THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE
 
 S 
 
 ^ //
 
 JUDITH 
 From the painting by C. Allori
 
 THE JOURNAL 
 
 OF A 
 
 RECLUSE 
 
 TRANSLATED FROM THE 
 ORIGINAL FRENCH 
 
 F'f $C 
 
 $?r; 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 THOMAS Y. CROWELL COMPANY 
 PUBLISHERS
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1909 
 BY THOMAS Y. CROWELL & CO. 
 
 Published, September, 
 Eighth Edition
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PART I SUNRISE AND NOON 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE v. 
 
 I. EARLY MEMORIES 3 
 
 II. A HAPPY ACCIDENT 17 
 
 III. A TUTOR OF THE OLD REGIME 26 
 
 IV. LOOKING FORWARD 36 
 
 V. ON FOREIGN SHORES 47 
 
 VI. A FABLE FOR COMMUNISTS AND DREAMERS OF HU- 
 MAN PERFECTIBILITY 53 
 
 VII. STILL LEARNING 58 
 
 VIII. A WOMAN IN REVOLT 63 
 
 IX. THE OLD, OLD PATHWAY, JUST WIDE ENOUGH 
 
 FOR Two 83 
 
 X. TRAVELING AGAIN 92 
 
 XI. COMPLICATIONS 101 
 
 XII. EN ROUTE FOR AMERICA 109 
 
 XIII. UNDER THE ROD 121 
 
 XIV. LA VITA NUOVA 132 
 
 XV. A NEW ACQUAINTANCE 137 
 
 PART II AFTERNOON AND EVENING 
 
 I. A VOICE FROM THE PAST 157 
 
 II. DREAMING ONCE MOKE 186 
 
 III. TRYING TO KEEP STEP TOGETHER 195 
 
 IV. A FIRE-SIDE CHAT 206 
 
 V. STORM AND STRESS 212 
 
 VI. THE SURPRISE 226 
 
 2135457
 
 iv CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 VII. THE RELAPSE 230 
 
 VIII. DARKNESS 239 
 
 IX. DAWN 250 
 
 X. AMONG THE SCHOOL-MASTERS . . ... 256 
 
 XI. AN EXPERIMENT IN ALTRUISM 274 
 
 XII. REUNION 287 
 
 XIII. EDUCATING A GIRL 293 
 
 XIV. A BROKEN SPIRIT 307 
 
 XV. BOOKS AND TRAVEL 313 
 
 XVI. TEMPESTE D'ANIME 319 
 
 XVII. LOOKING AT PICTURES 326 
 
 XVIII. SEED-TIME AND HARVEST 329
 
 TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE 
 
 Two years ago, I was traveling for my pleasure, and 
 incidentally for my profit, along the Pacific Coast of 
 the United States, and found myself in a small town 
 situated on Bellingham Bay, in the State of Washing- 
 ton. The town is probably not above fifty or sixty 
 years old; and perhaps for a long time will retain a 
 certain raw, unfinished appearance of youth, owing to 
 its situation too near Seattle and Vancouver, to hope 
 to have any commercial importance. However, two or 
 three saw-mills, and a factory for canning salmon, give 
 it a few internal resources, sufficient to keep it alive. 
 
 One day, walking along a railroad leading out of 
 town, skirting the bay and traversing a beautiful forest, 
 my attention was caught by a handsome shrub, which 
 I had seen too often in Scotland and Ireland to mis- 
 take for an indigenous plant. It was the broom, bright 
 with yellow blossoms, and a magnificent specimen at 
 that. It grew on a cliff, at some distance above my 
 head. Being a botanist in a mild sort of way, my curi- 
 osity was excited. It had been planted there, no doubt, 
 but by whom? Probably there was a house near by 
 the home of some emigrant. I was thirsty; I might 
 ask for a drink and casually learn how the broom had 
 found its way across the sea to bloom so brilliantly on 
 the edge of an American forest. 
 
 The bank was steep, but I made my way to the top 
 without difficulty; and discovered, as I surmised, a 
 fence not many feet beyond the bank, and behind it a 
 small log hut. No smoke came from the chimney, and 
 the long grass about it seemed untrodden. I climbed 
 the fence and approached the house. Then I noticed
 
 vi TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE 
 
 that the door, concealed by the projecting logs, was 
 open; and I caught a glimpse of a woman's dress. I 
 knocked twice at the door before the woman heard me ; 
 and when she rose with a start and came towards me, 
 I saw that her eyes were red and swollen with weep- 
 ing. She was a beautiful woman, past her first youth, 
 but still in the full splendor of a perfect maturity. That 
 she was not an ordinary woman, I saw at the first 
 glance; and when she spoke, her voice had that unmis- 
 takable accent which accompanies all real culture. 
 
 I apologized for my intrusion, and told her that a 
 long walk in the sunlight had made me thirsty, and 
 that I had ventured to call for a drink of water. 
 
 "There is no water in the house at present," she 
 answered, " but if you go down the bank, out at that 
 little gate yonder, you will find a spring of cool water 
 and a tin cup on a ledge of rock near by." 
 
 "Thank you, Madame; but before I go, may I ask 
 you how that broom happens to grow just outside the 
 fence yonder? I have never seen it except in Europe, 
 and I do not think that it is a native of this country." 
 
 " You are quite right ; he planted it here, from seeds 
 brought from Scotland. Pardon me, I mean my uncle. 
 Stop are you in a hurry? You look like a man of 
 judgment, of education ; and see here " she spoke 
 hastily, the color coming and going in her cheeks " I 
 
 have here " she turned over the pages of a pile of 
 
 note-books on the table before her, then without finish- 
 ing her sentence, asked abruptly: 
 
 " Are you a reader ? Do you know good books ? " 
 
 " I have lived among them all my life. I ought to 
 know them. At any rate, I have definite opinions about 
 them, and know what I like." 
 
 "Exactly," she said with a little note of pleasure. 
 " I thought so. Isn't it strange how one sometimes 
 knows people at the very first glance? I, too, know 
 what pleases me, books that leave a sweet taste in 
 my mouth that without asceticism sharpen my sense
 
 TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE vii 
 
 of duty that like mountain airs, filled with the odor 
 of the pines, blow over me, refreshing, tonic and here's 
 a book like that." She passed her hand caressingly 
 over the note-books as she spoke. "Do you read 
 French?" 
 
 "Yes, I passed my boyhood in France." 
 " Good ! " Her whole face brightened, her eyes flashed 
 with pleasure; then in her low, rapid, musical voice, 
 she told me that these note-books, written by her uncle 
 who had died two years before, had only recently been 
 found by her; that, in fact, she had just finished her 
 first reading of them. " And," she continued, *' he 
 seems to me living again in them, just as I knew him; 
 sensitive as a woman, yet so strong and manly; and I 
 cannot [consent that he shall be buried here in this 
 poor little hut, or that I alone should know him who 
 ought to be known and loved the wide world over. 
 Surely, when he left this record of himself, he did not 
 mean that it should perish, and it shall not. Think 
 of the wretched books that flood the country every 
 year poor little commonplace, wheezing, asthmatic 
 books, in which their authors moan about the air's sti- 
 fling them, when it is their own weak lungs that won't 
 work right; books made and read by women who have 
 never lived, only dreamed about living full of romantic 
 nonsense, or else sickly, hysterical, striving after impas- 
 sioned expression and only falling into flat lubricity; 
 aphoristic books, made by gathering up all the loose 
 ends of thought in the century; some daring, some 
 absurd, some insane, some only wicked, a few noble; 
 all spewed out in a sort of hodge-podge that smells of 
 Schopenhauer and Petronius Arbiter; inane, feebly 
 splashing books full of descriptions of furniture, clothes 
 and complexions, dull and silly as the woman's page of 
 a daily newspaper. Why shouldn't there issue from the 
 press once in a while a book with a soul, a book that 
 has red blood in its veins and a heart that beats sound 
 and strong? Nobody will read it? People want the
 
 viii TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE 
 
 mise en sctne, the decorations and all the accessories, 
 and are indifferent about the acting? Not the people 
 who are worth while! the mob, if you like, yes! But 
 we aren't all mob. There are still a few of us who 
 care more about the clear blaze of the fire on the hearth 
 than for the way in which the andirons are molded. I 
 am sure that I am not blinded by my affection. Read 
 that page and tell me whether it does not live." 
 
 I read it, and felt as she did, that real life had 
 gone to the making of it. 
 
 She questioned me about myself and my pursuits, 
 absorbed evidently in one idea. I was able to answer 
 her inquiries satisfactorily. The book, singularly 
 enough, was written entirely in French. Whether the 
 language had lent itself most readily to the author, or 
 whether he had employed it as a sort of veil to hide 
 even from himself the nudity of his thought, it is im- 
 possible to say. At any rate, he used it like a master; 
 and the present English version given to the reader 
 must necessarily lack much of the beautiful, energetic 
 clearness of the original. 
 
 " I cannot translate it myself," she continued. " It 
 would break my heart again, as it has done in the 
 reading of it. Besides, my very wish to do it well 
 would make me stumble and halt. Then, too, I do not 
 belong to myself. I have a husband and five children 
 who need me; and this dear one needs me no longer. 
 Could you undertake it, or do you know someone who 
 Could do it well ? " 
 
 In short, I consented to translate the book into Eng- 
 lish, after consultation with her husband, who confirmed 
 the good opinion of me which the wife had so hastily 
 formed. He is a chemist of note, and a gentleman in 
 every way worthy of her. I stayed a week with them 
 in their beautiful home, at some distance from the 
 little hut in which I first met the wife ; and I hope that 
 it is not presumption to say that the friendship there 
 formed will last throughout our lives. 
 
 I could not at once undertake the translation, owing
 
 TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE ix 
 
 to prior engagements; and it was decided that a care- 
 ful copy of the original should be sent to me later. 
 After mature consideration, we came to feel that the 
 book had nothing to say in the author's name that was 
 not equally valuable under any other name; and that, 
 as some with whom his life had been most intimately 
 associated were still living, it was altogether best and 
 most fitting that the real names should be suppressed, 
 and fictitious ones substituted for them. It is the sort 
 of semi-obscurity which he himself would have best 
 liked. 
 
 Upon the back of each one of the eight note-books 
 which comprise the original manuscript is written 
 " Le Journal d'un Reclus"; yet in the strict sense of 
 the word this man was no recluse; on the contrary, his 
 life was rich in contact with that of others; but there 
 was in it that subtle aloofness created by destiny which 
 makes it possible for a human life to flow silently 
 among other lives without contracting their color or 
 taking their course ; just as the Gulf Stream threads its 
 blue way through the ocean unchanged by the waters 
 that surround it. It was written without any division 
 into chapters, and I have taken the liberty to subdivide 
 it, for the convenience of the reader. 
 
 This book is the story of a wounded heart, searching 1 
 its cure in solitude and labor; the story of a quick 
 brain capable of thinking for itself; of a strong char- 
 acter that finds the best solution of life's problems in 
 the words, growth, work, and duty; the story of a 
 scholar who finds rich solace in books and study, and 
 judges wisely what he reads. 
 
 The mere story of his life may possibly interest a 
 few readers who will not otherwise care for the book, 
 for it is not devoid of incident or romance; but to 
 those who love to sound the great questions of human 
 life the mission of grief, the aim of culture, the true 
 use of life the book will speak in the voice of a 
 friend, a rare, new companion whose acquaintance they 
 will be glad to make.
 
 x TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE 
 
 Here was a man who dared to look into the abyss, 
 and who dared to say to the shadows of it: I will live 
 with you, believing that the sunshine will one day pene- 
 trate here; a man whose mind rose above all petty 
 short-sighted systems of philosophy, and knew how to 
 accept the unknowable without flattering his self-love 
 by giving fine names to his ignorance. Enlightened by 
 sorrow, he grew wise without asceticism, indulgent 
 without weakness, tender without demanding tenderness 
 in return, broad without losing the limitations of indi- 
 viduality, a philosopher without ceasing to be a man. 
 He knew how to renounce happiness without despising 
 it, and how to find joy in the smile of an infant, or 
 the flight of a bird. His old age was more beautiful 
 and happier than his youth; for his life was a 
 ceaseless growth, and with the fruits of his rich 
 experience, he knew how to enrich others. He began 
 as we all do by asking of life all or nothing, and he 
 finished by understanding what some of us never do, 
 why something is not only better than nothing, but 
 better than all. 
 
 In this simple story of his life, told without any at- 
 tempt to produce a work of art, he has produced a book 
 that will be especially suggestive and valuable to all 
 thoughtful men and women to whose care the educa- 
 tion of the young is entrusted. Receiving in his youth 
 an exceptional mental training, endowed by nature with 
 the shrinking, sensitive temperament of the artist, with- 
 out the artist's creative gift, capable of acute suffering 
 and acute joy, finding himself out of harmony with the 
 requirements of competitive struggle in commercial life, 
 he did not sink into a mere puling sentimentalist, or 
 harden into a sneering cynic; he found, or rather, made 
 a place for himself, independent and helpful; and 
 worked out a clear, sane view of life, which he ex- 
 presses in many a terse, wholesome and tonic aphorism. 
 
 For this reason, his book is destined to live more 
 than a summer season. It does not glitter with bril- 
 liant paradoxes that flatter the surface intelligence and
 
 TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE xi 
 
 tickle the senses, without feeding the heart. It is thick- 
 sown with the truths we live by, not the semi-truths by 
 which we amuse ourselves. Its atmosphere is wholly 
 an outdoor one. The wind blows through it: sunlight, 
 not candle-light, shines there; and the air is sweet with 
 the odor of pines and wild flowers. 
 
 It will speak in no unmistakable tones to those who 
 suffer, who think, who aspire; for its author missed 
 none of the deep experiences of life. He, too, had to 
 walk in darkness for a season and grope for light. 
 Tears glisten on the pages of his book. It would not 
 be human without them; but it is not water-soaked. 
 It preaches no sniveling gospel of despair. It recog- 
 nizes the beauty and strength of self-possession, and 
 the weakness and slavery of passion. The author does 
 not hug his chains, gild them with illusions, and call 
 them ornaments. He is not transformed by his desires 
 into a monster of colossal egotism who assumes for 
 himself a title of superiority and the right to be a law 
 unto himself. He recognizes the profound moral truth 
 that whoever arrogates to himself the title of super- 
 human, ends by becoming inhuman. His heart is too 
 big, too warm to wish for a moment to break the tie 
 which unites him to his kind. 
 
 The style of the book in its original French is easy, 
 rich, and limpid as a mountain stream. The author is 
 not of those who mistake muddiness for depth; nor is 
 he of those who, for want of thought, fall into long 
 and minute descriptions of exteriors. He seizes on 
 essentials; he etches, he does not paint. He writes be- 
 cause he has something to say; and he wishes to be 
 read and understood by those who care more for the 
 picture than for the frame. The whole man in his sim- 
 plicity and earnestness appears in his book. But we 
 shall let him speak for himself. He knows better how 
 to do it than we. 
 
 April 6, 1909. M. F.
 
 PART I 
 SUNRISE AND NOON
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 EARLY MEMORIES 
 
 April 12, 18 . 
 
 THERE are days when we seem to be born anew into 
 the pure joy of living, such as children and all healthy 
 young- animals feel. The stupidity and weariness that 
 had benumbed our faculties melt away like morning 
 mists, and the sun bursts out warm and brilliant. Curi- 
 osity and interest in everything revive. Without know- 
 ing it, we go about with a smile on our lips, or break 
 into singing. Life seems once more to need no par- 
 ticular aim, but to be aim and joy in itself. We are 
 glad simply to be alive. 
 
 Here I am, alive to the finger-tips on such a day. 
 I shall soon be forty; and I feel as if I were but 
 twenty, with the future still before me, big with hope 
 and promise. 
 
 I have just been reading Cellini's autobiography in 
 that familiar, simple old Italian whose strength and 
 suppleness no translation can possibly render. What a 
 superb mixture it is of arrogance and humility, hard 
 common sense and the wildest superstition, ribaldry and 
 poetry, courage and cowardice, coarseness and refine- 
 ment, tenderness and brutality (I note how beautifully 
 reverent he always is when he speaks of Michelangelo), 
 crime and innocence in short, the whole gamut of 
 human strength and weakness is there, illuminated by 
 great genius. 
 
 Is it immense egotism or an immense generosity that 
 makes a man capable of giving himself so entirely to 
 posterity, even to the innermost folds of his heart? I 
 think I could not do it, were I to suffer a thousand 
 deaths for the omission. That is because I am not
 
 4 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 rich enough. I should shrink into a corner, ashamed 
 of my rags and my nakedness ; yet I, too, have lived, 
 thought, felt keenly, suffered much and isn't that the 
 essence of literature? What is wanting to the writers 
 of to-day is that they have not known real difficulties, 
 noble sufferings. Life has been too easy for them. 
 They can't sit on stone benches any more; they must 
 have cushions under them. They don't know the mean- 
 ing of courage. They whine when they cut their fin- 
 gers. All their pains are colics fits of indigestion; 
 their nausea is not of vice, but of surfeiting. If they 
 were capable of believing in God, they would ask noth- 
 ing of him but an exemption from the evils that attend 
 the excessive gratification of their lusts. The soul ! the 
 soul! the soul! that is what we want of you; not your 
 houses, your furniture, your decorations, your diseases, 
 your satieties. What have you done to deserve to 
 walk upright instead of going on all fours? Tell us 
 that! 
 
 Cellini opens his biography by saying that all men, 
 no matter their condition, if they have done anything 
 worth while, ought with their own hand to write a de- 
 scription of their life; but ought not to commence 
 doing so until they have passed the age of forty. 
 
 And I? Have I done anything worth while, lived 
 to any purpose whatever these forty years? To the 
 wounded, solitude and silence! But the wound no 
 longer bleeds; I can look calmly on the scar which I 
 shall carry to my grave. I can look with gratitude on 
 these long days and long nights in the heart of a wood 
 whose silence has been at times an impassioned elo- 
 quence to me. A great sorrow or a great disillusion- 
 ment sets us apart, creates a solitude about us, even 
 in the market-place. The hum of voices seems to come 
 to us from afar, and from away below us. It is as if 
 we were lifted on high, where the only real life there 
 is, is concentrated in our throbbing veins and centered 
 in the tumult of our thoughts. Fortunate are those 
 who have not been numbed and chilled in this soli- 
 tude, but can find articulate speech for grief, translat-
 
 EARLY MEMORIES 5 
 
 ing it into music, poetry, or the vivifying strength of 
 a great thought or noble deed. 
 
 Noble, encouraging lines these of Goethe: 
 
 " Was ich irrte, was ich strebte, 
 Was ich litt und was ich lebte 
 Sind hier Blumen nur im Strauss; 
 Und das Alter wie die Jugend, 
 Und der Fehler wie die Tugend 
 Nimmt sich gut in Liedern aus." 
 
 Ah, if I, too, could gather my errors, my struggles, 
 my sufferings into such a Blumenstrauss, what would I 
 not give? There are times when I have suffered 
 intensely from wanting the power of expression. There 
 is a poet in me who has never found his wings, never 
 possessed the magnificent power of transforming his 
 griefs into song, else there is not a tear I have shed 
 but should glitter in verse, not a sigh I have breathed 
 but should make music in prose. 
 
 Something makes me feel to-day that though blasted 
 at top, like some old oak of the forest, the roots of 
 me live yet, and could send their sap up into living 
 branches capable of bearing fruit. Who knows? Let 
 me look myself squarely in the face from the pages of 
 this little note-book; let me recall the past once more, 
 to be done with its sorrow forever; or rather, to be 
 sure that I have digested its pain into the red blood 
 of courage and power. 
 
 My father, George Graham, whose name and whose 
 physical vigor I have inherited, was the head gardener 
 of a Scottish nobleman whose estate lay among the 
 Braid Hills near Edinburgh. From one of its heights 
 we could overlook the city; and with a slight change 
 of names I might sing with Walter Scott: 
 
 " Blackford ! on whose uncultured breast, 
 Among the broom, and thorn, and whin, 
 A truant boy, I sought the nest, 
 Or listed, as I lay at rest,
 
 6 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 While rose, on breezes thin, 
 The murmur of the city crowd, 
 And, from his steeple jangling loud, 
 Saint Giles's mingling din." 
 
 How I love her! this Auld Reekie, with her proud 
 outlook on the water, her old castle perched on a 
 granite cliff and seeming to grow out of it as natu- 
 rally as some stunted pine among the rocks ; her narrow 
 crooked streets and long lines of gray houses pressed 
 close together; her monuments and old palace, eloquent 
 of the life of the past! How often I have rambled 
 about her streets a dreaming boy, fancying myself some 
 knight or chevalier ready to do battle for my country, 
 or to die for the cause of Mary, Queen of Scots. I 
 remember how I envied the young Douglas who rowed 
 her across Lochleven, dropping the keys of the castle 
 into the lake; and would have eagerly bartered my 
 life and lain dust and ashes in his place, to have had 
 his privilege to look at her beautiful face. 
 
 It is a great thing for an imaginative child to be 
 born in a town with memories like Edinburgh. He 
 feels himself as it were legitimated the atmosphere of 
 poetry nourishes him; and his poverty sits light on him, 
 if he be poor; for is he not rich in historical remi- 
 niscences? 
 
 The house in which my father lived with his family 
 was a very pretty little lodge at the entrance of the 
 park, in the midst of which was the castle of his master. 
 I still remember with delight the picturesque beauty of 
 this house made of rough, brownish-gray stone, but al- 
 most entirely concealed by vines and climbing roses; 
 and the odor of sweet briar or of the honeysuckle ex- 
 haled at night-fall gives me even now a singularly deso- 
 late feeling of homesickness by recalling this pretty 
 nest of ours. 
 
 My father was a man of very unequal humor, other- 
 wise a really superior man, loving a good book better 
 than the idle chatter of an empty head. This taste un-
 
 EARLY MEMORIES 7 
 
 doubtedly preserved him from drink, the besetting 
 weakness of many men of his station, and kept him at 
 home. There were days when he was altogether charm- 
 ing, showing without egotism his singular good sense, 
 quick wit, and sincere cordiality. Unfortunately, these 
 days were not frequent; there were many more of them 
 when he was taciturn, easily fretted, and even savagely 
 morose. We children had a habit of saying to mother 
 when we had not yet seen him in the morning, and 
 she came to call us, or help one of us dress, " Is the 
 sun shining ? " If she said, " Ah, no, my children, it 
 is very cloudy to-day I" we kept out of his way as 
 much as possible, talked in whispers, and played no 
 noisy games within his hearing. 
 
 I believe that my mother, who was patience and kind- 
 ness itself, was not very happy with him. She was 
 gentle and forgiving; but she could not always forget, 
 on the days of his kindness, the cruel words with which 
 he had hurt her in ill humor. I never in my life heard 
 him beg her pardon; but when he had been very sar- 
 castic, he used to show his repentance by gathering the 
 choicest flowers and laying them in her lap, or at her 
 plate; or he would bring her some choice fruit and 
 insist upon her eating it. Sometimes, though very 
 rarely, he would stoop and kiss her. He was much 
 taller than she, with strong black hair, a swarthy skin, 
 and dark eyes that glowed like live coals when he was 
 angry. She was blonde, blue-eyed, and plump, a little 
 below the medium height, naturally the sweetest tem- 
 pered, most tranquil of women ; but, in his presence, she 
 always seemed anxious and nervous. She was wholly 
 uneducated, so far as books are concerned; but she 
 supplied this lack by natural shrewdness, a great deal 
 of practical ability, so that her very fingers seemed to 
 think, and a simplicity and natural grace full of charm. 
 She would have answered exactly Moliere's idea of 
 what a woman should be. She had been very pretty 
 as a girl. I have a small colored sketch of her that
 
 8 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 would pass for a copy of a head by Greuze; and in 
 growing stouter with advancing years, if she lost much 
 of that early infantile freshness, she gained by a sweet 
 air of maternity and goodness that attracted the con- 
 fidence and affection of all who saw her. 
 
 She was the mother of nine children, of whom I was 
 the third child and the first boy. My father had some 
 theories of his own about education, which he deter- 
 mined to carry out with his children. Undoubtedly, he 
 himself had often been tormented by tastes and ambi- 
 tions out of harmony with his station; and he had 
 resolved that none of his children should suffer in a 
 like manner. He thought the great majority of men 
 incapable of self-government, and cited the horrors of 
 the French Revolution to prove it. He had, therefore, 
 a profound distrust of all theories of social improve- 
 ment, as a result of what is called the education of 
 the masses, because he thought them incapable of as- 
 similating an education. Of course, he could not help 
 admitting that there were exceptional cases scattered 
 among them: Burns and Ferguson had taught him 
 that; but such men in receiving the gift of genius had 
 also received the power to educate themselves, under 
 any circumstances ; and with what fire he quoted Burns 
 to prove it: 
 
 " What's a* your jargon o' your schools. 
 Your Latin names for horns an' stools; 
 If honest nature made you fools, 
 What sairs your grammars? 
 Ye'd better ta'en up spades and shools, 
 Or knappin-hammers. 
 
 " A set o' dull, conceited hashes, 
 Confuse their brains in college classes! 
 They gang in stirks, and come out asses, 
 
 Plain truth to speak; 
 An' syne they think to climb Parnassus 
 
 By dint o' Greek 1
 
 EARLY MEMORIES 9 
 
 " Gie me a spark o' nature's fire. 
 That's a' the learning I desire; 
 Then though I drudge thro' dub and mire 
 
 At pleugh or cart, 
 My muse, though hamely in attire, 
 May touch the heart." 
 
 He was a Tory by conviction, and not by inherited 
 opinions; and so far above feeling class envy that he 
 used to declare that no greater misfortune could over- 
 take the human race than their arrival at a stage of per- 
 fect natural equality; and that all social and individual 
 progress, all charm in the variety of human types and 
 conditions of life, all the higher feelings of sympathy, 
 reverence, affection, depend on this very inequality 
 which exists among men. " Who will build your houses, 
 dig your sewers, pave your streets, till your fields, on 
 the day when you are all artists and poets ? " he would 
 say ; and again, " It is a great misfortune for a man 
 never to have known a superior. I would rather look 
 up than stoop continually. I would rather admire than 
 despise." In which views, I think he was altogether 
 right. 
 
 As for his children, he wished to give them the 
 strength of body and mind that comes from perfect 
 physical health, and the freedom and independence that 
 come from the privation of all luxuries. " Cleanliness," 
 he used to say, "is the luxury of the poor. I want 
 no one to outstrip you in that." 
 
 Our food, therefore, was always abundant enough 
 and varied enough, within the necessary limits; but it 
 was always very simple; however, as we brought a 
 healthy appetite to it, we ate it with a relish that few 
 children at present know anything about. We had 
 meat twice a week, good creamy milk for our por- 
 ridge, and a wholesome rye bread which my mother 
 made to perfection. We had a few chickens and they
 
 io THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 furnished us with eggs, and a little garden which sup- 
 plied us with the ordinary vegetables. But we had 
 neither candy, chewing-gum, cakes, nor imported fruits, 
 and I was ten years old before I had ever tasted any- 
 thing but home-made sweets. At New Year's and 
 Christmas, mother made us a big pan of taffy, which, 
 carefully hoarded, sometimes lasted three weeks. But, 
 taffy at any other time would have seemed to us all 
 only one of the sublime impossibilities of fairy-tales. 
 Neither did we ever own such a thing as an artificial 
 toy. My sisters' dolls were ingeniously fashioned out 
 of a bit of wood which my father whittled into the 
 rude semblance of a doll, burning eyes, nose, and 
 mouth into the face with a red-hot poker. A long 
 straight stick was my hobby-horse, and I pranced about, 
 astride it, rearing, kicking, running, jumping with it, 
 and getting a hundred times more exercise, and more 
 varied at that, than if it had been the finest of painted 
 rocking-horses. I am inclined to think that the exer- 
 cise of the imagination in a child's play gives a keener 
 zest to it when he is left in this way to find his own 
 playthings and invent his own games. Left to our- 
 selves we were never at a loss for amusement ; a pretty 
 pebble in the pathway, an early flower, a brightly col- 
 ored leaf, a curved bit of bark to sail on a stream, 
 made us rich for hours. My oldest sister, four years 
 my senior, was the leader and promoter of most of our 
 games; her quick fancy invested every thing about her 
 with life; and she had a really wonderful way of 
 making us share her imaginative gift. There were cer- 
 tain trees in the park we used to visit gravely; talk 
 with them, and converse about them, as if they were 
 human beings. She invented names for them, enter- 
 tained us with their extraordinary adventures; and we 
 were sad for a week when the lightning struck one of
 
 EARLY MEMORIES 11 
 
 them, shivering its top. We spoke of it as a death in 
 the family. Poor girl! with all that surplus sense of 
 life to enrich her own personality, she was not destined 
 to be happy. She married at twenty, against my father's 
 will, a young artist who was fascinated by her beauty. 
 She had inherited her mother's fair skin and yellow 
 hair, and the dark, luminous eyes of her father. She 
 had one child, a daughter; was never strong after- 
 wards, and her husband grew indifferent to her. There 
 may have been faults on her side; she was quick-tem- 
 pered, imaginative, morbidly sensitive, and capable of 
 suffering out of all proportion to the cause, which 
 would make her difficult to live with intimately. Al- 
 though her education, in accordance with my father's 
 ideas, had been wholly domestic, like that of the rest 
 of my sisters, in learning to read she had received 
 the key to a wider culture; and her language, in its 
 simplicity and correctness, would not have put her to 
 shame in any station. 
 
 Just as my sisters were destined to be good house- 
 wives, my brothers and I were all to be brought up to 
 some useful trade. It never entered my father's head 
 to make a scholar of one of us we might follow any- 
 thing that nature inclined us to; but we were to live 
 by our hands, not by our wits; and we were to be 
 subjected from infancy to a hardening process that 
 was intended to make us full of courage, self-reliant, 
 and resourceful. We were put to bed in the dark; we 
 slept in a room without fire; we bathed in cold water; 
 and as we had never known anything else, we no more 
 dreamed of asking for indulgence in these directions 
 than of asking for the moon to play with. But we 
 none of us escaped some particular discipline that burned 
 itself painfully into the memory. For my own part, 
 I still remember, with something like self-pity, a very
 
 12 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 cruel ordeal that fell to my lot. It happened when I 
 was a mere baby, hardly four years old. It was a 
 beautiful day in early summer. My father wanted my 
 mother to help him with some work in the meadows at 
 some distance from the house; a work in which the 
 two older children could also assist, and they were to 
 be taken along. I had fallen asleep, and though my 
 mother wished to awaken me, to take me with her, 
 my father would not consent to it, saying that I would 
 only be in the way and that I was quite old enough 
 now to be left alone; besides, I was really more of a 
 girl about tagging after my mother's heels than either 
 of my two sisters, and it was high time that I was 
 weaned. Nothing more was necessary than to lock 
 the doors and windows, so that if I awoke, I shouldn't 
 be able to get out and wander away; and that if I 
 cried, it would be good for my lungs. It was, prob- 
 ably, one of my father's cloudy days; and my mother 
 knew him too well to try to persuade him to the con- 
 trary; so taking her baby in her arms she left me with 
 a heavy heart and full of fears. Her anxiety wasn't 
 groundless. I had fallen asleep on the floor, and woke 
 duly, looking tranquilly about me, probably expecting 
 soon to see my mother's sweet, kind face bend over me 
 with a smile. All at once, I heard a strange buzzing 
 sound, that quickened the beating of my heart and 
 filled me with fear. I uttered a slight cry, expecting 
 to see some one appear at once; but nothing broke the 
 dead silence but the monotonous ticking of the clock, 
 and this strange buzzing sound that grew louder and 
 louder. Then I saw a large, hideous insect circling above 
 my head, and my alarm changed to the most cruel ter- 
 ror. I rose with a loud scream and rushed into the kitchen 
 to seek refuge in my mother's arms. The room was 
 I empty. I called aloud " Mother ! Mother ! " I ran
 
 EARLY MEMORIES 13 
 
 from room to room, the insect pursuing me. The un- 
 wonted solitude of the house, this frightful insect, the 
 immense terror that overwhelmed me, threw me into 
 convulsions. The minutes grew hours. How long this 
 lasted, I cannot tell ; but when at last the family came 
 back at noon, I was almost demented. My mother cried 
 and folded me in her arms; my father took me from 
 her, and bathing my face in cold water, at last suc- 
 ceeded in getting from me an explanation of the cause 
 of my terror. No sooner did he understand, than set- 
 ting me on the floor, he burst into a loud la,ugh. 
 Chasing the insect towards the window-pane, he told 
 me that it was a wasp, and putting a towel into my 
 hand, bade me try to kill it. Exhausted by terror, 
 trembling like a leaf, conscious that I could not do it, 
 I burst into tears and refused to try. Disobedience was 
 not a fault in my father's eyes, it was a crime. He 
 whipped me soundly, and wrapping the towel about 
 my baby hand, seized my arm and dashed it against 
 the wasp on the window-pane with such violence that 
 he broke the glass. Whether he killed the wasp or 
 not, I never knew. My mother, white as a sheet, 
 rushed forward, and picking me up in her arms, uttered 
 the only reproach to him I ever heard pass her lips; 
 but it was a furious one. " You brute ! " she cried, 
 " you do not deserve to have a child ! " 
 
 He did not answer, but white as herself, passed out 
 of the room. 
 
 When he came back at night he was entirely himself 
 again, for there was always something generous in his 
 anger; it spent itself all at once there was nothing 
 slow or sullen in his nature, he couldn't sulk the sky 
 cleared at once, as soon as the storm was over. He 
 talked cheerfully to us all, never made the slightest 
 allusion to what had happened, but just before it was
 
 14 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 time for us children to go to bed, he took me on his 
 lap, and drawing from his pocket a small book, he 
 began to show me the pictures in it, telling me that he 
 had bought it for me, and that I must learn my letters, 
 so that I could read it some day. It was a child's book 
 about animals, profusely illustrated, and simply written. 
 I was too much of a child, too healthy to feel resent- 
 ment, and family affections are very strong in simple 
 and uncorrupted natures. I did not love my father 
 the less for his austerities, perhaps I loved him the 
 more for them, not being able to imagine that a father 
 could act otherwise. I have spoken of my mother's 
 sharp reproof drawn from her in a moment of maternal 
 agony, but that was quite exceptional. In caressing 
 her children after some mistaken harshness on his 
 part, she took great pains to efface that view of it, and 
 never criticized him, or allowed us to complain. She 
 was his interpreter to us, explaining that he hated 
 cowardice, lying, shirking, and neglect of duty as he 
 ought to hate them, and as he meant that we should 
 hate them too. That he was quite successful at least 
 in making us hate and fear the consequences of weak- 
 ness, I can attest by another experience which occurred 
 about a year and a half later. 
 
 My father was a great smoker, and had the bad habit 
 of smoking, at times, in bed. I think he would have 
 quite frankly admitted that it was a very bad habit and 
 a very selfish one, and then would have justified it on 
 the score that perfection is no part of man's inheri- 
 tance or possible acquisition on earth; and that if he 
 didn't smoke in bed sometimes, he would probably do 
 worse. 
 
 One night, when for some reason or other my spell- 
 ing lesson had been neglected during the day, he called 
 me to him in bed, and I lay on his arm spelling for 
 him, while he smoked. It was a warm night, and my 
 gown was unbuttoned at the neck, exposing my shoul- 
 ders and chest. Finding that his pipe interfered with
 
 EARLY MEMORIES 15 
 
 the lesson, he took it from his mouth to put it on the 
 wash stand, near the head of the bed. In doing so, it 
 turned in his hand, so that the burning ashes fell on 
 my bare shoulder. He did not notice the mishap, and 
 though I winced involuntarily at the first touch, I 
 lay perfectly still afterwards, not daring even to brush 
 the ashes from my smarting skin, but heroically spelled 
 away till, yawning, he declared himself satisfied and 
 bade me run off to bed. I never told anyone how badly 
 I had been burnt, but there is a dotted white scar on my 
 shoulder that will tell the story till I, too, am dust and 
 ashes. 
 
 So much for our moral discipline, consisting not so 
 much of precept as of example ; for though my father 
 diligently read his Bible, and rarely discussed its teach- 
 ings, he left to my mother the care of instilling what 
 is commonly known as religious principles into us. 
 Like a man who had thought out the subject for him- 
 self, he had come to the conclusion that as the ordi- 
 nary man dislikes nothing so much as uncertainty, and, 
 like a child, is satisfied with any reply to his questions, 
 so long as it dogmatically affirms that it is a reply, 
 the name of religion covers a multitude of guesses and 
 reveries. He himself was satisfied with saying, " I do 
 not know " and to those who feel it necessary to say 
 " I do know," he would have recommended any form 
 of Protestantism as the most suitable guide to moral 
 living. But he had a supreme contempt for the man- 
 ner in which the majority of believers interpret and 
 follow their guide; and I once heard him define a 
 Christian as a man who pretended to believe in Christ, 
 but refused to imitate him; and a skeptic, as a man 
 who doubted Christ's divine origin, but believed in his 
 teachings with regard to the relation of man to man, 
 and tried to follow them. 
 
 He gave, therefore, a tacit recognition to the rules 
 of Christianity, and I was a grown young man before 
 I positively knew his convictions. I am the only one
 
 16 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 of his [children who ever suspected them. I think my 
 mother knew that he was not orthodox, but she never 
 said anything about it. As for herself, she had the 
 simplicity of faith of a little child. Never the shadow 
 of a doubt darkened her sweet, gentle spirit. She was 
 of those born to conviction. Her loving and faithful 
 heart needed an infinite and permanent love in which 
 to find the rest denied it here; in which characteristic 
 she was wholly woman. 
 
 I was a grown young man before my father spoke 
 frankly to me about his opinions, and I was the only 
 one of his children to whom he did so speak. I was 
 also the only one of them who received a liberal educa- 
 tion, and that happened quite contrary to his will. He 
 wished to teach us how to read and write and calcu- 
 late so far as the needs of practical life require knowl- 
 edge. He taught us the names of trees and plants, 
 and their virtues; the common minerals, and a prac- 
 tical sort of elementary chemistry, sufficient to allow 
 us to draw all the possible advantages from the soil. 
 If curiosity or a desire to know more, impelled us, well 
 and good we were properly started; we might go on 
 as fast or as slowly as we pleased. If not, we were 
 amply equipped with a skilled trade at our fingers' 
 ends to make our way respectably through life, 
 without being troubled by visions and setting up for 
 reformers. My brothers have proved the wisdom of 
 his ideas by becoming respectable and independent ar- 
 tisans; and I, who received the best education attain- 
 able in my youth, have found, if not the happiest, at 
 least the most useful and most tranquil days of my 
 life in following my father's pursuits. How my edu- 
 cation happened to take another bent was owing to a 
 singular circumstance.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 A HAPPY ACCIDENT 
 
 THE nobleman in whose service my father passed 
 his life, had an only son who was about two months 
 my senior. Unfortunately, he was born with a spinal 
 malady which threatened to deform him, and made 
 him suffer cruelly at times. All that medical and sur- 
 gical skill could do to relieve his sufferings had been 
 done ; but he was unable to walk, and had to be wheeled 
 about in an invalid's chair. But, as if nature had 
 wished to recompense him for her injuries, he was gifted 
 with a mind marvelously quick in receiving impressions, 
 and tenacious in holding them; and, though his poor 
 little body was twisted, his face was one of remarkable 
 beauty, with its large, dark eyes, broad, full forehead, 
 and sensitive mouth. I shall never forget the first 
 time that I saw this beautiful head quite near me. It 
 was a fine afternoon in May. I have shared with my 
 older sister a certain vivacity of imagination more easily 
 exercised in solitude than in company, to which I prob- 
 ably owe a strong inclination for rambling about in 
 woods and solitary places. I had been sauntering this 
 day along the edge of a stream which had cut its way 
 at the foot of a steep, wooded hill. Having followed 
 its course some distance, I climbed the hill at its steepest 
 point, where the wood was thickest. There, in a small, 
 open space, looking down on the ravine, I threw myself 
 on my back among the grass and wild flowers, with 
 my hands interlaced beneath my head, and my eyes 
 fixed on the bit of blue sky above me. I was in the 
 midst of one of those delightful reveries which only 
 lovers and fanciful children know, when I suddenly 
 
 17
 
 i8 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 heard the murmur of voices and the sound of ap- 
 proaching steps. I rose with a bound, and ran to hide 
 myself in a thick clump of bushes near by, in order 
 to wait the departure of my unwelcome intruders. From 
 my place of concealment, I could see very well without 
 being seen. To my great surprise, the intruders were 
 a young woman in the dress of an attendant nurse, 
 or governess, and two children; one, a girl of eleven 
 or twelve; the other, a boy of my own age, that is to 
 say, nine, seated in a wheeled chair. 
 
 " Oh," cried the girl, jumping up and down and clap- 
 ping her hands with pleasure, " this is the very place 
 we were looking for, isn't it? Let's set down here on 
 the grass, and you can finish the story. Don't you like 
 it, Eliot ? " She ran to the chair, leaning over it affec- 
 tionately; and the boy smiling up at her, answered that 
 he liked it, too. 
 
 " Very well," answered the nurse, ceasing to wheel 
 the chair. " It is very pretty here, and cool, too. What 
 did you do with the book, Lady Margaret?" 
 
 " I put it into the. chair." 
 
 The nurse began searching for the book, but could 
 not find it. 
 
 " No, it isn't here. Are you very sure that you put 
 it into the chair?" 
 
 " Yes. I slipped it in at the side, when we stopped 
 to pick the hare-bells." 
 
 "Then it must have fallen out. I'll go back and see 
 if I can find it. Do you think you can amuse your- 
 selves here a little while, till I come back? I won't 
 be long." 
 
 With that, she hastened away. I lay perfectly motion- 
 less, almost afraid to breathe, lest I should betray my 
 presence, but fascinated by the extreme beauty of the 
 children and the natural grace of the young girl. She 
 was dressed in white with a sash of blue ribbon; and 
 shoulder knots of the same color looped up her short 
 sleeves.
 
 A HAPPY ACCIDENT 19 
 
 Of course, I knew at once that they were the chil- 
 dren of Lord L ~, as I had seen them at times at 
 
 chapel service and riding out at the gate of the lodge; 
 but the cleft that social distinctions had created be- 
 tween us was so great that it had removed them in my 
 fancy so far above me that I never thought of them 
 as children, with the natural weaknesses and desires 
 of children, but as some sort of superior creatures to 
 whom I should look up with reverence, but never pre- 
 sume to think of as associates. My father had taken 
 great pains to instil this reverence into his children. 
 He, himself, was fully persuaded that however much 
 the nobility had degenerated, in individual cases through 
 shameful misalliances, it had its foundation originally 
 in a natural superiority of mental and physical force 
 qualities that imply leadership, and ought to imply 
 the willing obedience of inferior classes. 
 
 In the presence of this beauty and joyous grace, it 
 was not difficult for me, a shy, awkward, imaginative 
 boy, to feel the difference between these children and 
 myself; and to my fascinated eyes, the little girl re- 
 called the image of the angels of whom my mother de- 
 lighted to speak in recounting the joys of paradise. 
 
 Apparently, the governess could not readily find the 
 book which she had gone in search of, and the children 
 began to tire of doing nothing. The young girl began 
 to pick up pebbles from the bare stony incline of the 
 hill-side, and returning to the summit, amused herself 
 with trying to throw them into the stream she wasn't 
 often successful; but when the stone fell into the 
 stream with a splash, she laughed and shouted with 
 glee. The boy wished to share in the sport, and begged 
 her to wheel his chair nearer the edge, and to give 
 him some stones, also. She gathered up a handful of 
 pebbles, and rolled his chair dangerously near the in- 
 cline. He found the game amusing, and showed a 
 natural dexterity in hitting certain trees at which he 
 aimed; for when he found that he had not sufficient
 
 20 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 strength to hurl the stone into the stream, or, perhaps, 
 lacked a sufficiently good position from which to hurl 
 it, he desisted from the attempt, and declared it was 
 more fun to play that he was shooting game; and he 
 selected certain trees that he called deer, at which he 
 aimed. Soon he had thrown all the stones which she 
 had gathered, and begged her to go farther down the 
 hill and bring him up a quantity of larger ones. She 
 started off at once, but seing some beautiful flowers 
 growing along the edge of the stream, she went far- 
 ther than she had intended at first. The boy grew 
 impatient at her delay. Leaning far forward in a sudden 
 effort to look down into the ravine, he set the chair 
 in motion. I saw the peril in a moment, and, quick 
 as a flash, I darted from the bush and threw myself 
 headlong before the chair, stopping its course with my 
 body just as it was about to make a rapid and danger- 
 ous descent into the stream, which at that point was 
 deep enough to drown him. 
 
 He hadn't uttered a cry, although he must have 
 seen his danger; but, in falling, I had pierced the 
 fleshy part of my hand with a long thorn, and the 
 blood that ran from the wound caught his eye. Then 
 he commenced to call for help with all his might. His 
 sister, dropping her flowers, began to run, crying, to- 
 wards us, slipping and falling on the way; but before 
 she could reach us the governess appeared, and rescued 
 us without more ado. She was pale with terror, blamed 
 herself for having left them, overwhelmed me with ex- 
 pressions of gratitude, asked my name, and called me 
 a little hero. Seeing my wounded hand, she closed her 
 eyes a moment, then opening them, resolutely drew the 
 thorn from my hand, and bound her handkerchief about 
 the wound. 
 
 The young girl turned towards me with tears in her 
 eyes, saying simply : " How good and brave you are." 
 The boy alone said nothing; but he put out his hand, 
 and catching hold of mine, pressed it firmly. All three
 
 A HAPPY ACCIDENT. 21 
 
 wished to go with me to the lodge to see my hand 
 properly dressed, but confused, trembling like an aspen, 
 I begged to be allowed to go alone, and darted away 
 through the woods like some wild thing, and was soon 
 out of their sight or hearing. But I was in no hurry 
 to get home. Intimate joys like intimate griefs refuse 
 companionship, and I was inexpressibly happy. I had 
 saved a human life, and was born anew into my first 
 complete consciousness of individuality. Up to this 
 time I had existed as a chaos of romantic fancies, never 
 once accepting myself for what I really was the eldest 
 son of a poor peasant, destined to follow his footsteps 
 and till the soil in my turn. Sometimes, as I have al- 
 ready said, I was a knight-errant, wandering from coun- 
 try to country, a miniature Don Quixote, righting 
 wrongs and covering myself with glory. Sometimes, I 
 was only a humble missionary, 'carrying light into dark- 
 est Africa, preaching to black cannibals a religion of 
 love. But to-day, I was just myself a little boy nine 
 years old, who had rendered a great service to his 
 master, and felt that there was nothing sweeter in life 
 than just to serve. 
 
 My exaltation prevented me from feeling the slight- 
 est pain in my hand; but it did not prevent a sub-con- 
 sciousness of my surroundings which stamped them 
 so vividly on my memory that I seem to-day to feel 
 the hallowed hush of that beautiful May day in the 
 woods; to see the irregular wavering patches of sun- 
 light, filtered through the tree-tops, lighting up the 
 moss on their trunks ; to hear the dry dead twigs crackle 
 under my feet, the whirr of a bird's wing darting across 
 my path; and to smell the earthy odor of the damp 
 woods and moldering leaves. 
 
 Up to this time my affections, solid and tranquil, 
 had been limited entirely to my family, and were rather 
 of the nature of habits than passions; but to-day, my 
 childish heart swelled with passionate delight in an- 
 other, in this young master whose dark eyes had looked
 
 22 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 gratefully into mine, whose small fingers had clasped 
 my hand so fervently. I envied the woman who wheeled 
 his chair, the sister whose privilege it was to amuse 
 him; I regretted that I had not hurt myself more seri- 
 ously in his service. I longed to make myself worthy 
 of his regard. 
 
 As for his sister, although I had remarked her 
 beauty, I was as much troubled as charmed by it; I 
 felt myself so much beneath her, that it seemed an 
 audacity to wish to see her again. How coarse and 
 common I must seem to her! but he, he was a boy; 
 he would understand me, he might even learn to like 
 to have me about him! 
 
 When I reached home, I was so full of my new 
 happiness and at the same time rendered so timid by 
 the excess of my emotions, that I dared not speak of 
 my adventure; but to my mother's enquiries about my 
 sore hand I replied that I had fallen on the hill and 
 hurt it with a thorn. I had taken care to remove the 
 handkerchief and hide it in my pocket to avoid having 
 to give an account of it. 
 
 She washed the wound and sucked it, fearing poison ; 
 then carefully bound it up, telling me I was a good boy 
 not to cry and make a great fuss about it. 
 
 But my secret, my beautiful secret, was not destined 
 to remain unknown. We were all at supper on the 
 
 evening of the same day, when a servant of Lord L 
 
 announced his master's arrival at the Lodge. 
 
 Lord L was a tall, square-shouldered, handsome 
 
 man, with a leonine head and a haughty expression 
 that inspired respect and fear. Seeing him enter the 
 room, I felt myself turn scarlet, and my heart beat 
 so violently that it seemed to me it must force its way 
 through my chest. 
 
 " Good-evening, Graham," he said to my father, who 
 rose instantly from his chair, as did the rest of us. 
 " I have come to see one of your boys ; the one who 
 showed to-day that he can think and act at the right
 
 A HAPPY ACCIDENT 23 
 
 time, and hasn't a cowardly drop of blood in his veins. 
 Ah, there he is ! " he continued, catching sight of my 
 blushing face and hanging head. " See, he has his hand 
 bound up. Come here, my boy. He told you what he 
 did, didn't he?" 
 
 My father looked from his master to me with great 
 surprise, and answered: 
 
 " Not a word, my lord ! " 
 
 " And you, Madame ? " he said, turning to my mother. 
 
 Troubled and trembling almost as much as I, she 
 replied : 
 
 " My lord, he told me that he had fallen and hurt 
 his hand with a thorn, that is all." 
 
 His lordship put his hand on my head, and a smile 
 lighted his face, lending to it an expression of rare 
 sweetness. 
 
 " Then it is my great pleasure to tell you that he 
 saved the life of my son to-day; if not at the risk of 
 his own, at any rate at the risk of seriously injuring 
 himself. I am very glad that he escaped with a slight 
 wound and a few bruises." 
 
 " My lord, he did nothing but his duty and obeyed 
 a natural instinct," said my father. 
 
 " A boy who has such instincts and can obey them 
 so effectively can make a man worth the name." 
 
 " Thank you, my lord, I hope so," answered my 
 father with a respectful courtesy. 
 
 " But we must help a little at that. I know your 
 ideas about education, Graham, and I approve of them. 
 We plow the ground when we know that it is fertile 
 enough to repay us for our labor; but if we should 
 discover a gold mine in the same piece of ground, we 
 should stop making a wheat-field of it. We should sink 
 shafts, bring machines, and prepare for getting out the 
 ore. I want to see what I can get out of this boy of 
 yours, by giving him the same educational advantages 
 that my son will receive. You will consent to that, 
 I feel sure."
 
 24 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 " My lord," stammered my father, reddening to the 
 roots of his hair, " he is yours to do what you will with 
 him; but I fear you do us too much honor, and if you 
 should be mistaken, if there should be no gold in 
 him " 
 
 " Then we'll stop mining," interrupted his lordship 
 with a smile, " go back to plowing, and we shall have 
 some wheat. May I speak to you alone, concerning 
 my plans?" 
 
 He turned towards the door and my father followed 
 him into the yard. 
 
 My mother said nothing; but, folding her arms about 
 me, kissed me passionately and burst into tears. Whether 
 they were tears of joy and pride, or whether they 
 marked a sudden presentiment of misfortune in this 
 new destiny that was so widely different from that 
 of my brothers and sisters, I do not know. 
 
 As for myself, I was far from being either happy 
 or proud. My boyish love of freedom was stronger than 
 ambition. I did not dream that I was to be educated 
 along with his son, but that certain difficult tasks were 
 to be required of me, which I was not sure I could 
 perform. It seemed to me that I was going to cease 
 to belong to myself; for, once engaged in my task, I 
 felt I must do it, if I killed myself at it, rather than 
 disappoint his lordship's expectations of me. 
 
 I waited with extreme impatience the return of my 
 father. My mother was not less anxious. 
 
 "Well?" she said at my father's return. 
 
 I had never seen his face so grave. 
 
 He did not reply to her, but advancing towards me, 
 he said : 
 
 " George, I have just heard what you did, and you 
 did well, but it is not worth speaking of further, and 
 you were right to keep still about it. You heard what 
 
 Lord L has promised you. He speaks of giving 
 
 you advantages, and we have not the right to refuse 
 them. Now, it remains for you to prove that in edu-
 
 A HAPPY ACCIDENT 25 
 
 eating you, he really does give you advantages. In 
 future, you are to live two lives. For a few hours each 
 day you will live at the castle, where you are to take 
 your lessons with his son. You will see what it is to be 
 rich and noble; but for the rest of the day you will 
 live at home, where you will continue to see what it is 
 to be a peasant's son. Now, my boy, if the day ever 
 comes when you curse in your heart the station in 
 which you were born and lust after one above you; 
 when you blush to call me father and secretly spurn 
 your mother, that day, I shall wish that you had never 
 been born ; for that day you will prove that his lord- 
 ship was polishing brass and not gold. But if you have 
 good sense, if you can keep your head level, no matter 
 how high you may climb, if you can remember your 
 origin without false shame, if you can keep your heart 
 clean as well as your hands, if your education can 
 make you flexible without being fastidious; if, like a 
 cat, you can fall on your feet whenever you fall, then 
 you are saved. The greatest misfortune that can hap- 
 pen to a man is not to be neglected, but to be valued for 
 more than he is worth. Neglected, he is forced to play 
 no part, for he has no reputation to keep up; but 
 lauded for something which he isn't, he is continually 
 obliged to hide his weaknesses, to assume virtues which 
 he hasn't, and lives in a perpetual state of fear and de- 
 ceit. I'd rather be the lowest beggar than a mean man 
 set up in a high place." 
 
 I was too young to understand, perfectly, the drift 
 of what my father said, namely, that education quite 
 as often unfits a man for the duties of life as fits him 
 for them; but I felt keenly that he distrusted my power 
 to learn, and I secretly resolved that he should not be 
 disappointed in me. Besides, the fact that I was to see 
 the young lord every day, and study with him, put an 
 entirely new face on the matter. It seemed to me that 
 I could not help but learn, just to fit myself to be near 
 him.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 A TUTOR OF THE OLD REGIME 
 
 THE next morning at nine o'clock I accompanied my 
 father to the castle. Both of us were dressed in our 
 best; and we walked in silence, hand in hand. I think 
 my father himself was nervous ; but as for me, the most 
 absolute despair and terror had succeeded all my pretty 
 dreams, and I would have given anything in the world 
 to have obliterated my glorious yesterday, and to be 
 running barefoot in the dewy grass untroubled by the 
 least notice of me. A thick mist covered my eyes, and 
 my throat swelled with the pain of unshed tears. All 
 at once my father said: 
 
 " Do you remember very well what I said to you 
 last night, George?" 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 " There is something else I want to say to you. I 
 said you were going to live two lives. Every morning 
 you are to start to the castle with your Sunday clothes 
 on, and your brothers will be wearing their patched 
 trousers and going barefoot. They are not to share 
 your studies, and when their faces and hands will be 
 sunburnt, yours will be white. But for a time, at least, 
 you will come home every noon. The young lord's 
 health will not allow him to study more than a few 
 hours in the morning. When you come home I want 
 you to take off your clothes at once, put on the old 
 ones, and if no task is given you to do at home, you 
 are to help me as usual you have shown me that you 
 can keep a quiet tongue in your head now keep on 
 holding it. Don't undertake to make your brothers 
 discontented about what you see and hear and learn. 
 I don't want the whole household to be interested in 
 your experiences at the castle that concerns you, alone. 
 
 26
 
 A TUTOR OF THE OLD REGIME 27 
 
 If you find that you are not equal to this opportunity, 
 don't go, on pretending to be. Tell me frankly at once, 
 and I'll see that you are set free." 
 
 "Would you rather have me give it up, father?" 
 
 He sighed, he was silent a moment, and then said 
 with an effort, squeezing my small hand tightly in his 
 big one: 
 
 " No, George, I should be proud if my son could 
 show that he had a good head, could take a gentleman's 
 education and be a gentleman, not a conceited upstart. 
 Will you promise me to try to do your best ? " 
 
 "Yes, father, I promise you that I will work with 
 all my might." 
 
 " Come on, then. Courage, lad ! " He was looking 
 down at me, and for the first time noticed my extreme 
 timidity and pain, and his face brightened a little. 
 " Good ! you are not foolhardy, at least you know it 
 isn't going to be as easy as it looks, don't you? but 
 see here! if down in my heart I didn't believe you 
 capable, I should be ashamed to be leading you up here 
 to put you to the test." 
 
 He quickened his pace, and soon we were before the 
 castle. Never had it appeared so colossal, nor I so 
 little and insignificant. It was a large, somber-looking 
 building of dark gray stone, which looked as if it might 
 have been the work of giants, and destined to last as 
 long as the soil on which it stood. It was built on 
 the summit of a broad, rounded hill, and was surrounded 
 by magnificent oaks and plane trees, which at this hour 
 threw their lengthened shadows towards the west. 
 
 On entering the castle we were shown up a broad 
 marble stairway which led to a long corridor at the end 
 of which was the class-room. It was a very large room, 
 admirably lighted and aired by six large French win- 
 dows; three of them looking to the south, and three to 
 the east. The morning sunlight gave it a cheerful air, 
 which the scanty furniture, extremely plain and limited 
 to what was necessary, would hardly have done. The
 
 walls, delicately tinted with a bluish green, had no or- 
 naments beyond maps of various kinds, some well-filled 
 bookshelves and a huge fireplace in which some logs 
 were burning brightly. 
 
 Four little tables, covered with books, pens, and other 
 articles of study, occupied the center of the room, be- 
 fore three of which stood an upright chair. The fourth 
 table was much lower and peculiarly shaped to fit about 
 a reclining chair. 
 
 We found no one in the room but the tutor, a man 
 probably thirty or thirty-five years old, somewhat be- 
 low medium height, slender, active, seeming to sparkle 
 with life. There wasn't the slightest air of the peda- 
 gogue about him, and so much of natural kindness in 
 his bearing and in the expression of his face, that he 
 inspired me at once with a feeling of confidence and 
 affection. 
 
 He rose from one of the tables as soon as we were 
 shown in, and advanced towards us with an outstretched 
 hand. 
 
 " Mr. Graham, I am very glad to see you and your 
 son, and I hope we shall soon be good friends." He 
 took my hand, pressing it affectionately and smiling 
 kindly at me. My fear vanished in a moment. I was 
 sure that we should be friends. I looked at my father: 
 his face, too, had lighted up. 
 
 "You know how to read, of course," he continued in 
 his singularly pleasant voice. 
 
 "Yes, sir, a little," I answered. 
 
 " And what have you read ? " 
 
 " I have read * The Pilgrim's Progress,' and ' Robin- 
 son Crusoe/ and a little of the Bible, and some of 
 'Plutarch's Lives.'" 
 
 " Good ! That's a boy's best library. You have com- 
 menced well; and I dare say you'd be a great deal 
 happier to-day to be thrown on some desert island than 
 to come here to begin the life of a student, eh?" and 
 he patted my cheek.
 
 A TUTOR OF THE OLD REGIME 29 
 
 "Yes, sir," I replied in all seriousness. 
 
 He smiled, and pointing to one of the tables, told 
 me that it was mine, bidding me sit down by it. Then 
 he put a volume of Greek Mythology into my hands, 
 told me to read about the wanderings of Ceres in search 
 of Proserpine, and said he would ask me to tell him 
 about it when I had finished. 
 
 I buried myself in the book, while he spoke in a low 
 voice to my father. When I raised my head, at the 
 end of my reading, I was alone with him. He seemed 
 pleased with my way of telling the story; and when, in 
 recounting the experience of Ceres in nursing Tripto- 
 loinus back to health, I called the mother foolish in 
 her fears, he interrupted me eagerly to say: 
 
 " How right you are. She was a foolish mother, 
 wasn't she? She thought it possible for her boy to 
 grow strong and fine without ever knowing any pain 
 and hardship. That can't be, you know. I am glad 
 you noticed that. Well, go on." 
 
 He let me tell the story in my own way without 
 wishing to put his own words into my mouth, and 
 listened as attentively, and with as much apparent in- 
 terest as if he were hearing it for the first time. 
 
 I remember this as a marked characteristic of his 
 manner with his pupils he was never languid, never 
 pedantic ; the schoolmaster never absorbed the man in 
 him. He was never our inflexible master, he was our 
 companion, keenly interested in whatever we were do- 
 ing, and seeming himself to be learning it with us and 
 sharing with us the enthusiasm and delight of con- 
 scious growth. He had so admirably digested his 
 learning that it was conspicuous nowhere. I have since 
 seen men of erudition whose learning has absorbed all 
 their vitality, so that they seem no longer human, but 
 to be leather-bound books with legs and a dreary voice. 
 Perhaps there is nothing crueler in the experience of 
 the young in their exuberant freshness, than to be 
 brought into contact with these hidebound creatures.
 
 30 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 What scorn they feel and rightly feel for knowledge 
 mummified into the rigidity of uselessness. How su- 
 perior they feel in their power to laugh, to joke, to 
 run like deer, to feel, to think, to talk in their own 
 wild, free way. They are alive. He is dead and un- 
 fortunately for them, not buried yet. He cannot train 
 minds, he can only cram them; and cramming leads 
 to mental indigestion, to the stifling of the soul under 
 a pressure of matter. 
 
 But, if no greater misfortune can happen to the 
 young than to be crammed by a pedant, or neglected 
 by an ignoramus; on the other hand, no greater good 
 fortune can befall them, than to come under the care 
 of a really well-trained mind, a beautiful, broad, elas- 
 tic nature. Such a man was our tutor, Richard Glenn. 
 He was so human, in the largest sense of the word. He 
 could speak with equal ease and intelligence to a peas- 
 ant, a lord, a child, or a woman, and that without of- 
 fensive condescension or affected elevation. He seemed 
 to be a man of universal experience, and to under- 
 stand you intuitively. He had within him a great fund 
 of warm affection, which never degenerated either into 
 weakness or into sentimentality. We adored him, but 
 at the same time we deeply respected him. I do not 
 know how he made us feel that in spite of all his 
 kindness and his affection for us, he had an iron will 
 which we could neither melt by our tears and en- 
 treaties, nor bend by sulking or persistence. His " no " 
 and his " yes " were final, and we liked them to be so, 
 and felt that he was just. 
 
 He had, too, that rare preservative against pedan- 
 try, a keen sense of humor. He never took exaggerated 
 views of things, but kept the sane level of common 
 sense. We hear a great deal about methods of teach- 
 ing in educational circles. If you had asked him what 
 his method was, he would have answered, with reason, 
 that he had none. He taught in a hundred ways, as 
 the need or the occasion required. Sometimes, the big 
 study-hall rang with our mirth, and we were learning
 
 A TUTOR OF THE OLD REGIME 31 
 
 and laughing at the same time; and if the laugK 
 threatened to get the upper hand, he knew how to lead 
 us back to our tasks with a beautiful seriousness that 
 never missed its aim. There were times when he seemed 
 not one man, but twenty. He had a remarkable power 
 of mimicry, and a dramatic gift rarely seen off the 
 stage. His reading of the great poets was something- 
 unforgettable ; and in memory of it, I think that if 
 I were asked to name the most valuable natural gift 
 of a great teacher, I should say it was the power to 
 read well. I say natural gift advisedly, for I do not at 
 all mean what is called elocution. No one can be 
 taught to read well; it is as much a gift born with one 
 as the gift for music, painting, and poetry; and elo- 
 cution no more resembles it than a powder puff covered 
 with rouge resembles the healthy cheek of youth, glow- 
 ing with living color. It takes heart and brain to read 
 well; it only takes a little parrot-like capacity for imi- 
 tating to make an elocutionist. 
 
 I have seen Richard Glenn's face pale and flush as 
 he read, and his eyes fill with tears; I have heard his 
 voice tremble with genuine feeling; and we, too, 
 trembled as we listened with anger or scorn, pity or 
 affection, according to the emotion which he was por- 
 traying. 
 
 When I look back and try to recall the salient features 
 of his instruction, it seems to me that they may be 
 summed up in the effort to furnish us, not so much 
 with facts, as with principles. The chief value of a 
 difficult lesson wasn't the learning of the lesson itself, 
 but the discipline in concentration and perseverance 
 which it furnished. He hated all slovenliness in the 
 form of inattention and careless, half-learned work. He 
 would never repeat his direction or instructions if he 
 saw that we were listless. He never allowed us to say 
 " I can't ; " and if the phrase slipped out inadvertently, 
 how his fine gray eyes would flash, and his rich voice 
 ring out: 
 
 "Up! up! man, and try! Come! that's a coward's
 
 32 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 word. Let me never hear it again from your lips 
 you, who are a Scot, with the memory of Bruce and 
 Wallace as an inheritance!" 
 
 He had, too, a horror of lying, treachery, or in- 
 gratitude. He used to quote, with gusto, the proud 
 saying of the Greek aristocracy : " We, the truthful " 
 implying that it was a trait of the base-born to lie, 
 a mark, too, of cowardice. 
 
 After that, his chief solicitude was to make us love 
 the best literature, and know what made its excellence. 
 I have said that his first question to me was : " What 
 have you read ? " and it was also one of the last ques- 
 tions that he ever addressed to me. Books, he felt 
 to be the safest, best companions of the intelligence; 
 and he said that any man's education was assured if 
 he knew a good book from a poor one, and loved 
 reading. 
 
 Therefore, he set us at once to reading the world's 
 great masterpieces, troubling himself very little, at first, 
 as to whether we understood the purport of the author 
 he wished to accustom us to the atmosphere of the 
 best, so that we might feel at home in it, and recognize 
 it wherever we found it. He believed that all ex- 
 planations outside of our experience were useless, and 
 a mere waste of time. He never troubled our pleasure 
 in an author by any questions about style or grammar. 
 He never required us to analyze in any way what we 
 read, feeling sure that analytic methods were not the 
 way to make us feel truth and beauty; because they 
 would tend to make us critical before we had learned 
 to be appreciative, occupying us with the skeleton,, 
 when we should be enjoying the beauty of the body 
 of the work. But he often referred to some suggestive 
 passage in a book which we had read, when a proper 
 occasion offered, thus recalling it to our memory with 
 vivid force. For example, he very much disliked em- 
 phasis of all sorts loud speech, noisy music, vulgar
 
 A TUTOR OF THE OLD REGIME 33 
 
 over-dressing, officious politeness; and once calling our 
 attention to a striking example of vulgarity in dress 
 and manner in some American tourists, he said: 
 
 " Do you remember Jeanie Deans's experience with 
 Mrs. Dabby and the queen ? ' Mrs. Dabby,' she says, 
 ' was dressed twice as grand, and was twice as big, and 
 spoke twice as loud, and twice as muckle as the queen 
 did, but she hadna the same goss-hawk glance that 
 makes the skin creep and the knee bend; and though 
 she had very kindly gifted her with a loaf of sugar 
 and twa pounds of tea, yet she hadna athegither the 
 sweet look that the queen had when she put the needle- 
 book into her hand.' " 
 
 After that, Mrs. Dabby stood for us as the symbol 
 of the vulgar parvenu, and we invented a Mr. Dabby 
 and a great quantity of young Dabbies to fit all sorts 
 of impertinent boasters, either national or individual. 
 
 He had a way at times of thinking aloud, as it were, 
 before us; and sometimes the seed fell on stony 
 ground, sometimes it found soil and took root. I re- 
 member, one day, we passed a little gnarled crab-tree 
 on a ledge of rock and immediately afterwards a fine 
 old oak, with a generous stretch of branches and ample 
 shade. 
 
 " How foolish it would be," he said musingly, " to 
 quarrel with the gnarled little tree because it is not 
 so fine as the big one. It has grown as large as it 
 could. It isn't to be blamed for its size, any more 
 than the big one is to be praised as if it consciously 
 grew into symmetrical beauty. Shouldn't we have the 
 same forbearance with our cold and halting friends? 
 They are as responsive as they can be. Let us cease 
 to be exacting with them, and pity, not condemn them, 
 for their infirmities." 
 
 I do not recall that he ever deliberately thrust moral 
 lessons into our faces. He was not at all of those who 
 are so solicitous that you shall see their light shine,
 
 34 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 that they thrust their little candles under your nose, 
 singe your eyebrows and drip tallow all over your 
 clothes; but he managed to make us feel sincerely that 
 there is such a thing as moral health as beautiful and 
 desirable as health of the body; and that the signs of 
 it are perfect truthfulness, sincerity, kindness, helpful- 
 ness, self-respect, self-control, courage, and fulfilment of 
 duty. 
 
 To him education meant not an accumulation of facts 
 and philosophic systems in the memory, but the free 
 development of all the faculties of the mind so that a 
 man can find in them the source of his happiness an 
 awakened curiosity, a power of logical thinking, a soul 
 vibrating with sensibility, but strong enough to receive 
 the shocks of evil fortune without breaking under them. 
 
 There was very little of what is called science ad- 
 mitted into the approved course of study at that time. 
 Theology still dominated the theory of the universe; 
 but Richard Glenn had read the Encyclopedists of. 
 France, he had studied Lamarck, he had observed and 
 thought for himself. Without presuming to dogmatize, 
 he laid in us the foundations of a wise skepticism that 
 accepted fearlessly the conclusions of enlightened rea- 
 son, no matter how humiliating they might be to our 
 self-love; and tolerated contrary opinions venerable 
 through age and custom. 
 
 I was thirty-four when Darwin's " Origin of Spe- 
 cies " first appeared in 1859, and the main features of 
 its theory had been familiar to me from boyhood. 
 
 However, the prominent feature of our education 
 was linguistic. I happened to share with my young- 
 master an aptitude for learning languages, and we 
 passed from Latin and Greek to the four great lan- 
 guages of modern Europe: French, German, Spanish, 
 and Italian. Our tutor was not a philologist in the 
 strict sense of the word, that is, he loved languages, 
 not for their words, but for the ideas which they ex- 
 pressed; and the learning of a new language was to
 
 A TUTOR OF THE OLD REGIME 35 
 
 us the entrance into a new literature a new way of 
 looking at this old world and at human life. He had 
 his preference, too; he especially loved French for the 
 light and life in it, and succeeded in making us love it 
 too; conversing with us in it as often as in English; 
 so that in writing it now, I seem to be writing in my 
 mother-tongue.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 LOOKING FORWARD 
 
 THUS the years of my childhood slipped away in the 
 happiness of conscious growth, and the joy of delight- 
 ful companionship. But there were some shadows in 
 the sunny landscape. The fruits of my education be- 
 gan to show themselves in a few years, in a marked 
 difference in my tastes and my interests from those 
 of my brothers and sisters. As I was naturally a 
 boy of very strong family affections, the consciousness 
 of this difference and its resulting estrangement, was 
 extremely painful to me; and in spite of my father's 
 prohibition, I tried to lessen it by speaking of my 
 life and my studies at the chateau. But I soon found 
 that instead of awakening an interest, I only excited 
 envy and dislike in my brothers. They called me Lord 
 George in derision, and asked me why I didn't go and 
 live in the chateau for good, if I liked it so well. Then 
 I saw the wisdom of my father's prohibition, and it grew 
 easy for me, nay, it became necessary for me to hide 
 my real self from them, and I began to live two lives; 
 one of the soul, the other of the body, the mere sur- 
 face of me. Yet I didn't grow indifferent to my fam- 
 ily; on the contrary, my affections, wounded by their 
 misunderstanding, seemed to deepen, I knew them bet- 
 ter than ever before. I saw what I had not remarked, 
 as a child, that my father and mother were as solitary 
 as I, and that my father accepted his lot with a pa- 
 tience that savored much more of philosophy than 
 of virtue. Perhaps I judged him by myself, but it 
 seemed to me that he, too, had been a dreamer in his 
 youth, with that fatal devise " all or nothing," which 
 prepares the way for so much bitter disillusion, and 
 
 36
 
 LOOKING FORWARD 37 
 
 that he had deliberately destroyed his power to dream 
 any more, and had grasped firmly the nettle of reality 
 to crush its stings beyond the power of wounding him. 
 
 Like all those who dream, decisive action had prob- 
 ably been difficult for him, and had been learned late. 
 The duties of husband and father, in which he had 
 sought happiness, had finished by making a drudge of 
 him, whose chief good was his daily bread. 
 
 My mother vaguely felt this bitterness in him, and 
 wretched, because she was powerless to sweeten it, 
 took her refuge, womanlike, in a kingdom of noble 
 dreams which she called religion, accepting her destiny 
 without [complaint, finding a satisfactory solution to all 
 its complications in the reflection, " God knows best." 
 
 As for my relations at the chateau, they were most 
 harmonious. The young lord treated me, always, as if 
 I were his equal which does not mean that I felt 
 that I was. He had in his bearing something superior 
 which imposed respect without effort, something which 
 lifted him so far above his infirmity that it very rarely 
 occurred to me to pity him, and although he was only 
 two months my senior, I felt him far older than I. 
 Perhaps suffering in strong characters tends to mature 
 them. While I was still thinking as a boy, he thought 
 as a man, and as a proud ambitious man, treated un- 
 justly by nature, and resolved to make his physical 
 weakness forgotten by the solidity of his mind. 
 
 The strong bond, the subtle inexplicable sympathy 
 between us, had grown stronger with the years. We 
 were together a great deal, often making little excur- 
 sions alone; I wheeling his chair and listening to him, 
 as he talked of what interested him, or exchanging 
 opinions with him and forming plans for the future. 
 He especially liked the little clearing in the park where 
 we had first met. 
 
 I remember, particularly, one afternoon which we 
 spent there when we were sixteen years old I almost 
 a man in stature, he much smaller, much feebler, but
 
 38 
 
 with a superb head and face that made one forget every- 
 thing else. I never tired of it, it fascinated me anew 
 every time I looked at it that beautiful face with 
 the wonderful eyes which seemed to speak twenty lan- 
 guages. 
 
 It was a lovely afternoon one of those warm, fe- 
 cond spring days when the sap seems to circulate more 
 quickly in the veins and cells of every living thing, 
 and plants aspire to see the light in flowers and leaves. 
 White and yellow butterflies darted through the per- 
 fumed air, and a confused low murmur of insect life 
 rose from the grass. 
 
 We had ceased talking a moment, and it was he who 
 first broke the silence, saying: 
 
 " Do you ever have certain hours when you feel a 
 surplus of life surge through you, and your soul feels 
 too large for your body, and would break its prison just 
 to breathe fully? when if you were a woman you 
 would weep bitterly and not know why you were 
 weeping? Sehnsucht! that's the word sick with long- 
 ing for an unknown happiness, and all the suppressed 
 energy cramped within you cries out for action! ac- 
 tion! Oh, for a month I have felt force enough in 
 me to create a world and look at me, poor, impotent 
 wretch, glued to this cursed chair ! " He struck the arm 
 of the chair a violent blow and his face grew white 
 and then purple with the blood that rushed to it. I 
 looked at him a moment in amazement. I had never 
 seen him so agitated, and I felt embarrassed, not only 
 because I was thus an involuntary witness of what he 
 himself would be the first to term girlish weakness, but 
 because he had expressed the aimless unrest and melan- 
 choly which had often seized me of late, especially 
 during the long, mild nights when the moonlight bright- 
 ened my room. How many times, unable to sleep, I had 
 risen, my heart swelled with vague desires, my head 
 burning with a thousand projects for the future, in 
 which I saw myself rich, famous, loved! loved by 

 
 LOOKING FORWARD 39 
 
 whom? Whose was the face that always came to me 
 in these lonely hours, sometimes smiling, sometimes sad? 
 I had not the courage to dream out the fancy fully 
 Oh, it was madness to do that; as well wish for the 
 moon and the stars as playthings! 
 
 I looked at my young master, reddening as much 
 as he, hung my head and said nothing. 
 
 "If I had your body, your health to second my am- 
 bition," he continued, " do you think I should stay here, 
 burying my head in books, rethinking the thoughts of 
 others, acting over again the deeds of others? No, I 
 should create for myself a world in which I should see 
 my ideas take body and live, rising in large and beauti- 
 ful cities, or marching in victorious armies. Oh, you 
 don't know how many times I run, I jump, I fly across 
 the country, mounted on a fiery horse at the head of 
 brave men." 
 
 He hesitated; his voice trembled; there were tears 
 in his eyes. My heart beat furiously. He dashed 
 the tears away with a quick gesture, and smiled at me, 
 saying : 
 
 " Come, come, don't look so wretched, Sancho. Your 
 poor old Don Quixote has come to his senses again. 
 That's the first and the last time you'll ever see him 
 Charge at windmills. You see, I heard some of our 
 guests talking this morning. One of them was a man 
 who has traveled a great deal and has just come back 
 after an absence of fifteen years. He was talking of the 
 general unrest among the people they are rising every- 
 where, discontented, trying to shake off, not only the 
 social, but the natural inequality which exists among 
 men and making a fiasco of it from the French Rev- 
 olution to Owen's social settlement at New Harmony, 
 Ind., in the U. S. By the way, he visited that settle- 
 ment in '28, talked with Owen himself who was con- 
 fident that he was in a fair way to restore Eden on 
 earth and his settlement then was riddled from top 
 to bottom with discontent, envy, hatred, and all sorts
 
 40 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 of anti-social feelings among its members, and toppled 
 over like a card-house that it was, the very next year 
 isn't it all such stupid nonsense! I am only a boy in 
 years, I know, but I don't have to live to be fifty to 
 know that no social organization is possible with ab- 
 solute equality as a basis. There must be men who 
 work and men who think, there must be poverty as well 
 as riches to offer an incentive to labor, and when it 
 comes to a downright fighting chance for distinction, 
 it's the poor boy, not the rich fellow, who has all odds 
 in his power. How do you suppose a man can work 
 with all his might, when pleasure and ease are at his 
 elbow calling to him in a hundred different forms, 
 while the poor devil has hunger and hardship at his 
 heels, forever stinging and pricking him on. What do 
 you suppose is the origin of the nobility but natural 
 superiority, the keener eye, the quicker brain, the longer 
 staying power; and what is the cause of its degeneracy 
 but leisure, wealth and power. We shall deserve to go 
 down when we only hold our place by inherited name 
 and not inherited natural power. Do I deserve to be 
 your lord, when with a turn of your wrist you could 
 dash me down that cliff yonder? Oh, I think of these 
 things lying awake at night, and I see how the great 
 men, now, are coming from the ranks, how their 
 thoughts are moving the world, their discoveries and 
 inventions are revolutionizing labor, and we, we are 
 like those sterile, hot-house roses running by cultivation 
 to nothing but showy petals. Oh, I want to see more, 
 know more, feel more, that I, too, may think and move 
 others to think; and for that I need you, George I 
 need your legs to run about for me, your eyes to see 
 for me, in places where I cannot go. I shall ask my 
 father to let us go abroad next year will you go with 
 me, George?" 
 
 " Go ? Of course I will. How good you are," and 
 in a transport of enthusiasm I pressed to my lips the 
 hand that he had extended towards me.
 
 LOOKING FORWARD 41 
 
 At this moment I saw a figure in white furtively 
 approaching behind him, and a smile on the beautiful 
 face, the eyes full of loving mischief. She lifted her 
 hand to warn me that I must not give a sign of her 
 approach, and while the young lord continued to speak 
 of his plans, she stole nearer and nearer, and then quite 
 close behind him, suddenly clapped her two white hands 
 over his eyes, at the same time kissing him, saying: 
 
 "Who is it?" 
 
 "Who is it? Why who in the world but you, Mar- 
 garet. What other woman but you and mother would 
 want to kiss me." 
 
 " What other woman ? Why all women. You dear, 
 handsome fellow, if they knew you as well as we do. 
 Isn't that so, George?" and she turned to me. 
 
 In every life there are critical moments, big with 
 consequences, good or evil. I was standing before her, 
 as I had stood a hundred times without betraying my- 
 self either to her or to my own full consciousness, but 
 at this moment it flashed over me that I adored her. 
 I gave a name to this sentiment that made me timid 
 and awkward in her presence, and dream of her, absent. 
 
 I answered nothing. I trembled from head to foot. 
 I felt the warm blood surge to my heart, then return 
 in floods to my face. 
 
 What would she think of me, if she guessed my 
 secret? What would her brother think, who esteemed 
 and loved me beyond my merits? 
 
 But she did not seem to notice my confusion; she 
 was thinking only of him. 
 
 "You see," she continued, "he does not answer. 
 That is because he does not know you so well as I, 
 although you are always together of late. Do you 
 know that you are not giving me any more of your 
 time, little brother? What have you two to say to each 
 other that is so important that you must steal away to 
 say it. I get tired alone. They are going to call me a 
 woman pretty soon, and force me to shine in society,
 
 42 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 but before that I want to be your little sister, your 
 girl sister a while longer. I am afraid of this big world 
 that would laugh at me if it knew what really pleases 
 me instead of its noisy showy self a walk in the woods 
 gathering wild flowers; a chat with my brother, and 
 George near by, or a fairy story in which the princes 
 are always good and handsome, and love only just such 
 silly girls as myself." 
 
 " But that is just what I don't care for any more, 
 Margie." He stroked her hand as he talked. " I am 
 tired of being a boy, I want to be a mafn. I want to 
 see this world which frightens you. The fairy stories 
 charm me no longer. It's real people I am hungry to 
 know people who think, people who act." 
 
 " How strange ! " she said thoughtfully. " It seems 
 to me so beautiful to be young and not to have 
 to care about all these stupid realities. I should like 
 always to be just eighteen. Nineteen seems so old, so 
 old. Do I already seem old to you, George ? " 
 
 She looked at me quizzically, her fresh, young face 
 full of charm, and, though still a child in some respects, 
 she had all the feminine instincts of coquetry. She must 
 have known she was beautiful. Her mirror told her 
 that every day. I do not know what I answered, but 
 I still hear her cheerful laugh ring out, and if I should 
 live to be a hundred, I shall never forget what she was 
 to me that afternoon in June to me a boy in years, 
 but a man in feeling. Something inexpressibly sweet 
 and adorable, away above me, whose beauty and sweet- 
 ness were never meant for me. And yet so generous, so 
 perfect, so disinterested, was my love that I was con- 
 tent to be her faithful dog, and find my happiness in 
 her smiling tolerance of me. 
 
 She had coupled my name with her brother's in men- 
 tioning what she liked best, and that was quite enough 
 to fill me with a foolish, rapturous ecstasy, in which I 
 lived for weeks like one surrounded by a rosy mist that 
 softens, spiritualizes, beautifies all objects within the
 
 LOOKING FORWARD 43 
 
 range of vision. I saw nothing as it really was. I lived 
 in a sort of joyous delirium, which exalted and at the 
 same time softened my soul; so that I was capable of 
 all the heroisms, and yet vibrated sensitive as the wind 
 harp to the slightest touch; but I was ignorant of real 
 life as a babe in its mother's arms. 
 
 Although nearly all my lessons at the chateau had 
 been learned and recited with Lord Eliot, there were 
 some hours in the modern languages in which Lady 
 Margaret was allowed to join us. It was in these 
 hours that I learned to know well all her tastes. I have 
 but to shut my eyes to see her in fancy, as I saw her 
 in the class-room, always dressed with exquisite sim- 
 plicity; the dazzling freshness of her youthful beauty, 
 her only ornament. She sat by preference near the 
 south window, the morning sun in summer gilding her 
 rich brown hair as she bent over her book. She was 
 not so serious and attentive a student as her brother, 
 and her eyes often wandered outside; but she had a 
 quick ear, imitated sounds well and learned to speak 
 a foreign tongue with a truer accent than either her 
 brother or I acquired. Her voice had a peculiar mag- 
 netic quality that often made me tremble with delight. 
 
 I was always so conscious of her presence that I was 
 more or less stupid before her, and suffered horribly 
 at times, thinking that she must consider me a block- 
 head; but she was too well-bred ever to show anything 
 but the most perfect kindness to me, although she was 
 never expansive or affectionate with me as with her 
 brother, whom she adored. She liked better to be with 
 him than with anyone else; and as a proof of the 
 generosity of her nature, I do not recall a single in- 
 stance in which she showed any jealousy of me, though 
 she often saw my company preferred to hers. She 
 wished him to be happy in his own way. 
 
 And certainly he deserved the deep, faithful love 
 which she gave him. I have mentioned the unusual 
 force of his mind; but I have given no idea of a cer-
 
 44 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 tain tenacity of will that he had, and a beautiful courage 
 in suppressing signs of physical suffering which was 
 as wonderful as it was beautiful. He could not en- 
 dure to be pitied. Pity seemed to him an expression 
 of superiority, and he was too proud to accept it from 
 anyone but his mother. There was not a weak fiber 
 in his mind of steel. He never limited himself to the 
 tasks assigned, but always outran his lessons, and I, 
 who would have been ashamed to be left behind, did 
 with difficulty what was mere play for him. I owe to 
 his example a force in persistency that does not natu- 
 rally belong to me. I have always been naturally in- 
 clined to doubt my own powers, and therefore am 
 easily discouraged. He taught me what can be done 
 with moderate powers by sticking to a task day after 
 day. 
 
 At first, his quiet confidence in himself, his habit of 
 saying " I know " in place of " I think so," seemed a 
 a want of modesty; but it was only 'the admirable ve- 
 racity of a mind naturally strong and dominant. I 
 learned that he never expressed an opinion until he 
 had grounds for it, that he never undertook anything 
 that he could not do. He knew his limitations and kept 
 within the sphere of them. 
 
 He had naturally a very passionate nature, but he 
 early learned that all outbursts of violence ended by 
 crippling still more his feeble store of physical strength, 
 and he conquered his irritability as he conquered the 
 daily tasks set before him. He was an indefatigable 
 reader, and every trait of heroism or wisdom or moral 
 elevation excited in him a passionate admiration, and 
 I have often heard him express a noble jealousy be- 
 cause he had not had his part in some beautiful deed. 
 This thirst for the ideal as it shows itself in action was 
 his dominant characteristic, accompanied by a power 
 of distinguishing the great from the little, the true 
 from the false. 
 
 In the course of our historical studies, we had read
 
 LOOKING FORWARD 45 
 
 in connection with the rise and growth of Catholicism 
 many of the lives of the saints, and he drew from this 
 reading a consolation that was really touching. These 
 examples of moral heroism and exalted abnegation 
 seemed at last to have shown him a field of action in 
 which the soul was the actor; the body, the enemy. I 
 do not mean that he became a disciple of asceticism. 
 On the contrary, he vigorously combated the monkish 
 ideal, and believed that to withdraw from the world is 
 not the most effective way of combating its evils, that 
 it is on the contrary a kind of sublime egotism result- 
 ing, as all egotisms do, in mutilating the soul by blur- 
 ring its visions. One world at a time, was his devise; 
 he did not believe in eating dry bread in this world in 
 the hope of having it well-buttered in the next, nor 
 that it is necessary to make a hell of this life to gain 
 heaven in a prospective one. 
 
 But what touched him in these lives was just the 
 qualities he needed in his own, namely, the courage to 
 bear pain the energy that never sleeps. 
 
 As for me, I drew from them quite another lesson. 
 I was struck by the genius for loving manifested by 
 these saints whose ardent hearts slaked their thirst with 
 intoxicating draughts of divine love. I saw that there 
 are not two ways of loving, and that the saint as well 
 as the sinner employs the same language. I saw that 
 all these immense loves sought solitude and were nour- 
 ished in silence. I saw, also, that they were woven of 
 a thousand illusions, bizarre explanations of the most 
 trivial events, and that reason went often very far 
 astray in these flights of the soul to embrace infinity. 
 
 In this colossal egotism, I perceived the man in the 
 saint, understood him and pardoned him. Did not I, 
 too, love far, far beyond me? but life was smiling on 
 me. I felt no need yet for examples of courage, and 
 I found a language for my emotions in this language 
 of love that I learned in the Lives of the Saints. Their 
 austerities repelled me, their devotion attracted me. I
 
 46 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 remember particularly how Saint Bernard won me 
 wholly, when his austerity made me quite despair of his 
 humanity, by his letters to the monks who had left him, 
 and one in particular on the death of his brother. His 
 tenderness when he was tender was more than admir- 
 able, it was sublime, the superb flowering of a long, 
 ungracious reticence. He was like the century plant 
 that spends itself in a single flowering ; but, to tell the 
 truth, I liked better the rose that blooms every summer.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 ON FOREIGN SHORES 
 
 So passed my boyhood into youth. My experiences 
 were not those of young students in general. It was 
 not my vacations that brought to me ideas of liberty 
 and joy; on the contrary, they were infinitely stupid, 
 sterile periods which I must travel alone. They com- 
 menced with the middle of July and ended about the 
 1 5th of September. They meant no more lessons, no 
 more visits at the castle, no more of that sweet expan- 
 sion of soul in an atmosphere fitted to nourish senti- 
 ment and joy. The days dragged slowly, drearily by. 
 I tried as much as possible to be alone, to find my 
 society in my dreams and the memories of the absent 
 ones I loved. My father, finding that I continued in 
 favor at the castle, had gradually ceased to require 
 anything of me, allowing me to do quite as I pleased, 
 saying that as too many cooks spoil the broth, he 
 wouldn't interfere any longer with my education as a 
 gentleman. I thought that he treated me coldly; per- 
 haps he did not intend to; but I felt hurt, and my 
 mother, with the intuition of love, saw that I was 
 wounded and secretly lavished an unwonted tenderness 
 on me. But because I feared to be the cause of any 
 further estrangement between her and my father, I 
 avoided as much as possible being seen alone with her. 
 How much she must have suffered, and how much I 
 could have done to lessen her suffering by an appear- 
 ance of contentment, I know now. But youth is cruel 
 and egoistic, because it lacks the deep experiences of 
 the heart. It is not deeply rooted in its environments 
 and is ready to quit them at the first seductive voice that 
 calls it. It does not live in the present ; it belongs to the 
 
 47
 
 48 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 future by all its hopes and dreams. When our lord 
 and his family returned in the fall, life recommenced 
 for me. What a restless, nervous joy possessed me, 
 some days before their arrival! I could not sleep 
 at night, I could scarcely eat during the day. The sun 
 seemed to shine with a sweeter, lovelier light, inun- 
 dating me with floods of joy. No more solitude, no 
 more sadness, and my heart overflowing with happi- 
 ness made all things easy, I forgave my father his cold- 
 ness and my brothers their envy. I furtively kissed 
 my mother's hand, and she, caressing me gently, showed 
 by her moist eyes and trembling lips that she knew the 
 terrible sadness of those who do not suffice to make 
 the happiness of the ones they love. 
 
 Judge then of my joy when I learned in my eighteenth 
 year that I was to accompany my young lord to the 
 continent and remain with him until the completion 
 of his education by foreign travel. It meant the com- 
 pletion of my own education, too, and not only that, 
 but the cessation of the painful dual life I had been 
 leading. I should belong, now, wholly to my young 
 master; for as to any idea of any individual future 
 separate from his, it never so much as entered my head. 
 It seemed to me that his father, in educating me along 
 with his son, had destined me to be the latter's secre- 
 tary and assistant in whatever plans he might wish to 
 undertake, and although he had not committed himself 
 so far, I feel sure that that was his intention. At any 
 rate, it was the intention of my young master, who had 
 several times assured me that he needed me, and wished 
 never to be separated from me. 
 
 With regard to my position for the present, I was 
 to continue my study with him under his tutor who was 
 to accompany us, and I was, also, to render him the 
 services of a valet, under the directions of an experi- 
 enced man who had been with him from his child- 
 hood, and was physician, nurse, and valet in one. 
 
 We set sail for France in June, 1842, spent a year
 
 ON FOREIGN SHORES 49 
 
 and a half in various travels on the continent in which 
 we were sometimes joined by the family, and finally 
 settled at Paris. The year had been a truce to serious 
 study; we had been looking at cities, visiting museums, 
 art-galleries and fashionable salons, getting, in short, 
 a bird's-eye view of life, preparatory to settling down 
 to our own life-task. And what was that task? For 
 my own part, I am ashamed to confess that I did not 
 at all know. I had neither definite plans, nor definite 
 ambition. I lived from day to day in a sort of happy 
 dream, knowing no more of what real life is, as an in- 
 dependent, thoughtful existence implying struggle and 
 prudence, than if I had been a child in my mother's 
 arms. As I have hinted before, my passionate attach- 
 ment to my young lord, and his confidence in me, made 
 it almost impossible for me to conceive of a calling 
 which would separate me from him. Those of his tastes 
 which I did not naturally share I cultivated, because 
 they were his and as social questions deeply interested 
 him, I, too, turned my attention in that direction, and 
 though I hadn't the temerity to suggest remedies, I 
 became tolerably expert in detecting the weaknesses 
 of the present system of society. That it requires ab- 
 solutely no penetration to detect them, when one suffers 
 from them, is self-evident; but, as a matter of fact, 
 it isn't those who suffer from them who are the first 
 to complain so far as I know, no great labor move- 
 ment was ever instituted by a laborer, no plausible so- 
 cial theory was ever proposed by a man who himself 
 bore the burdens of the very poor and wrote with a hand 
 made callous by hard work. It is the man who has 
 looked on at the stone-breaking with his hands in his 
 pockets, and imagined how his own back and arms 
 would ache at the task, who has been the first to de- 
 nounce stone-breaking as inhuman, and to declare that 
 if it must be done, we should all take our turn at it. 
 To be sure, he doesn't seem to show any more eager- 
 ness to take his turn than anybody else, but he enjoys
 
 50 
 
 himself immensely talking about it; and if he talks 
 long and loud enough, he may end by creating a social 
 revolution, as witness Rousseau. 
 
 Of course, we read Rousseau it was the day of so- 
 cial experiments, and Rousseau was the prophet of all 
 sentimental reformers. Undoubtedly, like all young 
 people, we should have been fascinated beyond the 
 power of criticism by that wonderfully lucid, rapid 
 style, palpitating with feeling, which seduced his age, 
 had we not read him with our tutor, who tempered 
 our admiration by the sane criticism of reason and ex- 
 perience. While admitting the power of his genius, ha 
 showed us the limitations and exaggerations of it, due 
 to his morbid sensibility and sentimental egotism. He 
 made us feel that, while no writer has ever been so 
 keen-eyed and true an anatomist of the sentimental 
 weaknesses and passions of the human heart, no writer 
 of equal power was ever so profoundly ignorant of hu- 
 man nature, as it appears in the vast majority of men. 
 He knew only one man himself; and that man he 
 idealized. He measured strength by emotivity ; and when 
 he wept and trembled, he felt himself divine. In his 
 solitude he multiplied the image of himself and called 
 it humanity. It never entered his wildest conception 
 that man has come up from the brutes, and bears the 
 stamp of his brute origin in a thousand low instincts 
 and desires that civilization can no more eradicate than 
 the earth can get rid of her soil and still nourish the 
 life which she begets. He dreamed of a primitive man 
 who sprang perfect from the soil, whose days were 
 spent in delicious reveries and noble thoughts, broken 
 only by a few hours of necessary toil in which he found 
 the joy of legitimate action at the same time that he 
 supplied himself with simple food and simple raiment. 
 He degenerated by increased wants, by pride, ambition, 
 cruelty; and he called his degeneracy civilization. He 
 hewed down the forests, he bridged rivers, he robbed 
 and murdered his neighbors, and called it conquest; he
 
 ON FOREIGN SHORES 51 
 
 buiit cities and they sheltered rapacity, poverty, vice 
 and the stench and shame of his life cries to heaven in 
 every civilized nation on the globe. Away then with 
 civilization step backward into the freedom and beauty 
 of life with nature as the primitive races, the so-called 
 savages, live it, and you will be saved. 
 
 It all sounds absurdly bald and flat, ridiculously false, 
 stripped of its rhetoric and sophistry this social ideal 
 of Rousseau's, as reduced in this way to its elements; 
 but it was seductive eloquence, it was the truth on the 
 inspired lips of a prophet, to the restless idealists of his 
 age. It was Don Quixote's harangue on the acorns ex- 
 panded to volumes : " Happy times and happy ages 
 were those which the ancients termed the golden age! 
 not because gold, so prized in this, our iron age, was 
 to be obtained in that fortunate period without toil; 
 but because they who then lived were ignorant of those 
 two words, Mine and Thine." 
 
 There are Don Quixotes still delivering the old ha- 
 rangue; and there are not wanting many Sancho Pan- 
 zas, now as then, who listen in open-mouthed wonder, 
 and believe their doughty knights are to lead them into 
 a land flowing with milk and honey; or as Schopen- 
 hauer puts it, " a do-nothing land in which everything 
 grows of itself and roasted pigeons fly around, and 
 every one finds his ardently beloved at once, and wins 
 her without difficulty." 
 
 Young as we were, neither my lord Eliot nor I 
 believed in this do-nothing paradise, and we had no il- 
 lusions about the perfectibility of man, but saw that 
 the human race is as deeply indebted for its progress 
 to its imperfections as to its perfections; and that they 
 are not to be eliminated any more than the shadows from 
 the sunlight. 
 
 To be sure, we did not arrive at this mature reflec- 
 tion so early without being helped to it. That is always 
 a great day in which some profound truth lights up 
 the dark places of the mind, and I shall never forget
 
 52 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 one snowy winter day in Elberfeld, when I chanced 
 upon a stray volume of Ludwig Borne in the inn at 
 which we were stopping. Borne has been a favorite of 
 mine ever since. If he has not the brilliant whimsical 
 wit of Heine with its sudden transformations into gen- 
 uine poetry, he has a very delightful vein of humor 
 all his own, and a command of stinging sarcasm, based 
 on a large fund of common sense, that assures him a 
 place among the immortals. 
 
 The day in question I read his little allegory enti- 
 tled Honestus. I have read it many times since and 
 always with a fresh wonder that no writer has ever 
 found in it a suggestion for an anti-Utopian romance 
 to show the reverse side of the countless looking back- 
 wards and forwards into ideal states of society that 
 are no more practicable than a midsummer night's 
 dream, or Gonzalo's famous commonwealth in The 
 Tempest, whose " latter end forgets the beginning."
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 A FABLE FOR COMMUNISTS AND DREAMERS OF HUMAN 
 PERFECTIBILITY 
 
 HONESTUS is the story of a young Swedish artist, 
 naturally kind-hearted and joyous, who once had a 
 chance at trying to set the world right, and set it all 
 wrong, with as fatal consequences as rash Phaeton's 
 attempt to drive the chariot of the sun. 
 
 " Make all men good " was his generous cry to the 
 magician who had dazzled him with his wonders. 
 
 " Make all men good : make them happy ! " 
 
 The magician paled, and said in a low, trembling 
 voice : 
 
 " Don't ask that, my son. I dare not refuse your 
 request; but do not persist in it. Sin is rottenness, and 
 sin is the source of life." But Oscar in the intoxica- 
 tion of his philanthropy did not understand the old 
 man's words. He fell down before him, clasped his 
 knees and with hot tears streaming down his face, 
 implored : " O mighty father, give men virtue, give 
 them happiness." 
 
 The magician granted the prayer. The midnight 
 hour struck. The magician stretched his magic wand 
 towards the east, west, north, and south, and pro- 
 nounced mysterious words. Sweet harp tones sounded 
 from the heavens, and from the earth rose hideous 
 laughter. Oscar, trembling between rapture and horror, 
 asked the meaning of the horrible laughter. " Hush, 
 my son; that is the spirit of malice. Do not irritate 
 him. I have no power over him; come out into the 
 air, that we may see our work." 
 
 They stepped out; it was a still, solemn night, and 
 Oscar lifted his eyes devoutly to the starry sky above 
 
 53
 
 54 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 him. The old man was touched : " Rejoice once more 
 in this sweet night, it is the last on earth. Night is 
 sin, and the sun will never more set." 
 
 They passed into a gloomy street, and saw a ladder 
 leaning against a house, and a man climbing it who 
 looked anxiously about him. " Will you let that hap- 
 pen ? " asked Oscar. " Perhaps he will murder the 
 careless sleepers." " Be calm, my son. The theft has 
 already been committed. The midnight hour gave the 
 villain his honesty again, and he is bringing back the 
 stolen goods." 
 
 Honestus and the joyous youth went on, seeing every- 
 thing, themselves invisible. " What voices are those I 
 hear weeping in yonder great building?" "They are 
 robbers and murderers in prison, they are praying." 
 They entered a room lighted by a night-lamp. A beau- 
 tiful woman, with loosened hair, knelt before the cradle 
 of her child, kissed the sleeping infant and wept over it. 
 A man stood on the threshold of the door, and, redden- 
 ing, stretched his hand towards the woman, 'and the 
 mother covered her eyes. " Who are they, Honestus ? " 
 " That man is the seducer, who has come to the wife 
 of his friend at the hour she appointed for him. My 
 magic-staff was swift. Repentance came before the 
 guilt; the mother is imploring forgiveness of her child, 
 and the man is departing in sadness from the sweet 
 sin." 
 
 They came to a great square, beautified with many 
 trees ; and from all the houses round about rushed thou- 
 sands of men; soldiers hastened past, infantry and cav- 
 alry; flags waved, drums beat, cannons were planted, 
 and everywhere resounded the clang of weapons and 
 the cries of men. " What has happened ? " " Those 
 who come out of the houses are gamblers, cheats, de- 
 bauched men and spies, whom the magic of virtue has 
 chased out of their lurking-places; and power, unac- 
 customed to virtue and trembling before her, has sent 
 out her multitudes to meet this boldness."
 
 'A FABLE FOR COMMUNISTS 55 
 
 The morning dawned, but the stillness of night re- 
 mained. No carts rattled over the streets, no huckster 
 shrieked, no hammer-stroke was heard, the market-place 
 was empty. " What is the reason of this stillness, 
 Honestus ? " ** Men have no longer any false desires : 
 they are satisfied and rest." Before a baker's shop, 
 stood a clamoring multitude, that asked in vain for 
 bread. The bread had already been given away for 
 nothing to the famishing. Hundreds of corpses lay on 
 the streets. " Who are these unfortunates ? " " They 
 are spies, that would rather die of hunger than feed 
 themselves longer on disgrace." They came before the 
 palace of the king, which was unguarded. The king 
 no longer feared anyone, since no one feared him any 
 longer. They entered the hall where the courtiers were 
 assembled, and they saw wet eyes. An old gray-haired 
 man threw himself weeping at the feet of a youth, and 
 said : " Forgive me. I have slandered you." They 
 entered the king's apartments. The king sat upon his 
 throne, and a woman rushed shrieking through the 
 crowd, threw herself on her knees and cried : " Hold 
 back your sword ; he is innocent ! " And the king's 
 counselor paled and said : " O master, I have deceived 
 thee." And the king, weeping, descended from his 
 throne. 
 
 Honestus and the trembling Oscar hastened out of 
 the palace. They walked along the river, and came 
 upon the corpse of a young girl. Oscar turned his pale 
 face away. " Unhappy creature ! " said Honestus. 
 " The past night robbed her of her innocence, and in 
 despair at the loss of her richest jewel, she sought 
 death in the waves." They came to a bridge, and on 
 it stood a tall, pale youth, looking now at the sky, now 
 at the water. He was a pitiful object, yet his eye was 
 dry. Oscar felt himself powerfully drawn to the 
 stranger. "Who is this youth, my father?" "Away, 
 away," cried Honestus in a tone of horror, " and weep, 
 Oscar, that you are a man." " O stay, my father ;
 
 56 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 speak, who is this suffering youth ? " " Step nearer, 
 Oscar. Look at these cheeks, how pale they are ! Once 
 they were rose-red and only grew pale when he heard 
 of oppression. Look at those arms, how thin and slack 
 they are; once they were strong and hard as steel to 
 fight for freedom and justice. Look at that burnt-out 
 eye. Once it beamed, lighted by heaven itself, to kindle 
 the heart of a pious girl. Ah! he was so strong and 
 good; but who is too strong and too good for the se- 
 ducer? The sly tools of power slipped up behind him 
 to ruin him. They mingled, in his healthy soul, what 
 is most shameful in innocent play, most intoxicating in 
 wine, most poisonous in love. Then he yielded to base 
 gold, to the base tinsel of honor. They led him from 
 fun to frivolity, from frivolity to falseness, from false- 
 ness to crime. This ear, once open only to the voice of 
 virtue, listened slyly for the unguarded word. This eye, 
 once darting glances of love, sought the dark bypaths 
 of confidence and killed those who innocently trusted 
 it. This tongue that sang love and friendship became 
 an adder and stung. Then he betrayed the true friend 
 that died yesterday on the gallows. The deluded man 
 received his last kiss from his betrayer and whispered 
 in his ear : ' Revenge me.' The devil looked at him, 
 laughing with scorn, and in the evening he rioted with 
 the recompense for his crime. Then came the fearful 
 midnight over him, the midnight which at your request, 
 Oscar, I gave to the world. A frightful dream awoke 
 him from his slumber. ' I will revenge you,' he shrieked 
 in despair, and rushed to the bridge. 
 
 " Since midnight, the unhappy wretch has sought death 
 in the waves, fearing to find it, and seeking it again." 
 The pale youth stared now at the water. " Hold him 
 back, Honestus," cried the shuddering Oscar ; " it is too 
 terrible to appear before the judge with such fearful 
 guilt." " Oscar," answered the magician, " here ends 
 my power. Sin has left him, repentance has come. 
 What he owes to his guilt, he will repay." Oscar fell
 
 A FABLE FOR COMMUNISTS 57 
 
 on his knees before the magician, imploring pitifully: 
 " Then give him back his sins and take away repent- 
 ance. Give all men their desires, again. Give them 
 back their vices. Give all men their sins, again." 
 
 He awoke they had them, again. 
 
 I remember rising from the reading of this little alle- 
 gory, shocked, as it were, into the consciousness that 
 all that gives color, variety, and tragic beauty to life 
 comes from this very play of the passions, which often 
 results so fatally to the happiness of the individual. 
 Kill them in man, tame him to the image of the patient 
 ox that draws his cart, and it is all over with the dig- 
 nity and beauty of life; we shall have exchanged virtue 
 and struggle for impotence and stagnation. 
 
 I rushed with my book to share its contents with 
 my young master. He was not so excitable as I; he 
 read it through attentively and said: 
 
 " He is right. The lily, white and fragrant, is rooted 
 in mud. It isn't an air plant." 
 
 The doctrine of equality, we felt, also, to be entirely 
 false, and would no more have believed it possible to 
 make a wise man out of a naturally stupid one by 
 changing his environment, than we would have expected 
 to gather roses from a gooseberry bush by planting it 
 in a rose-garden. Therefore, in an epidemic of social- 
 istic theories, we presented the anomaly of two enthu- 
 siastic young students without a theory. We looked, 
 we listened, and were content to learn.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 STILL LEARNING 
 
 AT Paris, we lodged in some beautiful apartments 
 looking out on the Pare Monceau. Here for the first 
 time in my life I had a certain responsibility. The 
 health and comfort of my young master were, in a 
 great measure, in my hands. But the services which I 
 rendered him were a privilege for me and not a task. 
 He belonged to those rare souls, intimacy with whom 
 tends to increase, rather than to cool the affection. Pos- 
 sibly the secret of this lies in a certain chaste reserve 
 which it is impossible to violate without being either 
 stupid or brutal, and I was neither the one nor the 
 other. I knew how to respect that delicate veil in 
 which every beautiful soul wraps itself, without entirely 
 concealing itself; and I learned, too, though perhaps 
 later, in reflecting upon the unbroken harmony of our 
 relations, that a great love cannot survive a great inti- 
 macy without these chaste reserves. We become so 
 obtuse, not to say brutified, by custom and facility, that 
 it requires some mystery to keep alive that fear and 
 veneration which lie at the bottom of every profound 
 sentiment. This friend of my childhood and my youth 
 never became common to me; that is to say, I never 
 penetrated the deepest recesses of his soul. There was 
 always in him some new ground to explore. He was 
 interested in everything; he had beautiful enthusiasms 
 which were not mere transitory surface excitements. 
 He had an unerring taste that led him directly to what 
 is fine and noble, a power of losing himself in thought 
 and reverie which to a great degree compensated him 
 for the malady that shut him out from action. Seated 
 in the shade of a tree, watching apparently the patches 
 
 58
 
 STILL LEARNING 59 
 
 of blue sky through the foliage, his mind took flight, 
 traveled through distant countries, and brought back 
 their treasures. 
 
 People were naturally more to him than books or pic- 
 tures, and though aristocrat by birth and by many of his 
 tastes, he talked willingly with everybody, and always 
 with profit and pleasure, wherever he found naturalness 
 or sincerity. His handsome face, his natural eloquence, 
 a rare courtesy that always distinguished him, made 
 him a great favorite with women ; and had he chosen, 
 he might have always been the center of a little coterie 
 of devotees who would have asked nothing better than 
 to flatter and amuse him. But he had a great con- 
 tempt for what is Called a " ladies' man." 
 
 " I'll leave that to you," he said, jesting, one day to 
 me. "You have more time to waste than I, and are 
 better equipped for the role. There's no talking seri- 
 ously to a woman under fifty, and not even at that age, 
 if she has ever been a great beauty, and still retains 
 some marks of it. All conversation with them is only 
 a disguised coquetry on both sides ; and by the time you 
 have learned how to say, ' You are fascinating, I love 
 you,' in a thousand different, uncompromising ways, 
 there is no time for anything else. There are a few 
 women I have read about, I should like to have known 
 women with hearts and brains as well as beauty. 
 ' Should I have forgotten everything but their beauty ? I 
 don't know. I think not but I've seen no woman, as 
 yet, for an hour of whose society I would exchange ten 
 minutes with a sensible man. As for the cathedrals, the 
 art-galleries, the museums, the places made memorable 
 by great historical facts, they do very well as speaking 
 for a man in his absence, but I'd turn from them all for 
 a day with the man himself who has thought and lived." 
 
 This taste had undoubtedly been cultivated by his 
 having met as guests of his father, in his home and in 
 the capitals of the kingdom, the most brilliant intellects 
 of his time. He had heard them discuss serious prob-
 
 lems, and his precocious intelligence had been enriched 
 in a remarkable manner. As for me, my life had passed 
 wholly without incident, or without any occupation but 
 that of my studies and the familiar duties of family 
 life. I had, therefore, brought to Europe the inexperi- 
 ence of extreme youth. Everything was wonderful to 
 me, everything delighted me except the Florentine 
 school of old masters in the art-galleries. I had not 
 yet submitted to the spell there is in the names of Botti- 
 celli, Bellini, Ghirlandajo, Fra Filippo Lippi, Cimabue, 
 and Giotto. 
 
 I had not yet studied the history of art as an expres- 
 sion of religious sentiment, so that I had no interest in 
 the pictures outside of the canvas; and, there, I only 
 saw a dreary collection of dry, cracked, harsh-brown, 
 sharp-nosed, cadaverous saints; melancholy, shapeless 
 virgins; pug-nosed cherubs, and bulbous-headed, pot- 
 bellied infant Christs with circles around their heads to 
 distinguish them from the profane, who were often 
 much more attractive to me. I have since developed a 
 taste for some of these very pictures that I would not 
 at that time have consented to live with, for a small 
 fortune ; but I am not prepared to say whether the taste 
 is a wholly artificial one due to the familiarity that 
 breeds endurance and then liking; or whether it is a 
 natural development, growing out of an acquired power 
 to see beauty that lies deeper than surfaces. 
 
 My days in Paris were divided into three parts: in 
 the morning I read and conversed with my lord and 
 our tutor ; in the afternoon we drove out to see the city, 
 the parks or the suburbs; in the evenings we amused 
 ourselves in society or at the theater. Three afternoons 
 in the week I had entirely to myself; and I always 
 passed them roaming about the city, sometimes visiting 
 various places of historical interest, sometimes spending 
 hours among the old bookstalls along the Seine. One 
 day I ran across an old copy in three volumes of Mer- 
 cier's " L'An deux mille quatre cent quarante; reve s'il
 
 STILL LEARNING 61 
 
 en fut jamais." The date of its publication was 1786, 
 and I learned by its preface that it had first appeared 
 in 1770. I bought it at a bargain, and went back to my 
 lodgings as happy as if I had been lucky in a specula- 
 tion involving a fortune. The author was unknown to 
 me, but I learned later that he had also written a book 
 called " Tableau de Paris," a very interesting and faith- 
 ful picture of the life and appearance of the capital, as 
 he saw it at the close of the eighteenth century. 
 
 His " Year 2440 " interested Lord Eliot and myself 
 very much. It was one of those clever dreams about 
 a future state of society in which justice and plenty 
 are to reign on earth, and poverty and crime, if not 
 eradicated, are to be reduced to the minimum. There 
 was some good sense in the book, mingled with a good 
 deal of nonsense. We were not a little amused at the 
 very humble and subordinate role women are to play 
 under this new regime, the author showing a decided 
 contempt for their intelligence and a great deal of indig- 
 nation over the important part which they play in so- 
 cial life at present. We wondered what women in gen- 
 eral would think about it. We were not destined to 
 wonder long. Our enlightenment was due to an ac- 
 quaintance that I made shortly after, with a young man 
 of twenty-three, an enthusiastic communist and presi- 
 dent of an association whose object it was to spread the 
 doctrines of communism, and awaken a spirit of dis- 
 trust and revolt among the workingmen and the poor. 
 
 It was mere chance that procured me this acquaint- 
 ance. I had lost my way one afternoon in an obscure 
 quarter of Paris, and I asked for directions of the 
 first man whom I met. The young man whom I ac- 
 costed replied courteously, saying that his way led in 
 my direction, and that if I had no objection he would 
 accompany me. I thanked him, and we continued our 
 road together. I had not spoken very much before he 
 discovered the stranger in my accent, and asked me 
 if I were not an Englishman. I replied that I was a
 
 subject of England, and he showed at once a great 
 deal of enthusiasm and interest, assuring me that he 
 had studied English, had even spent a half year in 
 London, and was very fond of the English nation, not 
 at all sharing the prejudices of his countrymen. 
 
 " You have," he continued, " more frankness, more 
 good sense in your country than we have in ours. You 
 have not yet been so stupid as to show that you can't 
 govern yourselves, as we did in the Revolution. We 
 have lost by our folly, not only the confidence of the 
 soberer part of our own nation, but that of all nations. 
 We struck a blow at human progress, meaning to strike 
 it for it, from which it may take centuries to recover." 
 He continued to speak in this fashion, and finally con- 
 cluded by inviting me to be present at one of the assem- 
 blies over which he presided. 
 
 I was not long in accepting his invitation. It was 
 an excellent opportunity to see the Frenchman at home, 
 and it might be that I should witness another revolu- 
 tion in the egg.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 A WOMAN IN REVOLT 
 
 THE meeting took place in a large, miisty-smeilmg, 
 subterranean hall, badly lighted, and furnished with 
 wooden benches and straw-bottomed chairs. The walls, 
 up to a certain height, were blackened by the pressure 
 of innumerable dirty shoulders and greasy heads. The 
 ceiling was low and black with the fumes of oil-lamps, 
 suspended from a jcentral chandelier, and also attached 
 at regular intervals along the walls. At one end of the 
 hall ran a low platform, on which stood an ink-spotted 
 table and two or three chairs. 
 
 It was a chill, cloudy November night, and the atmos- 
 phere of the crowded* room was nauseously close and 
 heavy after the sharp air outside. The house was not 
 yet called to order; every man had his hat on; many 
 were smoking, and amidst the confused clatter of voices 
 a boisterous laugh rang out, now and then. 
 
 My dress and manner, so entirely different from the 
 rest of the audience, made me so conspicuous that I 
 was at once pointed out, and very likely would not 
 have been allowed to remain, had not my new friend 
 immediately taken me under his protection. The whole 
 experience was so entirely new to me that my heart 
 beat rapidly with the excitement of novelty, and I looked 
 with eager curiosity at these young men (they looked 
 all of them under thirty) ; and an instinct which served 
 me in place of experience assured me that these hands 
 were too nervous, too inexperienced, to mold the future 
 well. Their faces expressed that sort of precocious 
 audacity which so often passes for intelligence. Their 
 language was in harmony with their faces. It was 
 
 63
 
 64 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 audacity and egotism incarnate. No veneration, no 
 logic, no hesitation, no compromise; only an air of 
 insolence and hatred for the past, effrontery and audac- 
 ity for the present and a blind puerile confidence in the 
 future which was to be theirs, and theirs alone. They 
 had a singular way of talking about society, not as if 
 it were an aggregation of individuals whose separate 
 destiny is due to a countless number of correlated cir- 
 cumstances, but as if it were a single individual, a sort 
 of hideous, immoral monster, deliberately bent on re- 
 ducing three-fourths of the human race to slavery and 
 wretchedness to serve the remaining fourth. They had 
 no conception of the fact that circumstances have no 
 power to radically change human nature ; that the ut- 
 most they can do to any living jcreature, plant, animal, 
 or man is to determine whether or not each is to reach 
 the highest development of which each is individually 
 capable. The character of every living entity is deter- 
 mined at its birth by natural laws to which we have 
 no key. Each seed in plant-life contains the germ of 
 what it can become. The acorn will be an oak. The 
 dusty powder on the frond of a fern will reproduce its 
 kind; but soil, climate, favorable or unfavorable cir- 
 cumstances, will determine whether the oak will tower 
 up towards the skies and spread its branches widely, 
 freely; or whether it will remain dwarfed and scanty- 
 limbed; and whether the fern is to rival a tree in size 
 and beauty, or to tremble in the winds, six inches above 
 the ground. So it is with the moral nature of man; 
 no circumstances can develop in him that which is not 
 born in him. The wisdom of Socrates could not make 
 a sage of Alcibiades, nor the humane philosophy of 
 Seneca penetrate the brute mind of Nero. The infa- 
 mous Commodus was the son of Marcus Aurelius, and 
 Voltaire, nursed in the lap of the Jesuits, went out of 
 their schools a skeptic to make the world laugh with 
 him at what he had been taught. 
 
 But these young reformers were of quite another
 
 A WOMAN IN REVOLT 65 
 
 opinion. They seemed never to have understood that 
 homely adage which sums up the common experience 
 of mankind: "You can't make a silk purse out of a 
 sow's ear." They were quite sure you could. Only 
 feed and clothe your brute man well, and you will make 
 a gentleman of him equal to the best of his kind. Alas ! 
 they forgot that when they harangued against the rich 
 and the noble as the vile oppressors of humanity, they 
 were emphatically proving by their very criticism of 
 them the impotency of rank and wealth, food and 
 Clothes, to transform men into sages and philanthropists. 
 
 I was at this stage of my mental comments on what 
 I heard, when a change in the nature of the discussion 
 took place. I had noticed, on my entrance, that there 
 were a few women in the audience, one of whom, in 
 particular, was the object of general attention; and if 
 beauty, youth, and that indescribable sparkle of physical 
 health can deserve it, she was in every way most worthy 
 to receive it. On the question of woman's place in the 
 commonwealth, she rose to discuss it. 
 
 There are women of whom we seem incapable of 
 asking anything more than what they so richly give us 
 in their intoxicating beauty. We pardon everything to 
 their loveliness, even their stupidity; for beauty seems 
 always the highest manifestation of intelligence, and 
 its silent eloquence speaks more effectually than any lan- 
 guage of the tongue. But this woman had the super- 
 fluous gift of wit and intellect. She was a little above 
 the ordinary stature of her sex, perfectly formed, and 
 walked with an ease and dignity remarkable in a woman 
 of the people. She had an abundance of dark wavy 
 hair, a face rather oval than round, of that rich pale 
 Color which belongs to the southern type of beauty and 
 harmonizes so admirably with the large black eyes that 
 accompany it. Her eyes were peculiarly fascinating; 
 the lids drooped a little at the outer corners, giving 
 them a certain appealing expression, as if they said, 
 " Love me for I love you,"
 
 66 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 She advanced to the front of the hall, but did not 
 mount the platform, although urged to do so, saying 
 in a rich, full voice: 
 
 " I am not a little woman. I can see very well all 
 the heads before me, and I am sure that you can see 
 me." She held in her hand a book, which without any 
 explanation or comment, she opened and began to read 
 aloud : 
 
 " The affable and complaisant man who deigned to 
 instruct me, continued in the same tone of frankness: 
 ' You know that women have no other dowry than 
 their virtue and their charms. They have grown inter- 
 ested in cultivating their moral qualities, so by this legis- 
 lative measure, we have killed the hydra of coquetry, 
 so fertile in whims, vices and follies.' 
 
 " ' What ! no dowry ? Women have nothing of their 
 own, and who can marry them?' 
 
 " ' Women have no dowry, because by nature they are 
 dependent on the sex that makes their strength and 
 their glory, and whom nothing ought to withdraw from 
 this legitimate empire which is always less terrible than 
 the yoke which they give to themselves in their fatal 
 liberty. You no longer see a girl proud of her dowry 
 seem to grant a favor to the husband whom she ac- 
 cepts. Every man takes care of the woman who is 
 the mother of his children, and she, receiving every- 
 thing from her husband's hand, is more disposed to 
 fidelity and obedience: the law being universal, no one 
 feels the weight of it. All women, submissive to the 
 duties which their sex impose on them, feel their honor 
 involved in following these austere laws which alone 
 can insure their happiness.' " 
 
 She paused here, turned, and threw the book on the 
 table behind her, then faced the audience with her hands 
 folded, her head high, and a look of such scorn on her 
 beautiful face that she seemed a wholly different woman. 
 The languishing eyes no longer said " I love you," but 
 spoke the bitterest language of contempt. One moment,
 
 A WOMAN IN REVOLT 67 
 
 there was perfect silence, then the hall burst into ap- 
 plause. I leaned forward, my heart beating fast, my 
 face flushed; the woman was superb. We were ap- 
 plauding her beauty, we had forgotten everything else. 
 
 She shook her head, held up her hand imperatively, 
 and we were silent at once. 
 
 " You are not applauding that sentiment," she said. 
 " You are applauding what you know to be my utter 
 contempt for it." 
 
 We applauded her again, to assure her that she was 
 right. I recognized the extract she had read. It was 
 taken from Mercier's " Year 2440" How I wished for 
 Lord Eliot, now! 
 
 When the room was silent once more, she continued 
 in a firm, ringing voice that compelled attention: 
 
 " How dare any man accuse Nature of his own mis- 
 conduct, and declare that hers is the law which his own 
 brutal selfishness has made! Where, in all the brute 
 kingdom, and man is but a higher brute who has for- 
 gotten his origin, is the female dependent on the male? 
 To which, on the contrary, has Nature allotted the heav- 
 iest burden in the great law of interdependence, the law 
 of life? To the weakest, you think? Nature is no 
 blunderer. She never gives her burdens to those who 
 cannot carry them. She never intrusts her most im- 
 portant functions to weakness. She gives them to the 
 swift, to the strong." 
 
 Then in a clear, logical way she made her plea for 
 the recognition of the absolute equality of women before 
 the law. She would hear of no compromise. She 
 swept away all social considerations of woman's duties 
 as if they were so many cobwebs in her path. Woman 
 had one paramount duty just now, it was to herself. 
 Man's superiority as a social creature was nothing but 
 a superiority in crass egotism, in brutal audacity. 
 Woman, too, must dare to be free; she bore the yokes 
 of two degrading servitudes, marriage and public opin- 
 ion. She must break these yokes, prefer hardship and
 
 68 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 toil to them. She must prefer the truth, naked, ugly 
 though it be to the prettiest lie. She must make war 
 to the death on the illusions that ensnare and enslave 
 her ; and the most fatal of all illusions to her is the illu- 
 sion of love. Parodying Mme. Roland's apostrophe to 
 liberty, she exclaimed : " O Love, how many crimes and 
 vile abominations have been committed in thy name! 
 Woman in her folly has made a religion of it; she has 
 called it sacred, holy, the supreme joy of life. She has 
 centered all her hopes and aims on it, and, shipwrecked 
 ninety-nine times out of a hundred, sits helpless among 
 her ruins praying for death. Cowards! cowards! Up! 
 up! dare to live! If love were anything but a tran- 
 sient illusion, one might make a religion of it, but to go 
 from woman to woman and man to man, as from 
 feast to feast, in order to give oneself a state of delir- 
 ium, or intoxication, is the height of folly and crime. 
 Nature never designed a life of activity for man and 
 of dreaming passivity for woman; at bottom, men and 
 women have the same desire for freedom of choice and 
 action, the same delight in the full expansion and play 
 of the mind, and the same constitutional tastes and im- 
 pulses. It is not Nature but artificial custom which has 
 excluded woman from any world but that of the emo- 
 tions. This exclusion, this restriction of action, lies at 
 the bottom of shipwrecked marriages, morbid and hys- 
 terical moods, and all the social tragedies in which 
 woman appears as a factor. Let women have courage 
 to destroy this poison of love so sweet to taste, so bitter 
 to drink. You are loved to-day, flattered to the skies. 
 Who can venture to say that you will not be hated to- 
 morrow? And motherhood? Yes, that you shall re- 
 spect, when it is desired. But give no fine names to 
 what is involuntary. Don't make a god of your appe- 
 tites, and adorning them with tinsel and lace, fall down 
 and worship them. You need not despise them either. 
 Accept them as you accept the law of falling bodies 
 govern them, don't be governed by them. Slavery is
 
 A WOMAN IN REVOLT 69 
 
 slavery, no matter who the master be, and of all forms 
 of slavery that is the most degrading which subjects 
 the intellect to appetite." 
 
 In this new country and in this day of free thinking, 
 that all sounds very familiar as I write it down ; but 
 when I listened that night, much of what this beautiful 
 woman in revolt against society, had to say, came to 
 me with the force of novelty. Young, innocent, inex- 
 perienced, woman for me was the mystery of mysteries, 
 something sacred, lifted away above me, and I was 
 shocked and hurt at the rending of that beautiful veil 
 through which youth looks at love. Besides, to tell the 
 truth, all this complaint of man on the part of a woman 
 so beautiful as she, seemed singularly absurd, when 
 she must have known that if she set her heart upon 
 anything, there wasn't a man among us who wouldn't 
 have yielded to her will; and we were not different 
 from other men. In our place they would have done 
 as we did. She swayed us as she pleased, and with- 
 out believing a word of what she said, we were ready 
 to swear on our honor that she was right. Women 
 tyrannized by men? It seemed to me that, never in 
 my life, had I so plainly seen how a woman can hold 
 a man soul and body, slave to her caprice; never be- 
 fore felt so powerfully the mysterious, irresistible at- 
 traction of feminine beauty. When my new acquaint- 
 ance introduced me to her as his cousin, at the [close of 
 the assembly, I stammered my compliments like a bash- 
 ful schoolboy. And yet she did not in any way reach 
 my ideal of womanhood incarnated in Lady Margaret; 
 she did not, in the least, blur for me the sweet face that 
 I revered; but she touched me; she made me restless; 
 she made me unhappy; she made me feel myself a raw 
 boy who had dreamed and not lived as yet; she set me 
 to wishing, to hoping, and so far from discouraging 
 me by her denunciation of love, she made me feel that 
 it was the one thing in life worth while. 
 
 Of course, I lost no time in relating my experience
 
 70 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 to Lord Eliot, and he immediately expressed a wish to 
 meet these two cousins. I communicated his desire to 
 my new acquaintance, who felt very much flattered, and 
 a day was set for the introduction. It turned out to 
 be a cold, gloomy December day, the air dark with the 
 crossing of snow-flakes, the wind blowing sharply and 
 howling down the chimney like a wild beast. We had 
 a roaring fire in the drawing-room, and were sitting 
 near it when the visitors were announced. 
 
 In speaking of Mile C to Lord Eliot, I had 
 
 not dwelt on her beauty, but had contented myself with 
 saying that she was fine-looking. But this day she 
 was magnificent. The sharp air had brought a vivid 
 color to her cheeks, and her beautiful black eyes spar- 
 kled with health and vigor. She brought with her the 
 fresh pure air of out of doors to revive the heavy air 
 of the house. We had not spoken for some time be- 
 fore her entrance, and Lord Eliot, sunk in a profound 
 reverie, had not lifted his eyes until her arrival. I 
 shall never forget the sudden change in his face when 
 his eyes first met hers. He paled, he reddened, and 
 passed his hands over his face as if to conceal his 
 change of color then he looked at her again and 
 smiled. In recalling the scene, I have often thought 
 that their meeting resembled that of two souls that 
 belonged to each other who were seeing each other 
 again for the first time, after many days. All the viril- 
 ity of this feeble and delicate body seemed to say, " This 
 is what I need. Here is the health that will share its 
 superabundance with me. Here is the beauty that will 
 delight me every day, anew. Here is that warm femi- 
 nine sympathy that will lessen my pain in sharing it;" 
 for my astonished and observant eyes had remarked a 
 change almost as great in the young woman's face. 
 The air of cold indifference which she had shown to- 
 wards her companions on the memorable night in which 
 I had first seen her, was replaced by a manner full of 
 gentleness and solicitude. She approached him as a
 
 A WOMAN IN REVOLT 71 
 
 mother approaches a beloved child ; for there is in the 
 love of a woman, when it is profound and durable, a 
 mysterious element of maternity; she wishes to caress 
 and to care for him whom she loves, she would spare 
 him the lightest grief; but alas! this love so perfect, so 
 disinterested, lacks what to so many men is, in the 
 long run, the charm of love the piquant spur of haz- 
 ard, of doubt. Most men will love long, only what they 
 fear to lose; and jealousy, doubt, nay, at times, de- 
 spair are the food of their affection. 
 
 Do I speak too soon of love between these two who 
 had never before met ? No ; there is a love born of the 
 first chance meeting of the eyes. Ask the reason of it, 
 it can only reply, by saying like Montaigne: 
 
 " Si on me presse de dire pourquoi je I'aimais, je sens 
 que cela ne se peut exprimer qu'en repondant, parce 
 que c'etait lui; parce que c'etait moi." 
 
 These two couldn't have answered otherwise than 
 that : " Because it was he, because it was I." 
 
 There was in both of them the same capacity for 
 generous enthusiasm, the same courage, and if it were 
 necessary, the same audacity, the same strength of will, 
 the same intensity of feeling. For I had not been mis- 
 led by the bitterness with which she spoke of love; for 
 just as cynicism is often the outcome of the most un- 
 bounded confidence in humanity, after that confidence 
 has been deceived and betrayed, so a woman's rejection 
 of love as a necessary element of her happiness, is the 
 result of some bitterness in her experience that has left 
 her wounded for having too much leaned on that frail 
 support. But no one, not even the cynic, is always 
 proof against a return of confidence and affection. 
 This woman stood before Lord Eliot, now, devouring 
 with her eyes his magnificent head; and he was just 
 as much absorbed in her. For neither of them did 
 there exist another person in the world, at that mo- 
 ment. He was the first to speak. 
 
 "You are very courageous to brave the storm," he
 
 72 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 said, extending his hand, something which he very 
 rarely did. " Sit down near the fire ; you must be cold." 
 
 " Not at all," she answered, and her sonorous mu- 
 sical voice seemed to fill the room with something very 
 fresh and sound. " Not at all. I like the cold, I like 
 a storm, I like anything that calls out strength and 
 resistance in me. It makes me feel alive." 
 
 She reddened, as if involuntarily she might have 
 made him feel the weakness of his body in contrast with 
 the vigor of her own, and added, " I am very sure that 
 you understand me." 
 
 " Yes, I do ; and I can understand also how you can 
 often be in revolt against the laws of society." 
 
 " Yes, my lord," she answered gently, " against the 
 laws of society, never against the laws of nature. I 
 am not so stupid as to suppose that by willing we can 
 alter one of them; therefore, nothing is left but to 
 submit." 
 
 " But are we living now in a state of nature?" 
 
 " We are millions of miles from it." 
 
 "And you would like to return to it?" 
 
 " If you mean by a state of nature a state of sav- 
 agery, I answer * no,' of course ; but if you mean a con- 
 dition in which the laws of society are in harmony with 
 the laws of nature then, ' yes ' emphatically." 
 
 " And do you find that history has ever left us an 
 account of such a condition among men ? " 
 
 "No, my lord, that remains to be experienced; and 
 to hasten its approach is the duty of the present and 
 near future." 
 
 "And you believe in the realization of it in a re- 
 mote future ? " 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " I really can't exactly tell, Mademoiselle. I know 
 nothing of the world, and I am just nineteen. That is 
 the age of illusions, they tell us. But fate has nailed 
 me to a chair. That has given me time to reflect, that 
 has aged me; and when you reply with such sunny 
 confidence, I seem to myself to be a hundred years old,
 
 A WOMAN IN REVOLT 73 
 
 and, pardon me, Mademoiselle, I always speak with 
 abominable frankness to those whom I like you seem 
 to me to be nineteen." 
 
 I wish I could put into these words, as I write them, 
 the inexpressible sweetness of his voice, shaded with a 
 little teasing note of irony, and the striking beauty of 
 his manly face softened by something tender and full 
 of gaiety that shone out of his dark eyes. How proud 
 I was of him! How I loved him! O my master! my 
 friend ! 
 
 She laughed, thrust her hand through the soft masses 
 of br hair, shaking her head with a little gesture of 
 disagreement. 
 
 " My lord, as a woman, I ought to be flattered to be 
 taken for nineteen at twenty-eight, but I am not; and, 
 pardon me, it is you who are young, very young; and 
 I who am old, old, old as the wrongs that oppress us. 
 Listen seriously, I beg of you. There are a thousand 
 things we women wish for, because our lives are arti- 
 ficial: there is only one thing we need, and that is lib- 
 erty the breath of life, a free space in which the mind 
 can develop without being stunted. The past envelops 
 us like a shroud, and we stifle in it. We must think 
 over again its thoughts, repeat its actions, its words. 
 If we dare change our opinions ever so little, persecu- 
 tion commences, if not with open violence, then with 
 covert sneer; and it falls the heaviest on the weakest 
 socially, the women and the poor." 
 
 Her eyes shone, her cheeks glowed. 
 
 " For us women in particular there is a great specter 
 set up before our eyes as you set up a scarecrow in a 
 wheat field. Do you know what it is? It is the wom- 
 anly woman!" What an accent of contempt in these 
 last words! What a superb expression of disdain in 
 her beautiful features ! " And do you know what that 
 means? It means that she is to be the slave of man, 
 or else the pretty plaything of his leisure, whom he 
 will love passionately one day and tire of, perhaps 
 loathe, the day following."
 
 74 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 " Pardon me, Mademoiselle," said my young lord 
 quickly, " of all women whom I have ever met, you 
 have the least right to complain of slavery, you who 
 could enslave when you liked " 
 
 She tossed back her head with a proud air. 
 
 " Do you mean that I am beautiful ? O yes. I have 
 been called beautiful you said a moment ago that you 
 spoke frankly to those whom you like. I, too, speak 
 frankly, not only to those whom I like, but to every- 
 one, when it is necessary. I know that I can easily 
 make myself loved, as you call it; but is it / that am 
 loved, or my dark hair, my complexion, and the con- 
 tour of my face? If the small-pox were to blur my 
 features and dim my eyes, do you think I should be 
 loved? When old age withers me, do you think I shall 
 be respected? Do you think that I shall count for 
 anything but a supernumerary in this Christian land 
 that doesn't strangle its girls at birth, but lets them 
 grow up with the boys? Love! Men do not know the 
 meaning of the word. Woman has no meaning to them 
 except as a beautiful body. What do they care for 
 the soul of her except as it is willing to take all its 
 color from them? But don't you know that a love 
 which does not root itself below surfaces cannot live, 
 and that viewed in this way we are destined always to 
 be at the mercy of your caprice ? " 
 
 " Perhaps you are right, but aren't you attempting 
 here to change a law of nature that in the long run 
 you will be forced to submit to? We are born to love 
 beauty just as we are born to breathe the air. And 
 perhaps under that instinct lies a fine principle of race 
 preservation and progress who knows ? The soul can't 
 show itself on the surface, and often it wouldn't if it 
 could. Haven't you feelings and thoughts so intimate, 
 so peculiarly personal that to speak of them would be 
 to profane them? There is a modesty of the soul as 
 sensitive, as tremulous, as that of the body." 
 
 " I quite agree with you in that, my lord ; and it may
 
 A WOMAN IN REVOLT 75 
 
 be that I am quarreling with a law of nature and that 
 it is impossible for men to regard us in any other light 
 than that of their chief source of pleasure; but still, I 
 think I may legitimately complain that you persistently 
 shut us out from the sphere of your intellectual con- 
 quests, and condemn us to ignorance, preferring a thou- 
 sand times that we should be imbeciles, but coquettish 
 and frivolous, rather than real companions, capable of 
 walking side by side with you. I am fair enough, too, 
 to confess that a great many women, the majority it 
 may be, are too often quite content with their kingdom 
 of the flesh and try to strengthen it with all the artifice 
 in their power. But if you were to demand of them 
 solider attractions than these frail charms, they would 
 answer by giving you what you asked, and so become 
 infinitely more useful to the race. You make us feeble, 
 egotistic, base with all the meanness of jealousy, envy, 
 and deceit. You take away all legitimate power from 
 us, in denying 1 us the rights of citizenship; and you 
 force us to use craft and cunning in their place. A 
 man, all his life long, may count on your respect and 
 affection. A woman ceases to exist for you after forty. 
 Give us also the life of intelligence grant us the dig- 
 nity of meaning something to the government at any 
 age after the dawn of reason. Respect our old age. 
 Don't force us to risk all our happiness and dignity on 
 the frail bark of love where shipwreck is inevitable; 
 and do not despise us, if fate should deny us even the 
 chance at shipwreck which you make the supreme end 
 of a woman's existence. You have covered the name 
 of old maid with ridicule and contempt, and thus forced 
 thousands of women to sell themselves to escape it, be- 
 cause they hadn't the courage to face an honorable life 
 alone. Forgive me, I see that I have shocked you. I 
 have talked too much, but I feel too keenly on this sub- 
 ject to speak with indifference or with brevity." 
 
 My lord, in listening to her, had changed color more 
 than once, and an expression of real pain lay on his
 
 76 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 face at the close of her speech. He passed his white 
 hand over his face a moment, then lifting his eyes and 
 looking at her with a smile almost apologetic, he said: 
 
 " You may have reason to say what you do. I have 
 never thought of these things. For me, woman has 
 been my mother and my sister; that is to say, love and 
 devotion incarnate, the sun and the dew of my life. 
 Woman, otherwise, fate forbids me to think of. If I 
 have sometimes vaguely dreamed of that love of which 
 the poets speak, it has been as if I had dreamed of 
 the stars; and my eyes, dazzled and blinded for a mo- 
 ment, have quickly come back to earth again, where I 
 am destined to crawl painfully all my life. But " his 
 voice, low and hesitating until now, suddenly grew 
 stronger, and a sparkle of magnificent audacity bright- 
 ened his eyes as he went on " I must tell you fear- 
 lessly that if fate had been kind to me and had given 
 me the health and strength that ought to have been 
 my birthright, I should have loved like a man, and not 
 like a schoolmaster; that is to say, I should have felt 
 powerfully that irresistible unstable attraction of beauty 
 you contemn. I should have quitted Minerva for Venus. 
 And don't you see why? We need to be awakened out 
 of stagnation from time to time by a sudden shock 
 that sets all the chords of our being to vibrating again; 
 we need new sources of sensation, new horizons of 
 thought; and beauty often awakens us to life again, as 
 not even wisdom herself [can do. I can understand, 
 now, how a man might say to some woman whose 
 beauty was to him like a revelation : ' I never lived but 
 half until I saw you : you have given me eyes and ears 
 and a tongue to express the perfect sweetness of life 
 in your presence. What more do I need now that I 
 love you ? ' Didn't Dante feel a vita nuova after his 
 first meeting with Beatrice?" 
 
 He leaned forward towards her, his face glowing as 
 I had never seen it; she drew back a little, and I saw 
 her eyes grow moist as she said with a little catch in
 
 A WOMAN IN REVOLT 77 
 
 her voice and an accent of maternal sweetness that made 
 her adorable: 
 
 " Ah, you are young, and I do not wish you to think 
 that I never knew the illusions that belong to youth, 
 and so I am going to tell you that if ever I had re- 
 ceived from any man the proof of a sincere and inti- 
 mate sympathy with what is best in me, I shouldn't 
 have become the declamatory public woman you have 
 just listened to. I, too, might have been the sun and 
 dew in the life of another, as you so prettily express 
 it, if but O, what folly to talk like this! You make 
 
 me weak; or rather you show me how weak I am " 
 
 She rose from her chair and began to adjust her cloak 
 about her shoulders. He extended his hand eagerly 
 towards her, saying: 
 
 " Don't go yet, I beg of you. I still have something 
 to say to you, if you can spare me the time. Am I 
 keeping you from any duty ? " 
 
 " No, my lord, my time is yours. If you have any- 
 thing to say to me, I shall gladly listen." 
 
 She resumed her seat, flinging her cloak from her 
 shoulders, and looked at him expectantly. He hesi- 
 tated a moment, as if he were searching for some pre- 
 text to keep her longer. Finally, he took up the con- 
 versation impersonally, by remarking: 
 
 " You have given me some new ideas, and I shall 
 need some time to think them over. I should like to 
 ask you what remedy you propose for these evils of 
 which you speak. You have already said that you did 
 not hope to change nature." 
 
 " No, my lord, but we hope to change the attitude 
 of woman herself with regard to the opinions of which 
 she is the victim. We hope to teach her to respect 
 herself, even when she has forfeited the respect of so- 
 ciety. Women of genius have always done it. Why 
 should there be one law for them, and another for 
 women who have no eloquence but that of the heart? 
 We hope to give her courage. That is what she lacks.
 
 78 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 She is the slave of fashion, the slave of superstition, 
 the slave of illusions with regard to love; and for that 
 reason she lives in a state of cowardly fear and the 
 most ignoble kind of fear, fear to lose her fair skin 
 and the gloss of her hair. Look at the so-called woman's 
 page in our periodicals and see what is the chief occu- 
 pation of their thoughts ; the cut of their clothes, com- 
 plexion washes and hair dyes, and the petty regulations 
 of artificial society. There are times when I am 
 ashamed to be a woman because of this seemingly hope- 
 less childishness and silliness. But do you think that 
 we are naturally absolutely devoid of good sense and 
 intelligence? I do not believe it. Why, then, do we 
 seem to have lost it all? Simply because we have been 
 crowded out of all the work of society, and relegated 
 to one task alone, that of pleasing you men, and thus 
 securing the privilege of being taken care of, dressed, 
 clothed, and flattered by you." 
 
 " Then you would like to see women admitted to all 
 the professions, enter the business world and share with 
 man all the labor that belongs to social organization 
 build houses, clear forests, pave roads, and sit in the 
 Councils of the government?" 
 
 " Yes, my lord." 
 
 " Mademoiselle, we have in our language the beau- 
 tiful word 'home.' That means a ' chez vous' a little 
 personal retreat where a man, a woman, and their 
 children make a little kingdom all their own. In this 
 kingdom, each individual can exercise his peculiar 
 tastes; and here the woman is the pivot around which 
 everything turns. While the man works outside to 
 keep up this kingdom, she has the leisure to adorn 
 herself with all the ornaments of the mind, if she wishes 
 to. She can become for him the measure of taste, an 
 inspiration towards the ideal. Isn't that a role in civi- 
 lization as important as any that he plays? Tell me 
 frankly, do you mean to substitute for this home those 
 soulless colossal boarding-houses, or phalansteres, as
 
 A WOMAN IN REVOLT 79 
 
 Fourier calls them? I would rather be brought up 
 in a foundling asylum. Nay, look here; a thought has 
 just occurred to me. In the progress of humanitarian- 
 ism there will come a time when men will feel that 
 these big asylums are too spacious to lodge children in, 
 that they shrink and shiver there in the most pitiful of 
 all isolations, the isolation of a crowd; and that to be 
 properly brought up, they should be divided into little 
 families, housed under separate roofs. And they will 
 be so housed. Progress does not lie in the direction 
 of communism; that lies behind us. We have passed 
 out of it into individualism. The home, the sweetness 
 of family life is the chief mark of a higher civilization." 
 
 " My lord, you are looking at life through some very 
 pretty illusions. You are discussing dreams, not real- 
 ities. Marriage ought to be what you think it is, but 
 it is not; unfortunately it is anything but the happy 
 state of perpetual inspiration that you depict. It is 
 oftener an unspeakable wretchedness, when it is not an 
 unspeakable vileness. But as long as there is youth 
 and warm blood, there will be marriages; as to just 
 what form they will take, I am not prepared to say. 
 But what I am prepared particularly to say is this, that 
 no marriage bond ought to exist which gives all the 
 advantages to a man. A woman ought not to be com- 
 pelled by circumstances, as she is at present, to con- 
 tinue an unholy relation because she can find no pro- 
 tection outside of it. She should not be compelled to 
 perpetuate a mistake once made. Life is growth. It 
 is not the sinking inevitably into error and dying in it. 
 The poor, also, ought not to be condemned as they are 
 to the ceaseless gloom of poverty. The pride and ava- 
 rice of man have divided society into two great classes, 
 the rich and the poor. To the one all the pleasure, the 
 glory of civilization; to the other, all the toil and dark- 
 ness." 
 
 " Excuse me, Mademoiselle ; a few moments ago you 
 were complaining that men had appropriated all the
 
 8o THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 tasks of civilization, leaving to women the degradation 
 of leisure ; for leisure seemed to you to amount to that, 
 and you spoke of labor as a privilege which resulted in 
 the superior education and position of men. But just 
 now, in speaking of class-division, you seem to regard 
 labor as a badge and instrument of inferiority, and you 
 make idleness a desirable condition. I have not prop- 
 erly understood you, I am sure, and you can explain 
 away this apparent contradiction." 
 
 " Yes, my lord," she answered tranquilly, " you have 
 not properly understood me; or, rather, I have ex- 
 pressed myself badly. I do not at all mean to say that 
 idleness is an advantage, a condition of superiority. On 
 the contrary, it is the very essence of vice and degen- 
 eracy. Can the absence of responsibility and the cease- 
 less search for pleasure ennoble anyone ? Can you make 
 a day holy by doing nothing in it? But on the other 
 hand, if the whole life is nothing else but an anxious 
 effort to supply the needs of the body, food, clothes, 
 shelter the man is brutalized" by labor. Now society 
 ought not to condemn a soul to perish of idleness, on 
 the one hand, or to die crushed under the weight of 
 toil. The soil, like light and air, belong to us all alike. 
 It is the common source of independence; and selfishly 
 to take possession of it to the exclusion of others who 
 have as much right to it, is the first of social crimes." 
 
 " I have no doubt, Mademoiselle, that what we call 
 social progress is founded upon an immense amount 
 of brutal selfishness, and that we all ought to try to 
 reduce it to its minimum. But I do not believe that 
 it can ever be wholly eliminated, or that we shall ever 
 reach a condition of social equality which will wipe out 
 poverty and suffering. Such a belief seems to me to be 
 founded upon two capital errors; first, that we are all 
 born equal, and, second, that conditions determine char- 
 acter. As to the first, suppose we were all to be farmers 
 on a small scale, as you suggest, do you think that I 
 could make so much as a spear of grass grow? And
 
 A WOMAN IN REVOLT 81 
 
 I am not the only one whom nature has condemned to 
 inferiority, as witness our asylums and hospitals. I 
 could find it in my heart to curse her for not giving 
 me a beautiful body full of health and vigor like yours. 
 But a quoi bonf All my efforts, all my prayers could 
 not help me to drag myself to the window, yonder. 
 And as for conditions: if you were to make me king 
 of France, I couldn't even mount my throne unaided. 
 But grant, even, that this dream of social equality and 
 perpetual sunshine were practicable, I am afraid we 
 should all say with Voltaire : ' C'est une belle chose que 
 la tranquilite. Oui, mais I' ennui est de sa connaissance 
 et de sa famille.' What a frightful monotony, if we all 
 thought exactly alike, and all did the same things ! Bah ! 
 we should be reduced to sleep and silence for want of 
 a living interest. The oak is a noble tree, I like it 
 better than all the others; but I shouldn't like it to be 
 the only tree. I couldn't give up my willows and elms 
 and beeches and pines and all the others. They give to 
 a landscape that pretty variety which makes the charm 
 of it. The sunlight is beautiful, but we seek the shade 
 with gratitude at times, and are thankful for the cool- 
 ness and darkness of night. Virtue would not shine so 
 brightly if not contrasted with vice. Perfect virtue 
 everywhere would mean stagnation. Perfect happiness 
 is an empty dream." 
 
 " And yet, my lord, you do not hesitate to dream it 
 for another life if not this one, and call it heaven." 
 
 " Excuse me, Mademoiselle," he replied with a mis- 
 chievous smile. " I do not dream that way, either. 
 That is the dream of apathetic souls. My paradise 
 would be action, action, difficulties to conquer stum- 
 bling, falling and rising again, but ever onward, on- 
 ward ! " 
 
 " How easy it must be to talk like that with no diffi- 
 culties to conquer, with the future assured ! Do you 
 think then that physical pain is necessary to the enjoy- 
 ment of perfect health ? "
 
 82 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 " I cannot tell, "Mademoiselle. I have never known 
 perfect health. I have only suffered." 
 
 " And I, too, my lord. I have never seen life on its 
 beautiful side. I know it on all sides but that the side 
 of toil and difficulty and want and so I dream of that 
 other side which I do not know; I dream of its being 
 realized here on earth, and I do not think I am apa- 
 thetic either." 
 
 " That is to say, we finish our argument as we began 
 it, each holding his own opinion still. But really you 
 have given me something to think about." 
 
 " And you also have set me to thinking, and I hope, 
 
 I hope " She rose again, hesitating, reaching for 
 
 her cloak and blushing like a young girl. 
 
 " That we shall meet again ? " he said, holding out 
 his hand. "Ah, that would give me such great pleas- 
 ure."
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 THE OLD, OLD PATHWAY, JUST WIDE ENOUGH FOR TWO 
 
 THEY met again a great many times; but singularly 
 enough, he rarely if ever talked to me about her, and 
 I understood his reticence perfectly. Is it possible to 
 speak of one whom we deeply love in the first days of 
 that sweet intoxication which creates the world anew 
 for us? Such a love seems to be profaned the hour 
 in which we can speak of it, even to the loved ones. 
 During these first months of their friendship, there was 
 something like ecstasy in his entire mien, a smile singu- 
 larly beautiful, an inexplicable lighting up of the whole 
 face, an unaccustomed sweetness in the voice all be- 
 trayed the intensity of his emotional life. He spoke 
 very little, he dreamed a great deal, and his reveries 
 were evidently full of charm. 
 
 I do not know how to explain it, but in proportion 
 as he seemed to live fuller and deeper in joy, I grew 
 sadder and sadder. This new emotion was the first 
 sentiment of my young master that I had not shared, 
 and it seemed to make me no longer necessary to his 
 happiness; and threw me more and more upon myself. 
 I felt for the first time the terrible loneliness of aban- 
 donment. And yet he had not at all abandoned me. 
 I was present at all the interviews between him and 
 
 Mile C . Neither was I wholly insensible to her 
 
 charms. But my heart was filled with the image of 
 another. The ideal woman for me was all sweetness, 
 all gentleness: not strong enough to stand quite alone 
 in the world, but needing to lean where strength is; 
 and I would have wished to be that strength. But in 
 Mile C I felt something superior to myself, and 
 
 83
 
 84 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 where is the man, not effeminate, who loves triumphant 
 superiority in woman? 
 
 In my young lord she had found a will as strong as 
 her own and an intelligence much broader and finer, 
 and better trained. She never for a moment seemed to 
 me his equal, and yet I thought her a very superior 
 woman. But I distrusted her influence over him. I 
 felt vaguely that there had been in her life some ter- 
 rible experience which had completely disillusioned her, 
 destroyed her faith in man, and left her nothing but an 
 immense pride and ambition, and a broken power of 
 affection, wounded, sensitive and not destined to make 
 happy those on whom it was lavished. 
 
 Now that the years have given me a perspective and 
 I 'can see in their true relations all the incidents of my 
 life, and through them can judge the lives of others, I 
 look back, and I seem to see in this woman the incar- 
 nate spirit of revolt which characterizes the women of 
 our century. It has been called pre-eminently a skep- 
 tical, material age: men have turned from revelation to 
 observation, and have destroyed with needless fury the 
 articles of faith in defense of which they once destroyed 
 each other. The microscope has superseded the super- 
 natural ; mind is a property of matter, one of the count- 
 less manifestations of motion, and the emotions are sub- 
 jected to an analysis as curious as that of matter. But 
 none of them has suffered so much by this analysis as 
 the passion of love. Idealized by women and poets as 
 something divine, it has been degraded to a mere appe- 
 tite disguised by countless coquetries, a short-lived hun- 
 ger, destined inevitably to satiety if satisfied, and capa- 
 ble ,of innumerable re-awakenings for different objects. 
 Such an idea is fatal to the happiness of women. What ! 
 make so fickle and transitory a passion the basis of one's 
 happiness for life! To live from hand to mouth like 
 a beggar, never sure that the caresses received to-day 
 will not change to curses to-morrow, who for a moment 
 could endure such a destiny? The pain, the bitterness
 
 THE OLD, OLD PATHWAY 85 
 
 of this disillusionment colors deeply the literature of 
 our age. It has given us a literature of hysteria, a 
 literature of the human beast triumphing over the tra- 
 ditions of culture; an apotheosis of instinct over reason, 
 in which a return to barbarism is declared to be the 
 direct road to progress. In this literature, the sneer 
 of the debauchee passes for wit, his audacity for cour- 
 age, and the odors of the cesspools which he uncovers 
 are sniffed as greedily as if they were the spices of 
 Arabia. But this cannot always last; and when society 
 seems ready to die of rottenness, her disease will be 
 recognized, stringent remedies will be applied, and vir- 
 tue will once more be recognized as health and sanity. 
 
 I have said that I was always present at the inter- 
 views between my lord and Mile C . They were ac- 
 customed to meet two or three times a week, oftenest at 
 our lodgings; but when the beautiful spring days made 
 it a pleasure to be out of doors, they often met in the 
 Bois de Boulogne. There was a beautiful little grove 
 of oaks near a pond at some little distance from the 
 most frequented paths, and this was their favorite ren^ 
 'dezvous. A light low carriage had been especially built 
 for Lord Eliot's use. The main body of it was curved 
 in such a fashion that he could half recline at his ease in 
 it, and the coachman's box could seat two people quite 
 [comfortably. But he preferred me to drive him alone 
 to these meetings with Mile C , and liked me to re- 
 main with them during their conversation; sometimes 
 I was even invited to take my part in it, but much 
 oftener I was a silent listener, and sooner or later quite 
 forgotten by them. Sometimes I took a book with me 
 and read or strolled about in sight of the carriage, but 
 beyond hearing. 
 
 Their conversations were often playful, mere youth- 
 ful fun bubbling over from both of them, but sometimes 
 very earnest and always sincere. Perhaps without real- 
 izing it themselves, each was modifying the opinions of 
 the other. She was growing less and less dogmatic and
 
 86 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 declamatory, and he more and more penetrating and 
 more indulgent in his views of men and their relations 
 to each other. She found in him a precocious, clear- 
 sighted intelligence which a physical infirmity had not 
 weakened, but rather sharpened, by adding to it a keen 
 sensitiveness. I have often since compared him men- 
 tally to Leopardi, whom he much resembled in his gifts 
 and in his infirmities; and if he never reflected the 
 poet's pessimism in his language, I am not sure that 
 it was never in his thoughts. But a certain indomitable 
 pride a fine perception of the full extent of the beau- 
 tiful significance of the phrase "noblesse oblige," would 
 have made him feel that pessimism is an involuntary 
 revelation of inner wretchedness. We are all optimists 
 in the sunny days of youth and health. 
 
 And to him, she was woman in her most dangerous, 
 seductive form. I shall never forget her one particular 
 afternoon in early summer, when the air was filled with 
 the music of birds and the odors of flowers. We had 
 arrived the first at the little grove, something which 
 rarely happened. It was then that I noticed in my 
 young master something feverish and agitated, quite 
 unlike his usual calm. A little shiver passed over his 
 body from time to time, and I noticed that his arms 
 sometimes twitched convulsively. Whether he was suf- 
 fering physically or mentally I could not make out, for 
 I dared not observe him closely, without betraying my 
 anxiety. He spoke with unaccustomed haste, addressed 
 questions to me and did not wait for me to reply, but 
 continued to talk upon one indifferent subject or an- 
 other, evidently trying to escape some fixed idea that 
 tormented him. I resolved not to leave him this after- 
 noon, lest he might be seized with a paroxysm of suf- 
 fering. My heart bled for him. I would willingly have 
 given him all my strength and taken his infirmity upon 
 myself had it been possible. My mind hurried forward 
 to meet the woman whose coming was to bring him 
 joy. Would she notice, as I did, that he was not quite
 
 THE OLD, OLD PATHWAY 87 
 
 himself? Would she be gentle with him, as she knew 
 so well how to be, or would she be capricious and teas- 
 ing? And while I was wondering, I saw the flutter 
 of her white dress through the trees, and in a moment 
 she was with us, so beautiful, so fresh, so radiant with 
 health, that she seemed to make a circle of light about 
 her. She did not seat herself as usual on the bench near 
 the carriage, but came quite close to him, remaining 
 standing. She had a book with a yellow paper binding 
 in her hand. 
 
 "What have you there?" asked Lord Eliot, noticing 
 it at once. 
 
 I often observed that they almost always met in this 
 way, without exchanging any formal greeting. It was 
 as if they had never been separated. One day he said 
 a pretty thing to me that explained it all. 
 
 " Do you know that there may be moments in our 
 relations with those we love, when we leave them to 
 be nearer to them? Absent, they are all our own. We 
 hold them so near, so near to us. They say only what 
 we wish to hear, and we say nothing to them which we 
 wish afterwards unsaid. We understand each other so 
 perfectly in these solitary meetings of the fancy, that 
 the reality is sometimes deadly cold in comparison." 
 
 He did not know how well I understood him, and 
 how often of late I had left him to be nearer to him. 
 
 She smiled at his question and held out the volume 
 to him, and he read aloud its title: 
 
 "Poesies completes de Alfred de Musset." He 
 changed color, and frowned. 
 
 " Why do you read such stuff as that ? " 
 
 She took back the book, turned over its leaves care- 
 lessly, and answered: 
 
 " Because he is talked of now, and because future cen- 
 turies will talk of him, and say that he represents the 
 mental attitude of his age in its aspiration and its de- 
 spair. You don't believe that, of course." 
 
 " No, I don't believe it. He represents neither you
 
 88 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 nor me, nor the little world in which we each live, nor 
 the bigger world in which the great mass of men toil 
 and think. And thank God he doesn't. I should de- 
 spair of the future, and you ought to despair of it, too, 
 if he represented us. He represents no one but him- 
 self and those like him who try to find happiness in 
 debauchery and fall to whining because they can't find 
 it there. Do you think that we are all such cowards 
 that we cannot accept the disillusionments of life with- 
 out ever finding anything better to do than to sob and 
 cry over them like children who have broken their 
 china dolls?" 
 
 "But if it is a poet who weeps? If the sobs are 
 rhythmical and melodious? Aren't you just a little bit 
 hard on the artistic temperament ? " 
 
 " Artistic temperament ! What do you mean by that ? 
 Perpetual infancy? Impotence with regard to reality? 
 The power to see nothing, feel nothing, know nothing 
 outside of the little imaginary world of which you are 
 the center ? I know nothing so wickedly selfish and cruel 
 and so absolutely useless as that. I respect the dream 
 world of the opium-eater a thousand times more than 
 the dream world of the idealist; for it knows itself for 
 what it is; it calls itself by the right name; while the 
 other gives itself out for all sorts of fine things and 
 seduces poor fools to believe in it to their everlasting 
 misfortune and unhappiness. It is insanity calling it- 
 self wisdom, disease passing itself off for health, filth 
 and nastiness covering itself with tinsel and perfume, 
 and shouting ' How clean I am ! How sweet I smell ! ' 
 No! the great artists of the world have been made of 
 stronger fiber than that. They have had superb courage. 
 They didn't go on blowing bubbles to the end of their 
 life, hoping to find one at last that would be solid 
 enough to take hold of. They turned to what is solid, 
 they touched it, rested on it, found it good. They re- 
 ported of what is as well as of what ought to be, and 
 we go on reading their reports to the end of our days;
 
 THE OLD, OLD PATHWAY 89 
 
 but what man of sound judgment and clean life could 
 read Alfred de Musset after forty ? " 
 
 " But you you are not forty ; you are twenty. Have 
 you no idea of what love is ? " 
 
 She was standing very near him, the warm color 
 surging over her beautiful face. He looked at her a 
 long time without answering, looked at her unflinchingly 
 and then said in a quiet voice which sounded cold, but 
 back of which I felt the iron will mastering the feel- 
 ings within him: 
 
 " I have some idea, but to me love is as far from 
 debauchery as sunlight from lamplight." 
 
 " And yet nine men out of ten would not understand 
 you, but will understand Musset very well. It is here 
 that you are an idealist." 
 
 " What pleasure do you get from torturing me in 
 this way ? " 
 
 " Does it torture you ? I did not know that. You 
 have said to me many a time that you loved the truth, 
 preferred it, no matter how naked and ugly, to the most 
 beautiful illusion, sparkling with specious ornaments. 
 Do you really ? " 
 
 "Without question." 
 
 She turned her eyes away, looking dreamily before 
 her; then, as if a sudden thought had occurred to her, 
 she turned to him eagerly, saying: 
 
 " I am going to put that question in a more particu- 
 lar form. Imagine that you have a friend whom you 
 have adorned with all the beautiful qualities of your 
 own generous mind. Would you rather know that 
 these qualities had no other foundation than the blind- 
 ness of your friendship, or would you prefer to prolong 
 this illusion for your own happiness and contentment ? " 
 
 " I should wish to know the truth." 
 
 " And if the friendship were destined to die by this 
 revelation ? " 
 
 He was very white as he answered: 
 
 " Then it must die. I want no happiness built over
 
 90 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 an abyss slightly bridged by illusions. I want to wor- 
 ship no creature made by my own hands. The truth 
 at any price. I think we should hesitate a long time be- 
 fore doubting, but once absolutely sure that our friends 
 have been faithless to us or are unworthy of us, I think 
 we should cut them out of our lives as fearlessly as we 
 cut off a gangrened limb and never count the cost in 
 pain or crippling, though we must go maimed through 
 life for it. I hope I know how to suffer in silence like 
 a man, and not like Musset. Be very sure that I 
 shouldn't call in the world to hear me sob and sniffle, 
 even if I were musical at it." 
 
 He threw back his head proudly, his handsome face 
 expressing a supreme contempt, his eyes glowing with 
 a dazzling light. 
 
 She looked at him as if fascinated, and then her face 
 lighted up with a sort of superb audacity : 
 
 " I shall put you to the proof," she said, in a voice 
 singularly low and firm. Then looking around, her 
 glance fell on me, and with a smile of great sweetness, 
 she said : 
 
 " Will you excuse me if I wish to be with Lord 
 L a few minutes alone?" 
 
 I glanced at my young master, and he slightly nodded 
 his head as a sign of dismissal. I left my seat imme- 
 diately and walked away. I recall it all now, as if It 
 had happened yesterday ; the winding path across which 
 the sunlight lay in broken bars the violets blooming 
 here and there along its edge, and on my heart the 
 chill shadow of approaching grief. I walked about for 
 an hour or more, before returning, knowing well how 
 quickly the time would pass with them. When I came 
 back I found him alone. He was staring before him 
 with wide, dry eyes, and an expression of immense suf- 
 fering. I feared he was very ill, but at the first word I 
 uttered, he lifted his hand as a token of silence, and bade 
 me drive him home. I never knew what she said to 
 him; but I have made many conjectures about it. Un-
 
 THE OLD, OLD PATHWAY 91 
 
 doubtedly, there had been something in her life which 
 shocked terribly this mind so pure and yet so broad that 
 it was not easily shocked. But whatever it was, he 
 never spoke of it, nor did he ever see her or mention her 
 name to me again. But the blow had struck deep. It 
 sapped his vitality; for nights and nights, I know that 
 he hardly slept at all, and his days were feverish, rest- 
 less and filled with vain attempts to distract himself 
 from the fixed idea which had become his torment
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 TRAVELING AGAIN 
 
 WE left Paris, going to Switzerland, where the fam- 
 ily joined us; we finished the summer on the shores of 
 Lake Geneva, and in autumn went to Naples. Here we 
 began to be seriously alarmed at the increasing weak- 
 ness of my young master. He seemed to be slowly 
 dying before our eyes without our being able to assign 
 to any definite malady the cause of his condition. I, 
 alone, suspected the truth; but I respected so much the 
 secret of his soul which he could not reveal, that I had 
 not the courage to speak of it, until his condition be- 
 came really critical. Then I resolved to talk with our 
 tutor about it, for he was still with us, the indispensable 
 Companion of our studies and amusements. One morn- 
 ing when Lady Margaret and her mother were espe- 
 cially assiduous about Lord Eliot, I went out with Rich- 
 ard Glenn for a walk. We took the via Tasso, climb- 
 ing the heights, from which we had a magnificent view 
 of the bay and the city. We passed a little monastery 
 in which a choir of monks were singing together, and 
 we stopped a moment to listen to them. Molti peccati 
 was all that we could understand of the song that made 
 the tranquil morning air vibrate sonorously. At the 
 right and above us the terraces were green with vines 
 richly loaded with purple grapes. At last, we entered a 
 road enclosed on either side by high stone walls in the 
 chinks of which wild flowers and ferns were growing, 
 and white and orange-colored butterflies were fluttering 
 about them, looking themselves like flowers endowed 
 with motion. The air was admirably fresh and pure and 
 we felt exhilarated by our walk. 
 
 " How I wish Lord Eliot could be with us this morn- 
 
 92
 
 93 
 
 ing," I exclaimed, rather for the purpose of introducing 
 his name and directing the conversation to him, than 
 for anything else. 
 
 " Yes, I do, too, but I fear " he paused and shook 
 
 his head anxiously and sighed. 
 
 " You fear as I do," I returned, " that he is more 
 dangerously ill than we think." Then without more 
 ado, and as simply as I could, I related my fears and 
 suspicions and concluded by asking whether it were pos- 
 sible that an emotion too intense could result in any 
 one's death. 
 
 " Certainly," he answered quickly. " In a nature very 
 sensitive joined to a feeble body, a profound emotion 
 can kill like a slow poison. Lord Eliot has this sensi- 
 tive temperament, this suffering body. Love has come 
 to him with all the intensity of a primitive passion; 
 he has suffered deeply through it, and he will probably 
 die of it. He has a precocious intelligence and with a 
 strong body, his head would have succeeded in killing 
 his heart; he might have become a cynic like Schopen- 
 hauer, or a philosopher of the Goethean type, urbane, 
 moderate, with a large and piercing vision a sage, 
 the principal need of whose life is to belong to himself 
 as much as possible, while keeping his intelligence alert 
 and awake. But he has not the physical force to throw 
 off the depressing, deadly effect of this sudden with- 
 drawal from his life of all that gave it beauty and 
 meaning. The fact that he has never spoken to you of 
 it is sinister. The man who can talk of his grief is in 
 a fair way to recovery. But he who bleeds inwardly, 
 and will not reveal his wound may die of it. Oh, how 
 cruel, how cruel these hidden wounds are that no eye 
 sees or suspects, and yet that break the springs of life 
 in us, robbing the sun of his light and the cheerful 
 earth of her verdure. But few men or women of any 
 capacity for deep feeling pass through life without some 
 such experience. Nature, with her one inevitable pur- 
 pose, is at work within us all; but we do not always
 
 94 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 understand the meaning of this restless tenderness that 
 fills us with visions and longings. We can't see deeper 
 than surfaces, and beauty takes the place of everything; 
 we have only one real need at twenty. It is to love and 
 to be loved. A scorching thirst devours us, and if we 
 cannot find a pure, clear spring, we stoop to wet our 
 parched lips at the first pool of dirty water that we find 
 along the highway. A common nature will feel no re- 
 pugnance at this; but for a refined, superior nature, 
 nothing is so degrading, so humiliating as to have lav- 
 ished the best treasures of the heart on a low, unworthy 
 object. And I have one counsel to give you: If in lov- 
 ing you have still some power to choose, and are not the 
 victim of a blind instinct, love what is above you and 
 not what is below; and if you are destined to be un- 
 happy at least some nobleness will be mingled with your 
 grief. You will be lifted, purified by it, not degraded. 
 A love like that will not kill. You may be struck down, 
 but it will be to rise again. You will not despise 
 yourself for having taken tinsel for gold. You will feel 
 rather a noble pride that it was permitted to you to see 
 the highest and love it passionately." 
 
 I felt my blood driven back to my heart, then surge 
 to the surface in floods of color. Did he guess my 
 secret? 
 
 " Can't you speak to him ? " I asked in an unsteady 
 voice, " and- win, in some way, his confidence, so that 
 he can rid himself of this burden ? " 
 
 " No," he answered, " it is too late ; I should have 
 anticipated the result of this connection long ago, and 
 broken it off. But I was deceived by his wonderful 
 self-control, by the clearness and coolness of his head, 
 and the fact that, from his childhood, women have made 
 much of him and so destroyed his impressionability by 
 familiarity. But one can no more reason with passion 
 than with hunger and thirst or any other physical ne- 
 cessity. It can be killed, though, by supplanting it 
 with another passion. Happily, he has a keen and large
 
 TRAVELING AGAIN 95 
 
 intelligence. He is easily interested in everything 
 worthy of attention. The situation of this beautiful 
 Italy has touched him. Let us try to sharpen his inter- 
 est. Let us manage an introduction of the heads of 
 the Liberal party to him. I believe that I can bring 
 about an audience with Mazzini, or rather with one 
 of his most intimate friends who shares all his opinions 
 a brilliant, big-hearted fellow who happens just now, 
 to be in Naples." 
 
 "Do you know Mazzini himself?" 
 
 " O yes, very well. I met him for the first time at 
 London a few years ago. He had established there an 
 association of workmen, and during the summer vaca- 
 tions I made it my particular business to attend their 
 meetings to hear Mazzini talk. I never met any one 
 who was altogether so wise and just a friend of the 
 laborer as he was. But his own mind, so delicate, so 
 broad, probably exaggerated the possibility of awaken- 
 ing in the ordinary man those elevated sentiments which 
 make the real distinction between the vulgar and the 
 noble. I never met any man with a purer, more dis- 
 interested love for his fellow-man. He loved the work- 
 men far too well to flatter them, or to excite their envy 
 against the rich. He never left off telling them that 
 their real happiness and distinction depended upon what 
 they were in themselves and not in their possessions; 
 that dress, rich and abundant food, fine buildings, and 
 all the external appearances of luxury could not elevate 
 them one inch. He knew very well that it is difficult, 
 perhaps impossible, as he said, to make a source of in- 
 spiration in morality alone without a dogma or a heaven 
 to support it; but he never ceased to show the inap- 
 proachable beauty of perfect virtue as the finest of the 
 old masters taught it, that is to say, virtue which pro- 
 poses no other aim than itself. To do right not because 
 it is expedient, not becnuse it will bring its reward, but 
 because it is right, was the inflexible basis of his code 
 of ethics. Therefore, he never baited his moral pr
 
 cepts with sugar plums to make them go down the 
 easier. On the contrary, he said : * Do right without 
 thinking of the consequences. Learn to suffer with 
 courage. The aim of life is not happiness, it is develop- 
 ment. Keep on growing broader, better. Rain is as 
 essential to growth as sunlight. Life is duty; if duty 
 is agreeable, so much the better, but if your tears must 
 flow as you do it, do it just the same, and weep, if that 
 solaces you.' I think I can recall the exact words of 
 one of his stirring sentences. Here it is : ' Whether 
 the sun shine with the serene splendor of an Italian 
 morn, or the leaden, corpse-like hue of the northern 
 mist, I cannot see that it changes our duty.' Magnifi- 
 cent words, aren't they? I used to come away from 
 his talks feeling singularly rested and lifted ; and though 
 the heavy London fog choked the streets, the night 
 seemed full of stars. He had beautiful things, too, to 
 say of love. He hadn't dragged his ideals through filth 
 with loose living. He had no sneers for chastity, and 
 he complained that modern writers have degraded love 
 in persistently searching for sensuality as the basis of it. 
 Woman, he said, has been degraded to the female, and 
 he wished that women, laying aside their frivolity and 
 vanity, would search in man for what is noble in him to 
 encourage and support it, and that love between them 
 should be the two wings to bear them toward the ideal. 
 But he didn't make a fetich of love; he was no fem- 
 melette, he was a man, and he called love a flower 
 that blooms along the pathway of life, but said that it 
 could not change duty. His own life was beautiful with 
 renunciation of it. His country called him,- and he could 
 not stop to gather the flower that grew in his pathway; 
 but he did not tread on it scornfully and brutally; he 
 stepped aside and carried the memory of its beauty 
 with him till the end of his life." 
 
 Thus chatting, we walked on, stopping sometimes to 
 examine a new flower, or to express our joy in a new 
 glimpse of the beautiful landscape.
 
 TRAVELING AGAIN 97 
 
 Succeeding in his plan, our tutor had very soon drawn 
 into Lord Eliot's circle the most brilliant and most 
 celebrated young patriots of Italy who happened at that 
 time to be staying in Naples. In their suite were other 
 young men of noble birth, attracted not so much by 
 Lord Eliot's personality as by the remarkable beauty 
 of his sister, Lady Margaret. Among them was a young 
 marquis with many superficial showy accomplish- 
 ments, a handsome but empty head, a cold heart, a 
 great deal of egotism and a sensual temperament, by 
 virtue of which he was par excellence what is called 
 a ladies' man. He knew admirably how to address 
 himself to the most vulnerable point in a woman's van- 
 ity the wish to believe herself of paramount influence 
 in the life of a man; and made her believe that his 
 tastes, his character, his destiny depended on her alone. 
 He was a fluent talker of the thousand flattering little 
 personalities so dear to the heart of a woman, and 
 knew how to render all the little services and attentions 
 which a pretty woman expects. Now the character of 
 Don Juan has never seemed to me anything but con- 
 temptible, and the man who boasts of being a lady- 
 killer seems to me on a par with the hunter who should 
 boast of his prowess in a zoological garden where he 
 could kill a caged lion with the butt of his gun. Most 
 women are as easy game to a man who can flatter and 
 lie, as tame barn-yard fowl. They fly into his hands 
 in both cases. He couldn't help catching them if he 
 would, yet most Don Juans classify themselves with the 
 Caesars and Bonapartes, and think that the easy capture 
 of a woman's heart is equal to the taking of a citadel. 
 They forget that there is a decided difference in the 
 conditions. The first business of the average woman is 
 to b? captured. She wishes to be taken care of, to be 
 settled for the future, and capitulates with gratitude. 
 The first business of a beleaguered city is not to be 
 taken, and she resists till death and famine open her 
 gates.
 
 98 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 It is not necessary to say, then, that the young mar- 
 quis was violently antipathetic to me and he was none 
 the less so to Lord Eliot; but alas! so low as he fell in 
 our favor, so high did he rise in the esteem of Lady 
 Margaret. She was at this time in the full splendor of 
 her fresh, young beauty, to the charm of which she 
 added a simplicity and grace of manner extremely fas- 
 cinating. But I noticed that in the presence of the mar- 
 quis she was agitated and timid, and I cannot describe 
 the shock and pain which this discovery was to me. 
 I had but to look into my own heart to know what 
 that shrinking timidity meant; not that I was such an 
 ass as to believe that I could ever be anything to her 
 but an humble friend and silent adorer, not that I was 
 capable of being jealous of her happiness. No, I could 
 have seen her united to one worthy of her in every way, 
 and could have rejoiced at her promised happiness, and 
 been grateful that she at least had escaped the pain 
 of loving without return. But to see her waste the 
 treasure of her pure and noble heart on a shallow liber- 
 tine was agony to me. 
 
 I had seen this young girl in a thousand amiable 
 situations, yielding her will to her parents or to her 
 brother whom she adored, showing the sweetness and 
 flexibility of her mind under a tutor indulgent but 
 firm ; showing also that exquisite delicacy which in a 
 pure, young girl makes us liken her to a flower, all 
 beauty and perfume. I never dared to address her 
 first, I hardly dared even to look at her, so fearful was 
 I that I might betray my love, but secretly I devoured 
 her with my eyes, and there was not a charm of that 
 fresh, young beauty that had escaped me. And yet 
 so exalted, so perfect was my love that it asked noth- 
 ing in return; and all my joy was to see her, to hear 
 her laugh, to hear her talk. A word, a smile directed 
 to me alone, made me exquisitely happy for days after- 
 wards. 
 
 We have so soiled our thoughts of love by searching
 
 TRAVELING AGAIN 99 
 
 the foundation of this sweet flame in the desires of the 
 flesh, that we read Dante with sneering incredulity, 
 and even doubt the reality of this Beatrice who was the 
 inspiration of his life, and make of her a symbol of 
 intellectual perfection. But as for me, thanks to this 
 experience of my early youth, I can read the Vita 
 Nuova and feel all the truth of that passion so intense 
 that its white heat has burned out all the smoke and 
 ashes of carnality, and I can sing with the poet : 
 
 " Dico quando ella apparia da parte alcuna per la 
 speransa dell'ammirabile Salute, nullo nemico mi ri- 
 manea; anzi mi giugneva una fiamma di caritade, la 
 quale mi facea perdonare a chiunque m'avesse offeso: 
 e chi allora m'avesse addimandato di cosa alcuna, la 
 mia responsione sarebbe stata solamente Amore, con 
 viso vestito d'umilta." 
 
 She had not her brother's strong and courageous 
 mind, and could not follow him in his bold flights in 
 search of the truth. She trembled face to face with the 
 great questions of scientific research, and turning from 
 them, gladly grasped the loving hand that seemed ex- 
 tended to her from the darkness, saying, " I trust, I 
 believe." She was sensitive to the beautiful in all its 
 forms. She knew human nature only through her own 
 qualities, and was always discovering heroes where 
 there were only borrowed lion's skins. Lord Eliot, teas- 
 ing her sometimes, told her she was destined, like Ti- 
 tania, to fall in love with an ass's head. 
 
 The particular object of her study was art. She 
 hadn't, to be sure, either originality or force enough to 
 make a great artist (what woman has?) but she suc- 
 ceeded admirably in reproducing cheerful, sunny land- 
 scapes, a corner of a flowery meadow, a handful of 
 roses, or a delicate, young face like her own. 
 
 About this time there was a sort of renaissance of 
 early art, of which the followers have since received 
 the name of pre-Raphaelites. It was a movement back- 
 wards instead of forwards, for it wished to re-animate
 
 ioo THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 a faith that science had killed, by making it live again 
 in a form of art that does not belong to our century. 
 But it was especially agreeable to minds filled with 
 reverence for the past and not willing to break with 
 it wholly, and for timid minds distrustful of their 
 powers in a milieu they could not reproduce, and, from 
 a certain romantic turn of mind, could not enjoy. 
 
 It is to me a striking proof of the contagious char- 
 acter of taste, that I, who had been at first repelled 
 by the old masters, learned now to love their naive 
 simplicity and the stammering language in which they 
 told the story of Christian faith and Christian legends; 
 but I know perfectly well that I caught my enthusiasm 
 ready-made from Lady Margaret, and that it grew out 
 of a wish not to fail in seeing beauty and interest 
 where she found so much of it. I was often asked to 
 accompany her to the galleries, and listened in ecstasy 
 to her girlish outbursts of pleasure, and so learned to 
 anticipate her tastes and share them.
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 COMPLICATIONS 
 
 WE remained in Naples until the following spring, 
 when Lord Eliot, seeming to recover sufficiently to 
 travel further without danger, expressed a wish to see 
 Florence, and we all went there, intending to stay 
 some weeks to indulge Lady Margaret's taste for art. 
 
 The marquis followed us in a few days, much to 
 the displeasure of Lord Eliot, who, in spite of his 
 cleverness at concealing his feelings, could not, at times, 
 keep from betraying himself by a brusqueness of be- 
 havior wholly alien to him. The marquis, on the (con- 
 trary, was almost obsequious in his efforts to please 
 him, and one afternoon, unable to see Lady Margaret, 
 who was suffering from a headache, insisted on accom- 
 panying Lord Eliot and myself to the Pitti Palace. 
 
 His insipid comments on the pictures irritated my 
 lord to such an extent that he seemed, at times, to 
 check himself in an outburst of anger, and hardly no- 
 ticed the masterpieces at which we were looking, until 
 we stood before the celebrated Judith and Holofernes 
 of Cristofano Allori. 
 
 It was the first time we had seen it, and I was struck 
 immediately by one of those astounding resemblances as 
 cruel as they are striking, when they recall those once 
 loved whom we are vainly trying to forget. Involun- 
 tarily I looked at my young master. His face was the 
 color of ashes, his lips trembled, he breathed with the 
 greatest difficulty. But there was another who was 
 looking with admiration at this beautiful Judith with 
 the fine oval contour of the face and the languid eyes 
 veiled by the drooping lids; and it was upon his face 
 
 IOX
 
 102 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 that my lord's eyes were fixed with an expression of 
 horrible anguish. 
 
 " Per Baccho ! " exclaimed the marquis. " How is it 
 that beauty like that can cross two centuries and re- 
 appear almost identical in a French woman! I assure 
 
 you, my lord, that I knew at Paris, a young lady " 
 
 " Then it was you ! " 
 
 Never shall I forget the hoarse voice stifled with 
 passion in which my lord uttered this cry. At the same 
 time, as if the energy of his soul had triumphed once 
 for all over the weakness of his body, he rose to his 
 feet, his hand outstretched as if to smite. But it was 
 for a moment only. He fell back with a sharp cry. 
 The effort had killed him! 
 
 O my friend! O my brave heart! Forgive me if 
 these shallow words seem cold. They are not, I am 
 looking at them through my tears. I have never ceased 
 regretting you, never ceased loving you, and I never 
 shall. You cannot die to me, you cannot grow old and 
 I have said that you should not all die while I lived; 
 that what was fine and strong in you should live again 
 in me. But alas! I have not kept the promise. It 
 was grafting on alien stock, and I have borne no fruit. 
 You took away the joy and zest in life by leaving me; 
 and yet I feel challenged not to disappoint you, wholly. 
 I associate you with all that is noblest in human char- 
 acter, and when I am about to despair of men, I think 
 of you and my faith in them revives. I never see 
 anything beautiful, the splendor of the dawn, or of the 
 close of day, that I do not wish you with me. I never 
 read a stirring thought or hear of a noble deed that I 
 do not remember how you would have delighted in it; 
 and when I have keenly suffered, I have found some 
 solace in the thought that I, too, was traversing the 
 valley where the shadows hung black and threatening 
 over you, and so could understand you better, love 
 you more. O my friend, I know, now, how you suf- 
 fered, I know what a crushing grief you bore alone.
 
 COMPLICATIONS 103 
 
 Why did you not let me share its bitterness? But no 
 you would have felt it a crime to diffuse your grief; 
 you would have felt it an unspeakable baseness to re- 
 veal anything shameful in the life of one you had loved. 
 The secret of which you died, so far as you were con- 
 cerned, died with you. 
 
 But this woman, Mile C , I felt sure, had known 
 
 all the intoxication of a blind passion, and later, be- 
 trayed and abandoned, may have fallen into an irregu- 
 lar and shameful life. Perhaps, at first, she may have 
 designed to make a victim of Lord Eliot, but ended by 
 yielding to the better influence which he unconsciously 
 exerted over all who knew him. 
 
 I was as perfectly satisfied in my own mind of the 
 guilt of the marquis as if he had confessed it to me: 
 and what unspeakable anguish it was to me to know 
 that Lady Margaret was exposed to contamination by 
 his daily presence. I must warn her, I must tell her 
 the truth at all hazards. But when? How? It seemed 
 an exquisite cruelty to add to the deep grief she was 
 feeling from her brother's death, the humiliating grief 
 of disillusionment. But to keep silence was crueler 
 by far, for it was the happiness of all her future life 
 that was at stake. 
 
 Half mad with grief myself, I neither slept nor ate. 
 We were making hurried preparations for leaving Flor- 
 ence Lord Eliot's body was being embalmed, and we 
 were to take it back to Scotland with us. I was in my 
 room late in the afternoon walking up and down, up 
 and down, urged involuntarily to relax, by this restless 
 motion, the agonizing tension of my nerves. Finally 1 
 approached the window that looked out upon a garden 
 enclosed with high stone walls. There I saw my lady 
 in close conversation with the marquis. She was weep- 
 ing bitterly, concealing her face with her handkerchief. 
 He was bending over her, and I saw him seize her hand 
 and carry it to his lips. She made no resistance, and 
 he was about to draw her head down upon his shoulder
 
 104 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 when I rushed from the window in an agony of wounded 
 love, and jealousy for her honor, more terrible still. 
 
 my God ! My God ! I could not let this happen. I 
 must save her. There was no one else to do it. I was 
 father, brother, outraged lover at the same time. I 
 rushed downstairs, my brain on fire, through the lower 
 corridor, into the garden, and without excusing myself, 
 
 1 confronted the marquis, crying out: 
 
 " How dare you touch that lady's hand, you infamous 
 scoundrel ! Know that I am here to protect her ; and if 
 any harm comes to her from you, I shall kill you, as 
 I would crush a snake under my heel." 
 
 He did not understand English well, for in my rage 
 I was master of nothing but my mother tongue; but 
 he could not have misunderstood my frantic gestures 
 and furious expression. However, he hadn't time to 
 reply to me ; because my lady, drawing herself up to her 
 full height and looking at me with withering scorn, said : 
 
 " Have you gone stark mad ? What do you mean by 
 this insolent intrusion and brutal insult? Get down on 
 your knees, and ask pardon of this gentleman, at once ! " 
 
 "Ask pardon of him? Never! never! I have come 
 to save you from him." 
 
 She paled, and her face twitched convulsively. O 
 my lady, could you have looked into my heart that 
 day! 
 
 " What do you know of this man ? " she asked. 
 
 " Nothing and everything. Your brother " 
 
 She held up her hand imperiously. 
 
 " Stop ! You have no right to mention his name 
 here. He is not here to defend himself. He has told 
 you nothing. He was not a coward. He would have 
 spoken to me had he known anything that threatened 
 my happiness. You dare not say that he spoke to you, 
 who was silent with me. Tell me that lie, if you dare." 
 
 " No, my lady, he never spoke to me ! " 
 
 "Who then?" 
 
 " Nobody, but O my lady, for God's sake listen to 
 Tie."
 
 COMPLICATIONS 105 
 
 "No, I will not listen to any low suspicions. I am 
 not a coward, either. I dare be just even when it pains 
 me. You have been dear to me, because you were dear 
 to my brother, and if he were alive you would never 
 dare to outrage and insult me as you have done to-day 
 in the midst of the deepest grief of my life. Leave me, 
 and let me never see you again. Never, do you under- 
 stand? / never want to see your face again." 
 
 I reeled backwards. I thought for a moment I was 
 going to fall. I tried to speak, but she silenced me at 
 once with a look of deep contempt, saying: 
 
 " Not a word ! away with you, at once ! " I ran from 
 the garden beside myself with grief and humiliation; I 
 staggered to my room, threw myself across the bed and 
 wept like a child, and like the child that I was yet; but 
 when I ceased to sob at nightfall, I was a man. Grief 
 had baptized me. With stinging remorse, I recognized 
 the perfect imbecility of what I had done. I was ab- 
 solutely without any proof of the truth of the charge 
 I had mentally brought against the marquis, and which 
 I was prepared to make openly against him. It all 
 rested on that acute intuition which is stronger than 
 reason in us, and which no reasoning can refute. But 
 I was stunned with the blow of my lady's displeasure. 
 The love for her made me a coward in her presence. 
 I was struck dumb by those cruel words, " / never want 
 to see your face again ! " O, how could she say that to 
 me in this bitter hour of our mutual desolation! How 
 could she forget my long years of faithful service ! Was 
 all my silent adoration nothing to her, compared with 
 the flattering fondness of a stranger? 
 
 But I would not desist yet in my efforts to save her. 
 I rushed to Richard Glenn. I blurted out all my sus- 
 picions, my fears, my anguish, in a voice broken with 
 sobs. I begged him to go to her, not to try to re- 
 store me to favor, no, that was hopeless ; but to tell her 
 quietly, reasonably, just what had occurred before that 
 fatal canvas, that she might judge for herself what 
 grounds she had to fear that the man she loved was a
 
 106 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 heartless libertine. "And tell her/' I added, "that I 
 shall obey her to the letter, that she shall never see 
 me again; but that I leave her broken-hearted, never 
 again to know happiness, so long as I live." 
 
 " My poor boy ! my poor boy ! " He drew my head 
 to his breast ; he stroked my hair with a hand as tender 
 as my mother's. He promised to do all that I asked; 
 but he added that trite old adage that love is blind, 
 and said that to him it was not quite so conclusive as 
 to me, that the marquis was guilty of any illicit relation 
 
 with Mile C ; that in the morbid state of his feelings 
 
 Lord Eliot might have drawn unwarrantable conclu- 
 sions. Love warps the judgment tremendously ; for his 
 part, he had seen the Judith; but, unless his attention 
 had been called to the likeness, he would not have re- 
 marked its resemblance to Mile C . But he could quite 
 
 understand the situation. As for myself, if I wished to 
 go back to Scotland. Here I interrupted him, passion- 
 ately, to say that I could never consent to go back home ' 
 disgraced, or to run the risk of being seen by one to 
 whom I had become odious. No, the world itself 
 seemed too small to hold us both, and I wished that 
 I was lying stark and cold beside my dead friend. 
 
 He did not try to reason with me ; he knew the human 
 heart too well; but he bade me give way to my grief 
 and empty my heart of all its bitterness ; and then, when 
 the first paroxysm was over, he held my hand firmly 
 in his, and with a voice that trembled, and eyes that 
 were wet with tears, as they looked into mine, he told 
 me that in his solitary life I had been as a son to 
 him, that he had tried to put something of himself 
 into my young heart that it might live when he himself 
 was dust and ashes; and he implored me not to dis- 
 appoint him. Lord Eliot's death had been a terrible 
 blow, an unforgettable grief to him; but he had had 
 one consolation in the midst of it, I had been spared to 
 him. All his life-work had not been lost. 
 
 I looked at the thin face, worn with grief, sharp-
 
 COMPLICATIONS 107 
 
 ened with intellect. How was it that I had not seen 
 that he, too, suffered? The egotism of my grief melted 
 into sympathy for the moment. I pressed my hot lips 
 to his thin cheek. I promised him to be a man. I 
 thanked him warmly for all that he had done for me, 
 and bade him good-by, knowing that I was never to see 
 him again. 
 
 Since coming abroad I had received a regular salary, 
 but as I was able to save the greater part of it, I had 
 sent it home to my mother. Fortunately, I had not yet 
 sent off my last allowance, and it was quite enough, with 
 a little economy, to see me safely to America. 
 
 I knew that a merchant ship set out nearly every 
 week from Naples to New York, and I resolved to em- 
 bark by the first one that sailed. I made a little pack- 
 age of my clothes, putting among them a small volume 
 of Horace that my young master and I had often read 
 together. My tears fell anew, as I strapped it into my 
 bundle, and there came over me that fierce hunger to 
 see him once more, which has so often cruelly assailed 
 me. 
 
 On leaving the house, I made no effort to hire a car- 
 riage; it seemed to me impossible to endure the strain 
 of sitting still in a close carriage alone with my wretched- 
 ness. I felt the need of benumbing my body, or of 
 fatiguing it with walking, and so, if possible, dulling, 
 too, the torture of my mind. 
 
 The night was superb; one of those tranquil, cloud- 
 less nights when the moon is at her full, and lights up 
 the landscape almost with the distinctness of day. But 
 this serene sky and quiet loveliness of nature seemed 
 to mock my grief. I would have given all I possessed 
 for a storm to drench me to the skin, deafen my ears 
 with its thunder, and threaten me with vivid flashes of 
 lightning. Ah! Nature was kind, not cruel, to Lear, 
 when she loosed her winds and rains to beat against 
 him. I walked all night long, without once stopping, 
 for when I would have flagged, that cruel memory came
 
 io8 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 like a scourge to whip me into line. No one is a philos- 
 opher until after the tempest and in retrospect; during 
 the storm, he is a man. And I was very much of a 
 man that night and for many and many a day after. 
 To be sure I did all that I could to distract myself, 
 but in everything that I did and in everything that I 
 said, I was conscious of this dark background of sorrow. 
 It was my last thought when I fell asleep, my first 
 thought when I awoke. But it is very remarkable that 
 it never once appeared in my dreams. There is a gen- 
 erally received idea that our dreams are the shadowy re- 
 productions of our principal thoughts. But it- has never 
 happened to me to dream of what has occupied me the 
 most. And that has been a great comfort to me. 
 
 I did not make the entire journey between Florence 
 and Naples on foot ; but I was at the end of my strength 
 before I took a carriage. My feet were badly bruised 
 and swollen, my whole body ached and my head was 
 dizzy with extreme fatigue. There were hours when the 
 courage to live almost forsook me, and I think if I 
 had not found a ship at Naples ready to sail, it would 
 have gone hard with me. 
 
 At any other time I would have been extremely in- 
 terested in the crowds of emigrants that filled the ship. 
 But a great passion, either of grief or joy, makes 
 egotists of us, shuts us up in the narrow circle of our 
 own emotions, blinding us to everything outside of its 
 fatal circumference. I looked at this eager, restless 
 crowd huddled on the quay with perfect indifference, 
 although it was to furnish me with daily companions in 
 a long voyage.
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 EN ROUTE FOR AMERICA 
 
 I HAVE often asked myself since, whether I would 
 have undertaken the voyage if I could have anticipated 
 all the misery of that two months' sea-trip. I had not 
 foreseen one of the little details of equipment so neces- 
 sary to ensure as much comfort and convenience as 
 possible, which was little enough at the best. I had no 
 idea of the condition of the emigrants on one of these 
 great vessels, where I found we were heaped together 
 confusedly, men and women, old and young, like so 
 many cattle. All that is changed now. Foreign gov- 
 ernments think enough of their citizens to assure them 
 a passage across the ocean in which, at any rate, the 
 laws of decency shall be observed; but at that time 
 the only concern that any one had about them was to 
 get them across, no matter how. 
 
 My exceptional education had not at all decreased 
 my sympathy with the poor among whom I always 
 classed myself; but every sentiment of delicacy and 
 modesty in me revolted at the total impossibility of being 
 alone day or night. Then, too, I had some very de- 
 cided prejudices in favor of cleanliness, and the filthy 
 rags with which my companions tried to Cover their 
 nakedness, not always succeeding, exhaled a nauseous 
 odor of reeking bodies unfamiliar with soap and water 
 from the day of their birth that turned me deathly 
 sick. I would have been ashamed of myself had I 
 been effeminate enough to recoil before hunger, cold, 
 fatigue or hard work; but I should have had to be a 
 saint not to recoil before what makes the hideous ug- 
 liness of poverty dirt and indecency. My clothes, my; 
 
 109
 
 no ' THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 manner, my taciturnity and my foreign birth, quickly 
 created a prejudice against me that might have increased 
 to real hostility, had I not fallen very ill the second 
 day out. The stench and stifling heat of my first night 
 on board had finished me. I could not lift my head, I 
 shivered and burned, alternately, in a state of inde- 
 scribable pain and nausea. This atrocious suffering 
 made my companions forgive me for the time for being 
 socially their superior, and as I accepted their clumsy 
 efforts at relief with expressions of gratitude, they soon 
 vied with each other as to who should render me a serv- 
 ice; and I learned to recognize, under all their rags and 
 filth, a warm spontaneous kindness that augured well 
 for their capacity for improvement in the free country 
 to which they were going. When I grew better, I be- 
 gan to teach them English, which they were all eager 
 to learn; and my lessons lasted, not only from dawn till 
 nightfall, but during every moment I was awake. This 
 ceaseless occupation was all that made the voyage sup- 
 portable to me, half effacing, for the time at least, the 
 memory of my sufferings. And the teaching came back 
 to me in many a forcible lesson of patience and en- 
 durance; and in many an expression of impulsive love 
 from these sunny-hearted children of the South, whom 
 age never touches, except on the surface. They made 
 the very best of their miserable surroundings. They 
 laughed, they played, they sang, they quarreled, and 
 made up again. They decked themselves out on Sun- 
 days and feast days with bits of brilliant color and bright, 
 cheap jewels. They had their little romances in various 
 corners 'of this little motley ship-world, and even I, 
 morose, wretched, heart-hungry to famishing, had my 
 little romance, too, and was envied for my luck, chided 
 for my coldness, and but for my linguistic services, 
 might have fared badly at the hands of my jealous 
 rivals. 
 
 Chance had placed near me in the miserable holes 
 where we were obliged to pass the night together, a
 
 EN ROUTE FOR AMERICA in 
 
 young girl of sixteen, one of those brown beauties to be 
 found nowhere else but in the south of Italy and in 
 Spain. She had a great quantity of glossy, black hair, 
 never in order, yet never appearing untidy, and dark 
 eyes with a touching expression of melancholy, When 
 her face was in repose, but full of animation when she 
 laughed. For the rest, a girl who had matured early 
 under the sunny skies of Italy, but who had laughed 
 at love, for the very reason that love came running 
 after her on every side. 
 
 Now, for me, even the proximity of so beautiful a 
 girl couldn't lessen the horror of that first night on 
 the ship. To feel around me all these moist, warm 
 bodies ; to breathe the fetid air from these hundreds 
 of mouths, old and young, healthy and diseased; to 
 hear the groans, and hiccoughs, snores and curses, and 
 various forms of wailing that issued from them, was 
 for me the realization of Dante's most horrible visions. 
 My imagination increased the horrors of it to such an 
 extent that I believe I would have thrown myself into 
 the sea to escape it, had I not prevailed upon the 
 surgeon to grant me the privilege of sleeping on the 
 open deck. 
 
 But I was so poorly provided for the voyage, hav- 
 ing nothing with me but a change of clothing, that I 
 would have suffered from the cold had it not been 
 for the generosity of my companions, who furnished 
 me with blankets and a straw pillow. But to no one 
 was I indebted so much as to the beautiful young 
 Anita, who chose to be my nurse. During my long 
 illness of three weeks, she never left me, night or day. 
 How many times I awoke during the nights to find my 
 head reclining on her breast, her arms around my neck, 
 I cannot tell. I remonstrated with her. I was even 
 peevish and harsh. I opposed my cold rules of pro- 
 priety to the warm instincts of her heart, but all in vain. 
 She covered me with kisses; she called me her little 
 English icicle whom she meant to thaw back to life,
 
 112 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 and I finished like a coward by letting her have her 
 way, and accepted passively all the riches of this young 
 heart, saying vaguely to myself that to be irresponsive 
 is a crime. But I told her no lies. She knew well 
 that I did not love her. One night, near the end of 
 the voyage, we were sitting together on the deck; the 
 night was raw and misty, and we had thrown a heavy 
 blanket about our shoulders. I felt her body shivering 
 against mine, and I said: 
 
 "Are you cold, Nita?" 
 
 "Yes," she answered, and her teeth chattered, and 
 she huddled closer to me. I put my arm about her 
 and drew the blanket over her head. 
 
 " There, is that better ? Never mind, there won't 
 be many more nights of this. We'll soon be in Amer- 
 ica. They expect to sight land Thursday morning." 
 
 "Oh don't! don't! don't! I can't bear to hear you 
 say it like that," and she put her hand over my mouth. 
 " I wish we would never sight land. I wish we could 
 sail on forever and ever, you and I, like this. Oh, why 
 can't you love me? But I know very well why. There 
 is some one else whom you love. You are running 
 away from her, but you can't do it, she is still there, 
 there," and she placed her hand on my heart " and 
 there is no place for me. Oh, I could kill her, 
 kill her for having taken my place. Forget her. 
 Can't you do it? She does not know how to love 
 as I do." She seized my head with her two hands, and 
 I felt her moist, warm lips devour my face with furious 
 kisses. For a moment I was carried away by the ardor 
 of her passion and a terrible temptation assailed me; 
 but something stronger yet checked my impulse. I 
 tore myself from her, and grasping her two trembling 
 hands that felt like ice between my own, I told her 
 that she had spoken the truth. I did love another. 
 She bounded away from me with a low, moaning cry, 
 and, trembling like a leaf, I sat down again, and buried 
 my burning face in my hands. Shall I confess all the
 
 EN ROUTE FOR AMERICA 113 
 
 truth? I had no joy in my victory over myself, and 
 for a moment felt that I had committed a crime against 
 nature. 
 
 Three days afterwards we sighted the long bar of 
 Sandy Hook, glistening like gold in the morning sun- 
 light. We were wild with joy, weeping, shouting, jost- 
 ling each other, waving handkerchiefs, caps, shawls, 
 bits of rags, mothers holding their children high in their 
 arms, and shouting at the top of their voices: "La 
 terra! La terra!" How many gilded hopes, how many 
 visions of an earthly paradise were summed up in that 
 shining strip of yellow sand, against the blue horizon. 
 Say what we will of the bitterness of life, it has one 
 beautiful winged thing, and that is hope. But as for 
 me, my heart was too sore, yet, to be comforted by 
 hope. An inexpressible sadness seized me, in the midst 
 of all this excited joy. A feeling of terrible solitude, 
 a vague horror of the unknown destiny awaiting me 
 there, an impatience to confront it and know its worst, 
 was all that yellow shore icould offer me. While I 
 looked at it, I felt my eyes dimming and my throat 
 aching with suppressed sobs. Suddenly a hand touched 
 mine. I turned quickly and saw Nita beside me, her 
 pretty face bathed in tears. I had not seen her, to 
 speak to, since that night that I had repelled her love. 
 
 " And you would leave me," she said, " without even 
 saying good-by ? " 
 
 " No, no," I answered, bending over her and taking 
 her hand in mine. " I owe too much to all your kind- 
 ness to me, ever to forget you, or to be willing to leave 
 you without thanking you again with all my heart." 
 
 Her face brightened, as if the sun had suddenly shone 
 upon it. 
 
 " Oh, take me with you," she implored. " Don't leave 
 me, don't leave me, I beg of you. I ask nothing at all 
 of you, but leave to love you. I will be your faithful 
 servant ; I shan't even ask you to caress me. I only 
 want to hear your voice, to see you from time to time.
 
 114 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 Haven't you missed me just a little all these three days 1 
 They have seemed a thousand years to me. Oh, lov$ 
 me just a little, just a little." She hid her face against 
 my breast, weeping like a child. My heart ached with 
 sympathy, but not with love. What a capricious thing 
 is the human heart! Thirsting for love, and receiving 
 it in full measure, I could not quench my thirst, for 
 disdain of the cup in which it was offered me. There 
 are men whose heart is so unstable that they can quit 
 a beloved woman with their lips still warm with her 
 kisses, and fly to the arms of another. I am not of 
 that stamp. My affections have always had a singular 
 tenacity. All my being was rooted elsewhere. I could 
 not live in any other soil. 
 
 But strange revenge of time! more than any other 
 woman, she has come back to my mind during the long 
 years of our separation; and it may be only another 
 form of vulgar self-love and not gratitude, that recalls 
 her; but I have a singular pleasure in her memory. 
 Probably she has not thought of me half so often. 
 Violent loves, like violent storms, die out quickly, and 
 leave a calm after them; and, then, she was not one to 
 love but once. Very likely, she is now a happy wife 
 and mother, guarding in her memory only a half-effaced 
 souvenir of her early love; while with me, her memory 
 is always fresh and green ; and when I am on the point 
 of complaining of the aridness of my life, I think of 
 her, and feel her warm cheek touching mine a youth- 
 ful vision ever beautiful, ever young. 
 
 But when I met her I had just been driven out of 
 paradise. I had seen heaven, and could not content my- 
 self with earth. That is the reason, too, that I was 
 predestined to be unhappy in America. There was not 
 one of these poor, ignorant, half-clothed emigrants who 
 was not fitter than I to find a place that suited him. 
 My father had been quite right in his fears about me. 
 My education had prepared me for leisure and luxury. 
 I had acquired artificial tastes which nothing but an old
 
 "5 
 
 and cultured civilization could satisfy. I had high ideals 
 towards which I aspired with all the ardor of youth 
 and sincere faith; and I had absolutely no acquaintance 
 with vulgar realities. Of course I was prepared to find 
 striking contradictions in this land that proudly boasted 
 itself the land of the brave and the free, and held 
 thousands of its fellow-men enchained in slavery. I 
 expected a certain crudity of manners in a new coun- 
 try, chiefly bent on making use of its natural re- 
 sources. I expected a general recognition of merit 
 based only on the capacity for " getting on in the world," 
 which in its turn means getting plenty to eat, and drink, 
 and wear, and spend. But I was not at all prepared to 
 find everywhere an inordinate pride, or to speak more 
 properly, a colossal provincialism, so naive that it could 
 swallow the grossest flattery without suspicion that it 
 was anything but the truth, and could not bear the 
 slightest criticism without falling into a childish rage. 
 Everything, from the country itself to a Cross-road to- 
 bacco shop, was the " greatest in the world " ; and if a 
 stranger who had really seen something of the world 
 ventured to demur, he was set down as an ignoramus 
 filled with envy at what he saw, or unceremoniously 
 
 asked, why in h he didn't stay in his own country. 
 
 I also found a freedom of manners running into rude- 
 ness and insolence; a stubborn prejudice against foreign 
 nations, especially against the mother country from 
 whence came its best traditions; and a strange con- 
 tempt for all the conventionalities that facilitate social 
 intercourse, and make it agreeable, accompanied by a 
 perverse judgment in favor of coarseness and bluntness, 
 under the name of democracy. But this is only another 
 instance of the effort of self-love to save its pride by 
 decrying what it hasn't, after the fashion of the tailless 
 fox who insisted that all his neighbors should cut off 
 their tails, because he had lost his own. Just as soon 
 as facilities for foreign travel and the means of general 
 culture increase the acquaintance with social proprieties-
 
 Ii6 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 they will be practiced here as elsewhere; and, perhaps, 
 for a time, with exaggerated fastidiousness. I still 
 remember my amazement at the question of a vener- 
 able old lady, who had been educated in a boarding- 
 school, as to which was the proper way to fold one's 
 arms. She had been taught, she said, to spread the 
 hand over the elbows, but she had lately observed that 
 a great many people concealed one hand, and partly 
 displayed the other, in folding the arms. 
 
 But at present the great majority are very far from 
 any solicitude concerning their manners. 
 
 Indeed, the general respect for the want of good 
 manners is carried so far in certain parts of the coun- 
 try, that signs of personal negligence among men are 
 admiringly quoted as an indication of vigorous demo- 
 cratic manliness; and I have heard of a member of the 
 national legislature who owed his popularity entirely 
 to the fact that he always wore a slouch hat, his trousers 
 tucked into his boot-tops, and never in his life had 
 worn a dress-coat ; and I myself, at this writing actually 
 know a really clever man, college-bred, who couldn't 
 be elected in his district for an office, which he was 
 eminently qualified to fill, because the report was cir- 
 culated that he wore silk stockings; and the phrase 
 " silk-stocking aristocracy " was raised as a damaging 
 party-cry for the political campaign of that year. 
 
 But this did not shock me so much as it seemed puerile 
 and ridiculous, a mark of the infancy of a nation that 
 lacks the wholesome restraining influence of a venerable 
 past. A citizen of the old world has inherited noble 
 traditions that keep him in a proper state of modesty, 
 if he has any sense at all. When his pride in himself 
 would grow over-weening, history, art, architecture, 1 
 literature, are all there, to check him with the memory 
 of his fathers. He recognizes in them a generous 
 rivalry, for they are present only as a stimulus ; he goes 
 to school to them, as it were, and even should he sur- 
 "ass them, he does not reverence them the less; he
 
 EN ROUTE FOR AMERICA 117 
 
 knows that they laid the stepping stones by which he 
 climbed a little higher. 
 
 The citizens of the U. S., on the contrary, were or- 
 phans at an early age. They have brought up them- 
 selves, and, like self-made men, are proud of the fact. 
 Their success still smells of varnish. But the time will 
 come when they will be so accustomed to prosperity 
 and the extent of their territory, that they will take it 
 quite as a matter of course, and will not care to hear 
 their boots squeak, to show that they are new. And 
 when that time comes, neither will they be any longer 
 embarrassed by courtesy as a badge of distinction, but 
 will have learned to be courteous themselves. And 
 if that courtesy is a genuine outgrowth of char- 
 acter, and not a mere whitewash, there will be a 
 keener sense of honor prevalent, solid enough to resist 
 the vulgar temptations of commercial life. Truth and 
 honesty will be in repute again and not regarded, as 
 at present, as old-fashioned prejudices incompatible 
 with progress. I had come from the society of men to 
 whom the word liar wasn't simply a term of reproach, 
 but a deadly insult, as implying the most sneaking form 
 of cowardice. I found it in high repute on this side of 
 the water, and again and again heard young men boast 
 of the lies which they had told to secure trade, as if it 
 required a superior degree of intellectual acuteness to 
 !ie unblushingly. In short, victimizing other people 
 within the pale of the law passed for " smartness," and 
 I wasn't long in falling into the list of victims, because 
 I had had no experience except with honest people. 
 
 I had no difficulty in finding something to do, because 
 I was ready to do anything, no matter what were it 
 only sweeping the streets. My experience on board 
 ship had shown me the superiority of the spirit of the 
 acceptance of unavoidable misery over that of fas- 
 tidiousness ; and I was no longer inclined to revolt use- 
 lessly. I began with loading vessels on the quay, hard 
 work, at which I literally earned my bread in the sweat
 
 n8 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 of my brow, as later by breaking stone on the road. 
 Unaccustomed to physical labor, I trembled and stag- 
 gered under loads that seemed to crush my back and 
 shoulders. My uncalloused hands bled, but I perse- 
 vered, sustained by a fire within me that had not yet 
 had time to cool. I remembered my father's cold con- 
 tempt for weakness, to which was now added a sullen 
 anger that refused to pardon me for the course which 
 I had taken. I had written to my mother as soon as 
 I had arrived in America. I had said nothing of the 
 cause of my sudden departure from Italy; I had spoken 
 but briefly of that which touched me most, the death of 
 the young lord, and added that it seemed to me an in- 
 dication that I was henceforth to be thrown upon my 
 own resources, and that I hoped to show that my educa- 
 tion had not made a woman of me. I duly received a 
 reply to this letter written by my sister, married three 
 years before, and now living in Glasgow with her little 
 daughter and her husband. She told me that my letter 
 had broken my mother's heart; that my father had in- 
 terpreted it as a cowardly abandonment of my lord's 
 family in their need, and a cold indifference to my own 
 family, and was so enraged that he forbade my mother 
 to write to me, and declared that my name should 
 never be mentioned in his presence again. But she 
 added for her own part, that neither she nor my mother 
 had lost faith in me; that they believed I had had some 
 good reason for the action I had taken and that if I 
 continued to write I must send the letters to her, and 
 she would see that my mother was kept informed about 
 me. I did not reply to this letter, I felt utterly alone 
 in the world, and to the immense bitterness of my grief, 
 was added the vulgar sordidness of my surroundings. 
 A gloomy and defiant despair seized me; a dull rage 
 without a definite object; and although disgusted with 
 the coarse and brutal distractions of my companions, I 
 did for a time plunge into them, to try in vain to forget 
 that the world had ever seemed beautiful to me, and life
 
 EN ROUTE FOR AMERICA 119 
 
 worth living. But I could not persist in this course of 
 low dissipation. Every instinct in me revolted, and 
 called me back to decency. I found employment in a 
 large dry-goods house. My diligence and docility rapidly 
 advanced me. I gained the confidence of my employer 
 and was sometimes invited to his house to take tea 
 with his family. He was a self-made man of a great 
 deal of shrewdness and natural kindness. Among my 
 fellow-employees I found an ambitious young man about 
 my own age, who interested me. He told me there was 
 a French strain in his blood and that he was eager to 
 learn the language. I offered to teach him all that I 
 knew, and we spent three or four evenings of each week 
 together for that purpose. He seemed to be really at- 
 tached to me, and, for my part, in the barrenness of 
 my life, at present, he was the one bright spot. I 
 looked forward with eagerness to the end of the day, 
 when we could be together. We shared our thoughts, 
 and, though I never told him the story of my life, he 
 knew in a general way that I had received exceptional 
 advantages and he called himself a lucky dog in getting 
 acquainted with me, saying that I was as valuable to 
 him as a university course. 
 
 " I used to waste a lot of time with silly girls before 
 I knew you," he said to me one night. "But some- 
 how, after a fine talk with you, I can't stand gabbling 
 with a raw girl who hasn't two ideas in her head outside 
 of making herself pretty to look at." 
 
 One day about a year later he came to me in a great 
 deal of excitement, saying: "George, if I had $250 
 to start me off, I could be rich inside of a few years. 
 I've got a new scheme that nobody else has ever thought 
 of." With that, he unfolded his scheme, and concluded 
 by asking me if I could lend him the money at six 
 per cent. Now, I hadn't saved anything yet; but I was 
 so anxious to serve him as a friend, that I promised to 
 lend him the amount by borrowing it for him from my 
 employer. He thanked me effusively, assured me that
 
 120 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 before the year was out I should be repaid. I went 
 with a burning face to my employer to ask a favor for 
 my friend that I would not have asked for myself, for 
 all the world, and had no difficulty in getting the money. 
 I never shall forget the pride with which I handed 
 him the sum which, to the poverty of both of us, seemed 
 so considerable, and he seemed very grateful for it. I 
 assured him that if it had been my own he should have 
 had it as a friendly loan without interest, and that I 
 would pay it off as soon as possible, so that he needn't 
 be burdened with the interest. He looked at me a mo- 
 ment, then laughed, saying : " George, you're easy ! " 
 I didn't understand the full extent of the term; but if 
 being easy meant that it was a genuine pleasure for me 
 to inconvenience myself for my friends, then I really was 
 very " easy." He left the city and I have never seen 
 him since. 
 
 By private tutoring during my leisure hours, which 
 furnished an addition to my meager salary, and the 
 strictest economy, I was able to pay off the note and 
 interest at the close of a half year; but I had so far 
 lowered my vitality by over-work, cheap food, and men- 
 tal depression, that I fell ill of a fever, and was sent 
 to a hospital, where, for six weeks, I languished between 
 life and death. I left the hospital in debt for fees, and 
 too feeble to resume work, at once. I wrote to my 
 friend, asking him for a remittance of what he owed 
 me, explaining my situation to him. He wrote me that 
 he was sorry, but he had just got married, and needed 
 all his money to start housekeeping. Later, if he saw 
 his way clear, he would send me some money.
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 UNDER THE ROD 
 
 I READ the letter with a sinking of the heart that af- 
 fected me like a physical blow. I trembled and turned 
 faint. I could ill afford to lose the money; but I was 
 young and impressionable, and I could far less afford 
 to lose my faith in humanity, for it was the only capital 
 that I had, and he had made me bankrupt! I had 
 leaned on his friendship, and found it rotten straw. He 
 had deserted me in the hour of my greatest need. I 
 could no longer be useful to him, and common decency 
 had no power over him to replace the want of grati- 
 tude and honor. I can hardly forgive myself, now, 
 for the waste of pain which this disillusionment cost 
 me. But my world was a very narrow one at that time. 
 I had not yet learned to find my strength within my- 
 self, and to such as I was then, these are bitter hours 
 when human ties fail us. Later, we look at these dis- 
 illusionments as but the falling of the scaffolding when 
 the building is complete. One more blow was to follow, 
 and then my martyred heart had nothing more to fear, 
 for no human being was near enough to me to pain me 
 deeply by any treachery or any loss. This last blow 
 was the death of my mother; but it was one of those 
 pure griefs, mingled with no wounded self-love, and it 
 seemed to wash the bitterness out of my soul. I saw 
 her again, as I had seen her for the last time, her 
 sweet face wet with tears, her voice choked and trem- 
 bling as she said to me: 
 
 " George, you are happy now, you do not need me. 
 My love is something superfluous in the overflowing 
 
 121
 
 122 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 richness of your life. But, perhaps, there will come a 
 day (I hope not) when happiness will deceive you and 
 you will wish to rest on a heart that beats only for you. 
 Remember me on that day, my boy. If I am living, 
 come to me. If I am dead, remember, that I am up 
 there; and that even in heaven I could not be quite 
 happy if you were wretched; and, if possible, I shall 
 be near you to keep you from evil, and to throw about 
 you the influence of this great love which follows you 
 everywhere. O my eldest son! the pride of my 
 heart!" 
 
 I pressed her against my heart, astonished at this 
 simple eloquence which was not in her manner. I was 
 touched by her words, but my heart was so full of 
 joy pain seemed so impossible, so remote, that they 
 were but winged words and flew over, rather than sank 
 into my heart. But, to-day, they found a void, and 
 filled it. 
 
 I threw myself across the bed in the cheerless little 
 room that I occupied, and cried bitterly. Then a great 
 resolution came to me, a sacred hush in the grief that 
 absorbed me, and, rising, I whispered audibly, as if she 
 had been there to hear me: 
 
 " O my mother, I have wandered far away from 
 gratitude for your faithful love. I have sought its sweet- 
 ness elsewhere, and found nothing but bitterness; and 
 I swear to you, now, that hereafter I shall live as if 
 you were always near me, your hand holding mine, your 
 eyes looking into mine. I will do nothing at sight of 
 which you could not say : ' Well done, my son ! ' I 
 shall bear my griefs as you have borne yours, and when 
 I can no longer bear them, I will do as you did, I 
 will die of them. You have not loved and hoped all in 
 vain. No, by all that is sacred, I will make something 
 of my life for your sweet sake. I am done now for- 
 ever with false loves, false friends. I know, now, the 
 source of the only beneficent self-sacrificing love on 
 earth it is the heart of a mother."
 
 UNDER THE ROD 123 
 
 In murmuring this resolution, I felt a new strength 
 thrill me. I lost no time in vain regrets over my stu- 
 pidity. Remorse and regret sap the soul of vitality 
 when it most needs it. I recognized that all my errors, 
 all the sins of my life had been efforts to be happy. I 
 did not feel that my experiences had been wholly lost 
 on me. I had learned that it requires an extraordinary 
 natural impulse towards the intellectual life to sustain 
 it alongside a life of continued hard labor. Leisure 'is 
 the mother of civilization, and the man who hasn't it, 
 or who makes an ill use of it, is in danger of becoming 
 a brute. I saw that my satisfaction in life could only 
 come from a change of work that would assure me 
 leisure to think, to study, to resume in short the intel- 
 lectual interests that had been the occupation of my 
 boyhood and youth. My mother's love and thoughtful- 
 ness for me made this possible. Instead of spending the 
 money which I had sent her from Europe, while with 
 Lord Eliot, she had carefully put it all aside for me, 
 and at her death a cheque for that sum, amounting to 
 $450, was sent to me. 
 
 My resolutions made, I bathed my face, and looked 
 into the glass to see if the trace of the tears had been 
 removed. I was twenty-four years old a full-grown 
 man, but the face that looked back at me from the 
 glass had something very boyish in it, in spite of the 
 hard experiences through which I had passed. The eyes 
 were a little more sunken, the cheeks thinner than 
 formerly ; but my mother would have recognized me yet 
 in a moment. My hands alone retained no trace of 
 their former softness and whiteness. 
 
 It was the I3th of June, 1849, a brilliant day, the pure 
 air of which cooled my burning cheeks. "La vita 
 nuova," I said to myself as I stepped into the street. 
 
 Italy, then, was in the midst of her political throes 
 attendant the birth of a new regime, and I was follow- 
 ing her history with sympathy and curiosity. 
 
 Garibaldi was the hero of the hour; he had landed
 
 124 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 at Nice the preceding year, and all the civilized world 
 was following his movements. 
 
 I bought a copy of the New York Tribune from a 
 newsboy, and not only found the news which I was 
 searching, but also a new answer to the question which 
 was most deeply tormenting me: What shall I do with 
 my life? 
 
 I care little about American newspapers. There are 
 few of their editors who either properly realize, or 
 care in the least, about the moral influence which they 
 exert. Many of them are merely published as the 
 mouth-piece of political parties, and instead of trying 
 to give a better tone to the thoughts of their readers, 
 they aim merely at a foolish popularity, and cater to the 
 most vulgar curiosity of the public. They fill, for their 
 readers, the place of a malicious gossip in a country 
 town, who knows everybody's business when it is bad 
 and retails it with a relish to all her neighbors. The 
 only difference is that, instead of the town, it is the 
 world at large that furnishes the gossip on a colossal 
 scale; and the paper reeks with the odors of the sewer- 
 age of many cities. 
 
 Column after column of personal details concerning 
 notable people or notorious nobodies, scandal, prime, 
 casualties, are mingled with recipes for removing 
 freckles, and descriptions of fashionable toilets. 
 
 But there are newspapers of another class, not pub- 
 lished merely to set afloat national and international 
 gossip. Their editors are men of character and high 
 intelligence, who feel the distinction between gossip and 
 news. They feel it a matter of professional honor to 
 give their readers something worth reading. The New 
 York Tribune is of this number. About this time the 
 pretty, impracticable social dream of Brook Farm had 
 just ended in a flat failure. As communism is mostly 
 the dream of those who have never boarded, it does 
 not long survive a thorough experience of being boarder 
 and boarding-house keeper on a colossal ^gcale. Doing
 
 UNDER THE ROD 125 
 
 your own work in your own way is soon seen to be 
 vastly superior in comfort and satisfaction to doing 
 everybody's work in everybody's way; and communists, 
 after such an experience, go thankfully back to individ- 
 ualism, wide awake, with a conviction solid enough 
 never again to be shaken by the dream of human per- 
 fectibility as an outcome of holding hands. They have 
 learned the ever recurrent, ever bitter lesson of life that 
 in his deepest interests, every man is absolutely and 
 necessarily alone, and can count upon no one but him- 
 self for serious help. 
 
 George Ripley, the founder of the Brook Farm ex- 
 periment, had commenced contributing little essays and 
 literary criticisms to the Tribune, and it chanced that 
 on this day I found a review which he had written on 
 H. D. Thoreau's " A Week on the Concord and Mer- 
 rimac." I have the paper before me, now; I open it 
 with Kare, for it is torn at the folds and yellow with 
 years. Here are the first lines that struck me on that 
 June day long ago: 
 
 " A really new book a fresh, original work is sadly 
 rare in this age of omniferous publication. Mr. Thor- 
 eau's, if not entirely this, is very near it." Then fol- 
 lowed a temperate criticism, introduced by the obser- 
 vation that " Mr. Thoreau is a native and resident of 
 Concord, Massachusetts a scholar, a laborer and in 
 some sort a hermit. He traveled somewhat in his 
 earlier years (he is still young), generally trusting to 
 his own thoughts for company, and his walking cane 
 for motive power. It would seem a main purpose of 
 his life to demonstrate how slender an impediment is 
 poverty to a man who pampers no superfluous wants, 
 and how truly independent and self-sufficient is he who 
 is in no manner the slave of his own appetites." 
 
 I stopped at this sentence with a sudden thrill of 
 joy. I was like a blind man groping in the darkness, 
 to whom some great surgeon had suddenly held out 
 the hope of a restoration of his sight. That is what I
 
 was asking of life, this interior light which would in- 
 sure me independence. Poor, solitary, deeply humil- 
 iated, abandoned by those whom I had loved and 
 trusted, my heart still bleeding from an unhealed wound, 
 I wished to find in myself the strength and joy I had 
 sought in others. I wished to regain my own esteem, 
 and find life beautiful once more; but to do that I must 
 know how to transmute my griefs into strength; and 
 at the same time retain that sensibility which is tender 
 without weakness, and can enjoy without wishing to 
 possess. Had I been a woman, I might have sought, 
 and doubtless would have found, my consolation in re- 
 ligion, as so many women do. I should have renounced 
 happiness on earth for the promised bliss of heaven. 
 But I was a man. I wanted my happiness now, in this 
 life, which alone I was sure of. I had tasted it, I had 
 lost it, and knew that it was never to be found in the 
 same fashion, again. I did not wish to be counseled to 
 find my joy outside of myself, or to throw my griefs on 
 the shoulders of Christ. I wished to find my happi- 
 ness where alone it could be permanent and inviolable, 
 and that must be in my own heart and mind. 
 
 This new book gave me the hope of finding a guide. 
 I started off, immediately, to hunt for a copy, found 
 one, bought it, and hurried home to devour it at my 
 ease. Ripley's criticism had given me little more than 
 a vague idea of the richness of thought to be found in 
 the book, although his want of sympathy with its lib- 
 eral tone had encouraged me to hope that I should find 
 an eye which looked straight ahead, and not backwards. 
 I was not disappointed. Happy the man who finds the 
 book that can speak to him at the right time! For we 
 are not always ready to digest a good book. A year 
 earlier, I should have thought the book lacking in the 
 warm pulse-beat of life; that is to say, too radiant with 
 the white light of intelligence, not warmly enough col- 
 ored with the red blood of the heart. I would have 
 shivered and gasped for breath in this dry cold air; but,
 
 UNDER THE ROD 12) 
 
 to-day, I breathed it with full-expanded lungs, and i 
 was an elixir to me. 
 
 I was weary of useless suffering. I longed ardently 
 to be master of myself, to enjoy my liberty, to say to 
 the world: You can never again wound me, I have 
 escaped from your power; and I wished to say it with 
 my feet on the solid earth, and not from the tenth story 
 of a paradise of fools. I was too sound to be a de- 
 bauchee, too sane to be a mystic. I must live in healthy 
 realities to be happy. I had lived long enough in illu- 
 sions. Did I wish to forget that I had loved? A thou- 
 sand times, no. That love was woven into my very 
 growth. I could not lose the memory of it, without 
 losing my identity. But I wished it to pease to trouble 
 me with vain regrets and vain remorse. I wished to 
 possess it, without any longer being possessed by it. 
 
 In this book of Thoreau's, I saw the man I would 
 have given anything to be the man who having health 
 and a sharpened intelligence asks nothing of fortune, 
 nothing of society: he himself is fortune and society. 
 His solitude is the fullest and most intimate compan- 
 ionship, because his thoughts are neither shackled nor 
 interrupted by bigotry or babbling. Luxury would be 
 lost on him, for it speaks to tastes that he hasn't. Under 
 the open sky, he is everywhere at home: everywhere at 
 home, also, in the presence of truth and sincerity; only 
 an alien among the vain shows of things. 
 
 It is true, that this aloofness from what makes the 
 common interests of society will pass for selfishness or 
 for shirking, in the eyes of many; but it ought not to 
 be forgotten for a moment that that man does the most 
 for society who gives it the example and encourage- 
 ment of the best possible development of all his fac- 
 ulties. It is not Thoreau as a family man or a good 
 neighbor who could give us the peculiar, rich fruit of 
 him. It is Thoreau ripening in the fields and woods, 
 and not pot-planted in a back-parlor to the delight of 
 society, or fenced about for family use in a kitchen
 
 garden, from whom, in the long run, society and the 
 family are to get the most good. Like the rose which 
 fulfills its mission of blooming, intent on that alone, 
 and not troubling itself as to whether the lily and violet 
 near by are blooming also, he, too, puts forth his flower 
 and fruit to smell and taste sweet to those who were 
 to come after him. How full of courage, how tonic his 
 voice was to me that bright June day ! I no longer felt 
 myself an alien in the world. Here, too, was a man to 
 whom the world's gains are losses, purchased at the ex- 
 pense of senses dulled to any but coarse and sensual 
 pleasures. 
 
 My observations of commercial life had shown me 
 that all the delicate instincts of the mind, all its capac- 
 ity for larger thought and deeper sympathies are 
 atrophied in this exclusive and vulgar desire to get rich. 
 There is no principle of honor that is not strained to 
 breaking in this fierce struggle of competition, no warm 
 human tie that does not grow lax and cold. Such a 
 life was a torture to me. I felt gagged and bound hand 
 and foot in it. To give the best hours of my day and 
 the freshest fruits of my mind to long lines of figures 
 to lie and steal within the pale of the law, to take ad- 
 vantage of my neighbor's misfortunes to fill my own 
 purse, to come home every night with this stifling dust 
 of the world in my throat, stupefied, dulled ; to sit down 
 to a loaded table in company with office clerks and 
 commercial travelers, and hear over again the same 
 stale talk of money! money! money! seemed to me at 
 last, not merely insupportable, but suicidal. 
 
 I began to search eagerly for more information about 
 Thoreau, and I learned that he had voluntarily retired 
 from the world for two years in order to give himself 
 leisure to think and live in all his faculties; and that 
 during that time he had amply fed and clothed himself 
 from the fruits of his labor on a little patch of ground 
 on which he had built a hut. 
 
 Ah, that was something that I, too, could do. Here
 
 UNDER THE ROD 129 
 
 was the question of leisure and independence solved at 
 once, and I began immediately to make plans to carry 
 out a similar experiment. I recalled my delight in the 
 beautiful forest in the midst of which my childhood had 
 passed. I remembered what a charm the ocean had 
 had for me every time I had stood on its shores, and 
 I resolved to cross the continent and make a home for 
 myself in the virgin forests of the Pacific coast. In 
 making my preparations for departure, I felt for the 
 first time since my misfortune something which resem- 
 bled joy. My life had an aim. I had known the su- 
 preme felicity of perfect friendship, and I could carry 
 the memory of it with me into the wilderness. But the 
 shame and bitterness of the mock friendship, the crude 
 cold contact with those whom I daily met, I should 
 leave behind me when I turned my back on civilization. 
 I left New York on the twenty-fourth of June. I had 
 decided to make the greater part of the journey on 
 foot, and to take a year for it, if necessary, following 
 the line of the larger towns, interesting myself as much 
 as possible in the various aspects of life coming under 
 my notice. I had ordered a small portable bag made 
 for me of tough flexible leather, into which I placed a 
 few books: Shakespeare, Plutarch's Lives, Horace, 
 Montaigne, La Bruyere, La Rochefoucauld, and a small 
 copy of Silvio Pellico's " Le mie prigione," which I 
 bought in memory of the pleasure that Lord Eliot and 
 I had taken in it. My choice of the other books was 
 in accordance with the advice of our tutor, who had 
 said to us one day : " You will find that as the years 
 go by, the books which remain longest in your hands 
 and to which you most willingly return, will be those 
 which give you the best reflection of human life. Man 
 is, and always will be, to himself, at least, the greatest 
 fact in the universe. Study man, therefore, in your own 
 heart and in the heart of your fellowmen in life and 
 literature. But distrust for the most part the senti- 
 mental poets and novelists. They are incapable of see-
 
 130 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 ing things as they are ; either over-coloring -them with' 
 the hues of the rainbow or painting them pitch black, 
 according to the smiles or the tears, that destiny has 
 allotted them in life. But so much of human happiness 
 is based on illusion, that the sentimentalists will always 
 have the larger following: then, too, they represent the 
 two most charming things in life, youth and femininity, 
 and it is difficult to escape their fascination. Flee, too, 
 the paradoxical books. They are dead-sea fruit, pleas- 
 ing to look at, but ashes on the lips." 
 
 I was now about to study man under a new aspect. 
 I had seen him under the most favorable conditions of 
 culture I had seen him as an indispensable factor of 
 society the laborer; I was now to see him as a 
 drone, a superfluity in the society to whose skirts he 
 hangs; the professional tramp. In my journey across 
 the country, I was necessarily often thrown with him, 
 and I found him simply a man whom civilization has 
 left behind, the primitive man, in many respects, neither 
 esteeming nor desiring the advantages of social organ- 
 ization, regarding them rather as hindrances to the sat- 
 isfaction of the only deeply rooted desire he has, that 
 of supplying the needs of his body without turning his 
 hand over in work. He has his counterpart in the pro- 
 fessional beggar of the old world. He is the parasite 
 of the body politic. He is not wicked in the ordinary 
 sense of the word, as implying deliberate and conscious 
 transgression of the written and unwritten law; but he 
 seems incapable of absorbing anything of civilization but 
 its vices ; and he is easily corrupted by false ideas, and 
 thinks himself a victim of society, rather than a victim 
 of nature. But the turf is softer to him than a feather 
 bed, and to earn his living would to him be equivalent 
 to losing his life; for his instincts are wholly animal. 
 But I learned to understand his zest in this free, idle, 
 open air life. I grew strong and vigorous in it, and 
 a certain lightness of heart came to me in these long 
 solitary walks that often deepened to the keenest joy.
 
 UNDER THE ROD 131 
 
 The color of the sky, the shadows of trees, the flight of 
 a cloud, the brilliant reflection of light in a dewdrop, 
 the twitter of a bird, would sometimes thrill me like 
 the voice of one I loved, and the quick tears would 
 rush to my eyes and a sudden tenderness for all forms 
 of life would fill my heart to aching. Once in Utah, 
 I saw the sun gild a mountain slope, and the soft mel- 
 low glow was like a smile on the bare rock and cheered 
 me for hours. 
 
 But my experiences were not always delightful. I 
 learned to bear hunger and thirst, cold and rain, and 
 weariness in all its forms. I even had my courage put 
 to severe tests more than once. I knew dejection and 
 discouragement; but still I persisted, saying to myself 
 that the sunshine lay behind the clouds, and must pierce 
 through in time; and that I ought to be ashamed to 
 die until I had proved that I knew how to live. 
 
 And so I made my way across the great continent, 
 and found myself in San Francisco, which was then 
 only the hint of a town and swarmed with adventurers 
 rather than honest citizens. Here I supplied myself 
 with agricultural tools and a few necessary articles of 
 household furniture, grains and seeds and a quantity 
 of cuttings of young fruit trees, and embarked on a 
 vessel for the northern shores of Washington Terri- 
 tory. I chose for my future home a tract of land at 
 the head of Bellingham Bay, a beautiful sheet of water 
 surrounded by a magnificent forest. The United States 
 Government has always been generous with her land, 
 and I got mine on easy terms. I remember still the 
 curious exultation I felt in choosing a site for my log- 
 cabin, and how unconsciously the social instinct in me 
 triumphed over the would-be recluse; and all whom I 
 had known and loved trooped about me in fancy, ap- 
 proving or disapproving each new situation.
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 LA VITA NUOVA 
 
 THERE was a tribe of Indians settled not far from 
 me, and a few whites clustered some two or three miles 
 away, at what is now the town of W , but practi- 
 cally I was as solitary as Adam before the creation 
 of Eve. But I was too busy to feel lonely. To hew 
 the timber, to shape the logs, to build my cabin, was 
 the work of many days, and when finished I took as 
 much delight in it as if it had been a masterpiece of 
 architecture. I needed only one room,, but as space is 
 the luxury of a home, I made it very large and took 
 especial pains with the chimney, which I built with 
 stones gathered from the shore of the bay; and shaped 
 it within, to form a generous hearth after the fashion 
 of one which I had seen in Holyrood. I leveled and 
 beat the earth that I had enclosed, and wanting planks 
 for flooring, I covered it with smooth flat stones, form- 
 ing a rude mosaic, not wanting in beauty. Later I 
 bought bright, well-woven blankets from the Indians, 
 using them for rugs. I made myself a table, three 
 chairs, and a low couch, which I covered with bear- 
 skins procured again from my friendly neighbors, the 
 Indians. I made my first acquaintance with them about 
 a fortnight after my arrival. I had gone a good bit 
 farther down the bay than usual, searching a muddy 
 bed washed by the tide, in which I hoped to find some 
 edible mollusks. I not only found what I was search- 
 ing, but also three Indians, who were digging for clams 
 with great success. I knew that they were to be my 
 permanent neighbors, and that it behooved me to live 
 on terms of peace with them. Therefore, I saluted them 
 gravely, and though I could not as yet understand their 
 language, I made them understand my friendly inten- 
 
 132
 
 LA VITA NUOVA 133 
 
 tions, and by showing them some small coins and point- 
 ing to their freshly gathered clams, made some pur- 
 chases from them and willingly allowed them to carry 
 them home for me. Evidently they reported favorably 
 of me, for I never had the slightest difficulty with them, 
 and am much indebted to them for many a secret of 
 forest life that I might have been years discovering for 
 myself, for example: the medicinal value of various 
 herbs ; the edible roots and berries ; the way to snare 
 game and preserve the flesh; indications of changes in 
 the weather; an infallible guide to the points of the 
 compass, when lost in the woods ; the habits of the wild 
 animals; how to get fire without matches, and how to 
 make pottery of clay. In short, they put me to school 
 in the wild man's education as valuable in its way as 
 any other; for what is education but perfect adaptation 
 to one's surroundings? It was not a knowledge of 
 Latin and Greek and higher mathematics that I needed 
 here. They might pass current in civilization at a high 
 artificial value ; but here, in the wilderness, they were 
 like the gold and silver of the wrecked ship to Robinson 
 Crusoe, absolutely valueless compared with a handful 
 of nails and a hammer. I was touching life at its roots, 
 and not where the blossoms grow; and just as among 
 the rude lower class of day-laborers, I had to unlearn 
 much of my refinement to make life tolerable among 
 them; so, here, my body had to unlearn the pampering 
 and coddling of artificial life, and put itself into har- 
 mony with nature. Until I could do this, the wild man 
 was my superior. He feared neither wet nor cold. 
 This untamed nature was not his enemy, it was his 
 friend; for he was a part of it, as much as the other 
 animals. To be sure, his range of enjoyment was small 
 compared with that of the man of culture, and he had 
 his terrors of the imagination, but he had also its com- 
 pensations in that crude poetry in which the elements 
 are personified, and man projects his soul into the in- 
 animate life which surrounds him. They were a curious
 
 134 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 study to me, these grown children of the wood; and 
 I have often keenly regretted that mistaken charity 
 of the United States Government which, in attempt- 
 ing to force a nineteenth century culture on a primi- 
 tive race of the stone age, is slowly but inevitably anni- 
 hilating them. It is as if we were to force an ax into 
 the small hands of a child, and tell him that he must 
 fell forests with it, or perish. We, too, have come up 
 from the stone age, but slowly, painfully, through the 
 centuries. We climbed the tree of knowledge. We 
 weren't thrown forcibly up to the top of it and left 
 helplessly sprawling among the branches, unable to see 
 heaven or earth for the tangled leaves thrusting them- 
 selves into our eyes. Perhaps, some day, we may come 
 to recognize that a college education is not the universal 
 panacea for human ills, that there are even a vast num-- 
 ber of stubborn, stolid minds incapable of receiving it, 
 and that the whitewash of culture spread over them is 
 very thin, and will scale and rub off in a remarkably 
 short time. 
 
 I did not finish my house until the beginning of au- 
 tumn. I had worked like a slave, rising before the dawn 
 and quitting my labor with the fall of night, dividing 
 my time between the building of my house and the 
 clearing and tilling of my fields. The climate was de- 
 lightful, reminding me of that of my native country. 
 The winters were mild, and the summer heat had not 
 that fierce intensity which characterizes it in the Middle 
 States. 
 
 I planted an orchard of apples, cherries, peaches and 
 pears, which, in the course of a few years, gave me 
 an ample harvest. It was in connection with my fruits 
 that I began to feel develop in myself a certain love 
 of perfection, which is probably an innate trait of my 
 character, though I was not conscious of it, until now. 
 I did not care particularly about the quantity of fruits 
 my harvest yielded, but I was very solicitous about their 
 being of the first quality. I understood from the first, 
 that a poor tree takes up just as much space and re-
 
 LA VITA NUOVA 135 
 
 quires just as much care as a good one, and yields no 
 satisfactory results; so I systematically weeded out 
 everything of inferior quality that I had planted, and 
 substituted for it the best that I could get. And of this 
 best, I required the best that it could give me. When 
 my trees showed by their blossoms that they intended 
 to produce abundantly, I let the fruit set and then de- 
 stroyed much of it to insure a better development of 
 what was left. In preparing for the market, I refused 
 absolutely to sell anything that was not first-class, giv- 
 ing away the inferior fruits to whoever would take 
 the pains to come after them. In this way, I soon had 
 a particular reputation and could sell at the highest 
 price in the market. As the little town grew and the 
 facilities for shipping increased, I added flowers, small 
 fruits and vegetables to the products of my land, and 
 was able to give employment to a number of day la- 
 borers, who, in addition to the fair price that I paid 
 them, were allowed to use the fruits and vegetables 
 which I refused to sell. 
 
 This refusal was a sort of pride, I dare say, but as 
 my indigent neighbors profited by it, it did more good 
 than harm. I grew very much interested and very 
 happy in my work. Undoubtedly, I inherited from my 
 father his knack at making things grow, and my suc- 
 cess increased my ardor. And I can say with a cer- 
 tainty founded on experience, that there is no more 
 sovereign remedy for the griefs of the heart and the 
 weariness of the head than to plant something, care for 
 it, and watch it grow. It is not a mere happy acci- 
 dent that our earliest conception of paradise is a gar- 
 den. It is a conception founded on experience. Heart 
 and head are interested at the same time, and self- 
 love, without which it is not possible to live, finds its 
 aliment in the thought that all this beauty and vigor of 
 plant life is the work of one's own hands. 
 
 The virgin soil asked only to receive the seeds to give 
 them back a hundred fold, so that I had not to occupy 
 myself with those questions of soil that make a science
 
 136 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 of agriculture in our days, but I had questions of my 
 own to answer that cost no little time. Every living 
 thing has its enemies. There were harmful insects, 
 against which I had to make war; little wild animals 
 that found my garden a good foraging place; birds 
 that took rather too much pay for their song. I had 
 also to consider the tendency to spread, rather than to 
 concentrate, which dominates nature, whose intentions 
 are not always in the interests of man. I lavished on 
 my plants the care of a mother over her children, and 
 I reprimanded them in their faults, like a good father. 
 I learned to graft choice twigs on foreign stock, and 
 to bring forth new varieties, and, after many years, I 
 was known as an authority in my domain, and saw 
 money pile up around me without effort; and tranquil 
 happiness walked by my side. 
 
 Then the Civil War broke out. I am not at all a 
 man of war, and I did not enlist as a soldier, but I 
 felt the justice of the cause. I had enjoyed years of 
 liberty, and I did not wish to see the same privilege 
 denied to anyone on the score of the color of his skin. 
 I had saved about eight thousand dollars. I reserved 
 of that sum five hundred dollars, and gave the rest to 
 the government to be used in the care of the sick and 
 wounded, who were serving their country, and resolved 
 so long as the war continued, to give three-fourths of 
 my earnings for the same purpose. It seemed to me 
 the most legitimate way for me to share in the misfor- 
 tunes that had befallen the country which sheltered me. 
 
 The war is ended. Right has triumphed, but her 
 hands are red with blood. The victims are counted, and 
 history will relate the defeats and the victories; but I 
 am so far away from the hum and noise of it, that it 
 all seems local and temporal, measured with other ques- 
 tions universal and eternal. There is another slavery 
 worse than that which chains the body; and another 
 liberty, incomparably better than that of calling no man 
 master.
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 A NEW ACQUAINTANCE 
 
 I SHOULD give a wrong impression of my life, if it 
 should appear that during all this time I enjoyed no 
 pleasurable social intercourse with my fellow-man. On 
 the contrary, there hardly passed a day, except during 
 the winters, in which I did not see somebody. When I 
 made for my room three chairs, I had counted, even 
 then, on some company, and I did not count in vain. 
 But among my visitors there was only one man whom 
 I could really regard as my equal intellectually, and with 
 whom it really was an exceptional treat to converse. I 
 can hardly explain the feeling I had for him. He inter- 
 ested me at all times, he often fascinated me; yet there 
 were times when he irritated me exceedingly. I had 
 not yet arrived at that degree of wisdom which accepts 
 everything without astonishment, and his cool utter- 
 ances of what, to me, were the most selfishly immoral 
 principles, never left me unmoved. 
 
 Of course, I was familiar with the idea so forcibly 
 set forth by La Rochefoucauld that self-love lies at the 
 bottom of all our actions, even those which are appar- 
 ently the most disinterested; but to deliberately set up 
 egotism in its crudest, coldest forms as a code of morals ; 
 to place instinct and appetite above reason; to efface 
 the word duty, and substitute for it the word pleasure; 
 to deny that law and restraint are the necessary basis of 
 social organization was something entirely new to me. 
 If it be possible to be born without any moral sense, 
 or to lose it by a persistent course of self-indulgence, 
 I should say that the moral sense was absolutely want- 
 ing in him. That was good which pleased him, that 
 
 137
 
 138 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 was bad which caused him pain or inconvenience. The 
 universe revolved about him: he felt himself unique. 
 
 But, as I said, he was interesting, and unfortunately 
 we have all so great a horror of being bored that we 
 pardon everything to the man or woman who keeps us 
 from yawning. I have often thought, since I met him, 
 that it is a blessing to humanity that along with a 
 natural eloquence, sometimes even brilliant, he was too 
 indolent, or too indifferent to proselyte; else he might 
 easily have founded a modern sect of Epicuri de grege 
 porci. For it is a pitiful reflection upon human gulli- 
 bility that no doctrine is too vile or too idiotic to re- 
 ceive credence, if its founder be only brazen-lunged 
 and brazen-faced enough to keep on preaching it for 
 any length of time; and they who have exercised the 
 deepest influence and the most lasting are not the tran- 
 quil thinkers, exponents of truth and common sense; 
 but the wild fanatics, the eloquent insane, the restless 
 dreamers, the inspired idiots : not the Galileos, the Kep- 
 lers, and the Newtons, but the Mahomets, the Rous- 
 seaus, the Joanna Southcotes, and the Swedenborgs. 
 
 John McKenzie, tar that is the name of my new ac- 
 quaintance, came to Washington Territory about five 
 years ago, and took up his residence with an Indian 
 tribe. Among them he found a young Indian girl to his 
 taste, who lived with him as his wife and bore him 
 three children. He is a man of my age, strong, vig- 
 orous, handsome, with a bright dark eye, and a general 
 air of masculine strength and intelligence. Besides the 
 bond of race which unites us, there is the closer bond 
 of nationality. He comes from Ayrshire, Scotland, and 
 has his Burns on the tip of his tongue. 
 
 We first met one autumn day, two years ago. I was 
 rambling through the woods at a considerable distance 
 from home, a habit I have at this season of the year, 
 and in spring-time. I love to see the youth and the 
 old age of this natural vegetation, which is renewed 
 every year, and I love to see it quite alone. I wish
 
 A NEW ACQUAINTANCE 139 
 
 not to be fastidious in the streets, shops, or bazaars, I 
 have no quarrel with a companion when it comes to rid- 
 ing, driving, or a general conversation at home; but I 
 confess to a rigid exclusiveness when it comes to a long 
 walk in the woods. There I must have sympathy in 
 my companion. He must be capable of silence as well 
 as admiration; he must be indifferent to his individual 
 comfort, unconscious of the existence of dust or bram- 
 bles. I knew one such elastic, liberal soul, but none 
 here; so that my hours in the woods were always soli- 
 tary. 
 
 While I was walking along, gathering here and there 
 a brighter leaf, a late flower, or some edible berry, I 
 suddenly ran across a man, leaning over a little trap, 
 from which he was freeing a squirrel. I was as surprised 
 as Robinson Crusoe at the trace of a man's foot in the 
 sand of his deserted island; for, during all the years I 
 had lived here, I had never before met a white man 
 in the depths of the forest. As I knew by sight every 
 man in the village and for miles around it, I saw at 
 once that he was a stranger in this vicinity. However, 
 I greeted him as if we were old acquaintances, and he 
 replied in the same manner. Our conversation opened 
 with some questions and replies about the character of 
 the game in the forest. Then came the abrupt intro- 
 duction. 
 
 " You are Mr. George Graham, aren't you ? " asked 
 the stranger. 
 
 "Yes, that's my name. But you have the advantage 
 over me, for I can't so readily call yours." 
 
 " No," he replied with a smile. " I am not an old 
 settler here like you, and haven't made any reputation 
 among my neighbors. By the way, I hear nothing but 
 good of you, and am glad to know you. My name is 
 McKenzie John McKenzie." 
 
 " Ah, that's a Scotch name ; glad to meet you, sir." 
 
 " Yes, I'm from Ayrshire ; and if agreeable to you, 
 you'll very likely see more of me, for though I'm liv-
 
 140 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 ing among the Indians up here, I haven't so far unciv- 
 ilized myself as not to enjoy a talk now and then with 
 one of my race." 
 
 This remark interested me and I asked him how a 
 civilized man could reconcile himself to living with an 
 inferior race unless he felt himself called to do so as 
 a missionary ; adding that he didn't seem to me to have 
 the air of one, nor of a misanthrope, either. 
 
 He laughed, and said I was right: he was neither 
 missionary nor misanthrope, but that he had a passion 
 for liberty, liked to obey no laws but his own and 
 loved the air of the woods better than that of the 
 streets. Then the conversation took a general turn, and 
 we parted with the wish that we might soon meet again. 
 
 It is so difficult to escape judgments limited by one's 
 own personal experience, that thinking of him on the 
 way home, I unconsciously wove a vague romance 
 about him, and fancied some deep private sorrow lay 
 at the bottom of this voluntary withdrawal from his 
 race. I promised myself much pleasure from his com- 
 pany, and in that I was not disappointed, although I 
 soon found my romance about him was all nonsense. 
 
 He had read a very great deal, lived under a great 
 variety of circumstances, had thought a good deal, and 
 expressed himself with vigor and originality. He vis- 
 ited me often, seeming to be interested in my manner 
 of living, and to wonder a little at it. By this time I 
 had collected a small but very choice library of several 
 hundred volumes in English, French, German, Spanish, 
 Italian, Greek and Latin. 
 
 After looking them over with curiosity, one evening, 
 he said to me: 
 
 " Graham, you are a recluse only on the surface and 
 by accident. You belong to the world, and evidently 
 to the society of every country and every age. I am 
 really at heart more of a recluse than you, though I 
 don't call myself that. One of the greatest pleasures 
 I get from living with the Indians is the knowledge that
 
 A NEW ACQUAINTANCE 141 
 
 among them I am free from all attachments that are 
 more than skin-deep." 
 
 Now, he had already informed me that he was liv- 
 ing familiarly with a young Indian woman, who had 
 borne him children, so that I asked, with some sharp- 
 ness: 
 
 " How is it possible to live without deep attachments, 
 when one has a wife and children?" 
 
 We were seated before the huge fireplace, whose flick- 
 ering light danced over our faces. Outside, the cold 
 was intense, and the snow which had fallen all the short 
 winter day was piled high on the window casings. I 
 had filled a large wooden bowl with nuts, and a pitcher 
 with cider, and after refreshing ourselves with this 
 homely cheer, we had lighted our pipes, and the con- 
 versation was in full swing. 
 
 At my question, he took his pipe from his mouth, 
 and looking at me with his eyebrows slightly raised, 
 and a half-contemptuous smile on his lips, he said: 
 
 " Suppose the children are only accidents, and the 
 wife a convenience ? " 
 
 " Convenience ! accidents ! " I repeated, scarcely un- 
 derstanding him. 
 
 "I am paying you the compliment of absolute sin- 
 cerity. I am thinking out loud. Does that shock you ? " 
 
 " Shock ? no ; astonish ? yes. I know there are men 
 for whom woman does not exist except as a conveni- 
 ence, or a necessity, but you " 
 
 "But me? O, my friend, don't put me on a pedestal. 
 I want to stand on the ground where I belong. I 
 have only one virtue. It is that of not posing, or wish- 
 ing to pass for more than I am worth, and I detest 
 all sentimentalism that refuses to look at me except 
 through stained glass. The savage is strong in me. I 
 am glad of it. That means health, vigor, sanity. I am 
 not the man to think more highly of a bear because 
 he has learned to dance, or of a monkey because he has 
 on a red jacket and a cap with bells, and can hold out
 
 142 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 his hand to staring children for a penny. That is about 
 what civilization does for most of us; it teaches us to 
 dance, and to wear a cap and bells, and to bow to the 
 one whose cap is reddest and whose bells make the 
 most noise. That is to say, it creates artificial values. 
 Which is the stronger man of the two, you or I? You 
 can't make the wilderness habitable without bringing 
 into it the essence of civilization," and at this he made 
 a sweeping gesture with his arm in the direction of 
 the bookcases, along the wall " and I I shouldn't 
 know what to do with them ; this earth itself, the brown 
 crust of it tastes so sweet to me, that I want to nibble 
 at nothing else." 
 
 I smiled, and tranquilly asked : " Why do you kick 
 down the ladder by which you have climbed? You are 
 an educated man, and so you, too, carry into the wilder- 
 ness with you the essence of civilization in the most 
 portable of all forms: a trained intellect, the power to 
 think and feel subtly. You can't rid yourself of your 
 inheritance of the culture of your race by going into 
 the wilderness, any more than the red man could rid 
 himself of his inherited savagery by walking from his 
 wigwam into a public library. Neither is civilization a 
 mere ornament, a trick of carriage or a cap and bells. 
 It is an inherited tendency towards progress and a 
 capacity for it. Ask yourself therefore whether you 
 or an Indian chief are the stronger, and not you or I? 
 You and I are too much alike to be compared." 
 
 " No ! no ! Stop there ! " he cried eagerly. " That's 
 the point I wish to clear up. We are not alike, you 
 and I, and I want you to know me just as I am. That 
 will put our friendship on a solid basis. It will make 
 our association more agreeable for both of us. You 
 won't expect heroics of me, and I I shall not expect 
 from you any magnificent indifference to convention- 
 alities and to the so-called laws that make the founda- 
 tion of society. For although you live like a recluse, 
 you were born to be the ornament of a little coterie of
 
 A NEW ACQUAINTANCE 143 
 
 of women. You must have been a success among 
 them, eh?" 
 
 He took a long pull at his pipe, and then looked at 
 me in a teasing way, as if I had been a boy of twenty. 
 I felt myself redden, and stooped over to stir the fire, 
 which answered my efforts with leaping flames and a 
 cheerful crackling. 
 
 " You are entirely mistaken," I said. 
 
 " What ! " he exclaimed. " Do you mean to be re- 
 served here in the wilds of the forest, and with a 
 half-wild man?" 
 
 "Reserves? Who hasn't them, even with himself?" 
 
 " Then you deny that you have ever loved a woman ? " 
 
 " Not at all. I deny nothing. I admit nothing. But 
 I am an old story to myself and the subject doesn't 
 interest me. But you you are something new, since 
 you say you are not at all like me; let me hear your 
 views of life, then. I assure you that I am a good 
 listener." 
 
 He put his pipe into his mouth again, and after 
 smoking a few moments in silence, removed it, and 
 said: 
 
 "It is strange! I am not in the habit of talking 
 about myself, either: but I feel reminiscent to-night. 
 I am probably about your age, thirty-eight though you 
 look a good deal younger than I ; but from what you've 
 let fall now and then, I infer that you are older than 
 you look." 
 
 " I was born in 'twenty-five," I said. 
 
 " Indeed ? Well, that's my birth-year, too. I am 
 the youngest son of a well-to-do family, with an en- 
 tailed estate; and so I was destined from my birth for 
 the church. Absurd, isn't it, to mark out a child's ca- 
 reer before he has shown any aptitude for it. To be 
 sure, it doesn't require any degree of intelligence to suc- 
 ceed in the ministry. It is the one calling par excel- 
 lence in which a very mediocre person can make a fine 
 show in life. The whole outfit is purely conventional.
 
 144 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 Let him lay in a' stock of silk hats, long-tailed black 
 Coats and white cravats; let him fit up his head with a 
 conventional stock of ready-made doctrines and ^ reli- 
 gious phrases; let him shave regularly, and cultivate a 
 sleek expression ; let him practice a slow unctuous smile, 
 and a slow, monotonous, grave voice; let him see a 
 great deal of women, and very little of men, and he's 
 set up for life. Christmas and Thanksgiving are not 
 his only turkey days. He sleeps on feathers. He has 
 the fatted calf killed every time he dines out; he is the 
 idol of women and the revered guide of men, who think 
 in grooves, and out of the groove, flounder and fall. 
 Well, God never intended me for a stuffed doll like 
 that. He put blood into my veins instead of sawdust. 
 I could never bow my neck under any yoke, and the 
 predestination to the church was the scourge of my 
 childhood, the despair and shame of my youth, and 
 finally the cause of my voluntary exile from my native 
 land. I disgraced myself for disobedience at college, 
 and to avoid reproaches at home I enlisted in the reg- 
 ular army. But military discipline was no more to my 
 taste than college discipline, or the restraints of cler- 
 ical life. I tried the sea, for a while, saw many differ- 
 ent countries, and finally drifted out here. This half- 
 wild life suits me exactly. It isn't wanting in excite- 
 ment of a healthy sort, nor in danger; and it gives me 
 what I covet more than anything else on earth, perfect 
 liberty. My family still send me a few hundred dol- 
 lars from time to time, quite sufficient for all my wants, 
 so that I have never been obliged to succeed in any 
 enterprise I have undertaken. Twice in my younger 
 days I have experimented with civilized life, and ship- 
 wrecked my happiness each time. I can't endure the 
 flat monotony of the little petty round of daily duties, 
 where, like a squirrel in a cage, you tread the same 
 wheel forever and ever, and nibble at stale nuts thrown 
 in through the bars. God! how I hate it! Now, I 
 am going to confess, freely, that each time it was a
 
 A NEW ACQUAINTANCE 145 
 
 woman that caged me. And if I had ever found the 
 woman of the right sort, the woman with something 
 broad and free in her nature to answer to the freedom 
 in mine, I might never have broken the bars. But 
 there are no such women. They are all built narrow 
 gauge; and I know nothing in the long run of more 
 deadly weariness than the ordinary domestic woman 
 with her head full of ideas of personal decoration, and 
 a trim little set of social conventionalities to wind 
 around you, till you can't move hand or foot, or draw 
 a full breath to save your life. Do you know what I 
 think about this eternal woman question? I thoroughly 
 believe that, at bottom, outside of a few transitory mo- 
 ments, when nature speaks brutally, intent on her pur- 
 pose of life, men and women are radically different, and 
 by that one thing are implacable enemies. They haven't 
 the same tastes, the same ideals, the same purposes in 
 life. For man, the hunt, war, life in the open air; for 
 woman, repose, peace, life in the house; for him, the 
 exercise of the intelligence; for her, that of the affec- 
 tions. For him, the companionship of his own sex; 
 for her, that of children. 
 
 " The ancients knew that. The savages with whom 
 I live know it, and what virility of intellect they have, 
 they keep intact by knowing it. I tell you a woman 
 can no more think a man's thoughts than grow a man's 
 beard." 
 
 "Of course not," I interrupted; "and what of it? 
 Isn't her smooth chin as fine in its way as a beard? 
 Indeed, don't we confess by shaving off our own, that 
 we like it a good deal better? A woman's thoughts, of 
 course, are not a man's thoughts; but they are none 
 the less valuable and true, for they grow out of her 
 experiences, as a man's grow out of his. Her soprano 
 has not the volume of his bass, but it has its range and 
 sweetness, and it is as necessary in the full harmony 
 of music as his." 
 
 " Yes, yes, of course, I grant all that. But it isn't
 
 146 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 just now the relative value of feminine and masculine 
 gifts that I am concerned with; it is the difference: 
 and it is just this difference that your modern woman 
 is intent on disputing. She insists on calling the fuzz 
 on her chin a beard. She tries to swell her soprano 
 into a trumpet note; or, to speak plainly, she is ambi- 
 tious of applying her little fireside principles to the 
 management of society in general; she brings forward 
 her tame little conventional back-parlor standards and 
 offers them to men as iron-clad ethical principles; she 
 wants to measure the globe with her tape-measure, and 
 pluck sin out of the world with a pair of tweezers. 
 Now, that is what I object to. I object to effemina- 
 tion. I object to the spread of superstition. Their 
 hands pull backward. Their legs are made for short 
 steps, and not to leap over chasms. They are incapable 
 of dealing with facts. They can't find their happiness, 
 except in pretty illusions." 
 
 " But you can hardly call that a feminine weakness. 
 We are all more or less tarred with it. I believe as 
 you do, that there is nothing more beautiful in life 
 than that perfect sanity of mind which can look the 
 dreariest facts in the face without recoiling, or taking 
 refuge in the world of phantasms that we call the ideal ; 
 but there is really nothing more difficult. I confess 
 that ever since I passed out of boyhood I've been trying 
 to do that very thing, and I've come to the conclusion 
 that it is against nature, and the privilege of very rare, 
 very well-balanced minds to hug their ugly facts to 
 their bosom, without ever attempting to gild them a 
 little, or trick them out with the tinsel of the imag- 
 ination." 
 
 " But that's quite legitimate ; that's the essence of 
 poetry. I am not at all objecting to that. Life would 
 be very dull if there was nothing in it but the multipli- 
 cation table. The rose is as much of a fact as the 
 cabbage. I am speaking of the deliberate preference of 
 tne false to the true, which is the chief characteristic
 
 A NEW ACQUAINTANCE 147 
 
 of the feminine intellect. Most of them are capable of 
 giving you as their reason for belief in illusions and 
 false doctrines that they wouldn't like to believe any- 
 thing else. I heard a woman, who was accounted very 
 clever, say once that, for her, the chief argument for 
 immortality was man's intense desire for it. Such a 
 desire she was quite sure couldn't exist without a pos- 
 sibility of its fulfillment, as if every day of her life she 
 hadn't a score of wishes incapable of fulfillment. It is 
 this making of their desires and their immense vanity, 
 the touchstone of truth, that leads them into all those 
 silly vagaries of sentimentalism that every sensible man 
 ought to despise. Modern civilization, however, has 
 decreed that woman is man's equal and comrade, and 
 we must shorten our strides and take mincing steps to 
 make the gait comfortable for her. And in taking it 
 easy along with her, we, too, have become weak. Not 
 to shock her by the truth, we make hypocrites of our- 
 selves. We feign to blush at our nudity, we speak an 
 emasculated language, full of euphemisms and circum- 
 locutions. We cease to love the strong, in a maudlin 
 pity for the weak. We build asylums for idiots, and 
 let our scholars die in obscurity, or set them to serving 
 these same idiots. Now don't misunderstand me. I 
 think I am as capable of pity as any soft-hearted woman 
 of them all, but I don't misplace it. I don't project 
 myself into the situation of an unfortunate child, and 
 fancy that he feels exactly what I would if I were in 
 his situation, with all my present feelings, matured and 
 sharpened by entirely different surroundings. But that's 
 what women do. Sensitive, vain, emotional, fastidious, 
 they get up cases of pity, exactly as the novelist does, 
 by a play of the imagination. They have no concep- 
 tion, for example, of the fact that a hardened criminal 
 is capable of feeling the fiercest joy and pride in the 
 crime which he has committed. Oh, no they picture 
 him in tears, rent by remorse, as they would be in his 
 situation; they recall the sleepless night which they
 
 passed after having slapped Eddie in a momentary fit 
 of anger, and they take up a collection or beg flowers 
 from their neighbors to cheer up the poor fellow. Bah ! 
 it makes me sick to think of it ! " 
 
 I listened in silence to this harangue. I had read 
 Schopenhauer, and was very familiar with this attitude 
 of contempt towards women, and I remembered that 
 Schopenhauer, like all men who degrade women, was 
 at the same time their slave; and it seemed to me that 
 this bitter contempt is rather the cry of shame and 
 indignation at the slavery to woman than the calm 
 judgment of the intelligence. 
 
 "Then you haven't a very high idea of marriage on 
 the basis of companionship?" I said tentatively. 
 
 " No not at all for the simple reason that the pri- 
 mary object which unites two people in marriage, when 
 it is properly entered into, is not companionship. Mar- 
 riage exists for the sake of the family. If there is any 
 sanctity in it at all, it is the children that bring it. 
 They are at once the excuse and the recompense for 
 disillusionment, if there has been disillusionment, and 
 they are the bond of a closer union, when the mar- 
 riage is happy. There ought to be the strongest public 
 sentiment against any other object of union, so that the 
 union of old people or that of a young man with a 
 woman too old to bear children, or incapacitated for 
 bearing them, would be regarded as something shame- 
 fully disgraceful, and the young man made to feel that 
 he had committed a crime against his young manhood. 
 But what is the fact? It is women who create public 
 opinion in this matter; and marriage is their stock in 
 trade ; their way of getting a living or being taken care 
 of. I once boarded in a hotel where a woman habit- 
 ually spoke of her husband as her meal-ticket; and the 
 other women laughed. I said to her : ' So you sold 
 yourself for a mess of pottage.' She wasn't insulted; 
 how could she be ? Delicacy in women ! My God ! and 
 yet, if you tell them the naked truth about love, even 
 the woman who sells herself for a meal ticket will re-
 
 A NEW ACQUAINTANCE 149 
 
 volt and call you a brute. You see, it is excessively hu- 
 miliating to a woman's vanity to think that the attrac- 
 tion which she has for a man has nothing in it partic- 
 ular and stable, but that all women possess it to a cer- 
 tain degree. Yet, in her heart, she knows that it is 
 merely a matter of physical charm, and she tries to 
 preserve it with the appearance of youth as long as she 
 can, knowing very well that her empire is over with 
 wrinkles and gray hair. The movement to prolong her 
 empire by making herself valued for her intelligence 
 comes from those women who cannot hope to rule in 
 the empire of flesh a thousand times dearer to women, 
 and to man, too, than that of the mind." 
 
 " I think you exaggerate. But don't you see that the 
 very thing which you complain of marriage being a 
 sort of trade with women comes from your excluding 
 them from any other way of earning a livelihood. Years 
 ago, I met a brilliant young woman in Paris, a beauti- 
 ful and charming woman, too, who complained bitterly 
 of the restriction of a woman's sphere of action and 
 pleaded as eloquently as ever you could for that free- 
 dom which, you say, is so necessary to your happiness. 
 I shall never forget her. She had taken to public life, 
 and showed remarkable energy and decision in every- 
 thing she did. In any situation that required particular 
 adroitness, it was always to Mile C that her com- 
 panions turned." 
 
 "Mile C ! Mile C !" he repeated mu- 
 singly ; " where have I heard that name before ? Oh, yes, 
 I remember now. I wonder if it could possibly be the 
 same woman. About eleven years ago yes, it was '50 
 I happened to spend the winter in Paris, when a remark- 
 able criminal case was going on. The papers were full 
 of it. You heard it talked of wherever you went, and 
 there was a general sentiment in favor of the defendant, 
 
 who was none other than this Mile C . She, too, 
 
 was a public woman, a communist. She had shot, with 
 intention to kill, an Italian marquis, who refused to 
 acknowledge the paternity of her boy, about ten or
 
 150 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 eleven years old at that time, I think, maybe a little 
 older I don't exactly remember. A handsome boy, his 
 picture was reproduced everywhere, a boy any man 
 ought to be proud to acknowledge; but it seems the 
 marquis was on his wedding trip with a young English 
 lady, with an English woman's sentiments of propriety, 
 no doubt, and it wasn't convenient just then to make 
 explanations. It was easier to deny the whole thing, 
 and carry a bullet in his shoulder." 
 
 " She did not kill him, then ? " I asked the question 
 with drawling, apparently indifferent deliberation; and 
 my heart was beating like a trip-hammer, and I was 
 trembling like a leaf. 
 
 " No ; but she had intended to do so. She was finally 
 acquitted. The trial brought out some interesting per- 
 sonal details which created a general sympathy for her. 
 I think she had known some relative of the bride. I 
 am not sure, though. I remember at the time that I 
 was very curious to see the woman, but I could not get 
 into the courtroom. Now, it would be a strange coin- 
 cidence if she should be the same woman you knew. 
 Do you think she was ? " 
 
 The agony of this reminiscence made me a coward. 
 I couldn't talk of it, so I answered dryly: 
 
 " I think not." 
 
 "Well, at any rate," he continued, "there's a very 
 good example of the way in which a woman looks at 
 love. She can't accept it as something necessarily 
 transitory, an appetite that dies in the satisfaction. No, 
 she wants to eternize it, and you may as well try to 
 eternize the lightning flash. Love is not a normal con- 
 dition; it is a temporary exaltation, a fever of youth 
 that usually passes with it, unless one has the poetic 
 temperament." 
 
 " What do you understand by the poetic tempera- 
 ment?" 
 
 " The emotional temperament : the temperament in 
 which the feminine element in character dominates. For
 
 A NEW ACQUAINTANCE 151 
 
 tfiere are a great many men who lack the mental char- 
 acteristics of virility, just as there are a few women 
 whose minds have a masculine vigor, uncommon in their 
 sex. You are a reader of sentimental novels, and not an 
 observer of real life if you believe that the absorbing 
 loves of which literature has given us so many exam- 
 ples are at all common. All these rainbow tints of the 
 imagination, given to a very natural appetite, are en- 
 tirely wanting in the great majority of men. It is to 
 women that we owe their general recognition. For 
 them it is easier to love with the mind than with the 
 senses, and they are bent upon teaching us to love in 
 the same way. But nature isn't at all interested in this 
 enterprise, and the day on which all become platonic 
 lovers we shall be on the eve of extermination." 
 
 He was silent, lit his pipe again, leaned back in his 
 chair and looked at the fire. I scanned the energetic, 
 handsome profile a moment, and thought how cruel the 
 fate of any woman must be who would love him. Was 
 there a feminine fiber in me that revolted at his words? 
 
 " And you ? " he said suddenly. " Of course you're 
 dead against me." 
 
 " Well," I replied with some hesitation, " I don't think 
 I should make the sweeping assertion that love is noth- 
 ing but an appetite. I should say that it is the recog- 
 nition of incompleteness, the powerlessness to find one's 
 happiness alone; and the ideal of culture is to be self- 
 sufficient. That is all I know about it. But as for 
 women, I don't share your contempt for them. It is 
 they who bear the burden that love entails; and for 
 that we owe them help and comfort. It is they alone 
 who know the strength of love in its absolute purity 
 and want of egotism. Outside of books, I have known 
 no Pere Goriots, but mothers are everywhere. And I 
 don't blame them for trying to escape the empty monot- 
 ony of that obscure, trivial life of the house-corner 
 which you yourself think so infinitely dreary. They, 
 too, have a right to be self-sufficient and masters of
 
 152 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 their own happiness. And to be that, they have the 
 same right as we to a role in active life ; but I confess 
 that, like you, I do have a little fear of their leaning 
 towards superstitions." 
 
 "And you have good reason for that fear, for that 
 penchant is ineradicable. It comes from their need to 
 love and to believe themselves loved, if not by any 
 human creature around them, then by some invisible 
 creatures that their fancy creates. And what cowards 
 they are ! always listening to ' they say,' always molding 
 their conscience to the shape of popular opinion, never 
 seeing below surfaces, capable of denying Jesus Christ 
 if he squinted, or had a bowleg." 
 
 " Oh, pardon me you are quite mistaken. You forget 
 Wilkes's host of female admirers and the reply of one 
 of them to the criticism that he squinted : ' Oh, not any 
 more than a man ought to squint.' And you've forgot- 
 ten your Shakespeare, man! and Richard the hunch- 
 back: 
 
 " Was ever woman in this humor wooed ? 
 Was ever woman in this humor won ? " 
 
 " No, Graham. That's just the other side of the same 
 flimsy shield. Tongue-led, as I said, fickle as flies! 
 You're a wise man to hold them at a safe distance; for 
 by all I know of men, you have all the marks of a 
 victim about you. Do you never tire of your life in the 
 woods here ? " 
 
 " No, never. I feel rooted among these pines and 
 oaks, now. Far from being satiated, I find new pharms 
 every day. I think, now, that I couldn't be happy else- 
 where." 
 
 " Ah, that's because you've a bit of the poet in you. 
 How happy one must be whose heart and mind see all 
 things new, the hundredth time ; but, on the other hand, 
 you must be susceptible to a great many griefs that I 
 have never known, and will never know. I find that 
 everything is paid for in this world. We never hold
 
 A NEW ACQUAINTANCE 153 
 
 anything valuable that hasn't cost us something. Well, 
 I shall be leaving you, one of these days, in search of 
 fresh fields and pastures new; but I shall always re- 
 member with pleasure these fireside chats with you. 
 After all, there isn't anything much better in life than 
 a real conversation, where there is give and take, and 
 absolute sincerity on both sides." 
 
 Nearly two years have elapsed since this conversa- 
 tion, and though I saw him several times again, before 
 he went away, I have often recalled it as if it had been 
 our last. There was something of condescension in his 
 attitude towards me, mingled at times with an expres- 
 sion of regard. On the whole, I think he liked me, 
 or, at any rate, trusted me. He liked to utter his ideas, 
 and I was a good listener; but there were times after 
 a conversation with him when I thought less of our 
 race and more of this silent nature over which the good 
 and bad days passed without eliciting either a smile 
 or a sigh. With all his contempt for society, he was 
 not independent of it. A life which has no other aim 
 than pleasure wants a fixed center about which it can 
 tranquilly turn. It rushes headlong like a meteor, that 
 traverses space in a self-kindled blaze, and falls at last 
 as a heavy stone. 
 
 But while I am judging my brother, an inner voice 
 reproves me sharply, and asks me: 
 
 What are you doing with your own life? 
 
 What aim are you proposing for yourself? 
 
 You wished to broaden, strengthen your own mind, 
 to find in it the happiness which had escaped you. You 
 have despised the soul that limits its desires to the 
 massing up of money. But the soul that amasses the 
 riches of thought and feeling is in duty bound to ex- 
 tend their influence. The miser who has hoarded and 
 concealed his treasures all his life enriches somebody 
 at his death; his egotism, then, is not so far-reaching 
 as that of the man who conceals the treasures of his 
 heart and mind, for they perish with him.
 
 154 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 But what riches have I found that I could share with 
 another? Is it a heart free from all bonds that can 
 deeply wound it, so that its joys and sorrows hence- 
 forth come from itself? That would be the dreariest 
 poverty, in the eyes of most people. 
 
 Is it a mind open on all sides, fearless, assimilative,, 
 quenchless in its thirst to know? That requires leisure 
 and, it may be, natural capacity. 
 
 And, after all, what a proud, vain boast to say that 
 I am free from all ties, when the past can still make 
 my heart tremble with pain or with joy, and when at 
 this very moment I am stifling a cry in the depths of 
 it for human companionship, human love! There! 1 
 have written it out plainly. He is a coward who lies 
 to other men; but he who lies to himself is not only 
 a coward, but a fool. And why should I lie to myself? 
 This is the meaning of that strange restlessness which 
 drives me here and there. The breath of spring has 
 set the sap of life to stirring in leaf and branch, and 
 I feel it mount in me, too. I wish to live deeper, deeper, 
 even at the price of pain! There, I feel better, having 
 written it out; but mon Dieu! what folly! what folly! 
 to be attacked with the malady of youth at forty to 
 want better bread than white bread, sweeter honey than 
 the bees make wings instead of feet! What! do I 
 really wish to find happiness elsewhere than in tran- 
 quility and work? Do I wish to recommence all the 
 pain of the past? No, it is recalling it all in detail in 
 this way that has set my pulses throbbing feverishly. 
 I could never love again as I loved her. The power 
 to love is dead in me, and how happy I am, when all 
 my wretchedness is nothing but a passing restlessness, 
 which an hour in my garden with a hoe and a spade will 
 quickly dissipate! How sane work makes a man! 
 Leisure is the mother of all the follies. No I have 
 reached the summit of the hill of life. I have the 
 western sun in my face, the shadows lie all behind me. 
 I am master of my fate.
 
 PART II 
 AFTERNOON AND EVENING
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 A VOICE FROM THE PAST 
 
 November 16, 18 -, 
 
 I HAVE just read over the preceding page, written 
 thirty years ago. How young, and how full of the 
 pride and confidence of youth it is, although it was 
 written long after youth had passed! To-day, I could 
 not write so confidently, if I knew I were to die to- 
 morrow. Shouldn't I have one day still before me? 
 and isn't my old heart still capable of feeling pain at 
 the death or the grief of those whom I love? 
 
 No, man is never master of his fate, and it is well 
 that he isn't. I ought to record that here and prove it. 
 To finish with an air of triumph like that is to falsify 
 the truth. Life is a growth; it isn't finished at forty. 
 Sometimes it is only well begun. I like these sturdy 
 lines of Browning's, perhaps the cheeriest he has ever 
 written : 
 
 " Grow old along with me ! 
 The best is yet to be, 
 
 The last of life, for which the first was made: 
 Our times are in His hand 
 Who saith 'A whole I planned, 
 ' Youth shows but half ; trust God : see all, nor be afraid ! ' 
 
 " Then, welcome each rebuff 
 That turns earth's smoothness rough, 
 Each sting that bids nor sit, nor stand but go! 
 Be our joy three parts pain! 
 Strive, and hold cheap the strain; 
 Learn, nor account the pang; dare, never grudge the throe! " 
 
 Perhaps I should do better to destroy this little rec- 
 ord of my life, but I have not the courage. It is a 
 part of me, and to destroy it would be a kind of suicide
 
 158 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 of which I am not capable. No, I will finish the record. 
 That will be an occupation for these gloomy days of 
 rain and wind that keep me indoors longer than I like. 
 My memory is still green, though my sun is touching 
 the horizon; and I will go back, now, where I left off. 
 Two weeks after finishing the little record of my life, 
 I received a letter which read as follows: 
 
 " MY DEAR UNCLE, 
 
 " I am going to give you a great surprise, but I 
 hope that it will not be an unpleasant one. I am coming 
 to see you; coming to live with you; yes, I really am, 
 and I wish you knew just how much pleasure the 
 thought of it gives me. Now, don't think that it is 
 just a girl's caprice which has moved me to such a 
 resolution. No, I have thought it all over very seri- 
 ously. I have been wearying here a long time, since 
 dear mother's death; and it was she, herself, who first 
 gave me the idea of it. 
 
 " A few days before her death she was talking quietly 
 with me of my future, when she would be gone. * You 
 will be very, very lonely for a while,' she said. ' You 
 have an affectionate nature, you need to love and to be 
 loved, but there is no one to whom I should like to see 
 you give your life at present; besides, marriage ought 
 not to be entered upon hastily, even when love urges 
 one. There are so many other things to think of be- 
 sides love, but we think of nothing else when we are 
 young. Your father and I made a love match, and you 
 see how it has turned out.' She was holding my hand 
 and she pressed it, and tried to smile bravely, poor 
 dear mother ! ' If your uncle weren't so far away, your 
 Uncle George, I mean, I should say: Go to him, be a 
 comfort to his old age, cheer his home with loving 
 kindness. I have not seen him since he became a man, 
 but if he has kept the promise of his boyhood he has 
 a warm big heart and a quick mind. You would not 
 weary with him, he is a great student, a great traveler,
 
 A VOICE FROM THE PAST 159 
 
 and if he can find happiness in a wilderness, it is be- 
 cause he carries it with him. But he is too far away. 
 What a pity! You would be a great comfort to each 
 other I am sure. You would be a loving daughter to 
 him, as you have been to me; and you would know in 
 him what a father's tender care is.* 
 
 " Dear, dear Uncle, I cannot tell you how many 
 times I have thought of her words, till they have come 
 to be a sort of inspiration urging me to action. Too 
 far? For cowards, yes; but I am not a coward. I 
 have some of your blood in my veins; and I can go 
 where you have gone; and I can live where you have 
 lived. I shall love your pines and oaks far, far better 
 than the dust and grime of this great city of Glasgow. 
 And I shall not be solitary where you are, for I love 
 you, though I have never seen you. You have revealed 
 much of yourself in your letters, alas! too rare; and I 
 shall know how to make you love me. I am not one 
 of your gay society girls; dear mother was an invalid 
 all her life, after my birth ; and I have tried to be some 
 recompense by taking care of her. That has made me 
 more serious than most young women are. I love books, 
 too, and I shall try to share your tastes and mingle my 
 solitude with yours in a sweet filial affection. You will 
 be my father, I shall be your daughter. And yet in 
 that word, father, there may be a suggestion that will 
 frighten you. Don't misunderstand me, please. I shall 
 never be a burden on you. My mother has left me 
 enough to be independent, in a very modest way, of 
 course; but, still, independent. It is not therefore a 
 refuge I am seeking with you, it is not charity that I 
 want. No shall I be quite frank with you? It is a 
 care that I want; someone to whose happiness I can be 
 necessary. You don't need me? You have everything 
 you want? Wait! wait! The sun does not shine every 
 day. You must have had days of illness, days of sad- 
 ness ; or if you haven't, you will have them, for nobody 
 escapes them, and on such a day, you will say, ' O if
 
 160 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 I only had somebody here to give me a glass of water, 
 to smooth my pillow to care the least in the world, 
 whether I live or die.' 
 
 "Well, dearest, I want to be that somebody that 
 faithful, untiring nurse, that careful housekeeper, who 
 knows how to direct affairs. Because, although I am 
 a bit romantic (at least mother always said I was), 
 and a bit of a dreamer, building for myself a thou- 
 sand pretty castles in Spain, my feet patter very solidly 
 over the humble floors of my home, and my hands do 
 not love idleness. And, then, I am not a child. I am 
 twenty-three, you know. 
 
 " But you are a little proud, aren't you ? and you 
 dread very much seeing a young woman start out alone 
 on so long a journey, don't you? And I must not 
 think of coming, must I? You see, I anticipate all 
 your objections, and in order to avoid being disobedi- 
 ent, I must start out at once; and the day you get 
 this letter I shall be under the Stars and Stripes, and, 
 God willing, not so far away but that in a few hours, 
 or days, at the longest, I can send you a line saying: 
 Meet me at such and such a train. 
 
 " All my arrangements are made. I have made all the 
 necessary inquiries about reaching you. My trunk is 
 packed, my ticket bought. I have nothing to do but 
 wait the arrival of the steamer, and to say to you: I 
 am coming. / am coming. 
 
 " P. S. I forgot to say that I have remembered the 
 request you made in one of your letters for some seed 
 of the broom and whin. I shall bring you a little box 
 full of seeds; and we shall plant them together, and 
 watch them grow." 
 
 I do not know which emotion was the stronger in 
 me after finishing this letter astonishment or anger; 
 but it was anger that, in the end, gained the upper 
 hand. 
 
 "What an insufferably impertinent woman!" I said
 
 A VOICE FROM THE PAST 161 
 
 to myself. " How in the world did she get it into her 
 head that I was so decrepit and old that I needed a 
 guardian? or such an idiot that I could not be company 
 for myself without weariness?" And here, I believe, 
 that a mild oath escaped me, and that if my amiable 
 niece could have seen me, she would have gone to the 
 end of the world rather than to me. 
 
 " Crazy creature ! " I continued in .my mental ejac- 
 ulations. " What shall I do with her ? I have only one 
 room, and what with my books and other things, it 
 isn't a bit too large for me, and I don't want to divide 
 it by a partition. No, I'll take her to a tavern, show 
 her a little courtesy, for the sake of her mother, and 
 then send her back where she came from. Ordinarily, 
 a woman of twenty-three is more of a girl than a 
 woman; but at any rate she has some sense of decency, 
 and doesn't take a door off its hinges to get into a 
 house; but this one has half a century of brazenness. 
 She thinks I mean to father it? No, my daughter, 
 there'll be no mingling of solitudes in this case. I'll 
 do my own pillow-adjusting, if you please, and get my 
 own glasses of water; and your little feet won't ache 
 from all the pattering they get on my floors." So ru- 
 minating, my first anger passed away in a sudden con- 
 sciousness of the absurdity of the whole thing. It 
 seemed a huge joke. I had a good laugh at myself, and 
 then I tried to forget it. But in spite of all that I could 
 do, the fact that she was on the way to me would in- 
 trude itself disagreeably, and I went to town morning 
 and evening in search of the dreaded letter that was 
 to announce her arrival. At last it came, putting an 
 end to my suspense and exciting my mirth by an ex- 
 pression of solicitude about me, couched in such terms 
 that it was very evident to me that she imagined that 
 I was an infirm old man. My vanity was a little piqued 
 at that, and I took more than ordinary pains with my 
 dress in preparing to meet her. I wore a black mus- 
 tache; and my hair of the same color hadn't a white
 
 162 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 thread in it. My perfect health, the regularity and 
 tranquility of my life made me look much younger than 
 I really was. I had bought a new straw hat and a light- 
 colored cravat, and, in a new suit of well-fitting clothes, 
 had rather a spruce air, intending thereby to give my 
 affectionate niece her first lesson in the folly of leap- 
 ing to conclusions. 
 
 As to her appearance, I tried to form some idea of 
 it by recalling what her mother had been, but could 
 evoke no other image than that of a robust, florid young 
 woman, like so many of the women of our moist, north- 
 ern country, with the energetic, bold, masculine air of 
 the young women of our day. 
 
 Therefore, I really cannot say which of us was the 
 more surprised, I, to see descend from the car at the 
 station a slender, graceful young girl with a quantity 
 of rich brown hair and a very pretty, attractive face 
 that turned rose red when her eyes met mine; or she, 
 searching with her eyes among a few old men, idling 
 about the platform, for her uncle, who was to meet her 
 and who did not come, and shrinking timidly from me 
 when I approached her to ask: 
 
 " Excuse me, but are you Miss Abby Crawford ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir," she answered, " I was expecting my 
 uncle, Mr. Graham, whom I do not know by sight; 
 perhaps he has sent you for me ? " 
 
 I do not know what diabolical idea of playing a 
 trick on her came suddenly into my head, for without 
 thinking at all, I gravely replied: 
 
 " Yes, Miss, he has given me that pleasure. He is 
 not able to come after you to-day, and wishes me to 
 take you to a tavern." 
 
 " He is ill," she said with consternation, then ex- 
 citedly, as if talking to herself, rather than to me, " Oh, 
 I knew it very well. There was a something, I don't 
 know what, which impelled me to come; as if I had 
 seen him ill and needing me," then more quietly, and 
 with great firmness, she said "No, sir, I shall not go
 
 A VOICE FROM THE PAST 163 
 
 to a tavern. Will you please take me directly to 
 him?" 
 
 I could not help smiling; there was such a pretty 
 expression of anxiety and sympathy in the sweet face 
 looking up into mine. 
 
 " I beg of you, Miss Crawford, don't have the least 
 anxiety," I hastened to say. " He isn't at all ill, I 
 assure you. In fact, he is as well as I am; but he 
 isn't at home just now; but counts on being at home 
 to-morrow, and you will see him then." 
 
 " Oh ! " she answered, evidently disconcerted. " He 
 knew that I was to come to-day, or he couldn't have 
 sent you for me. I don't understand it." 
 
 " Well, I am very sure he will explain it satisfactorily 
 when you see him. You didn't give him time to pre- 
 pare for you. You know, or rather you don't know, 
 that his whole house consists of only one room." 
 
 " Oh, yes, I see," she answered, rather dejectedly, I 
 thought. " I am afraid I shall inconvenience him at 
 first, and I really didn't mean to put him to the least 
 trouble." 
 
 " And you aren't he'll be delighted to see you. You 
 have a trunk ? " 
 
 "Yes, here's the check." 
 
 I took it, along with a small valise that she carried 
 in her hand, and conducted her to the waiting-room, 
 while I went to see after her trunk. 
 
 I confess that for a brief moment the idea came to 
 me to have it sent out at once to my home, but I dis- 
 missed it as puerile and untenable. I really couldn't 
 accommodate her at present, and was I really willing 
 to do so? I wasn't prepared yet to say yes; although 
 the agreeable surprise she was to me was working very 
 much in her favor. 
 
 I returned to the waiting-room. 
 
 "The tavern isn't far from the station, Miss Craw- 
 ford. It won't take more than five minutes to walk 
 over to it."
 
 164 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 She rose from the bench saying : " I am really very 
 sorry to give you this trouble." 
 
 " Excuse me ; it isn't a trouble, it's a pleasure, and 
 I hope that I may be fortunate enough to see you 
 again, with your permission." 
 
 A blush spread over her face, and lowering her head 
 a little, she said timidly: 
 
 " Do you know my uncle very well ? " 
 
 " Yes. I know him as well as any man can know 
 another." 
 
 Here my conscience commenced to make me feel a 
 little uneasy. Had she been the impertinent, forward 
 creature I expected, I should have taken a malicious 
 pleasure in deceiving her, but it seemed really too bad 
 to trick a modest, trusting girl; so to avoid any more 
 Compromising questions, I changed the subject by 
 saying : 
 
 " If you have had my experience, you must have re- 
 plied twenty times to the question 'How do you like 
 America ? ' before having taken as many steps on its 
 soil ; so I'll vary the question a little by asking you how 
 you expect to find life in a forest supportable, after the 
 variety and movement of a great city like Glasgow ? " 
 
 " Oh, you don't know me. You can't imagine how 
 tired I was of that variety, which so soon ceases to be 
 agreeable and becomes only confusion. I am really so 
 glad to exchange all those endless lines of brick walls 
 and the broken glimpses of sky for these beautiful trees, 
 this uncultivated soil, and that broad stretch of blue 
 above me. My uncle lives right in the heart of a 
 forest, doesn't he?" 
 
 " Yes ; of course, he has cleared off a good bit of 
 land for gardens and orchards, but there's no other 
 roof in sight of his own." 
 
 " How pure the air is here," she continued. " All 
 along the road I kept the car- window open just to have 
 that odor of the woods about me. I never saw such 
 magnificent trees before. I have seen nothing but parks
 
 A VOICE FROM THE PAST 165 
 
 at home, you know ; and I had no idea how beautifully 
 tangled and wild an untouched forest is. I longed to be 
 out in it. But just look there! What a pity! I am all 
 turned round. The sun is setting in the east and I shall 
 see it rise in the west ! " 
 
 She had stopped a moment to look at the sky, mag- 
 nificently colored with sunset hues, and I very nearly 
 betrayed myself by telling her what splendid sunset views 
 I had at home looking out over the bay. The crickets 
 commenced to chirp in the grass. The dewy freshness 
 of evening filled the air, and the dust lay damp and 
 heavy on the roads. For fear of being greeted by the 
 villagers, who all knew me, I had avoided the main 
 street, and taken an unfrequented by-path that ran along 
 a clover-field, from which rose a delightful odor, and 
 I am sure that she exchanged it as reluctantly as I, for 
 the narrow plank sidewalk that led to the village inn. 
 
 I had already engaged a room for her the day before, 
 and in giving her over to the charge of the porter, I 
 took my departure rather brusquely, assuring her that 
 I would call in the morning about eleven o'clock to 
 conduct her to her uncle's. She thanked me heartily, 
 hesitating after the word Mr., as if she expected me to 
 announce my name, but I did not do it. 
 
 I went into the village immediately to buy provisions 
 for the morrow ; and putting them all together in a large 
 basket, I started home. A singular exhilaration had 
 taken possession of me, something like the hope and 
 light-heartedness of youth, and a sensation of super- 
 fluous physical energy that made me very glad to have 
 a good three miles' stretch of road before me. And 
 what a delicious walk it was! one of those beautiful 
 hours that grow rarer as we grow older, in which we 
 are hardly conscious of the body, except as the senses 
 serve the mind. Never before had I felt so intimate a 
 joy in the depths of these woods; never before felt 
 myself so closely one with all this exuberant life. The 
 dense shade cooled my flushed face, the herbs crushed
 
 166 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 by my feet exhaled an aromatic odor. Sometimes a 
 bird uttered a melodious cry over my head, sometimes a 
 squirrel darted across my path, then stopped to look at 
 me, its bushy tail curved over its back, its black eyes 
 sparkling like two glass beads; and I, too, stopped to 
 look at it, and smile, as if it were something human, 
 that knew my heart was overflowing with tenderness 
 and joy. Who can tell the cause of these sudden re- 
 newals of feeling in us, after days and weeks of stag- 
 nation? Is the source of them weakness or strength? 
 I shouldn't ask the question, if I had not observed that 
 these exaltations are followed by corresponding depres- 
 sions ; and that the normal condition of mind is not one 
 of emotion but of tranquility. But whether they be 
 of morbid origin or only the superb expression of per- 
 fect health, they are none the less exquisite hours, in 
 which we seem to condense more of life than in weeks 
 of an ordinary existence. My eyes, so long unused to 
 tears, grew dim from time to time, with pure excess of 
 feeling; not thoughts, but vague dreams and memories 
 of my youth crowded upon me thick and fast, and I 
 was astonished to find myself at home so soon. 
 
 I opened the door of my little log hut, asking my- 
 self how it would look to a woman, and answered my- 
 self at once, that it looked bare. Having discovered that 
 my pretty Indian rugs required a good deal of shaking 
 and cleaning to keep them presentable, I had taken them 
 from the floor and put them away in a large trunk. 
 I got them out at once and laid them down again; and 
 they added a touch of comfort and brightness to the 
 room. But the huge fireplace that in winter lighted 
 and warmed the whole room, yawned very black and 
 dreary along the western wall ; and I reflected some time 
 before I could solve the problem of transforming that 
 dark chasm into a thing of beauty. My eyes wandering 
 about the room, encountered a fine, large, clay water-jar 
 of Indian workmanship, very prettily ornamented with 
 a geometrical pattern in white and brown; and it sud-
 
 A VOICE FROM THE PAST 167 
 
 denly flashed over me that I might fill it with the large 
 spreading branches of the huckleberry, growing here 
 into a very handsome shrub with small, bright, glossy 
 leaves and pretty, reddish-brown stems. I went after 
 it immediately, and soon returned with my arms full, 
 put it into the jar, which I placed in the center of the 
 fireplace. It added just the touch of beauty and grace 
 wanting, and I couldn't forbear thinking how pleasant 
 it would be to have somebody near to whom I could 
 say : " Now, doesn't that look pretty ? " 
 
 I liked the effect so much that I thought I might 
 enliven other parts of the room with a green sprig here 
 and there. I cut some graceful branches from the pine 
 with pretty clusters of cones and tacked them on the 
 wall. As I prefer the wild flowers to the cultivated 
 ones, I determined to rise early the next morning and 
 scour the woods for its prettiest treasures ; for I thought 
 they would give a more harmonious effect to the room 
 and its rustic furnishings than the garden flowers. I 
 had suddenly grown critical and fastidious, for I wished 
 the room to please her. I even went so far as to dust 
 my books with a cloth, a proceeding to which they 
 were not at all accustomed, for my method of dusting 
 under ordinary circumstances was simply to blow the 
 dust off the one book which I happened to take down 
 from its shelf. 
 
 I went to bed much later than usual, but I couldn't 
 sleep. The sweet exaltation continued, and I heard my 
 clock strike three before I fell asleep to dream that I 
 was a boy again, traveling in Switzerland with the com- 
 panions of my youth. I thought that Richard Glenn, 
 Lady Margaret and I were scaling a mountain, when 
 we saw projecting from a ledge of rock on a steep and 
 difficult descent a bunch of brilliantly-colored flowers. 
 Lady Margaret uttered a cry of admiration, and clapped 
 her hands with pleasure. I rushed forward, bent upon 
 getting them for her, when she turned quite pale, beg- 
 ging me not to attempt so difficult a thing, which meant,
 
 168 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 perhaps, the risk of my life. But I was intoxicated with" 
 the thought that she cared even so little for me, and I 
 resolved to show her that her slightest wish was more 
 to me than life. I took another step forward, and 
 felt the ground crumble beneath my feet. My head 
 struck the rock, a dazzling light flashed before my eyes ; 
 and with that, I awoke, to hear my clock striking six, 
 and the sun shining full upon my face. My head ached. 
 I moved my pillow out of reach of the shaft of sun- 
 light. A great languor invaded me, an inexpressible 
 sadness, a vague sentiment of impending ill; then all 
 at once the events of the preceding day rushed into my 
 mind. I leaped from my bed, took a cold bath, and 
 before breakfasting struck out for the woods. It was 
 a magnificent morning, fresh, dewy, the air resinous 
 and tonic; and in a few moments my headache was 
 gone, and I was quite myself again. I found some 
 superb orchids of that beautiful kind commonly known 
 as the moccasin flower, or lady's slipper, with the 
 large, inflated lip of an exquisite whiteness dashed 
 with spots of crimson. What a pretty sight it would 
 be to a little lady from the town. Involuntarily I 
 smiled with pleasure, anticipating hers. I found, too, 
 some beautiful ferns to mingle with them and some 
 delicate trailing vines to complete my decorations, and 
 came back home happy as a boy, and with a boy's appe- 
 tite, which I satisfied with some soft-boiled eggs, bread 
 and butter, and a good cup of coffee. 
 
 No lady's maid could have taken more pains to make 
 a room pretty for her expected mistress than I to make 
 this room look inviting to my little lady. Strange! 
 but for the life of me I couldn't think of her as my 
 niece. I hadn't been able to trace in her the least re- 
 semblance to her mother, and it had been so long since 
 I had known close family ties that I felt myself, as it 
 were, unrelated to anybody. For me, therefore, she 
 was only a pretty young woman, unusually attractive, 
 because of a certain freshness and naivete wholly femi-
 
 A VOICE FROM THE PAST 169 
 
 nine, and alas! growing rarer and rarer from our pres- 
 ent popular systems of co-education. The thought of 
 receiving her into my home as a companion of my soli- 
 tude, if it had crossed my mind as a possibility, in 
 the curious exaltation of the evening before, seemed 
 impossible now in the bright light of morning. But 
 how should I tell her so? Would she herself not feel 
 it to be so, when she learned the truth? Well, there 
 was nothing to do but leave it to the happy solution 
 of chance, which has a trenchant way of cutting Gor- 
 dian knots and loosening spells, often quite superior to 
 the clumsy efforts of design. 
 
 She was waiting for me in the office when I entered 
 the tavern. She had put on a pretty dress of light 
 blue muslin, trimmed in narrow white bands, which gave 
 her even a more girlish air than she had had the day 
 before, in her simple gray traveling suit. She blushed 
 as she held out her little hand timidly to me, saying: 
 
 " My uncle did not come with you ? I thought per- 
 haps " 
 
 " He will be at home when you get there, and will 
 be very glad to see you. But he wishes me to warn you 
 not to expect elegance. It is impossible to live more 
 simply than he does." 
 
 "Yes, yes," she answered, "I shall like it the better 
 for that. But to tell you the truth, I hardly slept last 
 night for thinking that I may have done the most 
 foolish thing in the world to come here, and to suppose 
 that I could be any comfort or help to him. But I 
 love him, although I have never seen him. If I had 
 known where to find him, I think I should have risen 
 in the night to go to him. It seemed such an age 
 till morning, and then I began to fear that perhaps he 
 wouldn't like me, that I should seem a stranger to 
 him. Tell me, frankly, do you think I could please 
 him?" 
 
 She looked at me eagerly, her sweet eyes full of 
 tears, her pretty mouth trembling. Think how it moved
 
 170 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 me! I hadn't seen a woman's tear since many a long 
 year. A sudden tenderness for her filled me. I should 
 have liked to pet her as I would a child, and I said 
 hastily : 
 
 " Of course you will ; you would please anybody ; but, 
 although he isn't a heartless old man, perhaps he will 
 not please you. You have made for yourself an imagin- 
 ary uncle, who certainly is not at all like the real one. 
 Perhaps you had better see him before we take out 
 your trunk and your valise." I saw that she had or- 
 dered them brought down. " Did I tell you that he 
 lives about three miles from the village? I always walk 
 when I go out there, but I will order a carriage this 
 morning, if you prefer it." 
 
 " No, please don't ; I think I should rather walk. I 
 am a good walker, and it is so pretty about here; and 
 then you can tell me a little more about my uncle, 
 his tastes, his habits, and I shall be getting a little 
 acquainted with him." 
 
 I gave the necessary orders for the trunk and valise 
 to be returned to the room which she had occupied, 
 and we left the tavern. 
 
 We had a charming walk together. She was not of 
 those people with whom the least silence produces a 
 vague uneasiness and embarrassment, as if a secret 
 want of harmony had begun to reveal itself. She was 
 perfectly free from all affectation, the most natural 
 woman I think that I have ever known. I believe that 
 she had no idea how altogether pretty and attractive she 
 was; for her beauty wasn't of that pronounced and 
 striking type which at once draws all eyes to itself. She 
 had the unconscious frankness and fresh and vivid 
 curiosity of a child; and her pretty little cries of sur- 
 prise and admiration at the beauty of the forest showed 
 a lively sensibility to natural charms that augured well 
 for our enjoyment together. I began to understand how 
 it had been possible for her to undertake so adventurous 
 a journey. Her courage was simply innocence, perfect
 
 A VOICE FROM THE PAST 171 
 
 unconsciousness of danger; her confidence wasn't im- 
 pertinence, it was a superabundance of feeling. Her 
 whole young life had passed in loving and caring for 
 another. She couldn't conceive of life happily spent in 
 any other way. The color came and went in her cheeks, 
 and soon we were chatting together like old comrades. 
 It seemed to me now, as if I had always known her. 
 She continued to ask me questions about her uncle, and 
 it grew more and more difficult for me to conceive how 
 I was ever to undeceive her without wounding her 
 deeply, and I turned her attention from the subject 
 as often as I could, purposely lengthening the walk and 
 trying indirectly to show her myself and my real tastes, 
 that I might in some measure step into that imaginary 
 uncle's place. To do that, I was always very careful 
 to explain that my feelings were entirely in accord with 
 the uncle's whenever I was forced to dwell on his char- 
 acteristics. 
 
 At last we approached the house a plain log hut in 
 the midst of pines and oaks, on an eminence overlooking 
 the beautiful bay. I had trained a wisteria vine over 
 the logs, and heavy clusters of purple blossoms hung 
 from it. 
 
 " How pretty ! How pretty ! " she said in a low voice 
 full of feeling. "But the door is shut. Do you think 
 he is at home ? " 
 
 "Yes, follow me. Don't be afraid." 
 
 I hastened forward a step or two, opened the door 
 and bade her enter. Now that the time had come to 
 reveal myself, my heart beat furiously. I hated to blurt 
 the truth out. I wished with all my heart that she would 
 guess it; but she did not have the least suspicion of 
 the truth. She hesitated before the open door and 
 said faintly: 
 
 "Will you please tell him that I am here?" 
 
 " He knows it " I hesitated. I was about to say 
 " Abby," but that familiarity seemed an impertinence, 
 yet. She must know me before I could say that. Then
 
 172 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 a sudden fear seized me. Suppose that she wouldn't 
 believe me. 
 
 " Come in," I said, taking her gently by the arm. 
 Then I went directly to the table on which stood a 
 bottle of ink and some paper. I have a very peculiar 
 hand-writing, quite unmistakably my own to any one 
 who has seen it, and seating myself at the table, I de- 
 liberately wrote these words: 
 
 "You are welcome home, and your uncle is the hap- 
 piest uncle in the world to call so charming a girl his 
 niece. 
 
 "GEORGE GRAHAM." 
 
 She had followed all my movements with the most 
 painful suspense; I saw that, by the twitching mouth 
 and reddening brow. I smiled at her reassuringly, rose 
 and put the note into her trembling hand. She read 
 it and burst into tears. Then I felt that I had been 
 very cruel, and that my foolish little joke was no joke 
 at all, but something very serious. 
 
 "Abby, my dear girl, don't cry; don't, my dear. Lis- 
 ten to me," and I took her two hands with which she 
 had covered her face, and forced her to look at me. 
 " I only meant it for a little joke, and I detest myself 
 for it now; but you seemed to make so much of your 
 old uncle, half infirm, that I didn't have the heart to 
 show him to you all at once, quite well and vigorous. 
 That was stealing from you the task that you had been 
 kind enough to find a pleasure in." 
 
 She drew her hands from mine, and the expression 
 of shame and grief on her face grew more intense. 
 
 " Oh, how you must despise me for being such a silly 
 fool! How could I make such a mistake! Can you 
 forgive me? If you only knew how I am punished, I 
 believe you would be sorry. Remember, I am very, 
 very far away from home," ker eyes filled again, and
 
 A VOICE FROM THE PAST 173 
 
 she began to sob bitterly. Then my heart went out to 
 her, and I said: 
 
 " Don't say that while you are with me. Look around 
 you, it is all very simple, very poor, but what there is 
 of it is yours. You are mistress here as long as you 
 like. If I did not bring your things with me, it is be- 
 cause I wasn't sure that you could be content to share 
 my tranquil life, so remote from the stir of other lives. 
 I could not be sure that you would care for me, as I 
 really am, but if you could say to me now : ' Uncle 
 George, this does please me, and you please me, too,' I 
 shall be the happiest man in Washington Territory. 
 Can you say it, Abby Crawford ? " 
 
 I had not had the remotest intention of saying any- 
 thing of the kind ; but carried away by the sympathy of 
 the moment, I had put so much warmth into my words 
 that I finished by persuading myself that I desired noth- 
 ing so much in the world. And my desire increased in 
 proportion as I saw that she wasn't at all inclined to 
 accept my offer. 
 
 " But, but," she stammered, " don't you see that it 
 doesn't at all seem to me that you are my uncle ? " 
 
 " Do you doubt my word ? " 
 
 " No, no you have proved beyond a doubt who you 
 are, by that note. Besides, who else could get my let- 
 ters, and know my name, and that I was coming? 
 No, I feel that you are an honest man, but I don't feel 
 that you are Uncle George. I have not had the slight- 
 est premonition of a tie of blood between us. Do I 
 seem to you to be your niece ? " 
 
 " You say so, and I believe you, as you do me." 
 
 Her face cleared a moment. 
 
 "There! that's it. Don't you see? You feel exactly 
 as I do, this something impossible, which which 
 
 would make it improper " she hesitated, coloring 
 
 deeply. 
 
 " No, no," I answered quickly. " There is nothing
 
 174 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 impossible, nothing improper in it. Sit down, please. I 
 am going to speak very frankly to you." 
 
 "Yes, yes, do," she said, seating herself in the chair 
 that I offered her, and looking at me with an expres- 
 sion, avid of truth. " You are not my uncle, then ? " 
 
 " Listen to me patiently. Yes. I am your uncle. I 
 have a bundle of your mother's letters on that shelf 
 yonder. She was my favorite sister; and the only one 
 of my family with whom I have corresponded. I have 
 still the little letter, written twenty-three years ago, in 
 which she wrote me from Glasgow of your birth, and 
 as I was only a boy, then, she said she had given me 
 another little sister, that she hoped would love me as 
 much as the big sister had." 
 
 " Did she ? did she ? Can you show me that letter 
 now?" 
 
 " Yes. I'll get it for you." 
 
 I got out the bundle of letters, tied up with wrapping 
 cord, and easily found the letter referred to. She read 
 it with streaming eyes. 
 
 " But I never saw you," I went on, " and we men, in 
 general, need something tangible to care for. You wrote 
 me, that though you had never seen me, you loved me; 
 but I could hardly understand that, and I confess that 
 when I first read your decision to come, I thought 
 
 " Yes, I know," she interrupted, " something fright- 
 fully bold. I see it all, now, but - " 
 
 " No, not at all. You are incapable of boldness ; but 
 like all young girls who live in the world without belong- 
 ing to it, perhaps you are a little romantic ; but I made 
 as great a mistake in imagining what you were like as 
 you did about me, and I only wish that you had been 
 as agreeably disappointed. I fancied you a large, ro- 
 bust blonde, noisy, talkative, aggressive." For the first 
 time since her entrance into the house, a smile passed 
 over her face, and I was so far encouraged that I 
 sketched the figure a little more ludicrously than was
 
 A VOICE FROM THE PAST 175 
 
 necessary. " And you," I went on, " you saw in me 
 a venerable old man dragging out a solitary existence 
 without any of those charms of domesticity that make 
 the consolations of old age; and like a good little girl 
 that you are, being solitary, too, you came away out 
 here into the heart of an American wood to see if out 
 of these two solitudes, united, you could make a charm- 
 ing companionship. And you were quite right! and 
 though the old man isn't quite so old as you thought 
 him, he is none the less solitary, and is delighted at 
 the idea of so sweet a comrade, so charming a sister. 
 Come, Abby, let us confess that we have both made a 
 delightful blunder, and ought to congratulate ourselves 
 on it. And now, take off your hat, my girl, and help 
 me get dinner ; for if- our walk has done for you what 
 it has for me, you are very hungry. You are going to 
 laugh at my primitive way of doing things, and show 
 me how very much I needed you." 
 
 I held out my hand to take the hat, which she was 
 removing with nervous hands, and she said, in a very 
 low voice: 
 
 " You are very good." 
 
 " No. I am only very happy, and I have only one 
 wish, and that is to see you happy, too. Wait, I've 
 been talking about setting you to work and you haven't 
 yet seen what a fine view I have from this south door; 
 because, though there is not very much inside the house, 
 there is a very great deal out of doors." 
 
 I opened the door and we stepped out. Before us 
 stretched the blue waters of the bay, sparkling under 
 the summer sun, its beach below us showing huge bar- 
 nacle-covered rocks, and strips of shining sand. On the 
 southern horizon towered the Olympic range of moun- 
 tains, and bounding the waters of the bay on the west 
 rose gentle heights of dark green with a serrated out- 
 line of spiked firs against the blue sky; and close at 
 hand was the heavy timber of gigantic firs, cedars, 
 spruces with tangled undergrowths of brake and fern.
 
 176 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 Towards the east towered the huge dome of Mt. Baker 
 covered thick with snow, but so far away that it was 
 visible only on clear days, a sort of phantom mountain 
 that came and went like a dissolving view. 
 
 The sensitive nature of the young girl answered to 
 this beauty in a cry of joy. She forgot her disappoint- 
 ment and embarrassment, as if by magic. 
 
 " Oh, how beautiful ! how beautiful ! " she exclaimed. 
 " How admirably you have chosen the site of your 
 home. And you can never feel alone here, in the 
 midst of so much beauty." 
 
 " No," I answered frankly, for I wished her to know 
 me thoroughly, now. " I have lived a great deal in 
 forty years; for, living goes by thinking and feeling, 
 doesn't it? And I have learned to be company to my- 
 self. I remember once hearing an old Scotch woman 
 say to someone who sympathized with her, thinking 
 she must be lonely in her solitary home among the 
 mountain passes, * No, I never weary. There's such 
 a kind feeling comes from the hills.' It was her homely, 
 yet expressive, way of saying what Byron says so 
 beautifully : 
 
 'There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, 
 There is a rapture on the lonely shore, 
 There is society where none intrudes 
 By the deep sea, and music in its roar.' 
 
 And yet it is good to have someone like-minded near 
 by, to whom one can say how charming this dual soli- 
 tude is." 
 
 " Yes," she answered, her cheeks aflush like the wild 
 rose. Then after a short silence, during which her eyes 
 were feeding on the varied beauty of the scenes about 
 her, she turned to me as if she had made a sudden 
 resolution and said to me very gravely: 
 
 " Do you really forgive me ? " 
 
 "For what?"
 
 A VOICE FROM THE PAST 177 
 
 "For being here." 
 
 " It isn't a question of forgiveness, but of gratitude. 
 I thank you from my heart for being here. And will 
 you forgive me for the silly little joke, growing out 
 of my vanity, I dare say, that I played on you ? " 
 
 A smile lighted up her face, so serious the moment 
 before. 
 
 " Oh, yes ! yes ! You wouldn't have seemed any more 
 my uncle to me if you had confessed at once; and I 
 should have been so miserably unhappy about my mis- 
 take all night long, that I think I should have taken the 
 next train out of town and never seen you again; and 
 yet, I I liked you." She covered her face with her 
 hands to hide the deep red rushing to the roots of her 
 hair. 
 
 "Dear girl!" I said. 
 
 " No, no ! " she exclaimed, hastily dropping her hands 
 and looking at me fearlessly. " Don't speak to me like 
 a man of the world ; or say anything to me that you will 
 wish unsaid to-morrow, or the next day, or the many 
 days that are to come. That would be too frightfully 
 cruel. Let us talk without fear to each other in the 
 frankest language of our hearts, as if we stood both of 
 us, as God knows we may, on the edge of an abyss, 
 and one step forward would send both of us into ever- 
 lasting darkness. You have known the truth longer 
 than I; you must have reflected." She was speaking 
 rapidly now, trying with all her might to suppress the 
 signs of the emotion which she felt. "You know that 
 I came from Scotland hoping to care for you as I had 
 cared for mother, to be a faithful companion, sharing 
 the dark days more willingly than the sunny ones. God 
 only knows how I came to make this fatal mistake of 
 supposing you much older than my mother. I didn't 
 know what hint of your life made me think you must 
 be worn out, a melancholy recluse, yet capable of in- 
 tense feeling and joy; that I gathered from the few
 
 letters of yours which I have seen. There are certain 
 sentences in them that I know by heart, written to con- 
 sole her. Here is one of them: 
 
 " ' Not for anything in the world would I have missed 
 the keenest of my sufferings, if I could choose to blot 
 them from my life and make it all as sunny as a cloud- 
 less June. They have been my university, in which I 
 have learned the most intimate secrets of the human 
 heart, the broadest knowledge of life.' 
 
 "And do you know what I've always thought! It is 
 this: Joy, too, can teach, and somehow, a certain shy- 
 ness kept me always from asking much about you; 
 and I thought you were attacked by one of those mala- 
 dies of the soul which waste the body, as well as make 
 desolate the heart. And romantic as I suppose most 
 women are, I felt my heart drawn toward you. When 
 I was a very little girl, I used to think about you, 
 and say to myself: When I'm a woman, I'm going to 
 him." 
 
 " Bless your dear little heart ! " I exclaimed. 
 
 " I shall be his daughter. He shall not miss in his 
 
 life the devotion of a woman, who " Her eyes filled, 
 
 her voice choked, she could say no more. My heart 
 melted toward her in a deep sentiment of tenderness 
 and pity. I felt what a rich gift she was giving me; 
 I was profoundly grateful for it, and for nothing in 
 the world would I have had her leave me now. What 
 right had stupid conventionalities or silly and selfish 
 fears to intrude themselves between us? She pleased 
 me to the innermost fiber of my being. She could en- 
 rich my life by sharing it in a sweet and chaste com- 
 panionship. 
 
 Once more I took the little trembling hands in mine, 
 and drawing her toward me, lightly touched her fore- 
 head with my lips. She hid her face upon my shoulder, 
 and wept to her heart's content; and I let her cry un- 
 checked, knowing well that the nervous tension which 
 she was under was best relaxed by tears; and I ca-^
 
 A VOICE FROM THE PAST 179 
 
 ressed the little head, murmuring affectionate words such 
 as one speaks to a penitent child whom one loves. I 
 was happy, with a healthy, serene joy, full of hope. 
 Like a lightning flash, our life together rose before me, 
 innocent as that of a brother and sister full of the 
 sweetness of love without the sting of passion. My 
 home would be, now, a home in the full sense of the 
 word ; for it would shelter the sweet figure of a woman 
 to encourage me in my tasks, to say good-by when I 
 left the house, and bid me welcome when I entered. I 
 could easily build two more rooms to the cottage and 
 divide the large room into two. 
 
 Suddenly the young head left my shoulder, and the 
 dear face looked up at me, smiling through its tears. 
 
 "You see," she said, ."I am only a child, after all, 
 to be taken care of myself, and you you are not my 
 uncle." 
 
 " I see nothing but this," I answered. " You are 
 here, where you belong. I am your uncle; and though 
 I didn't love you before I saw you, I do love you now, 
 and I don't know why, any more than you do; and I 
 don't care. I see, too, that you came here to take care 
 of me. Well, that suits me exactly. I need to be taken 
 care of. Just think of it. I sew on my buttons without 
 a thimble. Isn't that dreadful? Did you bring your 
 thimble along? If you didn't, I shall get you one when 
 we go to town. For I don't mean to let you go. Be 
 sure of that. The house isn't quite ready for you, so 
 I'll take you back to the tavern this evening; and give 
 orders to the carpenters to begin work to-morrow, and 
 then in two or three weeks we'll have our house-warm- 
 ing, and invite the squirrels and the robins to see how 
 happy we are, in our new nest. If I am not the morose 
 old man whose solitude you came to console, I am, at 
 least, a mature man (who has days when he feels very 
 young, to-day, for example), a solitary man at whom 
 fate has not smiled often enough to spoil in him a warm 
 appreciation of a simple and pure companionship. I
 
 i8o THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 shall know how to be a faithful friend, for I have served 
 my apprenticeship in that; I know how to be grateful, 
 for my heart has not yet grown cold; and I need you, 
 for I need, once more in my life, to know perfect hap- 
 piness. You are right. Too much rain makes my fruit 
 spoil and mold. They need the warm sunshine. So do 
 I. It has rained enough in my life. Shine out, O sun 
 of love, warm and bright; let me feel what it is not 
 to shiver any more! Tell me that I do not too much 
 displease you, and that I may hope to be a dangerous 
 rival to that old uncle, who, to tell you the truth, be- 
 gins to make me feel a little jealous, just now. You've 
 made a hero out of him, and generous joy in the excel- 
 lence of others, is rare; and I'd rather you loved me 
 with all my faults, than him." 
 
 She gave me no reply beyond a bright smile, and the 
 assurance, again, that I was " good." I told her that 
 I wasn't, but that I should let her go on thinking so; 
 as we all need a superfluous stock of illusions in youth 
 to take us a good way through life, until we are able 
 to get on comfortably with the memory of them. Then 
 she reminded me that I said I was hungry, and that I 
 wished her to help me get dinner. Would I show her 
 where I kept my things? 
 
 I turned towards the house, arguing in this question 
 an assent to my hopes ; and at this moment a lovely little 
 squirrel that I had tamed darted towards me from the 
 corner of the house, but stopped at some distance, look- 
 ing timidly at my new companion. 
 
 " Come on, Jacques," I said, stooping and holding out 
 my arm, encouragingly. " Don't be afraid, you are go- 
 ing to have two friends now instead of one. Come 
 on, come on, and let me introduce you to your new 
 mistress." 
 
 With a bound he was on my shoulder, whisking his 
 tail in my face, and peering down at the young girl by 
 my side. 
 
 " You dear little thing ! " she said, putting out her
 
 A VOICE FROM THE PAST 181 
 
 hand to stroke him, but with another bound he leaped 
 to the ground and scampered away. 
 
 " He is afraid of me. What a pity ! I am going to 
 take away all your wood friends." 
 
 " Oh, no ! They will soon get used to you. You have 
 but to hold yourself perfectly still among them, making 
 no advances, paying no attention to them, and finally 
 they come to think of you as a part of the forest like 
 themselves and have no fear of you. And now you 
 are going to laugh at my primitive style of cooking. 
 About ten or twelve years ago oh, no, it's much longer 
 than that, I bought a little portable stove from an Italian, 
 such as they use in the streets of Naples to do the 
 family cooking. I liked it so well that when it wore 
 out I had another made by a tinsmith after the old 
 model. With a little charcoal you can get enough heat 
 to boil water, fry a beefsteak, or an egg. As for my 
 bread, a woman in the village makes some fresh loaves 
 every Saturday. But now that you've come I'll buy a 
 regular stove. Do you know how to cook ? " 
 
 " Yes, that is about all I do know except taking care 
 of the sick. Oh, what lovely, lovely flowers ! " 
 
 She had just noticed my floral decorations, made in 
 her honor. 
 
 " I never before saw a flower like that. What is its 
 name ? " 
 
 I gave her its name, explaining that it was a wild 
 flower, of which we had many beautiful varieties in the 
 woods. 
 
 " I can't offer you an exquisite menu," I said, ap- 
 proaching the little stove to light it and put on some 
 water. " Would you like coffee or tea ? " 
 
 " It makes no difference. Whatever you like best will 
 please me most." 
 
 " Then I must make both, to see which you prefer." 
 
 " No, no. I beg your pardon. I like tea best." 
 
 "Very well, you shall have it," and I lied in adding 
 that I preferred it, too.
 
 182 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 " Well ! I knew I had forgotten something. Do you 
 know that I haven't such a thing as a table-cloth or a 
 napkin to my name? The necessary has occupied me, 
 to the exclusion of everything else." 
 
 " And these flowers, and that beautiful green bush 
 on the hearth?" 
 
 " Were put there to please my lady." 
 
 " I thank you," and she lowered her eyes. 
 
 " I know now what I can do. I have two big sheets 
 of white wrapping paper. They'll do very well for a 
 table-cloth, won't they? You see," I continued, un- 
 wrapping some bundles and spreading the paper on the 
 table, " luxury entered the world by means of a woman." 
 
 " But I beg of you not to inconvenience yourself for 
 me. I should love to sit down with you just as you 
 are accustomed to do alone." 
 
 " But I wouldn't like it all ; and your uncle is a very 
 selfish old man, quite tired of his homely way of living; 
 let him put on a few extra touches for you, and he'll 
 enjoy the novelty of it immensely." 
 
 " As you like." 
 
 She helped me set the table, and when she saw me 
 use a large white clam shell for a ladle to scoop out 
 sugar and salt, and employ other primitive substitutes 
 for dishes, she laughed merrily, saying it seemed like 
 playing at housekeeping, and protested against any in- 
 novations that would banish them from use. 
 
 " I like that glistening, pearly-white surface. It is 
 so much prettier than metal; and cleaner, too, for it 
 won't tarnish. But how do you get this smooth, white 
 surface on the outside ? " 
 
 " I boil them in wood-ashes. By the way, there's 
 a fine clam-bed a little way down the bay. I must 
 teach you how to make chowder." 
 
 Then we sat down to dinner before the open 'door, 
 and window that looked out upon the yard, with its 
 luxuriant grass, now ripening in the summer sun; and 
 beyond it, vistas of orchards and glimpses of the forest.
 
 A VOICE FROM THE PAST 183 
 
 Around us the great silence of nature, broken only by 
 the song of a bird or the cry of a squirrel, or the drop- 
 ping of a cone on the roof. We might have been Adam 
 and Eve in some western paradise before the fall. A 
 great joy, innocent, foolish, it may be, took possession 
 of me. I seemed to have found my youth again, with 
 all its happy carelessness. She followed all my words, 
 my gestures, my gaiety, smiling, laughing, stammering 
 some broken words at intervals, and finally she ex- 
 claimed : 
 
 " How strange ! how strange ! Punished or blessed 
 by my audacity, which ? " 
 
 "Of us? But I needed you !" 
 
 " You are younger than I. Tell me the truth, are 
 you quite sure that you never felt alone here ? " 
 
 "Alone? Look at my companions," and I pointed to 
 long rows of shelves filled with books. 
 
 " Yes. I see. But a book can't laugh with you, thank 
 you, and tell you that you have given it pleasure." 
 
 " Nor quarrel with you, nor deceive you, nor abandon 
 you. But you are right. Flesh and blood are better 
 than paper and ink. I haven't felt lonely for more than 
 a few minutes at a time, because I have met no one in 
 many years whose company I preferred to my own 
 thoughts. You have come, and you please me. Why? 
 I don't know. You don't disturb my solitude. You 
 give me a sense of enlarged personality. You add to 
 my happiness. I feel that you might become indispen- 
 sable to it. And in that case, I shall have trapped my- 
 self again; I who came out here in search of liberty. 
 For you are woman, you are young. You will wish to 
 be a wife, a mother, and one day you will leave me. 
 But why stain to-day's blue sky with to-morrow's clouds. 
 You are here now. Let me be wise and enjoy the 
 present." 
 
 " Yes, and enjoy it fearlessly," she answered, " for 
 there are no cloudy skies for you in that direction. But " 
 she hesitated, blushed, then continued, " is my sky
 
 184 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 clear, with regard to you? How do I know whether 
 you are free to receive me here as your only com- 
 panion? Do you not think of marrying some day? The 
 uncle I came out to live with had no intentions in that 
 direction." 
 
 " Then I am that very uncle." 
 
 She looked at me a moment, then shook her head 
 with decision. 
 
 " Do you know that it seems to me the absurdest 
 thing in the world to call you uncle? and do you know 
 further, that I'm getting so I almost hate the name? 
 Isn't that dreadful?" 
 
 I laughed. I didn't like it so very much, myself. 
 
 " Call me George, then. We shall be George and 
 Abby to each other." 
 
 " Brother and sister, as my mother predicted." 
 
 "Yes, brother and sister. Are you agreed?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 I extended my hand, and, without hesitation, she put 
 hers into it and returned the cordial pressure that I 
 gave it. 
 
 This agreement seemed to remove a certain constraint 
 and embarrassment in her manner, and soon we were 
 chatting together like old comrades. The hours flew 
 by on wings. It was evening before we thought the 
 afternoon had well begun. I had shown her my books 
 to acquaint her with my tastes. We had spoken of the 
 necessary changes to be made in the house. She was 
 very much opposed to the idea of dividing the large 
 room into two. She wished it exactly as it was, with 
 its luxury of space, its accommodation to my tastes. 
 It must still remain my room, and the living-room, if 
 I wished at all to please her. Thus chatting, it was 
 nearly sunset before we left the house to return to the 
 village. 
 
 Shall I ever forget that delicious walk with her in 
 the cool of the evening, and the sweet intervals of si- 
 lence that interrupted our talk, a silence that was filled
 
 A VOICE FROM THE PAST 185 
 
 to each of us with the consciousness of a larger life, 
 and deeper sympathies? An exquisite peace, a deep, 
 full, breathless peace, a sense of spiritual harmony, a 
 quiet, intense joy that filled us with a sense of the 
 richness of life and yet could find no other expression 
 for itself than a pressure of the hand and a long look 
 into each other's eyes ; if there is a heaven, and joy in 
 it, I think it must be like this.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 DREAMING ONCE MORE 
 
 HOME again, after making arrangements with the car- 
 penters, I went late to bed and slept fitfully. I was 
 making plans for the future. I had become all at once 
 a social man. I thought of home with her, and won- 
 dered how I could make it charming for her. I had 
 decided to yield to her request and leave the large room 
 intact to serve as a sort of salon, for I felt sure that 
 this young girl, with her social instincts, would soon at- 
 attract to herself all the young people of the village. 
 I would, therefore, add three rooms, one of which would 
 serve as kitchen and dining-room. The rooms should 
 all be spacious, well aired, well lighted, and nothing 
 omitted to make them convenient and comfortable, with- 
 out putting them out of harmony, by too much elegance, 
 with the rugged beauty of their environment. Too 
 many rooms would simply mean an additional care 
 without added convenience. I have no sympathy with 
 the modern itch for huge piles of brick and stone. I 
 am not without my ambition; but there are some things 
 in which I am very willing to be outdone. I never 
 identify myself with my furniture and think the more I 
 have of it, and the larger place I have to put it in, the 
 more I amount to as a human being. Therefore, I am 
 very willing to have others outdo me in houses, dress, 
 furniture, land, and money; but I am very unwilling 
 that they should excel me in cleanliness, decency, virtue, 
 and wisdom. I would have my house my shelter; and 
 my intelligence my ornament. 
 
 Yet, with all that preference for simplicity myself, 
 I asked myself a thousand times what a woman's tastes 
 
 1 86
 
 DREAMING ONCE MORE 187 
 
 were, and in what way I could make a room attractive 
 for Abby. How should I be able to find anything 
 really beautiful and in good taste so far from the cen- 
 ters of civilization? All my own tastes were for the 
 time being in abeyance. They had ceased to occupy 
 me. My books, that only a few days ago had been all 
 the world to me, my friends, my solace, my delight, 
 spoke to me no longer. 
 
 I have often thought, since, how many of the activi- 
 ties of civilization a woman absorbs. It is she who 
 makes luxury possible. It is she who is the materialist, 
 and who makes us men, who are the idealists, material- 
 istic in our turn. I am often reminded, as I wander 
 through the great department stores of our cities, of 
 the countless superfluities that the vanity and helpless- 
 ness of women have called into existence. Yet, to this 
 very vanity and helplessness thousands of honest work- 
 men owe their livelihood. 
 
 At the end of three weeks the house was completed, 
 furnished, occupied, for I had put the largest possible 
 force of men at work on it; and Abby and I com- 
 menced our solitude a deux. And we were happy, per- 
 fectly happy. I asked nothing more of destiny. I 
 would not have changed Abby in any particular. She 
 had a great deal of good common sense, in spite of the 
 tinge of romanticism in her nature, for which, indeed, 
 I was very grateful, for it had sent her across the ocean 
 in quest of her uncle. In fact, if we consider a mo- 
 ment, we shall find that the most beautiful discoveries, 
 and great movements of humanity are due to this power- 
 ful lever of action romanticism; and we should stag- 
 nate, and sink eventually to the condition of brutes if 
 we were controlled by no impulses not to be found in 
 some form in the multiplication table. She was an ex- 
 cellent housekeeper, quick, thrifty, willing; loving her 
 daily tasks, as if they were the reason of her existence. 
 Though fragile looking, she was strong, elastic, recov- 
 ering quickly from weariness. She had a beautiful
 
 i88 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 cheerfulness, almost childish, finding her pleasures, as 
 I did, in the simplest things, a stroll on the beach, a 
 softer, brighter cushion of moss on some fallen tree 
 trunk, an iridescent shell, and the glory of the morning 
 and evening sky. It was always fete day with her, 
 rain or shine. 
 
 She thought me extravagant, though not wasteful, 
 and took possession of the fruits which I refused to sell, 
 exchanging them for commodities in the village, as- 
 suring me that I had no right to give to those who 
 were able to buy ; for, I not only lessened my power to 
 do good to the really indigent, but encouraged a pro- 
 pensity to get something for nothing, which did nobody 
 any good. Then, too, I was wrong in not wishing to 
 be rich, in a perfectly legitimate way; for, riches mean 
 power, and I was not one who would abuse it; and all 
 this was said and done in the gentlest way, so that al- 
 most unconsciously, I finished by yielding to her judg- 
 ments, and I began to wonder how I had ever managed 
 to do anything right without her. And then she was so 
 pretty, so neat and fresh, always, that it was a pleasure 
 simply to look at her. She wore no jewels whatever, 
 not even a ring; but she had exquisite taste, and what- 
 ever she wore adorned her. 
 
 But this good little head that knew so well how to 
 Calculate and govern in the household, had not the 
 slightest taste for the great, austere truths of the sages 
 and philosophers. She cared little or nothing for books, 
 although she really thought that she did. She was de- 
 vout, but without austerity. Religion was for her a 
 kind of poetry, into which she escaped when realities 
 were cruel or ugly. She could not have told you why 
 she believed. Her faith was a part of her ancestral 
 heritage, and recalling my mother, whose opinions I 
 did not share, I respected her faith and wouldn't have 
 destroyed it for the world. But she, on her side, could 
 not be content with my indifference to what was so 
 sacred to her, and this little note of discord, in the
 
 DREAMING ONCE MORE 189 
 
 otherwise perfect harmony of our relations, pained her 
 deeply. 
 
 " Do you never go to church, George ? " she said to 
 me one Saturday evening, when we were taking our 
 favorite walk along the edge of the wood, looking out 
 on the magnificent sheet of water that reflected the 
 evening sky. 
 
 " No," I replied, " we go to church, don't we, to lift 
 ourselves above the vulgar cares of this world, and feel 
 ourselves more intimately allied to the great unknown 
 that we call the Eternal Good? Well, little girl, it isn't 
 in the churches that I feel those flights of gratitude, 
 and an aspiration toward a more complete, more noble 
 life, or that wonderful interior calm so near to ecstasy, 
 in which we lose the consciousness of the body, except 
 as an excuse to keep the soul on earth, and all the 
 coarseness in our life, all our baseness slips from our 
 shoulders like Christian's burden, and we rise new-born 
 to innocent joys, as if the best of childhood had re- 
 commenced within us. I explain myself badly. I be- 
 lieve that this feeling of inner purification is the es- 
 sence of what we call religion, and it is also the essence 
 of poetry ; but, it is a feeling that never comes to me in 
 churches; but always in solitary places like these woods 
 and the bay, yonder. It is an exaltation that comes from 
 the contemplation of. beauty, power and perfection. 
 That is why men who have been very far from perfect 
 themselves, but who have had a sensitive temperament, 
 have frequently felt it. Burns expressed the feeling 1 
 admirably, when he said: 
 
 " * I never hear the loud solitary whistle of the cur- 
 lew in a summer's noon, or the wild mixing cadence 
 of a troop of gray plover in an autumn morning with- 
 out feeling an elevation of soul like the enthusiasm of 
 devotion or poetry.' And elsewhere he says: 
 
 " ' There is scarcely any earthly object gives me more, 
 I do not know if I should call it pleasure, but some- 
 thing which exalts me, something which enraptures me,
 
 190 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 than to walk in the sheltered side of a wood or high 
 plantation in a cloudy, winter day, and hear the stormy 
 wind howling among the trees and raving over the 
 plain. It is my best season for devotion; my mind is 
 wrapt up in a kind of enthusiasm to Him who in the 
 pompous language of the Hebrew bard "walks on the 
 wings of the wind." ' 
 
 " I do not know why an elevated sentiment like that, 
 Abby, which disposes a man to be better, is not worth 
 the same sentiment awakened within the walls of a 
 church and often dying away outside of them." 
 
 We had seated ourselves on the fallen trunk of a 
 huge pine, covered with moss, enriching with its decay 
 the soil around it, where delicate wild flowers grew. 
 A cool breeze blew up from the bay. 
 
 She looked at me silently a moment, her sweet face 
 full of seriousness. 
 
 "Yes," she said thoughtfully, "it is worth just as 
 much. You are right, as you always are. But I, un- 
 fortunately, do not belong to those favored souls who 
 can feel beauty in the form of a noble thought, or an 
 enlightening and purifying emotion. Pleasure, yes, and 
 intense pleasure at times, I feel from it, but not that 
 calm you speak of rather a restlessness, an eager de- 
 sire to possess it more intimately. Then, too, I am not 
 capable of enjoying anything alone, I need the personal 
 element to enter into my enjoyment in some way. For 
 example, how very beautiful it is here just now, at this 
 hour. Look at that rich crimson cloud floating on the 
 surface of the water, just as it floats in the sky. Look 
 at those long beams of rich yellow light that pierce 
 through the leaves of the trees and light up those thick 
 patches of moss so vividly. These pretty spikes of 
 golden-rod that seem to have been steeped in the sun- 
 light aren't they beautiful? Yes, I feel all this to the 
 innermost core of my heart ; but, George, if you weren't 
 here, if I could not hear your voice, or touch your
 
 DREAMING ONCE MORE 191 
 
 hand " she slipped her hand into mine, interlacing her 
 fingers with mine, " do you think I could feel it at 
 all? No I couldn't. I should be miserable alone, as 
 you were, before I came. I need somebody with me 
 before I can enjoy anything. I should never be the 
 first to break a pathway in any direction. I must follow 
 where a path has been made. It is the same thing with 
 religion. I should go all astray were I left to my own 
 devices. I need before me the broad pathway that my 
 ancestors have trodden. There is something sacred to 
 me in this dust, which has felt the pressure of so many 
 feet. The strange, the novel, frighten me. Why? I 
 am a woman. That explains it all, doesn't it? I used 
 to think we women quite as intelligent, quite as brave 
 and strong as you men : I don't think so any more." 
 
 She drew closer to me, and I lifted to my lips the 
 little hand that I held. She was very dear to me, and 
 growing dearer every day. She drew her hand away 
 quickly, and brusquely rose from the old log, saying 
 with feverish haste: 
 
 " Come, come, the sun is setting, the bay is calling 
 us. I want a boat-ride, don't you? You haven't yet 
 taught me to row, and you promised me that. It has 
 been too warm, but it is cool this evening ; let's not lose 
 the chance. Live near a beautiful sheet of water like 
 that and not know how to row, isn't that ridiculous?" 
 
 She was walking rapidly towards the beach, refusing 
 any help from me in descending the steep cliff, running 
 when she could, stopping short to recover her breath, 
 and to push back the thick masses of hair which the 
 breeze had disordered, laughing merrily, but not looking 
 at me, except with furtive glances that shunned mine 
 persistently. A mood, a girl's caprice. 
 
 Arrived at the water's edge, she seized the oars, say- 
 ing: 
 
 " I have watched you carefully when you rowed. I 
 half believe I can row now. Won't you please sit over
 
 192 THE JOURNAL 1 OF A RECLUSE 
 
 there at the end, and let me have the middle seat? I 
 want to show you that my muscles are not so weak as 
 my ideas." 
 
 I obeyed her, and though she was a little awkward 
 and slow at first, soon the irregular and jerky move- 
 ment grew measured and rythmical. She rowed a long 
 time without looking at me, though I sat facing her. 
 Her eyes strayed over the bay and the wood. Slowly 
 the crimson colors died from the water and the sky, and 
 gave place to darker hues. A light blue mist half con- 
 cealed the shores with a soft veil, indescribably pretty. 
 A great silence fell around us. She suddenly let fall 
 her arms, the oars rested in their locks; then, for the 
 first time looking at me, she said in a low, hushed voice : 
 
 "This is the calm you were speaking of." She 
 paused a moment. I did not reply. There was no ne- 
 cessity for words. 
 
 " Do you know," she continued after a few moments, 
 " that sometimes my former life seems to me all a 
 dream and that instead of five weeks, it has been all 
 my life that I have lived in this forest, and looked at 
 this blue water with you. You don't believe in Provi- 
 dence. How sorry I am! But I do. I was brought 
 here for something, some great trial, it may be, I don't 
 know. But I should like to be worthy of it. You have 
 a great influence over me, too great, perhaps, but don't 
 destroy my faith, I beg you. I feel that somehow it is 
 intertwined with the very roots of my being, and could 
 not be plucked out without killing me, body and soul; 
 and that whatever happiness this world could offer me, 
 it could never fill the void of a world without God. 
 You make me happy, I was going to say supremely, 
 perfectly happy; but I do not breathe so freely, how 
 shall I explain myself nor with so much security, 
 since I have not been to church. It has been many 
 Sundays now since I have missed going. Of course I 
 could not go on the journey, but, settled here, I think 
 it isn't right of me to neglect this duty."
 
 DREAMING ONCE MORE 193 
 
 " Very well, my girl, you shall go to-morrow," I 
 said very quickly. " I shall take you there myself. But 
 why didn't you mention it sooner?" 
 
 "Why? because I did not know that you were so 
 good, and I so wicked; and I wanted to fit myself en- 
 tirely into your way of living. I feared to weary you, 
 to inconvenience you by any marked change, and then 
 I was always hoping that you would say to me some 
 day, 'Abby, we'll go to church this morning,' but you 
 never said it. And now, I know that I can't be good in 
 
 your way, I must be good in my own way, and so " 
 
 she stopped and smiled at me in her sweet youthful 
 manner, so full of charm. 
 
 "You were wrong to wait for me to guess what is 
 necessary to your happiness, Abby," I said gravely. 
 " Now, never forget that I do not wish to control or 
 restrain you in the least thing in the world. I wish you 
 to live in perfect liberty here. Dear as you are to me, 
 I wouldn't hold you a moment if you wished to go. It 
 would grieve me to lose you, but it would grieve me 
 much more to know that you were unhappy with me. In 
 friendship, as in love, there is no law. That which 
 unites us to those we love is not a (compact, it is an 
 attraction that comes and goes without our will, we 
 know not how, or when." 
 
 I was silent, and she repeated softly: "You are 
 right; it comes and goes, we know not how, or when. 
 You think, then, that we are not responsible for our 
 feelings ? " 
 
 " Up to a certain point, yes, beyond that, no. We 
 can weakly yield to our inclinations and let them in- 
 crease beyond our power to control them, or we can 
 vigorously combat them, and free ourselves from their 
 influence." 
 
 " And it is the end, always, that counts, isn't it? 
 If the drink leaves a bitter taste in the mouth, it is 
 folly to drink it, no matter how sweet it tastes, at first. 
 Isn't it so?"
 
 194 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 " Perhaps," I answered dreamily. I was thinking 
 of my youth and of that sweet draught of friendship 
 and love which I had drunk, and whose after-taste had 
 been so bitter. But wasn't it worth it? "I am not sure, 
 Abby, that it is wise to be always counting the cost of 
 things. We should miss an immense amount of life 
 if we did. It is better to live with a certain generous 
 fearlessness and take the bitter with the sweet."
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 TRYING TO KEEP STEP TOGETHER 
 
 I WENT with her to church the next day, voluntarily 
 doing violence to my own sentiments to avoid wounding 
 hers. At first I found a real pleasure in this little sac- 
 rifice, for it really was a sacrifice for me ; but, at the end 
 of a few months, the pleasure had changed into an in- 
 supportable weariness. I dreaded the approach of Sun- 
 day as a schoolboy dreads his tasks. If I could once 
 have heard a stirring or energetic word ; if I could once 
 have been reminded that the man to whom I listened 
 had had his life enriched by any valuable experiences 
 to give weight to counsels and reflections that it would 
 have been a privilege to listen to, I would have gladly 
 gone. But there was nothing but the same dry, threshed 
 straw, Sunday after Sunday, till the dust of its chaff got 
 into my throat and stifled me. He had not even lived 
 enough to know the meaning of any life, let alone that 
 of the great moral genius whose teachings it was his 
 business to spread. Without capacity enough to doubt, 
 he dared to speak of those deep painful experiences of 
 every thoughtful mind with the contempt of shallow 
 ignorance; and at last it became impossible for me to 
 go any more and keep my self-respect. In short, if 
 Abby couldn't be good in my way, I found it just as im- 
 possible for me to be good in her way. We both 
 thrived on a different mental diet. I felt myself in a 
 false position, which grew base the longer I persisted in 
 it, so one Sunday, at the church door, feeling unusually 
 rebellious, and unable to sustain an hour of torture 
 within, I said: 
 
 "Abby, if you like I will stay outside to-day: but I 
 will come for you at the end of the service."
 
 196 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 The quick color surged over her pretty face, and she 
 answered quickly: 
 
 " Yes, yes ; don't stay, and don't wait for me either. 
 There's no need of it; I know the road home just as 
 well as you do." 
 
 We were so dear to each other that we were each 
 conscious of the slightest movement in the fluctuation 
 of feeling between us. I felt that I had wounded her; 
 but before I could answer a word she had disappeared. 
 If I had yielded to my first impulse, I should have fol- 
 lowed her into the church, but some indomitable prin- 
 ciple in me held firm. I knew that, in the long run, 
 the sentiment of liberty and progress was stronger in 
 me than anything else. It was putting on again the 
 swaddling clothes of my infancy to seat myself there, 
 every Sunday. The high-pitched, whining tunes of the 
 hymns, the pompous, nasal drawl from the pulpit, irri- 
 tated every nerve in me. All the best of me was in re- 
 bellion: but to be quite frank, I was very much more 
 unhappy away from Abby, and sure that I had hurt 
 her, this one interminable Sunday morning. Would 
 it never end? I suffered horribly at having made her 
 suffer. I felt something weak and unbalanced in me, 
 something that hurt me with an intensity far out of 
 all proportion to the cause. I trembled like a child 
 when, at last, I saw her appear at the church door, 
 and hastened forward in joy. But she held her little 
 head very high; her cheeks were flaming; her eyes 
 sparkling, and her whole air was very different from 
 what it usually was. She saw me, but quickly turned 
 her eyes away, and tried to avoid me; but I was at her 
 side in a moment. She feigned great surprise at see- 
 ing me, and said, in a cool, unnatural way: 
 
 " Why 1 is it you? I thought you had gone back 
 home." 
 
 " No ! no ! and Abby, you didn't think anything of 
 the kind. You knew that I was hanging around here 
 like a whipped cur, miserable without you."
 
 TRYING TO KEEP STEP TOGETHER 197 
 
 We were walking rapidly in order to escape the crowd. 
 Besides, it was quite chilly: for it was a raw, gray day 
 in December, and the trees, stripped of their leaves, 
 were whipped to and fro in a sharp wind. 
 
 " And why," she asked, raising her eyes for the first 
 time to look at me, " why should you be miserable with- 
 out me?" 
 
 " Because I had hurt you. No, little girl, don't deny 
 it. You and I must always speak the truth to one an- 
 other. Unless we do, we shall be a thousand miles 
 apart, though as near together as we are now. Take 
 my arm, please: we shall walk more easily arm in arm 
 in this strong wind. There ! that's better, isn't it? Now, 
 confess to me, like a good girl. I did hurt you, didn't 
 I? And I am sorry for it." 
 
 " Yes," she said, " and I was wrong to feel hurt ; 
 but how does it happen that I am so sensitive with re- 
 gard to you? I never used to be like that, but a word 
 from you, no, not even a word, just a look, a little ab- 
 sent-minded or cold, cuts me to the heart, wounds me 
 horribly : and I begin to imagine all sorts of silly things. 
 Yes, I know they're silly: but I can't help it no, I 
 can't help it for the life of me. I say to myself, ' I am 
 in his way. He is tired of me. Far from being neces- 
 sary to him, I am an inconvenience. I keep him from 
 enjoying his books and his thoughts; he would like me 
 to go away ' ; and then I get so unhappy, so very un- 
 happy." 
 
 I heard a sob : the tears were rolling down her cheeks. 
 A strange joy seized me, an intoxication of gaiety. 
 
 " My little one, my little pet," I said, patting the hand 
 that rested so lightly on my arm, " you make the joy 
 of my life. Without you, I should have no light, no 
 warmth. I wonder now how I ever found these woods 
 habitable without you, or could content myself with 
 books alone, for companionship. You are more to me 
 than anything else in the world. Don't forget that, even 
 if I shouldn't say it to you every day. But under-
 
 198 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 stand me well. I can't be you. I can't at forty, think 
 the thoughts of a young girl in her twenties. You find 
 your food and drink, where I should die of hunger and 
 thirst; and you must bear with me, if I cannot live on 
 a rose-bud and a drop of dew. I need bread and meat. 
 It is not my fault. Nature made me so. And I do not 
 ask you to be one whit different from what you are 
 and least of all should I like you to resemble me. I 
 shouldn't find the same charm in you if you were an 
 echo of myself. Let us respect these differences be- 
 tween us. I am satisfied with you. Try to be con- 
 tent with me as I am." 
 
 " Content with you ! " she repeated, wiping the tears 
 from her eyes. " Oh, I am only too content with you, 
 and that is my great happiness, and my great mis- 
 fortune. Be patient with me. I don't know myself 
 any more ! Ah ! how fine that wind is ! It does me good 
 to hear it rage like that. Don't you like these tempests, 
 sometimes, in which you seem to feel a soul that an- 
 swers to your own ? " 
 
 "What! Do you mean that there is anything like 
 that rage in you, little girl? If so, then I don't know 
 you any more, either." 
 
 "No? I am getting wicked, am I not? Oh, I felt 
 so wicked in church this morning. Let's stop here a 
 moment." We had entered the edge of the wood. " Lis- 
 ten how the wind roars among the trees, magnificent, 
 isn't it? Now, I understand you and your Burns. This 
 is better than a sermon. If I should become capable 
 of getting what you do out of these things, would it 
 please you better ? " 
 
 There was in her voice, her look, her gesture some- 
 thing so wild and excited, that my pleasure in her emo- 
 tion changed to pity. I saw at once that I had to do 
 with an exaggerated sensibility, which might easily be- 
 come morbid and give rise to painful misunderstand- 
 ings between two creatures capable of giving each other 
 the purest joy. Young, over-sensitive, romantic, she
 
 TRYING TO KEEP STEP TOGETHER 199 
 
 could not explain a difference of tastes except in terms 
 of repugnance. She was content with nothing less than 
 a complete harmony between us, on all possible subjects. 
 She suffered at the least appearance of discord between 
 us. If I read in her presence, she felt it a tacit reproach 
 to herself for not being as interesting as the book. Like 
 the poplar that trembles in the still air, as if a tempest 
 were raging, her sensitive nerves vibrated even to the 
 merest suggestion of indifference in me. I recalled this 
 trait of over-sensitiveness in her mother, and knew how 
 it had embittered some of the sweetest experiences of her 
 life. I determined if possible, gently but firmly, to make 
 her feel how cruel unnecessary suffering is, and how 
 essential it is to our comfort to. accept things which 
 we cannot change: and persistently dwell on what is 
 cheerful and happy in our lives rather than on what 
 is painful. And as for those who turn their sunshine 
 into gloom, I meant to tell her that they merit the ter- 
 rible sarcasm of Dante, who portrays them in his In- 
 ferno fixed in black slime, because they were sad and 
 sluggish in the sweet air cheered by the sun: 
 
 " Tristi fummo 
 
 Nell' aer dolce che dal sol s'allegra, 
 Portando dentro accidioso fummo: 
 Or ci attristiam nella belletta negra." 
 
 I knew myself well enough to recognize that beneath 
 all ebullitions of sensibility, there was in me something 
 positive, ineradicable, destined to survive them, and that 
 if I weakened now, we were lost. I believed, too, that 
 deep within her nature, there was an inextinguishable 
 persistent need, that of taking refuge from the crosses 
 of life in faith in an ever present and inexhaustible 
 divine love. Upon this subject, we must clearly under- 
 stand one another. I knew now, without the shadow of 
 a doubt, that this great solicitude to please me, this fear 
 of tiring me, came from a genuine affection that would
 
 200 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 be either our felicity, or our torment; for there is no 
 joy like that of a generous, fearless love; no torment 
 more unendurable than that of a nagging, jealous, petty 
 love, always doubting, always needing to be reassured, 
 tormenting itself in a thousand foolish ways, content 
 neither with renunciation nor possession. 
 
 Accustomed to indifference, having lived so long 
 among strangers that I accepted mere courtesies with 
 gratitude, and was content with toleration, I was in- 
 tensely grateful for this warm young affection that had 
 come into my life. But I did not wish it to enter a 
 crisis, whence it must come out mutilated, scarred with 
 suspicions and dissensions. I dreamed of a tranquil love, 
 a sky eternally blue, without the shadow of a cloud. 
 Yes, I was guilty of that folly; I, a mature man, who 
 thought that I knew the human heart to its innermost 
 fold; I, who knew what it was to suffer from loving 
 too well. 
 
 In proportion as Abby lost her coolness, I acquired 
 it, and began to reason quietly with her. 
 
 " Abby, answer me frankly. Let us conceal nothing 
 from each other. We have been living under the same 
 roof about six months. Have you been happy with me? 
 Now, don't answer to please me. You could not wrong 
 me more than that." 
 
 " Happy ! " she repeated with emphasis. " That seems 
 a poor little word to express the perfect joy that I feel 
 with you. But" she plucked a long grass stalk, as 
 she talked, and bent and broke it nervously " it is a 
 joy that is mingled with anxiety. I am fearing always 
 to lose it, to displease you in some way, tire you, and 
 not for all the world would I do that." 
 
 She turned her face away from me, and we recom- 
 menced our walk in the wind among the fallen leaves 
 and dead twigs ; black clouds were flying above our 
 heads, and now and then the harsh caw of a crow 
 was heard. 
 
 " I understand that perfectly," I said. " This is
 
 TRYING TO KEEP STEP TOGETHER 201 
 
 the first time in your life that you have lived intimately 
 with a stranger; for that is what I really was to you, 
 when you came." 
 
 " No," she answered quickly, glancing up at me, as 
 she lifted her hand to hold down the brim of her hat. 
 " You were never a stranger to me, from the first mo- 
 ment that I saw you, but you weren't my uncle." 
 
 "Who was I, then?" 
 
 " I don't know. Someone whom I had always 
 known, but from whom I had been separated a long 
 time." 
 
 " Well, little girl, if you know me so well, you ought 
 to know, also, that it is impossible for you to tire me, 
 or to vex me. But you might make me unhappy, if I 
 saw you unhappy; but in no other way. It is true that 
 I can't see everything with your eyes, and it would be 
 a miracle if I could, for my eyes are many years older, 
 and the eyes of a man, not of a young woman. Life 
 had commenced to teach me before you were born, and 
 do you think that I stopped at those early lessons to 
 stagnate and grow old? I hope not. I hope I have still 
 some few inches of mental growth left me before I die. 
 And you, dear, you have also your apprenticeship to 
 serve in life. You have only well commenced, and here 
 you are, in haste to strip off your pretty illusions and 
 see things in gray, and not rose any more. Believe me, 
 that isn't wise. Let the years do that. They do it quite 
 fast enough without any help. Keep intact in yourself, 
 as long as possible, this pretty souvenir of my own 
 youth. If you can't do it, if you are wretched, because 
 you can't become my echo, or because I can't roll the 
 years from my shoulders, I shall think myself poor com- 
 pany for you, and that we must look for a better com- 
 rade among the young people of the village." 
 
 " No, no don't say that please. You don't know 
 how much you hurt me, when you think that I am 
 not satisfied with you." 
 
 " Yes, don't you see that works both ways ? "
 
 202 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 " I wouldn't have you a day younger," she contin- 
 ued, heedless of my interruption, " not a day. You are 
 exactly right as you are, and I see that I am foolish 
 and ungrateful to be over-sensitive. It is just a little 
 weakness in me, George, which you must forgive, and 
 to prove to you that I mean to cure myself of it, I 
 shall go to church alone in future; and I shall be sat- 
 isfied with knowing you are at home, thinking, perhaps, 
 once in a while of me, and who knows, sometimes 
 wishing for me, maybe." 
 
 " There is no ' maybe ' about it, Abby. I always 
 wish for you when you are not with me; and I wasn't 
 using an extravagant term when I said that I was mis- 
 erable without you, this morning. I really was; and 
 I was so impatient for the sermon to end. You have 
 come to mean a great part of my life, little girl." 
 
 " Really ? " she said, putting her small hand into mine. 
 " Come, run with me a little : how happy you make me ! 
 I love this wind, don't you? What music it makes 
 among the trees, and how the leaves rustle under our 
 feet ! What makes us love that noise ? Really, I am still 
 a child. Come ! " We started to run together, until 
 by a brusque movement of her hand, she stopped me. 
 
 " Enough ! Enough ! " she cried. " I am all out of 
 breath." Then after a short silence: 
 
 " Did you know my father ? " 
 
 " No. I only saw him twice. I remember that he 
 was an artist, and that he fell in love with your mother 
 the first time that he saw her." 
 
 " I adored my father, even when I knew that his 
 neglect made my mother unhappy. He was so very 
 handsome, very distinguished looking: but do you know 
 that with him, too, I was always fearful of giving of- 
 fense, or being in the way. Now, I loved my mother, 
 but in a different sort of way. My father traveled a 
 great deal, and we were years and years alone together. 
 And I knew her as I know myself. And then I was 
 necessary to her, for she was an invalid. I had to think
 
 TRYING TO KEEP STEP TOGETHER 203 
 
 and plan for her and spare her anxiety. I had no time 
 to think of myself. But with you, I have no cares, 
 no anxieties; and so I have had to make myself some, 
 I suppose. I have heard, haven't you, of people who 
 are never happy unless they are miserable? Poor 
 Mother! I remember father's saying that to her, one 
 day. Do you know, I really think she grieved herself 
 to death about him, and that he was rarely out of her 
 mind. It is cruel to love like that, isn't it? so very 
 cruel! One day, not long before her death, she said 
 to me : ' I've been thinking over my life while lying 
 here, and there is one thing in it that I deeply regret.' 
 ' Mamma/ I answered, ' yon have never done any- 
 thing in your life that you need to regret.' ' Yes, my 
 daughter,' she replied. ' I regret that I ever married 
 your father/ ' Why, mamma ! mamma ! ' I cried, ' that 
 means that you regret me, too me, who would do any- 
 thing in the world for you/ She put her hand on mine, 
 her eyes full of tears. ' My daughter, I bought you at 
 the price of great suffering/ ' And I am not worth the 
 price, mamma ? ' I said. She smiled at me so sweetly, 
 so reassuringly. She must have been very pretty as a 
 girl, for at that moment she was beautiful. ' Yes, you 
 are worth the price. Marriage with all its degradations, 
 all its cruel disillusionments and humiliations, has one 
 pearl motherhood/ " 
 
 "Yes," I answered, "your mother was right, Abby. 
 Marriage means the family. It is the children who 
 bring the magnificent word duty into a man's life. So 
 far as my experience goes, love between men and women 
 isn't a particularly noble sentiment, in spite of all the 
 noble things that are said about it. It is very often 
 nothing but the doubling of a man's egotism, and I 
 am not sure that egotism in pairs is much better than 
 egotism in one. I have known men to be false to the 
 commonest sentiments of honor and friendship to flat- 
 ter their self-love in the love of a woman." 
 
 " George, I don't like to hear you talk like that.
 
 204 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 Can it be possible that you, too, have a skeleton in the 
 closet?" 
 
 I laughed. 
 
 " No, no, my girl. I have no skeleton, if you mean 
 by that some grief that has ossified instead of dissipating 
 with time. I have had my griefs, bitter ones, too; who 
 hasn't ? but they have been to me what these dead leaves 
 will be to the trees from which they fall. The soil that 
 furnishes them their nourishment will be only the richer 
 for them." 
 
 " Then there is a chemistry of life, an assimilation 
 of sorrow and pain and a transformation of it into fruits 
 and flowers? It is good to remember that. George, 
 did you ever think of getting married ? " 
 
 " Never." 
 
 " But you do you " she stammered and was si- 
 lent. 
 
 I burst out laughing and repeated her words in her 
 manner, adding : " Ah ha ! little girl, you want to find 
 out all my secrets, whether I ever loved a woman, 
 whether I can love again, and all sorts of things, eh ? " 
 
 " Yes. I should like to know you^ tlnrough and 
 through." 
 
 " And do you remember what happened once to a 
 woman who wanted to know too much ? " 
 
 " Yes, she lost herself, and all the human race." 
 
 " And that doesn't frighten you a bit ? " 
 
 " Not the least in the world." 
 
 " But it does me, and I shan't let you run any such 
 risk. Be content with knowing that I haven't found 
 the woman, yet, who would be content to walk with 
 me through the solitudes of life: even you, little girl, 
 won't stay with me very long. One of these fine days, 
 you will be discovering that you have wings, and you'll 
 be flying away to build your nest elsewhere." 
 
 " Never ; never ! Oh, how you vex me when you talk 
 like that, even in jest! How little, how very little you 
 know me."
 
 TRYING TO KEEP STEP TOGETHER 205 
 
 " Do I, really ? Very well, then I shall believe in you, 
 until " 
 
 " There is no until don't you remember telling me 
 one day not to darken to-day's sunshine with to-mor- 
 row's clouds? Well, then here you are at that, and 
 to-day to-day is ours." 
 
 "You are right, dear, to-day is ours: we'll let to- 
 morrow take care of itself." 
 
 But in spite of that declaration, I couldn't help busy- 
 ing myself with the future; not on my own account, 
 but on hers. Here was a young girl who had come to 
 give me the blossom-time of her life, and I could not 
 think of her solitary old age without an indescribable 
 sadness. Would this passionate young heart, feeling 
 the need to love and be loved, content itself with the 
 tranquil affection that united us? Wouldn't the day 
 come, sooner or later, when she would repent having 
 come, and feel that she had buried her activities instead 
 of finding a healthy outlet for them? If if Oh, these 
 thousand ifs of a cruel fate no, I did not finish the 
 vague thought that troubled me. I resolved to do vio- 
 lence to my distaste for what is so prettily called 'so- 
 cial life,' and put between us the distraction of new 
 faces. This dual solitude was becoming too dear to us, 
 absorbing us too much. I threw my doors wide open, 
 I invited all the most interesting young people of the vil- 
 lage, the school-master, the school-mistress, the beaux 
 and belles of the village and the country, round about; 
 and I did my best to amuse them, and to create a solid 
 bond of union between her and these young people, 
 so eager to receive her into their circle. But when in- 
 vitations began to rain on her, she refused them all 
 on some pretext or other.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 A FIRE-SIDE CHAT 
 
 ONE fine January night Abby had just refused a 
 sleigh-ride. The moon was at its full, the snow in fine 
 condition, and it was the young school-master whom 
 she had sent away with the excuse that her head ached 
 badly. 
 
 When the door was closed, and we were sitting once 
 more before the fire-place, I said to her: 
 
 " Abby, why didn't you tell me that you were suffer- 
 ing?" 
 
 She covered her face with her hands, and laughed 
 merrily. Then removing them, and showing a face as 
 rosy as the blaze from the hearth that lighted it, she 
 said: 
 
 " No, don't scold me, please. I haven't the least bit 
 of a headache in the world. I have told a deliberate 
 lie, but I really think that there are some lies which 
 are better than the truth. I couldn't say to him, frankly, 
 ' No, I will not go with you, because I would a thousand 
 times rather stay at home.' That would have wounded 
 his self-love quite unnecessarily. And what good would 
 have come from sacrificing my pleasures to go with 
 him? To have done that would have been to lie more 
 seriously than I did. That would have been saying that 
 I preferred his society to yours; and what an unpar- 
 donably monstrous lie that would have been. I could 
 never have forgiven myself for that lie, and I can 
 really forgive myself for the other. It was forced on 
 me. And then, you you really wouldn't have liked 
 me to leave you all alone here, now would you? Say 
 ' no ' quickly and very emphatically, please, do, George, 
 and then I won't have anything to forgive myself for." 
 
 206
 
 A FIRE-SIDE CHAT 207 
 
 " But, my pet, if it gave you any pleasure to go, I 
 should willingly stay alone with my " 
 
 " Books ! Oh, you are so horribly good and polite. 
 I would give anything on earth to see you frown, and 
 hear you say with disgust and spitef ulness : ' Abby, 
 chase away all those cursed idiots that come to disturb 
 us. Let us return to our tranquil, solitary life, so full 
 of charm/ 
 
 "Haven't you felt as I do, George, that our home 
 for the past few weeks hasn't been a home, but a pub- 
 lic house? Oh, you are a charming host. You know 
 how to shine, in making others shine. All the young 
 girls about here are madly in love with you; and you 
 seem so perfectly unconscious of it, that I really can't 
 be sure whether you really are, or whether you pretend. 
 Really, I feel it to be an indelicate intrusion to come 
 near you, when Miss Thompson is with you. She al- 
 ways seems to be on the point of making you a declara- 
 tion. She besieges me to have news of you. Your name 
 is forever on her lips. She is so glad that I have come, 
 not only on my own account, but to give people a 
 chance to know you. You have always been admired, 
 countless efforts have been made to draw you from 
 your solitude, but in vain. I have come to save you 
 to deliver you over to society: and while she keeps on 
 like that I get colder and silenter, until some day I 
 am sure I shall quite freeze up, and you'll have to throw 
 me into the fire-place to thaw me out. But she doesn't 
 take the least notice of it. Oh, no. Provided she scan 
 have your name on her lips, she is in an ecstasy, and 
 sees nothing whatever that is going on around her. It is 
 perfectly disgusting. And when I think that it's I who 
 have led you into all that ! " 
 
 I threw back my head; and the room rang with my 
 laughter. 
 
 " Abby ! Abby ! are you jealous of Miss Thompson ? " 
 
 "Jealous!" she repeated scornfully, and her eyes 
 sparkled like diamonds. " What an absurdity ! One
 
 208 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 can't be jealous of one's inferiors ; and she is a thousand 
 leagues below me. You can't be jealous of fleas and 
 flies; but you can loathe them, and wish to get rid of 
 them or crush them." 
 
 " You little savage ! Where have you been hiding all 
 that rage, of which I hadn't the least suspicion ? " 
 
 " Yes, I am dreadful, am I not ? but listen, dear 
 George: let's talk straight from the heart again, as we 
 did that Sunday in the woods; do you remember?" 
 
 " Perfectly. But do we ever talk in any other way 
 to each other? " 
 
 " Yes, when our actions are not in harmony with 
 our will. Answer me frankly without any buts, or any 
 allusions whatever to me. Do you like this bustling of 
 people around you ? " 
 
 I frowned, I stretched my legs out towards the fire, 
 throwing my body back into my chair, joined the ends 
 of my fingers, holding them before my mouth, and 
 thought awhile, looking steadily into the fire. I could 
 feel that she was watching me intently. 
 
 " Now, frankly, remember," she repeated. 
 
 I slowly shook my head and answered, " No." 
 
 " Good ! Good ! " she cried, clapping her hands and 
 then gently patted my head. " There is one thing I 
 like best of all in you, you really won't lie, when you 
 are put on your honor. Now for another question. 
 Do you think 7 like it?" 
 
 " I don't know ! " 
 
 "George! You know I just praised you for not ly- 
 ing. Now, try again." 
 
 " Well, I wanted to know whether you would or not." 
 
 " That's an evasion. Once more : come now, be 
 brave." 
 
 " I don't think you do." 
 
 " Right ! but you said you wished to find out whether 
 I did or not?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Well, have I shown any particular joy over the 
 change in our way of life ? "
 
 A FIRE-SIDE CHAT 209 
 
 " Not any delirious joy that I can see, but I may be 
 blind." 
 
 " No, you are not, except to Miss Thompson's inten- 
 tions to captivate you. But for fear you are not 
 wholly enlightened about my sentiments, I want to tell 
 you exactly how I feel. If I have led you to think 
 that I have welcomed all these people, or have even re- 
 ceived them with so mild a feeling as indifference, I 
 have done wrong. No, it is rather a great grief that 
 I feel, when I think that we, who really care for each 
 other we do, don't we?" 
 
 I pressed tenderly the hand that she had slipped into 
 mine. 
 
 " Yes, we do. I shouldn't even have asked that ques- 
 tion: well, we who care for each other, surround our- 
 selves by people that we don't care for. Evening after 
 evening we are separated; and listen, dear George, it 
 is only you who are necessary to me. I don't need all 
 these young people. You are youth and joy to me. 
 How is it that I have been so mute, that I couldn't 
 find a voice to make you understand that? It is humil- 
 iating to have to say it so flatly, so plainly, but it must 
 be said. We can't go on wickedly wasting our short 
 hours in this way. I should like to make you feel it, 
 as I feel when I please, or when I wound you : for I do 
 wound you at times. I see that you are afraid of losing 
 me. Yes, let me say it, although it sounds so horribly 
 egotistic. You are afraid of these few foolish years 
 which separate us, according to you, but which to me 
 seem rather to bring us closer together; for I need 
 this richer life of yours to broaden mine, I am so poor 
 in thought that I need to draw from your surplus store. 
 I know exactly what you have been thinking to your- 
 self. You've been saying: It is wrong and selfish of 
 me to shut her away from those of her age. I shall 
 be generous. I shall surround her with the young and 
 give her the distractions which she needs. Tell me, 
 didn't you say all that to yourself ? " 
 
 " Yes."
 
 210 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 " There. You see that I know you perfectly. Why 
 is it that you don't know me so well? Am I a hypo- 
 crite? Do I say one thing and mean another? I should 
 like to live in a desert with you, just to be all to you, 
 as you are to me. I never tire of you; never, never, 
 dearest." 
 
 Her voice had grown soft and low, and I felt the tears 
 back of it. What could I do? I believed her. I put 
 aside my fears. I let her know that she, too, was all 
 the society that I needed. I said to myself: Accept 
 the day, live in it, to-morrow isn't yours. When it 
 comes, let it settle its own affairs. And we were happy 
 again. This chaste love in which we held the senses 
 chained by a stern respect was very beautiful; but it 
 was contrary to nature. It was fated to end, but I 
 cannot regret the sweet experience of our life together 
 in which the days slipped away like hours and the months 
 like days; in which the separation during the hours of 
 repose renewed us for each other and kept away satiety. 
 She never wearied me a moment. I had with her a 
 feeling of perfect harmony, a sense of completion, very 
 different from the tumultuous ecstasy of the love of my 
 youth. 
 
 But she hadn't, with me, the same tranquil happiness. 
 There were days when she seemed to avoid me, and 
 busy herself with things in which I could take no part. 
 But these days were followed by days of expansion 
 and thoughtless gaiety; and I said to myself, this is 
 what is called feminine caprice; and I took good care 
 not to speak of her moods, believing that it encourages 
 them to take notice of them. There were days when 
 I was sure that she was perfectly happy. She came 
 and went about the house with the lightness of a bird. 
 She laughed, joked, and teased me, with the pretty co- 
 quetry of a woman. I have but to close my eyes to 
 see her before me, as she was then. 
 
 She loved color, and in winter wore, by preference, 
 some soft wool of a rich, deep red. " It is the color of
 
 A FIRE-SIDE CHAT 211 
 
 life" she said to me one day and, indeed, she seemed 
 to warm and vivify everything by her presence. But 
 in summer a pale blue or soft pink were her favorite 
 colors ; but she liked also to wear white, in which I pre- 
 ferred to see her. The soft, white skin that flushed so 
 quickly, the delicate, pure features, the little mouth, 
 the well-shaped head, with its abundant hair, seemed to 
 be brought out in stronger relief by white than by any 
 color. 
 
 She saw my pleasure in her beauty, and often con- 
 sulted me about what she should wear. 
 
 " Do you wish me to put on my blue dress or my 
 white one ? Do you like this hat ? " 
 
 I have no coldness in my answers for which to re- 
 proach myself. To put a cold, flabby hand into a firm, 
 warm one, whose pressure betrays the pulsations of the 
 heart; to stare with a wooden face at another face that 
 smiles; to repulse with a harsh word the sweet word 
 love, are not offences that can ever be charged to me. 
 
 I remember, one day, when she had pleased me and 
 I had told her so, she turned quickly towards me, hold- 
 ing out her hand and saying: 
 
 " How I thank you for saying that to me. It makes 
 me so sure of you, and I need to feel sure. Do you 
 think me the silliest creature in the world to care so 
 much about pleasing you?" 
 
 " No, we ought both of us to care about pleasing the 
 other. I have only you, and you say you wish only 
 me." 
 
 " Yes, I wish only you, no one but you." 
 
 I believe that she was sincere when she said it. I 
 will be just to her. I will say here, that whatever I 
 may have had to reproach her with, later, I cannot, in 
 this one short year of happiness with her, recall a single 
 serious fault in her; and I am deeply grateful to her 
 for that happiness.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 STORM AND STRESS 
 
 ANOTHER summer had rolled round again. We were 
 In the first part of July. The weather was unusually 
 warm and dry. I had ceased accompanying Abby to 
 church, and usually gave my Sunday mornings to seri- 
 ous reading and study. She had now charge of a Sun- 
 day-school class, and went away earlier, so that I had 
 almost the whole morning to myself. About haff an 
 hour before she was due at the house, I very nearly 
 always started out to meet her, so that we had a walk 
 home together. 
 
 One sultry Sunday morning she had left me as usual, 
 waving her hand at the last turn in the path before she 
 disappeared among the trees. I went back into the 
 house with a smile on my lips, reflecting on my hap- 
 piness with her. I passed in review all the little scenes 
 of my life with her, and suddenly, I cannot tell how it 
 came over me, any more than I can solve any other of 
 the great mysteries of life, but I knew that love, not in 
 its sweetness, its tranquility, its security, had come into 
 my life, but love in all its passionate desire, its bitter- 
 ness, its renunciation. And I knew that she, too, loved 
 me with the love that is cruel. I had become in a mo- 
 ment clairvoyant. This was the meaning of her moods, 
 her caprices. A wicked joy thrilled me. She should 
 be mine. There were countries in Europe, Germany, 
 for example, where marriage between an uncle and a 
 niece is recognized by law. Morality is, after all, only a 
 question of geography. By an accident, we belonged to 
 a country that said no, where Germany said yes. Was 
 it right to immolate our happiness, because we hap- 
 pened to be born in one country, rather than in an- 
 
 aia
 
 STORM AND STRESS 213 
 
 other? But could I make her believe that? Could I 
 break down the prejudice which I knew would make 
 her feel it a crime to be my wife? I rushed out of 
 doors; I wanted the free air to think in. A prairie 
 lark soaring over my head broke into song. I threw 
 myself on the grass, buried my head in my arms, and 
 sobbed like a child. I was a man, but my heart was still 
 young, unwithered by vice, my conscience quick. I 
 felt the sophistry of my reasoning, dictated by desire. 
 Could I make of my heart a nest of serpents? Could 
 I wake every morning with a new lie on my lips to 
 assuage the stings of her conscience? Could I delib- 
 erately kill in myself the power to feel all these vivid 
 impersonal joys which nature gave me the bird-song, 
 the limpid azure of the sky, the wild flower's grace 
 should I ever know them again? Should I stray in the 
 forest and along the banks of streams, with the mark 
 of Cain on my forehead, because I had murdered inno- 
 cence? The cynic, the man of the world, would laugh 
 at these confessions. To him, with his sensibilities 
 dulled, or extinguished in vice, these words would seem 
 childish and silly; but in me the fervid noon sun had 
 not yet dried up the dew of the dawn. 
 
 All at once I felt the wind blowing, and large drops 
 of rain falling. I rose from the ground and hurried 
 into the house. The sky was black with clouds, and 
 heavy peals of thunder rent the air. I looked at my 
 watch. Abby must have entered the wood by this time. 
 She had taken only her parasol with her, and wore a 
 thin, white muslin. I seized her rain-cloak and a large 
 umbrella, and hastened away to meet her. I felt like 
 an honest man again, and resolved to comport myself 
 like one. I felt that a caress from me, a touch of the 
 hand was no longer innocent, v/hile this fire burned in 
 my veins; and that the more intensely I loved her, the 
 colder I was in duty bound to appear. But my heart 
 beat so wildly that it seemed to me that all Concealment 
 of my weakness was impossible.
 
 2i 4 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 The rain came on heavily, and the wind blew so hard 
 that I could not keep the umbrella open. I had not 
 walked above a quarter of an hour, when I heard some 
 one laugh back of a group of pines, where the pathway 
 made a turn to the left. It was Abby's laugh. I would 
 have recognized it among a hundred voices; something 
 so youthful, sunny and full of cheer in it. 
 
 " Here I am," I cried, hastening my steps to meet 
 her. 
 
 Yes, it was she; but she was not alone. There was 
 a man with her, who had taken off his coat to put it 
 around her shoulders. He was leaning over her, hold- 
 ing an umbrella. She had taken his arm and was 
 looking at him and laughing, when I came upon them; 
 and it was he, not she, who saw me first. We recog- 
 nized each other immediately. It was McKenzie. I 
 felt my face redden in a fit of anger mingled with fear, 
 like that which one might feel in seeing a lamb in the 
 power of a wolf. 
 
 He was the first to speak with his accustomed air 
 of polite ease that gave his manners a certain distinc- 
 tion. 
 
 " Good-afternoon, Mr. Graham. You are a little too 
 late; but, you see, I have been taking as good care of 
 your niece as was possible, under the circumstances." 
 
 I remembered that the first time we met we had ad- 
 dressed each other as if we had just parted. So we did 
 to-day; as if the three years of our separation had been 
 but a few hours. It never occurred to me to say: 
 " Where did you come from ? " and " How are you ? " 
 I accepted his presence as an habitual thing, and re- 
 plied : 
 
 " Thank you. I have brought her cloak ; you can take 
 back your coat." 
 
 He took the cloak from my hands, and quickly re- 
 moving his coat, replaced it by her own mantle. 
 
 And Abby laughed and thanked him with effusion, 
 adding :
 
 STORM AND STRESS 215 
 
 "And you must go home with us for dinner. Mr. 
 McKenzie has told me that you are old friends, George. 
 What a pleasure it must be to you to see each other 
 again." 
 
 " Well, I can answer for myself that it is," he re- 
 plied graciously. 
 
 I felt forced to second the invitation to dinner; but 
 I avoided the question of pleasure, and we resumed our 
 road together, with this difference, that it was I who 
 conducted Abby, her arm drawn through mine. 
 
 With the intuition that serves a woman instead of 
 reason, she saw my displeasure, and wishing to conceal 
 it from McKenzie, chattered like a bird all the way 
 home. 
 
 " I knew very well you would be anxious about me 
 when the sky began to look threatening, and although 
 I was asked to stop with the McLeods, I wouldn't have 
 done it for anything. I knew that at the worst I could 
 only get thoroughly wet. And what is a little clean rain- 
 water, when you can put on dry clothes at home. Then 
 I was sure you would venture out in the storm to meet 
 me. But, really, I had counted on a storm much less 
 violent. I had just taken refuge under that great tree 
 to wait the end of the heaviest shower, when all at once 
 your friend appeared. Where from? I don't know. 
 The clouds, perhaps. He asked me where I was 
 going, too, and I learned that he was an old friend of 
 yours. Of course, that was introduction enough, and I 
 felt quite at home with him immediately. Do you know 
 that he is very much like you? I don't mean in ap- 
 pearance, exactly, but there is something in him that 
 reminds me of you." 
 
 " No," I said brusauely. " We do not at all resemble 
 each other." 
 
 " But excuse me," she persisted, " I think you do. 
 You both love solitude, you both came here to make 
 your home among these rocks and trees." 
 
 " But you forget that I didn't come here with a family ;
 
 216 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 and that for him a wife and children helped to people 
 the deserted places." 
 
 " Oh," said Abby, turning round quickly and address- 
 ing McKenzie, who was following at a little distance 
 behind us. " You have a family, Mr. McKenzie ? " 
 
 " I had one, Miss Crawford. I have no longer 
 a family." 
 
 " I beg your pardon," she answered with an accent 
 of sympathy, and she pressed my arm, as a mute sign 
 of regret at having opened a wound. And I, who 
 knew so well his ideas about women and marriage, did 
 not doubt for a moment that he had abandoned them; 
 but, of course, I could not utter my suspicion just then. 
 Certainly, he did not look like a man upon whose head 
 had fallen one of those cruel blows of fate that age 
 more than years do. Never had I seen him look better. 
 Where had he been? What had he been doing? Why 
 had he come back? These were the questions that an- 
 noyed me during the walk home. He seemed sincerely 
 glad to see, again, this wood which he had so often 
 scoured, and took pains to show me that he was glad 
 to see me, too. 
 
 " I have really missed you," he said. " There are so 
 few people with whom one can exchange a few reason- 
 able words, and the mind needs to stretch its legs, as 
 well as the body. How often I have thought of those 
 long winter evenings, when we used to talk to each 
 other, as if we were thinking aloud." 
 
 " How I should like to have been a quiet listener, 
 there," said Abby with enthusiasm. 
 
 I did not know what to say. He had disarmed me 
 with flattery; the secret anger which consumed me 
 began to abate a little, and I could even give him a 
 decent welcome into the house. The rain had ceased by 
 this time, but we were dripping wet, and our first care 
 was to change our clothes. I lent McKenzie a light 
 gray suit which fitted him admirably, and caused Abby 
 to say:
 
 STORM AND STRESS 217 
 
 " There ! didn't I tell you that you were alike ? " 
 
 What fixed idea was this which she had got into her 
 head, of finding us alike? It annoyed me excessively. 
 
 While she was changing her clothes, taking more 
 time to it than we had taken, he had conversed amica- 
 bly with me, feigning not to notice or, it may be, not 
 really seeing, my hostile attitude towards him. 
 
 " Of any other man than you," he said facetiously, 
 " I should refuse to believe this story of uncle and 
 niece, and would congratulate you on finding a com- 
 panion so amiable and so pretty. I am not sure that 
 she couldn't reawaken in me the belief in a felicity 
 a deux, and you know I am skeptical to the last degree 
 on such a probability. But she has such a sweet little 
 taking air with her. Just the sort of woman one would 
 like to pet." 
 
 I reddened with anger, and might have replied of- 
 fensively had not Abby appeared at this moment. 
 Never had I seen her look prettier. She had changed 
 her white dress for a delicate blue, and her sweet face 
 was aglow with health and happiness. She had the air 
 of a woman confident that she pleased, an expression 
 unusual with her. 
 
 In a few moments she had prepared a delicious cold 
 lunch for us and presided at the table with charming 
 grace, smiling, laughing, talking pretty nonsense, full 
 of unconscious coquetry. I saw that she fascinated 
 McKenzie. He hardly took his eyes from her. He was 
 transformed into another man full of deference, and 
 prettily turned compliments. 
 
 When he was ready to go, he expressed a lively re- 
 gret at the flight of time, and asked permission of her 
 to come again, adding with inconceivable boldness: 
 
 " I have no need to ask that permission of my old 
 friend, here. I know that, to him, I am always wel- 
 come." 
 
 I made no reply; and when he had gone, Abby ap- 
 proached me, and stroking back my hair, she said:
 
 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 "George, you've been a naughty boy. Why didn't 
 you answer your friend? Are you afraid that I shall 
 think him an intruder, and be jealous of him? Well, I 
 shan't. I am really happy to think that you can have 
 his companionship. He may come every day, if he 
 likes. I shall make a friend of him, too; and we shall 
 be an incomparable trio." 
 
 I drew my head brusquely from beneath her hand, 
 with an ill-humor I could not conceal. 
 
 " You need not cultivate him, on my account, Abby. 
 He greatly exaggerates the extent of our friendship. 
 We tolerated, rather than loved each other; that's about 
 the whole of it. His ideas, his manner of living, are 
 totally different from mine." 
 
 "Yes, I know. He is a family man." 
 
 "Yes, if you call living in common among the In- 
 dians, a family man, he is one. As for me, I don't 
 choose to mingle my blood with that of an inferior race, 
 and to abandon my children when I tire of their 
 mother." 
 
 She flushed scarlet. 
 
 " What ! do you mean to say that he was not mar- 
 ried ? " she asked faintly. 
 
 " And you mean by that, that a clergyman did not 
 consecrate his union with a woman ? " 
 
 " Certainly, there is no real marriage without such 
 a consecration." 
 
 " I am not so sure of that." 
 
 " George ! Please don't talk that way. You make 
 me shudder; besides, it isn't like you. You are a little 
 vexed; and I understand very well why. If I had 
 known that this man was a libertine I should not have 
 received him with so much cordiality. I thought, with 
 my stupid way of leaping to conclusions, that he vas 
 a widower, and that the sight of a friend had been a 
 real joy to him; and I really think it was. He was 
 really very amiable, wasn't he ? I liked him. I thought
 
 STORM AND STRESS 219 
 
 you were alike, and that is why he didn't seem quite a 
 stranger to me." 
 
 This time she came very near me, threw her arm 
 about my neck, and, stooping, kissed my forehead. I 
 was wild with love of her, and this arm about my 
 neck, this fresh face so close to mine, melted all my 
 resolutions as if they had been wax in flame. I trem- 
 bled violently, all my being seemed to melt and flow 
 towards her. 
 
 " My love ! my love ! " I murmured. " You are mine. 
 Tell me that you are wholly mine as long as we two 
 live. What do the words of a priest matter to us, whom 
 a great love has united?" . 
 
 Quick as a flash she had freed herself from my em- 
 brace, and cried out in a voice to which pity and terror 
 gave an unnatural key: 
 
 " O George ! George ! Don't finish what you are go- 
 ing to say. Let me see you always as you really are, 
 a thousand times better and nobler than I, something 
 to which I can raise my eyes in admiration, without 
 offending God, or the most sacred beliefs of my heart. 
 As for myself, I am a poor weak thing, full of wicked 
 thoughts which I battle against with all my might. 
 But you, you are strong. You will be my guide and 
 my guard. You will help me to vanquish myself. Tell 
 me that you will, I beg of you." 
 
 She fell on her knees before me, weeping bitterly, 
 and I could not have harmed a hair of her head. Her 
 sorrow had sobered me. I lifted her gently, and said: 
 
 " Abby, you have nothing more to fear. I forgot 
 myself for a moment. You will forgive me ; but I shall 
 never forgive myself." 
 
 With that I led her to an armchair, and hurriedly left 
 tbe house, tortured with shame, and blinded with pas- 
 sion, unable to see or feel the right. 
 
 I strayed about aimlessly until nightfall ; and returned 
 to the house, dejected and exhausted. I note this ex-
 
 220 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 perience, because it was the beginning of the most de- 
 grading and servile condition of my life. I was no 
 longer the same man; or, rather, all that was base in 
 my nature came to the surface. I became a slave to 
 jealousy, hatred, and one dominant burning desire. But 
 I was so completely under the spell of illusion that it 
 seemed to me that I had never fully lived until now. 
 In the passion of my youth, there had been something 
 exalted, some ever present consciousness of the barrier 
 between myself and the object of my love that chas- 
 tened and subdued desire. But in this passion of my 
 maturity, I felt no barrier but that erected by preju- 
 dice, and I chafed and fretted under it like a passion- 
 ate spoiled child. My sufferings seemed so unnecessary, 
 so useless; for I knew that she, too, loved me. 
 
 That is why she was patience itself with me, during 
 all the feverish agitations, despairs and irritations of this 
 time, growing stronger, as I grew weaker. I cannot 
 recall this period without reddening, as a man must 
 redden when he recalls an attack of acute mania. But 
 it has helped me to sympathize where I might have been 
 harsh; and it has given me the right to speak without 
 feeble sentimentality or criminal indulgence of the most 
 absorbing question in modern social life, the question 
 of the rights of love between man and woman. 
 
 The histories of passion are always the same. We 
 give to its intense egotism and absorbing selfishness, the 
 loftiest names; we idealize our weakness and call it 
 strength, and think that it absolves us from all obliga- 
 tions and duties except what concerns itself, alone. We 
 believe ourselves heroes and heroines, because we can 
 feel; and would set the world on fire to warm our be- 
 loved's fingers. We would make the links of our chains 
 firmer, instead of loosening them; and the heavier they 
 grow, the more we liken them to a garland of flowers. 
 
 I lived through all that; the little became the great, 
 to me; the great, little. I saw, in the most indifferent 
 trifles, causes for joy or chagrin. All the sweet, inno-
 
 STORM AND STRESS 221 
 
 cent, tranquil happiness which I had known with this 
 young girl was gone. McKenzie continued to visit us. 
 I should say visit her. I suffered tortures from his 
 attentions to her, but I was too proud to complain; 
 and I even feigned not to notice the increasing intimacy 
 between them. 
 
 I grew taciturn, moody. Abby questioned me, affec- 
 tionately. I said that I was tired, and I was; for I 
 worked like a galley slave, whipped to my task by this 
 fever of the mind which was consuming me. 
 
 One evening, after having met by chance Abby and 
 McKenzie in town, I was so unhappy that I could not 
 eat a mouthful of the dainty supper which she had pre- 
 pared. I pushed my plate aside, and rose from the 
 table. I was suffocating. She rose also, accompanying 
 me to the door, towards which I was going. 
 
 " You are sick, George," she cried. 
 
 " No, no, not at all. Don't trouble yourself in the 
 least about me." 
 
 "But, where are you going?" 
 
 " Just out for a little walk." 
 
 " I'm going with you." 
 
 " No," I said, turning round to look her full in the 
 face. "I prefer to be alone." 
 
 She put her hand on my arm, and her face twitched 
 nervously. 
 
 " George, you never looked at me like that before, 
 and you shall not leave me in this mood. You are 
 angry with me. Hush " she put her hand on my 
 mouth; and I moved away from her, but stood still 
 to listen to what she was saying. 
 
 " You must not say a word till you have listened 
 to me, George, dearest." Her soft low voice full of 
 feeling made the blood leap in my veins. " It is true, 
 my love. I did make an appointment with him to meet 
 him in town, but it was all for your sake. If you 
 knew how many months I have been thinking how I 
 could give you some pleasant little surprise, give you
 
 222 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 something that you would care for. You are always 
 getting something for me. But I had to have some help, 
 and McKenzie has really been very kind in the matter. 
 And don't ask me anything more about it, just now, 
 for I can't give you the surprise, to-day. But to-morrow, 
 and it won't be but half a surprise, now I've spoken 
 of it, will it? But I can't bear you to keep on think- 
 ing wrong of me." She blushed, she hesitated; and 
 then, in a voice broken with emotion, she continued 
 rapidly : " Do have some pity for me, George, and love 
 me in the sweet tender way you used to love me. You 
 are all my life. I have no thought that isn't yours. I 
 am incapable of thinking of anyone else. I know that 
 you love me, too; and that you have courage for both 
 of us. I am wax in your hands, but you will not break 
 me ; you will mold me into something better than I am ; 
 and, dearest, don't misunderstand me. I should be in- 
 capable of loving you so fully, so fearlessly, if I did not 
 feel in you a moral force stronger than mine. I trust 
 you, sweetheart. I have suffered very much, yes, very, 
 very much ; but not so much now that I know that you 
 love me, too. Yes. I know it, and I see that I have 
 pained you. But have no fear. Never shall another 
 possess my heart. I have consecrated my life to you, 
 and we shall live together as the angels live in heaven, 
 without fear one of the other, and in perfect confidence 
 and love." 
 
 Her face beamed, her eyes hung on me with a look 
 of ecstasy. I believe that she was sincere, even now; 
 and at that time I would have been a knave to doubt 
 her. My heart expanded in the warmth of her affec- 
 tion, as a flower in the sunshine of spring. I cannot 
 speak of the happiness of that hour, succeeding hours 
 of doubt and jealousy. There was something deeply pa- 
 thetic in the abnegation of this love profoundly rooted 
 in nature, yet aspiring to be purely spiritual. And just 
 as words fail me, now, to express the joy of that hour, 
 so they failed me then. I felt my heart swell like a
 
 STORM AND STRESS 223 
 
 mother's over a beloved child, restored to her from the 
 mouth of the tomb. Tears filled my eyes. I pressed 
 her two hands in mine ; and it seemed to me that youth 
 revived in me, in all its purity and enthusiastic ardor, 
 making the most difficult task light and easy. 
 
 When I look back and compare myself at that time 
 with men of the same age to-day, I seem to myself 
 singularly, perhaps ridiculously, ingenuous and young in 
 feeling. But all the quiet events of my solitary and 
 monotonous life for many years, had contributed to- 
 wards keeping me in that state of mind, which we call 
 youthful, or, if you like, poetical. My heart had not 
 been exhausted with venal loves; it was still sensitive, 
 and capable of tenderness and profound feeling. A 
 strong love of nature tends also to keep open the 
 springs of feeling, and I had loved this mute nature 
 about me, without reflection and without restraint, as 
 we love all that is beautiful. 
 
 Therefore, there is not one mature man in a hun- 
 dred who will understand me when I say that I could 
 still believe possible a life of innocent happiness for 
 us, into whose solitude passionate love had entered. 
 
 I know that there is at present a pseudo-scientific way 
 of speaking of man as wholly a product of his envi- 
 ronment, chained to ancestral laws which determine his 
 every action and every thought. This is the modern 
 transformation of the theologian's gloomy dogma of 
 predestination. But that fine unconscious sub-stratum 
 of common sense which saves men from the folly of 
 their conclusions, by directing them in a systematic 
 course of action, diametrically opposed to their beliefs, 
 keeps them moving onward in accordance with the 
 truth, misunderstood and denied, though it may be, that 
 man is not a mere mechanism without any other will 
 than instinct, but is at liberty to follow the highest 
 aspirations of his soul. Otherwise, there is no hope for 
 the race, and we are hopelessly sunk in ancestral slime. 
 
 Man is an animal. Yes; but an animal that reasons,
 
 224 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 that is capable of sacrificing his instincts in obedience 
 to an ethical law, which he recognizes as beautiful and 
 noble. All progress depends on that fact. 
 
 We are no longer living in a state of nature, but in 
 a state conformable to the best development of the 
 intellect, a social state in which each man is in honor 
 and duty bound to contribute what is best in him to 
 maintain order and happiness among the greatest num- 
 ber; and he cannot contribute his best without stifling 
 the worst in him; he cannot make a law of unrestraint 
 for himself, and deny the privileges of it to others, on 
 the score that he is their superior. Who has declared 
 that he is better than they? Himself? The witness is 
 prejudiced. 
 
 I can see this all very clearly to-day, and I have 
 earned the right to say it. 
 
 "Let him not boast who puts his armor on 
 As he who puts it off, the battle done." 
 
 But I saw only one thing clearly then, and that was 
 that I had no right to use any power which I might 
 have over the woman whom I loved, to bring upon her 
 the horrors of an infraction of the civil law, which 
 would have for her the aspect of a crime. The appeal 
 to what was best in me from what was best in her, 
 broke the cruel spell under which I was suffering, and 
 I would have suffered any torture before offending her 
 without provocation, again. Then, too, the sweet con- 
 sciousness that she really did love me, and that I was 
 in no danger of losing her through the intrigues of a 
 man whom I knew to be wholly unworthy of her, re- 
 stored me to myself. I offered her no caress, I would 
 not touch the soft trembling mouth held up to mine, 
 but contented myself with looking at her through a 
 mist of tears, and saying: 
 
 "You make me perfectly happy, my love light of 
 my life. We are not angels, or rather 7 am not one;
 
 STORM AND STRESS 225 
 
 but I am not a devil, either. I respect you, as I respect 
 the memory of my mother; and I will promise you 
 that you will never again hear from me a word that 
 she could not hear, and smile as she heard it. No, no, 
 little one, don't cry. I am just as much ashamed as 
 you are of my folly. I confess, frankly, that I was 
 jealous, miserable as a lover, and I had no right to feel 
 like that. I ought to be glad at whatever makes you 
 happy. And I will try with all my heart to be so. I 
 want no consecration of your life from any sense of 
 duty. There is no question, whatever, of duty between 
 us, so far as the disposal of our lives is concerned. 
 I feel that I could lead you to the arms of another, 
 to-morrow, if your happiness would result from it. But, 
 Abby, this man could not make you happy. His impure 
 life, his cynical views, so incapable of finding an echo 
 in your candid and inexperienced soul, would make you 
 wretched. His heart is worn out. He is incapable of 
 anything but a transitory and superficial affection, and 
 you are not the woman to content yourself with being 
 the plaything of a month. If you are to be a wife and 
 mother, I wish you to find a heart warm and sensitive 
 as your own, and blood as young and vigorous to mingle 
 with yours, in your children." 
 
 " But, why are you always thinking of him, George ? 
 As for me, I think of no one but you. Sometimes, I 
 really wish I could. It would be better for me; but 
 I am not afraid any more, dear, that I am in the way, 
 for I know you love me, too."
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 THE SURPRISE 
 
 THE next day, after finishing our dinner, Abby rose 
 quickly, and removing the dishes with more than ordi- 
 nary rapidity, she said: 
 
 "You didn't guess what that package was, which 
 Mr. McKenzie brought a little while ago, did you? 
 You're a good boy; you haven't asked me one question 
 about it, and you were decent to McKenzie, too, which 
 you haven't been for a long time. Now, you are going 
 to have your surprise, and I want you to tell me that 
 you like what I have bought for you." 
 
 She brought from her room a large portfolio, which 
 she laid on the table before me, continuing to chat away 
 as she untied the ribbons that held it together. 
 
 " You know that I would not dare to buy you any 
 books. What a presumption that would be! You have 
 your decided tastes ; and, besides, you have all the great 
 men, and I shouldn't like to humiliate either you or 
 myself by putting one of the little fellows among them. 
 But, you have hardly any pictures just that head of 
 Erasmus, which you persist in thinking so fine, in spite 
 of his long nose; and that terrible, low-browed Savon- 
 arola, uglier still. One day you told me that you had 
 seen the great galleries of Europe, too young to enjoy 
 them, and that you would like to have some repro- 
 ductions of the great masters; that art is also a lan- 
 guage, and that one loves to see the ideas of great 
 genius expressed on canvas. That is what I spoke to 
 Mr. McKenzie about. I am so stupid, I hadn't the 
 slightest idea how I should get them, and he managed 
 all that for me. I wanted them for your birthday, but 
 he had to send abroad for them, and they have only 
 
 226
 
 THE SURPRISE 227 
 
 just come. I think it would be wicked to wait till your 
 next birthday, or until Christmas, when you might be 
 enjoying them all that time, don't you?" 
 
 She had opened the portfolio and was turning over 
 the beautiful prints to give me a general view of the 
 contents of the portfolio, but stopped in admiration be- 
 fore a beautiful copy of Allori's "Judith." 
 
 I had been so nervous for several weeks that I was 
 in that state of morbid susceptibility when a trifle can 
 wound or charm us; and the unexpected sight of this 
 beautiful head recalled the tragic morning in Florence 
 with such vividness, that for a moment I thought I 
 should swoon with the shock of it. 
 
 " George, George dear, what is the matter with you ? 
 You are as white as a sheet. O my God! you have 
 known a woman like that ! " 
 
 " Yes but I can't talk of it. You have been good 
 to give me these beautiful pictures. I thank you very 
 much for the pleasure they will give me, but I will 
 look at them later." 
 
 I shut the portfolio, rose from the table, and left the 
 house. I returned in the course of an hour or two, 
 tranquil, and resolved to be cheerful. Abby's eyes were 
 red and swollen with tears. I asked no questions, and 
 took no notice of her emotion. I was too much ashamed 
 of myself to be able to make either an excuse or an 
 apology for my strange behavior at noon. I felt that 
 I had acted like a child ; but that the best way to make 
 amends was to ignore the incident, and act as if noth- 
 ing had happened, so I said: 
 
 " Now, Abby, let's have the pictures again. I want 
 to look at them, carefully." 
 
 She brought them to me in silence, but before open- 
 ing the portfolio, she said with a cold and indifferent 
 tone, so marked that it betrayed affectation: 
 
 " Do you really wish to see them, or do you think 
 it will please me to take notice of them ? " 
 
 I looked up in astonishment. She had never spoken
 
 228 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 to me like that, but I understood her waywardness, as 
 she had understood mine. Mysterious bondage, sweet 
 and bitter, cruel and kind, hideous and beautiful, by 
 what delirium do we call it the noblest sentiment in 
 life? Pitiable state, when a smile or a frown can make 
 heaven or hell for us, when the great aims of life are 
 lost in pitiable egotisms, or tremors of ecstasy or pain 
 in the thought of another! 
 
 " Abby," I said, reproachfully, " do I need to tell you 
 that I appreciate your kindness, and am always deeply 
 touched when you think of me ? " 
 
 "Do I think of anything else?" Her voice trem- 
 bled, her cheeks flushed. I put my hand on hers, as 
 it rested on the table. We were silent. We were happy 
 again, but I only pretended to look at the pictures. 
 However, I noticed the absence of the beautiful head 
 which I never saw again; I think that she destroyed it. 
 
 About this time I received an invitation to address 
 a convention of agriculturists in the State of New York, 
 and I seized on the opportunity for distraction which 
 it promised me with a feeling that was almost gratitude. 
 I set about the preparation of the address at once; and 
 in order to share the wholesome distraction with Abby, 
 I furnished her with a number of old journals, from 
 which she was to gather materials for certain reports 
 which I wished to make. It did us both good to have 
 a common intellectual interest outside of ourselves. We 
 talked, as Abby said, like two old farmers, and returned, 
 in a great measure, to our former tranquil companion- 
 ship. 
 
 But to him who has acquired a taste for wine, water 
 is insipid; so is friendship after love. The heart rebels 
 at this calmness after the delicious tumult that it has 
 felt. Even the quarrels, the mutual recriminations, now 
 that they are past, seem infinitely better than this deadly 
 stagnation, this creeping paralysis of the heart. I no- 
 ticed in Abby a certain resigned melancholy at times, 
 but I dared not question her about it, or show any so-
 
 THE SURPRISE 229 
 
 licitude, and I must have appeared cold to her after 
 the joyous gaiety and expansion of our first year to- 
 gether. But if she could have looked into my heart, 
 what a volcano she would have seen burning there, 
 under the cold outer crust. How little we know each 
 other! even we who live side by side and touch hands, 
 every day! I have passed through the world almost 
 wholly unknown, and have often been called cold, where 
 I have felt the deepest. It is so easy to be showily 
 effusive, with a little surface emotion. I hardly know 
 a falser saying than this, that out of the fullness of 
 the heart, the mouth speaketh. It doesn't. The fuller 
 the heart, the greater the silence, or if there be speech, 
 the more halting it is.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 THE RELAPSE 
 
 ONE beautiful October evening, that one preceding 
 the day of my departure for New York, we were sitting 
 together on the threshold of the south door, looking out 
 on the bay. The leaves were commencing to take on 
 their vivid autumn coloring. The sun was setting in 
 a delicate haze, giving to the landscape that soft blurred 
 effect, at times much more beautiful than vivid dis- 
 tinctiveness. Around us, the most perfect silence. 
 Abby had broken it to say how much she would miss 
 me, and how I must hurry back as soon as I could. I 
 had said that that was my pleasure, too; and then we 
 were silent again. 
 
 Suddenly, she said in a quiet way that betrayed no 
 emotion : 
 
 " Do you believe that if one has truly loved once, 
 one ever forgets ? " 
 
 " Do you mean ceases to love ? " 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "When hope dies, one ceases to love, I think." 
 
 " I do not believe it." 
 
 "And I know it is so." 
 
 " No." She raised her head, and looked at me fix- 
 edly. " Excuse me. We think we know things with 
 our brains, but the blood and the flesh, stronger than 
 they are, speak quite differently. I believe that there 
 is somewhere, though perhaps we may not meet, the 
 being who for us is supreme; who belongs to us by 
 the rights of a profound passion, but from whom des- 
 tiny, or some accidental circumstance, fatally separates 
 us. I believe that we may sometimes be mistaken, and 
 think that the love which we feel is the supreme love. 
 
 230
 
 THE RELAPSE 231 
 
 Then arise painful complications, sometimes tragedies, 
 when we are undeceived; but once the supreme love 
 comes, once master of us, I believe that it is invincible. 
 You have never spoken to me of your youth, but I 
 believe that you have once loved like that, and that you 
 have never forgotten." 
 
 I burst out laughing, but it was a nervous laugh, 
 and I felt the blood mount to my forehead. 
 
 " What an idea ! " I exclaimed. 
 
 " Yes, what an idea ! But it is an idea that I can't 
 get rid of, lately. Be frank with me. Talk to me of 
 her, I shall listen with great sympathy." 
 
 It flashed over me at once that it was the Judith 
 head of which she was jealous. Perhaps if I could 
 have told her the whole story of that beautiful head, it 
 might all have turned out differently for us. But I 
 could not do it. It was his story, not mine^ and it 
 seemed to. profane his memory to tell it; so I said: 
 
 " There's nothing to tell you, little one. The happi- 
 ness of my life, as I have so often told you, began with 
 you." 
 
 She put her hand on my arm, and an expression of 
 deep pain lay on her face. 
 
 " You are not speaking the truth, George, but it is 
 not necessary to say anything more. You love her still, 
 or you could speak of her. The most serious and deep- 
 est feelings of our heart, we jealously guard at the 
 bottom of it, and sometimes we do not even confess 
 them to ourselves. But what's the use of talking any 
 longer." 
 
 She sighed deeply, and rose, saying with affected 
 gaiety : " Come with me ; let's throw stones from the 
 edge of the cliff into the bay. It's good exercise, it's 
 better than sitting moping here." 
 
 She often had these sudden caprices. I dare say all 
 women have ; but one fault, perhaps the most dangerous 
 of all for happiness, she was wholly free from, and that 
 is sulking. Her clouds were all summer ones, and
 
 232 THE JOURNAL 1 OF A RECLUSE 
 
 passed in an hour. Usually, I had flexibility enough" to 
 yield to all her moods; but this evening, I was sad at 
 heart. Something savage and rebellious in me was 
 asking that dangerous question: What's the use? 
 What is to be the end of this misunderstanding be- 
 tween two creatures made to be each other's joy? 
 
 As she rose, I laid my hand on her shoulder, and 
 forced her to sit down again. 
 
 " No ! " I exclaimed, almost rudely. " Let us not quit 
 a serious conversation for such childishness. We have 
 much to say to each other. Let's try to say it, this 
 evening. To-morrow, we shall be far apart, and we 
 neither of us know how long it may be before we shall 
 have the chance to talk frankly, again. You have re- 
 peatedly accused me of being unhappy with you. I have 
 repeatedly assured you of the contrary. But I do not 
 need to accuse you. The love you feel for me is min- 
 gled with bitterness, suspicions, anxieties. It is never 
 at rest." 
 
 " And do you think," she interrupted me quickly, 
 " that there is a deep love which is at the same time 
 tranquil? If there is, then I don't know it. My love 
 is a sea; it is not a stagnant, scum-covered mill-pond." 
 
 " And flood and ebb-tide in it," I said with a bitter 
 laugh. 
 
 " Yes, flood and ebb-tide in it," she repeated. " The 
 love which I feel for you oh, I mean to say it all 
 out, clearly once, just once my love is something 
 which possesses me wholly, which will finish, I think, 
 by killing me. A happiness? Yes, an ecstasy; and a 
 wretchedness ? Yes at times, a martyrdom ; but it has 
 its crown, and I would not escape it if I could. I 
 belong wholly to you, and I would like to possess you 
 in the same way. I do not wish to share you with any- 
 thing. I am capable of being jealous of your work, 
 your past, your books in short, of anything that sep- 
 arates me from you." 
 
 " But not of McKenzie," I said sarcastically.
 
 THE RELAPSE 233 
 
 A smile passed over her face. 
 
 "I thank you for that word," she said. "Don't you 
 see why? I have felt a keen joy in your jealousy of 
 him. It meant that you felt as I did. But wait, don't 
 judge me too harshly, yet. I only felt so at first. I 
 only needed the proof: when I saw that you, too, could 
 suffer for me, I did not wish you to suffer. I was 
 eager, then, to show you that I didn't care the least in 
 the world for him, and I don't. He is amusing. I 
 like to talk with him, sometimes. I think that he is 
 really clever; and he is always a perfect gentleman 
 to me, but he is no more you, than that bay, yonder, 
 is the ocean. And just because I don't know what love 
 is, without this restlessness, and doubt, and longing, and 
 entire possession of me, giving me no rest the tran- 
 quillity and uniform kindness of your love seems to 
 make of it something so pale, and faded, compared with 
 mine: and then I think that you must once have loved 
 like me, so madly that you would be willing to buy 
 an hour of paradise for an eternity of repentance. Do 
 I shock you horribly ? " 
 
 "You do not shock me at all; but when you speak 
 so contemptuously of the tameness of my love, you 
 seem not at all to remember that it was I who first 
 forgot this tie of blood which unites us and separates 
 us, and that it was you who called me back to reason, 
 and begged me to save you, and not to ruin you. And, 
 Abby, I have never thanked you for that appeal to the 
 man in me. I could not do it at the time, I could only 
 bow my head in resignation to your decision. But I 
 have thanked you, silently, many a time since then. 
 You saved us both. I was ready, then, to say: All or 
 nothing, no matter the price. I've thought a great deal 
 since then, and I know that the eternity of repentance 
 outweighs the hour of paradise, a million times. You 
 have spoken of my past. I did love unhappily one who 
 was far, far above me, and to the pain of this love 
 without hope, I had the terrible misfortune to offend
 
 234 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 her, and to become in her eyes a contemptible creature. 
 Oh, how wretched I was! I feel still pained and humil- 
 iated, when I think of it; but I have long ago ceased 
 to love her. She has become a sort of dream of my 
 youth, almost without reality. I do not feel myself 
 the same man who adored her. Life, work, study, have 
 almost effaced her image in my mind. But it is a 
 singular fact that the friendship which I felt for her 
 brother is still alive. A great-souled fellow he was; a 
 mind, broad, alert, giving of its superfluity to all who 
 surrounded him I shall miss him till the end of my 
 life. Therefore, I know that though love can give the 
 most exquisite joys and the keenest pain, it doesn't last 
 in its freshness as friendship does. It is a fever that 
 passes, a rosy mist through which we do not see dis- 
 tinctly, and in just proportions, but which dissipates at 
 last, and leaves everything bare and common. I know 
 that seems horrible to you ; and it seems horrible to me, 
 too; and I should never have believed it, at your age." 
 
 " And I shall never, never believe it, at yours, George. 
 I love you, and I shall love you, all my life." 
 
 The tears blurred my eyes. For a while, I could not 
 speak for the emotion that stifled me. She was silent, 
 too, looking straight before her, her chin resting in her 
 hand. When I was sufficiently master of myself to 
 speak, I said: 
 
 " How I thank you for this frank, generous affec- 
 tion. I don't deserve it, but I will try to; and if the 
 day comes when you have forgotten what you have just 
 said to me, be frank, and if you wish to leave me to 
 seek happiness elsewhere, do not hesitate a moment to 
 tell me." 
 
 She covered her face with her hands and began to 
 weep. 
 
 " You are very cruel," she sobbed, " to think that 
 such a day could ever arrive. If you loved me the 
 least bit in the world, you would know that in our 
 lives there is no to-morrow. All the future is only a
 
 THE RELAPSE 235 
 
 great to-day. We have nothing to do with anything 
 but the present. Don't speak to me any more of this 
 frightful to-morrow. Isn't to-day sufficient ? " 
 
 " Why do you cry, then ? " I asked gently. 
 
 " Because you enrage me so with your cold reason ; 
 and because the little reason that I have that is not 
 effaced by my heart, tells me you are right, as you 
 always are. I am such a coward, such a coward ! " 
 
 " No, you are not. What you call cowardice is per- 
 fect health. I understand you thoroughly. It is not 
 long since I felt, as you do, the frightful cruelty of our 
 situation. I felt like taking the world by the throat, 
 and saying : ' I do not need you. I can live alone, alone 
 with the sky, the earth, and her I love. You do not 
 exist for me.' I think I could still have enough cour- 
 age, or rather enough contempt for the world, to do it 
 without regret ; but you, and don't believe that I think 
 you weaker for it, but rather more loving, more sensi- 
 tive, more moral, you could never bear the reproaches 
 of the world added to the reproach of your conscience. 
 The memory of your mother " 
 
 " No, no," she interrupted feebly, " I could not bear 
 that. I should die of it, but, perhaps, content who 
 knows ? " 
 
 " No, one does not die of reproach, and die content. 
 If one were content, one wouldn't die." 
 
 " You always have your answer ready. O how 
 tired I am! How tired! how tired! If I could only 
 be so cool and indifferent as you ! " 
 
 I blushed and bit my lips to keep back the emotion 
 which stifled me. She was watching me closely, and 
 when I betrayed myself, she clapped her hands, and 
 rising, stood before me, smiling down at me with a 
 flushed, excited face. 
 
 " How superb you are, like that ! " she cried. " You 
 have said more to me by that frown and gesture than 
 by all your fine words." 
 
 "And how horribly cruel you are," I answered, leap-
 
 236 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 ing to my feet with a sudden ferocity, and, seizing her 
 by the wrists, I said in a hoarse voice: 
 
 " Will you live with me as my wife, or as my sister? 
 You have your destiny in your own hands, again. Do 
 not blame me, if you do not choose right. Speak. In 
 a few years we shall be dust and ashes. There is a 
 flower growing in our path. It may be poisonous, but 
 it looks sweet and beautiful ; shall we gather it? Speak ! " 
 
 She turned white as snow. 
 
 " Quick," I said, and shook her arm. " Which shall 
 it be, wife or sister?" 
 
 " Oh, forgive me, forgive me, George ! Your sister, 
 your sister always." 
 
 I freed her instantly. An intense disgust filled me. 
 What did she mean? Why did she torture me, play 
 with me like a cat with a mouse; hold out a cup to 
 my burning lips, to dash it to the earth when I stooped 
 to drink? 
 
 " Oh, don't look at me like that, George. Kill me 
 rather. I know that I am a coward, a wretch. But 
 don't condemn me so harshly. I needed only to know 
 that you love me, yet." 
 
 " Silence ! " I said harshly. " That word must never 
 again be pronounced between us. Brother and sister? 
 Are there scenes like this, between them?" 
 
 " Say you forgive me." 
 
 She was trembling so violently, and there was in 
 her eyes a look of such intense pain, that I must have 
 had a heart of stone not to be touched by it. 
 
 " Yes, I forgive you," I said slowly. " You do not 
 know what you do when you play with fire. But we 
 must finish by putting a little more distance between 
 us, if we do not wish to be burned." An idea suddenly 
 occurred to me, and in consequence of it, I continued: 
 " Abby, I shall not come back from New York as 
 quickly as I meant to. I shall stay away a few weeks. 
 We have reached a crisis in our lives that asks resolu- 
 tion and a firmness of will that we no longer possess,
 
 THE RELAPSE 237 
 
 in the presence of each other. If we are not strong 
 enough to wrestle with an enemy, we must avoid him. 
 Life is beautiful. We must not spoil it in this way. 
 We must find our way back to the joy that we have 
 known. I won't leave you all alone, here. Invite Miss 
 Dudley to stay with you. She is a fine sensible girl, 
 and you like her." 
 
 " No," she answered excitedly. " You must not let 
 me chase you away from home like this. It is I who 
 will leave. I shall go back to Scotland. I ought never 
 to have come here. Oh, how cruelly I have been pun- 
 ished for my folly ! " 
 
 With that she burst into tears, and I had all the 
 difficulty in the world to calm her, and make her con- 
 sent to remain and invite her friend to stay with her. 
 
 I made my preparations for departure immediately, 
 and the next morning I left home for the first time in 
 many years. I had now the leisure and opportunity to 
 reflect upon the problem that life had offered me for 
 solution. I did not try to excuse myself, and I saw 
 with inexpressible horror that I could not count on 
 myself to act upon what I knew deep within me was 
 right. I longed with all my heart to become master of 
 myself, again. No youthful glamour of poetry could 
 any longer disguise from me how much of caprice and 
 vanity and self-love and brutal appetite are mingled in 
 the sentiment called love. And yet with all that knowl- 
 edge, if I had been sure that I could have made Abby 
 happy by defying the civil law, I believe that I would 
 have done it. But I knew her better than she knew 
 herself. The first novelty passed, the deep moral sub- 
 stratum of her character would reassert itself. Over- 
 whelmed with remorse, our union would seem a crime 
 to her, our life would become a hell. But she had not 
 yet arrived at that point of despair, when it is necessary 
 to flee or to perish. Young, inexperienced, loving with 
 all the ardor of a first passion, unconscious of the feroc-
 
 238 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 ity of the brute within us, seeing no real danger in 
 our life, revolting against the idea of my growing indif- 
 ferent to her, wishing with all her heart to enchain me 
 permanently, but shocked, revolted, at the idea of a 
 bond unsanctioned by law, she was certainly more un- 
 happy than I, and I had left her with a tenderness 
 mingled with compassion, like the tenderness of a 
 mother. 
 
 Flying through the forests on the train, my eyes ap- 
 parently fixed on the landscape, I saw nothing but her 
 face distorted with pain, her eyes swimming in tears. 
 It was her sobs that I heard, and not the whistling, 
 the shrieks, the incessant noises of the train; and per- 
 haps I had never loved her so perfectly as in these 
 hours when I was trying to reason myself into loving 
 no more. It is a frightful hour, that hour in human 
 life when we say good-by forever to love. It seems 
 as if the desolation of death had sunk into the soul, 
 and that henceforth we are dragging a corpse and not 
 an animated body through life. And all literature, all 
 the teachings listened to from childhood, tend to confirm 
 us in this feeling. There are no winged words for the 
 austere courage of solitude; love is the only theme to 
 which the poet fits his music. 
 
 I tried to think of other things, but my mind seemed 
 incapable of freeing itself from her, and at the end of 
 a few minutes came back inevitably to her. I tried to 
 talk with an old man, whose sensible ideas might have 
 interested me, at any other time; but to-day he bored 
 me excessively. Everything that he said seemed to me 
 cold, insipid, and unimportant, compared with this burn- 
 ing question which consumed me. To wish and not to 
 wish, to be the slave of an emotion, to feel one's self 
 tossed from desire to desire, like a cork on the waves, 
 what a miserable fate! But he who can reflect may be 
 saved. I recognized my folly.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 DARKNESS 
 
 ARRIVED at my destination in New York State, I was 
 met by a delegation who took me to the best private 
 boarding-house in town, the hotels being full. It was 
 kept by a bustling portly woman with a little inoffen- 
 sive-looking husband, with a timid apologetic air that 
 seemed to ask pardon for being in the way. The posi- 
 tion of woman in America very often reverses the mar- 
 ital relations, and it is the husband, who, in private 
 boarding-houses, usually receives his daily bread from 
 the hands of his vigorous spouse. Feminine pride in 
 adornment, the satisfaction of vanity by living in a 
 large house in town, the domination of social life by 
 the young, in which the young girl lives only to make 
 a brilliant show, the publicity of family life in the in- 
 numerable boarding-houses of our large cities, tend in 
 a great measure to destroy in a vast number of men 
 the primitive sentiment of independence. Every board- 
 ing-house is first of all the sacrifice of a home. It 
 shows a good face to the street, but it is desolate 
 within, huddling a motley crowd, bound by no tie but 
 the common need of food and shelter. But I needed 
 just the feeble splash of this atmosphere of gossip, with 
 its undertone of spite and envy, to feel the tranquil 
 beauty of family life, where ties are not material, but 
 hearts are bound together in loving affection. And 
 when I recalled my life with Abby, it was not the piti- 
 able misunderstandings and tumults of feverish love 
 which I dwelt on, but the sweetness of innocent gaiety, 
 the charming simplicity of our life, far from all the 
 tedious distractions that invade the home from social 
 
 239
 
 2 4 o THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 requirements our entire sufficiency one to the other. 
 What madness had seized us and introduced into our 
 paradise the serpent of despair? 
 
 I wrote to her that I would return another man, cured 
 forever of my folly, recognizing in her tender friendship 
 the great wealth that I possessed. I did not need to 
 learn the same lesson three times over. I had quite got 
 it by heart now; and she should live with me free as 
 the birds of the air, free to take flight whenever it 
 seemed good to her, or to stay with me, the solace and 
 the joy of my life. 
 
 I received from her a letter full of despair and bit- 
 terness. She accused herself of having made life insup- 
 portable to me, of having driven me from home. She 
 called herself ungrateful, foolish, criminal. She begged 
 me to stay away from her until she herself could re- 
 solve what was the best thing for her to do: but at 
 any rate she begged me to forgive her for any evil she 
 had done, or might do yet in the moral darkness that 
 shrouded her at present. 
 
 I was alarmed at the tone of despair in the letter, and 
 was about to make preparations for an immediate return, 
 feeling that she needed me, when another letter, fol- 
 lowing upon the heels of this one, was as cheerful, as 
 calm, as the other had been lugubrious. She accused 
 herself, in this letter, of a vulgar exaggeration in the 
 other, assuring me that she had no sooner mailed it 
 than she would have given anything in the world to 
 have been able to recall it ; but that she would try now, 
 as much as possible, to efface the effects of it. Didn't 
 I know that these black moods were not at all natural 
 to her? Romantic? Oh, yes, she might be that, but 
 romantic on the rosy side. She loved life as much as I 
 did. She would gather its roses, and quietly pluck off 
 its thorns. She had been stupid, stupid! stupid! but she 
 was beginning to see dawn on the horizon, soon it would 
 be full day ; and she would be so wise wise as a china 
 doll.
 
 DARKNESS 241 
 
 Who can ever be sure that he knows well all the secret 
 folds of the human heart? This letter which expressed 
 the most careless gaiety pained me a great deal more 
 than the first one, in which a real sorrow was depicted. 
 It was not a cold indifference, a worldly cynicism that 
 I wished, or expected from her. But what did I want? 
 I could not have clearly told if I had tried. But, piqued 
 or wounded. I hardly know which, I replied briefly, as- 
 suring her that her letter had pleased me very much; 
 that we were both now on the road to wisdom, and that 
 nothing remained to do but to continue in it, and that 
 I should stay in New York a month longer. It was 
 three weeks before I received a. reply to this letter, but, 
 in the meantime, I continued to write her cheerful 
 letters, in which I never failed to say that I should be 
 glad to be back home with her. 
 
 It was the truth. I was frightfully bored among all 
 these women, who, for some reason or other, took par- 
 ticular pains to try to entertain me. Now, I have the 
 greatest respect for a woman who is natural and good; 
 and, like all men, I am weak enough to be susceptible to 
 the flatteries of coquettish beauty. I can also find in 
 the conversation of a bright woman, no matter what her 
 age is, a lively and delicate pleasure. Indeed, I hardly 
 know anything so sweet and charming as an aged wo- 
 man whose heart is still as warm as her brain is quick, 
 and in whom that maternal instinct which makes the 
 dominant trait of every good woman is not restricted 
 to the limited circle of her family, but expands into a 
 sweet tenderness that envelops all who enter her atmos- 
 phere. I have been rich enough in my life to know 
 two or three such women, not more. I especially re- 
 member one such, who was nearly eighty, when I knew 
 her; but she was a woman over whose heart and mind 
 time had no power who was younger in the fullness 
 of her years than half the young people I have ever 
 known, whose room was the heart of the house which 
 she made a home. She brimmed it with sunshine, the
 
 242 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 cloudiest day. I used to go to her, when I was fretted or 
 disappointed, and her talk was a tonic to me. I always 
 came away feeling stronger and fuller of cheer. The 
 influence of a woman like that is inestimable. But it 
 comes from ripeness and sweetness of character, from 
 difficulties met, and struggled with, from patience, long 
 suffering, thoughtful study, not from selfish seeking of 
 pleasure, and selfish shirking from duty. 
 
 But I have known far more women of another type, 
 the type of the woman who cannot reconcile herself to 
 the years which gather about her, whose body withers 
 and ages, while the mind remains green and immature: 
 women who try in vain to force youth to return to them 
 by the aid of cosmetics and dyes. 
 
 We are in the habit of saying, to-day, that there are 
 no more old women. It always grieves me to hear it, 
 for it means that the wide experience, the large and 
 tender tolerance of the frank and loving woman exist 
 no more ; and that her place is filled by living mani- 
 kins whose steel heart and wired brain are galvanized 
 by vanity into the hideous semblance of life. 
 
 And in truth, there is no mark of wisdom and serenity 
 in the vast majority of women nowadays, nor in this 
 century that more than any other bears the mark of 
 their influence. Listen to their talk. Not content with 
 commas and periods and plain type, they want every 
 word underscored, and every mark an 'exclamation point. 
 As if the rose-bush would be so beautiful, were every 
 leaf a flower; as if the dark green didn't relieve and 
 bring out the vivid coloring of the rose! And so I like 
 a background of quiet strength and serenity in a woman. 
 I like to find in her a refuge for my serious hours, a well 
 of quiet waters, cool, refreshing, when I am hot and 
 thirsty. I like to find in her real depth of feeling, and 
 not mere sentimental soapsuds blown into an eye-catch- 
 ing bubble that is ninety-nine parts air. 
 
 There was at this time a vulgar superstition in vogue 
 among the half-educated, among whom, by the way,
 
 DARKNESS 243 
 
 the vulgar superstitions of our age find their largest fol- 
 lowing; and it called itself spiritualism, though its chief 
 business was materializing. One heard, also, a great 
 deal about theosophy and various other osophies and 
 isms, all tending to, and growing out of, exaggerated 
 forms of individual egotism. Here again, women were 
 the readiest and most numerous converts, some of them 
 imagining themselves all spirit, all thought, some of 
 them laying claim to recollections of a former existence 
 on this earth, when they were great actresses, or fas- 
 cinating beauties of international reputation. 
 
 I contrasted these superstitious follies, with Abby's 
 piety, and it smelt clean and sweet to me, in comparison. 
 At least, it was free from the foul inflation of egotism. 
 I longed to see her again; and at last, feeling myself 
 strong enough to carry out my resolutions, I started 
 back home, a smile upon my lips. I made a score of 
 plans to live more wisely, more broadly. I saw that in 
 many ways, I had been very selfish, and that my life 
 with Abby was tending to make us both more selfish 
 still. We had no right to shut ourselves up in our joy 
 like two mites in a cheese. I resolved in my mind sev- 
 eral ways of benefiting the community near us, and 
 thought what pleasure it would give her to be asso- 
 ciated with me in these plans. 
 
 I had written to her telling her the exact day on 
 which I should arrive, so that she might have the joy 
 of anticipating my return. I fancied her counting the 
 hours, thinking of nothing else. She would have the 
 house in perfect order. The train would not arrive until 
 late, and I wrote her not to think of coming to meet me, 
 but something told me that she would disobey me, and, 
 down in my heart, I should be glad of that disobedience, 
 and would scold her very sweetly for it. That is why I 
 searched eagerly all the faces of the women at the sta- 
 tion. But the night was cold ; a thick mist covered the 
 earth, and I knew very well why she had stayed at home. 
 She wished to keep up the fire, so that I should find
 
 244 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 the comfort which I should need, after a long walk in 
 the cold mist. But I was too impatient to get home at 
 once, so I hired a carriage. My heart beat with an 
 ardor that would seem to be a protest against the idea 
 that my love was transformed into friendship; but it 
 really was an ardor quite pure, whose transport was half 
 the joy of giving joy, of showing that I had come back 
 not less loving, but no longer the slave of an emotion. 
 The sentiment of honor had triumphed over my weak- 
 ness. I rejoiced unselfishly in the thought of this young 
 life attached to mine. I fancied her rosy with pleas- 
 ure, her heart beating faster, too, as the time for my 
 arrival approached. I saw the little table set for two, a 
 huge pine log crackling in the fire-place, and adding its 
 red light to that of the evening lamp. Oh, how good 
 it is, this home coming, after the cold indifference of the 
 world ! 
 
 I dismissed the cabman at the foot of the winding 
 pathway that led to the house, glad to put a little solitude 
 and silence before my great joy. It was like a mute 
 prayer of thankfulness. I plunged into the shade of the 
 tall forest trees that quite concealed the house. A few 
 minutes more, and I should have the first glimpse of it, 
 in the beam of light that would send its welcome to me 
 through the darkness. O sublime folly of the human 
 heart! My eyes moistened at thought of that bright 
 beam which was to salute me like a word from her. Oh, 
 a thousand blessings on her forever! My joy, my pride! 
 Here I am at the turn of the pathway, my eyes hungry 
 and thirsty for that light. It was not there. What a 
 child I was to feel this sudden sinking of the heart 
 this keen disappointment. On! on! I was too far 
 away yet, the mist concealed it, of course. I started to 
 run, my eyes straining the darkness as if my life de- 
 pended on this ruddy beam. Nothing yet. She had 
 drawn down the curtains, of course. She wished to shut 
 in all this ruddy warmth that I might say, " How beauti- 
 ful and cheerful it is here ! What a contrast to the cold
 
 DARKNESS 245 
 
 and gloom outside." In a moment I was at the door. 
 I put my hand on the knob and tried to turn it, but it 
 would not yield. Oh, she was afraid ! I knocked loudly. 
 I waited. No answer came. The minutes seemed hours. 
 Had she gone to visit one of her friends? Then, she 
 had not received my letter. What a pity! I wanted to 
 see her, then and there. A feeling of bitter disappoint- 
 ment, akin to despair, seized me. I rummaged in my 
 pocket for a key, but my trembling and impatient hands 
 could not find the keyhole. The damp fog enveloped me 
 like a wet rag. I lighted a match. It burned a moment, 
 and went out. I lighted another, found the keyhole and 
 with a push flung open the door and entered the house. 
 All was black and cold ; and that musty, sickening odor 
 of a house long shut up, assailed my nostrils. My heart 
 felt like lead. Was she dead ? " Abby ! Abby ! " I cried 
 in terror, as if I could recall her from the tomb. "O 
 Abby ! Abby ! My -God, where are you ? " 
 
 I struck another match, found the lamp and lighted 
 it. I looked around me in amazement, almost ready to 
 swoon in terror and despair. I rushed with the lamp 
 into her room. It was stripped bare of all the pretty 
 little decorations which she had put there. Not a dress 
 on the hooks, her trunk and her valise gone. My blood 
 was on fire. My temples beat like sledge-hammers. I 
 was stifling. I trembled so violently that I feared to 
 let fall the lamp, and approached the table to put it down. 
 There, fastened to the tablecloth with a large pin, was 
 a sheet of paper, closely written over. I seized it, and 
 devoured it. So long as I live, I shall never forget 
 these lines that were written on it: 
 
 " I have never loved you so dearly as at this moment, 
 when I leave you forever. Do not look for me. Do not 
 seek to know how much I suffer. Do not judge me. 
 Do not blame me. I am going away with him. I could 
 not go alone. I was too cowardly to die. There is 
 still in the world one being to whom I am dear. I
 
 246 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 shall try to be faithful to him except in thought. There 
 God help me! I am wholly yours. You believe in 
 the remedy of time. I do not. But there is one, per- 
 haps, and I risk all on this great perhaps; but only on 
 one condition, and that is, that I shall never see you 
 any more. Good-by! good-by! good-by, forever! O 
 my only love! I have one consolation in this dreadful 
 hour, and that is that I shall never again grieve you, 
 never again drive you from home." 
 
 I cannot describe the delirium of pain into which this 
 letter plunged me. The paper fell from my hands. The 
 blood seemed to congeal about my heart. The blow had 
 struck with all its force. I have great natural vigor. I 
 never swooned in my life, but, for a moment, I thought 
 that I was going to lose consciousness. I staggered 
 like a drunken man. An immense gulf had yawned 
 before me, swallowing up all my happiness. 
 
 I picked up the paper, and looked for the date. It 
 bore that of the third day after my departure. A futile 
 rage succeeded my despair. I tore the letter into a 
 thousand fragments. If she had stood before me, at 
 this moment, I could have killed her, in the flood of 
 hatred and contempt that swept over me. She had 
 wantonly deceived me. She had kept alive my confi- 
 dence in her, in order to use it to betray me. I drew 
 from my pocket the letters which she had written, though 
 I had no need to do so, to know their contents. I ran 
 rapidly through them, trying to read in them her pur- 
 pose, in the light of this discovery; but saw no trace 
 of it. I destroyed them, also. I would have liked to 
 destroy and efface her memory in my heart, if that 
 were possible. I could have borne the loss of her with 
 patience, if she had been open and frank with me; but 
 to steal away in this dastardly manner, to keep up the 
 farce of our undisturbed relations in the very heart of 
 her treachery, that was unpardonable. There came over 
 me the bitterest humiliation of a proud man, that of
 
 DARKNESS 247 
 
 having been hoodwinked, of having taken base metal 
 for gold. As I write now, I would not, for a great 
 deal, think that I had never in my life been generous 
 enough to commit a folly, never truthful and trustful 
 enough to have been deceived. But in the first fierce 
 sting and pain of this blow, I cursed my folly, and I 
 said to myself : " If you shed one tear, George Graham, 
 I shall kill you ! I shall kill you ! " and burying my head 
 in my hands, I sat with hot, dry eyes, and thought it 
 all over. Why should I weep for the loss of a glass 
 bead that I had taken for a diamond? What a weak, 
 sentimental puling ass I had been to fall in love with 
 a pair of bright eyes and a soft voice, and stake my 
 happiness on a smile. I, a man grown, a man whom 
 years might have taught, were there anything teachable 
 in him. Coward! slave! that I was. I had always 
 weakly run away from pain, as if it hadn't wings where 
 I had legs, and couldn't catch me and strangle me with 
 its pitiless hands. Strangle me? No! It had never 
 strangled me, yet, and it shouldn't now. There was 
 something in me that it couldn't reach, some ever-green 
 sprig of life that it could not blast. I was like a man 
 to whom a delirium gives muscles of steel. All the 
 man in me cried out: Up, up and onward! Work 
 toil change night into day, if need be, but make some- 
 thing of your life. You have been frittering away your 
 leisure in the most useless and absurd reveries. You 
 have grown, before, under the baptism of grief. You 
 will grow again. Never again will you trail your man- 
 hood through the narrow, dirty stream of sentimental- 
 ity, you will bathe in the boundless ocean of truth. Its 
 cold pure waters will give back vigor to your flaccid 
 muscles. Look steadily into the abyss until your eyes 
 are used to the darkness, and you will see emerge from 
 it the forms of the great souls of all ages. Listen, and 
 you will hear their sighs and groans transformed into 
 melody. 
 
 There are hours when a line of poetry, a great thought
 
 248 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 speaks to us for the first time. We have read it a thou- 
 sand times without having seized its significance; but 
 to-day the line is luminous; it has found a penetrating 
 voice, and we tremble with sympathy as we listen. That 
 night I read " King Lear." ' 
 
 I, too, had dared to stake my happiness on another, 
 and I was to be punished for the folly, as if it had been 
 a crime. But liberty, health, vigor were still mine, and 
 the last word had not been said. But there was one rock 
 I wished to avoid. I did not wish to be a cynic. I had 
 a horror of pessimism that hardening of the heart 
 after bitter experiences. I wanted calm, but not stagna- 
 tion ; breadth, but not vagueness of view ; liberty of the 
 heart, but not cold indifference. I wished to profit by 
 my pain, rather than to forget it. Of course, I did not 
 feel these desires so strong at first. It was pride that 
 particularly dominated me, the instinct of self-preserva- 
 tion, under a disagreeable form. But in the midst of 
 all these efforts and aspirations, the image of the woman 
 whom I had loved never left me, for a moment. A great 
 love is stunned, not killed, at the first blow of treachery, 
 and it dies hard; for it is rooted in all the fibers of our 
 being, mingled with our blood and our brain. But 
 what hell is comparable to that of being condemned 
 to love that which we neither respect nor esteem? To 
 this first hour of supreme misery, of contempt mingled 
 with wounded love, succeeded long hours of tenderness, 
 in which the wound pulsated painfully and all my being 
 seemed to circle around her, and to cry out for an as- 
 surance that she was not severed wholly from me. To 
 reason over a wound does not cure us of its pain. 
 Time alone does that. Still, I struggled with all my 
 power to overcome the weakness of my heart. But all 
 this repressed tenderness within me made me tremu- 
 lously sensitive to the least touch of beauty or emotion. 
 I often felt the tears rise to my eyes at sight of a superb 
 sunset, or at the sweet face of a child looking up trust- 
 fully into mine. But I knew that this extreme sensi-
 
 DARKNESS 249 
 
 bility was morbid the effort of the soul to throw off 
 its pain. 
 
 I had stretched out my arms towards the impossible, 
 without seeing the snare at my feet. I had fallen into 
 it, and, mangled and suffering, I moved about feverishly, 
 waiting for the hand of the deliverer, and the dawn of 
 a new day. It was a long time coming, this dawn. The 
 shadows lasted two long years. I still remember the 
 first day when she was not my first thought in waking, 
 my last, when I sank to sleep.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 DAWN 
 
 IT was a bright day in early summer; a bird had 
 alighted on the window sill, near my bed. I heard its 
 cheerful twitterings and, waking, saw its bright eye 
 fixed on me. I smiled. I put my hand out gently, and 
 it flew away, but I rose with a reinforcement of vigor 
 that I had not felt in a long time. The morning sun was 
 sparkling in the dew ; everything about me was so fresh 
 and young in this sweet bright light, that I, too, seemed 
 to share in its youthful vigor. I dressed myself in haste, 
 prepared a light breakfast, and then, as I sat down to 
 eat it, she came, suddenly, into my mind, but not with 
 the vivid distinctness of old, but as if faded, obliter- 
 ated; no longer a part of me. It was finished; time 
 and work had conquered. I belonged to myself once 
 more, reborn into tranquil strength. 
 
 I faced the future again with a light heart. I asked 
 nothing more of it than health and an open mind. The 
 dream of happiness in love had faded away, never to 
 revive; for I am not of those whose heart easily in- 
 flamed renews, again and again, the same experience. 
 I had loved twice, with all my heart, with all my mind, 
 and with all my strength; I was exhausted for that ex- 
 perience ; but still capable of warm and generous feeling. 
 More than half of my life was gone, but I might still 
 reasonably count on twenty years more. I had all the 
 money that I wanted, that is to say, all that I needed. 
 I passionately loved books, but I had no creative gen- 
 ius, only some little critical talent. It was not enough 
 to make me a power in directing the taste of my con- 
 temporaries; but just enough to make me fastidious, 
 and prevent me from joining the great army of the 
 mediocre, who have invaded literature in our day. 
 
 250
 
 DAWN 251 
 
 It is only the Greeks who have ever realized the dan- 
 ger of confiding the same doctrines to everybody. Mod- 
 ern thought is suffering from the invention of print- 
 ing and the institution of popular education. Formerly, 
 it was only men of genius who devoted themselves to 
 creating works of art and literature, and they created 
 for the pleasure and instruction of a superior class of 
 readers. But, to-day, is the reign of mediocrity. The 
 man of genius is replaced by the man of talent, or the 
 glib man, who no longer speaks to the highest intelli- 
 gence, but to the average mind. But the average mind 
 lives in the little things of daily life. It has not wings 
 with which to soar above the heights for the sake of 
 a superb outlook. It loves the easy, not the difficult. 
 Its incitation to knowledge are curiosity or envy. It 
 wishes emotions, not thoughts. It is the child's mind, 
 never long content with one thing, avid always of what 
 is new, eager for sensation. And here the childishness 
 ceases, and curiosity becomes prurience, and for the 
 sake of a sensation, the mind willingly lends itself as a 
 sewer for all the filth of humanity to drip through. 
 
 Who cares now for the real value of things, for that 
 which lies below the surface? Who prefers perfect 
 courage, perfect sincerity, to weak compliance and flat- 
 tering illusions? Not many: and yet, I think that I 
 can class myself among the lovers of truth and cour- 
 age. I knew, therefore, how to choose and to love what 
 is fine in literature, and I would willingly have passed 
 my life in the enjoyment of my leisure and my books, 
 if my conscience had not told me that my sun had 
 not yet sunk low enough on the horizon to warrant me 
 in folding my arms and taking my ease. 
 
 The inner voice kept asking me : " Have you received 
 all these gifts of leisure to use them on yourself? Have 
 you been fertilized by pain to bear no fruits? Are you 
 but an animal to graze peacefully among the tall grass 
 in your corner of the meadow, then fatten and die?" 
 
 Free from personal sorrow, this spur pricked me more
 
 252 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 and more keenly. Placed in circumstances very favor- 
 able for becoming very rich, I might have turned my 
 attention to commerce, especially, become the prime 
 mover of material prosperity to a growing community, 
 represented it politically, and been called a man of in- 
 fluence. But this influence wasn't intimate enough to 
 satisfy me. I had seen many of these public men, in 
 my time, ruling their little world as from a pedestal, 
 yet touching but superficially, and through purely ma- 
 terial interests, all those with whom they came into con- 
 tact, and passing, they left no trace of themselves. The 
 poorest school-master, guided by a sense of right, does 
 more in a day than such men in a year: for his mind 
 has awakened the intelligence of another. 
 
 Of this period of doubt and hesitation, I especially 
 remember one day in August when I was taking a walk 
 along the edge of a deep ravine where a stream of 
 water flowed over a rough, pebbly bed. I was thinking 
 of my mother, and her memory returned to me puri- 
 fied, exalted in its heroic abnegation. She had, for all 
 her philosophy, no other precept than resignation to a 
 divine will: but she bore her daily crosses and daily 
 burdens with more sweetness than anyone whom I had 
 ever known. My heart hungered after her, just an hour 
 of her presence, to lay my head in her lap, to feel her 
 soft hand stroke my hair, and hear the quiet voice utter 
 some word of love or consolation. I sat down at the 
 foot of a large tree; the rustling of the leaves in the 
 breeze filled my ears with a vague murmur. I fell into 
 one of those delicious reveries, from which we come 
 out strengthened, calmed, contented. I don't know how 
 long I sat there, but when I rose I noticed at my feet 
 some broken fragments of rock, bearing the fluted im- 
 press of a shell. It was a voice from the past whis- 
 pering again to me, " Leave thy trace before thou 
 diest." 
 
 Returning home, I surveyed my large tract of land, 
 ten times larger than my needs. Did it belong to me
 
 DAWN 253 
 
 then? No. What should I do with it? Who was to 
 come after me to claim it? An idea flashed through 
 my mind. In the town near by were many youths grow- 
 ing up in indolence and poverty their days passing 
 without reflection, without duties. There was my task. 
 These boys belonged to me, by my power to help them. 
 Even if I could make of but one of them a dutiful citi- 
 zen, would it not be worth while? I had no son to call 
 me father; but the father-heart was big in me, and I 
 could do vicarious duty here, and render a service to the 
 country that had sheltered and fed me so long. But 
 how should I set about it? The human soul is not a 
 piece of clay that :can be molded into the form we will. 
 I was not a dupe to what is called the influence of en- 
 vironment, which, as generally interpreted, means that 
 you can grow grapes of thorns. I knew that that couldn't 
 be done. But how look through this thick layer of flesh, 
 and know of a truth that the soul in it would repay 
 the trouble taken in cultivating it? For with regard to 
 this subject, also, of education, I was no longer a senti- 
 mentalist, and did not believe that it could supply de- 
 fects of nature. 
 
 Every naturalist knows that Nature is prodigal, be- 
 cause she does not intend to fail in the single design on 
 which she is bent: namely, that of reproducing herself 
 in a thousand forms. The oak casts its acorns to the 
 ground by thousands, so that one or two may have the 
 good fortune to live. It is life that she loves, and she 
 breathes the breath of it as willingly into a rat as into 
 man ; and when man in his pride calls himself her fa- 
 vorite, and even dares to try to separate himself from 
 her, by ignoring her laws, she strikes him with sterility. 
 She has no interest whatever in his intelligence: it 
 is his body that she wants, and this is one of those 
 crude facts that we cannot too often repeat to ourselves ; 
 for at present, as in the days of Rousseau, there is a 
 very great deal of false sentiment with regard to nature. 
 I had been living for twenty years alongside Indian
 
 254 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 tribes, who were living according to nature: that is, 
 according to the rats of the field. I saw them degen- 
 erate at the approach of civilization, not because civi- 
 lization is degenerating, but because they could not as- 
 similate it. The most natural food in a feeble stomach, 
 that cannot do its work, may poison the system: and as 
 I have said before, the United States, in giving itself 
 the enormous and impossible task of civilizing the In- 
 dian, has adopted the most refined means of extermi- 
 nating a rude and hardy race. 
 
 In a similar way, there are, in the midst of our most 
 flourishing civilizations, great numbers of so-called de- 
 generates who are at bottom nothing but barbarians and 
 may sooner or later find themselves in our asylums and 
 in our prisons. The true degenerate is a fallen creature, 
 whose nerves are wrecked by abuse. The barbarian is 
 a creature who has never risen. His nerves are of steel, 
 he knows none of the refinements of feeling of which 
 the degenerate is frequently capable, and which often 
 awaken in the unthinking a misplaced sympathy. The 
 degenerate may be a poet, may pass in the world for 
 one of its rarest souls because he can weep over the 
 breaking of a butterfly's wing. But beware of him. 
 Don't make him your friend, if you are a man; don't 
 love him, if you are a woman. He is capable of the 
 most frightful cruelties, the most revolting vices. He 
 can rend like a tiger and stab like an assassin. He has 
 no sense of proportion. He will tell you that the im- 
 prisonment of a white mouse in a cage affects him with 
 as deep a rage of hate and pity, as the enslavement of 
 a nation. He is as unstable as water; he will fall on 
 your bosom to-day, he will bite you to-morrow. He is 
 to himself the center of the universe. The sun shines 
 to warm him alone; and the moon rises to give him an 
 opportunity to sniffle his sentimentalisms into the fond 
 ears of a beautiful woman! Strange mixture of lust, 
 greed, cruelty, vice, treachery, egotism, and sentimental 
 tenderness ! And women are his foreordained victims.
 
 DAWN 255 
 
 To them, he pours out his sorrows, his melancholy ; the 
 cold world does not understand him, and the woman 
 alas! thinks that she does, and wastes her heart's treas- 
 ure in this bottomless pit. The barbarian, the degener- 
 ate, are the pests of our civilization; but we have as 
 yet found no way of eliminating them. There is only 
 one example in history of a nation that tried to do it 
 systematically, and that nation lives, now, only on the 
 pages of Plutarch. 
 
 Of the two, the degenerate is the more dangerous 
 by far, because he passes for what he isn't ; and has the 
 art of perfuming his filth with Cologne water. 
 
 Now, I had no intention of trying to educate either 
 a barbarian or a degenerate. I meant to choose the 
 best of the material at hand and do what I could with 
 it. I had a hundred and fifty acres of woodland on 
 the outskirts of the town and daily increasing in value 
 with the growth of it. I resolved to divide it into 
 twenty lots of five acres, each properly laid out so as 
 to be accessible, and to give it to twenty young people 
 from sixteen to eighteen years of age, on condition that 
 they should clear it off and cultivate it. The timber cut, 
 would more than amply pay them for the first year's 
 labor of clearing the ground; after which, each might 
 cultivate his own five acres, as it seemed best to him. 
 After five years' work on it, they would earn a clear 
 title to it and would receive it from me. But, if at any 
 time, they relaxed their zeal, the land was to be aban- 
 doned, and I had the right to bestow it on somebody 
 else. I required also a systematic and thorough study 
 of agriculture, including botany, the nature of plants, 
 and the constituents of the soil. 
 
 I did this from the belief that though nature has no 
 interest in the man of intelligence, civilization is the 
 product of intelligence and is maintained by it; and so 
 far as it is possible, labor should always be united to 
 intelligence to secure its best results.
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 AMONG THE SCHOOL-MASTERS 
 
 I BEGAN now, daily, to look for my boys. I demanded 
 a healthy body, an open intelligence and a disposition 
 to do right; in short, a good soil in which to sow my 
 seed. And here, I wish to render a tardy justice to my 
 father. I believe that his ideas were right in wishing 
 my education to be practical, rather than ornamental. 
 To introduce a new need where there is contentment, 
 does not always mean the introduction of an element 
 of growth. In a stupid mind, it may mean to pave the 
 first step to folly or to crime. 
 
 I was confirmed in this idea by a systematic study 
 of the educational system of the United States; and in 
 long conversations with some of the best school-masters 
 of the country, I have come to the following con- 
 clusions : 
 
 That the system is an ideal one, and that that is the 
 root and branch of its weakness. The ideal is the im- 
 practicable, that which is never attained, but which 
 serves as an aspiration, a direction in which we walk. 
 What is needed, is a real educational system : one which 
 recognizes limitations, one which recognizes distinctions, 
 and is not based upon a false and vicious presumption of 
 equality among minds. The total absence of any such 
 recognition was the first thing that struck me in look- 
 ing over the High School curriculum of the free public 
 schools. It was a complete bill of fare of all possible 
 forms of instruction art, science, literature, languages, 
 ancient and modern, music, elocution, mathematics, phi- 
 losophy, even including that most speculative of all 
 studies, psychology, which, at the very least, requires 
 
 256
 
 AMONG THE SCHOOL-MASTERS 257 
 
 half a lifetime of reflection and observation before one 
 can be sure of a single principle in it, in short, the 
 whole vast domain of human knowledge and research 
 was set before boys and girls ranging from twelve to 
 nineteen years of age! 
 
 I looked at it in amazement. 
 
 "This is what you do for your picked minds; what 
 provision do you make for the mediocre, who, like the 
 poor, are always with us ? " I asked the principal of a 
 flourishing city High School. He did not quite under- 
 stand me, so I continued: 
 
 " Do you mean to say that every pupil who enters 
 your High School, and completes its four years' course, 
 is expected to be proficient in the greater number of 
 these subjects?" 
 
 " Oh, yes, certainly. That is what his diploma 
 means." 
 
 " Then you have some rigid method of sifting minds, 
 by which you give this varied and exceptional training 
 to the few, who can really profit by it ? " 
 
 " Oh, no. They come up from the ward schools, 
 where they have spent from seven to eight years in 
 preparatory work. Of course, a system of natural sift- 
 ing goes on there. The very weak drop out, and we get 
 the stronger ones. Our enrollment this year is 1750." 
 
 " Seventeen hundred and fifty ! Do you mean to say 
 that you have found 1750 boys and girls, who can take 
 the training of an intellectual athlete, a savant, and come 
 out strong under it? What time have they for recre- 
 ation ? What time have they even for proper study ? " 
 
 He smiled rather uncomfortably, and said : 
 
 " The recreation problem, to be frank with you, solves 
 itself more easily than the other. The American boy 
 or girl is not subjected to the same rigid home discipline 
 as the European child. He is self-assertive from the 
 cradle. It is the parent who does the submitting, not 
 the child. He says, ' Mother, I am going out to-night/ 
 if he is considerate enough to mention the fact at all;
 
 1258 THE JOURNAL; OF A RECLUSE 
 
 instead of, * Mother, may I go out to-night ? ' The re- 
 sult is that he goes out a great deal too much. He 
 begins his social life, sometimes, before he gets into his 
 knee-trousers. He has his parties, his picnics, his girl, 
 even, if you please; the girl you see has as much free- 
 dom here as the boy, and the parks and theaters offer 
 their temptations, so that, on the whole " he hesitated, 
 scratched his head, and raised his eyebrows, and I fin- 
 ished his sentence for him. 
 
 "You have a surplus of recreation." 
 
 " Yes, so, you see, it becomes a question of regulat- 
 ing it, rather than providing for it. And we do that," 
 he added cheerfully. " We recognize that the young 
 need pleasure, need youthful companionship, need sun- 
 shine just like the plants; and we give them plenty of 
 it. We don't draw the reins tight on these restive young 
 colts perhaps not tight enough. We let them form 
 literary societies, scientific, art, or debating clubs ; we 
 give them opportunities to show what they can do by 
 dramatic entertainments before the public." 
 
 " What ! " I interrupted, " you run a sort of private 
 theater in connection with your schools? You complain 
 of a surplus of recreation, and you deliberately add to 
 your surplus, instead of trying to reduce it? or is it 
 the homeopathic theory set to education, that like cures 
 like?" 
 
 " No, no, you don't understand me at all. I said 
 we regulated the amusements of the young. We try to 
 substitute for the aimless, gossiping, social waste of time 
 a legitimate intellectual form of amusement. Play is 
 the normal pastime of the young. The acceptance of 
 that fact by modern educators was a revolution in edu- 
 cation. It set aside force, rigidity, harshness and sub- 
 stituted inclination for them. It banished the rod." 
 
 " And substituted barley-sugar. Yes, I understand 
 you, now. You put a pill into the child's candy, and 
 you never leave off feeding him candy." 
 
 "What do you mean?"
 
 AMONG THE SCHOOL-MASTERS 259 
 
 "Just what I said. You Americans have made a 
 hobby horse of the kindergarten method, and it follows 
 the child into his youth and into the High School, where 
 it would seem time to put off the infant's swaddling 
 clothes. You ' mother ' the boy after he is weaned, and 
 needs ' fathering,' so it seems to me. But the proof of 
 the pudding is in the eating. I shan't condemn the sys- 
 tem till I know the results. In my time, we thought play 
 one thing, and work another. We said ' all work and 
 no play makes Jack a dull boy ' ; but we never thought 
 of mixing them. We thought change an element of 
 zest, and went with more alacrity -.from work to play, 
 and play to work. ' Mais nous avons change tout cela! 
 You have athletic clubs, too, I see; out-door games." 
 
 " Oh, certainly. It's in the air. You breathe it. You 
 can't get rid of it. It's all very well to talk about ideal 
 situations; but you have conditions to deal with, facts 
 you can't get rid of. You must yield to them, or rather 
 compromise." 
 
 " Ah, yes, I see, the United States school system, 
 then, is like the parent: it does not guide the young; it 
 submits to them. I have been told that when the negroes 
 were first emancipated, they all wanted to learn Latin 
 and Greek. To them, it was the mysterious sesame, 
 the open door into all the luxuries of wealth and leisure. 
 Your young country has looked at education in the same 
 way, and not as a stern discipline, an emancipation of 
 the mind by a long, thorough course of fixed, persistent, 
 painful labor. Your boys and girls talk about going to 
 college as they talk about going to the races. It's a 
 rollicking good time they are. after, first and an educa- 
 tion, incidentally. Now, it doesn't seem to me worth 
 while to expend the immense sums of money which you 
 spend on education, just to give multitudes of idle young 
 people a good time. Not long ago, I saw some books 
 advertised, and all the stress was laid on the elegant 
 binding and the high quality of the paper. Nothing was 
 said about the contents. The books were evidently
 
 260 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 intended to make a brave show on some unused library 
 shelves. I have been looking over catalogues of various 
 private and public seminaries, and I noticed here that 
 all the stress was laid on the electric lights, and modern 
 improvements the vast grounds, the facilities for boat- 
 ing and out-door games. Not a line about the efficiency 
 of the teachers, the thoroughness of the instruction. 
 Material comforts and pleasures were the drawing-cards. 
 I look over this ambitious curriculum of yours, and it 
 seems to me like an immense dinner-table, furnished 
 with meats and fruits and dainties from all the climes 
 and countries of the world. And everybody is invited 
 to sit down to it; the dyspeptic, the weak, the diseased, 
 the fastidious, have just as much room there as the 
 strong. And they are asked to eat of everything. A 
 Gargantua alone would be at home there. But where 
 are the Gargantuas with an ideal digestive apparatus? 
 What are the results of this culinary orgy? The dys- 
 peptics and the sick are only made more dyspeptic and 
 weaker from indigestion, and the strong rise gorged 
 and dulled. What should you do? You should put 
 before your guests the simple, wholesome food that 
 they can digest. It is not the quantity eaten, but the 
 quantity digested, that strengthens the body, and the 
 same fact holds true with regard to intellectual food." 
 
 " That's all well enough, sir, but the American 
 people know what they want, and they are willing to 
 pay for it, too. They've a perfect right to do as they 
 please." 
 
 "Oh, certainly, nobody contests that right, only let's 
 not call a superficial smattering, a peck here and there 
 at a bushel of educational plums an education. I 
 have seen graduating essays on the loftiest themes com- 
 piled from encyclopedias, and every unusual word and a 
 great many ordinary ones, were misspelled in it. The 
 writer hadn't even learned to use his eyes correctly, and 
 see properly, what was set before him. I have seen 
 pupils in higher mathematics boggle at the multiplication
 
 AMONG THE SCHOOL-MASTERS 261 
 
 table, and pupils who had ' finished ' geography locate 
 Egypt in India. It is this sort of ' finish ' that I am ob- 
 jecting to. It isn't courtesy to say all this; but I have 
 a definite object in view. I wish to profit by your weak- 
 ness as well as your strength. There is strength in your 
 system. I don't deny it. It is so palpable that it does 
 not need dwelling upon. It is a glorious thing that not 
 a young soul in your country need lose his social birth- 
 right to a good education, if he wants it. It is a mag- 
 nificent thing, that among all the common pebbles on 
 which you have given yourselves the ungrateful and use- 
 less task of putting a high polish, there may be here 
 and there an agate, or even a diamond that need not 
 pass without luster, unrecognized through life. But it 
 is the enormous waste that troubles my Scotch thrift. 
 Josiah Wedgwood used to go through his pottery, and 
 with that quick, vigilant, beauty-loving eye of his, he 
 would single out every bit of bad work and smash it 
 with his stick. It had no right to exist and pass itself 
 off for perfect. Walter Scott, in his private journal, 
 once wrote: 
 
 " ' To give education to dull mediocrity is a flinging 
 of the children's bread to dogs ; it is sharpening a hatchet 
 on a razor strop, which renders the strop useless, and 
 does no good to the hatchet/ 
 
 " You waste millions and millions of dollars annually 
 sharpening hatchets on razor strops. Instead of smash- 
 ing your bad work, and refusing to send it out as per- 
 fect, you tie a blue ribbon on it, and label it with a 
 diploma. It is a shame ! That is why the United States 
 presents the singular paradox of spending more time and 
 money on education than any other country in the world, 
 and yet holds the real scholar in the least esteem. His 
 place in your country is purely factitious; he fits in 
 nowhere, for nobody really wants his scholarship, or 
 appreciates and enjoys it. Your system of smattering 
 destroys the respect which pure ignorance has for what 
 it does not at all comprehend, Your dull boy studies
 
 physics : and because he sees his teacher perform a few 
 experiments, thinks he knows all about it, and as what 
 he really does know amounts to nothing, he rates every- 
 body else's knowledge of the subject by the light, or 
 rather the darkness, of his own personal experience and 
 he despises it. 
 
 " You force your best specimens of literature into the 
 hands of ignorance and immaturity and because no 
 thrill of the consciousness of higher power is possible 
 to them, they think your great writers asses and dull- 
 ards. 
 
 " I visited a class the other day, where a boy, forced to 
 give his opinion of Emerson, deliberately called him a 
 fool. Of course, he was a fool to the boy's dense folly. 
 In another class, a girl refused to grant any superiority 
 to Franklin, because he had broken his engagement 
 with a young woman to whom he had grown indifferent. 
 No man could possibly be great who would do such a 
 mean thing as that, said little Miss with a toss of her 
 silly head. Now, why was it necessary to disclose this 
 interesting bit of biography to a girl, who had not suffi- 
 cient experience in life to judge properly? 
 
 " But I find that it is a pet theory of your educational 
 system to require every boy and girl to have an opinion, 
 or to make one on the spot, if he hasn't one. Your 
 English teaching is all based on that, and your pupils 
 are graded on glibness. It is good training for an 
 auctioneer; but I emphatically deny that it makes for 
 culture. What opinion, original and true, coming from 
 deep inner experience, can any ordinary child in his 
 'teens have? Criticism means life. Live, feel, suffer, 
 that's the tax you must pay for the right to utter a lit- 
 erary criticism, or an ethical opinion worth having." 
 
 I was getting heated, and felt it time to stop, so ex- 
 cusing myself with an apology for my warmth, I bowed 
 myself out of the principal's office, quite conscious that 
 I was leaving him angered, and more confident than 
 ever in the right of the American citizen to do as he
 
 AMONG THE SCHOOL-MASTERS 263 
 
 pleased. I find that when all other arguments fail, this 
 one settles the matter conclusively. 
 
 From a consideration of the educational system itself, 
 I turned my attention to the teachers. I visited the so- 
 called institutes or periodical meetings of teachers for 
 the purpose of discussing their work. Here I was aston- 
 ished to find that the great majority of them were 
 women, and that of these women, most of them were 
 young, having taken up teaching not as a profession, 
 but as a temporary method of earning a respectable 
 living, prior to settling down in their own households. 
 A bright, vivacious spectacle they made, but as for any 
 serious attention they were giving to what was going 
 on on the platform, they might as well have been at a 
 circus. Indeed, they conducted themselves very much 
 as if they were; whispering, laughing, eating peanuts, 
 or chewing gum with no effort at all at concealment, and 
 were several times called to order by the venerable 
 chairman. I was so unfortunate as to be seated behind 
 an elderly woman with a harsh, steel-like voice, who ac- 
 companied all the discussions from the platform with a 
 running aside of bitter sarcasms, which, at last, annoyed 
 me so much that I had to retire to a remote and de- 
 serted corner of the gallery in order to hear anything 
 in peace. I was interested in what was said, if she 
 wasn't, and thought that if she did not like it, there was 
 no necessity of obtruding her misplaced wit on a public 
 audience; and that she might have adopted the quieter 
 method of some of her colleagues, who were undis- 
 guisedly reading newspapers or books. This was an- 
 other striking example of the American way of doing 
 what one pleases, but it made a very disagreeable and 
 painful impression on me. My heart went out to the 
 gray-haired educator whose task it was to impress these 
 frivolous young women with the importance of their 
 (daily duties, but who were rebellious, uninterested, feel- 
 ing themselves inconvenienced in their Saturday's shop- 
 ping by a forced attendance at an educational meeting.
 
 264 THE JOURNAL 1 OF 'A RECLUSE 
 
 My Heart went out to the multitudes of boys wlio were 
 to be trained into virility under such petticoat govern- 
 ment, and to the multitudes of young girls who ought 
 to be trained to the serene dignity of perfect woman- 
 hood. 
 
 However, their conduct explained another anomaly 
 in public school education here, namely, a total indiffer- 
 ence to manners or personal bearing. Boys are allowed 
 to lounge through the halls from class to class, their 
 hands in their pockets, their books huddled under their 
 arm-pits. They loll and lean over their desks in recita- 
 tion as do the girls. They chew gum incessantly, not 
 even taking the trouble to remove it to answer a ques- 
 tion. They reply with an Uh-huh for yes, and are not 
 reproved for it. They wear rings on their fingers, and 
 dirt under their finger nails. They push and rush and 
 scramble to recitations, loudly laughing and talking, 
 walk sometimes arm in arm, three or four abreast; in 
 short, do as they please. 
 
 The girls over-dress in a painfully unbecoming way, 
 looking often as if they were ready for a ball, instead of 
 the school-room; and a great many use paint and pow- 
 der, and provide themselves with mirrors at which they 
 adjust their hair and give another powder-rag wipe to 
 their faces between recitations. 
 
 When I spoke of this to teachers, some of them de- 
 plored it, and excused it, on the ground that parents 
 resented their interference with regard to personal mat- 
 ters ; and they were forced to accept what they could not 
 mend. Sometimes I found a teacher so rightly con- 
 scious of her duty that she had courage to face unpopu- 
 larity or the resentment of parents, and frankly tried 
 to introduce a little order into this moral chaos; and 
 whenever I met a teacher like that, I took off my hat 
 to her. 
 
 It seems to me that the dominant fear of the teacher 
 in the United States is the fear of unpopularity, and 
 that efficiency in teaching suffers sadly from it. It is
 
 AMONG THE SCHOOL-MASTERS 265 
 
 this fear that pushes large numbers of wholly incompe- 
 tent dullards from grade to grade, and diploma to 
 diploma, until the day is coming, if not here now, when 
 the word " diploma " will be as meaningless as the 
 words " colonel " and " professor." It encourages the 
 premature and unrestrained social intercourse of the 
 young of both sexes, and all the weakness and follies 
 that result from it in elopements and divorces. I heard 
 a principal announce to his pupils from the platform a 
 ball game to come off the next day, and add that every 
 young man in the hall ought to be ashamed of himself, 
 if he did not take a girl with him. More tickets must 
 be sold. The team needed support. Did moral order 
 need no support? No; it did not pay visible cash re- 
 turns. It is this fact that crushes out all freedom of 
 utterance: makes fruitless all freedom of thought. In 
 the universities of Germany, a Haeckel may advance 
 the boldest speculations of modern thought, and hold 
 his chair as securely as the most conservative theo- 
 logian. Not so in the land of freedom. He must do 
 his thinking and talking in chorus. No solos allowed. 
 Hence it is quite comprehensible that all free upward 
 intellectual growth ceases when the censor's pruning 
 knife ruthlessly and indiscriminately lops off the top 
 branches. 
 
 There is, however, a stirring undercurrent of dis- 
 content among the most conscientious and thoughtful 
 of older teachers, who have lived to see the fallacy of 
 popular education as a universal panacea for social 
 disorders, and a better day may come, if the discontent 
 finds free expression. 
 
 " How long have you been teaching Latin ? " I asked 
 of one veteran school-master. 
 
 " Thirty-one years," he replied. 
 
 " And in that time, how many pupils have you 
 taught?" 
 
 " I can't exactly say, but some thousands, at any 
 rate."
 
 266 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 "And of these thousands, how many, at the end of 
 their four years' course, were able to read with ease, 
 profit, or pleasure the Latin classics ? " 
 
 " I can't affirm, without doubt, that there were ten 
 of them." 
 
 " Then you have passed your thirty-one years at the 
 task of the daughters of Danaus, filling sieves with 
 water?" 
 
 " It seems to me that I have." 
 
 " Can you tell me why you did not succeed ? " 
 
 " In carrying water in a sieve ? " 
 
 " Pardon me, the question was stupid. Then that 
 means that an intelligence, curious, active, and reten- 
 tive, is very rare?" 
 
 " Yes, very, very rare, especially one that is capable of 
 impersonal interests. The ordinary mind is interested 
 in itself, and in the little circle of facts around it. It 
 is only by vanity, that it is induced to extend its circle. 
 A man doesn't like another to out-do him in anything; 
 therefore, he feigns an interest, of which he is not 
 capable. Vanity keeps him at it, when he is tired of it ; 
 but that support withdrawn, he goes no farther. Ask of 
 any first year Latin pupil why he is studying it, and ten 
 to one he will tell you either that he expects to go to 
 college; or that he has heard a good deal about it; or 
 that he expects to study a modern language, and he has 
 heard that Latin helps. But you see that Latin is not 
 an end in itself, but a means to an end. His feeble curi- 
 osity satisfied, or his college exams, passed, he drops it; 
 and what he has learned quickly fades from his mind. 
 When a boy tells me that he is studying Latin to facili- 
 tate his mastery of a modern tongue, I tell him that he 
 is acting exactly as a boy who would buy a pair of 
 roller-skates, because he wanted to learn how to swim. 
 Let the skates alone, and save time by plunging into the 
 water at once. Strange! how these stereotyped ideas 
 pass on from one generation to another, isn't it? When 
 Latin was the only medium for written thought, there
 
 AMONG THE SCHOOL-MASTERS 267 
 
 was a reason for studying it, but why an ordinary in- 
 telligence should lose so much time now from what it 
 can do, to waste it on what it can not do, is one of those 
 impenetrable mysteries of human stupidity that ought 
 to cease astonishing us, because they are so common." 
 
 I smiled and said : " Your reasoning about Latin, as 
 a means to an end, seems to me to apply very well also 
 to the higher mathematics. One hears so much about 
 their value as an excellent mental discipline. Now, 
 what do you think about it ? " 
 
 " What do I think about it?" he repeated. " I think 
 that the study of mathematics can teach you to reason 
 about problems, but it does not follow from that, that 
 you are able to reason about things with no figures in 
 them; the great problems of life how to escape from 
 a difficulty, how to recover your independence, when 
 under the domination of a tyrannical passion. We hear, 
 too, a very great deal of nonsense about the require- 
 ments of literary culture. But do the lives of literary 
 men give us brilliant examples of temperance, chastity, 
 prudence? On the contrary, they furnish the saddest 
 history of human weaknesses and corruption that we 
 have on record. And as for the intellectual value of 
 mathematics and literature, would it not be proper to 
 infer that those men who make of these studies their 
 life-work in teaching them to others, would be national 
 models of wisdom? But is that so? Is the school- 
 master the influential man ? the builders of our railways ? 
 the founders of our commerce? Have they built our 
 towns, furrowed the seas, written the books that have 
 cheered the hearts of men from generation to genera- 
 tion? Aren't they, on the contrary, the helpless victims 
 of the solidest, most exacting education there is the 
 education of practical life? Don't the real estate agents 
 seek them out first of all to sell them the little lots 
 remote from town, which in a short time are to be of 
 enormous value and which they are receiving at specially 
 favored rates, because they are they. If there are any
 
 268 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 coffee plantations in the Orient, or down in old Mexico, 
 selling off at immense bargains, aren't the school-teach- 
 ers the first to be notified? Aren't the gold mines and 
 the permanently flowing oil wells especially created for 
 them, too? I speak knowingly; I have several hundred 
 dollars, I can ill afford to lose, floating gayly in oil, but 
 never floating back to me. And look through all the 
 centuries at the school-master in literature. At best, 
 he is a mild innocent with a bulging forehead; or a 
 great ass, tumefied with pedantry. No, they say it is a 
 dirty bird that fouls its own nest; but I have always 
 thought that if there had been much of a man in me, 
 I would have given over my task to the petticoats, and 
 gone out into the world, and worked among men. The 
 real, the only education that any man gets is that which 
 he gives to himself. All that we school-masters can do, 
 is to point out the road, walk in it ourselves, and give 
 others the courage to follow us. We can't furnish them 
 with carriages, or bear them on our shoulders. 
 
 " But I shouldn't like to leave the question of classical 
 studies without saying what they have done for me, 
 and what I have tried to make them do for my pupils. 
 I am no cut and dried philologist. I care nothing for 
 the word without the thought behind it, any more than 
 I care for the dress without the person in it, and I have 
 studied the ancients to know what they thought, and not 
 to find in their language the roots of other tongues. 
 Therefore, classic literature has given me a standard of 
 values which I prize above everything else. The ancients 
 have taught me what are the essentials of life. When 
 I read them I am ashamed of the noisy boasts of our 
 age, and I feel that we have little or nothing to teach 
 them of permanent value in life. We have enormously 
 increased luxuries and complications in life we ride 
 faster, we eat more things, we travel farther, we have 
 substituted another mythology for theirs, but when you 
 have said that, you have said about all; and in return, 
 they can show us an immense superiority in personal
 
 AMONG THE SCHOOL-MASTERS 269 
 
 courage and endurance, and probity in general. There 
 were no cushions between them and the earth; they 
 sat harder it may be, but they walked better. With them, 
 a progressive nation was one that carried its arts and 
 sciences into other lands. They did it by force of arms, 
 I grant it; but where they conquered, they civilized. 
 With us, a progressive nation is one in which milliners 
 wear diamonds, and servants silk dresses ; and the daily 
 laborer may live with his family in the kitchen and the 
 attic of a mansion with a brown-stone, or marble front, 
 by renting out all the habitable rooms ; where the wash- 
 woman may own a piano that nobody in the family can 
 play on ; and a cook can demand any price she asks, and 
 then regard her services as a favor which she renders 
 you. This is democracy ; the reign of the average man, 
 who erects statues to Dumas, loves in art the eccentric 
 and the ugly, so long as they are novel or vicious, and 
 gives his eulogies where he finds his material com- 
 forts." 
 
 I continued my search for information among the 
 larger colleges and universities. Everywhere I received 
 the same replies, the same complaints, uttered with more 
 or less freedom. A great many deplored the effects of 
 co-education, not only with respect to the increased 
 facilities for the distractions of social life, but as less- 
 ening the solidity and profundity of the instruction. I 
 remember that a professor of history, in particular, told 
 me that his work was badly crippled by the necessity he 
 was under of diluting his instruction, to make it palat- 
 able to his women students. Great social problems could 
 not be probed to the bottom without offending their 
 prejudices, or their fastidiousness. Almost all of them 
 deplored the facility with which the doors of colleges 
 and universities are swung open to admit the incompe- 
 tent. In some cases, classes were deliberately formed to 
 give employment to professors. 
 
 " We are engaged for the most part," said one of the 
 men to me, " in trying to put a sharp, hard edge on a
 
 270 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 leaden blade, to give the durable lustre of gold to a piece 
 of brass. You see that that is not only an impossible, 
 but a shamefully silly task. I come from my work, 
 sometimes, cursing myself. I had been sowing good 
 grain on sand. I had been giving my pearls to be 
 trampled under foot by swine, and all that time I might 
 have been doing something useful for humanity. In- 
 stead of that, I had wearied myself in a thankless and 
 fruitless task. I feel that I am growing more and more 
 incapable of any task worthy of me. But what can I 
 do?" 
 
 " What can you do ? You can stop wasting your time 
 on imbeciles. For what you are doing is not only a 
 waste, but it is treason to real intelligence. You are not 
 'dispensing light. You are giving a false lustre to igno- 
 rance." 
 
 "But if our classes diminish in size, we are repri- 
 manded by our superior for too high a standard. It's 
 numbers, not standard of quality, that the colleges want. 
 If the classes grow too small, we lose our job, and yet 
 we must live." 
 
 I had not the cruelty to give the response uttered 
 once before to the same plea : " I don't see the necessity," 
 but replied,, " One can always plant potatoes." 
 
 But this question of a livelihood is the hidden rock 
 against which so many good reforms are in danger of 
 being wrecked. But it seems to me that it is an ex- 
 pensive way of giving them a livelihood, and that in the 
 interests of solid learning and culture, both professors 
 and students should be ruthlessly weeded out, if they 
 dre not serving the beautiful purpose for which they 
 are in institutions of learning. 
 
 The multiplicity of books, the increasing number of 
 public libraries, gives to everyone the chance for self- 
 culture, and I know more than one man whose educa- 
 tion, due to nothing but his own unaided exertions, 
 would put to the blush that of many a distinguished 
 college professor. What is the history of so many men
 
 AMONG THE SCHOOL-MASTERS 271 
 
 of genius of obscure origin? How did they acquire 
 their knowledge? Incited by a veritable hunger for 
 learning, they have searched the truth everywhere. They 
 have been indefatigable readers; incessant thinkers 
 and observers. Society was not a necessity to them ; it 
 was rather a shackle. " My leisure ! my beautiful lei- 
 sure; do not break in upon it, and steal it from me," 
 was their constant wish, unuttered or spoken. What is it 
 we search in society? Amusement, flattery. And what 
 is the greatest, the most exquisitely delightful of all flat- 
 teries? Love. To be chosen from among thousands, 
 to be caressed, to be adored ! What is more delightful ? 
 How many eulogies we have written of it, how many 
 snares we have laid to trap youth, and persuade it that 
 the sum of human felicity is to be found in it. How de- 
 licious the new surprise of it, each time that it steals 
 into the heart, anew ; how desolate it leaves us when it 
 fades away. How useless to preach that it, too, is a 
 snare. 
 
 "La solitude effraye une dme de vingt ans." 
 We nearly all follow the same path, and buy our wis- 
 dom with our gray hairs. But having bought it, let 
 us not keep it to ourselves. Let us give it to the young, 
 by teaching them those old, old truths, old as the wisdom 
 of the ancient philosophers and the ethics of Christ ; and 
 yet young as the lispings of infancy to-day, because 
 immortal the truths of the perishability of human 
 works and human ties ; the impossibility of their ever 
 wholly satisfying the ceaseless hunger of the spirit; 
 and that other gray, nun-like truth that perfect hap- 
 piness is never found except in renunciation, that not 
 until we are able to do without a coveted good, are we 
 fit to possess and enjoy it fully. 
 
 Hard truths, these, to teach the young, and not to be 
 taught by iteration, but by example and wise, careful, 
 practical training. You cannot teach your daughter pre- 
 cepts of unworldliness and at the same time dress her 
 sumptuously, and make her feel that her value depends
 
 272 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 upon the richness of her wardrobe. She will take your 
 dresses and leave you the precepts. You cannot teach 
 her that true wealth lies not in the abundance of things 
 possessed, but in the open humble heart, the inquir- 
 ing, studious mind, and yet gratify her every desire for 
 material pleasure, fix her eyes upon the shows of things 
 and not on realities. 
 
 I say it sadly, but with confidence, and I would be 
 willing to appeal to the experience of every teacher in 
 the country, in support of the statement, that the great 
 difficulty which teachers have to meet, in the training 
 of the young, is that they are not given to them with 
 clean, sound minds, eager for knowledge and already 
 instinctively turning towards it, as the seedling climbs 
 up towards the sun. Their work in the school-room 
 does not begin with doing, but with MM-doing, and alas ! 
 so often hopeless un-doing; for these boys and girls 
 have begun life at the wrong end begun by being men 
 and women instead of children begun by loving all 
 the artificial excitements that stimulate the jaded world- 
 ling and yet their teachers are expected to give them 
 joy in the calm pleasures of the intellect to make them 
 love the school-room, instead of the ball-room the 
 dewy wild flowers of the meadow, instead of the lus- 
 cious, heavy, languorous, perfumed roses of the conser- 
 vatory the lives of heroes on printed pages more than 
 the pageantry of mimic life in the theater. It can't be 
 done, any more than you can revive a taste for spring 
 water in the wine-drenched mouth of an epicure. And 
 yet, until you can do this, until you can fill the hearts and 
 minds of our young men and women with a contempt 
 for vain show, vain pleasure-seeking, selfish and cruel 
 frivolity, until you can impart to them an eager desire 
 to know the best that has been thought and said in the 
 world, awaken in them that sane and exquisite delight 
 irr the beauty of the natural world which is the essence 
 of true refinement, and make them feel that health, 
 moral and physical, is beautiful, and sin and disease are
 
 AMONG THE SCHOOL-MASTERS 273 
 
 hideous, and that every human soul has its own peculiar 
 responsibilities and duties, which it is base and cow- 
 ardly to shirk until you can do all this your fine 
 schools are only whited sepulchres, and you are not 
 training the men and women demanded by modern civi- 
 lization.
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 AN EXPERIMENT IN ALTRUISM 
 
 THE general result of my observations and study of 
 schools was to confirm me in my determination to use 
 my material for what it was worth, and not put an arti- 
 ficial value upon it. I had one immense advantage over 
 the salaried school-master, I was subjected to no temp- 
 tation to cringe to authorities or to fear the results of 
 unpopularity. I expected neither good nor evil of any- 
 body ; and I had been often enough disappointed in life, 
 not to set out by expecting too much. 
 
 I returned home about the middle of September. The 
 summer heat was over, but a great many beautiful days 
 were in store for us before winter set in. I made regu- 
 lar tours of inspection about town ; but found only ten 
 boys to my liking, and of these, three abandoned their 
 work at the end of three months. 
 
 I had resolved to build a laboratory for myself, or 
 rather to transform the room which Abby had occupied 
 into one. I am ashamed to confess that, after her de- 
 parture, I had never re-entered her room. But I opened 
 it, now, almost without thinking of her ; but the memory 
 is singularly responsive to suggestions and associations, 
 and once in it, again, a faint sick longing seized me in- 
 describably painful. It seemed to me that I had opened 
 a tomb. I went out hastily, but felt that I had been de- 
 testably weak, so hurried away to get a broom and a 
 bucket of water. I opened all the windows, cleaned the 
 room, and forced myself to whistle as I did it. But the 
 whistle might have been a funeral march, for all the 
 gaiety there was in it, and once or twice my eyes grew 
 moist. 
 
 I called in the carpenters to my aid, I sent away for 
 
 274
 
 AN EXPERIMENT IN ALTRUISM 275 
 
 my supplies, and, by the end of November, I had a fine 
 little laboratory, with abundance of shelves covered with 
 mysterious bottles. I destined my winters to chemical 
 studies, in which I determined to interest my boys, if 
 possible; but our first task was to clear off the land. 
 They commenced with a fine healthy appetite for work. 
 Their new axes, the novelty of their task, the sweet out- 
 door air, a definite aim in view, had much to do with it, 
 no doubt. It is possible, too, that my presence, as their 
 leader and director, the energy with which I worked 
 alongside of them, helped to keep them in heart. 
 
 I chatted freely with them when the occasion pre- 
 sented itself; I praised them whenever they deserved it; 
 and I demanded nothing of them, that they could not do 
 well, by exerting themselves. 
 
 In our hours of rest, I directed their attention to the 
 wild plants. I showed them the regular branching of 
 trees, the provision which nature cautiously makes for 
 next year's foliage, the nature of buds, their evolution 
 and transformation. I talked of the nature of the soil, 
 the manner in which plants are nourished, the necessity 
 of knowing what mineral foods are most essential to the 
 perfect development of the different esculent plants. That 
 naturally led to their interest and share in the laboratory 
 work. Here, I was pupil as well as master, and much 
 the most ardent and curious of them all. I had always 
 been interested in the exact sciences as opposed to 
 those which are speculative. Of all the impertinences 
 and follies of the human mind, that seems to me the 
 most unpardonable which wastes a life-time in filling 
 with mere speculations the abyss of our ignorance. But 
 it seems to be an ineradicable defect of the human in- 
 tellect. We divide and classify our ignorance, and give 
 names to its divisions as we do to the imaginary canals 
 in Mars ; and try to sanctify it by blaspheming the name 
 of science, in calling it science. 
 
 Henri Beyle says wittily of the Germans : " Saint Ber- 
 nard, preaching to the Germans in a language of which
 
 276 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 they did not understand a word, converted them by 
 thousands. In our days, Kant has re-commenced this 
 miracle." 
 
 All these searches for the absolute are only voyages 
 in a very narrow circle, of which we are the center. 
 There is not one inch of firm foot-hold outside of the 
 worn pathway trodden by human experience; and yet 
 this no-man's land of the vague and unknowable has 
 been peopled from time immemorial by dreamers and 
 charlatans, and the starved hearts of women, and will 
 continue to be so peopled while men and women dream 
 and hope and suffer. And there will also be a few sane 
 minds who love to feel the solid ground under their 
 feet; even when the ground is rough and stony, and 
 must pierce the foot that treads it. They will be scorned 
 by the vacuum lovers; branded as materialists, as if 
 there were something infinitely shameful in believing 
 that flesh and blood and bones are flesh and blood and 
 bones, and the good brown earth is good brown earth ; 
 but let them pay no heed to the scorn, knowing well 
 that the vacuists, if I may coin a word, are as much at- 
 tracted to matter as we who aren't ashamed of it, and 
 live in it quite as openly, sometimes even a little more 
 flauntingly. 
 
 My studies confirmed me in the belief that what we 
 call spirit is only a property of matter, that in man it 
 shows itself as intelligence, in mute nature as motion; 
 and I believe the time will come, when physicists will 
 include motion as one of the indispensable properties 
 of matter. That, of course, a property of anything can- 
 not exist in the abstract goes without saying. Hence 
 matter, and force, spirit, motion, or whatever you choose 
 to call the animating quality, are indissolubly bound 
 together, subject to unceasing change and transforma- 
 tions. 
 
 To see for myself, and to show to these young souls, 
 some of these wonderful transformations, became, now, 
 for many years the occupation of my life. I tried to in-
 
 AN EXPERIMENT IN ALTRUISM 277 
 
 spire in them a love and respect for this mute, pregnant 
 matter so often despised ; to show it living, silently grop- 
 ing upward, concealing in itself miracles of beauty, 
 ceaselessly circulating in countless forms, immortal, but 
 protean. 
 
 However, I was not long in discovering that among 
 my boys there were very few capable of sustained at- 
 tention and prolonged study. Here, I made up my mind 
 that not having any time to waste, I shouldn't imitate 
 the public schools, and try to sharpen and polish my 
 lead. I studied my boys attentively, unknown to them. 
 I put them to the test in all sorts of ways; and when I 
 saw a mind easily distracted, difficult to fix, indifferent 
 to results, careless of the truth, lax in principles of 
 honor, eager to pass for more than he was worth, vain 
 boasting, glib-tongued, a loiterer, a procrastinator, I did 
 not give him many chances to yawn in my face, or to 
 take up the room of one more worthy than he. I sent 
 him about his business, which was not mine, and thought 
 myself well rid of him. I had an intense desire to find 
 a boy after my own heart, who could enter into my 
 studies with ardent zeal, and who from his youth could 
 make that progress in them, denied to me, who had com- 
 menced so late in life. I had the great good fortune to 
 find him at last, and counted myself the happiest of men 
 in having found the fertile soil into which I could cast 
 my grain, and hope to see it bear fruit. 
 
 He was the eldest son of a brave Scotch widow of 
 remarkable good sense a woman who earned a frugal 
 living by her needle for herself and three children. 
 
 That which struck me most in Aleck during the first 
 weeks of our association was his ardent love of truth. 
 I have often remarked, since then, that this trait of per- 
 fect truthfulness is the distinguishing characteristic of 
 a first-class mind. It is true that there is an age in 
 childhood when almost every child is a liar ; not through 
 natural viciousness, but through an excess of imagina- 
 tion, in which the real and unreal are confused, or
 
 278 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 through fear, or through vanity, the habit of lying from 
 the last sources, being most difficult to overcome. But 
 this impressionable, imaginative age passed, the good 
 mind invariably becomes truthful, feeling shame over a 
 lie, as the contemptible characteristic of cowardice. 
 Then, too, the majestic beauty of truth is borne in upon 
 him. He is, as it were, amorous of her, and he cannot 
 suffer a lie to take her place in his warm heart. 
 
 This love of truth is the especial gift of the scientist, 
 who must be ready to abandon his most cherished be- 
 liefs, as soon as he has discovered a fallacy in them. 
 
 My young Aleck had a mind in which this strong love 
 of truth was united to an imagination, full of color and 
 beauty a rare combination, indeed. For there is a 
 form of mind, cold, bare, in which truth assumes rigid- 
 ity and an absolute tyranny. What we call a fine sense 
 of humor is wanting to it. Such a mind has no wings ; 
 it cannot go far. Its truths do not attract us. We look 
 at them and yawn. It lives in the forms of things, and 
 sees no spirits in them. It is incapable of feeling the 
 beauty and the disguised truths of poetry. It would ask 
 of the Iliad, " What does it prove ? " and before the 
 fables of La Fontaine, indignantly demand " Can ani- 
 mals talk?" 
 
 My Aleck was far above this. His eyes of a deep 
 blue, sparkling with intelligence, were made to delight 
 in the colors of the dawn and the sunset, as well as 
 in the soil under his feet. He had superb health, and 
 at fourteen, the stature of a young athlete. 
 
 " Life is glorious, isn't it ? " I heard him say one 
 day. " I am so much obliged to mother for having me. 
 I don't really know what I should have done, if I hadn't 
 been born." 
 
 His nature was full of kindness, sensitive to suffering 
 even of the meanest insect. I've seen him stoop to 
 turn over an ugly black beetle that lay on its back, help- 
 lessly fluttering its thread-like legs in the air, in a hope-
 
 AN EXPERIMENT IN ALTRUISM 279 
 
 less effort to get on its feet again. His intelligence was 
 alert; no need to explain the same thing twice to him. 
 But I did not know all his worth at first. I had to be 
 teased by the stupidities of the other boys before I knew 
 that I had found a precious stone among my pebbles. 
 Then I saw the prospect of another friendship to be 
 the joy of my declining years, as the friendship of my 
 boyhood had sweetened my youth. 
 
 His example was a spur to the other boys ; but there 
 is no spur that has the power of being effective year 
 after year, except that which comes from one's self ; and 
 although all my boys, who finished their years of pro- 
 bation with me, had learned with a certain pleasure the 
 elementary facts of chemistry, that is to say, enough to 
 make intelligent agriculturists of themselves, there was 
 none but Aleck who persisted, after acquiring the neces- 
 sary information. The power of patient observation and 
 brooding reflection is a gift, not an acquirement. 
 
 As for the general success of my plans, I saw with 
 pleasure a very respectable number of young boys grow 
 up capable of earning an honorable and useful liveli- 
 hood. I saw a general interest in horticulture and agri- 
 culture grow and spread around me; and I founded an 
 agricultural school that has enriched the community in 
 many ways; and I learned for myself that education 
 means something quite individual, for it means putting 
 a man into harmony with his environment ; making him 
 capable of using its advantages ; giving him tastes, which 
 it is possible to gratify in his hours of leisure, so that 
 he may be delivered from the temptations and torments 
 of ennui. The great trouble with most people is that 
 they don't know what to do with their leisure hours. 
 Man is naturally inclined to physical action, and loves 
 the excitement of danger. He is born warrior and 
 hunter; but civilization would make of him a man of 
 peace and a vegetarian. She gives him a thousand arti- 
 ficial tastes in compensation for the stifling of his in-
 
 stincts. Education gives itself the enormous task of 
 modifying these instincts, to make them harmonize with 
 artificial surroundings. What are all the crimes, per- 
 fidies, and hypocrises of society but reversions to these 
 savage instincts, which make the foundation of every 
 man. We are tamed bears with be-ribboned head- 
 dress, made to dance, and taught to eat bonbons. 
 But the master's whip out of sight, we go on all fours 
 again, tear our pretty ribbons to pieces, throw away 
 our bonbons and feed again on flesh and blood. 
 
 This is what our lower classes are continually doing. 
 They fill their leisure hours with sensual gratifications. 
 Go into any one of the great popular amusement parks 
 of our large cities, and watch how the people amuse 
 themselves. Their amusement is an interpretation of 
 their daily life. They live half the time in public. Home 
 is but a place to sleep, not always a place to eat. They 
 spend a great part of their time in street-cars, elevators, 
 railway carriages, subjected to the irritating influences 
 of ceaseless noise and constant nervous jars. All the 
 senses are so ceaselessly appealed to, that wearied, ex- 
 hausted with over-work, the nervous system has lost its 
 power to respond healthily to natural stimuli and con- 
 stantly seeks novel excitements, for the sake of a pleas- 
 urable sensation. To gratify that sensation, we seek 
 to startle, confuse and further excite the over-worked 
 senses speaking always to them, because we seem to 
 have lost the art of speaking to the heart and brain. 
 In this country we have not gone so far as the Parisians, 
 who, to quicken their jaded senses, appeal to them all 
 at once in certain dramatic representations in which a 
 change of scene is announced by a differently colored 
 light, while an orchestra plays in a different key, and 
 an atomizer in the center of the theater disperses a 
 different odor ; but we aren't far behind it ; we require 
 to be tricked and amused like children, bumped and 
 tossed and turned in scenic railways and " roulettes " 
 and " ticklers." We don't have bull-fights, but we must
 
 AN EXPERIMENT IN ALTRUISM 281 
 
 feast our eyes and thrill our blood on mimic railway 
 wrecks, steamer explosions, and other horrors too nu- 
 merous to mention. 
 
 No fact or truth can get simply and quietly impressed 
 on the public mind. It must be shouted, sung, danced, 
 symbolized, and placarded on all our walls. Our 
 churches built in the name of Him who had not where 
 to lay his head, vie with each other in the splendor of 
 their appointments, and women- journalists tell the fash- 
 ionable world that their orayer-books must match their 
 Sunday gown! 
 
 There was a time when men and women did not go 
 to church to be entertained, to listen to good music and 
 eloquent rhetoric, to look at beautiful flowers, to feel 
 an aesthetic pleasure in the play of soft patches of 
 colored light on stately pillars or frescoed walls. Not 
 that I mean to say anything against the refining influ- 
 ence of music, art, and eloquence. I could not, were I 
 to try, say enough in praise of them. They are the 
 crowning delights of civilization. Only, the sweet vo- 
 luptuous sensation arising from them should never for a 
 moment be mistaken for a religious sentiment for that 
 pure, rapt, austere sentiment, which annihilates the body 
 and its claims, and brings the bare cell of the devout 
 monk nearer to the portals of heaven than the stateli- 
 est cathedral. 
 
 If Christ could enter one of our fashionable churches 
 to-day, as he walked the shores of Galilee 1900 years 
 ago, bare-footed, bare-headed, do you think he could 
 utter there, with anything but irony, that profound 
 truth : 
 
 " Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat or 
 what ye shall drink, nor yet of your body what ye shall 
 put on. Is not the life more than the meat and the 
 body than raiment ? " or : 
 
 " What went ye out for to see ? A man clothed in 
 soft raiment? Behold they which are gorgeously ap- 
 parelled and live delicately, are in kings' courts."
 
 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 In her admirable criticism of German composers, 
 Mme. de Stae'l says: 
 
 " Those who do not love painting in itself attach a 
 great importance to the subjects of pictures. They wish 
 to find in them the impressions which dramatic scenes 
 produce. It is the same in music. Those who enjoy 
 it but feebly, require it to be faithfully accompanied 
 by words; but those whom music stirs to the very 
 depths of their souls, regard every attention not given 
 to the melody itself, as but an impertinent distraction." 
 
 I will add: It is the same with the sentiment of 
 religion. If it needs to be fostered, as in the Salvation 
 Army, by flags and uniforms and beating of drums, or 
 in our fashionable churches by attractive music, elo- 
 quence, and extraneous decorations, it is felt but feebly, 
 and exists for its accompaniments, and not for itself. 
 
 Along with this constant demand to be entertained 
 in novel and exciting ways, there exists that effeminate 
 shrinking from discomfort, that morbid sensitiveness to 
 the impression of agreeable and painful things, which 
 always accompanies physical weakness. It is an age 
 of anodynes and sugar-coatings, in which the heroic 
 element is stifled under cotton and cushion an age in 
 which to endure, to struggle, to fall and rise again, are 
 old-fashioned virtues virtues that belong to something 
 wholesome and primitive in man, that civilization ought 
 never to kill out, but rather to foster and develop. 
 
 I meant to foster and develop it in my boys. Ex- 
 perience had brushed the morning dew from my illu- 
 sions. I knew that I couldn't make angels of my boys, 
 and I had no wish to try. I wanted to see them full- 
 blooded, broad-chested men, ready to fight a man's bat- 
 tle in life when foes assailed them within or without. 
 
 While we were clearing off the ground, or preparing 
 it each year for the season's sowing, there was no need 
 of physical exercise. But there were long winter 
 and autumn days and days in spring, when nature 
 was working for us and we had nothing to do; and
 
 AN EXPERIMENT IN ALTRUISM 283 
 
 these were the days I wished to put to profit. We did 
 a great deal of solid reading in them, and we played a 
 good deal at athletic games out of doors. There is a 
 child in every boy, and the child sometimes persists in 
 the man to the end of his life, asking to be amused, 
 or distracted. Women seem to be able to amuse them- 
 selves much better than men, or it may be that they bear 
 idleness better. But for a man, there is no torture like 
 that of having to sit around with his hands in his 
 pockets, and yawn. He prefers any danger, no matter 
 how hair-raising, to such an insufferable hour. 
 
 We played tennis, cricket, golf, baseball. We took 
 long exploring tramps together, camping out, hunting, 
 fishing. We climbed to the summit of Mt. Baker, and 
 sat among the clouds. As for myself, I found the boy 
 in me was as much alive as ever; I don't know that I 
 have ever laughed more heartily in my life, or lived with 
 a keener zest than in this free, out-door life, with my 
 boys. The sun and the air got in at every chink of 
 me, cleaning and healing old mental wounds, and filling 
 me once more with the sap of healthy happiness. 
 
 Aleck passed hours in the laboratory with me, where 
 we tried to surprise some of nature's secrets. We were 
 amateurs in the noblest sense of the word, and though 
 we surprised no new secrets, we confirmed the truth of 
 many known discoveries ; for example, that the leaves 
 of plants are so many tiny laboratories where is formed 
 the sugar that sweetens the roots of beets or the grapes 
 of the vine. 
 
 From the sale of the timber cut from each boy's 
 tract of land, he received a good round sum, and was 
 permitted to use it in improving his land. It was one 
 of my principles to give each boy as much liberty as 
 possible, with regard to the use he made of his land, 
 experience being the best of all teachers. Some of 
 them, wishing to save a little money, bought a cheap 
 quality of seed; but the result invariably showed them 
 that much more is gained by perfecting a product, than
 
 284 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 in increasing its quantity ; and that one acre, well seeded, 
 well cultivated, is more profitable than five acres of 
 inferior quality. 
 
 I wish also to note here, that, as out-doors, we were 
 not only farmers and athletes, but geologists, botanists 
 and zoologists as well; the interest which my boys be- 
 gan to take in the wild animals had, for its first ethical 
 result, a very noticeable increase of genuine sympathy. 
 The cruelty of youth, like its courage, comes from 
 ignorance. I was amused in observing, at the com- 
 mencement of our rambles, the general fear of every- 
 thing new. A rare insect, an unknown plant, or ani- 
 mal, seemed noxious to them, and their first instinct 
 was to kill it. But reassured by me, they began at last 
 to feel that link which binds all creatures in a common 
 chain of being a feeling which enlarges the sense of 
 life more than anything else, multiplying its sensations 
 by a vivid sympathy. That is why science is the great 
 civilizer; and morality without it, as a basis, is subject 
 to terrible mistakes. I never forced moral precepts on 
 my boys, but I never failed to seize an opportunity that 
 thrust itself on me to inculcate an ethical principle, 
 knowing well that we do not readily forget what strikes 
 us through our interest, sympathy or by novelty. 
 
 It happened sometimes that a boy's illness prevented 
 him from attending to his field, for a while. I wished 
 them to volunteer their help, knowing that a forced 
 magnanimity is an insult to him who receives it, and 
 no virtue in him who gives it; and just as the only 
 education that remains with us is that which we give 
 ourselves, so the only well-rooted morality is that which 
 is born in us of our relations one to the other, inciting 
 us to action. 
 
 Therefore, I set them an example by showing a lively 
 sympathy with the boy's misfortune, and they were thus 
 induced to offer their aid. I remember one particular 
 instance of their zeal. A violent storm had uprooted 
 trees, dammed the natural bed of a stream and forced
 
 AN EXPERIMENT IN ALTRUISM 285 
 
 it into a new channel, by which it destroyed a great part 
 of one of the boys' fields. We all set to work to re- 
 claim the soil, to build dykes, clear away rubbish, and 
 force the stream to return to its old channel. It was 
 difficult work, but we put a hearty interest and a good 
 will into it, and were delighted at our success. 
 
 But because it was also one of my fixed principles 
 that each boy should, as far as lay in his power, be 
 independent in his work, I positively forbade any aid 
 to be given to him who neglected his work for his 
 pleasures or for his love of idleness; and if this neg- 
 ligence persisted, I took from the boy his right to re- 
 tain the land, and put it into other hands. 
 
 So passed eight years, not without disappointments, 
 hopes deceived, ingratitude at the hands of those for 
 whom I had been a real benefactor; but, in spite of all 
 that, with sufficiently satisfactory results to afford me 
 no cause for repentance in the step I had taken. 
 
 We had created markets for our fruits and vegetables ; 
 a current of intelligent commercial activity circulated 
 around us; an agricultural school had been founded, 
 other industries, growing out of our efforts, had arisen; 
 and we ourselves had not been stagnating. 
 
 My young Aleck was now entering his twenty-first 
 year. He had built for his mother and the family a 
 pretty little cottage on his land, and I have hardly 
 ever known a happier, more contented little family. 
 The mother never ceased to show the most lively grati- 
 tude to me for being, as she said, the " making " of 
 her boy; and it was for them, as much as for me, a 
 real fete day, when I consented to take a Sunday 
 dinner with them. They would have liked very well to 
 have me with them every Sunday, but I still had some- 
 thing of a wild flavor about me. I needed, from time 
 to time, to bathe in this human river; but I always 
 came out of it grateful for my tranquil solitude, where 
 I bathed in another human river, that of the great souls 
 who have enriehed the race with their thoughts. The
 
 286 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 man whom the hand of knowledge has once seized, 
 never frees himself again. But I saw with a little in- 
 quietude that my Aleck was following rather too closely 
 my footsteps and seemed headed towards celibacy, where 
 I was not so sure that he would find as much happiness 
 &s I. For it is very hard to free one's self from the 
 example and prejudices of the race; and I thought I 
 should like to see Aleck well married. I ventured to 
 speak to him about it one day ; and he frankly confessed 
 that though he liked all the girls well enough, he hadn't 
 found any one of them sufficiently attractive to com- 
 pensate him for the loss of liberty. They talked such 
 nonsense, too, that they tired him in the long run. I 
 felt the force of the objection, and resigned myself to 
 wait the arrival of the incomparable She whose non- 
 sense would seem divine, and make the wisdom of 
 the sages infinitely stupid in Comparison.
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 REUNION 
 
 ONE dreary day, at the close of November, not long 
 after this conversation with Aleck, the following note 
 was hastily delivered to me by a boy on horseback : 
 
 " George Graham : I believe in your generosity, and 
 I need you. That is why I am writing you. My wife, 
 for aught I know, is lying at death's door with a new- 
 born infant at her side. My other two children are 
 hungry. As for myself, I am helpless, nailed to the 
 floor by an accident which may prove fatal. I cannot 
 say that I hope it will not prove so. You will come at 
 once. I know you will. The boy who brings you this 
 will tell you where we are and return with you, bring- 
 ing along some food. I have also asked him to send 
 out a physician and a nurse right away. Therefore, 
 there is nothing for you to do but come yourself. 
 "Very truly yours, 
 
 "J. McKENZIE." 
 
 " Did you send a doctor out to him ? " I asked the 
 boy who brought the note. 
 
 " Yes, sir. Dr. Elbright." 
 
 "What's the matter with the man?" 
 
 " He has an arm and a leg broken." 
 
 " What about the provisions ? " 
 
 " I thought we'd get them on our way back through 
 town." 
 
 "That's right. Did he tell you what to get?" 
 
 "Yes, sir. Tea, sugar, bread, and eggs." 
 
 287
 
 " I have all that here. Can you go out and saddle 
 a horse for me, while I get the things ready ? " 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 I added a beefsteak, some bacon, and fresh fruits to 
 the stock of provisions, and giving the hamper into the 
 charge of the boy, we started off at once. 
 
 Is there so much of the selfish brute in us that we 
 do not know how to forget and forgive? I blush with 
 shame to confess it, yet my first movement wasn't at 
 all one of pity. No, I felt a lively satisfaction. Time 
 had avenged me. "// tempo e galant' uomo" I said 
 to myself with a smile on my lips, while hastening to 
 her aid. Yes, it was of her that I was thinking, not of 
 him. I had never made the slightest effort in all these 
 years to know anything about her, where she lived, 
 whether she was happy, or unhappy. But I had learned 
 indirectly that she lived ten or twelve miles down the 
 bay ; and that she had had the first year of her marriage, 
 a little girl who must now be nine years old. 
 
 We rode rapidly through the woods, skirting the bay. 
 A fine rain, like a thick mist, shut out the view on all 
 sides. There was something singularly in harmony with 
 my feelings in this dull rain that gave no definite out- 
 line to anything. There was nothing well-defined in 
 my feelings either, except a general sentiment of satis- 
 faction. I did not try to fancy how she would look, 
 after these years of absence. I did not trouble myself 
 about thinking how I should greet her. But when at 
 last I caught sight of the little log house on a side-hill 
 clearing, overlooking the bay, looking so dull and lonely, 
 with its background of somber pines and firs, something 
 made my heart sink drearily. I saw her again, as I had 
 seen her the last time, I heard the sound of her voice 
 with its unforgettable accent, so rich and sweet ; and 
 it took real courage to alight from my horse and knock 
 at the door. 
 
 A tiny girl, apparently six or seven, but who was 
 older than she looked, opened the door, saying to me:
 
 REUNION 289 
 
 " Come in, sir. Papa is there," and she pointed to an 
 adjoining room. " He is hurt very bad, my papa is, 
 and mamma is sick, too." 
 
 She was a lovely child, with dark, wavy hair in pretty 
 'disorder, large, brown eyes, and the sweetest, little red 
 mouth, just made for kisses. She ran rather than walked 
 to the half-opened door, threw it open, saying : " They 
 are here." 
 
 Yes, they were there. I should have known him any- 
 where, though he had aged and his hair was whitening. 
 He lay on some bear-skins on the floor, near his wife's 
 bed. But as for her, I would have passed her by, and 
 never for a moment recognized, in the worn, thin face, 
 aged before its time, and the sunken eyes that reddened 
 with tears, as they looked at me, the woman whom I 
 had so often called the joy and pride of my life ! 
 
 All that was personal in my feeling for her, all re- 
 sentment, all my cruel satisfaction in her woe, died in 
 a moment, and I became human again. I saw nothing 
 before me but misery, which it was in my power to al- 
 leviate to some degree. At a glance, I saw what was 
 needed. A feeble fire was burning on the hearth, and 
 on the bare table stood a half loaf of bread. The whole 
 room had that sordid air which comes from neglect. 
 
 I approached McKenzie, first, saying : " I thank you 
 very much for sending for me ; but why did you not do 
 it sooner ? " 
 
 " It was not necessary until to-day," he replied, " but 
 this little one," he put his arm around the child who had 
 nestled on the rug close beside him, "my wife and the 
 babies mustn't suffer. That's all the fire we have; the 
 little one gathered the sticks near the house. I am 
 afraid to let her go far away. Fortunately, the weather 
 isn't too cold, only a little raw. The child was on the 
 watch all morning for a passerby. Luckily a boy had 
 come out for game; she saw him and I made a mes- 
 senger of him, or God knows what would have become 
 of us ; for that's the last loaf."
 
 290 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 " I thank you again for your confidence in me. 
 There's a doctor and a nurse on the way. Are you 
 suffering much ? " 
 
 " Horribly, but never mind me." 
 
 I took off my coat to get ready for work, saying: 
 
 " What's your name, little girl ? " 
 
 " Edith, sir, only I'm called Eda for short, and for 
 petting. I like it best." 
 
 " Oh, do you ? Well, bless your little heart, Eda you 
 shall be to me. Now, can you help me to find things, 
 Eda?" 
 
 " Yes, sir." She leaped from the floor, and at the 
 same moment a pretty head looked out from the bed- 
 clothes near his mamma. She saw it in a moment, and 
 said with a funny little air of command: 
 
 " Lie down, Willie, you'll catch more cold, and make 
 mamma cold, lifting the covers that way." 
 
 " I'm hungry," he whimpered. 
 
 " Are you, my child ? Well, I've brought you some- 
 thing to eat and you are going to have it very soon." 
 
 I approached the bed, as I said this, and adjusted the 
 quilt over the little shoulders. Abby was sobbing, her 
 face covered with her hands. 
 
 " Abby ! " I said gently. " Don't cry. Tell me what I 
 can do for you first of all." 
 
 " Nothing ! nothing ! " she sobbed. " Nothing for me. 
 Help them," and she buried her face in the pillow. I 
 softly stroked her head. I would have done it had she 
 been a perfect stranger to me. It was her suffering, 
 not herself, that touched me. 
 
 " Trust me," I said, " a nurse will soon be here. You 
 will have all the care you need now, until you are a 
 strong woman again. I promise you that." 
 
 I caught a glimpse of the tiny baby asleep beside 
 her. It looked healthy; and Abby herself did not 
 seem to be in immediate danger, so turning to 
 my little assistant, I asked : " Where is the kitchen, 
 Eda?"
 
 REUNION 291 
 
 She took me into another room ; there were but three 
 rooms in all in the house. I started a fire in the stove, 
 found a bucket in which the water did not appear to be 
 fresh, and asked: 
 
 " Where do you get fresh water, Eda ? " 
 
 " I'll show you. It's from the spring near the bay." 
 
 I took the bucket, and receiving her directions, gave 
 the bucket to the boy who had accompanied me, telling 
 him where to get the water, and taking the hamper of 
 provisions from him, returned to the house. When the 
 boy came back with the water, I bade him gather us 
 a good pile of dry fagots and pine cones, and then dis- 
 missed him with a fee. 
 
 Soon we had a good fire cheerfully roaring in the 
 stove, and I fried my beefsteak. The child helped me 
 to prepare the meal, washing and wiping dishes and 
 bringing salt and pepper, and other things needed. Soon 
 she came up close to me, and said with a sweet, childish 
 coquetry, looking up and smiling: 
 
 " You are almost as good as papa." 
 
 "And why am I not quite as good?" 
 
 She leaned her pretty head towards me where do 
 children learn these fascinating little ways? 
 
 " My papa loves me," she answered. 
 
 " And I don't I love you, too ? " I put down the 
 fork which I was holding, and seizing her round the 
 waist, I lifted her up, kissed the moist, red, little mouth ; 
 and she tried to hide her head on my arm, laughing 
 with all her might. Such a dear, sweet, ringing, child- 
 ish laugh ! It had been years since I heard a laugh 
 so young and buoyant as that, and I laughed too and 
 the boy in me came out of his hiding-place, and for a 
 little while I was ten years old again. The child's vo- 
 cabulary came back to me. My work was play. I im- 
 provised a tray from a large bread pan, putting a clean 
 napkin over it, and placing my beefsteak, a cup of tea, 
 and a bit of toast on it, carried it, first of all, to Mc- 
 Kenzie, whose heroic endurance of his agonizing situa-
 
 292 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 tion touched me deeply. He drew his shirt sleeve across 
 his eyes, and said to me hoarsely: 
 
 " I am full up to the throat. Let the others eat 
 first." 
 
 " No," I said, " there is plenty for all. You and the 
 little one may eat here, and I've this plate ready for 
 Abby and the boy. By the way, do you know what 
 Eda has just said to me?" 
 
 " No. I heard you both laughing. It was music to 
 us. She has a sharp tongue, that lassie of mine." 
 
 " She said that I was almost as good as you. That's 
 a compliment, isn't it ? " 
 
 "My God! what a sarcasm that must have seemed 
 to you," he murmured. " But you will let her still 
 think I am good, won't you? That's all I have to live 
 for. Otherwise, I " here he made a significant ges- 
 ture by drawing his finger across his throat. That was 
 the first thing to recall to me our mutual relations. I 
 had forgotten them utterly. Did he think that the past 
 counted anything with me, now? 
 
 " Don't be afraid," I replied reassuringly. " What 
 you are to the child, you shall be to me." 
 
 Abby ate a little of the bread steeped in the savory 
 juice of the steak, and drank a cup of tea. 
 
 The meal over, the doctor and the nurse appeared. 
 At the end of an hour the capable woman had given an 
 air of order and cleanliness to the room, the doctor had 
 set the broken arm and leg, praising justly the courage 
 of the man. It seemed that in pursuing a deer, and hav- 
 ing taken an incautious step backwards, he had fallen 
 from a considerable height, breaking his right arm and 
 leg. After the first shock of the fall was passed, he 
 had dragged himself a quarter of a mile home, arriving 
 in rags, the skin mangled and torn, where he had lain 
 exhausted, suffering agonies for hours, but bravely sup- 
 pressing his groans, so that he might not add to the 
 distress and anxiety of his family.
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 EDUCATING A GIRL 
 
 IT was six o'clock before I left the house. The mist 
 had grown thicker, so that the trees looked like faint 
 specters through it; but instead of impressions, vague 
 as the landscape that surrounded me, I had now some 
 very clear ones. All my past with Abby was as if 
 obliterated, or rather the woman who had given me so 
 much pain and so much happiness (let me be just, and 
 remember that, too), was dead to me. The woman who 
 lay there sick, suffering, was completely forgiven. I 
 had ceased to love her. Strange that we never pardon 
 fully, until we have ceased to love. I reflected with 
 humility on this passion so violent, so exacting, alas ! 
 so transitory. I had loved a phantom woman, a smiling 
 mouth, a cheerful eye, a skin all white and red. The 
 eye had faded, the skin had grown sallow, the mouth 
 no longer smiled, but drooped, and so she could never 
 again make my heart beat fast and my pulses thrill with 
 rapture. I felt even frankly grateful to the fate that 
 had pronounced an inexorable " no " to our union. 
 
 But I quickly abandoned these reflections to ask my- 
 self what I ought to do for these helpless beings whom 
 I seemed called upon to succor. The beautiful little 
 girl attracted me powerfully. I would have asked noth- 
 ing better than to see her every day and listen to her 
 charming prattle. The father awoke in me at sight 
 of her that love so tender and sweet the only love 
 that can give a man tranquil nights and happy days. 
 My imagination commenced to work. I saw myself 
 her tutor, educating her into a fine girl, suppressing her 
 weaknesses, guarding her against pride in her beauty, 
 
 293
 
 294 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 filling her mind with solid virtues. And why not do 
 it ? Suddenly it flashed over me that she belonged some- 
 what to me by a tie of blood. I was her great uncle. 
 And the other children were in some degree mine, too. 
 Why not build a house for the family, not too far from 
 mine, where I could look after their education, and bring 
 them up properly? 
 
 I lay awake that night a long time revolving the pros 
 and cons of this new project, and the pros had not any 
 great difficulty in carrying the day over the cons; and 
 breakfast over, I started again for the little hut. 
 
 I found everybody as well and as cheerful as could 
 be expected. The nurse reported that Abby had passed 
 a wakeful night, but was in no real danger. After 
 these proper inquiries, I paved the way to the intro- 
 duction of the subject which I had most at heart, and 
 at last explained my hopes and plans to McKenzie. He 
 reddened and turned nervously on the couch on which 
 he had been placed in the room adjoining that in which 
 his wife lay. 
 
 " Did the doctor tell you that it was all over with 
 me ? " he said at last. 
 
 " By no means ; but he says that your recovery will 
 be slow. However, that is not the question. The ques- 
 tion is the education of your children." 
 
 " Yes, yes. I have understood that you've turned 
 school-master. That is becoming " he suddenly stopped 
 as if ashamed of what he was going to say, and ex- 
 tended his hand, cordially grasped mine, and continued : 
 
 " I have no right to stand in my children's way, and 
 I ought to be very grateful to you. In fact, I really 
 am grateful. But hear me and don't laugh. I am 
 the same man, and I am not the same man, whom you 
 knew of old. It is the little one who has transformed 
 me. Can you believe me ? " He lowered his voice for 
 fear of being heard in the next room. " My wife was 
 very ill at her birth, and was a long time getting back 
 her strength; so the care of the little one, from the
 
 EDUCATING A GIRL 295 
 
 very first, fell on me. One finishes by loving very much 
 whatever one takes care of, if it is only a beast or a 
 flower. But when it is a being so beautiful, so perfect 
 as she is, forgive me if I seem to rave one ends by 
 adoring her. She is so clever! the little chatter-box. 
 She charmed you, too, at first, didn't she? Le coup de 
 foudre. She does it with everyone. And don't you 
 see ? I can't bear to share her. I should like her to owe 
 everything to me. There that's the old man in rne, 
 again. You recognize him, don't you? But I loved her 
 so that I choked back the cries of pain that were ready 
 to break from me in my agony. I never did any- 
 thing so fine in my life as that, and I did it to spare 
 her pain. And I love her so well that I can restrain 
 the cries of wounded paternal love, if you should suc- 
 ceed in getting the first place in the heart of my child." 
 
 I blushed in my turn. I understood that he was 
 right to feel in this way. 
 
 " Mack," I said, using the familiar abbreviation by 
 which I sometimes addressed him when we were in ac- 
 cord, " I was wrong. I deserve all the reproaches you 
 wish to give me, but I must confess that if I had 
 thought " 
 
 "That I loved my wife and children?" he inter- 
 rupted with an accent of malicious irony. 
 
 I was silent. I felt like a criminal. What right had 
 I to assume that I could do better than he with his 
 own? He was silent, too, evidently reflecting, for his 
 heavy eyebrows were tightly knitted. I rose to say 
 good-by, and at this moment the little girl opened the 
 door and running towards me, put her arms about my 
 body, and lifted her little mouth for a kiss. I stooped 
 and kissed her. 
 
 " Come here, Eda," said her father. 
 
 She ran to him and caressed him. 
 
 "Do you love this gentleman?" 
 
 " Yes, and he loves me, too." 
 
 " Do you love him better than me ? "
 
 296 THE JOURNAL: OF A RECLUSE 
 
 " No ! no ! no ! " she said emphatically, " but he is 
 good to you, and good to us all." 
 
 " You are right. There, run away to your mamma ; 
 I want to speak to him." He sighed heavily, and when 
 the child was gone, he said: "I am a jealous egoist. 
 I shall very likely never be anything else. You will 
 very often regret your proposal of this morning, but I 
 am going to accept it. I am even going to change front, 
 and ask you to hasten the beginning of this vie a cinq. 
 I probably need you more than all the others. I hon- 
 estly believe that it's all up with me; and that it's time 
 to be looking after the future provision of mine hostages 
 to fortune. My wife has always regretted you. She 
 has never once pronounced your name to me. That is 
 why I know that she has been thinking too much of it. 
 But both of you ought to be thankful to me for rescuing 
 you from a ridiculous and impossible situation. You 
 were trying to be friends and learning to be lovers. 
 There is nothing in the world so unstable as the friend- 
 ship between a man and a woman. Sooner or later, the 
 unconscious attraction of sex asserts itself; and then 
 friendship is over. I cut the Gordian knot for you. 
 She has not always been unhappy with me. She has 
 loved her children, especially the boy, who would have 
 borne your name if her lips had been courageous enough 
 to pronounce it. It was I who proposed calling him 
 George. She paled and said ' No, I wish him to be 
 called after my father.' Perhaps we can christen this 
 last little fellow after you, but I shan't promise. But 
 the girl if there is any excuse needed for what we 
 did I offer her as the excuse. She had a right to be 
 eh? She has stopped my lips when a regret for the loss 
 of my liberty would have passed them. She makes 
 everything right, everything possible; but I shall seem 
 to be in my dotage if I talk more of her. She is my 
 life, that's all." 
 
 His lips trembled. I had no idea that he was capable 
 of so strong an emotion. I thought of those fathers
 
 EDUCATING A GIRL 297 
 
 with a genius for loving, who have made the tragedies 
 of literature, the Pere Goriots, the King Lears of the 
 Steppes. Then there are such fathers. He might be 
 one of them, and this radiant little creature made him 
 tremble like a child. 
 
 I built the house for them, nearer the town than 
 mine, and concealed from my own place by an inter- 
 vening hill, covered with a thick wood. There, about a 
 quarter of an hour's walk from me, sheltered from 
 misery, they were to find a home for the rest of their 
 days. My habits were not at all changed by this new 
 interest which had entered my life. I still clung to 
 my old home. I still looked after my boys, but I had 
 a girl to educate now. That was all. 
 
 But how shall I explain this paradox? The more 
 effort I put forward to succeed admirably, the farther 
 from success I seemed to be. With my boys, I had 
 clear, definite ideas. I understood them. I had been 
 a boy myself. But a girl seemed to me to be a creature 
 of another mold. I have come, now, to believe that 
 after all, there isn't so great a difference between them 
 as I then thought there was; and that the apparent 
 difference is owing to the fact that the girl is earlier 
 subjected to the restrictions of conventionalities than 
 the boy, and matures more rapidly than he. 
 
 As to her future, that was the problem which ab- 
 sorbed me. First of all, I wished her to be wholly 
 woman, and no hybrid creature with masculine tastes 
 and airs. But when I came to question myself as to 
 what I meant by that, I found myself falling into certain 
 masculine prejudices, by which I wished her to please 
 me rather than to please herself. 
 
 One day I had a long conversation with her father 
 on the subject. It was the first year of his removal 
 to his new home which he was not destined to occupy 
 long. He died the second year after our reunion. He 
 never recovered from the effects of his accident. A 
 creeping paralysis seized him, which made him almost
 
 298 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 helpless, but did not impair his faculties. All the ran- 
 cor, all the antipathy he had ever excited in me had 
 quite disappeared, leaving in me nothing but a gentle 
 pity, and often a genuine admiration for the keen flashes 
 of psychological insight, which he often showed in our 
 conversations. 
 
 I saw, too, that the sharing of his daughter's heart 
 with me was a bitter trial to him, and that he struggled 
 manfully to suppress all signs of the moody fits that 
 attacked him from time to time, and of which he was 
 ashamed. 
 
 As for Abby, she had quite recovered, and went about 
 her daily tasks with a calmness that was the reflection 
 of the religion of resignation which she faithfully pro- 
 fessed. I rarely saw her alone and we never made the 
 slightest allusion to the past. Evidently, for her, as for 
 me, it was buried without recall. She sometimes quietly 
 expressed her gratitude for what I was doing for the 
 family, but that was all. The gaiety, the caprice of her 
 youth, had left her with her beauty; for, although she 
 was not ugly, she was only the faded portrait of the 
 pretty, vivacious girl of former days. 
 
 On the day of the conversation alluded to above, Mc- 
 Kenzie had painfully dragged himself into the orchard 
 after me, where the apples were ripening in the mild 
 autumn air, and the golden-rod was sending forth its 
 honey-like fragrance along the grassy borders. 
 
 The little one had followed us as usual, but seeing 
 Aleck at some distance, she ran after him. For poor 
 Aleck, she was the most fascinating, most capricious, 
 and most tyrannical of little queens; direct result of 
 his having deliberately spoiled her, in always giving 
 way to her whims. She knew her power over him and 
 abused it, as people with power always do when they 
 can. 
 
 " What shall we do with that little miss ? " asked the 
 father, following her with eyes full of tenderness and 
 pride. He hadn't the slightest jealousy of Aleck. He
 
 EDUCATING A GIRL 299 
 
 was amused by the tricks which she sometimes played 
 on him. 
 
 " That is the question of questions," I answered. 
 " Neither you nor I are, perhaps, the best masters for 
 a young girl." 
 
 " Oh, as for me, certainly not. You are right there. 
 But what is wanting in you that you do not know how 
 to guide a young girl ? " 
 
 " A thousand things : first of all, I am not sure about 
 what I want to make of her. Let's talk about it seri- 
 ously. Perhaps by dint of reflection and discussion we 
 shall dig up some good ideas. All that I know well, 
 now, is that she is still a child and that we must pa- 
 tiently await the age of reason before we can decide on 
 her future." 
 
 " What future is there for a woman except that of 
 wife and mother ? Isn't that the future of all women ? " 
 
 " Yes and no. Mightn't you just as well say that 
 it is the fate of all men to be husbands and fathers? 
 Yet here I am, neither the one nor the other, and yet 
 sufficiently contented and happy." 
 
 " By Jove, you're right. Well, what then ? " 
 
 " We must bring her up a reasonable woman, give 
 her all the educational advantages possible and then 
 let her choose for herself." 
 
 " Yes," he said hesitatingly. " That sounds all right, 
 but look here. Let us understand each other. I am not 
 sure that I know what you mean by educational ad- 
 vantages. I think your ideas on the education of boys 
 perfectly sound, and I think they may be applied to 
 girls, too. Fit a girl for what she can do, and not for 
 what she thinks she can do. I am dead set against the 
 chinch-bug that wants to be a butterfly; the mole that 
 aspires to the piercing vision of an eagle; the cabbage 
 that would prefer to be a rose; the tallow-candle that 
 wants to be Arcturus." 
 
 I laughed and said I was exactly of his opinion. 
 
 " Well, do you think Eda has any particular gifts ? "
 
 300 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 " She has a voice of remarkable range, Mack." 
 
 " That only means that she has wit and quick feeling. 
 Voice expresses feeling by the range of pitch, loudness, 
 timbre. Have you ever noticed that imbeciles and 
 feeble-minded, as well as dull persons, have little or no 
 vocal range? They express themselves in a dull, mo- 
 notonous, lifeless way, which corresponds to their de- 
 ficiency in intellect and feeling. Excitable persons, on 
 the other hand, have great vocal range. Eda is ex- 
 citable. And, do you know, one of the very things I 
 have to thank God most devoutly for, is that she hasn't 
 musical gifts ; so don't let's go to work incubating them 
 for her. There is more money and time wasted on 
 music than would wipe poverty from the face of the 
 earth. Did you ever board in your life? Do you re- 
 member the parlor piano? and the young man with the 
 flute in the next room? and the fellow with the feet 
 and the violin over your head, and you don't know 
 whether it's the feet or the violin that are coming 
 through the floor? Let's not put Eda into that class. 
 Let's keep her hands virgin. She is as natural as a 
 wild flower; don't you think so?" 
 
 " That is her greatest charm." 
 
 " Very well, we won't spoil that either by any of . 
 your fashionable boarding-schools. Let's keep the dew 
 in the heart of our wild rose as long as we can. God 
 knows the sun of worldliness dries it out soon enough ! 
 Why spoil her simplicity by putting her among girls 
 who are no longer girls except in years? You see, I 
 can't bear to be separated from her. I don't want her 
 to come back to me a little worldling, her head full 
 of follies and vanities, inflated with ideas of grandeur, 
 discontented with home, ashamed of her mother and 
 me, because we are no longer young and brilliant. 
 Beautiful as she is, infinitely dear as she is to me, fresh 
 as that flower at your feet, I would rather see her stark 
 and cold in death than come back like that to me." 
 
 He drew his shirt-sleeve across his dripping brow,
 
 EDUCATING A GIRL 301 
 
 and I saw that he was trembling violently. I hastened 
 to reassure him, and bade him sit down on the low 
 stone orchard wall. 
 
 " And what makes it more dangerous to send her 
 away," he continued, " is that she is cursed with beauty. 
 I say it advisedly, cursed with beauty; because she 
 pleases without the least effort on her part. She does 
 not have to be obliging, good-natured, clever, sym- 
 pathetic, helpful. She has simply to show herself to 
 be charming. I have known beautiful women who were 
 monsters of egotism, and might have been saints, if they 
 had only been ugly. But we shan't spoil her. I notice 
 that you never tell her that she is pretty. Neither do 
 I; sometimes I even tell her that she is an ugly little 
 puss, when I think she's setting herself up from a look 
 at the mirror." 
 
 I listened to him with great satisfaction. We weren't 
 far removed from each other in thought. The love of 
 this charming girl had brought us together. 
 
 " I am entirely of your opinion," I said. " We shall 
 keep her with us. But do you know what I was think- 
 ing while you were talking? It is this: That we men 
 are always thinking of women in relation to ourselves, 
 and never with regard to their own peculiar individual- 
 ity. Now, it may happen that a woman's individuality 
 is marked enough to warrant her in taking her fate 
 in her own hands, and living her life according to the 
 dictates of her best feelings. Now, we should think it 
 very droll if women were to assign us our life-role on 
 condition of undertaking to protect and care for us. 
 Woman has become dependent on man through the 
 social institutions which make of her the home-keeper, 
 and of him the bread-winner. The dependence is not 
 felt when the relations between man and wife are 
 what they should be ; but how common are such re- 
 lations? Woman sometimes degenerates in the com- 
 pact, and vain, puerile, egotistic, by her extravagance 
 changes her husband into a mere drudge and money-
 
 302 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 machine to satisfy her caprices. Or, the woman be- 
 comes the household drudge and the suffering is re- 
 versed. I would have every woman so far independent 
 by the resources of her brain or her hand, that she 
 need not fear a life of solitude, if she cannot find her 
 mate, or having been deceived, finds life impossible with 
 the man she has chosen. I want to make Eda inde- 
 pendent; that's what I mean by giving her the best 
 educational advantages." 
 
 He quite agreed with me on the aspect of the question 
 and urged me to take wholly upon myself the task of 
 educating her and the two boys. 
 
 As for Abby, she was quite charmed with the idea, 
 but one day she said to me: 
 
 " I feel sure that you will not misunderstand me. 
 There is one thing that troubles me and I must be 
 frank with you. You know that while I esteem your 
 opinions higher than my own or those of anyone whom 
 I know, I am still forced to disagree with you on one 
 vital point vital to me, at any rate, for it makes life 
 possible. I mean religious faith. I wish my children 
 to be brought up in the faith that has saved me. Prom- 
 ise me that you will not insinuate into these young 
 minds, who adore you, any doubt of this reality of 
 realities. If I were capable of teaching them I should 
 hesitate before giving them to anybody; for, he who 
 teaches a child becomes the mother of its soul. I have 
 given them their body ; it is you, now, who are going to 
 furnish it with a soul that can think." 
 
 I was silent a moment, for I, too, think that the first 
 necessity of any serious conversation is frankness; but 
 frankness is not always incompatible with a discreet 
 silence. After pondering a minute, I said: 
 
 " Abby, I never wantonly destroyed anybody's faith ; 
 for that might mean wrenching a cripple's staff from 
 his hand, or stealing the bread of life from a starving 
 soul. Any faith is good that keeps the life clean and 
 the heart full of courage. I can promise you, then,
 
 EDUCATING A GIRL 303 
 
 that as long as your children believe they shall not be 
 disturbed in their faith by me. But if the day should 
 come that the scaffolding is ready to fall, and there is 
 danger of their being hurt by its fall, that day I shall 
 speak with perfect frankness, giving them certitude for 
 doubt, fixed principles for dissolving faiths, ardor for 
 indifference. For me, to whom religion is nothing but 
 poetry petrified into dogma, the recognition of its real 
 character does not in the least change the value of its 
 moral precepts which have been given to us by social 
 experience. It still remains a crime to murder, a sin to 
 steal, a want of good faith to lie and deceive. It is still 
 a duty to help others, even if it should not be possible 
 to love them as ourselves; and it is our duty to refrain 
 from injuring those whom we dislike which is, per- 
 haps, better for them and for us, than to love them with 
 our tongues and hate them in our actions." 
 
 She colored to the roots of her hair, and looked ready 
 to burst into tears. I felt immediately that she had mis- 
 understood me, and could think that I had had the bad 
 taste to allude to the past, which was far from my 
 thoughts. To assure her that I was only speaking in a 
 general, purely impersonal way, I continued : 
 
 " It is, perhaps, in bad taste to allude in this way to 
 the cruelties of the church, which, in the name of Him 
 who said ' Love your neighbor as yourself ' subjected 
 the honest doubter to the most infamous tortures, or 
 burned him at the stake ; but I am always nettled at the 
 supposition that there can be no morality without a pro- 
 fession of faith to which is attached a hope of heaven 
 or fear of hell. To me, to love the right, because it is 
 right, and not because you are to get a sugar-plum for 
 it, or to be whipped if you don't, is a far nobler love 
 than the interested one, and much more to be depended 
 on." 
 
 " Forgive me," she whispered. 
 
 "There is nothing to forgive. Do you trust me?" 
 
 " Yes," she answered firmly enough now. " I trust
 
 304 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 you and put my little world into your hands, very fear- 
 lessly. But take especial care of Edith. Her father 
 adores her, but he takes good care not to tell her all 
 he thinks." 
 
 " I know how to be discreet, too." 
 
 At this moment she came running up to me, calling 
 me as was her wont, " Papa George." We could never 
 get her to say uncle. She said it wasn't a pretty name ; 
 and she hated the word. 
 
 " O, Papa George ! Papa George ! I've something 
 to show you. No, mamma, I don't want you to see it " ; 
 and she put her right hand into mine and with the 
 other made a sweeping negative gesture towards her 
 mother. 
 
 " And why not ? " asked the latter. " You're always 
 having secrets with Papa George or Aleck and never 
 with me. Very well, I'm going to have my secrets with 
 Willie and Bob." 
 
 "That's it exactly," she exclaimed, frowning darkly 
 and stamping the ground. " You can't keep a secret 
 to yourself. You promised me not to show the other 
 bird's nest that I found, and you told Willie the first 
 thing, and he wouldn't let it alone." 
 
 " Oh, then it's another bird's nest, is it ? " 
 
 Furious at herself for having incautiously betrayed 
 her secret, the little one screamed out: 
 
 "No, no." 
 
 "What!" I said. "Isn't it a bird's nest?" 
 
 "Yes," she whispered, turning her rosy face to me. 
 
 "Then tell mamma that she was right, my girl, and 
 we'll go and look at it." 
 
 I had said it very tranquilly, but firmly. 
 
 She hesitated a moment. She was a most rebellious 
 little soul; and I had had my little scenes with her be- 
 fore; and although I was flexible as wax on a trivial 
 question, I was hard as iron on a principle, and she 
 knew that I loved the truth. She pulled at my hand as 
 a sign to go, but I stood quite still, holding her fast;
 
 EDUCATING A GIRL 305 
 
 then rapidly, as if the words were burning her tongue, 
 she said: 
 
 " Mamma, you are right." 
 
 I insisted on nothing more. I felt the fever of im- 
 patience in her, the anger badly suppressed. The child 
 took after her father in what was most characteristic 
 in him his love of liberty which felt the least re- 
 straint as a heavy burden: his love of out-door life in 
 the sun and rain, and she promised to be one of those 
 women who despise the weaknesses of their sex, and 
 aspire to the liberties of their brothers. There was 
 something in her nature capable of great excess or great 
 perfection. She would go far in whatever direction she 
 turned; and, therefore, she was sometimes the despair 
 of her mother. I do not know how I had obtained an 
 empire over her; perhaps, becaused I loved her wisely 
 and without foolish indulgence, wishing to be loved by 
 her with what was best and most permanent in her, 
 and not by what was selfish and capricious. It some- 
 times cost me a good deal of self-control to resist her 
 little coaxing ways, when she wished to escape from 
 some duty or task; but I made a resolution from the 
 very first to guide and not to be led, and never to dis- 
 pute with her, or reason with her, as the euphemism 
 of our days has it. I knew from observation that there 
 is nothing so futile as these so-called reasonings be- 
 tween children and adults. They are taught to argue 
 expertly on their own side, and the argument finishes 
 usually by the yielding of the adult, because he has no 
 longer the capacity for blind persistence that is a trait 
 of youth. Thus they are taught to despise counsel that 
 so readily yields to their arguments, and to lose respect 
 for the counselors. Age, to them, is no longer a 
 crown of dignity, a fruit-time, for which the blossom- 
 time existed, and therefore we have at present the piti- 
 ful spectacle of an old age that asks pardon for being 
 old; that feels itself pushed to the wall and in the way 
 everywhere ; and with tragic facetiousness tries at times
 
 306 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 to deny its age as if it were a crime, and says to youth: 
 " I am as young as you ; I am seventy years young. 
 My heart and my hair are not the same date," forgetting 
 that youth with gray hair is as abnormal as decrepitude 
 at twenty. To be respected, one must be respectable. 
 Let age cease its grimacing and enter upon its inheri- 
 tance. Wisdom, dignity, moderation, enlarged sym- 
 pathy, tranquillity, the possession of one's self these 
 are the fruits of right living. This is old age, full of 
 service still. It holds out the hand to give, not to get. 
 It demands nothing. It knows how to accept what is 
 due it, with gratitude. It sits a spectator in the theater 
 of life, but an interested specator, who knows how to 
 applaud and encourage in the right place. 
 
 I, too, had my days of anxiety over " the little one," 
 as her father so fondly called her. I watched her 
 closely, I studied her, I tried to glide into this child's 
 soul to find the world new again. I was gay, grave, 
 even severe, if it were necessary, and it was sometimes 
 necessary in order to escape this furious tyranny of 
 young desires, so strong, so persistent. 
 
 She hated dish-washing, sweeping, and all household 
 tasks, and Abby, who was in her element there, would 
 willingly have spared her them; but I insisted that she 
 should not be spared. I wished to make her equal to 
 anything. In the division of labor, that of the household 
 naturally falls to woman, and her training there must 
 not be neglected. Besides that, even the happiest life 
 offers no uniform picture of unaltering bliss ; and shoul- 
 ders must be trained to bear burdens that they may not 
 droop and faint under them when life offers them.
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 A BROKEN SPIRIT 
 
 MY relations with the children gave me ample oc- 
 casion to see the result of this marriage, of which the 
 only foundation had been caprice and instinct. I can- 
 not truthfully say that it was more unhappy than or- 
 dinary love marriages are. In fact, to the cursory ob- 
 server, it might even have passed for a very happy 
 and successful one. But that marriage only is success- 
 ful in which the two spouses attain the full develop- 
 ment of which they are capable; their minds maturing 
 and bearing the fruits of magnanimity and wide sym- 
 pathies. But these two had both suffered, narrowed. 
 It is true, that the man had gained in suppleness and 
 gentleness ; but the gentleness was that of a wild animal 
 grown old in a cage. It was rather a loss of ferocity 
 than a transformation. He was still at bottom the 
 tiger but a lethargic, toothless tiger that yawned and 
 fed on pap, and bit and tore no longer. 
 
 One day, shortly before his death, he was dragging 
 himself along in the sun beside me, when I stepped in 
 front of him to remove from his path a branch of pine 
 which the wind of the preceding night had torn from 
 the tree. 
 
 He uttered an oath: I turned around astonished. I 
 thought that he had hurt himself. 
 
 " No," he said to my inquiry. " It's nothing, noth- 
 ing at all," but his face was burning as if lighted by 
 some interior fire. 
 
 " It is only an explosion of some remains of volcanic 
 fire in me," he said. " Ruined ! ruined ! dragging my 
 rags of flesh about, when you can leap, yet, like a boy,* 
 
 307
 
 308 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 and I ought to have the same physical energy as you. 
 But I have lived ! I have lived ! " he cried in a sort of 
 savage rage. " I have known the joy of throwing my- 
 self on social conventions and breaking them like glass. 
 I have had the courage to seize hold of what I wanted 
 and devour it while the appetite was strong. That is 
 harmful to the digestion, you say. Damn your laws 
 of digestion! A good mouthful is worth a belly-ache. 
 To creep along all your life with your head bent 
 down for fear of cracking it against some over- 
 hanging beam what hideous cowardice! Thank God! 
 I never was a coward like that. To live in the 
 sunshine with an umbrella over your head for fear of 
 feeling some water on your shoulders what a dog's 
 life! I never did it. Well, you say, you live now with 
 your hand stretched out." 
 
 A great pity filled me for this soul in torture trying 
 to reason itself right in its life-course. 
 
 " My friend my dear friend," I said with energy, 
 " don't say that. It hurts me. It is I, not you, who 
 live on charity. You brought into the dawn of my old 
 age, new duties, new sentiments for which I thank you 
 with all my heart." 
 
 He shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " Yes. I understand you," he continued. " You are 
 one of those weaklings that civilization makes, who 
 search happiness among women and children. I am a 
 man, wholly a man, conqueror not conquered. I was 
 never meant to be chained to one spot even by the most 
 flattering sentiments. But look at me now. Is there 
 any fate viler than mine? A child has subjugated me 
 the dimpled hand of a girl-baby. 
 
 " My wife was not mine a week before I could have 
 quitted her without a sigh. Why didn't I do it? I felt 
 a little spite against you. You had been very uppish 
 with me for a long time. Oh, I saw it all, though I 
 never let on. And I kept her, because I did not want 
 to send her back to you. That is also why I treated
 
 A BROKEN SPIRIT 309 
 
 her well enough, in keeping for myself as much liberty 
 as I could. And she, with her insipid affectations of 
 religion, felt it a point of honor to play the Griselda. 
 I have never really known whether she loved or only 
 tolerated me. Then the little one came, but I have told 
 you about her, and how my real slavery began." 
 
 " Don't talk like that, I beg of you." 
 
 " Oh, no," he said ironically, " I should rather call it 
 my renaissance, or my resurrection. I know all your 
 ideas feminine ideas. But listen to me. There is not 
 a sentiment that has crippled so many souls, shed so 
 many tears, broken so many hearts, ruined so many 
 lives, kindled so many wars, spread so much disaster 
 everywhere, as love. And there is this devilish thing 
 about it that we always think there is something noble 
 in losing ourselves in another. For a woman, it is a 
 necessity to lose herself this way. Hers is the task to 
 sacrifice herself for the race. But why should we accept 
 her definition of love? Why should we muffle ourselves 
 in the faded illusions which she is always steeping in 
 some new dye to make them look brilliant ? I am speak- 
 ing abominations to you. Well, that's because I'm, 
 not you. Your laws are not my laws. Liberty is my 
 law. What you call good is not good to me, it is evil. 
 And when I do what you call evil, something sings in 
 me, and tells me that it is good." 
 
 He was terrible at this moment, his eyes rolling wildly, 
 his hand lifted as if he would strike a death blow. His 
 lips seemed like the mouth of a serpent emitting poison. 
 I felt the uselessness of all argument with this soul in 
 revolt, which felt the sting of the iron he had riveted 
 upon himself. 
 
 " What is religion," he went on, " but a confession of 
 weakness or malady in the soul. And what is love but 
 another malady, which we do not try to cure but to 
 prolong. I wish to be cured! Without this cursed 
 malady I should have left my wife and all this domestic 
 cowardice, that is no more suited to me than to the
 
 3io THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 eagles of the air. I should still be a man, not crippled, 
 ruined for life. Never again shall I feel the icy air of 
 winter whip my face. I am not one of those anaemic 
 creatures that tremble when the north wind blows. It 
 was made for my lungs that north wind, and I have 
 sunk so far that I can contentedly fill them with chim- 
 ney-smoke! Come, you called yourself my friend. 
 Prove to me that you are. Tear me from this slavery. 
 Break the chain of my daughter's love for me. It is 
 the last chain that throttles me. O my God, who can 
 give me back my lost strength, the iron energy in an 
 iron body ! " 
 
 At this moment the cry of a child reached our ears. 
 We turned around hastily. The little one, running after 
 us as fast as her little legs could carry her, had stumbled, 
 fallen and hurt herself. We saw blood on the distorted 
 little face, pitifully lifted from the ground. He was 
 at her side in a moment. How? I don't know. These 
 marvels happen from time to time, to mock our material 
 theories and make us see the superhuman force of a 
 great emotion. It is as if the soul had received an 
 electric charge, and passed it into the feeble body to 
 give it back its strength. He held the child in his arms. 
 His face had become human again radiant. 
 
 " It is no use," he murmured. " Here I am, a will- 
 ing slave again." 
 
 With these words, he trembled. The crisis had 
 passed. He very nearly let fall the child whom I took 
 from his arms. I supported him, almost carrying him 
 to the house, where his strength, as if it had been but 
 a great effort of the will, entirely left him. Abby 
 helped me to put him on a couch, from which he was 
 fated never to rise. He died two days later. 
 
 His death gave me much to reflect upon. Violent 
 and erratic in his feelings, the suppression of his desires 
 must have often appeared an outrage to him, and led 
 him to adopt a code of morals in which desire was the 
 only guide to action, and moderation seemed to him
 
 A BROKEN SPIRIT 311 
 
 weakness. That he must often have suffered, I have 
 no doubt; but I believe that, of the two, his wife had 
 suffered the most. 
 
 She never complained to me ; but there was in the per- 
 fect effacement of her life, her silence, her devotion to 
 her religion, traces of suppression just as marked, which 
 in her sensitive temperament indicated a sharper degree 
 of suffering. She had taken refuge in religion as one 
 takes shelter in a storm. She had learned to accept her 
 let. Was her resignation a fall? Resignation is not 
 always a virtue. It is as often the cowardly abandon- 
 ment of the best that is in us in order to live in peace 
 with what is mediocre. Did her duties weigh heavy 
 on her? I do not know. She performed them without 
 complaint. Hers was one of those natures profoundly 
 moral, which make the stable element of our civilization. 
 Misguided by passion, she had for a moment hesitated 
 on the path of rectitude and all her life she had felt 
 that this hesitation was a blot on it. No other course 
 of action could have resulted happily for her. She had 
 none of those false, sentimental ideas about the divine 
 right of passion which lead astray so many weak heads. 
 She would never have had the baseness to gild a wrong 
 in order to make it pass for gold. Suffer? Yes, she 
 could do that. A greater than she had suffered the 
 Divine One. She turned to religion became devout, 
 calm, serene, grave. She was not always consequential; 
 she made her little mistakes like the rest of us, but 
 one felt that she could be trusted, that she was not 
 one to be blown here and there by the wind of caprice. 
 She knew, with all her heart, that passion cannot be 
 made a law of life, but that duty is the only fundamental 
 guide. She warmed her heart in the love of her chil- 
 dren on earth, and of her God in heaven. That sufficed 
 her. 
 
 When I began to know her well, she interested me 
 by her character. I had loved her beauty, her fresh- 
 ness, her gaiety. They were gone. I could never love
 
 312 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 her again in the old way. But the sentiment which she 
 awakened, though much colder, was permanent. We 
 were friends now. 
 
 She bore her husband's death with a tranquillity which 
 was not indifference. She had forced herself to find 
 much that was admirable in him and had succeeded. 
 " He was a good father," she said to me one day, " and 
 he wished to be a good husband; and, on the whole, I 
 think he was. I don't know whether I can make you 
 understand exactly but there was a grain of folly in 
 him, a sort of mania for liberty. He could not bear con- 
 tradiction, nor the slightest appearance of force. I 
 soon learned that. I had a sincere friendship for him, 
 and that is not so exacting as a passionate love." 
 
 She was right; and, perhaps, marriages, to be per- 
 manently happy, must settle at last into this condition 
 of companionable friendship, wholly free from illusions, 
 and full of mutual forbearance.
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 BOOKS AND TRAVEL 
 
 BUT if the wife bore the loss of her husband calmly, 
 poor little Eda was almost crushed by her father's 
 death. It seemed to age her ten years. But, little by 
 little, nature and time brought their healing, and she 
 became once more sound and strong. She seemed to 
 redouble her affection for me, as if fearing to lose me, 
 too. We became almost inseparable companions during 
 our hours of leisure. When the two boys were old 
 enough to commence their book education, she was 
 eager to help me teach them, that we might have more 
 time for our daily reading; for I had early commenced, 
 either to recount or to read to them, the great master- 
 pieces of the world, in order to enlarge for them the 
 little sheltered corner of it which we inhabited. 
 
 John Bunyan had his place in these readings; for 
 there is so much poetry, so many profound truths in 
 this old classic, that it is a pity to relegate it to the 
 top shelf of the library. It ought always to be within 
 reach of the fingers of the young, in spite of its ob- 
 solescent theology. Do we reject the beautiful fables 
 of Greece, because we no longer offer sacrifices to Ju- 
 piter? How many times I have encouraged my little 
 family at the threshold of a difficulty by saying: 
 
 "What! Are you in the clutches of Giant Despair? 
 Do you mean to let him crunch your bones ? " 
 
 Children dearly love the world of fable and fiction, 
 and modern education does them a great wrong in 
 wishing to substitute for it only the naked truth. There 
 are beautiful truths which insinuate their way into these 
 little brains prettily clothed in the sparkling veils of the 
 
 313
 
 3H THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 fairy world. As for Don Quixote, he was a veritable 
 feast for them. In our walks together, we often hu- 
 morously employed the extravagant language of chiv- 
 alry, borrowed from the famous knight, or from Wal- 
 ter Scott. What thoughtless and healthy peals of 
 laughter rang through the forest at little Bob's "Avaunt, 
 vile caitiff!" his pretty blonde head thrown back, in 
 his hand a willow branch in place of a sword, in all his 
 tiny body the attempt to reproduce the haughty or 
 threatening air of a chevalier, or a brigand. 
 
 How many times we transformed ourselves into ex- 
 plorers ; and so many countries and so many climes were 
 mingled in our northern wood, that it was like an en- 
 chanted one. I steeped myself again in this pure stream 
 of youth, and felt my life rich beyond expression. Old- 
 fashioned books, you will say, and not much read now, 
 these which I have mentioned; yet, I pity the child 
 who has not once looked at the world through the eyes 
 of Walter Scott. We can't read him after our first 
 youth is past with that perfect abandonment which 
 conies with innocence; but it is good to turn back to 
 him, from time to time, at any stage in life. What 
 lessons of honor, courage, purity, we can draw from 
 this world in which the odor of forests perfumes the 
 air, instead of rose water; where love is not an insidi- 
 ous poison undermining courage and virility ; where pain 
 is frankly, proudly accepted as an inevitable element 
 in life. Bravo, Walter Scott 1 
 
 We had fine heroic days with Plutarch, too. As for 
 Addison, the girl who has once read him with pleasure 
 is saved from the follies of her sex ; and my Eda loved 
 Addison. 
 
 So passed our days, full from dawn to darkness. I 
 taught Eda French and German, and as she showed a 
 real talent for acquiring languages, I yielded to her 
 entreaty to teach her Latin. And in all this time of 
 quiet happiness, one tiny cloud, alone, rose above the 
 horizon. As Eda grew into maidenhood, I saw that
 
 BOOKS AND TRAVEL 315 
 
 my Aleck was setting all his brave, faithful heart on 
 her. Did she know it? Certainly. What woman does 
 not know that she is loved? And did she love him in 
 return ? No, and there was the cloud. Did she not even 
 like him? Oh, yes, very much indeed. And she had 
 other admirers? Scores of them; but she cared noth- 
 ing for any of them. Aleck had no rival. 
 
 Then the old question, What shall I do with her? 
 began to torment me again; and I determined to travel 
 with her for a year or two, in order to see what solu- 
 tion to Aleck's problem, absence and an entire change 
 of scene might bring. To be sure, he was about twelve 
 years her senior, but he was in the fresh vigor of early 
 manhood and had not wasted his strength in dissipa- 
 tion ; and he was so entirely superior to most young 
 men of his age, that I could think of nothing better for 
 her than to join her young life to his, in mutual re- 
 spect and love. 
 
 But I did not wish to take her abroad before she was 
 sufficiently mature to profit by her travels. The story 
 of the German gosling that flew across the Rhine and 
 came back a goose, is the history of all immature trav- 
 elers. They boast a cosmopolitanism, which is noth- 
 ing but a profound indifference to all countries, and a 
 general, dissolution of nobler sentiments. This is very 
 different from the cosmopolitanism which embraces all 
 nations in a more perfect, more intelligent love. The 
 first cosmopolite is a man without a country ; the second 
 is a man of all countries. 
 
 At nineteen, one is ordinarily still too young to travel 
 with entire profit; but Eda had received an excep- 
 tional training; and I thought her mature enough to 
 travel with advantage. I thought it best to see Amer- 
 ica first, because after having enjoyed the wealth of 
 associations in those old countries whosa very soil 
 speaks a human tongue, the mute landscapes of the new 
 world seem a little monotonous and dull. 
 
 We skirted first the Pacific Coast from Vancouver to
 
 316 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 San Diego, and it was a perfect delight to me to note 
 the fresh joy of this beautiful girl unspoiled by the 
 artificial life of cities. She would have been the most 
 agreeable of companions for anybody. Nothing incon- 
 venienced her ; accustomed to long tramps in the woods, 
 where she must encounter all sorts of obstacles to easy 
 walking, she seemed not to know that dust and mud 
 existed. She was simple in her manners, without being 
 awkward, naive without being ridiculous; she was 
 keenly interested in everything that she saw, but never 
 obtruded her interests where she thought they were not 
 shared. She was magnanimous and sympathetic in a 
 sweet, fluid way that made itself felt without being em- 
 barrassingly noticeable; and, rarest of all virtues in a 
 woman, she was capable of silence in the right place; 
 so that one could enjoy his impressions with her in that 
 incommunicable, subtle personal way which belongs to 
 solitude; and she could express her pleasure in fit terms 
 without employing meaningless and ridiculous superla- 
 tives. I hate to talk with a woman who calls everything 
 "grand" or "dear." 
 
 We saw the snow on the summit of Popocatepetl. 
 We ate mangoes in Maximilian's gardens at Cuerna- 
 vaca; we walked under the mighty cypress trees of the 
 Montezumas; we looked out on the St. Lawrence from 
 the citadel of Quebec ; we walked in the grassy meadows 
 of Acadia; and, at last, we set sail for Europe. 
 
 I did not intend to make of these years of travel, 
 years of idle pleasure, but of active pleasure. I wished 
 to free my girl from provincialism; let her see that 
 wherever she might go, she would find a ceaseless force 
 impelling the human mind to activity. Art, literature, 
 history, music, occupied our leisure. I chose the great 
 representative cities of Europe to tarry in: Paris, Lon- 
 don, Edinburgh, Rome, Venice, Naples, Berlin, St. 
 Petersburg. I avoided as much as possible a long stay 
 in a large hotel, for the reason that they are all alike, 
 and one seems to be traveling in a cage, shut up with
 
 BOOKS AND TRAVEL 317 
 
 the same restless, chattering crowd, all looking through 
 the bars at a new nation. I preferred to get out of 
 the cage and see the people face to face in the smaller 
 pensions, where one's own countrymen are rarely found. 
 
 Of all the cities in which we stopped for any length 
 of time, Edinburgh and Naples pleased us the most, 
 and two cities can hardly be more different. That I 
 should love my own Auld Reekie was very natural. I 
 had her blood in my veins. But Eda loved her, too, 
 history and literature supplying the lack of personal 
 souvenirs. She re-read the " Heart of Midlothian," and 
 sat through a service in St. Giles's Cathedral. We re- 
 cited Scott's apostrophe to Edinburgh from the summit 
 of Blackford Hill, looking out on the gray city, bathed 
 in the morning light. 
 
 At Naples, we rented an apartment of four rooms, 
 and my girl undertook to keep house with the aid of a 
 little Italian woman. She commenced the study of 
 Italian with a mature woman, a native of Florence, and 
 during her lesson hours in the early morning, I went out 
 for a walk in the Villa Nazionale overlooking the bay. 
 These solitary walks, in which all my life seemed to un- 
 roll before me, were not the least delightful hours I 
 passed. Seated on one of the benches in the park, 
 under a cloudjess sky, the bay before me, at my feet, 
 on the sand tiny ants tracing zigzag lines here and 
 there, I seemed to dilate and absorb all the life around 
 me, sentient and insentient. The trembling patches of 
 sunlight on the rough tree trunks, the waving shadows, 
 the splashing of the water in the fountains, the daisies 
 with their white crown and golden heart, the soft grass 
 with its varying shades of green, the delicate blue mist 
 which veiled the distant shores of the bay, the sparkle of 
 the blue water under the perfect sky all this pene- 
 trated me with a delicious tranquillity ; I seemed to drink 
 in rich deep draughts of life, and to see its sunset hues 
 more brilliant than the hues of dawn. 
 
 But I had other hours full of joy with my Eda. It
 
 318 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 seemed to me that I had never so fully possessed he\, 
 never so perfectly known her, as now, when we were 
 all in all to each other. Her beauty made her welcome 
 everywhere, and she had her adorers among these in- 
 flammable sons of the South: some of them even went 
 so far as to ask her i? marriage a few hours after hav- 
 ing met her.
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 TEMPESTE D'ANIME 
 
 ONE evening after an experience of this kind, we were 
 sitting on the balcony which looked out on the heights 
 of Posillipo, and the bay. The night was superb with 
 all the languorous beauty of a Southern summer. A 
 young man and a girl, both dressed very fantastically, 
 were singing in rich clear voices a popular song, "O 
 Sole mio," down in the street below us. I was smoking 
 a cigar, my feet resting on the low railing that enclosed 
 the balcony. 
 
 Eda drew her chair up close to mine, and putting her 
 arm around my neck and her pretty head on my shoul- 
 der, she said to me: 
 
 " Papa George, I am not home-sick, but I should like 
 all those whom we love to be here this evening 
 mamma and the boys, and " 
 
 She hesitated. 
 
 " And Aleck," I added. 
 
 " Yes, and Aleck. Why doesn't he write to me, 
 Papa George? He has never sent me so much as one 
 line : and in his letters to you he never writes my name. 
 I think that's so queer. Do you think that's quite rea- 
 sonable or just? I was always nice to him, and since 
 I've been here I always send my regards, when I write 
 to mamma, and I've even sent him quite a number of 
 post-cards and he doesn't pay the slightest attention to 
 them. Now, one of the first things you taught me, 
 Papa George, was never to receive the slightest favor, 
 no matter what it was, without acknowledging it with 
 thanks. Did you forget to teach Aleck that, or is it 
 only for girls ? " 
 
 319 .
 
 320 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 " Eda, you are not a little girl any more. You 
 are a charming little woman. Now, be frank with 
 me. I know that's the hardest thing to ask of a 
 woman " 
 
 " Papa George ! Papa George ! Take care ! When 
 wasn't I frank with you?" 
 
 She lifted her head from my shoulder, and taking 
 my chin in her hand, looked steadily into my eyes. 
 
 " Yesterday, when you were tearing the letter which 
 you had just received, and told me it was nothing at 
 all." 
 
 " Yes, but that was because I was so ashamed to see 
 myself asked in marriage by a man who had never 
 spoken to me but once. I am not a prude. You know 
 I am not, but I can't make you understand the kind of 
 nausea or disgust that seizes me when I know I am 
 loved by a man for whom I don't care the rap of my 
 finger. Once I remember when I was playing games 
 with some strange children, a boy kissed me. I was 
 furious, and scratched him like a tiger. He still bears 
 the marks of my nails, and likes to tease me by calling 
 it a souvenir of me." 
 
 " What a cold little heart ! " I said, jestingly. 
 
 " Ah ! you know so well that it isn't. There's a world 
 of love locked up in me ready to burst forth for the 
 great Somebody, who doesn't seem to be in a hurry to 
 come along with the key. But he must be like you and 
 papa. Do you know, sometimes I think that I shall 
 never meet him. You two, my two heroes, make all 
 other men look so little in comparison." 
 
 " And Aleck, doesn't he have a tiny corner somewhere 
 in your heart?" 
 
 " On the same level with you and papa ? O, no ! no ! 
 a thousand times, no." 
 
 " Did he ever tell you that he loves you ? " 
 
 " No, but I know that he does. And that's funny, 
 too: but it does not vex me to have him love me; for
 
 TEMPESTE D'ANIME 321 
 
 he knows very well that on the day he tells me that 
 he loves me, it's all over with our friendship." 
 
 I was a little piqued by her tone. I loved Aleck sin- 
 cerely. I knew his Scotch fidelity, his big heart, his 
 quick intelligence. 
 
 I threw away my cigar. I wanted to talk with her 
 seriously. 
 
 " See here, little one. I said to you a moment ago 
 that it was difficult for a woman to be frank. Sound 
 your heart well, and tell me why you wish to hear 
 directly from Aleck, if you do not love him?" 
 
 " But I didn't tell you that I didn't love him. I mean 
 simply that I don't want to marry him. I don't love 
 him that way." 
 
 " Very well, you aren't going to be forced or coaxed 
 to marry him. Be sure of that. Nor need you marry 
 anyone if you prefer to live single. I have known some 
 very charming old maids, whose lives have been so full 
 of service, whose big hearts have escaped from the lit- 
 tle circle of maternity to warm and comfort hundreds 
 of little children's hearts, so that I have thought it would 
 have been a pity if they had ever married." 
 
 She laughed in a nervous way, then replied in her 
 charmingly coquettish manner, " No, no, no my heart 
 isn't big enough to be a foundling asylum. I was made 
 to love in a very narrow circle. I could love desperately : 
 I feel it in me. Don't you think that there is a great 
 difference between a simple feeling of companionship, 
 and that how shall I describe it? that entire loss of 
 yourself in another?" 
 
 " Yes, but I believe now, what I didn't believe at your 
 age, that the feeling of companionship is the surest 
 foundation for happiness in marriage." 
 
 " Papa George ! fie ! for shame ! " 
 
 She pushed me away from her with an expression of 
 extreme disapproval, as if I had just uttered a blas- 
 phemy.
 
 322 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 " Yes. I understand, Eda. When the blood boils 
 and the pulse beats fast in the presence of a beloved be- 
 ing, it seems impossible to believe that we can ever be 
 indifferent in the same presence. But passionate love 
 is a dream out of which marriage awakens us. We see 
 clearly wide awake now; and are in a rage of hate and 
 contempt over being deceived. We would like to crush 
 the idol that we have adored." 
 
 " Papa George, have you ever loved passionately ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " And you were deceived ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " My poor papa," she stroked my face as she talked. 
 "And you are so good, so noble. You were made for 
 the supreme happiness, and you have missed it." 
 
 " No, Eda I have known it in its purest intoxica- 
 tion, and I have escaped the long agony of being chained 
 alive to a dead love. I regret nothing." 
 
 " No, Papa George, you are not quite frank now. 
 You are talking as I did when I was a child and the 
 bee stung me: do you remember? You pitied me, and 
 I said it didn't hurt. I was so angry to think it dared 
 sting me. I believe I even said that I liked it, didn't 
 I?" 
 
 "Yes, you did, bless your brave little heart." 
 
 " No I am not brave, when it comes to feelings of 
 the heart. If I were deceived, where I loved, I should 
 die of it. And I can't think you are entirely right about 
 the love changing so sadly. Papa and mamma were 
 quite happy, and papa was like me, he had fire in his 
 veins. If he had been disappointed, he would have left 
 mamma in a moment. He would not have remained 
 chained, as you say, to a dead love, he who was so 
 keenly alive. Of course mamma is another story. She 
 is so calm. I don't think she was ever capable of losing 
 herself entirely in another. She might very well con- 
 tent herself with your so-called companionship. It is 
 funny, isn't it, but do you know, I never in the world
 
 TEMPESTE D'ANIME 323 
 
 could speak to mamma about love. It seems to me that 
 she would not understand, and that I should be doing 
 something bold and immodest to speak to her about it. 
 But you, you understand me, perfectly, in spite of all 
 your frightful ideas of love, cooled by an old age, that 
 is not yet yours." 
 
 I let her chatter away without interruption. I felt 
 the immense distance of years that separated us. She 
 was very young; I seemed, just now, to myself, very 
 old. Why uselessly try to see with the same eyes? It 
 is destined to be perpetually renewed this enchanting 
 moment of youth, and it is very wrong of us who are old 
 to burn all this glittering gauze and these dazzling false 
 jewels in the white fire of our experience. If we could 
 succeed, what desolation would result! A world of 
 celibates, among whom the laughter of children is never 
 heard, nor the low murmur of passionate tenderness! 
 No, it is far better as it is this natural progress of 
 springtime to winter, than a perpetual winter of ice and 
 snow. 
 
 Seeing that I did not interrupt her, she continued with 
 a triumphant little laugh. 
 
 " Ah ! ha ! You see you have nothing more to say, 
 because there is nothing more to say." 
 
 She was right. There was nothing more to say. The 
 great mistake that old age makes, is to wish to force 
 its bitter experience on youth. But let us be just to 
 both. The fruit has a right to say to the flower : " You 
 live to produce me"; but it has not the right to say: 
 " Make haste to drop your petals and exhale your per- 
 fumes and become like me." There is marvelous grace 
 and beauty in this springtime of the fruit. Let the 
 flower open slowly of itself, perfect itself, and gradually 
 change. Every age has its own peculiar charm, but only 
 on condition of remaining true to its own epoch: 
 for the flower, beauty and grace: for the fruit, savor, 
 the power to refresh and nourish, and to give promise 
 of a continuance of life.
 
 324 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 I did not sleep well that night. I saw that the in- 
 evitable experiences were commencing for these young 
 hearts I loved, and that no experience of mine would 
 avail them the least in the world. And, after all, it was 
 a weakness to wish to spare them the pain which I my- 
 self had learned to bless as the source of power. 
 
 By dint of reasoning in this way, I recovered from 
 my inquietude, and was content to let things take their 
 natural course. 
 
 One morning, passing through the Villa Nazionale, 
 we saw a crowd assembled near the fountain, and, at- 
 tracted by curiosity, hastened to the spot. The crowd 
 opened a way for us, and permitted us to see the object 
 of attraction. It was a man who had committed sui- 
 cide, and he lay on the ground in a pool of blood. 
 
 Eda turned pale as death, and I felt her arm tremble 
 in mine. 
 
 " Terrible ! terrible ! " she said in a low trembling 
 voice, and her eyes filled with tears. "And the world 
 is so beautiful, life so glorious ! " 
 
 A daily paper gave a brief report of the suicide, along 
 with other suicides of the same character, under the 
 headline : 
 
 " Tempeste d'anime." 
 
 She brought the paper to me and silently pointed to 
 the article. When I had read it, she said: 
 
 " When I saw him this morning, something awfully 
 solemn came over me, and I said to myself: Poor 
 wretch! You shall not die without having given some 
 good impulse to another life. I shall be braver, calmer, 
 more generous, and a wholly better woman for having 
 seen you lying dead there." 
 
 The story was the old one of passion and despair, 
 of folly and ardor carrying the day over duty, the fierce 
 hunger for happiness scorning the thousand quiet 
 avenues of it, and staking its all on the possession of a 
 heart.
 
 TEMPESTE D'ANIME 325 
 
 " Papa George, I see now that it is not good to love 
 like that. I was talking nonsense the other night. It 
 is a thousand times better to sleep and wake with grief, 
 till time wears it away, than to rush desperately into 
 eternal darkness. Life is good. I want to live; and 
 don't you think, dearest, that we've had enough of 
 Naples now ? "
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 LOOKING AT PICTURES 
 
 WE went to Rome, Florence, Venice, where we gave 
 a great deal of time to looking at pictures. Eda had 
 already some acquaintance with the character of the 
 old masters from my collection of photographs. It 
 gave me a genuine pleasure to listen to the expression 
 of a taste not spoiled by premeditation, or the reading of 
 art criticism. 
 
 She very quickly distinguished her interest in a pic- 
 ture because of its history, from her interest in it as a 
 work of art, and leaving aside dramatic action, ethical 
 teaching, historical fidelity, went straight to the beauty 
 and vigor of the representation, as it appealed to her- 
 self. It goes without saying that she was not always 
 in accord with the stars and double stars of her guide- 
 book; and that they were sometimes her despair, until 
 I said to her one day : " Never mind, my girl, what 
 the paper and ink say. See with your own eyes and be 
 frank with yourself. Don't be afraid to confess that 
 you can't see a picture in smears and blotches, no mat- 
 ter what it is labeled." 
 
 " Oh, no, that doesn't bother me. I begin even now to 
 respect those old cracked coffee-colored canvases of 
 the early Christian painters: for, at least, they did try 
 to paint for people with normal eyes, who see things 
 whole, and not smeared and in pieces. They didn't 
 think that a head hasn't a face ; they put eyes and nose 
 and mouth into it. They respected the body and gave 
 it some form. But it is Ruskin and that lovely little 
 book, " Mornings in Florence," that have made me feel 
 such a Pariah, and as if I had no right to look at pic- 
 tures, at all. And I did try so hard to see the St. Louis
 
 LOOKING AT PICTURES 327 
 
 in St. Croce, and had to go back to the book to see it. 
 I could get nothing from the fresco itself. Do put me 
 in countenance a little, and tell me that you weren't 
 enraptured either. And I had an opera glass, too, you 
 know; and did just what he said. I really wanted to 
 see. It is so beautiful to have a genuine admiration 
 all your own." 
 
 " That's it, Eda, all your own; borrowed admirations 
 never thrill anything but the tongue. Ruskin's little 
 book, as you say, is a very lovely one, and the writer 
 himself perhaps the most inspiring of our century, but 
 he has created an eruption of factitious admiration that 
 he himself would be the very first one to deplore. 
 Giotto was an artist of great power from the direct 
 simplicity of his work; but to expect to see in him all 
 that Ruskin does, to expect to buy, with a pair of opera 
 glasses, the Ruskin temperament, the Ruskin eye, is 
 the absurdest thing in the world: and ten thousand 
 people may look at Giotto's St. Louis without feeling 
 the emotions which stirred Ruskin when he saw it. 
 Why, then, be ashamed, if he leaves you cold when he 
 warmed the poet in Ruskin? When you can bring to 
 art his knowledge, his vivid interests, his passionate ad- 
 mirations, his poetical temperament, which surrounds 
 everything he sees with the radiant light of sentiment, 
 his contempt for the vulgar shows of the world, for its 
 riches, its ostentation, its sensual pleasures, you can 
 hope to feel something of the sentiment which filled him 
 when he looked on Giotto. It was not the artist's work 
 which he saw ; it was the life of King Louis, its perfect 
 chivalry, the poetry of its courage and devotion. 
 
 " So, my daughter, love the pictures that speak to you, 
 though they may be voiceless for others. Don't get into 
 your head the absurd idea that you can know art by 
 reading criticisms of it, instead of going directly to the 
 pictures themselves, to see how it goes with you there. 
 Don't be afraid of the stars and double stars in the 
 catalogues, and think yourself in duty bound to be en-
 
 328 THE JOURNAL' OF A RECLUSE 
 
 raptured wherever you find them. Make your own 
 stars: and be very glad if one picture in a thousand 
 gives you an emotion and the desire to see it again. 
 
 " If the admiration which many of the allegorical pic- 
 tures of the old masters were well traced to its source it 
 would resolve itself into that very ordinary, complacent 
 self-love, which the admirer feels in discovering to his 
 satisfaction the secret of a problem. It is identical with 
 that which we feel in translating a difficult passage in 
 classic literature; or in studying a meaning into an ob- 
 scure line of Robert Browning. The student is proud 
 of himself at having so much intelligence : and confuses 
 the admiration which he feels for himself with that 
 which he thinks the object of his study ought to ex- 
 cite. There is no subtler form of self-love than that." 
 
 We traveled in Switzerland, Austria, Germany, 
 France, Holland, Russia, until we began to feel the 
 power to enjoy exhausted in us and to stand in the 
 presence of beauty and feel no thrill from it, is the most 
 humiliating and arid experience of an intelligent mind. 
 
 It was, then, that Eda said to me one day : 
 
 " Papa George, I am very, very tired of being a 
 traveled tramp, aren't you? I am getting hungry for 
 my own people, my own country, and my own little 
 corner of the woods near the bay: aren't you? You 
 may talk as you please of universal fraternity, but there 
 is a family bond, a national tie, stronger than any other ; 
 don't you think so ? " 
 
 " Yes. We are beginning now to repeat the experi- 
 ences, which had no pleasure or value except in novelty. 
 It is time to go home. We are carrying abundant stores 
 of recollection to enjoy, as we rest." 
 
 If I had had the least doubt in the world, which I 
 hadn't, with regard to whether she was one of those 
 whose mind needs continual changes, and who acquire 
 from their travels nothing but a number of bizarre tastes, 
 that make them discontented at home and the despair 
 of their friends, her home-coming would have completely 
 reassured me.
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 SEED-TIME AND HARVEST 
 
 WHAT a holiday it was for us all, that October day 
 of the home-coming! The great European galleries 
 were far away, but all out-doors was a living art gal- 
 lery; white clouds curdled against the perfect blue, 
 oaks and maples aflame with color, the sun shining 
 softly down on it all. What warm heart beating, what 
 smiles changing into tears of joy, what glad cries of 
 mutual pleasure, what an aimless going and coming, and 
 forgetting of what one started to do, and Abby taking 
 me apart to say : 
 
 " You have brought me back the same girl you took 
 away. You have not spoiled her." 
 
 She was growing prematurely white, no trace now 
 of the rich brown tint in the hair, and her face looked 
 worn and thin. 
 
 " I have missed you both very much," she said. " But 
 you will see that I shall grow young again, now you are 
 back." 
 
 She kept her word. In a few weeks one would 
 have hardly recognized her. The tense, worn look wore 
 away from her face; little by little, it gave way to an 
 expression of unusual sweetness. Had she feared that 
 she would never see us again? I do not know. 
 
 To tell the truth, another interest was absorbing me. 
 Aleck had been working enormously during our absence. 
 He had not written me that he was on the eve of a 
 great discovery. Like all serious workers, he had his 
 secrets that he could not reveal, any more than the tree 
 can upturn its roots to the sun. We found him pale 
 with protracted hours of study, his hands blackened and 
 burned, his eyes sunken, his face thin, but luminout 
 
 329
 
 330 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 with the subtle fire of thought. Never had he appeared 
 to me so virile, so handsome, so full of force ; and when 
 these two beautiful creatures, Eda and he, looked at 
 each other, after their long absence, and I saw the swift 
 color flame into their faces, and their hands tremble as 
 they touched, I knew that they belonged to each other; 
 and love again seemed as beautiful and glorious as in 
 the days of my youth. 
 
 If I were a novelist, I might write a pretty idyl of 
 the progress of this love as yet unconfessed, that had, 
 like all loves, its days of radiant sunshine and of misty 
 gloom. For even the springtime of love has its rainy 
 days, in the midst of its odorous flowers, dewy trass, 
 and enchanting bird-songs. 
 
 They were married in the spring following our re- 
 turn. Aleck built a beautiful cottage on a piece of 
 ground which I gave him a, lovely incline, looking 
 down into the bay. 
 
 Eda begged me to go to live with them, but I was 
 inexorable. 
 
 " But, Papa George," she cried, her sweet eyes brim- 
 ming with tears, " it is really living like an egotist to 
 stay among those miserable old books, when you might 
 double our pleasure, and add to your own, I know it, by 
 coming and living with us. Aren't you happy with 
 me?" 
 
 " Perfectly happy, little one." 
 
 " Well, and I am happy, too, with you : and don't 
 you see, my love of a papa, that I am so used to having 
 you about me, now, that I can't get on without you? 
 You suit me to a T, in everything you say and do. 
 Something of myself leaves me when you go away. I 
 have only half my joy, half my wits, when you are 
 gone. / need you! I need you! I can't be weaned 
 yet ! " The pretty lips trembled ; she laid her head on 
 my shoulder, and cried like a child. 
 
 Yes, she loved me, my daughter, my Eda: and she 
 was very, very dear to me. For a moment, I felt weak
 
 SEED-TIME AND HARVEST 331 
 
 enough to wish to yield to this sweet insistence. How 
 beautiful to have always about me this rich heart, this 
 admirable beauty and youth, the solace of my old age! 
 But it was only a moment. The egotism of old age, 
 living like a parasite on the sap of youth, has always 
 seemed nauseous to me. And if ever I ought to keep 
 my independence, it seemed to me that I ought to keep 
 it now. So I lifted the dear head, kissed the warm 
 mouth, saying: 
 
 " My Eda, you have sometimes praised my good 
 sense; listen, now, to what the good sense says. You 
 are a young married woman, and all your happiness 
 depends upon the harmony which exists between your- 
 self and your husband. I am glad to see that the love 
 between you is not the intense egotism of two who ab- 
 sorb each other: such a love as that ends by a paralysis 
 of all the moral faculties. It is an obsession that nar- 
 rows and subjugates us; yet a man and wife should be 
 first to each other. What role have you offered me? 
 I enter your house. I am, at first, the third person, 
 loved by both of you; but I shall become, insensibly, 
 either the second, or nothing at all. From day to day, 
 an insensible attraction will diaw you nearer either to 
 him or to me. I shall become either more and more 
 isolated near you, or more and more the companion of 
 your leisure, the sharer of your thoughts ; and one day, 
 of us three, there will be one who is solitary. But that 
 role of solitude belongs to me, not to your husband: or 
 your marriage is a failure. And I can best play the 
 role in my own house. I have had you all to myself 
 for two years. I will not share you with anyone in 
 the same house. In your home, your husband must 
 be the supreme attraction. You are united to a supe- 
 rior man, of whom you may justly be proud. He has 
 a clear, active mind full of noble curiosity; and, one 
 day, his solitary researches are to enrich the human 
 race. You are to be his helpmate in the best sense of 
 the word, and his source of joy and relaxation. You
 
 332 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 must spare to him his leisure as much as possible; take 
 upon yourself those annoying domestic details, which 
 eat up a man's time and give him nothing but worry 
 in return. I should be ashamed of you, if you were 
 not willing to do this. There are so many women who 
 have but one idea of marriage. It is to procure for 
 themselves an advantageous milieu, in which they can 
 shine by the brilliancy of their beauty or their intellect. 
 They are deadly parasites that suck the life-sap from 
 many a noble man, and condemn him to life-long ob- 
 scurity and slavish toil. That is man's punishment for 
 having said to woman: You were born to lean on me. 
 They do lean on him, but so heavily as to crush him, 
 by the demands of their enormous vanity and their 
 cold-hearted selfishness. I have given you the best pos- 
 sible education, so that you might have an interior 
 wealth, from which you could draw in time of need. 
 I do not wish you to live the narrow, jealous, exacting 
 life of the heart, alone, in which so many women live 
 exclusively; and just as your husband has his world of 
 thought and study into which you cannot fully enter, so 
 you will have your individual tastes and interests, which 
 will make life well worth living, when his lips are not 
 touching yours. For to make him happy, and to be 
 happy yourself, you must in some measure learn to 
 live alone, to stand firmly on your two feet, without 
 leaning on anyone. You must learn to digest your 
 private griefs into better thought and finer action ; for 
 you must not expect to grow old without knowing 
 pain. Nobody escapes it: it lies either behind him, is 
 present with him, or lies in ambush in the future. And 
 never forget this: The sorrows of a beloved woman 
 have a charm, in the commencement, for the man who 
 loves her. They give him the best of excuses for lav- 
 ishing on her the caresses with which his heart is run- 
 ning over. He adores her, in this complete abandon- 
 ment, in which she turns to him alone for her conso- 
 lation. He savors these tears, the traces of which he
 
 SEED-TIME AND HARVEST 333 
 
 kisses away. But not for a very long time. A man 
 is not made, like a woman, to lose himself long in the 
 griefs of another. He wearies, he yawns> he looks 
 askance at the door, then at his watch, and finds an 
 excuse for escaping. Health, vigor, the sunlight of the 
 mind, have stronger and more permanent attractions for 
 him. Then, don't abuse your husband's sympathy. Use 
 it sparingly, that it may be genuine. Don't be deceived 
 by the maxim that ' pity is akin to love ' ; for pity 
 often implies a sentiment of superiority, a little shade 
 of contempt, which in the end is fatal to love; or, 
 pressed too far, changes to weariness. 
 
 "And, Eda dearest, one thing more. Guard in your- 
 self as nature's richest gift to woman the mother in- 
 stinct, the love of the arms of little children around 
 your neck. There, love, don't cry; don't think I mean 
 to quietly slip away from your life I couldn't, if I 
 tried. I shall see you every day. Isn't your house 
 built so that I can wave my hand to you from my 
 front yard? That signal to you will be my sunrise. I 
 shall go back to my books and my work, warmed, ex- 
 hilarated. 
 
 " There, love, are a great many counsels from a man 
 who has never known the joys of domestic life, except 
 at another man's hearth; and who has seen, at times, 
 why the fire doesn't burn well, there. One forgets, 
 sometimes, to throw new logs on to the dying embers, 
 and the room grows chill, where two sit shivering whose 
 love once made the warmth of it." 
 
 I was silent, then, and smiled at her, caressing her. 
 
 " Yes," she said thoughtfully, " a great many coun- 
 sels, a great deal of good sense, my love of a papa, 
 and I am so young, so ignorant, so foolish, that per- 
 haps I don't well see the reach of it all. But there is 
 one thing that I see clearly, and that is that you have 
 suffered. That hurts me, just as it did that night in 
 Naples, when we talked on the balcony. Do you re- 
 member? "
 
 334 THE JOURNAL OF A RECLUSE 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Tell me, again, that you are happy, now ; that all 
 that suffering is past, like les neiges d'antan." 
 
 " Yes, Eda, all past ; and far from regretting the 
 sorrows, I would not for much have wanted their disci- 
 pline." 
 
 " Must one suffer in order to think, to know, to feel 
 deeply?" 
 
 " I think so." 
 
 " But you do not wish me to suffer ? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Explain that to me." 
 
 " It is not necessary for everybody to think, and 
 know, and feel deeply." 
 
 " Very well, then, I am to be satisfied with happy 
 ignorance; and I mean to show you that I can love 
 you tenderly, faithfully all my life without getting into 
 trouble with Aleck, or threatening our happiness. But 
 I shall give you your full liberty, you dear, delightful 
 Recluse. I commence to divine that solitude is, after 
 all, your real life. But I shall always be within call. 
 I am always at home to you, and when your books 
 grow mute and won't talk to you any more, I shall do 
 wonders to suffer, in order to know enough to talk to 
 you, so that you won't yawn." 
 
 She has kept her word, my beautiful Eda. She has 
 overwhelmed me with love and care without being im- 
 portunate or wearisome: and my old age passes like 
 those lovely autumn days veiled in luminous haze, when 
 the air is heavy with the odor of ripening fruits, and 
 the forests are aglow. 
 
 THE END
 
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