, the penmanship of Petro Bey extended no farther 
 than the ability to scrawl his name illegibly at the foot of 
 letters and documents dictated to his secretary. I have 
 in my possession several letters and papers signed in 
 this way. 
 
 One occasion that made a very great impression on 
 my memory as a child was the funeral of Kolakotroni. 
 He had l)een one of the most turbulent and unscrupulous, 
 yet brilliant generals of the Greek Revolution. It was the 
 first military funeral I had ever seen and had elements of 
 picturesqueness sometimes lacking in the obsequies of sol- 
 diers elsewhere. The procession passed directly under 
 our windows. According to the custom of the Greek 
 C'luirch, the body was not enclosed in a coffin, but lay on 
 the bier as if he were asleep, the head slightly raised on 
 a pillow. He was dressed in the white fustanella or kilt, 
 scarlet fez, and gold-embroidered vest, white frilled shirt 
 of silk and cotton with open, flowing sleeves, many 
 colored silken sash and pistol belt, red embroidered bus- 
 kins and red shoes, and the scimitar lay at his side — the 
 one he wore in battle or on state occasions. The pallor of 
 the old warrior's features contrasted strangely with the 
 gorgeousness of his military trappings, as he passed slow- 
 ly to his grave. A throng of priests, acolytes, and incense 
 bearers in gorgeous vestments attended the bier, chanting 
 a solemn requiem ; and the Bavarian troops then at 
 Athens, contrasted their European uniforms with the pic- 
 torial national dress of war. Scarred, white-haired veter- 
 ans followed their old general to his last review. 
 
 22 
 
Hadji Christo, hero of the Revolution and comrade of 
 Kolakotroni, was another of the interesting figures oc- 
 casionally seen at our house. As I remember him, he was 
 of medium height, spare and wiry. Hadjd Christo was 
 noted for the hardships he had endured at the hands of 
 the Turks. One of his adventures was his captivity in a 
 noisome dungeon so dark that he could not see his own 
 hand distinctly. After being there for weeks he felt some- 
 thing warm, some living creature, nestling under his 
 jacket when he awoke one day. Greatly alarmed, he still 
 remained perfectly quiet and awaited developments. It 
 proved to be a serpent that sought a snug bod in his 
 bosom, but whether poisonous or not, the captive could 
 not tell. Day after day the reptile returned to the same 
 place, growing as tame and familiar as the mouse of 
 Baron Trenck. In the meantime, Hadji Christo liimself 
 began to find even such companionship a relief in a soli- 
 tude that he expected would end sooner or later with tor- 
 ture or famine. This strange friendship continued for 
 months, until the prisoner was unexpectedly released by 
 the triumph of his compatriots. 
 
 One of the most familiar characters at Athens, who 
 might be seen any day stalking with a band of choice 
 spirits like himself about the Agora or the Stadium where 
 Alcibiades stalked two thousand years ago to the detri- 
 ment of his native state, was Griziotis, a noted, or rather 
 notorious palikar of the Revolution. He made as much 
 noise during his military and political career as some who 
 accomplish much more for the good of their country, 
 being in fact a selfish, egotistical, turbulent schemer, a 
 demagogue in military garb, a modern Alcibiades, without 
 his genius. He represented a type unfortunately too 
 
 23 
 
connnon everywhere, especially among democracies, and 
 above all those that are characteristically Greek. Kleon, 
 who swaggered about Athens during the Peloponnesian 
 war, was a prominent example of this undesirable class 
 that has always abounded in Greece, greatly to her in- 
 jury, and is coming well to the front in the United States 
 today. Not all the Greeks are of this sort ; far from it ; 
 there are Greeks and Greeks, but this type has flourished 
 with especial success on Hellenic soil. 
 
 I saw Doctor Wolfe again at Trebizond, when return- 
 ing from Bokhara, and the change in his appearance Mas 
 something I shall never forget. From being a man of 
 self-importance, jovial, frank, restless and loud-voiced 
 he had become sly, suspicious, fearful, wary and careless 
 of speech. If he had passed a year or two in a den of 
 cobras and rattlesnakes, he could not have become more 
 changed. During his entire stay within the limits of Bo- 
 khara he had been conscious that his life hung by a thread. 
 He was thousands of miles from a friend ; his purpose 
 was more than suspected and he was watched as a croco- 
 dile watches the child playing on the bank. What did it 
 matter to the brooding fanatic on the throne of Bokhara 
 whether there was one infidel dog, more or less, in the 
 world? He had but to say the word. Ostensibly, Dr. 
 Wolfe went there to gather information about the Jews 
 of that khanate, and hence, immediately on arriving 
 there, he placed himself in connnunication with the Rabbis 
 of the place. But so closely was he watched that he was 
 forced to converse with them by means of the Psalms of 
 David which have invocations and responses. With the 
 manuscript open before them, they would chant apparent- 
 ly one verse, and he would chant the response, as in the 
 
 24 
 
English Litany. But what they actually did, was to in- 
 terchange questions and replies in Hebrew regarding the 
 two last envoys, their horrible sufferings and cruel exe- 
 cution. Dr. Wolfe learned by this means that he was 
 threatened with the same fate, probably by poison. For 
 this reason for weeks he ate only eggs and watermelons, 
 and what with this and the constant alarm in which he 
 lived, he nearly died. The Emcer himself finally gave 
 Dr. Wolfe his own version of the reasons that caused 
 liim to murder the two envoys, and then, with a strange 
 freak of mercy, permitted or rather expelled the victim 
 of his power from his dominions. Wandering through 
 vast desert wastes Dr. Wolfe fell into the hands of a band 
 of cutthroats who stripped him to the skin. The Rajah 
 of Lahore, learning of his desperate condition, sent him 
 assistance. He was found in the desert completely naked 
 and so nearly starved that he seized the jars of preserves 
 sent to him and dug out the sweetmeats with his fingers. 
 Dr. Wolfe returned home by way of Persia, and we saw 
 him at Trebizond while he was waiting for a steamer, t];iin 
 as a rail, and woefully subdued in manner, as I have al- 
 ready observed. 
 
 When Mr. Perdicaris, our excellent consul at Athens, 
 resigned, my father was appointed acting consul, prac- 
 tically a diplomatic agent, in his place and continued to 
 serve as such until he left Athens. Evidently he ful- 
 filled the duties of the post with such credit that no for- 
 mal successor was named for several years. But this of- 
 fice, while it greatly added to his influence and extended 
 his acquaintances, also added distinctly to his labors ; his 
 correspondence, as missionary and consul, was very large. 
 Envelops were then practically unknown, and large square 
 
 25 
 
sheets were used even in private correspondence, folded 
 to receive the address on the back, and sealed with wax or 
 wafers. All documents entering Greece from the east 
 and south, were thoroughly slashed and fumigated, 
 owing to the prevalence of the plague in the Levant. The 
 quarantine was the most effectual means known to pre- 
 vent its spread, and it meant forty days of seclusion in 
 dead earnest. In the year before I was born, 107,000 
 people died at Constantinople of bubonic plague, when my 
 father attended the annual meeting of the missionaries at 
 Smyrna in 1841, he was obliged to remain one month and 
 ten days in the lazaretto at Syra before he could 
 be permitted to land at the Piraeus, or Port of Athens. 
 In the apartment my father occupied at Smyrna a man 
 liad been previously confined who actually had the 
 plague and was one of the few who ever recovered from 
 it. Impelled by some morbid motive, before leaving the 
 quarantine, the man hid a fragment of his underclothing 
 in a niche near the ceiling of the room. Sometime later 
 he. happened to be assigned to the same room, having in 
 the meantime been travelling in regions entirely free from 
 the pest. A fatal curiosity led him to see if the rag was 
 still in the niche; it was there; he took it in his hand, 
 caught from it a second attack of plague and in a few 
 hours was carried out in his coffin. 
 
 My father was capable of accomplishing a great deal 
 with more ease than most men. His faculties were thor- 
 oughly disciplined and perfectly at his command. He 
 mastered modern Greek and translated several works into 
 that language ; at the same time he instructed classes of 
 young men of whom several eventually completed their 
 studies and acquired professions in the United States ; 
 
 26 
 
and he carried on a large correspondence with the clergy 
 and public men of Greece, besides showing every courtesy 
 to the American travellers, more numerous at Athens 
 then than now, who called on him, whether as fellow coun- 
 trymen or as consul. Amid his varied duties, however, 
 he never forgot his devotion to his family nor neglected 
 the wife and children he loved for the engrossing cares of 
 his profession. Thoughtfully remembering how few boy 
 companions I had, he often took me with him (when ac- 
 compan^'ing American tourists) to the classic spots of 
 the neighborhood and especially the Acropolis and ^Mars 
 Hill, and the immortal antiquities that cluster about those 
 hallowed localities. Young as I was, I still gathered 
 enough from what I heard and saw, to have my fancy 
 stimulated by the atmosphere of Greece and the throng of 
 its legendary and historic associations. And there never 
 was a time in my memory that my mind was not open to 
 the influences of nature; my heart has ever thrilled since 
 infancy with a sense of the beautiful. Even then the 
 ruins of the Acropolis and the noble plains of Athens, 
 covered with exquisite grey-green olive groves, and the 
 superb peacock-blue expanse of the Aegean beyond, 
 gemmed with roseate isles and sheened with snowy lateen 
 sails, overarched by the dreamy azure of heaven, filled my 
 soul with a vague yet unspeakable rapture. I well re- 
 member, too, the beauty of tlie frangrant wall-flowers that 
 grew out of the crevices of the ruins, and the quaint hoot 
 of the little owls, who as the special favorite of Minerva, 
 haunted the Parthenon and made themselves heard as the 
 shades of twilight yielded the purple vesture of the clas- 
 sic land. I confess that I am myself surprised that I re- 
 member so vividly after more than a half centurv tlie 
 
 27 
 
emotions I felt in the presence of those immortal pros- 
 pects. 
 
 We passed several seasons at the village of Marousi 
 which, mere hamlet as it has always been, is yet mentioned 
 in classic literature. There, we occupied a plain tiled 
 cottage of three rooms, situated in a fruit orchard, through 
 whose shaded sod, babbled a mountain brook. The peas- 
 ant w^omen of the neighborhood came there to wash their 
 clothes, like Nausikaa and her maids, singing and chatting 
 the live-long day under olive and mulberry trees, on whose 
 boughs the cicada droned from morn till night. INIy first 
 essays in navigation w-ere made in one of the sJcafes, or ob- 
 long wash-tubs of these barefooted damsels. The garden 
 walls were skirted by bright colored brambles and sweet 
 scented flowering bushes w^hose romantic fragrance often 
 comes back to me although I cannot recall their names. 
 My sister's nurse, a typical Hydriote woman with the eye 
 and profile of a Juno, used to repeat to me on those 
 dreamy summer days, tales of the old folk-lore which held 
 me like a spell. 
 
 The drive to IMarousi from Athens in a caleche, was 
 quite romantic oA'er a rough road speckled with the shade 
 of olive trees. On one occasion when I was going out 
 there with my father, we met a tall peasant striding to 
 town with the long swinging gait peculiar to that class of 
 yeomanry, half shepherd, lialf palikar. His figure was 
 enveloped in a capote of undressed sheep skin, worn with 
 the wool outside. On his shoulder rested the long bar- 
 relled flintlock then common to the East and still to be 
 seen in out of the way nooks. His left elbow w^as crooked 
 as if he were carrying something heavy and bulky. When 
 he came up with the carriage he stopped and drew from 
 
 28 
 
under the capote (and held out at arm's length,) the head 
 of an immense wolf dripping blood the tongue hanging 
 between the gaunt jaws. "What do you think of that?" 
 he exclaimed ; "I killed him an hour ago over yonder, and 
 now I am going for the reward." The wolves of Europe 
 and Asia are much larger and fiercer than the American 
 species, and this one especially had done great mischief 
 to the flocks. One summer we passed at an old monaster}^ 
 on Mount Hymettus, famed in Greek poesy for its honey 
 flavored with aromatic thyme. The monastery was cen- 
 turies old, almost like a fortress, and clinging fortress- 
 like to the rocky side of the mountain in a glade among 
 the forests of olive. The bearded, long tressed monks 
 were genial, jolly good fellows serving the Lord appar- 
 ently with great zeal of mind and bod}', solid and dignified 
 characters. 
 
 When I was six 3'^ears old my mother's health failed. 
 The question was, how was she to get the needed change 
 of scene. To take the steamer for Smyrna (several small 
 steamers had then been pUnng in the Levant for a short 
 time) was not to be thought of, for it implied a long, de- 
 pressing quarantine at Syra on her return. To go to 
 America was even more difficult, if she went alone with 
 her children by sailing ship, (the way in those days.) Mv 
 father could not accompany her, without permission from 
 the American Board, which probably could not be ob- 
 tained under five or six months. He decided, therefore, 
 to charter a small Greek vessel, and send my mother and 
 her two children, respectively six and three vcars old, on 
 a roving cruise about the Aegean-lNIane, the extreme 
 southern district of Greece. This was to be the objec- 
 tive point, for an American missionary was already sta- 
 
 29 
 
tioned tliere with his family. At his house she would re- 
 main with children and servants, until my father could 
 come after us. 
 
 Behold us then on an inexpensive Greek goletta of 
 barely fifty tons, sailing out of the Piraeus with a fair 
 wind, to cruise in the wake of Ulysses. Our party in- 
 cluded besides my mother and her children, a Hydriote 
 nurse, the one mentioned on a previous page, and faith- 
 ful Constantine, a tall, grand, old veteran of the Revolu- 
 tion, one of those retainers one may still see sometimes 
 in the old countries, who identify themselves with the in- 
 terests of their employers, and can be depended upon to 
 stand firm and true whate'er betide. A goletta, is the 
 Greek term for what we call a brigantine. The Greeks 
 had feluccas, lateen rigged fore and afters, the forerun- 
 ners of our schooners, and other odd rigs, but for the most 
 part they favored square rigged craft, or vessels with 
 yards and square sails, even when vei'y small. They re- 
 quired more watchfulness and larger crews than in the 
 case of sloops and schooners. Often a brig or goletta 
 was owned and sailed by a family, the father or oldest 
 brother acting as captain, and the others making up the 
 crew. Naturally, the Greek democratic spirit found vent 
 in these domestic arrangements ; all spoke or argued to- 
 gether or bawled contradictory orders. Fortunately this 
 apparent insubordination rarely went beyond w'ords, and 
 accidents were less common than in Yankee craft because 
 the Greek mariners had learned prudence and caution 
 from cruising among the squally islands and headlands of 
 the Archipelago. The polacre rig they used, was also an 
 element of safety for permitting the square sails to be 
 closed down quickly while the spanker or fore and aft 
 
 30 
 
mainsail was brailed to the mast, instead of lowered. Sea- 
 men will easily understand these technicalities. 
 
 The cabin of our little goletta was so small and close 
 and so swarming with cockroaches and fleas that my 
 mother preferred the hold ; our mattresses were there- 
 fore spread on the gravel ballast. The hatch being left 
 open in good weather, the ventilation was reasonably good. 
 We jogged along under easy sail and I was soon on good 
 terms with the crew who showed me how the sails were 
 worked and how to steer with the tiller. There was a droll 
 young lad on board, the nephew of the skipper, ten or 
 twelve years old, who considered me in a sense as his pro- 
 tege. We were not on a racing voyage; speed was not 
 insisted on, in the articles of the charter, but safety and 
 comfort were. Hence, we touched at a number of ports, 
 chiefly among the islets. Of these I remember three or 
 four. The captain hailed from Hydra, and naturally 
 found it convenient to cast anchor in the snug harbor of 
 the tight little island which showed such naval activity and 
 heroism during the Greek Revolution. The sides of the 
 harbor spring steeply from the blue water and the white 
 and 3^ellow walls and the red tiled roofs of the city, closely 
 packed from water's edge to crest, and fringed by rows of 
 white-sailed windmills, produced an indelible impression. 
 The captain took us on shore to visit his sister, who was 
 married to one of the leading priests of the island. Priests 
 of the Greek church are not only permitted, but required 
 to marry once, but not twice. Thus it may be supposed 
 that the}' take good care not to be left widowers. The 
 lady received us cordially and after the usual refresh- 
 ments of coff'ee and preserves, took us to see her husband's 
 church which adjoined the house. He was officiating at 
 vespers to a small congregation. 
 
 31 
 3 
 
From Hydra we followed our devious way from isle to 
 isle, until we arrived at Cape Malea or St. Angelo, the 
 southern end of the Grecian peninsula, and the limit of an- 
 cient Laconia. It has a very bad name for puffy, danger- 
 ous squalls. For many years a monk has lodged in a 
 cave at the extreme end, who has been supposed to have 
 an influence over the weather. For this reason Greek 
 sailors have been in the habit of heaving to, and sending 
 a boat on shore with provisions to propitiate and stimulate 
 his prayers, when the weather allowed them to do so. As 
 this fat ecclesiastical berth has never seemed to be vacant, 
 it may be inferred that the first incumbent has had succes- 
 sors to fill his place. We came off the Cape at night, and 
 probably because we were unable to send our quota of 
 provisiions to the old monk at that hour, we did not es- 
 cape the caprice of the genius loci. About midnight the 
 goletta Avas nearly thrown on her beam ends by a violent 
 squall. The crew instantly fell to their knees and vowed 
 the customary tribute of candles and provisions to St. 
 Nicholas the protector of ships and sailors, and then went 
 to work to shorten sail. It was a wild and grotesque 
 scene not a little terrifying to those of us who were be- 
 low in the hold. But old Constantine did his best to 
 quiet our alarm, ever and anon putting his head down in 
 the hatch to assure us that there was no danger and that 
 all would soon be well. But for all that we had a smart 
 shaking up, rolled down to leeward over the single ballast 
 and against the creaking timbers of the natty little ship, 
 through whose planks the dashing water sounded very 
 near. 
 
 The following morning proved serene, and after break- 
 fast, a simple, primitive meal, as may be imagined, we an- 
 
 32 
 
chored in the haven of Elaphonisi, the isle whither Paris 
 and Helen first sought an asylum when they fled from 
 Sparta, at least so the ancient bards assure us. Ac- 
 companied by Constantine, who carried my little sister 
 on his arm, we landed and called on the governor, who re- 
 ceived us with that graceful affability Greeks and 
 orientals alike display, when they have nothing to gain 
 by an opposite course. He presented us with a basket of 
 fresh figs and prickly pears, and a throng of islanders, 
 not one of whom had probably ever before seen an Ameri- 
 can lady and child, flocked to the beach to see us go on 
 board. The next morning our romantic little cruise 
 ended safely, when we and our effects were rowed to the 
 mainland of Laconia, at the village of Marathonisi, on 
 the rocky peninsula of Kakavoulia or Evil Council. There, 
 we expected to be met by jNIr. liCyburn and taken to his 
 house at Areopolis, a few miles from the coast. The day 
 was very warm and sultry, and we gladly sought a cool 
 shade under some rocks by the shore. Few trees were 
 anywhere to be seen ; nothing but the azure sea and sky, 
 the yellow gra}^ rocks bluish in the distance, the scatter- 
 ing little town dreaming by the water, and a few fishing 
 boats and coasters swinging idly at their moorings. The 
 scene is plainly impressed on my memory because we were 
 very hungry, and could hardly wait for Constantine to re- 
 turn from the village with a loaf of hard black Spartan 
 bread and some smoked herrings. How good they did 
 taste. I shall never forget them. From that day to this 
 I never smell a smoked herring but that I instantly see 
 before me that scene where my mother and sister and I 
 sat on the shore in the south of Greece so many long years 
 ago, and waited for ]Mr. Leyburn. At last we heard the 
 
 33 
 
clatter of hoofs on the stony road, and saw his white um- 
 brella moving above the wild cactus. We were speedily 
 mounted on mules, and in a couple of hours were wel- 
 comed to an American home in Sparta, and the only one 
 in Greece outside of Athens. 
 
 Being whole souled Virginians who for years had lived 
 in that remote place without seeing the face of a fellow 
 countryman, the Leyburns were as delighted to welcome 
 us, as we were to see them. What was a great pleasure 
 to me, they had three children, two of them, Elizabeth and 
 George, near my own age. The Leyburns lived in a 
 tower called by the natives a pyrgo or fortalice. It was 
 a type of many such structures found all over the prov- 
 ince Mane or Laconia. It consisted of three lofty stories, 
 containing originally one large square room to each story, 
 reached by ladders and trap-doors. But the Leyburns 
 had caused stairs to be built to the second floor, and di- 
 vided it by partitions. They occupied that with their fam- 
 ily, the first or ground floor, which was eight or nine feet 
 from the ground, being used for dining and common sit- 
 ting room. The third story, with its ladder, trap-door, 
 and large single apartment, was assigned to us. Each 
 floor was lighted by small windows, intended to serve also 
 as loopholes for muskets. 
 
 Some have considered these pyrgos of Mane to be of 
 comparatively modern origin, imitated from Italian 
 towers when the Venetians and Genoese occupied Greece. 
 But I think they began to be used at a far earlier period 
 with possibly some later modifications, for allusion to 
 such structures is found in classic writers, and especially 
 in "The Morals" of Plutarch. He states that Aristo- 
 demus, during the Messenian War, used to make furtive 
 
 34 
 
visits to his mistress, who would meet him with the utmost 
 secrecy at his mother's tower, for his life w^as earnestly 
 sought by his deadly enemies the Spartans. Now, it is 
 categorically related that he would climb a ladder to an 
 upper room and close the trap-door. His mother would 
 remove the ladder, as if no one was up there, and restore 
 it when he was ready to leave before dawn. That was a 
 long time before the Christian era, and hence the tradition 
 evidently points to such towers at a very early period. In 
 the time immediately preceding and following the Revolu- 
 tion, the people of Mane were cursed with vendettas like 
 the Spartans or Corsicans or the Kentuckians of later 
 days. They were only safe when abroad if carried on the 
 backs of women. Their enemies were constantly on the 
 lookout to pick them off. Within their pijrgoes, however, 
 they could in turn keep a constant watch Avith their own 
 muskets ever ready at the loophole to shoot down an un- 
 wary foe. This vendetta system is not abolished alto- 
 gether even at this day in southern Mane. 
 
 Adjoining Mr. Leyburn's pyrgo, was a smaller build- 
 ing for the kitchen and servants. A high wall surrounded 
 the premises, and a large wolf dog of uncompromising 
 ferocity Avas chained there during the day and turned loose 
 at night. From our four small windows we commanded a 
 superb prospect over the distant yet grand mass of !Mt. 
 Taygetus and the rocky landscape of Sparta in the north, 
 while in the south spread the blue expanse of the ]\Iediter- 
 ranean. Our mattresses were laid on the floor at night 
 and rolled up in the day time. My sister Frances slept 
 in a genuine Doric cradle, doubtless the same as those in 
 which infants slept whom the "Doric mothers bore" in the 
 davs of Lvcurgus. It consisted of a small hammock of 
 
 35 
 
red leather decorated with tinsel, and suspended by long 
 ropes from the rafters of the roof above. She was tied 
 into it, and the nurse rocked it, as she sat in the window 
 knitting, by a rope attached to her foot and bent over her 
 knee. As the knee swayed back and forth the cradle 
 swayed to and fro, and thus the Hellenic nurse rocked 
 the little American girl, and crooned to her a cradle song 
 in the long drawn, plaintive notes of oriental peasant 
 melody. 
 
 At the end of three months my father arrived to take us 
 home. He came in a Greek corvette that was cruising in 
 those waters. I well remember the bright day when the 
 nurse called me to the window with a cry of delight, and 
 bade me see the white gleaming sails of the ship of war as 
 she approached the port. 
 
 We returned to Athens by land, which meant on horse- 
 back or muleback, the luggage and indispensable bedding 
 we required being carried on mules. During the first 
 stages of our journey the muleteers were Spartan women 
 who held the tails of the mules to steady them when de- 
 scending steep declines and did the same when climbing 
 to assist themselves. I have but a faint recollection of 
 Mistra which occupies the site of the ancient Sparta but 
 which, famous as it is, left but comparatively few antiqui- 
 ties. The civilization of Sparta did not favor the fine arts. 
 But I have a vivid recollection of the ridge of Taygetus 
 rising snow-capped beyond the town, and some recollec- 
 tion of revisiting Argos, my birthplace, and of the neigh- 
 boring antiquities of Tiryns and Mypenal where Helen 
 and Clytemnaestra, Menelaus and Agamemnon, lived 
 and are buried. At Argos we visited at the house of 
 General Gordon, one of the most noted of the Philhellenes 
 
 36 
 
who gave their money, their labor, or their lives to the 
 liberation of Greece. His history of the Greek Revolu- 
 tion is an invaluable record of that struggle. 
 
 After nodding for several stages, my memory becomes 
 bright and clear again as we entered Arkadia. I have a 
 keen recollection of the shepherds we passed tending their 
 flocks in the Arkadian valleys, and piping wild, sweet, 
 simple ditties on rude flutes of reed such as were used long 
 before the days of Theocritus. Another feature of the 
 country which took my fancy but which is rarely alluded 
 to by travellers, was the masses of wild oleander growing 
 luxuriantly by the bank of streams, brightening the land- 
 scape and lading the air with perfume. The recent scare 
 about the poison of oleander fragrance is bosh. One of 
 the most vivid memories of my childhood is the terrible 
 climb to the village of Ahoori in the storm. It was at 
 noon that we stopped to lunch under the olive trees near 
 a roadside guard house. The weather looked very threat- 
 ening. But as it was Saturday, we were anxious to reach 
 a lodging where we could pass a quiet Sunday. At one 
 o'clock, therefore, we were again in the saddle. One of 
 the muleteers and two of the military escort furnished 
 us by the government, (my father having a certain con- 
 sular right) and who accompanied us as a protection 
 against brigands, led the way; then came my father hold- 
 ing me on the saddle before him ; then my mother and after 
 her, the nurse, old Constantine, holding my little sister, 
 and finally followed the other two guards, the muleteers 
 and the sumpter-mules loaded with baggage and bedding. 
 Our way led along a tortuous, stony bridle path zig- 
 zagging up the mountains, through the heart of a rock- 
 ribbed gorge and along the edge of steep precipices. 
 
 37 
 
What was worse, the winding road often crossed a torrent 
 whose bed followed the turn of the ravines. It is called 
 the Saranta potamos or forty-fold river because it has 
 forty windings or bends, that travellers must cross in go- 
 ing to the road's end. We crossed it many times on that 
 single afternoon ! 
 
 The rain began to pour soon after we struck the bed 
 of the torrent. At that time the stream was a mere 
 whimpering rivulet like a silver thread over the sand in 
 the centre of the bed, whose full width was many yards 
 across. Soon the rain increased to a regular cloud burst, 
 a deluge appalling in its volume and lasting most of the 
 afternoon. The wind blew down the gorge in blasts that 
 well nigh stopped our progress ; the incessant blinding 
 lightning seemed to strike the rocks all around us, and 
 the steady peal of thunder rebounding from cliff to cliff, 
 far surpassed the continuous roar of battle. Of course, 
 we were all completely soaked in a few minutes, except as 
 our heads and shoulders were only partially protected by 
 capotes of felt, for such a hurricane was hardly expected 
 so early in the season. But there was no shelter to be 
 found, and our only course was to proceed. What added 
 a distinct element of danger to the horrors of the day, the 
 bed of the torrent began to fill up until the crisis came 
 when we had to ford it over and over again through a rag- 
 ing, tumbling, tawny flood reaching over the horse's 
 girths, rolling down roots and rocks, and threatening to 
 sweep us to destruction. Happily, towards night the 
 tempest began to abate. Cold gleams of livid light broke 
 sullenly over the mountain tops in the west, and after 
 dark, we finally reached a plateau sodden with rain, and 
 
 38 
 
saw a few lights twinkling in the gloom. This was the 
 hamlet of Ahoori, where we were to pass Sunday. 
 
 After the usual searching and chaffering, a small upper 
 room was obtained for us in one of the best hovels in the 
 village. It was reached by an outside ladder, and was 
 directly over the only other apartment of the dwelling 
 which was in fact a stable for horses and cattle. Our 
 room had the advantage of .a chimney and fireplace, and 
 a roaring wood fire was soon kindled. We sent out for 
 eggs and goat's milk, brewed a pot of tea, and with these 
 meagre provisions supplemented by cold chicken and black 
 bread from our soaked bags, sat down on the floor to a 
 meal seasoned with Spartan sauce if it had no other merit. 
 In the meantime we children were weighed down with sleep, 
 and as soon as our appetite was satisfied, we were rolled 
 up in a rug and laid away in a corner, while the bedding 
 was dried in a perfunctory manner before the fire. The 
 smoke from the chimney and the fumes reeking through 
 the floor from the stable below produced an atmosphere 
 that would paralyze some of the over fastidious, ultra re- 
 fined bacteria and microbe-scared travellers of the present 
 da}'. Dress suits and diamonds were not on the menu of 
 travellers in Arkadia in those days ! 
 
 But we had your genuine traveller's nature, and trifles 
 did not disturb our capacity to take life as we found it on 
 the road, and enjoy it because it was not exactly like the 
 home we had left behind. Since that eventful day I have 
 encountered numerous scenes more or less resembling this, 
 and therefore, can say emphatically, that all the so-called 
 improvements and comforts of modern travel have addeil 
 nothing to the real pleasure of touring; on the contrary 
 they have taken away from it a keen zest, a gamy flavor. 
 
 39 
 
a wild indescribable, blood-stirring joy that only those 
 who have tried it can understand and appreciate. 
 
 Ever impressionable to the effects of nature, I well re- 
 member the prospect when I was dressed the next morning 
 soon after sunrise, and went out to get fresh air. The 
 sun languidly breaking through the banks of glowering 
 clouds with a watery glare, shone full on great pools left 
 by the rain and skirted by mountains. The pools were 
 red as blood. The sullen silence of the morning, the san- 
 guine reflection on the water, conveyed the impression of 
 the reaction that follows after a great battle, when the 
 combatants have retired, and the bloody field is left to the 
 dying and the dead, like Cannae or Chalons, after Car- 
 thaginian, Hun, Roman, and Gaul have hewn each other 
 to pieces and the survivors are brooding over the doom 
 they have given or escaped. It is a curious mental 
 idiosyncracy that whenever since that day I have read the 
 account in Genesis of Chedorlaomer and the slaughter of 
 the Kings and how the water looked like blood, that scene 
 at Ahoori appears before me. 
 
 From Ahoori we passed northward through Tripolitza, 
 still unrecovered from its dreadful siege and the awful out- 
 rage and slaughter when the Greeks carried it by storm. 
 We kept on through Corinth and jMegara, finally reach- 
 ing our pleasant home at Athens without further serious 
 adventure. 
 
 When I was about eight years old the American Board, 
 having already lessened its force in Greece, decided to re- 
 duce its efforts in that country still further, perceiving 
 the inexpediency of undertaking to convert the Greek 
 Christians to Protestantism at that time. Dr. King and 
 my father were soon the only missionaries of the Board 
 
 40 
 
remaining in Greece. As the Armenian field seemed to 
 promise better results, the Board was wisely seeking to 
 enlarge its influence in Turkey where most of the Arme- 
 nians lived. My father was, therefore, soon directed to 
 proceed to Trebizond, at the eastern end of the Black 
 Sea. It was no small effort and sacrifice to move that 
 distance in those times with a wife and several small chil- 
 dren and household goods, and to abandon a field where 
 he had mastered the language and understood the people. 
 It implied an arduous journey of 1400 miles with several 
 breaks, settling among — to us — new peoples, and the ac- 
 quisition of another, perhaps two, entirely distinct lang- 
 uages — Armenian and Turkish. But my parents cheer- 
 fully acquiesced, and in due time we took passage on the 
 American steam packet for Constantinople. 
 
 41 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 FROM TREBIZOND TO AMERICA. 
 
 The day after we sailed from the Piraeus I became 
 keenly aware that I was entei'ing on a distinctly new and 
 stirring phase of life. The steamer reached Syra in the 
 morning and remained there until sunset. My father 
 took us to the residence of the Rev. Mr. Hilner, an ex- 
 cellent German missionary, who lived near the top of the 
 steep slope on which the white stone houses of the city 
 are closely packed. Mr. Hilner had several sons who 
 studied under a private tutor. A holiday was granted 
 them in order that we might enjoy a few hours of sport 
 together. They were full of enthusiasm for the Greek 
 heroes they read of in their classical studies and were 
 fired likewise by the recent German military spirit. Ac- 
 cordingly their chief amusement was to imitate' the com- 
 bats of the Greek and Roman soldiers with shields, hel- 
 mets, and swords of pasteboard, wood and tin. Nothing 
 would do but I must encase myself in one of these awk- 
 ward suits of armor and fight. For a boy who had been 
 tied, as it were, to his mother's apron strings until that 
 day, this proceeding was sufficiently novel to mark a dis- 
 tinct turn in life. But, considering the circumstances, I 
 think I took to the change with unexpected spirit, and 
 acquitted myself creditably with these jolly young Teu- 
 
 42 
 
tons, for I remember giving and receiving some hard 
 knocks, becoming wonderfully excited, and finally leav- 
 ing those bright lads with regret. I may add that as 
 their language was German and mine was English, we 
 were forced to converse in Greek, a common tongue for 
 us both. 
 
 Proceeding from Syra to Smyrna and thence to Con- 
 stantinople, I was fairly in the land of the "unspeakable 
 Turk," While awaiting the completion of his arrange- 
 ments for continuing the journey, my father with his 
 family visited the neighboring city of Brusa, in Bithynia 
 and the first capital of the Turkish empire, for it was es- 
 sential to consult the missionaries stationed in Brusa. Of 
 this little trip three facts are especially impressed on my 
 memory ; the exceeding beauty of the plains of Brusa, 
 flanked by the snow-capped range of the Bithynian 
 Olympus ; the mode of travel, for my sister Frances and I 
 rode in kadjavehs or basket seats slung one on each side 
 of a pack horse and balancing each other ; and lastly the 
 fact that the children of the American missionaries in 
 Brusa spoke Turkish altogether among themselves in 
 preference to English. Accustomed to hearing English, 
 Greek and French, the sonorous Turkish tongue was com- 
 paratively new to me, and to hear American boys chatter- 
 ing in that language when at play aifected me somewhat as 
 the ignorant Greek priest of Scio was impressed when he 
 heard some English lads speaking their native tongue; 
 "Why, the little devils actually speak English!" he ex- 
 claimed, never imagining that it might be otherwise than 
 an acquired language, like Latin in our day. 
 
 The distance from Constantinople to Trebizond by sea 
 required a week, for the weather was boisterous, the 
 
 43 
 
steamer was small, the line being but recently started, and 
 we touched at Sinope and Samsun, both open roadsteads. 
 The port of Trebizond was also an exposed road, ver}'^ 
 dangerous and often impracticable in winter. Goods and 
 passengers had to be landed in surf boats and carried on 
 shore on men's shoulders. We were received cordially by 
 Rev. Edwin Bliss and Mr. Stevens, the British consul, 
 who conducted us to the house engaged for our occupancy. 
 It was a typical Turkish dwelling common in Asif. Minor, 
 massively built of stone for the first or ground floor, and 
 of wood for the second story, which overlapped the first 
 in such wise as to form a broad covered veranda on the 
 ground floor. The apartments were large and lofty, the 
 windows of the lower floor protected by strong cross bars 
 of iron like a prison, according to the law of the land. The 
 red tiles of the roof, ovei'grown with green mosses, har- 
 monized well with the weather-worn red of the sides of the 
 upper story ; the lower was iron grey, the natural color of 
 the stone. The house stood in a neglected enclosed gar- 
 den, the part near the house paved with cobblestones, the 
 remainder divided off by a rickety espalier fence over- 
 grown with untrimmed jessamine and syringa vines, and 
 fruit trees. The orchard included a few untrimmed 
 apple, cherry, plum and pear trees, in a state of neglect. 
 The kitchen, quarters for the servants, and stables, were 
 in a group by themselves, and a high massive stone wall, 
 whose upper edge was bevelled to a sharp ridge armed with 
 savage bits of broken glass set in the mortar, enclosed the 
 entire premises, and shut us out from the world. Of 
 course this establishment was too spacious for our very 
 modest menage, but it was obtained cheap and was in fact 
 the only sort of thing to be had unless we occupied one 
 
 44 
 
of the rickety and mean dwellings huddled in the lower 
 town for the poverty stricken rayalis. The entrance was 
 small, just large enough to admit a horse. Small street 
 gates are the rule in Asia, even for mansions of wealth, 
 for obvious I'easons of safety from mobs or government 
 rapacity. The entrance opened on one of the chief resi- 
 dential streets of Trebizond ; yet that street or sokdk went 
 up and down and this way and that, without a windo\\ 
 opening on it, and barely wide enough for two loaded 
 horses to pass each other. The grounds on the north side 
 directly adjoined the edge of the precipitous rocky ledge 
 that, as a natural barrier, protected the city from the 
 inroads of the surges. From our second story we had an 
 unobstiTJcted view of the roadstead and the wild expanse 
 of the bleak, boisterous Euxine stretching north and east. 
 j\Iany a time did I see water spouts in the lowering offing, 
 sometimes several in a row like a colonnade supporting the 
 sky ; and when the storms blew, the roar of the surges 
 was indescribably grand and melancholy. One black stormy 
 night an ill-fated brig and her crew were dashed to pieces 
 on the rocks only a few yards distant from our grounds. 
 Naturally our house was exceedingly bleak and inclement 
 during winter. The natives in the cold season wore fur- 
 lined robes and cuddled around mangals or braziers con- 
 taining charcoal. Sometimes a pan of live coals was 
 placed on a raised platform under a table lined with tin 
 and called a fandoor. Over this a cover resembling a 
 heavy comforter was thrown, reaching in massive folds 
 to the floor. The family would thrust their feet and 
 legs under this, and so manage by the aid of furs, 
 pipes, coffee, knitting and embroidery, and books to 
 worry through the winter. American air-tight stoves 
 
 45 
 
had begun to be introduced into Turkey; the missionaries 
 at Constantinople already had thcni. Mr. Bliss, our as- 
 sociate, had brought one from America, bvit could only 
 make it draw by putting the pipe out of the window. We 
 were obliged to resort for the most part to the native 
 method for keeping warm, and so managed to see the 
 spring sunshine and flowers return. But as may be im- 
 agined, a delicate woman like my mother suffered severely 
 from such hardships during our life at Trebizond. 
 
 Our social advantages were sufficiently restricted in 
 that city in those days, but, of course, for a missionary 
 that is a minor consideration, a mere detail. The Rev. 
 Edwin Bliss, a new missionary of the Board, his young 
 wife and their infant, were the only Americans besides 
 ourselves at Trebizond. Mr. Stevens, the British con- 
 sul, and his sister, Mr. Charnaud, the Belgian consul, and 
 family, and the German physician, comprised, so far as I 
 can recollect, the sum total of the European population 
 of Trebizond. Of course my father was closely occupied 
 studying Armenian and Turkish, and my mother had four 
 young children to care for, to clothe, to teach and to 
 nurse. 
 
 Thrown once more on my own resources, I passed much 
 of my time watching the movements of the ships, whose 
 various models and rigs I tried to imitate with my jfick- 
 knife. I also built in the yard a rude sort of hull, out of 
 boxes ; my mother gave me old sheets w^hich I cut into 
 sails ; and I would sit in it by the hour about as much 
 alone as Robinson Crusoe, sometimes furling or setting 
 the sails, occasionally catching a harmless capsize and 
 fancying myself at sea in a ship. At this time, also, I kept 
 a rude sort of a journal, one of the few relics of those days 
 
 46 
 
of the long ago, that I have preserved through all my wan- 
 derings. But its brief, naive jottings ended when I left 
 Trebizond. This solitude also led me to cultivate a love 
 for books, and I read enormously for a lad only nine that 
 winter. There were few books written in those days for 
 young people that were not of the flabby religious sort. 
 Such as were in our house were happily of a class to stimu- 
 late the growth of the intellectual spine, such as "Pierre 
 and His Family," ""Decision Makes the ]\Ian," and "Rob- 
 ert Dawson," all healthy reading for the young mind. 
 Practically and fortunately I was forced to take up what- 
 ever came to hand. Among the literature I then read I 
 especially remember Morier's "Hadji Baba," — the Per- 
 sian Gil Bias, (little imagining I should ever live in Per- 
 sia) and the "Eclectic Magazine," that time honored 
 periodical, which lived so many years, for solid usefulness 
 and readableness has never been surpassed or equalled. 
 It contained nothing frothy, yet it was not heav}". It 
 gave the cream of the British reviews when such writers 
 as De Quincey and Macaulay were in their prime, and each 
 number was embellished by a copy of some noted picture 
 by Wilkie, Eastlake, Leslie, Landseer, and the like suf- 
 ficiently well engraved in mezzotint by John Sartain. I 
 began to read the "Eclectic" at Trebizond and devoured 
 almost every article with avidity. !My father gave us 
 much amusement winter evenings imitating with his hands 
 Wilkic's inimitable "Rabbit on the Wall," as rendered 
 by a plate in the "Eclectic." 
 
 But tlie book tliat made the most instantaneous and 
 lasting impression on my mind, proving, in fact, a turn- 
 ing point in my intellectual development, was Fetcr Par- 
 ley's Hist or ij of the World, attributed to Goodricli. It 
 
 47 
 
was actually written by Nathaniel Hawthorne, a fact now 
 well known. I came across a greasy, well thumbed copy 
 of that book in the room of Krikor, a poor, young, Ar- 
 menian protestant who was sheltered from persecution at 
 our house. He was trying to learn English in the inter- 
 val, and "Peter Parley" had been put in his hands by an- 
 other Armenian who had received it from the missionaries 
 at Constantinople. I had never seen the book before, and 
 it proved a genuine revelation of style and subject to my 
 boyish mind. I was captivated from the very first page; 
 I could hardly leave it for my meals. And when I had 
 finished it, immediately read it again. From that day to 
 this no branch of literature has held a greater fascination 
 for me than history, or has had more influence in shaping 
 my life, character, and opinions. 
 
 Krikor, the Armenian youth already alluded to, having 
 been much influenced by the instruction of the American 
 missionaries, had been terribly scourged by his people, 
 then cast into a noisome dungeon on a trumped up charge, 
 and left there to rot. He was rescued thence through the 
 kind offices of the English consul, Mr. Stevens. The Ar- 
 menians were good persecutors in those days and many of 
 them thoroughly hated the American missionaries, as some 
 of them do still. When we crossed the meidan or public 
 square by the governor's honak and the bazaars, the 
 rabble of precious Armenian pezevenks or hoodlums used 
 to hurl stones at us, and revile us for Free Masons, which, 
 in their opinion, was even more opprobrious than the ob- 
 scene epithets that generally issued from their lips. As 
 I look back to those scenes, although they were not unat- 
 tended with danger, I am amused rather than indignant. 
 Those poor fellows did simply as they had been taught ; 
 
 48 
 
they knew no better. We are all in the same predicament. 
 The best of us act only according to our lights, and the 
 light of even some Americans is pretty dim. The Ar- 
 menians have never been backward in trying to rival other 
 Christians in the gentle art of shaping religious opinion 
 by open violence, or endeavoring to steer souls into heaven 
 by resort to quasi legal means. If the Turkish authori- 
 ties have sometimes yielded to the urgent appeals or bribes 
 of the Armenians and aided them by furnishing author- 
 ity and means for destroying each other, let us not too 
 hastily blame them, for these Christians (who have received 
 from them a toleration hardly permitted even now in some 
 Christian lands), have maligned them for ages throughout 
 Christendom, 
 
 A curious incident occurred during our residence at 
 Trebizond corroborating a statement in Xenophon's "An- 
 abasis." My father's Turkish teacher, an affable gentle- 
 man of middle age, failed to come one day. We supposed 
 him to be ill. But when he appeared on the third day, 
 he said the explanation of his absence was that he had 
 eaten copiously of some wild honey which a peasant had 
 brought him from the mountains. It had operated like a 
 powerful narcotic. He was thrown into a deep sleep 
 which had lasted more than twenty-four hours. Xenophon 
 relates that after coming in sight of the Euxinc, the Ten 
 Thousand found some wild honey of which they all par- 
 took freely, and very soon the whole army fell into a long, 
 heavy slumber. It is evident that in both cases it was the 
 same kind of honey that was eaten, and that the bees had 
 imbibed the juice of some unsuspected narcotic flowers. 
 
 Of the natives who visited my parents I learned much 
 of Oriental life and character, and gained further glimpses 
 
 49 
 
of it strolling through the bazaars or markets with my 
 father or watching the curiously built ships stealing into 
 port, oddly rigged and decorated with quaint colors and 
 elaborate carvings. Sometimes the deck of those vessels 
 were partitioned and protected with awnings for the Cir- 
 cassian girls proceeding from the neighboring shores of 
 Circassia to the slave markets of Constantinople or other 
 Turkish ports. Much unnecessary sentiment has been 
 wasted over the sale of fair Circassians for such purposes, 
 considering where they were born and brought up. If 
 they had remained at home they would have been bartered 
 to some peasant as poor, perhaps, as themselves, and as 
 effectually separated from their kinsfolk. Family ties 
 and moral obligations are and always were, as loose as 
 they could be in the Caucasus among all races and classes. 
 But by being taken to Constantinople these waifs of 
 destiny were sure of reasonable treatment lest their charms 
 be impaired, and they would be purchased by wealthy 
 Turks who offered them more comforts than they would 
 have had in Circassia, raised them to be wives and com- 
 panions, and bestowed on them more attention than tliey 
 would ever have found in their native home. It has often 
 happened that these quasi slaves, when elevated to position 
 and influence in the harem, have remembered their parents 
 and sent them costly gifts. Everything, to be rightly 
 •judged, must be considered in relation to its environment, 
 a fact which is constantly forgotten. Things are too 
 rarely viewed in their proper perspective, hence many of 
 the harsh condemnations in which Christians often indulge 
 regarding Orientals. In any case slavery in the Orient 
 never has been as cruel, as heart-rending, as it was in the 
 southern United States, and the marriage de convenance 
 
 50 
 
prevalent in Europe and not unknown in America, and the 
 heartless state marriages of the nobility and royalty, not- 
 withstanding that they are sanctified by the church, have 
 been entirely for policy and as pitiful and demoralizing 
 to society as the marriages of the East, and probably less 
 happy. These observations are made by one who has had 
 opportunities for obser%ang life alike in the East and the 
 West. 
 
 Trebizond was picturesquely^ built on a steep slope 
 springing directly from the water. It was surrounded 
 by ivied walls dating back to the period when a branch 
 of the Byzantine imperial house held sway on the Black 
 Sea. The decaying but once noble cathedral of Santa 
 Sophia and other venerable structures, some of which I 
 still remember, bore evidence of former splendor. Doubt- 
 less in time we should have been won by these attractions 
 and acquired a feeling of home among the steep, narrow 
 streets, crumbling towers and gaily painted buildings, 
 tarnished and faded though their colors might be, like the 
 glory of the dominion to which this old city belongs. My 
 mother's health in 18tt7 demanded a change more radical 
 than any yet attempted. My father decided, therefore, to 
 send his resignation to the Board, and started for Amer- 
 ica, a matter easy enough to record in a few words, but j.o 
 easy task for him and his family, either physically or 
 mentally. We made directly for Smyrna via Constan- 
 tinople on the small Austrian steam packet, whence we 
 sailed for America and home. 
 
 In those days there was a steady trade carried on en- 
 tirely in sailing ships mostly American, between Boston 
 and Smyrna. The vessels would be considered small in 
 these days, averaging 2.50 tons, but many of them very 
 
 51 
 
smart, sailed by smart men, and they made smart voy- 
 ages with the right slant of wind. The smartest yachts 
 turned out by Herreshoff, Fife or Burgess never did bet- 
 ter than the run of the lovely little bark Susan Jane from 
 Boston to Smyrna, 5200 miles in twenty-nine days ! Us- 
 ually, however, the voyage was long, and to some people 
 tedious, as must be the case with sail for motive power. 
 Still I would not exchange it for steam, so far as my own 
 pleasure is concerned. 
 
 We embarked about the middle of May in the bark 
 Stambul, Captain Alfred Kendrick, a sister ship of the 
 Osmanlee, commanded by his brother. The ships were 
 thoroughly armed and built expressly for the Smyrna 
 trade, which required expedition, as they were expected to 
 race home in the fall with the first figs and raisins for 
 Thanksgiving and Christmas. The voyage took us six- 
 ty-five days, and was far from lacking in wild and roman- 
 tic incidents such as were common in those days. The 
 Stambul was just under 300 tons, although less by modern 
 measurement. She was painted black with a white stripe 
 and imitation port holes to resemble a man-of-war; and she 
 had the figure of a Turk at the bow, all quite in the style of 
 those days. There was a small raised poop deck with a low 
 rail or bulwark, altogether too low for a vessel carrying 
 passengers and children. The neat, cosy cabin was en- 
 tirely below deck. It contained six staterooms, the size 
 of ward robes, and was painted white picked out with gold. 
 That was the height of marine style in those days. The 
 forecastle or quarters of the crew, instead of being on deck 
 as it is now, was right in the eyes of the ship below deck, 
 and a very close, noisome unventilated hole it was indeed. 
 The Stambul carried two good sized brass cannon amid- 
 
 52 
 
ships that were meant for business, and an armory of 
 muskets, pikes, cutlasses and pistols was handsomely ar- 
 ranged in the cabin around the mizzen-mast. Pirates were 
 not yet extinct in the Mediterranean and about the 
 "Straits," and one never knew when a band of ruffians 
 might steal out from behind a romantic Greek island or 
 from the coast of Barbary. It was not very long after 
 that an English schooner was boarded in the Archipelago, 
 plundered, and every soul on board murdered. The 
 Stamhul was heavily sparred, which was most important 
 before steam crippled sail competition, and she carried all 
 the kites customary until recent years, sky sails, studding- 
 sails, from top gallant yards down, and ring-tails. 
 Double top-sails were then unknown; any sailor can judge 
 of the amount of work laid out for the crew of this taut 
 little bark in the matter of making sail alone. The deck 
 was likewise scrubbed with so-called "holy-stone'' and 
 "prayerbooks" on Sunday; and sail mending, painting 
 the hull inside and out, setting up and tarring the 
 rigging, scraping and slushing the masts helped to oc- 
 cup3^ every waking hour, for iron spars and wire rigging 
 were unused in tliose days. 
 
 An interesting fact of this vo^^age was that captain, 
 officers and crew were all Yankees, sturdy Cape Cod men 
 and Marbleheaders, except the cook and steward, who 
 were mulattos from the south, and John the Swede, one of 
 the men before the mast. It would probably be impos- 
 sible to find any vessel now floating the Stars and Stripes 
 having any such a homogeneous crew. John was a clever 
 craftsman and a good hearted fellow. Like the rest of 
 tlie crew he took a liking to me as I was already a sort of 
 sea-dog in miniature, never feeling seasick, and loving 
 
 53 
 
everything about a ship instinctively as a duck takes to 
 water. John's interest in me took tangible shape when he 
 made me a beautiful model of the Stamhul, very carefully 
 executed. It was long kept in the family as a much cher- 
 ished souvenir. Captain Kendrick was a member of the 
 Universalist Church and in good weather often indulged 
 in a lively tilt with my parents on predestinarianism, 
 eternal damnation and other kindred topics about which 
 they probably agree better now, in the other world, than 
 they did then. 
 
 Tlie voyage was on the whole uneventful, although a 
 number of characteristic incidents occurred illustrating 
 the nature of sea life before the fifties. Of course to one 
 who loves a sailing ship, voyaging that way can rarely be 
 said to be wholly uneventful. There is always some in- 
 cident to sustain interest, to quicken curiosity and expecta- 
 tion. In those days, when ocean traffic was conducted al- 
 most entirely in sailing ships, a large fleet would some- 
 times collect near the Straits of Gibraltar, waiting for a 
 favorable shift of the wind. It happened thus in our case. 
 We were in the midst of a crowd of eighty sails, when the 
 breeze came out of the east, each presenting a cloud of can- 
 vas and flying all her colors as we glided past the mighty 
 rock fortress brooding over the entrance to the broad At- 
 lantic. Every stitch was set alow and aloft. It was one 
 of the most thrilling scenes in my recollection. One after 
 another our gallant bark passed them by. At last the 
 race lay between the Stamhul and a British brig that was 
 slightly larger, the William Gary of Dundee. For some- 
 time the two vessels, leading the fleet, glided along swiftly 
 side by side, so near that we carried on a conversation 
 and the sough of the wind could be heard rushing through 
 
the sails and rigging and between the two ships when they 
 rolled toward each other on the heave of the sea. Then 
 the Stambul, as if putting forth a final conscious effort, 
 began to forge ahead an inch at a time, and then looked 
 out towards her port in the west three thousand miles 
 away, with seventy-nine sail following astern, the queen 
 of the race. 
 
 Some days after this stirring scene a bark hove in sight 
 bound eastward, and passed some three miles from us. Sig- 
 nals were exchanged, and she proved to be the Osmanlee the 
 consort of the Stambul, commanded by the brother of our 
 Captain Kendrick. This was the first greeting the 
 brothers had exchanged for years and might be their last ! 
 
 We passed the Azores on a clear day with a top gal- 
 lant breeze. It was very fortunate for us that this hap- 
 pened by daylight otherwise, I should not now be alive to 
 write these pages ; for, as we held our regular course after 
 passing Santa Maria, Captain Kendrick was astounded to 
 discover tremendous breakers, tumbling over a reef he 
 had never seen there before and which was not marked on 
 the chart. He had sailed many times directly over that 
 spot. As we had a fair wind we were able to steer clear 
 of the breakers, but if this incident had occurred at night 
 the ship would undoubtedly have gone to pieces on the 
 reef and her fate would have been vmknown forever. The 
 Azores are of volcanic origin, and at the southern end of 
 the group, reefs and islands are sometimes thrown up 
 above the ocean, and after a few months or years vanish 
 out of sight. It was on such an unexpected terror that 
 the Stcmihul so nearly met her fate. 
 
 On the Fourth of July, when near the Banks of New- 
 foundland, the atmosphere suddenly became sharp and 
 
 55 
 
wintry. Wlicn the sun arose in a clear sky the entire 
 horizon flashed like the gleam of bayonets of an army. 
 We were surrounded by ice, both field ice and bergs. 
 Good luck was it for us that the weather was clear and 
 that we had a working breeze to give us control of the 
 ship. As the day wore on, a day of wonderful awe and 
 splendor, the ice closed in around us and at sunset the 
 scene was magnificent, the glittering crystal far and near 
 being of malachite and ultramarine hues in the shadows, 
 and a deep glowing rose where smitten by the sun, as if 
 we were floating literally amid pearl and gold. One iceberg 
 less than half a mile from us w^as four hundred feet high 
 according to the Captain's calculation ; it was certainly 
 twice the height of our mainmast ; and above its topmost 
 pinnacle gleamed the evening star. Such a spectacle as 
 this, so extensive and superb, is rarely seen in that lati- 
 tude. Child as I was, it yet left an indelible impression 
 on my memory. But it was an hour of keen anxiety as 
 well as wonder. The utmost watchfulness was required to 
 keep clear of these floating masses. But about midnight 
 the wind freshened in our favor, and by careful steering 
 under press of sail we cleared the last of the ice by day- 
 break. 
 
 Soon after we struck into a dense fog and then we had 
 to keep a sharp lookout for we w^ere on the fishing banks 
 and liable to run foul of bank schooners at any moment, 
 far more numerous in those waters then than now. As 
 the fog thinned a little for a short time we actually found 
 ourselves close aboard of a fleet of these craft riding at 
 anchor ; we had already heard the spectral blast of their 
 foghorns mingling with the swash of the sea. Captain 
 Kendrick stood by the mizzen-rigging hoping to catch a 
 
 56 
 
glimpse of his boy, who was mate of a Cape Cod banker. 
 Suddenly a halloo came over the water, and there indeed 
 he was waving his hat. Rapidly father and son exchanged 
 a hurried greeting, the latter sending a kind word to his 
 mother, then the vessels separated, fading away in the 
 fog, and years might pass before they would meet again ! 
 Such was the life of the hardy sons of the New England 
 coast in those days. Enterprise, thrift, separation, and 
 adventure. There were Yankee sailing ships roaming the 
 high seas in that time, and they were manned by Yan- 
 kees, the best sailors the world has seen since Noah cut 
 adrift for dry land and a port. 
 
 A day or two after this, we took a northeast gale that 
 carried us straight to Boston Light staggering over the 
 mounting billows under a press of canvas. Sail after sail 
 blew away and others were bent in their place. It was one 
 of tliose wild, maddening races when no effort or risk is 
 spared to economize every breath of a favoring wind. 
 The salt tempest infused a fierce exultation into our veins 
 as we flew for port or destruction, until one grey, drip- 
 ping dawn a pilot schooner hove to, under our lee. She was 
 painted green, like all our pilot boats then, and I dis- 
 tinctly remember the pilot stepping on the deck of the 
 Stambul with a package of newspapers, and shaking 
 hands with the Captain and my father. But my delight 
 on reaching my country for the first time was keenly 
 embittered by the fact that my little dog, Malo, a beauti- 
 ful King Charles spaniel, given me by the King of Greece, 
 and who had accompanied us on our travels, lay dying 
 in the cabin below. 
 
 In those days there were no tugs to tow ships to the 
 wharves, and so the Stambul slowly worked her way up 
 
 57 
 
the tortuous clianncl under sail and warped up to lier 
 berth at Long Wharf, just sixty-five days out from 
 Smyrna ; and here occurred one of those curious coin- 
 cidences of life that confound one. A vessel going to sea 
 got in our way, and her bowsprit became entangled with 
 our mizzen-rigging over the quarter deck where my father 
 was standing. Among the men who swarmed out on the 
 jib-boom to separate the ships was her captain; and he 
 proved to be Captain Drew who had taken my parents 
 to Smyrna, and this was the very vessel in which they had 
 sailed. 
 
 We went from Boston to North Adams by rail. This 
 was the first time, I think, that my parents had travelled 
 that way, and the part of the line from Pittsfield to North 
 Adams had only been open two or three days before our 
 arrival. At North Adams our friends met and took us 
 by carriage to Williamstown. After visiting various 
 family friends in New York and New Jersey I was left 
 to pass the winter with my good grandmother and at- 
 tend district school under tlic shadow of Williams Col- 
 lege.' 
 
 An incident wliich occurred soon after we reached 
 Williamstown is worth recording, as indicating how much 
 some customs have changed since then, in this country. 
 Dr. Hopkins invited my father to preach in the church 
 where the students of Williams College and the towns- 
 people then worshipped together. My grandmother looked 
 forward again with maternal pride to seeing her youngest 
 and favorite child in the pulpit. But there was one ob- 
 stacle in the way, and until it was overcome she must fore- 
 go the anticipated pleasure. My father had allowed his 
 mustache to grow during the voyage. A chin beard he had 
 
 58 
 
worn for years. The former he now found to be not 
 only a convenient but also a becoming addition. Having 
 likewise, seen the mustache universally worn in the Levant 
 by good as well as by bad men, my father had become 
 accustomed to regard it as without sin. He was resolved 
 therefore, to keep his mustache. This required some 
 courage, for in America at that time the mustache was 
 considered the attribute of sports, gamblers, and bold, bad 
 dragoons, of all that class, in fact, who defy public 
 opinion or lead reckless lives. My grandmother vowed 
 that she would stay at home when her son preached, which 
 she had not done from infancy, except in illness, unless the 
 obnoxious mustache came off. What is more, she meant 
 every word. And so the mustache came off ! 
 
 yiy grandmother Benjamin was a most excellent, kind- 
 hearted woman, and I am sure that sometimes she 
 must have suffered keenly between her natural sympathies 
 and the strict sense of duty required in those days of 
 one who had been brought up in Puritan orthodoxy. I 
 carried her foot stove to the meeting-house on the hill. 
 and did my best to keep from falling off the high pew 
 with drowsiness during the long disquisitions from the 
 pulpit, in a building so cold that the ])reath seemed to 
 freeze before it could float the aspirations of the pious 
 to the upper sanctuary. The famous Saturday evening 
 meetings held in her parlour for many years, and well 
 remembered by many Williams graduates who became 
 ministers and missionaries, were my distinct and pet aver- 
 sion, because I was quite too young to appreciate them, 
 and the entire evening I would be tortured with a drowsi- 
 ness horrible enough to have been sent by the Evil One him- 
 self, a torment poorly compensated by the savory tidbits 
 
 59 
 
tliat steamed on her hospitable table. To this day I also 
 look back with amazement to the ghastly New England 
 custom, which my good father never observed except when 
 at Williamstown, out of respect to his mother, the cus- 
 tom of beginning the sabbath on Saturday evening 
 directly the sun dropped down behind the hills with 
 a sort of parting malicious gleam, as it seemed to me, as 
 though he would say, "Now, small boys, look out!" Satur- 
 da}^ afternoon was a half holiday, the only one during the 
 Aveek of long school hours. Imagine then what double- 
 dyed misery it was to keep in mind during the whole of 
 that short afternoon that I must be home before sun- 
 down. Although doing the best I could, it yet happened 
 several times that I reached home a few seconds after the 
 carefully watched sun had dipped below the rim of the 
 hills in the west, I am convinced, on reflecting over the 
 matter in later years, that I was occasionally on time, 
 Av^hen seemingly late, because my grandmother's house, 
 being nearer the hills, caused the sun to seem to set 
 earlier than it actually did. But no mercy was shown, no 
 possible palliations were considered on account of my ex- 
 treme youth or prior ignorance of the custom or absence 
 of a watch in my pocket. The sabbath had to be kept 
 holy whatever the hour when it began, and hence, if late, 
 I was immediately sent supperless to bed. This severity 
 I am willing to believe went "against the grain" with my 
 grandmother ; she merely acted according to her train- 
 ing and conscience ; but in my case, at least, such a course 
 naturally aroused a deep sense of injustice and wrong, 
 wliich I was too young to analyze exactly or to resent 
 with safety, but which gave me a permanent aversion to 
 strict Sabbatarianism and all attempts to hound souls 
 
 60 
 
into heaven by violence or law. "More flies are caught 
 by molasses than by vinegar !" From that day to this, 
 I have been strongly and unswervingly opposed to sump- 
 tuary laws, to controlling men by man-made interpreta- 
 tions of scriptural laws, to forcing one's opinions on 
 others, or having laws except for the protection of life 
 and property, or to severity in administering penalties ex- 
 cept for deliberate and unnecessary crime. 
 
 I am reminded in this connection of an incident that 
 occurred to me in the winter of 1846. Dr. Scuddcr, the 
 famous missionary to India, visited Williamstown that 
 season, conducted services for young and old, and at- 
 tracted much interest by tlie fervor of his manner. Learn- 
 ing my parentage, he put to me the pointed question, 
 "Do you wish to be a missionary .P" It came as a shock 
 to me, for I was a mere lad, ten years old, fond of sport 
 and reading, but having never given a thought to my 
 future vocation. As I was probably so constituted as 
 never to be fitted for missionary work, this question put 
 me on my guard, and for years I actually suffered from 
 dread that I might be influenced to become a foreign mis- 
 sionary ! I never had a desire to be one and I may frankly 
 say that I have never been able to believe that the men and 
 women and youth I met and associated with in the East, 
 were so very much worse than the people at home as to 
 require to be raked and disturbed. According to our 
 light and advantages, I cannot perceive that we are much 
 better ethically, as a people, than they. 
 
 About that period I remember meeting Mrs. Sigourney, 
 the poetess. She resided in Hartford, and she and my 
 mother were life long friends. They corresponded for 
 years, and most of ~Mrs. Sigourney's works, with her 
 
 61 
 
autograph on the title page, found their way to our 
 parlor table. Mrs. Sigourney's prose and verse enjoyed 
 a wide reputation in America at that time. Much of it 
 was commonplace ; but some of her occasional verses had 
 gleams of genius, like her ode on the return of the body 
 of Napoleon, which contained some thrilling passages, and 
 was justly honored by the gift of a gold necklace from 
 Queen Amelic. As I remember Mrs. Sigourney the last 
 time I saw her, standing on her portico, and the lights 
 and shadows of the vines playing on her figure, she was 
 rather a handsome woman. Her complexion was a warm, 
 clear blonde, and her ample white brow was wreathed 
 with brown ringlets. Her manner was ladylike and re- 
 fined, although slightly formal and decidedly self con- 
 scious. Poor woman ! she had her sorrows as well as 
 triumphs. It is worth stating here that my mother in 
 those days and sometimes at a later time wrote some 
 beautiful poems which had considerable circulation. 
 
 After his return to America, my father proposed to 
 settle down as pastor of a country parish, and in due 
 course received a call that was satisfactory. But during 
 the interval my mother's health, greatly strengthened by 
 the long sea voyage, had been still further improved, and 
 apparently entirely restored. My father's ability, ex- 
 perience and knowledge of foreign languages were ac- 
 quisitions the Board were anxious to retain for the mis- 
 sionary field. At the last moment, therefore, it was de- 
 cided that we should go back to the Levant. I think my 
 grandmother was pleased with this decision ; for, although 
 it was a sore trial to relinquish her son again, probably 
 forever, she felt about the question much like a patriotic 
 Spartan mother, who, when the call to arms summoned 
 
 62 
 
the citizens to fight for their country, was proud to see 
 her son foremost among the brave, living or dead. It is 
 difficult to realize in this inishing, material generation 
 what a tremendous energy the foreign missionary spirit 
 once was, what zeal it displayed, what sacrifices were in- 
 volved for those who went and for those who remained 
 at home. Perhaps this did not imply that there is less 
 earnest altruism now than then, but more avenues for the 
 expression of religious benevolence have opened at home 
 and, the seed having been sown, there is less need for 
 active missionary pioneering abroad. Hence the mani- 
 festation of the missionary spirit has taken another form 
 adapted to other fields, and in any case is attended with 
 far less sacrifice than formerly. 
 
 Before sailing Ave went to Williamstown to say fare- 
 well to the numerous members of my father's family 
 living there. The last reunion was at the home of my 
 aunt, Abbie Sabin, wife of Dr. Sabin, a trustee of the 
 college. We dined arovuid one large table, twenty-two 
 in all. 
 
 We took passage at Boston in the bark Harriet T. 
 Bartlett, Elisha Baker, master. Why we should have 
 selected that season for such a voyage is beyond my com- 
 prehension. On the day of sailing the secretary of the 
 Board and a number of Christian brethren came down 
 to the ship to bid us Godspeed. A brief service of 
 prayer and praise was held in the small cabin, more or 
 less interrupted by the shrill orders of the officers, the 
 chanty songs of the crew, the quick stamp of feet, and 
 the creak of blocks and slatting of sails. If Providence 
 hears petitions for material benefits, then we certainly 
 needed praying for, in view of the perils we were about 
 
 63 
 
to encounter. The snow lay cold on the roofs and wharves 
 of Boston and on the islands in the harbor ; the water 
 looked like molten lead, and the sky lowered grim in the 
 offing as we slipped away from Long Wharf under can- 
 vas. The law of storms had not yet been codified by 
 Maury, Thom, and Fitzroy, and no official warnings 
 guided the movements of shipping. 
 
 Not a moment was lost after sailing to put everything 
 to rights in the cabin before the winds and waves should 
 bring on the seasickness that would make it impossible 
 for many of the crew as well as the passengers to do any- 
 thing but lie groaning in the berths. What sort of a task 
 my parents, and especially my mother, had before them 
 may be inferred from a description of the ship. The 
 Harriet T. Bartlett was a bark that measured only 190 
 tons, a little more than half the tonnage of the Sfamhul. 
 
 She was a trim, staunch little ship, a trifle longer 
 than a New York pilot boat, but more full, deep, and 
 broad. The cabin and forecastle or sailor's quarters were 
 on deck, a recent Yankee innovation in the direction of 
 economy, the space they had formerly occupied being 
 devoted to cargo ; naturally such a vessel would be loaded 
 deeper than one with the cabins below. At that time this 
 innovation was considered a doubtful experiment, and I 
 remember that my mother hesitated about going in this 
 vessel on that account. Our cabin, to the best of my recol- 
 lection, was about thirty-six feet long, with an average 
 width of about eighteen feet. Out of this space, in order 
 to judge of the size of our own quarters, must be deducted 
 the two small staterooms of the captain and his wife, and 
 the two mates and the steward's pantry and the bath 
 closet diagonally opposite. This left an irregular saloon 
 
 64 
 
about fifteen feet long and sixteen feet at the widest. 
 On each side of this saloon were four berths in two tiers. 
 In the centre was the common table where we ate, screwed 
 firmly to the floor, and having a settee on each side with 
 a movable back, cushioned with a slippery hair-cloth 
 and also clinched fast to the deck or floor. As there were 
 no staterooms for the passengers all the privacy we could 
 obtain was by fixing brass rods a foot and a half from the 
 berths, on which curtains travelled by means of brass 
 rings. In this contracted space, shared partly with others, 
 my parents and four children, the oldest ten years, were 
 expected to brave the rigors of winter on the raging 
 Atlantic and scarcely less boisterous Mediterranean. That 
 was the way missionaries went to the East then, but it is 
 not the way they go now ! I have no recollection of any 
 stove in the cabin. It is my impression that we were to 
 keep warm on hope and faith until we struck the Gulf 
 Stream, and after that blow on our fingers and continue 
 to cuddle around the hearthstone of hope and faith. This, 
 mind you, was in the sweet month of December, 1846. 
 
 The menu was the same as on the Stamhul, salt meats, 
 and coffee and tea without milk and strong as lye. Two 
 items of improvement should be mentioned. Captain 
 Baker had his wife along with him, a genial, refined lady 
 who always accompanied her husband and did her best 
 to smooth his irascible temper. It was due to Mrs. 
 Baker that we had pie for dinner — she made it herself — 
 and hot biscuits and steaming apple sauce for supper. 
 It was only in the heaviest weather that these dishes were 
 omitted. How well I remember the apple sauce of those 
 wild winter evenings on the bark Harriet T. BartJett, as 
 we all sat around the cabin table, the dishes kept from 
 
 65 
 
slipping off by heavy racks, and the dim, swinging lamp 
 lighting up the faces of old and young as we chatted 
 merrily together in our floating home, while the wind 
 wailed in the rigging and beat the ropes against the 
 masts. 
 
 66 
 
CHAPTER III, 
 
 SMYRNA AND EARTHQUAKES. 
 
 My fatlicr was designated to the Armenians and Greeks 
 of Smyrna, numbering about three-fifths of its popula- 
 tion. Whatever that city may be now, under the influ- 
 ence of modern innovations, it was then a charming resi- 
 dence for those who enjoy the blending of Oriental life 
 and scenery with semi-European society and customs. 
 The port was always enlivened by shipping coming in, 
 or by vessels which lay at anchor. Smyrna was an im- 
 portant naval station, and men-of-war, sometimes entire 
 fleets, lay there. I remember seeing a fleet of eight French 
 line of battle ships, five frigates, and several vessels come 
 in under scudding sails before a staving breeze, their 
 black sides bristling with long tiers of guns, and every 
 sail bellying to the wind, white and gleaming as driven 
 snow. Suddenly the boatswains' whistles piped shrilly 
 from ship to ship, every sail came in at once, and as the 
 stately fabrics rounded to their anchorage simultaneously, 
 the crews swarmed up the rigging by thousands to furl 
 the sails. Say what you will about it, I am bold to affirm 
 that such a magnificent naval spectacle will never be 
 seen again by mortal eye. 
 
 The quarter of Smyrna occupied by the Turks, the 
 dominant race, was eff'ectively massed on the slope of tlie 
 
 67 
 
elevation called Mount Pagos, from the water to the rums 
 of the old Roman citadel. In this part of the city were 
 included the tomb of Polycarp, the bazaars, barracks of 
 the garrison, water batteries, mosques and minarets and 
 palace of the governor. It was flanked by the vast proces- 
 sion of dark, towering cypresses which mark a Turkish 
 cemetery. 
 
 Along the water front of the Frank quarter ran the 
 marino, or sea esplanade, where picturesque boats were 
 constantly seen as well as the launches of foreign war 
 ships whose crews sang in melodious chorus by moonlight 
 while the officers were playing billiards or attending balls. 
 This was the favorite promenade of the Franks : but if 
 one was in search of feminine loveliness it was in the 
 Greek quarter that he would look, rather than among the 
 nondescript foreign and eurasian population knoAvn as 
 Franks. The Greek and Armenian quarters lay north 
 and east, and it was among the former especially that one 
 looked for the famed beauties of Smyrna. 
 
 The Frank quarters of Smyrna had one remarkable 
 feature. For a good part of a mile, between Frank 
 Street, its main thoroughfare, and the Marino, there 
 was an unbroken row of parallel lanes or courts connect- 
 ing those two streets. Each court belonged to one pro- 
 prietor, be it an individual or a company. For the most 
 part these courts were open at both ends during- the day, 
 and one could thus pass through from one street to the 
 other except with caravans. But at sunset they ceased 
 to be thoroughfares, and were firmly closed with massive 
 iron bound gates, yielding access only to actual resi- 
 dents within and their guests. Each court had tAvo or 
 more porters, who carried burdens by day, and mounted 
 
 68 
 
guard by night. They were invariabl}' Turks, as bemg 
 by far the most honest, courageous, and reliable of all 
 the native populations. Magnificent fellows they were, 
 large, massively built, powerful, trained for the business. 
 The porters' lodge was just within the Frank Street gate; 
 many a time have I seen them at nightfall, saying their 
 prayers devoutly on the prayer rug, or preparing the 
 evening meal on the mangal or earthpan of live coals, or 
 quietly smoking the tchibook. These sons of Anak wore 
 large turbans, baggy trousers, and heavy beards, and were 
 provided with formidable yataghans and flintlock pistols. 
 Whoever attemped unlawfully to enter the court at night 
 met with scant mercy at their hands. And yet they were 
 proudl}^ deferential to their superiors, affable in their 
 manners, and, like all genuine Turks, fond of children, 
 gentle and almost playful with them. 
 
 Such precautions were necessary because the neighbor- 
 hood abounded with desperadoes, the police force was 
 crude, and these courts contained the consulates and 
 the counting houses and magazines of wealthy merchants 
 engaged in foreign trade. The offices were on the ground 
 floor. On the floor above were one or more dwellings or 
 flats, occupied by the owner and by respectable tenants. 
 These dwellings, overlooking Frank Street or the Marino, 
 could be reached only by the gates at either end. They 
 were built of stone and sometimes each apartment was 
 roofed with a dome as a protection against earthquakes. 
 Naturally such buildings were made to last for ages ; they 
 were as strong as fortresses. A portion of the roof of 
 the ground floor was invariably not built upon ; thus 
 a flat terrace or roof garden, protected by a low, massive 
 parapet was left for the occupants of the dwellings. On 
 
 69 
 
those terraces the family promenaded at twilight or 
 slept in warm weather when they were not at the country 
 resorts, while the boys, by no means the least important 
 members of the community, flew their kites from them 
 and watched the incoming ships. 
 
 Smyrna was in those days the world's chief emporium 
 for the market in dried figs. There being no railway in 
 Turkey then, during the fig season the fruit was brought 
 to Smyrna by vast caravans of camels. For weeks the 
 bells of the camels were heard day and night as these 
 living freight trains marched into the city. At the head 
 of each train rode the camel driver, encased in a huge 
 sheepskin cloak, that served a variety of purposes, and 
 mounted on a donkey scarcely larger than a St. Bernard 
 dog, but whose toughness and strength were in inverse 
 ratio to his size. 
 
 Smyrna, in the forties, was like a sieve through which 
 passed the current of European travel in the East. There 
 were no railways, and comparatively few steamers, and 
 most of the latter touched at Smyrna as a distributing 
 point for travel as well as for commerce. In this way 
 many tourists and sightseers passed our way, whom my 
 father, with native hospitality, invited to his house. 
 Among them, a German baron, who soon requested the 
 favor of a small loan, with apologies that his drafts had 
 been unexpectedly delayed. Baron Friedel had shown a 
 number of his drawings, indicating a good artist in black 
 and white, or pencil drawing, and my father with some 
 shrewdness suggested a way to relieve the Baron's em- 
 barrassment, by his giving to the children of the family 
 bi-weekly drawing lessons In return for his board. Thus 
 began my first education in art. Everything was rosy 
 
 70 
 
for awhile, wc children took hold with zeal and our in- 
 structor seemed interested, but this soon waned, as time 
 elapsed, and the so-called baron failed to fulfill obliga- 
 tions, and my father was obliged to decline longer to en- 
 tertain him. Up to this time I had shown no marked 
 vocation for art. What I had done had been in the direc- 
 tion of an artisan, rather than an artist. My father had 
 given me a small set of tools (he was always mindful of 
 my welfare), and I was extravagantly fond of using them, 
 making pigeon cotes, flagstaifs, kites and ship models, 
 some of them were elaborate and executed with technical 
 obserA'ation of nautical distinctions in shape and rig. One 
 of these models was a frigate made to a scale with every 
 sail fitted to hoist and lower, anchors, guns, and the like. 
 But the first lesson I took with Baron Friedel acted as 
 decisively as the first chapter of Peter Parley's histor}^ 
 which I read, as already stated, at Trebizond. From that 
 day to this I have been passionately fond of my brush and 
 pencil, a passion that has sometimes slumbered only to 
 awake with renewed vigor. My father bought me a sketch 
 book, and wherever I went I sketched from nature, ships, 
 landscapes, old picturesque buildings and figures. 
 
 As the potential events or incidents in our lives come 
 in groups, it happened soon after Baron Friedel departed, 
 that I became acquainted with a local Armeniai. lithog- 
 rapher named Tatikian. He was but a middling artist, 
 but he knew far more than I did, and his subjects, drawn 
 from street scenes to sell to travellers, attracted me. He 
 was Avilling that I should visit his studio and see him work. 
 From his patience in representing detail I also learned 
 patience and care. Then followed another source of sug- 
 gestion for shading, the expression of foliage and rapid 
 
 71 
 
sketcliing from nature. The hints I received from these 
 latter points were given me by the Van Lennep brothers, 
 who, when they saw my interest in drawing, very kindly 
 looked over my sketches, encouraged me to proceed, and 
 showed me how to put into practice the rudimentary prin- 
 ciples of drawing. 
 
 The Van Lenneps were an old and wealthy family of 
 Dutch descent, engaged in business and consular duties 
 at Smyrna for over a century. They had intermarried 
 with English and French families, but continued staunch 
 protestants, and for respectability and integrity were 
 among the first families of the European colonies of the 
 Levant. The Dutch consular chapel was at the disposal 
 of the American missionaries, and Jacob Van Lennep, 
 consul while we were there, and at the time quite aged, 
 was one of the noblest gentlemen I have met. The 
 family owned a large tchiflik or farmstead some hours 
 out in the country, where the brothers would take a 
 rational relaxation from business in sports of the chase. 
 They kept their gamekeepers, dogs, falcons, etc., at the 
 tchiflik, and often brought down leopards, wolves, or 
 wild boar, not to speak of hare, partridges or other 
 feathered game. They kept two large books of record, 
 and in the evening, after an exciting hunt, one of them 
 would record the incidents of the day with his pen, while 
 another would, in the other book, sketch with his pencil 
 the most pictorial scenes of the hunt. 
 
 My other studies were pursued in a rather desultory 
 manner much of the time, although when I did study it 
 was done in earnest and I have no recollection of trying 
 to shirk or prepare my tasks in a slovenly manner. But 
 I learned with facility and that gave me the more leisure 
 
 72 
 
for reading and sport. French, ancient Greek, and Ar- 
 menian I studied with inexpensive tutors who came to the 
 house, a common method with the European youth of 
 Smyrna. Latin I pursued with my father. It came so 
 easily that I soon reached Virgil, with facility, and to this 
 day the Aeneid is one of my favorite poems. 
 
 One summer that we passed in the subvirban village of 
 Bournabat I attended the so-called Smyrna College to 
 acquire a closer discipline in Greek and French. This in- 
 stitution resembled what we called a preparatory school, 
 and included youths of any age. It was under English 
 auspices, although Roman Catholics and Greeks and 
 one or two Turks attended it as well as English boys. 
 The principal was an Englishman named Turrell. He 
 was tall, handsome, athletic, well built, a Cambridge man, 
 a good scholar, a capital shot, and a brutal disciplinarian. 
 He had the manners of a captain of the Dragoons, and 
 indeed he was aid to Lord Raglan afterward in the Crimea. 
 Flogging was frequent and severe, and his habitual weapon 
 was a lash of rhinoceros hide, which brought out howls 
 of pain. Greatly differing from Mr. Turrell was my 
 French teacher, jM. de Cours, who was drowned while 
 bathing, and his body never recovered. The day before he 
 had been explaining to me in his winning way, the sar- 
 castic humor of La Fontaine's Fables, and now his voice 
 would never be heard again ! I remember that it seemed 
 passing strange to my young mind that the sky could be 
 so blue and cloudless, the sun so bright, the song of the 
 birds so merry, when such a terrible drama threw a pall 
 over the heart, and while all about me, and I myself, 
 were moving inevitably to the same unseen bourne of 
 which no one knows and from which no one returns. I 
 
 73 
 
walked home quite overcome by these reflections, nor do 
 I yet see any adequate explanation of these mysteries. 
 
 When Mr. Turrell sundered his connection with the 
 Smyrna College, the Trustees, before sending to England 
 for another principal, came to my father, although an 
 American, and urged him to accept the vacant chair. It 
 was a great compliment to his modesty, scholarship, and 
 judgment; he appreciated it as such, and therefore held 
 tlic question under advisement for several days. Undoubt- 
 edly the position was one not to be hastily declined. The 
 salary was quite in excess of a missionary's ; the office gave 
 the incumbent a foremost rank not only in the European 
 colony but in the Levant as well ; in the hands of the 
 right man it offered a growing sphere of influence, similar 
 to that subsequently won by the famous Robert College 
 at Constantinople. If my father had accepted the place, 
 with his exceptional qualifications he might have ante- 
 dated the enterprise of Dr. Hamlin in a similar direction. 
 But having decided once for all to be a missionary in the 
 strict sense of the term, he felt it to be his duty to decline 
 this flattering invitation. 
 
 But I have not yet spoken of an educating factor which 
 in those days had as much to do with my development as 
 tutors and textbooks. Although as passionately devoted 
 to sport as any boy that ever lived, I was equally fond of 
 reading. Strange to say I was more interested in solid 
 matter than in fiction. A liistory of a true narrative of 
 adventure had greater attraction for me than a novel 
 pure and simple. For this reason Robinson Crusoe, usual- 
 ly more interesting to boys than men, held my attention 
 less at that time than it has done in later years when I 
 have learned to see the matchless quality of its style 
 
 74 
 
and the verities of life and character which teem in its 
 fascinating pages. The educating factor to which I al- 
 kided above was the library of Mr. Adger. My father 
 took the place at Smyrna which had been vacated by the 
 resignation of Rev. John B. Adger, who was a scion of 
 one of the first families of South Carolina. 
 
 When Mr. Adger left Smyrna he generously donated 
 his valuable library to the mission station. It contained 
 several thousand volumes of miscellaneous literature. The 
 missionaries had no leisure to devote to it, or were suf- 
 ficiently supplied already. The library was therefore 
 kept locked in a dark room and apparently forgotten. I 
 learned of its existence accidently, and it was not long be- 
 fore I had the key with permission to browse among the 
 books at will. It proved a perfect mine. Many a precious 
 hour did I pass in that room alone, pouring over books 
 of every description in English, French, Greek and Latin. 
 Of course I was yet too young to fully appreciate every- 
 thing that I read there, but still it was an education to 
 me, for what one reads under such circumstances, when 
 the attention is undistracted and the tablets of the mem- 
 ory are fresh, is hot on.ly remembered but becomes in- 
 corporated into the very fibre of one's being. 
 
 One of the American missionaries at Smyrna was the 
 Rev. T. P. Johnston. Pk'ontis, his oldest son, was a bright 
 talented youth, who later became a prominent southern 
 clergyman. He was three years my elder, but as we as- 
 sociated together pleasantly, that fact proved of use to 
 me, as he led me on and served as an exemplar. He started 
 the first youth's newspaper ever issued in the Levant. 
 What inspired the idea I have forgotten ; but it was al- 
 most like an inspiration of genius, for nothing of the 
 
 75 
 
sort had ever been heard of before in that region, since 
 they flashed the news of the fall of Troy across the Aegean 
 with bonfires. It was called The Smyrna Star. William, 
 his next oldest brother, afterwards a Skull and Bones man 
 at Yale, and I, were associate editors. This was my first 
 connection with any periodical. I was then thirteen years 
 old. Our model was l' Impartial, a French paper pub- 
 lished at Smyrna. Like most French newspapers it had 
 its feuilleton or original romance across the lower third 
 of the pages. There was also a digest of home and foreign 
 news, local gossip, shipping intelligence, including notes 
 about the movements of men-of-war, missionary intelli- 
 gence, correspondence from Constantinople and a pot- 
 pouri of anecdotes and riddles. It filled a compact folio 
 sheet, and, of course, was entirely in manuscript, for we 
 could not afford the public press ; and typewriters, hecto- 
 graphs, and the like were then unknown. Dividing the 
 work among ourselves, we contrived to make several 
 copies of each number, which were creditably executed. 
 They were readily subscribed for, and the proceeds ad- 
 ded materially to the indispensable pocket money required 
 for the colored paper and twine for our kites, paint for 
 our boats, and katemarias at the pastry cooks, the lat- 
 ter being one of the special luxuries for which Smyrna 
 was famous. The success of the Smyrna Star led the 
 missionary boys at Constantinople to start a rival sheet 
 called The Bebek Messenger. I was placed on the staff 
 of that paper as Smyrna correspondent, and eventually 
 became one of its editors. What with one thing and an- 
 other, my time was fully occupied in those days ! 
 
 As may be surmised by the foregoing pages, I as- 
 associated at Smyrna with the native boys far more than 
 
 76 
 
when at Athens. My parents, while strict within certain 
 limits, were anxious that I should learn self reliance, and 
 gain culture from observation and experience no less than 
 from books. 
 
 My companions were therefore of mixed and various 
 characters, English, Greeks, Franks or Levantines, Ar- 
 menians, and occasionally Turks. I saw a great deal of 
 every variety of Oriental life, and obtained an insight into 
 more phases of national character and customs than often 
 falls to youth. There w^ere many English boys of my 
 own age, some of them fine, w^holesouled fellows, good 
 fighters but at the same time straightforward and manly. 
 We Avere very chummy together, more than with boys of 
 other nations, for after all blood is thicker than water, 
 and the use of a common language was a strong tie. But 
 the national sentiment was also strong in us, and each 
 stood up stoutly for the land from which his parents 
 came. We chaifed each other, and often came to blows, 
 but this only led to mutual respect and esteem. 
 
 Sometimes, during the summer in the country, we Eng- 
 lish speaking boys would unite to beat off the gang of 
 Greek rowdies who would make a dead set at us. Form- 
 ing in a line, the opposing forces fought with stones in 
 the open or behind trees when possible. If our side 
 gained on the enemy, we would make a combined rush with 
 sticks and switches, and give them a sound thrashing. 
 Sometimes severe bruises were received, and it is a wonder 
 none of us lost our lives in these dangerous bouts. 
 
 The suburbs of Smyrna were indescribably Oriental in 
 character, and hence rural and picturesque in the extreme. 
 The mountains, closing around the lower landscape like 
 an amphitheatre, mountains haunted with classic legends 
 
 77 
 
of the long past ages, were bare at the summit, revealmg a 
 rich scale of color. As they descended thej became 
 draped with heather, thyme and lentisk, which was grad- 
 ually replaced by olive groves, tufts of mysterious stone 
 pine sighing over the cliffs, vineyards, orchards, and grain 
 fields. The latter were crimson for miles and miles with 
 wild poppies or white with daisies, vast masses of color, 
 until the wheat grew high as one's head, swaying in the 
 breeze like billows of the sea over which flew the fleet 
 shadows of the clouds. Here and there in the clearing the 
 flocks were seen browsing under guardianship of the 
 shaggy wolf dog, while the sandalled shepherd under an 
 olive tree ate his bread and olives, knit his coarse stock- 
 ings, or piped on his reed flute. The memory of those 
 poetic landscapes of Smyrna sometimes lulls me into the 
 illusion that life is worth living. 
 
 Other incidents suggesting the nature of some of the 
 phases of life in that romantic city of Smyrna occur to 
 me. But there must be a limit to these records, especially 
 as I was now about to turn my face towards new scenes 
 and conditions. It was greatly to my regret at the time, 
 that I heard of the decision of the American Board to con- 
 centrate at Constantinople the work of translating and 
 printing religious publications for the Turkish empire. 
 That this move was not decided earlier shows the tentative 
 character of the missionary campaign. It was only after 
 years of scattered labor at various points that American 
 religious enterprise was able to discover the points of ef- 
 fective action and to systematize the distribution of its 
 efforts to produce the best results. Dr. Riggs and my 
 father were transferred, therefore, to Constantinople, 
 Mr. Johnston seized this occasion to retire permanently 
 
 78 
 
from the missionary field. In passing I may add that 
 before relying on the English and Greek printers at 
 Smyrna, the Board had already sent an American printer 
 to Smyrna. This gentleman had preceded my father to 
 that city and left for home before we settled in Smyrna. 
 His name was Josiah Brewer, and he was the father of 
 the late Justice J. Brewer of the U. S. Supreme Court, 
 who was born at Smyrna the year that I was born at 
 Argos on the opposite shore of the Aegean. 
 
 As adding to the interest of my Smyrna days I may 
 mention two or three noted persons I met there. One of 
 them was Louis Kassuth with his family and suite, when 
 on his way to America in the United States steam frigate 
 Mississippi, which was subsequently burned in the 
 Civil War. We went on board the vessel, and T well re- 
 member the distinguislied Hungarian and his generals. 
 We were also visited by Captain Pigeal, who afterwards 
 won repute as the commander of a French line of battle- 
 ship in the Crimean war. He was one of those rare birds, 
 a French protestant naval officer, and a strict and pious 
 one at that. 
 
 Captain Ingraliam, commander of the St. Louis, 
 likewise called on us, and we in turn visited his handsome 
 corvette and were cordial!}' entertained. His manners 
 were polished and agreeable, like those of many old time 
 southerners when sectional questions were kept out of 
 sight. It will be remembered that Captain Ingraham im- 
 fortunately lived long enough to turn against the flag 
 wliich he defended so well in the Bay of Smyrna. 
 
 Another character whom I met there was General 
 Walker, who was afterwards shot in Nicaragua for fili- 
 bustering. He was, as I remember him, of medium height. 
 
 79 
 
spare but symmetrically built, had small, well shaped 
 hands and keen blue eyes. Like many distinguished men 
 of action and daring, his voice was low and his ordinary 
 manner quiet and gentle. I went with my father when 
 he accompanied General, then Captain, Walker on board 
 the steamer that was to take him to Trieste. They talked 
 long together on the quarter deck, before the signal for 
 departure was given. 
 
 Near Smyrna a number of pretty villages nestled in the 
 valleys under the green gloam of the mulberries and lin- 
 dens. Their population consisted chiefly of small landed 
 proprietors or gentry, mainly Turks, and the unambitious 
 peasantry who tilled the fields and tended the flocks for 
 them. It was truly an idyllic scene when with tinkling 
 bells, the sheep and goats returned to the folds bleating 
 towards evening and crowding each other in the narrow 
 lanes, while the shouts of the shepherds were not un- 
 melodious blended with the other sounds of that magical 
 hour. The tops of the tall sentinel cypresses at the gates 
 shone rosy in the last fading glow of the setting sun, and 
 purple shadows drew a veil over roof and garden. Then 
 all became still except the dashing of the torrent down 
 the streets, whose waters were used for irrigating the 
 gardens. 
 
 My father breakfasted in summer precisely at six, tak- 
 ing with his family a light meal of coffee, eggs, and cool 
 figs just plucked from the trees. He then rode eight miles 
 on horseback to the city, for his daily duties, returning 
 at evening in season for dinner. During the day my 
 mother taught her children and took us to walk among 
 the fields. She was exceedingly fond of walking, and In this 
 respect I have taken after her. In the evening my father 
 
 80 
 
heard my Latin recitation, and we enjoyed a delightful 
 home hour of singing, conversation or reading aloud, un- 
 til bedtime was announced for the young folks. 
 
 I think it was in the same summer that I had rather a 
 disagreeable adventure. This region about Smyrna, as 
 in most warm climates, is infested with venomous insects 
 and reptiles. Scorpions, centipedes and deadly asps were 
 not uncommon, although less numerous than at Trebizond, 
 where we were obliged to have a canopy over our beds 
 and sweep it every morning, and always shook our shoes 
 and clothing before putting them on. Serious accidents 
 sometimes occurred from this source but on the whole the 
 people gave little thought to the matter. One evening we 
 had an unpleasant reminder, however, that the vermin 
 were by no means extinct. We were at supper. Accord- 
 ing to my custom the greater part of the year in that 
 climate, I was clad in pumps, short, light socks, duck 
 trousers, shirt with open Byron collar, and a middy's 
 blue jacket. Suddenly I felt something creep from the 
 stone floor on my foot and then start up my bare leg. I 
 knew at once from the sensation what it must be ; a centi- 
 pede it was indeed. It had not an hundred feet, but it had 
 enough, a dozen or more on each side. To utter a sound 
 would have precipitated a panic that might cost me my 
 life. I therefore kept perfectly quiet, the creature mean- 
 while deliberately crawling up my shin, and scratching 
 the skin with its sharp, homey feet. To move would be 
 to startle it into burying its foreceps into my flesh and 
 depositing the poison. To allow it to pass my knee would 
 also make it impossible to act with it effectually. ISIoving 
 with the utmost caution, I clasped my hands across my 
 knee to prevent the insect from passing that point; then 
 
 81 
 
saying to myself, one, two, three, I shook my leg sud- 
 denly. The centipede dropped to the floor, and I crushed 
 it witli my shoe. It measured six inches. The bite of 
 the centipede is always exceedingly painful, and often 
 proves fatal. 
 
 One of the most delightful families of Smyrna was 
 that of Rev. Mr. Lewis, the British Chaplain. We were 
 invited to their country house for Christmas festivities. 
 During the evening a violent gale of wind had been blow- 
 ing. The sky was clear, but I distinctly remember that 
 the atmosphere was hazy. This phenomena was not un- 
 important, I slept in a room alone, and was kept awake 
 half an hour by a cat hunting mice. After sleeping an 
 hour I was rudely awakened. The first thought was that 
 it was the cat and mice. But the next instant, trained by 
 experience, I perceived to my horror that we were in the 
 midst of a sharp earthquake. It took but a second to 
 spring to the floor and rush into the drawing room, which 
 adjoined my room, and was probably the safest apartment 
 in the building. At the same moment from all parts of 
 the house, by one door or another, the family rushed in 
 pell-mell into the same apartment. There was just light 
 enough to notice white figures of every age and sex, flit- 
 ting like ghosts through the doors ; little feminine shrieks, 
 faint exclamations of surprise and alarm, showed that it 
 was not ghosts but beings, very human beings indeed, who 
 were gathering thus unconventionally in their robes de 
 nuit. After the first hard shock was over, and we found 
 the house still standing minus a chimney or two and some 
 plaster, and while we waited for the next shock which in- 
 A'arlably follows a smart earthquake, the sexes instinc- 
 tively arranged themselves in groups in opposite corners, 
 
 82 
 
and began to compare notes. Then followed a succession 
 of side-splitting giggles and convulsive tittering. 
 
 When the clattering subsided a sense of awe succeeded, 
 and we waited with the suspense and apprehension only 
 they who have lived in earthquake lands can understand. 
 I then noticed that the gale of wind had entirely stopped 
 and that a deathly stillness had followed. This is an in- 
 variable phenomena of earthquakes, according to my own 
 observation. An earthquake never occurs while the wind 
 is actually blowing. After the lapse of fifteen minutes, 
 we heard the howding of dogs and cackling of fowls re- 
 newed, and within a few^ seconds a second shock quivered 
 through the land. We stood breathless until it passed; 
 as it was feebler than the first shock, a favorable indica- 
 tion, then we stole back to our couches. 
 
 Smyrna has been an earthquake center for ages, and 
 was several times almost destroyed. The shocks spoken 
 of above w'ere simply what were expected every tw^o or 
 three years ; not unusually severe but alarming because 
 of the dreadful uncertainty that attends any seismic phe- 
 nomena. But during the fifth year of our residence in 
 that city a protracted period of earth-shaking occurred 
 that was most extraordinary and completely demoralized 
 the nerves of the community. Habit made us acquainted 
 with the signs of approaching agitation, and we young 
 people regarded earthquakes with the awe that children 
 fear ghosts. Slight shocks often quivered by in the night. 
 If there was any doubt about it it was settled by the 
 simple seismometer used in Smyrna. Between the Avail 
 and a ball suspended from a nail was a piece of paper. 
 The least tremor caused the paper to drop. The houses 
 were very solidly built of stone, no wind could shake them 
 
 83 
 
and earthquakes were windless ; we proved that no walking 
 or jumping could shake our house enough to remove the 
 paper ; and there were no carriages or railway trains in 
 the city or neighborhood. It was clear that only an earth- 
 quake could be the cause when the paper was found on the 
 floor. 
 
 The earthquake season I have alluded to was preceded 
 by an unusual phenomena that could hardly have 
 been a coincidence, particulai'ly as haziness in the sky 
 often accompanies earthquakes, showing a certain rela- 
 tion beween the two. It was in the spring, the kite fly- 
 ing season, and it was while flying my kite at midday that 
 I first observed this phenomena. The usual sea breeze was 
 blowing fresh from the west, but the cloudless sky, in- 
 stead of being as usual a clear blue, shaded into a copper 
 hue and a vast halo appeared arovmd the sun like the 
 ring around the moon that precedes a heavy snow in 
 America, I spoke of this to my father, who was sur- 
 prised and alarmed, and thought it foreboded some great 
 atmospheric disturbance like a hurricane ; and so thought 
 the sailors and boatmen, for this coppery haze and ring 
 continued into the second day, and aroused general super- 
 stition and dismay. Well, on the second night about 
 twelve, the whole city was brought to its feet by a long, 
 violent shock, followed by another in a very few minutes. 
 The walls of the strongest buildings were cracked, chim- 
 neys and weak buildings Avere demolished, and the dwel- 
 lings gave forth their people as the children went forth 
 after the piping of the "pied piper of Hamlin." IMen, 
 women and children crowded the streets by scores of thou- 
 sands shouting in agony "Lord have mercy !" 
 
 84 
 
I remember my first instinct Avas to stand under 
 the cross-piece of my bedroom door, that being consid- 
 ered safer than under the ceiling. After the first shock I 
 saw my father and mother, my brothers and sisters, gath- 
 ered in the hall hastily putting on such clothes as they 
 had been able to snatch on the instant. Doing the same 
 I joined them. When we heard the second shock coming 
 we rushed down stairs into the court ; of course we were 
 not safe even there; for we might be crushed by falling 
 walls or the earth might open under us, a contingency 
 not uncommon with Smyrna earthquakes. It happened at 
 several places in the outskirts at that very time. The 
 earthquake continued trembling for two weeks. I do not 
 mean by this that shocks were occurring at intervals dur- 
 ing that period, but that there was actually a continuous 
 vibration intensified Avith shocks of more or less violence 
 at frequent intervals. For two weeks the paper indicator 
 of our seismometer could not be kept in place ! That told 
 the story. One could hardly imagine to what a degree of 
 demoralization the community arrived. Business was 
 practically paralyzed. Forty thousand people deserted 
 to the suburbs and lived in tents and booths. It was 
 scarcely possible to sleep at night. Any moment might 
 bring the final collapse. At length the missionaries Avith 
 some of the lay Protestant element, appointed a day of 
 fasting and prayer. It was a A'ery solemn occasion. The 
 next day the ground stopped quaking, and not another 
 shock was felt for a year, and that quite harmless. What 
 connection there Avas between the fast-day prayers and the 
 cessation of the earthquake visitation there seems to be 
 no means of knoAving. It might have been more than a 
 coincidence. But Avho shall decide? Anyway it had a re- 
 
 85 
 
assaring effect on those who believed it a direct answer 
 to prayer, forgetting what an excessively small percent- 
 age of prayers are directly or affirmatively answered. 
 
 I took two short sea trips when in my fifteenth year. 
 The first was unattended with special danger or ad- 
 venture. A missionary lady needed an escort to Constan- 
 tinople, the Station at Smyrna decided to send me. I 
 was to have tMo weeks at Constantinople for visiting, and 
 then return home alone. My father gave me four or five 
 dollars beside my ticket, with which, after delivering Miss 
 Harris in safety, I did some sight-seeing and returned 
 home quite satisfied to accept earthquakes and centipedes 
 if I could have Smyrna. 
 
 This trip was the fourth time in six years. I had 
 traversed the Hellespont and looked on the straits where 
 Leander swam to meet Hero, and on Mount Ida, the plains 
 of Troy and the tombs of Ajax and Achilles. Is it any 
 wonder, that these scenes impressed my mind, and led me 
 to write two books on Troy later in life.'' 
 
 The following summer, owing to the activity of brigands 
 in the villages about Smyrna and my mother's ill-health, 
 we were forced to look elsewhere for change of air. We 
 decided on the island of Scio. The Austrian-Loyd boat 
 only touched at midnight, stopping out side of the port, 
 (with no landing in bad weather) and we considered our- 
 selves in luck to be able to find passage on a small 
 schooner-rigged, iron-screw tender of the Turkish navy, 
 bound to Scio direct. The deck, we found was crowded 
 with Turkish troops going to Scio and Samos. My 
 mother and two sisters were the only females on board, 
 and the first engineer the only European besides our- 
 selves. 
 
 86 
 
All went well until we came to weather Cape Ivaro 
 Bournoo at the entrance of the Bay of Smyrna. There 
 we encountered a fierce wind blowing from the southwest 
 in furious blasts with a very wild cobbling sea. The sky 
 was blackening rapidly and almost every one but the 
 crew became deathly sick. As usual, my stomach was 
 exempt from mal de mer. Sails were furled, topmasts 
 and yards lowered, and altogether we were in for a very 
 nasty afternoon. The Turkish captain, with a courtesy 
 we could never forget, insisted that my father should take 
 his family below and occupy the captain's stateroom. 
 After seeing that everything had been done to make us 
 comfortable, he ordered the steward to bring us coffee, 
 placing his services at our disposal, and then hastened to 
 resume his post on deck. It was high time. The wind 
 was blowing great guns, the waves, the steep walls with 
 deep green hollows of the ^Mediterranean, rolled over the 
 bow with thundering crash, the spra}* flying in sheets to 
 the stern and completely drenching the poor soldiers to 
 the skin. It was such a storm as they have occasionally 
 in summer in the Aegean, disturbing the regularity of the 
 elements, such a storm as Falcaner describes so graphi- 
 cally in his "Shipwreck." It became evident by the middle 
 of the afternoon that not only should we fail to reach Scio 
 that day, but also that we were likely to go to Davy 
 Jones' lockers, if we did not succeed in making a safe lee 
 before night. The propeller engine was practically a new 
 invention in those days, and the slightest stoppage in the 
 machinery at this crisis would have foundered the vessel 
 or cast her on a lee shore. In a word, the condition of af- 
 fairs was serious. So unexpectedly do crises aiid perils 
 arise in life! When we sailed in the earlv morning not a 
 
 87 
 
soul dreamed that such a tempest was brewmg, so even 
 is the summer weather in those waters. Watching for a 
 lull, our plucky captain, a Turk, whose handsome face, so 
 far as I could see, did not show the quiver of a muscle 
 during the furious blasts of the storm, put his ship be- 
 fore the wind with admirable coolness, and headed for 
 Phokis. It was almost dark when we arrived off the en- 
 trance to that port; the only member of our family who 
 was not seasick, I stood on deck holding fast to the com- 
 panion way, ducking my head as the seas poured over, 
 and watched with keen fascination the delicate manoeuv- 
 ring through the unbuoyed channel. On one side stood 
 an ancient Genoese castle, our chief landmark, for there 
 was neither lighthouse nor beacon. A tremendous sea 
 was rolling on the bar, and the flying spoondrift made 
 the grey twilight thick and almost impenetrable. Some 
 fishermen dimly discerned on the point bearing close on 
 the starboard, waved directions for our course. It was 
 touch and go, with us. But wc made it, and then it seemed 
 but a moment ere we were out of the storm, the lights of 
 the town twinkling in the fast gathering gloam, and our 
 cable rattling in a safe, snug haven. The violence of the 
 weather may be judged from the fact that we found a 
 French and an Austrian steamer, each several times larger 
 than our little steamer, lying at Phokis, where they also 
 had sought refuge from one of the heaviest blows felt in 
 the Levant for years. 
 
 Our servant was sent on shore to procure provisions, 
 our slender supply being exhausted. He returned with 
 eggs, a chicken just killed for us, goat's milk and sour 
 leavened bread. They were eaten with a relish. The cap- 
 tain slept on a settee under the transom and turned over 
 
the remainder of the cabin to us. The following day, as it 
 still blew hard, my father took his family for a stroll 
 among the narrow streets and antiquities of the little 
 town, which twenty-five centuries ago was one of the chief 
 ports of the eastern Aegean. Her mariners founded jNIar- 
 seilles and were the first to pass the Strait of Gibral- 
 tar. 
 
 The third morning broke serene and clear. I was 
 aroused by the clicking of the pawls of the windlass, and 
 the shouting of the crew, "Yah, Allah !" as they bent to 
 the handspikes and brought up the anchor. I sprang on 
 deck instantly. Although a mere youth, my young fancy 
 was fairly entranced by the magical beauty and quietude 
 of the hour. The dawn was a deep orange hue melting 
 into throbbing purple where gleamed the pure splendor of 
 the morning star, whose rays quiAered on the smooth water 
 like a silver falchion. Far and near rang the shrill crow 
 of chanticleer. As the sun neared the hilltops the solemn, 
 melodious chant of the viuezzin floated from the white 
 minaret in cadences long drawn out and slowly dying 
 away like a mystical voice from past ages, out of the 
 fantastical vagueness of the realm of dreams. The sol- 
 diers, who had already carefully performed their ablu- 
 tions, knelt in silent rows on deck, and with devout aspira- 
 tion offered their orisons to the Author and Ruler of the 
 universe. 
 
 We reached Port Kastro, chief port of Scio, at three 
 p. m. Tlie mole, and the old fort opposite, with its 
 masonry of variegated tints, its pepper-box turrets, fosse 
 and drawbridge, were ver}^ interesting, surmounted by 
 the scarlet banner of Turkey, all faithfully reflecterl 
 in the lapis laznli surface of the sea. The market 
 
 89 
 
booths on the quay in front of the town presented a pic- 
 turesque animation in contrast with the long row of wind- 
 mills crowning the hill on the left, and whirling their w^hite 
 canvas sails with a drowsy regularity that was as delight- 
 ful, as applying poppy seeds to the eyes. 
 
 The captain of the steamer politely but firmly declined 
 the slightest compensation for giving up his cabin to us, 
 for tliroc days. Not to be outdone in courtesy, my father 
 on landing, hastened to purchase a quantity of the famous 
 conserves of Scio, mastic, rose, cherry, and quince, and 
 sent them aboard the steamer with his compliments to this 
 noble mariner and "unspeakable Turk." 
 
 A house had been already engaged for us in the Campo, 
 a rich, sloping plain between the mountains and the sea. 
 The magnates of the island, the chief landed proprietors, 
 had their estates in the Campo. Mr. Petrokokino, a Greek 
 who had been rescued from the Sciote massacre of the 
 Revolution and educated in the United States, but who 
 subsequently settled again on his paternal estate in the 
 Campo, met us at the pier, escorted us to his town house 
 where we were treated to refreshments by the ladies and 
 then conducted to the modest dwelling he had rented 
 for us five miles from the city. Although it was modest 
 compared with some of the stately mansions of Scio, yet 
 our quarters were comfortable, and commodious, and 
 commanded a fine prospect. We had entirely to our- 
 selves the whole of the second floor, the porter's lodge 
 and terrace and the run of the grounds. For this we 
 paid tlie munificent equivalent of four dollars a month ! 
 But they calculate in Turkey by the piastre, and prices 
 and expenditures are generally based on the monetary 
 
 90 
 
unit. In France a franc goes nearly as far among French- 
 men, as a dollar does among Americans. 
 
 Our pyrgo, although less ornate than many Sciote 
 pyrgoes, (especially as to the colored stones and grand 
 stairways), was typical in general style and arrangement. 
 It had two floors with flat roof parapeted, the second 
 story reached by a grand stairway terminating in a 
 spacious open portico, the windows and doors strong 
 enough for a castle, the second floor paved with figured 
 marble and sandstone, the ceilings arched, and everything 
 built to last for ages. The natives slept for the most 
 part on matresses laid on the floor and rolled up by day; 
 but we used light cots. A graceful open gallery led to the 
 porter's lodge over the great entrance gate, used also as 
 a reception room. There was a trellis supported on mas- 
 sive pillars covered with a dense grape-vine fairly purple 
 with clusters of grapes, and under its shade, was a deep 
 well whose water was drawn by a huge creaking wheel 
 with buckets turned by a nude. The water was used for 
 irrigating the garden and orchard. Around all, after the 
 oriental fashion, ran a lofty stone wall. From our porch 
 and roof we looked over one of the world's loveliest land- 
 scapes. A mile from us spread the blue Aegean skirted 
 with historic isles, and beyond, the Teian shore where 
 Anacreon sung, and where Diana's famous temple stood. 
 Nearer on the left were the mountains where nestled the 
 old, old village of Valisso, which existed away back in 
 that misty age, and where Homer is said to have lived and 
 sung. 
 
 The life Me led there was even and uneventful. It was 
 a subjective existence, if one may use the term, when im- 
 pressions are made that are scarcely noticed at the time 
 
 91 
 
but which incorporate themselves with our being and un- 
 consciously shape the character and hence perhaps one's 
 future. We read, we talked, we strolled on foot or on 
 mules, and we dreamed. We were imbibing health for 
 body and mind as the plant draws sustenance from the 
 sun. What I remember especially about those Scian days 
 was enjoying so much of the society of my mother. She 
 was entirely with her children during that summer. She 
 interested herself deeply in their amusements, read or 
 sang to them, and repeated the legends and story of the 
 island. She could be decided when necessary, but she 
 ruled chiefly by sweetness and affection. I was old 
 enough then to begin to appreciate the resources of her 
 mind, as could not have been the case, if I had been 
 younger or had companions of my own age. As I look 
 back to my mother and venture reverentially to analyze 
 her character, I can see that one of her qualities was a 
 thoroughly sane and well-balanced nature, swayed equally 
 by practical common sense and by warm and demon- 
 strative affections, and withal thoroughly feminine. I 
 cannot imagine her endeavoring to Avin influence, power 
 or fame by invading the domain of masculine faculties or 
 disdaining the sphere in which destiny had placed her. 
 She Avas proud to be a woman, and to exert her talents 
 and opportunities as such first in the domestic and second 
 in the social or public line of duties. 
 
 One of my recreations in Scio was to accompany our 
 Armenian servant Takvore on his foraging expeditions 
 among the plantations or to the market at Port Kastro. 
 We rode on sleek and well-trained mules. The saddles 
 were flat and broad, intended both for loads and for rid- 
 ing, and Ave generally rode sidewise like the natives. In 
 
 92 
 
this Avay I saw much of the people, and picked up their 
 patois, a branch of the Doric. As we ambled along the 
 country roads, by leafy lanes up the mountain side or by 
 the sea, the various rural sounds blending pleasantly in 
 the drowsy air, Takvore manifested a vein of sentimental- 
 it}^ thoroughly oriental. Allowing the mule to choose its 
 own pace, he beat his heels lazily against the sides of the 
 beast, and launched out into erotic ditties, rendered with 
 quick rising inflection, then passed into a long drawn-out 
 monotone, tapering away to silence. Those eastern songs 
 cannot be said to be musical in the western sense, but 
 they certainly excel in the power of expressing passion 
 and firing the blood. Takvore was a character. Faith- 
 ful in his duties, trusty to his master, and yet with a 
 certain galliard deviltry about him that was highly amus- 
 ing. He was versatile and clever, lazy or industrious, at 
 will, and I fear a sad fellow with the girls, in a word, an 
 oriental Sam Weller, or Gil Bias. He followed our for- 
 tunes for several years until we returned to America. 
 After that he went to London, changed his name into 
 its English equivalent and became ]Mr. King; he also 
 adopted the European dress, opened a pastr}^ and con- 
 fectionery shop in that city, and prospered. 
 
 One of our entertainments at eventide was listening to 
 the tap of the seinandvoes or sounding boards used to sum- 
 mon the people to vespers. The subject Christians in 
 Turkey, although allowed many privileges, were not at 
 that time permitted to use church bells out of Constanti- 
 nople and Smyrna. Accordingly they substituted the 
 semandro. There were many chapels in the island, and it 
 was curious to hear the quick tatao beaten on the boards 
 far and near, b}'^ the seashore, in the valleys, on the moun- 
 
 93 
 
tains. Then night came on and we securely closed the 
 doors and shutters with massive bars, according to the 
 custom of the land. There was no police, the dwellings 
 stood far apart generally, and I have often thought my 
 mother very courageous to live there alone for months. 
 Once, indeed, she had a very serious and mysterious 
 alarm, and perhaps it was owing to this that my father 
 took us home early in August, instead of leaving us there 
 until the heat of September was past. 
 
 The exploits in the environs of Smyrna of the banditti 
 to whom I have alluded, together with their confederates in 
 and out of the city, and the desperate character of some of 
 the Frank residents at that time, naturally added greatly 
 to the events which most interested me during the clos- 
 ing years of my life at Smyrna. But as the story is a 
 long one, and I have already related part of it in another 
 work, I can only allude to these facts in this work. These 
 fellows, about whose characters there was littlo of the 
 romance which some writers have associated with the pro- 
 fession of brigandage, were Christians, drawn from the 
 horde of desperadoes who had flocked hither from 
 every thieves' rookery in the Mediterranean, chiefly, how- 
 ever, from Italy, Malta, and Greece, fugitives from jus- 
 tice or adventurers ill-satisfied Avith their luck, but in- 
 variably "good Christians" who would sooner cut a throat 
 than eat meat on Fridays. Turks were not permitted to 
 join their fraternity, nor did they yearn to do so, firstly 
 because they scorned the Christians, and secondly because 
 the Turks, whatever their other faults, have rarely in- 
 cluded brigandage with their national pursuits. These 
 Christian ruffians actually forced one of their number to 
 hurl from a cliff* a Turkish woman and her daughter whom 
 
 94 
 
he had taken to the rendezvous (after murdering their 
 husband and father) before they would admit him to mem- 
 bership in their band. The splendid nerve this worthy ex- 
 hibited on that occasion eventually raised him to a 
 pinnacle of fame and power in the Clan that won for him 
 the doom of a brigand chief. 
 
 The consternation created throughout the city by such 
 events as the successive capture of the vice consul of Hol- 
 land, of an English physician, and other prominent in- 
 dividuals, the barely frustrated attempt to steal the eldest 
 daughter of the British chaplain, and the like, can hardly 
 be described here. No one knew when he was safe. No 
 one dared to ride in the suburbs nor felt safe even in the 
 heart of the city. Tlie Turkish government, however, was 
 forced to bestir itself, although the ^Moslems doubtless 
 enjoyed seeing the Christians thus harrying each other. 
 But the business prosperity of Smyrna and the remon- 
 strances of the foreign envoys made it necessary to crush 
 these disturbances ; and soon, the results of Turkish mili- 
 tary courage and enterprise began to be evident. The 
 brigands were forced successively out of their dens, and 
 driven to smuggle themselves out of the country in coast- 
 ers ; some were shot, some captured and executed, some- 
 times by summary hanging in public places, sometimes by 
 methods which they doubtless deserved but which modern 
 civilization condemns. One day I was thrilled by hearing 
 a friend of ours describing to my father a most interest- 
 ing interview with a noted captain of brigands in his 
 dungeon the day before he was to suffer a lingering death. 
 On another day, as I was thoughtlessly strolling near the 
 bazaars, I was stupefied by seeing a robber hanging by 
 the neck from the eaves of a house. In the East, they do 
 
 95 
 
not perhaps stab a man's reputation and success, by means 
 of the newspaper press as we do, but when they strike at 
 his life, they strike to kilL They follow all the forms of 
 law, but the law does not sleep nor dawdle over a case. 
 Whether administered justly or otherwise, it acts with 
 directness and speed. That the Turkish authorities 
 stamped brigandage so thoroughly out of the region about 
 Smyrna speaks well for them, when one considers how It 
 lingers still, a perpetual festering social sore In Italy and 
 Greece, and especially as the efforts of those gentry were 
 directed against Christians, and not Turks. 
 
 The condition of things within the city corresponding 
 with the bold outrages in the suburbs, was Indicated In 
 no uncertain way by various serious incidents, of which 
 I can mention here only a single typical example. We oc- 
 cupied for a year, a house on one of the Khans or courts 
 which I have previously described. This happened to be 
 one of the darkest and most narrow courts in the city, and 
 the dwelling we occupied was an uncanny sort of a place, 
 which had lain empty for years, because It was reputed to 
 be haunted, and it was so shut in, that If there had been 
 ghosts among its dreary corridors we should have es- 
 caped from them with difficulty. It was said that a gang 
 of counterfeiters were the real ghosts. They had worked 
 at their trade In the dark magazines under the house, and 
 In order to be able to carry on their schemes safely had 
 derived means to frighten away the occupants. This may 
 have been an explanation contrived to reassure tenants, 
 and there may have been ghosts there. In very sooth. We 
 saw none, but that proves nothing, for we might not have 
 had the "seeing" eye; but we saw and heard abundant rats, 
 and felt earthquakes and heard and saw other matters 
 
 96 
 
enough to make our life there memorable to us. The 
 entrance of the court was guarded by two magnificent 
 Turks with green turbans. But we were one hundred 
 yards away from them at the other end. Over dark dun- 
 geon-like magazines, we came to an entresol, off the stair- 
 landing, and then passed to a hall, one hundred and forty- 
 four feet long and eighteen feet high ; at one end, was the 
 parlor, at the other the dining-room. The former over- 
 looked the Marino, and the latter a winding passage that 
 led to the kitchen. The bedrooms were ranged in a row 
 on one side of the hall, not communicating, and a line of 
 small square windows near the ceiling, pierced the opposite 
 side of the hall. This corridor was reached from the court 
 by a broad stairway. When anyone desired admittance 
 he banged a huge knocker that could be heard half a mile ; 
 before opening the door we invariably looked out of the 
 window to see who was there, and then raised the latch b}^ 
 pulling a rope. You can imagine what an awesome kind of 
 a dwelling this must have been. I well remember how 
 lonely and solemn it seemed one gloomy day, when an 
 eartliquake shook the city, and made all our bells ring. 
 And that reminds me that this was one of the few resi- 
 dences in Symrna supplied with bells, placed there prob- 
 ably, by its former tenants, the counterfeiters, to add to 
 its other mysteries. It was while we were occupying this 
 house — that one night, every soul in that part of the city 
 was awakened by appalling shrieks, and the rapid crash 
 of pistol shots, which in those days of huge flintlock 
 horse-pistols, were much louder than the feeble crack of a 
 modern revolver. 
 
 When morning came — and it was as fair a Sunday 
 morning, as ever dawned — we heard all about the dread- 
 
 97 
 
ful tragedy that had occurred but a few doors from our 
 house. I relate it here, because it illustrates the charac- 
 ter of some of the European colony at Smyrna. There 
 dwelt in that city a well-known Italian of wealth. He 
 was an importer of maccaroni and other Italian edibles — 
 and so far as the public was aware, he enjoyed a good re- 
 pute. On the Saturday evening when this event took 
 place he gave a handsome entertainment to some of his 
 friends. While the banquet was at its height, and the 
 wine was flowing freely, and the merry guests were toast- 
 ing the bejeweled charms of the fair hostess, his wife, 
 word was whispered in the ear of the host that someone 
 desired to speak with him a moment. He stepped into the 
 ante-room, and instantly returned to request the com- 
 pany to excuse him for half an hour, as he was unex- 
 pectedly summoned to attend to an item of business, a 
 mere trifle that would detain him a brief half hour. Turn- 
 ing to Madame, he added that he was sure that la signora 
 would do her best to entertain their guests during his ab- 
 sence. 
 
 Passing to his own room, the merchant donned a busi- 
 ness suit, armed himself, threw a Spanish cloak over his 
 shoulders, and hastened to the Marino gate of the court 
 or Khan which enclosed the office and magazine of the 
 Austrian consulate. Tapping lightly he was softly ad- 
 mitted into the court where five confederates were waiting 
 for him. Evidently there was a seventh who was missing. 
 They were all armed. Without waiting for the seventh, 
 although disturbed by his absence, they proceeded, under 
 cover of the dense shadow of the court, to the office of 
 the consulate, unlocked the iron door with a false key, 
 and immediately laid hold of a massive chest containing 
 
 98 
 
many thousands in gold that was to be shipped Monda}' 
 on the steamer. The chest was heavy, but the confeder- 
 ates managed to lift it into the court without perceptible 
 sound, and carry it almost to the gate whence they pro- 
 posed to put it on board a stout boat waiting in the 
 shadow of the pier close at hand. At that moment a troop 
 of Zaptichs or police officers armed to the teeth, to- 
 gether with the porters of the court, sprang on them as it 
 were out of the ground. These guards had been waiting 
 there since early in the evening. A horrible battle en- 
 sued. But the robbers were taken by surprise, and al- 
 though fighting desperately were overpowered by num- 
 bers, and in a short time were massacred to the last man. 
 
 All of the following day, the six corpses, hacked and 
 mangled almost out of shape and recognition, lay stark 
 naked in a row, on the pavement of Frank street, a 
 ghastly exhibition for the gaping crowds. 
 
 This was not the only instance of men of means and 
 apparent respectability, who at that time were in 
 league with bands of miscreants in Smyrna. Brigandage 
 broke out in the neighborhood of that city soon after the 
 incident just narrated, and extended its operations by 
 means of confederates into the very heart of Smyrna. 
 Wealth}^ residents received anonymous letters, which it 
 was useless to disregard, demanding sums of money to 
 be left at a specified place, at a certain hour. To attempt 
 to have officers on hand to watch or seize the scoundrels 
 was also worse than useless as it would simply lead to the 
 assassination of anyone who resisted the demand in such 
 manner. The regular brigands were, of course, all Chris- 
 tians, raked together, from the scum of the Levant, in- 
 cluding some mountaineers, several of them had some 
 
 99 
 
education, but all were drawn together by desperate for- 
 tunes. 
 
 One day Mr. Richard Van Lennep, the Dutch vice con- 
 sul general, was seized at the very gate of his grounds 
 and whisked off to the mountains where he was held until 
 the ransom of 65,000 piastres was paid. This capture 
 created an uproar from all Smyrna, and his thrilling ac- 
 count on his return home of his sojourn in the brigand's 
 stronghold, produced a prodigious impression on my 
 youthful fancy. The Turkish government refunded the 
 ransom, I believe, and the Sultan sent Mr. Van Lennep a 
 superb gold snuff-box, set with diamonds, as a salvo to 
 his feelings. 
 
 From motives of self-interest the Smyrna brigands al- 
 lowed no deviation from their code of blood and iron. As 
 Christians they would admit no Mussulmans into their 
 fraternity, and therefore when Yami Katchiky joined them 
 with a young Turkish girl and her mother, who had 
 robbed and murdered their husband and father, they 
 forced him to slaughter the women before they would ad- 
 mit him to fellowship. Nerved by such an imitation 
 Yami, eventually worked his way to the chieftainship. 
 In the same way every agreement or threat made to a pris- 
 oner was carried out to the letter. If the ransom money 
 arrived at the appointed time he was instantly released. 
 If there was delay, one ear was sent to the family, with 
 the limit of time stated before the other ear or the head 
 followed. If the brigands were captured they were 
 executed, generally by hanging from the eaves of a house 
 in some prominent place. I remember how startled I 
 was one day to see the body of one of them suspended in 
 
 100 
 
that wa}^, near the gate leading from the Yaliathika into 
 the bazaars. 
 
 My seven years of Hfe in Smyrna were full of interest. 
 Aside from the earthquakes, the insubordinate character 
 of the various peoples, the great variety of the Levantine 
 colonists, the numerous sailing craft that swarmed in the 
 port, the picturesque brigands who imperiled the neigh- 
 borhood, and especially the rare loveliness of the scenery, 
 all gave infinite attraction to my days in Eastern Asia 
 Minor. Chief perhaps, among these, I recall my two 
 months in the superb Island of Scio and the vivacity of 
 the little newspaper called The Smyrna Star. These de- 
 tails, however, would be unattractive probably to most of 
 my readers — hence I turn my face to Constantinople, 
 whither my parents were now directed to move, by the 
 American Board. 
 
 101 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 CONSTANTINOPLE . 
 
 Ix 1853 my father and his family were transferred 
 from Smyrna to Constantinople, an event of decided im- 
 portance to me. A considerable colony of missionaries 
 lived there, including of course, numerous sons and daugh- 
 ters, all of which proved of great interest, although less 
 to me than it would have been to some missionaries' sons ; 
 for I was less in sympathy with the missionary Avork than 
 my companions. Why this was so, I cannot tell, unless 
 it be because of a decided difference of temperament. But 
 on the other hand, I was very soon almost intoxicated by 
 the inexhaustible and bewildering beauty of the Bos- 
 phorus and the Golden Horn. How can I ever forget 
 the effect of those scenes on my young imagination, 
 just beginning to expand and to respond with fervor to 
 whatever appealed to the eye and the senses. How shall I 
 ever forget the impression then made of the picturesque- 
 ness of the groups thronging the streets, the floating 
 bridges and the wharves ; the curious rigs of the swarm- 
 ing coasters ; the artistic bits that met the eye at every 
 turn ; the legend-haunted towers and battlements and the 
 forest of gilded, tapering minarets ; the carved caiques 
 skimming like swallows over the turquoise colored waters 
 
 102 
 
of the port, the superb coloring of sky and sea and toAvn: 
 the barbaric splendor of the court-pageants ; the en- 
 trancing and voluptuous charms of the Circassian women 
 thinly veiled by gauzy yashmaks, the piquant beauty of 
 the Periote girls combining the traits of Hellenic and 
 Latin races, and the wealth of historic associations that 
 pervaded every nook and corner, like the subtle perfumes 
 lingering about a lady's boudoir after she has left 
 for tlie ball; it hovered over the domes of the imperial 
 city like the lavish glory of the setting sun fading into 
 night. Such were the objects, the scenes, that fired my 
 young enthusiasm and captured my heart forever. 
 
 It was at that critical juncture of my life that another 
 of those decisive incidents occurred, which have a distinct 
 influence in shaping one's course in later years. I had 
 begun sketching with pencil and chalk up to the time of 
 leaving Smyrna. But I had reached a point where a thor- 
 ough discipline in the rudiments of art practice had be- 
 come indispensable, otherwise, probably, I should have 
 become irretrievably mannered, have lost interest, and 
 entirel}' abandoned the pencil. One of the first things I 
 asked of my father, therefore, on reaching Constantinople, 
 was to find me a good drawing master, if such there was 
 in the place. As it happened there were several good ar- 
 tists then in that city, who executed excellent sketches of 
 local scenery and genre which they often lithographed. 
 Prominent among them were Schranz and Presiozzi. But 
 by far the best artist for my purpose at Constantinople 
 was a young Italian belonging to the Frank colony of the 
 European c^uarter, called Pera (or the Beyond,) by the 
 old time Byzantines and still known as such. His name 
 was Carlo Brindesi. He was a master in perspecjtive, pen- 
 
 103 
 
cil drawing, fresco and aquarelle. For appreciating the 
 essence of the picturesque, and suggesting it with a few 
 telling strokes of the pencil or brush, whether an old 
 building or a figure I have never seen his superior. If he 
 had settled in Paris instead of in his native city I am sure 
 that Brindesi could have achieved a fame approaching 
 that of Fortuny whose style he suggested. As it was, he 
 preferred to remain at Constantinople, and accumulate a 
 fortune by dashing off telling bits of genre in water color 
 which he sold to tourists for good prices. His power of 
 production was great, and while he had all the avidity of 
 a Levantine, he also took enthusiastic pleasure in his work, 
 like the true artist that he was. No one could be more 
 faithful and thorough as a teacher than Brindesi. He 
 often made me copy a drawing several times, and he did 
 not hesitate to slash and criticise; but he also gave judi- 
 cious praise when deserved. This is an excellent quality 
 not only when imparting instruction, but in every depart- 
 ment of effort. Appreciation or praise judiciously but 
 heartily bestowed usually does more good than harsh or in- 
 discriminate ^ensure or cold, sullen assent. This fact is 
 often forgotten even by well meaning people who by with- 
 holding a kind, encouraging word at the right time do 
 more harm than good. Several of Brindesi's methods were 
 unusually valuable, and I often thought they might be fol- 
 lowed profitably in some of our schools. He insisted, for 
 example, on my using only one pencil, and that a soft No. 
 1 of prime quality, both for drawing outline and for every 
 variation of finish and shading. The degrees of accentua- 
 tion were to be expressed by graduating the pressure and 
 often sharpening the pencil. He insisted that only in this 
 way could one represent an even tone and gain full ffexi- 
 
 104 
 
bility of the fingers and wrist, and hence complete sup- 
 port between hand and brain ; that the fewer mediums 
 one uses the larger his reserve force. He was entirely 
 right. I have proved it by considerable experience both 
 with pencil and brush. I followed this principle when I 
 took up oil painting at a later period, and have always 
 set my palette with fewer colors than most artists, and have 
 confined myself to fewer brushes. This method has been 
 advantageous at least to me. I do not speak for other 
 artists; each, if true to himself, must practice his own 
 method and style. Another of Brindesi's methods, which 
 is only possible when the master has but two or three 
 pupils in the class to copy the same drawings, was to draw 
 the model picture in the pupil's presence. Having seen 
 how the drawing was executed, the pupil was then to copy 
 the style as well as the subject. This required devotion 
 and patience on the part of the master, while for an ad- 
 vanced student it would be undesirable, as tending to 
 check the initiative, the originality of expression, of the 
 would-be professional artist. But up to a certain point, 
 nothing could give the .pupil a clearer perception of art 
 methods than such a plan. Few teachers of art, however, 
 have the facility or inclination to follow this practice. 
 Whether Brindcsi employed it with other pupils I am not 
 aware. But I do know that he liked my severe applica- 
 tion and enthusiasm, and foretold my success, if I should 
 devote myself to art as a profession. He advised me to 
 go to Rome or preferably to Paris, which I ought to have 
 done. Sometimes Brindesi showed his friendly interest 
 in me by inviting me to a stroll in the outskirts of the city, 
 pointing out the picturesque effects and suggesting how I 
 should draw them. Full of the galliard spirit of early 
 
 105 
 
manhood and conceited like a true Levantine, he yet never 
 lost sight of his art, which he loved with all his heart. He 
 was an ideal instructor to whom I owe a lasting debt of 
 gratitude, as to one whose influence in shaping my intel- 
 lectual tendencies was among the very first. I studied 
 with him over two years steadily, and when I left him had 
 become well grounded in pencil drawing, with a fair knowl- 
 edge of linear perspective, I had considerable notion of 
 the principles of light and shade, and had made a fair be- 
 ginning in aquarelle. 
 
 Water colors have never altogether satisfied me. If 
 one intends to paint only sketchy effects of color or 
 rapid studies, of course nothing can be more brilliant or 
 telling than a pure wash. But if one desires to represent 
 power, depth, and subtlety, sucli as the movement of great 
 billows in a sea storm, then oil colors are the medium that 
 most appeals to me. Impressed instinctively by this feel- 
 ing, during my last year at Constantinople I found my 
 way to the studio of a French painter in oils, Favier 
 by name. He was a short, elderly man, with ruddy com- 
 plexion, blue eyes, whose fire kindled when he spoke of 
 his art, and iron grey hair, mustache and imperial, hav- 
 ing a somewhat military aspect. He received me, although 
 a mere youth and a total stranger, with urbanity^ was in- 
 terested to learn of my artistic aspirations, and seemed 
 to take it as a compliment that I should visit his studio. 
 He talked freely to me of the art of painting in oil, showed 
 me the canvases attached against the wall, and spoke of 
 them with mingled pride and pathos as children of his 
 heart which a busy, capricious public has not yet learned 
 to appreciate. "Mais que voulez vous. Monsieur; c'est 
 le bun Dieu qui arrange le sort de chacun," he said, with 
 
 106 
 
u shrug of the shoulder. He invited me to call again, 
 which I did repeatedly, finding great fascination in that 
 dingy, cob-webbed studio on the hill of Pera, near the 
 Russian legation, and overlooking the entrance to the 
 Bosphorus, I have often harked back to that little known 
 artist, who represented a character that Hawthorne would 
 have lovingly portrayed with his quaint and inimitable 
 pen, one of the multitude of artists and writers whose 
 taste and ambition have exceeded their talents or their luck, 
 but who have still plodded on until old age, loving their 
 pursuits, and nourishing in their bosoms a tiny spark of 
 hope. 
 
 I contrived out of my little savings to buy from this 
 artist a canvas, a palette, and some oil colors and brushes. 
 An easel I made in secret, and in secret began to paint a 
 composition representing the ill-fated steamer San Fran- 
 cisco fighting her last battle with the storms, a subject 
 about which I also wrote a poem at the same time. I 
 painted privately because I wished to be sure of myself 
 before incurring criticism or censure for neglecting my 
 other studies. But scarcely had I finished my first can- 
 vas when my father's death occurred, and years passed 
 ere I attempted again to paint in oil colors. 
 
 It is a curious fact illustrating how difficult it is to turn 
 a vigorous mind from its natural bent, that although 
 Brindesi's instruction was wholly in linear and aerial per- 
 spective and landscape was subordinate figures thrown in, 
 and although I was completely captivated by the pic- 
 turesque scenes about me, and often sketched them with 
 great care, and although I had some faculty for seizing 
 a likeness, yet whenever I undertook an imaginary scene 
 
 107 
 
it was almost invariably about ships and the sea. And so 
 it has been all through life. 
 
 After the opening of the Crimean war I sent a number 
 of drawings to the Illustrated London News, represent- 
 ing scenes connected with the marine operations of that 
 conflict. They were accepted and published. Alone with 
 a Turkish boatman, I skirmished about the Bosphorous 
 and stored my memory and my sketch book with many 
 interesting and attractive scenes. On one occasion, in 
 my seventeenth year, I followed the example of so many 
 newspaper illustrators, and sent to the London Il- 
 lustrated News an "original" drawing of the wreck of 
 an Egyptian Line of battleship on the coast of the Black 
 Sea. It was a wild night scene, the doomed vessel in the 
 foreground, her spars partly gone and her foresail flying 
 in the gale as she plunged madly towards the breakers. 
 The picture received the place of honor on the first page 
 of the paper. I well remember my father's delight. I was 
 busy in my room, turning over my "Liddell and Scott," 
 when I heard him stepping quickly across the hall. The 
 next moment he entered the door, his face beaming and 
 holding out to me the Illustrated News which had just 
 arrived by mail. I am sure that he was more elated than 
 I. 
 
 Strange to say, when I intimated to my father that I 
 wished to become a professional artist, devoting all my 
 energies to that pursuit, he kindly but strenuously op- 
 posed my plan. The singular fact in this case was, that 
 my father acknowledged that I had a distinct turn in that 
 direction and that he had given me every opportunity 
 available to emphasize it, even to drawing on his pros- 
 pective patrimony to pay for my art instruction. But it 
 
 108 
 
seems that he had merely intended it as an accompKsh- 
 ment to enlarge my mental scope and add to my happiness. 
 He knew little about the condition of art in America ex- 
 cept that it had yet to win solid achievement and recog- 
 nition, in other branches than portraiture for which I 
 had less inclination. To send me to encounter the temp- 
 tations of Paris was beyond his own intentions and means. 
 It was his cherished wish that I should enter college, 
 where both he and my grandmother hoped that I might 
 be influenced to study for the ministry and become a mis- 
 sionary, but this phase of the question he discretely re- 
 frained from pressing. Possibly he already discerned 
 what I had always felt, that that was the very last vocation 
 for which I was fitted. Then I urged him to allow me to 
 go to sea or to enter the naval academy. A sea life or 
 the life of a sea painter was what I desired then with more 
 urgency than anything I have ever wanted to do. But 
 they both felt so earnestly on the subject, that after ser- 
 ious deliberation I agreed to enter college, with a saving 
 clause that I should follow my own choice of occupation 
 after graduation. I was seventeen at the time of this de- 
 cision and it was settled that I should shortly proceed to 
 \merica and enter college. Having formed a definite 
 resolution, I wasted no vain regrets on the subject, but 
 with a sort of fatalism decided to do my best, and leave 
 the opportunities or results to destiny. Even at that 
 early age I began dimly to perceive that man's so-called 
 free agency is a fond delusion. His fate depends largely 
 on causes outside of his volition and power, although the 
 theory of free agency may serve to encourage him to per- 
 severe, from his sense of individualism. 
 
 109 
 
One of the best instructors I ever had was Madame 
 Brun, wlio gave me considerable advancement in French, 
 at Constantinople. She conversed admirably, and I 
 learned in that way as much as by exercises and text 
 books. She had lived in Russia and Poland, and the facts 
 she gave me about the Russian government and the rela- 
 tion of nobles and serfs did much to enlighten me at 
 the time of the approach of the Crimean war; this in- 
 fluence was likewise of assistance to me, along with other 
 clues, for arriving at the practical knowledge of Russian 
 character and policy, which proved useful to me when I 
 had official dealings with Russian diplomats at a later da}'. 
 
 The missionary colony at Constantinople was dis- 
 tributed over three districts, of which one was in the 
 European-Greco quarter called Pera ; another in the Ar- 
 mcno-Jewish suburb of Hasskeuy, and the third at Bebek, 
 one of the most exquisite spots on the face of the globe. 
 The year before we left the East a lodgment was also 
 effected in Yeni Kapoo, the Armenian quarter of the old 
 city within the walls, hitherto closed to European resi- 
 dents. It was the custom of the American missionaries to 
 hold what was called a station meeting every Saturday at 
 some one of these places to discuss business and advise re- 
 garding their Christian labors. The families generally ac- 
 companied them. We went sometimes in arabas or cur- 
 ious native coaches drawn by oxen and long since extinct, 
 squatting on the mattress spread over the floor as people 
 go when taking what is called a straw-ride in New Eng- 
 land, But generally we preferred the fleet Constantinople 
 wherries called caiques; they were rowed by athletic oars- 
 men whose costume consisted of a white intermixed silk 
 and cotton shirt open at the neck and bosom, and with 
 
 110 
 
loose flowing sleeves which exposed the brawny arm. The 
 leg was bare below the full white breeches which reached 
 to the knee. The rich sunbrown of the skin, the grey or 
 black mustache, the scarlet fez and blue tassel, the varie- 
 gated silk girdle and the red shoes added harmonious notes 
 of color in keeping with the vivid tints of sea, sky and 
 landscape, and the black hue and gilded carving of the 
 boat, the tout ensemble presenting an unsurpassed effect 
 of physical manhood decorated with consummate, even if 
 unconscious artistic result. Thus we skimmed by garden, 
 tower, and town, minaret, C3'press, grave, kiosk and palace 
 between the romantic shores of the Bosphorus, so com- 
 posed by nature that never was it seen in its whole extent, 
 but the eye was carried from point to point, and the fancy 
 was ever stimulated by reaching out to what was beyond. 
 Art can no farther go than to kindle enthusiasm and 
 quicken imaginative curiosity by the supreme power of 
 suggestion. 
 
 Sometimes with my brother and two companions of 
 our age, who were especially associated with us in active 
 sports, I walked to Bebek on the occasions mentioned 
 above. We followed the string of villages that skirted 
 the shore. The distance there and back was ten miles. 
 We carried short, stout clubs to defend ourselves against 
 the famous groups of dogs that often lay in the middle 
 of the street at cross-ways, or prowled about the meat 
 shops. Singly they were not dangerous, being a low- 
 down lot of curs, but a dozen flying at us at once, re- 
 quired us to bestir ourselves. We were liable also to be 
 insulted or have stones thrown at us, for we were "Frang- 
 his^' or foreign devils. As we went about metaphorically 
 speaking, with chips on our shoulders, somewhat rash, 
 
 111 
 
haughty and proud of being Yankees, it is a wonder that 
 we never met with any serious adventure. When I look 
 back to my life in the East, I am amazed at the immunity 
 we enjoyed, and the general good nature and courtesy of 
 the natives, and especially the Turks, who certainly had 
 no reason to love Christians or Europeans. 
 
 Once a year the annual meeting of the missionaries of 
 the American Board resident in Turkey was held at Con- 
 stantinople. Of course all could not come the same year, 
 but they alternated in representing the stations. As 
 their families usually accompanied the delegates, these 
 occasions served for a change and perhaps a rest. On 
 reaching the capital the delegates were quartered on the 
 resident missionary families. These visits lasted two or 
 three weeks. They were enjoyable to the young people 
 whose companionship in a foreign land, especially in the 
 interior of Turkey, was limited, while their school books 
 were closed for the time being. But my impression is, 
 that these occasions made a large draught on the stor- 
 age of Christian feeling, brotherly love and physical 
 strength of their elders. The services were conducted 
 with a melancholy fervor that seemed to suggest the com- 
 plete isolation of the missionary community in a distant, 
 foreign land. 
 
 I remember that on one occasion Dr. Schauffler, after 
 some very affecting words, paused, looking over his au- 
 dience with dread solemnity, said, "My brethren and 
 sisters, we too may say, like the old Guard when sum- 
 moned to yield, we too may exclaim, that whatever betide 
 us, 'The Old Guard dies ; the Old Guard never surren- 
 ders !" To them, all the teeming millions about them 
 were proceeding with headlong speed to eternal suffering 
 
 112 
 
and damnation, and how few had been gathered into the 
 fold of salvation. If they could but have seen their 
 position, as we see it, how their souls would have rejoiced! 
 Although the ninnber of genuine converts to the faith 
 taught by American missionaries was yet small compared 
 with the total population of the Turkish empire, 
 the net result was important in view of the fact that 
 the men and women who had first broken ground there 
 were still living in the full enjoyment of their powers. 
 The converts not only numbered thousands already but 
 Avere sufficiently numerous, intelligent and influential to be 
 formed into a separate community like that of the Greeks 
 and Armenians, represented at the Grand Porte by an of- 
 ficial head who cared for their secular and religious rights. 
 But far more than this, the missionaries had sown the fields 
 with seed that they forgot required ages to produce full 
 crops, but which could not result in crops unless first it 
 be sown. In the evolution of religious thought during 
 the last half century, it is now generally considered that 
 men here and hereafter are to be weighed and tried by a 
 common standard, to wit that they are estimated by the 
 degree in which they endeavor to do their duty according 
 to their environment, according to the conscience pro- 
 duced by that environment. If this conclusion be sound 
 the highest result so far reached by the missionary enter- 
 prise it would seem, has been to stimulate altruism and 
 thus to enlarge the standard of ethical or spiritual ef- 
 fort among our own people — and this is no small gain. 
 
 To descend from important to unimportant matters, I 
 ma}' add that the work of the mission, and especially the 
 annual meetings, were advantageous to me both pe- 
 cuniarily, and because they stimulated habits of careful 
 
 113 
 
application. Many of the missionary documents required 
 to be copied. There were no typewriters at that time; 
 and these papers were turned over to me. I did the work 
 for much less than an adult, but the sum total was of 
 material value to a youth who had so little spending 
 money. Envelopes were just beginning to be used. Ob- 
 taining samples here and there, I laid them on a sheet of 
 paper and drew the outline around them. This I cut 
 out with scissors, folded and pasted. I sold such rough 
 and ready envelopes among the missionaries and the Eng- 
 lish, and so added to my savings that at sixteen I bought 
 myself a brand, new, silver, hunting watch, hand made of 
 course, which did good service until it was picked out of 
 my brother's pocket while he was absorbed gazing at a 
 picture in a window on Broadway, New York, just before 
 he was commissioned for the Civil War. 
 
 Our house was situated in the heart of Pera, opposite 
 the grounds of the British embassy. It was two stor- 
 ies above the ground floor, the latter of stone being de- 
 voted to the kitchen, stable and offices. The two upper 
 stories were of wood; above them was a large attic. 
 There was a small backyard, and the cellar, which was 
 closed with windows, leading to a flight of stone stairs 
 damp with mould, was intended for the storage of fur- 
 niture in case of fires, for which Constantinople was 
 famous. 
 
 The Board paid part of the house rent as the greater 
 portion of the second floor was used as a chapel, the par- 
 titions being removed. Armenian, Greek and English 
 services were held there every Sabbath. 
 
 We met many people of distinction during our resi- 
 dence at Constantinople. The proportion of American 
 
 114 
 
tourists who visited the East in those days was larger 
 than it is now, partly because Algeria, Sweden and Nor- 
 way, Japan and other now oft visited regions, had not yet 
 filled the popular eye, while the enthusiasm aroused by the 
 Greek Revolution and the poetry of Lord Byron had not 
 altogether waned. There was no one who visited our 
 house at that time whom I remember more vividly than 
 General Williams, the celebrated defender and hero of 
 Kars. He was a typical English soldier, tall, squarely 
 built, erect, with a sort of leonine aspect in his bearing, 
 yet modest withal. His keen blue eye was frank and hon- 
 est, his florid complexion was mellowed by exposure and 
 emphasized by a trim, iron grey mustache, and his reso- 
 nant voice was full and hearty. Altogether General Wil- 
 liams seemed a man who could be gentle to his friends, 
 and terrible to his enemies. The illustrious Sir Strat- 
 ford Canning, later Lord Stratford de Redclyffe, was at 
 that time British ambassador near the Grand Porte, one 
 of the few diplomats who have thoroughly penetrated and 
 understood Russia's unscrupulous and devious policy, or 
 rather her undeviating deviovisness, and never flinched 
 from his duty of resisting her plans for panslavic exten- 
 sion. I saw him often and recollect him as of spare habit 
 and pale, but masterful features, a nervous manner, and 
 quick, incisive speech. It is said that he not rarely swore 
 abundantly Avhen his rage was aroused. Of this I have 
 no personal knowledge, but I did see him preside with im- 
 pressive dignity at a memorable meeting convened at Mis- 
 seri's hotel for prayer and conference by the missionar- 
 ies, the Protestant members of the diplomatic corps, and 
 other residents at Constantinople during the Crimean 
 War. ^Nlanv of them felt with sound reason that one of 
 
 115 
 
Russia's aims in forcing the war on Turkey was to check 
 the progress of the missionary work, which would tend to 
 liberalize thought and religion in a country she herself 
 proposed to absorb in good time. 
 
 The Crimean War broke out in 1853. I do not propose 
 to go into the origin and causes of that war; the miserable 
 business of the Holy Places in which Christian nations 
 display the childish and pitifully human side of the majes- 
 tic creed they profess, nor to narrate the chicanery, ar- 
 rogance and duplicity by which, under the guise of re- 
 ligious zeal, the Czar of Holy Russia proposed to gain 
 the whip hand in the control of the Turkish empire; nor 
 would I describe the events of the great war that followed. 
 But I may narrate here as succinctly as may be some of 
 the characteristic incidents that came under my own ob- 
 servation. 
 
 I well remember the day, in May of 1853, when Prince 
 Menschikof, the fiery and haughty envoy of Russia, 
 took his departure from Constantinople, baffled in his mad 
 attempt to bully the Sultan into making a new treaty in 
 time of peace, and practically abandoning to the sov- 
 ereignty of the Czar, the Greek subjects of Turkey, legally 
 subjects although members of the Greco-Russian church, 
 as legally the subjects of the Moslem as the Cossacks were 
 subjects of the Muskovite. The courageous firmness of 
 the Turk, which has so often stood him in good stead, 
 backed in this case by the astute firmness of Sir Strat- 
 ford Canning, thwarted the treacherous designs of the 
 Slav, and out of mortified pride, issued war. The pal- 
 ace of the Russian embassy was a pillared pile of yellow 
 stone situated on the Grand Rue de Pcra, and on the brow 
 of the steep slope commanding from the rear windows a 
 
 116 
 
supei'b view of the Bosphorus and the Golden Horn, the 
 Seraglio Point, St. Sophia, and the Sea of Marmora be- 
 yond. It was one of the first objects to meet the eye as 
 one entered the port. The grounds were protected on the 
 street side by a high iron fence with gilded gates sur- 
 mounted by the two-headed eagle of Russia. (Thirty 
 years after that day I passed through those gates to call 
 on the Russian ambassador when I in turn was on the way 
 to establish the United States legation in Persia.) 
 
 ^Menschikof departed in a towering rage. His diplo- 
 macy was discredited, and he demanded his passports, 
 ordered his carriage, and went aboard the Russian steamer 
 with the entire suite of the embassy. A dense crowd 
 packed the Grand Rue de Pera, and every window was 
 filled with eager faces, when the colossal descendant of all 
 the Menschikofs issued from the embassy and strode to 
 the coachi The coachman cracked his whip, a cloud of 
 uniformed outriders followed, and the iron gates snapped 
 together with a clang that was soon to be echoed back 
 by the roar of guns on the Euxine and the Danube. 
 
 It was not long before news began to come from the 
 northern frontiers, where the Turks were making heroic 
 efforts to resist the advance of the Russian armies. The 
 greatest excitement prevailed at Constantinople ; but ad- 
 mirable order was preserved, notwithstanding that the 
 fanaticism of the ^Moslem and Christian populations might 
 have been expected to lead to bloody collisions. But the 
 latter for once showed the good sense to keep their relig- 
 ious passions from effervescing, while the former were en- 
 joined by the authorities to reserve display of their ardor 
 for the battlefield. Still, there was naturally a certain 
 explosive, volcanic quality in the atmosphere of which 
 
 117 
 
every one was apprehensive until the arrival of the allied 
 forces brought a sense of relief. When we consider the 
 wanton and perpetual intrigues and attacks to which the 
 integrity of the Turkish empire has been subjected for 
 centuries, the forbearance the Turks have usually shown 
 to the Christian populations must be admitted even by 
 those who can see only one side to the Turkish character, 
 rights and polity. For my part, I marvel at their general 
 good nature and moderation, and the greed and duplicity 
 of those who profess to be standard bearers of the Cross 
 and all that Christianity implies but does not always dis- 
 play. The unforewarned and treacherous destruction of 
 the Turkish fleet at Sinope by a far more powerful Rus- 
 sian force, and the slaughter of 4,000 Turks, produced a 
 tremendous sensation at Constantinople, and was quali- 
 fied to arouse a justifiable fury of the Moslems against 
 the Christians ; but not a soul was injured on that ac- 
 count. 
 
 This event, however, hastened the arrival of the war 
 fleets of France and England in the Bosphorus, followed 
 by transports bearing troops and munitions of war. 
 There is one fact connected with the Crimean invasion, 
 which I do not remember to have seen mentioned by any 
 of its historians. This was its theatric character. King- 
 lake, partly an eye-witness, practically exhausted the dip- 
 lomatic and military aspects of the subject with his mar- 
 velously analytical style and his minutely detailed de- 
 scriptions of scenes, persons and events, but what King- 
 lake failed to give, was a broad, vivid sketch of that war 
 in its entirety, an impression of the conflict as seen in 
 the mass, rather than in detail. There have been but 
 few great wars of such concentrated efl'ect as that of the 
 
 118 
 
siege of Sebastopol ; as one who was on the spot, so to 
 speak, it was quite natural that it should appear to mj^ 
 young mind as unusual and stupendous. But as that 
 great movement has receded, and I am able to look at it 
 in its right perspective, and in the light of a maturer ex- 
 perience, and observation, I find that instead of losing, it 
 gains in relative magnitude, while the simplicity of its 
 plan enables the mind to grasp more readily the pictures- 
 queness of its details and the concentrated grandeur of 
 its operations. It exhibited certain features never ex- 
 hibited before or since, on such a colossal scale, and which 
 aided to make it vniique in the records of war. For ex- 
 ample, there have been many wars in which far mightier 
 hosts have been employed, and in which the fame of far 
 greater captains has been made or lost ; but none, at least 
 since the invasion of Xerxes, excepting, perhaps, the re- 
 cent war in South Africa, in which shipping was used on 
 such a vast plan (or was more vital to the prosecution of 
 the enterprise), and none in modern times in which by 
 common consent effort was, from the outset so com- 
 pletely and decisively directed to one point. From the 
 first, the eyes of the world were focused on Sebastopol. 
 It was like a desperate game in which both sides played 
 out their trump cards at the very beginning. At 
 Sebastopol, Russia massed the energy of her hosts ; to 
 Sebastopol the fleets of England, France, Italy and 
 Turkey bore the allied armies to concentrate their guns 
 on the vital spot, for two long terrible years to dig, to 
 fight, to suffer, to storm, and within the space of a few 
 miles to shape the destiny of Europe for ages. All the 
 other operations of the hostile powers in that war, the 
 l)ombardment of Odessa or the ports of the Baltic, the at- 
 
 119 
 
tack on Kertch, the siege of Kars, were mere side shows, 
 subsidiary episodes, in the great drama whose stage was 
 the Crimea, the chief character and victim was the Czar 
 Nicholas, crushed, broken-hearted, to the grave, and the 
 grand climax was the fall of Sebastopol. 
 
 The naval fortress of Sebastopol with its extensive 
 dockyard was of course created as a menace to Turkey. 
 The sailing ships of the Russian fleet on the Black Sea 
 could easily make the short distance to Constantinople in 
 two or three days with a fair wind, and, with or without 
 wind, dropping down the Bosphorus by the aid of the 
 swift, unremitting currents that shoot from the Euxine 
 to the Dardanelles. A few sailing line of battleships 
 would have placed the Turkish empire at the feet of Rus- 
 sia if it were not for apprehension of the fleets of the 
 powers. But it was quite otherwise with the allied fleets. 
 Sailing vessels going northward to the Black Sea cannot 
 breast the currents of the Bosphorus except with a strong 
 fair wind from the south. Hence, whenever the south 
 wind set in, vast white winged fleets of merchant men, aver- 
 aging 10,000 annually, were seen gliding through the 
 azure strait. It is plain that no such expedition as that 
 of the allies could have held together, or manoeuvred ef- 
 ficiently in concert, or even kept the army in supplies, if 
 they had been obliged to depend wholly on the capricious 
 breezes from the south. It was precisely at the period 
 shortly preceding this, that the priceless invention of 
 John Erickson of the screw-propellor began to be sup- 
 plied to men-of-war and merchant vessels of magnitude. 
 Economy of space and fuel were obtained by this means, 
 while during the early years of the use of the propellor 
 little or no change was made in the sail plan, and hence 
 
 120 
 
such magnificent steam transports as the Himalayah and 
 the Black Prince were about as imposing as simple sailing 
 vessels, and ships-of-war fitted with screws like the Aga- 
 memnon and the Jean Bart were still in appearance like 
 the old line of battleships. By the aid of these steamers 
 provided with steam power and b}^ smaller steam tugs, 
 the mighty fleets of the allies were able to stem the cur- 
 rents of the straits and reach the destination in tlie Euxine 
 Avithin measurable time and with calculable concert of 
 action. And what a spectacle it was to watch these ves- 
 sels, either under sail or their own steam or following the 
 tow line, moving day after day, and month after month, 
 over the blue waters of the Bosphorus, by castle, palace, 
 minaret, village or foliaged cliff, to the stormy waves of 
 the lowering Euxine and the bloody theatre of war. Mag- 
 nificent and imposing beyond anything one sees now in 
 our day were the gathering of stately line of battleships 
 with their triple rows of guns, or lithe, saucy frigates 
 anchored at Beycos on the Bosphorus. ]Many an hour, 
 spyglass in hand, did I watch these thrilling spectacles 
 from my, window, or, rowed by some picturesque Turk, in 
 a swift caique, among the anchored or moving fleets, and 
 hear the merry whistles of the boatswains which trilled 
 over the water like the music of birds, while the crews 
 practiced at the guns or swarmed aloft like bees. 
 
 In this soft atmosphere, the blending of the red of 
 the standards, the gleam of the bayonets, or the bur- 
 nished corselet of a cuirassier merged in an harmonious 
 pattern with the dazzling red and gold uniforms of the 
 chief officers, all made up to my boyish fancy a veil of 
 roseate gauze. The romance of war, never more em- 
 phatically displayed than at the review of Ranice Tchi- 
 
 J21 
 
flik, so soon alas ! to be transformed into the cruel heart- 
 rending tragedies of Inkerman and Balaklava. 
 
 The Turks looked on with calm surprise, except when 
 soldiers attacked their cherished customs or prejudices, 
 especially where women were concerned. - Two French 
 sailors approaching a native carriage on the bridge of 
 Galata, boldly raised the veil of the lady riding within 
 — no one may do this, with impunity, even if the woman 
 be a prostitute or the wife of the man who does it. The 
 two sailors were sabred on the spot, and no farther notice 
 was taken of the matter. Foreign ambassadors never in- 
 terfere in such cases. 
 
 One day an incident occurred that struck me like an 
 electric shock ; I seemed to see the great Napoleon in a 
 figure that rode past me on the narrow street. "Who is 
 that cavalier .f'" I asked impetuously of a soldier near by. 
 "Why! don't you know.^" he said, "that is Prince Napole- 
 on, cousin of the present Emperor, and nephew of the 
 great Napoleon." The lower features of the two were very 
 alike, and on horseback with the head covered, they might 
 easily have been mistaken for one another, but the young 
 Prince lacked the high, full, massive brow of his dis- 
 tinguished uncle. I saw at that time the famous "Scots 
 Greys," the cavalry regiment who participated in the 
 charge at Balaklava, and were immortalized by Tenny- 
 son in his lyric, "The Charge of the Light Brigade." 
 
 The large yellow quadrangle of barracks on the heights 
 of Scutari received many of the Crimean wounded, and 
 it was there that Florence Nightingale bestowed the 
 greater part of her ministrations. It was there that I saw 
 her ; as I remember her, she was a tall, slender, gracefully 
 formed, though rather flat-chested young woman. She 
 
 122 
 
was dressed in white, her brown hair arranged in smooth 
 bands over the temples and ears, the style of that period. 
 It suited her oval face which was comely and refined, yet 
 rather lacking in strength. To the casual observer, she 
 seemed a sweet, delicate, typical English lady, and it was 
 doubtless her Christian charity and desire to relieve suf- 
 fering that developed in her the force of character that 
 took one of her retiring disposition so far away among 
 strangers. As I remember her through the mists of the 
 past, flitting like some white angel through the long, dark 
 corridors of the Scutari Hospital, it is as though I saw 
 some sweet impersonation of the "spirit of self-abnega- 
 tion," rather than a being of flesh and blood. 
 
 While the allied army were in and about Constantinople 
 a great prayer meeting was held in the drawing-room of 
 the Misseres Hotel d' Angleterre. Many of the English 
 army soldiers belonged to a new sect called the "Plymouth 
 Brethren." They were earnest zealots, and were very 
 democratic in their religious affinities — they seem to me to 
 have been fore-runners in a way, of the Salvation Army. 
 They attended the missionary meetings, but meekness was 
 not an article of their creed, they were of the "Church 
 Militant" and argued warmly with the missionaries on 
 the error of their sectarianism, which seemed to me rich- 
 ness, considering all the circumstances. By Protestants, 
 generally, the religious aspects of the war were well under- 
 stood, viz. : the ever-recurring question of ownership or 
 disposal of the Holy Sepulchre and religious places at 
 Jerusalem. 
 
 About this time, perhaps to emulate the life of a sol- 
 dier, I began to train myself to Spartan discipline. I 
 poured a pail of ice-cold water over m^^self every morning, 
 
 123 
 
for two winters, in an open room, regardless of exposure. 
 I secretly took off the mattress and slept on the bare 
 boards of my bed, and by the way, I never slept better, 
 and I really believe the process (which my family objected 
 to) strengthened a tenacious, although yielding consti- 
 tution. 
 
 I was full of an enthusiasm and interest in life, and not 
 reserved in the expression of emotion ; a maturer experi- 
 ence has taught me that to disguise one's feelings under an 
 impassive exterior is sometimes the wisest policy. 
 
 Bebck is one of the most charming and romantic spots 
 in the world ! From the windows of our house, the Bos- 
 phorus, shut in by hills and promontories looked like a 
 lake. Opposite were the green groves skirting the heavenly 
 waters and the old castle of Asia. At one side was a vil- 
 lage, rising on steep terraces, and on the other side rose 
 the battlemented tower of the castle of Europe, rising 
 picturesquely above a group of cypresses. These two 
 castles were built by ]\Iahomet, preparatory to the cap- 
 ture of Constantinople. At that point was the bridge of 
 boats on which the army of Darius crossed from Asia 
 into Thrace. There was a charm about this beautiful 
 spot and our sweet family life together there, which was 
 soon to be rudely broken. Blow after blow descended 
 upon us. The idyllic life was shattered; we were, so to 
 speak, sent adrift to breast the billow's of destiny. Such 
 crises come to all! We are not choosers, and for happi- 
 ness we sometimes have to pay pawn-brokers' price ! If 
 there is "no cloud without its silver lining," it seems to 
 be equally true, there is no "silver lining" without a 
 shadow, correspondingly dark. 
 
 124 
 
Owing to the death of my beautiful sister, Mary, in 
 1854, my departure for America to enter college was post- 
 poned to the following year. About midsummer I accepted 
 an invitation to become the guest of Mr. and Mrs, Henry 
 Van Lennep, already mentioned in the previous chapter. 
 They were summering in a plain country farm house on 
 the Island of Prinkipo, one of the Princes Islands in 
 the Sea of Marmora. Whatever the cause I became aware 
 in a few days that I was on the eve of a severe illness and 
 hastened home. The physician, one of the best in Con- 
 stantinople, immediately ordered me to be leeched and bled. 
 This was done by a barber, who in the East, as in Europe 
 in the days of Gil Bias, was also half a surgeon. I am not 
 prepared to decide absolutely against the use of phle- 
 botomy, at least in such climates, although it is the fashion 
 now to condemn the letting of blood as a relic of bar- 
 barism. This remedy was tried on me, several times in 
 childhood and youth, for fevers and contusions, and not 
 only did I recover, but no ill results appeared to follow. 
 From the first, my case was pronounced critical. I be- 
 came so low that no one spoke in the house above a whis- 
 per. That was the symptom I remember as the most pain- 
 ful throughout my sickness — extreme sensitiveness to 
 noise. I was conscious throughout, but apathetic. And 
 yet, although apparently so free from pain, I was but a 
 hair breadth from the grave. I suppose this is often the 
 case Avith the sick. Those who have been rescued from 
 the clutch of the lion's paw have said that after the first 
 blow, dread of the fearful end that impended, seemed to 
 yield to a passive acceptance of doom. 
 
 My convalescence was slow. When able to be moved 
 I was laid on the divan bv the window where I could see 
 
 125 
 
the white winged vessels passing by. jMy mother read to 
 me, and they all ministered to my every want as to one 
 raised from the dead, for all hope had been abandoned. 
 As my strength returned I became aware of the sudden 
 unfolding of a new phase of my mind. Although my 
 course of reading had been multifarious, yet I had read 
 less poetry than other departments of literature, and 
 although appreciating Virgil when studying the Aeneid, 
 I had been practically indifferent to poetry, my sense for 
 beauty and the emotions it arouses having found vent 
 chiefly in an enthusiasm for pictorial art. But now I 
 found myself yearning to read and write poetry, and this 
 feeling first manifested itself in a curious way. There 
 was in Dr. Hamlin's parlor a copy of Scott's Rokehy, 
 handsomely bound and illustrated. I had amused myself 
 with looking at the engravings while listening to the^ music 
 of his fair daughters on the pia.no, but had felt no in- 
 clination to read the poem. But it was to read this very 
 poem that intense hunger now seized me, a hunger akin 
 to the convalescent's desire for food. Diffident of letting 
 my mother know of this newly awakened taste, I confided 
 my secret to one of my companions. He smuggled the 
 precious copy of Rohehy into my room, and I devoured 
 it on the sly, hiding it under my pillow whenever my 
 mother's footstep was heard. JMy bashfulness on the 
 subject was needless, for her poetic nature keenly sym- 
 pathized with mine when the secret at last came out. 
 That settled the matter. I devoured every book of poetry 
 I could lay hold of; and some very good poetry they had 
 in those days. Some of it may have gone out of fashion 
 with the more modern reader, as that of our day will in 
 turn be laid aside, but it was quite up to the best of today, 
 
 126 
 
perhaps better. Being then as now a wide liker, Milton, 
 Young, Cowper, Bryant, Southey, Burns, Campbell, 
 Byron, Coleridge, Keats, Hemans, Scott, Wordsworth, 
 Whittier, Longfellow, and Goethe, Schiller, Camoens in 
 translations, the Brownings, Tennyson, and many others 
 were read with the avidity with which one gathers the 
 glittering coin of a newly found treasure. Shakespeare 
 and the English dramatists I cared less for at that time 
 than for Homer, Euripides and Moliere. I grew up to a 
 fuller appreciation of him in later years, and still measure 
 my intellectual growth by gaining capacity to understand 
 and enjoy the works of that greatest mind in the realms of 
 literature, Homer and Dante completing the triad of 
 which Shakespeare is the head. Of the poets with whose 
 genius I became acquainted at that time and much of whose 
 work I still read with pleasure, Byron and Tennyson 
 maintain a specially strong hold on my fancy. The lat- 
 ter appeals to me in almost any mood as a thinker, a 
 poet, or a literary artist ; while the former carries me back 
 to the home of my childhood and youth. I am now able 
 to see the mere fustian of many of his verses. But they 
 contain a residuum of lofty merit that fires certain chords 
 in my nature, and the cantos of "Childe Harold" and 
 "Don Juan" relating to the Levant transport me back 
 to the Greece and Turkey of those years as does nothing 
 else that has ever been put in print. No one has equalled 
 Byron in the power to appreciate, and the genius to de- 
 scribe the picturesqueness, the fury, the languor, in the 
 life, scenery and character of those climes. His "Isles of 
 Greece" is an immortal epitome of the sentiments and 
 emotions they suggest; and his description of Haidee, and 
 especially of her grim sire Lambro, are amazingly truth- 
 
 127 
 
ful portraits of the people among whom my childhood was 
 passed. 
 
 The next phase of the awakening of the poetic in my 
 nature was a keen desire for its expression ; and I began 
 to scribble verses with a burning fervor that seemed to 
 indicate that this was destined to be my vocation. I would 
 spring from my bed in the middle of the night, strike a 
 light, and scratch off the lines that came to me almost 
 without effort. Between sketching and reading and writ- 
 ing poetry my brain was in a complete ferment. In one 
 pocket I carried a notebook for my crude effusions, and 
 in another a drawing book in whose pages to dash off a 
 picturesque bit of landscape or marine. Once on my feet 
 again, I seemed to have more than regained the vigor, 
 which in spite of my short stature, made me crave athletic 
 sports, for which I trained myself in a fervor to emulate 
 the Spartans. This was done in secret, but one morning 
 I forgot to replace the mattress, the secret was discovered, 
 and I was strictly enjoined to practice this heroic physical 
 training no more. 
 
 After our return to tlie city for the winter, I prepared 
 to leave for America in the spring, when our family was 
 overwhelmed by an irretrievable and apparently final sor- 
 row. Our house was unhealthy, owing to bad sewage, and 
 the gathering of stagnant water in the fire magazine or 
 cellar. Such matters were less understood at that time 
 than now ; and our long immunity from disease had blinded 
 us to the lurking perils that were gradually permeating 
 every corner of our house with pestilential air. We dis- 
 covered our mistake, a mistake born of ignorance, when 
 my dear father was struck down with typhus fever. Al- 
 though he had a strong constitution, this being his first 
 
 128 
 
serious illness, the physicians pronounced the case hope- 
 less from the outset, as the attack was very severe, and 
 his system had been sapped by a great strain for years, 
 and the reserve store of vitality had been exhausted. 
 He was conscious until within a few hours of his death, 
 and bade us all a calm, affectionate farewell. 
 
 Thus, on the 27th of January, 1855, at the early age 
 of forty-two, while still in the prime of his powers, passed 
 away one of the ablest and most useful missionaries ever 
 commissioned by the American Board. My early im- 
 pression of his character has been confirmed as I have 
 mingled with men and been able to compare him with 
 others who have achieved distinction. He had scholarly 
 tastes and acquired, besides the ancient classics, the Turk- 
 ish, French, Araienian and modern Greek languages. In 
 the two last he not only preached, but translated many 
 important works, such as Bunyan's "Pilgrim's Progress" 
 and Danbigne's "History of the Reformation." He had a 
 high spirit combined with great modesty, manly courage, 
 warm affections, artistic tastes, a fine ear for music, the 
 refined manners of a thorough gentleman, a well balanced 
 judgment, a keen knowledge of men, and infinite tact. 
 The career for which, in my opinion, he was fitted was 
 diplomacy. If he had been a native of England or France 
 he would have achieved position in that profession. For 
 the last years of his life an enormous burden of labor was 
 laid on his shoulders. The powers of no missionary in the 
 field were so taxed except Dr. Hamlin, who was made of 
 steel and could only exist by keeping his nerves at high 
 pressure. Although broken by chronic neuralgia and the 
 loss of his daughter, Mary, my father rarely retired be- 
 fore midnight, and was in his study again and resuming 
 
 129 
 
his pen after his private devotions, before breakfast. He 
 had on his hands at the same time the work of translation 
 and revision, the writing and preaching of sermons in 
 Greek, Armenian, and English, the editing of the "Ave- 
 daper," which he founded and which was the first Ar- 
 menian newspaper ever published ; and to crown all he 
 was the treasurer and shipper for the entire mission in 
 Turkey, which meant the keeping of books, the reduction 
 of exchange, and a vast amount of correspondence. After 
 his death this department was given to a lay missionary, 
 being alone sufficient to occupy the entire attention of one 
 capable man. My father's abilities are concisely but justly 
 stated in Allen's and Scott's American Biog. Encyclo- 
 paedia and elsewhere, viz. : Allen's Encyc. Amer. Biog., 
 Lamb's do., etc. 
 
 My mother decided to return with the remainder of 
 her family to America as soon as the preparations for 
 doing so, were complete. But I fell ill again with the 
 same disorder that had brought me so low the previous 
 summer. This attack was less severe; I was pronounced 
 out of danger in two weeks, and in another week was able 
 to be about again. Without further delay we took up our 
 quarters under the hospitable roof of Dr. Dwight while we 
 proceeded to dispose of our furniture and pack what we 
 reserved for the home voyage. Dr. Dwight had recently 
 moved to the Armenian quarters called Yeni Kapoo in 
 the old Byzantium or City proper, named by the Turks, 
 Stambul. Greeks and Armenians, subjects of the Porte, 
 had always been permitted to have their quarters there, 
 but this was the first time since the capture of Constan- 
 tinople in the 15th century, that any foreigner or Euro- 
 pean had been permitted to live within the walls of Stam- 
 
 130 
 
bul. For Dr. Dwiglit to do so, was an experiment desirable 
 in order to be in the heart of the most important Ar- 
 menian community in Turkey, but it is unlikely that 
 it would have been attempted then but for the Crimean 
 War and the presence of the Allies, which caused the 
 Turks to close their eyes on certain infractions of their 
 less important customs and prejudices. Dr. Dwight lived 
 miles from the Golden Horn, near the ancient battle- 
 mented walls that face the Marmora Sea. Almost every 
 day I passed from Dr. Dwight's to our house to see to 
 our preparations. I generally walked, but sometimes took 
 a horse part of the way. I had to traverse Stambul alone, 
 and thus obtained a better idea of that famous capital 
 than I could possibly have gained otherwise at that 
 period. 
 
 The day for our departure was not far distant when 
 my dear sister Margaret, about thirteen years old, was 
 obliged to take to her bed with the same dreadful fever of 
 which my father had died. The strength of her consti- 
 tution prolonged her illness and rendered her sufferings 
 very acute. She passed away at twilight. We were all 
 gathered around her bed as she breathed her last sigh. 
 At that instant a most appalling event occurred. A ter- 
 rible earthquake shook the city to its foundations. Its 
 violence may be inferred from the fact that the city of 
 Brusa seventy miles distant in an air line was partially 
 overthrown, and several hundred lives were lost, while an 
 earthquake wave rolled across the Sea of Marmora and 
 poured over the battlements of the city walls only a few 
 yards from the room where we were standing by the side 
 of my departed sister. In all my experiences I remember 
 no hour so dreadful. 
 
 131 
 
In less than one year my mother had lost her husband 
 and two beloved daughters. Her home was broken up, and 
 she was now to seek her fortunes in what had practically 
 become to her although the home-land, a strange land. 
 But this was no time to falter. Her Christian faith and 
 fortitude, which under the circumstances I was hardly 
 able to understand, and for which I still fail to find ade- 
 quate reason, was of the most exalted character. With a 
 sublime faith that all was as it should be, my mother bade 
 farewell to her friends at Constantinople, whose tender 
 ministrations in her hour of trial had increased her at- 
 tachment, and turned her face westward. 
 
 132 
 
YOUTH. 
 
 PART II. 
 
 Glad as the song the lark at daylight sings. 
 
 When soaring from the dew; 
 A roundelay of praise she flings. 
 
 From the sun-smitten blue. 
 
 Not always thus! at last arrived the day 
 
 When at my side there stood 
 A spirit form, not like her sisters gay. 
 
 But of a graver mood. 
 
 Low, were her accents, and her face austere. 
 She whispered "Youth has gone: 
 
 Manhood has come: and hush! for draweth near 
 The hour of sorroxo^s daxvn." 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 COLLEGE LIFE. 
 
 The death of my father and of my two sisters at Con- 
 stantinople, combined with the severe iHness I had myself 
 suffered, had given a shock to my nerves, and deepened 
 my native tendency to melancholy. This, for years, re- 
 quired indomitable resolution on my part to resist. 
 
 I still loved Constantinople, but it was a relief at that 
 time to find myself with my mother and surviving brother 
 and sister on board the French steamer Osiris bound for 
 Marseilles, and a new home in the West. I think my 
 mother was the first American missionary to take passage 
 to America from Turkey, by steamer, although few, if 
 any, have since preferred the slow sailing ship. The 
 lovely scenery en route and the romantic castles beheld in 
 our passage across France, with stops at Avignon, Lyons, 
 and other cities en route to Paris, were very enjoyable 
 and highly educational. Although too 3'oung to appre- 
 ciate all that I saw% still the hours spent at Notre Dame 
 and Versailles, and in the galleries of the Louvre, the 
 Luxembourg and the Salon, made useful impressions. I 
 was especially taken by the examples of the Dutch School, 
 and I remember with satisfaction that Da Vinci's im- 
 mortal "Mona Lisa" appealed especially to my artistic 
 
 135 
 
sense, and has led me to cherish the genius of that artist 
 with a permanent veneration. 
 
 We reached New York in June, and soon after I pre- 
 sented myself for admission to Williams College. In the 
 matter of the classics and general knowledge I was 
 promptly pronounced fitted for admission ; but I was 
 weak in mathematics and was advised to give it serious 
 attention during the summer vacation. I had expected 
 this. But it was unfortunate that my tutor was the best 
 mathematician in the graduating class, to whom that sub- 
 ject came so naturally that he could not see how one 
 could fail to understand a problem almost at sight, and 
 he found it hard to lower his explanations to my dull 
 mathematical perceptions. Hence I entered college quali- 
 fied to acquit myself creditably in some branches and un- 
 fitted by mental constitution and training for others, and 
 therefore unable to hope for the symmetrical average of 
 academic acquirement taught and expected in the Ameri- 
 can college of that period, and in many at this time. My 
 experience and training had been of such exceptional char- 
 acter that what I needed was a course of preparation and 
 intellectual effort altogether different than that of the 
 four years now before me at Williams. I realized this to 
 a certain degree. But having once resolved to carry out 
 the wishes of my dear father, I had abandoned all idea 
 of painting, and an academic course followed by some liter- 
 ary avocation seemed to be my destiny. Ceteris paribus. 
 it is also of value, even if one does not shine in his 
 classes, to have the four years of fun, discipline, or demo- 
 cratic intercourse with other minds, such as one can 
 hardly gather in any other way than by the college course. 
 Therefore, although my college life was of far less im- 
 
 136 
 
portance to me than it is to some, yet I would not lose 
 for anything some of my recollections at Williams. The 
 textbooks did me little good, but the general experience 
 was invaluable. Mr. William D. Howells once said to me 
 that one regret of his life was that he had never been 
 through college. Not, he was quick to add, because it 
 would have enabled him to write any better, but because 
 every college graduate, however obscure, had the advan- 
 tage of him in the possession of a fund of experience en- 
 tirely special and delightful, to be acquired in no other 
 way, and which made collegians a class by themselves. 
 
 I shall not soon forget the first meeting of the class 
 of '59, summoned after our initial recitations, to compare 
 notes, "size each other up," lay the foundations of an 
 esprit du corps, and suggest the lines on which we were to 
 maintain class prestige against all, and especially against 
 our natural enemies the sophomores. The occasion was 
 one of unusual interest to me, because it illustrated to a 
 remarkable degree the fact that there is no place where a 
 man finds his level so surely as in college. The oft quoted 
 adage tliat one is taken at his own estimate, that is, if he 
 holds his head high the world more readily accords him 
 credit, is only measurably true, like many other popular 
 maxims. It holds good only until the world has had op- 
 portunity to discover whether one's self valuation and 
 bearing, are borne out by actual merit, whether of brains, 
 money or station. A college is a microcosm whose mem- 
 bers are sufficiently mature to exercise, but with less re- 
 sponsibility, the passions, ambitions, shrewdness, mean- 
 ness, malice, duplicity or nobility of men in the larger 
 world outside. It is perhaps because of his youth and 
 that the comedy of college life is limited to four short 
 
 137 
 
years, that the young collegian more quickly reveals his 
 nature and ambitions, and for that reason is more quickly 
 diagnosed and placed at his true level. 
 
 I observed the proceedings of our first class meeting 
 therefore, with great interest and curiosity. The situa- 
 tion was entirely novel to me because I had studied chiefly 
 with tutors rather than in preparatory schools, and was 
 also quite unfamiliar with deliberate assemblies to which 
 every American youth early becomes accustomed. Being 
 diffident, it is likewise my habit, a habit I have carried 
 through life, to say but little or at least to be cautious 
 and non-committal, when with those of whose character or 
 mental calibre I was ignorant. Allowing them the initia- 
 tive, I would, as it were, draw their fire and ascertain our 
 relative strength. Having measured this I could then 
 either continue reserved, or could launch out in direc- 
 tions in which I felt myself to be equal or superior. In the 
 present instance I also perceived instinctively that my 
 position was especially anomalous, suggesting unusual 
 caution on my part. 
 
 J\Iy classmates had far more textbook drilling than I, 
 and a better knowledge of how things were done and what 
 opinions were popular in America. On the other hand 
 my general information was far greater than theirs, my 
 reading was larger and broader, and my mind was less 
 interested in what was local and concerned our immediate 
 environment, than in what concerned foreign questions and 
 the world at large. My tastes were more catholic, covered 
 a wider range. But I knew enough of human nature to be 
 aware that to intrude my own tastes or wider information 
 at that time would simply cause me to be misunderstood, 
 and my only course was to maintain silence, doing what- 
 
 1-68 
 
ever I had to Jo as well as possible, and leaving results 
 to take care of themselves. This resolution cost me very 
 little, for I was not then and never have been much 
 bothered by ambition. What I have really desired has 
 been to follow my tastes unmolested, unhindered, whether 
 for the sea, for art, literature, or sport. If anything 
 came of it, all right; if not, at least I had the personal 
 satisfaction as I went along. The honors of life have 
 from the first, seemed to me too uncertain, too evanescent, 
 to be made an end, and to money I was indifferent, except 
 as it became necessary as a means to an end. For these 
 reasons I can honestly say that I have never been jealous 
 of others who, without more ability perhaps, but with 
 greater energy and ambition, have outstripped me in 
 the race for wealth, influence and fame. 
 
 As matters turned out, my freshman year proved more 
 eventful for me than I had any reason to expect. It was 
 doubtless due. to extreme verdancy that I had the presump- 
 tion to aspire to become a contributor to the Williams 
 Quarterly. This was a serious, slightly heavy, but dignified 
 magazine, one of the first college periodicals as it also 
 continued to be one of the best until smothered in later 
 years by more pretentious, ephemeral, and "up-to-date" 
 rivals. The Quarterly was essentially an organ of the 
 upper classes, and was conducted by five editors selected 
 annually from the senior class. One of them was supposed 
 to manage the business end as publislier, while the others 
 edited in turn one of the four quarterly numbers. Two of 
 the editors in my freshman year were John J. Ingalls and 
 James A. Garfield. The former became a distinguished 
 member of the United States Senate, and the latter reached 
 the White House. They roomed together. Of course I 
 
 139 
 
was not at that time in the secret of the greatness that 
 destiny had in store for them, but at any rate they were 
 seniors and ranked among the leaders of intellectual 
 ability in college; this was enough to suggest great pru- 
 dence and circumspection on the part of a freshman in 
 approaching them. It was therefore with some trepida- 
 tion, that, without breathing a word to anyone of my 
 daring purpose, and actually in my first term freshman 
 year, I knocked one morning at the sanctum of the above 
 mentioned grave and august seniors. Garfield opened the 
 door. He was putting on a clean shirt and Ingalls was 
 shaving himself before the glass. Garfield, considering 
 his powerful physique and senioral rank, was affable, and 
 good naturedly invited me to enter, while Ingalls contented 
 himself with a cynical glance of scorn out of the corner 
 of his eye such as he employed with such withering force 
 on his political foes, in later years. I modestly declined 
 the invitation, apologized for intruding at such an hour, 
 and placed in Garfield's hand a poem which I desired to 
 submit for admission to the Williams Quarterly. Gar- 
 field took it politely without the common editorial observa- 
 tion that "they were just then overcrowded with matter, 
 and said this without prejudice to the merits of the ar- 
 ticle," and replied that he would carefully read my manu- 
 script. There was, however, a quizzical, half humorous 
 look in his eye, as of wonder at the assurance of a fresh- 
 man who so early ventured to invite inevitable rejection. 
 I thought no more of the matter, however, until the issue 
 of the next number of the Quarterly. To my surprise, the 
 entire piece, a poem of some 200 lines in blank verse, the 
 scene on the Bosphorous, was published, and I found 
 myself achieving an altogether unexpected prominence 
 
 140 
 
in the college. A review of the poem was read at a 
 meeting of the Philotechnian Society, and during the rest 
 of the course I think not a number of the Quarterly ap- 
 peared without one of my contributions. 
 
 Garfield, as is well known, entered college late and was 
 about twenty-seven when he graduated. He wore a 
 full brown beard, and not only looked but actually was, 
 more mature than most of his fellow collegians. This fact 
 alone, however, would not have sufficed to give him the 
 prominence he held while an undergraduate. His talents 
 and force of character made him easily a leader, whatever 
 his age. If he lacked at the outset, some of the educational 
 advantages of his classmates, which some consider essen- 
 tial, on the other hand his contact with exceptional phases 
 of life, had given him a power which told when, he applied 
 himself to his collegiate course. It is experience and ob- 
 servation no less than books that educate and rounrl out 
 the mind. Much stress has been laid on Garfield's unusual 
 scholarship. It was unusual, perhaps, to see an American 
 engaged in the political arena possessing much scholar- 
 ship for if our public men begin, with some smattering 
 of the classics and elegant literature, it is generally pretty 
 well rubbed off in the rough-and-tumble scramble by which 
 they reach congress or the White House. Garfield un- 
 doubtedly had a natural taste for such studies, but I 
 question whether he was entitled to be considered a scholar, 
 except by comparison with most of his political colleagues. 
 He simply did not have time either in war or in politics, 
 to carry his studies very far; and certainly the course at 
 Williams in those days was not qualified to make great 
 scholars, except in mental science. Garfield's reputation 
 and influence in college, so far as I remember, were chiefly 
 
 141 
 
clue to other forms of ability more in line with the suc- 
 cesses of his career in after years. Garfield was a clear 
 and forcible rather than an elegant writer of prose and 
 verse, he had a logical mind, a powerful way of present- 
 ing an argument to an audience, and remarkable quickness 
 of repartee, humor, and sarcasm in debate. His massive 
 figure, commanding, self-confident manner, and magnifi- 
 cent bursts of fiery eloquence, won and held the attention 
 of his audience from the moment he opened his lips. All 
 these qualities were in their prime during his senior year, 
 and I question whether he was ever more eloquent or con- 
 vincing in congress than he appeared on the college forum, 
 with the faculty of one of the most critical audiences in 
 America to laugh and applaud. He was undoubtedly one 
 of the greatest natural debaters ever seen at Williams 
 College. When it was announced that Garfield was to speak 
 collegians and townsfolk all crowded to hear him. No 
 one enjoyed listening to him more than dear old Prex 
 Mark Hopkins, who, of course, sat on the platform in full 
 view of the audience, his Ciceronian profile clearly out- 
 lined against the background. He would sit there doubled 
 up in his armchair with his long thin legs twisted into a 
 knot, and would almost go into convulsions of laughter. 
 
 Garfield had a hearty, hale-fellow-well-met manner, ap- 
 parently the outspoken good nature of an honest, genial, 
 democratic heart, which led many, when he was in public 
 life, to consider him insincere, but my impression is, that 
 there was originally no guile in the "gush" as it was 
 called, which made him enemies at the height of his career 
 because of the fact that his acts did not always tally with 
 his professions. It was the natural manner of a person 
 who was good natured but not very deep. The habit of 
 
 142 
 
promising favors clung to him when he was in affairs, and 
 when it would have been the truer policy to himself and 
 to others, to hold himself with more reserve. Perhaps he 
 did not have the talent so important in social and especi- 
 ally public life, of being reserved in the spoken expression 
 of his Ideas, and yet affable in manner. Blaine had this 
 gift, and thus won full as many friends as he merited. 
 Benjamin Harrison lacked it, and thus lost half that he 
 made, or might have had, and also his reelection. Garfield, 
 from conviction or policy, belonged to the anti-secret as- 
 sociation at Williams, which was pledged to fight and, if 
 possible, demolish secret societies. While Garfield was at 
 Williams the anti-secrets formed a powerful body, but 
 eventually the organization lost spirit and disappeared. 
 He was also a Campbellite preacher at that time and on 
 Sundays earned a few honest dollars to pay his weekday 
 expenses. I fancy that as Garfield gained scope in war and 
 politics his interest in the pulpit declined. When ho was 
 elected President I resolved that at least one of his friends 
 should not use the acquaintance as a lever to office and I 
 asked nothing from him. I wrote him a congratulatory 
 note to which he very cordially replied in a holographic 
 letter. Considering how busy he must have been at that 
 time, and that he had nothing to gain from me, this cer- 
 tainly looked as if he had more sincerity of feeling than 
 his enemies allowed him. jNIy personal recollections of 
 him are wholly favorable. 
 
 Toward the close of freshman year I ventured to send 
 a short poem to the Independent, at that time one of 
 the great powers of the northern press — entitled the 
 "Arctic Ocean." It was accepted and published over my 
 initials, and was copied by LitteU's Magazine and other 
 
 143 
 
 10 
 
periodicals. During the year I gradually found my affini- 
 ties in college, arrived at certain opinions on various ques- 
 tions in and out of the institution, some of which I have 
 seen no occasion to revise, and gained fuller courage to 
 give expression to my convictions. I held a respectable 
 rank in Greek and Latin ; and gave our excellent, en- 
 thusiastic Latin professor, Lincoln, great and unexpected 
 pleasure by preparing metrical versions in English of 
 some of Horace's odes. Unfortunately I have lost every 
 copy of these translations in moving about, and therefore 
 have no present means of knowing what was their actual 
 merit. 
 
 But in mathematics my standing was simply deplorable. 
 The professor, to save his conscience and my feelings, 
 called me up to recite as rarely as possible, and then T 
 usually "flunked." 
 
 The amount of it all was that my mind was not so much 
 averse to mathematics as that it reached conclusions and 
 solved problems by methods other than those laid down in 
 the books. As occasion has required, since leaving college, 
 I have solved problems I could not successfully tackle 
 there by the textbooks. There was a radical difficulty 
 in my mental make up, which hindered progress in mathe- 
 matics as taught. The student in that field must take 
 much on faith, accepting fonnulas, axioms and processes 
 without question, and proceed as if he understood them 
 whether he does or not. 
 
 At this crisis, a happy avenue of escape offered itself, 
 which I received with rejoicing. The year before, a student 
 had been admitted to college on a tentative basis which 
 has been quite common since, termed the "university 
 course." It was an experiment not regarded favorably 
 
 144 
 
by the faculty as it might prove an entering wedge for 
 subverting the procrustean system of the American col- 
 lege of the period. The university student was required 
 to choose two of the current studies and attend the reci- 
 tations in them, it being implied that the course fur- 
 nished studies which he could pursue congenially. His con- 
 tinuance depended, however, on his standing in the studies 
 he selected; and for these privileges he was obliged to 
 abandon all claim to college honors and degrees. No 
 sooner was this expedient suggested to me, than I ac- 
 cepted it without a moment's hesitation. I cared nothing 
 for the college honors, and never dreamed of aspiring to 
 them. I was in college to please my parents and to fit 
 myself for the inevitable struggle beyond. I felt that 
 at last I was relieved from a crushing burden. I had 
 given much useless time and some health to the mortifying 
 study of mathematics in my freshman year, which had 
 placed me in a false position and prevented me from doing 
 justice to myself and my aims. I had, in a word, been 
 chewing a file instead of meat. Now, at last, I was 
 comparatively free again, and I entered my sophomore 
 year with a sense of relief such as I have rarely experi- 
 enced. 
 
 And yet, when I consider the conditions of life at Wil- 
 liams College in tliose days I rather wonder what it was 
 that kept me there at all. For one who went there as I 
 did from a genial climate, the picturesque and romantic 
 scenery and life in the Levant, the contrast was harsh 
 and repelling. But as it is my nature to carry to a con- 
 clusion whatever I undertake, I kept to my original resolu- 
 tion in favor of the collegiate period to the end. 
 
 145 
 
For various reasons, doubtless the result of applied 
 civilization, the Berkshire climate appears to have grown 
 more agreeable of late years, and the college discipline 
 and regulations have kept pace with nature's increasing 
 amiability. The sons of the wealthy have also invaded the 
 institution in large numbers, often sons of graduates, 
 bringing with them the manifold luxuries of the age ; the 
 college endowments have likewise greatly enlarged, and the 
 town has financially become a fashionable resort for 
 permanent or opulent sunnner residents. The general tone 
 of the place has, in fact, become so wonderfully modified 
 that any description of Williams College, when I was a 
 sophomore, is sufficiently historical to require no justi- 
 fying plea. 
 
 The students and villagers worshipped together on the 
 Sabbath in the Congregational Church on the hill, which 
 was also the site of old Fort Massachusetts. The students 
 occupied the gallery. The spire of this building was razed 
 to save repairs, and eventually the entire structure was 
 levelled as it did not harmonize with the contemplated 
 village improvements. It was a barn-like structure painted 
 white, with green blinds. But it was rich with the asso- 
 ciations of many commencements and college entertain- 
 ments, including many incipient flirtations, and from its 
 plain pulpit had been delivered some of the greatest ser- 
 mons by the greatest preachers ever heard in the United 
 States. It was a mistake to tear down that old temple. It 
 should have been remodeled and preserved on that com- 
 manding site where everyone as he entered the town could 
 see at once the structure which suggested the mental and 
 moral grandeur on which the greatness of New England 
 was founded. The college day began with prayers at six 
 
 146 
 
o'clock summer and winter. This meant that we often 
 had to fight our way in the face of a driving snow storm 
 before daylight, leaping from a warm bed to throw on a 
 few hurried clothes, some even going unwashed and un- 
 combed, and still in night shirts under their shawls or 
 overcoats, facing dense, stinging clouds of driving sleet 
 and snow or burying themselves in great drifts in their 
 efforts to reach the chapel ere the doors were shut, the 
 doleful peal of the bell the while rising and falling on the 
 howling blast. The chapel was bitter cold, but even thus, 
 some under their shawls stole a glance at their textbooks, 
 as "Prof. Al" or "Prof. Perry" offered prayers to which 
 the response could only have been perfunctory under the 
 circumstances. From prayers the three lower classes 
 proceeded directly to recitation in rooms some distance 
 from chapel. Our room was on the ground fioor. Most 
 likely we found the member of the class who for a pittance 
 took care of it trying to make the feeble, ill-smelling 
 whale oil lights give out a pale gleam, or blowing the fire 
 in the box stove into a smoky flame. Perhaps the room was 
 already half full of smoke, which obliged us to open the 
 door, when the wind and snow whirled in and made it pleas- 
 ant for those who sat near it. We had to sit out the recita- 
 tion for a full hour with empty stomachs and closely 
 crowded on a hard, narrow bench that ran around three 
 sides of the room against the wall. Those who sat near the 
 stove if the fire became fairly ignited, roasted their faces 
 and chilled their backs. Those who sat farther away, 
 froze both their faces and their backs. The recitation 
 was continuously interrupted by sneezing and coughing. 
 That was before the days when people had become so 
 tender that they turned pale at the woi'ds microbe or 
 
 147 
 
bacteria. After recitation we were graciously permitted 
 to go to breakfast. 
 
 The condition of the dormitories was about on a par 
 with the classrooms. They were heated by box stoves, 
 the fuel being wood. With this feature of the heating 
 there could be little complaint, for there is something 
 rarely cheering in the roar of blazing wood compared with 
 the sullen warmth of coal. Those of the students who 
 could afford it had their beds made and rooms swept by 
 a tall, lank, withered old janitor named Cox, usually 
 dubbed the Professor of Dust and Ashes, but many took 
 entire charge of their own rooms, and the hour after 
 breakfast was devoted by them to sweeping, bed making, 
 bringing in wood and kindling the fire, lucky if they did 
 not have to chop and saw their own wood. 
 
 There is no question, however, that we contrived 
 to extract considerable entertainment out of our college 
 life. But after these long intervening years the impres- 
 sion resting in my memory is that the first half of my col- 
 lege days was depressing. This may have been partly 
 due to the state of my own mind at the time. But it was 
 also due to the fact that Ave were oppressed by a Puritan- 
 ism of the densest character. I blame no one for this. Men 
 for the most part act or believe as they are educated by 
 precept or environment. If the Faculty had not believed 
 what they sought to enforce by constant pressure and 
 influence they could not at that period have been elected 
 to chairs at Williams. 
 
 To be obliged to attend prayers twice a day on pain 
 of serious penalties at a time when my character was prac- 
 tically formed, I resented. To be forced to appear at 
 two long services in a cold church on Sunday without 
 
 148 
 
liberty to select my own place of worship or be expelled, 
 seemed to me an outrage. I was a man and no longer a 
 boy. I felt this duress the more keenly because of the 
 sombre, tremendous, denunciatory character of much of 
 the preaching to which we must listen. But a large pro- 
 portion of it, I must admit, was of a high order of elo- 
 quence and logic. Of course when Dr. Hopkins preached 
 few of us desired to stay away. Even when we could 
 not accept his terms we listened to the march of his 
 logical periods and the peal of his magnificent eloquence 
 as to a matchless intellectual feast. Others of the faculty 
 were likewise good sermonizers. But the universal tone 
 of the preaching to which we were forced to listen in 
 term time was on the whole damnatory, slightly qualified 
 according to the disposition of the speaker, and the bot- 
 tomless pit was ever yawning before us. The Saviour's 
 love w^as sometimes mentioned, but what did that avail 
 by contrast with the denunciation of such paintings of 
 Pandemonium .P I could never quite understand what I 
 had done up to that time, that was so unspeakably crim- 
 inal, and deserved such fierce condemnation and penalty ; 
 and if I had already become so wicked, wherein lay the 
 goodness or justice of a Creator who would bring me into 
 the world to become a candidate for eternal suffering and 
 perdition before I had barely reached mature years ? This 
 thought produced an unwholesome spirit of defiance, but 
 the pressure brought to bear on all of us was tremendous, 
 and the solemnity that pervaded the entire community, 
 funereal. 
 
 One of my classmates, who was reputed to be a member 
 of the rapid set, "came under conviction," as the phrase 
 goes, at one of the revival meetings. On returning to his 
 
 149 
 
room, overcome by a spasm of virtue and piety, he snatched 
 up his box of tobacco and flung it with disgust into a 
 
 corner, exclaiming, "Let the d d thing lie there!" 
 
 After the first impulse was over, I believe he resumed 
 smoking. 
 
 Sophomore year was marked by yet more strenuous 
 religious effort than my freshman year. But my spirits 
 were rather less affected by it ; partly because my course 
 of study was more congenial, and partly because certain 
 elements had come into my life which divided my attention. 
 One of these was the entrance into the Kappa Alpha 
 secret society which brought me into contact with some 
 of the best men in college on such terms of social equality 
 as to prove highly beneficial to me, as many of them 
 were, of course, in advance classes, and their experience 
 was of great service. Some of the most enduring friend- 
 ships of my life were formed in this admirable association, 
 and I look back with unqualified pleasure and gratitude 
 to the advantages I enjoyed while an active member of the 
 Kappa Alpha chapter at Williams. 
 
 It was during the first sophomore term that an amusing 
 incident occurred. There were several of the class, as 
 there are in every class, who stood not in awe of serious 
 things and found a more or less rational diversion in the 
 gentle art of hazing. It is unnecessary to record in this 
 place that various efforts in this direction, which vexed 
 the faculty cheered even the serious students, and gave a 
 temporary notoriety to the chief actors in this phase of the 
 college drama. 
 
 One incident I remember seems worthy of being rescued 
 from oblivion. One evening while three of these worthies 
 were devoting their energies to making one of their class- 
 
 150 
 
mates particular!}' miserable in his room, which was in 
 a private house, a scout reported to the faculty, who were 
 at this time especially on the watch to catch the hazers 
 in flagi'ante delicto, were close at hand. The hazers did not 
 tarry on the order of their going, but hastened to leap 
 from the second story window to the ground just as the 
 advance files of the faculty burst in the door. One of 
 the fugitives unfortunately left his large silk hat behind 
 him. The well known character of one of the hazers, the 
 fact that he was the largest man in college, and one of 
 the very few students who wore such a hat, naturally 
 suggested that W. was the owner of this especial hat. 
 He was therefore summoned to appear before Professor 
 Tatlock, the executive of the sophomore class. After put- 
 ting various questions which were skillfully parried, the 
 professor took the hat from under his chair, and said, 
 "W., try on this hat." It fitted exactly. This was ap- 
 parently proof positive, and it seemed as if nothing more 
 remained to be said, when W. unexpectedly turned the 
 tables by saying, "Professor, will you try on the hat.'"' 
 Professor Tatlock was so dumbfounded that, without 
 thinking, he also tried on the hat, and it fitted him literally 
 to a hair. This stroke of wit was so effective that there 
 was nothing to do but to allow W. to go free with a 
 warning. This incident has repeatedly gone the round 
 of the press in recent years as having occured at this or 
 that college. It actually occurred at Williams College in 
 my sophomore year. 
 
 During my first sophomore term the editors of the 
 Williams Quarterly, actuated by a commendable desire to 
 stimulate literary activity among the students, offered a 
 small money prize for the best prose essay of a given 
 
 151 
 
length. The successful essay was also to be published in 
 the Quarterly. The Professor of Literature was the 
 chairman of the deciding committee, and the competition 
 was open to every class. I sent in a paper, and gave the 
 matter no further thought until I saw my good friend 
 and classmate Walter de Forest Day coming toward me 
 one afternoon waving his hat in the air. When he came 
 up to me he seized my hand and warmly congratulated 
 me for winning the prize. I confess that I was greatly 
 surprised myself, for there were some vigorous writers 
 and thinkers in college, and I hardly supposed that a 
 sophomore in the first term could win over the heads of 
 juniors and seniors. The essay was crude in thought and 
 decidedly sophomoric in style, but in common with other 
 articles I wrote in college, it had an affluent flow of lan- 
 guage and the warmth of sincere unaffected enthusiasm 
 which came from the heart. 
 
 152 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 COLLEGE VACATIONS. RALPH WALDO EMER- 
 SON AND DR. HOPKINS. 
 
 My college vacations were partly spent at my maternal 
 grandfather's place at Concord, Massachusetts, whither 
 he passed the summers after leaving Trenton. He was 
 descended from the Wheelers who, I have been told, re- 
 ceived two centuries and a half ago a grant from the 
 Crown of the tract now covered by the town of Concord. 
 
 My grandfather, moved by these traditions, was led to 
 purchase an old place for a summer residence from one 
 of the Wheelers still resident in Concord. The Concord 
 River ran through the grounds at a point where it was 
 crossed by a venerable stone bridge with three arches, that 
 was noted in the early history of the Revolution. Be- 
 coming impaired by age and weather, it has in late years 
 been replaced by a modern structure. Happily I made 
 a careful drawing of the old bridge during one of my 
 visits to Concord. The mansion stood on rising ground 
 at the top of a lawn that sloped to the River. It was a 
 rambling but not inelegant structure erected in colonial 
 times, and had an added and appreciable value because 
 it was occupied by Harvard College during the period 
 when the hostilities between the old country and the 
 
 153 
 
colonies obliged the temporary removal of that institution. 
 There was a good library of standard literature in the 
 house, and it was one of my favorite habits when at 
 Concord to read in bed an hour before rising in the morn- 
 ing. Through the open windows I heard the haymakers 
 whetting their scythes and the lowing of the cattle, and 
 breathed in the fragrance of tedded hay and honeysuckles. 
 How long ago seem those magical days of my youth ! 
 Sometimes I took a gallop over the good roads of old Con- 
 cord, or let the horse saunter at will by Walden Pond and 
 Thoreau's Cabin in the woods, or by the old Manse im- 
 mortalized by Hawthorne. He was not there at that 
 time, I think, at least I never saw him. But I met Emer- 
 son repeatedly. My uncle, who was a man of fine culture 
 and literary tastes, a valedictorian at Williams at seven- 
 teen, and a clear headed lawyer, was well acquainted with 
 the sage of Concord, and they sometimes walked together 
 toward evening. But I was then too young or too im- 
 mature fully to appreciate the calibre of the tall, slender, 
 serious, homely but kindly faced philosopher who did so 
 much to give character and fame to our national litera- 
 ture. I met Mr. Emerson years later, on the occasion 
 of my being invited to read a paper before the Literary 
 Club of Concord. He was present and sat near to me. 
 When I had finished my reading, he put a number of ques- 
 tions, and a pleasant conversation ensued, apropos of the 
 subject of the lecture. In the course of the conversation, 
 Mr, Emerson said, "I think that American authors are 
 more modest or reticent in speaking of themselves and 
 their work than European authors. I remember a curious 
 example of this fact that happened when I was abroad. 
 At an entertainment which I attended when I was in Lon- 
 
 154 
 
don I was introduced to jNIr., afterwards Sir James Fer- 
 guson, the architect and writer on architecture. As I 
 was thinking of A'isiting the Continent, I asked him to in- 
 form me of some work that would give me such descrip- 
 tions of the chief buildings as would enable me to study 
 them with intelligence. He answered, 'Mr. Emerson, I 
 know of no work that will answer your purpose better 
 than my Hand Book of Architecture. I would advise you 
 to get it.' Now," continued Mr. Emerson, "I can con- 
 ceive of no American author who would think of recom- 
 mending any of his own books so unblushingly." 
 
 This incident, so illustrative of j\Ir. Emerson's simple, 
 unaffected modesty, seemed to me rather as an evidence 
 of certain traits peculiar to himself rather than applicable 
 to American authors as a class. It is quite conceivable 
 that outspoken egotism may be found among American 
 men of letters. Certainly every one can remember native 
 authors whose manner if not their speech has plainly in- 
 dicated a self appreciation quite equal to those of Europe. 
 
 During the latter part of sophomore year I sent an 
 article describing my trip to Brusa accompanied by 
 several illustrations of my own, to the Xational Magazine. 
 This periodical was published by the Methodists and held 
 a respectable rank at a time when Harper''s Monthly, the 
 Knickerbocker and North American Bevieic were the only 
 really prominent magazines. INIy article was accepted 
 and published by the National Magazine. The illustra- 
 tions were very well engraved considering the state of the 
 art in America at that time. But to my surprise I re- 
 ceived no check and heard not a word from Dr. Porter, 
 the editor. Being densely ignorant of business matters, 
 and especially as to the relations which not uncommonly 
 
 155 
 
obtain between author and editor or publisher, I wrote to 
 the editor of the National Magazine that if the check has 
 miscarried it should be looked up. The blood curd- 
 ling reply which I received should have proved an eye- 
 opener that ought to have effectually diverted me from 
 any intention of making a livelihood by the pen. The 
 reverend editor stated that he did not propose to pay 
 for my article ; it ought to be sufficient compensation for a 
 new writer, a young collegian at that, to see his article 
 published and illustrated in a periodical like the 
 National Magazine. The reputation thereby acquired 
 would bring other opportunities which might in time lead 
 to pecuniary rewards. Doubtless according to the ethics 
 of some periodicals the Doctor was acting within his 
 rights. But I did not know of the fact then. Hence, in- 
 stead of accepting the pious editor's reply as final, I was 
 so unsophisticated as to renew my request for a check. Of 
 course no attention was paid to my reply. Happening to 
 be in New York some weeks later, I called on Dr. Porter. 
 He received me civilly ; he was handsome, courteous, digni- 
 fied, clothed in the conscious integrit}^ of his Chris- 
 tian profession. But he firmly though blandly declined to 
 pay me a cent for my article. The next day I wrote him 
 that if I did not receive a check by return mail I should 
 place the matter in a lawyer's hands. The check came, 
 and a liberal one too for those days ! 
 
 Notwithstanding my success on this occasion, I would 
 on no account advise a young writer to follow my example 
 in a case of this sort. It is poor policy in the long run as 
 things are constituted in the literary world. Write for 
 nothing in the form of money until your reputation is 
 sufficiently established to create a demand for your work. 
 
 156 
 
Write because, like the "Ancient Mariner," you have 
 something to say and must say it or die. 
 
 While recording this disagreeable incident in my early 
 literary experiences it is only fair that I should mention 
 an experience of an opposite character which occurred 
 about the same time. Theodore Tilton was then managing 
 or literary editor of the Independent. I sent poems to 
 that paper several times while in college, and occasionally 
 after that. He published them promptly, writing me kmd, 
 pleasant notes about them. Although I never asked pay 
 for them, entirely satisfied to find such an excellent medi- 
 um for publishing them, yet he sent me checks ever after 
 the first publication of my poems in his columns. This 
 modest success did not delude me however, into the pre- 
 posterous hope of making a living out of writing poetry 
 in this age and country. And the poetry I may have 
 composed since those days and published at long inter- 
 vals has been solely for the gratification of personal emo- 
 tions regardless of public acceptance. On one occasion 
 Mr. Tilton performed an act of editorial courtesy alto- 
 gether unique and which I can never forget. Not having 
 space for one of my poems on a timely subject, he actually 
 took it to another periodical and had it published there 
 within a fortnight. 
 
 In the summer of 1858 I took a walking expedition 
 with my friend Day such as were quite the vogue with 
 students of our country colleges in those days. Now they 
 go on bicycles or automobiles or devote themselves to 
 aquatic and athletic sports. I had already taken a num- 
 ber of tramps around Williamstown proving that I was 
 naturally a good, enduring pedestrian. We carried knap- 
 sacks on our backs and averaged twenty-five to thirty 
 
 157 
 
miles a day. Our last stretch, from sunset until nine 
 o'clock the next morning was thirty-five miles. This 
 trip with my good friend Day was one of the most en- 
 joyable excursions of my life. I was enchanted with the 
 scenery of Vermont through which we passed, and perhaps 
 the impression made upon me at that time had some in- 
 fluence in taking me back to that State later in life, and 
 passing my summers for many years with my dear wife 
 and daughter, on the shores of what seems to me the 
 most picturesque sheet of water on the continent. Even- 
 tually we built there a long, low bungalow, about one 
 hundred feet above the lake on the shores of a beautiful 
 bay, about fifteen miles from Burlington. The site com- 
 mands one of the finest views of the Adirondack region, 
 on the Vermont side of the lake, and off in the east are 
 seen the rounded summits of the Green Mountain range. 
 We struck north among the lovely intervals lying west 
 of the Green Mountains to Rutland and Otter Creek. 
 We then turned westward to Lake George. What added 
 to the pleasure of the trip was the delightful companion- 
 ship of Day, a man who combined in his character the 
 sterling qualities of his English and French ancestry. To 
 rare, sturdy integrity he added steadfastness in friend- 
 ship, warm affections, great delicacy and refinement, an 
 appreciative love of the beautiful in Nature, tact, a de- 
 licious sense of humor, and a keen perception of human 
 nature. He had a passion for sport, especially trout fish- 
 ing, and enjoyed the gift of elegant literarj^ expression. 
 Day studied medicine. For many years he was pro- 
 fessor in the college of Materia Medica and INIedical In- 
 spector of the Board of Health of New York City. He 
 died of heart disease in the prime of life. Our friendship 
 
 158 
 
continued to the last, and I was indebted to him for many 
 disinterested evidences of friendship. 
 
 We reached Fort William Henry Hotel at Caldwell 
 about twilight. In our checked shirt sleeves, less common 
 in those days at summer resorts than now, carrying knap- 
 sacks in our hands, and somewhat the worse in appearance 
 for marching all day along dusty roads, we walked boldly 
 to the clerk's desk at the moment a stage load of fashion- 
 able ladies and gentlemen were also arriving. The clerk 
 took a quick professional glance at us over his flamboyant 
 stud and to our request for rooms replied carelessly, "Yes, 
 I guess so," and then studiously neglected us while he 
 attended to other business. Finally my companion, as 
 the elder, exclaimed briskly, "If you can't let us have 
 a good room right away, we'll go over to the Caldwell 
 House." A tone of confident assurance goes a great way 
 in this world ; modesty must wait, however becoming, 
 while confidence commands. The clerk took a second look, 
 and this time seemed to discover gentilit}^ perhaps money, 
 under our dust stained clothes. He promptly summoned 
 two colored boys to carry our knapsacks to one of the 
 best corner rooms on the second floor. When we reached 
 the apartment the boys, who had not yet discerned as 
 much as the clerk, invited us in a sneering tone to show 
 them the goods we had for sale in the packs. Day made a 
 dash for one of them, I seized the other, and they went out 
 of the door so quickly the}^ had not time to know whether 
 they were on their heads or their feet. This thrilling in- 
 cident evidently echoed to the ears of the head waiter in 
 the dining hall, and when we appeared before him after 
 bathing and donning dark suits and white linen, we were 
 served like princes in disguise. Nothing was too good for 
 
 159 
 11 
 
us. After supper we met some friends who were staying 
 at the hotel. This confirmed the employees in their revised 
 estimate of our social position. And when we left dressed 
 as we had entered the hotel, as mere, pedestrians, we were 
 treated as lords. I relate this trifling incident because it 
 is typical of the way of the world in the larger affairs of 
 life. It was an epitome of human nature ! 
 
 We were up betimes the following day, proposing to 
 take a trip on Lake George in the Steamer Lady of the 
 Lake. But on comparing purses we found our funds too 
 low to afford it. We therefore reluctantly abandoned the 
 sail ; and I contented myself with taking a few sketches 
 including one that had the steamer in the distance gliding 
 away on what proved to be her last trip. A few hours 
 later she caught fire and burned to the water's edge, seven 
 or eight of her passengers losing their lives. It was a 
 narrow escape for us. 
 
 Nearly half of my Junior year was passed away 
 from college by permission of the faculty, on condition 
 that I should keep up my studies in my absence. The 
 American diet of those days especially, consisted largely 
 of hot biscuit, hot cakes, and the like, so different from the 
 wholesome, well seasoned cuisine to which I was accus- 
 tomed in the East, disagreed with me, together with reci- 
 tation in cold, bare rooms at unseasonable hours, and long 
 sessions at religious services immediately after hearty 
 meals. In other words I was not yet acclimated to Ameri- 
 can life. One result was a serious illness that greatly re- 
 duced me. During my absence I assisted my mother to 
 establish herself at Brookfield, Massachusetts, where she 
 decided to open a family boarding school for girls. 
 
 160 
 
During this absence I was informed of my unanimous 
 election as one of the editors of the Williams Quarterly 
 for the ensuing year. This was one of the most gratifying 
 incidents of my college course for I really desired it, but, 
 as usual in such matters, had not even expressed a wish 
 on the subject and did not expect it under the circum- 
 stances. 
 
 My senior year passed serenely. Few incidents of 
 that period linger in my memory, hence it must have been 
 serene. The studies Averc of a higher order than those of 
 the previous years, more reflective and argumentative. We 
 were leaving the textbooks of our adolescence behind, and 
 approaching the table-land of intellectual emancipation 
 and manhood. There was something sobering, at least 
 to my mind, in the thought that but a few months, weeks 
 and days and I should be adrift on the wide world, under 
 my own inexperienced guidance to pick out a course, seek 
 for favoring winds and point however deviously for a 
 port beyond the raging billows. 
 
 The instinctive way in which some of our minds were 
 already beginning to look for new paths of effort out- 
 side of the prescribed collegiate course was incidentally 
 shown by the curious attempt begun in the latter part of 
 my junior year to establish an art association. It was 
 suggested first I think, by a senior, Horace E. Scudder, 
 associated with Titus M. Coan, both well known since 
 then as authors, editors, or publishers, Scudder gathered 
 about him a few enthusiasts infected with the new Ruskin 
 cult, and as innocent as himself as to the true scope of 
 a practical aesthetic organization. Scudder was the first 
 president of the Williams Art Association, and I succeed- 
 ed him in senior year, probably because no other member 
 
 161 
 
cared for the office or knew less about the futility of such 
 an attempt than I did. I believe this was my first official 
 position and this was probably the first distinct associa- 
 tion for the active promotion of art education in an 
 American college. The faculty kindly granted us the use 
 of one of the rooms in the old chapel building. We held 
 our meetings there, and gathered a meagre collection of 
 engravings, water-colors and illustrations, together with a 
 few simple productions by two or three of the members. 
 Pitifully small as was this collection it must be admitted 
 that it showed a certain intelligent correct feeling and 
 taste as far as it went. Only one of the then members 
 ever practiced art professionally after graduation, and 
 this effort itself was premature if not altogether unsuit- 
 able. The time for the culture of art in the academies and 
 colleges of the United States had not yet come, nor has it 
 yet arrived. But this is not to be regretted. Art has its 
 own special channels of influence and instruction, its own 
 special organizations. For the college to undertake in- 
 struction in art, whether by art collections or by direct 
 tuition, appears incongruous, inappropriate. It tends to 
 foster the notion that art is a mere accomplishment rather 
 than an earnest pursuit, while it robs the student of the 
 time and energy indispensable for the legitimate academic 
 curriculum. 
 
 I recall with interest also the fact that I first met the 
 poet of Thanatopsis during senior year. It was at a 
 reception given at the mansion of President Hopkins to 
 which some members of the upper class were invited. 
 William Cullen Bryant had studied for two years at Wil- 
 liams College and was its great literary lion. His presence 
 on this occasion was therefore an event of some moment. 
 
 162 
 
In the course of the evening I had the honor of an intro- 
 duction to the poet. He was gracious in his manner, and 
 considering that I was a mere under graduate I was sur- 
 prised that he was wilhng to converse with me so affably 
 for ten minutes. It was evident to me, however, that he 
 took himself very seriously. He spoke in measured per- 
 iods, and his manner was to the last degree dignified and 
 impressive, the manner of the monarch of a mighty em- 
 pire. It is sometimes in such interviews with men of note 
 that one may casually gain an unerring and unexpected 
 insight into their character or the scope and limitations 
 of their genius. Mr. Bryant had visited the Levant twice 
 and written more or less on the subject. I was interested 
 to know how Oriental scenery had impressed one who was 
 so distinctly a poet of nature. 
 
 "Mr. Bryant," said I, "how did you enjoy the East.^ 
 How did the landscapes of Greece and Turkey impress 
 you. Sir.?" "Not favorably," he replied; "the mountains 
 are too barren, vegetation is too scarce; there are not 
 enough forests in the Levant. The scenery of America, 
 Avith the music of its streams and the grandeur of its 
 forests, is to me more agreeable." 
 
 This statement struck me at once as a forcible indication 
 of the limitations of the poet's mind, coming as it did 
 from one who at that very time was posing as an admirer 
 of Greece and her literature by undertaking the transla- 
 tion of Homer. It was evident that Mr. Bryant was not 
 what is called a wide liker: hence his capacity for enjoy- 
 ment and appreciation was restricted, a fact implying 
 narrow if acute judgment and perhaps imperfect percep- 
 tion of the relation of things. It was evident also that he 
 had a feeble sense of color, and his own poetry seems to 
 
 163 
 
confirm this. Tlie exquisite coloring which is a prominent 
 quality of Mediterranean and Oriental scenery and at- 
 mosphere, when brilliant more brilliant than our own, and 
 when sober suffused with unsurpassed variety, softness 
 and suggestion, failed to touch eyes that warmed for his 
 native landscape alone. I must add that in spite of Mr. 
 Bryant's courtesy to me on that occasion or the kind and 
 recognizing notice he subsequently gave to my humble 
 volume of poems, I do not look back to him as one whose 
 face suggested the author of Thanatopsis, The Ape- 
 nines or The Conqueror^s Grave, three of the finest 
 conceptions in our literature. As seen across a room his 
 massive head, shaggy eyebrows, and snowy beard looked 
 altogether Homeric. With a harp in his hands he might 
 well have passed for a bard of old. But on nearer inspec- 
 tion one could not but observe that his keenly scintillating 
 grey eyes gave forth no warmth of heart and soul. They 
 were cold, judicial, severe; if of a poet, then of a poet of 
 wrath and denunciation. They suggested no magnetic 
 enthusiasm or passion, but marble. How a man like 
 Bryant composed such poems is to me a psychological 
 mystery. 
 
 Of course the most important feature, the great fact of 
 our senior year, was the instruction we enjoyed under 
 Dr. Hopkins, who Avas practically our only preceptor dur- 
 ing the last three terms at Williams. It is true we re- 
 ceived lessons in chemistry, literature, etc. from other 
 members of the faculty during that year, some of them 
 men of a certain irregular force and ability, but, to use 
 a common phrase, they did not count in comparison with 
 the enlarging influence of that master mind, one of the 
 greatest of those who have ever sought to mould and pre- 
 
 164 
 
pare developing youth for life's career. He discussed 
 with us anatomy, ethics, and metaphysics, with a dash of 
 theology on Saturdays when the "Assembly's Shorter 
 Catechism" was made the medium of analytical inquiry 
 into the problems of destiny. The information we gained 
 from such theoretical and nebulous studies was slight. 
 But the mental discipline acquired by contact with such an 
 intellectual power as Dr. Hopkins was of a very high 
 order. Even those minds which cared least for such men- 
 tal exertion were aroused for the time being, while those 
 who sympathized in the gymnastics of thought, passed 
 their leisure moments in continuing discussion of the ques- 
 tions brought up by the president. It was highly amus- 
 ing to observe them balancing on the fence of the college 
 grounds eagerly disputing on nominalism, realism or 
 idealism, predestination, free agency, altruism, and kin- 
 dred topics with the earnestness of men on whom the uni- 
 verse depended. Dr. Hopkins' method was practically to 
 elevate his students to the rank of companions. Instead 
 of lecturing an hour and then dismissing them he made 
 fellow disputants. Not only did he ask questions him- 
 self, but he invited and answered questions and arguments. 
 As he selected those to be interrogated by lot, there was no 
 favoritism, and all in turn entered into the discussion and 
 hence were obliged to give close attention to what was go- 
 ing on. The occasion was often enlivened by pithy il- 
 lustrative anecdotes or humorous sallies. Prex greatly 
 enjoyed cornering a student by asking him some seem- 
 ingly unimportant question, following it up until he 
 floored him with the argiimentum ad absurd um; then the 
 entire class collapsed with laughter, Dr. Hopkins himself 
 joining with us heartily. 
 
 165 
 
Dr. Hopkins was above all things a born leader of men, 
 an orator, a diplomat. He had admirable self control, a 
 deep knowledge of human nature, immense tact, and a per- 
 suasive address couched in a phraseology peculiarly his 
 own, that moulded characters and opinions. This latter 
 talent was greatly aided by his keen sense of humor, an 
 important qualification for one who would lead men. He 
 was also equipped with a power of sharp sarcasm and in- 
 fective which, happily, he employed only on rare occasions. 
 His logic was cumulative, proceeding by steady sequence 
 to an irresistable climax and his arguments were presented 
 with an earnest sincerity such as marks the great orators, 
 and is more permanently effective than a graceful delivery 
 alone. Dr. Hopkins was undoubtedly assisted in his pub- 
 lic appearances by a towering, massive figure. Other 
 things being equal, a large man greatly handicaps one of 
 short stature in public life. Although the Graces do not 
 seem to have presided at his birth, the mental and 
 physical qualities so combined in him with the suscep- 
 tibilities as to render him one of the greatest orators of 
 this or any other age. 
 
 To his intellectual powers President Hopkins added a 
 kind heart, warm feeling, tender emotions and a broad 
 charity. If we admired him for the former, we loved him 
 for the latter. Men of combative, dictatorial character 
 sometimes called him weak or politic. He himself was 
 capable of tremendous wrath on occasion, but a conscious- 
 ness of strength led him to prefer to win his battles by 
 less forceful but no less efficacious methods. Because of 
 his generally temperate tone and manner I remember 
 the more vividly an extraordinary incident that occurred 
 while he was preaching one Sunday afternoon during a 
 
 166 
 
revival. Several of my classmates, who took but slight 
 interest in what were termed serious things, and who were 
 therefore more readily overcome after a hearty dinner by 
 the heavy air in the galleries, had fallen asleep during one 
 of the preacher's most solemn sermon appeals. His keen 
 eye detected these unfortunate beings lolling on the 
 cushionless benches, their heads dropping in poppied 
 slumber. Pausing a moment, Dr. Hopkins fixed his stern 
 gaze on them, thus attracting the attention of all pres- 
 ent ; then he reached his long arm toward the sleepers and 
 with a voice that rang from one end of the building to 
 the other he exclaimed, "Yea, sinners will sleep even when 
 the message of God sounds in their ears warning them to 
 flee from the wrath to come!" The unhappy youths 
 needed no second call; they started up looking sheepish 
 enough, and a smile passed around the audience. 
 
 At the time when Jane Eyre was at the flood tide of 
 its popularity it was read and discussed by every social 
 and literary clique in Williamstown. Of course a copy 
 found its way to the house of the President; it was read 
 with avidity by the ladies of his family, and talked about 
 in his presence; but no one supposed that, immersed in his' 
 classes and metaphys.ics, Dr. Hopkins had given the 
 slightest thought to the book, or would condescend to 
 concern himself with a popular romance. But one day 
 Jane Eyre was missed, and defied all efi'orts to find it. 
 Soon after one of Dr. Hopkins' daughters, stepping into 
 his study unexpectedly, detected him deeply engaged in 
 the absorbing pages of that novel. Exclaiming, "Oh 
 pshaw !" he hastily laid down the book and snatched up 
 his pen. But the secret was out and was too good to 
 keep. The great Dr. Hopkins was actually devouring a 
 
 167 
 
popular novel with the intensity of a young school girl. 
 Immensely amused, 02ie after another of his family 
 dropped into his study on various pretexts to enjoy the 
 fun of seeing him fling the book petulantly aside as if 
 ashamed to be caught reading it. I think none who heard 
 of this incident respected him the less, while all except here 
 and there a prig, loved him more for such evidence of a 
 fellow feeling with what interests other mortals. 
 
 168 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 EPISODES OF TEACHING AND LIFE AT ALBANY. 
 
 When I left college I had a little of my share of our 
 patrimony, remaining. It was all I had to begin life with, 
 except several hundred books. I had formed no expensive 
 habits ; but I knew little of the value of money, and cared 
 little for it except for what it might bring, in permitting 
 freedom to follow my intellectual tastes. Still I knew it 
 never would do to wait until what money I had, was gone. 
 Through the kind influence of a good friend of our family, 
 resident in New York, the Rev. Dr. Geo. W. Wood, I 
 received the appointment of principal of Staples Free 
 Academy at Easton, Connecticut, within a few weeks after 
 my graduation. The position was considered unusually 
 good, for one just out of college. The salary was $500, 
 equivalent to at least twice that sum in New York then, 
 or anywhere in America now. It was a hazardous experi- 
 ment, however, because I lacked experience in teaching 
 and was weak in mathematics, I accepted the place 
 temporarily. The experience would be of value, at least, 
 for Ave learn that every eflort, and energy expended, gen- 
 erally brings a return sometime in someway. 
 
 Captain Alfred Burr, a hale, jolly old farmer and one of 
 the trustees of the Academy welcomed me to his house when 
 
 169 
 
I arrived one September evening at the straggling little 
 New England village of Easton Center after a ride of 
 nine miles by stage coach from Bridgeport. He offered 
 me room and board under his roof for the modest sum of 
 three dollars a week. That certainly was reasonable 
 enough. The following day was Sunday, and I shall not 
 soon forget the curious interest shown by the entire con- 
 gregation, including the fair sex of course, in the short, 
 slender, blonde, brown eyed youth with a budding mustache 
 who sat in Captain Burr's pew, in one of the front corners 
 of the church near the pulpit. The interest for the time be- 
 ing, could hardly have been greater if I had been a young, 
 unmarried minister. Still suffering somewhat from con- 
 stitutional diffidence, I found it rather a trying ordeal. 
 When I entered the schoolroom on Monday I found 
 about forty pupils seated there awaiting me. They 
 ranged from thirteen to twenty — I was only twenty-two. 
 Nearly half of them were buxom maidens qualified to make 
 the heart of the young man quail. They certainly looked 
 less abashed than I felt. As to the boys and young men a 
 number were nearly six feet high, and I opined from a 
 glance at some of them that all my tact and will power 
 would be called into exercise before I got through with 
 them, perhaps also some muscle. 
 
 The first thing to be done was to take their intellectual 
 measure, that is to ascertain in what studies they were 
 most proficient, in what they were deficient, to look over 
 their textbooks, arrange the classes and assign to each 
 his tasks. The question of arithmetic and mathematics I 
 approached with caution. I had resolved already what 
 course to pursue on this subject but desired to bring it 
 about with as little friction as possible and in such manner 
 
 170 
 
as to suggest no suspicion of my motives. Happily I 
 found that all the pupils had studied arithmetic out of the 
 same textbook term after term. Very naturally they pre- 
 ferred to continue solving the same problems they already 
 knew by heart. I found that practically they had ruled 
 the school, forcing my predecessors to leave the choice of 
 studies with the pupils. Hence the latter knew little thor- 
 oughly or at all besides arithmetic, although several were 
 ostensibly preparing for college. A few of them, had 
 studied algebra which I utterly detested. But none of 
 them had looked into geometry. Here then was my chance. 
 At dinner time I asked Captain Burr if he, as trustee, 
 objected to the introduction of new studies in the 
 Academy, such as in my judgment seemed for the ad- 
 vancement of the institution. He was flattered by the def- 
 erence shown to his opinion and left the matter entirely 
 to me. In the afternoon session, therefore, I announced 
 that the classes in Latin and grammar would be enlarged 
 and that a course in natural history would be introduced. 
 I then caused a sensation by adding that for the present 
 geometry would be substituted for arithmetic, in which 
 the school had been so thoroughly drilled that there could 
 be no mental discipline in going over it again. 
 
 For some weeks matters proceeded smoothly. Although 
 I understood geometr}' but little better than when I 
 stumbled through it in freshman year, yet I was able to 
 teach it effectively by memorizing each problem and its 
 solution. Our good Professor Tatlock at Williams had 
 geometry so much at his fingers' ends that he went into 
 the classroom without the textbook. I did the same in 
 order to appear as pastmaster in a science I did not under- 
 stand, hearing the demonstrations or explaining them as 
 
 171 
 
if they were as clear as daylight to my mind and familiar 
 as a. b. c. But it was all done by memory. I sat up 
 nightly until the small hours, learned the problems by 
 heart and carried them in my mind until after the recita- 
 tion was over. The main difficulty was that if a pupil 
 stumbled in explaining a problem I could not take it up 
 where he left off, but had to begin at the beginning and 
 go all through it, for, of course, I had no prompter, and 
 it was only by giving it entire, that my memory served. 
 In this way I went through Euclid without a single slip 
 of the memory. The feat is not so difficult as one would 
 suppose. It implied intense application in memorizing 
 and carrying the problem and perfect self-control in the 
 schoolroom, but only for a few hours. I can learn any- 
 thing in that way, but unless it is something in which I 
 am interested the impression fades away when the pres- 
 sure is past, like an undeveloped photographic impres- 
 sion. My memory is naturally retentive, except for mat- 
 ters acquired by rote for a specific, and uncongenial end. 
 
 But after conducting themselves for over a month with 
 a docility unusual, some of the more unruly or indolent 
 pupils began to object to geometry and to demand the 
 restoration of arithmetic. I was privately informed by 
 two of the youths, who had taken a liking to me and al- 
 ways remained faithful, that a plot was already formed 
 to force me out of the school by a well defined system of 
 persecution such as they had practiced with my predeces- 
 sors, their motive being akin to that of many politicans, 
 to rule or ruin. A significant incident soon occurred like 
 a straw showing the way the wind is veering. One day 
 in the midst of the Latin recitation one of the larger boys. 
 
 172 
 
who was supposed to be studying his natural history, 
 raised his hand to call my attention. 
 
 '^What is it, White?" said I. 
 
 "I can't see how to do this sum?" 
 
 "What sum?" 
 
 "Why, this last sum in the arithmetic, Sir." 
 
 "Is the sum part of your lesson today?" 
 
 "No, but I just thought I'd like to do it, and I want 
 3'ou to help me." 
 
 I saw at once that this was a trap set by the con- 
 spirators to catch me. After weeks of surmising why I 
 had laid aside arithmetic in the Academy, some shrewd 
 ringleader seemed at last to have suspected that it might 
 be because of inability on my part to teach arithmetic. 
 Once let that suspicion be verified and my career at 
 Staples Free Academy was ended. Therefore I replied 
 with perfect coolness and distinct asperity, "George 
 White, you ought to know better than to interrupt me un- 
 necessarily when I am hearing a recitation, and especially 
 about something that does not concern your own lessons. 
 Now you can just attend to your regular studies. At 
 some more proper time, if you wish, I will show you how 
 to do tliat sum." 
 
 A titter passed around the room, and for the time be- 
 ing the danger was averted. But I was well aware the 
 crisis could not be long postponed, and that the victory 
 would lie with the one who should strike the first blow. 
 Luckily this incident happened in the morning session, 
 otherwise I should have lost the game. I have been ])ar- 
 ticularly fortunate at certain critical moments of life in 
 having trifling turns of luck unexpectedly offer them- 
 selves which, being iiistantlv seized, have savt'd mv from 
 
 173 
 
very disagreeable results. When I went home to dinner 
 at noon, I found that Captain Burr's son, who had but 
 just returned from the west, was going to Bridgeport that 
 very afternoon, which happened to be the Saturday half 
 holiday, another capital point in my favor. I requested 
 him not to fail to bring me a key to the arithmetic if he 
 had to go all over Bridgeport to find it. Mr. Burr re- 
 turned at bed time with the "key!" Never in my life 
 have I enjoyed a keener sense of relief and triumph. 
 
 I lost not a moment with grappling with that terrible 
 problem. The answer or rather the analysis of the ques- 
 tion covered a whole page of the key. To undertake to 
 solve the sum by reasoning it out, when I understood noth- 
 ing of the problems for a hundred pages back, was out of 
 the question at the time. I had a working knowledge of 
 arithmetic simply for accounts but for nothing beyond 
 that. The best I could do therefore was to memorize the 
 entire calculation, and so thoroughly that I could begin any 
 part without becoming confused or losing the logical se- 
 quence of the formidable platoon of figures ; for I knew 
 perfectly well that my enemies had the problem at their 
 fingers' ends and would be sure to trip me if I made a 
 mistake of a single figure. I began by writing out the 
 answer as a whole and in parts, in order to familiarize 
 myself by the sight of the figures. I sat up until three 
 o'clock that night, resumed my task after breakfast, ex- 
 cused myself from afternoon service, and continued my 
 task until midnight, until I could almost repeat the pro- 
 cess backward ; I went at it again before breakfast Mon- 
 day morning, until I felt sure that I had mastered the 
 problem and the school as well. It should be added that 
 along with this task I also had to learn my daily stunt in 
 Euclid. 
 
 174 
 
On Tuesday, conscious that I could not carry that bur- 
 den on my memory much longer, without a reaction, I 
 said in a nonchalant tone during recess, "By the way, 
 White, if you want me to explain how to do the sum you 
 asked me about last week, I will show you now. But, re- 
 member, you must not meddle during school hours with 
 studies that do not concern the course we selected at the 
 beginning of the term." Then I took a piece of chalk and 
 demonstrated the problem, covering the blackboard with 
 figures entirely by effort of memory, while the whole 
 school, eager with curiosity or disappointed mischief, 
 looked on without saying a word. As if out of bravado, 
 I repeated various isolated parts of the process, thereby 
 showing that I understood and could explain the most ob- 
 struse arithmetical puzzles. My memory served me well, 
 and apparently not a slip occurred, for some of my au- 
 dience were entirely able to trip me if any mistake hap- 
 pened in my demonstration. 
 
 After this triumph there was no more question of my 
 knowledge of arithmetic. Indeed the respect of the school 
 and of the community for my supposed grasp of various 
 sorts of information was greatly increased, but the ring- 
 leaders of the cabal were chagrined and sullen. 
 
 When I reached the Academy one morning, instead of 
 finding the pupils chattering in groups about the entrance 
 or in the lobby, I noticed that a great stillness pervaded 
 the building. This conduct was a complete give-a-way on 
 their part. As I had not passed four years at Williams 
 College for nothing, I scented mischief in the air at once, 
 and was not mistaken. The pupils were all in their seats 
 awaiting my coming, although it yet lacked five minutes 
 of the opening hour. It was not a cold morning, but tlie 
 
 175 
 12 
 
huge box stove, which stood near my own desk, was 
 crammed with wood, and red hot. The windows at my 
 end of the room were also tightly shut, although let down 
 at the top where the pupils sat. Instead of taking off 
 my overcoat, as usual, I kept it on, and when the clock 
 struck nine I ordered the door and every window to be 
 closed. Then I directed two boys to bring more wood, 
 and fill the stove to its utmost capacity. The room be- 
 came as warm as tophet, and before long, hand after hand 
 was raised by pupils begging to have the windows opened. 
 I merely replied that as I could endure the temperature in 
 my winter overcoat the air could not be oppressive, and 
 ordered the fuel to be replenished. I felt really sorry for 
 some of the pretty girls whose faces had become purple 
 and dripped with perspiration, but the time for mercy had 
 passed. I was weary of this nonsense, and had made up 
 my mind to master the young ruffians who had so long 
 domineered at Staples Free Academy, or perish in the at- 
 tempt. I had treated every one there with justice, civility, 
 and kindness, had put them well forward in the pursuit of 
 knowledge, and the whole trouble originated in pul'e 
 "cussedness." When noon arrived the schoolroom was so 
 hot that it lacked but little of setting the building on fire. 
 The pupils sneaked out to dinner more dead than alive ; 
 but they never tried that game again. Eventually, the 
 two most troublesome boys, were expelled from school. 
 
 When the long term closed at Christmas the trustees 
 were pleased to express their satisfaction with my course 
 at Staples Free Academy, and urged me to continue as 
 principal. Although I had prepared myself to teach 
 arithmetic, if I should return, I decided on mature con- 
 sideration to decline the invitation of the trustees. Mv 
 
 176 
 
leisure moments were devoted to studying nature, writ- 
 ing essays, some of which were eventually published, and 
 composing poetry, which was my greatest intellectual 
 pleasure in those days. At this time I published my first 
 and practically my only volume of poetry, entitled Con- 
 stantinople, the Isle of Pearls, and other Poems. I was 
 not so unsophisticated as to fancy that any publisher 
 would at his own risk issue a collection by an unknown 
 poet, without strong literary backing. Therefore I se- 
 sured enough subscriptions to pay the expense. The 
 copies sent to the press were received with great kindness. 
 The New York Evening Post said that the book in- 
 dicated promise, and the Congregationalist gave me a 
 glowing critique of over a column. Although I had no 
 cause to complain of the success of my first effort, and 
 have since then written and published considerable verse, 
 yet as the years went on, a survey of life made me more and 
 more indifferent to publishing my poems in book form, 
 and my Ode on the Death of Abraham Lincoln and 
 the metrical translation of Muretus' Latin ode en- 
 titled Advice to a Son, are the only exceptions I have 
 made in mature years to the rule. This has been due to 
 the fact that unless I could be a great poet, I did not care 
 to make public verses inspired chiefly by personal feel- 
 ings ; to be such a poet would naturally demand a life- 
 service to the muse. To be merely a minor poet in a 
 busy, commercial country swarming with such poets, hum- 
 ming their little song and as soon forgotten as the fire- 
 flies of a summer eve, was not my ambition. And then 
 came my devotion to painting, to which for several years 
 I gave my best energies and enthusiasm. 
 
 177 
 
In 1861 I was informed that the trustees of the New 
 York State Library at Albany had elected me assistant 
 librarian. I was glad to accept the position, rather as an- 
 other step in life than as a permanency. It offered me an 
 honorable and comfortable berth as a single man, training 
 in methodical habits, and a means for acquiring a knowl- 
 edge of books that would doubtless prove very useful. If 
 I could not read them all, at any rate in a carefully 
 selected collection of 80,000 volumes, including many 
 books of comparative rarity, I could learn much of where 
 knowledge could be found. The library opened at nine 
 and closed at five, except during the sessions of the legis- 
 lature, when it was kept open until ten P. M. As the ses- 
 sions sometimes lasted six months, it is evidsTit that the 
 •average hours of duty were sufficiently long, even when we 
 took turns at relieving each other. The library did not 
 open until I appeared in the morning and during the 
 three years that I was there, I arrived invariably on the 
 second. It was not a circulating, but a consulting library 
 for the justices and the members of the legislature. 
 We added an average of 1<,000 volumes a year, kept a 
 printed catalogue, of which new editions or bulletins were 
 constantly required, besides carefully filing all pamphlets 
 and state, federal, and foreign official documents. Among 
 other tasks I indexed 800 volumes of bound pamphlets. 
 The general public is little aware how often even the most 
 apparently worthless pamphlets are consulted by scholars. 
 
 Of course, every position has its disagreeable features, 
 and at Albany one of the most annoying was the fact that 
 the legislature threatened every year to cut down the suf- 
 ficiently meagre salaries of the library, and much attention 
 had to be given on our part to prevent this. The rural 
 
 178 
 
members, who were accustomed to get their board and 
 lodging off their farms, and to gauge the price of intel- 
 lectual work by the pay of farm hands or young teachers 
 in the country district schools, were especially keen in 
 trying to whittle down our compensation. 
 
 But on the whole I rather enjoyed my life at the State 
 Library. I kept to my habits of walking, often going out 
 on a tramp in the suburbs before breakfast. I cannot ad- 
 vise anyone to walk far in that way, but my duties at that 
 time forced me to this objectionable habit. In summer I 
 sometimes took an afternoon for boating on the Hudson. 
 The annual vacation was but two weeks. Albany, the 
 buildings, not the people, was not attractive for residence; 
 but the neighboring country was very agreeable; and the 
 city presented a rather foreign and dreamily beautiful ef- 
 fect in those days when the sun was low in the morning 
 and evening and the purple mists and slanting gleams 
 veiled and glorified the ugly buildings crowded on the 
 steep slopes and in the ravines. It cannot be said that 
 "culture"' in the Boston sense existed in Albany at that 
 time. Society there as I found and mingled with it, was 
 much as it is elsewhere, although the distinctions were pos- 
 sibly more marked. 
 
 Albanians were not indifferent to local talent develop- 
 ing in other directions than business and politics. Al- 
 though it was not the place where an ambitious artist, for 
 example, would care to work out his destiny, there are 
 worse places in which a young artist or author can make 
 his debut. Dr. Ray Palmer here, I believe, wrote his de- 
 votional lyrics. Among them, the beautiful My Faith 
 Looks up fa Thee. Certainly Palmer, the sculptor be- 
 gan and passed his entire art life at Albany, and he had 
 
 179 
 
scant reason, so far as I know, to complain of the en- 
 couragement given him by the citizens of that city. 
 Launt Thompson, one of our greatest sculptors, began 
 at Albany and took his first lessons from Palmer. George 
 Boughton and the brothers, William and James Hart, also 
 began their art career in Albany. There were a number 
 of scientific men connected with the State government like 
 James Hill, the geologist, who gave a certain elevation to 
 circles at Albany in those days ; and a few authors of more 
 or less distinction gave a quasi literary tone to the social 
 atmosphere while suggesting the barrenness of culture by 
 their rarity. Chief among them, were William L. Stone, 
 Alfred B. Street, and John G. Saxe. It is true that Stone 
 lived at Saratoga, but he passed much of his time con- 
 sulting the State records for his colonial histories. In 
 this connection I may mention Dr. O'Callaghan, the State 
 historian, and Gen. J. Meredith Read. The former was a 
 most entertaining conversationalist, full of amusing anec- 
 dotes and reminiscences. Read resided in Albany at that 
 time and passed many hours at the library preparing his 
 life of Major Andre. Neither Read nor I dreamed, as 
 we met in those days, he enjoying an elegant literary 
 leisure, and I just beginning to win my way, that in 
 future years we should meet as diplomats who had repre- 
 sented our country abroad. Read came from an old 
 Philadelphia family and had married a lady of wealth at 
 Albany. He had, as is well known, a weakness for place, 
 but he never forgot the deportment of a gentleman which 
 he was, emphatically, and in every sense of the word. 
 
 Street, I knew well, for as custodian of the splendid 
 law department of the State Library, he was one of my 
 colleagues. Of course he was much my elder, having al- 
 
 180 
 
ready achieved what he was destined to accomplish in 
 literature; he had lived long enough to pass the age of 
 hope, and had reached the period of disappointment and 
 regret. Street entered on his career with poetic aspira- 
 tions, weighted by that over-estimate of his abilities that 
 often results in an embittered soul. Possessed of wide 
 reading, he had a fondness for nature in early life, and 
 within certain limitation a power of keen analytical ob- 
 servation, but with only moderate sentiment or sense of 
 the music of rhythmic expression. He possessed none of 
 the majesty of thought which elevated Bryant's poetry 
 above the minuteness of the naturalists' descriptions. It 
 is doubtful whether at any other period of American liter- 
 ature Street could have won the reputation he held at one 
 time. In other words, he was a man of talent, but lacking 
 in the fire of genius. I well remember a walk I took with 
 Street one charming afternoon in October. Nature was 
 in one of her most winning and enchanting moods. I 
 could not avoid giving frequent utterance to my en- 
 thusiasm. What was my amazement, then, when Street, 
 a poet of nature par excellence, stopped, faced me, and 
 stamping his cane impatiently on the ground, exclaimed, 
 "I tell you, Benjamin, all this talk about the love of nature 
 and the influence of nature on the soul is a humbug. I 
 have lived long enough to find out that it does not pay. I 
 don't doubt that you think that you love nature now, 
 but you will live to discover that it is a superficial senti- 
 ment or a mere affectation." I was so dumbfounded by such 
 an utterance from such a source, that I could only walk 
 on in silence for some moments, and then turned the sub- 
 ject. But it gave me a key to the character of Street, 
 and at least one reasonable explanation of his failure to 
 
 181 
 
achieve greater things. I have since then been led to ob- 
 serve that the author who writes for fame rather than be- 
 cause he is moved by deep, over-mastering thoughts that 
 demand expression cannot win true success, which, in the 
 highest sense comes only to the artist or author who leaves 
 the question of fame or money to take care of itself, pro- 
 vided he has requisite genius. 
 
 There could not be two characters more unlike than Al- 
 fred B. Street and John G. Saxe. Nothing could be 
 more unconventional than the way I made the acquaint- 
 ance of Saxe. I was not even aware that he was living in 
 Albany, when a gentleman requested my assistance one 
 afternoon to look up some information he desired. He 
 was tall and massively built, bald, round faced, of ruddy 
 complexion and wore a silk hat and a short skirted frock 
 coat. His blue eye had a pleasant, jolly expression, half 
 boyish, but shrewd; his manner was brisk and offhand. 
 I should have taken him for a Yankee sea captain rather 
 than a literary man, but for his thoroughly correct and 
 grammatical English. He seemed pleased with my at- 
 tentions for, as he went away, he said to me, "I should 
 be very glad to see you again ; call and see me any eve- 
 ning; I live at such a number Hudson Street." I thanked 
 him heartily, but as I saw he was a man of some conse- 
 quence, hesitated to ask his name. But as soon as he had 
 gone I inquired of a bystander who it was, and was sur- 
 prised and delighted to hear that it was no less a person 
 than John Godfrey Saxe, whose humorous and society 
 poems I had learned to admire while I was yet a boy. In 
 this unconventional way began, what I think became a 
 genuine friendship on both sides. My frequent visits to 
 the poet's house after that occasion, and the genial society 
 
 182 
 
of himself and his pleasant famil}^ and the friends I met 
 there, formed one of the pleasantest features of my life 
 in Albany. 
 
 Saxe was a man of the utmost bonhommie. There was 
 nothing airy about him, and I never discerned the slight- 
 est taint of malice in his nature ; none of the arrogance or 
 hauteur one finds too often among successful authors and 
 artists. That Saxe was vain in a certain boyish way I 
 do not deny. But in his case it was a harmless vanity 
 altogether unattended by jealousy. He never spoke dis- 
 paragingly of his fellow craftsmen in letters. With this 
 open simplicity, however, Saxe combined Yankee shrewd- 
 ness in making and keeping money, and keen penetration 
 into the superficial traits of social life and the foibles of 
 liunian nature. He was not a deep thinker, but what he saw, 
 he saw clearly, and what he said was said with perfect di- 
 rectness, and limpidity ; he respected his art, and studied 
 for a harmonious, finished, and classical style. His ver- 
 sification is always agreeable and carefully modulated 
 to the subject. In the choice of diction there was no re- 
 dundancy. With Horatian skill, he used precisely the word 
 that would convey his meaning. His best pieces possessed 
 a rounded completeness that renders them consummate 
 works of art; and yet all is so easy, simple, direct, that 
 the reader is unconscious of the art. As a literary artist 
 Saxe has no superiors in American poetry. His nearest 
 rivals on this score are Holmes, Aldrich and Poe. His 
 sense of humor, and of the power to use language for the 
 just expression of his ideal was equal to Holmes, his satir- 
 ical sense was greater, although in affluence of fancy and in 
 intellectual scope and versatility, Saxe was of course in- 
 ferior to the ffenial "Professor of the Breakfast Table." 
 
 183 
 
As an example of diction, thought and rhythm working to- 
 gether in perfect harmony, the ideal of style, what could 
 be finer than Saxe's The Mourner a la Mode? I have 
 heard him read it, and he did it admirably. He was what 
 few poets are, an easy, graceful, eloquent reader of 
 poetry; with no singsong or false emphasis, his voice was 
 thoroughly attuned to the mechanism and the sense. 
 
 Saxe's unconventional freedom of manner was il- 
 lustrated by an amusing incident which occurred when I 
 met him one day on my way to dinner. He was hurry- 
 ing down Eagle Street when he spied me. 
 
 "Here, Benjamin," said he, "sit right down here on 
 this doorstep ; I'm on my way to catch the train to New 
 York; but I've got time to show you just the funniest 
 thing you ever saw." 
 
 Suiting the action to the word, he sat down without re- 
 gard to the publicity of the spot, and pulled out of his 
 pocket the manuscript of his Herr Van Stopplenose, 
 which he had just completed and was taking to the pub- 
 lisher. The poem, if such it could be called, was a comical 
 skit composed to accompany some farcical designs by 
 Busch of Munich, who was just beginning to attract at- 
 tention. Saxe read it entirely through to me, and was 
 as much amused as a lad with a new whistle. As he put it 
 back in his pocket and started again for the train, he 
 said, "I'll give you a copy when it is published," and he 
 remembered his promise, which is more than some authors 
 do under similar circumstances. 
 
 This rare bit of inspiration was written at Bellows Falls, 
 Vt. in the summer of 1852 by a then unknown poet, John 
 G. Saxe. A beautiful young lady asked him for a line in 
 his autograph for rememberance sake, when, tearing off the 
 
 184 
 
blank half sheet of a note he had just received, he wrote: 
 
 "My dearest Sarah, 
 
 Sometimes tax 
 
 Your sack of thoughts 
 
 With thoughts of Saxe." 
 
 Like many authors of mercurial disposition and ready 
 flow of ideas, Mr. Saxe was an affluent talker, conversa- 
 tionalist I can hardly call him, for he enjoyed monopoliz- 
 ing the conversation. But one could readily forgive him 
 this trait, as he used such exceptionally simple, correct 
 English, free, too, from slang or colloquialisms of the day, 
 and what he had to say held one spellbound. He did not 
 go into abstruse subjects, he ignored politics, avoided 
 gossip, and did not harangue like Coleridge or INIacaulay. 
 He was especially happy as a raconteur. His usual theme 
 was human life, of which he was a sharp observer. He il- 
 lustrated his remarks by ancedotes, one suggesting an- 
 other, humorous or pathetic, and sparkling with wit or 
 apt quotations. Sometimes, also, he favored us with his 
 literary opinions, in which he showed that he was well 
 versed in belles lettres of all ages. If one could not ac- 
 cept all his conclusions on that subject one always found 
 them scholarly and suggestive. Take him for all in all, 
 I have never heard a more delightful talker of the mas- 
 culine sex, than John G. Saxe. 
 
 I recall here a very amusing incident that occurred one 
 evening at his house. When I arrived I found what was 
 very unusual, that Mr. Saxe was dumb, while the con- 
 versation was "personally conducted" by Mr. Williams, 
 editor of the Albany Evening Journal. Williams had 
 just returned from a trip abroad, which was more of an 
 event in the sixties than it is now; he Avas also a man who 
 
 185 
 
liked to do something of the talking himself. On this oc- 
 casion he was primetl with something fresher than the 
 polemics of political factions. As he knew Saxe's method 
 of old, he immediately installed himself as the lion of the 
 evening and general purveyor of talk, which he was the 
 better able to do, as an eligible bachelor. Starting out 
 with a detailed account of his journey, he soon gathered 
 the ladies about him. Having got the lead, he held on 
 manfully through England, France and Germany to 
 Italy and the Mediterranean. Saxe, in the meantime, (his 
 occupation gone), strode up and down the drawing room 
 disconsolately, rubbing his bald crown, and vainly watch- 
 ing for an opening whereby to repossess himself of his 
 lost lead. I took in the situation at a glance, and must 
 admit that I was intensely amused. Finally, in the course 
 of his wanderings, Williams reached Smyrna. Knowing 
 that I had been abroad in the East, he turned to me and 
 airily inquired, "By the way, Mr. Benjamin, in the course 
 of your travels did you ever happen to touch at Smyrna ?" 
 Willing to give Saxe a chance, I replied as dryl}' as pos- 
 sible, "I lived there seven years." Saxe burst into an un- 
 controllable peal of laughter in which all joined, for it was 
 evident that Williams would now have to proceed cau- 
 tiously in the presence of one who knew the Levant so 
 thoroughly, and without giving Williams an instant to 
 recover himself, proceeded to relate an incident suggested 
 by what I had said, in reply. It referred to Miss Wads- 
 worth when she was in England while her family were still 
 vast landholders in western New York. One evening at a 
 social function, an English lady said to her, "Miss Wads- 
 worth, in your travels about America did you ever happen 
 to see the Falls of Niagara?" "Madame, I oxen them," re- 
 
 186 
 
plied Miss Wadsworth. Of course Saxe found that this 
 story suggested another, and poor Williams never got be- 
 yond Smyrna for the rest of the evening. 
 
 I can say from a varied experience, that although in- 
 fluence is not universally essential for admittance to a 
 prominent periodical, yet I must admit that in too many 
 instances a new writer must wait a long time unless he has 
 a friend at court to turn the scale in his favor. Editors 
 deny this, but I happen to know it to be a fact. '"Kiss- 
 ing goes by favor" at the outset of an author's career, no 
 less than in other pursuits. 
 
 I once wrote an article on Cemeteries, that had a curious 
 experience which is worth relating. It was written when I 
 had abundant leisure, and had a distinct purpose to pre- 
 pare magazine articles on a purely literary character, 
 rather than such as simply convey information or discuss 
 ethical and economic or social and political topics, which 
 are now mostly in demand. It is safe to say that no article 
 of the length or cast of my paper, could now find entrance 
 to any periodical published in America. I was steeped 
 in book lore. I had been browsing among such authors as 
 Plutarch, in his Morals, Montaigne, Burton, Sir 
 Thomas Browne, Pascual, Izaak Walton, Donne, Jeremy 
 Taylor, Joinville, Malory, and the like, and although not 
 formally striving to copy any of them, my thought in 
 those days followed somewhat similar channels. My pen 
 rambled discursively from one point to another, I gave 
 the rein to fancy, quoted abundantly from authors of 
 every age, and wrote with intense feeling. 
 
 I sent the above article to the Atlantic Monthly, 
 which returned it with a courteous explanation that it 
 was liked and woidd liave been accepted but for the ac- 
 
 187 
 
ceptance of another article on the same subject. Then I 
 sent it to Harper's Monthly, which returned it with a 
 similar reply. After this second failure I sent it to the 
 Knickerbocker Magazine. Receiving no reply after 
 several weeks, I called on the editor, ]\Ir. Louis Gaylord 
 Clark, who offered me a seat with great politeness. 
 Strange as it may seem, he also had received an article on 
 this subject; thus three articles on the gruesome question 
 of cemeteries were knocking at the editorial doors, at 
 the same time with mine. INIr. Clark stated that he liked 
 mine so much better than the one he had accepted, that 
 he asked permission to retain it awhile, as he might per- 
 haps see his way to publish both articles. Eventually he 
 returned mine, and it finally came out in Harper's 
 Magazine, by Mr. Saxe's kind interposition. 
 
 Although, as a librarian, I was leading a quasi literary 
 life at Albany, yet there was another side of it too scarcely 
 less interesting to me. Thrown much among law students, 
 I continued my reading of law in my leisure moments, and 
 was inevitably drawn into the consideration of the politi- 
 cal questions at that time agitating the country. Albany 
 was then a great centre for the movement of troops and 
 the determination of measures affecting the conduct of the 
 Civil War. Whoever was in the slightest way connected 
 with the State government was brought into actual con- 
 tact with these movements, met many of the chief actors 
 on this arena, and heard much that was going on below 
 the surface of events. Next to Washington there was not 
 then in the United States such a political vortex as Al- 
 bany. The fiery passions of the stupendous conflict, the 
 intrigues, the selfishness, the self-abnegating patriotism, 
 the treason, the pathos, the pettiness, the grandeur, the 
 
 188 
 
suffering, and the triumph of humanity, were all displayed 
 in bold relief on that busy provincial theatre in those stir- 
 ring days which so many now seem anxious to forget, but 
 which no one who was in the midst of them, can ever for- 
 get to this time. 
 
 The capture of Fort Donaldson, made an indelible im- 
 pression on my memory. It was the first important move- 
 ment of the war that indicated distinct moral courage 
 combined with military genius. From that day, I looked 
 on General Grant as the "coming man" of whom the 
 country was in such sore need. The prisoners were 
 sent to Elmira, and passed through Albany. I might 
 easily have obtained a commission in the army as was 
 distinctly hinted to me. It was useless to think of it, 
 however, at that time. For my brother had been for sev- 
 eral campaigns connected with the army of the Potomac 
 and in the thick of the fighting. My widowed mother was 
 vuiwilling to sacrifice both her sons, after losing four chil- 
 dren already, and exacted from me, a solemn promise not 
 to join the army at least until the necessity for troops 
 became more imperative. But when the draft came, I 
 was drawn and assigned to a regiment. Considering this, 
 as destiny, I made no attempt to procure a substitute. 
 For some reason into which, however, I did not inquire, I 
 was never summoned into the field. However, I gave $550, a 
 sum I had saved by out of my salary, towards recruiting 
 several companies of the regiment called the Gris'^vold Cav- 
 alry, which distinguished itself in Sheridan's command. 
 Recruiting, like politics, requires money for offices, travel- 
 ling, etc. When the wounded were brought from the field 
 to the hospitals at Albany, I volunteered my services for 
 night watching, and in that way contributed my quota to 
 
 189 
 
the war. Party spirit had now assumed the ascendant 
 in the Democratic Party, and this became evident at 
 Albany in a very marked degree. From all I heard 
 talked about me, Gov. Seymour, who has been so much 
 blamed, merely represented the genuine sentiment of the 
 majority of his Party. He was of a timorous nature, and 
 became a traitor to the best interests of his country, with- 
 out the boldness, that successful treason demands. Gov. 
 Seymour had a kindly sympathetic nature and his heart 
 was better than his head. The chief agent of the "under 
 ground railroad" who had aided hundreds of fugitive 
 slaves to Canada told me privately as a remarkable fact, 
 that "Seymour was one of the best friends, of the poor 
 fugitives, at the very time, when his political influence was 
 thrown entirely on the side of the slave-holders." Many 
 times when the cause, or some slave had need of funds, 
 Seymour had, with ready sympathy, the agent told me, ad- 
 vanced money from his own purse. The governor was a 
 cousin of my father, and I am glad to remember this. In 
 all his instincts he was a refined man and a gentleman, but 
 for that matter so, it is said, is the Devil. His face was 
 handsome, but I thought weak and insincere. 
 
 It was during his administration that one of the bitter- 
 est political contests in history (for speakership of the 
 House), took place, henchmen of Tammany flourished 
 their revolvers in the legislative chamber to intimidate 
 unflinching Republicans, who finally (the end came sud- 
 denly) won their cause by one vote of a Democrat, who had 
 been bribed to vote with them, by promise of the speaker- 
 ship. 
 
 Callicott was a good-looking man, about forty-five, with 
 brown eyes, jet black beard and ruddy complexion. He 
 
 190 
 
appeared somewhat embarrassed as well he might be, but 
 he afterward filled the office with some ability, though never 
 re-elected. 
 
 The swearing that took place on the train to New York 
 that night, it is said was something absolutely phenomenal. 
 My young trust in an overruling Providence, T confess 
 received a hard wrench at this time, but I reasoned that 
 it was apparently essential to the Union, that the Repub- 
 licans should win, and the universe was governed by a 
 Power evidently willing to do evil that good might come. 
 From that day I have been specially observant of in- 
 stances of good resulting from moral evil, and my judg- 
 ment of some actions, held to be sinful, or inexcusable, has 
 been greatly modified. Evil seems often to be encouraged 
 for what the world calls "Progress" which is really the 
 evolution or change, which seems to be distinctly a factor 
 in the development of the race. Man's responsibility 
 must therefore be far less, than creeds and theologians 
 assume. 
 
 Soon after the political troubles at Albany, the Demo- 
 cratic politicians gave General McClellan, "little ]Mac," a 
 grand ovation there. I shook hands with him and noticed 
 that his figure was of medium size, compact and firm, that 
 of a man of action, a soldier, but I did not like the face. 
 It was kindly, suggestive of amiability, but it had no 
 nobility, and no suggestion of reserve power, no unused 
 resources. The eyes were deep-set and near together, the 
 hair inclined to grow from the low forehead, stiff and up- 
 wards (often a sign of intense self-esteem). Seymour and 
 McClellan received "the boys" as they passed the Capitol 
 that night with their torches, and bugles rent the air. 
 
 Among other persons I met at Albany who have since 
 
 191 
 13 
 
achieved wide repute were Chauncey Depew, and Mr. An- 
 drew White, who became president of Cornell University 
 and Ambassador to Germany, but at that time was serv- 
 ing his first term in the State Senate. He was a man of re- 
 fined address and intelligent expression, but he gave the 
 impression of being greatly indebted to affluent circum- 
 stances and influence for his early rise to position. His 
 career was creditable without being in any way great. 
 
 Depew on the other hand owed his success to a certain 
 intellectual alertness, and great tact, combined with a 
 knowledge of men, rather than books. Deteranination, 
 hope, self-confidence and health were all evident early in 
 this aspirant for fame. I well remember his tall, lithe, 
 slender figure, his blonde, hyacinthine hair and whiskers, 
 his bright, blue eyes, and kindly manners all that went to 
 make up the successful aspirant for political honors. 
 
 192 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 EARLY MARRIAGE AND RETURN TO THE 
 
 LEVANT. 
 
 It was with health impaired by the steady confinement 
 at the State Library, ill suited to one of my independent 
 disposition, that I left Albany after a residence there of 
 three years. I retired to Brookfield, I married Clara 
 Stowell, a woman of very lovable character and of good 
 family, and thus at the age of twenty-seven (my wife 
 eighteen) entered on another distinct phase of my life. 
 Later on, unexpected opportunities for the development 
 of latent powers were gradually opened to me. But at 
 that especial time, it seemed to me that I was engaged in 
 a hopeless struggle for recognition. I placed an article 
 in the North American Review, then a purely literary pub- 
 lication, another in the New Englander, and occasionally 
 a poem in the Independent and other papers. Otherwise 
 my articles came back to me with remorseless regularity. 
 What made the struggle harder, I received but scant en- 
 couragement among some of my own family. As I was 
 naturally inclined to doubt myself, even wdien I had not the 
 slightest intention of abandoning what I had undertaken, 
 I felt these obstacles keenly, not perceiving as yet, that 
 success in art or letters is often of very slow achievement, 
 
 193 
 
conditioned on indomitable resolution. My marriage had 
 been one of esteem and affection, and later one child, a 
 daughter was born to us. 
 
 This continued disappointment following the close con- 
 finement at the State Library finally told on my nerves ; 
 and I had reached a highly sensitive condition one morn- 
 ing when I called at my brother-in-law's house nearby. 
 Perceiving my state, he offered me a glass of sherry. 
 Naturally I have a strong head for liquors and was not un- 
 accustomed to them at that time. But this glass acted 
 like a spark on gunpowder. I never experienced such a 
 result before or since. I hastened home, went to bed and 
 sent for the doctor. The stores of my memory were un- 
 locked and rushed forth as when the floodgates of a reser- 
 voir burst open. I suffered no actual pain at the time, 
 but the abnormal excitement was akin to pain. Every 
 scene of my past life, every person, every sound, returned 
 to me with the vividness of reality. My brain was in the 
 condition described by those who have narrowly escaped 
 drowning; only this was prolonged for several days. 
 After the excitement was allayed, and the action of mem- 
 ory was restored to its normal condition, an alarming ex- 
 haustion supervened. For three months I did not put my 
 foot on the floor. Then at last I began to rally. Ap- 
 petite returned ; I was able to read, and in a few days took 
 rides in the neighborhood. But the power of sleep contin- 
 ued impaired. Bromide of potassium, whose virtues had 
 recently been discovered, proved exactly the remedy I re- 
 quired. It agreed with me admirably ; and although I 
 took it for nearly a year, it produced no permanent habit, 
 perhaps, because I used it with intelligence and self-con- 
 trol. 
 
 194 
 
But although able to get about again and to sleep some 
 by the aid of that drug, my system had become so shat- 
 tered it was doubtful whether I should ever be good for 
 much again. The physicians advised a long rest and com- 
 plete rebuilding of my constitution. My old longing for 
 the sea came back to me. I took passage in the fine ship 
 John Bright, 2,000 tons. We caught a stiff sou'wester at 
 Sandy Hook, and carried it across the Atlantic. The coast 
 of Ireland was sighted in fourteen days ; I have been lucky 
 in making some of the smartest sailing voyages on record. 
 But we came near to grief the following morning. The 
 wind had freshened into a gale and we were running free 
 under close reefed topsails and foresail. It was thick 
 and we could not see a ship's length ahead when the mist 
 parted a moment, and to our horror the dread Coningberg 
 reef was discovered dead ahead, with vast surges breaking 
 over it. In less than five minutes our ship would have 
 struck, and gone to pieces and every soul been lost. At 
 the cry, "Breakers ahead !" the breakfast table was 
 cleared, Captain Dewar sprang up the companion-way at 
 a bound, and rang out his orders in quick succession. The 
 helm was put down, the yards braced sharp up and the 
 mainsail spread as fast as I can describe it. The old 
 ship buried her lee scuppers and her masts bent like 
 whalebones. Happily everything held, and the vessel 
 just barely cleared the lightship, the lightkeepers waving 
 their hands to us to keep clear of them, and looking white 
 as the huge fabric thundered by tossing the foam from 
 her bow on their deck. It was a thrilling scene, a mar- 
 velous exhibition of seamanship, and one of the closest of 
 the many narrow escapes I had had. We moored at the 
 Liverpool docks in just sixteen days out from Sandy 
 Hook. 
 
 195 
 
This was my first visit to England, the land of my an- 
 cestors and I was filled with eager longing to see its lovely 
 scenery, and historic and legendary scenes. But as my 
 ultimate destination was Constantinople, and the scenes 
 of my early life, from which I had been absent ten years, 
 I tarried in England only three weeks on this occasion. 
 Finding no sailing ship eligible for passengers going at 
 that time (as I had hoped), I took the slowest steamer 
 bound to Constantinople, much to the amusement of the 
 agent and captain, who never before heard of a Yankee 
 looking for a slow ship. 
 
 This was the La Plata, and we were out twenty days. 
 When we reached Malta, we learned people were dying 
 rapidly of cholera. I decided to proceed in the La Plata. 
 My reason for so deciding was, that if destined to die by 
 cholera, it was preferable at Constantinople among 
 friends, where also I could be buried beside my father 
 and sisters, than among strangers at Malta. The 
 morning after we left Valetta I had all the premonitory 
 symptoms of cholera, but I had the needful remedies and 
 knew how to treat it; having been exposed to it in former 
 years. Hence I checked the attack in time, and without 
 alarming those on board. Fear has much to do with ag- 
 gravating the symptoms of the fell disease, at least in 
 many cases. Therefore I turned aside all questions about 
 my condition as of no moment, and seeing me so calm the 
 others forgot all about the matter. 
 
 When we reached Constantinople the victims of the 
 epidemic were averaging some two thousand per diem, and 
 the streets were full of hurried funerals. A pall seemed 
 to brood over the vast imperial capital. For several 
 days, even with the utmost care, I was unable to avoid a 
 
 196 
 
constant griping colic and tendency to diarrhoea. That 
 I escaped with my hfe seems marvelous to me. The 
 scourge came to a climax ^nth a turn of the wind to the 
 north, and terminated altogether two or three weeks after 
 my arrival, having destroyed nearly 50,000 people. 
 
 When the impression of these dreadful scenes had in a 
 measure passed away, I found the picturesque and poetic 
 aspects of Constantinople and the Bosphorus as enchant- 
 ing as memory had pictured them, and the climate as in- 
 vigorating as I had hoped, and I lingered there for several 
 months. One of the most interesting incidents of this so- 
 journ to Constantinople was a visit to the summer resi- 
 dence of Dr. Millingen at the suburban village of Buyuk- 
 dere. The family was charming and the location was su- 
 perb. Mrs. Millingen, his third wife, was an amiable 
 Swiss lady, and her husband was one of the most notable 
 characters at the capital. He began his career as one of 
 the medical suite of Lord Byron, whom he attended during 
 the brief but romantic course of the poet in Greece, when 
 he ended his days at Missolonghi. Dr. Millingen informed 
 me that his opinion of Byron's character was much 
 higher than that of many ; and that he had certain revela- 
 tions to make on that subject in the autobiography that 
 was to be published after his death. But this work, which 
 would doubtless have been of much value on another sub- 
 ject as Avell, was unfortunately burned in the last great 
 fire of Constantinople, and the doctor was then too old to 
 re-write it. 
 
 At the time that I knew Dr. Millingen he was one of 
 the physicians of the royal palace at Constantinople, a 
 position he held under two successive reigns. He had the 
 ear of the sovereign, and possessed great influence at 
 
 197 
 
court. He was a particular favorite with Abdul Mejid, 
 a kind, well-dispositioned man ; but like many good 
 hearted Oriental monarchs, hampered by his environment, 
 and shocked by customs and prejudices he was obliged to 
 observe or place his throne and life In jeopardy. I think 
 it was largely due to the counsels of Dr. Milllngen that 
 the horrible custom was abolished which condemned the 
 male offspring of the dynasty to the bowstring excepting 
 the heir to the throne, In order to prevent struggles for 
 the succession. The bloody career of Constantine the 
 Great and his descendants, and other similar royal trage- 
 dies show what has occasionally been produced by that 
 cause even under Christian governments. But in Turkey 
 for several ages it was an unwritten law to reduce the 
 number of possible heirs to the throne by violence. This 
 greM^ out of the fact that the succession In Oriental coun- 
 tries has not depended on primogeniture, but rather on 
 the whim or will of the monarch or the ability of his sons 
 to maintain or acquire power ; while under the system of 
 polygamy each wife became a rival who schemed to win 
 the crown for her own son. I well remember the horror 
 aroused In Smyrna when Khaleel Pasha came there as 
 governor and the tragedy of his harem became common 
 talk. Sultan Mahmoud had given his daughter in marriage 
 to Khaleel Pasha on the distinct promise that If she should 
 have sons they should be allowed to live. But when they 
 arrived at the period of youth, her royal father, in view 
 of the disturbed state of the empire and of his own ap- 
 proaching demise, ordered them to be torn from their 
 mother's arms and strangled. Execrating the day she 
 was born a princess, she wasted away and died of grief. 
 Verily there is nothing perfect, and every boon of destiny 
 has Its shadow! 
 
 198 
 
It was the duty of Dr. Millingen to pass two nights 
 of the week at the palace, in readiness to be summoned 
 at any moment to attend to some one of the Sultan's 
 numerous family. Among so many wives, concubines, and 
 children, medical advice was often in request. Perhaps 
 His Majesty himself desired an opiate to sleep away the 
 cares of state, or sought relief by chatting with a man of 
 intelligence, who saw the world from the outside and in 
 whose discretion he could confide. Dr. Millingen was one 
 of the few about the court whose integrity was beyond 
 the shadow of doubt. 
 
 I remember calling to see him at the palace with refer- 
 ence to certain business of an American citizen. It was 
 about ten o'clock at night. I was conducted past the 
 sentries and a horde of underlings from one passage to 
 another, until I found him in a marble pavilion, luxurious- 
 ly furnished in Oriental style, with sumptuous rugs and 
 portieres and richly embroidered cushions. A pleasant 
 light from olive oil lamps suspended in carved bronze 
 sconces diffused a mild glow about the apartment. Sever- 
 al medical aides were also there. I found Dr. Millingen 
 reclining on a snug corner of the ample divan reading 
 history and smoking a narghile. When he saw me he 
 bade me be seated beside him and ordered coffee and an- 
 other pipe. After I had stated my message we had a 
 delightful chat on literary and archaeological matters. 
 The doctor was full of rare information and no one could 
 be with him ten minutes without going away the richer 
 in knowledge. I may add that in a place like Constanti- 
 nople, where men of all nations meet, where the affairs 
 of all nations are discussed, and where the throng of 
 associations and antiquities render the past a living topic 
 
 199 
 
scarcely less than the present, conversation is often larger, 
 broader, more cosmopolitan, and more informing to the 
 active mind than in places where thought is centered on 
 what is local and provincial. 
 
 Before turning my face homeward again, I took a very 
 enjoyable trip through Bithynia. I went by steamer to 
 Iznik, the ancient Nicomedia. It lies on a steep slope on 
 the shores of the Gulf of the same name. Many inter- 
 esting antiquities add to the attractions of this pictur- 
 esque, thoroughly characteristic old city, a city celebrated 
 as the residence of the great emperor Diocletian, as well 
 as the scene of great pageants and appalling tragedies. 
 
 From Nicomedia I started on horseback accompanied 
 by a Turkish surigee or muleteer, in whom I placed more 
 confidence than if he had belonged to any other race in 
 Turkey. As the Turks or Osmanlis reach the higher 
 ranks they often become destitute of principle or self 
 respect, partly because of contact with the duplicity of 
 the Christians of all classes, business or diplomatic ; and 
 partly because it seems to be chiefly by intrigue that they 
 can remain in power. But the Turks of the middle or 
 lower classes are the most trustworthy people in the East, 
 more trustworthy than many of the same grades in Chris- 
 tian lands. It was my purpose to overtake Dr. Justin 
 Parsons, who had started on his annual trip a day or two 
 before I reached Nicomedia. 
 
 The scenes that most impressed me was the magnificent 
 gorge of the Sakarins, through which marched so many 
 great armies of long past ages, and the ruins of the city 
 of Nicea, where the famous council of the early church 
 enunciated the creed that still binds the souls of so 
 many millions. Although deserted except by a few shep- 
 
 200 
 
herds, the walls and battlements of that ancient city by 
 the Bithynian lake are in more perfect condition than of 
 any old town except Carcassonne. But that has been pre- 
 served and restored by the French government as a 
 memorial of bygone military architecture; whereas the 
 walls of Nicea, warred against by Roman, Crusader, and 
 Osmanli, have been left unprotected to the ravages o^ 
 time ; but in this case time has treated them very gently, 
 and nowhere can one find a finer existing example of an- 
 cient fortifications, or a spectacle much more inspiring 
 than that cordon of ivy-draped walls on the shores of the 
 blue waves of Lake Ascanius. Fortunately few Euro- 
 pean travellers go that way to despoil those ruins, and 
 no neighboring town exists to require stones torn from the 
 noble remains of Nicea. 
 
 Proceeding from this point to Brusa, which I revisited 
 for the third time — it is curious how these unexpected 
 repetitions occur in some lives — I returned thence to Con- 
 stantinople, and sailed for Athens and Smyrna. These 
 visits to the earliest homes of my life, endeared by so 
 many sacred recollections, filled my soul with the most 
 tender sentiments. 
 
 In the Gulf of Lyons, en route westward, I had the grim 
 pleasure of encountering for once in my life a genuine 
 mistral bloAving from the Cevennes with a fury rarely 
 equalled, if surpassed at sea. Having weathered it in 
 safety, I flew to Paris, where I remained several weeks 
 revisiting the art gallaries, and enlarging some of my 
 early opinions formed of the people during the visit of 
 1855. Among them, this, that the French excel all others 
 for the drawing-room and diplomacy, as their language 
 is the most perfect in the expression of intellectual sub- 
 
 201 
 
tillties, and the refinement of social courtesy ; whereas the 
 English language and people are the synonym of elo- 
 quence, directness and power. 
 
 The voyage home lasted 19 days, during twelve of 
 which the wind blew a hurricane, beating down the waves 
 to a flat plain, while the spray flew over us like snow on 
 a frozen lake. My state-room companions were a Spanish 
 West Indian, who looked like a pirate, and a Jesuit priest; 
 both I found very entertaining. Another passenger was 
 a Fenian leader going to America. 
 
 Although my health had benefitted by my trip to the 
 Mediterranean, yet it seemed preferable to continue, to- 
 gether with the resumption of literary work, the plan I 
 had formed of rebuilding my constitution, the true method 
 in my opinion for repairing an impaired nervous system. 
 Therefore we moved to Salem, Massachusetts, a place 
 whose old associations and quietude were wholly to my 
 taste, and whose bracing ocean air would prove a power- 
 ful tonic. A pleasant, comfortable house, near the water, 
 was secured, and the next thing was to provide myself 
 with a sailboat. It was a small keel sloop built after pro- 
 portions suggested by myself to the Herreshoffs of Bris- 
 tol, wlio were just beginning to acquire their now world- 
 wide reputation. They were wholly in favor of centre- 
 board boats ; but I stood out for a keel boat, as the best 
 for sea sailing, and after many years they have come 
 around so far as to abandon the centreboard for a deep 
 keel. The result of our consultations was a fast and 
 graceful little boat called the Hilda; she gained quite 
 a reputation among the mosquito fleet of Salem Bay. I 
 have owned several larger boats since that day, but never 
 have I enjoyed any pleasure craft as I did my little 
 
 202 
 
Hilda. Six months of the year I sailed about the waters 
 from Cape Ann to Boston Light in my little sloop, often 
 alone, but sometimes taking my wife and others with me, 
 who heartily entered into the sport. Perhaps it was for 
 this reason that the recollection of my first sailboat con- 
 tinues so vivid. After the day's sail I would return home 
 so exhilarated that I seem to myself under the influence 
 of some subtle intoxication that stimulated my imagination 
 almost like the opium-eater's poppied drug. I was one of 
 the first in America to suggest and advocate the modi- 
 fication of the sloop rig by splitting the head sail, step- 
 ping the mast farther aft, and reducing length of main 
 boom, which the late Commodore Centre first put into 
 practice with his noted iron cutter, the Vindex. 
 
 Captain Brown, a Dane, sometimes accompanied me 
 on my cruises down the coa§t, as crew and general fac- 
 totum (when I had a larger boat) as he was unfitted by 
 the diseases of a hard career, to take charge again on 
 long "across sea" voyages. He was a weird character, 
 just cut out, as it were, for one of Stephenson's tales. 
 His life was a mystery beyond the fact that he had been 
 in the African trade. He had undoubtedly been engaged 
 at one time in the Blackbird or slave trade, and the 
 recollections of it haunted him as Banquo's ghost worried 
 the brain of Macbeth. I have seen him repeatedly, when 
 steering on a mild day, wake out of a fit of musing and 
 shake his fist at some imaginary shape in the water, 
 cursing and growling, "Get down there! get out of sight, 
 damn you !" Once I asked him what he saw ; he gruffly 
 replied, "Nothing, nothing; I was only just a dreaming." 
 What tales of horror he could have told ! He had a hand- 
 some wife who took to evil ways and forsook him. Per- 
 
 203 
 
haps his roughness and fierce visions drove her from his 
 bed. Abandoning her husband and fair young daughter, 
 she drifted to New York, gradually dropping lower, 
 until, under the sobriquet of "Shakespeare," a grey- 
 haired harridan, she was murdered in a West Street den. 
 An Algerine called Frenchy was sent for life to State's 
 prison for the crime; but who really committed the mur- 
 der, undoubtedly remains an insoluble problem. 
 
 During my winters in Salem, while the Hilda was laid 
 up, I did an enormous amount of reading, which has 
 proved useful to me in later years ; and, which, added to 
 previous reading, has so greatly aided most of my sub- 
 sequent literary work. I have no reason to complain of 
 my memory for general purposes, as it is of the useful 
 sort which responds readily to the associations of ideas. 
 The library of the Salem Athenaeum, as conducted at that 
 time, proved a mine" to me. In a small provincial town 
 like Salem, before the modern library system had obtained 
 in this country, any reputable visitor was allowed free 
 use of the books, as if they were his own, and I would 
 pass entire days mousing among the 25,000 or 30,000 
 miscellaneous volumes that loaded the shelves of the 
 Athenaeum. As most of these works were quite other 
 than recent, some of them rare, one may perceive 
 what a privilege this was. I also wrote and studied often 
 in my own quiet room, while my wife sat by the window 
 with her needle and kept me company. Taken all in all, 
 I think those days in Salem were the most quietly satis- 
 factory of my life. I had a small but steady income, was 
 free from money worries which destroy the pleasure of 
 life, and which later handicapped me for years. My 
 domestic happiness was pure and unalloyed. My mother 
 
 204 
 
and family lived near me. I could cultivate at leisure 
 my literary tastes, for I used my pencil in those days 
 scarcely less than the pen, and carried drawing as far 
 as I could go: I could enjoy to the full the sea and my 
 favorite sport of yachting, and my health was again 
 robust. If I had died then, having perfect health and so 
 many ways of enjoying it, I could have accounted my 
 life happy, as things go in this world, even if not bril- 
 liantly successful in results. But we are not always 
 choosers or masters of our destiny notwithstanding the 
 bosh uttered by shallow thinkers to the contrary. "There 
 is a destiny that shapes our ends, rough hew them as we 
 will." Already circumstances were shaping that were to 
 give altogether another cast to my life and character, my 
 aims, hopes and fears, and altogether different spheres 
 of effort. 
 
 Soon after returning from abroad and before settling 
 in Salem, I had published a smallish volume callerl The 
 Turk, the Greek, or Creeds, Races, and Slavery in Greece, 
 Turleij, and the Isles of Greece. The title was too big 
 for the book. While not destitute for merits, one of which 
 was that every word of it was true (which is more than can 
 be said of some books of travel), it had the fatal quality 
 of being chiefly composed of correspondence to the news- 
 papers, and elsewhere, hastily put together to meet a 
 fleeting public interest aroused by "the Cretan rebellion. 
 No good literature, no thorough work, can come from an 
 effort to meet a special occasion, or at least only rarely. 
 Then too, the book suffered from too great familiarity 
 with the subject. Many local details, such as no mere 
 traveller can learn or which one fresh to the Orient, would 
 have noted at once, and which add piquancy to a work. 
 
 205 
 
I purposely omitted or overlooked simply because they 
 were so obvious to me that I fancied they would be trite 
 to others likewise. I was also so unsophisticated as to 
 imagine that good wine needs no bush, and that if the 
 book had merit it must sell, being in this respect unlike 
 some thrifty authors, who pull wires in every possible way 
 to attract notice to their books. This, of course, was 
 not what is called business, but I have always revolted 
 against anything of the sort, and have doubtless suffered 
 from such simplicity. Anyway, although no book pub- 
 lished in America for years has met so flattering a re- 
 ception from the public, only five hundred copies were 
 sold. As this fact was not known, however, outside of 
 the firm of Hurd and Houghton, the publishers, the wide 
 spread notices gave me a certain repute, and I now found 
 the periodicals coming to me for articles of travel and 
 fiction, the latter for young folks. One of such, published 
 was a serial called Tom Roper, which eventually came 
 out in book form, and brought me several hundred dol- 
 lars, although in my opinion far inferior to the former 
 book which brought me not a cent ; a curious instance of 
 the crookedness of things. To some of these papers I 
 added illustrations of my own. I learned drawing on the 
 wood, and might have succeeded in that art if I had not 
 found it trying to my eyes, which have always been weak 
 and hence required care. Drawing on wood obliged me 
 to bend over closely and was too finiky, circumscribed as 
 it generally was, to small spaces. After photogravure 
 and process work came into vogue, later, I was able to 
 make illustrations by broad washes or monochrome on 
 canvas which were photographed on the wood or gelatine, 
 and I received good prices for such designs. Thus, by 
 
 206 
 
the time I left Salem, I had the way open mto the periodi- 
 cals and was able to add very materially to my income. 
 I did not blind myself to the fact that much of this sort 
 of work could not be strictly classed with literature; but 
 I hoped it might lead to that, and at intervals I wrote 
 verses or articles in harmon}^ with my literary tastes. 
 For my pen I accepted almost everything that came to 
 hand except in cases which were clearly out of my prov- 
 ince to treat with justice, a course which I have declined 
 in my painting, in which I have, with a few exceptions, 
 clung rigorously to the rule of taking few commissions 
 and doing only what was spontaneous and original — the 
 only way to follow art in the right spirit, in my humble 
 opinion. I may add here, once and for all, that some 
 years before this I had deliberately decided to follow no 
 one pursuit but to be guided by my inclinations, my char- 
 acter being too active and my tastes and interests too 
 varied. They leaned sometimes to one, sometimes to an- 
 other branch of effort, without abandoning any of them 
 permanently. If I have failed of achieving the position 
 which can be reached generally only by concentration of 
 effort, on the other hand I have touched life at more 
 points, by this course, and have certainl}' kept my feel- 
 ings 3'Oung and my mind active longer than if I had fol- 
 lowed one line of energy from beginning to end. 
 
 It is not solely the unexpected that happens ! It 
 is also the unexpected (and often seemingly unimportant) 
 that turns our steps unconsciously. this or that way, and 
 leads us into unforeseen paths of destiny. Strolling along 
 Essex Street, Salem, I noticed a clever little sea piece 
 in the window of a mirror and art shop. On inquiry I 
 learned that it was by a young man named George Mevan- 
 
 207 
 14 
 
jed White, who was struggling to make his way in his 
 native town. Certainly Salem was scarcely the place for 
 achieving a successful art career. Observing ray interest, 
 young Shaw, son of the proprietor, offered to introduce 
 me to Mr. White, whose studio was but a few doors dis- 
 tant. I found a modest yet self-respecting young man 
 of ardent disposition and great intelligence. His father 
 had been a sea captain, and the artist, when a boy, had 
 made voyages to Zanzibar. Hence his taste for out-at- 
 sea effects. As I watched the young artist, so full of ardor 
 and hope, and not without a touch of genius, wielding 
 the brush with confident facility, and with every stroke 
 bringing out new effects, a new yearning suddenly awoke 
 in me. It had been slumbering ever since my father, 
 fourteen years before, had insisted that I should abandon 
 all thought of following art professionally. "If he who 
 has so few facilities can paint so well and can venture on 
 so precarious career," I thought to myself, "why may not 
 I do likewise, who have had such schooling and practice 
 in drawing, and have seen the works of the great masters 
 abroad.'' Although I am thirty-one years old, my mind 
 is yet far from its maturity, and it is not too late to do 
 something with the brush before I die." I went out from 
 that studio with a new ambition that was to shape my 
 life henceforth, and, if not always gratified, was never 
 more to be dormant. It was to take me away from my 
 peaceful, happy, unambitious domestic life to wander 
 over the seas, to achieve a certain measure of success in 
 art, exercise my energies in various directions, and enjoy 
 an experience in diplomacy as one of the results, none 
 of which I had dreamed of nor foreseen. 
 
 A year was to pass, however, before I could put my 
 new resolution into practice. My wife fell into a condition 
 
 208 
 
of chronic ill health which made it impracticable for her 
 to continue the cares of housekeeping. Yielding to the 
 urgent invitation of my excellent mother-in-law, we aban- 
 doned our pleasant home in Salem, and returned to Brook- 
 field. But before leaving that place it was my luck to be 
 engaged in one of the maddest yacht cruises ever seen on 
 our coast; of which I can give only an outline here. 
 
 An acquaintance in Salem had purchased a sloop yacht, 
 hired a Portuguese seaman who claimed to have been mate, 
 and proposed a short cruise, to see the race of the Eastern 
 Yacht Club off the Isles of Shoals. He invited three friends 
 to accompany him ; but as no one but the Portuguese knew 
 anything about sailing, and he, I found, was not good 
 for much, Derby asked me to take entire command during 
 the cruise. I accepted after some hesitation on the posi- 
 tive promise that I should have absolute control, free 
 from any interference whatever. We started out with a 
 smacking breeze from the southwest, which increased after 
 we passed Thatcher's Island, and we were followed by a 
 good lump of sea when we were crossing Ipswich Bay, 
 all of which required the most careful steering. Before 
 going below to take a "modest quencher" with the rest of 
 the company, I gave the strictest injunctions to the Por- 
 tuguese to mind his wheel, as we had the whole mainsail 
 set and the centreboard up. Scarcely had we placed the 
 glasses to our lips when a terrific lurch threw us all in 
 a heap on the starboard side, and the water poured in a 
 great torrent down the companion-way. An inch more and 
 she would have completely capsized and gone down ; and 
 there was not a sail within two miles to pick up a soul of 
 us. The rascal of a Portuguese had let the mainsail jibe, 
 and had been within an ace of costing us all our lives. 
 
 209 
 
I ordered him forward, growling to himself, and kept 
 the helm until we were approaching the Isles of Shoals, 
 when I turned it over to him again, in order to take a 
 rapid sketch. Suddenly the yacht rose on a huge heaving 
 roller and then I heard the roar of breakers on a reef but 
 a cable's length ahead, on which the fool of a Portuguese 
 was letting her drive to go to pieces. I thrust him aside, 
 put the helm down, and just cleared the sunken rocks. 
 But I was forced after that to keep the helm until we 
 dropped anchor. 
 
 We proposed to pass the night at Star Island, and 
 there was a large fleet of yachts gathering there for the 
 morrow's race. But before we could come to anchor, a 
 heavy, shifting squall was seen blackening the southwest 
 horizon. The Isles of Shoals offered no adequate shelter 
 in such a contingency, and the entire fleet started for 
 Portsmouth. It was a nine miles' stretch and we had a 
 wild, exciting race under press of sail against the squall, 
 some sixty yachts of all sizes shoving a mound of foam 
 under their bows, one of the finest sea sights I have ever 
 seen. As we rushed up the channed past Whaleback 
 Light against the tide, huddled together so that it seemed 
 impossible to avoid collision, and the thunder and light- 
 ning drawing nearer, the scene was one never to be for- 
 gotten. We had just cleared the point at the entrance 
 when the squall struck us. Dousing all sail, we turned 
 into a snug cove and anchored just in the nick of time. 
 A heavy storm set in that night, and the fleet, running 
 past Pull-and-be-damn Point, lay at Portsmouth two 
 days, during Avhich there was much visiting and junket- 
 ing among the jolly yachtsmen. This proved too much 
 for my friend, the owner of our yacht, who, I now first 
 
 210 
 
learned, was inclined to dipsomania, which as a man of 
 business, he generally controlled, and was then an amiable, 
 agreeable fellow. But when under the influence of liquor 
 he was surly and obstinate, not to say dangerous, insist- 
 ing on taking command, which I resisted, as he knew 
 nothing about sailing. 
 
 The day after, he and his Portuguese had another fight, 
 and contrived also to get in the way of a freighting 
 schooner, which took the mast out of the yacht, and she 
 had to be towed into port, but we reached home alive. 
 Since that unlucky cruise I have always been careful to 
 take no liquors when yachting except some good rye 
 whiskey in my private locker, for special emergencies, 
 and to leave dipsomaniacs on shore. 
 
 After moving back to Brookfield, and before under- 
 taking my plans for painting, I carried out my idea of 
 welding together in a consecutive story the various frag- 
 ments relating to the siege of Troy, which have survived 
 from classical literature and of which the Iliad, the Odys- 
 sey, and Aeneid and Aeschylus' "Agamemnon" and the 
 fragments of the Cyclic poets give or suggest episodes. I 
 had given considerable thought and study to the subject, 
 and composed the work with enthusiasm, embellishing 
 it with touches of local color from my early observations 
 in Greece and the Aegean Isles. I still think it is one of 
 the best, if not the best of my prose writings. But it had 
 no popular success, although I had decided evidence that 
 they wlu) took pains to read it through were greatly 
 pleased with it. The publishers ascribed this result to 
 the title — TJte Choice of Parift — which was misleading, 
 few people in those days being aware to what incident it 
 referred, even some critics, as not unfrequcntly happens. 
 
 211 
 
not looking beyond the title. Undoubtedly the title is 
 half the battle in this period of ephemeral literature, and 
 of appetites craving for what is spiced and sensational. 
 Perhaps, also, the time for a book on that subject was not 
 yet ripe. My second attempt at the Trojan question in 
 1881 with my Troy, Its Legend, Literature, and Topog- 
 raphy, was sufficiently successful to procure me many 
 fine critiques and to recoup me financially for the effort 
 spent on The Choice of Paris, and it continues to sell 
 after twenty years. Still the enthusiasm I had given to 
 the first little book was such that its failure to meet with 
 adequate response was one of the keenest disappointments 
 in my life; and after that I became indifferent to writing 
 books of pure literature and looked forward to the issue 
 of another work with cynical sangfroid. 
 
 212 
 
MANHOOD. 
 
 PART III. 
 
 THE AGNOSTIC'S CREED. 
 
 S. G. W. B. 
 
 We come, we knoxv not whence 
 We go, we knoxv not zchere; 
 
 We live a life intense 
 
 'Mid struggle and despair. 
 
 In mist, zee vainly grope; 
 
 We watch the voiceless shy. 
 While doubts obscure our hope; 
 
 And thus we long to diet 
 
 The sun goes down in night. 
 
 The soul sounds deepest glooms 
 
 All things steal out of sight; 
 Birth, leads but to the tomb. 
 
 S. G. W. B. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 MADEIRA. 
 
 After the publication of The Choice of Paris the way 
 was clear for me to carry out my plan of entering upon 
 an art career. Had that book been successful, I might have 
 been led to recede from the plan. Brookfield was near 
 to Boston, where I proposed to begin, and hence I should 
 not to be separated from my family by long intervals. I 
 passed the winter of 1869 studying oil painting with S. L. 
 Gerry and William E. Norton, the former a landscape art- 
 ist of fair merit, although not of the modern French school, 
 and the latter one of the breeziest of our marine painters, 
 who, if he gained something in technique and tone by his 
 subsequent studies and life abroad, also lost the slap and 
 dash which gave his earlier work a suggestion of genius 
 less apparent in his later efforts. But it was not my in- 
 tention to imitate the style of either of these artists or 
 of any others, nature and my own impressions being my 
 sources of inspiration. Nor could they teach me much 
 about drawing and prospective. My education in these 
 branches was equal to theirs, and had been cultivated 
 still further in later years. But I could learn from them 
 what I really needed, the properties and management of 
 oil pigments and hints in composition, matters in which 
 
 215 
 
a few months of expert instruction was worth years of 
 ignorant experiment. 
 
 After leaving the studios of these artists, where I made 
 the acquaintance of many other painters, and acquired a 
 certain professional feeling, I took passage in the brig 
 Clara to Newfoundland, to study the sea and observe its 
 effects in the broad, in order to avoid the vicious style 
 of giving too many needless details. I began to feel al- 
 ready that breadth in composition and expression, sug- 
 gestion, rather than the mosaic-like detail and finish, was a 
 prime object of good art; and furthermore, that a sense 
 of movement and power cannot otherwise be well repre- 
 sented, while impressions of the majesty of out-at-sea 
 waves can only be truly obtained, in my opinion, from the 
 deck of small sailing ships, rather than from immense 
 steamships. 
 
 The voyage to Newfoundland occupied several weeks. 
 It was attended by some adventure and fine storm effects. 
 Owing to the character of the crew and passengers, all 
 Irish Newfoundlanders, it was also one of the spiciest 
 trips in my experience. The vessel was deep-loaded, and 
 lived through a gale of wind only to come near to ship- 
 wreck on Sable Island. Escape from the latter peril was 
 perhaps due to my own observations when at the wheel. 
 I noticed that the brig was by the head, and carried too 
 much sail for that condition. Hence she made as much 
 leeway as headway, driven sidewise by the swift currents 
 towards the treacherous quicksands of a desolate isle 
 which was so low that it could not be perceived until al- 
 most on it. The captain had been puzzled and alarmed by 
 this mysterious driftway. My report gave an instant solu- 
 tion of the problem. The trim of the vessel was altered 
 
 216 
 
as well as the sails. Thus we cleared the island by sun- 
 down, and made a straight course for Cape Race before 
 a strong, steady breeze. The hardtack and salt beef 
 furnished all hands fore and aft was the worst I ever 
 experienced during a somewhat varied career, and the 
 rations were short at that. My teeth and stomach sur- 
 vived both. The crew was of the roughest, men accus- 
 tomed to sealing among the ice floes in the spring of the 
 year, crowded in small brigs and schooners, and all that 
 that implies. They were a hardened set of sinners, but 
 their unfailing Irish wit, humor, and brogue, and their 
 intense belief in "the Church" and likewise in the exist- 
 ence of the celebrated "Black Dog" and his frequent, 
 actual appearance in Newfoundland, and indeed to some 
 of those on board, gave one new impressions of the in- 
 finite varieties of human life and character. In the in- 
 tervals between the yarns about miracles of the Saints, 
 and deeds of the Black Dog, I was entertained by the 
 vixenish tirades of a handsome young Irish shrew who 
 perpetually belabored her patient spouse. 
 
 On my return home I hired a studio in Boston. Before 
 the end of the season, Messrs. Williams and Everett, 
 the well known art dealers to whose early encouragement 
 I feel duly grateful, put on exhibition the first painting 
 I offered to the public, a twenty-inch by twelve canvas ; 
 and in a month they sold it for sixty dollars. As I do not 
 believe it beneficial to the progress of true art to mix 
 the commercial Avith the artistic strides of the profession, 
 I shall not allude again to the prices received for my paint- 
 ings, although I have no cause to be ashamed on that 
 score, and only mention the price of m}' first sale here as 
 suggestive of the rapidity of my first success. As to the 
 
 217 
 
merit of the paintings* I executed during the ten years 
 when my brush was busiest, that is a question for others 
 to decide. But I may say, perhaps, that the best of them 
 had spirit, boldness, and action, an originaHty in color 
 and a "go" that pleased people. These qualities came 
 from my being full of the subject, goaded on by an earnest 
 demand for expression, now that I had found a vent in 
 that direction, and by the prime fact that my art gave 
 no hint of any master, studio, or school, but was strictly 
 original. These qualities won attention in spite of the 
 occasional crudeness and unpolished technique. Boldness 
 and force was what I sought rather than refinement, and 
 suggestion rather than complete rendition of details. 
 This I may say frankly, my avoidance of dangerous 
 colors for immediate effect gave a permanence to the 
 chromatic effects I sought, and so far as I know my earliest 
 pictures are still uncracked and as fresh as when first 
 executed. 
 
 From the outset I determined to make my study of the 
 sea from a ship's deck on the broad ocean, rather than 
 from the shore. In pursuance of this object I now entered 
 on a series of voyages which furnished material for my 
 pictorial efforts and whose expenses were paid by the ar- 
 ticles I wrote. The cruise in the brig Clara was the first 
 trip of this sort. The second voyage was in the bark 
 Jehu to the Azores. When I was twenty-eight I was 
 seized, without any apparent cause, with the premonition 
 that I should die when I was thirty-seven. f This thought 
 did not specially depress my spirits, but it was ever pres- 
 ent as a certainty to be taken into account in arranging 
 
 *Note list of paintings solO 
 
 *Note list of paintings soUl. 
 
 tHis last illness began in his 74th year. (Twice thirty-seven). 
 
 218 
 
my plans. Accordingly I hesitated before embarking 
 on this cruise, being thirty-seven, and seriously proposed 
 to myself to abandon it. But I reasoned that if my fate 
 was to be settled that year, it would come wherever I hap- 
 pened to be. So I bade good-bye to my family as though 
 for the last time, and put to sea. As it happened the 
 voyage actually proved one of the most perilous and ad- 
 venturous I ever sailed ; several times the vessel came near 
 to being lost with all on board. But, after all we reached 
 home safely, and I have never been troubled with any such 
 mysterious warning since then. 
 
 To give a full account of this cruise would take a vol- 
 ume. I can only present a mere sketch of it here. The 
 vessel was a small, extreme clipper bark of 240 tons, in 
 ballast. In the first place, Captain BroAvn, once a skilful 
 seaman, was now too old for such exceptional service and 
 hence practically incompetent. But for the iron discipline 
 which happily and necessarily rules at sea, he would have 
 been deposed before half the voyage was over, and the 
 usual fearful results of mutiny might have followed. He 
 would go on deck at critical moments, take the command 
 from the mate, a good Yankee sailor, or the second mate, 
 a magnificent, barefooted, but eagle-eyed Portuguese, and 
 then drop to sleep on the hatch. On one occasion he did 
 this when all were anxiously waiting orders to take in the 
 sail for an approaching squall, and no one dared to arouse 
 him. The squall threw the vessel on her beam ends and 
 she came within an ace of foundering! 
 
 The ostensible object of the voyage was to procure a 
 charter for a cargo of oranges in November, but this 
 was too thin a pretext to blind anyone, especially as a 
 strip of canvas was hung over the stern to conceal her 
 
 219 
 
name. The real purpose was to steal Portuguese, that is 
 to smuggle young men out of the islands who sought to 
 evade the dreaded conscription which meant life ruin, but 
 who lacked the sum essential to purchase exemption. On 
 the previous voyage the Jehu had brought 140 fugitives ; 
 and there was an organized secret agency on most of the 
 islands to watch for them, arrange the rendezvous, and 
 ship the fugitives, on board. Of course such a conspiracy 
 could not long evade detection, and the armed bateaux 
 or garda costas of the local authorities were constantly 
 on the alert not only to seize the refugees, but to capture 
 and confiscate the bark itself, if caught in fragrante del- 
 icto, even at the risk of a bloody fight. I never enjoyed 
 any voyage more than this one, for it gave me unsur- 
 passed opportunities to study the sea and sea cliffs, and 
 the manoeuvering of the sailing ship, to participate in 
 romantic adventure, and to observe the hardy, brave, 
 picturesque people of those lonely but sublime oases, in 
 the vast wastes of the Atlantic. 
 
 One of our most thrilling experiences occurred under 
 the tremendous precipices of St. George. We had others 
 as dangerous, but their duration was briefer, sooner met 
 and sooner ended. But this one lasted for several hours, 
 and we had ample time to face and realize in prolonged 
 apprehension, the doom that seemed inevitable. We had 
 intelligence that a band of fugitives would meet our boats 
 at the foot of the cliffs on the north side of the island. 
 It was blowing a living gale of wind from the southwest 
 when we rounded the eastern end, under close-reefed top- 
 sails. We ran at once into a heavy but comparatively 
 smooth northwest swell and almost a calm under the pro- 
 tection of the cliffs scarcely anywhere less than fifteen 
 
 220 
 
hundred feet high, sheer up and down like a Titanic wall; 
 and yet we dared not shake out a single reef for whenever 
 we came to a gulch the wind shot down with the swiftness 
 and fury of a cannon ball. Once indeed the bark was laid 
 over so suddenly for an instant that everyone on deck was 
 hurled into the lee scuppers. At length a faint column 
 of smoke was discerned near the water. The bark was 
 hove to and the largest yawl was despatched to bring 
 off the fugitives. It was a very serious job. The rollers 
 were high, the surf made it impossible to land, and those 
 of the refugees who were desperate enough to incur the 
 risk, leaped into the water and were with great difficulty 
 picked up. All this consumed several hours and it was 
 nightfall before the boat finally returned with all on board 
 greatly exhausted as well as indignant, as the ship had 
 not been kept sufficiently near, as they claimed. 
 
 In the meantime we who had remained with the bark 
 had our hands full with our own toils and anxieties. The 
 captain allowed the vessel to drift so far under the island 
 that he lost the wind altogether, and entirely at the mercy 
 of the huge northwest swell, she swung steadily towards 
 the implacable rocks which offered no anchorage or land- 
 ing. There was every evidence that the wind was prepar- 
 ing to shift, which would have taken away our last hope 
 by placing us on a lee shore. The sky became overcast. 
 The clouds in the offing had the appearance of land, a 
 very sinister sign ; and the mist gathering on the crest of 
 the island spilled over the brow of the cliffs like silent 
 cataracts. Captain Brown summoned all hands to aid and 
 ordered every stitch of canvas to be spread. The long boat 
 and the gig were lowered and the refugees already with 
 us Avere sent forward to tow the ship farther out. Me, 
 
 221 
 
he ordered to the wheel with directions to watch and take 
 advantage of every puff of air stirring aloft. It was pain- 
 ful to observe his senile anxiety. For once sleep w^as 
 driven from his eyelids. But all was of no use. The good 
 bark, apparently doomed, drew nearer and nearer to her 
 fate, and the night was now not far off which for us 
 would probably have no dawn. About the same time that 
 the long absent boat was descried approaching, a savage 
 squall was also seen making towards us out of the north- 
 west, the ship mind you, being now under all sail to take 
 advantage of any favorable air, and the mate and myself 
 the only men on board besides the captain. The latter 
 sent the mate forward to order the towing boats along- 
 side instantly, w'hile he himself beckoned and yelled to 
 the other boat to hurry up. The men tumbled aboard, 
 the boats were hastily made fast to the rail with an even 
 chance of being lost, and at the same moment the top- 
 sails slapped the masts with a sound of thunder, and the 
 ship shuddered from stem to stern as the shifting squall 
 roared through the rigging. Fortunately I had got a 
 little way on her by watchful steering, enough to bring 
 her into the wind, or she would have gone over. As it 
 was, everything for a few moments was in the most ap- 
 palling disorder, while intense gloom settled over the sea. 
 We now had fifteen miles to go to clear the island, and 
 to do it we had to carry a press of sail in a furious sea; 
 it was our only hope, and a slim one at that. If a single 
 spar had gone or a single sheet started, we were doomed. 
 Smothered in foam the good ship dashed on, but it was 
 several hours before the suspense was over, and we could 
 feel that at last we were in comparative safety and could 
 come down to snug sail. But we had to lie to for two days 
 
 222 
 
before the gale blew out. In his Cruise of the Cachelot, 
 George Buller graphically describes the peril of three 
 whalers becalmed under a precipice less than half a mile 
 long while a storm was approaching. But that was a mere 
 trifle compared with our tremendous experience laider the 
 cliff walls of St. George. 
 
 One of the most agreeable incidents of this cruise was 
 our visit to the isle of Flores, situated, with the near 
 neighboring rock, Corvo, far from the rest of the group. 
 The bark lay off and in the open, while Capt. Brown, his 
 wife and the writer landed for the night. There was some- 
 thing strangely weird and piquant in this islet ten miles 
 long and two or three wide, and its 5,000 people, alo?ie in 
 the broad Atlantic. It had its little cliff-enclosed port, 
 entered by a passage wide enough to admit a boat heaving 
 in on the everlasting rollers, its little capital of 1,200 
 souls, named, of course, Santa Cruz, its little aristocracy, 
 whose sons studied at the university in Portugal, and then 
 returned to vegetate on their insular estates, and its peas- 
 ant class ; everything multum in parvo, remote, obscure, 
 contented, while the surges beat its precipitous sides, and 
 the boisterous nations fought and struggled in far away 
 lands, unrecked by the simple folk of Flores. To some 
 individuals such a corner of the world might prove a 
 welcome refuge from adversities and agitations that had 
 assailed them elsewhere. A philosopher might also find 
 reflective ease in such an asylum. One man I found there 
 who seemed to prove the truth of these observations. He 
 was a solitary Italian, an artificer in the precious metals 
 who wrought by the barred window of his apartment in 
 a massive old stone building cverlooking the port. His 
 white hair, crowned by a black velvet skull cap, and his 
 
 223 
 15 
 
silken white beard, suggested a man of seventy, but I 
 judged from various signs that he was about fifty. He 
 told me that he had left his native land to find rest. He 
 had had his troubles ; possibly he was a political refugee. 
 He found what he sought at Flores, and was content to 
 remain there until death. He needed little there, and that 
 little, he gained from the filigree earrings and finger rings 
 he made for the peasants of Flores and Fayal. He was 
 a genial if somewhat serious character. There was a his- 
 tory in his life which I might have learned could I have 
 remained there a year or two, as I yearned to do. 
 
 At the house of our host at one of these islands, a well- 
 to-do gentleman, where we passed the night, I met with 
 an experience novel to me then, but as I now know not 
 uncommon in Portuguese society, especially the colonies. 
 The very novelty of it suggested prudence and discretion, 
 and thus I escaped the serious consequence that would 
 have surely followed a different course. Our host was a 
 widower, and hence the oldest of his three sisters assumed 
 the hospitable custom of a hostess to her guest. When the 
 hour came for retiring this comely young lady led the 
 way to the apartment I was to occupy, and entering with 
 me, closed the door, took a seat, and began to converse 
 with me without the slightest embarrassment, which was 
 more than I could say for myself. After talking with her 
 for a few moments and perceiving that she showed no 
 intention of withdrawing, I proceeded to disrobe myself 
 as coolly as possible. She looked on every movement with 
 unaffected interest, and when I mustered courage to get 
 into bed she smoothed the sheets, and sat down by the bed 
 side and chatted for some moments. Then she asked if 
 there was anything more she could do for my comfort, to 
 
 224 
 
Avhicli I was careful to reply in the negative, bade me a 
 pleasant slumber, and left me to reflect on some of the 
 strangest sensations in my experience. Many nations, 
 many customs ! Evidently this was one of the most ser- 
 ious perils of this adventurous cruise, for an opposite 
 course on my part might have cost my life; as I subse- 
 quently learned. 
 
 On the voyage home the vessel came near to burning up 
 one stormy night through the carelessness of one of the 
 men and the consequent ignition of some loose oakum be- 
 tween decks. Fancy what would have been the results, a 
 tempestuous night in mid ocean, a huge sea, one hundred 
 and twenty-five souls on board including some thirty 
 women and children, and only three boats ! I saw the 
 whole performance, being on deck with the watch. Our 
 salvation was due to the amazing presence of mind of the 
 mate. 
 
 The following summer I sailed once more in the bark 
 Jehu for the "Azores, and Madeira, and a market," with 
 Captain George Hardy in command, this time. I took 
 several voyages with this excellent seaman and Christian 
 gentleman. A nobler sailor never trod the quarter-deck. 
 Captain Hardy was born in the south of England, and 
 came of good old English stock. He was articled to an 
 attorney with a view to following the law ; but ran away 
 to sea when he was seventeen. He was one of the some- 
 what rare men who have told me that the boyish passion 
 for the sea had not been dampened by subsequent hard- 
 ships and perils. At twenty, he was in command. He 
 was a Christian, a convert to the Plymouth Brethren. 
 Every evening he had prayers in the cabin, but he would 
 rise to an emergency, the coolest man there. 
 
 225 
 
The last time I saw Captain Hardy was on his return 
 from a long trading cruise to Australia and the East 
 Indies. He had offered me a stateroom and urged my 
 going with him. But the health of my wife made such a 
 long absence inexpedient at that time. On learning of his 
 arrival in Boston, I went immediately to welcome him, 
 and heard the details of a voyage which had promised so 
 much of unusual interest when it was proposed to me. I 
 have always regretted that I was prevented from under- 
 taking it. It was on this voyage that Captain Hardy en- 
 countered a most thrilling and remarkable experience. 
 His vessel, the good bark EtJian Allen, was lying at Chit- 
 tagong during one of the most appalling hurricanes on 
 record. At nightfall one hundred and fifty-three vessels 
 were at anchor in the roads. At daybreak the Ethan Al- 
 len was the only one left afloat ! All the others had either 
 foundered or gone on shore, while the huge rollers, sweep- 
 ing completely over the low island, had carried the dense 
 population, by scores of thousands, into eternity. He 
 showed me photographs he had taken of the wrecks, ly- 
 ing piled together in ghastly heaps on the sand as the 
 water receded. Captain Hardy also told me that the 
 water had been blown as high as his top-gallant yards, 
 what remained of the furled sails being brown with mud. 
 He stood in the pilot house all night expecting the final 
 catastrophe any moment. He attributed the safety of his 
 ship to the fact that by lying farther out, he had escaped 
 collision with ships adrift, and also to the very excellent 
 ground-tackle he had procured before leaving Boston. 
 On the voyage succeeding this one Captain Hardy suc- 
 cumbed at last, to a disease which he had borne for years 
 with unflinching fortitude. 
 
 226 
 
One of the most original characters of the Jehu's crew 
 was Charlie, the Austrian cook. He was fat and generally 
 good natured, although fully appreciating the dignity and 
 power of his position as purveyor of the chief comforts 
 of those who go down to the sea in ships. He chaffed the 
 crew without stint, but was careful how they chaffed in re- 
 turn. Master of all the mysteries of the ship's cuisine, 
 they knew that the quality of Sunday's plum duff de- 
 pended on how they stood in with him. It was jolly, 
 when the captain announced eight bells at noon, to hear 
 the cook sing out in his galley, "Come and see me." Im- 
 mediately after the men would be seen thronging about the 
 galley door with pin'iMns and trenchers to get their prog. 
 I have spoken of this worthy because of his curious fate. 
 The second year after this. Captain Hardy having just 
 laid his bark alongside of Long Wliarf, once so famous as 
 the rendezvous of our sailing vessels, Charlie, the cook, 
 and the anchor watch were the only hands on board. It 
 was a winter morning and bitter cold. The decks and 
 bulwarks were caked with snow and slippery with ice. 
 The watch was below busied about something. When he 
 came on deck he missed the cook. Looking over the side, 
 he saw the galley bucket floating among the grinding ice 
 cakes, but nothing of the cook, who, it was evident, had 
 slipped and fallen over when attempting to draw salt 
 water. The alarm was given, but all search proved of no 
 avail. When Spring came divers went down and discov- 
 ered the corpse of poor Charlie clinging to a pile, the arms 
 and legs clasped tightly around the timber as in his last 
 agony he had frantically tried to climb the cold wood, 
 slippery with green slime. 
 
 While we remained at Horta, the port of Fayal, I 
 
 227 
 
seized the interval to do a little mountain climbing. One 
 day I ascended the central peak of the island, nearly 4,000 
 feet high, and descended into the vast crater, 1,500 feet 
 deep. The fires were extinct or at least slumbering, and 
 I was able to walk over the vast floor of the crater, soft, 
 slippery and noiseless, carpeted with mossy grass. In 
 the center was a smaller pyramidal crater. The silence 
 and solitude were appalling. I had with me only a Portu- 
 guese lad. We seemed shut out from the world forever; 
 while the clouds floated like phantom cataracts over the 
 walls of the abyss, and vanished into nothingness ere they 
 were half way down. 
 
 Four or five miles from Fayal is the island of Pico, the 
 strait between the two islands forming the port of Fayal. 
 The Peak of Pico, one of the grandest insular volcanic 
 cones in the world in shape and situation, gives character 
 to every prospect in the neighborhood, and serves as a 
 barometer to the islanders as well as to approaching ves- 
 sels, according as it is clear or dofl's its hood of cloud. It 
 is 8,300 feet in height, nearly twice the altitude of Ve- 
 suvius. When the sun sets in clear weather, the apex of 
 this sublime mountain burns like a live coal, while its 
 majestic slopes at the base are draped in royal purple. 
 I crossed the strait in a little felucca manned by handsome, 
 barefooted islanders. As for myself, the air and the 
 scenes acted on me as an elixir, and I was never in bet- 
 ter trim to climb a mountain. The picturesque, semi- 
 classic beauty of the peasant girls, who flocked to the 
 fountain near the beach to fill their jars, reminded me of 
 similar scenes in the Greek Isles or the Odyssey, and I 
 was none too old to appreciate the artistic or the roman- 
 tic possibilities of what I saw. Tennyson says, "In the 
 
 228 
 
spring the young man's heart turns lightly to the thoughts 
 of love" ; but to the properly constituted young man one 
 season answers as well as another. It is usually with him 
 not a question of season, but of opportunity or expe- 
 diency. 
 
 In order to make an early start as near the foot of the 
 direct ascent as possible, I decided not to pass the night 
 at the quinta of Mr. Dabney our consul at Fayal, which 
 he had kindly placed at my disposal, but to proceed a 
 thousand feet higher to Vellas village, where my guide 
 gave me a rude bed in his primitive hovel. His neigh- 
 bors dropped in, to have a sight of the stranger and per- 
 haps to show a sense of hospitality. The extreme pov- 
 erty as well as comradship of these humble folk was dis- 
 played when the host rolled a cigarette and passed it 
 around, each one taking two or three precious whiffs. The 
 high duties on tobacco make it go high in the Portuguese 
 islands and act also as a premium on smuggling the weed. 
 At four in the morning, after a hurried meal, we began 
 the ascent of Pico Peak. I rode a donkey for half the 
 distance. The remainder of the climb offered no special 
 difficulties for foot travel until we reached the first crater. 
 This was a wonderful pit of brown lava, whose steep walls 
 were composed of black, shining slag twisted into incon- 
 ceivably grotesque forms like monsters of the antediluvian 
 world suddenly transfixed into stone in the midst of their 
 uncouth writhing. The little sharp peak which springs 
 some 300 feet above this crater, and at a distance seems 
 to come to a needle-like point, presented the first real 
 danger, and the guides earnestly warned me not to at- 
 tempt it ; or at least to keep on the inner side, as the outer 
 slope formed a continuous line with the drop of the moun- 
 
 229 
 
tain, and an accident there implied a fall and a roll of 
 thousands of feet. As it turned out, we did not escape 
 peril, for the face of the little peak is composed of loose 
 blocks that are easily dislodged by the climber. One of 
 the guides went ahead, and the other followed close after 
 me. The former started a lava rock half as big as my 
 body that bounded over me near enough to graze the rim 
 of my hat. The summit was hallowed into a bowl, twenty 
 to thirty feet in diameter. A thin vapor issued from it, 
 and the rim on which we sat was sufficiently warm to re- 
 quire shifting of position, although no eruption had been 
 recorded, so far as I could learn, for several ages. The 
 prospect from that dizzy height was impressive to the last 
 degree. Although we were miles in a direct line from the 
 sea yet the descent is so abrupt, that as I sat on the edge 
 of the little crater and dangled my feet into space, it 
 seemed possible to throw a stone into the purple ocean 
 whose eternal breakers fringed the shore a mile and a half 
 below with a thread of silver foam. 
 
 It was long after nightfall when we returned to Vellas, 
 and I crossed the strait at sunrise, my heart swelling with 
 the exhilaration of the various incidents of the trip. On 
 reaching the bark, I found Captain Hardy starting to 
 breakfast with the Baron de Freitas. He gave me just 
 ten minutes to dress, including shaving, as we were al- 
 ready overtime. I accomplished the feat with man-of-war 
 speed and method, having several seconds to spare, greatly 
 to Captain Hardy's innocent merriment. 
 
 From Fayal we sailed to Madeira. It fell a dead calm 
 while we were miles from the anchorage at Funchal. 
 Slowly we drifted in on the swell, and it was three in the 
 morning before the cable rattled and the anchor took the 
 
 230 
 
ground. I walked the deck until then, overpowered by the 
 majestic scene, listening to the low, distant boom of the 
 surf, watching the twinkling lights, and the vast steeps 
 veiled in darkness and mystery, wondering the while what 
 loveliness that I was yet to learn, was to throw a spell 
 over me and enthrall my soul like no other place my eyes 
 have seen. Captain Hardy had long whetted my curios- 
 ity with his glowing descriptions, but I found that half 
 had not been told me ! 
 
 As when a man falls irrevocably in love at first sight, 
 as the Chevalier de Grisieux recognized his destined af- 
 finity the instant he first glanced at Manon 1' Escant, so, 
 likewise, did I utterly and forever lose my heart when 
 jNIadeira, glowing in the splendor of day, revealed her 
 charms to me for the first time by the turquoise sea that 
 laved her feet, a new Aphrodite springing with eternal 
 poesy and beauty from the waves. I have seen many 
 lovely spots before and since, many of the world's most 
 famed resorts ; but none of them have ever so won upon 
 my affections, so incorporated with my being, so united 
 in perfect harmony with my tastes, as Madeira the peer- 
 less and superb, matchless in scenery, and unsurpassed in 
 its elysian climate, the gem of the ocean. 
 
 A fortnight at Funchal was busily passed by me ex- 
 ploring the gorges and valleys and pretty hamlets, skirt- 
 ing the cliffs and shores in boats, and climbing to the sum- 
 mit of Pico Ruivo the highest of the central group of lofty 
 peaks, and taking studies here and there, before we 
 made sail once more for Boston. For several months I 
 worked hard in my studio, painting some of my ^Madeira 
 studies and compositions suggested by my recent voyages, 
 a number of which I was able to sell for what would be 
 
 231 
 
considered good prices for one comparatively new in the 
 profession. By the end of winter I was read} to sail 
 again with Captain Hardy, this time with the intention of 
 staying sometime in Madeira and adding to my collection 
 of insular studies. Captain Hardy was now in command 
 of the fine bark, Ethan Allen, a half clipper of 540 tons, 
 with a poop deck in the old style and the cabin below, a 
 smart, all around sailor, altogether an admirable example 
 of the best we could do in shipbuilding in those days. 
 During the Civil War she was employed as a blockader 
 and mounted a battery. I have already alluded to her 
 performance at the Chittagong monsoon. After Cap- 
 tain Hardy's death she was sold to King Kalakaua, and 
 formed the sum total of the Hawaiian navy. Being sent 
 on a cruise to Samoa, the Ethan Allen was seized and held 
 as security for a bill of repairs. For ought I know, she 
 may be still employed in those waters. On this, my second 
 voyage to Madeira, this smart vessel especially distin- 
 guished herself by one of the most remarkable runs ever 
 made by a sailing ship. We shook out the rags on the 
 third of March, in the midst of a piercing nor'west gale, 
 favorable, but of great fury. We passed Boston Light 
 under close reefed topsails, reefed foresail and fore top- 
 mast staysail, and carried the gale until we struck the 
 northeast trades of the coast of Portugal, stood close- 
 hauled for two days, and dropped the mud-hook in Fun- 
 chal roads precisely thirteen days after losing sight of 
 Long Wharf; the distance covered was somewhat farther 
 than to Liverpool. Li less than a fortnight I had passed 
 from the snowy hills and icy blasts of Massachusetts to 
 the luscious fruits, perennial verdure and flowers and 
 balmy airs of Madeira. 
 
 232 
 
To go into a full description of the varied and superb 
 scenery of Madeira, of my happy days there, or my en- 
 joyment and adventures, would require a separate volume, 
 and hardly comes within the scope of this work. I can 
 only touch on a few salient points here. By boat, ham- 
 mock carried by men, by sledge, sliding down the smooth- 
 paved mountain slopes, or on horseback and on foot, I 
 left but few spots on the island unvisited and unexplored. 
 I was told that no stranger had so thoroughly traversed 
 Madeira from one end to the other except Sir Charles 
 Lyell the geologist, and certainly the tourists who now 
 touch for a few hours at Madeira never see much of its 
 best. There is this special advantage attaching to an 
 island thirty miles long by nine wide over a continent, 
 that, however varied and broken its scenery, one may 
 hope to master it with reasonable thoroughness, which 
 is clearly impossible with a continent, even though 
 compassed by rail. I made my headquarters for a time 
 at Funchal, then for a time in the districts of San Vin- 
 cente, Camacha, Santa Cruz, and especially Santa Anna, 
 branching thence over the neighborhood as fancy or artis- 
 tic impulse inclined me. I became so accustomed to tre- 
 mendous precipices, gruesome ledges where one could drop 
 a stone plumb down 1,000 feet or more, steep, rocky, de- 
 scents, and the like, both on foot and in the saddle, that 
 I got a name for fool hardiness. As I am naturally pru- 
 dent, and disinclined to unusual risks unless there is a 
 positive equivalent, I can only attribute my seeming reck- 
 lessness to growing familiarity with such scenes, which 
 is the basis of most physical courage, to an enthusiasm 
 that made me forget everything in the marvelous loveli- 
 ness and grandeur of the scenery, and to a certain stimu- 
 lant quality in the air acting like an elixir. 
 
 233 
 
Although I took numerous studies and sketches which 
 proved useful to me, the chief advantage I gained from 
 this unbroken contact with the scenery of Madeira was 
 spiritual and subjective more than material. Everything 
 is massed there on such a broad, grandise scale that one 
 learns to consider less the details of every scene, however 
 exquisite, and to view things in the large. At least such 
 was the effect on me, I think from that time my mind has 
 surveyed the world and the matters and problems of exis- 
 tence from a different standpoint ; and to consider re- 
 sults rather than the more or less minute and interin- 
 volved processes that lead to them. The comparative soli- 
 tude in which many of my days at Madeira were passed, 
 wandering and reflecting among those glorious and stupen- 
 dous aspects of nature, quite apart from the din of the 
 busiest age since the creation, as it were in the legendary 
 cycles of prehistoric aeons, led me unconsciously to revise 
 my trains of thought, and enter on new methodi and as- 
 pirations, which, alas, I was unable to follow as completely 
 as I hoped, when plunged again into the seething vortex of 
 innumerable energies on my return to the western world. 
 Perhaps it is this, that has made the memory of my 
 Madeira life so indelible and fills me with periodical long- 
 ing to return thither for my closing years. 
 
 I became very fond of the people, too, the courteous 
 hospitality of the upper class or proprietarios, and the 
 galliard nature and respectful manners of the peasantry. 
 However needy, they were outwardly jolly and content, 
 never whined for alms, served faithfully, without grum- 
 bling. The tinkle of the guitar was heard at all hours 
 along the country roads, showing the merry, lighthearted 
 disposition of these hard working islanders. 
 
 234 
 
The months I passed at Santa Anna were perhaps the 
 most enjoyable, although for out and out perfection of 
 scenery, the finest I saw there or anywhere else, was that 
 of Valparaiso or the Vale of Paradise, some 2,500 feet 
 above the sea. I lodged at Santa Anna at the simple, but 
 neat hostel of Senor Acciaoli, chief man of the district, 
 and as thorough a gentleman as ever lived. But the naive 
 unconventionalism of life there, its frank adaptation to 
 local conditions and natural wants, were typified by a droll 
 incident that occurred at a church fair one Sunday after- 
 noon in the church precincts. The parish priest, a hand- 
 some, young man, was nephew of the senor. An attrac- 
 tive young woman was gazing from the window of the 
 parsonage at the festivities. Aware of the way they did 
 things in Madeira, I said without hesitation to the old 
 gentleman, "I suppose that is the priest's mistress?" 
 Instead of glowering at me as one would have done in 
 America at such a question, the uncle took it as a matter 
 of course, and simply replied, "No, that is her sister; 
 his mistress has gone to town for a short absence !" In 
 other words, they realized the fact at Madeira that the 
 priest was a man. The only reasonable way to get around 
 the dilemma is to abolish vows of celibacy, leaving to each 
 ecclesiastic to choose or avoid it, according to his inclina- 
 tions or convictions. The clerical laxity winked at for 
 ages in the Latin countries appears to have been connived 
 at, on some such tacit grounds and palliations, and cer- 
 tainly this laxity does not seem to have extended so far, 
 as to interfere with the faithful discharge of parochial 
 duties. 
 
 For the most part I was entirely alone at Santa Anna 
 but, yet was never lonely. Did not the trade winds ever 
 
 235 
 
waft their balmy and healthful airs around that gracious 
 spot, producing a temperature so even that for forty 
 years the mercury had not fallen below sixty nor risen 
 above eighty at that point? Was not the amethystine 
 sea ever about me leaving stupendous cliffs whichever way 
 I turned? Were not the mountains, the idyllic valleys, 
 the brawling streams, the featherlike cascades, the mar- 
 velous cloud pageantries, ever inviting me to study the 
 poetry of nature, and listen to the music she sang to the 
 soul? I never was lonely for a moment; nay, I rather 
 regretted the days when an occasional tourist appeared, 
 now, perhaps, a Brazilian count, or another day Lieuten- 
 ant Henn, famed in later years as the owner of Galatea, 
 racer for the Queen's Cup. However agreeable they 
 proved to be, they jarred on my moods in those halcyon 
 days. 
 
 But I cannot forget that I came near leaving my bones 
 at Santa Anna in a ticklish adventure. The northern 
 coast of Madeira is everywhere lofty and bold, without 
 harbor or anchorage. Here and there the stubborn face 
 of the cliffs receded where a gulch or chasm occurs, on 
 whose edge perhaps perches a picturesque hamlet. But 
 for the most part one only sees tremendous cliffs reaching 
 like a wall, which average 1,300 feet in height, and some- 
 times soar to upwards of two thousand feet. At the foot 
 is a beach of similar titanic character, composed of stones 
 or immense boulders that have fallen from the disintegrat- 
 ing precipices during the ages, and which continue to drop 
 without warning. This rugged shore is forever lashed by 
 the huge rollers impelled by the trade winds. The bare- 
 footed peasants sometimes pick their way down the 
 crumbling face of the cliffs, zigzaging from one dizzy 
 
 236 
 
shelf to another in search of herbage for their animals or 
 of help and shellfish. Every year some of them lost their 
 lives however, in this dangerous task. 
 
 About where my lodging stood the precipice had a sheer 
 descent of 1,020 feet by barometrical measurement. The 
 garden wall of the hamlet skirted the very edge of the 
 precipice. One day I took a notion to scramble down to 
 the beach, and without leaving word of my intention, I fol- 
 lowed a thin tortuous trail in places scarce wide enough 
 for a foothold, and treacherous where the formation was 
 loose rubble. However, I reached the bottom safely, but 
 was awed by the impressive solitude. Not a house nor a 
 living being was in sight ; only the beach and the vast 
 thundering surf on one side extending thirty miles, and 
 the appalling cliff wall whose highest pinnacles were 
 wreathed with trailing clouds. 
 
 The fall of a large stone near to me, leaping from a 
 great height, and the incoming tide, reminded me that it 
 would be well to turn homeward or rather upward, and 
 then I realized that I had no light task before me. By 
 slow, careful steps I reached somewhat over five hundred 
 feet safely, when I came to a sharp turn in the path, 
 where the inner edge of the trail was higher than the outer 
 edge, the trail being but fifteen to eighteen inches wide; at 
 this giddy juncture I felt the loose earth start carrying 
 my feet towards the edge. The next instant I should have 
 plunged to the beach below if I had not dropped on my 
 knees and dug my fingers into the earth above me. Hap- 
 pily a slight, frail bush grew just within my reach. It 
 was too lightly grounded to allow me to pull hard on it ; 
 but it afforded a sort of moral support that enabled me 
 to collect my wits. Slowly reaching out my hand to grasp 
 
 237 
 
it, I was able to check the slipping over movement until I 
 could consider how to avoid the impending destruction. 
 Pivoting myself on my left knee and hand, I then grad- 
 ually worked my right knee around, the earth crumbling 
 all the time from under it, until I could lay my right hand 
 on a projecting stone. If that should prove merely super- 
 ficially imbedded, I was lost. By great good luck the 
 stone was fairly fixed and held as I dragged myself by 
 this ticklish means around the corner of the zigzag to a 
 point of comparative safety. This manoeuver, which had 
 required the utmost coolness and patience, probably took 
 seven or eight minutes, although at the time it seemed an 
 hour. This was one of the closest escapes from violent 
 death in my experience. The next time I descended those 
 precipices I did not venture without a companion and a 
 sheathed rod. 
 
 After tarrying at Madeira, for nearly eight months this 
 time, (a sojourn which proved an era in my life,) I 
 sailed for home in the Ethan Allen. The bark was in bal- 
 last, which gives rise to several lively experiences. We 
 were struck by a squall off Newfoundland, and the hatches 
 having been carelessly left open and the vessel knocked 
 down to her beam ends, she came near filling and going 
 to the bottom. I ran forward to let go the foretopsail 
 halliards. The cabin boy, who was carrying a pail of 
 water, slipped down as she careened and threw me off 
 my balance just as I cast off the halliards. My leg was 
 caught in the coil, and only by extreme agility did I 
 save the limb or escape being hoisted to the foretop as the 
 heavy yard and sail thundered down. Life in an old time 
 sailing ship abounded with such exciting incidents. Off 
 Scutari, while working up to Sydney, Cape Breton Is- 
 
 238 
 
land, \Ae encountered a heavy November gale. When the 
 wind shifted into nor'west with terrific fury it did so 
 after a lull of several hours, quite an unusual circum- 
 stance, as the lull in such cases is generally brief. Hence 
 we had again made sail, and were taken aback under a 
 dangerous spread of canvas. For a square-rigger to be 
 taken aback in a storm is one of the greatest perils of the 
 sea life. We could not sway the wet, heavy sails around, 
 glued as they were to the masts by the awful power of 
 the blast, and the ship would not pay off until the after- 
 sail was lowered. But the spanker stuck and Avould not 
 come down. The bark would have foundered stern fore- 
 most in the angry sea that began to tower over the stern 
 if one of the men had not sprung up one of the mast 
 hoops. I followed after him and by our united weight we 
 started the sail. It came down on the run, and the ship 
 payed off, came under control, and was saved. 
 
 As the Ethan Allen was going to load coal at Sydney 
 for the West Indies, I availed myself gladly of the offer 
 of a bunk in one of our saucy, old-fashioned fishing 
 schooners bound from the Grand Banks to Gloucester. 
 The Anna Maria, Jewett, skipper, was but sixty feet 
 long, her little cuddy was crowded with fourteen men, and 
 it was just on the edge of winter, with plenty of cold, 
 foul weather to be expected. But all this promised to add 
 zest to the home stretch. I must admit, however, that 
 the first whiff of mephitic air below was almost too much, 
 even for my well seasoned nostrils and stomach, a stom- 
 ach, I may add, that always had a voracious appetite at 
 sea, that has never known the qualms of mal de mer nor 
 lost a meal on either salt or fresh water. The cabin 
 reeked with the fumes of the soft coal from the usually 
 
 239 
 16 
 
red hot cylinder stove, to which must be added the stench 
 of bilge water under the floor, of barrels packed with 
 fish and the intolerable effluvia of stale fish gurry ac- 
 cumulated by months on the banks. The garbage tub 
 stood by the stove, the men turiied in in their wet boots 
 and clothes, two in a bunk, and there was a large dog 
 besides. One can form a faint idea, perhaps, from these 
 details, of the atmosphere of an apartment barely four- 
 teen by twelve In size, under such circumstances. The 
 tobacco smoke doubtless somewhat deodorized the seem- 
 ingly pestiferous odors, still my experience there and 
 elsewhere, convinces me that it is hard to kill one by bad 
 smells alone, especially when neutralized by bracing salt 
 air on deck. Anyway, I was soon accustomed to the con- 
 ditions of life on the schooner, and have rarely enjoyed 
 myself more. The true way for your genuine adventurer 
 to enjoy the rough and tumble of life is not to kick or set 
 up as a reformer, whereby he makes everyone uncomfort- 
 able, and is regarded askance as a tenderfoot and inter- 
 loper, but to place himself without blinking, en rapport 
 with his environment. As I have always acted on this 
 principle, probably this is a chief reason why I have 
 gained so much pleasure out of travel and got the best 
 there is out of sea life. 
 
 We were three weeks from Sydney to Gloucester, pass- 
 ing, at the outset through the famous Bras d'or, a sheet 
 of water then unknown to American tourists. The glor- 
 ious tints of autumn still lingered on the foliage and the 
 weather was practically serene on that noble sheet of 
 water. We met many picturesque characters of Gaelic 
 stock at places where we touched or anchored at night- 
 fall, and received much genial hospitality. If I had been 
 
 240 
 
a jolly bachelor, I might have lost my heart to some of 
 the blooming, passionate lasses of that romantic region, 
 several of whom still linger pleasantly in my memory. 
 The canal at St. Peters had recently been completed, and 
 through it we passed out on the broad Atlantic. The 
 effect presented by the fleet of schooners anchored at St. 
 Peters for the night, with lights in their rigging and stars 
 gleaming superbly above, and reflected in the dark wave 
 below, still comes before me like a scene in fairyland. 
 
 But we saw no more such scenes on that voyage. For 
 we now entered on a succession of squalls and gales, of 
 reefing and lying to, of decks swept fore and aft by 
 mountain surges, of scuppers buried in a smother of 
 foam, of ice forming where the spray fell, and of running 
 into this or that port for a haven of refuge. But we 
 reached Gloucester safely at last on a mild Sabbath after- 
 noon. 
 
 241 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 FROM THE WHITE HOUSE TO THE BAHAMAS. 
 
 In the spring of IST-l it was suggested to me to go to 
 Nassau, Bahama Islands, to write them up in the interests 
 of the Royal Victoria Hotel, recently purchased by 
 Grover Cleveland, later President of the United States, 
 and his brother, who was aftenvards lost in the steamer 
 that was burned off Abaco. As it presented an oppor- 
 tunity for fresh sea studies, and as it was now evident 
 that the Chicago Fire, where my wife and I, lost prop- 
 erty was to throw me entirely on my own exertions for 
 some years, I accepted the proposal. But I did so, on 
 the condition that my expenses thither and back should 
 in any event be paid me, and that I should not be ex- 
 pected to prepare the article unless I found the Royal 
 Victoria Hotel to be an establishment altogether worthy 
 to be recommended to the public ; and finally that the 
 article should be in substance an account of the Bahamas, 
 with incidental allusions to the hotel. Mr. Cleveland ar- 
 ranged with Harper's Monthly to publish the paper. 
 
 I met Grover Cleveland on the day of sailing at Mr. 
 Ligerwood's store on Broadway, near 4th St. I think, 
 and we sampled some of the best rye whiskey in the 
 country. The interview was free and easy, but I gained 
 
 242 
 
from it that he was a man scrupulously careful and sys- 
 tematic in business matters, but in other respects what one 
 would call a thoroughly good fellow. I question whether 
 the idea of becoming Governor of New York had even 
 entered his brain at that time, much less the captivating, 
 tantalizing dream of becoming the master of the White 
 House, to which so many think they are called while so 
 few are chosen. On my return from Persia, which was 
 due to the Democratic party coming into power, I called 
 to pay my respects to President Cleveland on one of his 
 reception days. Although ten years had elapsed, he 
 recognized me at a glance, out of a throng of those who 
 were waiting to shake hands with him ; this seemed to me 
 an evidence of a born fitness for high position, as the 
 recollection of faces, has always been one of the traits pe- 
 culiar, if not universal, to men prominent in public life. 
 Drawing me aside to a corner of the apartment, the Presi- 
 dent chatted pleasantly for some time, asking information 
 and advice in regard to Persia, and the sort of man to ap- 
 point in my place. He also requested me to call on Mr. 
 Bayard, his self-sufficient although, sometimes inefficient 
 secretary of state, and repeat to the latter the substance 
 of what I had just said to the President. I may add here 
 that when I did call accordingly, on Mr. Bayard, I found 
 in a very few moments what I already surmised, that he 
 desired neither information or advice from a Republican. 
 Verhum Sap! The first remark of Mr. Cleveland to me 
 on this occasion was, "We have met before," with a twinkle 
 in his eye as he said it. To this I replied, "Yes, Mr. 
 President, and perhaps neither of us thought then, that 
 the next time we should shake hands would be in the 
 AVhite House." He responded by a mysterious smile, as 
 
 243 
 
if to saj, "you cannot expect me to give myself away by 
 conceding that my election to the governorship of New 
 York and my subsequent election to this position was the 
 result of the split in the Republican party in New York, 
 and the manipulation of ballots by Tammany rather than 
 the climax of a livelong, well-laid plan directed by lofty 
 ambition and crowned by the success due to a patriotic ef- 
 fort and merit !" 
 
 There is a curious and important state secret connected 
 with Mr. Cleveland's second administration, which would 
 have made a sensation of the first magnitude if revealed 
 at the time, and in such event would have affected his 
 plans materially, even if disavowed, as of course it would 
 have been. But I can do no more than allude to it here, 
 as I learned of it in such a way that my honor is pledged 
 to divulge nothing while a certain party is living. 
 
 My return from Persia — being a Republican — was due 
 to the coming of Mr. Cleveland and the Democrats into 
 power ; and there is no doubt, likewise, that his rapid rise 
 from being sheriff of Buffalo to the highest position in 
 the New World, was immediately due to what looks like 
 stupendous luck. Notwithstanding these facts, candor 
 obliges me to admit that Grover Cleveland was a man of 
 very great ability, standing head and shoulders above the 
 chief contemporary leaders of his party, in fitness for the 
 position he has occupied. I do not think him a statesman 
 in the highest sense of the term, nor was he widely in- 
 formed when he passed from Buffalo to Albany. His 
 political honesty was not above par, nor was he capable 
 in those days, at least, of warming to the glow of exalted 
 patriotism. His record shows this ; his most important 
 appointments were generally given to men who had fought 
 
 244 
 
against the flag, although it was still proper that they 
 should hold back seats. However, advantageous as par- 
 tisan policy, such a course as regards foreign appoint- 
 ments and the position of secretary of state, was in poor 
 taste and unjust to the north which has fought to pre- 
 serve the nation. I question whether Mr. Cleveland took 
 much interest in the sacrifices and triumphs of the heroes 
 who saved the Republic, of which he eventuall}^ became the 
 head. He never alluded to the subject except to reduce 
 pensions and return rebel flags. But he was shrewd to a 
 degree, was rich in sterling common sense, w^as a wonder- 
 ful manipulator of political wires, had a genius for par- 
 tisan politics, was well grounded on sound financial prin- 
 ciples, had convictions of his own and noble firmness in 
 maintaining them, and as a private citizen he has exhib- 
 ited good average integrity. That he liked his glass and 
 a good time occasionally, is nothing against him, perhaps 
 rather in his favor. I am inclined to feel more suspicious 
 of the man who never has (or professes never to have) 
 such inclinations than of the one who is human, and does. 
 So long as one fills his public duties acceptably, it is no- 
 body's business Avhat he does as an individual, short of 
 breaking the laws. 
 
 I had had other interviews with our presidents at the 
 White House. One was President Arthur, whom I met 
 several times officially, before going to Persia, as he 
 signed my commission. He was exceedingly afl'able, as 
 was characteristic of him, but he impressed me as being 
 possessed of more heart than head, of a warm, kindly, 
 emotional nature and of good, but not unusual intellectual 
 or commanding character. He was strikingly handsome, 
 however, and his manner was more that of the polished 
 
 245 
 
gentleman of the world than of any American president 
 since the early history of the Republic that I have met or 
 known. 
 
 President Hayes was refined and courteous although 
 not courtly, to which was added a subtle suggestion of 
 self-reliance and power, if need were to express it, which 
 Arthur seemed to me to lack. In appearance and manner 
 Hayes reminded one of the better class of our college 
 presidents, or the cultured prosperous pastor of a 
 prominent metropolitan church. The soldier element in 
 him, was apparent only in his erect carriage and the alert, 
 eagle glance of his eye. They were blue-grey, and while 
 habitually of mild expression, they would on occasion 
 flash with keen intensity, and pierce through one, like a 
 falchion. I can imagine he looked that way, in battle. 
 Owing to the issue raised about his election, and the con- 
 sequent intolerable abuse cast on him and his administra- 
 tion. President Hayes has never received the just meed 
 of appreciation which was emphatically his due. A man 
 of the highest probity and the purest patriotism, he also 
 possessed decision of character and abounding common 
 sense. My brother, Charles Alfred Benjamin, who en- 
 tered the Army of the Potomac at sixteen, and served 
 with credit in the brilliant campaigns of the Shenandoah 
 Valley, and had frequent opportunities to see Hayes' 
 brigade, both in camp and in action, told me that there 
 was no brigade in Sheridan's army better handled, better 
 disciplined, and more creditable to the service and its 
 conmiander. Others who were near to President Hayes 
 for many years and knew him well have also informed me 
 that he was gifted with a fund of general information un- 
 equalled, perhaps, by any of our presidents, and that the 
 
 246 
 
range of his tastes and observations was unusually ex- 
 tensive. For example he took a great interest in ornithol- 
 ogy ; if one were out riding or walking with him in the 
 country, he would call attention to facts in regard to 
 American birds often original to himself, or known only 
 to a few professional ornithologists. It may have been 
 this circumstance, that suggested to Mrs. Hayes to have 
 a service of china made for the White House decorated 
 with designs of the birds of the United States, by 
 Theodore R. Davis, whom I knew well. Davis was a 
 singular and picturesque character, with something of 
 the Indian about his look and bearing. But that is an- 
 other story ! 
 
 I happened to be in London, and at the American rooms 
 in Charing Cross, Avhen the news of General Hayes' nomi- 
 nation was flashed across the cable. Having recently ar- 
 rived from the States, I was asked by those present, what 
 was the forecast for his election. Having made two close 
 and correct guesses about the canvas of IMcClellan and 
 Greele}'^, I ventured on a third after reflecting a moment, 
 saying, "It will be the closest election in our history ;" and 
 such it proved, as everyone knows. This result was due 
 to the desperate claims set up by the Democrats, although 
 there is not the slightest doubt that the slaughter of Re- 
 publican citizens in Louisiana and South Carolina vitiated 
 the electoral votes of those States, through which the elec- 
 tion of Tilden was asserted. 
 
 I met President Hayes several times at the White 
 House, always to be greeted with a pleasant word. One 
 morning he invited me to his private office called the South 
 Room, I believe, and conversed with me for half an hour. 
 Among other matters, he informed me that he had made a 
 
 247 
 
special study of the history and legends of the White 
 House. Among other facts he related how the meridian 
 of Washington was established. When the question was 
 mooted the commissioners called on President Jefferson 
 to ask his advice. They were conferring in the same 
 apartment where we were talking. "Well, gentlemen," 
 exclaimed Jefferson, "Why not draw the line of the merid- 
 ian right through the middle of this room.'"' They ac- 
 cepted the suggestion at once, and the line accordingly 
 bisects the White House and Sixteenth Street, running 
 directly north from the presidential mansion. 
 
 It was intimated to me through a friend that the con- 
 sulate at Bucharest, afterwards elevated with Athens to a 
 legation, might be given me, on formal application. But 
 while very grateful to President Hayes, I desired to stay 
 at home for the reasons that led me to decline similar for- 
 eign appointments on two occasions. I was not by nature 
 an office holder as I might have been if our foreign ser- 
 vice were a profession for life. The tenure of our foreign 
 service is too precarious, the expense exceeds the salary, 
 if one is sufficiently patriotic to sustain such a position 
 as it should be; the wire pulling essential in securing 
 nomination and confirmation was exceedingly distasteful 
 to me, an office holder is at the beck and call of those above 
 him, and is liable to suffer the abuse of an unbridled press 
 on the slightest cause ; and finally, I was at that time 
 fully occupied with pursuits more or less congenial and 
 which gave a fair livelihood if public and publishers con- 
 tinued their patronage. 
 
 My stay of six weeks at the Bahamas was sufficiently 
 agreeable and not painfully laborious. The gathering 
 of data for my article or of studies for my easel Avas more 
 
 248 
 
in the nature of play than of work. As everyone was 
 anxious to have the Islands exploited everyone was cour- 
 teous and hospitable. I was invited repeatedly to break- 
 fasts and balls at the Government house, took brandy and 
 soda with the officers of the garrison or of the warships, 
 on latticed piazzas shaded with flowering vines ; or sat 
 till the small hours at solemn, old-fashioned whist-parties, 
 while a black waiter in livery offered us toothsome re- 
 freshments at intervals between the games. Having been 
 with the English more or less all my life, and liking them 
 about as well as our own Yankee folk, I got along with 
 them perfectly well on this occasion. Sir John Pope Hen- 
 nesey, the governor, afterwards governor at Hong Kong, 
 was suave, polite, and agreeable; not very heavy timber, 
 I fancy, but gifted with a flexible spine, and understand- 
 ing the supreme art for one who would rise without com- 
 manding genius, of identif3'ing himself with the designs, 
 character and especially the weaknesses, of his superiors. 
 Lady Hennesey impressed one as rather more genuine, 
 with more heart if not with more brains. She was said to 
 be the daughter of a French colonial governor and a Chi- 
 nese lady, and born on the west coast of Africa. Tall, 
 slender, graceful as a palm of her own native shore, her 
 pale slightly yellow features were mobile and refined, sug- 
 gesting a capacity for suffering which I sincerely hope 
 was never put to the test, for she was certainly an un- 
 usually attractive woman. 
 
 At the Royal Victoria Hotel I became acquainted also 
 with Mrs. General John C. Fremont, famous in ante hel- 
 ium days as Jessie. She bore herself with the hauteur of 
 one who had won, rather than lost, in that great presi- 
 dential contest ; and whv should she not, with the blond 
 
 249 
 
of Thomas Benton coursing in her veins? But although 
 rather more snobbish to those she considered her infer- 
 iors, than comports with the real lady, she could also be 
 exceedingly affable and magnetic. Her regard for the 
 general, who was one of the handsomest, if not the great- 
 est of men, was little less than idolatry. I still have or 
 had, some years since, a rose, (somewhat withered it is 
 true,) which she gracefully presented me at the close of a 
 pleasant call on her and the general, at their residence 
 in New York. 
 
 An amusing incident happened to me at Nassau, which 
 reminded me of the well known story of the French of- 
 ficer who sought the camp of an Arab chieftain to buy 
 a noted mare for the stables of the Emperor. I was anx- 
 ious to paint one of the superb fish of those waters which 
 are a rich turquoise blue verging to brown on the belly and 
 to coral and vermilion around the mouth. I offered a 
 good price for the first one brought to me directly out 
 of the water. One afternoon a sound of heavy steps was 
 heard in the corridor leading to my room, followed by a 
 bold knock on the door. On opening it I saw Sampson, 
 the six-foot black boatman, a well-known character of 
 Nassau, holding up a splendid specimen of blue fish. Im- 
 mediately I sat down to make a careful study of this mag- 
 nificent model. As I had not quite finished when twi- 
 light began, I sent the fish down to the ice chest of the 
 hotel to be kept until morning. After })reakfast I ordered 
 the blue fish to be brought again to my room. To my 
 chagrin I was told that it had been served up to me with 
 my coffee! 
 
 Of course there was no end of delightful sea picnics in 
 the waters adjacent to Nassau and some exciting racing 
 
 250 
 
with small yachts, for the weather and scenery were de- 
 licious for the former, and the sharks that abounded 
 acted as no deterrent to the latter. But my most agree- 
 able days at the Bahamas were passed on a cruise among 
 some of the islands east of Nassau in a forty-foot 
 schooner. Nothing unusually exciting occurred during 
 this little voyage, but it was so replete with an indescrib- 
 able charm, so full of details enchanting to one who en- 
 joys that sort of pleasure, that I refrain from saying 
 more about it here, lest I should not know when to stop. 
 The entire cruise was a poem of dreamland. 
 
 The following summer I passed at home with my family, 
 with the exception of short cmises on the coast to avoid 
 hay fever from which I was an acute sufferer during the 
 warm season whenever away from the sea in our country. 
 As winter approached I went back to my studies in Bos- 
 ton ; but I had barely painted two or three pictures when 
 a received a letter from the editor of Harper's Monthly 
 suggesting another expedition. He wrote that the 
 Scribner's Magazine, announced some articles on the 
 Channel Islands and the adjacent coast, to appear 
 within certain months not far distant. As the business 
 rivalry, (an absurd feature of literary enterprises,) was 
 at that time very sharp between the two periodicals, and 
 as articles of travel were then a special feature (which 
 they have long ceased to be). Harper's wanted to know 
 whether I could guarantee papers on the aforesaid sub- 
 ject in time to appear in each case, a month ahead of 
 Scribner's. But, in such a case, I must take the next 
 boat for England ; not a moment was to be lost. Fond 
 as I was of travel and adventure, I must admit that in 
 the present instance I preferred to stay at home. I 
 
 251 
 
wished to paint several more of my many subjects and 
 sketches, while the impressions were still vivid. My dear 
 wife, also, was in declining health and needed me near her, 
 and the childhood of our little daughter was passing, and 
 I was not with her to enjoy it. It is true that what direct 
 returns my articles brought me from these trips paid but 
 moderate profit above my travelling expenses, and those 
 expenses had to be advanced out of my own pocket, such 
 is often the way of the publisher with his contributor. 
 But I made something additional by side articles and lec- 
 tures of travel, and by the subjects suggested for my 
 brush; hence on the whole, my journeys were fairly profit- 
 able. To this, must be added the fact that being then "in 
 the swim," I was able to raise my terms with each suc- 
 ceeding trip, while all the time I was looking ahead to 
 winning positions or high prices for painting, whereby to 
 emancipate myself from writing for periodicals, whose 
 limitations, rules, editorial supervision as well as the dic- 
 tating tastes of a variable public, I found somewhat gall- 
 ing. Naturally of independent spirit, it was with hesita- 
 tion that I submitted any article to an editor. From the 
 very first and s-till more as my maturing opinions grew 
 more emphatic, I lived in hope of reaching the point of 
 being entirely independent of newspapers and periodicals, 
 writing only books and painting pictures to please myself 
 first, and the public afterwards. When it happened, as it 
 did sometimes, that the subject of an article was entirely 
 congenial, then and then only, was I quite satisfied to 
 pursue the lot assigned to me. 
 
 In the present instance I assented more willingly per- 
 haps, than sometimes, to the behest or stress of destiny, 
 because I had wished to visit the places mentioned, and 
 
 252 
 
also saw a means thereby to carry out certain other ob- 
 jects I had in view. Hence I accepted the agreeable pro- 
 posal of Harper's Magazine, conditioned on receiving 
 an adequate sum for each article, photographs being paid 
 for, on space rates, and drafts being remitted by return 
 mail on receipt of each article. I then flew around to the 
 office of the Atlantic Monthly and engaged three other 
 articles on other subjects, to be paid for in advance. 
 Then I hastened to the office of the Boston branch of the 
 Cunard Line and engaged passage on the boat leaving the 
 next morning. I had barely time after accomplishing 
 these arrangements to catch the train to Brookfield, 
 seventy miles up the State, where my family were. There 
 I packed my trunk, bade farewell to them, took a late 
 train back, and at six a. m., less than twenty-four hours 
 after receiving the Harpers' letter, I was on board the 
 steamship Samaria, Captain Roberts, steaming past Bos- 
 ton Light bound to Liverpool, on a six months' trip. 
 
 One little incident of this voyage I often recall with un- 
 qualified pleasure for having the moral courage to per- 
 form a necessary but disagreeable duty. As it was the 
 cold season, the Captain's table accommodated most of 
 the first class passengers, who were chiefly English and 
 German with a sprinkling of Americans. I sat next to 
 Captain Roberts, on his left. Opposite to me at his right, 
 was a party of ladies and gentlemen of monosyllabic 
 name, who did not delay to inform us by their manner 
 and conversation that they were from Boston and mem- 
 bers of an exclusive set of the upper swelldom. They con- 
 fined their attention and conversation to the Captain. 
 After the custom of a certain class of soi-distant auto- 
 cratic Bostonians, the lii^c of whom, this country has 
 
 253 
 
quite too large a share, they thought to display their 
 superiority by lauding foreign customs and criticizing 
 their own country, its government, people, cuisine, and 
 the like. This they did, not once, but perpetually, en- 
 tirely regardless of the foreigners present. The latter 
 as well as the Americans listened with amazement. Cap- 
 tain Roberts himself seemed annoyed by this impropriety. 
 He sometimes ventured to qualify the diatribes by a few 
 words commendatory of America. 
 
 After this had continued for some days, I felt that the 
 time had come to speak out and administer the rebuke 
 these fellow-countrymen so richly deserved. 
 
 "You will pardon me," said I one day, "over the wal- 
 nuts and the wine," and looking squarely at the offenders, 
 "if I say a word apropos of the steady praise of foreigners 
 and the unstinted abuse of our own country which we have 
 heard since we sailed from Boston. You have forgotten 
 to mention perhaps, one praise-worthy quality in which 
 all foreigners excel. Whatever causes of discontent the 
 English, French, Germans, Russians, or other peoples 
 may have against their own government and people, their 
 patriotism is so transcendent, their esprit du corps so 
 true, that they rarely deliberately and consciously air the 
 soiled linen of their own country in the presence of for- 
 eigners." 
 
 The effort to say this on my part, was so severe that 
 every nerve in me trembled. The ladies blushed, the 
 gentlemen turned white with rage and mortification. But 
 they answered not a word ; and from that hour until w^e 
 reached Liverpool not a syllable was uttered against 
 America by the D's or any one else at that table. When 
 we adjourned from dinner to the deck the other passen- 
 
 254 
 
gers gathered around me, shook me heartily by the hand, 
 and thanked me. I shall not soon forget that scene. As 
 for Captain Roberts, he came up to me in turn, and said, 
 "My dear sir, you did nobly. I myself did not half like 
 what those countrymen of yours have been saying. They 
 deserved what they got, and I'm. glad you gave it to them. 
 And now let me say before I go forward, that my state- 
 room, charts and books are entirely at your service, when- 
 ever you like to use them ; come when you like, and make 
 yourself at home in my cabin for the rest of the passage." 
 
 It is worth mentioning that ten or twelve years after 
 this occasion, when my family were returning from Europe 
 the same Captain Roberts was in command. Attracted by 
 the name, he asked them if they were related to me; on 
 their replying in the affirmative, he repeated this incident 
 to them, saying that it had made an indelible impression 
 on his memory. I heard of this incident also, when in 
 Bermuda long after, from a gentleman visiting the is- 
 lands ; on hearing my name, he inquired if I was the man 
 who, as he had been told, had defended the fair name of his 
 country on a Cunard steamer. 
 
 The offensive class represented by the D's is offset, by 
 another, quite as illbred, although better natured. It is 
 composed of those Americans who make an ostentatious 
 display of their patriotism, and brag on every occasion of 
 their country and its achievements. Good breeding sug- 
 gests, that before foreigners or strangers generally, one 
 should neither announce or denounce or deny his country, 
 ancestors, or religion, unless for special cause. These are 
 matters that can take care of themselves. 
 
 I arrived at the Channel Islands in December. Al- 
 though the temperature was far milder than that of Xew 
 
 255 
 17 
 
England at that season, yet it was unusually severe for 
 those waters. I had the questionable pleasure of seeing 
 the first snow, known at Jersey for many years, and visit- 
 ing Mount Orgeuil Castle when it was robed in a mantle 
 of ermine. Although I enjoyed some charming days there, 
 yet I encountered some terrific weather in going from one 
 island to another, and saw the fiercest waves the Atlantic 
 ever raises. I shall never forget the morning we ran out 
 of St. Heliers. Only two or three passengers ventured 
 out in the staunch steam packet. We shipped a broad- 
 side sea as we turned westward from the mouth of the 
 port that swept the decks from stem to stern ; and few 
 sights could be more appalling than the lee shore from 
 that point to the Corbiere lighthouse and rock, an iron- 
 bound coast beset with pitiless pinnacles and reefs buried 
 under an unbroken mass of thundering foam. From the 
 Corbiere of which I made a painting now owned by the 
 Boston Art Club, we drove before the tempest in a thick 
 mist of snow, losing our course, and very near running 
 against the ragged crags of Guernsey. With difficulty 
 we made St. Peter's Port, where the steamer was forced 
 to lay up until the storm blew itself out. I explored 
 Guernsey and Jersey somewhat thoroughly, quite suf- 
 ficiently to enable me to find out the just proportions of 
 truth and fiction, in Victor Hugo's powerful but prepos- 
 terous yarn called The Toilers of the Sea. The fact 
 of it all, is that the author knew practically nothing 
 of the sea and ships. But he crammed up for the story 
 by talking with old and young salts, some of whom seemed 
 to have stuffed his brain with Munchausen-like fancies. 
 The result is a sea-story told by a landsman, a narrative 
 full of marine terms misapplied at random, and incredible, 
 
 256 
 
mechanical feats suitable for landsmen as fresh as Hugo 
 himself. One who has scoured the seas in sailing ships and 
 eaten his share of salt grog can tell at a glance whether an 
 author or an artist of marine compositions has got his 
 facts from personal experience or at second and third 
 hand by cramming. The inimitable editor of the yachting 
 monthly called the Rudder has vividly described the 
 difference between the landlubber and the marine expert. 
 
 I found the Channel Islands as interesting as they 
 are famed to be ; the scenery offered a fascinating blend- 
 ing of the savage and the beautiful, and the race physi- 
 cally is one of the handsomest on the globe — Mrs. Lang- 
 try came of that stock. I made some charming acquaint- 
 ances and encountered a variety of romantic incidents. 
 I might have prolonged my stay there without any diffi- 
 culty, and much pleasure, but my engagement with the 
 Harpers obliged me to complete and despatch my article 
 on these Islands, and hasten on to Brittany, where I 
 made my first landing at St. Malo, and took my first lodg- 
 ing at the respectable Hotel Franklin, whither I was 
 directed by an affable, good hearted priest, like most of 
 his profession in France. 
 
 Brittany proved to be what I anticipated, a land after 
 ni}' own heart. Much as I love sunshine, blue skies, and 
 riant landscapes clothed with verdure, there is also another 
 quite as pronounced a side of my nature, which shows my 
 northern blood. It is through this, that I enjoy the grew- 
 some fury of the sea, and love to paint the melancholy' 
 of its watery wastes ; and it was through this trait of my 
 soul that I appreciated the brumes and glooms, the savage 
 coasts, gre}^ surges, sullen skies, weird legends and roman- 
 ces, prehistoric and mediaeval antiquities, and picturesque 
 
 257 
 
folk of that Druidic peninsula who seem to reach out to 
 the Arthurian cycles and the Keltic clans north and west. 
 Already, before I landed, I yearned for Brittany, the 
 Lyonnesse of old, her monuments and her dreams. I was 
 steeped to the eyes, likewise in Froissart's immortal story 
 of the part the Bretons played in the days of chivalry, 
 and in the romance and tragedy of these periods to the 
 fury of the Terror, and my enthusiasm had been kindled 
 by the picturesque chasse marees of Morlaix, and the 
 daring of those sea dogs, Jean Bart and Dugay-Trouin, 
 coursing the oceans, blessed by candles and holy water and 
 all the pomp of the church. It was therefore with fierce 
 impatience, with a mind .thoroughly sympathetic, and 
 prepared for vivid impressions, that I set out to explore 
 the old towns, antiquities and lonely moors of Brittany, 
 But this is not the place to describe a journey which 
 was unmarked by unusual or exciting incident or ad- 
 venture, and what is outside of the personal element can 
 properly receive only passing notice in a work of reminis- 
 cences. But I may say that to me, albeit it was the winter 
 season when everything was especially sad and sombre, 
 this journey through Brittany was surpassed in interest 
 and sentiment b}' few of my excursions ; for above and 
 beyond all other traits, the quality that pervades every 
 nook of Brittany and broods over it like an all pervading 
 mist of the sea, is sentiment. 
 
 Before leaving this province, however, I will briefly 
 relate two incidents unimportant in themselves, but which 
 especially impressed me, one of them bringing results 
 some years later. After enjoying Heneban, to which I 
 had been attracted by Froissart's graphic account of 
 its defence by the Countess de Montfort, and its thrilling 
 
 258 
 
rescue by Sir Walter Manny, who received a hearty em- 
 brace in return, a kiss which vibrates through the ages, 
 I made a dash for Carhaix, in the heart of Brittany, a 
 place rarely if ever visited by Americans. 
 
 The diligence, a poor affair, like that described by 
 Balzac in the opening pages of Les Chouans, was drawn 
 by one poor horse, the vehicle was overloaded, and often 
 it seemed as if the poor animal would fall dead. The 
 cruelty of the Latin races, inherited from the Romans, 
 was evident on this occasion. No one except myself 
 remonstrated when the ruthless driver broke his whip 
 over the horse's ears, and then ran alongside of him, 
 beating him over the eyes and prodding the tender flesh 
 under the joints with the ragged end of the whipstalk 
 until the blood ran. The night was black, the gusts were 
 keen and mournful, and the rain drove in our faces with 
 incessant spite. The solitude was dreary to the last 
 degree. It was the night for witches to be abroad. 
 Once or twice we passed a hamlet ; now and then a church 
 tower and a graveyard, or a calvaire with huge crucifix, 
 was dimly visible in the gloom. 
 
 About midway we changed ovir poor horse, called Louis 
 Quatorze, for another, scarcely more fit for dragging us 
 through the mire over unspeakable roads. After twelve 
 hours of this sort of torture, for it was hardly anything 
 better, towards one in the morning we heard the wind 
 whistling through a mediaeval belfry that lost itself in 
 the wrack of low scud driving above in weird tumult, and 
 entered a narrow lane between high walls. There our 
 progress was blocked by a drove of grunting, unruly 
 pigs which an old peasant with elfish grey locks streaming 
 over his shoulders and his equally ancient wife were driving 
 
 259 
 
the Deil knew whither. At hist the vehicle stopped before 
 a squat, squaHd buikiing, one of a row wrapped in gloom 
 and apparently in slumber. But the loud oaths of the 
 driver aroused the attention of those within. A door 
 creaked open, revealing a group of paysans, chattering 
 before the fire of a country tavern. We had arrived at 
 Carhaix. It was difficult for me to believe that we had 
 reached the shire town of a great province in a civilized 
 nation like France. I fancy that if one should diligently 
 explore that picturesque land of contrasts and extremes, 
 he might find other towns as enmeshed in the cobwebs of 
 ages as Carhaix. 
 
 After directing mine host of the cabaret to stable and 
 feed the wornout horse, the driver offered to guide me to 
 the hotel. I gladly accepted the rascal's offer, although 
 doubtful of his character and intentions, especially as a 
 grudge had grown up between us owing to certain words 
 about "Louis Quatorze." Still I was armed, although he 
 was not aware of it. This fact would have been of little 
 ultimate use to me, however, for the worst event that can 
 happen to a foreigner, and especially to an American, in 
 France is to fall into the hands of the Law, even though 
 innocent. We followed the crooked lanes a long time, as 
 it seemed to me, meeting not a soul and hearing no sound 
 except the barking of dogs and the sighing of" the wind. 
 At every step my feet sank into the mire. What a night 
 and hour that was for wandering ghosts and errant spirits 
 or uncanny crimes ! At length we came to an open space 
 that seemed almost the end of the town. Its dreariness 
 was intensified by a dim lantern suspended on a slack rope 
 stretched across the square, the only attempt I saw to 
 illuminate the black streets of Carhaix. At the farther 
 
 260 
 
end of the square there were no buildings, but merely a 
 vague suggestion of a waste moorland merging into eter- 
 nal night. Out of the shadows far away floated the yelp 
 of a sheep dog or a wolf. The last house stood on the 
 left quite aloof and alone. "That must be it," said I to 
 myself, "or else whither is the fellow leading me." And 
 yet it could not be, for it seemed rather to be a prison or 
 frontier fort than a hotel affording genial hospitality and 
 cheer. It stood square, massive, solid, and mysterious, 
 evidently of stone. The windows, so far as discernible, 
 were closed with iron shutters, and not a gleam of light 
 or other sign of life was to be seen or heard about it. 
 "Voila, voila!" exclaimed the man dramatically, the first 
 words he had uttered through the tramp. He then smote 
 the door twice or thrice hard with the heavy knob of his 
 Breton stick. Judge of my amazement when the broad 
 door flew open and I was welcomed by a superb young 
 Avoman of perhaps three and twenty, with flashing black 
 eyes, red cheeks, a wealth of raven hair, and a plump, yet 
 lissome figure outlined against the glow of a wood fire 
 that crackled on an ample hearth and warmed a spacious 
 hall. Extausted, chilled, famished as I was, the effect 
 on me of this delectable surprise was instantaneous and 
 electrifying. When the lady said, "Vous etes cliez voiis. 
 Monsieur,'' I needed no second invitation to enter and 
 seat myself before the fire. 
 
 Still my apprehension was not quite allayed. Owing 
 to the lateness of the hour, towards two a. m., I feared 
 that I might have to go to bed svippcrless. But I was 
 soon quieted on this point as the diligence was generally 
 late, a late dinner was in readiness against its arrival. 
 On this occasion the diligence was even tardier than usual, 
 
 261 
 
but it was in my favor that several gentlemen hunting in 
 the neighborhood were still at the table, and would doubt- 
 less welcome an addition to their number. After a hasty 
 toilet, I entered the salle a manger to find an attractive 
 apartment, heated by a blazing wood fire that bade de- 
 fiance to the elements, and lighted by numerous candles 
 in silver candlesticks, distributed about a board loaded 
 with game and choice wines. The gentlemen seated around 
 it arose as I entered and cordially invited me to share 
 their good cheer. Your genuine hunter, sailor or soldier, 
 may generally be depended on to lay aside snobbery and 
 punctilio when at ease, and to recognize the comradeship 
 of one who can appreciate a good dinner, a good glass 
 of wine, and a genial chat that accompanies a stomach 
 cultivated and satisfied. The contrast between this festive 
 scene and the dozen hours of roughing that preceded it 
 reminded me of Virgil's significant line, '^Forsan et haec 
 olim meminisse juvabit." 
 
 The other incident to which I alluded grew out of my 
 trip to Belle Isle en Mer. Exactly what led me to visit 
 that islet, four or five miles long, with its little town, 
 admirable lighthouse, and its Druidic remains, I do not 
 remember. Probably it was due to the whim I have al- 
 ways entertained for small islands, and for seeking out 
 places comparatively unknown in preference to spots 
 which every one has seen, written and lectured about, or 
 sketched, painted and photographed. I made the passage 
 from Auray in a miniature, schooner-rigged auxiliary 
 boat. It was thick and stormy when I went there; it was 
 stormy and thick when I returned. I saw about all there 
 was to be seen on that tight little isle, met a brother of 
 General Trochu whose estates were there, and who com- 
 
 262 
 
manded at the seige of Paris, hob-a-nobbed with the 
 fisher-peasantrv, observed the sardine fisheries, and, as 
 the phrase goes, had a good time, where there was not 
 ver}" much to see at that season but sea. fog, foam, and 
 rocks. Still, there was a certain zest in the consciousness 
 that I was, as it were, discovering "Belle Isle en Mer," 
 for Americans who might come after me. So far as I could 
 learn I was the first American tourist to step foot on that 
 island. The character of the proprietor of the neat hotel 
 where I lodged, seemed to confirm this fact. His manner 
 was suave like that of every French host when receiving 
 a guest to his hotel. I wish I could say the same of them 
 when the bill is presented and settled. He had the brisk 
 French alertness, and the quick intelligence common to 
 his countrymen, an intelligence that is too often confined 
 to the limits of his environment and experience. Anything 
 beyond that is, of course, beneath the notice of your true 
 chauvinist. ]My bonifacc of Belle Isle was no exception 
 to these observations. 
 
 "Ah," said he tentatively, after the first compliments 
 were passed, "Monsieur, although he speaks French fluent- 
 ly, is probably from, voyons! yes, from Germany?" 
 
 "No, I am not a German," said I, amused. 
 
 "Why, of course, how could I have been so mistaken : 
 One sees at a glance that Monsieur is from Holland." 
 
 "No, I am not a Dutchman." 
 
 "Well, it's odd that I should be so stupid ; I have it 
 now; Monsieur is one Englishman from la Grande Bre- 
 tagne, and naturally speaks English." 
 
 "I speak English, it is true, but yet I am not an 
 Englishman." 
 
 263 
 
"Monsieur speaks English and yet is not an English- 
 man ! Parbleu, what then are you, sir?" 
 
 "I am an American." 
 
 "An American, An American? I might have thought 
 of that ; I have heard of America ; but then you speak 
 English, and how can that be? Well, well; and pray how 
 did you come, sir? Did you come by rail?" 
 
 "No, the railroad is not built yet," I replied drily. But 
 he did not perceive the implied sarcasm. That he should 
 be ignorant of any facts relating to America was a mere 
 unimportant trifle thin as air to your born chauvinist. 
 
 As a type of this form of naivete I recall a remark of a 
 lady whom I knew well, one of two sisters who conducted 
 a fashionable young ladies' boarding school. Speaking of 
 our civil war she observed that it was a pity the North 
 did not cut a channel across the Isthmus of Darien and 
 let the South go ! 
 
 Anyway, the remark of my landlord of Belle Isle put 
 an idea in my head which resulted years after in my story 
 entitled The Transatlantic Raihcay. I gave consider- 
 able thought to the preparation of that skit. The calcula- 
 tions for overcoming the mechanical, commercial and en- 
 gineering problems of such a stupendous enterprise were 
 done not at random but with care. Naturally I think I 
 have some turn for such matters, but have not developed it 
 as my energies have been drawn in other directions ; to 
 the principles of shipbuilding I have, it is true, given con- 
 siderable attention, and have written and lectured on the 
 subject. In point of style the article was one of the 
 raciest and most plausible I have composed, enlivened as 
 it was, by a vein of satire. I took it to the Forum. 
 Mr. Lorettus C. Metcalfe, the editor, after keeping it 
 
 264 
 
a reasonable time, asked me to call and discuss the article. 
 He greatly liked it, but not being sure of certain points 
 desired to show it to Professor Thurston, an expert on 
 such questions. This suggestion nettled me. Any article 
 or book which depends chiefly for success on its origi- 
 nality, loses its bloom and sometimes the first use of its 
 ideas, if hawked around. No author can protect himself 
 too carefully on this score in these days, as I have learned 
 to my own cost. Besides this I was now sure that the work 
 had merit and despised the cowardice of an editor who did 
 not dare to go before the public with an article he liked, 
 without the advice of third parties. The most prominent 
 and general character of our editors nowadays is their 
 moral cowardice, their dread of what the world, Mrs. 
 Grundy, or the paying subscribers will say. And yet 
 the world recognizes power, admires and follows it, when 
 it succeeds. Would that we had more editors like the late 
 S. R. Crocker of Boston and the present Fra Albcrtus of 
 Aurora. I withdrew the manuscript of my Transaflan- 
 fic Railway at once, from the Forum (much to the ir- 
 ritation of the editor, and published it first in the Nexv 
 York Star, and subsequently in my little collection called 
 Sea Spray. The critics, who knew little of such matters, 
 or had no leisure to read my skit, carefully either ignored 
 or sneered at it (it could not become a popular article in 
 any case). But it did appeal to an audience of intelligent 
 readers ; careful readers it found ; those who read it, liked 
 it extremely, and some did not hesitate to steal from it. 
 
 After making the tour of Britany I returned to St. 
 Malo, where I had left my chest, and remained there until 
 I had written and despatched my Breton article, which, 
 with that of the Channel Islands, appeared in Harper's 
 
 265 
 
within the prescribed period. I enjoyed the quaint old 
 town by the sea, closely packed within its battlemented 
 walls, as of old, and reeking with memories of its daring 
 privateersmen. When weary of writing I strolled about 
 the narrow streets, among the shipping at the wharves, 
 or on the sands in sight of the tomb of Chateaubriand. 
 One of the port gates was close to my window; and girls 
 in sabots, shovelled hatted priests, and bronzed sailors 
 in berrettas and blouses, clattered through it from sunrise 
 to sunset. Between the battlements I could see the masts 
 of ships and hear the creaking of blocks and spars, and 
 inhale the pungent smell of tar. Would that I were there 
 again and Avere sure to find things quite as I left them ! 
 It is just such bits of picturesqueness and old time asso- 
 ciations that win the heart and fancy of the artist and 
 man of sentiment, and account for his oft time yearning 
 for the old world in preference to the new. 
 
 266 
 
CHAPTER XI. 
 
 PARIS AND PORTUGAL. 
 
 I reached Paris while the storms of one of the wildest 
 winters known for years were still raging. But even so 
 it seemed natural to be there again. Although perhaps 
 preferring London for a permanent residence, which is 
 only natural to one who prizes his English blood and 
 history, yet I must admit that I never had any difficulty 
 in adapting myself to the conditions of life in Paris, al- 
 though after a time it begins to pall on the Anglo-Saxon, 
 owing to the difficulty of arousing the home feeling which 
 is possible in some lands but less practicable in France. 
 I say this with no ill feeling but from a knowledge of 
 the French character and life. I have been able to pene- 
 trate in some degree beyond the almost impervious shell 
 of social and especially domestic reserve that hedges 
 in the people like a Avail, behind the outward suavity for 
 which France is famous. An English gentleman's first 
 manner towards a stranger is distant, cold, not to say 
 brusque. But if he takes a liking to him and finds him 
 worthy of confidence, he takes him to his heart, in- 
 vites him to his home and fireside with hearty good will. 
 The Frenchman, on the other hand, is open, civil, obliging, 
 
 267 
 
entertaining from the start, but is careful not to extend 
 domestic courtesies to the stranger except in rare and 
 exceptional circumstances. When therefore I hear Ameri- 
 cans talking of being entertained at French homes I am 
 inclined to take their statement cum grano soli unless they 
 happen to be Roman Catholics. That does indeed make 
 a difference. With these French people, especially of the 
 upper bourgeoisie and aristocracy, who still cling devoutly 
 to the Papacy, the sharing of a common religion operates 
 like an open sesame or a masonic sign. Whatever their 
 civil allegiance or government, all Romanists tacitly or 
 openly claim a higher allegiance to one common Lord, and 
 to one exalted, secular and religious sovereign, the one 
 supreme Pope. Unity of faith goes far in this case to 
 obliterate racial and national differences, at this period 
 more than ever before, when the actual secular sovereign- 
 ty of the Pope is losing its grasp over minds and govern- 
 ments. There is also another reason for this domestic 
 reserve of the French, I fancy. All the Latin races have 
 retained to some degree the Oriental notions about domestic 
 life and the seclusion of women which the Romans bor- 
 rowed from the Greeks and Asiatics. Li proportion as 
 the French have gradually departed from the details of 
 this system they still instinctively cling to the original 
 traditions more or less, by excluding Anglo-Saxons from 
 their home intimacy. French family life is really that 
 of the clan or of the sept of the Asiatic nomads, patri- 
 archism pure and simple, and the civil laws and statutes 
 are founded on this basis. In France the family is the 
 unit; in England and America, the individual is the unit 
 considered in the conventions and laws which regulate 
 society. Herein we find a fundamental reason for the 
 
 268 
 
lack of affinity between the Frenchman and the Anglo- 
 Saxon, which only generations of intermingling can efface. 
 The marriage de convenance, a relic of Oriental patriar- 
 chal and clan society, which treats the interests of the clan 
 as superior to those of the individual, and hence ignores 
 the importance of love or mutual affinity in the marriage 
 relations, is undoubtedly the cause of existing social con- 
 ditions and opinions in France. They who are united 
 purely to perpetuate the clan and the clan fortune, natur- 
 ally seek expression of the sexual affections and emotions 
 elsewhere; and hence also a tendency to regard matri- 
 monial infidelity with lenience, so long as no open scandal 
 occurs and appearances are preserved. Such a condition 
 of things would be still more natural with a people whose 
 passions are exceptionally strong. Some people are in- 
 clined to attribute such laxity among Latin races to the 
 religious cult. But this seems to me decidedly erroneous. 
 The Irish, whose Catholicism is proverbially staunch, are 
 among the most chaste of peoples. The Greeks who are 
 of the same religion with the Russians, are more chaste. 
 Some Protestant nations are also more licentious than 
 others. This is largely a question of race, of blood which, 
 among the French, is especially marked for the reasons 
 stated above. 
 
 Abolish the marriage de convenance in France and tlie 
 sex question would regulate itself in that country. Until 
 that occurs some French wives there will be who will imi- 
 tate their husbands, and make themselves agreeable to the 
 husbands of other wives. To make oneself agreeable, to 
 fascinate, is the prerogative par excellence of women. Per- 
 haps the greatest crime of which she can be accused is 
 to be insipid, it is worse than to be naughty, so far as 
 
 269 
 
her mission in society is concerned. Much may be for- 
 given to her who has the priceless power to charm. Twice 
 happy are they who dwell among social conditions which 
 permit them to be at once agreeable and virtuous. That 
 society can alone approach perfection which frowns alike 
 on unchastity and prudishness, both of which proceed 
 alike from defective social customs producing an un- 
 healthy public opinion. 
 
 But the prime defect of the French character, so glar- 
 ing and universal as almost to blind one to the many 
 brilliant and noble qualities of that people is the greed 
 for money for itself, an avarice exceeding that of the 
 Greeks, which is saying much. It penetrates all classes. 
 We Americans are accused of being given over as a nation 
 to the quest of riches. Doubtless there is much truth in 
 this ; but a very large proportion of our money-seekers 
 are such, either for ostentation, for power, or because 
 it is the most ready avenue open, for the exercise of our 
 vast energy and organizing genius ; rather than for the 
 mere love of money. If possible, many of the women of 
 France are more grasping as to money than the men, 
 and a most painful trait of their nature it is, to observe. 
 But for this the fair sex of that beautiful land would 
 probably be the superiors in character to the men., as they 
 are in most other Latin countries at the present day. 
 The novels of Balzac reek with descriptions of sordidness 
 and its attendant results, as Tolstoi's tales are foul with 
 the sensuality of the Russians. Look at Balzac's My 
 Cousin Pons. 
 
 I passed nearly two months at Paris on this visit, col- 
 lecting material for my article on Modern French Art. 
 My previous visits to that city had given me some knowl- 
 
 270 
 
edge of the European and also French art so far as 
 represented in the public galleries and historic monu- 
 ments. But what I now sought was the practice and 
 principles of the later schools. Two months is a short 
 time for such a vast study. But I was already somewhat 
 grounded on the subject, and by going to work system- 
 atically and with unceasing effort, I was able, at least, 
 to write up some of the essential points for a public to 
 whom the facts and theories presented would be essen- 
 tially new. In preparing such papers as well as simple 
 articles of travel, I made it a point, so far as possible, 
 to gather my information at first hand. Doubtless such 
 close adherence to facts sometimes impaired the literary 
 interest of my articles for those who prefer style, theories 
 and glowing periods, to mere statements and statistics. 
 But the editors did not wish theories which might arouse 
 controversy, nor was there space for them in articles 
 whose very words were numbered. The old fashion has 
 passed away; half the space of an article had to be re- 
 served for illustrations ; and the scope allowed to a writer 
 when Macaulay could publish essays the length of a' book 
 in the Reviews has passed away. Condense, condense, 
 condense, forever condense, was now the mot d' ordre 
 issued from every editorial office throughout the land. 
 
 Among the artists whom I met that winter in Paris, 
 two made especial impression on me. The first was Dau- 
 bigne, the great landscape painter. He was a small man, 
 about five feet five, spare, but well made, and in his studio 
 wore a black velvet cap, close cropped beard and sack 
 coat. His manner was self assured but modest, quiet, but 
 affable. What does not always happen between the artist 
 and his works (although perhaps more than in other voca- 
 
 271 
 18 
 
tions) he seemed in looks and manner exactly the man 
 one would expect to paint the grey, subdued, contempla- 
 tive canvasses that gave him fame. There was nothing 
 bizarre, ostentatious, haughty or sensational about the 
 artist or his plain but ample studio. The latter abounded 
 in a background of mysterious twilight, — it was simply 
 furnished and was free from the huddle of old hangings 
 and bric-a-brac which overload the walls and corners of 
 so many studios, giving a shoppy impression and detract- 
 ing rather than aiding the effect of the paintings on the 
 easel. 
 
 The other artist to whom I alluded was Moses Wight 
 of Boston, who made his home in Paris. I met him as a 
 total stranger, without even a letter of introduction, and 
 the kind courtesy he showed me throughout my stay 
 forms one of the pleasantest memories of my years of 
 travel. He was then in middle life, wearing an air of 
 gravity that was belied, however, by the sly humor that 
 pervaded his conversation. He was of medium size, and 
 the cast of his features fringed by an imperial, reminded 
 me of the portraits of iNIontaigne, whom, I think, he 
 may have resembled in temperament as well. There must 
 have been a strain of Gallic blood in Wight's composition, 
 modified and sweetened by English ancestry, he so readily 
 adapted himself to the French and their views of life. 
 Strange to say, however, notwithstanding that he had lived 
 so long in France, and a bachelor at that, he found diffi- 
 culty in acquiring the language. 
 
 Wight was a careful, painstaking artist, a master of 
 the technique of the French contemporary school, and his 
 choice cabinet compositions brought good prices. His 
 subjects were generally elegant interiors, as accessory to 
 
 272 
 
handsome women dressed, somewhat in the style of Tojet- 
 ti's pictures. But there was nothing salacious or im- 
 modest about them. Even his occasional nudes were far 
 from suggestive. His Eve at the Fountain might have 
 been looked at by a Sunday School without harm, while 
 in the adjoining alcove hung the painting of Es^neralda 
 and Haidee, by Van Lerius, in which the figure and ex- 
 pression of the girl was such as to melt an iceberg. 
 
 But the side of Wight's nature that was least known 
 to the world was his conversational talent, warmed by 
 a genial heart. He was one of the most agreeable talkers 
 I have ever heard. His remarks partook of the sprightli- 
 ness of woman's gossip, pleasantly but not bitterly acid, 
 combined with the acuteness of one who had experienced 
 life and studied human nature below the surface. A light 
 vein of cynicism, a delicious gleam of raillery, sparkled 
 through his conversation, but free from malice or jealousy. 
 Of all the good male talkers I have met, few have dis- 
 played less resentment or jealousy, innuendo or backbiting 
 than Moses Wight and John G. Saxe. One could listen 
 to them without being ashamed afterwards to meet the 
 people of whom they may have spoken. Whether in his 
 studio or Avith a group of artists at the theatre, dining 
 in a crack restaurant of the Boulevard des Italiens, or 
 strolling among the galleries, Wight was always equally 
 entertaining and informing. He was especially interesting 
 when chatting of the subjects which absorb so much of the 
 attention of the gay Parisians, the studios, the artists 
 and the art sales, the theatres and places of amusement, 
 and the coryphees of the haute demi monde, who with their 
 fashionable, aristocratic followers, occupy so prominent a 
 position at the French capital. But when on these topics 
 
 273 
 
Wight's talk was so simple and straightforward and en- 
 livened by such a naive gaiety that one would be as little 
 corrupted by it, as by the comical amours of the wrens on 
 the fence under one's window. The vast number of 
 licensed dogs of all sizes, degrees and pedigrees seen in 
 the streets of Paris afforded Wight a perpetual source of 
 philosophic mirth. Whenever we ran across a group of 
 dogs or saw a trim grisette with a poodle following close 
 in her wake, he would chuckle sotto voce, "a great people 
 for dogs ! a great people for dogs !" Take him all in all, 
 he was a rarely good fellow, 
 
 Paris is really the Art capital of Europe, although 
 Munich and Berlin are pressing it hard. In London, vast 
 as is the art field, other interests and occupations, in a 
 city so enormous make art but one of many forms of ex- 
 pressions, while the Gallic race no longer presents us men 
 of so commanding strength as clustered around Henry 
 IV or Louis XIV. While it no longer presents us with 
 a Camille, a Moliere, a Voltaire, a Madame Roland, a 
 Turenne or a Soult, a Bossuet or a Mirabeau, France 
 continues to offer us an art that shows little decline in 
 vitality. Indeed ! the artistic turn of the French people 
 impresses one more and more each time he returns to the 
 French capital. 
 
 It is generally conceded that the 2nd empire degraded 
 the character of the French nation, and that the terrible 
 overthrow France suffered at the hands of Germany, was 
 owing largely to this cause. Will "the Republic" save 
 the people of France from the moral decline which is likely 
 in time to sap the heart of the nation? France must either 
 rise in power or go down, for German militarism is ever 
 on the watch, and is but biding its time to spring! Then 
 
 274 
 
shall come a war, long and terrible which shall eventually 
 change the map of Europe. 
 
 The vastness and magnificence of Paris is like a great 
 maelstrom, to draw thither artistic minds from all parts 
 of the world. Its art exercises a powerful influence over 
 the public taste. Streets are laid out with consummate 
 perspective effect. The eye for color and effect is ap- 
 parent. Even the shop windows, where various shades of 
 drapery and other stuffs are often arranged on a harmony 
 so exquisite as to move one like a concord of sweet sounds. 
 
 Beauty for its own sake, and that sensuous love of it, 
 which inspired the Athenian of old, is with the Parisian 
 of today a more powerful motor than either moral or 
 political principal. You may say Paris is not France — 
 no ; but it is the consummate flower of its intellectuality. 
 
 It must be remembered that the government is behind 
 all its chief institutions. The French people must have 
 felt for a long time that art talent was a peculiar gift of 
 their race, for they have fostered the growth of art by 
 organization, far-seeing in their bearing. Whether 
 government patronage of art education is the best thing 
 for a true growth of art is a question about which there 
 is a difference of opinion, but at any rate we find in 
 France a "Minister of Fine Arts," who superintends the 
 whole question of art in the country, and large allowances 
 are given by the legislature. The sales of paintings alone 
 have averaged from 40 to 50,000,000 of francs per an- 
 num, which by reason of difference in values, would be 
 equal to twice that sum in the United States. The French 
 opinion of the value of their annual exhibitions in the 
 Salon, is that one may sell pictures, or possibly acquire 
 reputation without it, but never fame ! I found the French 
 
 275 
 
art students a curious medley of seemingly dicordant 
 elements, full of intensive art ability and wonderful en- 
 thusiasm, but often coarse, even to the point sometimes 
 of being brutal and disgusting, and yet these untamed 
 and untameable art students, astonish one by thtir extra- 
 ordinary perception of art and color. The great Corot 
 had been dead but a short time when I was in Paris and I 
 heard many things about him and his life. He inherited 
 property from his father, but made for himself an in- 
 come averaging 200,000 francs per annum from his art. 
 As he never married, much of this was given away to poor 
 artists or their families. It is said one of his earlier 
 paintings was badly hung, and no one looked at it. He 
 went himself and stood before it, thinking "Men are like 
 flies, if one alights on a dish, others will follow." Soon a 
 number of people gathered about it, one lady said "Oh, 
 it is horrid ! let us go." This picture sold for 700 francs, 
 and afterward brought 12,000 at auction. 
 
 Next to the art interest I found the restaurant sys- 
 tem of Paris the most important outgrowth of the peculiar 
 conditions of society in the city. Thrice daily, Paris 
 empties itself into the streets and inundates the cafees 
 creviirics and restaurants. Families by tens of thou- 
 sands daily take their meals abroad and in public. To 
 me it was an astonishing spectacle indicating absence of 
 home attractions and looseness of the family tie. One 
 who sees this, can better understand why the French battle- 
 cry is not "fight for your hearthstones and your homes," 
 but "fight for glory !" Doubtless the marriage customs 
 of the country have much to do with this, as love is 
 ignored as a factor to a prosperous marriage-tie. 
 
 Women are everywhere employed in business, and all 
 vocations except soldiering and sailoring, which proves 
 
 276 
 
woman is capable of all this, but it also proves that the 
 adoption of masculine pursuits for women, tends to 
 coarsen thought, language and action, and to depreciate 
 domestic ties, and to destroy the attractions of "home." 
 
 Having written and mailed my article on French Art 
 for the Atlantic Montlily, I took passage from Havre in 
 a small French steamer bound to Portugal, this time pre- 
 ferring a trip by water. She was a freighter with accom- 
 modations for only four passengers. On this trip there 
 was one other passenger beside myself. We two with the 
 captain formed a companionship that was far from 
 tedious. We were all fond of eating and talking, and each 
 was able to contribute his share of information and en- 
 tertainment. The cuisine being savory and satisfactory, 
 as it is invariably on French ships, we sat at the table 
 for hours relating our experiences and arranging the 
 affairs of the universe. Nor were the lighter condiments 
 of table talk wanting. Captain Marchand had command- 
 ed a ship-of-war in the recent Franco-German conflict, 
 and was altogether an open-hearted, intelligent seaman 
 in middle life. My fellow passenger, who made a specialty 
 of dressing the salad daily for the roast, was a well bal- 
 anced man of fine education and considerable knowledge 
 of affairs, somewhat positive in his opinions, and, by pro- 
 fession, a civil engineer, if I rightly remember, holding a 
 government position. I learned some facts from him 
 regarding the idioms of the French language that were 
 new to me. But he made no statement that more impress- 
 ed me than what he had told me about Rosa Bonheur, con- 
 firming rumors already suggested to me. 
 
 We were talking of Bernhardt, George Sand, Rachel, 
 and other noted French women of the time — a Frenchman 
 
 277 
 
would hardly be expected to be aware of any other noted 
 women in other lands — I alluded to Rosa Bonheur. 
 
 "I know her well," said my compagnon de voyage. 
 
 "She's a great painter," I replied. 
 
 "Yes, if — " he answered with a shrug of his shoulders. 
 "Why, do you think there's some truth in the rumor 
 floating about the studios, as to her sex?" 
 
 "It's true, every word of it, and that is the reason why 
 the women have given so much less attention to her than to 
 other brilliant artists and authors of her own sex. You 
 notice that they practically ignore her, whom, if in all 
 respects a woman, would be the greatest artist the sex 
 could boast of. How do I feel so sure of my facts .? you 
 ask. I have known about it since I was a boy. Her 
 family and my family lived almost next door to each other, 
 and of course were well acquainted. It was a matter 
 of common talk with us that there was serious question 
 whether Rosa should have that or a masculine name, 
 whether she should be brought up as a man or woman. 
 Finally the latter was decided on because likely to be the 
 least embarrassing when she should grow up ; but this 
 fact explains the masculinity of her tastes, and the celi- 
 bate character of her life. No, I assure you that there 
 is not the slightest doubt that the painter of the 'Horse 
 Fair' has the attributes of both sexes about equally de- 
 veloped." 
 
 In due time we arrived off Oporto, where we were to 
 touch and discharge some cargo. We found that the bar 
 at the mouth of the Tagus, which is also the entrance 
 to the port, was still so violent after the rise of the river 
 that several days must elapse before we could enter. 
 Quite a fleet of sailing ships had already waited some 
 
 278 
 
time for entrance, which is one of the most dangerous in 
 Europe. There is a tremendous surf on the bar with 
 westerly w4nds, which is awful when it encounters the 
 spring freshets or sudden rain floods from the mountains. 
 At such times it is dangerous even for vessels lying at 
 the wharves. How Oporto ever became a seaport under 
 such circumstances is only explainable by the value of its 
 export of wine which grows in the immediate neighbor- 
 hood, a vintage whose merit and value seem to warrant 
 the risk of getting it to market. No ships, either sail 
 or steam, ever attempt to enter Oporto except when the 
 signal is given at the Point of Foz that the bar is passable, 
 and the channel is indicated by men following along the 
 shore waving red flags. We managed to tide over the 
 four days of waiting in the open under slow steam fairly 
 well, in the cabin at least, relieving the slow flight of 
 hours by eating and drinking and conversation. 
 
 During the interval I had another opportunity to 
 observe once more how diff'erently matters proceed on 
 a French vessel than upon an English or American ship. 
 It is not a question of courage. The French are brave 
 enough. None braver. It is a matter of temperament. 
 Nor is it exactly because of lack of knowledge of the sea, 
 but rather of natural fitness for it, in which, excepting 
 perhaps the Portuguese, the Latin races difi'er strongly 
 from the peoples of the North. 
 
 As it is not my aim to give descriptions here of countries 
 and places except briefly and rarely, I can only barely 
 allude to my saunterings over Portugal, and must keep 
 a firm hand on the reins of my memory and the rush of 
 my kindling enthusiasms. I had no stirring adventures, 
 no hair-breadth escapes, in that beautiful, romantic land. 
 
 279 
 
The enjoyment it gave me, although replete with novel 
 incidents, was chiefly quiet, restful, elevating. But it 
 appealed alike to my artistic and poetic sense ; the scenery 
 I found enchanting, and the kindness, hospitality and 
 gracious courtesy I met on every hand tended to increase 
 my love for the Portuguese people and to give them a place 
 in my heart forever. I traversed the country in every 
 direction by rail, diligence, private conveyance, or the 
 saddle, making my headquarters at Lisbon. It is perti- 
 nent to state that my mind had already been prepared to 
 appreciate that country before even I stepped foot in 
 Portugal, not only by what I have seen of the Portuguese 
 in the Azores and Madeira, and on my cruises with Por- 
 tuguese seamen ; but also by the reading of Camoens, Oso- 
 rio, Barios, and other Portuguese classics, at the time I was 
 in the State Library at Albany, where I taught myself 
 to read the language with some fluency. The enthusiasm 
 engendered thereby had resulted, among other papers, in 
 a fervid article on the Portuguese in Iiulia, which ap- 
 peared in the New Englander. 
 
 My interest in Portugal had a curious sequel more than 
 twenty years after my visit to that country. Self Cul- 
 ture, a monthly magazine, published an article in 1898 
 on the smaller states of Europe. It approved of a con- 
 tinuance of their independence excepting in the case of 
 Portugal, which it dismissed with a surly paragraph to 
 the efi'ect that that country had no sufficient reason for 
 separate existence, and should straightw^ay be absorbed 
 into Spain. This assertion was so manifestly unjust, so 
 plainly founded on absolute ignorance of the facts, that 
 I sat down immediately and dashed off a reply giving an 
 animated resume of the character and achievements of 
 
 280 
 
Portugal, past and present. The editor of Self Culture 
 had the rare magnanimity to publish my article verbatim. 
 It came to the notice of a Portuguese resident. His heart 
 was fired by the perusal of a paper based on knowledge 
 and justice, rarely evidenced by recent writers on that 
 country. By this means the editor of the Portuguese 
 organ in America was led to publish a most appreciative 
 critique recommending my article to all his countrymen 
 at home and abroad. Some weeks later the "Portuguese 
 Protective Association of San Francisco" passed a series 
 of dignified resolutions warmly acknowledging my efforts, 
 and commending me to the kind attention of all Portuguese 
 patriots. An engrossed copy with the gold seal of the 
 Association was forwarded to me. It is needless to add 
 that to one who loved Portugal as I do that these proceed- 
 ings were exceedingly gratifying. 
 
 While at Lisbon I met my excellent friends, Jasper 
 Smith, Esq., U. S. Consul at Madeira, and his amiable 
 wife, whose friendly courtesies to me at INIadeira formed 
 one of the most agreeable features of my visits to that 
 island. 
 
 We took an enjoyable little trip to Cintra and Mafra. 
 At the former place we met Lord John Hay, vice ad- 
 miral of the British Channel Fleet, who was staying at 
 the same hotel with ourselves, the fleet being then at 
 Lisbon. Having a common languag to bring on a con- 
 versing acquaintance, we sat for hours at the table after 
 it Avas cleared and the other guests had left; over our 
 wine and cigars we chatted until late, of matters Anglo- 
 American. The recurrence of the interview on the fol- 
 lowing evening gave his lordship such pleasure that he 
 invited us through his secretary to dine on board his 
 
 281 
 
flagship on our return to Lisbon. We accepted the invita- 
 tion in the spirit in which it was given, and passed a de- 
 lightful evening on the magnificent ship Northumberland. 
 She was one of the several full-rigged, five masted, iron- 
 clad war ships constructed during the experimental or 
 transitional period resulting in the modern battleships, 
 and good only, as his lordship facetiously observed, to serve 
 as breakwaters behind which the smaller vessels could run 
 for shelter in battle or storm. The other captains of the 
 fleet were present, and it was altogether quite a stately 
 function. After dinner we had cards in the main cabin. 
 
 The admiral of the Channel Fleet at that time was Lord 
 Seymour, afterwards Lord Alcester. When Mr. Moran, 
 our then minister at the Court of Portugal, learned in the 
 course of conversation, that I was directly descended from 
 the Seymours of Hartford, being well up in that gene- 
 ology, he at once offered to accompany me on board Lord 
 Seymour's flagship and introduce me to him, as kinsman 
 by blood. But the fleet was unexpectedly ordered away, 
 and I was thus deprived of meeting the head of the 
 Seymour clan. 
 
 The Hotel Central, where I made"my headquarters, was 
 by far the best place in Lisbon to meet casually the 
 prominent men passing through the city or dropping in 
 to dine as at a club. In this way I met Admiral Sartorius, 
 at one time a considerable figure in the naval afl'airs of 
 Portugal, in which he had enlisted his services, an English 
 marine knight of fortune. When I was at Lisbon he was 
 still handsome and of distinguished port, although well 
 past eighty. He was residing at the hotel under very 
 extraordinary circumstances. When his days of active 
 service were over the admiral decided to pass the remainder 
 
 282 
 
of his life in Portugal, a charming country where he was 
 a favorite and had formed enduring friendships. Whether 
 he was a bachelor or a widower I forget, but he had no 
 near relations having any special claim to his estate 
 after his death. Judging from the average of human 
 life and perhaps from his own constitution, he assumed 
 that he would probably not live beyond eighty. He 
 therefore divided his property into certain equal parts 
 which, with the interest, would carry him comfortably 
 until eighty. He was taking some risk, but a small one 
 as he thought, and in the meantime he would enjoy life 
 affluently in the society of his friends. Strange to say 
 the allotted period arrived and the venerable admiral 
 found himself still in excellent health, without the slight- 
 est hint of the approach of death ; but he had also reached 
 the end of his funds ! Here was a pleasant predicament 
 indeed ! The door of the poor-house seemed open be- 
 fore him. If he had been a Frenchman or a German 
 he might have settled the matter with a pan of char- 
 coal or a pistol. But he was a man of different metal. 
 While considering how to solve the dilemma, the many 
 friends who had been recipients of his benevolence and 
 hospitality formed a plan for the relief of the gallant 
 old gentleman which was creditable to all concerned. They 
 clubbed together and agreed that they would be respon- 
 sible for maintaining him in all the comfort to which he 
 had been accustomed to the end of his days. When I 
 met him he had already lived a number of years at the 
 Hotel Central under this arrangement, and still appeared 
 hale and heart}" enough to last for an indefinite period. 
 Mr. Moran, the newly appointed U. S. INIinister to the 
 Court of Portugal, was a gentleman in every sense of the 
 
 283 
 
term, a man of the utmost tact, courtesy and refinement, 
 whose heart had not been hardened by contact with the 
 ways of the world, while, as secretary for years of the 
 legation at the Court of St. James and at one time charge, 
 he was well up in all the rules and usages of diplomatic 
 etiquette and procedure. 
 
 I met another gentleman at Lisbon who had been a 
 creditable member of our diplomatic service abroad. I 
 refer to Mr. Horatio J. Perry ; after graduating at 
 Harvard and serving as aid to General Shields in the 
 Mexican War, he was appointed secretary of legation at 
 Madrid. He remained at that post for a number of years, 
 and the advantages of allowing a good man to gain ex- 
 perience by continuous service instead of constantly rotat- 
 ing them out of office, was clearly shown in his case. As 
 charge d' affaires he was able to avert the hostilities 
 which threatened out of the affair of the "Warrior." 
 Later, in 1861, Mr. Perry was instrumental in inducing 
 Spain to issue a proclamation of neutrality between the 
 North and the South during the Rebellion ; of which 
 course, one result was, that the privateer Sumpter was 
 ordered out of Cadiz. At the time I met Mr. Perry, he 
 was residing at Lisbon. 
 
 A few days before I left Portugal a curious incident 
 occurred at the Hotel Central. A French Count was 
 staying at the hotel. His companion, a lady who 
 might have passed as his wife so far as appearances were 
 concerned, was not. This did not seem to make any dif- 
 ference, however. She was admitted to the table d' hote 
 with the Count; no one objected, and no one apparently 
 paid any attention to the matter. In person she was of 
 a superb type of beauty, reminding one of the Em- 
 
 284 
 
press Eugene. Her voice was low and agreeable, and her 
 manners altogether comme il faut; neither so reserved as 
 to suggest prudery nor so bold as to invite unwelcome 
 attention. But one day sometliing happened which showed 
 her perfect self-command. There was a Portuguese Count 
 who sometimes dropped in to dine at the Hotel Central. 
 He was tall and handsome, but enormously conceited. On 
 the day of which I speak this gentleman was seated op- 
 posite the aforesaid lady, whom he had not before seen 
 but of whom he had evidently heard. He directed his 
 gaze at his fair vis-a-vis pretty steadily during the meal. 
 She had the fortitude to endure this impudence without 
 displaying annoyance. When the table was cleared and 
 the desert was brought on, the Portuguese Count proceed- 
 ed to peel an orange in the most artistic style, leaving it 
 attached to the rind which had been separated in the form 
 of a star. Placing it upon the palm of his aristocratic 
 white hand, he reached across the table and offered the 
 orange to the lady with some complimentary phrase. 
 Under the circumstances this was a distinct affront. The 
 lady declined the proffered fruit with dignity, saying that 
 she was not eating oranges that day. The Count had not 
 recovered from so evident a rebuff, when she reached over 
 to the dish of oranges herself, selected one and proceeded 
 to peel it. The Count sprang from his seat, hastened from 
 the room and the hotel, and was not seen there again 
 while I was in Portugal. 
 
 The sensation produced by this incident was immense, 
 and the tact and spirit of the lady were universally ap- 
 plauded. 
 
 Having "sampled" the famed old reserve port in the 
 vaults of Oporto, to my taste the finest of wines, (to which 
 
 285 
 
and close lifter it I would add prime Madeira, like the 
 vintage of 1868, for example) ; and having made many 
 pleasant acquaintances, and formed a lasting attachment 
 for dear old Portugal, its superb scenery, architecture and 
 romantic story, of which I contrived to see a great deal in 
 various directions, I took passage in the Maria Pia for 
 Madeira. After remaining there two weeks on this my 
 third visit to that magical isle — I could not tear myself 
 away from that Paradise in less time — I sailed for the 
 "Blue Canary Isles," the objective point of this expedition. 
 
 286 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 BOSTON, AND A TRIP TO CUBA. 
 
 My art life in Boston and New York was full of in- 
 terest but it must be given small space in this record of 
 memories. I went to Boston to study and to paint and 
 not from special interest in its literary circles. In fact 
 I was prejudiced against them because of the reputation 
 for snobbishness and intellectual arrogance which Boston 
 had gained. Of all vanities that of intellectual arrogance 
 had always seemed to me the least reasonable, for aside 
 from the fact that mind is greatly an inheritance, there 
 is the thought of how far the wisdom of the most cul- 
 tured mind is, from the wisdom and intelligence of possible 
 higher attainment. What one knows, is so far from all 
 that one does not know and ma}' not attain for ages to 
 come, why should little man be proud! 
 
 Although I did not seek them, it happened that I met 
 in a friendly way several of Boston's "shining lights." 
 Emerson, the real leader of the Hub's literary circle, I 
 have before this mentioned in these records. He was one 
 of the most modest and unassuming of them all. Long- 
 fellow, from whom I had received some very courteous and 
 kindly notes, I found to be one of the most agreeable, 
 perhaps the ideal "literary man" socially. Possessed of 
 
 287 
 19 
 
ample means and social position, his scholarship in cer- 
 tain directions thorough, his poetry agreeable, (if not 
 great), his mind cultivated, he rightly claimed the position 
 that Boston and the public generally, gave to him. 
 Holmes, I met several times. It always seemed to me (ex- 
 cept in the case of life-long friends) acquaintance with him, 
 would have to be at the cost of incense, galore. In spite of 
 his reputation as a "Boston snob" he was a man of ability, 
 of large reading and talent, but (or so he impressed me) 
 with only a spark of real genius. Aldrich I always found 
 agreeable, though inclined to be someAvhat "airy" ; as a 
 raconteur I have never known his superior. Hopkinson 
 Smith was a brilliant rival of Aldrich in this respect al- 
 though rather as a reciter of dramatic scenes arranged 
 by others, than as a narrator of incidents personal to 
 himself. Aldrich visited my studio once with a dis- 
 tinguished engraver (A. V. S. Anthony) and I shall never 
 forget his witty account to us of his ascent in a captive 
 balloon. We laughed till the tears rolled from our eyes. 
 His description was the funniest thing I ever heard. When 
 Aldrich was editor of the Atlantic he would have nothing 
 to do with arranging terms with contributors, saying he 
 knew nothing about business. He was shrewd and wise ! 
 Howells was introduced to me by an old friend, as- 
 sociated with the firm that is now "Houghton, Miflin and 
 Co. (Horace E. Scudder) and I wish to acknowledge to 
 Scudder, right here, my indebtedness for numerous liter- 
 ary courtesies. Howells was at that time thoroughly 
 identified with the Boston literary aristocracy, and was 
 editor of the Atlantic Monthly. He was the peer of any 
 New England writer except Emerson and Hawthorne, 
 whose calibre is at the top of American authorship. He 
 
 288 
 
was a western man and not a Harvard graduate. He 
 told me once that it was a source of regret to him that he 
 was not a college graduate, "not," he quickly alluded, 
 "that a college education is at all a requisite to success, 
 but because it offers interesting experience, and is a de- 
 lightful adjunct to one's store of memories." 
 
 To the writer of creative work (poems, fiction, etc.) 
 the chief sources of information, I think, and of dis- 
 cipline must be Nature, and one's own inner thought ; 
 collegiate education can only give style to the mode of 
 expression ; but to the professional man, to the scholar, 
 college education does seem to me, practically essential. 
 
 Howells was not a wide liker, but one whose sympathies 
 were limited. His sympathy for the anarchist spoke better 
 for his heart than his head. His attack on Thackeray 
 and Dickens always seemed to me to be from a desire 
 (when his influence was waning) to do something a little 
 emotional, to attract attention to himself, and thus per- 
 haps to renew his popularity with the public. Mr. How- 
 ells although very courteous in receiving friends, could 
 be easily aroused to rudeness if they dared differ from 
 him in opinion, and I came to the conclusion he was still 
 somewhat unsophisticated in social conventialities and 
 that he was naturally intolerant. He was kind enough to 
 put my first article on French art in the A tlantic Montlily, 
 at the head of the number. After that, several of my ar- 
 ticles appeared in that exclusive periodical. 
 
 Bradford Torrey was another interesting man. I met 
 him in Boston. He eventually acquired a name highly 
 esteemed by a choice audience, for his enthusiasm over 
 New England ornithology and flora; he had an effective 
 style, and won a place for himself with such writers as 
 
 289 
 
Isaac Walton, Gilbert White, Thoreau, Burrows, and 
 other naturalists. I met also in Boston salons, the fas- 
 cinating Mrs. Katharine McDowell, a beautiful southern- 
 er, who was the heroine of a story published after her 
 death, entitled The Story of Margaret Kent. It was 
 said Longfellow fell in love with her and wished to marry 
 her. Another good friend I made in Boston was Samuel 
 R. Crocker, the founder of the Literary World. He im- 
 pressed me at my first interview as looking like a portrait 
 from Rembrandt; his pale face, with black, piercing eyes, 
 hair and beard like the raven. From the first we were 
 friends ; he seemed to have taken an extraordinary liking 
 to me. He had all the resources of a well-stored mind. 
 He started the Literary World with sheer pluck, without 
 funds, and at first wrote every word of it himself. He 
 had no hobby to ride, no partizanship to bias his judg- 
 ment, he feared no one, neither author, publisher, sect or 
 the public. Eventually success came — well known con- 
 tributors sent articles, his gains increased, until he was 
 able to buy a pleasant home for his wife and children, 
 where I was invited to dine the Sunday after they moved 
 in, to share their happiness. 
 
 But the strain had been too great, something was 
 likely to give way, and he was urged to seek rest for a 
 time. He asked me if I would assume charge of the Literary 
 World for a month or more, which I consented to do. 
 But the "rest" for him came too late. Paresis had set in. 
 In less than a year he passed away. 
 
 When I knew that the Literary World was "for sale," 
 I resolved to buy it. I approved its policy, and knew 
 what could be made of it. I could drop all magazine 
 work (writing what editors preferred, I detested) and 
 
 290 
 
though my painting paid well, I foresaw the "hard times" 
 would soon affect it. Here then was a property I could 
 make of permanent value, giving me a chance to develop 
 a power of my own which should bring influence and 
 shekels. 
 
 From motives of delicacy I decided to wait twenty-four 
 hours, hesitating to be in too great haste to profit by 
 the misfortunes of my friend. Other parties got in their 
 application first, and secured an option which the}^ were 
 not going to allow to escape them. It was a great I'egret 
 to me, and really a turning point in my life — for circum- 
 stances soon after led me to leave Boston for a life in 
 New York. 
 
 I must add a word here of some of the artists I met in 
 Boston. Mr. Walter Smith was director of the Massachu- 
 setts Normal Art School. He was an enthusiast in his 
 vocation, and he believed in forcing artistic genius by 
 rule and law. When my article on French art appeared, 
 he asked me to lecture before the Normal Art School. This 
 led to other invitations in Boston and vicinity, and to a 
 lecture before the Peabody Institute. In those days, one 
 of the most considerable figures in Boston art circles, 
 was William Morris Hunt. His appearance was most 
 distinguished, there was something patrician about his 
 look and bearing. I met him many times, and always 
 found him distinctly affable, although he had a reputation 
 for snobbishness. He was a great portrait painter, es- 
 pecially of men; but his creative genius was less apparent. 
 
 Hunt's two paintings for the State House at Albany 
 told greatly on his strength. His mind did not move 
 spontaneously in conception. Hunt's important work 
 while abroad was to study and introduce to American 
 
 291 
 
artists, new methods of technique and composition. He 
 turned up the dead soil of conventionalism, and he also 
 suggested the advantage of daring and force, in art ex- 
 pression. All this brought him as many enemies as 
 friends, in Boston. 
 
 George Inness was never permanently identified with 
 the Boston art circle, but he happened to be temporarily 
 located there, while I was in Boston. His studio was in 
 the rooms of the Boston Art Club (as was my own) and 
 I saw him often, and perhaps more than I saw him in New 
 York. He was almost as much of an "original," and as un- 
 conventional as Turner. He was of Scotch descent and 
 had Highland blood in his veins doubtless ; to look at his 
 face you would have pronounced him a Kelt or an Indian, 
 but a glance at his clothes suggested a Baptist or a 
 Methodist preacher. He was essentially religious, with a 
 strong bias toward mysticism. It was said he was a 
 Swedenborgian, but his thought followed a range of its 
 own, leading him into those nebulous regions where he con- 
 ceived the superb atmosphere, possibly, that he depicted 
 on his noble canvasses. He delighted to talk, and spoke 
 with eloquence, while he paced with long strides up and 
 down the room, his mind soon wandering into mystical 
 harrangues. If interrupted, he would break short off, 
 and go to the window or leave the room. Inness had little 
 vanity or self-consciousness, but was a profound observer 
 and egotist, and he painted by the sheer inspiration of 
 genius. 
 
 Naturally I met scores of other Boston artists, some 
 of whom I came to know and like well, as for example, 
 A. F. Fellows and John E. C. Peterson, who claimed to 
 have been in the Danish Navy and painted sea pictures. 
 
 292 
 
George Fuller who was in pictorial art, something of 
 what Hawthorne was in literary, distinctly creative. Then 
 there was Bannister, a negro, good looking and intelli- 
 gent, with the manners of a gentleman, and as an artist, 
 with a vigorous and natural style — he lived in Providence. 
 There was also A. P. Close, who made excellent illustra- 
 tions for the Riverside Magazine to which I contributed 
 articles. Through this talented young artist I made the 
 acquaintance of E. L. Weeks, who died in 1903, after a 
 brilliant career as a painter of Oriental scenes. He was 
 himself so decidedly oriental in looks that habited in 
 Moorish garb, Weeks could easily have passed for an 
 Arab gentleman of Damascus. He was intensely am- 
 bitious, had much travel and study ; and with a powerful 
 constitution, was energetic to a degree. As an artist. 
 Weeks' sense of form and movement was naturall}^ feeble, 
 but he had the eastern love for brilliant effects and over- 
 came any lack, by diligent study in Paris. His pictures 
 are well up in the technical standards of the French 
 school; they represent objects in repose and suggest still 
 life. 
 
 Weeks urged Close and myself to go with him on a 
 journey to Turkey and Syria. I might have done so but 
 for meeting Capt. Hardy, who fired my brain with his 
 descriptions of new things to be seen in Madeira. Close 
 and Weeks therefore sailed without me, and reached 
 Palestine, where Close succumbed to the climate, and the 
 sod of the Holy Land closed over the remains of this 
 pure, young life forever. 
 
 On the whole, I found life in Boston sufficiently amusing, 
 and quite as stimulating to the brain as was necessary. 
 I found the intense clan sentiment very much like the 
 
 m 
 
"caste" feeling in India, the entire atmosphere being per- 
 vaded by the essence of snobbery. It was delicious to 
 study the airiness of even some very young snobs of 
 the genus "Bostonian." All these cliques, though distinct 
 and at different social elevations, in the main stood to- 
 gether like the bricks of a solid wall, and so formed are 
 an essential feature of Boston's esprit du corps or pro- 
 vincialism. The city was not then, so large or spread out 
 as at present, but was like a hive, containing one great 
 family, the buzz of whose petty cliques could be heard 
 from Dorchester to the North End and from Newton 
 to Long Wharf. 
 
 The activity was enormous, but it was of the head, 
 rather than the heart, and Bostonians grew up cold to 
 those who happened to live in other social atmospheres. 
 Boston can display waves of sympathy at times, on sud- 
 den emergencies, but the sympathy is for intellectual ob- 
 jects or for public emergencies, and often exhibits a 
 heartless censorship over private needs. And so this 
 little, great city interested me for its littleness and for 
 its greatness. I could fill a book with narratives illus- 
 trating my text, which would be very entertaining, but 
 my life moves on to other phases ! 
 
 In 1876 I went to Europe to prepare articles re- 
 quested by Harper's Magazine on "Art life abroad," and 
 visited the south of France and all that romantic region 
 between the Gulf of Lyons and the Bay of Biscay, in- 
 cluding afterward the old cities of Avignon and Carcas- 
 sonne which I had always longed to see. My two journeys 
 abroad at that time, ended in arriving again at Boston, 
 but somehow the place seemed changed. During my few 
 years of absence Long Wharf and Grey's Wharf, among 
 
 294 
 
other old landmarks had been modernized and failed to 
 interest me. 
 
 The time comes in one's life when in the rapidly shift- 
 ing panorama, we feel the impelling power toward new 
 scenes. Another stage in the drama was to be enacted, and 
 it requires other scenes and other characters. 
 
 It soon after seemed expedient I should move to New 
 York because of a cold, the severe east winds of Boston 
 helped to increase, and because of the desire of being nearer 
 to some of the publishing houses. When I told Howells 
 I was going to New York to live, in his mellow, sarcastic 
 way he said, "So, Benjamin, you prefer quantity to 
 quality !" "No ;" I replied, "I am going because I like 
 the quality so well. I wish to get more of it !" In a year 
 or two Howells followed, and has continued in New York 
 ever since. 
 
 The wisdom of transferring my headquarters to New 
 York became immediately apparent. The busiest ten 
 years of my life began as soon as I was settled in my studio 
 in tlie Y. M. C. A. building on the corner of 23rd Street 
 and Fourth Avenue. I afterward took a studio in the 
 old University Building on Washington Square, to whicli 
 I was attracted by its romantic character. That grim, 
 feudal looking pile of granite was one of the interesting 
 landmarks of New York, and many there were, who re- 
 gretted its demolition. Aside from its aspect, it had a 
 semi-historical character because of the well known in- 
 dividuals who had occupied its apartments. For the 
 purpose of adding to its revenues the University had 
 reserved to itself only the second floor, which was used 
 for recitation rooms and a chapel. One did not realize 
 until he actually occupied quarters there, how spacious 
 
 295 
 
was the interior, and how winding and numerous were 
 its corridors and staircases. There was no elevator, and 
 one liad to climb and walk real distances to find anyone. 
 This made it a fine place for thieves, and robberies were 
 not infrequent. 
 
 Ed^win White, the portrait painter, had his studio 
 once at the University building. Winthrop, the author 
 of Cecil Dreeme, who by his soldier's fate, gave a 
 vogue to works, that had looked for a publisher in vain, 
 lived and wrote there until the Civil War called him 
 to battle. And Morse, a portrait-painter better known 
 as the electrician, experimented on the roof with the 
 invention that was to give him immortality. Winslow 
 Homer, at the outset of his career, had painted in the 
 studio that I occupied later. It was a rare old room that 
 I enjoyed there until the climb to it up the long stair- 
 ways proved too severe. It was one of three immense 
 studios at the top of the building, made by cutting off 
 the north part of the chapel. My room was about 24 
 by 25 feet and 21 feet high. There were two lancet 
 shaped windows and the vaulted ceiling was grained, 
 ribbed, and supported by angles, all of tinted stucco, but 
 still very picturesque and in an American studio, unique. 
 Shirlow, who has recently left us, had the studio next to 
 mine, and I was able to continue the acquaintance begun 
 in Munich with one of the most serious, earnest, con- 
 scientious characters who has appeared in our art, a man 
 whom one only had to know to respect and admire. I 
 would gladly say more of him, but I foresee that if I were 
 to undertake to write of all the artists, writers, or other 
 distinguished characters with Avhom I was brought in 
 contact during my New York life, or relate the incidents 
 
 296 
 
occurring under my observation, I should never exhaust 
 the subject or complete this record. This fact will ex- 
 plain why many are omitted here, or merely mentioned, 
 aside from the fact that it is inexpedient to say much of 
 those who are still living. 
 
 Before I had fairly got into the vortex of the New 
 York maelstrom I took a run over to Bermuda to write 
 it up for my forthcoming book on the Atlantic Islands, 
 which was published by the Harpers in 1878. Although 
 it did not have a very large sale, it was republished in 
 London, and brought letters to me on the subject even 
 from Australia, India, and other distant places. The 
 notices of it were also excellent. It proved to me that mis- 
 cellaneous collections, even when made up of cognate 
 subjects, are not attractive to the popular taste. The 
 case is similar with pictorial compositions. The simpler 
 a composition the deeper the impression produced. If 
 there must be figures or objects, care must be taken to 
 have one figure or one group somewhat more impressive 
 or prominent than the others that the attention may be 
 concentrated upon that ; otherwise the work is likely to 
 prove a failure so far as concerns its popular acceptance. 
 It matters not whether it be a historical genre, or a 
 cattle or ship picture, the above principle of composition 
 applies to them all. 
 
 Soon after my return from Bermuda I started for 
 a trip to the Sea Islands of our southern coast. At 
 Fernandina I happened to run across an excursion party 
 that was accompanying Postmaster General Key to Cuba. 
 He was going there to look personally into the possibili- 
 ties of arranging with the Governor General a fast mail 
 service from New York to Havana. Mr. Roberts, (presi- 
 
 297 
 
dent of the company that was desirous of conducting this 
 service), Vice-President Hamlin, Senator or Ex-Governor 
 Kirkwood, and Attorney General Campbell were the other 
 members of the official committee, A bright party of 
 Washingtonians, journalists, officials in the Departments, 
 two or three army and navy officials and several ladies 
 had been invited to enjoy the pleasures of the excursion 
 and relieve the dignity of the official element. The party 
 had stopped at Fernandina to meet Ex-Senator Yulee, 
 who resided there, and had some pecuniary interest in 
 the success of the enterprise. There was to be a ball in 
 the evening at the Egmont House where I was staying, 
 in honor of the excursionists. As things turn out some- 
 times on such occasions, I came fortuitously in contact 
 with Mr. Roberts and others of the party, who insisted 
 in the kindest manner that I should accompany them to 
 Cuba, offering not only to pay all my expenses but to 
 give me a return ticket by rail to New York, as I had 
 not yet finished my tour among the Sea Islands. I did 
 not hesitate to accept this generous opportunity. 
 
 The party left Fernandina for the west coast of Florida 
 by rail, stopping at various places to see what little of 
 interest is offered the stranger in the northern part of 
 the peninsula. 
 
 At Cedar Keys we had to wait a day for the boat, and 
 the party devoted several hours to fishing from the win- 
 dows of the train which was switched off on to a tressel- 
 work making an arm of the Gulf. It is not often that 
 fish are caught in that way. At Key West the whole 
 town turned out to meet us, and the City government gave 
 us a banquet in the town hall. The collector of the port 
 placed his bathing enclosure at our disposal. It was pro- 
 
 298 
 
tected by strong high stakes planted close together, and 
 as I swam within the enclosure I could see the huge sharks 
 rubbing their noses against the palisade, longing for a 
 chance to get hold of me. It was rather a gruesome 
 sight, qualified to make one nervous even though apparent- 
 ly safe. We went on board the U. S. Surveying boat, 
 and there I met Lieutenant, afterward Captain Sigsbee, 
 who in later years was commander of the Ma'me, when 
 blown up at Havana. It is worth stating here that when 
 the Maine was building I was probably the first to visit, 
 describe and illustrate her for the periodical press. 
 
 I shall never forget the morning of our landing at 
 Havana. Not because there was anything remarkable 
 to me, who had landed at so many far more interesting 
 places, in the mere fact of going on shore at this then 
 dirty port amid a throng of negroes, idle Cubans and 
 lounging troops, although the spectacle had a certain 
 interest. But there was one circumstance connected with 
 this event that is ineffaceable. 
 
 This was the incident, and I think it worth recording 
 because it illustrates not so much republican simplicity 
 as a lack of true sense of the fitness of things and a self 
 complacency that leads us to forget the respect due to 
 those who, whether personally or as public officials, have 
 a right to be met with respect. The committee had gone 
 to Havana in the interests of the two countries, and was 
 composed of some of the highest dignitaries of the United 
 States. Recognizing this fact, the Governor General of 
 Cuba sent an official deputation on board to welcome and 
 escort the travelling delegation to their hotel. The mem- 
 bers of this official deputation were in full official uni- 
 form, as was perfectly proper. And how did the distin- 
 
 299 
 
guished American committee receive them? Without coats, 
 but in straw hats, linen dusters and collars without any 
 cravat or necktie whatever. And in this noble costume 
 they landed and paraded between the gaping multitude 
 on the street. The weather was hot, it is true, but it is 
 sometimes as warm in New York ; and not one of these 
 gentlemen would have dared to present himself on any 
 public official occasion at Washington in such preposterous 
 dress, whatever the temperature. That they did it at 
 Havana seemed like sheer, discourteous bravado ; a dis- 
 tinct affront to the Government with which they pro- 
 posed to form an advantageous postal contract. When 
 they waited on the Governor General at his palace, one 
 or two of these gentlemen had so far recovered their 
 senses, as to donn black frock coats ; but several did ac- 
 tually penetrate into his presence, in those infernal linen 
 dusters. Some years after this incident, when Senator 
 Hamlin, a very able man, was minister to Madrid, I have 
 been told that he has been seen carrying an unwrapped 
 pair of old boots in his hand to be cobbled at a cheap shoe- 
 maker's around the corner. When one occupies a promi- 
 nent post among foreigners who do not understand the 
 sense of such incongruities, this is a childish ostentation 
 of republican simplicity, like that of the Spartans who 
 Avent to the Olympic games in rags. It indicates to my 
 mind a mental condition that has not yet grown to un- 
 derstand the true relation of things. 
 
 On my return I left the party at Gainesville and skir- 
 mished about the Sea Islanders at my leisure. Among var- 
 ious points visited during this to me, important trip was 
 to Cumberland Island, which I was the first to describe 
 for the public. It was well I went there at that time, and 
 
 300 
 
made a sketch of Dungeness, which appeared afterwards 
 in Harper's Monthly. Dungeness was the stately man- 
 orhouse of the island. It was of cochina which was still in 
 firm condition, hut the roof had caught fire when the slaves 
 were in charge during the war and been consumed. When 
 I saw the ruin the windows were bare, but the lofty walls 
 were standing tapestried with flowering vines. It was 
 situated on the edge of what I cannot but think the noblest 
 oak forest, since Paradise, reaching unbroken for twenty 
 miles, the trunks regular as the pillars of Cordova's mos- 
 que, and shaded with Druidic gloom like a temple of 
 primeval gods. All around boomed the deep roar of the 
 ocean, melting away into the shadows ; altogether the most 
 romantic and impressive woodland scene I have encounter- 
 ed since I gazed on ^Madeira's Vol Paraiso. I am glad I 
 saw it then, but I do not wish to see it again. The Car- 
 negies bought the island; and the first thing they did, was 
 to tear down Dungeness, one of the few really pictures- 
 que, sentiment-invested ruins in America. What else they 
 have done to modernize the island I neither know nor care. 
 Doubtless they have beautified the place in an artificial and 
 fashionable sense, but they never can restore the superb 
 solitary sylvan splendor of Cumberland Island and old 
 Dungeness. Fort George Island also dreAv me to its heart 
 with its delicate, subtropical witchery, its stately oaks and 
 palms waving with rhytlnnic music in the steady sweep of 
 the northeast trades. Fortunate did I think myself, when 
 I landed on this lovely islet, at the mouth of the St. Johns, 
 the scene of some of the most thrilling tragedies of our 
 early history, the domain at one time of that quaint cliar- 
 acter, Capt. Kingsley, but now the fighting ground of 
 speculators and promoters. I look liack to the days I 
 
 301 
 
passed there, more as if it were a dream of storied isles in 
 the old world, than of a spot on the more prosaic shores 
 of this western land. On my return what I said about 
 Fort George Island in Harper's Monthly contributed 
 to attract attention to the island and to lead to the forma- 
 tion of a syndicate which bought 1,500 acres, being most 
 of the island, and erected a handsome hotel there. I 
 joined the syndicate and put in a small amount. The en- 
 terprise promised success ; but there were too many in the 
 company for the amount of the capital invested, dif- 
 ficulties arose out of the title, and when the syndicate was 
 reformed I drew out of it, glad that I had not lost more. 
 Later I wrote an article for the Atlantic Monthly, in 
 which I claimed from careful observations on the spot, 
 that when Parkman wrote his stirring account of the 
 bloody conflicts between the French and Spaniards at the 
 mouth of the river of INIay or St. Johns, entitled the 
 "Vengeance of Dominique de Gourgoes," he had not been 
 on the ground, and had fallen into palpable error in the 
 location of the fort, and hence in his description of the 
 movements of the hostile forces. There was nothing to 
 answer to my statements, which were conclusive. Whether 
 Parkman's mistake was corrected in later editions of his 
 book I am not aware; but probably not; because to do so 
 would have required the rewriting of much of his narra- 
 tive. 
 
 But the most important result of my trip to Havana, 
 lay in the fact that I made the acquaintance of a lady who, 
 (with her brother) was an invited guest of the party! I 
 saw little of her then, but several years later, she became 
 my life-friend and partner ; and this marriage, led in a way 
 to my becoming United States Minister to Persia. That 
 
 302 
 
is the way events of our life are woven together, one un- 
 foreseen incident leading to another, apparently by our 
 nominal free agency, but practically by a mysterious 
 energy that takes us hither and thither. As we look back 
 over our lives, we see that the important crises of life 
 have come from unexpected, often trivial incidents, with 
 which we had little or nothing to do apparently. Where 
 does our free agency appear, in this sequence of events? 
 The problem is too deep for me, too deep for the solution 
 or any mortal in this mundane existence. But whether I 
 can solve this question or no, I can now see with the ut- 
 most distinctness the various turning points in my life, 
 and the various steps of cause and effect, that have led 
 me from one stage to another. How they affected my 
 character I cannot discern with the same clearness. I 
 cannot yet see that character is shaped by events ; rather 
 are they seized or shaped by character. What man is at 
 his birth he is at his death. Only the events of his life, 
 if he lives to maturity, tend to bring out with increasing 
 vividness, the original traits and tendencies, some of which, 
 at times, lie dormant half a life time, until called into ac- 
 tion by the electric spark of manifest destiny. 
 
 One of the most interesting characters I met soon 
 after going to New York was Mr. Oliver B. Bunce the 
 literary manager of D. Appleton and Company. No one 
 had a kinder heart than Mr. Bunce or a more unfortunate 
 manner, i. e. unfortunate to those who did not know him. 
 I called to see him with reference to the publication of an 
 article in Appleton^s Magazine. He received me curtly, 
 but asked me to sit down, and then attacked my article 
 so savagely that I considered myself lost. After letting 
 off this blast, the first and only example of the sort I 
 
 303 
 20 
 
ever experienoed in an American editorial office, he quieted 
 down to the mildness of a summer evening, and actually ac- 
 cepted and published my paper without altering a word ! 
 When I left, he asked me to call again, and what was more 
 amazing, gave me an invitation to the hospitalities of the 
 Sunday evening literary receptions at his house. I at- 
 tended these soirees several times and found them alto- 
 gether informal and partly for that reason very enter- 
 taining; partly also owing to the unaffected cordiality of 
 the host and his attractive family. The feature of the 
 evening was the free and easy supper, where we sat 
 around tables and all joined in the conversation. The 
 company was rather miscellaneous and Bohemian, but one 
 often met bright, well known people there whose ac- 
 quaintance was well worth the making. 
 
 Mr. Bunce asked me to write two books for the Apple- 
 ton's Handy Volume Series, The Multitudinous Seas and 
 The World's Paradises. Fortunately they were both 
 kindly received by critics and public, and sold well. The 
 first I wrote in four days. It was a subject I knew thor- 
 oughly and loved with enthusiasm. The second pleased 
 him so well, especially as I had not stinted my material to 
 keep within the limits of the remuneration — a mistake 
 which some authors make in these mercenary days — that 
 he actually surprised me by an additional check above the 
 sum agreed upon. 
 
 Later in 1884, Mr. Bunce made me a cash offer for 
 The Cruise of the Alice May, after it had appeared in 
 the Century Magazine, and brought it out in handsome 
 form. I am very glad to have this opportunity to pay 
 this tribute here, to one of the kindest and best friends 
 I ever met in my literary labors. 
 
 304 
 
I had contracted with Scribner's to write a concise nar- 
 rative and critical account of the Trojan Legend, with 
 the title, Troy, Its Legend, Literature, and Topog- 
 raphy. The study I had given to the subject when I 
 wrote my Choice of Paris, years before, was now 
 of material aid to me. The book was to be one of their 
 series of Epochs of History. It proved successful as 
 such books go, both with critics and buyers. Part of it 
 I dictated while at the same time painting at my easel. As 
 Schliemann was about to issue another work on Troy, and 
 I was anxious to anticipate some of his forthcoming state- 
 ments by a theory of my own, in the early Autumn as 
 the holiday book trade was approaching, I was obliged to 
 read the proofs under very painful circumstances. My 
 dear wife, after an illness of years, which she had borne 
 with great patience, passed away. Following a period of 
 comparative quiet with my brush and pen, I was now 
 again to enter the fascinating field which I found so con- 
 genial and which I especially needed at this time, the field 
 of active adventure and open air effort. It was preceded, 
 however, by a very serious illness from whose first effects 
 I was the better able to recover because of the diversion 
 and travel which followed. Three of us were dining in 
 the garden of the University Club, then situated on the 
 corner of Fifth Avenue and thirty-fifth street. It was a 
 mild summer afternoon, but there was steady easterly 
 wind blowing. I began to cough in a few hours. The 
 cough increased, but being ignorant of the symptoms of 
 bronchitis, I paid little attention to it as it was summer 
 time, until a friend warned me that I was threatened with 
 serious trouble. ' It was not many days before I was 
 forced to take to my bed. My good friend Dr. Walter de 
 
 305 
 
Forest Day, for many years medical inspector of the New 
 York Board of Health and Professor of Materia Medica 
 in the College of Pharmac}^, one of the most faithful 
 friends that ever a man had, then insisted that I should 
 go to his house for more careful nursing. One of the best 
 physicians in New York was also called in, and I lay 
 there for several weeks in the clutches of acute capillary 
 bronchitis. For some of the time my life hung by a 
 thread. When I rallied from the attack and was able 
 to leave the house, the Doctors told me that with care I 
 might live years, but that my breathing apparatus had 
 received a permanent shock, and that I should be liable 
 at any time to fresh attacks any one of which, might be 
 fatal. Their prediction has proved true. Several times 
 have I been brought to the edge of the grave by this af- 
 fliction, and eventually I was obliged to abandon New 
 York and live directly on the seashore within the in- 
 fluence of the Gulf Stream or in equally mild temperatures 
 inland, my plans and life-work being more or less shaped 
 by this cause. An elastic constitution, intelligent caution 
 and will power have doubtless been valuable to me in this 
 emergency, and also the steady use of whiskey and tobac- 
 co. I had enjoyed them in moderation for some years 
 without injury, and since I have been troubled with weak 
 throat and lungs, I have found them of the greatest bene- 
 fit thus proving that nothing is more absurd or mis- 
 chievous than to undertake to formulate dietetic laws for 
 universal application or to shackle widely varying in- 
 dividual constitutions and temperaments, by cast-iron 
 regulations, or to try to enforce such regulations by rough 
 treatment. I have found moderate smoking protective and 
 strengthening. I am, however, what is called a slow smo- 
 
 306 
 
ker. I do not smoke with quick nervous puffs, as some do» 
 and do not inhale the smoke into the lungs. I carefully 
 avoid cigarettes also, not because the tobacco in them is 
 necessarily worse than other tobacco ; sometimes it is bet- 
 ter, but one is liable to take more smoke in his lungs from 
 them than he needs either for health or enjoyment, and 
 the paper is apt to be injurious to the tissues. I never 
 yet have had a chill, although in my travels I have been in 
 many malodorous, malarial places, have been among rice 
 fields and have travelled all night through miasmatic re- 
 gions on horseback unaffected by night airs. I consider 
 this immunity due in part to tobacco, which is a deodorizer. 
 I am convinced that I also owe to tobacco and spirits, at 
 least in part, the admirable digestion with which I have 
 always been blessed, and also perhaps, the freedom from 
 thirst, which may be due partly to my fondness for tea. 
 Except in the hottest weather I rarely feel a sensation of 
 thirst, and sometimes months elapse without a drop of 
 water passing my lips except to brush my teeth. Some 
 might be injured by it. By my experience is, that people 
 are so differently constituted, "what is one man's meat, 
 is another's poison." This is the reason intelligent and 
 well-meaning doctors (especially "experts" with theories) 
 sometimes kill, or fail to cure. They know too much, and 
 too little! 
 
 307 
 
MATURITY 
 
 PART IV 
 
 THE SAILOR'S FATE. 
 
 A Sailor born, his ship he loved. 
 
 And loved the sea, with love that greater grew — 
 
 And ever found zchere e'er he roved 
 
 The wild blue sea, to him, was friend most true. 
 
 Then let the waves his praises sound. 
 His restless heart forever calmed. 
 Lower him a thousand fathoms dozen 
 With solemn vastness of the sea embalmed! 
 
 There, let the leaves his requiem sing. 
 While o'er his corse, the trooping ages go! 
 And round about him, as round King, 
 The royal purple of the Sea enfolds! 
 
 S. G. AV. B. 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 NEW YORK ART LIFE. 
 
 My articles on Contemporary Art in Europe, the 
 first of the sort that had appeared in an American maga- 
 zine, and their subsequent publication in a handsome 
 volumn, met with sufficient attention in our commercial 
 community to incline the Messrs. Harper to seize the tide 
 at its flood — one must do that way in America or be left 
 behind. They proposed to issue a series of articles on 
 American Art, describing its development from Colonial 
 times, the same to be illustrated regardless of cost and 
 afterwards to be put together in a book for the holidays. 
 They offered the undertaking to me. I protested that 
 the time for such a work had not yet arrived ; that I did 
 not yet feel equal to treat the subject properly, and that 
 in the end it would prove injurious to my position as an 
 artist to criticize my fellow artists, aside from the appear- 
 ance of presum.ption it implied. They replied that they 
 were bound to have such a work prepared as soon as pos- 
 sible, and that if I did not do it they would offer it to 
 some other writer less sensitive than myself. I needed the 
 money, I did not wish to fall out of favor with the INIessrs. 
 Harper, who had always treated me with consideration and 
 to whom I was under promise not to write for the rival il- 
 
 311 
 
lustrated monthlies while writmg for their house, and I 
 hoped that the artists themselves would not too deeply re- 
 sent what I might say, as I have always aimed to avoid 
 harshness or hypercriticism. After some hesitation I de- 
 cided, weakly perhaps, to undertake a labor that resulted 
 in keeping me more busy for several years than I have 
 ever been before or since, although not always in directions 
 I might have preferred, if at liberty to choose. 
 
 The writing of these articles on American Art was the 
 smallest part of the work. I had to visit city after city 
 looking up the work of our old time artists in private or 
 public collections, and selecting such things as would best 
 serve as examples. I also had to visit the studios of our 
 living artists for the same purpose, and then have careful 
 photographs taken of works selected. Of course in this 
 way I saw a good part of the product of our art, and made 
 the acquaintance of many of our first citizens and of our 
 leading artists. There was also much investigation to be 
 made in old records, and a vast amount of correspon- 
 dence, before boiling the material down, into the compact- 
 ness required by magazine articles. As soon as it became 
 known that I was preparing such a work I had numerous 
 applications from artists in various quarters to have their 
 names included, in some cases offering to pay for the en- 
 graving of their pictures. These were the individuals, 
 generally, that we did not want, and it was embarrassing to 
 have to decline their applications. Doubtless some worthy 
 names slipped my attention in so large a country, and in 
 any case it was very trying and mortifying to me to be 
 able to devote only a paragraph or two or three lines to 
 deserving artists. In writing about European artists for 
 the American public this was of unimportance to me, but it 
 
 312 
 
was quite another affair, when treating of American ar- 
 tists, as I eventually found to my cost. The Harpers gave 
 the greatest attention to the preparation of the engrav- 
 ings. Some of them were engraved repeatedly to achieve 
 complete satisfaction. But I did not quite approve the aim 
 sought with some of the cuts, which was to give a 
 realistic impression of the style, the very brush marks, of 
 the works of our more recent painters, and to suggest, as 
 they said, the color. This idea of suggesting color in a 
 black and white engraving is to me absurd, a sheer affec- 
 tation. A vivid fancy can perhaps imagine it sees the 
 tints of a sunset or grey landscape in black and white, 
 but after all it is the form and the light and shade alone, 
 that the graver can or should attempt to reproduce. But 
 the editor and engravers of Harpers deserve credit for 
 conscientiously trying to achieve the highest possible re- 
 sults in the illustrations of this work, which, barring the 
 above exceptions, were truly admirable. The crudeness 
 of the public art tastes of the period were shown in some 
 of the letters received by the editor. Some objected to the 
 immorality of reproducing the nude, as represented by 
 such chaste works as Powers' Eve. One writer, noticing a 
 slight defect in the wood, criticised the engraver for put- 
 ting a pimple on the thigh of a nymph ! 
 
 These repeated publications on art subjects brought 
 me numerous unsolicited commissions for articles and 
 books and I had my hands full of work. I had numerous 
 articles to write for that stately art magazine, The 
 American Art Revieic, edited by INIr. S. R. Kochler, a 
 periodical for which our public was still hardly ripe, and it 
 lived only two or three years. The Iconographic Encylo- 
 paedia asked me to prepare the history of painting in the 
 
 313 
 
later Renaissance. At the kind suggestion of Mr. R. H. 
 Stoddard, the poet and literary editor of the Mail and 
 Express, to whose genial friendship I owe repeated 
 courtesies, I was offered the Art Editorship of that paper. 
 At the same time the publishers of the Literary Table 
 asked me to edit their Art Department, and in due course, 
 the Magazine of Art decided to add an American de- 
 partment to that monthly and the editorship was at my 
 disposal. In the meantime I was painting, exhibiting and 
 selling pictures at the Academy and at numerous exhibi- 
 tions elsewhere, and writing the books already mentioned 
 together with various side articles. If it be asked how I 
 managed to do all this I can say that I had valuable help in 
 cultivated assistants who were able to visit the studios for 
 me or to write and copy intelligently at my dictation. On 
 a few occasions I wrote two articles at once, dictating one 
 to my amanuensis, while I myself was writing another. At 
 other times, after a painting was advanced beyond the 
 composition, I would paint and dictate at the same time. I 
 also had an inestimable and un-American faculty of 
 knowing how to rest. When I reached a certain point in 
 my work I would not only lay the pen or brush aside but 
 also put the whole subject practically out of mind, and go 
 down to the wharves and look at the ships and yachts ; or 
 I would stroll over to the Club and with a cigar and in 
 easy chat with a friend or two, give my thoughts entire 
 diversion and repose. Then again, I never began work 
 until I was ready, no matter what time of the day. In that 
 way everything was assorted in my mind; I knew just 
 what I wanted to write or paint, and rarely had to do it 
 over. I also made it a habit to eat and drink something 
 before going to bed, in this way insuring a sound, un- 
 
 314 
 
broken sleep, and waking thoroughly refreshed. This has 
 been my habit for thirty-five years. Of course I should 
 have preferred to work at more leisure; but perhaps I 
 might have produced no better results ; some work best 
 under pressure. I realized that I must make hay while the 
 sun shone; "work while the boom is on," my friends said; 
 and I added myself, "It does not last long in this rapid age 
 and country." 
 
 A friend in Detroit had suggested my name to the 
 superintendent of the Board of Education of the State 
 of Michigan, who offered me the chair of literature and 
 history in the State Normal School, with the reversion 
 to the presidency, when vacant. He came on to see me 
 about it, and I gave the matter serious consideration ; but 
 finally decided against accepting so flattering an invitation 
 for the same reasons that I had declined one or two posi- 
 tions already. I was of too independent a nature to be 
 willing to promise to stay permanently ; but not to do so 
 would be unfair to the institution. I realized that my 
 tastes were too cosmopolitan to allow me to settle definite- 
 ly at one post, unless the forms of energy were entirely in 
 harmony with my disposition. 
 
 The results that I had apprehended from writing Art 
 in America, began to become apparent in due time. My 
 books had given me wider reputation than I could have 
 hoped for, as an artist in America, unless an Inness or a 
 Turner, but they had injured my position as an artist; 
 for artists, as a rule, are jealous and suspicious of one 
 of their calling who does not devote himself wholly to art. 
 One must be a Da Vinci to brave and live down this senti- 
 ment. Fromentin, tried deliberately to do so, but barely 
 succeeded in the attempt. The artists continued to hang 
 
 315 
 
my paintings at the Academy, occasionally even on the 
 line, but I was soon made to feel, (and have been made to 
 feel more and more in later years,) that if one both paints 
 and writes and lectures on Art, many artists will insist 
 that he shall be considered an "art-critic" and not a pro- 
 fessional painter. This is unjust, but the average artist 
 is not broad-minded, however keen his faculties. I was 
 asked if I was willing to have my name put up for election 
 as associate member of the National Academy. I replied 
 that I was willing provided it could be previously ascer- 
 tained that there was a very sure chance of my election. 
 A canvass of the members developed a very bitter feeling 
 on the part of two or three who felt that I had not as- 
 signed them the highest places in the niches of fame, and 
 they were bound to defeat my election. Therefore I de- 
 clined to have my name put forward. In such a case the 
 virulent pertinacity of one foe is greater than the efforts 
 of ten friends. 
 
 Shortly before this incident I was asked by the Wide 
 Awake, a youth's magazine of Boston, to prepare a 
 dozen short biographical articles about American artists, 
 to appear monthly at my own terms, and with illustra- 
 tions. After the series had begun, the order was duplicat- 
 ed, making twenty-four articles in all. It seems that D. 
 Lothrop & Co. had been led to make the offer as soon as 
 they saw that I was preparing articles for Harpers on 
 American Art; and without consulting me as to my own 
 Interests, they put the first twelve articles in book form 
 and announced them for the Holidays at the same time 
 that the Harpers announced my Art in America. 
 Legally Lothrop had a right to do this, because In my in- 
 nocence, I had not protected myself. But morally they 
 
 316 
 
were not justified. Tliey allowed me no copyright or 
 profits on their book, and as it was every way a cheaper 
 book than the other, and sold for half the price, many 
 bought them in preference to the other, on which I had a 
 copyright and profits. As it turned out the Harper's and 
 I, found our expected profits on Art in America cut 
 down at least half by this unauthorized trick. It 
 hurt me also with the Harper's at first, as I had diffi- 
 culty in making them understand that I had nothing to do 
 with it but was equally a sufferer with themselves. It 
 is a very hard thing to say, the fact remains that in all 
 my experience with editors and publishers I have suffered 
 proportionally far more, from pious publishers and editors, 
 whether clergymen or laymen, than from the unregenerate. 
 I have no comment to make, the facts speak for themselves, 
 and professional Christians can draw their own inferences. 
 I could recall several forcible instances bearing out this 
 statement. 
 
 One of these biographical articles for Wide Arvake 
 was about the well known illustrator Charles S. Relnhart ; 
 and in preparing this article I came across another ex- 
 ample of the way my Art in America had prejudiced 
 me among the artists. He had agreed to furnish me with 
 a photograph of himself and one or two illustrations to 
 be engraved with the article. After I had written it, I 
 dropped him a line asking when the pictures would be 
 ready. Some days passed without a reply, and I was 
 about to send him again, when I met him on the steps of 
 the Academy. Relnhart was a tall, handsome, finely built 
 man, who might have posed for an Apollo. But when he 
 saw me on this occasion the expression of his face instant- 
 ly changed to such a degree that he might at that moment 
 
 317 
 
have posed for Milton's Satan in Hell. Paying no at- 
 tention to this changed mood, although on my guard, as 
 something was evidently brewing, I said, "Mr. Reinhart, 
 will you kindly tell me when I can have those pictures, as 
 I am in some haste for them." 
 
 He glared at me a moment like an insane man, and then 
 exclaimed, "I have a good mind to knock you down !" 
 
 "Why, I should like to know what is the meaning of 
 this?" 
 
 "The meaning of it is, that you lied about me in your 
 book and I am going to knock you down." 
 
 I stood and looked at him, and then replied, "I think 
 I am entitled to know what you have against me, but in 
 the mean time I am waiting for you to go ahead." An- 
 other pause. "I thought you wanted to knock me down ; 
 you'll never have a better chance." 
 
 He advanced a step and raised his clenched fist ; then 
 dropped it ; his face flushed, and he trembled with ex- 
 citement. 
 
 "Well.?" 
 
 "The amount of it is that you say in your book that 
 Abbey is a greater artist than I am. Everyone knows that 
 that is not true. We studied together; he's had a lot of 
 luck, but you can ask anybody and they'll tell you that 
 I draw more carefully than he, and hold my own with him 
 as an all-around artist; and you, you have given him the 
 precedence above me!" 
 
 "Mr. Reinhart," said I, "you flatter me by implying 
 that anything I can say can have such weight. I am 
 fallible like all men ; I was limited in the space allowed me ; 
 it was my wish to be fair to all; I may unintentionally 
 have said less about your talents than they deserve, but 
 
 318 
 
that I have a high opinion of them, is shown by the fact 
 that I have asked the favor of including you in my selec- 
 tion of twenty-four artists to be written up in Wide 
 Awake. Mr article about you is written and they are 
 waiting for it ; when can I have the illustrations ?" 
 
 "I can't let you have them. What you say may be so, 
 but I don't like your way of speaking of me as an artist, 
 and shall have nothing to do with your article." 
 
 "Do as you please about it ; but I considered you as a 
 man of honor on whose word I could depend." 
 
 He gave me a parting look of hate, and left me. But 
 my last words rankled in his mind, and three hours later 
 a messenger rapped at ni}' door and brought me ]Mr. Rein- 
 hart's illustrations. They were accompanied by a brief, 
 civil note, expressing a wish that I should suffer no incon- 
 venience in the matter. Reinhart was a man of very genu- 
 ine artistic merit, but it was the merit of talent, supple- 
 mented by earnest effort rather than of genius. Abbey 
 may justly claim to a share of genius although his source 
 of inspiration is neither copious nor deep. The American 
 pictorial artists of great genius are still for the most part 
 in passe rather than in esse, sensational, rather sugges- 
 sively creative, excepting in the field of landscape. Let 
 us hope the day of their coming is near, the day when 
 American art shall shine forth in native and unsurpassed 
 splendor, with the vast reserve indicated by the masters 
 of the old world. 
 
 Another artist who was odd but in altogether a dif- 
 ferent way was Louis Lang, a native of Bavaria, who 
 came early to this country. He was short and squat, and 
 when I knew him wore a brown wig and had his beard 
 dyed of the same color. He was thrifty and hence, with- 
 
 319 
 
 21 
 
out being much of a painter, although he had been elected 
 Academician, had managed to lay by a snug sum which 
 kept him very comfortably after he was too old to do much 
 with the brush. Lang was born a Catholic. But he soon 
 left that faith and always thereafter was a liberal in his 
 views. Whether he had spiritual consolation at the end 
 I know not, but he told me at seventy that he had confess- 
 ed only once in his life ; that was when he was eight years 
 old. He was told that he must confess his sins to a priest. 
 Ignorant of what would be required of him he looked into 
 a book he found lying about, containing every variety of 
 questions applicable to different ages, sexes, and con- 
 ditions. He then frankly confessed to having committed, 
 murder, theft, adultery and other crimes. "What sort of 
 a boy is this Louis .P" inquired the priest of the boy's 
 teacher ; "he has confessed to every iniquity ; he is either 
 a great rogue or a great fool." Lang said he never con- 
 fessed after that, except to the ladies. 
 
 William H. Beard, who has recently passed away, was 
 one of the artists whom I knew well in those days. He 
 would have been a noteworthy character in New York even 
 if he had not been a genius in his special line of art, on 
 account of his personal appearance. No one who has seen 
 his familiar figure going down Sixth Avenue to his studio 
 in the morning would ever forget him. He stood over six 
 feet high and was massively built ; he had a grey mustache 
 and imperial, his blue eyes sparkled keenly as gems with 
 sharp observation and good humor under shaggy grey 
 eyebrows, and his florid features were wi'eathed by the 
 great wave of white locks hanging to his shoulders. A 
 certain indescribable romantic picturesqueness was im- 
 parted to his figure and completed the time effect by 
 
 320 
 
the slouch hat and Spanish cloak he wore. The sight of 
 him carried one back to Florence and Rome. Unlike many 
 humorists, Beard enjoyed his jokes audibly and supple- 
 mented them with a rich, mellow chuckle. Towards the 
 end of his life he lost this merry laugh, however; he be- 
 came cynical and pessimistic, and the pleasure I had en- 
 joyed in his inimitable society turned to pain. Whether 
 Beard was a great painter as well as humorist it would be 
 hazardous to assert in these days when new foreign theor- 
 ies and methods are cried up in our studios as the true 
 ones to follow. Granting that Beard's technical ability 
 was, according to his lights, inferior to his knowledge of 
 the true inwardness of animals and men, he was yet a 
 genius who deserved well of his country. It is true that 
 he had distinct appreciation and vogue at one time, but 
 it was his misfortune to outlive his success, to find himself 
 left behind and forgotten, as happens to many in our 
 volatile republic. What was worse, unlike some, who have 
 means on which to retire and live in dignified seclusion 
 under such circumstances, he was left entirely dependent 
 on his brush when his brush no longer availed to keep 
 the wolf from the door. Poor Beard had one consolation, 
 however ; he could not reproach himself with having wasted 
 his substance in riotous living, like some artists and au- 
 thors in distress. Other traits he had also, but he had al- 
 ways his head high and preserved his integrity to the 
 last. 
 
 Altogether different in character and circumstances was 
 another of the longtime denizens of the Famous Tenth 
 Street Studio Rookery. I refer to Frederick E. Church. 
 He was well formed but slight; his features were delicate, 
 refined and spirituelle almost like a woman's; his manner 
 
 321 
 
was quiet and gentle, that of a dilettante and a scholar 
 born to a life of ease, calm retirement and aristocratic 
 culture. But what he achieved, showed that he had force 
 of character as w^ell as brains, and that the competence 
 he had always enjoyed had not hindered him from follow- 
 ing the dictates of his praiseworthy ambition. It had prob- 
 ably made him selfish; it is not likely that his less fortu- 
 nate brother artist found in him one so likely to aid them 
 in their troubles as those who had had their turn of 
 struggle and suffering; his virtues were negative rather 
 than positive. I understand that he inherited property ; 
 perhaps his marriage was also fortunate in this respect; 
 and probably, with the exception of two or three of our 
 sculptors, no American artists have earned so much 
 money out of their art, as Church. The prices he received 
 were enormous. I remember an uncle of mine gave him 
 $1,000 for a little sunset, about a foot square. Some of 
 his larger paintings sold for even more proportionally. 
 He had an elegant manorial country seat, at Hudson, 
 where I visited him once with my family. It stood on the 
 brow of a steep slope commanding one of the noblest 
 prospects in the lands. Within, it was planned and decor- 
 ated partly in mediaeval, partly in Oriental style, attrac- 
 tive as an artist of Church's wealth and taste would be 
 likely to make it. In his last years he suffered acutely 
 from rheumatism and could not use a brush ; but he had 
 his wealth to fall back on and could pass the winters in 
 Mexico. It would have been an interesting puzzle in 
 psychology to ask these two men. Beard and Church, oc- 
 cupying studios under the same roof, whether they would 
 have been willing to exchange places with each other, the 
 
 322 
 
one hopelessly poor yet with health to pamt, and the other 
 hopelessly disabled in health, but free from the anxieties 
 and mortifications of impecuniousness. There are some 
 of the fanatical followers of the present art-styles who 
 would deny Church's ability as a painter. This is sheer 
 nonsense, narrow mindedness, ignorance of the law of the 
 intellectual pendulum, blindness to the fact that the time 
 will come when they in turn wall be either sneered at or 
 forgotten. It may be that some of Church's canvasses 
 were thin or suggested scene-painting; the latter criticism 
 is not necessarily condemnatory; for some modern scene 
 painting is very effective and could only be accomplished 
 by men of real ability. It must also be considered that 
 Church and some of his colleagues in semi-topographical 
 art, came at the time they were needed, and did much to in- 
 terest our people in the grandeur and beauty of our pos- 
 sessions. But Church was more than that. The man who 
 painted his view of Niagara, may not have done it as an 
 Inness, or Constable, or Turner or Diaz might have repre- 
 sented it ; nevertheless that is a great picture and he was a 
 great painter, one of the greatest poets and landscape 
 artists out country has ever produced, and that painting 
 will live and be admired by cultured minds long after some 
 of our artists of today are forgotten. 
 
 An artist whom I remember with the greatest respect 
 w^as Sanford R. Gifford, one of the leaders of the so- 
 called Hudson River School. I have never met with a 
 man who more profoundly impressed me with the full 
 meaning of the grand old word "gentleman." Tall, erect, 
 and quiet in manner like a soldier — I believe he served in 
 the army during our Civil war — he added to it, the quiet 
 dignity of a Spanish grandee. His features were Span- 
 
 323 
 
ish, and his pointed iron grey beard lent force to the re- 
 semblance. He looked as if he had stepped out of the can- 
 vas of Velasquez. I shall not soon forget a visit he 
 paid me at my studio. I felt as if I were receiving a 
 nobleman of the past. And yet there was no haughtiness 
 or self-assertion in him; on the contrary a certain air 
 of reserve and high self-respect, as of one who would 
 scorn to do aught to lower himself below the lofty stand- 
 ard of true manhood that he had raised as the rule of 
 conduct. In criticising my painting, also, he was careful 
 that the blame should not pain nor the praise suggest 
 flattery, for he was both kind hearted and sincere. I may 
 add here that refinement was then more commonly a trait 
 of our native born and native educated artists, who did not 
 go abroad until their character had been formed, than it 
 is of the brilliant school now presiding over our fine arts, 
 whose members have been bred among the rough, brutal, 
 half civilized influences of the modern art schools of 
 France and Germany, where genius may abound, but 
 where the art of being a gentleman with all that the word 
 implies is too often considered unimportant. 
 
 I am led at this point in my reminiscences to speak of 
 William Bradford, who made a reputation as a painter of 
 icebergs. He was a good man, ethically speaking, de- 
 vout in the New England sense, and conscientious as a 
 Quaker should be. But as an artist he was one of the 
 queerest I ever met in the profession. He had some tal- 
 ent and considerable ambition, but he achieved a name 
 disproportioned to his art ability because he was so happy 
 as to select a subject for painting that was then entirelv 
 new in America, although I think that the superb Danish 
 marine painters began, about the same time to draw in- 
 
 324 
 
spiration from polar life and scenery. Bradford began 
 life as a storekeeper or merchant and one never could 
 be with him long, without feeling that the commercial spir- 
 it had a strong hold of his nature. He loved beautiful 
 objects, broad landscapes, and had a love for adventure, 
 but his conversation always turned to the cost and value 
 of things, the sharp bargains he had driven, and the like. 
 It would not be fair to criticize his paintings, as one would 
 those of one who had enjoyed early advantages for art 
 education. The wonder is that he did so well under the 
 circumstances. Another wonder is that, having advanced 
 so far, he was never able to acquire a sense of proportion 
 and perspective. His ships were rarely placed so as to 
 look their true size. They were put at random apparently, 
 without regard to the horizon line or their relation to 
 other objects in the picture, and hence a vessel of several 
 hundred tons, would look like a toyboat and vice versa — 
 much the same might be said of his icebergs. 
 
 Poor Launt Thompson is one of the New York artists 
 whom I remember with the keenest interest and sympathy. 
 Of his art I do not need to speak. His name will long be 
 remembered, I hope, in this country as of one who had a 
 genius approached by very few of our scuptors up to 
 that time, and whose portrait busts have been unsurpassed 
 in American plastic art. When sober he was a charming 
 companion, intelligent, amiable and agreeable. But when 
 he at last yielded to the habits of a dypsomaniac his sprees 
 became frequent and more violent. I am led to speak of 
 this, because of all men whom I have known who were intem- 
 perate his form of that disease was the most remarkable. 
 There was no thickening of the voice, no loss of speech, 
 no weakness of the legs or reeling such as one commonly 
 
 325 
 
sees with drunkards. His language was apparently ra- 
 tional, and one who did not know him well and was not 
 familiar with his mind and manners would notice noth- 
 ing except, perhaps, that he seemed at times abnormally 
 excited. The first time I saw him in one of these attacks 
 he suggested that we dine together at a restaurant. At 
 such times I would try to escape from him, anxious to 
 avoid being the receptacle of some information he gave. 
 On one such occasion Thompson repeated an altercation 
 he had with one of his Italian assistants in Florence, and 
 with manual force tried to show the trick by which he got 
 the better of his insolent employee and could have killed 
 him if the man had not asked for pardon. It was done 
 by springing behind a man suddenly thrusting his middle 
 fingers into his mouth and, by the purchase thus gained, 
 pressing the thumbs against the base of the skull and for- 
 cing the victim down on his knees with the intolerable pain. 
 *'Just let me show you," said he to me. At the word, he 
 got behind me and was getting his fingers in my mouth 
 when I shook myself out of his grasp, and left the room. 
 He later, attempted this with Edwin Booth, the actor. 
 Suspecting nothing. Booth was in an instant entirely 
 helpless and suffering acute pain. His cries brought the 
 servants to his aid. 
 
 Apropos of these art anecdotes I may repeat here 
 one of the most dramatic that ever occurred in the art 
 circles of New York, although it did not happen until 
 several years later and after my return from Persia. It 
 was during the visit of Vereschagin to America with the 
 collection of large sensational paintings of war and Orient- 
 al subjects that were exhibited in several of our great 
 cities. The subject of one of these paintings, by the way, 
 
 326 
 
••The shooting of prisoners from the guns in the East In- 
 dian Mutiny," seemed to me exceedingly ill chosen for 
 selection by a Russian artist. Of course it was done in 
 order to bring discredit on the English and to hold them 
 up as the representatively cruel people of modern times. 
 It really indicated on the contrary that the artist de- 
 liberately ignored the horrors Russia had perpetrated or 
 that he inferred that the world was ignorant of them, in 
 which latter supposition he would have been correct, for 
 few people know much of history besides their own, and 
 not much of that. In America likewise the history and 
 character of Russia are less known and understood than 
 anywhere else, and her professions are accepted on their 
 face value. 
 
 Vereschagin, it will be remembered, is the artist who it 
 is reported, in the last Russo-Turkish war, proposed to 
 witness the execution of two Turkish prisoners, and with 
 brush and palette in hand, intended to produce a realistic 
 study of their dying agonies. When their lives were 
 spared for a milder sentence, he protested with indigna- 
 tion against the change, and urged that the original 
 sentence be carried out, as he needed the bloody spectacle 
 to assist him in furthering his art-designs. As every one 
 knows, he at last went down with the ill-fated battleshii) 
 Petropavlosli, off Port Arthur, in the Japanese war, a fit- 
 ting end to the career of an artist whose brush was dipped 
 in blood. 
 
 Like many other distinguished foreigners who visit New 
 York, Mr. Vereschagin received an invitation to the 
 monthly meeting of the Century Club. This was especially 
 apropos in his case, as that club is at least ostensibly an 
 art-association, and includes in its membership many of the 
 
 327 
 
most distinguished metropolitan artists. I did not arrive 
 until late that evening. When I entered the gallery, where, 
 as usual at these meetings, an exhibition of paintings by 
 the members was hung on the walls, I instantly obs irveJ. 
 that something unusual was occurring. On one side 
 fifteen or twenty artists were standing in a group, with a 
 half scared, half surprised or indignant look on their faces, 
 and by their manner evidently baffled and discomforted. 
 On the other side stood (farther ahead) Stedman, the 
 poet, undertaking to sustain an argument, but not quite 
 with his customary aggressiveness and evidence of power. 
 Between them, in a space by himself, stood Vereschagin, a 
 great picturesque Moscovite, shaking his white locks and 
 beard, and gesticulating violently, defiant, too, like a 
 buffalo confronting a flock of wolves. In the background, 
 lay-members of the club looked on. It was a magnificent 
 tableau composed of eminent men representing various 
 passions. I took in the situation in a glance. Vereschagin, 
 although the guest of the club, had been attacking Ameri- 
 can art, with brutal and contemptuous frankness. The 
 artists present, had successively tried to champion their 
 side of the question, but labored under the disadvantage 
 of having pictures of their own in the gallery. Vereschagin 
 had silenced them all, though unconvinced, and Sted- 
 man, able on many subjects, had then gallantly come to 
 the rescue of the American cause, and he was a man to 
 quail before his adversary. But he was somewhat stag- 
 gered on this occasion, not being an artist, and hence un- 
 able to discuss the subject from a professional point of 
 view. 
 
 The situation was of a nature to fire my blood. The 
 subject at issue was on ground with which I was reason- 
 
 328 
 
ably familiar, and which I could discuss without embar- 
 rassment, as I had no painting there, on that evening. I 
 also understood perfectly well how foreigners should be 
 treated when comporting themselves like this Russian 
 painter, Europeans are so accustomed to see Americans 
 abroad either displaying a childish national vanity or 
 humiliating toadyism to all that is foreign, that when 
 they meet with one who is quiet and modest but at the 
 same time unflinchingly bold in resenting attacks on 
 America, they are completely taken aback. To use a 
 vulgar colloquialism, the true way to treat foreigners when 
 they "sass" us, is to "sass" back, and to strike from the 
 shoulder; that and that alone brings them to their senses. 
 In nine times out of ten it works to a charm. 
 
 As I entered the gallery, Vereschagin, with a tone of 
 authority was reiterating in fluent English, his con- 
 demnation of the American art, as being thus far without 
 successful achievement, and offering no promise of future 
 improvement. There was some ground perhaps, for his 
 criticisms, but this was not the time nor the place to 
 express them. "But surely you must admit," said Sted- 
 man deprecatingly, "that we have produced some fine 
 portrait and landscape painters, quite enough to make 
 us hope that a great national school has begun." "Par- 
 don me, I cannot agn?e with you," replied the Russian, 
 shrugging his shoulders and turning out the palms of 
 his hands, as if he would add, "I, Vereschagin, the Russian, 
 have said it, is it not enough?" 
 
 Boiling with rage, having fought diplomatic battles 
 with Russians before, I seized the interval when Stedman, 
 nonplussed, was looking for an answer, stepped forward, 
 and said, "Mr. Vereschagin, allow me to suggest that it 
 
 329 
 
appears to me either you have seen very Kttle of Ameri- 
 can art, or that, like many Europeans, you come here 
 prejudiced and determined not to do us justice." 
 
 "I must say that I have seen few good pictures here 
 by your artists, and therefore it is, that I declare that 
 there is no promise that you will have a good national art; 
 in other things I admit you have made some progress." 
 
 "Admitting the correctness of your opinion about what 
 our artists have already done, which I only admit for 
 argument's sake, still what you say shows that you have 
 not looked at the subject philosophically. You have not 
 applied to it the law of evolution ; the law of art-develop- 
 ment is a question of slow growth and is based on certain 
 conditions. Even in Russia, where you try the forcing 
 process, and try to develop civilization by authority and 
 ukase, you have not yet been able to produce a great 
 art." 
 
 "Well, well, if you feel so hopeful about your art, 
 zvhen do you expect it?" 
 
 "We have been busy for three centuries trying to build 
 up a nation ; we have had to fight savages, to fight for our 
 liberty, to clear a continent, to lay railwaj^s, to produce 
 great inventions, to assimilate the incoming hordes of 
 Europe. It is with such matters that the brain and 
 effort of our people have been occupied. It is remark- 
 able that we have done as well as we have in the pursuit of 
 art. We shall do far better in due time. Art must be spon- 
 taneous. All we ask is time in order to equal or surpass 
 the art of Europe. Art-pro7nise is already quite evident 
 here." 
 
 "This sounds all right ; but it is too indefinite ; you are 
 vague ; you have done little in art, and yet you prophesy 
 
 330 
 
a great art. Come, come, when will it be, this art of 
 yours?" 
 
 "You, in Russia, were a nation before America was 
 discovered ; you had a school of architecture and a deco- 
 rative art that were both creditable before Columbus was 
 born ; and yet you are today in many respects far behind 
 the rest of Christendom in many points that are con- 
 sidered essential to a high civilization. And you have 
 not yet equalled the rest of Europe in the fine arts ; but 
 we may still admit that Russia has accomplished enough 
 to lead us to think that she gives promise of doing far 
 better in the course of ages." 
 
 "I thank you for your good opinion of Russia ; thank 
 God, she is able to take care of herself; she needs no 
 advice"; waving his hand disdainfully. "But my question, 
 why do you not answer my question? When do you ex- 
 pect your American art to appear above the horizon?" 
 
 "I am not in the councils of the Infinite; it is not for 
 me to name the day and hour when it will come in its 
 splendor. The development of a nation's energies is not 
 like the quick growth of a man. It is a matter of ages. 
 But I insist that any unprejudiced person looking at 
 some of our civic and domestic buildings, some of our 
 stained glass and our paintings, would admit that these 
 signs of art activity are cropping out so abundantly all 
 over the country as to indicate that the aesthetic genius 
 is rapidly growing here in harmony with its environment, 
 and must develop a great and an original art even earlier 
 than might ordinarily be expected. One thing is certain, 
 unless you unshackle the popular mind of Russia, and 
 leave it more free to develop in ever}' direction, we Ameri- 
 
 331 
 
cans are bound to have our schools of art before you have 
 yours, and possibly a greater one." 
 
 He shook his head impatiently, and exclaiming, "I can 
 do nothing with you !" turned suddenly on his heel and 
 strode to the corner of the room where he proceeded to 
 occupy himself busily examining one of the paintings he 
 had scorned. I seized the opportunity to go into the 
 supper room and get a dish of oysters and a glass of 
 punch. 
 
 332 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 MARRIAGE AND A CRUISE. 
 
 I had been writing for the Harpers off and on since 
 1863. After 1873 I had written for their "monthly," 
 more illustrated articles probably than any other writer 
 during that period. They had also published three books 
 for me, in handsome style. They had paid me as liberally 
 as any of their contributors, and I had no cause to com- 
 plain. Joseph W. Harper, practically the head of the 
 firm, had been especially friendly to me. He was one of 
 tlie class of publishers that authors like to meet, but 
 who, under the changed conditions of the publishing busi- 
 ness are perhaps less common now than formerly. In 
 terms, the publisher of today would hesitate to deny that 
 the interests of author and publisher are interchange- 
 able, and that each is essential to the success of the other. 
 But there is a growing tendency to assume in practice, 
 that the publisher is the capitalist, while the author is 
 the farmhand who gathers the cotton or the grain which 
 the capitalist turns into usable fabrics. But IMr. Joseph 
 W. Harper was not a man of this class. To him the 
 author was a gentleman and an equal, and the relations 
 between us were rather those of a genial acquaintance and 
 friendship than that of a trade pure and simple. He was 
 
 833 
 
also a hon garcon, the reverse of a prig, one who liked to 
 hear or tell a good story, and he enjoyed a glass and a 
 cigar with his authors or editors. Withal he had one 
 of the best business heads ever seen in the publishing 
 business. He could sec at a glance what was for the 
 best interests of the house, and had the true executive 
 ability that knows how to select one's lieutenants and then 
 leave to each the charge of the details of his department. 
 But the time had come when Joe Harper was about to 
 turn over his position to others, equally diligent per- 
 haps, but of other temperament and methods. The time 
 had come also, I thought, when it was best for the Harpers 
 and for me to separate. They had done well by me, and 
 I had given them good, honest results for their outlay. But 
 I wanted once more to be a "free lance," and, having taken 
 my time "to view the landscape o'er," I directed my steps 
 towards the office of the Century. The prospect of the 
 renewal of the international cup races promised a revival 
 of interest in yachting, and timeliness is now-a-days a 
 supreme factor in most of the articles accepted by the 
 magazines. But there was another point to consider, 
 which had not yet received much attention from ^^achts- 
 men on either side of the Atlantic. This was the fact 
 that for some years a tendency had become evident to 
 modify the English and American types by borrowing 
 from each other models both as to hull and sail plan. 
 This had not begun to be as apparent as it is now, but it 
 was sufficient to suggest to the expert observer that the 
 yachts of the two nations were passing through an 
 evolutionary stage. This again suggested to me the fact 
 that the development of ships from one age to another 
 really proceeds according to a distinct law of evolution. 
 
 334 
 
Hence I proposed to prepare an illustrated paper demon- 
 strating this law as applying to our pleasure craft, and 
 called it The Evolution of the American Yacht. So 
 far as I know this was the first time that so systematic 
 an attempt had been made to define and illustrate this 
 theory. The Century company commissioned me to pre- 
 pare such an article at once for the summer numbers ; 
 the article took most satisfactoril}' with all who are in- 
 terested in aquatic sports ; and Dixon Kemp, at that time 
 the leading yacht writer, designer and expert in England, 
 gave my article a column and a half small print review 
 in the London Field. Among other points I foretold that 
 in all probability the English and American types would 
 eventually approximate until there would practically be 
 no essential difference between the types, and hence, by 
 implication, the winning in cup races would depend on 
 flukes of wind, but especially on the crews and the 
 men in command. And this has practically happened. To 
 these factors, however, we must add that lightness of 
 weight, of material, is one of the essentials now considered, 
 and that pitiful aid to yacht racing, is a quality that any 
 one can appl^' without regard to model. In my opinion 
 there is a great deal more of what might be called "jockey- 
 ing" in construction, and less of the merits of respective 
 models than fairly belongs to true sportsmanship. This 
 article was immediately followed by one on the "American 
 Steam Yacht." But this, I am ashamed to say, I wrote 
 purely for the money and repute and not with the en- 
 thusiastic tone I gave to the first article, as I cared little 
 for steam or any other auxiliary craft, and a paper on 
 that subject would necessarih' be devoted chiefly to pic- 
 
 335 
 22 
 
tures and descriptions of the decorations of luxurious 
 cabins rather than to model and seamanship. 
 
 Still I got some enjoyment out of preparing the sec- 
 ond article as I continued my wanderings among the ship 
 yards. Indeed, I found it exceedingly fascinating to pre- 
 pare these yachting papers, for, although pretty thorough- 
 ly informed on my subject, yet it was essential to visit 
 the yards of many yacht builders, and to examine numei'- 
 ous yachts to confirm my theory and to procure sketches 
 and photographs. I did this thoroughly, as I was in the 
 habit of doing all articles of fact. I took nothing at sec- 
 ond hand when it was possible for me to see into a subject 
 personally. This, of course, was a very expensive proc- 
 ess, and generally reduced the profits of my articles very 
 materially; I know it is not a method always practiced 
 by those who prepare such papers for our periodicals. 
 But justice to myself, to my subject, and to my pub- 
 lishers made it impossible for me to practice any other 
 rule. I remember how deeply I was offended once by 
 the editor and proprietor of a new magazine who, when 
 I told him I was not clearing above forty percent of the 
 price he was to pay for some articles, replied in a sneering 
 way, "you don't really mean to tell me that you travel 
 about to get up the facts and illustrations in these ar- 
 ticles? You can get your material right around home out 
 of the libraries and art dealers' photos and from the 
 illustrated papers." "Mr. Blank," I replied, "you af- 
 front me. I would not take your money for that per- 
 functory kind of work. Even if I did, not make ten cents 
 on a dollar out of an article I had engaged to prepare, 
 I should get my material at first hand." Notwithstanding 
 my emphatic language he looked incredulous, but I took 
 
 336 
 
his measure on the spot, and was careful from that moment 
 to receive my money when I delivered my article, and 
 very wisely, as the event proved. 
 
 Not many months after the publication of these yacht- 
 ing articles I was engaged to prepare another important 
 paper for the Century. It was to describe a cruise in a 
 pilot boat. Mr. ]M. J. Burns was to accompany me to 
 furnish the illustrations. This was right, both because 
 he had suggested the paper inviting me to accompany him, 
 and because he was much stronger than I in drawing 
 figure subjects, and had made a specialty of marine 
 genre in which he has few superiors. I often furnished 
 sea pieces for my articles from my own pencil and brush, 
 but the figures were always subsidiary parts of the compo- 
 sition. As this proved one of my most interesting and 
 adventurous cruises and the most varied of my pilot 
 trips, I shall venture to give some account of it in these 
 pages. 
 
 It was a lowering morning towards the end of February 
 when we were notified that the Caprice, schooner, having 
 just returned from a cruise to pick up her pilots and lay 
 in a fresh stock of provisions, was about to put to sea 
 again. We repaired to the ofl^ce of the pilot commission- 
 ers, a low-studded, elbow-shaped room, on the corner of 
 Burling Slip. A massive mahogany desk served partly to 
 conceal the busy secretary of the board. Between two win- 
 dows stood a large chronometer clock, including in its 
 case a thermometer and barometer ; ship lockers were 
 ranged about the walls ; the entire apartment suggested 
 a ship's cabin, this impression being aided by the masts 
 visible through the windows and the creak of tackle 
 blocks. One by one the pilots straggled in, and discussed 
 
 337 
 
the weather, which was pronounced unusually foreboding, 
 with the mercury below twenty-nine, and a most sinster 
 sky. At half past nine we started for the Caprice, which 
 was lying at a neighboring pier. She was a graceful craft, 
 ninety feet over all, twenty feet beam, and drawing eleven 
 feet. Her masts were beautiful sticks, without knot or 
 crack, as behooved a vessel employed in such arduous busi- 
 ness. The cabin was cosiness itself. Perhaps we appre- 
 ciated it more keenly because of the gloom and chill of 
 the external atmosphere. A stove was firmly fixed in the 
 centre, on a brightly burnished plate of brass with a 
 raised rim. On each side were a stateroom and two 
 berths that could be closed by slides. The galley and 
 quarters of the crew were amidships, and separated from 
 the cabin by a bulkhead. The crew included a lascar 
 cook, a cabin boy, four able seaman preparing to become 
 pilots in turn, and the boatkeeper, who commanded the 
 schooner and took her home after all the pilots had been 
 put on board other vessels. But before that, the boat was 
 always under orders of the pilot whose turn it was to board 
 the next ship. On this occasion we put to sea with six 
 pilots, the full complement for the Caprice being seven. 
 But one had not yet reported. 
 
 There was little wind as we shoved off and made sail, 
 but there were evidences that we should have an abun- 
 dance before long. We had scarcely cleared Castle Garden 
 and were heading for the Narrows when a brig was per- 
 ceived a mile ahead, bound out. Making sail with man-of- 
 war speed, and taking advantage of every whiffling air, 
 we overhauled her and put a pilot aboard to take her past 
 the bar. The storm signal was flying at Sandy Hook, 
 but pilots take little heed of such warnings, so we ran 
 
 338 
 
out to sea and headed south. At dark we double-reefed 
 the mainsail and hove to. We were now in the water where 
 the Caprice, at Christmas tide some seasons earlier, had 
 nearly foundered with the weight of ice accumulating on 
 her deck in a northwest gale. The following winter she 
 lost three men in a fearful storm. Two years later she 
 was hove down in a squall and lost a man. The next year 
 she was tripped and filled by a huge wave, and abandoned 
 by crew, who took to the boats and were picked up. 
 Eventually the Caprice was unexpectedly found, water- 
 logged, but still afloat, and towed to port. All these 
 cheerful items I read in the log book, narrated in terse, 
 uncouth phrases, and giving me a sample of the possi- 
 bilities before us. 
 
 Nothing of special note occurred the next day, except 
 an exciting race with another pilot boat to pick up a 
 ship. The weather continued foul, and the third night 
 it blew half a gale of wind, and we hove to under close 
 reefs off Barnegat. About ten o'clock the lights of a 
 steamer heading north were discovered in the gloom. 
 
 "Give her a torch !" was the order that followed the 
 discovery. A tub containing turpentine was brought on 
 deck; a ball of cotton on a stick was dipped into it and 
 set on fire. The torch was held up to show the large 
 numbers on the mainsail. Nothing more spectacularly 
 effective could be imagined than this vivid contrast of 
 light and shade — the dark figure in uncouth oil suit stand- 
 ing on the reeling deck whirling the ball of fire over his 
 head, and the ruddy sail and rigging clear-cut against the 
 impenetrable blackness of the night, while the foam seemed 
 turned into blood as it washed on board. The steamer 
 passed heedless of our signal ; all hands but the watch 
 
 339 
 
turned in again. On the following morning a wild spec- 
 tacle presented itself when I went on deck. The gale, 
 which had been blowing around us and of which we had 
 had a taste, suddenly shifted into the northwest and 
 shrieked out of that quarter with every prospect of in- 
 creasing. The emerald waves, smitten by the gleam of 
 the sun bursting over the low shores of New Jersey were 
 rising fast ; and as there was no prospect of picking up any 
 ships bound in this wind, it was decided to work nearer 
 the land into smoother water. It was a long, hard beat 
 to the lee of Little Egg Harbor, Avhere we trimmed the 
 sheets and under very small canvas ran up the coast to 
 the Highlands. The blasts swept off the land with great 
 suddenness and violence, burying the lee rail under a mass 
 of boiling foam, the spray smoking under the bow and 
 tearing off to leeward in sheets. Flying past the long 
 line of resorts that fringe the Jersey shore, we saw at 
 last the lofty shaft of Sandy Hook loom in the north, and 
 as the glow of the setting sun suffused land and sea with 
 almost unearthly splendor we headed into a cove and 
 dropped anchor for the night. Then we all snatched a 
 much needed slumber before going forth once more to 
 brave the wild March winds on the grey wastes of the At- 
 lantic. At dawn we made sail and stood due east before a 
 strong wind. We headed straight for the George's Banks 
 after inbound steamers. To secure one of them also insures 
 piloting her out again. For such chances great risks were 
 encountered. After two or three disappointments in try- 
 ing to get a steamer and finding that they had been 
 "boarded," i. e., already had a pilot, we caught up with 
 plenty of weather east of Nantucket Light Ship, where 
 we met the full brunt of the ocean waves and surges. The 
 
 340 
 
second morning after our second departure from Sandy 
 Hook the da}^ broke high over a savage scene. Enormous 
 mounds of water, churned into a greyish green and crested 
 witli plumes of foam, swelled up against the sk}^, and 
 tossed the little Caprice like an eggshell. The gale in- 
 creasing with great fury, we hove to under trysails, a 
 spread of canvas so moderate that, as they say at sea, 
 we were under "a three reefed mitten with the thumb 
 brailed up." The squalls were tremendous, and accom- 
 panied by blinding sheets of snow which in a moment en- 
 veloped the sea in impenetrable gloom. The deck and 
 rigging were enveloped in ermine. The gale increased to 
 a hurricane. The little scooner for the most part rode 
 easily, but sometimes a sea would go bodily over her, and 
 might have sunk her but for the low bulwarks that al- 
 lowed the water to run off. Sometimes, also, she was car- 
 ried over so far that there was danger of her completely 
 rolling over, a catastrophe that sometimes happens to 
 small vessels. Three times during the day we wore ship 
 in order that we might not be driven out of the track of 
 steamers ; whatever the weather, business was not for- 
 gotten. This manoeuvre was, under the circumstances 
 one of extreme peril, and required utmost coolness and 
 skill. The sun went down over one of the wildest scenes I 
 have witnessed at sea and I have witnessed a good many. 
 With some difficulty we managed to get supper ; the deaf- 
 ening roar of the howling winds and the thunder of the 
 surges pounding on deck almost deadened the conversation 
 that went on uninterruptedly below. Yarns were told, 
 and intricate problems with cards were discussed by men 
 in oil jackets and sou'-westers, while the cook served out 
 rations of hot coffee from time to time. The helm was 
 
 341 
 
lashed and the hatches tightly closed, and there was 
 nothing to be done but to await whatever might occur. 
 Any moment a catastrophe was liable to overwhelm us 
 from collision or foundering, but it is not in the nature 
 of the sailor nor is it expedient, for his morale, after he 
 has taken all precautions, to borrow trouble about pos- 
 sibilities. A vivid flash of lightning gleaming through the 
 skylight at long intervals announced that the tempest was 
 approaching its height, and it was decided to put up 
 stanchions, or posts, in the cabin. They were firmly fixed 
 between the deck beams and the cabin floor, to keep the 
 ballast from shifting, in case a sudden lurch should throw 
 the schooner on her beam ends, a fatal contingency. No 
 one slept until towards dawn, when the weather moderated 
 slightly. 
 
 But while the wind was less fierce and steady, it blew 
 hard at intervals, and the temperature was so low that 
 the deck was covered with ice. At noon we succeeded in 
 getting an observation, as the pale sun flashed for a 
 moment through the grey scud and caused the heaving 
 deck to look like molten silver. We were in longitude 
 66° 30' and heading southwest under short sail when a 
 fearful squall blackened the horizon and rushed towards 
 us with frightful rapidity. At the same moment the 
 lookout discovered two steamers and a pilot boat to the 
 eastward. The wildest excitement ensued. Reefs were 
 shaken out, notwithstanding the squall, and the little 
 schooner flew before the blast as if bewitched. This ap- 
 peared the most ticklish crisis of the voyage, owing to 
 the danger of broaching to. When the pall of gloom 
 finally passed to leeward, the southermost steamer was 
 discovered to have been boarded by our rival. Every effort 
 
 342 
 
that skill could devise was then put forth to catch the 
 other steamer. As we lessened the distance, the Caprice 
 was hove to and awaited her approach. Slowing up, the 
 great Cunarder gradually drew towards us, majestically 
 mounting and plunging on the vast surges, while cataracts 
 spouted from her hawse-holes as the bow soared skyward. 
 At this thrilling moment a whale, a little shorter than our- 
 schooner, arose close alongside the Caprice, spouted as if 
 to salute her, and dived again into the depths. The yawl, 
 only sixteen feet long, was now launched over the leeside 
 into the frothing waters, the squall having happily moder- 
 ated, and with two seamen and a pilot started for the steam- 
 er, then a quarter of a mile distant, I confess it was an 
 exciting spectacle to see this mere cockle shell, with her 
 precious freight of three lives, now lifted far above us 
 on a mountainous billow, and anon descending out of 
 sight into the depths of a hollow vale, and hiding there 
 until it seemed she would never appear again. By slow 
 degrees the boat succeeded in reaching the lee side of the 
 steamer. There again the greatest prudence was required 
 to prevent her being sucked under by the action of the 
 mighty sea. At last the pilot made out to spring on the 
 ladder, and crept up the side of the steamer. Then fol- 
 lowed the equally difficult task of picking up the yawl. 
 It was done by holding her head to the wind and allowing 
 her to drift down towards the schooner. By wearing we 
 kept directly in the track of the yawl ; until she slipped 
 across our stern, and was hauled up over our lee side. 
 On the eighth day out we were four hundred and fifty 
 miles east of New York. The day turned out gloriously 
 beautiful, the sky cloudless, and the swell remaining after 
 the storm was scarcely dimpled by the zephyr-like cat's- 
 
 343 
 
paws. One of the crack schooners of the New York pilot- 
 fleet loomed above the western horizon, carrying every 
 stitch of canvas. Her shapely sails gleaming in the morn- 
 ing sun, she crept up gradually in our wake, while another 
 boat was also A^isible in the eastern board. As it is a 
 cut-throat game of rivalry between the pilot boats, each 
 looking out for itself, we hauled to the wind on the star- 
 board tack and headed south. "Our policy is to scatter," 
 dryly remarked one of our pilots. A standing reward of 
 two dollars for the discovery of a steamer was now offered 
 to the crew. "Sail ho," rang out from the masthead about 
 noon. It proved to be a sailing ship far to the south, and 
 as the Avind was light and the weather was too uncertain 
 to send the yawl such a distance we had to abandon her. 
 
 Two days of perfect weather, each closing with a sunset 
 of magical splendor, unfortunately proved weather breed- 
 ers. The glass began to fall, a sad wind moaned over the 
 sullen deep and wailed in the rigging, and a mist gradu- 
 ally closed around us. Then came fitful showers, and, 
 between the flows, the little schooner flapped her slatting 
 sails with foreboding dreariness. That night there was a 
 snow-ring around the moon. The following day we had 
 an exciting but useless chase after a White Star boat. 
 Towards night the wind settled into an easterly gale. 
 "Call all hands to reef!" rang through the ship. As the 
 gale freshened we concluded to scud before it foi home, 
 having been twelve days out of fifteen since we left Nev/ 
 York ; and we were due for the Caprice to take her turn 
 as station boat off Sandy Hook. At sunset the dun clouds 
 lifted enough to allow the sun to burst forth and kindle 
 the horizon with a band of living fire, below which the ocean 
 rolled intcnsly sullen and livid. But who can describe 
 
 344 
 
the awful magnificence wliich irradiated the entire heavens 
 with a volcanic glow ! The sky was like the dome of a vast 
 oven heated to the last degree. At the same moment a 
 shower fell, and immediately two perfect rainbows spanned 
 the firmament. Then, as if a curtain had been drawn 
 across the scene, night closed in, and the wild vvinds 
 howled over a little ship tossing alone on a dreary waste 
 of waters. It blew hard that night. A dangerous cross- 
 sea set in, and twice the Caprice was nearly thrown on 
 her beam ends. The following day notwithstanding the 
 wind, fog, and rain, we succeeded at ten of that night in 
 putting a pilot aboard a large sailing ship. It was wild 
 indeed to see our little yawl going off in the dark and 
 the myster}' on the rolling deep whose waves could be 
 heard but scarcely seen in the gloom. Nor was it an easy 
 task to pick up the yawl on its return, although her crew 
 waved an Ignis-Fatuus of a lantern from time to time. We 
 also came very near to being run down by the huge black 
 hulk of a steamer after midnight, which sheered off just 
 in time after we had fired the cannon we carried for such 
 nights. At dawn the war of the elements was raging Avith 
 great fury. As we were now approaching a lee shore it 
 had become highly desirable to make a port. The wind 
 was southeast, where the most wicked winds are raised, 
 and we were in the bight made by the coasts of New 
 Jersey and Long Island. There was nothing for us but 
 to scud for New York, with the chance of crossing the 
 bar without mishap. Nothing was set but a bit of the fore- 
 sail. At times it seemed as if the hungry, following seas 
 would founder the schooner as they curled over tlie low 
 taffrail. Not a sail was in sight; not even a solitary gull. 
 Excepting the petrels, seabirds keep near the land in bad 
 
 345 
 
weather, a fact apparently unknown to some sea painters. 
 About ten the Sandy Hook Lightship hove into sight. A 
 tremendous sea was foaming on the bar, but the skilful 
 steering of the Caprice rode over it like a racer clearing 
 a hurdle, and ran up the lower bay and through the 
 Narrows under bare poles. It was almost with a sense of 
 regret that I changed the pure expanses of ocean, the 
 lovely little schooner and her gallant crew for the cramp- 
 ing influences and scenes of city life. A hundred times 
 during the following week did I wish myself on the Caprice 
 again, looking out on the salt hills whose foaming slopes 
 she had breasted so nobly. 
 
 In 1881 I was asked by Messrs. Dodd and Mead to 
 write the letter press criticisms on "etchers and etching" 
 to accompany a collection of fine plates which they had 
 secured abroad. The result was a sumptuous volume which 
 sold at $10., but eventually went as high at $25. a copy. 
 
 In the late spring of 1882 the editors of the Century 
 Magazine, evidently satisfied with the articles I had al- 
 ready contributed to that periodical, and with the vigorous 
 illustrations furnished by Mr. Burns for the article on 
 the pilot boat cruise, suggested to us a still more im- 
 portant enterprise, one of the most important, in fact, 
 ever undertaken by an American magazine up to that time. 
 They now proposed that we should charter a schooner and 
 explore the shores of the gulf of St. Lawrence. The ex- 
 penses were to be paid by the publishers, and my colleague 
 and I were offered satisfactory terms for articles and illus- 
 trations. Naturally we fell in with the proposal, and now 
 ensued not the least entertaining part of the undertaking. 
 We had a delightful experience skurrying about the shores 
 of New York Bay, examining and pricing yachts that 
 might answer the purpose, our first plan being to sail from 
 
 346 
 
New York direct for the Gulf of Canso, But this plan was 
 abandoned when it was found that New York craft were 
 too costly both as to the charter and cost of running. 
 It was then decided to try our luck at Prince Edwards 
 Island. Burns went a week ahead of me and succeeded in 
 finding a small schooner, not such as he wanted but the 
 best to be had on such short notice. She was named the 
 Alice May, and her crew consisted of a captain and mate 
 and two hands ; also a colored cook, Henry Richards, by 
 name, who proved the best of the lot. The Alice May 
 was only fifty-four feet long over all, and sixteen feet 
 beam, not any too large for such a cruise and the possi- 
 bilities it involved. The small cuddy aft we turned over 
 to the crew and to the cook's galley. For ourselves we 
 reserved the hold. Two bulkheads, one at each end, served 
 to make us a rude but comfortable cabin about 16 x 15 
 feet. Rough bunks were improvised on each side, and a 
 companion way and a plain ladder led to the deck. In these 
 simple quarters we passed nearly three delightful months, 
 replete with entertaining adventure and giving us views 
 of some of the most magnificent and sublime scenery on 
 the east coast of North America, much of which was scarce- 
 ly known and had never before been described. We cruised 
 along the coast of New Brunswick, went into the Bay of 
 Chaleur and Gaspe Bay, ran across the ]\Iagdalen Islands, 
 thence to the wonderful Bay of Islands on the west coast 
 of Newfoundland, and thence down to the southern coast 
 of that island as far as the unique French settlement on 
 St. Pierre Island, thence to Sidney, Cape Bi'eton Island, 
 througli the Bras d' Or to Arichat, thence through the 
 Gulf of Canso back to Prince Edward Island. If we had 
 had a better ship and crew we should also have visited 
 
 347 
 
Cheticamp. But our time M\as about up and the equinoctial 
 was at hand; hence we ended the cruise at Georgetown, 
 Prince Edward's Island. But it is not my purpose here 
 to go into a narrative of this most interesting cruise, for 
 an account of it was published in the Century, and after- 
 wards brought out in an attractive volume bearing the 
 imprimatur of D. Applcton & Co. 
 
 I had only been home two or three weeks when I re- 
 ceived an invitation to go in the famous old frigate Con- 
 stitution, or Old Ironsides, on her last voyage. It is true 
 it was to be a short one, only as far as Portsmouth, 
 New Hampshire, where she was to be laid up, nor was 
 she going under her own canvas, but was to be towed 
 by the Powhattan, one of the early steamships of our 
 navy, a slow, heavily sparred, paddle-wheel boat. Still 
 it was a matter of no ordinary interest to be for a few days 
 in the historic old ship, and all my patriotic blood fired 
 at the prospect. I was strongly advised by a naval friend, 
 however, to decline the invitation, as the ship was dread- 
 fully out of repair and leaked so seriously it was a ques- 
 tion whether they would be able to get her to Portsmouth. 
 But this only stimulated my determination to go. There 
 was a zest of danger added to what might otherwise have 
 been a rather tame affair. Captain Jaques, the very cour- 
 teous commander, when I went on board, reiterated the 
 possibility that the old ship might go down under us, and 
 indicated the boat to which I must betake myself in case 
 an alarm were given. I occupied the stateroom of Com- 
 modore Hull ! From the moment I stepped on her deck 
 until we landed at Portsmouth Navy Yard, I felt myself 
 as it were infused with an ecstasy of exultation. The 
 constellations shone with unusual splendor in the dark, 
 
 348 
 
clear vault, as we sailed along the sound, indicating an 
 east wind coming. We had no more than reached abreast 
 Martha's Vineyard when the wind developed into a gale, 
 and we were forced to come to anchor at Nantucket, as 
 it was not prudent to venture around the cape in such 
 weather, considering the condition of tlie Constitution, 
 The next afternoon, when the wind was about to shift to 
 nor'west, we moved our position to make a Ice under 
 Cape Cod, in Chatham Roads. The fourth afternoon, 
 the weather being now serene, we started out again. We 
 were surrounded by a fleet of schooners taking advantage 
 of the westerly breeze, numerous and beautiful as a flock 
 of seafowl, the sails gleaming rosy red in the glow of a 
 superb sunset. There was still a high swell running, 
 vestige of the gale, but everything otherwise promised 
 a fine night when, to the amazement of all on board, the 
 old ship, courtesying on a big wave, came down with a 
 terrible thump on the bar, striking in the middle of her 
 keel. She repeated the blow, and we gave her up for 
 lost ; it did not seem possible for the old ship to survive 
 two such blows. The order was given to sound the pumps, 
 and it was found that the leak had been doubled. Al- 
 though we kept on our course wc passed an anxious night, 
 for it did not seem as if she could keep afloat till morn- 
 ing. But the weather continued fine, the sea moderate, and 
 the usual luck of the Constitution was still in her favor. 
 She kept afloat, and the next afternoon she was at last laid 
 at her destined berth alongside of the pier of the Ports- 
 mouth Navy Yard. I have always believed firmly in the 
 good and bad luck of ships, and my superstition on this 
 subject, if superstition it be, was confirmed by the escape 
 of the Constitution from a peril that might have sunk a 
 newer ship and one less lucky. 
 
 349 
 
The following month, November, 1882, after a period 
 of great activity, I was married to my second wife, Mrs. 
 Fannie Nichols Weed, a woman of warm heart, wide ex- 
 perience and intelligence, and varied accomplishments, 
 the author of a charming, suggestive volume of essays 
 which went through several editions, published first by 
 Ticknor & Co., and subsequently by Houghton, Mifflin 
 & Co., entitled The Sunny Side of Shadow. 
 
 During the succeeding winter Congress passed a bill 
 to establish legations in Siam, Corea, and Persia. I was 
 urged by my friends to apply for the Persian mission. 
 At first I strongly objected to doing so. I had already 
 declined several distinct opportunities to accept foreign 
 appointments. My objections were that our foreign ser- 
 vice is precarious. Various contingencies were possible that 
 might abridge my term of office after having sacrificed 
 other interests for it. My father had been acting Consid 
 General for several years and I had been much in foreign 
 countries, especially in the East, and had met so many 
 diplomats and consuls, that I knew more of what on official 
 ought to be, than most of our representatives when they 
 go abroad for the first time. I had also read international 
 law from interest in the subject years before I had any 
 intention or expectation of accepting a foreign appoint- 
 ment. But for these reasons I felt that for the interest 
 of our government as well as for my own, I ought to have 
 had some actual experience in diplomatic life before under- 
 taking to establish a new legation, especially in a country 
 where, I very well knew, I must have more or less relation 
 with the diplomats of Russia, of whose methods I was not 
 wholly ignorant. As I look back to my reflections at that 
 time, and my practical observations in Persia, I have no 
 
 350 
 
hesitation in affirming that our foreign service should be 
 a permanent system like that of our army and navy, such 
 as exists with most civilized governments, involving some 
 prior instruction and experience, and including a regular 
 scale of promotion from clerkships to ambassadorial posts, 
 the highest offices to be dependent on proved special fit- 
 ness conditioned on previous education and experience. 
 At seventy, the official, whatever his rank might perhaps 
 be retired on half pay. This is the true, the common sense 
 system on which our foreign service should be conducted. 
 As to gaining the appointment to foreign posts it is the 
 quality or character, and not the quantity of endorse- 
 ments that should and generally do carry weight in pro- 
 curing such positions. One good, warm friend well-known 
 can do more for one than a ton of perfunctory names. 
 One of my letters was from Ralph Waldo Emerson. An- 
 other, strange to say, was from Mr. Garfield, who had 
 been in his grave several months. It was a strong docu- 
 ment which he had furnished me some years previously 
 when I thought of seeking an appointment elsewhere, but 
 when I decided negatively, I had laid the letter aside 
 as an autograph, and now it came in ver}^ handily, apply- 
 ing to his successor. Another letter was from the secre- 
 tary of the Presbyterian Board of Missions. Having ac- 
 complished this much, I left the matter to destiny, little 
 expecting success. Judge then, of my surprise Avhen I took 
 up the New York paper one evening after dinner, and saw 
 that my name had been sent in by the President. But 
 getting the nomination was in this case, only half 
 the battle. There were a number of candidates for the 
 place, two or three of them at least, men of fitness and 
 ability, who had been abroad in the service, one of 
 
 351 
 23 
 
them backed by a university, another, brother of the 
 governor of a great state, and from the way they were 
 using the press I knew they were working like beavers, 
 and if they could not get it, they were seemingly bound 
 that I should not. On the other hand, having got thus far, 
 I did not propose to be bluffed or beaten. I did not go near 
 a paper; that was not the sort of influence I needed then. 
 But I brought powerful personal influences to bear on 
 the senators directly, and thus, after the result had been 
 pending for weeks, I was confirmed by a comfortable 
 majority. But I did not go near Washington until sum- 
 moned there to get my instructions. 
 
 352 
 
CHAPTER XV. 
 
 INCIDENTS OF LIFE IN PERSIA. 
 
 In my books on Persia, The Story of Persia, and Persia 
 and the Persians I presented respectively a sketch of the 
 history of that country and a description of its customs, 
 people, scenery, government and resources, as they were 
 when I was there. I propose here to give a narrative of 
 some of the chief incidents with which I was personally 
 connected during my residence in Persia. This will natur- 
 ally include some incidents which I could not properly 
 describe while in official position, or which it might not 
 have been expedient to make public for some thne in order 
 not to embarrass our government. The time has come, 
 however, when I can speak more freely, and in fact, may 
 render a service in doing so. Since I left Persia our coun- 
 try has been brought by the war with Spain, into more 
 intimate relations with foreign powers, and has been 
 obliged to abandon our flaccid policy for one more in 
 accordance Avith our growing commerce and national 
 power. 
 
 I foresaw that the task before me was one of unusual 
 difficulty, requiring caution and alertness. I was com- 
 missioned to establish a legation in a country that knew 
 next to nothing about the United States, and so situated 
 
 353 
 
that it would be practically impossible for our government 
 to aid me by demonstrations of military or naval strength, 
 and hence, where I would have to depend wholly on my own 
 tact and firmness. I knew enough to be aware that the 
 other legations at Teheran, excepting perhaps those of 
 England and Austria-Hungary, would throw obstacles in 
 my way. From Russian influence in Persia I knew I must 
 expect opposition unless I permitted our legation to play 
 into his hands and become subservient to Russia's aims. 
 She feared the missionary influence in a land she hoped 
 eventually to absorb, and the possible friendly relations 
 of the British legation with our own. These difficulties 
 I had to meet, and also to establish precedents and pres- 
 tige, which, once established, would make the work of my 
 successors far less arduous than mine would be likely to 
 prove. For these reasons I decided not to go through 
 Russia proper, but by way of Constantinople. At that 
 place I could get some points, and gradually approach 
 these difficulties by a subsequent passage through Russian 
 territory across the Caucasas. Caution and alertness was 
 the motto I proposed to follow, to which, later on, I found 
 it necessary to add firmness. Those three words form the 
 basis of diplomacy in dealing with Russians and Orient- 
 als generally. Fortunately I had a good knowledge of 
 the French language, as well as Greek and Turkish, and 
 some experience in speaking other European tongues, all 
 of which proved of the greatest advantage to me from the 
 first moment I entered Russian territory, and crossed the 
 threshold of Persia, until the last day of my services 
 abroad. One can travel almost anywhere in Russia with 
 a knowledge of French, and all the foreigners in Persia 
 except Americans, and many of the chief officials and 
 
 354 
 
grandees of that kingdom are conversant with it. The 
 Shah himself was familiar with that language. What I 
 should have done, situated as I was at that time, without 
 such knowledge I do not know ; my hands would have been 
 practically bound. Before I left Persia I could also under- 
 stand most that was said in Persian, and should have been 
 able to converse in it fluently, although I was too busy 
 while there to study it systematically. 
 
 At the port of Resht, on the Caspian I was taken from 
 the Russian steamer to the shore in a smaller steamboat, 
 termed the Shah's yacht. It was the only vessel on the 
 Caspian sea owned by the Persian government; but the in- 
 fluence of Russia was painfully evident from the fact that 
 even this small craft was not permitted to fly Persian col- 
 ors ! After an attractive collation, we were rowed up a 
 sluggish, tawny stream to the city of Resht, where we 
 Avere met by dignitaries on horseback who escorted us to 
 the palace of the governor. There we were hospitably en- 
 tertained for two or three days making preparations for 
 the journey to the capital. M. Vlassof, the Russian con- 
 sul and his wife, also invited us to dine, receiving us with 
 the effusive hospitality and the delicious menu peculiar to 
 Russia, where there is friendship between host and guest or 
 something to gain by cordiality. In this case there was a 
 mixture of both. But I did not know whether to be amused 
 or offended by M. Vlassof's patronizing and demon- 
 strative recommendation to rely on the Russian minister 
 at Teheran, to render me all the assistance and advice I 
 might need in dealing with those "canaille" the Persians. 
 I thanked him with the guileless air of one who would fall 
 easily into the trap. 
 
 355 
 
Before starting from Reslit a dispatch was received by 
 the mehmandar or dignitary deputed to escort me to 
 Teheran, which stated that the Shah was to leave his capi- 
 tal for the season, and unless I arrived there within a cer- 
 tain day, I could not present my credentials until his re- 
 turn, which might not be for three months or more, and 
 I could not otherwise enter the capital city. This contin- 
 gency was of course to be avoided, if possible, and there- 
 fore at the last moment I had to completely change my 
 plans. I had to hasten on with the mehmandar and one 
 servant by chappd or post, which meant going at a gal- 
 lop, chiefly at night, at the rate of eighty to one hundred 
 miles a day. As I had not been on a horse for a dozen 
 years, this was a cheerful prospect. But what I most 
 cared about was that I was obliged to leave my wife and 
 daughter behind, to follow me by slow stages over the 
 lonely, mountainous roads of a thinly peopled country 
 of which they knew nothing, guided by servants and mule- 
 teers. It is true I left them with my faithful Nestorian 
 head servant, and my private secretary, who, as a recent 
 graduate of Harvard, might reasonably be supposed to 
 know everything worth knowing; but that was scarcely 
 enough in a country that had never heard of Harvard. 
 After two weeks and a half, however, they accomplished 
 the mountainous overland journey of 250 miles, and re- 
 joined me safely. 
 
 The ride by chappd is strangely interesting; at long 
 intervals one meets a party going the opposite direction ; 
 neither stops, but goes on without a word, as if bound on 
 the unknown errands of Allah on enchanted steeds that 
 have been flying over the wastes of ages with the mystic 
 messages of destiny. 
 
 356 
 
"This is indeed like diving into the centuries of k)ng 
 ago, into the mazes of history of which Firdusi chants 
 in immortal strains, into the very heart of Central Asia 
 to which I am bound!" Thus I kept saying to myself as 
 we flew onward as if forever on this mystic race. My fancy 
 was on fire even though I began to grow very weary, for 
 although accustomed to riding at one time, this was the 
 first time I had mounted the saddle for years, my wander- 
 ings having led me across the grey seas on reeling decks, 
 and lulled by the roar of the ocean foam rather than on 
 the back of horses stretching out for the provender and 
 the stall to which they were bound. 
 
 When we had galloped sixteen miles — fortunately the 
 horse, the stallion of Persia, gallops instead of trots, and 
 this, in my opinion, is easier — when we had reached the 
 fourth station of that first ride, I say I began to feel 
 very sore. But this would not do, if we were to reach the 
 capital in time for the audience before the successor of 
 Cyrus and Chosroes should start for his summer pleasur- 
 ing. 
 
 Although I heartily enjoyed the canter over the moun- 
 tain passes, and the rests at the picturesque wayside cara- 
 vanserai, yet I was hardly in a fit state, after such un- 
 accustomed exertion, to encounter the "reception" pre- 
 paring for me as we approached the capital, a reception 
 that was an exceeding tax on the nerves of one who had 
 hitherto had little to do personally with public functions. 
 In former ages the arrival of an envoy at a European or 
 foreign court was a matter of very great moment, and the 
 pomp and ceremony employed on such an occasion went by 
 the name of solemn entry. But all this has been done away 
 with by the increasing intercourse of nations. A minister 
 
 357 
 
arrives quietly by boat or train, is met at the pier or the 
 station by an attache, and proceeds to his quarters like 
 any private citizen. On a subsequent day he presents his 
 letters of credence with scarcely more pomp, and that is 
 all of it that comes under the public eye. But in Persia 
 the first arrival of a foreign envoy at the capital was still 
 celebrated with all the imposing pomp and punctilio cus- 
 tomary in olden time. Whether it is now falling into dis- 
 use in Persia I know not.* 
 
 I had taken the precaution to exchange my traveling 
 clothes for a black suit at a station a few miles from the 
 pavilion of the race-course near the city where the high 
 dignitaries of the realm were waiting to escort me. It 
 was a handsome, imposing body of men who met me there, 
 in magnificent uniforms glittering with gems and gold 
 lace. I exchanged my travelling suit for one of black, and 
 my tough, lean-boned post-horse for one of the most 
 superb stallions of the royal stables (his long tail dyed 
 crimson, indicating he was a gift from the King) and the 
 procession started for the city. Besides the officials al- 
 ready mentioned, who were all mounted, there were several 
 regiments of infantry and cavalry, including a regiment 
 of Persian Cossacks who went through every manner of 
 skilful evolutions, as we proceeded across the plain to 
 the city gate. 
 
 On arriving at the palace it was my first duty to wait 
 on the minister of foreign affairs whose official apart- 
 
 *The following description of Mr. Benjamin's personal appear- 
 ance about this time was given by a New York journalist : "The new 
 Minister is a man with slight upright body, topped with a taking head. 
 His face is a thing of good looks, his mustachios betoken a man of 
 forty-five years or so, and straight out through rimless glasses, smile 
 eyes, that have a touch of the eagle's in them, a type, quite out of the 
 ordinary." 
 
 358 
 
ments joined the ark or palace of the Shah. He received 
 me with true Oriental affability, and the customary refresh- 
 ments were served. In due time a messenger announced 
 that the Shah was ready to receive the American envoy. 
 The minister of ceremonies then took me in charge, an in- 
 genious young noble, son-in-law of the Shah, and robed 
 in superb stuffs, stiff with magnificent embroidery. In 
 his right hand he bore a staff inlaid with elaborate de- 
 signs. He walked by my side. With slow and measured 
 steps we descended and proceeded to the palace followed 
 by many attendants. The audience hall was reached by 
 another flight of stairs. At the entrance I slipped off 
 my galoshes, worn for the nonce, but not my shoes. This 
 was a diplomatic compromise with a custom immemorial 
 in the East, not so much an indication of inferiority 
 as a necessity by existing conditions. The rugs of Asia, 
 often very rich, sometimes indeed of silk or of hand em- 
 broidery, were not made to be trodden upon and worn 
 out by heavy shoes. 
 
 The audience hall which I now entered was a vast 
 apartment whose ceiling was vaulted, while the floor was 
 inlaid with a rich mosaic of glazed tiles. A row of arm 
 chairs on either hand, covered with beaten gold, led up the 
 hall to the famous peacock throne, one of the world's 
 great historic treasures brought from Delhi by tlij famous 
 Nadir Shah. A few paces in front of the throne stood the 
 worthy successor of Djemsheed, Cyrus, Darius, Ardeshir, 
 Anoorshirman, Abbass, and Nadir; Nasr-ed-Deen Shah, 
 who with the majesty that befits a king, awaited my 
 approach. For one who was new to official life and royal 
 pomps, it was a trying moment; and as I contrasted my 
 
 359 
 
inexperience with his reign of forty years, and my plain 
 black garb with his glittering splendor, it required a 
 consciousness of our potential power and of the four hun- 
 dred millions of "reserve" at that time in our treasury 
 to brace my nerves for the ordeal that confronted me. 
 
 A little at one side of the Shah, stood his brother-in- 
 law, the Muschir-i-Dowleh, one of the first magnates of 
 the court, who spoke French admirably and acted as in- 
 terpreter. Although the Shah spoke that language with 
 some facility, and understood it well, at a formal state 
 function like this, his dignity permitted him to use only 
 his native tongue. On later and less ceremonious oc- 
 casions he sometimes conversed with me without the in- 
 tervention of an interpreter. 
 
 After bidding me welcome with a genial nod and a few 
 pleasant words, it was signified that the presentation of 
 my letters of credence was in order. I laid the document 
 on a plate of solid gold, which was extended towards me 
 by the Muschir-i-Dowleh, and then replied with a few 
 pertinent observations in French. The Shah inquired in 
 turn after the health of the President, expressed the hope 
 that my journey had been agreeable, that his people were 
 duly mindful of my comfort, and that my stay in Persia 
 might prove agreeable and for the advantage of both 
 nations. He then took a step back, said, ^^Marakhus est," 
 "It is permitted to withdraw," and the audience was at an 
 end. 
 
 To retire backwards the length of that stately hall 
 while his Majesty waited until I passed out of sight was 
 an awkward affair for one not in practice, demanding all 
 my circumspection. I found on subsequent occasions, when 
 
 360 
 
the entire diplomatic corps repaired to the royal presence 
 on festal occasions, that even greater care was required, 
 while five or six entire legations were obliged to retire back- 
 wards together without any contretemps. On less formal 
 interviews I was received sometimes in more private apart- 
 ments of the palace. 
 
 On my return to my quarters from the royal audience 
 I was waited on by the first secretary of the Turkish Am- 
 bassador, who was dean of the diplomatic corps. He came 
 ostensibly to arrange the time when I would be prepared 
 to exchange calls of ceremony with the legations, but in 
 reality his errand was to raise anew the question which 
 had been raised and settled at every European court in 
 turn, and which it was now my turn to meet and settle, 
 the question of official uniform. As is well known, an 
 American envoy is enjoined to wear on official occasions 
 a civilian's suit of plain black, no matter how magnificent 
 the uniforms of other officials present. But I knew that the 
 point was likely to come up on the establishment of a 
 new legation at a distant post, and, would be made a test 
 case by which to put my mettle to the proof. Hence I 
 was prepared with my answer when the secretary said, 
 "His Excellency, the Ambassador, wished me to inquire 
 in what dress your excellency will receive the members 
 of the diplomatic corps." 
 
 "I shall be pleased to call on them and to receive their 
 visits, and shall wear a plain black suit on those oc- 
 casions," I replied. 
 
 "In that case, of course, they also will call on your ex- 
 cellency in black," 
 
 "On the contrary that would be inadmissible ; for I 
 shall wear the identical suit I wore in the presence of the 
 
 361 
 
President of the United States and of his Majesty, the 
 Shah of Persia, and I shall expect the members of the 
 diplomatic corps to exchange official visits with my le- 
 gation in the uniforms that they wear on similar occasions. 
 Kindly present my compliments to the Ambassador, your 
 chief, and say that I should greatly regret any delay on 
 this account, but that it is impossible for me to offer any 
 other reply on this question." 
 
 This was the last I heard of this question. I wore 
 black, and they wore gold lace galore, but we got along 
 very pleasantly notwithstanding, and no one ever thought 
 after that, what clothes we had on. Notwithstanding all 
 this, I am bound to admit that I think our way of clothing 
 our officials abroad in plain black is a foolish affectation, 
 an ostentation of republican simplicity that no longer 
 exists. It is all right at home, but abroad it looks like the 
 jejune eccentricity of a crude people. Every one knows 
 that with the vast national wealth we now enjoy we have 
 become one of the most luxurious, splendor loving, spec- 
 tacular people in the world. Why then affect such official 
 simplicity? It is not necessary that our diplomats should 
 copy the costly splendor of foreign officials ; but a uni- 
 form with some modest decorations would not hurt the 
 brains of our diplomats and would make them less con 
 spicuously eccentric amid the formal ceremonies of diplo- 
 matic life. The attempt of one of my successors at 
 Teheran to wear a military uniform was not as absurd as 
 some of our comic sheets tried to make it appear. 
 
 My first duty after disposing of these august cere- 
 monies was to secure a lodging for myself and family. 
 The native khans or hostelries were of course oat of the 
 question. The small French hotel was hardly equal to 
 
 362 
 
the occasion, aside from the fact that owing to the ar- 
 rival of the hot season, and the removal of the court and 
 the European colony to the country, it was there that I 
 must seek for a temporary abode, and that, in the ab- 
 sence of furniture and for other reasons, was extremely 
 difficult at this juncture. The missionaries kindly re- 
 lieved my embarrassment by placing part of their summer 
 quarters at Tejrish in the Shimran, at my disposal. This 
 was feasible owing to the usual plan of the dwellings of 
 the Shimran scattered over wide space under dense 
 masses of embowering foliage, including the quarters of the 
 men and the anderoon or apartments of the women. My 
 next duty was to engage a dragoman, a most important 
 functionary at an Oriental legation, especially when the 
 minister is aided by few or no attaches. The latter was my 
 case, although I had to execute the double duties of 
 minister and consul general. I was most fortunate in 
 securing the services of Mr. Alfred B. Keiin, a young 
 man whose great natural ability was supplemented by his 
 varied experience under the Persian government and by 
 the official traditions of his family, which had held con- 
 sular positions in the Levant for several generations. 
 He was of Dutch and English descent, although reared 
 in the East. My knowledge of conditions in the Levant 
 enabled me to perceive at once the advantage of engaging 
 Mr. Keiin as dragoman which, in this case was equivalent 
 to first secretary. And I never had reason to regret my 
 selection. Indeed his experience and intelligence proved of 
 the greatest use to me. My own private secretary whom 
 I had to pay out of my limited resources, was entirely 
 inexperienced. After this I had to engage a moonsTiee 
 or Oriental secretary, who must be capable of translating 
 
 363 
 
documents into the official language of Persia, and must 
 also have some knowledge of French. Asker Khan, a 
 shrewd Afghan, filled this place with acceptance. He 
 needed a little watching, but I found in him the man 
 I needed, and both of these gentlemen continued attached 
 to the legation until my return home. I also appointed 
 as vice consul general, Doctor Torrence, a missionary phy- 
 sician at Teheran. He was to act as consul in the event 
 of my absence, but without salary except when actual 
 locum tenens. 
 
 The next important duty to be done was the preparation 
 of a code, for the administration of justice to United States 
 citizens and proteges in Persia. For the benefit of those 
 who are not informed, it may be well to state that owing 
 to the differences in the dispensation of legal principles, 
 especially when Church and State united in the govern- 
 ing power, there arose what is called the right of extra- 
 territoriality by which the citizens or subjects of one coun- 
 try, resident in another country, have a right to be pro- 
 tected or tried under their own law^s by their own minister 
 or consul ; and the premises of the legation or consulate 
 are considered as being an integral part of their owti 
 country, and the invasion of such legation or consulate 
 is equivalent to an invasion of the country whose officials 
 are occupying it. The code 
 
 I drew up was in accord with the Statutes of the United 
 States with special adaptations to conditions in Persia. 
 After being approved by the attorney general at Wash- 
 ington it went into practice in Persia. According to its 
 provisions all cases between American citizens were tried 
 in the consulate, at Teheran or in any other United 
 States consular courts in Persia, subject to final 
 
 354 
 
revision by the Minister. Convictions for capital crimes 
 were referred for final decision to the President, as in 
 court martials. Cases between American citizens and Per- 
 sian subjects were tried in Persian courts but before a 
 U. S. official, who would see that the Persian law was ad- 
 ministered without prejudice. Cases between American 
 citizens and the subjects of countries other than Persia, 
 were to be tried in the consular court and under the laws 
 of the defendant, with an official of the same nation as 
 the plaintiff to serve as counsel for him. 
 
 My next duty was to secure and furnish suitable prem- 
 ises in Teheran for the legation and consulate and to 
 furnish them. The furnishing of the former had to be 
 paid out of my own pocket and cost far more even than 
 in the United States, the most expensive country in the 
 world. The house I rented was of adobe faced, and deco- 
 rated with gatch or plaster of Paris, like most of the 
 buildings in Central Persia, where wood and stone are 
 scarce and the climate is dry and steady. It was of 
 one story, but contained upwards of twenty large apart- 
 ments, around three courts, one large court for the living 
 rooms, one for bath, and one for the stables. The windows 
 all gave on the courts. What added interest was the fact 
 that it was owned by the husband of the famous Madeleine 
 Lemaire, the admirable artist who illustrated U Abbe 
 Constantin, and who stands among the leading artists of 
 her sex at Paris. 
 
 Owing to conditions in Persia it was necessary for me, 
 although keeping down the expenses of the legation to 
 the lowest possible scale, as I had to pay myself at least 
 a dollar for every dollar the government paid, it was 
 necessary, I say, to purchase a carriage and maintain at 
 
 365 
 
least a dozen horses in the stable, and from twelve to 
 fourteen servants. By the special request of the Shah, for 
 the better protection of the legations in a ^Mohammedan 
 country, where Europeans were very few, I was obliged 
 to include a corporal and twelve soldiers in my menage, 
 whose pay and board had to come out of the legation 
 funds. Some of the other legations at Teheran had 
 from twenty-five to forty soldiers. These men received 
 a new password every evening, and had to stand alternate 
 watches. All these people, with their own families and 
 servants, were proteges of the legation while in its ser- 
 vice, entitled to its protection as to their persons, goods 
 and chattels, even to a matter of medical aid, and were 
 also liable to trial and punishment under the laws of the 
 legation. Thus we formed quite a patriarchal community 
 under the American flag at Teheran, besides the citizens 
 for whose protection the legation was established. I 
 estimated that I had a family of 112 souls to look after 
 at Teheran. 
 
 Another duty before me on settling in our city resi- 
 dence was the erection of a suitable flagstaff. The govern- 
 ment had sent me two large flags. The short poles put 
 over the gates of the Persian palaces and of legations 
 would not answer. I had been accustomed to see the con- 
 sular flagstaff in the Levant lofty, like a ship's mast, 
 with topmast and crosstrees. The reason they did not 
 have such at Teheran was because the Persians did not 
 know how to make them. I determined to put one up at 
 Teheran which should overtop every other flag at that 
 capital. I made a model of such a flagstaff myself on a 
 scale, for the guidance of my workmen. Then I went to 
 the bazaars and selected the spars. Everything had to be 
 
 366 
 
made for it, including the rope for stays and guys and 
 halyards, and the blocks for hoisting and lowering the 
 topmast in the occasional heavy squalls. I had to super- 
 intend everything even to the setting it up. The minister 
 of war kindly loaned me windlasses and a gang of men, 
 and finally got it in place. It was painted and scraped 
 like a ship's mast and a gilded ball of hollow brass capped 
 the truck. Our government allowed me $150. towards this 
 flagstaff, and it cost me .$261.; the balance of course 
 came out of my own pocket. But I felt amply repaid 
 when I could see the Stars and Stripes flying above the 
 roofs of Persia's capital, no other flag being in sight ; when 
 the English minister with envious eyes complimented me 
 on my success ; and when Nasr-ed-Deen Shah himself rode 
 past the legation on purpose to see the new flagstaff and 
 the glorious banner that was flowing from it to the breeze. 
 I think I felt more proud of that undertaking than if I 
 had published a successful book. 
 
 Only a few days after my arrival in Teheran an inci- 
 dent occurred due to the indiscretion of some of our 
 American colony, which later, led to serious results mak- 
 ing it a very difficult case to settle. 
 
 By the laws of Persia, Christian churches and Jewish 
 synagogues that had long existed, were allowed to be re- 
 paired and rebuilt if on the same foundations. But ab- 
 solutely no religious edifices on new sites could at that 
 time be erected in Persia without a special order from 
 the authorities, which except for Mohammedanism, was 
 by no means easy, althovigh sometimes possible, to obtain. 
 
 The American missionaries had built a new church, 
 shortly before I arrived, and liad neglected to apply for 
 the necessary license. This injudicious procedure natur- 
 
 367 
 24 
 
ally caused comment among Persians, and too soon we had 
 reason to apprehend trouble. In view of my approach- 
 ing arrival, the Government for the time had winked at 
 the matter, and no avert opposition had yet occurred. 
 
 The premises opposite the school ground, where the 
 new church was erected, was occupied by the city man- 
 sion of Emin-e-Sultan, one of the most powerful and 
 wealthy nobles in Persia ; he was a favorite of the Shah, 
 with whom he had great influence. He honestly feared the 
 result of foreign ideas and influence in his country at that 
 time, and his conservatism made him a leading factor 
 against missionary effort in Teheran. I had gone to my 
 summer home in the Shimran, when a swift messenger 
 came one hot day with the news that a riot had occurred. 
 The retainers of the Emin-i-Sultan in the city attacked a 
 gang of men who were building the new missionary chapel. 
 
 I went to town, as soon as a swift horse could carry me, 
 examined into the matter, and obtained from the minister 
 of foreign affairs an assurance that the American mis- 
 sionaries should not be again disturbed : — but this was not 
 the end. The causes lay deep under the surface. The 
 whole body of the Mollahs (Mohammedan clergy) were 
 back of the disturbance as were also the judiciary. When 
 the church was completed, and was about to be dedicated 
 the missionaries received official notice from the foreign of- 
 fice that they had no authority for opening a new house 
 of worship, therefore the church must be closed. The 
 Persians had acted within their laws, and I had anticipated 
 the only course left open to me to settle matters for the 
 present, without bloodshed. 
 
 As a foreign envoy, I had a right to a house of wor- 
 ship for the U. S. Legation — moreover as the English had 
 
 368 
 
no chapel, I asked Sir Ronald Thompson, the minister, 
 if they would not join us provided the English service 
 could be read ; he readily consented, and thus the Per- 
 sians were apparently checkmated, but the Prince was a 
 consummate strategist. He foresaw that, sooner or later 
 the missionaries would get Mohammedan converts into the 
 church and in due time official notice was lodged at the 
 legation, that Persians had been seen attending the ser- 
 vices. The premises were watched and I was notified, this 
 "could not be allowed as it was clearly against — treaty 
 regulations." 
 
 The missionaries finally agreed not to invite Mohamme- 
 dans to attend the services, on the other hand they would 
 not put them out, if they attended. 
 
 I represented to the foreign office, that the ]Mohamme- 
 dan clergy or others, were entirely at liberty to hinder or 
 arrest Persians who wished to enter the chapel ; we 
 should in no way interfere. After this, things quieted 
 down for awhile, but our grim opponent had studied the 
 ground carefully. One morning without warning, he began 
 to have a kiosk or pavilion built, at the angle of the wall 
 between the premises, with two windows overlooking the 
 grounds of the mission schools where the chapel stood. 
 Apparently this was a trifling matter, but actually it was 
 a serious infringement of Mohammedan law and all Oriental 
 usage, to have windows overlooking a neighbors premises, 
 and it might greatly affect the value of the property own- 
 ed by American subjects. I represented this fact, at the 
 foreign office, and after some effort, procured a decree 
 that the windows should be closed. This was done very in- 
 effectually with boards, a few bricks, which soon fell out — ■ 
 and in short, the matter finally had to be brouglit to the 
 
 869 
 
attention of the Shah. He appointed a committee of 
 three, the minister of foreign affairs, the Emin-i-Sultan 
 and the U. S. Minister to discuss a possible solution. I 
 suggested as a final end to the trouble that the Emin-i- 
 Sultan should buy the property, all of it, on terms that 
 should be mutually satisfactory, and that the Shah should 
 then guarantee premises to the missionaries, as agree- 
 able to them, but not so near the heart of the city ; and 
 that this should be done on terms which would enable 
 Americans to recoup themselves, including a permission to 
 build a church there. 
 
 The Shah was delighted to have the matter thus finally 
 settled, and the missionaries liked it because in this way, 
 they would gain a distinct official footing in Persia, for 
 their work, and for a church building. 
 
 Unfortunately when the case was finally presented to 
 the Emin-i-Sultan, he after some shifting, declined to 
 purchase the property, alleging that the terms of the mis- 
 sionaries were too high, and he soon after this allowed the 
 bricks to fall again out of the closed windows. I had a 
 serious talk with the foreign minister about it and I 
 finally proposed a plan to him, to distinctly end the mat- 
 ter, which could only avail In Asiatic countries having a 
 theocratic government. 
 
 The head of the Persian Hierarchy was called the "Chief 
 Mushtahed." His impartiality was assumed to be im- 
 peccable, still it was a hazardous test for the American 
 minister to rest his case upon. There was no telling what 
 intrigue or counter-plot might be concocted between the 
 minister of foreign affairs and the Emin-i-Sultan, nor 
 was it certain that at least two of the foreign legations 
 might not be quite content to see the progress of Amerl- 
 
 370 
 
can missions in the East retarded. Of the good faith of 
 the Shah I had no doubt whatever, but he was, under 
 present circumstances, not entirely master of the situa- 
 tion. Rather to my surprise the minister of foreign af- 
 fairs, readily accepted my suggestion, and promised to ob- 
 tain the decision of the Chief Mushtahed without delay, 
 and it was mutually agreed we should each abide by this 
 decision as final. 
 
 The hope of the contestants lay in continuous exas- 
 perating delay, as Oriental principles and usage were in- 
 volved in the question of the open windows ; on the other 
 hand my position was made more difficult because the mis- 
 sionaries had really violated rules and traditions of Per- 
 sian law. 
 
 I decided I must plav a trump card on the result of 
 which, depended, perhaps, my influence both at Teheran 
 and Washington. I had devised a plan to fight the enemy 
 with his own weapons. To accomplish my end, I must rely 
 however, on the native cunning and honor of my Afghan 
 moonshee, whose courage and shrewdness, fitted him to 
 be an admirable tool to carry out my schemes. He knew 
 if he revealed my secret, he would receive only punish- 
 ment from the Persians, whereas he knew that any promise 
 I might make him, he could rely upon, absolutely. Asker 
 Khan accepted my commission asking four weeks time, 
 which was granted. At the end of the time, he had ap- 
 parently accomplished nothing. "I gave you credit for 
 more ability," I said to him. "It is a difficult business," 
 he replied, "but I have made some progress, will Your Ex- 
 cellency allow me ten days more.?" I granted it, saying I 
 preferred that he should complete the business if he 
 could. In about a week, Asker Khan, entered my rooms, 
 
 371 
 
and with a beaming face handed me the priceless docu- 
 ment bearing the potent signature and seal of the Chief 
 Mushtahed, who was the final expounder of Koranic law, 
 and before whose decisions Persian princes and potentates 
 gave way. The point at question was decided in our fav- 
 or! 
 
 The day, after I sent our dragoman to the foreign 
 office to ask the minister if he had procured the desired 
 paper from the chief ^Mushtahed, if not, would he request 
 the 1st secretary to call at the U. S. legation. When he 
 arrived, I spoke with considerable freedom, on the delay 
 of the Government to get some final decision on the 
 questions affecting so vitally American missionaries, then 
 as he was about to leave, I handed him the momentous 
 paper. He looked quickly at the seal, examined the sig- 
 nature with care (a signature which could send heads to 
 the block, or even threaten the Throne) and gasped, 
 "Hadji M'ollah Allee! there is no doubt! it goes against 
 us." His face fell. "Your Excellency is to be congratu- 
 lated," then he said slowly, "You have won the game!" 
 
 Oriental women receive much sympathy from their 
 western sisters. They have some trials, so do the women 
 of Christian lands, but it is a question, whether women in 
 the East do not enjoy the greater personal influence and 
 power. It was through two Oriental wives, that Asker 
 Khan procured the august signature. The women of 
 some Christian lands, are perhaps gaining a cumulative 
 power that the women of the East do not yet know. They 
 are gaining it by organization while working together, but 
 I believe their individual influence will thereby decrease, 
 and the}^ will have less hold over the man. Something of 
 the power and beauty of the marriage-tie also is failing. 
 
 372 
 
Possibly this is a new phase of a social evolution, that is 
 to lead to a decrease of population, or the planet might 
 become too small to hold its inhabitants. 
 
 Meantime the Persian woman does not think or worry 
 about these questions. She takes her baby, or her em- 
 broidery and goes to the Hmnum or public Bath, which 
 is a sort of club or public house for all the women except 
 those of high position. There they exchange news, in- 
 trigue and gossip, (qviite as Western club-women do). The 
 wife of my moonsJiee doubtless went to the Bath with the 
 important paper at hand, and by abundant use of finesse 
 induced a friend of higher rank to carry it on to one yet 
 higher, until at last perhaps it reached the hands of the 
 fair favorite wife of Hadji Mollah Alice. 
 
 It was a simple paper adroitly drawn asking his de- 
 cision on a point of Persian law which was stated — it 
 had apparently no special or personal reference, and was 
 written informally in Persian on a half sheet of paper. 
 
 Two days after its receipt, the foreign minister sent 
 workmen to close the windows of the Prince solidly with 
 stone, and thus the matter was finally ended. The Emin-i- 
 Sultan was intensely mortified, I was told, and wrote 
 a bitter letter to the chief Mushtahed, who was rather 
 amused it would seem by my adroitness, and expressed a 
 desire "to make my acquaintance." This decision was 
 probably the first favorable decision, ever given by this 
 ^Mohammedan "Pope" to a foreigner and it was an ex- 
 tremely hazardous experiment for me to rest my case 
 upon. He was in fact, in his sole person the equivalent of 
 the Supreme Court of the United States with all its nine 
 judges. But something had to be effected quickly, to bring 
 a solution of a deep laid plot against missionary inter- 
 ests. 
 
 373 
 
Of other cases, to which as protector of American in- 
 terests I was called, one of the most singular was not that 
 of converts (many of whom had appealed to me) but of 
 the missionaries themselves at Hamadan, several hundred 
 miles from the capital. 
 
 It was not without an element of humor, like many 
 cases I had to settle and was complicated by the hesita- 
 tion of the minister of foreign affairs, to offend those 
 near the Throne, a matter not always fully appreciated by 
 the missionaries. 
 
 I have a certain respect for many Oriental diplomats. 
 They are as astute as foxes, unsurpassed in suavity, and 
 not more parsimonious of truth, than Russia and other 
 Christian powers. While displaying a keener intelli- 
 gence than the European diplomat, they are masters in 
 the art of procrastination. Nor should they be blamed 
 for this with all the nations of Europe hammering at 
 their frontiers, equipped with the modern implements of 
 war, finance, dissimulation and intrigue, and uniting in 
 the game of grab on the pretext of spreading commerce, 
 disseminating Christianity, defending the honor of the 
 flag, etc., etc. 
 
 The Orientals have grown to be suspicious of all Chris- 
 tian nations, to doubt all their professions, and to de- 
 fend themselves with the only available weapon left to the 
 Asiatic, in this general scramble — procrastination. It is 
 this awful fear of the advance and influence of these per- 
 petual foes of Asiatic customs and independence that 
 makes all Orientals, of whatever faith or race, regard with 
 apprehension the progress of missionary effort in their 
 borders. 
 
 374 
 
We call this fanaticism. In one sense it is such, for it 
 proceeds ostensibly against foreigners who are aiming to 
 undermine the faiths of Eastern peoples. 
 
 But in its last analysis this fanaticism takes its origin 
 in an instinct of conservation, or self-preservation, because 
 church and state, church and race, are so inextricably 
 interwoven, it is to threaten the dissolution of the entire 
 body politic. 
 
 At the time of our arrival at Teheran in 1883, Persia 
 was still one of the most thoroughly Oriental nations left 
 to remind one of ages almost lost in the mists of a hoary 
 antiquity. It was ancient in its characters, its people, its 
 laws, its literature, its religions, its government. And 
 yet in the chief cities, and especially its capital, enough 
 of its male citizens, had been out of the country, to study 
 European manners, customs and languages, all of which, 
 gave a sort of veneer of Occidental character, apparent to 
 the stranger on his first arrival. 
 
 But after awhile, one learns that such impressions of 
 the country are superficial, and that no people in Asia is 
 less changed in its essential characteristics than Persia. 
 
 It is still a far away land, and calls the traveller back 
 to the original cradle and home of the Aryan races. None 
 but Aryans touch its frontiers today, except the mixed 
 races of Turanian stock, Tartars, and Turcoman and 
 Semitic Arabs. Even the eunuchs of Persia, are for 
 the most part white, picked up in border raids. Unlike 
 the Turks who gather wives from every quarter and so 
 are a thoroughly mixed people, the Persians barter their 
 wives from the peasant class in Persia and thus nomads or 
 merchants often fill their harems, and purely Persian off- 
 spring are the result. It is this, which has kept the race 
 
 375 
 
of the early Imans practically homogeneous, mind and 
 body, from the time of Cyrus until now, with scarce any 
 mental or physical changes. Unlike Turanian and Tartar 
 races, they are volatile, quick tempered, poetic, specu- 
 lative, intellectual. These facts were first impressed on 
 my observation when I reached Constantinople. I pro- 
 ceeded direct to that focus of influence in order to gather 
 certain special information before proceeding farther 
 East, and found it to be of great advantage, especially in 
 meeting officials representing at the gateway of the Orient 
 the legations of Persia and Russia, whose governments are 
 looking at each other over the border line ; one, on the de- 
 fensive, fighting for her life, by finesse and diplomacy, and 
 the other, preparing to give the coup de grace, if Kismet 
 or the Fates, permit. 
 
 We all passed a delightful day with Gen. and Mrs. 
 Lew Wallace at their pleasant home on the Bosphorus 
 en route to Persia, and his experience in dealing with both 
 Oriental and missionaries interested me greatly. 
 
 Gen. Wallace was a fine looking, rather large man of 
 quiet manners, not a great talker except when specially 
 drawn out — and his wife a woman of excellent good sense. 
 We saw them often, and I had many a pleasant talk at 
 that time with the famous author of Ben Hur, then minis- 
 ter to Turkey. 
 
 We both agreed, that the Aryan and Turanian races 
 seem to have left traces of two distinct civilizations, mer- 
 ging somewhat at a later period as for example did the Mo- 
 hammedans and the Persians, although intensely and fur- 
 iously opposed, in matters of religion. The Persians of old 
 were, after the Hellenes, the most remarkable and civilized 
 people of Asiatic antiquity, at the same time they were 
 
 376 
 
incredibly cruel. While this temperment is somewhat 
 modified of late years, it is regrettable that amid so many 
 elements of genius, it still crops out at times. At the 
 present time it is well nigh impossible to reconcile un- 
 controlled and fiery temper with an active and highly 
 civilized people. But we see something of such extremes 
 displayed by the French, perhaps the most brilliant people 
 in history, since the Athenian Republic retired from its 
 amazing supremacy. French civilization has always been 
 marked by such extremes. 
 
 377 
 
CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 SOCIETY AND DIPLOMACY. 
 
 In the case of the difficulties and outrages at Hamadan, 
 the opposition came simultaneously from several quarters. 
 Armenians, Jews and Persians were united in their ob- 
 jection to the proselyting and schools of the American 
 missionaries in that district. If there were others they 
 covered their tracks. This gave the movement great 
 strength, which was reinforced by the fact that the people 
 there, knew or cared nothing for the United States of 
 America as such; they thought they could persecute with 
 impunity. It now became my duty to disabuse their 
 minds of this pious impression. Another fact was that a 
 younger brother of Nasr-ed-Deen Shah, an intense, al- 
 though an intelligent fanatic, was governor of the 
 province. There, he ruled, through his son, a youth of six- 
 teen. Added to this powerful group of enemies to the mis- 
 sionaries, there was the conservatism of the then minister 
 of foreign affairs, Mirza Scyed Khan, who could not, in 
 tlie presence of the Diplomatic Corps, display his ani- 
 mosity, but imagined that at a distant post, disturbances 
 against the missionaries might be unnoticed, that could 
 not pass unchallenged at Teheran. 
 
 378 
 
I must add that personally I liked Mirza Seyed Khan. 
 He was a gentleman in manners, of good disposition, and 
 of scholarly tastes, and when a diplomatic conference was 
 ended, we sometimes enjoyed a discussion on Oriental lit- 
 erature. Although I had to express myself with emphasis 
 sometimes, in regard to our affairs, it was difficult for me 
 personally to feel otherwise than pleasantly towards this 
 fine gentleman of the old school. Perhaps my sympathies 
 in his favor were more lively, because he was old and feeble ; 
 indeed he died when I had been only one year in Persia, 
 and I was the only foreign minister at Teheran who 
 broke through the reserve they generally maintain towards 
 Orientals on such occasions, and I sent my moonshee in our 
 carriage to represent the legation at the funeral, and 
 afterwards called personally on his son ; courtesies which 
 Avere sincerely appreciated by the family and the Govern- 
 ment of the Shah. 
 
 The disturbances at Hamadan began by the seizure of 
 a church building. It belonged to an Armenian congrega- 
 tion of which the majority had become Protestants. This 
 fact had led the American missionaries at Teheran to loan 
 them 250 tomans — about 400 dollars — during the season 
 of famine ; the missionaries were to have possession and 
 undisputed use of the building at least until the money 
 was repaid. After several years six members of the 
 original congregation who remained in the old faith, be- 
 gan to feel their dislike of Protestants overpower the 
 sense of their obligations to the missionaries, who had 
 helped them in the hour of trial. Urged on by other 
 Armenians in Hamadan, they appealed to the Armenian 
 bishop of Ispahan. The bishop in turn appealed to 
 
 379 
 
Mirza Achmet, practically governor though nominally pre- 
 ceptor of the so-called Little Prince. 
 
 The fanaticism of Mirza Achmet took fire at this op- 
 portunity, quickened doubtless by a little money. He de- 
 spised the Armenians but he hated the missionaries more. 
 The former were giours, it is true. But at any rate they 
 were subjects, and might be bastinadoed and beheaded 
 without interference. 
 
 Although very serious, the determination and audacity 
 of the leaders of this plot were deliciously exhilarating, 
 more so to me, probably than to the good missionaries 
 who were actually in danger. 
 
 This began about the time the United States legation 
 was being established at Teheran. The first and easiest 
 form of attack was to resume possession of the church 
 notwithstanding the loan upon it and carry off the keys, 
 no attention being given to the demand for the return 
 either of building or money. The hot season had now be- 
 gun, and for several months I was occupied with getting 
 settled and arranging the numerous matters brought to 
 my attention in establishing an entirely new legation. 
 
 In the meantime, taking advantage of these circum- 
 stances, Mirza Achmet and his cabal, were bringing the 
 conspiracy to a head. I must say here that the course of 
 the missionaries at Hamadan and the meekness and 
 patience they displayed were beyond praise. They never 
 indicated the slightest doubt of the zeal of the legation in 
 behalf of the American citizens. 
 
 The outrages at Hamadan having started well with 
 the seizure of the church, Hirza Achmet proceeded to in- 
 vade the mission premises, seized the school buildings, 
 drove off the pupils and carried away the keys. Then he 
 
 380 
 
ordered the owner of the dwellmgs they occupied to be 
 bastinadoed. Then he proceeded, all in due order, to take 
 written pledges, from artisans of all sorts not to work for 
 the missionaries and drove away their servants. He ended 
 by getting iltisames from tradesmen not to sell them fuel, 
 or any of the ordinary necessaries of life, ending by for- 
 bidding anyone, under pain of punishment, even to sell 
 any manner of food to the American citizens, and remov- 
 ed the telegraph operator, thus impeding communications 
 with the United States legation and the outside world. It 
 was only by using the vigilance of the people of a belea- 
 guered town that our citizens were able to smuggle small 
 supplies of the necessaries of life within their premises. 
 
 xVt this point, laying aside other business, and having 
 exhausted all efforts at the foreign office, I felt that the 
 hour had come to take active measures to bring the au- 
 thorities and people of Hamadan to a sense of what it 
 means to trifle with American citizens, w^hethei lay or 
 clerical. For several -months I had remonstr;ite(l with 
 Mirza Seyed Khan. He palavered abundantly, denied the 
 reports, and promised to put an end to the "alleged dis- 
 turbances," closing each interview with charming suavity, 
 and the most fragrant coffee and tobacco, served with 
 jewelled kalians. It all ended literally in smoke. 
 
 Finally I decided on a measure which I was aware could 
 not to be considered quite permissible in diplomatic pro- 
 cedure at European courts, but was justified when pos- 
 sible, at an Oriental court, whose methods differ widely 
 from the normal usages of Christendom. It required reso- 
 lution, resource, and courage; but I felt particularly justi- 
 fied on this occasion because the missionaries at Hamadan 
 had made no efforts to Christianize ^lohammedans, which 
 
 381 
 
was very gratifying to me, as my views on this point were 
 firmly opposed to the practice. 
 
 I ordered Mr. Keiin, our dragoman or first secretary 
 as he practically was at our legation, to prepare to start 
 on the following day for Hamadan with a Persian of rare 
 fitness for anything that called for courage. As to Mr. 
 Keiin, he was exceptionally fitted to aid me. He was born 
 in Smyrna of good family, of adventurous spirit, he had 
 drifted to Persia. He was one who commanded interest 
 from the first glance. If he had lived, I am sure he would 
 have won high distinction, if not in Asia then in the West. 
 He was about twenty-five years old, could speak six 
 languages fluently, was straight as an arrow, supple as a 
 bow, with the manners of a gentleman and the bearing of a 
 soldier of high breeding. The journey was taken for 
 the most part by night, as was usual at that season. Es- 
 caping safely from a brush with robbers, Mr. Keiin final- 
 ly reached Hamadan. He found Mirza Achmet and his 
 followers totally unprepared fov such an unexpected 
 event, surly and insolent, and refusing at first even to 
 admit him to the audience hall. Well conversant with the 
 Persian character, Mr. Keiin held his head high, as one 
 who represented a great power. This course finally 
 brought the Little Prince and Mirza Achmet to a growing 
 consciousness that something was to be done. Mr. Keiin 
 was granted an interview and he laid matters before them 
 in a manner that made them wince. 
 
 Having once begun to yield, the authorities ended by 
 conceding about all that he demanded. The iltisames were 
 given up to him, the keys to the missionary premises and 
 of the church aforesaid. Several of the persecutors were 
 also flogged for doing exactly what Mirza Achmet had 
 
 382 
 
commanded them to do, the American citizens and their 
 converts were in the future to be unmolested, both as to 
 their persons and property, and all outrages should cease 
 thenceforth. The only concession we were willing to 
 grant was as to the money due for the church. Ready 
 money being scarce, as it is apt to be in the East, I directed 
 Mr, Keiin to grant them a renewal of the mortgage for a 
 stated period. We could afford this concession under the 
 circumstances. This much having been accomplished, Mr. 
 Keiin was directed by telegraph to return to Teheran. 
 In honor of the man he proved to be, and the power he rep- 
 resented, of which they had now obtained new light, the 
 authorities actually escorted him on horseback to the out- 
 skirts of Hamadan. 
 
 For several months comparative peace reigned at Hama- 
 dan, although I was convinced that sooner or later a new 
 plot was liable to break out in some form or another so 
 long as Mirza Achmet, the arch demon of the play, was 
 permitted to remain in power. 
 
 My expectations proved eventually correct, and I then 
 laid a formal demand at the foreign office for the re- 
 moval and disgrace of Mirza Achmet. The demand was 
 met with the usual procrastination, and I forthwith pre- 
 pared for more urgent methods to stop the Hamadan out- 
 rages, when an altogether unexpected and startling inci- 
 dent gave me the weather-gage in the struggle, and a com- 
 plete triumph. 
 
 On the afternoon of the 12th of June I was returning 
 from Teheran to Arajeb, our summer quarters at the vil- 
 lage of Djafferabad, in our carriage, a plain open 
 barouche. My young daughter accompanied me. It was 
 a slow ride of twelve miles up a gradual slope that led to 
 
 383 
 25 
 
the cooler region of the Shimran. We were accompanied 
 by two outriders the usual protection on ordinary occa- 
 sions. Both the}^ and the coachman, all Persians, wore the 
 simple livery of our legation, navy blue and a silver star 
 on the conical cap of black lambskin. 
 
 On approaching the wayside waiting place where travel- 
 lers stopped for a pipe, a cup of tea, or a cluster of 
 grapes, while the horses were drenched in the roadside 
 brook, under the plane trees, I became aware of a long 
 train of old-fashioned coaches painted blue and gold and 
 drawn by four horses each. They were so foreshortened 
 in perspective, and hazy in the twinkling shadows that I 
 did not realize at first the character of this procession. It 
 proved to be a train of the Shah's wives. Several Euro- 
 peans were waiting near us for these royal ladies to finish 
 their refreshments before they could proceed. 
 
 For ages it has been and may still be, for aught I know, 
 "a law of the Medes and Persians which changeth not," 
 that no one shall pass the King's wives on the road, and 
 if any one meets them, he must either face the other way 
 or turn, if possible, into another street or by-way. The 
 day is still within the memory of some living, when any 
 helpless individual caught looking or crossing the road 
 in front of them has been slaughtered on the spot. While 
 of course yielding the precedent to the Shah himself, 
 the Legations at Teheran had for some time claimed the 
 right to keep straight on, when meeting his wives, who 
 are a step below the throne, and the claim had been tacit- 
 ly allowed to foreign ministers for some years. 
 
 On this occasion we were much surprised to see a 
 squadron of the royal guards spur their horses from 
 each side of the road and fly at my outriders who im- 
 
 384 
 
mediately yelled, "The American minister is in the car- 
 riage !" This did not seem to produce the effect desired 
 for the troopers continued to bear down on my outriders, 
 striving to arrest them ; my men in the meantime, resisting 
 with admirable pluck. Then my carriage itself was at- 
 tacked. I shall not soon forget the Captain's position as, 
 mounted on a fiery gray steed, and with tawny beard and 
 flashing eyes, he vainly strove to check the wild dash of 
 my black Afghans as they flew past the carriages of the 
 royal wives until he was forced to let go, to save himself 
 from being hurled under their hoofs. 
 
 Although armed I felt that it was sufficient to leave 
 my gallant attendants the task of extricating us from the 
 difficulty by keeping straight on, until the royal cortege 
 was passed, so long as no deliberate personal violence was 
 offered to the occupants of the carriage, or that my own 
 horses did not get away from control and hurl us into the 
 road. I felt that I must exercise coolness in order to 
 avoid a catastrophe. My little daughter fortunate- 
 
 ly remained quite calm, uttering not a word, although 
 naturally excited by the alarming spectacle of a troop of 
 mounted soldiers dashing furiously around her with 
 raised sabres and furious yells. 
 
 What might have been the ultimate result of the melee 
 I do not care to speculate about, for before matters became 
 more serious, a head eunuch, despatched with orders from 
 the chief wife of the Shah, dispersed the cavalry, and es- 
 corted us clear of the royal train. 
 
 When we had passed the vanguard of cavalry, I called 
 a halt under the trees, to give the officers an opportunity 
 to come up and speak to me, if they had any explanations 
 or apologies to offer. But they did not do so, and this 
 
 385 
 
error on their part led to serious consequences. My men 
 behaved admirably. But for their courage we might have 
 come out of the encounter with less credit and comfort. 
 But they knew from previous experience in the United 
 States legation, what was to be expected of them. After 
 we reached home I gave each of them a liberal present as 
 evidence of approval of their conduct in a situation of 
 some gravity. 
 
 In' such emergencies, time is everything. Therefore 
 after dinner I sat down and wrote a brief statement of the 
 incident to the minister of foreign affairs, whose summer 
 residence was near, demanding satisfaction but in general 
 terms, I avoided stating a precise form of redress, in order 
 to leave the Persian government to act in the matter with 
 an appearance of spontaneity. The n«te must be despatch- 
 ed without delay to forestall any complaint on their part. 
 Asker Khan, our moonsliee, already well known in these 
 pages, however made a Persian translation which was at- 
 tached to the note, both were taken by him across the 
 brawling brook in the ravine at half past ten that same 
 evening to Mahmood Khan, the successor to the late 
 minister of foreign affairs. On reading the note, he was 
 sharp enough to say to the moonshee that he would like 
 to see my coachman and outriders on the following morn- 
 ing. Asker Khan proved faithful to our interests, and 
 reported to me exactly what the minister had said ; on 
 hearing this I forbade the men to stir out of the lega- 
 tion. I did not propose to have Mahmood Khan lecture 
 my servants for doing their duty, or trying to frighten 
 or bribe them to bear false testimony. 
 
 No official reply to my note had been received from 
 the foreign office when the minister of foreign affairs 
 
 386 
 
and the diplomatic corps met the United States lega- 
 tion at Djafferabad at breakfast. Of course no allusion 
 was made openly to the question at issue. But several of 
 the foreign envoys said to me privately that they were 
 read}' to back me in my demands, as the affair practically 
 concerned the prestige and standing of all the legations at 
 Teheran. 
 
 After the guests had left I despatched our drago- 
 mmu Mr. Keiin, to the English minister, the dean of the 
 diplomatic corps at the time, to ask how far I should be 
 justified in forcing this business on the attention of the 
 Persian government. He replied that there was only one 
 course to take, if I felt strong enough, in the backing of 
 my own government, to carry out the plan consistently, 
 otherwise it would have to be transferred to Washington. 
 I knew full well what the latter implied. I was not al- 
 lowed a cipher like the other legations. A long telegraph 
 message would not be approved, and a short one would not 
 answer. If I depended on the mails, at least ninety days 
 would be probably required before reply. I seriously ques- 
 tioned too, whether any grit would be shown by the Home 
 department, and anyway the question by that time would 
 be cold, and past reviving. Hence, at the great risk of 
 failure and of being disallowed by the State department, 
 I determined on a manly, swift and decisive action, willing 
 to sacrifice myself in the cause of what I considered to 
 be manifest duty. On the other hand, if I succeeded, I 
 knew that it would help American influence and prestige 
 in Persia. 
 
 Immediately on Mr. Keiin's return from the British 
 legation, therefore, I sent word to the minister of for- 
 eign affairs that the I^ited States dragoman desired to 
 call on him, and asked him to name the hour. Reply was 
 
 387 
 
received that the mmister was asleep and could not be 
 disturbed. 
 
 Mr. Keiin, after a second attempt with a similar result, 
 was now directed to go to the house of the minister of 
 foreign affairs himself, and ask to be admitted. If he 
 was refused, then he was to send in word that I should at 
 once haul down the United States flag. Mahmood Khan 
 ordered Mr. Keiin to be shown into the reception room. 
 
 "Your Excellency," said Mr. Keiin, "has been long 
 enough connected with state aifairs and diplomatic life to 
 understand that this is not an ordinary case. On the con- 
 trary, it is one of those cases which do not permit long 
 investigations nor evasions, but requires prompt and 
 adequate adjustment." 
 
 "That is what you say," replied the minister. "But 
 we have to make inquiries ; find out the offenders. How do 
 you expect us to punish our people without carefully 
 looking at all the facts.^" 
 
 "Your Excellency," replied Mr. Keiin, "the word of 
 the United States minister is at issue in your remarks. 
 He says he was attacked by government troops ; the af- 
 fair occurred in broad daylight on a public highway, and, 
 as if to aggravate it, his daughter was with him and might 
 have lost her life in the melee." 
 
 "What do you want.f"" said Mahmood Khan. 
 
 "I am instructed to say to your Excellency that we 
 shall be satisfied if, first, we have a written apology from 
 the foreign office; and second, if the men, including their 
 captain, who made the attack are punished in the pres- 
 ence of a member of the United States legation ; and, 
 third, if the colonel of the guards comes to the legation 
 and apologizes to the minister in person ; and fourth, if a 
 
 388 
 
member of the Cabinet comes to the legation and offers the 
 personal regrets of His Majesty the Shah." 
 
 "I will speak to His Majesty about this. I will report 
 the conditions you suggest, and will reply in due time," 
 said the minister. 
 
 "But, your Excellency, I am instructed to add that it 
 is now over forty hours since my minister sent his note, 
 and no official reply has as yet been received. I am there- 
 fore instructed to add, that if we do not have satisfac- 
 tion in thirty-six hours, the minister will haul down his 
 flag." 
 
 "Thirty-six hours ! Haul down the flag ! What do you 
 mean by that.''" gasped Mahmood Khan. 
 
 "Your Excellency," replied the dragoman, "is too well 
 versed in diplomacy to require an explanation of these 
 phases. It means if his request is not granted, the Ameri- 
 can minister intends to cease diplomatic relations." 
 
 At eleven o'clock A. M. I received a formal call from 
 the Sani-e-Dowleh, a member of the Cabinet, as minis- 
 ter of the Press, who stated that he had been ordered by 
 the Shall to call on me and express personally the regrets 
 of His Majesty, for the untoward incident of the 12th. 
 inst., and to ask me what were precisely my terms. I re- 
 plied, a written apology from the foreign ofiice, the pun- 
 ishment of the men who attacked me, including their cap- 
 tain and an apology in person from the commander of the 
 Corps of Imperial Guards. In the evening came a quaint, 
 pleasantly couched note from the minister of foreign 
 affairs conveying the regret of His Majesty and his 
 Cabinet. In this note he requested our moonshee to visit 
 him on the following day and arrange for the punishment 
 of the offending guards. I would have been glad to have 
 
 389 
 
omitted this ceremony altogether, If they had not acted 
 contrary to their Intelligence and Information. 
 
 At nine the following morning Asker Khan was sent for 
 from the palace with two of the men who were with me on 
 the day of the attack. Five of the guards and their cap- 
 tain were then bastinadoed in presence of Asker Khan and 
 my men, but this was done very lightly, according to my 
 orders. 
 
 On the following afternoon an officer ranking as major, 
 who was Shah Gada or scion of blood royal, called at the 
 legation, personally to apologize for the troops, and to 
 deprecate any further displeasure on my part. I received 
 him standing, accepted his apology, and ordered him a 
 cup of tea. 
 
 The following day I called on Mahmood Khan, the 
 minister of foreign affairs, and acknowledged my per- 
 sonal and official satisfaction with the way that my rep- 
 resentations had been met. In the afternoon I further 
 acknowledged by letter the receipt of the note of apology, 
 and reiterated the gratification of my government with 
 the high cordiality shown by His Majesty, Nasr ed-Deen 
 Shah, In the settlement of the question. This closed the 
 incident. 
 
 The United States government highly approved, but did 
 not yet offer me a separate mail pouch, as In the case of 
 other legations at Teheran. Several times I availed myself 
 of the courtesy of the British minister to send Important 
 despatches by his official courier ; but, of course, I could 
 only avail myself of this privilege, on unusual occasions. 
 
 The results In this affair of the Guards soon became 
 apparent. I was given to understand that the standing 
 of the entire diplomatic corps at Teheran had been ad- 
 
 390 
 
vanced by our action on this occasion. Our own aifairs 
 at the court certainly moved with less friction. Invita- 
 tions to A'isit the ladies at the Royal Anderoon were re- 
 peatedly extended to my family and official audiences for 
 the transaction of important questions were readily grant- 
 ed. Instead of displaying any coldness, Nasr-ed-Deen 
 Shah was, if possible, more affable and confidential than 
 ever before. 
 
 The disturbances at Hamadan, which had been now 
 quiescent for ten months, having broken out again I laid 
 the matter before His Majesty directly, and immedia^te 
 and stringent orders were given in my presence that tran- 
 quility should be restored at once. When the term Hake- 
 man is employed as in this case, in a royal mandate, it is 
 final, and he who trifles with it imperils his head What 
 was greatly to my satisfaction was that Mirza Achmet, 
 the arch instrument of mischief, was dismissed, and the 
 money owing to the missionaries was now paitl by the 
 Shahee. 
 
 The effect of this memorable visit was immediately ap- 
 parent. Orders were sent without the usual delays. Our 
 citizens were put in possession of their property, the gover- 
 nor of the district was recalled, the iltisames were given 
 back, and the poor landlord who had already been flogged 
 on the soles of his feet for letting the property to Ameri- 
 cans, was forced to apologize for doing what he had been 
 punished for, and to declare that he had been born in an un- 
 lucky hour. Another affair was terminated satisfac- 
 torily within five weeks from the time complaint was first 
 made. The missionaries of Oroomieh were so pleased that 
 they honored me with a special vote of thanks for efficient 
 action. 
 
 391 
 
It is worthy of observation here that during these and 
 other transactions with the Persian government the re- 
 lations between Nasr-e-Deen and 'his cabinet and the 
 first minister of the United States were not only friendly 
 but cordial and continued so during my entire stay in 
 Persia; notwithstanding that I was sometimes obliged to 
 proceed with considerable earnestness. I think this was 
 due in part to our having no aggressive aims there, no am- 
 bitions beyond establishing trade, protecting Americans, 
 and extending our influence. 
 
 One of the most interesting features of official life at 
 Teheran was the diplomatic entertainments between the 
 legations at which Persians of distinction often sat down 
 with Europeans. 
 
 One of the most important entertainments it was my 
 fortune to give at the legation, was one at which some of 
 the highest dignitaries of the realm were present, and only 
 one European besides the host. After sending out the in- 
 vitations I became aware that I had a very difficult prob- 
 lem before me. Each one must be awarded his seat exactly 
 in accordance with his official rank. The Persian court 
 is one of the most punctilious in the world. I resolved to 
 take advice of a very astute and prominent dignitary of 
 the court who, being confined to his room was unable to 
 attend the dinner. My moonshee called on him with my 
 compliments and laid the matter before him. 
 
 "I do not wonder the minister hesitates in arranging 
 these plans. Even I, may make a mistake. Therefore, if 
 I help you I must have your positive assurance, on no 
 account must my name be mixed up with the business." 
 He then gave himself to the task, which he declared to be 
 equal to a deep game of chess. 
 
 392 
 
It is almost needless to say that the banquet passed off 
 without a single hitch. The lantern which glowed on the 
 top of our flagstaff gleamed till a late hour. "How did your 
 minister manage to seat us all so suitably to our indi- 
 vidual rank.f"' inquired one of the guests. Asker Khan re- 
 plied with a mysterious smile, "Our minister is equal to 
 the occasion." 
 
 Apropos of this subject of entertaining and the social 
 life at Teheran I must say here, that the ministers gave 
 dinners, banquets, musicales, every week or so. I am re- 
 minded here also of a unique dinner given to myself and 
 family, by Nasiri Dowleh, son-in-law of His Majesty 
 Nasr-ed-Deen Shah. As it was given by orders of the 
 King, he was practically our host, although not himself 
 visible on that occasion. The entertainment was in every 
 respect in the native style except that instead of being 
 served on the embroidered rugs, spread on the floor and 
 backed by cushions, according to Persian custom, we sat 
 around the table, which was in the carved and decorated 
 banqueting apartment. Everything was according to the 
 sumptuous style practiced in Persia for ages. The var- 
 ious dishes laid before us, roasts, entremets, soups, sweets 
 and cordials served on the rarest of china and gold, were 
 superb. But the most interesting incident of this enter- 
 tainment, was the fact that His Majesty and his favorite 
 wife and attendants were witnesses of the scene, observ- 
 ing us through carved lattice screens in the gallery. Oc- 
 casionally we heard low whispering, and after we returned 
 to the legation we were informed of the details of the 
 royal compliment by which the Shah had lionored the rep- 
 resentative of the United States. 
 
 393 
 
The United States legation during our second summer 
 in Persia was isolated by several miles from the other 
 legations, and, if I remember rightly Ave were the only 
 foreigners passing the summer at Djafferabad. But for 
 the fact that the minister of foreign affairs also had his 
 place at that village we should have been without any val- 
 uable protection at our summer home. 
 
 The grounds of the legation were quite extensive. They 
 were enclosed by a wall. The cluster of graceful adobe 
 buildings decorated with porticoes of gatch or plaster of 
 paris stood near the center on the two upper terraces, 
 three in all. They were approached from the main en- 
 trance through a winding avenue of chenars trimmed to re- 
 semble large poplars. Ranks of the same trees were ar- 
 ranged in platoons at the rear of the buildings. Behind 
 these, rose the grand precipices of the Elburz mountains 
 to a height of 13,000 feet. The water used for irrigation 
 ran in stone channels through the terraces filling several 
 large circular tanks, in the center of which were spouts 
 that tossed the water in silvery clouds of cooling spray. 
 This artificial stream finally coursed under our dining- 
 room, and emerged beneath the windows in a cascade that 
 carried the water to the adjoining grounds. Our living 
 rooms were around this court connected by a private way. 
 
 The pavilion assigned to the business of the legation in 
 summer, stood alone with its row of white pillars on the 
 highest terrace. From our porches we could look for 
 fifty or sixty miles over and beyond the city of Teheran 
 and the vast plateau reaching through haze and mirage two 
 hundred leagues to the Persian Gulf. 
 
 During the day the southwest breeze, like a trade wind, 
 soughed in the groves that waved majestically around us. 
 
 394 
 
At night the moon in cloudless sky bathed the white build- 
 ings in light, and the scene was like fairy land. Then the 
 winds slept, and the nightingales began their delicious 
 improvisations, and throughout the night continued tlie 
 chorus of liquid song. The name of the place was Arajeb 
 but we liked to call it Nightingale Park. 
 
 Amid the entrancing delights of this seemingly ideal 
 Persian home we were constrained sometimes to feel our 
 loneliness, and the necessity of ever keeping on the alert. 
 ^ly guards received the password regularly every evening, 
 and were distributed at the main gate and on the upper 
 terrace, and a sentry stood guard from sunset to sunrise. 
 No one after dark could pass in or out without the watch- 
 word, which, of course was changed every evening. It 
 happened several times that visitors who had forgotten to 
 get the password on taking leave failed to pass the sentry 
 until they had returned to quarters and freshened their 
 memory. 
 
 Several weeks after the exciting affair with the royal 
 guards, a swift messenger came to me one morning soon 
 after I had taken my coffee. He was sent to me by Mr. 
 Keiin, our dragoman, avIio, during the summer lived in a 
 separate house a little distance from Arajeb, and hap- 
 pened to be ill in bed at the time. The messenger stated 
 that ^Ir. Keiin's servant, in a quarrel with a neighbor, an 
 aged peasant, had perhaps broken his arm and otherwise 
 injured the aged husbandman. Infuriated by this oc- 
 currence, and without stopping to look at the right of the 
 case, but thirsting for vengeance against Christian for- 
 eigners, a mob of the Persian villagers was about to at- 
 tack the United States legation, and I must lose no time to 
 take such precautions as were feasible for our preservation. 
 
 895 
 
I knew, from what had happened to poor Embajadayoff 
 and his people, and to an Englishman and his family at a 
 more recent mobbing at Teheran what was likely to happen. 
 There is nothing more inflammable than a crowd of Per- 
 sian fanatics. 
 
 I ordered horses to be saddled at once for the ladies 
 and the maid, and directed Asker Khan and two of my 
 most trusty man to escort them, by a postern gate over 
 the hills to the British legation at Gulhek as soon as they 
 should hear the firing begin, but to defer starting until 
 then. At the same time I despatched a messenger to Mah- 
 mood Khan, the minister of foreign affairs, who lived in 
 summer at Djafferabad. Then I gave orders to my corpor- 
 al, to load all his muskets with ball and not to shrink from 
 using the bayonet. He and his men were to hold the gate, 
 but not fire until it was burst in. If overpowered, 
 they were to fall back, if possible, to the head of the 
 Avenue at the second terrace, where four .more men and 
 some of my servants were stationed to enfilade the avenue. 
 I took my place with the rest of the soldiers and servants 
 at the legation ofiice, which commanded the third terrace, 
 like a citadel. 
 
 The military guard, of course had their own arms, aside 
 from these I had two rifles including a Spencer repeating 
 rifle, several muskets, scimitars and revolvers, and man- 
 aged with these to arm the servants, keeping for my own a 
 Smith and Wesson 35 calibre repeater. The courage and 
 fidelity of some of the servants was doubtful ; but four or 
 five of them I could depend on to the last drop ; these men 
 I retained with me. The soldiers I trusted, because they 
 were trained soldiers. I had treated them well, and they 
 had already stated that they would stand firm except in 
 
 896 
 
the single event, that Hadji Mollah Allee, should order 
 them directly to slay us. But there was nothing to dread 
 from that quarter at that time. 
 
 The mob could be heard approaching towards the main 
 entrance with howls and yells. The shrill voices of women 
 were distinguished mingling with the general din, which 
 was a bad sign. Man in a state of rage may sometimes be 
 amenable to reason. But when, throwing aside the reserve 
 of their sex, women join their fury to that of the men, it 
 is like pouring oil on fire, and it is hard indeed then to ex- 
 tinguish it. 
 
 Several scores of 3'elling men and women at last surged 
 against the legation gate. Strong as it was, it could not 
 have resisted long when Mahmood Khan, the minister of 
 foreign affairs, appeared on the scene, almost breathless, 
 and moved to the last degree by the urgency of the situa- 
 tion. He, at least, had not forgotten the affair of the 
 Royal Guards, and did not propose that his country 
 should be embarrassed and humiliated by any more vio- 
 lence against the Diplomatic Corps. 
 
 Pushing among the howling crowd with his attendants, 
 the minister with threats, expostulations, entreaties and 
 commands, and promising to care for the wounded man, 
 urged the people to disperse, and go home. Reluctantly 
 they scattered with deep mutterings, and in half an hour, 
 all was quiet again about the legation. Mahmond Khan 
 ordered a doctor to prescribe for the broken arm ; I also 
 sent a present of money, which, to a Persian is balm in- 
 deed ; and the trouble was heard of no more. Although it 
 had proved a flash in the pan, it had come too unpleasant- 
 ly near to be agreeable. 
 
 397 
 
I had not been well, for some weeks, and to the excite- 
 ment and anxiety of the last attack by natives, was due 
 perhaps a rather serious return of illness, which necessi- 
 tated a complete change and more bracing air. 
 
 Dr. Porter, a good missionary friend, offered to go with 
 me to the Lar Valley high up on the side of Mt. Demavend. 
 In the defile of Hivanikeff I was very ill, and we stopped 
 at a picturesque village overlooking the amazingly dense, 
 continuous forests of the Caspian-skirted province of 
 Mazanderan, and sent him in search of a native doctor. He 
 proved to be a tall, handsome, intelligent, itinerant Jew. 
 Following the custom of his people when practicing in 
 Asia, he would not directly prescribe for men of rank and 
 power; accordingly he sent my servant to a small country 
 grocery in the neighborhood to buy the needed drugs 
 himself. These he ordered to be ground and mixed or 
 boiled, as the case might be, in my presence, which was 
 indispensable. Thus this canny doctor reduced the dan- 
 gers to which he might be exposed in case the patient 
 should die on his hands. 
 
 The Valley of the Lar is a magnificent volcanic depres- 
 sion forming the floor of the vast crater of Mount De- 
 mavend. It is over 10,000 feet above the sea. A deep, 
 mysterious stream winds across the turfy plain, surround- 
 ed by the walls of the crater rising some 2,000 feet high- 
 er. At one end of this great crater rises the snow clad, 
 cone-shaped peak, 9,000 feet above the crater, altogether 
 one of the noblest examples of volcanic scenery the world 
 can show. 
 
 There I pitched my tent and sent a courier to Djaff era- 
 bad for my despatches and to inform my family of my 
 welfare. Travelling hard by direct line across the moun- 
 
 398 
 
tain paths he reached the legation after twenty-four hours 
 of steady travelHng. As soon as Mrs. Benjamin heard of 
 my ilhiess, her imagination took alarm, and she resolved 
 to come up to the Lar at once, without an hour's delay, a 
 hazardous enterprise under the circumstances, and which 
 I could not have permitted for a moment, if I had known 
 of her intentions in time to prevent it. The journey was a 
 desperate undertaking under any circumstances, but es- 
 pecially for a woman, and in summer, as little travelling is 
 done by daylight in Persia during the season, over the 
 wild, lonely mountains of stern Sierras, safe only with suf- 
 ficient escort, whether by day or night. 
 
 Fortunately Mr. Keiin, our capable drogoman, was 
 sufficiently recovered in health to accompany them and 
 they also took the Nestorian maid, Salbee. The advantage 
 of keeping a number of horses was now manifest. To hire 
 good animals on short notice is not easy in Persia, es- 
 pecially if one happens to be distant from the city. My 
 wdfe and daughter had each a saddle horse, and both were 
 fearless riders. 
 
 Soon after four P. ]M. they started for the Lar with Mr. 
 Keiin, tw^o soldiers, and three servants including the maid, 
 and three extra horses carrying bedding and luggage. 
 They were accompanied by Madoc, our magnificent Bac- 
 tiari hound, the finest dog in Persia, large, handsome and 
 fierce, but intelligent, affectionate and faithful as ever a 
 living being could be. He served admirably as a scout. 
 The party took a more direct but more broken and arduous 
 path than the one usually followed in going to the Lar, 
 the one taken tliat very day by my messenger. It was 
 devious, often along the edge of frightful precipices, and 
 often so narrow they had to turn aside and wait for the 
 
 399 
 26 
 
caravans to pass. These consisted, for the most part, of 
 long, slow trains of mules laden with coal or rice from 
 the Caspian provinces. They were driven by rough moun- 
 taineers, who had no character to lose, and incurred little 
 risk in picking a quarrel with wayfarers, or robbing or 
 murdering them. 
 
 At one place the party, descrying a group of these des- 
 peradoes approaching them in the gloom, had just time 
 to dismount and conceal themselves in a dark cleft. At 
 another place they wandered from the right path and had 
 to retrace their steps, not without difficulty. At length, 
 to their great relief, daylight began to dawn over the 
 mountain peaks, and they were able to stop by a rivulet 
 in a ravine and snatch a light breakfast. About five o'clock 
 in the afternoon I was struck with amazement to see my 
 wife and daughter ride up in front of my tent where I was 
 quietly sketching. I must say I was greatly overcome by 
 this example of domestic affection. My second thought 
 was, that they must suffer ill consequences from such sud- 
 den exertion and exposure. It was indeed a relief to me 
 when I found that the stimulus of the pure mountain 
 air of the Lar had restored their energies. I ought to 
 add here that throughout our entire residence in Persia, 
 whatever the circumstances, these ladies never displayed 
 any weakness or timidity. 
 
 We remained a fortnight in that unique retreat. The 
 French minister, M. Balloy, also had his tent there, and 
 was enjoying a rest from official duties. We met often 
 and passed our evenings together around "the walnuts 
 and the wine." Altogether, I am convinced there is 
 nowhere in the world a more romantic spot for resting the 
 nerves and the brain than the Valley of Lar. 
 
 400 
 
As soon as possible after arriving at Teheran I set 
 about preparing a code for the direction of purely con- 
 sular duties such as arise in conflicts either between 
 American citizens and the people of the country, or be- 
 tween our citizens alone. In some cases mixed cases might 
 occur in which the intervention of the minister brought 
 such cases within the diplomatic supervision of the minis- 
 ter himself. Being at once the head of both of these 
 departments of executive effort as charge d' affaires, 
 minister and consul general, my duties brought all these 
 offices under my supervision during my mission to Persia. 
 
 As the customs and conditions vary, more or less, in 
 Oriental countries, each United States legation had a code 
 of its own, prepared for special conditions. The code 
 which I drew up by direction of the department, and 
 which was approved by the attorney general at Wash- 
 ington, was made as simple as possible. 
 
 I was none too soon in preparing this document. I had 
 been awaiting a summons from the Russian minister, M. 
 Melnikoff. It was characteristic and breezy when it came, 
 Russia's usual aggressive manner in dealing with Asiatic 
 peoples. The business was sufficiently important as it 
 was a test case that would settle the whole question of land 
 titles held by all foreign subjects and citizens holding 
 realty in Persia. As their number was increasing, the 
 principles involved were also gaining in importance pro- 
 portionately as Russia was steadily straining every 
 nerve to increase her influence in Persia. 
 
 So far as I was concerned in the case I entered into 
 the business with a certain zest because for many years 
 I had been brought into contact with many of the races 
 of the Levant, including the Russians, all to a degree 
 
 401 
 
distinct, yet all combining, to form a species of pictorial 
 design different from that of the Anglo-Saxon race com- 
 bination, and perhaps more interesting and picturesque, 
 with virtues of its own, and sins as well. 
 
 The case of Nazarhekoff v. Bassett well illustiated this 
 fact, involving from first to last, Armenians, Persians, 
 Russians, English, Afghans, Americans, Austro-Hungari- 
 ans, French, Turks, and Dutch from its inception to its 
 final close. Apparently an ordinary suit at law, it really 
 determined the position in Persia of a great international 
 problem or principle. It began with the transfer of a 
 certain parcel of land within the walls of Teheran, alleged 
 by James Bassett, an American citizen, to have been 
 bought by him from an Armenian widow named Otanes, 
 a Persian subject, for which he paid in coin, the amount 
 agreed upon by the said contracting parties. 
 
 Thus far all had proceeded according to the laws of 
 Persia as established with sundry amendments and com- 
 mentaries based on the Koranic laws, and practiced with- 
 out question for many centuries. 
 
 Subsequently a firm of Russo-Armenian merchants, 
 Nazarbekoff by name, and subjects of Russia, laid claim 
 that they had purchased the aforesaid land directly from 
 Otanes, late husband of said Perso-Armenian widow, and 
 that the Bassett claim and title were null and void. Here 
 the hand of Russia first appeared as the protector of 
 the claims of the Nazarbekoff litigants. 
 
 To make a long story short, there being at the time 
 the case was first opened, no American minister in Persia 
 Mr. Bassett took his papers to the English legation, who 
 after looking into the claims of the Russian decided 
 several of the documents produced, were spurious, and de- 
 
 402 
 
clincd to accept the decision in fcavor of the Russian. All 
 papers in the still unsettled case were turned over to me 
 soon after my arrival, and I advised Mr. Bassett to 
 throw up a wall around the premises in question, and I 
 sent a soldier to keep out all intruders. This action 
 brought a sharp note from ^l. Mclnikoff virtually ordering 
 us off the land of his Russian client. I replied in suitable 
 terms, wherein he could read between the lines that it 
 might be some time before his client would possess the 
 coveted land. In short, he finally consented, after much 
 manoeuvring, to submit the case to a board of referees. 
 
 It shows the arrogant methods of Russia, that the 
 minister at Teheran should have given judgment in this 
 case without at least serving notice on Mr. Bassett ; for, 
 of course, without his being himself present or represented 
 by his deputy to show cause, the judgment must necessari- 
 ly be without binding force, unless after a long period 
 in very exceptional cases. But the Russians gave this no 
 attention. I insisted that the case could not be submitted 
 until the validity of all the documents was finally proven. 
 This statement from the American minister was a stun- 
 ning blow to the plea of the plaintiff, and I had insisted 
 the case should be tried in a consular court according to 
 usage in countries where principles of extra-territoriality 
 prevailed — this of course implied a trial in United States 
 premises. 
 
 The Russians then objected to Persian law, and for 
 many weeks endeavored to get me to sul)mit the case to 
 European law, but I was firm that land titles in Persia 
 must be decided by the laws of Persia. This case was 
 finally decided in our favor in all points. 
 
 403 
 
The purposes of Russia in Asia are cool, long headed, 
 determined, and nothing is too small or insignificant to 
 hold her attention if it compromises her plans, while it 
 is of no consequence how great it is, if it does not affect 
 her designs. Religion has something to do with her per- 
 tinacity, but ambition, a certain ceaseless yearning to 
 round out the empire she has planned for ages back, is 
 behind all her movements. For these reasons an American 
 legation in Persia, and groups of active missionaries 
 disseminating religious and economic influence and in- 
 struction in the heart of Asia, Russia thinks needs watch- 
 ing. It is needless to go into all the facts, I did some 
 watching in turn and was not wholly ignorant of what was 
 going on. It is to a degree permissible and expected 
 that a diplomatic official should keep his eyes open and 
 learn all he can. Miquefort has pertinently said, "An 
 ambassador is a distinguished spy, who is under the pro- 
 tection of the law of nations." 
 
 I knew we were under keen, ever wide open ocular 
 and auricular observation in Persia. Such espionage in 
 Turkey is less important now owing to a change in con- 
 ditions. 
 
 Except 'for this Bassett trial and the minister's rather 
 humiliating defeat, our relations with the Russian legation 
 were always cordial and gratifying, adding distinctly to 
 the interest of our Persian life. As for example, we were 
 invited to attend with the minister's family, Sunday ser- 
 vices of the Greek Church in their private chapel, with 
 a charming dinner afterward at the legation. 
 
 We enjoyed more than once their abundant hospitality, 
 their appetizing zakoushkas and generous board. I con- 
 fess that these great, massive blue-eyed rulers of men, 
 
 404 
 
and all the splendor of their stately autocratic bearing, 
 had a wonderful attraction. I accepted their professions 
 of friendship whether sly or sincere, and greatly enjoyed 
 their boisterous, open-hearted hilarity, their bursts of 
 effusive geniality — (often followed by sudden explosions 
 of rage). 
 
 An effective expression of the essence of my observation 
 of Russian ideas is found in the words of Lev Vassilie- 
 vitch, repeated with naive simplicity and sincerity and 
 yet, to one who is not a Russian, an expression of the most 
 appalling sarcasm ever put in print. It is simply impos- 
 sible for one to express the sincerity, at least, of the au- 
 thor of such language. "Voila," says he, "voila les £jar- 
 diens armes (the cossacks) qui portent haut-la-bas notre 
 
 drapeau toujours pacifique car pour Les Vassilie- 
 
 vitch les guerres Russes sont tellement chretiennes, telle- 
 ment nationales, tellement Russes enfin, qu' elles ont en- 
 core la caractere de la paix." 
 
 The population of Teheran is estimated at upwards of 
 200,000. One gets a sense of isolation as one approaches 
 over the vast sand-plains that surround the capital and 
 sees the extensive fortified walls that hem it in, but pass- 
 ing through the lofty gates covered with the resplendant 
 glazed tiles for wliich Persia is so famous, the surprise is 
 great. Xo monotonous blocks as in most cities, but charm- 
 ing gardens, sumptuous foliage, until one reaches the heart 
 of the great city. 
 
 Outside the gates there are at a little distance, charm- 
 ing villas surrounded by large grounds, among them that 
 of the Sayed Azem, who married a French widow (who had 
 been governess in his family) at the .suggestion of his first 
 wife, who wished to help her. Some ingratitude followed 
 
 405 
 
on the part of the French woman, who aspired to be chief 
 wife, and she was afterward relegated to a subordinate 
 place. If Persian men may have relations with Chris- 
 tian women, this is not a privilige allowed to both sexes. 
 No Christian of any nation shall intermarry with a 
 Mohammedan woman in Persia, or have anything to do 
 with them, at the peril of their lives. A Frenchman whom 
 I knew well, had a love affair with a Persian woman of low 
 rank, and through indiscretion forgot the law of the land. 
 They were found out, and a mob arose like a spring-tide 
 and storming the premises where they were meeting, 
 slaughtered the unfortunate woman, the lover dropping 
 over the wall into a neighbor's yard, reached a mosque 
 before the howling mob, and turned Musselman on the 
 spot, and was duly circumsized. 
 
 The great qualities of the Turk are shown in executive 
 and military matters, and these finer traits are at their 
 best, when not mingled with Christian blood ; but these 
 nobler qualities of Turkish race run in narrow channels 
 for the most part. The Ottoman learns from observation 
 and is not a great student or a conversationalist. He 
 impresses one more by a certain stolid dignity than by 
 what he says. 
 
 With the Persian it is quite otherwise. He is versatile, 
 mercurial in manner, brilliant in conversation, and ready 
 to impart any information of interest he has won — some- 
 times with considerable added color. 
 
 I had special advantages at Teheran in studying the 
 character of the people, as well as the ancient arts and 
 literature of the country, and through previous residence 
 and journey ings in the East, I was able to get at the true 
 inwardness of the very complex abilities and character 
 
 406 
 
of the Perso-Aryan races. It is a great field for the study 
 of the etlmologist, tlie artist, the philosopher, and the 
 archaeologist. I know of no Asiatic people that offer 
 such a store of racial problems. 
 
 A study of the Persian today will enable us better to 
 understand the man of 2,000 years ago. If you would 
 know the character of Greeks who fought before Troy, 
 study the Greeks of today. They lack the stupendous 
 genius or the opportunity to call it forth, but the general 
 essentials of character are the same. 
 
 Among other interesting men I met in Persia were the 
 Parsees, or original Fireworshippers, of whom some twenty 
 or thirty thousand still remain in the land of Iran. They, 
 with the Parsees of Bombay, form an active and most in- 
 telligent body of men. Their "Towers of Silence" or 
 burial places are sometimes passed in Persia, and are 
 gruesome enough. They still preserve intact, the cult of 
 Zoroaster, as indicated by ^Moore's Lalla Rookh. The Sect 
 of Babis, now called Bahaists, were in an interesting stage 
 of their progress and numbered I was told, already several 
 hundred thousand in Persia and elsewhere. In Teheran 
 they had to push their work with great circumspection, 
 and I could not officially meet them, although I would 
 gladly have talked with their leaders. They were con- 
 sidered "a politico-religious body" although they claimed 
 in Persia to be wholly devoted to religion and morals 
 founded on Islamism. 
 
 Civil and political principles were held by Persian of- 
 ficials to be at the basis of the movement, which had reached 
 such a momentum that it was thought to be a menace to the 
 theocratic government of Mohanmiedan peoples. On one 
 occasion I was invited to visit the president of the Persian 
 
 407 
 
board of trade, and on arriving was ushered into an 
 exquisite kiosk supported by light groups of saracenic 
 arches and pillars, and walls faced with floral designs 
 of glazed tiles. The vaulted ceiling was azure, picked out 
 with gilded stars, and in the centre of the marble floor 
 was a deep tank shaped like a star, whose facets spouted 
 silver rain with tinkling music. It was altogether one of 
 the most beautiful and superb examples of decorative art 
 it has been my good fortune to behold. It seemed to 
 me that if one would knoAV of what manner were the 
 charms of the famous gardens which the great king 
 erected on the hanging gardens of Babylon he w^ould 
 only need to look at the grounds and pavilion of which I 
 have endeavored to give a faint description in these pages. 
 
 The dignitary who stepped forward to meet me with 
 two or three attendants or companions was every way 
 fitted to be the proprietor of this abode of pleasantness. 
 He was six feet tall, in the prime of life, and every inch 
 a Persian of the purest stock. His complexion was hrun 
 and ruddy, his eyes flashed fire, and his flowing black 
 beard slightly tinged with henna, was carefully barbered 
 and combed smoothly as silk. His dress was Oriental to 
 the last detail, also entirely of silk sumptuously em- 
 broidered and reaching to the floor. His manner was that 
 of an emperor, and as of one so sure of his worth and 
 position he could condescend without yielding an iota of 
 his place and power. 
 
 Of course at the outset of the visit conversation was 
 formal and ceremonious. But after the first refreshments 
 had been served and the pipes filled with the most fragrant 
 tobacco of the East, my host began to display the opulent 
 versatility of his fancy and intelligence, and that mer- 
 
 408 
 
curial warmth and culture for which Persians are noted 
 beyond all men of the East, and then whatever subject 
 was touched upon was sure to suggest an opportunity 
 for displaying his talents. 
 
 First we touched on matters of fact, and he held us by 
 the excellent sense he showed in discussing with due 
 prudence civic and political questions, public resources, 
 and the like. Gradually we passed to matters more purely 
 conversational, and here again I found him a master or 
 at least a clear thinker on Avhatever subject was brought 
 forth, with a keen eye for matters at home and abroad. 
 Then we passed to wit and humor and repartee, and then 
 to art and poetry. He was equally ready in passing from 
 one topic to the other, and seemed to be especially on 
 his native heather when he repeated folk lore or quotations 
 from the great poets that have adorned the literature of 
 Persia. 
 
 The fact that most deeply impressed me during this 
 visit, was the enormous difference between the business 
 men or financeers of central Asia, especially Persia, and 
 those of America. 
 
 409 
 
CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 HOMEWARD BOUND. 
 
 When the result of our November elections reached 
 Persia, and the Democratic party came into power, I 
 knew as an ardent Republican my days in Persia were 
 ended, and I wrote out my "resignation" and began to 
 make preparations to turn my face westward. 
 
 The years had been full of interest in many respects 
 to us all, but in a way we had skimmed the cream, and as 
 we began to think of home interests, we were on the whole 
 glad to go. 
 
 One of my last official duties was to take leave of His 
 Majesty, Nasr-ed-Deen Shah and the chief officials of the 
 Court. Nothing could exceed the kindness and affability 
 shown to us. His Majesty had already sent word by one 
 of his cabinet to suggest that, if any word of the king 
 could avail to extend my residence in Persia, he would 
 gladly use his influence at Washington, and I could rely 
 on him. He also requested me to send a strong message 
 of amity to the President. His favorite wife also sent 
 her best wishes and bon voyage to Mrs. Benjamin with 
 very beautiful presents. 
 
 When on the point of leaving I was greatly surprised 
 and moved, to receive resolutions of thanks from out citi- 
 
 410 
 
zens in various parts of the realm, one of these I may be 
 permitted to quote here as an example of the rest. "The 
 following resolutions were unanimously adopted b}" Tab- 
 reeg Station of the Western Persia Mission, May 4th, 
 1885, and b}^ Rev. W. Whipple, Agent, American Bible 
 Society for Persia. 
 
 "Whereas we have learned with deep regret of the re- 
 call by our government of His Excellency S. G- W. Ben- 
 jamin, Minister of the United States to the Persian Court 
 therefore 
 
 Resolved, that we express our warmest thanks to Minis- 
 ter Benjamin for the promptness and efficiency which he 
 has always displayed in protecting our interests as Ameri- 
 can citizens and for the cordial sympathy with us and 
 with our work which he has ever shown. 
 
 Resolved, that we bespeak for ]Mr. Benjamin a career 
 of eminent success whether in public or in private life, 
 and that our progress will go with him and with his 
 family on their long journey home, that it may be a safe 
 and pleasant one, and that the Lord may abundantly 
 bless them in all their ways. 
 
 "(Signed) George A. Holmes, 
 
 "Sec'y pro tem." 
 
 The most affecting scene of our departure and one of 
 the most sorrowful in my life, was the parting from our 
 noble hound, Madoc. For weeks he had obsei-^'ed all our 
 movements, growing more restless and sad, as the fateful 
 day approached. He seemed to knoAv, poor fellow, what 
 was about to happen. Fain would we have taken him with 
 us. But it was impossible, owing to the long, circuitous 
 way home, and the uncertainty of our movements and 
 plans. There was one gleam of hope when he accompanied 
 
 411 
 
us out a few miles. But when he at last realized that the 
 moment of eternal farew^ell had come, he coiled himself 
 in a corner with a look of indescribable despair in his 
 brown eyes. He seemed hardly to dare look at us, and 
 deep sighs came from him. I need not say that my family 
 were bathed in tears. 
 
 We learned afterward that for months the poor hound, 
 who had to be dragged with a chain back to Teheran, 
 haunted the legation, pacing slowly through each apart- 
 ment, looking in vain for those for whom he would have 
 sacrificed his life. Such a tragedy as this, I am free to con- 
 fess, seemed to me gratuitous injustice, and for the time 
 effaced all the Scriptures and philosophies. 
 
 Who shall explain the unexplainable anguish of a brute 
 creature, always faithful and true, and who may happen 
 to have the same susceptibilities as a human being? 
 
 Go to ; the more I see and know of life the more deeply 
 do I feel, that the chief, perhaps the only proof we have 
 of immortality hereafter, is the absolute necessity of an- 
 other existence to rights the wrongs of this. 
 
 My official calls on leaving my diplomatic post were 
 agreeable, and in some cases affecting. I found the Naib 
 Sultaneh attended by a large number of secretaries, seated 
 in rows on their heels with the paper and kalendans in 
 their hands. The minister of foreign affairs was very 
 cordial, and expressed much regret at our leaving. The 
 Prince asked me to write to him. I learned that the 
 English government had recently sold to the Persian 
 government a quantity of arms, which accounted for 
 recent reluctance of the Persians to buy arms from the 
 United States, as partly agreed upon. 
 
 412 
 
iNIy last call on the Mochir-i-Dowleh* was exceedingly 
 interesting, in his old residence, buried among the narrow, 
 but very picturesque streets of old Teheran. 
 
 These Persian dwellings are a complete surprise. 
 Enter, and you find a gorgeous and stately magnificence 
 beyond description. The hall where I was received, 
 looked upon an oranger}'^ on one side, and a wild wood of 
 foliage and flowers on the other. At each end was an im- 
 mense window, extending across the apartment, with in- 
 tricate mouldings, the upper part of stained glass, like 
 a cathedral window. All the furnishings were of the most 
 sumptuous character, and this in the very heart of a 
 large .and old city. 
 
 He had another establishment quite as sumptuous, I 
 was told — Persia must have wealth, certainly every Per- 
 sian city has men of wealth, culture and luxurious tastes. 
 We had some charming dinners given us, and it is 
 pleasant to feel we left Persia with no enemies. Even 
 the Russian minister, who had felt very much his de- 
 feat in the Bassett case, so as to make a decided cool- 
 ness in personal relations for awhile, called upon me 
 and in a most friendly way wished to have me forget 
 any previous action. He kissed me good-bye, it being 
 the custom in some countries for men to kiss. I had 
 a call from the leading Armenian Priest of the prov- 
 ince, who earnestly requested to see me before I left 
 Teheran. He said that all the Armenians would pray 
 for my welfare, and hope for my return here. My wife 
 and daughter were invited to luncheon at the palace to 
 meet the Countess Monteforte, and a day or two after, 
 the chief eunuch came again, bringing to ]Mrs. Benjamin 
 
 *Minister of Foreign Affairs. 
 413 
 
as a parting gift from the Anisa Dowleh, a ring of old 
 mine diamonds, consisting of a large, central solitaire 
 and several smaller ones, clustered about it. This favorite 
 wife of the king sent also a quantity of what are called 
 dombalen, which are very rare, found only near Ker- 
 manshah, and considered a great delicacy, to be had only 
 by the roj^al household. She invited my wife and daugh- 
 ter to a farewell dejiftne where the Shah himself came in, 
 and said a kindly good-bye. 
 
 When we left she requested her eunuch to buy for her, 
 the furniture of ]Mrs. Benjamin's sleeping room, and she 
 expressed a wish to hear from her by letter after her 
 return home. 
 
 The Anisa DoAvleh was a typical Oriental woman 
 of the higher order ; large, stout, of fine presence, very in- 
 telligent, without being cultivated in our sense. She loved 
 the Shah to whom she had been married twenty years, 
 with passionate devotion, and his tragic death so soon 
 after, must have been a terrible shock to her. Mirza Ali- 
 Kuli Khan says "womanhood is the heart of the body of 
 the nation ; manhood is the brain of the bod}^ of hu- 
 manity." 
 
 One of our last dinners was at the Turkish legation. 
 The Turkish minister being the dean of the diplomatic 
 corps — the English minister being next in rank. The de- 
 licious fruits of Persia were much in evidence, especially 
 the famous pomegranite, so luscious in taste and color. 
 
 I had an interesting semi-confidential talk with the 
 Russian minister before leaving Persia. He said that '"Rus- 
 sians had been like apes, until within the last thirty years, 
 imitating other nations and sensitive to foreign opinion ; 
 but now they were entering into a maturer period with a 
 
 414 
 
consciousness of being a great nation, with a great future, 
 and thej proposed to walk in their path to the great 
 destiny allotted to them, indifferent to foreign ideas and 
 approval." 
 
 "The universal howl now," he said, "was for constitu- 
 tional governments. Russia would be great and happy 
 with a paternal government." I replied that America also, 
 had passed the period of dependence, that since our civil 
 war we had learned the strength of union and a central 
 government and although Russia and the United States of 
 America were marching under entirely different organi- 
 zations we were at present the two governments that had 
 a Future, whose interests were not in collision. I asked 
 him what he thought of the prospects of a general Euro- 
 pean war before many years. "Russia is in a Avretched 
 financial condition now," he said, "beside, we are already 
 too much spread out, why add more territory.'^" "Then 
 your demonstration on the eastern frontier is a menace to 
 England, rather than any definite intention to declare 
 war," I said. "You wish perhaps to force her to make 
 concessions regarding Constantinople, and once such a 
 needed outlet obtained, your policy would doubtless cease 
 to be aggressive." The minister turned slowly, looked me 
 steadily in the eye as if to see how far I was in earnest, 
 and slightly bent his head, but refrained from making any 
 oral reply. 
 
 The Germans of Russia arc not yet identified with the 
 slavic race. The Poles are more highly strung than the 
 Russians, and they attained civilization earlier, and once 
 had an important history, and consider themselves superior 
 to Russians, declining to idenfify themselves with them. 
 
 415 
 27 
 
Our journey to the Caspian I shall never forget, the 
 second view of the wonderful mountain scenery between 
 Teheran and Resht, confirmed my first impressions of its 
 unique beauty. It possesses extraordinary richness and 
 variety. We took some of our native servants with us 
 for our overland trip, and our maid had insisted on ac- 
 companying the ladies to America. We tried to dissuade 
 her, but finding she had sold a cottage she owned, to fit 
 herself with funds to go, in case we would not take her, 
 we allowed her to begin the journey with us. Arriving at 
 Resht where we were to embark on a Russian steamer, 
 she became appalled at the sea trip, but was still de- 
 termined to go on. On arriving at Baku, where every- 
 thing is saturated with the odor of oil-wells she was some- 
 what disenchanted, but it remained for the sight and taste 
 of European bread to finally decide her to return to Per- 
 sia where she could find her much relished sangak or Per- 
 sian bread. "You eat that!" she said, looking at a loaf 
 of European baker's bread. I assured her we had no 
 other bread in our country. She was deeply depressed as 
 she weighed in the balance her love for us and the horror 
 of eating forever, the unpalatable wheaten mixture, but 
 she at any rate would go to the cars with us. Here was 
 another trial for her, we had taken two compartments at 
 the rear end of the car. "What !" she exclaimed, "a 
 vizier not have the whole car !" We tried to explain to 
 her that in America she would probably have only one 
 seat — altogether the disillusion was so complete, it took 
 but little persuading, to send her back to Teheran with 
 Ali and Hassan, our Persian attendants up to this point. 
 
 We embarked at Batoum for Odessa, intending to visit 
 the Russian summer-resort Yalta, where are the royal 
 
 416 
 
summer palaces and beautiful homes of the nobility. 
 Thence we passed on to Kertch, an old town, full of 
 unique antique carvings, marbles, hoary with age, some 
 of them built into the exterior of cheap, modern houses. 
 Longing to linger there we were obliged to proceed with 
 our steamer to Sebastopol. Heretofore through the 
 Crimea a high ridge of mountains had served as back- 
 ground, rising like a solid wall of masonry back of the 
 picturesque villages, but the mountains gradually became 
 lower and lower, until they disappeared in the plains be- 
 low. 
 
 I left my family at Vienna in the care of our ambassa- 
 dor, ]Mr, Francis, who with his good wife, made their stay 
 of many weeks as delightful as possible. 
 
 ^ly welcome home was a warm one, and almost as many 
 dinners were given me, as when I sailed. The Salamagundy 
 Club did not, however, this time, present the demijon of 
 "Scotch," which was to insure my health in Persia. Per- 
 haps they had heard reports from my secretary, of how 
 often and with what care this particular "parcel" had to 
 be examined en route to Persia by custom house officers, 
 until I was finally forced to have it carefully boxed. In 
 any event, New York was not malarious, what need of it ! 
 
 I found the settling down to old pursuits not so easy as 
 I supposed. Although nu' official life had not been many 
 years, I had formed habits of mind and effort so different 
 from any former life I had lived, I could never quite re- 
 turn to the same groove again. 
 
 I had been in Persia long enough I discovered, to de- 
 velop quite a taste for diplomatic life, and while the ex- 
 pense and precariousness of such position made me quite 
 determined never again to seek it, or even to accept, 
 if offered, still I missed it. 
 
 417 
 
I found my life in Persia had well nigh effaced my 
 formei' work in the memory of many, and although this 
 Avas advantageous for a time, giving me innumerable re- 
 quests to lecture and to write books and articles, still in 
 the end, it was an injury. 
 
 I became for the time authority on Oriental matters, 
 and was beseiged for articles on Persian art and other 
 kindred subjects. INIy Persia and the Persians, was 
 sought by two prominent American publishing houses. 
 I gave it to the one that made me the largest advance cash 
 offer: Ticknor & Co. (now Houghton and Mifflin) who 
 brought it out beautifully. John Murray also issued an 
 edition in England, where it was most favorably received 
 by the press. 
 
 My Story of Persia was published by Nevins in 
 London, and was translated into two of the East Indian 
 languages and published at Bombay. 
 
 I was about this time invited to resume my position 
 as Art-critic to the Evening Mail and Express, but 
 declined it. Innumerable invitations to write and lecture 
 came to me from different parts of the country. Chicker- 
 ing Hall, N. Y. was packed to hear a lecture on Persian 
 customs. 
 
 I published my Trans-Atlantic Railzvay, which 
 caused some sensation, and some of its suggestions I was 
 told, were afterwards seriously utilized by engineers. 
 
 My story We Tzco on an Island, came to me one 
 morning on awakening. I sat down to write after break- 
 fast, and wrote for two days Avith little interruptions, 
 and it went to press with scarce an alteration. When is- 
 sued in book form, it received much favorable comment, 
 even from such slow and cautious reviews as The Nation, 
 and others. 
 
 418 
 
]My friend, Richard Stoddard was much interested to 
 help me in many ways, and was a very genuine, kind- 
 hearted man. The Bowens, of the Independent . and ]\Irs. 
 Hannah Lamb, the talented editor of the Historical Maga- 
 zine, and our Sunday evenings at the Stedman's with the 
 delightful people met there all lend a charm to our mem- 
 ories of New York. 
 
 I wrote about this time a carefully prepared article 
 on the Nicaragua Canal, at the request of the company 
 in charge, who widely distributed it, and another article 
 was written by me for the U. S. Senate ; Why the govern- 
 ment suddenly decided on the Panama route as one of 
 the mysteries like that of the Man with the Iron Masque, 
 or the authorship of Junius. 
 
 The fate of the American Art Review is another ex- 
 ample of the fact that literary work of intrinsic merit 
 finds scant recognition in contrast with the magazines 
 of fiction, with important or sensational names, as con- 
 tributors. For example I have been offered prices., much 
 in advance of those paid for good articles, for a few lines 
 written by the Shah of Persia. About this time I bought 
 a pleasant and artistic home in New Brighton, Statcn 
 Island, said to have been built by the art editor of Har- 
 per^s for his own home. In the rear it overlooked the entire 
 New York harbor. Wo lived many years there very de- 
 lightfully, my wife identifying herself with work for 
 women and the "Woman's Club," of which she is still 
 an honorary member. 
 
 While on the Island I was elected President of the Re- 
 publican Club of Richmond County. I had been a strong 
 Republican since the fall of Sumter, but I had never 
 thought of such political office, and did not care for this, 
 
 4t9 
 
but was urged into accepting it. It was intimated to me 
 that Blaine had it under consideration to send me back 
 to Persia if I would approve the policy he proposed for 
 the investment of American capital in that country. I 
 did not approve it, and those who carried out his views 
 sank a pile of money. My experience as Republican lead- 
 er, leads me to express, if possible, more decidedly than 
 before, the importance of reducing the number of presi- 
 dential electors. I found some good Republicans who 
 were actuated by high principle and genuine patriotism, 
 and as for the horde of petty office seekers, the feuds and 
 jealousies found in political clubs! Well! the Democratic 
 party has even more. One can say of our political par- 
 ties what the Greek priest said of some milk he saw for 
 sale, "There is milk in it." 
 
 One of the interesting incidents of our life on Staten 
 Island was the frequent meeting with George W. Curtis 
 and family and William Winter whom we know quite well. 
 Mr. Curtis was a handsome man of fine presence and de- 
 lightful manners. He liked to talk, and was a great 
 favorite socially. 
 
 Another, was the entertaining in our home for two or 
 three weeks, of a Buddhist priest, whom my family met in 
 Chicago during the World's Fair. He had been sent as 
 delegate to represent the liberal Buddhism of Japan at 
 the Parliament of Religions, "Kinza Rieuge INIinamoto no 
 Yoshimasa Hirai," was one of the most delightful of 
 guests. A member of the old nobility, his family had for 
 twenty-two generations held exalted positions in Japan, 
 and his manners betokened the highest breeding. We gave 
 him a dinner, inviting Archdeacon Johnson of the Epis- 
 copal Church, Staten Island ; Dr. G. W. Birch, Presby- 
 
 420 
 
terian of New York City (moderator of the convention 
 that tried Dr. Briggs for heresy) ; Dr. Bowles, leader of 
 the Universalist Church of New York, and others, quite 
 a "Parliament of Religions" in miniature. 
 
 During these exceedingly busy years I entered into a 
 partnership with a well known professor of a well known 
 university, to prepare a concise, popular encyclopedia 
 on a novel plan. The enterprise dragged somewhat, as 
 we lived in separate towns, and the divided responsibility 
 became somewhat irksome as the literary strain of the 
 last few years began to tell on my health ; I decided to 
 sell out my rights and good will to him, which I did for a 
 good price. 
 
 This was a help to me at the time, as money advanced 
 to aid a family friend had brought on pecuniary diffi- 
 culties and debts which troubled me. I had been made 
 poorer by over $20,000 through my desire to aid others. 
 But my accumulated efforts and struggles finally brought 
 me to a point where changes and rest, became imperative. 
 A severe attack of acute bronchitis, complicated with 
 pneumonia, did not quite kill me, but it forced me to leave 
 the island, and eventually New York climate altogether. 
 
 We secured a charming place on Lake Champlain for 
 our summer home, and bought a house in Washington, 
 D. C. to live in winters. 
 
 Washington as a home, never specially appealed to me 
 except for the cosmopolitan atmosphere its social life 
 engendered. My wife had a delightful acquaintance there 
 and warm friends having passed so man}^ winters of her 
 life, in its official social circles. 
 
 There was little art interest to speak of, though a few 
 good artists. I had seen enough of political life in and 
 
 421 
 
about New York; and my experience as presiding officer 
 the year of the presidential election had quite satisfied 
 me with American politics. The capital city had there- 
 fore no attraction in that line ; it had, however^ a good 
 climate and good markets, and I needed a change and a 
 rest from thinking and working over much. 
 
 Several opportunities were offered me later on, for re- 
 turning to the East either in diplomacy or business, all 
 of which I declined. Before the establishment of the Per- 
 sian legation in this country, while living in New York, 
 I was approached by one very well known, with the sug- 
 gestion that the government of the Shah had intimated 
 that I might be called to represent Persia at the United 
 States, if I would consent to take such position. Upon 
 due consideration, although highly pleased with the com- 
 pliment I thought it best to decline. In point of fact 
 I had lost so much pecuniarily, by my experience in 
 diplomacy I had been more or less embarrassed ever since, 
 aside from the fact that it took me from my legitimate 
 work. 
 
 So far as trade with Persia was concerned, steam and 
 electric railroads there, were of the first importance, but 
 they are not likely to be profitable until the population 
 is greatly increased. Local travel and freight implies 
 people. Our distinguished citizen, Theodore Roosevelt, 
 ought to have been sent out to expostulate in regard to 
 the small families, although his eloquent pleas do not 
 seem to bear abundant fruit here as yet. Persia has an 
 area larger than France, Germany and Spain altogether, 
 and has barely nine million of souls. 
 
 My opinion is that so long as the Anglo-Russo-Germanic 
 rivalry and disturbances continue in Central Asia, Uncle 
 
 422 
 
Sam can do more in extending his trade in China, the 
 Philippines and South America, and allowing longer 
 credits to foreign merchants where it is demanded. 
 
 Germany is working her way with her railways and her 
 traffic from the west eastward, while Russia has a dog-in- 
 the-manger way of approaching Persia, her bayonets 
 gleam, ever reaching over the border. 
 
 With Russia this system of conquest is chronic, and 
 includes in its schemes, about every inch of Asia, except, 
 possibly, Japan. And so the Slavic race-ideal in Asia 
 and the Teutonic in Europe must some day meet and 
 clash. The mystic God of the Spirit, and the Kaiser's 
 God of Force will both be called upon for aid and the 
 result.^ Quin Sabe! ^lay it not be possible that some 
 world-war will realize the prediction of ancient prophecy 
 in no very distant future.'' Even now a great conflict 
 is simmering.! The Kaiser cannot long resist the pull of 
 the German military autocracy, and will call (as Victor 
 Hugo did for the French) on "the world" to come to 
 the aid of his country as "the centre and hub of culture 
 and civilization"; and yet, had Hugo read Philip de 
 Commines, he would have learned that "the French were 
 more cruel in war than the people of Italy or Spain." 
 How if the Kaiser should read history with a better under- 
 standing? The hypocrisy of nations is prover})ial ; each 
 looks with horror on the doings of the others, failing to 
 see the obliquities in their own conduct. 
 
 Of old, Tacitus alludes to this, in writing of the Romans 
 and the Parthians. 
 
 The present German idea of world-domination for state, 
 military, and scientific efficiency and force, will inevitalily 
 in time, sweep Germany into war with nations who favor 
 
 423 
 
the peace-idea, arbitration and treaties. The Teutonic 
 ideal to succeed, must "down" all other ideals ; This, in 
 the opinion of the writer, will never be accomplished. 
 
 The great World Spirit which is above all world forces, 
 and which will doubtless be appealed to, by both Czar and 
 Kaiser, may surprise the nations, by revealing how the 
 deep forces of spirit, can control all human material 
 struggle, and imperfection, toward ultimate ends, not 
 dreamed of; toward some higher ideal of better economic, 
 political, and psychological conditions, thus preserving a 
 righteous balance between the rights of individuals, and 
 the rights of state, and the rights of one state as bear- 
 ing on the rights of all states. Nous verrons! 
 
 ******* 
 
 I am spending my last days in the university town of 
 Burlington, Vermont, a State I have always been attracted 
 to since my first college tramps among its beautiful hills. 
 I have much time in this quiet home to study the deeper 
 questions I have only touched upon, in these pages. Now, 
 more than ever in history, do they engross the attention 
 of sentient beings ; the flippancy with which they are 
 often discussed (as if the speaker had some key to t-he 
 insoluble mysteries) is often unspeakably irritating. 
 The more one sees of life, the less does he in very 
 truth know about it ; we can only breathe with profound 
 reverence, "Wait !" some where, some time, the light of 
 revelation may dawn upon us, faintly at first, for the soul 
 that would all at once see wholly, must be consumed by 
 the Glory that comes from LIGHT UNSPEAKABLE! 
 
 424 
 
"A VISION OF ETERNITY." 
 
 Poem by S. G. W. Benjamin, shown his wife about a 
 month before his death, July 19, IQIJ*. (Probably written 
 some time before). 
 
 A youth came down unto the sea and bathes 
 
 The shores of time; (a youth, as age is marked 
 
 In heavenly spheres). His eyes, from watching long 
 
 The sufferings of mortality, were dim. 
 
 And his pale cheeks were haggard from the pang, 
 
 Of keen disappointment, unavailing grief, 
 
 And a weird and restless longing for repose. 
 
 He stood upon a beetling cliff, and gazed on the mysterious 
 
 ocean with a look 
 Intense, as he would pierce the encircling mists 
 That overhang the vast Unknown from whence 
 The sea's low moanings faintly reached his ear ; 
 And then he sighed, "Oh death, in former years 
 A hideous phantom, now ni}^ dearest friend. 
 My brother ! guide me to eternity ; 
 Release my spirit from these gyves of clay 
 That weight it down with pain, and when it most 
 Aspires to soar toward heaven, do bind its wings with 
 
 selfish aims," ******** 
 ********** 
 
 * * * * The mist now seemed to break. 
 And at his side an angel form appeared, 
 Majestic, garmented in light with eyes 
 That beamed a tender radiance; 
 
 425 
 
She touched his eyelids ; then thick darkness veiled 
 His vision for a moment, and a spasm 
 Oonvulsed his shivering frame with agony — 
 Only a moment; for returning light 
 Dazzled his sight, and from his spirit fell 
 The fleshy robe of earth's infirmities. 
 His soul stood forth upon that solemn strand 
 Free, pure, and wonderful, as when it left 
 Its Maker's hands in the aeons of the past. 
 By this a skiff came gliding to the shore 
 jNIore beautifully formed than fairy's boat 
 Of curling shell, and delicately veined 
 With pearl and purple (as the eyelid soft 
 Of sleeping infant) and the youth began 
 The voyage infinite. The sliding keel 
 Swifter than lightning flew, moved by the soul's un- 
 quenchable desire to see, to learn. 
 To understand the boundless universe, and its Creator. 
 Isles of light arose 
 
 Innumerably to view. Upon their shores 
 Seraphs were marshalled, and from star to star. 
 From age to age celestial anthems pealed 
 Creation heard that harmony divine — - 
 A rapturous hallelujah that shall cease 
 When dim eternity shall end. 
 Cycles and ages had gone by; (if there 
 They note such periods ;) and still the skiff swept on 
 Its steady course swift as the flight of thought, 
 And silent as the lapse of years. The youth's 
 Fair brow with growing knowledge grew more noble. 
 And his eyes kindled with the fervid glow 
 That to his vision gradually increased 
 
 426 
 
Like the broad splendor of the summer dawn, 
 Albeit the glor}^ of a thousand suns 
 Were but a taper's twinkle to the light 
 Ineffable that issued from the throne 
 Of God, the center of infinity. ****** 
 ******** 
 
 * * * * ^,g yg|- ^]-,js sQ^i \^n^(\ only dimly caught 
 
 Faint adumbrations of the majesty 
 
 And glory of celestial life. But time, 
 
 Ages on ages, came and went. That spirit 
 
 Had reached a higher being, and had gained 
 
 The stature of archangel. Now, it felt 
 
 (Not only saw) the Universe, Oh now 
 
 The recollection of the agonies 
 
 Of his mortality, the burning brain. 
 
 The racking pains, and the cankering grief, 
 
 Sorrows of brief duration to the bliss 
 
 Serene, he now experienced, lent a peace 
 
 Unutterable by contrast. Now, he knew 
 
 The mystery of affliction — knew that woe 
 
 Is mercy's boon, and that one day of grief 
 
 May gladden ages of eternity. 
 
 Gratitude, love, and adoration filled 
 
 That huml>le, raptured soul. The Deity 
 
 Transfused his throbbing bosom with a power 
 
 To love, which may be never, never told. 
 
 Unless by lips seraphic, numberless. 
 
 And evermore ^abrating harps of gold. 
 
 And wings that upwards waft the triune hymn 
 
 To the exalted and eternal throne 
 
 Where God Himself reveals the ETERNAL GOOD. 
 
 Published in Burlington Free Press, 
 Saturday, Aug. 1st. 
 
 427 
 
Partial list of the paintings of S. G. W. Benjamin from June 
 1871. Sold at prices ranging from $60 to $600. 
 
 Topsail Schooner — Size 20 in. by 12. 
 
 Sloop runing down the coasts — 10 in. by 16. 
 
 Oxitivard Bound — 16 in. by 10. 
 
 Outivard Bound — larger copy — 16 in. by 26. 
 
 Sloop Yacht before the wind — 7 in. by 10. 
 
 Shore Scene — 9 in. by 4. 
 
 Bankers — 20 in. by 12. 
 
 Corsica — 10 in. by 7. 
 
 Corsica — larger copy — 16 in. by 10. 
 
 Yachting — 30 in. by 20. 
 
 Schooner Yacht Ella— 20 in. by 12. 
 
 Ship anchoring in Smyrna harbor — 36 in. by 24. 
 
 Bark running down schooner in a fog. 
 
 Pico Peak with bark running — 20 in. by 12. 
 
 Pico Peak and San Jorge — 12 in. by 7. 
 
 Pico Peak and San Jorge — 30 in. by 18. 
 
 Gibraltar — 15 in. by 30. 
 
 Seminot, Isle of Wight — 10 in. by 7. 
 
 Atalaya Rock — Madeira — 24 in. by 18. 
 
 Pico Peak from Sou'west — 20 in. by 12. 
 
 Gale off Rosales Rock-Azores — 26 in. by 18. 
 
 Panto Forado — Madeira — 12 in. by 7. 
 
 Atalaya Rock — 30 in. by 20. 
 
 Foul Weather off Ponto Forado — 26 in. by 16. 
 
 Off Cape Race— 24: in. by 16. 
 
 Bugio Island with bark — 20 in. by 12. 
 
 Making Land — 36 in. by 24. 
 
 A Stiff Breeze— 10 in. by 16. 
 
 Full rigged brig, running under close reefed topsails — 12 in. by 7. 
 
 Off Cape Race — Schooner running— lli/o in. by 714. 
 
 Baker's Island Lights — 12 in. by 7. 
 
 Entrance to St. John's — 12 in. by 7. 
 
 Porto da Cruz — Madeira — 50 in. by 26. 
 
 Sunset at Nassau — 9 in. by 18. 
 
 Penha d' Aquia — Madeira — 40 in. by 24. 
 
 Study of Spay — 10 in. by 16. 
 
 Stormy Sunset at Sea — 10 in. by 16. 
 
 Calm Day off Manchester — 30 in. by 18. 
 
 Fishing boats of Madeira Scurrying home — 8 in. by 12. 
 
 Volcanic Rocks — Madeira — 12 in. by 20. 
 
 Barque Ethan Allen — 20 in. by 12. 
 
 Life on the Ocean Wave^Seaman on a raft — 18 in. by 26. 
 
 Calm day off Manchester — 8i^ in. by 14. 
 
 Caught on a Lee Shore — 30 in. by 18. 
 
 428 
 
Home of the Sea bir-ds — 20 in. by 12. 
 
 Courtado Peak — 18 in. by 12. 
 
 Brazen Head and Fort Santiago — 20 in. by 12. 
 
 Pleasant Day at Sea — 11 in. by 7. 
 
 CoaM Scene — Madeira — 30 in. by 18. 
 
 Sunset at Sea — 5 in. by 10. 
 
 A Fresh Puff off the land— 20 in. by 12. 
 
 Early Morning at Sea — 8 in. by 12. 
 
 Surf among the Rocks — San Tincent — 30 in. by 18. 
 
 Thatcher's Island — 7 in. by 14. 
 
 Low Tide at Grcenhithe — 7 in. by 10. 
 
 Sunset on the Grand Banks — 10 in. by 5. 
 
 A Squally Sunrise — 7 in. by 5. 
 
 Faial Beach — Madeira — 6 in. by 13. 
 
 Faial Beach — Madeira — 24 in. by 16. 
 
 Fishing Boats of Porto Santo — 14 in. by 7. 
 
 A Squall— 2(y in. by 20. 
 
 Daivn off White Island — 24 in. by 16. 
 
 Old Convent Orotava—Tetieriffe — 13 in. by 7. 
 
 Wind against Tide off Entry Isle — 26 in. by 18. 
 
 Pico Peak and San Jorge — 30 in. by 18. 
 
 Loo Rock — Madeira — 30 in. by 18. 
 
 The Farm — Landscape — 40 in. by 27. 
 
 Life — Shipwrecked Sailor on rock — 20 in. by 10. 
 
 Pico Peak, Azores — Sunset — 12 in. by 20. 
 
 Pico Peak — Cutter Yawl in foreground — 12 in. by 20. 
 
 "The Wide, Wide, Sea"— 24 in. by 40. 
 
 A Head Sea— 18 in. by 30. 
 
 French Fishing Lugger — 10 in. by 14. 
 
 Noi'th Foreland — Straits Dover — 11% in. by ^Va- 
 
 The Corbiere or Sailors Dead — Isle of Jersey — 26 in. by 50. 
 
 After the Storm — 18 in. by 30. 
 
 Twilight at Sea— 18 in. by 30. 
 
 Among the Breakers — 18 in. by 30. 
 
 A Summer Breeze — 9 in. by 14. 
 
 Cutter running before a Squall — 6 in. by 10. 
 
 Tiviliglit on the Grand Banks — 36 in. by 60. 
 
 Cape Cap au Meule — 9 in. by 13. 
 
 Yachts Struck by a Squall — 27 in. by 41. 
 
 A Breeze Coming — 18 in. by 30. 
 
 A Sunset — Small. 
 
 A Fresh Breeze— IG in. by 26. 
 
 OivVs Head — Penobscot Bay — 12 in. by 20. 
 
 A Westerly Gale on the Atlantic — 12 in. by 20. 
 
 Shark's Nose — Maine Coast — 12 in. by 20. 
 
 Entering Port — 20 in. by 26. 
 
 Among the Breakers — replica — 24 in. by 40. 
 
 Off the Harbor Mouth— 2i in. by 40. 
 
 429 
 
In the Roaring Forties — 36 in. by 60. 
 
 A Pleasant Outlook — Small. 
 
 Home of the Sea-birds — replica. 
 
 A Schooner Yacht before the Wind — 7 in. by 12. 
 
 Reef and Lighthonse off Barnegat. 
 
 A Stormy Sunrise off House Isle — 18 in. by 30. 
 
 Clearing Weather — 24 in. by 40. 
 
 Rtinning into Port — Moonlight — 20 in. by 12. 
 
 The Gloiv of Evening — Small. 
 
 A Cutter and a Breeze — 10 in. by 10. 
 
 Penha d'Aguia — Madeira — 18 in. by 30. 
 
 Running before a SoiCivester — 60 in. by 36. 
 
 A Breezy Afternoon — 18 in. by 30. 
 
 A Threatening Sunset — 18 in. by 32. 
 
 Pilot boat cruising in foul weather — Small. 
 
 Moonlight night at Sea — Small. 
 
 Surf on Coast of Madeira — Small. 
 
 Summer Stinset on the Sound — Small. 
 
 Brig Becalmed off Isle of Shoals — 20 in. by 12. 
 
 Sloop running under reefs — 18 in. by 12. 
 
 Peace after the Storm — water color. 
 
 Sloop becalmed in Neto York Bay — water color. 
 
 Tug Toiving Derelict — 24 in. by 16. 
 
 A Harbor Scene. 
 
 Surf Wave — 14 in. by 22. 
 
 Market Fishing Boat — Moonlight — 14 in. by 18. 
 
 Barkentine before a gale — 20 in. by 12. 
 
 A Calm Day in Mediterranean. 
 
 On the Jersey Shore — Sm-f scene— ^0 in. by 11%. 
 
 A Moonlight. 
 
 A Threatening Sunset. 
 
 Coast Scene. 
 
 A Calm Evening. 
 
 A'Spanish Slaver overbauled by American cruiser in the "forties' 
 
 off Coast of Africa— 28 in. by 18. 
 A Freshening Breeze — 20 in. by 12. 
 Reflections of Sunset — water color. 
 The Lotus Eaters — 40 in. by 24. 
 Abandoned — 20 in. by 18. 
 Surf dashing on rocks — 18% in. by 11%. 
 A Squally Afternoon — 14 in. by 10. 
 Rock and Surf Scene — Small. 
 Night Scene — Fire on Cliff — Small. 
 Beach at San Vincinte — Madeira — water color. 
 Yacht Race — 8 in. by 12. 
 Old Convent Orotava — 30 in. by 15. 
 
 430 
 
ivi310076 
 
 ti^^-^pKELEV LIBRARIES 
 
 COMbOTm^c,